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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/9633-8.txt b/9633-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a861bd7 --- /dev/null +++ b/9633-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9425 @@ +Project Gutenberg's Sir George Tressady, Vol. I, by Mrs. Humphry Ward + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Sir George Tressady, Vol. I + +Author: Mrs. Humphry Ward + +Posting Date: December 10, 2011 [EBook #9633] +Release Date: January, 2006 +First Posted: October 11, 2003 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SIR GEORGE TRESSADY, VOL. I *** + + + + +Produced by Andrew Templeton, Juliet Sutherland, Mary +Meehan, and Project Gutenberg Distributed Proofreaders + + + + + + + + + + + +SIR GEORGE TRESSADY, VOLUME I + +IN TWO VOLUMES + +BY + +MRS. HUMPHRY WARD + +AUTHOR OF "MARCELLA," "THE HISTORY OF DAVID GRIEVE," +"ROBERT ELSMEKE," ETC. + + + + + + +To my Brother and friend + +WILLIAM THOMAS ARNOLD + +I INSCRIBE THIS BOOK + + + + + + + +VOLUME I. + + + + +PART I + + + +CHAPTER I + + +"Well, that's over, thank Heaven!" + +The young man speaking drew in his head from the carriage-window. But +instead of sitting down he turned with a joyous, excited gesture and +lifted the flap over the little window in the back of the landau, +supporting himself, as he stooped to look, by a hand on his companion's +shoulder. Through this peephole he saw, as the horses trotted away, the +crowd in the main street of Market Malford, still huzzaing and waving, +the wild glare of half a dozen torches on the faces and the moving forms, +the closed shops on either hand, the irregular roofs and chimneys +sharp-cut against a wintry sky, and in the far distance the little +lantern belfry and taller mass of the new town-hall. + +"I'm much astonished the horses didn't bolt!" said the man addressed. +"That bay mare would have lost all the temper she's got in another +moment. It's a good thing we made them shut the carriage--it has turned +abominably cold. Hadn't you better sit down?" + +And Lord Fontenoy made a movement as though to withdraw from the hand on +his shoulder. + +The owner of the hand flung himself down on the seat, with a word of +apology, took off his hat, and drew a long breath of fatigue. At the same +moment a sudden look of disgust effaced the smile with which he had taken +his last glimpse at the crowd. + +"All very well!--but what one wants after this business is _a moral tub_! +The lies I've told during the last three weeks--the bunkum I've +talked!--it's a feeling of positive dirt! And the worst of it is, however +you may scrub your mind afterwards, some of it must stick." + +He took out a cigarette, and lit it at his companion's with a rather +unsteady hand. He had a thin, long face and fair hair; and one would have +guessed him some ten years younger than the man beside him. + +"Certainly--it will stick," said the other. "Election promises nowadays +are sharply looked after. I heard no bunkum. As far as I know, our party +doesn't talk any. We leave that to the Government!" + +Sir George Tressady, the young man addressed, shrugged his shoulders. His +mouth was still twitching under the influence of nervous excitement. But +as they rolled along between the dark hedges, the carriage-lamps shining +on their wet branches, green yet, in spite of November, he began to +recover a half-cynical self-control. The poll for the Market Malford +Division of West Mercia had been declared that afternoon, between two and +three o'clock, after a hotly contested election; he, as the successful +candidate by a very narrow majority, had since addressed a shouting mob +from the balcony of the Greyhound Hotel, had suffered the usual taking +out of horses and triumphal dragging through the town, and was now +returning with his supporter and party-leader, Lord Fontenoy, to the +great Tory mansion which had sent them forth in the morning, and had been +Tressady's headquarters during the greater part of the fight. + +"Did you ever see anyone so down as Burrows?" he said presently, with a +little leap of laughter. "By George! it _is_ hard lines. I suppose he +thought himself safe, what with the work he'd done in the division and +the hold he had on the miners. Then a confounded stranger turns up, and +the chance of seventeen ignorant voters kicks you out! He could hardly +bring himself to shake hands with me. I had come rather to admire him, +hadn't you?" + +Lord Fontenoy nodded. + +"I thought his speeches showed ability," he said indifferently, "only of +a kind that must be kept out of Parliament--that's all. Sorry you have +qualms--quite unnecessary, I assure you! At the present moment, either +Burrows and his like knock under, or you and your like. This time--by +seventeen votes--Burrows knocks under. Thank the Lord! say I"--and the +speaker opened the window an instant to knock off the end of his cigar. + +Tressady made no reply. But again a look, half-chagrined, +half-reflective, puckered his brow, which was smooth, white, and boyish +under his straight, fair hair; whereas the rest of the face was subtly +lined, and browned as though by travel and varied living. The nose and +mouth, though not handsome, were small and delicately cut, while the +long, pointed chin, slightly protruding, made those who disliked him say +that he was like those innumerable portraits of Philip IV., by and after +Velasquez, which bestrew the collections of Europe. But if the Hapsburg +chin had to be admitted, nothing could be more modern, intelligent, +alert, than the rest of him. + +The two rolled along a while in silence. They were passing through an +undulating midland country, dimly seen under the stars. At frequent +intervals rose high mounds, with tall chimneys and huddled buildings +beside them or upon them which marked the sites of collieries; while the +lights also, which had begun to twinkle over the face of the land, showed +that it was thickly inhabited. + +Suddenly the carriage rattled into a village, and Tressady looked out. + +"I say, Fontenoy, here's a crowd! Do you suppose they know? Why, +Gregson's taken us another way round!" + +Lord Fontenoy let down his window, and identified the small mining +village of Battage. + +"Why did you bring us this way, Gregson?" he said to the coachman. + +The man, a Londoner, turned, and spoke in a low voice. "I thought we +might find some rioting going on in Marraby, my lord. And now I see +there's lots o' them out here!" + +Indeed, with the words he had to check his horses. The village street was +full from end to end with miners just come up from work. Fontenoy at once +perceived that the news of the election had arrived. The men were massed +in large groups, talking and discussing, with evident and angry +excitement, and as soon as the well-known liveries on the box of the new +member's carriage were identified there was an instant rush towards it. +Some of the men had already gone into their houses on either hand, but at +the sound of the wheels and the uproar they came rushing out again. A +howling hubbub arose, a confused sound of booing and groaning, and the +carriage was soon surrounded by grimed men, gesticulating and shouting. + +"Yer bloated parasites, yer!" cried a young fellow, catching at the +door-handle on Lord Fontenoy's side; "we'll make a d----d end o' yer +afore we've done wi' yer. Who asked yer to come meddlin in +Malford--d----n yer!" + +"Whativer do we want wi' the loikes o' yo representin us!" shouted +another man, pointing at Tressady. "Look at 'im; ee can't walk, ee can't; +mus be druv, poor hinnercent! When did yo iver do a day's work, eh? Look +at my 'ands! Them's the 'ands for honest men--ain't they, you fellers?" + +There was a roar of laughter and approval from the crowd, and up went a +forest of begrimed hands, flourishing and waving. + +George calmly put down the carriage-window, and, leaning his arms upon +it, put his head out. He flung some good-humoured banter at some of +the nearest men, and two or three responded. But the majority of the +faces were lowering and fierce, and the horses were becoming +inconveniently crowded. + +"Get on, Gregson," said Fontenoy, opening the front window of the +brougham. + +"If they'll let me, your lordship," said Gregson, rather pale, +raising his whip. + +The horses made a sudden start forward. There was a yell from the crowd, +and three or four men had just dashed for the horses' heads, when a shout +of a different kind ascended. + +"Burrows! 'Ere's Burrows! Three cheers for Burrows!" + +And some distance behind them, at the corner of the village street, +Tressady suddenly perceived a tall dogcart drawing up with two men in it. +It was already surrounded by a cheering and tumultuous assembly, and one +of the men in the cart was shaking hands right and left. + +George drew in his head, with a laugh. "This is dramatic. They've stopped +the horses, and here's Burrows!" + +Fontenoy shrugged his shoulders. "They'll blackguard us a bit, I suppose, +and let us go. Burrows 'll keep them in order." + +"What d'yer mean by it, heh, dash yer!" shouted a huge man, as he sprang +on the step of the carriage and shook a black fist in Tressady's +face--"thrustin yer d----d carkiss where yer ain't wanted? We wanted +'_im_, and we've worked for 'im. This is a workin-class district, an +we've a _right_ to 'im. Do yer 'ear?" + +"Then you should have given him seventeen more votes," said George, +composedly, as he thrust his hands into his pockets. "It's the fortunes +of war--your turn next time. I say, suppose you tell your fellows to let +our man get on. We've had a long day, and we're hungry. Ah"--to +Fontenoy--"here's Burrows coming!" + +Fontenoy turned, and saw that the dogcart had drawn up alongside them, +and that one of the men was standing on the step of it, holding on to the +rail of the cart. + +He was a tall, finely built man, and as he looked down on the carriage, +and on Tressady leaning over the window, the light from a street-lamp +near showed a handsome face blanched with excitement and fatigue. + +"Now, my friends," he said, raising his arm, and addressing the crowd, +"you let Sir George go home to his dinner. He's beaten us, and so far as +I know _he's_ fought fair, whatever some of his friends may have done for +him. I'm going home to have a bite of something and a wash. I'm done. But +if any of you like to come round to the club--eight o'clock--I'll tell +you a thing or two about this election. Now goodnight to you, Sir George. +We'll beat you yet, trust us. Fall back there!" + +He pointed peremptorily to the men holding the horses. They and the crowd +instantly obeyed him. + +The carriage swept on, followed by the hooting and groans of the whole +community, men, women, and children, who were now massed along the street +on either hand. + +"It's easy to see this man Gregson's a new hand," said Fontenoy, with an +accent of annoyance, as they got clear of the village. "I believe the +Wattons have only just imported him, otherwise he'd never have avoided +Marraby, and come round by Battage." + +"Battage has some special connection with Burrows, hasn't it? I had +forgotten." + +"Of course. He was check-weigher at the Acme pit here for years, before +they made him district secretary of the union." + +"That's why they gave me such a hot meeting here a fortnight ago!--I +remember now; but one thing drives another out of one's head. Well, +I daresay you and I'll have plenty more to do with Burrows before +we've done." + +Tressady threw himself back in his corner with a yawn. + +Fontenoy laughed. + +"There'll be another big strike some time next year," he said +drily--"bound to be, as far as I can see. We shall all have plenty to do +with Burrows then." + +"All right," said Tressady, indistinctly, pulling his hat over his eyes. +"Burrows or anybody else may blow me up next year, so long as they let me +go to sleep now." + +However, he did not find it so easy to go to sleep. His pulses were still +tingling under the emotions of the day and the stimulus of the hubbub +they had just passed through. His mind raced backwards and forwards over +the incidents and excitements of the last six months, over the scenes of +his canvass--and over some other scenes of a different kind which had +taken place in the country-house whither he and Fontenoy were returning. + +But he did his best to feign sleep. His one desire was that Fontenoy +should not talk to him. Fontenoy, however, was not easily taken in, and +no sooner did George make his first restless movement under the rug he +had drawn over him, than his companion broke silence. + +"By the way, what did you think of that memorandum of mine on Maxwell's +bill?" + +George fidgeted and mumbled. Fontenoy, undaunted, began to harangue on +certain minutiae of factory law with a monotonous zest of voice and +gesture which seemed to Tressady nothing short of amazing. + +He watched the speaker a minute or two through his half-shut eyes. So +this was his leader to be--the man who had made him member for Market +Malford. + +Eight years before, when George Tressady had first entered Christchurch, +he had found that place of tempered learning alive with traditions on the +subject of "Dicky Fontenoy." And such traditions--good Heavens! +Subsequently, at most race-meetings, large and small, and at various +clubs, theatres, and places of public resort, the younger man had had his +opportunities of observing the elder, and had used them always with +relish, and sometimes with admiration. He himself had no desire to follow +in Fontenoy's footsteps. Other elements ruled in him, which drew him +other ways. But there was a magnificence about the impetuosity, or rather +the doggedness with which Fontenoy had plunged into the business of +ruining himself, which stirred the imagination. On the last occasion, +some three and a half years before this Market Malford election, when +Tressady had seen Fontenoy before starting himself on a long Eastern +tour, he had been conscious of a lively curiosity as to what might have +happened to "Dicky" by the time he came back again. The eldest sons of +peers do not generally come to the workhouse; but there are aristocratic +substitutes which, relatively, are not much less disagreeable; and George +hardly saw how they were to be escaped. + +And now--not four years!--and here sat Dicky Fontenoy, haranguing on the +dull clauses of a technical act, throat hoarse with the speaking of the +last three weeks, eyes cavernous with anxiety and overwork, the creator +and leader of a political party which did not exist when Tressady left +England, and now bade fair to hold the balance of power in English +government! The surprises of fate and character! Tressady pondered them a +little in a sleepy way; but the fatigue of many days asserted itself. +Even his companion was soon obliged to give him up as a listener. Lord +Fontenoy ceased to talk; yet every now and then, as some jolt of the +carriage made George open his eyes, he saw the broad-shouldered figure +beside him, sitting in the same attitude, erect and tireless, the same +half-peevish pugnacity giving expression to mouth and eye. + + * * * * * + +"Come, wake up, Tressady! Here we are!" + +There was a vindictive eagerness in Fontenoy's voice. Ease was no longer +welcome to him, whether in himself or as a spectacle in other men. +George, startled from a momentary profundity of sleep, staggered to his +feet, and clutched at various bags and rugs. + +The carriage was standing under the pillared porch of Malford House, and +the great house-doors, thrown back upon an inner flight of marble steps, +gave passage to a blaze of light. George, descending, had just shaken +himself awake, and handed the things he held to a footman, when there was +a sudden uproar from within. A crowd of figures--men and women, the men +cheering, the women clapping and laughing--ran down the inner steps +towards him. He was surrounded, embraced, slapped on the back, and +finally carried triumphantly into the hall. + +"Bring him in!" said an exultant voice; "and stand back, please, and let +his mother get at him." + +The laughing group fell back, and George, blinking, radiant, and abashed, +found himself in the arms of an exceedingly sprightly and youthful dame, +with pale, frizzled hair, and the figure of seventeen. + +"Oh, you dear, great, foolish thing!" said the lady, with the voice and +the fervour, moreover, of seventeen. "So you've got in--you've done it! +Well, I should never have spoken to you again if you hadn't! And I +suppose you'd have minded that a little--from your own mother. Goodness! +how cold he is!" + +And she flew at him with little pecking kisses, retreating every now and +again to look at him, and then closing upon him again in ecstasy, till +George, at the end of his patience, held her off with a strong arm. + +"Now, mother, that's enough. Have the others been home long?" he +asked, addressing a smiling young man in knickerbockers who, with his +hands in his pockets, was standing beside the hero of the occasion +surveying the scene. + +"Oh! about half an hour. They reported you'd have some difficulty +in getting out of the clutches of the crowd. We hardly expected +you so soon." + +"How's Miss Sewell's headache? Does she know?" + +The expression of the young man's eye, which was bent on Tressady, +changed ever so slightly as he replied: + +"Oh yes, she knows. As soon as the others got back Mrs. Watton went up to +tell her. She didn't show at lunch." + +"Mrs. Watton came to tell _me_--naughty man!" said the lady whom George +had addressed as his mother, tapping the speaker on the arm with her fan. +"Mothers first, if you please, especially when they're cripples like me, +and can't go and see their dear darlings' triumphs with their own eyes. +And _I_ told Miss Sewell." + +She put her head on one side, and looked archly at her son. Her high +gown, a work of the most approved Parisian art, was so cut as to show +much more throat than usual, and, in addition, a row of very fine pearls. +Her very elegant waist and bust were defined by a sort of Empire sash; +her complexion did her maid and, indeed, her years, infinite credit. + +George flushed slightly at his mother's words, and was turning away from +her when he was gripped by the owner of the house, Squire Watton, an +eloquent and soft-hearted old gentleman who, having in George's opinion +already overdone it greatly at the town-hall in the way of hand-shaking +and congratulations, was now most unreasonably prepared to overdo it +again. Lady Tressady joined in with little shrieks and sallies, the other +guests of the house gathered round, and the hero of the day was once +more lost to sight and hearing amid the general hubbub of talk and +laughter--for the young man in knickerbockers, at any rate, who stood a +little way off from the rest. + +"I wonder when she'll condescend to come down," he said to himself, +examining his boots with a speculative smile. "Of course it was mere +caprice that she didn't go to Malford; she meant it to annoy." + +"I say, do let me get warm," said Tressady at last, breaking from his +tormentors, and coming up to the open log fire, in front of which the +young man stood. "Where's Fontenoy vanished to?" + +"Went up to write letters directly he had swallowed a cup of tea," said +the young man, whose name was Bayle; "and called Marks to go with him." +(Marks was Lord Fontenoy's private secretary.) + +George Tressady threw up his hands in disgust. + +"It's absurd. He never allows himself an hour's peace. If he expects me +to grind as he does, he'll soon regret that he lent a hand to put me into +Parliament. Well, I'm stiff all over, and as tired as a rat. I'll go and +have a warm bath before dinner." + +But still he lingered, warming his hands over the blaze, and every now +and then scanning the gallery which ran round the big hall. Bayle chatted +to Mm about some of the incidents of the day. George answered at random. +He did, indeed, look tired out, and his expression was restless and +discontented. + +Suddenly there was a cry from the group of young men and maidens who were +amusing themselves in the centre of the hall. + +"Why, there's Letty! and as fresh as paint." + +George turned abruptly. Bayle saw his manner stiffen and his eye kindle. + +A young girl was slowly coming down the great staircase which led to the +hall. She was in a soft black dress with a blue sash, and a knot of blue +at her throat--a childish slip of a dress, which answered to her small +rounded form, her curly head, and the hand slipping along the marble +rail. She came down silently smiling, taking each step with great +deliberation, in spite of the outbreak of half-derisive sympathy with +which she was greeted from her friends below. Her bright eyes glanced +from face to face--from the mocking inquirers immediately beneath her to +George Tressady standing by the fire. + +At the moment when she reached the last step Tressady found it necessary +to put another log on a fire already piled to repletion. + +Meanwhile Miss Sewell went straight towards the new member and held +out her hand. + +"I am so glad, Sir George; let me congratulate you." + +George put down his log, and then looked at his fingers critically. + +"I am very sorry, Miss Sewell, but I am not fit to touch. I hope your +headache is better." + +Miss Sewell dropped her hand meekly, shot him a glance which was not +meek, and said demurely: + +"Oh! my headaches do what they're told. You see, I was determined to come +down and congratulate you." + +"I see," he repeated, making her a little bow. "I hope my ailments, when +I get them, will be as docile. So my mother told you?" + +"I didn't want telling," she said placidly. "I knew it was all safe." + +"Then you knew what only the gods knew--for I only got in by +seventeen votes." + +"Yes, so I heard. I was very sorry for Burrows." + +She put one foot on the stone fender, raised her pretty dress with one +hand, and leant the other lightly against the mantelpiece. The attitude +was full of grace, and the little sighing voice fitted the curves of a +mouth which seemed always ready to laugh, yet seldom laughed frankly. + +As she made her remark about Burrows Tressady smiled. + +"My prophetic soul was right," he said deliberately; "I knew you would be +sorry for Burrows." + +"Well, it _is_ hard on him, isn't it? You can't deny you're a +carpet-bagger, can you?" + +"Why should I? I'm proud of it." + +Then he looked round him. The rest of the party--not without whispers and +smothered laughter--had withdrawn from them. Some of the ladies had +already gone up to dress. The men had wandered away into a little library +and smoking-room which opened on the hall. Only the squire, safe in a +capacious armchair a little way off, was absorbed in a local paper and +the last humours of the election. + +Satisfied with his glance, Tressady put his hands into his pockets, and +leant back against the fireplace, in a way to give himself fuller command +of Miss Sewell's countenance. + +"Do you never give your friends any better sympathy than you have given +me in this affair, Miss Sewell?" he said suddenly, as their eyes met. + +She made a little face. + +"Why, I've been an angel!" she said, poking at a prominent log +with her foot. + +George laughed. + +"Then our ideas of angels agree no better than the rest. Why didn't you +come and hear the poll declared, after promising me you would be there?" + +"Because I had a headache, Sir George." + +He responded with a little inclination, as though ceremoniously accepting +her statement. + +"May I ask at what time your headache began?" + +"Let me see," she said, laughing; "I think it was directly after +breakfast." + +"Yes. It declared itself, if I remember right, immediately after certain +remarks of mine about a Captain Addison?" + +He looked straight before him, with a detached air. + +"Yes," said Letty, thoughtfully; "it was a curious coincidence, +wasn't it?" + +There was a moment's silence. Then she broke into infectious laughter. + +"Don't you know," she said, laying her hand on his shoulder--"don't you +know that you're a most foolish and wasteful person? We get along +capitally, you and I--we've had a rattling time all this week--and then +you will go and make uncivil remarks about my friends--in public, too! +You actually think I'm going to let you tell Aunt Watton how to manage +me! You get me into no end of a fuss--it'll take me weeks to undo the +mischief you've been making--and then you expect me to take it like a +lamb! Now, do I look like a lamb?" + +All this time she was holding him tight by the arm, and her dimpled face, +alive with mirth and malice, was so close to his that a moment's wild +impulse flashed through him to kiss her there and then. But the impulse +passed. He and Letty Sewell had known each other for about three weeks. +They were not engaged--far from it. And these--the hand on the arm, and +the rest--were Letty Sewell's ways. + +Instead of kissing her, then, he scanned her deliberately. + +"_I_ never saw anyone more plainly given over to obstinacy and pride," +he said quietly; "I told you some plain facts about the character of a +man whom I know, and you don't, whereupon you sulk all day, you break +all your promises about coming to Malford, and when I come back you call +me names." + +She raised her eyebrows and withdrew her hand. + +"Well, it's plain, isn't it? that I must have been in a great rage. It +was very dull upstairs, though I did write reams to my best friend all +about you--a very candid account--I shall have to soften it down. By the +way, are you ever going to dress for dinner?" + +George started, and looked at his watch. + +"Are we alone? Is anyone coming from outside?" + +"Only a few 'locals,' just to celebrate the occasion. I know the +clergyman's wife's coming, for she told me she had been copying one of my +frocks, and wanted me to tell her what I thought." + +George laughed. + +"Poor lady!" + +"I don't _think_ I shall be nice to her," said Letty, playing with a +flower on the mantelpiece. "Dowdy people make me feel wicked. Well, _I_ +must dress." + +It was now his turn to lay a detaining hand. + +"Are you sorry?" he said, bending over to her. His bright grey eyes had +shaken off fatigue. + +"For what? Because you got in?" + +Her face overflowed with laughter. He let her go. She linked her arm in +that of the daughter of the house--Miss Florence Watton--who was crossing +the hall at the moment, and the two went upstairs together, she throwing +back one triumphant glance at him from the landing. + +George stood watching them till they disappeared. His expression was +neither soft nor angry. There was in it a mocking self-possession which +showed that he too had been playing a part--mingled, perhaps, with a +certain perplexity. + + + + +CHAPTER II + + +George Tressady came down very late for dinner, and found his hostess on +the verge of annoyance. Mrs. Watton was a large, commanding woman, who +seldom thought it worth while to disguise any disapproval she might +feel--and she had a great deal of that commodity to expend, both on +persons and institutions. + +George hastened to propitiate her with the usual futilities: he had +supposed that he was in excellent time, his watch had been playing +tricks, and so on. + +Mrs. Watton, who, after all, on this great day beheld in the new member +the visible triumph of her dearest principles, received these excuses at +first with stiffness, but soon thawed. + +"Oh, you _naughty_ boy, you naughty, mendacious boy!" said a +sprightly voice in Tressady's ear. "'Excellent time,' indeed! I saw +you--for shame!" + +And Lady Tressady flounced away from her son, laughing over her +shoulder in one of her accustomed poses. She wore white muslin over +cherry-coloured silk. The display of neck and shoulders could hardly +have been more lavish; and the rouge on her cheeks had been overdone, +which rarely happened. George turned from her hurriedly to speak to +Lord Fontenoy. + +"What a fool that woman is!" thought Mrs. Watton to herself, as her +sharp eye followed her guest. "She will make George positively dislike +her soon--and all the time she is bound to get him to pay her debts, or +there will be a smash. What! dinner? John, will you please take Lady +Tressady; Harding, will you take Mrs. Hawkins"--pointing her second son +towards a lady in black sitting stiffly on the edge of an ottoman; "Mr. +Hawkins takes Florence; Sir George"--she waved her hand towards Miss +Sewell. "Now, Lord Fontenoy, you must take me; and the rest of you sort +yourselves." + +As the young people, mostly cousins, laughingly did what they were told, +Sir George held out his arm to Miss Sewell. + +"I am very sorry for you," he said, as they passed into the dining-room. + +"Oh! I knew it would be my turn," said Letty, with resignation. "You see, +you took Florrie last night, and Aunt Watton the night before." + +George settled himself deliberately in his chair, and turned to study his +companion. + +"Do you mind warning me, to begin with, how I can avoid giving you a +headache? Since this morning my nerve has gone--I want directions." + +"Well--" said Letty, pondering, "let us lay down the subjects we _may_ +talk about first. For instance, you may talk of Mrs. Hawkins." + +She gave an imperceptible nod which directed his eyes to the thin woman +sitting opposite, to whom Harding Watton, a fashionable and fastidious +youth, was paying but scant attention. + +George examined her. + +"I don't want to," he said shortly; "besides, she would last us no +time at all." + +"Oh!--on the contrary," said Letty, with malice sparkling in her brown +eye, "she would last me a good twenty minutes. She has got on my gown." + +"I didn't recognise it," said George, studying the thin lady again. + +"I wouldn't mind," said Letty, in the same tone of reflection, "if Mrs. +Hawkins didn't think it her duty to lecture me in the intervals of +copying my frocks. If I disapproved of anybody, I don't think I should +send my nurse to ask their maid for patterns." + +"I notice you take disapproval very calmly." + +"Callously, you mean. Well, it is my misfortune. I always feel myself so +much more reasonable than the people who disapprove." + +"This morning, then, you thought me a fool?" + +"Oh no! Only--well--I _knew_, you see, that I knew better. _I_ was +reasonable, and--" + +"Oh! don't finish," said George, hastily; "and don't suppose that I shall +ever give you any more good advice." + +"Won't you?" + +Her mocking look sent a challenge, which he met with outward firmness. +Meanwhile he was inwardly haunted by a phrase he had once heard a woman +apply to the mental capacities of her best friend. "Her _mind_?--her +mind, my dear, is a shallow chaos!" The words made a neat label, he +scoffingly thought, for his own present sensations. For he could not +persuade himself that there was much profundity in his feelings towards +Miss Sewell, whatever reckless possibilities life might seem to hold at +times; when, for instance, she wore that particular pink gown in which +she was attired to-night, or when her little impertinent airs suited her +as well as they were suiting her just now. Something cool and critical in +him was judging her all the time. Ten years hence, he made himself +reflect, she would probably have no prettiness left. Whereas now, what +with bloom and grace, what with small proportions and movements light as +air, what with an inventive refinement in dress and personal adornment +that never failed, all Letty Sewell's defects of feature or expression +were easily lost in a general aspect which most men found dazzling and +perturbing enough. Letty, at any rate within her own circle, had never +yet been without partners, or lovers, or any other form of girlish +excitement that she desired, and had been generally supposed--though she +herself was aware of some strong evidence to the contrary--to be capable +of getting anything she had set her mind upon. She had set her mind, as +the spectators in this particular case had speedily divined, upon +enslaving young George Tressady. And she had not failed. For even during +these last stirring days it had been tolerably clear that she and his +election had divided Tressady's mind between them, with a balance, +perhaps, to her side. As to the _measure_ of her success, however, that +was still doubtful--to herself and him most of all. + +To-night, at any rate, he could not detach himself from her. He tried +repeatedly to talk to the girl on his left, a noble-faced child fresh out +of the schoolroom, who in three years' time would be as much Letty +Sewell's superior in beauty as in other things. But the effort was too +great. The strenuous business of the day had but left him--in fatigue and +reaction--the more athirst for amusement and the gratification of another +set of powers. He turned back to Letty, and through course after course +they chattered and sparred, discussing people, plays and books, or +rather, under cover of these, a number of those topics on the borderland +of passion whereby men and women make their first snatches at +intimacy--till Mrs. Watton's sharp grey eyes smiled behind her fan, and +the attention of her neighbour, Lord Fontenoy--an uneasy attention--was +again and again drawn to the pair. + +Meanwhile, during the first half of dinner, a chair immediately opposite +to Tressady's place remained vacant. It was being kept for the eldest son +of the house, his mother explaining carelessly to Lord Fontenoy that she +believed he was "Out parishing somewhere, as usual." + +However, with the appearance of the pheasants the door from the +drawing-room opened, and a slim dark-haired man slipped in. He took his +place noiselessly, with a smile of greeting to George and his +neighbour, and bade the butler in a whisper aside bring him any course +that might be going. + +"Nonsense, Edward!" said his mother's loud voice from the head of the +table; "don't be ridiculous. Morris, bring back that hare _entrée_ and +the mutton for Mr. Edward." + +The newcomer raised his eyebrows mildly, smiled, and submitted. + +"Where have you been, Edward?" said Tressady; "I haven't seen you since +the town-hall." + +"I have been at a rehearsal. There is a parish concert next week, and I +conduct these functions." + +"The concerts are always bad," said Mrs. Watton, curtly. + +Edward Watton shrugged his shoulder. He had a charming timid air, +contradicted now and then by a look of enthusiastic resolution in the +eyes. + +"All the more reason for rehearsal," he said. "However, really, they +won't do badly this time." + +"Edward is one of the persons," said Mrs. Watton in a low aside to Lord +Fontenoy, "who think you can make friends with people--the lower +orders--by shaking hands with them, showing them Burne-Jones's pictures, +and singing 'The Messiah' with them. I had the same idea once. Everybody +had. It was like the measles. But the sensible persons have got over it." + +"Thank you, mamma," said Watton, making her a smiling bow. + +Lady Tressady interrupted her talk with the squire at the other end of +the table to observe what was going on. She had been chattering very +fast in a shrill, affected voice, with a gesticulation so free and +French, and a face so close to his, that the nervous and finicking +squire had been every moment afraid lest the next should find her white +fingers in his very eyes. He felt an inward spasm of relief when he saw +her attention diverted. + +"Is that Mr. Edward talking his Radicalism?" she asked, putting up a +gold eyeglass--"his dear, wicked Radicalism? Ah! we all know where Mr. +Edward got it." + +The table laughed. Harding Watton looked particularly amused. + +"Egeria was in this neighbourhood last week," he said, addressing Lady +Tressady. "Edward rode over to see her. Since then he has joined two new +societies, and ordered six new books on the Labour Question." + +Edward flushed a little, but went on eating his dinner without any other +sign of disturbance. + +"If you mean Lady Maxwell," he said good-humouredly, "I can only be sorry +for the rest of you that you don't know her." + +He raised his handsome head with a bright air of challenge that became +him, but at the same time exasperated his mother. + +"That _woman!_" said Mrs. Watton with ponderous force, throwing up her +hands as she spoke. Then she turned to Lord Fontenoy. "Don't _you_ regard +her as the source of half the mischievous work done by this precious +Government in the last two years?" she asked him imperiously. + +A half-contemptuous smile crossed Lord Fontenoy's worn face. + +"Well, really, I'm not inclined to make Lady Maxwell the scapegoat. Let +them bear their own misdeeds." + +"Besides, what worse can you say of English Ministers than that they +should be led by a woman?" said Mr. Watton, from the bottom of the table, +in a piping voice. "In my young days such a state of things would have +been unheard of. No offence, my dear, no offence," he added hastily, +glancing at his wife. + +Letty glanced at George, and put up a handkerchief to hide her own +merriment. + +Mrs. Watton looked impatient. + +"Plenty of English Cabinet Ministers have been led by women before now," +she said drily; "and no blame to them or anybody else. Only in the old +days you knew where you were. Women were corrupt--as they were meant to +be--for their husbands and brothers and sons. They wanted something for +somebody--and got it. Now they are corrupt--like Lady Maxwell--for what +they are pleased to call 'causes,' and it is that which will take the +nation to ruin." + +At this there was an incautious protest from Edward Watton against the +word "corrupt," followed by a confirmatory clamour from his mother and +brother which seemed to fill the dining-room. Lady Tressady threw in +affected comments from time to time, trying hard to hold her own in the +conversation by a liberal use of fan and Christian names, and little +personal audacities applied to each speaker in turn. Only Edward Watton, +however, occasionally took civil or smiling notice of her; the others +ignored her. They were engaged in a congenial task, the hunting of the +one disaffected and insubordinate member of their pack, and had for the +moment no attention to spare for other people. + +"I shall see the great lady, I suppose, in a week or two," said George to +Miss Sewell, under cover of the noise. "It is curious that I should never +have seen her." + +"Who? Lady Maxwell?" + +"Yes. You remember I have been four years out of England. She was in +town, I suppose, the year before I left, but I never came across her." + +"I prophesy you will like her enormously," said Letty, with decision. "At +least, I know that's what happens to me when Aunt Watton abuses anybody. +I couldn't dislike them afterwards if I tried." + +"That, allow me to impress upon you, is _not_ my disposition! I am a +human being--I am influenced by my friends." + +He turned round towards her so as to appropriate her again. + +"Oh! you are not at all the poor creature you paint yourself!" said +Letty, shaking her head. "In reality, you are the most obstinate +person I know--you can never let a subject alone--you never know when +you're beaten." + +"Beaten?" said George, reflectively; "by a headache? Well, there is no +disgrace in that. One will probably 'live to fight another day.' Do you +mean to say that you will take no notice--no notice--of all that array of +facts I laid before you this morning on the subject of Captain Addison?" + +"I shall be kind to you, and forget them. Now, do listen to Aunt Watton! +It is your duty. Aunt Watton is accustomed to be listened to, and you +haven't heard it all a hundred times before, as I have." + +Mrs. Watton, indeed, was haranguing her end of the table on a subject +that clearly excited her. Contempt and antagonism gave a fine energy to a +head and face already sufficiently expressive. Both were on a large +scale, but without commonness. The old-lace coif she wore suited her +waved and grizzled hair, and was carried with conscious dignity; the +hand, which lay beside her on the table, though long and bony, was full +of nervous distinction. Mrs. Watton was, and looked, a tyrant--but a +tyrant of ability. + +"A neighbour of theirs in Brookshire," she was saying, "was giving me +last week the most extraordinary account of the doings at Mellor. She was +the heiress of that house at Mellor"--here she addressed young Bayle, +who, as a comparative stranger in the house, might be supposed to be +ignorant of facts which everybody else knew--"a tumbledown place with an +income of about two thousand a year. Directly she married she put a +Socialist of the most unscrupulous type--so they tell me--into +possession. The man has established what they call a 'standard rate' of +wages for the estate--practically double the normal rate--coerced all the +farmers, and made the neighbours furious. They say the whole district is +in a ferment. It used to be the quietest part of the world imaginable, +and now she has set it all by the ears. _She_, having married thirty +thousand a year, can afford her little amusements; other people, who must +live by their land, have their lives worried out of them." + +"She tells me that the system works on the whole extremely well," said +Edward Watton, whose heightened colour alone betrayed the irritation of +his mother's chronic aggression, "and that Maxwell is not at all unlikely +to adopt it on his own estate." + +Mrs. Watton threw up her hands again. + +"The _idiocy_ of that man! Till he married her he was a man of sense. And +now she leads him by the nose, and whatever tune he calls, the Government +must dance to, because of his power in the House of Lords." + +"And the worst of it is," said Harding Watton, with an unpleasant laugh, +"that if she were not a handsome woman, her influence would not be half +what it is. She uses her beauty in the most unscrupulous way." + +"I believe that to be _entirely_ untrue," said Edward Watton, with +emphasis, looking at his brother with hostility. + +George Tressady interrupted. He had an affection for Edward Watton, and +cordially disliked Harding. "Is she really so handsome?" he asked, +bending forward and addressing his hostess. + +Mrs. Watton scornfully took no notice. + +"Well, an old diplomat told me the other day," said Lord Fontenoy--but +with a cold unwillingness, as though he disliked the subject--"that she +was the most beautiful woman, he thought, that had been seen in London +since Lady Blessington's time." + +"Lady Blessington! dear, dear!--Lady Blessington!" said Lady Tressady +with malicious emphasis--an unfortunate comparison, don't you think? Not +many people would like to be regarded as Lady Blessington's successor." + +"In any other respect than beauty," said Edward Watton, haughtily, with +the same tension as before, "the comparison, of course, would be +ridiculous." + +Harding shrugged his shoulders, and, tilting his chair back, said in the +ear of a shy young man who sat next him: + +"In my opinion, the Count d'Orsay is only a question of time! However, +one mustn't say that to Edward." + +Harding read memoirs, and considered himself a man of general +cultivation. The young man addressed, who read no printed matter outside +the sporting papers that he could help, and had no idea as to who Lady +Blessington and Count d'Orsay might be, smiled vaguely, and said nothing. + +"My dear," said the squire, plaintively, "isn't this room extremely hot?" + +There was a ripple of meaning laughter from all the young people, to many +of whom this particular quarrel was already tiresomely familiar. Mr. +Watton, who never understood anything, looked round with an inquiring +air. Mrs. Watton condescended to take the hint and retire. + +In the drawing-room afterwards Mrs. Watton first allotted a +duty-conversation of some ten minutes in length, and dealing strictly +with the affairs of the parish, to Mrs. Hawkins, who, as clergyman's +wife, had a definite official place in the Malford House circle, quite +irrespective of any individuality she might happen to possess. Mrs. +Hawkins was plain, self-conscious, and in no way interesting to Mrs. +Watton, who never took the smallest trouble to approach her in any other +capacity than that upon which she had entered by marrying the incumbent +of the squire's home living. But the civilities and respects that were +recognised as belonging to her station she received. + +This however, alas! was not enough for Mrs. Hawkins, who was full of +ambitions, which had a bad manner, a plague of shyness, and a narrow +income, were perpetually thwarting. As soon as the ten minutes were over, +and Mrs. Watton, who was nothing if not political, and saw no occasion to +make a stranger of the vicar's wife, had plunged into the evening papers +brought her by the footman, Mrs. Hawkins threw herself on Letty Sewell. +She was effusively grateful--too grateful--for the patterns lent her by +Miss Sewell's maid. + +"Did she lend you some patterns?" said Letty, raising her brows. "Dear +me; I didn't know." + +And her eyes ran cooly over Mrs. Hawkins's attire, which did, indeed, +present a village imitation of the delicate gown in which Miss Sewell had +robed herself for the evening. + +Mrs. Hawkins coloured. + +"I specially told my nurse," she said hastily, "that of course your leave +must be asked. But my nurse and your maid seem to have made friends. Of +course my nurse has plenty of time for dressmaking with only one child of +four to look after, and--and--one really gets no new ideas in a poky +place like this. But I would not have taken a liberty for the world." + +Her pride and _mauvaise honte_ together made both voice and manner +particularly unattractive. Letty was seized with the same temper that +little boys show towards flies. + +"Of course I am delighted!" she said indifferently. "It's so nice and +good to have one's things made at home. Your nurse must be a treasure." + +All the time her gaze was diligently inspecting every ill-cut seam and +tortured trimming of the homemade triumph before her. The ear of the +vicar's wife, always morbidly sensitive in that particular drawing-room, +caught a tone of insult in every light word. A passionate resentment +flamed up in her, and she determined to hold her own. + +"Are you going in for more visits when you leave here?" she inquired. + +"Yes, two or three," said Letty, turning her delicate head unwittingly. +She had been throwing blandishments to Mrs. Watton's dog, a grey Aberdeen +terrier, who stood on the rug quietly regarding her. + +"You spend most of the year in visits, don't you?" + +"Well, a good deal of it," said Letty. + +"Don't you find it dreadfully time-wasting? Does it leave you leisure +for _any_ serious occupations at all? I am afraid it would make _me_ +terribly idle!" + +Mrs. Hawkins laughed, attempting a tone of banter. + +Letty put up a small hand to hide a sudden yawn, which, however, was +visible enough. + +"Would it?" she said, with an impertinence which hardly tried to +conceal itself. "Evelyn, do look at that dog. Doesn't he remind you of +Mr. Bayley?" + +She beckoned to the handsome child of sixteen who had sat on George +Tressady's left hand at dinner, and, taking up a pinch of rose-leaves +that had dropped from a vase beside her, she flung them at the dog, +calling him to her. Instead of going to her, however, the dog slowly +curled himself up on the rug, and, laying his nose along his front paws, +stared at her steadily with the expression of one mounting guard. + +"He never will make friends with you, Letty. Isn't it odd?" said Evelyn, +laughing, and stooping to stroke the creature. + +"Never mind; other dogs will. Did you see that adorable black Spitz of +Lady Arthur's? She has promised to give me one." + +The two cousins fell into a chatter about their county neighbours, mostly +rich and aristocratic people, of whom Mrs. Hawkins knew little or +nothing. Evelyn Watton, whose instincts were quick and generous, tried +again and again to draw the vicar's wife into the conversation. Letty was +determined to exclude her. She lay back against the sofa, chatting her +liveliest, the whiteness of her neck and cheek shining against the red of +the damask behind, one foot lightly crossed over the other, showing her +costly little slippers with their paste buckles. She sparkled with jewels +as much as a girl may--more, indeed, in Mrs. Hawkins's opinion, than a +girl should. From head to foot she breathed affluence, seduction, +success--only the seduction was not for Mrs. Hawkins and her like. + +The vicar's wife sat flushed and erect on her chair, disdaining after a +time to make any further effort, but inwardly intolerably sore. She could +not despise Letty Sewell, unfortunately, since Letty's advantages were +just those that she herself most desired. But there was something else in +her mind than small jealousy. When Letty had been a brilliant child in +short frocks, the vicar's wife, who was scarcely six years older, had +opened her heart, had tried to make herself loved by Mrs. Watton's niece. +There had been a moment when they had been "Madge" and "Letty" to each +other, even since Letty had "come out." Now, whenever Mrs. Hawkins +attempted the Christian name, it stuck in her throat; it seemed, even to +herself, a familiarity that had nothing to go upon; while with every +succeeding visit to Malford, Letty had dropped her former friend more +decidedly, and "Madge" was heard no more. + +The gentlemen, deep in election incident and gossip, were, in the view +chiefly of the successful candidate, unreasonably long in leaving the +dining-room. When they appeared at last, George Tressady once more +made an attempt to talk to someone else than Letty Sewell, and once +more failed. + +"I want you to tell me something about Miss Sewell," said Lord Fontenoy +presently in Mrs. Watton's ear. He had been sitting silent beside her on +the sofa for some little time, apparently toying with the evening papers, +which Mrs. Watton had relinquished to him. + +Mrs. Watton looked up, followed the direction of his eyes towards a +settee in a distant corner of the room, and showed a half-impatient +amusement. + +"Letty? Oh! Letty's my niece--the daughter of my brother, Walter Sewell, +of Helbeck. They live in Yorkshire. My brother has my father's place--a +small estate, and rents very irregular. I often wonder how they manage to +dress that child as they do. However, she has always had her own way +since she was a foot high. As for my poor brother, he has been an +invalid for the last ten years, and neither he nor his wife--oh! such a +stupid woman!"--Mrs. Watton's energetic hands and eyes once more, called +Heaven to witness--"have ever counted for much, I should say, in Letty's +career. There is another sister, a little delicate, silent thing, that +looks after them. Oh! Letty isn't stupid; I should think not. I suppose +you're alarmed about Sir George. You needn't be. She does it with +everybody." + +The candid aunt pursued the conversation a little further, in the same +tone of a half-caustic indulgence. At the end of it, however, Lord +Fontenoy was still uneasy. He had only migrated to Malford House for the +declaration of the poll, having spent the canvassing weeks mainly in +another part of the division. And now, on this triumphant evening, he was +conscious of a sudden sense of defective information, which was +disagreeable and damping. + + * * * * * + +When bedtime came, Letty lingered in the drawing-room a little behind the +other ladies, on the plea of gathering up some trifles that belonged to +her. So that when George Tressady went out with her to light her candle +for her in the gallery, they found themselves alone. + +He had fallen into a sudden silence, which made her sweep him a look of +scrutiny as she took her candlestick. The slim yet virile figure drawn to +its full height, the significant, long-chinned face, pleased her senses. +He might be plain--she supposed he was--but he was, nevertheless, +distinguished, and extraordinarily alive. + +"I believe you are tired to death," she said to him. "Why don't you +go to bed?" + +She spoke with the freedom of one accustomed to advise all her male +acquaintance for their good. George laughed. + +"Tired? Not I. I was before dinner. Look here, Miss Sewell, I've got a +question to ask." + +"Ask it." + +"You don't want to spoil my great day, do you? You do repent that +headache?" + +They looked at each other, dancing laughter in each pair of eyes, +combined in his with an excited insistence. + +"Good-night, Sir George," she said, holding out her hand. + +He retained it. + +"You do?" he said, bending over her. + +She liked the situation, and made no immediate effort to change it. + +"Ask me a month hence, when I have proved your statements." + +"Then you admit it was all pretence?" + +"I admit nothing," she said joyously. "I protected my friend." + +"Yes, by injuring and offending another friend. Would it please you if I +said I missed you _very_ much at Malford to-day?" + +"I will tell you to-morrow--it is so late! Please let me have my hand." + +He took no notice, and they went hand-in-hand, she drawing him, to the +foot of the stairs. + +"George!" said a shrill, hesitating voice from overhead. + +George looked up, and saw his mother. He and Letty started apart, and in +another second Letty had glided upstairs and disappeared. + +"Yes, mother," said George, impatiently. + +"Will you come here?" + +He mounted, and found Lady Tressady a little discomposed, but as +affected as usual. + +"Oh, George! it was so dark--I didn't see--I didn't know. George, will +you have half an hour's talk with me after breakfast to-morrow? Oh, +George, my dear boy, my _dear_ boy! Your poor mammy understands!" + +She laid one hand on his shoulder and, lifting her feather fan in the +other, shook it with playful meaning in the direction whither Letty +had departed. + +George hastily withdrew himself. "Of course I will have a talk with you, +mother. As for anything else, I don't know what you mean. But you really +must let me go to bed; I am much too tired to talk now. Good-night." + +Lady Tressady went back to her room, smiling but anxious. + +"She has caught him!" she said to herself; "barefaced little flirt! It is +not altogether the best thing for me. But it may dispose him to be +generous, if--if I can play my cards." + +Letty Sewell meanwhile had reached the quiet of a luxurious bedroom, and +summoned her maid to her assistance. When the maid departed, the mistress +held long counsel with herself over the fire: the general position of her +affairs; what she desired; what other people intended; her will, and the +chances, of getting it. Her thoughts dealt with these various problems in +a skilled and business-like way. To a particular form of self-examination +Letty was well accustomed, and it had become by now a strong agent in the +development of individuality, as self-examination of another sort is said +to be by other kinds of people. + +She herself was pleasantly conscious of real agitation. George Tressady +had touched her feelings, thrilled her nerves, more than--Yes! she said +to herself decidedly, more than anybody else, more than "the rest." She +thought of "the rest," one after the other--thought of them +contemptuously. Yet, certainly few girls in her own set and part of the +country had enjoyed a better time--few, perhaps, had dared so many +adventures. Her mother had never interfered with her; and she herself had +not been afraid to be "talked about." Dances, picnics, moonlight walks; +the joys of outrageous "sitting-out," and hot rivalries with prettier +girls; of impertinences towards the men who didn't matter, and pretty +flatteries towards the men who did--it was all pleasant enough to think +of. She could not reproach herself with having missed any chances, any +opportunities her own will might have given her. + +And yet--well, she was tired of it!--out of love altogether with her +maiden state and its opportunities. She had come to Malford House in a +state of soreness, which partly accounted, perhaps, for such airs as she +had been showing to poor Mrs. Hawkins. During the past year a particular +marriage--the marriage of her neighbourhood--had seemed intermittently +within her reach. She had played every card she knew--and she had failed! +Failed, too, in the most humiliating way. For the bride, indeed, was +chosen; but it was not Letty Sewell, but one of Letty's girl-neighbours. + +To-night, almost for the first time, she could bear to think of it; she +could even smile at it. Vanity and ambition alone had been concerned, and +to-night these wild beasts of the heart were soothed and placable. + +Well, it was no great match, of course--if it came off. All that Aunt +Watton knew about the Tressadys had been long since extracted from her by +her niece. And with Tressady himself Letty's artless questions had been +very effective. She knew almost all that she wished to know. No doubt +Ferth was a very second-rate "place"; and, since those horrid miners had +become so troublesome, his income as a coal-owner could not be what his +father's had been--three or four thousand a year, she supposed--more, +perhaps, in good years. It was not much. + +Still--she pressed her hands on her eyes--he was _distinguished_; she saw +that plainly already. He would be welcome anywhere. + +"And we are _not_ distinguished--that is just it. We are small people, in +a rather dull set. And I have had hard work to make anything of it. Aunt +Watton was very lucky to marry as she did. Of course, she _made_ Uncle +Watton marry her; but that was a chance--and papa always says nobody else +could have done it!" + +She fell happily thinking of Tressady's skirmishes with her, her face +dimpling with amusement. Captain Addison! How amazed he would be could he +know the use to which she had put his name and his very hesitating +attentions. But he would never know; and meanwhile Sir George had been +really pricked--really jealous! She laughed to herself--a low laugh of +pure pleasure. + +Yes--she had made up her mind. With a sigh, she put away from her all +other and loftier ambitions. She supposed that she had not money or +family enough. One must face the facts. George Tressady would take her +socially into another _milieu_ than her own, and a higher one. She told +herself that she had always pined for Parliament, politics, and eminent +people. Why should she not succeed in that world as well as in the +Helbeck world? Of course she would succeed! + +There was his mother--silly, painted old lady! She was naturally the +_great_ drawback; and Aunt Watton said she was absurdly extravagant, and +would ruin Tressady if it went on. All the more reason why he should be +protected. Letty drew herself sharply together in her pretty white +dressing-gown, with the feeling that mothers of that kind must and could +be kept in their place. + +A house in town, of course--and _not_ in Warwick Square, where, +apparently, the Tressadys owned a house, which had been let, and was now +once more in Sir George's hands. That might do for Lady Tressady--if, +indeed, she could afford it when her son had married and taken other +claims upon him. + +Letty allowed her thoughts to wander dreamily on, envisaging the London +life that was to be: the young member, Lord Fontenoy's special friend and +_protégé_--the young member's wife making her way among great people, +giving charming little parties at Ferth-- + +All very well! But what, please, were the facts on his side? She buried +her small chin deep in her hands as she tried, frowning, to think it out. +Certainly he was very much drawn, very much taken. She had watched him, +sometimes, trying to keep away from her--and her lips parted in a broad +smile as she recalled the triumph of his sudden returns and submissions. +She believed he had a curious temper--easily depressed, for all his +coolness. But he had never been depressed in her company. + +Still, _nothing_ was certain. All that had happened might melt away into +nothingness with the greatest ease if--well! if the right steps were not +taken. He was no novice, any more than she; he must have had scores of +"affairs" by now, with that manner of his. Such men were always capable +of second thoughts, of tardy retreats--and especially if there were the +smallest thought of persecution, of pursuit. + +She believed--she was nearly certain--he would have a reaction to-morrow, +perhaps because his mother had caught them together. Next morning he +would be just a little bored by the thought of it--a little bored by +having to begin again where he had left off. Without great tact and skill +the whole edifice might tumble together like a house of cards. Had she +the courage to make difficulties--to put a water-ditch across his path? + +It was close on midnight when Letty at last raised her little chin from +the hands that held it and rang the bell that communicated with her +maid's room, but cautiously, so as not to disturb the rest of the +sleeping house. + +"If Grier _is_ asleep, she must wake up, that's all!" + +Two or three minutes afterwards a dishevelled maid startled out of her +first slumber appeared, to ask whether her mistress was ill. + +"No, Grier, but I wanted to tell you that I have changed my mind about +staying here till Saturday. I am going to-morrow morning by the 9.30 +train. You can order a fly first thing, and bring me my breakfast early." + +The maid, groaning at the thought of the boxes that would have to be +packed in this inconceivable hurry, ventured to protest. + +"Never mind, you can get the housemaid to help you," said Miss Sewell, +decidedly. "I don't mind what you give her. Now go to bed, Grier. I'm +sorry I woke you up; you look as tired as an owl." + +Then she stood still, looking at herself--hands clasped lightly before +her--in the long glass. + +"'Letty went by the nine o'clock train,'" she said aloud, smiling, and +mocking her own white reflection. "'Dear me! How sudden! how +extraordinary! Yes, but that's like her. H'm--' Then he must write to me, +for I shall write _him_ a civil little note asking for that book I lent +him. Oh! I _hope_ Aunt Watton and his mother will bore him to death!" + +She broke out into a merry laugh; then, sweeping her mass of pretty hair +to one side, she began rapidly to coil it up for the night, her fingers +working as fast as her thoughts, which were busy with one ingenious plan +after another for her next meeting with George Tressady. + + + + +CHAPTER III + + +During this same space of time, which for Miss Sewell's maid ended so +disagreeably, George Tressady was engaged in a curious conversation. + +He had excused himself from smoking, on the ground of fatigue, +immediately after his parting from Letty. But he had only nominally gone +to bed. He too found it difficult to tear himself from thinking and the +fire, and had not begun to undress when he heard a knock at his door. On +his reply, Lord Fontenoy entered. + +"May I come in, Tressady?" + +"By all means." + +George, however, stared at his invader in some astonishment. His +relations with Fontenoy were not personally intimate. + +"Well, I'm glad to find you still up, for I had a few words on my mind to +say to you before I go off to-morrow. Can you spare me ten minutes?" + +"Certainly; do sit down. Only--well, I'm afraid I'm pretty well done. If +it's anything important, I can't promise to take it in." + +Lord Fontenoy for a moment made no reply. He stood by the fire, looking +at the cigarette he still held, in silence. George watched him with +repressed annoyance. + +"It's been a very hot fight, this," said Fontenoy at last, slowly, "and +you've won it well. All our band have prospered in the matter of +elections. But this contest of yours has been, I think, the most +conspicuous that any of us have fought. Your speeches have made a +mark--one can see that from the way in which the Press has begun to take +them, political beginner though you are. In the House you will be, I +think, our best speaker--of course with time and experience. As for me, +if you give me a fortnight to prepare in, I can make out something. +Otherwise I am no use. _You_ will take a good debating place from the +beginning. Well, it is only what I expected." + +The speaker stopped. George, fidgeting in his chair, said nothing; and +presently Fontenoy resumed: + +"I trust you will not think what I am going to say an intrusion, but--you +remember my letters to you in India?" + +George nodded. + +"They put the case strongly, I think," Fontenoy went on, "but, in my +opinion, not strongly enough. This wretched Government is in power by the +help of a tyranny--a tyranny of Labour. They call themselves +Conservatives--they are really State Socialists, and the mere catspaws of +the revolutionary Socialists. You and I are in Parliament to break down +that tyranny, if we can. This year and next will be all-important. If we +can hold Maxwell and his friends in check for a time--if we can put some +backbone into the party of freedom--if we can rally and call up the +forces we have in the country, the thing will be done. We shall have +established the counterpoise--we shall very likely turn the next +election, and liberty--or what still remains of it!--will be saved for a +generation. But to succeed, the effort, the sacrifice, from each one of +us, will have to be _enormous_." + +Fontenoy paused, and looked at his companion. George was lying back in +an armchair with his eyes shut. Why on earth--so he was +thinking--should Fontenoy have chosen this particular hour and this +particular night to _débiter_ these very stale things, that he had +already served up in innumerable speeches and almost every letter that +George had received from him? + +"I don't suppose it will be child's-play," he said, stifling a +yawn--"hope I shall feel keener after a night's rest!" He looked up +with a smile. + +Fontenoy dropped his cigarette into the fender and stood silent a moment, +his hands clasped behind his back. + +"Look here, Tressady!" he said at last, turning to his companion; "you +remember how affairs stood with me when you left England? I didn't know +much of you, but I believe, like many of my juniors, you knew a great +deal about me?" + +George made the sign of assent expected of him. + +"I knew something about you, certainly," he said, smiling; "it was not +difficult." + +Fontenoy smiled too, though without geniality. Geniality had become +impossible to a man always overworked and on edge. + +"I was a fool," he said quickly--"an open and notorious fool. But I +enjoyed my life. I don't suppose anyone ever enjoyed life more. Every day +of my former existence gave the lie to the good people who tell you that +to be happy you must be virtuous. I was idle, extravagant, and vicious, +and I was one of the happiest of men. As to my racing and my horses, they +were a constant delight to me. I can't think now of those mornings on the +Heath--the gallops of my colts--the change and excitement of it all, +without longing for it to come back again. Yet I have never owned a +horse, or seen a race, or made a bet, for the last three years. I never +go into society, except for political purposes; and I scarcely ever touch +wine. In fact, I have thrown overboard everything that once gave _me_ +pleasure and amusement so completely that I have, perhaps, some right to +press upon the party that follows me my conviction that unless each and +all of us give up private ease and comfort as I have done--unless we are +contented, as the Parnellites were, to be bores in the House and +nuisances to ourselves--to peg away in season and out of season--to give +up everything for the cause, we may just as well not go into the fight at +all--for we shall do nothing with it." + +George clasped his hands round his knee, and stared stubbornly into the +fire. Sermonising was all very well, but Fontenoy did too much of it; +nobody need suppose that he would have done what he had done, unless, on +the whole, it had given him more pleasure to do it than not to do it. + +"Well," he said, looking up at last with a laugh, "I wonder what you +_mean_--really. Do you mean, for instance, that I oughtn't to get +myself married?" + +His offhand manner covered a good deal of irritation. He made a shrewd +guess at the idea in Fontenoy's mind, and meant to show that he would not +be dictated to. + +Fontenoy also laughed, with as little geniality as before. Then he +applied himself to a deliberate answer. + +"_This_ is what I mean. If you, just elected--at the beginning of this +critical session--were to give your best mind to anything else in the +world than the fight before us, I should regard you as, for the time, at +any rate, lost to us--as, so far, betraying us." + +The colour rushed into George's cheeks. + +"Upon my word!" he said, springing up--"upon my word, you are a +taskmaster!" + +Fontenoy hastened to reply, in a different tone, "I only want to keep the +machine in order." + +George paced up and down for a few moments without speaking. Presently +he paused. + +"Look here, Fontenoy! I cannot look at the matter as you do, and we may +as well understand each other. To me, this election of mine is, after +all, an ordinary affair. I take it, and what is to come after it, just as +other men do. I have accepted your party and your programme, and I mean +to stick to them. I see that the political situation is difficult and +exciting, and I don't intend to shirk. But I am no more going to slay my +private life and interests at the altar of politics than my father did +when he was in Parliament. If the revolution is coming, it will come in +spite of you and me. And, moreover--if you will let me say so--I am +convinced that your modes of procedure are not even profitable to the +cause in the long run. No man can work as you do, without rest and +without distraction. You will break down, and then, where will the +'cause' be?" + +Lord Fontenoy surveyed the speaker with a curious, calculating look. It +was as though, with as much rapidity as his mind was capable of, he +balanced a number of pros and cons against each other, and finally +decided to let the matter drop, perhaps not without some regret for +having raised it. + +"Ah! well," he said, "I have no doubt that what I have said appears to +you mere meddlesomeness. If so, you will change your view, and you will +forgive me. I must trust the compulsion of the situation. You will +realise it, as I have done, when you get well into the fight. There is +something in this Labour tyranny which rouses all a man's passions, bad +and good. If it does not rouse yours, I have been much mistaken in my +estimate of you. As for me, don't waste your concern. There are few +stronger men than I. You forget, too--" + +There was a pause. Of late years, since his transformation in fact, Lord +Fontenoy's stiff reserve about himself had been rarely broken through. At +this moment, however, George, looking up, saw that his companion was in +some way moved by a kind of sombre and personal emotion. + +"You forget," the speaker resumed, "that I learnt nothing either at +school or college, and that a man who wants to lead a party must, some +time or other, pay for that precious privilege. When you left England, +the only financial statement I could understand was a betting-book. I +knew no history except what one gets from living among people who have +been making it, and even that I was too lazy to profit by. I couldn't +understand the simplest economical argument, and I _hated_ trouble of all +kinds. Nothing but the toil of a galley-slave could have enabled me to do +what I have done. You would be astonished sometimes if you could look in +upon me at night and see what I am doing--what I am obliged to do to keep +up the most elementary appearances." + +George was touched. The tone of the speaker had passed suddenly into one +of plain dignity, in spite of, perhaps because of, the half-bitter +humility that mingled with it. + +"I know you make one ashamed," he said sincerely, though awkwardly. +"Well, don't distrust me; I'll do my best." + +"Good-night," said Lord Fontenoy, and held out his hand. He had gained no +promises, and George had shown and felt annoyance. Yet the friendship +between the two men had sensibly advanced. + + * * * * * + +George shut the door upon him, and came back to the fire to ponder this +odd quarter of an hour. + +His experience certainly contained no more extraordinary fact than this +conversion of a gambler and a spendthrift into the passionate leader of +an arduous cause. Only one quality linked the man he remembered with the +politician he had now pledged himself to follow--the quality of +intensity. Dicky Fontenoy in his follies had been neither gay nor +lovable, but his fierce will, his extravagant and reckless force, had +given him the command of men softer than himself. That will and that +force were still there, steeled and concentrated. But George Tressady was +sometimes restlessly doubtful as to how far he himself was prepared to +submit to them. + +His personal acquaintance with Fontenoy was of comparatively recent date. +He himself had been for some four years away from England, to which he +had only returned about three months before the Market Malford election. +A letter from Fontenoy had been the immediate cause of his return; but +before it arrived the two men had been in no direct communication. + +The circumstances of Tressady's long absence concern his later story, and +were on this wise. His father, Sir William, the owner of Ferth Place, in +West Mercia, died in the year that George, his only surviving child and +the son of his old age, left college. The son, finding his father's debts +considerable and his own distaste for the law, to which he had been +destined, amazingly increased by his newly acquired freedom to do what he +liked with himself, turned his mind at once towards travelling. Travel he +must if he was ever to take up public and parliamentary life, and for no +other profession--so he announced--did he feel the smallest vocation. +Moreover, economy was absolutely necessary. During his absence the London +house could be let, and Lady Tressady could live quietly at Ferth upon an +allowance, while his uncles looked after the colliery property. + +Lady Tressady made no difficulty, except as to the figure first named for +the proposed allowance, which she declared was absurd. The uncles, +elderly business men, could not understand why the younger generation +should not go into harness at once without indulgences, as they +themselves had done; but George got his way, and had much reason to show +for it. He had not been idle at college, though perhaps at no time +industrious enough. Influenced by natural ambition and an able tutor, he +had won some distinction, and he was now a man full of odds and ends of +ideas, of nascent interests, curiosities, and opinions, strongly +influenced moreover already, though he said less about it than about +other things, by the desire for political distinction. While still at +college he had been especially attracted--owing mainly to the chances of +an undergraduate friendship--by a group of Eastern problems bearing upon +England's future in Asia; and he was no sooner free to govern himself and +his moderate income than there flamed up in him the Englishman's passion +to see, to touch, to handle, coupled with the young man's natural desire +to go where it was dangerous to go, and where other men were not going. +His friend--the son of an eminent geographer, possessed by inheritance of +the explorer's instincts--was just leaving England for Asia Minor, +Armenia, and Persia. George made up his mind, hastily but firmly, to go +with him, and his family had to put up with it. + +The year, however, for which the young fellow had stipulated went by; two +others were added to it; and a fourth began to run its course--still +George showed but faint signs of returning. According to his letters +home, he had wandered through Persia, India, and Ceylon; had found +friends and amusement everywhere; and in the latter colony had even +served eight months as private secretary to the Governor, who had taken +a fancy to him, and had been suddenly bereft by a boating accident of the +indispensable young man who was accustomed to direct the hospitalities of +Government House before Tressady's advent. Thence he went to China and +Japan, made a trip from Pekin into Mongolia, landed on Formosa, fell in +with some French naval officers at Saigon, spending with them some of the +gayest and maddest weeks of his life; explored Siam, and finally returned +by way of Burmah to Calcutta, with the dim intention this time of some +day, before long, taking ship for home. + +Meanwhile during the last months of his stay in Ceylon he had written +some signed articles for an important English newspaper, which, together +with the natural liking felt by the many important persons he had come to +know in the East for an intelligent and promising young fellow, endowed +with brains, family, and good manners, served to bring him considerably +into notice. The tone of the articles was strongly English and +Imperialist. The first of them came out immediately before his visit to +Saigon, and Tressady thanked his lucky stars that the foreign reading of +his French friends was, perhaps, not so extensive as their practical +acquaintance with life. He was, however, proud of his first literary +achievement, and it served to crystallise in him a number of ideas and +sentiments which had previously represented rather the prejudices of a +traveller accustomed to find his race in the ascendant, and to be well +received by its official class than any reasoned political theory. As he +went on writing, conviction, grew with statement, became a faith, +ultimately a passion--till, as he turned homewards, he seemed to himself +to have attained a philosophy sufficient to steer the rest of life by. It +was the common philosophy of the educated and fastidious observer; and it +rested on ideas of the greatness of England and the infinity of England's +mission, on the rights of ability to govern as contrasted with the +squalid possibilities of democracy, on the natural kingship of the higher +races, and on a profound personal admiration for the virtues of the +administrator and the soldier. + +Now, no man in whom these perceptions take strong root early, need expect +to love popular government. Tressady read his English newspapers with +increasing disgust. On that little England in those far seas all +depended, and England meant the English working-man with his flatteries +of either party. He blundered and blustered at home, while the Empire, +its services and its defences, by which alone all this pullulating +"street folk" existed for a day, were in danger of starvation and +hindrance abroad, to meet the unreasonable fancies of a degenerate race. +A deep hatred of mob-rule rooted itself in Tressady, passing gradually, +during his last three months in India, into a growing inclination to +return and take his place in the fight--to have his say. "Government to +the competent--_not_ to the many," might have been the summary of his +three years' experience. + +Nor were private influences wanting. He was a West Mercian landowner in a +coal-mining district, and owned a group of pits on the borders of his +estate. His uncles, who had shares in the property, reported to him +periodically during his absence. With every quarter it seemed to Tressady +that the reports grew worse and the dividends less. His uncles' letters, +indeed, were full of anxieties and complaints. After a long period of +peace in the coal-trade, it looked as though a time of hot war between +masters and men was approaching. "We have to thrash them every fifteen +years," wrote one of the uncles, "and the time is nearly up." + +The unreason, brutality, and extravagance of the men; the tyranny of the +Union; the growing insolence of the Union officials--Tressady's letters +from home after a time spoke of little else. And Tressady's bankbook +meanwhile formed a disagreeable comment on the correspondence. The pits +were almost running at a loss; yet neither party had made up their minds +to the trial of strength. + +Tressady was still lingering in Bombay--though supposed to be on his way +home--when Lord Fontenoy's letter reached him. + +The writer referred slightly to their previous acquaintance, and to a +remote family connection between himself and Tressady; dwelt in +flattering terms on the reports which had reached him from many quarters +of Tressady's opinions and abilities; described the genesis and aims of +the new Parliamentary party, of which the writer was the founder and +head; and finally urged him to come home at once, and to stand for +Parliament as a candidate for the Market Malford division, where the +influence of Fontenoy's family was considerable. Since the general +election, which had taken place in June, and had returned a moderate +Conservative Government to power, the member for Market Malford had +become incurably ill. The seat might be vacant at any moment. Fontenoy +asked for a telegram, and urged the next steamer. + +Tressady had already--partly from private talk, partly from the +newspapers--learnt the main outlines of Lord Fontenoy's later story. The +first political speech of Fontenoy's he had ever read made a +half-farcical impression on him--let Dicky stick to his two-year-olds! +The second he read twice over, and alike in it, in certain party +manifestoes from the same hand printed in the newspapers, and in the +letter he had now received, there spoke something for which it seemed to +him he had been waiting. The style was rough and halting, but Tressady +felt in it the note and power of a leader. + +He took an hour's walk through the streets of Bombay to think it +over, then sent his telegram, and booked his passage on his way home +to luncheon. + +Such, in brief outline, had been the origin of the two men's +acquaintance. Since George's return they had been constantly together. +Fontenoy had thrown his whole colossal power of work into the struggle +for the Market Malford seat, and George owed him much. + + * * * * * + +After he was left to himself on this particular night, Tressady was for +long restless and wakeful. In spite of resistance, Fontenoy's talk and +Fontenoy's personality had nevertheless restored for the moment an +earlier balance of mind. The interests of ambition and the intellect +returned in force. Letty Sewell had, no doubt, made life very agreeable +to him during the past three weeks; but, after all--was it worth while? + +Her little figure danced before the inward eye as his fire sank into +darkness; fragments of her chatter ran through his mind. He began to be +rather ashamed of himself. Fontenoy was right. It was not the moment. No +doubt he must marry some day; he had come home, indeed, with the vague +intention of marrying; but the world was wide, and women many. That he +had very little romance in his temperament was probably due to his +mother. His childish experiences of her character, and of her relations +to his father, had left him no room, alas! for the natural childish +opinion that all grown-ups, and especially all mothers, are saints. In +India he had amused himself a good deal; but his adventures had, on the +whole, confirmed his boyish bias. If he had been forced to put his inmost +opinions about women into words, the result would have been +crude--perhaps brutal; which did not prevent him from holding a very +strong and vivid conviction of the pleasure to be got from their society. + +Accordingly, he woke up next morning precisely in the mood that Letty, +for her own reasons, had foreseen. It worried him to think that for two +or three days more he and Letty Sewell must still be thrown together in +close relations. He and his mother were waiting on at Malford for a day +or two till some workmen should be out of his own house, which lay +twenty miles away, at the farther edge of the Market Malford division. +Meanwhile a couple of shooting-parties had been arranged, mainly for +his entertainment. Still, was there no urgent business that required +him in town? + +He sauntered in to breakfast a little before ten. Only Evelyn Watton and +her mother were visible, most of the men having already gone off to a +distant meet. + +"Now sit down and entertain us, Sir George," said Mrs. Watton, holding +out her hand to him with an odd expression. "We're as dull as ditch +water--the men have all gone--Florrie's in bed with a chill--and Letty +departed by the 9.30 train." + +George's start, as he took his coffee from her, did not escape her. + +"Miss Sewell gone? But why this suddenness?" he inquired. "I thought Miss +Letty was to be here to the end of the week." + +Mrs. Watton raised her shoulders. "She sent a note in to me at half-past +eight to say her mother wasn't well, and she was wanted at home. She just +rushed in to say good-bye to me, chattered a great deal, kissed everybody +a great deal--and I know no more. I hear she had breakfast and a fly, +which is all I troubled myself about. I never interfere with the modern +young woman." + +Then she raised her eyeglass, and looked hard and curiously at Tressady. +His face told her nothing, however, and as she was the least sympathetic +of women, she soon forgot her own curiosity. + +Evelyn Watton, a vision of fresh girlhood in her morning frock, glanced +shyly at him once or twice as she gave him scones and mustard. She was +passing through a moment of poetry and happy dreams. All human beings +walked glorified in her eyes, especially if they were young. Letty was +not wholly to her taste, and had never been a particular friend. But she +thought ill of no one, and her little heart must needs flutter tenderly +in the presence of anything that suggested love and marriage. It had +delighted her to watch George and Letty together. Now, why had Letty +rushed away like this? _She_ thought with concern, thrilling all the +time, that Sir George looked grave and depressed. + +George, however, was not depressed--or thought he was not. He walked into +the library after breakfast, whistling, and quoting to himself: + +And there be they +Who kissed his wings which brought him yesterday, +And thank his wings to-day that he is flown. + +He prided himself on his memory of some modern poets, and the lines +pleased him particularly. + +He had no sooner done quoting, however, than his mother peered into the +room, claiming the business talk that had been promised. From that talk +George emerged irritable and silent. His mother's extravagance was really +preposterous!--not to be borne. For four years now he had been free from +the constant daily friction of money troubles which had spoilt his youth +and robbed him of all power of respecting his mother. And he had hugged +his freedom. But all the time it seemed he had been hugging illusion, and +the troubles had been merely piling up for his return! Her present +claims--and he knew very well that they were not the whole--would exhaust +all his available balance at his bankers'. + +Lady Tressady, for her part, thought, with indignant despair, that he had +not behaved at all as an only son should--especially an only son just +returned to a widowed mother after four years' absence. How could anyone +suppose that in four years there would be no debts--on such a pittance of +an income? Some money, indeed, he had promised her; but not nearly +enough, and not immediately. He "must look into things at home." Lady +Tressady was enraged with herself and him that she had not succeeded +better in making him understand how pressing, how _urgent_, matters were. + +She _must_, indeed, bring it home to him that there might be a scandal at +any moment. That odious livery-stable man, two or three dressmakers--in +these directions every phase and shift of the debtor's long _finesse_ had +been exhausted long ago. Even _she_ was at her wits' end. + +As for other matters--But from these her thoughts turned hurriedly away. +Luck would change, of course, sometime; it must change! No need to say +anything about _that_ just yet, especially while George's temper was in +such a queer state. + +It was very odd--most annoying! As a baby even he had never been +caressing or sweet like other people's babies. And now, really!--why +_her_ son should have such unattractive ways! + +But, manoeuvre as she would, George would not be drawn into further +discussion. She could only show him offended airs, and rack her brains +morning and night as to how best to help herself. + +Meanwhile George had never been so little pleased with living as +during these few days. He was overwhelmed with congratulations; and, +to judge from the newspapers, "all England," as Lady Tressady said, +"was talking of him." It seemed to him ridiculous that a man should +derive so little entertainment from such a fact. Nevertheless, his +dulness remained, and refused to be got rid of. He discussed with +himself, of course, for a new set of reasons, the possibility of +evading the shooting-parties, and departing. But he was deeply pledged +to stay; and he was under considerable obligations to the Wattons. So +he stayed; but he shot so as to increase his own dissatisfaction with +the universe, and to make the other men in the house wonder what might +be the general value of an Indian sporting reputation when it came to +dealing with the British pheasant. + +Then he turned to business. He tried to read some Parliamentary reports +bearing on a coming measure, and full of notes by Fontenoy, which +Fontenoy had left with him. But it only ended in his putting them hastily +aside, lest in the mood of obscure contradiction that possessed him he +should destroy his opinions before he had taken his seat. + +On the day before the last "shoot," among the letters his servant brought +him in the early morning, was one that he tore open in a hurry, tossing +the rest aside. + +It was from Miss Sewell, requesting, prettily, in as few words as +possible, that he would return her a book she had lent him. + +"My mother," she wrote, "has almost recovered from her sudden attack of +chill. I trust the shooting-parties have amused you, and that you have +read _all_ Lord Fontenoy's Blue Books." + +George wrote a reply before he went down to breakfast--a piece of +ordinary small-talk, that seemed to him the most wretched stuff +conceivable. But he pulled two pens to pieces before he achieved it. + +Then he went out for a long walk alone, pondering what was the matter +with him. Had that little witch dropped the old familiar poison into his +veins after all? Certainly some women made life vivacity and pleasure, +while others--his mother or Mrs. Watton, for instance--made it fatigue +or tedium. + +Ever since his boyhood Tressady had been conscious of intermittent +assaults of melancholy, fits of some inner disgust, which hung the world +in black, crippled his will, made him hate himself and despise his +neighbours. It was, possibly, some half-conscious dread lest this morbid +speck in his nature should gain upon the rest that made him so hungry for +travel and change of scene after he left college. It explained many +surprises, many apparent ficklenesses in his life. During the three weeks +that he had spent in the same house with Letty Sewell he had never once +been conscious of this lurking element of his life. And now, after four +days, he found himself positively pining for her voice, the rustle of her +delicate dress, her defiant, provocative ways that kept a man on the +alert--still more, her smiling silences that seemed to challenge all his +powers, the touch of her small cool hand that crushed so easily in his. + +What had she left the house for in that wilful way? He did not believe +her excuses. Yet he was mystified. Did she realise that things were +becoming serious, and did she not mean them to be serious? If so, who or +what hindered? + +As for Fontenoy-- + +Tressady quickened his step impatiently as he recalled that harassed and +toiling figure. Politics or no politics, _he_ would live his life! +Besides, it was obviously to his profit to marry. How could he ever make +a common household with his mother? He meant to do his duty by her, but +she annoyed and abashed him twenty times a day. He would be far happier +married, far better able to do his work. He was not passionately in +love--not at all. But--for it was no good fencing with himself any +longer--he desired Letty Sewell's companionship more than he had desired +anything for a long time. He wanted the right to carry off the little +musical box, with all its tunes, and set it playing in his own house, to +keep him gay. Why not? He could house it prettily, and reward it well. + +As for the rest, he decided, without thinking about it, that Letty Sewell +was well born and bred. She had, of course, all the little refinements a +fastidious taste might desire in a woman. She would never discredit a man +in society. On the contrary, she would be a great strength to him there. +And she must be sweet-tempered, or that pretty child Evelyn Watton would +not be so fond of her. + +That pretty child, meanwhile, was absorbed in the excitement of her own +small _rôle_. Tressady, who had only made duty-conversation with her +before, had found out somehow that she was sympathetic--that she would +talk to him charmingly about Letty. After a very little pretending, he +let himself go; and Evelyn dreamt at night of his confidences, her heart, +without knowing it, leaping forward to the time when a man would look at +her so, for her own sake--not another's. She forgot that she had ever +criticised Letty, thought her vain or selfish. Nay, she made a heroine of +her forthwith; she remembered all sorts of delightful things to say of +her, simply that she might keep the young member talking in a corner, +that she might still enjoy the delicious pride of feeling that she +knew--she was helping it on. + +After the big "shoot," for instance, when all the other gentlemen were +stiff and sleepy, George spent the whole evening in chattering to Evelyn, +or, rather, in making her chatter. Lady Tressady loitered near them once +or twice. She heard the names "Letty," "Miss Sewell," passing and +repassing--one talker catching up the other. Over any topic that included +Miss Sewell they lingered; when anything was begun that did not concern +her, it dropped at once, like a ball ill thrown. The mother went away +smiling rather sourly. + +She watched her son, indeed, cat-like all these days, trying to discover +what had happened--what his real mind was. She did not wish for a +daughter-in-law at all, and she had even a secret fear of Letty Sewell +in that capacity. But somehow George must be managed, her own needs must +be met. She felt that she might be undoing the future; but the present +drove her on. + +On the following morning, from one of Mrs. Watton's numerous letters +there dropped out the fact that Letty Sewell was expected immediately at +a country house in North Mercia whereof a certain Mrs. Corfield was +mistress--a house only distant some twenty miles from the Tressadys' +estate of Ferth Place. + +"My sister-in-law has recovered with remarkable rapidity," said Mrs. +Watton, raising a sarcastic eye. "Do you know anything of the Corfields, +Sir George?" + +"Nothing at all," said George. "One hears of them sometimes from +neighbours. They are said to be very lively folk. Miss Sewell will have a +gay time." + +"Corfield?" said Lady Tressady, her head on one side and her cup balanced +in two jewelled hands. "What! _Aspasia Corfield_! Why, my dear +George--one of my oldest friends!" + +George laughed--the short, grating laugh his mother so often evoked. + +"Beg pardon, mother; I can only answer for myself. To the best of my +belief I never saw her, either at Ferth or anywhere else." + +"Why, Aspasia Corfield and I," said Lady Tressady with languid +reflectiveness--"Aspasia Corfield and I copied each other's dresses, +and bought our hats at the same place, when we were eighteen. I haven't +seen her for an eternity. But Aspasia used to be a _dear_ girl--and so +fond of me!" + +She put down her cup with a sigh, intended as a reproach to George. +George only buried himself the deeper in his morning's letters. + +Mrs. Watton, behind her newspaper, glanced grimly from the mother +to the son. + +"I wonder if that woman has a single real old friend in the world. How +is George Tressady going to put up with her?" + +The Wattons themselves had been on friendly terms with Tressady's father +for many years. Since Sir William's death and George's absence, however, +Mrs. Watton had not troubled herself much about Lady Tressady, in which +she believed she was only following suit with the rest of West Mercia. +But now that George had reappeared as a promising politician, his +mother--till he married--had to be to some extent accepted along with +him. Mrs. Watton accordingly had thought it her duty to invite her for +the election, not without an active sense of martyrdom. "She always has +bored me to tears since I first saw Sir William trailing her about," she +would remark to Letty. "Where did he pick her up? The marvel is that she +has kept respectable. She has never looked it. I always feel inclined to +ask her at breakfast why she dresses for dinner twelve hours too soon!" + +Very soon after the little conversation about the Corfields Lady Tressady +withdrew to her room, sat thoughtful for a while, with her writing-block +on her knee, then wrote a letter. She was perfectly aware of the fact +that since George had come back to her she was likely to be welcome once +more in many houses that for years had shown no particular desire to +receive her. She took the situation very easily. It was seldom her way to +be bitter. She was only determined to amuse herself, to enjoy her life in +her own way. If people disapproved of her, she thought them fools, but it +did not prevent her from trying to make it up with them next day, if she +saw an opening and it seemed worth while. + +"There!" she said to herself as she sealed the letter, and looked at it +with admiration, "I really have a knack for doing those things. I should +think Aspasia Corfield would ask him by return--me, too, if she has any +decency, though she _has_ dropped me for fifteen years. She has a tribe +of daughters.--_Why_ I should play Miss Sewell's game like this I don't +know! Well, one must try something." + +That same afternoon mother and son took their departure for Ferth Place. + +George, who had only spent a few weeks at Ferth since his return from +India, should have found plenty to do both indoors and out. The house +struck him as singularly dingy and out of order. Changes were +imperatively demanded in the garden and in the estate. His business as a +colliery-owner was in a tangled and critical condition. And meanwhile +Fontenoy plied him incessantly with a political correspondence which of +itself made large demands upon intelligence and energy. + +Nevertheless he shuffled out of everything, unless it were the +correspondence with Fontenoy. As to the notion that all the languor could +be due merely to an unsatisfied craving for Letty Sewell's society, when +it presented itself he still fought with it. The Indian climate might +have somehow affected him. An English winter is soon forgotten, and has +to be re-learnt like a distasteful lesson. + +About a week after their arrival at Ferth George was sitting at his +solitary breakfast when his mother came floating into the room, preceded +by a rattle of bangles, a flutter of streamers, and the barking of +little dogs. + +She held various newly opened letters, and, running up to him, she laid +her hands on his shoulders. + +"Now"--thought George to himself with annoyance, "she is going to be +arch!" + +"Oh! you silly boy!" she said, holding him, with her head on one side. +"Who's been cross and nasty to his poor old mammy? Who wants cheering up +a bit before he settles down to his horrid work? Who would take his +mammy to a nice party at a nice house, if he were prettily asked--eh? +who would?" + +She pinched his cheek before he could escape. + +"Well, mother, of course you will do what you like," said George, walking +off to supply himself with ham. "I shall not leave home again, just yet." + +Lady Tressady smiled. + +"Well, anyhow, you can read Aspasia Corfield's letter," she said, holding +it out to him. "You know, really, that house isn't bad. They took over +the Dryburghs' _chef_, and Aspasia knows how to pick her people." + +"Aspasia!" The tone of patronising intimacy! George blushed, if his +mother did not. + +Yet he took the letter. He read it, then put it down, and walked to the +window to look at a crowd of birds that had been collecting round a plate +of food he had just put out upon the snow. + +"Well, will you go?" said his mother. + +"If you particularly wish it," he said, after a pause, in an +embarrassed voice. + +Lady Tressady's dimples were in full play as she settled herself into her +seat and began to gather a supply of provisions. But as he returned to +his place, and she glanced at him, she saw that he was not in a mood to +be bantered, and understood that he was not going to let her force his +confidence, however shrewdly she might guess at his affairs. So she +controlled herself, and began to chatter about the Corfields and their +party. He responded, and by the end of breakfast they were on much better +terms than they had been for some weeks. + +That morning also he wrote a cheque for her immediate necessities, which +made her--for the time--a happy woman; and she overwhelmed him with +grateful tears and embraces, which he did his best to bear. + +Early in December he and she became the Corfields' guests. They found a +large party collected, and Letty Sewell happily established as the spoilt +child of the house. At the first touch of her hand, the first glance of +her eyes, George's cloud dispersed. + +"Why did you run away?" George asked her on the first possible occasion. + +Letty laughed, fenced with the question for four days, during which +George was never dull for a single instant, and then capitulated. She +allowed him to propose to her, and was graciously pleased to accept him. + +The following week Tressady went down with Letty to her home at Helbeck. +He found an invalid father, a remarkably foolish, inconsequent mother, +and a younger sister, Elsie, on whom, as it seemed to him, the burdens of +the house mainly rested. + +The father, who was suffering from a slow but incurable disease, had the +remains of much natural ability and acuteness. He was well content with +Tressady as a son-in-law; though in the few interviews that Tressady was +able to have with him on the question of settlements the young man took +pains to state his money affairs as carefully and modestly as possible. +Letty was not often in her father's room, and Mr. Sewell treated her, +when she did come, rather like an agreeable guest than a daughter. But he +was evidently extremely proud of her--as also was the mother--and he +would talk much to George, when his health allowed it, of her good looks +and her social success. + +With the younger sister Tressady did not find it easy to make friends. + +She was plain, sickly, and rather silent. She seemed to have scientific +tastes and to be a great reader. And, so far as he could judge, the two +sisters were not intimate. + +"Don't hate me for taking her away!" he said, as he was bidding good-bye +to Elsie, and glancing over her shoulder at Letty on the stairs. + +The girl's quiet eyes were crossed by a momentary look of amusement. Then +she controlled herself, and said gently: + +"We didn't expect to keep her! Good-bye." + + + + +CHAPTER IV + + +"Oh, Tully, look at my cloak! You've let it fall! Hold my fan, please, +and give me the opera-glasses." + +The speaker was Miss Sewell. She and an elderly lady were sitting side by +side in the stalls, about halfway down St. James's Hall. The occasion was +a popular concert, and, as Joachim was to play, every seat in the hall +was rapidly filling up. + +Letty rose as she asked for the opera-glasses, and scanned the crowds +streaming in through the side-doors. + +"No--no signs of him! He must have been kept at the House, after all," +she said, with annoyance. "Really, Tully, I do think you might have got a +programme all this time! Why do you leave everything to me?" + +"My dear!" said her companion, protesting, "you didn't tell me to." + +"Well, I don't see why I should _tell_ you everything. Of course I want a +programme. Is that he? No! What a nuisance!" + +"Sir George must have been detained," murmured her companion, timidly. + +"What a very original thing to say, wasn't it, Tully?" remarked Miss +Sewell, with sarcasm, as she sat down again. + +The lady addressed was silent, instinctively waiting till Letty's nerves +should have quieted down. She was a Miss Tulloch, a former governess of +the Sewells, and now often employed by Letty, when she was in town, as a +convenient chaperon. Letty was accustomed to stay with an aunt in +Cavendish Square, an old lady who did not go out in the evenings. A +chaperon therefore was indispensable, and Maria Tulloch could always be +had. She existed somewhere in West Kensington, on an income of seventy +pounds a year. Letty took her freely to the opera and the theatre, to +concerts and galleries, and occasionally gave her a dress she did not +want. Miss Tulloch clung to the connection as her only chance of relief +from the boarding-house routine she detested, and was always abjectly +ready to do as she was told. She saw nothing she was not meant to see, +and she could be shaken off at a moment's notice. For the rest, she came +of a stock of gentlefolk; and her invariable black dress, her bits of +carefully treasured lace, the weak refinement of her face, and her timid +manner did no discredit to the brilliant creature beside her. + +When the first number of the programme was over, Letty got up once more, +opera-glass in hand, to search among the late-comers for her missing +lover. She nodded to many acquaintances, but George Tressady was not to +be seen; and she sat down finally in no mood either to listen or to +enjoy, though the magician of the evening was already at work. + +"There's something very special, isn't there, you want to see Sir George +about to-night?" Tully inquired humbly when the next pause occurred. + +"Of course there is!" said Letty, crossly. "You do ask such +foolish questions, Tully. If I don't see him to-night, he may let +that house in Brook Street slip. There are several people after +it--the agents told me." + +"And he thinks it too expensive?" + +"Only because of _her_. If she makes him pay her that preposterous +allowance, of course it will be too expensive. But I don't mean him +to pay it." + +"Lady Tressady is terribly extravagant," murmured Miss Tulloch. + +"Well, so long as she isn't extravagant with his money--_our_ money--I +don't care a rap," said Letty; "only she sha'n't spend all her own and +all ours too, which is what she has been doing. When George was away he +let her live at Ferth, and spend almost all the income, except five +hundred a year that he kept for himself. And _then_ she got so shamefully +into debt that he doesn't know when he shall ever clear her. He gave her +money at Christmas, and again, I am _sure_, just lately. Well! all I know +is that it must be _stopped_. I don't know that I shall be able to do +much till I'm married, but I mean to make him take this house." + +"Is Lady Tressady nice to you? She is in town, isn't she?" + +"Oh yes! she's in town. Nice?" said Letty, with a little laugh. "She +can't bear me, of course; but we're quite civil." + +"I thought she tried to bring it on?" said the confidante, anxious, above +all things, to be sympathetic. + +"Well, she brought him to the Corfields, and let me know she had. I don't +know why she did it. I suppose she wanted to get something out of him. +Ah! _there_ he is!" + +And Letty stood up, smiling and beckoning, while Tressady's tall thin +figure made its way along the central passage. + +"Horrid House! What made you so late?" she said, as he sat down between +her and Miss Tulloch. + +George Tressady looked at her with delight. The shrewish contractions in +the face, which had been very evident to Tully a few minutes before, had +all disappeared, and the sharp slight lines of it seemed to George the +height of delicacy. At sight of him colour and eyes had brightened. Yet +at the same time there was not a trace of the raw girl about her. She +knew very well that he had no taste for _ingénues_, and she was neither +nervous nor sentimental in his company. + +"Do you suppose I should have stayed a second longer than I was obliged?" +he asked her, smiling, pressing her little hand under pretence of taking +her programme. + +The first notes of a new Brahms quartette mounted, thin and sweet, into +the air. The musical portion of the audience, having come for this +particular morsel, prepared themselves eagerly for the tasting and trying +of it. George and Letty tried to say a few things more to each other +before yielding to the general silence, but an old gentleman in front +turned upon them a face of such disdain and fury they must needs laugh +and desist. + +Not that George was unwilling. He was tired; and silence with Letty +beside him was not only repose, but pleasure. Moreover, he derived a +certain honest pleasure of a mixed sort from music. It suggested literary +or pictorial ideas to him which stirred him, and gave him a sense of +enjoyment. Now, as the playing flowed on, it called up delightful images +in his brain: of woody places, of whirling forms, of quiet rivers, of +thin trees Corot-like against the sky--scenes of pleading, of frolic, +reproachful pain, dissolving joy. With it all mingled his own story, his +own feeling; his pride of possession in this white creature touching him; +his sense of youth, of opening life, of a crowded stage whereon his "cue" +had just been given, his "call" sounded. He listened with eagerness, +welcoming each fancy as it floated past, conscious of a grain of +self-abandonment even--a rare mood with him. He was not absorbed in love +by any means; the music spoke to him of a hundred other kindling or +enchanting things. Nevertheless it made it doubly pleasant to be there, +with Letty beside him. He was quite satisfied with himself and her; quite +certain that he had done everything for the best. All this the music in +some way emphasised--made clear. + +When it was over, and the applause was subsiding, Letty said in his ear: +"Have you settled about the house?" + +He smiled down upon her, not hearing what she said, but admiring her +dress, its little complication and subtleties, the violets that perfumed +every movement, the slim fingers holding the fan. Her mere ways of +personal adornment were to him like pleasant talk. They surprised and +amused him--stood between him and ennui. + +She repeated her question. + +A frown crossed his brow, and the face changed wholly. + +"Ah!--it is so difficult to see one's way," he said, with a little sigh +of annoyance. + +Letty played with her fan, and was silent. + +"Do you so much prefer it to the others?" he asked her. + +Letty looked up with astonishment. + +"Why, it is a house!" she said, lifting her eyebrows; "and the others--" + +"Hovels? Well, you are about right. The small London house is an +abomination. Perhaps I can make them take less premium." + +Letty shook her head. + +"It is not at all a dear house," she said decidedly. + +He still frowned, with the look of one recalled to an annoyance he had +shaken off. + +"Well, darling, if you wish it so much, that settles it. Promise to be +still nice to me when we go through the Bankruptcy Court!" + +"We will let lodgings, and I will do the waiting," said Letty, just +laying her hand lightly against his for an instant. "Just think! That +house would draw like anything. Of course, we will only take the eldest +sons of peers. By the way, do you see Lord Fontenoy?" + +They were in the middle of the "interval," and almost everyone about +them, including Miss Tulloch, was standing up, talking or examining their +neighbours. + +George craned his neck round Miss Tulloch, and saw Fontenoy sitting +beside a lady, on the other side of the middle gangway. + +"Who is the lady?" Letty inquired. "I saw her with him the other night at +the Foreign Office." + +George smiled. + +"_That_--if you want to know--is Fontenoy's story!" + +"Oh, but tell me at once!" said Letty, imperiously. "But he hasn't got a +story, or a heart. He's only stuffed with blue-book." + +"So I thought till a few weeks ago. But I know a good deal more now about +Master Fontenoy than I did." + +"But who is she?" + +"She is a Mrs. Allison. Isn't that white hair beautiful? And her +face--half saint, I always think--you might take her for a +mother-abbess--and half princess. Did you ever see such diamonds?" + +George pulled his moustaches, and grinned as he looked across at +Fontenoy. + +"Tell me quick!" said Letty, tapping him on the arm--"Is she a +widow?--and is he going to marry her? Why didn't you tell me before?--why +didn't you tell me at Malford?" + +"Because I didn't know," said George, laughing. "Oh! it's a strange +story--too long to tell now. She is a widow, but he is not going to marry +her, apparently. She has a grown-up son, who hasn't yet found himself a +wife, and thinks it isn't fair to him. If Fontenoy wants to introduce +her, don't refuse. She is the mistress of Castle Luton, and has +delightful parties. Yes!--if I'd known at Malford what I know now!" + +And he laughed again, remembering Fontenoy's nocturnal incursion upon +him, and its apparent object. Who would have imagined that the preacher +of that occasion had ever given one serious thought to woman and woman's +arts--least of all that he was the creation and slave of a woman! + +Letty's curiosity was piqued, and she would have plied George with +questions, but that she suddenly perceived that Fontenoy had risen, and +was coming across to them. + +"Gracious!" she said; "here he comes. I can't think why; he +doesn't like me." + +Fontenoy, however, when he had made his way to them, greeted Miss Sewell +with as much apparent cordiality as he showed to anyone else. He had +received George's news of the marriage with all decorum, and had since +sent a handsome wedding-present to the bride-elect. Letty, however, was +never at ease with him, which, indeed, was the case with most women. + +He stood beside the _fiances_ for a minute or two, exchanging a few +commonplaces with Letty on the performers and the audience; then he +turned to George with a change of look. + +"No need for us to go back to-night, I think?" + +"What, to the House? Dear, no! Grooby and Havershon may be trusted to +drone the evening out, I should hope, with no trouble to anybody but +themselves. The Government are just keeping a house, that's all. Have you +been grinding at your speech all day?" + +Fontenoy shrugged his shoulders. + +"I sha'n't get anything out that I want to say. Are you coming to the +House on Friday, Miss Sewell?" + +"Friday?" said Letty, looking puzzled. + +George laughed. + +"I told you. You must plead trousseau if you want to save yourself!" + +Amusement shone in his blue eyes as they passed from Letty to Fontenoy. +He had long ago discovered that Letty was incapable of any serious +interest in his public life. It did not disturb him at all. But it +tickled his sense of humour that Letty would have to talk politics all +the same, and to talk them with people like Fontenoy. + +"Oh! you mean your Resolution!" cried Letty. "Isn't it a Resolution? Yes, +of course I'm coming. It's very absurd, for I don't know anything about +it. But George says I must, and till I promise to obey, you see, I don't +mind being obedient!" + +Archness, however, was thrown away on Fontenoy. He stood beside her, +awkward and irresponsive. Not being allowed to be womanish, she could +only try once more to be political. + +"It's to be a great attack on Mr. Dowson, isn't it?" she asked him. "You +and George are mad about some things he has been doing? He's Home +Secretary, isn't he? Yes, of _course_! And he's been driving trade away, +and tyrannising over the manufacturers? I _wish_ you'd explain it to me! +I ask George, and he tells me not to talk shop." + +"Oh, for goodness' sake," groaned George, "let it alone! I came to meet +you and hear Joachim. However, I may as well warn you, Letty, that I +sha'n't have time to be married once Fontenoy's anti-Maxwell campaign +begins; and it will go on till the Day of Judgment." + +"Why anti-Maxwell," said Letty, puzzled. "I thought it was Mr. Dowson you +are going to attack?" + +George, a little vexed that she should require it, began to explain that +as Maxwell was "only a miserable peer," he could have nothing to do with +the House of Commons, and that Dowson was the official mouthpiece of the +Maxwell group and policy in the Lower House. "The hands were the hands of +Esau," etc. Letty meanwhile, conscious that she was not showing to +advantage, flushed, began to play nervously with her fan, and wished that +George would leave off. + +Fontenoy did nothing to assist George's political lesson. He stood +impassive, till suddenly he tried to look across his immediate +neighbours, and then said, turning to Letty: + +"The Maxwells, I see, are here to-night." He nodded towards a group on +the left, some two or three benches behind them. "Are you an admirer of +Lady Maxwell's, Miss Sewell?--you've seen her, of course?" + +"Oh yes, _often_!" said Letty, annoyed by the question, standing, +however, eagerly on tiptoe. "I know her, too, a little; but she never +remembers me. She was at the Foreign Office on Saturday, with such a +_hideous_ dress on--it spoilt her completely." + +"Hideous!" said Fontenoy, with a puzzled look. "Some artist--I forget +who--came and raved to me about it; said it was like some Florentine +picture--I forget what--don't think I ever heard of it." + +Letty looked contemptuous. Her expression said that in this matter, at +any rate, she knew what she was talking about. Nevertheless her eyes +followed the dark head Fontenoy had pointed out to her. + +Lady Maxwell was at the moment the centre of a large group of people, +mostly men, all of whom seemed to be eager to get a word with her, and +she was talking with great animation, appealing from time to time to a +tall, broad-shouldered gentleman, with greyish hair, who stood, smiling +and silent, at the edge of the group. Letty noticed that many glasses +from the balcony were directed to this particular knot of persons; that +everybody near them, or rather every woman, was watching Lady Maxwell, or +trying to get a better view of her. The girl felt a secret pang of envy +and dislike. + +The figure of a well-known accompanist appeared suddenly at the head of +the staircase leading from the artists' room. The interval was over, and +the audience began to subside into attention. + +Fontenoy bowed and took his leave. + +"You see, he _didn't_ introduce me," said Letty, not without chagrin, +as she settled down. "And how plain he is! I think him uglier every +time I see him." + +George made a vague sound of assent, but did not really agree with her in +the least. Fontenoy's air of overwork was more decided than ever; his +eyes had almost sunk out of sight; the complexion of his broad strong +face had reddened and coarsened from lack of exercise and sleep; his +brown hair was thinning and grizzling fast. Nevertheless a man saw much +to admire in the ungainly head and long-limbed frame, and did not think +any the better of a woman's intelligence for failing to perceive it. + +After the concert, as George and Letty stood together in the crowded +vestibule, he said to her, with a smile: + +"So I take that house?" + +"If you want to do anything disagreeable," she retorted, quickly, "don't +_ask_ me. Do it, and then wait till I am good-tempered again!" + +"What a tempting prospect! Do you know that when you put on that +particular hood that I would take Buckingham Palace to please you? Do you +know also that my mother will think us very extravagant?" + +"Ah, we can't all be economical!" said Letty. + +He saw the little toss of the head and sharpening of the lips. They only +amused him. Though he had never, so far, discussed his mother and her +affairs with Letty in any detail, he understood perfectly well that her +feeling about this particular house in some way concerned his mother, and +that Letty and Lady Tressady were rapidly coming to dislike each other. +Well, why should Letty pretend? He liked her the better for not +pretending. + +There was a movement in the crowd about them, and Letty, looking up, +suddenly found herself close to a tall lady, whose dark eyes were +bent upon her. + +"How do you do, Miss Sewell?" + +Letty, a little fluttered, gave her hand and replied. Lady Maxwell +glanced across her at the tall young man, with the fair, irregular face. +George bowed involuntarily, and she slightly responded. Then she was +swept on by her own party. + +"Have you sent for your carriage?" George heard someone say to her. + +"No; I am going home in a hansom. I've tired out both the horses +to-day. Aldous is going down to the club to see if he can hear anything +about Devizes." + +"Oh! the election?" + +She nodded, then caught sight of her husband at the door beckoning, and +hurried on. + +"What a head!" said George, looking after her with admiration. + +"Yes," said Letty, unwillingly. "It's the hair that's so splendid, the +long black waves of it. How ridiculous to talk of tiring out her +horses--that's just like her! As though she mightn't have fifty horses if +she liked! Oh, George, there's our man! Quick, Tully!" + +They made their way out. In the press George put his arm half round +Letty, shielding her. The touch of her light form, the nearness of her +delicate face, enchanted him. When their carriage had rolled away, and he +turned homewards along Piccadilly, he walked absently for a time, +conscious only of pulsing pleasure. + +It was a mild February night. After a long frost, and a grudging thaw, +westerly winds were setting in, and Spring could be foreseen. It had been +pouring with rain during the concert, but was now fair, the rushing +clouds leaving behind them, as they passed, great torn spaces of blue, +where the stars shone. + +Gusts of warm moist air swept through the street. As George's moment of +intoxication gradually subsided, he felt the physical charm of the soft +buffeting wind. How good seemed all living!--youth and capacity--this +roaring multitudinous London--the future with its chances! This common +pleasant chance of marriage amongst them--he was glad he had put out his +hand to it. His wife that was to be was no saint and no philosopher. He +thanked the fates! He at least asked for neither--on the hearth. "Praise, +blame, love, kisses"--for all of those, life with Letty would give scope; +yet for none of them in excess. There would be plenty of room left for +other things, other passions--the passion of political power, for +instance, the art of dealing with and commanding other men. He, the +novice, the beginner, to talk of "commanding!" Yet already he felt his +foot upon the ladder. Fontenoy consulted him, and confided in him more +and more. In spite of his engagement, he was informing himself rapidly on +a hundred questions, and the mental wrestle of every day was +exhilarating. Their small group in the House, compact, tireless, +audacious, was growing in importance and in the attention it extorted +from the public. Never had the whole tribe of factory inspectors shown a +more hawk-like, a more inquisitorial, a more intolerable vigilance than +during the past twelve months. All the persons concerned with matches and +white-lead, with certain chemical or metal-working industries, with +"season" dressmaking or tailoring, were up in arms, rallying to +Fontenoy's support with loud wrath and lamentations, claiming to speak +not only for themselves, but for their "hands," in the angry protest +that things had gone and were going a great deal too far, that trade was +simply being harassed out of the country. A Whiggish group of +manufacturers on the Liberal side were all with Fontenoy; while the +Socialists, on whom the Government should have been able in such a matter +to count to the death, had a special grievance against the Cabinet at the +moment, and were sulking in their tents. The attack and defence would +probably take two nights; for the Government, admitting the gravity of +the assault, had agreed, in case the debate should not be concluded on +Friday, to give up Monday to it. Altogether the affair would make a +noise. George would probably get in his maiden speech on the second +night, and was, in truth, devoting a great deal of his mind to the +prospect; though to Letty he had persistently laughed at it and belittled +it, refusing altogether to let her come and hear him. + +Then, after Easter would come Maxwell's Bill, and the fat in the fire! +Poor little Letty!--she would get but few of the bridal observances due +to her when _that_ struggle began. But first would come Easter and their +wedding; that one short fortnight, when he would carry her off--soft, +willing prey!--to the country, draw a "wind-warm space" about himself and +her, and minister to all her whims. + +He turned down St. James's Street, passed Marlborough House, and +entered the Mall, on the way to Warwick Square, where he was living +with his mother. + +Suddenly he became aware of a crowd, immediately in front of him, in the +direction of Buckingham Palace. A hansom and horse were standing in the +roadway; the driver, crimson and hatless, was bandying words with one of +the policemen, who had his notebook open, and from the middle of the +crowd came a sound of wailing. + +He walked up to the edge of the circle. + +"Anybody hurt?" he said to the policeman, as the man shut his notebook. + +"Little girl run over, sir." + +"Can I be of any assistance? Is there an ambulance coming?" + +"No, sir. There was a lady in the hansom. She's just now bandaging the +child's leg, and says she'll take it to the hospital." + +George mounted on one of the seats under the trees that stood handy, and +looked over the heads of the crowd to the space in the centre which the +other policeman was keeping clear. A little girl lay on the ground, or +rather on a heap of coats; another girl, apparently about sixteen, stood +near her, crying bitterly, and a lady-- + +"Goodness!" said Tressady; and, jumping down, he touched the policeman on +the shoulder. + +"Can you get me through? I think I could be some help. That lady"--he +spoke a word in the policeman's ear. + +The man touched his hat. + +"Stand back, please!" he said, addressing the crowd, "and let this +gentleman through." + +The crowd divided unwillingly. But at the same moment it parted from the +inside, and a little procession came through, both policemen joining +their energies to make a free passage for it. In front walked the +policeman carrying the little girl, a child apparently of about twelve +years old. Her right foot lay stiffly across his arm, held straight and +still in an impromptu splint of umbrellas and handkerchiefs. Immediately +behind came the lady whom George had caught sight of, holding the other +girl's hand in hers. She was bareheaded and in evening dress. Her +opera-cloak, with its heavy sable collar, showed beneath it a dress of +some light-coloured satin, which had already suffered deplorably from the +puddles of the road, and, as she neared the lamp beneath which the cab +had stopped, the diamonds on her wrists sparkled in the light. During her +passage through the crowd, George perceived that one or two people +recognised her, and that a murmur ran from mouth to mouth. + +Of anything of the sort she herself was totally unconscious. George saw +at once that she, not the policeman, was in command. She gave him +directions, as they approached the cab, in a quick, imperative voice +which left no room for hesitation. + +"The driver is drunk," he heard her say; "who will drive?" + +"One of us will drive, ma'am." + +"What--the other man? Ask him to take the reins at once, please, before I +get in. The horse is fresh, and might start. That's right. Now, when I +say the word, give me the child." + +She settled herself in the cab. George saw the policeman somewhat +embarrassed, for a moment, with his burden. He came forward to his help, +and between them they handed in the child, placing her carefully on her +protector's knee. + +Then, standing at the open door of the cab, George raised his hat. "Can I +be of any further assistance to you, Lady Maxwell? I saw you just now at +the concert." + +She turned in some astonishment as she heard her name, and looked at the +speaker. Then, very quickly, she seemed to understand. + +"I don't know," she said, pondering. "Yes! you could help me. I am going +to take the child to hospital. But there is this other girl. Could you +take her home--she is very much upset? No!--first, could you bring her +after me to St. George's? She wants to see where we put her sister." + +"I will call another cab, and be there as soon as you." + +"Thank you. Just let me speak to the sister a moment, please." + +He put the weeping girl forward, and Lady Maxwell bent across the burden +on her knee to say a few words to her--soft, quick words in another +voice. The girl understood, her face cleared a little, and she let +Tressady take charge of her. + +One of the policemen mounted the box of the hansom, amid the "chaff" of +the crowd, and the cab started. A few hats were raised in George's +neighbourhood, and there was something of a cheer. + +"I tell yer," said a voice, "I knowed her fust sight--seed her picture +lots o' times in the papers, and in the winders too. My word, ain't she +good-lookin! And did yer see all them diamonds?" + +"Come along!" said George, impatiently, hurrying his charge into the +four-wheeler the other policeman had just stopped for them. + +In a few more seconds he, the girl, and the policeman were pursuing Lady +Maxwell's hansom at the best speed of an indifferent horse. George tried +to say a few consoling things to his neighbour; and the girl, reassured +by his kind manner, found her tongue, and began to chatter in a tearful +voice about the how and when of the accident: about the elder sister in a +lodging in Crawford Street, Tottenham Court Road, whom she and the little +one had been visiting; the grandmother in Westminster with whom they +lived; poor Lizzie's place in a laundry, which now she must lose; how the +lady had begged handkerchiefs and umbrellas from the crowd to tie up +Lizzie's leg with--and so on through a number of other details incoherent +or plaintive. + +George heard her absently. His mind all the time was absorbed in the +dramatic or ironic aspects of what he had just seen. For dramatic they +were--though perhaps a little cheap. Could he, could anyone, have made +acquaintance with this particular woman in more characteristic fashion? +He laughed to think how he would tell the story to Fontenoy. The +beautiful creature in her diamonds, kneeling on her satin dress in the +mud, to bind up a little laundrymaid's leg--it was so extravagantly in +keeping with Marcella Maxwell that it amused one like an overdone +coincidence in a clumsy play. + +What made her so beautiful? The face had marked defects; but in colour, +expression, subtlety of line incomparable! On the other hand, the +manner--no!--he shrugged his shoulders. The remembrance of its +mannish--or should it be, rather, boyish?--energy and assurance somehow +set him on edge. + +In the end, they were not much behind the hansom; for the hospital porter +was only just in the act of taking the injured child from Lady Maxwell as +Tressady dismounted and went forward again to see what he could do. + +But, somewhat to his chagrin, he was not wanted. Lady Maxwell and the +porter did everything. As they went into the hospital, George caught a +few of the things she was saying to the porter as she supported the +child's leg. She spoke in a rapid, professional way, and the man +answered, as the policeman had done, with a deference and understanding +which were clearly not due only to her "grand air" and her evening dress. +George was puzzled. + +He and the elder sister followed her into the waiting-room. The +house-surgeon and a nurse were summoned, and the injured leg was put into +a splint there and then. The patient moaned and cried most of the time, +and Tressady had hard work to keep the sister quiet. Then nurse and +doctor lifted the child. + +"They are going to put her to bed," said Lady Maxwell, turning to George. +"I am going up with them. Would you kindly wait? The sister"--she dropped +her business tone, and, smiling, touched the elder girl on the arm--"can +come up when the little one is undressed." + +The little procession swept away, and George was left with his charge. As +soon as the small sister was out of sight, the elder one began to +chatter again out of sheer excitement, crying at intervals. George did +not heed her much. He walked up and down, with his hands in his pockets, +conscious of a curious irritability. He did not think a woman should take +a strange man's service quite so coolly. + +At the end of another quarter of an hour a nurse appeared to summon the +sister. Tressady was told he might come too if he would, and his charge +threw him a quick, timid look, as though asking him not to desert her in +this unknown and formidable place. So they followed the nurse up white +stone stairs, and through half-lit corridors, where all was silent, save +that once a sound of delirious shrieking and talking reached them +through a closed door, and made the sister's consumptive little face +turn whiter still. + +At last the nurse, putting her finger on her lip, turned a handle, and +George was conscious of a sudden feeling of pleasure. + +They were standing on the threshold of a children's ward. On either hand +was a range of beds, bluish-white between the yellow picture-covered +walls and the middle-way of spotless floor. Far away, at the other end, a +great fire glowed. On a bare table in the centre, laden with bottles and +various surgical necessaries, stood a shaded lamp, and beside it the +chair where the night-nurse had been sitting. In the beds were sleeping +children of various ages, some burrowing, face downward, animal-like, +into their pillows; others lying on their backs, painfully straight and +still. The air was warm, yet light, and there was the inevitable smell of +antiseptics. Something in the fire-lit space and comfort of the great +room, its ordered lines and colours, the gentleness of the shaded light +as contrasted with the dim figures in the beds, seemed to make a poem of +it--a poem of human tenderness. + +Two or three beds away to the right, Lady Maxwell was standing with the +night-nurse of the ward. The little girl had been undressed, and was +lying quiet, with a drawn, piteous face that turned eagerly as her sister +came in. The whole scene was new and touching to Tressady. Yet, after the +first impression, his attention was perforce held by Lady Maxwell, and he +saw the rest only in relation to her. She had slipped off her heavy +cloak, in order, perhaps, that she might help in the undressing of the +child. Beneath, she wore a little shawl or cape of some delicate lace +over her low dress. The dress itself was of a pale shade of green; the +mire and mud with which it was bedabbled no longer showed in the half +light; and the satin folds glistened dimly as she moved. The poetic +dignity of the head, so finely wreathed with its black hair, of the full +throat and falling shoulders, received a sort of special emphasis from +the wide spaces, the pale colours and level lines of the ward. Tressady +was conscious again of the dramatic significant note as he watched her, +yet without any softening of his nascent feeling of antagonism. + +She turned and beckoned to the sister as they entered: + +"Come and see how comfortable she is! And then you must give this lady +your name and address." + +The girl timidly approached. Whilst she was occupied with her sister and +with the nurse, Lady Maxwell suddenly looked round, and saw Tressady +standing by the table a yard or two from her. + +A momentary expression of astonishment crossed her face. He saw that, in +her absorption with the case and the two sisters, she had clean forgotten +all about him. But in a flash she remembered, and smiled. + +"So you are really going to take her home? That is very kind of you. It +will make all the difference to the grandmother that somebody should go +and explain. You see, they leave her in the splint for the night, and +to-morrow they will put the leg in plaster. Probably they won't keep her +in hospital more than about three weeks, for they are very full." + +"You seem to know all about it!" + +"I was a nurse myself once, for a time," she said, but with a certain +stiffness which seemed to mark the transition from the professional to +the great lady. + +"Ah! I should have remembered that. I had heard it from Edward Watton." + +She looked up quickly. He felt that for the first time she took notice of +him as an individual. + +"You know Mr. Watton? I think you are Sir George Tressady, are you not? +You got in for Market Malford in November? I recollect. I didn't like +your speeches." + +She laughed. So did he. + +"Yes, I got in just in time for a fighting session." + +Her laugh disappeared. + +"An odious fight!" she said gravely. + +"I am not so sure. That depends on whether you like fighting, and how +certain you are of your cause!" + +She hesitated a moment; then she said: + +"How can Lord Fontenoy be certain of his cause!" + +The slight note of scorn roused him. + +"Isn't that what all parties say of their opponents?" + +She glanced at him again, curiously. He was evidently quite +young--younger than herself, she guessed. But his careless ease and +experience of bearing, contrasted with his thin boy's figure, attracted +her. Her lip softened reluctantly into a smile. + +"Perhaps," she said. "Only sometimes, you know, it must be true! Well, +evidently we can't discuss it here at one o'clock in the morning--and +there is the nurse making signs to me. It is really very good of you. If +you are in our neighbourhood on Sunday, will you report?" + +"Certainly--with the greatest pleasure. I will come and give you a full +account of my mission." + +She held out a slim hand. The sister, red-eyed with crying, was handed +over to him, and he and she were soon in a cab, speeding towards the +Westminster mews whither she directed him. + +Well, was Maxwell to be so greatly envied? Tressady was not sure. Such a +woman, he thought, for all her beauty, would not have greatly stirred his +own pulses. + + + + +CHAPTER V + + +The week which had opened thus for Tressady promised to be one of lively +interest for such persons as were either concerned in or took notice of +the House of Commons and its doings. Fontenoy's onslaught upon the +administration of the Home Office, and, through the Home Secretary, on +the Maxwell group and influence, had been long expected, and was known to +have been ably prepared. Its possible results were already keenly +discussed. Even if it were a damaging attack, it was not supposed that it +could have any immediate effect on the state of parties or the strength +of the Government. But after Easter Maxwell's factory Bill--a special +Factory Act for East London, touching the grown man for the first time, +and absolutely prohibiting home-work in certain specified industries--was +to be brought forward, and could not fail to provide Maxwell's +adversaries with many chances of red and glorious battle. It was +disputable from end to end; it had already broken up one Government; it +was strongly pressed and fiercely opposed; and on the fate of each clause +in Committee might hang the life or death of the Ministry--not so much +because of the intrinsic importance of the matter, as because Maxwell was +indispensable to the Cabinet, and it was known that neither Maxwell nor +his close friend and henchman, Dowson, the Home Secretary, would accept +defeat on any of the really vital points of the Bill. + +The general situation was a curious one. Some two years before this time +a strong and long-lived Tory Government had come to an end. Since then +all had been confusion in English politics. A weak Liberal Government, +undermined by Socialist rebellion, had lasted but a short time, to be +followed by an equally precarious Tory Ministry, in which Lord +Maxwell--after an absence from politics of some four years or +so--returned to his party, only to break it up. For he succeeded in +imposing upon them a measure in which his own deepest convictions and +feelings were concerned, and which had behind it the support of all the +more important trade unions. Upon that measure the Ministry fell; but +during their short administration Maxwell had made so great an impression +upon his own side that when they returned, as they did return, with an +enlarged majority, the Maxwell Bill retained one of the foremost places +in their programme, and might be said, indeed, at the present moment to +hold the centre of the political field. + +That field, in the eyes of any middle-aged observer, was in strange +disarray. The old Liberal party had been almost swept away; only a few +waifs and strays remained, the exponents of a programme that nobody +wanted, and of cries that stirred nobody's blood. A large Independent +Labour and Socialist party filled the empty benches of the Liberals--a +revolutionary, enthusiastic crew, of whom the country was a little +frightened, and who were, if the truth were known, a little frightened +at themselves. They had a coherent programme, and represented a +formidable "domination" in English life. And that English life itself, in +all that concerned the advance and transformation of labour, was in a +singularly tossed and troubled state. After a long period of stagnation +and comparative industrial peace, storms at home, answering to storms on +the Continent, had been let loose, and forces both of reaction and of +revolution were making themselves felt in new forms and under the command +of new masters. + +At the head of the party of reaction stood Fontenoy. Some four years +before the present session the circumstances of a great strike in the +Midlands--together, no doubt, with some other influence--had first drawn +him into public life, had cut him off from racing and all his natural +pleasures. The strike affected his father's vast domain in North Mercia; +it was marked by an unusual violence on the part of the men and their +leaders; and Fontenoy, driven, sorely against his will, to take a part by +the fact that his father, the hard and competent administrator of an +enormous fortune, happened at the moment to be struck down by illness, +found himself before many weeks were over taking it with passion, and +emerged from the struggle a changed man. Property must be upheld; +low-born disorder and greed must be put down. He sold his race-horses, +and proceeded forthwith to throw into the formation of a new party all +the doggedness, the astuteness, and the audacity he had been accustomed +to lavish upon the intrigues and the triumphs of the Turf. + +And now in this new Parliament his immense labour was beginning to tell. +The men who followed him had grown in number and improved in quality. +They abhorred equally a temporising conservatism and a plundering +democracy. They stood frankly for birth and wealth, the Church and the +expert. They were the apostles of resistance and negation; they were +sworn to oppose any further meddling with trade and the personal liberty +of master and workman, and to undo, if they could, some of the meddling +that had been already carried through. A certain academic quality +prevailed among them, which made them peculiarly sensitive to the +absurdities of men who had not been to Oxford or Cambridge; while some, +like Tressady, had been travellers, and wore an Imperialist heart upon +their sleeve. The group possessed an unusual share of debating and +oratorical ability, and they had never attracted so much attention as now +that they were about to make the Maxwell Bill their prey. + +Meanwhile, for the initiated, the situation possessed one or two points +of special interest. Lady Maxwell, indeed, was by this time scarcely less +of a political force than her husband. Was her position an illustration +of some new power in women's hands, or was it merely an example of +something as well known to the Pharaohs as to the nineteenth century--the +ability of any woman with a certain physique to get her way? That this +particular woman's way happened to be also her husband's way made the +case less interesting for some observers. On the other hand, her obvious +wifely devotion attracted simple souls to whom the meddling of women in +politics would have been nothing but repellent had it not been +recommended to them by the facts that Marcella Maxwell was held to be +good as well as beautiful; that she loved her husband; and was the +excellent mother of a fine son. + +Of her devotion, in the case of this particular Bill, there was neither +concealment nor doubt. She was known to have given her husband every +assistance in the final drafting of the measure: she had seen for herself +the working of every trade that it affected; she had innumerable friends +among wage-earners of all sorts, to whom she gave half her social life; +and both among them and in the drawing-rooms of the rich she fought her +husband's cause unceasingly, by the help of beauty, wits, and something +else--a broad impulsiveness and charm--which might be vilified or +scorned, but could hardly be matched, by the enemy. + +Meanwhile Lord Maxwell was a comparatively ineffective speaker, and +passed in social life for a reserved and difficult personality. His +friends put no one else beside him; and his colleagues in the Cabinet +were well aware that he represented the keystone in their arch. But +the man in the street, whether of the aristocratic or plebeian sort, +knew comparatively little about him. All of which, combined with the +special knowledge of an inner circle, helped still more to concentrate +public attention on the convictions, the temperament, and the beauty +of his wife. + +Amid a situation charged with these personal or dramatic elements the +Friday so keenly awaited by Fontenoy and his party arrived. + +Immediately after question-time Fontenoy made his speech. In reply, the +Home Secretary, suave, statistical, and conciliatory, poured a stream of +facts and reports upon the House. The more repulsive they were, the +softer and more mincing grew his voice in dealing with them. Fontenoy had +excited his audience, Dowson succeeded in making it shudder. +Nevertheless, the effect of the evening lay with Fontenoy. + +George stayed to hear the official defence to its end. Then he hurried +upstairs in search of Letty, who, with Miss Tulloch, was in the Speaker's +private gallery. As he went he thought of Fontenoy's speech, its halting +opening, the savage force of its peroration. His pulses tingled: +"Magnificent!" he said to himself; "_magnificent!_ We have found a man!" + +Letty was eagerly waiting for him, and they walked down the corridor +together. "Well?" he said, thrusting his hands deep into his pockets, and +looking down upon her with a smile. "Well?" + +Letty saw that she was expected to praise, and she did her best, his +smile still bent upon her. He was perfectly aware all the time of the +fatuity of what she was saying. She had caught up since her engagement a +certain number of political phrases, and it amused him to note the cheap +and tinkling use she made of them. Nevertheless she was chatting, +smiling, gesticulating, for his pleasure. She was posing for him, using +her grey eyes in these expressive ways, all for him. He thought her the +most entertaining plaything; though it did occur to him sometimes that +when they were married he would give her instruction. + +"Ah, well, you liked it--that's good!" he said at last, interrupting her. +"We've begun well, any way. It'll be rather hard, though, to have to +speak after that on Monday!" + +"As if you need be afraid! You're not, you know--it's only mock modesty. +Do you know that Lady Maxwell was sitting two from me?" + +"No! Well, how did she like Fontenoy?" + +"She never moved after he got up. She pressed her face against that +horrid grating, and stared at him all the time. I thought she was very +flushed--but that may have been the heat--and in a very bad temper," +added Letty, maliciously. "I talked to her a little about your +adventure." + +"Did she remember my existence?" + +"Oh dear, yes! She said she expected you on Sunday. She never asked _me_ +to come." Letty looked arch. "But then one doesn't expect her to have +pretty manners. People say she is shy. But, of course, that is only your +friends' way of saying that you're rude." + +"She wasn't rude to you?" said George, outwardly eager, inwardly +sceptical. "Shall I not go on Sunday?" + +"But of course you must go. We shall have to know them. She's not a +woman's woman--that's all. Now, are we going to get some dinner, for +Tully and I are famishing?" + +"Come along, then, and I'll collect the party." + +George had asked a few of his acquaintance in the House to meet his +betrothed, together with an old General Tressady and his wife who were +his distant cousins. The party were to assemble in the room of an +under-secretary much given to such hospitable functions; and thither +accordingly George led the way. + +The room, when they reached it, was already fairly full of people, and +alive with talk. + +"Another party!" said George, looking round him. "Benson is great at this +sort of thing." + +"Do you see Lady Maxwell?" said Letty, in his ear. + +George looked to his right, and perceived the lady in question. She also +recognised him at once, and bowed, but without rising. She was the centre +of a group of people, who were gathered round her and the small table on +which she was leaning, and they were so deeply absorbed in the +conversation that had been going on that they hardly noticed the entrance +of Tressady and his companion. + +"Leven has a party, you see," said the under-secretary. "Blaythwaite was +to have taken them in--couldn't at the last moment; so they had to come +in here. This is _your_ side of the room! But none of your guests have +come yet. Dinner at the House in the winter is a poor sort of business, +Miss Sewell. We want the Terrace for these occasions." + +He led the young girl to a sofa at the further end of the room, and made +himself agreeable, to him the easiest process in the world. He was a +fashionable and charming person, in the most irreproachable of +frock-coats, and Letty was soon at her ease with him, and mistress of +all her usual arts and graces. + +"You know Lady Maxwell?" he said to her, with a slight motion of the head +towards the distant group. + +Letty replied; and while she and her companion chattered, George, who was +standing behind them, watched the other party. + +They were apparently in the thick of an argument, and Lady Maxwell, whose +hands were lightly clasped on the table in front of her, was leaning +forward with the look of one who had just shot her bolt, and was waiting +to see how it would strike. + +It struck apparently in the direction of her _vis-à-vis,_ Sir Frank +Leven, for he bent over to her, making a quick reply in a half-petulant +boy's voice. He had been three years in the House, but had still the air +of an Eton "swell" in his last half. + +Lady Maxwell listened to what he had to say, a sort of silent passion in +her face all the time--a noble passion nobly restrained. + +When he stopped, George caught her reply. + +"He has neither _seen_ nor _felt_--every sentence showed it--that is all +one can say. How can one take his judgment?" + +George's mouth twitched. He slipped, smiling, into a place beside Letty. +"Did you hear that?" he inquired. + +"Fontenoy's speech, of course," said the under-secretary, looking round. +"She's pitching into Leven, I suppose. He's as cranky and unsound as he +can be. Shouldn't wonder if you got him before long." + +He nodded good-temperedly to Tressady, then got up to speak to a man on +the edge of the further group. + +"How amusing!" said George, his satirical eyes still watching Lady +Maxwell. "How much that set has 'seen and felt' of sweaters, and +white-lead workers, and that ilk! Don't they look like it?" + +"Who are they?" + +Letty was now using all her eyes to find out, and especially for the +purpose of carrying away a mental photograph of Lady Maxwell's black hat +and dress. + +"Oh! the Maxwells' particular friends in the House--most of them as well +provided with family and goods as they make 'em: a philanthropic, +idealist lot, that yearns for the people, and will be the first to be +kicked downstairs when the people gets its own. However, they aren't all +quite happy in their minds. Frank Leven there, as Benson says, is +decidedly shaky. He is the member for the Maxwells' division--Maxwell, of +course, put him in. He has a house there, I believe, and he married Lady +Maxwell's great friend, Miss Macdonald--an ambitious little party, they +say, who simply insisted on his going into Parliament. Oh, then, Bennett +is there--do you see?--the little dark man with a frock-coat and +spectacles? He's Lady Maxwell's link with the Independents--oldest +workman member--been in the House a long time, so that by now he isn't +quite as one-eyed and one-eared as the rest of them. I suppose she hopes +to make use of him at critical moments--she takes care to have tools of +all sorts. Gracious--listen!" + +There was, indeed, a very storm of discussion sweeping through the rival +party. Lady Maxwell's penetrating but not loud voice seemed to pervade +it, and her eyes and face, as she glanced from one speaker to another, +drew alternately the shafts and the sympathy of the rest. + +Tressady made a face. + +"I say, Letty, promise me one thing!" His hand stole towards hers. Tully +discreetly looked the other way. "Promise me not to be a political woman, +there's a dear!" + +Letty hastily withdrew her fingers, having no mind at all for caresses +in public. + +"But I _must_ be a political woman--I shall have to be! I know heaps of +girls and married women who get up everything in the papers--all the +stupidest things--not because they know anything about it, or because +they care a rap, but because some of their men friends happen to be +members; and when they come to see you, you must know what to talk to +them about." + +"Must you?" said George, "How odd! As though one went to tea with a woman +for the sake of talking about the very same things you have been doing +all day, and are probably sick to death of already." + +"Never mind," said Letty, with her little air of sharp wisdom. "I _know_ +they do it, and I shall have to do it too. I shall pick it up." + +"Will you? Of course you will! Only, when I've got a big Bill on, let me +do a little of it for myself--give me some of the credit!" + +Letty laughed maliciously. + +"I don't know why you've taken such a dislike to her," she said, but in +rather a contented tone, as her eye once more travelled across to Lady +Maxwell. "Does she trample on her husband, after all?" + +Tressady gave an impatient shrug. + +"Trample on him? Goodness, no! That's all part of the play, too--wifely +affection and the rest of it. Why can't she keep out of sight a little? +We don't want the women meddling." + +"Thank you, my domestic tyrant!" said Letty, making him a little bow. + +"How much tyranny will you want before you accept those sentiments?" he +asked her, smiling tenderly into her eyes. Both had a moment's pleasant +thrill; then George sprang up. + +"Ah, here they are at last!--the General, and all the lot. Now, I hope, +we shall get some dinner." + +Tressady had, of course, to introduce his elderly cousins and his three +or four political friends to his future wife; and, amid the small flutter +of the performance, the break-up and disappearance of the rival party +passed unnoticed. When Tressady's guests entered the dining-room which +looks on the terrace, and made their way to the top table reserved for +them, the Leven dinner, near the door, was already half through. + +George's little banquet passed merrily enough. The grey-haired General +and his wife turned out to be agreeable and well-bred people, quite able +to repay George's hospitality by the dropping of little compliments on +the subject of Letty into his half-yielded ear. For his way of taking +such things was always a trifle cynical. He believed that people say +habitually twice what they mean, whether in praise or blame; and he did +not feel that his own view of Letty was much affected by what other +people thought of her. + +So, at least, he would have said. In reality, he got a good deal of +pleasure out of his _fiancée's_ success. Letty, indeed, was enjoying +herself greatly. This political world, as she had expected, satisfied her +instinct for social importance better than any world she had yet known. +She was determined to get on in it; nor, apparently, was there likely to +be any difficulty in the matter. George's friends thought her a pretty, +lively creature, and showed the usual inclination of the male sex to +linger in her society. She mostly wanted to be informed as to the House +and its ways. It was all so new to her!--she said. But her ignorance was +not insipid; her questions had flavour. There was much talk and laughter; +Letty felt herself the mistress of the table, and her social ambitions +swelled within her. + +Suddenly George's attention was recalled to the Maxwell table by the +break-up of the group around it. He saw Lady Maxwell rise and look +round her as though in search of someone. Her eyes fell upon him, and +he involuntarily rose at the same instant to meet the step she made +towards him. + +"I must say another word of thanks to you"--she held out her hand. "That +girl and her grandmother were most grateful to you." + +"Ah, well!--I must come and make my report. Sunday, I think you said?" + +She assented. Then her expression altered: + +"When do you speak?" + +The question fell out abruptly, and took George by surprise. + +"I? On Monday, I believe, if I get my turn. But I fear the British Empire +will go on if I don't!" + +She threw a glance of scrutiny at his thin, whimsical face, with its fair +moustache and sunburnt skin. + +"I hear you are a good speaker," she said simply. "And you are entirely +with Lord Fontenoy?" + +He bowed lightly, his hands on his sides. + +"You'll agree our case was well put? The worst of it--" + +Then he stopped. He saw that Lady Maxwell had ceased to listen to him. +She turned her head towards the door, and, without even saying good-bye +to him, she hurried away from him towards the further end of the room. + +"Maxwell, I see!" said Tressady to himself, with a shrug, as he returned +to his seat. "Not flattering--but rather pretty, all the same!" + +He was thinking of the quick change that had remade the face while he was +talking to her--a change as lovely as it was unconscious. + +Lord Maxwell, indeed, had just entered the dining-room in search of his +wife, and he and she now left it together, while the rest of the Leven +party gradually dispersed. Letty also announced that she must go home. + +"Let me just go back into the House and see what is going on," said +George. "Ten to one I sha'n't be wanted, and I could see you home." + +He hurried off, only to return in a minute with the news that the debate +was given up to a succession of superfluous people, and he was free, at +any rate for an hour. Letty, Miss Tulloch, and he accordingly made their +way to Palace Yard. A bright moon shone in their faces as they emerged +into the open air, which was still mild and spring-like, as it had been +all the week. + +"I say--send Miss Tulloch home in a cab!" George pleaded in Letty's ear, +"and walk with me a bit. Come and look at the moon over the river. I will +bring you back to the bridge and put you in a cab." + +Letty looked astonished and demure. "Aunt Charlotte would be +shocked," she said. + +George grew impatient, and Letty, pleased with his impatience, at last +yielded. Tully, the most complaisant of chaperons, was put into a hansom +and despatched. + +As the pair reached the entrance of Palace Yard they were overtaken by a +brougham, which drew up an instant in the gateway itself, till it should +find an opening in the traffic outside. + +"Look!" said George, pressing Letty's arm. + +She looked round hurriedly, and, as the lamps of the gateway shone into +the carriage, she caught a vivid glimpse of the people inside it. Their +faces were turned towards each other as though in intimate +conversation--that was all. The lady's hands were crossed on her knee; +the man held a despatch-box. In a minute they were gone; but both Letty +and George were left with the same impression--the sense of something +exquisite surprised. It had already visited George that evening, only a +few minutes earlier, in connection with the same woman's face. + +Letty laughed, rather consciously. + +George looked down upon her as he guided her through the gate. + +"Some people seem to find it pleasant to be together!" he said, with a +vibration in his voice. "But why did we look?" he added, discontentedly. + +"How could we help it, you silly boy?" + +They walked to wards the bridge and down the steps, happy in each other, +and freshened by the night breeze. Over the river the moon, hung full and +white, and beneath it everything--the silver tracks on the water, the +blaze of light at Charing Cross Station, the lamps on Westminster Bridge +and in the passing steamers, a train of barges, even the darkness of the +Surrey shore--had a gentle and poetic air. The vast city had, as it were, +veiled her greatness and her tragedy; she offered herself kindly and +protectingly to these two--to their happiness and their youth. + +George made his companion wait beside the parapet and look, while he +himself drew in the air with a sort of hunger. + +"To think of the hours we spend in this climate," he said, "caged up in +abominable places like the House of Commons!" + +The traveller's distaste for the monotony of town and indoor life spoke +in his vehemence. Letty raised her eyebrows. + +"I am very glad of my furs, thank you! You seem to forget that it is +February." + +"Never mind!--since Monday it has had the feel of April. Did you see my +mother to-day?" + +"Yes. She caught me just after luncheon, and we talked for an hour." + +"Poor darling! I ought to have been there to protect you. But she vowed +she would have her say about that house." + +He looked down upon her, trying to see her expression in the shifting +light. He had gone through a disagreeable little scene with his mother at +breakfast. She had actually lectured him on the rashness of taking the +Brook Street house!--he understanding the whole time that what the odd +performance really meant was, that if he took it he would have a smaller +margin of income wherefrom to supplement her allowance. + +"Oh, it was all right!" said Letty, composedly. "She declared we should +get into difficulties at once, that I could have no idea of the value +of money, that you always _had_ been extravagant, that everybody would +be astonished at our doing such a thing, etcetera, etcetera. I +_think_--you don't mind?--I think she cried a little. But she wasn't +really very unhappy." + +"What did you say?" + +"Well, I suggested that when we were married, we and she should both set +up account-books; and I promised faithfully that if she would let us see +hers, we would let her see ours." + +George threw back his head with a gurgle of laughter. + +"Well?" + +"She was afraid," said Letty, demurely, "that I didn't take things +seriously enough. Then I asked her to come and see my gowns." + +"And that, I suppose, appeased her?" + +"Not at all. She turned up her nose at everything, by way of punishing +me. You see, she had on a new-Worth--the third since Christmas. My poor +little trousseau rags had no chance." + +"H'm!" said George, meditatively. "I wonder how my mamma is going to +manage when we are married," he added, after a pause. + +Letty made no reply. She was walking firmly and briskly; her eyes, full +of a sparkling decision, looked straight before her; her little mouth was +close set. Meanwhile through George's mind there passed a number of +fragmentary answers to his own question. His feeling towards his mother +was wholly abnormal; he had no sense of any unseemliness in the +conversation about her which was gradually growing common between himself +and Letty; and he meant to draw strict lines in the future. At the same +time, there was the tie of old habit, and of that uneasy and unwelcome +responsibility with regard to her which had descended upon him at the +time of his father's death. He could not honestly regard himself as an +affectionate son; but the filial relationship, even in its most imperfect +aspect, has a way of imposing itself. + +"Ah, well! I daresay we shall pull through," he said, dismissing the +familiar worry with a long breath. "Why, how far we have come!" he added, +looking back at Charing Cross and the Westminster towers. "And how +extraordinarily mild it is! We can't turn back yet, and you'll be tired +if I race you on in this way. Look, Letty, there's a seat! Would you be +afraid--just five minutes?" + +Letty looked doubtful. + +"It's so absurdly late. George, you _are_ funny! Suppose somebody came by +who knew us?" + +He opened his eyes. + +"And why not? But see! there isn't a carriage, and hardly a person, in +sight. Just a minute!" + +Most unwillingly Letty let herself be persuaded. It seemed to her a +foolish and extravagant thing to do; and there was now no need for either +folly or extravagance. Since her engagement she had dropped a good many +of the small audacities of the social sort she had so freely allowed +herself before it. It was as though, indeed, now that these audacities +had served their purpose, some stronger and perhaps inherited instincts +emerged in her, obscuring the earlier self. George was sometimes +astonished by an ultra-conventional note, of which certainly he had heard +nothing in their first days of intimacy at Malford. + +However, she sat down beside him, protesting. But he had no sooner stolen +her hand, than the moonlight showed her a dark, absent look creeping over +his face. And to her amazement he began to talk about the House of +Commons, about the Home Secretary's speech, of all things in the world! +He seemed to be harking back to Mr. Dowson's arguments, to some of the +stories the Home Secretary had told of those wretched people who +apparently enjoy dying of overwork and phosphorus, and white-lead, who +positively will die of them, unless the inspectors are always harrying +them. He still held her hand, but she saw he was not thinking of her; +and a sudden pique rose in her small mind. Generally, she accepted his +love-making very coolly--just as it came, or did not come. But to-night +she asked herself with irritation--for what had he led her into his silly +escapade, but to make love to her? And now here were her fingers slipping +out of his, while he harangued her on things she knew and cared nothing +about, in a voice and manner he might have addressed to anybody! + +"Well, I don't understand--I really _don't!_" she interrupted sharply. "I +thought you were all against the Government--I thought you didn't believe +a word they say!" + +He laughed. + +"The difference between them and us, darling, is only that _they_ think +the world can be mended by Act of Parliament, and _we_ think it can't. Do +what you will, _we_ say the world is, and must be, a wretched hole for +the majority of those that live in it; _they_ suppose they can cure it by +quack meddlings and tyrannies." + +He looked straight before him, absorbed, and she was struck with the +harsh melancholy of his face. + +What on earth had he kept her here for to talk this kind of talk! + +"George, I really _must_ go!" she began, flushing, and drawing her +hand away. + +Instantly he turned to her, his look brightening and melting. + +"Must you? Well, the world sha'n't be a wretched hole for us, shall it, +darling? We'll make a little nest in it--we'll forget what we can't +help--we'll be happy as long as the fates let us--won't we, Letty?" + +His arm slipped round behind her. He caught her hands. + +He had recollected himself. Nevertheless Letty was keenly conscious that +it was all most absurd, this sitting on a seat in a public thoroughfare +late at night, and behaving like any 'Arry and 'Arriet. + +"Why, of course we shall be happy," she said, rising with decision as she +spoke; "only somehow I don't always understand you, George. I wish I knew +what you were really thinking about." + +"_You!_" he said, laughing, and drawing her hand within his arm, as they +turned backwards towards the bridge. + +She shook her head doubtfully. Whereupon he awoke fully to the situation, +and during the short remainder of their walk he wooed and flattered her +as usual. But when he had put her safely into a hansom at the corner of +the bridge, and smiled good-bye to her, he turned to walk back to the +House in much sudden flatness of mood. Her little restless egotisms of +mind and manner had chilled him unawares. Had Fontenoy's speech been so +fine, after all? Were politics--was anything--quite worth while? It +seemed to him that all emotions were small, all crises disappointing. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + + +The following Sunday, somewhere towards five o'clock, George rang the +bell of the Maxwells' house in St. James's Square. It was a very fine +house, and George's eye, as he stood waiting, ran over the facade with an +amused, investigating look. + +He allowed himself the same expression once or twice in the hall, as one +mute and splendid person relieved him of his coat, and another, equally +mute and equally unsurpassable, waited for him on the stairs, while +across a passage beyond the hall he saw two red-liveried footmen +carrying tea. + +"When one is a friend of the people," he pondered as he went upstairs, +"is one limited in horses but not in flunkeys? These things are obscure." + +He was ushered first into a stately outer drawing-room, filled with +old French furniture and fine pictures; then the butler lifted a +velvet curtain, pronounced the visitor's name with a voice and +emphasis as perfectly trained as the rest of him, and stood aside for +George to enter. + +He found himself on the threshold of a charming room looking west, and +lit by some last beams of February sun. The pale-green walls were covered +with a medley of prints and sketches. A large writing-table, untidily +heaped with papers, stood conspicuous on the blue self-coloured carpet, +which over a great part of the floor was pleasantly void and bare. Flat +earthenware pans, planted with hyacinths and narcissus, stood here and +there, and filled the air with spring scents. Books ran round the lower +walls, or lay piled where-ever there was a space for them; while about +the fire at the further end was gathered a circle of chintz-covered +chairs--chairs of all shapes and sizes, meant for talking. The whole +impression of the pretty, disorderly place, compared with the stately +drawing-room behind it, was one of intimity and freedom; the room made a +friend of you as you entered. + +Half a dozen people were sitting with Lady Maxwell when Tressady was +announced. She rose to meet him with great cordiality, introduced him to +little Lady Leven, an elfish creature in a cloud of fair hair, and with a +pleasant "You know all the rest," offered him a chair beside herself and +the tea-table. + +"The rest" were Frank Leven, Edward Watton, Bayle, the Foreign Office +private secretary who had been staying at Malford House at the time of +Tressady's election, and Bennett, the "small, dark man" whom George had +pointed out to Letty in the House as a Labour member, and one of the +Maxwells' particular friends. + +"Well?" said Lady Maxwell, turning to her new visitor as she handed him +some tea, "were you as much taken with the grandmother as the grandmother +was taken with you? She told me she had never seen a 'more haffable +gentleman, nor one as she'd a been more willin to ha done for'!" + +George laughed. "I see," he said, "that my report has been anticipated." + +"Yes--I have been there. I have found a 'case' in them indeed--alack! The +granny--I am afraid she is an unseemly old woman--and the elder girl both +work for the Jew son-in-law on the first floor--homework of the most +abominable kind--that girl will be dead in a year if it goes on." + +George was rapidly conscious of two contradictory impressions--one of +pleasure, one of annoyance--pleasure in her tall, slim presence, her +white hand, and all the other flashing points of a beauty not to be +denied--and irritation that she should have talked "shop" to him with her +first breath. Could one never escape this altruistic chatter? + +But he was not left to grapple with it alone, for Lady Leven looked +up quickly. + +"Mr. Watton, will you please take Lady Maxwell's tea away if she mentions +the word 'case' again? We gave her fair warning." + +Lady Maxwell hastily clasped both her hands round her tea-cup. + +"Betty, we have discussed the opera for at least twenty minutes." + +"Yes--at peril of our lives!" said Lady Leven. "I never talked so fast +before. One felt as though one _must_ say everything one had to say about +Melba and the de Reszkes, all in one breath--before one's poor little +subject was torn from one--one would never have such a chance again." + +Lady Maxwell laughed, but coloured too. + +"Am I such a nuisance?" she said, dropping her hands on her knee with a +little sigh. Then she turned to Tressady. + +"But Lady Leven really makes it out worse than it is. We haven't even +_approached_ a Factory Act all the afternoon." + +Lady Leven sprang forward in her chair. "Because! _because_, my dear, we +simply declined to let you. We made a league--didn't we, Mr. +Bennett?--even you joined it." + +Bennett smiled. + +"Lady Maxwell overworks herself--we all know that," he said, his look, at +once kind, honest, and perennially embarrassed, passing from Lady Leven +to his hostess. + +"Oh, don't sympathise, for Heaven's sake!" cried Betty. "Wage war upon +her--it's our only hope." + +"Don't you think Sunday at least ought to be frivolous?" said Tressady, +smiling, to Lady Maxwell. + +"Well, personally, I like to talk about what interests me on Sunday as +well as on other days," she said with a frank simplicity; "but I know I +ought to be kept in order--I become a terrible bore." + +Frank Leven roused himself from the sofa on which he had languidly +subsided. + +"Bores?" he said indignantly, "we're all bores. We all have been bores +since people began to think about what they're pleased to call 'social +work.' Why should I love my neighbour?--I'd much rather hate him. I +generally do." + +"Doesn't it all depend," said Tressady, "on whether he happens to be able +to make it disagreeable for you in return?" + +"That's just it," said Betty Leven, eagerly. "I agree with Frank--it's +all so stupid, this 'loving' everybody. It makes one positively hot. We +sit under a clergyman, Frank and I, who talks of nothing every Sunday but +love--_love_--like that, long-drawn-out--how our politics should be +'love,' and our shopping should be 'love'--till we long simply to +bastinado somebody. I want to have a little real nice cruelty--something +sharp and interesting. I should like to stick pins into my maid, only +unfortunately, as she has more than once pointed out to me, it would be +so much easier for her to stick them into me!" + +"You want the time of Miss Austen's novels back again," said young Bayle, +stooping to her, with his measured and agreeable smile--"before even the +clergy had a mission." + +"Ah! but it would be no good," said Lady Leven, sighing, "if _she_ +were there!" + +She threw out her small hand towards her hostess, and everybody laughed. + +Up to the moment of the laugh, Lady Maxwell had been lying back in her +chair listening, the beautiful mouth absently merry, and the eyes +speaking--Tressady thought--of quite other things, of some hidden +converse of her own, going on in the brain behind the eyes. A certain +prophetess-air seemed natural to her. Nevertheless, that first impression +of her he had carried away from the hospital scene was being somehow +blurred and broken up. + +She joined in the laugh against herself; then, with a little nod towards +her assailant, she said to Edward Watton, who was sitting on her right +hand. "_You're_ not taken in, I know." + +"Oh, if you mean that I go in for 'cases' and 'causes' too," cried Lady +Leven, interrupting, "of course I do--I can't be left alone. I must dance +as my generation pipes." + +"Which means," said her husband, drily, "that she went for two days +filling soda-water bottles the week before last, and a day's shirt-making +last week. From the first, I was told that she would probably return to +me with an eye knocked out, she being totally inexperienced and absurdly +rash. As to the second, to judge from the description she gave me of the +den she had been sitting in when she came home, and the headache she had +next day, I still expect typhoid. The fortnight isn't up till Wednesday." + +There was a shout of mingled laughter and inquiry. + +"How did you do it?--and whom did you bribe?" said Bayle to Lady Leven. + +"I didn't bribe anybody," she said indignantly. "You don't understand. My +friends introduced me." + +Then, drawn out by him, she plunged into a lively account of her workshop +experiences, interrupted every now and then by the sarcastic comments of +her husband and the amusement of the two younger men who had brought +their chairs close to her. Betty Leven ranked high among the lively +chatterboxes of her day and set. + +Lady Maxwell, however, had not laughed at Frank Leven's speech. Rather, +as he spoke of his wife's experiences, her face had clouded, as though +the blight of some too familiar image, some sad ever-present vision, had +descended upon her. + +Beimett also did not laugh. He watched the Levens indulgently for a few +minutes, then insensibly he, Lady Maxwell, Edward Watton, and Tressady +drew together into a circle of their own. + +"Do you gather that Lord Fontenoy's speech on Friday has been much +taken up in the country?" said Bennett, bending forward and addressing +Lady Maxwell. Tressady, who was observing him, noticed that his dress +was precisely the "Sunday best" of the respectable workman, and was, +moreover, reminded by the expression of the eyes and brow that Bennett +was said to have been a well-known "local preacher" in his +north-country youth. + +Lady Maxwell smiled, and pointed to Tressady. + +"Here," she said, "is Lord Fontenoy's first-lieutenant." + +Bennett looked at George. + +"I should be glad," he said, "to know what Sir George thinks?" + +"Why, certainly--we think it has been very warmly taken up," said George, +promptly--"to judge from the newspapers, the letters that have been +pouring in, and the petitions that seem to be preparing." + +Lady Maxwell's eyes gleamed. She looked at Bennett silently a moment, +then she said: + +"Isn't it amazing to you how strong an impossible case can be made to +look?" + +"It is inevitable," said Bennett, with a little shrug, "quite +inevitable. These social experiments of ours are so young--there is +always a strong case to be made out against any of them, and there will +be for years to come." + +"Well and good," said George; "then we cavillers are inevitable too. +Don't attack us--praise us rather; by your own confession, we are as much +a part of the game as you are." + +Bennett smiled slightly, but did not in reality quite follow. Lady +Maxwell bent forward. + +"Do you know whether Lord Fontenoy has any _personal_ knowledge of the +trades he was speaking about?" she said, in her rich eager voice; "that +is what I want so much to find out." + +George was nettled by both the question and the manner. + +"I regard Fontenoy as a very competent person," he said drily. "I imagine +he did his best to inform himself. But there was not much need; the +persons concerned--whom you think you are protecting--were so very eager +to inform us!" + +Lady Maxwell flushed. + +"And you think that settles it--the eagerness of the cheap life to be +allowed to maim and waste itself? But again and again English law has +stepped in to prevent it--and again and again everybody has been +thankful." + +"It is all a question of balance, of course," said George. "Must a +few unwise people be allowed to kill themselves--or thousands lose +their liberty?" + +His blue eyes scanned her beautiful impetuous face with a certain cool +hardness. Internally he was more and more in revolt against a "monstrous +regiment of women" and the influence upon the most complex economic +problems of such a personality as that before him. + +But his word "liberty" pricked her. The look of feeling passed away. Her +eyes kindled as sharply and drily as his own. + +"Freedom?--let me quote you Cromwell! 'Every sectary saith, "O give me +liberty!" But give it him, and to the best of his power he will yield it +to no one else.' So with your careless or brutal employer--give him +liberty, and no one else shall get it." + +"Only by metaphor--not legally," said George, stubbornly. "So long as men +are not slaves by law there is always a chance for freedom. Any way _we_ +stand for freedom--as an end, not a means. It is not the business of the +State to make people happy--not at all!--at least that is our view--but +it _is_ the business of the State to keep them free." + +"Ah!" said Bennett, with a long breath, "there you've hit the nail--the +whole difference between you and us." + +George nodded. Lady Maxwell did not speak immediately. But George was +conscious that he was being observed, closely considered. Their glances +crossed an instant, in antagonism, certainly, if not in dislike. + +"How long is it since you came home from India?" she asked him suddenly. + +"About six months." + +"And you were, I think, a long time abroad?" + +"Nearly four years. Does that make you think I have not had much time to +get up the things I am going to vote about?" said the young man, +laughing. "I don't know! On the broadest issues of politics, one makes up +one's mind as well in Asia as in Europe--better perhaps." + +"On the Empire, I suppose--and England's place in the world? That's a +side which--I know--I remember much too little. You think our life +depends on a governing class--and that _we_ and democracy are weakening +that class too much?" + +"That's about it. And for democracy it is all right. But _you_--you are +the traitors!" + +His thrust, however, did not rouse her to any corresponding rhetoric. She +smiled merely, and began to question him about his travels. She did it +with great deftness, so that after an answer or two both his temper and +manner insensibly softened, and he found himself talking with ease and +success. His mixed personality revealed itself--his capacity for certain +veiled enthusiasms, his respect for power, for knowledge, his pessimist +beliefs as to the average lot of men. + +Bennett, who listened easily, was glad to help her make her guest talk. +Frank Leven left the group near the sofa and came to listen, too. +Tressady was more and more spurred, carried out of himself. Lady +Maxwell's fine eyes and stately ways were humanised after all by a quick +responsiveness, which for most people, however critical, made +conversation with her draw like a magnet. Her intelligence, too, was +competent, left the mere feminine behind in these connections that +Tressady offered her, no less than in others. She had not lived in the +world of high politics for nearly five years for nothing; so that +unconsciously, and indeed quite against his will, Tressady found himself +talking to her, after a while, as though she had been a man and an equal, +while at the same time taking more pains than he would ever have taken +for a man. + +"Well, you _have_ seen a lot!" said Frank Leven at last, with a rather +envious sigh. + +Bennett's modest face suddenly reddened. + +"If only Sir George will use his eyes to as good purpose at home--" he +said involuntarily, then stopped. Few men were more unready and awkward +in conversation; yet when roused he was one of the best platform speakers +of his day. + +George laughed. + +"One sees best what appeals to one, I am afraid," he said, only to be +instantly conscious that he had made a rather stupid admission in face of +the enemy. + +Lady Maxwell's lip twitched; he saw the flash of some quick thought cross +her face. But she said nothing. + +Only when he got up to go, she bade him notice that she was always at +home on Sundays, and would be glad that he should remember it. He made a +rather cold and perfunctory reply. Inwardly he said to himself, "Why does +she say nothing of Letty, whom she knows--and of our marriage--if she +wants to make friends?" + +Nevertheless, he left the house with the feeling of one who has passed +an hour not of the common sort. He had done himself justice, made his +mark. And as for her--in spite of his flashes of dislike he carried +away a strong impression of something passionate and vivid that clung +to the memory. Or was it merely eyes and pose, that astonishingly +beautiful colour, and touch of classic dignity which she got--so the +world said--from some remote strain of Italian blood? Most probably! +All the same, she had fewer of the ordinary womanly arts than he had +imagined. How easy it would have been to send that message to Letty she +had not sent! He thought simply that for a clever woman she might have +been more adroit. + + * * * * * + +The door had no sooner closed behind Tressady than Betty Leven, with +a quick look after him, bent across to her hostess, and said in a +stage whisper: + +"Who? Post me up, please." + +"One of Fontenoy's gang," said her husband, before Lady Maxwell could +answer. "A new member, and as sharp as needles. He's been exactly to all +the places where I want to go, Betty, and you won't let me." + +He glanced at his wife with a certain sharpness. For Tressady had spoken +in passing of nilghai-shooting in the Himalayas, and the remark had +brought the flush of an habitual discontent to the young man's cheek. + +Betty merely held out a white child's wrist. + +"Button my glove, please, and don't talk. I have got ever so many +questions to ask Marcella." + +Leven applied himself rather sulkily to his task while Betty pursued her +inquiries. + +"Isn't he going to marry Letty Sewell?" + +"Yes," said Lady Maxwell, opening her eyes rather wide. "Do you +know her?" + +"Why, my dear, she's Mr. Watton's cousin--isn't she?" said Betty, turning +towards that young man. "I saw her once at your mother's." + +"Certainly she is my cousin," said that young man, smiling, "and she is +going to marry Tressady at Easter. So much I can vouch for, though I +don't know her so well, perhaps, as the rest of my family do." + +"Oh!" said Betty, drily, releasing her husband and crossing her small +hands across her knee. "That means--Miss Sewell isn't one of Mr. Watton's +_favourite_ cousins. You don't mind talking about your cousins, do you? +You may blacken the character of all mine. Is she nice?" + +"Who--Letty? Why, of course she is nice," said Edward Watton, laughing. +"All young ladies are." + +"Oh goodness!" said Betty, shaking her halo of gold hair. "Commend me to +cousins for letting one down easy." + +"Too bad, Lady Leven!" said Watton, getting up to escape. "Why not ask +Bayle? He knows all things. Let me hand you over to him. He will sing you +all my cousin's charms." + +"Delighted!" said Bayle as he, too, rose--"only unfortunately I ought at +this moment to be at Wimbledon." + +He had the air of a typical official, well dressed, suave, and infinitely +self-possessed, as he held out his hand--deprecatingly--to Lady Leven. + +"Oh! you private secretaries!" said Betty, pouting and turning +away from him. + +"Don't abolish us," he said, pleading. "We must live." + +"_Je n'en vois pas la nécessité!_" said Betty, over her shoulder. + +"Betty, what a babe you are!" cried her husband, as Bayle, Watton, and +Bennett all disappeared together. + +"Not at all!" cried Betty. "I wanted to get some truth out of somebody. +For, of course, the real truth is that this Miss Sewell is--" + +"Is what?" said Leven, lost in admiration all the time, as Lady Maxwell +saw, of his wife's dainty grace and rose-leaf colour. + +"Well--a--_minx!_" said Betty, with innocent slowness, +opening her blue eyes very wide; "a mischievous--rather +pretty--hard-hearted--flirting--little minx!" + +"Really, Betty!" cried Lady Maxwell. "Where have you seen her?" + +"Oh, I saw her last year several times at the Wattons' and other places," +said Betty, composedly. "And so did you too, please, madam. I remember +very well one day Mrs. Watton brought her into the Winterbournes' when +you and I were there, and she chattered a great deal." + +"Oh yes!--I had forgotten." + +"Well, my dear, you'll soon have to remember her! so you needn't talk +in that lofty tone. For they're going to be married at Easter, and if +you want to make friends with the young man, you'll have to realise +the wife!" + +"Married at Easter? How do you know?" + +"In the first place Mr. Watton said so, in the next there are such +things as newspapers. But of course you didn't notice such trifles, you +never do." + +"Betty, you're very cross with me to-day!" Lady Maxwell looked up at her +friend with a little pleading air. + +"Oh no! only for your good. I know you're thinking of nothing in the +world but how to make that man take a reasonable view of Maxwell's Bill. +And I want to impress upon you that _he's_ probably thinking a great deal +more about getting married than about Factory Bills. You see, _your_ +getting married was a kind of accident. But other people are different. +And oh, dear, you do know so little about them when they don't live hi +four pair backs! There, don't defend yourself--you sha'n't!" + +And, stooping, Betty stifled her friend's possible protest by +kissing her. + +"Now then, come along, Frank--you've got your speech to write--and I've +got to copy it out. Don't swear! you know you're going to have two whole +days' golfing next week. Good-bye, Marcella! My love to Aldous--and tell +him not to be so late next time I come to tea. Good-bye!" + +And off she swept, pausing, however, on the landing to open the door +again and put in an eager face. + +"Oh! and, by the way, the young man has a mother--Frank reminded me. His +womenkind don't seem to be his strong point--but as she doesn't earn +_even_ four-and-sixpence a week--very sadly the contrary--I won't tell +you any more now, or you'll forget. Next time!" + +When Marcella Maxwell was at last left alone, she began to pace slowly up +and down the large bare room, as it was very much her wont to do. + +She was thinking of George Tressady, and of the personality his talk had +seemed to reveal. + +"His heart is all in _power_--in what he takes for magnificence." she +said to herself. "He talks as if he had no humanity, and did not care a +rap for anybody. But it is a pose--I _think_ it is a pose. He is +interesting--he will develop. One would like--to show him things." + +After another pensive turn or two she stopped beside a photograph that +stood upon her writing-table. It was a photograph of her husband--a tall, +smoothfaced man, with pleasant eyes, features of no particular emphasis, +and the free carriage of the country-bred Englishman. As she looked at it +her face relaxed unconsciously, inevitably; under the stimulus of some +habitual and secret joy. It was for his sake, for his sake only that she +was still thinking of George Tressady, still pondering the young man's +character and remarks. + +So much at least was true--no other member of Fontenoy's party had as +yet given her even the chance of arguing with him. Once or twice in +society she had tried to approach Fontenoy himself, to get somehow into +touch with him. But she had made no way. Lord Fontenoy had simply turned +his square-jawed face and red-rimmed eyes upon her with a stupid +irresponsive air, which Marcella knew perfectly well to be a mask, while +it protected him none the less effectively for that against both her +eloquence and her charm. The other members of the party were young +aristocrats, either of the ultra-exclusive or of the sporting type. She +had made her attempts here and there among them, but with no more +success. And once or twice, when she had pushed her attack to close +quarters, she had been suddenly conscious of an underlying insolence in +her opponent--a quick glance of bold or sensual eyes which seemed to +relegate the mere woman to her place. + +But this young Tressady, for all his narrowness and bitterness, was of a +different stamp--or she thought so. + +She began to pace up and down again, lost in reverie, till after a few +minutes she came slowly to a stop before a long Louis Quinze +mirror--her hands clasped in front of her, her eyes half consciously +studying what she saw. + +Her own beauty invariably gave her pleasure--though very seldom for the +reasons that would have affected other women. She felt instinctively that +it made life easier for her than it could otherwise have been; that it +provided her with a natural and profitable "opening" in any game she +might wish to play; and that even among the workmen, unionist leaders, +and officials of the East End it had helped her again and again to score +the points that she wanted to make. She was accustomed to be looked at, +to be the centre, to feel things yielding before her; and without +thinking it out, she knew perfectly well what it was she gained by this +"fair seeming show" of eye and lip and form. Somehow it made nothing seem +impossible to her; it gave her a dazzling self-confidence. + +The handle of the door turned. She looked round with a smiling start, +and waited. + +A tall man in a grey suit came in, crossed the room quickly, and put his +arms round her. She leant back against his shoulder, putting up one hand +to touch his cheek caressingly. + +"Why, how late you are! Betty left reproaches for you." + +"I had a walk with Dowson. Then two or three people caught me on the +way back--Rashdell among others." (Lord Rashdell was Foreign +Secretary.) "There are some interesting telegrams from Paris--I copied +them out for you." + +The country happened to be at the moment in the midst of one of its +periodical difficulties with France. There had been a good deal of +diplomatic friction, and a certain amount of anxiety at the Foreign +Office. Marcella lit the silver kettle again and made her man some fresh +tea, while he told her the news, and they discussed the various points of +the telegrams he had copied for her, with a comrade's freedom and +vivacity. Then she said: + +"Well, I have had an interesting time too! That young Tressady has +been to tea." + +"Oh! has he? They say there is a lot of stuff in him, and he may do us a +great deal of mischief. How did you find him?" + +"Oh, very clever, very limited--and a mass of prejudices," she said, +laughing. "I never saw an odder mixture of knowledge and ignorance." + +"What? Knowledge of India and the East?--that kind of thing?" + +She nodded. + +"Knowledge of everything except the subject he has come home to fight +about! Do you know, Aldous--" + +She paused. She was sitting on a stool beside him, her arm upon his knee. + +"What do I know?" he said, his hand seeking hers. + +"Well, I can't help feeling that that man might live and learn. He isn't +a mere obstructive block--like the rest." + +Maxwell laughed. + +"Then Fontenoy is not as shrewd as usual. They say he regards him as +their best recruit." + +"Never mind. I rather wish you'd try to make friends with him." + +Maxwell, however, helped himself to cake and made no response. On the two +or three occasions on which he had met George Tressady, he had been +conscious, if the truth were told, of a certain vague antipathy to the +young man. + +Marcella pondered. + +"No," she said, "no--I don't think after all he's your sort. Suppose _I_ +see what can be done!" + +And she got up with her flashing smile--half love, half fun--and +crossed the room to summon her little boy, Hallin, for his evening +play. Maxwell looked after her, not heeding at all what she was saying, +heeding only herself, her voice, the atmosphere of charm and life she +carried with her. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + + +Marcella Maxwell, however, had not been easily wooed by the man who now +filled all the horizon of her life. At the time when Aldous Raeburn, as +he then was--the grandson and heir of old Lord Maxwell--came across her +first she was a handsome, undeveloped girl, of a type not uncommon in our +modern world, belonging by birth to the country-squire class, and by the +chances of a few years of student life in London to the youth that takes +nothing on authority, and puts to fierce question whatever it finds +already on its path--Governments, Churches, the powers of family and +wealth--that takes, moreover, its social pity for the only standard, and +spends that pity only on one sort and type of existence. She accepted +Raeburn, then the best _parti_ in the county, without understanding or +loving him, simply that she might use his power and wealth for certain +social ends to which the crude philanthropy of her youth had pledged +itself. Naturally, they were no sooner engaged than Raeburn found himself +launched upon a long wrestle with the girl who had thus--in the +selfishness of her passionate idealist youth--opened her relation to him +with a deliberate affront to the heart offered her. The engagement had +stormy passages, and was for a time wholly broken off. Aldous was made +bitterly jealous, or miserably unhappy. Marcella left the old house in +the neighbourhood of the Maxwell property, where her lover had first seen +and courted her. She plunged into London life, and into nursing, that +common outlet for the woman at war with herself or society. She suffered +and struggled, and once or twice she came very near to throwing away all +her chances of happiness. But in the end, Maxwell tamed her; Maxwell +recovered her. The rise of love in the unruly, impetuous creature, when +the rise came, was like the sudden growth of some great forest flower. It +spread with transforming beauty over the whole nature, till at last the +girl who had once looked upon him as the mere tool of her own moral +ambitions threw herself upon Maxwell's heart with a self-abandoning +passion and penitence, which her developed powers and her adorable beauty +made a veritable intoxication. + +And Maxwell was worthy that she should do this thing. When he and +Marcella first met, he was a man of thirty, very able, very reserved, and +often painfully diffident as to his own powers and future. He was the +only young representative of a famous stock, and had grown up from his +childhood under the shadow of great sorrows and heavy responsibilities. +The stuff of the poet and the thinker lay hidden behind his shy manners; +and he loved Marcella Boyce with all the delicacy, all the idealising +respect, that passion generates in natures so strong and so highly +tempered. At the same time, he had little buoyancy or gaiety; he had a +belief in his class, and a constitutional dislike of change, which were +always fighting in his mind with the energies of moral debate; and he +acquiesced very easily--perhaps indifferently--in many outward +conventions and prejudices. + +The crisis through which Marcella put him developed and matured the man. +To the influences of love, moreover, were added the influences of +friendship--of such a friendship as our modern time but seldom rears to +perfection. In Raeburn's college days, a man of rare and delicate powers +had possessed himself of Raeburn's tenacious affection, and had +thenceforward played the leader to Raeburn's strength, physical and +moral, availing himself freely, wherever his own failed him, of the +powers and capacities of his friend. For he himself bore in him from his +youth up the seeds of physical failure and early death. It was partly the +marvellous struggle in him of soul with body that subdued to him the +homage of the stronger man. And it was clearly his influence that broke +up and fired Raeburn's slower and more distrustful temper, informing an +inbred Toryism, a natural passion for tradition, and the England of +tradition with that "repining restlessness" which is the best spur of +noble living. + +Hallin was a lecturer and an economist; a man who lived in the perception +of the great paradox that in our modern world political power has gone to +the workman, while yet socially and intellectually he remains little less +weak, or starved, or subject than before. When he died he left to Raeburn +a legacy of feelings and ideas, all largely concerned with this contrast +between the huge and growing "tyranny" of the working class and the +individual helplessness or bareness of the working man. And it was these +feelings and ideas which from the beginning made a link between Raeburn +and the young revolts and compassions of Marcella Boyce. They were at one +in their love of Edward Hallin; and after Hallin's death, in their sore +and tender wish to make his thoughts tell upon the English world. + + * * * * * + +The Maxwells had now been married some five years, years of almost +incredible happiness. The equal comradeship of marriage at its best and +finest, all the daily disciplines, the profound and painless lessons of +love, the covetous bliss of parentage, the constant anxieties of power +nobly understood, had harmonised the stormy nature of the woman, and had +transformed the somewhat pessimist and scrupulous character of the man. +Not that life with Marcella Maxwell was always easy. Now as ever she +remained on the moral side a creature of strain and effort, tormented by +ideals not to be realised, and eager to drive herself and others in a +breathless pursuit of them. + +But if in some sort she seemed to be always dragging those that loved her +through the heart of a tempest, the tempest had such golden moments! No +wife had ever more capacity for all the delicacies and depths of passion +towards the man of her choice. All the anxieties she brought with her, +all the perplexities and difficulties she imposed, had never yet seemed +to Maxwell anything but divinely worth while. So far, indeed, he had +never even remotely allowed himself to put the question. Her faults were +her; and she was his light of life. + +For some time after their marriage, which took place about a year after +his accession to the title and estates, they had lived at the stately +house in Brookshire belonging to the Maxwells, and Marcella had thrown +herself into the management of a large household and property with +characteristic energy and originality. She had tried new ways of choosing +and governing her servants; new ways of entertaining the poor, and of +making Maxwell Court the centre, not of one class, but of all. She ran up +a fair score of blunders, but not one of them was the blunder of meanness +or vulgarity. Her nature was inventive and poetic, and the rich +fulfilment that had overtaken her own personal desires did but sting her +eager passion to give and to serve. + +Meanwhile the family house in town was sold, and what with the birth of +her son, and the multiplicity of the rural interests to which she had set +her hand, Marcella felt no need of London. But towards the end of the +second year she perceived--though he said little about it--that there was +in her husband's mind a strong and persistent drawing towards his former +political interests and associations. The late Lord Maxwell had sat in +several Conservative cabinets, and his grandson, after a distinguished +career in the House as a private member, had accepted a subordinate place +in the Government only a few months before his grandfather's death +transferred him to the Lords. After that event, a scrupulous conscience +had forced him to take landowning as a profession and an arduous one. The +Premier made him flattering advances, and his friends remonstrated, but +he had none the less relinquished office, and buried himself on his land. + +Now, however, after some three years' hard and unremitting work, the +estate was in excellent condition; the "new ways" of the new owners had +been well started; and both Maxwell and Marcella had fitting lieutenants +who could be left in charge. Moreover, matters were being agitated at +the moment in politics which had special significance for the man's +idealist and reflective mind. His country friends and neighbours hardly +understood why. + +For it was merely a question of certain further measures of factory +reform. A group of labour leaders were pressing upon the public and the +Government a proposal to pass a special Factory Act for certain +districts and trades of East London. In spite of Commissions, in spite +of recent laws, "sweating," so it was urged, was as bad as ever--nay, in +certain localities and industries was more frightful and more oppressive +than ever. The waste of life and health involved in the great clothing +industries of East London, for instance, which had provoked law after +law, inquiry after inquiry, still went--so it was maintained--its +hideous way. + +"Have courage!" cried the reformers. "Take, at last, the only effectual +step. Make it penal to practise certain trades in the houses of the +people--drive them all into factories of a certain size, where alone +these degraded industries can be humanised and controlled. Above all, +make up your mind to a legal working day for East London men as well as +East London women. Try the great experiment first of all in this +omnivorous, inarticulate London, this dustbin for the rubbish of all +nations. Here the problem is worst--here the victims are weakest and +most manageable. London will bear what would stir a riot in Birmingham or +Leeds. Make the experiment as partial and as tentative as you +please--give the Home Office power to extend or revoke it at will--but +_try it_!" + +The change proposed was itself of vast importance, and was, moreover, but +a prelude to things still more far-reaching. But, critical as it was, +Maxwell was prepared for it. During the later years of his friend +Hallin's life the two men had constantly discussed the industrial +consequences of democracy with unflagging eagerness and intelligence. To +both it seemed not only inevitable, but the object of the citizen's +dearest hopes, that the rule of the people should bring with it, in +ever-ascending degree, the ordering and moralising of the worker's toil. +Yet neither had the smallest belief that any of the great civilised +communities would ever see the State the sole landlord and the sole +capitalist; or that Collectivism as a system has, or deserves to have, +any serious prospects in the world. To both, possession--private and +personal possession--from the child's first toy, or the tiny garden where +it sows its passionately watched seeds, to the great business or the +great estate, is one of the first and chiefest elements of human +training, not to be escaped by human effort, or only at such a cost of +impoverishment and disaster that mankind would but take the +step--supposing it conceivable that it should take it--to retrace it +instantly. + +Maxwell's _heart_, however, was much less concerned with this belief, +tenaciously as he held it, than with its relative--the limitation of +private possession by the authority of the common conscience. That "we +are not our own" has not, indeed, been left to Lassalle or Marx to +discover. But if you could have moved this quiet Englishman to speak, he +would have said--his strong, brooding face all kindled and alive--that +the enormous industrial development of the past century has shown us the +forces at work in the evolution of human societies on a gigantic scale, +and by thus magnifying them has given us a new understanding of them. The +vast extension of the individual will and power which science has brought +to humanity during the last hundred years was always present to him as +food for a natural exultation--a kind of pledge of the boundless +prospects of the race. On the other hand the struggle of society brought +face to face with this huge increment of the individual power, forced to +deal with it for its own higher and mysterious ends, to moralise and +socialise it lest it should destroy itself and the State together; the +slow steps by which the modern community has succeeded in asserting +itself against the individual, in protecting the weak from his weakness, +the poor from his poverty, in defending the woman and child from the +fierce claims of capital, in forcing upon trade after trade the axiom +that no man may lawfully build his wealth upon the exhaustion and +degradation of his fellow--these things stirred in him the far deeper +enthusiasms of the moral nature. Nay more! Together with all the other +main facts which mark the long travail of man's ethical and social life, +they were among the only "evidences" of religion a critical mind allowed +itself--the most striking signs of something "greater than we know" +working among the dust and ugliness of our common day. Attack wealth as +wealth, possession as possession, and civilisation is undone. But bring +the force of the social conscience to bear as keenly and ardently as you +may, upon the separate activities of factory and household, farm and +office; and from the results you will only get a richer individual +freedom, one more illustration of the divinest law man serves--that he +must "die to live," must surrender to obtain. + +Such at least was Maxwell's persuasion; though as a practical man he +admitted, of course, many limitations of time, occasion, and degree. And +long companionship with him had impressed the same faith also on +Marcella. With the natural conceit of the shrewd woman, she would +probably have maintained that her social creed came entirely of +mother-wit and her own exertions--her experiences in London, reading, +and the rest. In reality it was in her the pure birth of a pure passion. +She had learnt it while she was learning to love Aldous Raeburn; and it +need astonish no one that the more dependent all her various +philosophies of life had become on the mere personal influence and joy +of marriage, the more agile had she grown in all that concerned the mere +intellectual defence of them. She could argue better and think better; +but at bottom, if the truth were told, they were Maxwell's arguments and +Maxwell's thoughts. + +So that when this particular agitation began, and he grew restless in his +silent way, she grew restless too. They took down the old worn +portfolios of Hallin's papers and letters, and looked through them, night +after night, as they sat alone together in the great library of the +Court. Both Marcella and Aldous could remember the writing of many of +these innumerable drafts of Acts, these endless memoranda on special +points, and must needs try, for love's sake, to forget the terrible +strain and effort with which a dying man had put them together. She was +led by them to think of the many workmen friends she had made during the +year of her nursing life; while he had remembrances of much personal work +and investigation of his own, undertaken during the time of his +under-secretaryship, to add to hers. Another Liberal government was +slipping to its fall--if a Conservative government came in, with a +possible opening in it for Aldous Maxwell, what then? Was the chance to +be seized? + +One May twilight, just before dinner, as the two were strolling up and +down the great terrace just in front of the Court, Aldous paused and +looked at the majestic house beside them. + +"What's the good of talking about these things while we live _there_?" he +said, with a gesture towards the house, half impatient, half humorous. + +Marcella laughed. Then she sprang away from him, considering, a sudden +brightness in her eye. She had an idea. + +The idea after all was a very simple one. But the probability is that, +had she not been there to carry him through, Maxwell would have neither +found it nor followed it. However that may be, in a very few days she had +clothed it with fact, and made so real a thing of it that she was amazed +at her own success. She and Maxwell had settled themselves in a small +furnished house in the Mile End Road, and Maxwell was once more studying +the problems of his measure that was to be in the midst of the +populations to whom it applied. The house had been recently let in +"apartments" by a young tradesman and his wife, well known to Marcella. +In his artisan days the man had been her friend, and for a time her +patient. She knew how to put her hand on him at once. + +They spent five months in the little house, while the London that knew +them in St. James's Square looked on, and made the comments--half amused, +half inquisitive--that the act seemed to invite. There was of course no +surprise. Nothing surprises the London of to-day. Or if there were any, +it was all Marcella's. In spite of her passionate sympathy with the +multitude who live in disagreeable homes on about a pound a week, she +herself was very sensitive to the neighbourhood of beautiful things, to +the charm of old homes, cool woods, green lawns, and the rise and fall of +Brookshire hills. Against her wish, she had thought of sacrifice in +thinking of the Mile End Road in August. + +But there was no sacrifice. Frankly, these five months were among the +happiest of her life. She and Maxwell were constantly together, from +morning till night, doing the things that were congenial to them, and +seeing the things that interested them. They went in and out of every +factory and workshop in which certain trades were practised, within a +three-mile radius; they became the intimate friends of every factory +inspector and every trade-union official in the place. Luckily, Maxwell's +shyness--at least in Mile End--was not of the sort that can be readily +mistaken for a haughty mind. He was always ready to be informed; his +diffident kindness asked to be set at ease; while in any real ardour of +debate his trained capacity and his stores of knowledge would put even +the expert on his mettle. + +As for Marcella, it was her idiosyncrasy that these tailors, furriers, +machinists, shirtmakers, by whom she was surrounded in East London, +stirred her imagination far more readily than the dwellers in great +houses and the wearers of fine raiment had ever stirred it. And +Marcella, in the kindled sympathetic state, was always delightful to +herself and others. She revelled in the little house and its ugly, +druggetted rooms; in the absence of all the usual paraphernalia of their +life; in her undisturbed possession of the husband who was at once her +lover and the best company she knew or could desire. On the few days +when he left her for the day on some errand in which she could not +share, to meet him at the train in the evening like any small clerk's +wife, to help him carry the books and papers with which he was generally +laden along the hot and dingy street, to make him tea from her little +spirit kettle, and then to hear the news of the day in the shade of the +little smutty back-garden, while the German charwoman who cooked for +them had her way with the dinner--there was not an incident in the whole +trivial procession that did not amuse and delight her. She renewed her +youth; she escaped from the burdensome "glories of our birth, and +state"; from that teasing "duty to our equals" on which only the wisest +preachers have ever laid sufficient stress; and her one trouble was that +the little masquerade must end. + +One other drawback indeed, one more blight upon a golden time, there was. +Not even Marcella could make up her mind to transplant little Hallin, her +only child, from Maxwell Court to East London. It was springtime, and the +woods about the Court were breaking into sheets of white and blue. +Marcella must needs leave the boy to his flowers and his "grandame +earth," sadly warned thereto by the cheeks of other little boys in and +about the Mile End Road. But every Friday night she and Maxwell said +good-bye to the two little workhouse girls, and the German charwoman, and +the village boy from Mellor, who supplied them with all the service they +wanted in Mile End, took with them the ancient maid who had been +Marcella's mother's maid, and fled home to Brookshire. So on Saturday +mornings it generally happened that little Hallin went out to inform his +particular friend among the garden boys, that "Mummy had tum ome," and +that he was not therefore so much his own master as usual. He explained +that he had to show mummy "_eaps_ of things"--the two new kittens, the +"edge-sparrer's nest," and the "ump they'd made in the churchyard over +old Tom Collins from the parish ouses," the sore place on the pony's +shoulder, the "ole that mummy's orse had kicked in the stable door," and +a host of other curiosities. By way of linking the child with the soil +and its people, Marcella had taken care to give him nursemaids from the +village. And the village being only some thirty miles from London, talked +in the main the language of London, a language which it soon communicated +to the tongue of Maxwell's heir. Marcella tried to school her boy in +vain. Hallin chattered, laughed, broadened his a's and dropped all his +h's into a bottomless limbo none the less. + +What days of joy those Saturdays were for mother and child! All the +morning and till about four o'clock, he and she would be inseparable, +trailing about together over field and wood, she one of the handsomest +of women, he one of the plainest of children--a little square-faced +chubby fellow, with eyes monstrously black and big, fat cheeks that +hung a little over the firm chin, a sallow complexion, and a large +humorous mouth. + +But in the late afternoon, alas! Hallin was apt to find the world grow +tiresome. For against all his advice "mummy" would allow herself to be +clad by Annette, the maid, in a frock of state; carriages would drive up +from the 5.10 train; and presently in the lengthening evening the great +lawns of the Court would be dotted with strolling groups, or the red +drawing-room, with its Romneys and Gainsboroughs, would be filled with +talk and laughter circling round mummy at the tea-table; so that all that +was left to Hallin was that seat on mummy's knee--his big, dark head +pressed disconsolately against her breast, his thumb in his mouth for +comfort--which no boy of any spirit would ever consent to occupy, so long +as there was any chance of goading a slack companion into things better +worth while. + +Marcella herself was no less rebellious at heart, and would have asked +nothing better than to be left free to spend her weekly holiday in +roaming an April world with Hallin. But our country being what it is, the +plans that are made in Mile End or Shoreditch have to be adopted by +Mayfair or Mayfair's equivalent; otherwise they are apt to find an +inglorious tomb in the portfolios that bred them. We have still, it +seems, a "ruling class"; and in spite of democracy it is still this +"ruling class" that matters. Maxwell was perfectly aware of it; and these +Sundays to him were the mere complements of the Mile End weekdays. +Marcella ruefully admitted that English life was so, and she did her +best. But on Monday mornings she was generally left protesting in her +inmost soul against half the women whom these peers and politicians, +these administrators and journalists, brought with them, or wondering +anxiously whether her particular share in the social effort just over +might not have done Aldous more harm than good. She understood vaguely, +without vanity, that she was a power in this English society, that she +had many warm friends, especially among men of the finer and abler sort. +But when a woman loved her, and insisted, as it were, on making her know +it--and, after all, the experience was not a rare one--Marcella received +the overture with a kind of grateful surprise. She was accustomed, +without knowing why, to feel herself ill at ease with certain types of +women; even in her own house she was often aware of being furtively +watched by hostile eyes; or she found herself suddenly the goal of some +sharp little pleasantry that pricked like a stiletto. She supposed that +she was often forgetful and indiscreet. Perhaps the large court she held +so easily on these occasions beneath the trees or in the great +drawing-rooms of the old house had more to do with the matter. If so, she +never guessed the riddle. In society she was conscious of one aim, and +one aim only. Its very simplicity made other women incredulous, while it +kept herself in the dark. + +However, by dint of great pains, she had not yet done Aldous any harm +that counted. During all the time of their East End sojourn, a Liberal +government, embarrassed by large schemes it had not force enough to +carry, was sinking towards inevitable collapse. When the crash came, a +weak Conservative government, in which Aldous Maxwell occupied a +prominent post, accepted office for a time without a dissolution. They +came in on a cry of "industrial reform," and, by way of testing their own +party and the country, adopted the Factory Bill for East London, which +had now, by the common consent of all the workers upon it, passed into +Maxwell's hands. The Bill rent the party in twain; but the Ministry had +the courage to go to the country with a programme in which the Maxwell +Bill held a prominent place. Trade-unionism rallied to their support; the +forces both of reaction and of progress fought for them, in strangely +mingled ways; and they were returned with a sufficient, though not large, +majority. Lord Ardagh, the veteran leader of the party, became Premier. +Maxwell was made President of the Council, while his old friend and +associate, Henry Dowson, became Home Secretary, and thereby responsible +for the conduct of the long-expected Bill through the Commons. + +When Maxwell came back to her on the afternoon of his decisive interview +with Lord Ardagh, she was waiting for him in that same inner room where +Tressady paid his first visit. At the sound of her husband's step +outside, she sprang up, and they met half-way, her hands clasped in his, +against his breast, her face looking up at him. + +"Dear wife! at last we have our chance--our real chance," he said to her. + +She clung to him, and there was a moment of high emotion, in which +thoughts of the past and of the dead mingled with the natural ambition of +two people in the prime of life and power. Then Maxwell laughed and drew +a long breath. + +"The eggs have been all put into my basket in the most generous manner. +We stand or fall by the Bill. But it will be a hard fight." + +And, in his acute, deliberate way, he began to sum up the forces against +him--to speculate on the action of this group and that--Fontenoy's group +first and foremost. + +Marcella listened, her beautiful hand pensive against her cheek, her +eyes on his. Half trembling, she realised what failure, if after all +failure should come, would mean to him. Something infinitely tender and +maternal spoke in her, pledging her to the utmost help that love and a +woman could give. + + * * * * * + +Such for Maxwell and his wife had been the antecedents of a +memorable session. + +And now the session was here--was in full stream, indeed, rushing +towards the main battle still to come. On the second night of Fontenoy's +debate, George Tressady duly caught the Speaker's eye, and made a very +fair maiden speech, which earned him a good deal more praise, both from +his party and the press, than he--in a disgusted mood--thought at all +reasonable. He had misplaced half his notes, and, in his own opinion, +made a mess of his main argument. He remarked to Fontenoy afterwards that +he had better hang himself, and stalked home after the division pleased +with one thing only--that he had not allowed Letty to come. + +In reality he had done nothing to mar the reputation that was beginning +to attach to him. Fontenoy was content; and the scantiness of the +majority by which the Resolution was defeated served at once to make the +prospects of the Maxwell Bill, which was to be brought in after Easter, +more doubtful, and to sharpen the temper of its foes. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + +"Goodness!--what an ugly place it is! It wants five thousand spent on it +at once to make it tolerable!" + +The remark was Letty Tressady's. She was standing disconsolate on the +lawn at Ferth, scanning the old-fashioned house to which George had +brought her just five days before. They had been married a fortnight, and +were still to spend another week in the country before going back to +London and to Parliament. But already Letty had made up her mind that +Ferth _must_ be rebuilt and refurnished, or she could never endure it. + +She threw herself down on a garden seat with a sigh, still studying the +house. It was a straight barrack-like building, very high for its +breadth, erected early in the last century by an architect who, finding +that he was to be allowed but a very scanty sum for his performance, +determined with considerable strength of mind to spend all that he had +for decoration upon the inside rather than the outside of his mansion. +Accordingly the inside had charm--though even so much Letty could not now +be got to confess; panellings, mantelpieces, and doorways showed the work +of a man of taste. But outside all that had been aimed at was the +provision of a central block of building carried up to a considerable +height so as to give the rooms demanded, while it economised in +foundations and general space; an outer wall pierced with the plainest +openings possible at regular intervals; a high-pitched roof to keep out +the rain, whereof the original warm tiles had been long since replaced by +the chilliest Welsh slates; and two low and disfiguring wings which held +the servants and the kitchens. The stucco with which the house had been +originally covered had blackened under the influence of time, weather, +and the smoke from the Tressady coalpits. Altogether, what with its +pitchy colour, its mean windows, its factory-like plainness and height, +Ferth Place had no doubt a cheerless and repellent air, which was +increased by its immediate surroundings. For it stood on the very summit +of a high hill, whereon the trees were few and windbeaten; while the +carriage drives and the paths that climbed the hill were all of them a +coaly black. The flower garden behind the house was small and neglected; +neither shrubberies nor kitchen garden, nor the small park, had any +character or stateliness; everything bore the stamp of bygone possessors +who had been rich neither in money nor in fancy; who had been quite +content to live small lives in a small way. + +Ferth's new mistress thought bitterly of them, as she sat looking at +their handiwork. What could be done with such a place? How could she have +London people to stay there? Why, their very maids would strike! And, +pray, what was a country house worth, without the usual country-house +amenities and accessories? + +Yet she already began to feel fretted and hampered about money. The +inside of the house had been to some extent renovated. She had helped +George to choose papers and curtains for the rooms that were to be her +special domain, while they were in London together before Easter. But she +knew that George had at one time meant to do much more than had actually +been done; and he had been in a mood of lover-like apology on the first +day of their arrival. "Darling, I had hoped to buy you a hundred pretty +things!--but times is bad--dreadful bad!" he had said to her with a +laugh. "We will do it by degrees--you won't mind?" + +Then she had tried to make him tell her why it was that he had abandoned +some of the schemes of improvement that had certainly been in his mind +during the first weeks of their engagement. But he had not been very +communicative, and had put the blame mostly, as she understood him, on +the "beastly pits" and the very low dividends they had been earning +during the past six months. + +Letty, however, did not in the least believe that the comparatively +pinched state of their finances, which, bride as she was, she was already +brooding over, was wholly or even mainly due to the pits. She set her +little white teeth in sudden anger as she said to herself that it was +_not_ the pits--it was Lady Tressady! George was crippled now because of +the large sums his mother had not been ashamed to wring from him during +the last six months. Letty--George's wife--was to go without comforts and +conveniences, without the means of seeing her friends and taking her +proper position in the world, because George's mother--a ridiculous, +painted old woman, who went in for flirtations and French gowns, when she +ought to be subsiding quietly into caps and Bath chairs--would sponge +upon his very moderate income, and take what did not belong to her. + +"I am _certain_ there is something in the background!" said Letty to +herself, as she sat looking at the ugly house--"something that she is +ashamed of, and that she doesn't tell George. She _couldn't_ spend all +that money on dress! I believe she is a wicked old woman--she has the +most extraordinary creatures at her parties." + +The girl's delicate face stiffened vindictively as she fell brooding for +the hundredth time over Lady Tressady's enormities. + +Then suddenly the garden door opened, and Letty, looking up, saw that +George was on the threshold, waving his hand to her. He had left her that +morning--almost for the first time since their marriage--to go and see +his principal agent and discuss the position of affairs. + +As he approached her, she noticed instantly that he was looking tired and +ruffled. But the sight of her smoothed his brow. He threw himself down on +the grass at her feet, and pressed his lips to the delicately tended hand +that lay upon her lap. + +"Have you missed me, madame?" he said, peremptorily. + +Preoccupied as she was, Letty must needs flush and smile, so well she +knew from his eager eye that she pleased him, that he noticed the pretty +gown she had put on for luncheon, and that all the petting his absence +had withdrawn from her for an hour or two had come back to her. Other +women--more or less of her type--had found his ways beguiling before +now. He took courtship as an art, and had his own rooted ideas as to how +women should be treated. Neither too gingerly nor too sentimentally--but, +above all, with variety! + +He repeated his question insistently; whereupon Letty said, with her pert +brightness, thinking all the time of the house, "I'm _not_ going to make +you vain. Besides, I have been frightfully busy." + +"You're not going to make me vain? But I choose to be vain. I'll go away +for the whole afternoon if I'm not made vain this instant. Ah! that's +better. Do you know that you have the softest little curl on your soft +little neck, and that your hair has caught the sun on it this morning?" + +Letty instinctively put up a hand to tuck away the curl. But he seized +the hand. "Little vandal!--What have you been busy with?" + +"Oh! I have been over the house with Mrs. Matthews," said Letty, in +another tone. "George, it's _dreadful_--the number of things that want +doing. Do you know, _positively_, we could not put up more than two +couples, if we tried ever so. And as for the state of the attics! Now do +listen, George!" + +And, holding his hand tight in her eagerness, she went through a vehement +catalogue of all that was wanted--new furniture, new decoration, new +grates, a new hot-water system, the raising of the wings, and so on to +the alteration of the stables and the replanning of the garden. She had +no sooner begun upon her list than George's look of worry returned. He +got up from the grass, and sat on the bench beside her. + +"Well, I'm sorry you dislike the place so much," he said, when her breath +failed her, staring rather gloomily at his despised mansion. "Of course, +it's quite true--it is an ugly hole. But the worst of it is, darling, I +don't quite see how we're to do all this you talk about. I don't bring +any good news from the pits, alas!" + +He turned quickly towards her. The thought flashed through his +mind--could he be justly charged with having married her on false +pretences as to his affairs? No! There had been no misrepresentation of +his income or his risks. Everything had been plainly and honestly stated +to her father, and therefore to her. For Letty knew all that she wanted +to know, and had managed her family since she was a baby. + +Letty flushed at his last words. + +"Do you mean to say," she said with emphasis, "that those men are really +going to strike?" + +"I am afraid so. We _must_ enforce a reduction, to avoid working at sheer +loss, and the men vow they'll come out." + +"They want you to make them a present of the mines, I suppose!" said +Letty, bitterly. "Why, the tales I hear of their extravagance and +laziness! Mrs. Matthews says they'll have none but the best cuts of meat, +that they all of them have an harmonium or a piano in the house, that +their houses are _stuffed_ with furniture--and the amount of money they +spend in betting on their dogs and their football matches is perfectly +sickening. And now, I suppose they'll ruin themselves and us, rather than +allow you to make a decent profit!" + +"That's about it," said George, flinging himself back on the bench. +"That's about it." + +There was a pause of silence. The eyes of both were turned to the +colliery village far below, at the foot of the hill. From this high +stretch of garden one looked across the valley and its straggling line of +houses, to the pits on the further hillside, the straight black line of +the "bank," the pulley wheels, and tall chimneys against the sky. To the +left, along the ascending valley, similar chimneys and "banks" were +scattered at long intervals, while to the right the valley dipped in +sharp wooded undulations to a blue plain bounded by far Welsh hills. The +immediate neighbourhood of Ferth, for a coal country, had a woodland +charm and wildness which often surprised a stranger. There were untouched +copses, and little rivers and fern-covered hills, which still held their +own against the ever-encroaching mounds of "spoil" thrown out by the +mines. Only the villages were invariably ugly. They were the modern +creations of the coal, and had therefore no history and no originality. +Their monotonous rows of red cottages were like fragments from some dingy +town suburb, and the brick meeting-houses in which they abounded did +nothing to abate the general unloveliness. + +This view from the Ferth hill was one which had great familiarity for +Tressady, and yet no charm. As a boy he had had no love for his home and +very few acquaintances in the village. His mother hated the place and the +people. She had married very young--for the sake of money and +position--to his dull old father, who nevertheless managed to keep his +flighty wife in order by dint of a dumb, continuous stubbornness and +tyranny, which would have overborne a stronger nature than Lady +Tressady's. She was always struggling to get away from Ferth; he to keep +her tied there. He was never at ease away from his estate and his pits; +she felt herself ten years younger as soon as she had lost sight of the +grim black house on its hilltop. + +And this one opinion of hers she was able to impress upon her +son--George, too, was always glad to turn his back on Ferth and its +people. The colliers seemed to him a brutal crew, given over to coarse +sports, coarse pleasures, and an odious religion. As to their supposed +grievances and hardships, his intimate conviction as a boy had always +been that the miner got the utmost both out of his employers and out of +society that he was worth. + +"Upon my word, I often think," he said at last, his inward reverie +finding speech, "I often think it was a great pity my grandfather +discovered the coal at all! In the long run I believe we should have done +better without it. We should not at any rate have been bound up with +these hordes, with whom you can no more reason than with so many blocks +of their own coal!" + +Letty made no answer. She had turned back towards the house. Suddenly +she said, with an energy that startled him, + +"George, what _are_ we to do with that place? It gives me a nightmare. +The extraordinary thing is the way that everything in it has gone to +ruin. Did your mother really live here while you were away?" + +George's expression darkened. + +"I always used to suppose she was here," he said. "That was our bargain. +But I begin to believe now that she was mostly in London. One can't +wonder at it--she always hated the place." + +"Of course she was in London!" thought Letty to herself, "spending piles +of money, running shamefully into debt, and letting the house go to +pieces. Why, the linen hasn't been darned for years!" + +Aloud she said: + +"Mrs. Matthews says a charwoman and a little girl from the village used +to be left alone in the house for months, to play any sort of games, with +nobody to look after them--_nobody_--while you were away!" + +George looked at his wife--and then would only slip his arm round her +for answer. + +"Darling! you don't know how I've been worried all the morning--don't +let's make worry at home. After all it _is_ rather nice to be here +together, isn't it?--and we shall do--we sha'n't starve! Perhaps we shall +pull through with the pits after all--it is difficult to believe the men +will make such fools of themselves--and--well! you know my angel mother +can't always be swooping upon us as she has done lately. Let's just be +patient a little--very likely I can sell a few bits of land before long +that will give us some money in hand--and then this small person shall +bedizen herself and the house as much as she pleases. And meanwhile, +_madame ma femme_, let me point out to you that your George never +professed to be anything but a very bad match for you!" + +Letty remembered all his facts and figures perfectly. Only somehow she +had regarded them with the optimism natural to a girl who is determined +to be married. She had promptly forgotten the adverse chances he had +insisted upon, and she had converted all his averages into minima. No, +she could not say she had not been warned; but nevertheless the result +promised to be quite different from what she had expected. + +However, with her husband's arm round her, it was not easy to maintain +her ill-humour, and she yielded. They wandered on into the wood which +fringed the hill on its further side, she coquetting, he courting and +flattering her in a hundred ways. Her soft new dress, her dainty +lightness and freshness, made harmony in his senses with the April day, +the building rooks, the breaths of sudden perfume from field and wood, +the delicate green that was creeping over the copses, softening all the +edges of the black scars left by the pits. The bridal illusion returned. +George eagerly--hungrily--gave himself up to it. And Letty, though +conscious all the while of a restless feeling at the back of her mind +that they were losing time, must needs submit. + +However, when the luncheon gong had sounded and they were strolling +back to the house, he bethought himself, knit his brows again, and +said to her: + +"Do you know, darling, Dalling told me this morning"--Dalling was the +Tressadys' principal agent--"that he thought it would be a good thing if +we could make friends with some of the people here? The Union are not--or +_were_ not--quite so strong in this valley as they are in some other +parts. That's why that fellow Burrows--confound him!--has come to live +here of late. It might be possible to make some of the more intelligent +fellows hear reason. My uncles have always managed the thing with a very +high hand--very natural!--the men _are_ a set of rough, ungrateful +brutes, who talk impossible stuff, and never remember anything that's +done for them--but after all, if one has to make a living out of them, +one may as well learn how to drive them, and what they want to be at. +Suppose you come and show yourself in the village this afternoon?" + +Letty looked extremely doubtful. + +"I really don't get on very well with poor people, George. It's very +dreadful, I know, but there!--I'm not Lady Maxwell--and I can't help it. +Of course, with the poor people at home in our own cottages it's +different--they always curtsy and are very respectful--but Mrs. Matthews +says the people here are so independent, and think nothing of being rude +to you if they don't like you." + +George laughed. + +"Go and call upon them in that dress and see! I'll eat my hat if +anybody's rude. Beside, I shall be there to protect you. We won't go, of +course, to any of the strong Union people. But there are two or +three--an old nurse of mine I really used to be rather fond of--and a +fireman that's a good sort--and one or two others. I believe it would +amuse you." + +Letty was quite certain that it would not amuse her at all. However, she +assented unwillingly, and they went in to lunch. + + * * * * * + +So in the afternoon the husband and wife sallied forth. Letty felt that +she was being taken through an ordeal, and that George was rather foolish +to wish it. However, she did her best to be cheerful, and to please +George she still wore the pretty Paris frock of the morning, though it +seemed to her absurd to be trailing it through a village street with only +colliers and their wives to look at it. + +"What ill luck," said George, suddenly, as they descended their own hill, +"that that fellow Burrows should have settled down here, in one's very +pocket, like this!" + +"Yes, you had enough of him at Malford, didn't you?" said Letty. "I don't +yet understand how he comes to be here." + +George explained that about the preceding Christmas there had been, +temporarily, strong signs of decline in the Union strength of the Perth +district. A great many miners had quietly seceded; one of the periodical +waves of suspicion as to funds and management to which all trade unions +are liable had swept over the neighbourhood; and wholesale desertion from +the Union standard seemed likely. In hot haste the Central Committee +sent down Burrows as organising agent. The good fight he had made against +Tressady at the Market Malford election had given him prestige; and he +had both presence and speaking power. He had been four months at Perth, +speaking all over the district, and now, instead of leaving the Union, +the men had been crowding into it, and were just as hot--so it was +said--for a trial of strength with the masters as their comrades in other +parts of the county. + +"And before Burrows has done with us, I should say he'll have cost the +masters in this district hundreds of thousands. I call him dear at the +money!" said George, finally, with a dismal cheerfulness. + +He was really full of Burrows, and of the general news of the district +which his agent had been that morning pouring into his ear. But he had +done his best not to talk about either at luncheon. Letty had a curious +way of making the bearer of unpleasant tidings feel that it was somehow +all his own fault that things should be so; and George, even in this dawn +of marriage, was beginning, half consciously, to recognise two or three +such peculiarities of hers. + +"What I cannot understand," said Letty, vigorously, "is why such people +as Mr. Burrows are _allowed_ to go about making the mischief he does." + +George laughed, but nevertheless repressed a sudden feeling of +irritation. The inept remark of a pretty woman generally only amused him. +But this Burrows matter was beginning to touch him home. + +"You see we happen to be a free country," he said drily, "and Burrows and +his like happen to be running us just now. Maxwell & Co. are in the +shafts. Burrows sits up aloft and whips on the team. The extraordinary +thing is that nothing personal makes any difference. The people here know +perfectly well that Burrows drinks--that the woman he lives with is not +his wife--" + +"George!" cried Letty, "how _can_ you say such dreadful things!" + +"Sorry, my darling! but the world is not a nice place. He picked her up +somehow--they say she was a commercial traveller's wife--left on his +hands at a country inn. Anyway she's not divorced, and the husband's +alive. She looks like a walking skeleton, and is probably going to die. +Nevertheless they say Burrows adores her. And as for my +resentments--don't be shocked--I'm inclined to like Burrows all the +better for _that_ little affair. But then I'm not pious, like the people +here. However, they don't mind--and they don't mind the drink--and they +believe he spends their money on magnificent dinners at hotels--and they +don't mind that. They don't mind anything--they shout themselves hoarse +whenever Burrows speaks--they're as proud as Punch if he shakes hands +with them--and then they tell the most gruesome tales of him behind his +back, and like him all the better, apparently, for being a scoundrel. +Queer but true. Well, here we are--now, darling, you may expect to be +stared at!" + +For they had entered on the village street, and Ferth Magna, by some +quick freemasonry, had become suddenly conscious of the bride and +bridegroom. Here and there a begrimed man in his shirt-sleeves would +open his front door cautiously and look at them; the children and +womenkind stood boldly on the doorsteps and stared; while the people in +the little shops ran back into the street, parcels and baskets in hand. +The men working the morning shift had just come back from the pits, and +their wives were preparing to wash their blackened lords, before the +whole family sat down to tea. But both tea and ablutions were forgotten, +so long as the owner of Ferth Place and the new Lady Tressady were in +sight. The village eyes took note of everything; of the young man's +immaculate serge suit and tan waistcoat, his thin, bronzed face and fair +moustache; of the bride's grey gown, the knot of airy pink at her +throat, the coils of bright brown hair on which her hat was set, and the +buckles on her pretty shoes. Then the village retreated within doors +again; and each house buzzed and gossiped its fill. There had been a +certain amount of not very cordial response to George's salutations; but +to Letty's thinking the women had eyed her with an unpleasant and rather +hostile boldness. + +"Mary Batchelor's house is down here," said George, turning into a +side lane, not without a feeling of relief. "I hope we sha'n't find +her out--no, there she is. You can't call these people affectionate, +can you?" + +They were close on a group of three brick cottages all close together. +Their doors were all open. In one cottage a stout collier's wife was +toiling through her wash. At the door of another the sewing-machine agent +was waiting for his weekly payment; while on the threshold of the third +stood an elderly tottering woman shading her eyes from the light as she +tried to make out the features of the approaching couple. + +"Why, Mary!" said George, "you haven't forgotten me? I have brought my +wife to see you." + +And he held out his hand with a boyish kindness. + +The old woman looked at them both in a bewildered way. Her face, with its +long chin and powerful nose, was blanched and drawn, her grey hair +straggling from under her worn black-ribboned cap; and her black dress +had a neglected air, which drew George's attention. Mary Batchelor, so +long as he remembered her, whether as his old nurse, or in later days as +the Bible-woman of the village, had always been remarkable for a peculiar +dignity and neatness. + +"Mary, is there anything wrong?" he asked her, holding her hand. + +"Coom yer ways in," said the old woman, grasping his arm, and taking no +notice of Letty. "He's gone--he'll not freeten nobody--he wor here three +days afore they buried him. I could no let him go--but it's three weeks +now sen they put him away." + +"Why, Mary, what is it? Not _James_!--not your son!" said George, letting +her guide him into the cottage. + +"Aye, it's James--it's my son," she repeated drearily. "Will +yer be takkin a cheer--an perhaps"--she looked round uncertainly, +first at Letty, then at the wet floor where she had been feebly +scrubbing--"perhaps the leddy ull be sittin down. I'm nobbut in a +muddle. But I don't seem to get forard wi my work a mornins--not sen +they put im away." + +And she dropped into a chair herself, with a long sigh--forgetting her +visitors apparently--her large and bony hands, scarred with their life's +work, lying along her knees. + +George stood beside her silent a moment. + +"I hardly like to say I hadn't heard," he said at last, gently. "You'll +think I _ought_ to have heard. But I didn't know. I have been in town and +very busy." + +"Aye," said Mary, without looking up, "aye, an yer've been gettin +married. I knew as yer didn't mean nothin onkind." + +Then she stopped again--till suddenly, with a furtive gesture, she +raised her apron, and drew it across her eyes, which had the look of +perennial tears. + +On the other side of the cottage meanwhile a boy of about fourteen was +sitting. He had just done his afternoon's wash, and was resting himself +by the fire, enjoying a thumbed football almanac. He had not risen when +the visitors entered, and while his grandmother was speaking his lips +still moved dumbly, as he went on adding up the football scores. He was a +sickly, rather repulsive lad with a callous expression. + +"Let me wait outside, George," said Letty, hurriedly. + +Some instinct in her shrank from the poor mother and her story. But +George begged her to stay, and she sat down nervously by the door, trying +to protect her pretty skirt from the wet boards. + +"Will you tell me how it was?" said George, sitting down himself in front +of the bowed mother, and bending towards her. "Was it in the pit? Jamie +wasn't one of our men, I know. Wasn't it for Mr. Morrison he worked?" + +Mrs. Batchelor made a sign of assent. Then she raised her head quickly, +and a flash of some passionate convulsion passed through her face. + +"It wor John Burgess as done it," she said, staring at George. "It wor +him as took the boy's life. But he's gone himsel--so theer--I'll not say +no more. It wor Jamie's first week o hewin--he'd been a loader this three +year, an taken a turn at the hewin now an again--an five weeks sen John +Burgess--he wor butty for Mr. Morrison, yer know, in the Owd Pit--took +him on, an the lad wor arnin six an sixpence a day. An he wor that +pleased yo cud see it shinin out ov im. And it wor on the Tuesday as he +went on the afternoon shift. I saw im go, an he wor down'earted. An I +fell a cryin as he went up the street, for I knew why he wor down'earted, +an I asked the Lord to elp him. And about six o'clock they come +runnin--an they towd me there'd bin an accident, an they wor bringin +im--an he wor alive--an I must bear up. They'd found him kneelin in his +place with his arm up, an the pick in it--just as the blast had took +him--An his poor back--oh! my God--scorched off him--_scorched off him_." + +A shudder ran through her. But she recovered herself and went on, still +gazing intently at Tressady, her gaunt hand raised as though for +attention. + +"An they braat him in, an they laid him on that settle"--she pointed to +the bench by the fire--"an the doctors didn't interfere--there wor nowt +to do--they left me alone wi un. But he come to, a minute after they laid +im down--an I ses, 'Jamie, ow did it appen' an he ses, 'Mother, it wor +John Burgess--ee opened my lamp for to light hissen as had gone out--an +I don't know no more.' An then after a bit he ses, 'Mother, don't you +fret--I'm glad I'm goin--I'd got the drink in me,' he ses. An then he +give two three little breaths, as though he wor pantin--an I kiss him." + +She stopped, her face working, her trembling hands pressed hard against +each other on her knee. Letty felt the tears leap to her eyes in a rush +that startled herself. + +"An he would a bin twenty-one year old, come next August--an allus a lad +as yer couldn't help gettin fond on--not sen he were a little un. An when +he wor layin there, I ses to myself, 'He's the third as the coal-gettin +ha took from me.' An I minded my feyther an uncle--how they was braat +home both togither, when I wor nobbut thirteen years old--not a scar on +em, nobbut a little blood on my feyther's forehead--but stone dead, both +on em--from the afterdamp. Theer was thirty-six men killed in that +explosion--an I recolleck how old Mr. Morrison--Mr. Walter's father--sent +the coffins round--an how the men went on because they warn't good ones. +Not a man would go down the pit till they was changed--if a man got the +life choked out of im, they thowt the least the masters could do was to +give un a dacent coffin to lie in. But theer--nobody helped me wi +Jamie--I buried him mysel--an it wor all o the best." + +She dried her eyes again, sighing plaintively. George said what kind and +consoling things he could think of. Mary Batchelor put up her hand and +touched him on the arm as he leant over her. + +"Aye, I knew yo'd be sorry--an yor wife--" + +She turned feebly towards Letty, trying with her blurred and tear-dimmed +sight to make out what Sir George's bride might be like. She looked for a +moment at the small, elegant person in the corner,--at the sheaf of +nodding rosebuds on the hat--the bracelets--the pink cheeks under the +dainty veil,--looked with a curious aloofness, as though from a great +distance. Then, evidently, another thought struck her like a lash. She +ceased to see or think of Letty. Her grip tightened on George's arm. + +"An I'm allus thinkin," she said, with a passionate sob, "of that what he +said about the drink. He'd allus bin a sober lad, till this lasst winter +it did seem as though he cudna keep hiself from it--it kep creepin on +im--an several times lately he'd broke out very bad, pay-days--an he knew +I'd been frettin. And who was ter blame--I ast yo, or onybody--who was it +ter blame?" + +Her voice rose to a kind of cry. + +"His feyther died ov it, and his grandfeyther afore that. His +grandfeyther wor found dead i the roadside, after they'd made him +blind-drunk at owd Morse's public-house, where the butty wor reckonin +with im an his mates. But he'd never ha gone near the drink if they'd +hadn't druv him to't, for he wasn't inclined that way. But the butty as +gave him work kep the public, an if yer didn't drink, yer didn't get no +work. You must drink yoursel sick o Saturdays, or theer'd be no work for +you o Mondays. 'Noa, yer can sit at ome,' they'd say to un, 'ef yer so +damned pertickler.' I ast yor pardon, sir, for the bad word, but that's +ow they'd say it. I've often heerd owd John say as he'd a been glad to ha +given the butty back a shillin ov is pay to be let off the drink. An +Willum, that's my usband, he wor allus at it too--an the doctor towd me +one day, as Willum lay a-dyin, as it ran in the blood--an Jamie heard +im--I know he did--for I fouu im on the stairs--listenin." + +She paused again, lost in a mist of incoherent memories, the tears +falling slowly. + +After a minute's silence, George said--not indeed knowing what to +say--"We're _very_ sorry for you, Mary--my wife and I--we wish we +could do anything to help you. I am afraid it can't make any difference +to you--I expect it makes it all the worse--to think that accidents are +so much fewer--that so much has been done. And yet times are mended, +aren't they?" + +Mary made no answer. + +George sat looking at her, conscious, as he seldom was, of raw youth and +unreadiness--conscious, too, of Letty's presence in a strange, hindering +way--as of something that both blunted emotion and made one rather +ashamed to show it. + +He could only pursue the lame topic of improvement, of changed times. The +disappearance of old abuses, of "butties" and "tommy-shops"; the greater +care for life; the accident laws; the inspectors. He found himself +growing eloquent at last, yet all the time regarding himself, as it were, +from a distance--ironically. + +Mary Batchelor listened to him for a while, her head bent with something +of the submission of the old servant, till something he said roused +again the quick shudder, the look of anguished protest. + +"Aye, I dessay it's aw reet, Mr. George--I dessay it is--what yer say. +The inspectors is very cliver--an the wages is paid proper. But +theer--say what yer will! I've a son on the railway out Lichfield +way--an he's allus taakin about is long hours--they're killing im, he +says--an I allus ses to im, 'Yer may jest thank the Lord, Harry, as yer +not in the pits.' He never gets no pity out o me. An soomtimes I wakes +in the morning, an I thinks o the men, cropin away in the dark--down +theer--under me and my bed--for they do say the pits now runs right +under Ferth village--an I think to mysel--how long will it be before yo +poor fellers is laying like my Jim? Yer may be reet about the +accidents, Mr. George--but I _know_, ef yer wor to go fro house to +house i this village--it would be like tis in the Bible--I've often +thowt o them words--'_Theer was not a house_--no, nary one!--_where +there was not one dead_.'" + +She hung her head again, muttering to herself. George made out with +difficulty that she was going through one phantom scene after another--of +burning, wounds, and sudden death. One or two of the phrases--of the +fragmentary details that dropped out without name or place--made his +flesh creep. He was afraid lest Letty should hear them, and was just +putting out his hand for his hat, when Mrs. Batchelor gripped his arm +again. Her face--so white and large-featured--had the gleam of something +like a miserable smile upon it. + +"Aye, an the men theirsels ud say jest as you do. 'Lor. Mrs. Batchelor,' +they'd say, 'why, the pits is as safe as a church'--an they'd +_laff_--Jamie ud laff at me times. But it's the _women_, Mr. George, as +knows--it's the women that ave to wash the bodies." + +A great trembling ran through her again. George instinctively rose, and +motioned to Letty to go. She too rose, but she did not go. She stood by +the door, her wide grey eyes fixed with a kind of fascination on the +speaker; while behind her a ring of children could be seen in the street, +staring at the pretty lady. + +Mary Batchelor saw nothing but Tressady, whom she was still holding by +the arm--looking up to him. + +"Aye, but I didna disturb my Jamie, yer know. Noa!--I left im i the owd +coat they'd thrown over im i the pit--I dursn't ha touched is back. Noa, +I _dursn't_. But I made his shroud mysen, an I put it ower his poor +workin clothes, an I washed his face, an is hands an feet--an then I +kissed him, an I said, 'Jamie, yo mun go an tell the Lord as yo ha done +your best, an He ha dealt hardly by you!--an that's the treuth--He ha +dealt hardly by yer!'" + +She gave a loud sob, and bowed her head on her hands a moment. Then, +pushing back her grey locks from her face, she rose, struggling for +composure. + +"Aye, aye, Mr. George--aye, aye, I'll not keep yer no longer." + +But as she took his hand, she added passionately: + +"An I towd the vicar I couldn't be Bible-woman no more. Theer's somethin +broken in me sen Jamie died. I must keep things to mysen--I ain't got +nuthin good to say to others--I'm allus _grievin_ at the Lord. Good-bye +to yer--good-bye to yer." + +Her voice had grown absent, indifferent. But when George asked her, just +as they were leaving the cottage, who was the boy sitting by the fire, +her face darkened. She came hurriedly to the door with them, and said in +George's ear: + +"He's my darter's child--my darter by my first usband. His feyther an +mother are gone, an he come up from West Bromwich to live wi me. But he +isn't no comfort to me. He don't take no notice of anybody. He set like +that, with his football, when Jamie lay a-dyin. I'd as lief be shut on +him. But theer--I've got to put up wi im." + +Letty meanwhile had approached the boy and looked at him curiously. + +"Do you work in the pits too?" she asked him. + +The boy stared at her. + +"Yes," he said. + +"Do you like it?" + +He gave a rough laugh. + +"I reckon yo've got to like it," he said. And turning his back on his +questioner, he went back to his almanac. + +"Don't let us do any more visiting," said George, impatiently, as they +emerged into the main street. "I'm out of love with the village. We'll do +our blandishments another day. Let's go a little further up the valley +and get away from the houses." + +Letty assented, and they walked along the village, she looking curiously +into the open doors of the houses, by way of return for the inquisitive +attention once more lavished upon herself and George. + +"The houses are _quite_ comfortable," she said presently. "And I looked +into Mrs. Batchelor's back room while you were talking. It was just as +Mrs. Matthews said--such good carpets and curtains, two chests of +drawers, and an harmonium--and pictures--and flowers in the windows. +George! what are 'butties'?" + +"'Butties' are sub-contractors," he said absently--"men who contract with +the pit-owners to get the coal, either on a large or a small scale--now +mostly on a small scale. They engage and pay the colliers in some pits, +in others the owners deal direct." + +"And what is a 'tommy-shop'?" + +"'Tommy' is the local word for 'truck'--paying in kind instead of in +money. You see, the butties and the owners between them used to own the +public-houses and the provision-shops, and the amount of coin of the +realm the men got in wages in the bad old times was infinitesimal. They +were expected to drink the butty's beer, and consume the butty's +provisions--at the butty's prices, of course--and the butty kept the +accounts. Oh! it was an abomination! but of course it was done away with +long ago." + +"Of course it was!" said Letty, indignantly. "They never remember what's +done for them. Did you see what _excellent_ teas there were laid out in +some of the houses--and those girls with their hats smothered in +feathers? Why, I should never dream of wearing so many!" + +She was once more her quick, shrewd self. All trace of the tears that had +surprised her while Mary Batchelor was describing her son's death had +passed away. Her half-malicious eyes glanced to right and left, peering +into the secrets of the village. + +"And these are the people that talk of starving!" she said to George, +scornfully, as they emerged into the open road. "Why, anyone can see--" + +George, suddenly returned from a reverie, understood what she was saying, +and remarked, with an odd look: + +"You think their houses aren't so bad? One is always a little +surprised--don't you think?--when the poor are comfortable? One takes it +as something to one's own credit--I detect it in myself scores of times. +Well!--one seems to say--they _could_ have done without it--one might +have kept it for oneself--what a fine generous fellow I am!" + +He laughed. + +"I didn't mean that at all," said Letty, protesting. + +"Didn't you? Well, after all, darling--you see, you don't have to live in +those houses, nice as they are--and you don't have to do your own +scrubbing. Ferth may be a vile hole, but I suppose you could put a score +of these houses inside it--and I'm a pauper, but I can provide you with +two housemaids. I say, why do you walk so far away from me?" + +And in spite of her resistance, he took her hand, put it through his arm, +and held it there. + +"Look at me, darling," he said imperiously. "How _can_ anyone spy upon us +with these trees and high walls? I want to see how pretty and fresh you +look--I want to forget that poor thing and her tale. Do you know that +somewhere--far down in me--there's a sort of black pool--and when +anything stirs it up--for the moment I want to hang myself--the world +seems such an awful place! It got stirred up just now--not while she was +talking--but just as I looked back at that miserable old soul, standing +at her door. She used to be such a jolly old thing--always happy in her +Bible--and in Jamie, I suppose--quite sure that she was going to a nice +heaven, and would only have to wait a little bit, till Jamie got there +too. She seemed to know all about the Almighty's plans for herself and +everybody else. Her drunken husband was dead; my father left her a bit of +money, so did an old uncle, I believe. She'd gossip and pray and preach +with anybody. And now she'll weep and pine like that till she dies--and +she isn't sure even about heaven any more--and instead of Jamie, she's +got that oafish lad, that changeling, hung round her neck--to kick her +and ill-treat her in another year or two. Well! and do you ever think +that something like that has got to happen to all of us--something +hideous--some torture--something that'll make us wish we'd never been +born? Darling, am I a mad sort of a fool? Stop here--in the shade--give +me a kiss!" + +And he made her pause at a shady corner in the road, between two oak +copses on either hand--a river babbling at the foot of one of them. He +put his arm round her, and stooping kissed her red lips with a kind of +covetous passion. Then, still holding her, he looked out from the trees +to the upper valley with its scattered villages, its chimneys and +engine-houses. + +"It struck me--what she said of the men under our feet. They're at it +now, Letty, hewing and sweating. Why are they there, and you and I here? +I'm _precious_ glad, aren't you? But I'm not going to make believe that +there's no difference. Don't let's he hypocrites, whatever we are." + +Letty was perplexed and a little troubled. He had only shown her this +excitability once before--on that odd uncomfortable night when he made +her sit with him on the Embankment. Whenever it came it seemed to upset +her dominant impression of him. But yet it excited her too--it appealed +to something undeveloped--some yearning, protecting instinct which was +new to her. + +She suddenly put up her hand and touched his hair. + +"You talk so oddly, George. I think sometimes"--she laughed with a pretty +gaiety--"you'll go bodily over to Lady Maxwell and her 'set' some day!" + +George made a contemptuous sound. + +"May the Lord preserve us from quacks," he said lightly. "One had better +be a hypocrite. Look, little woman, there is a shower coming. Shall we +turn home?" + +They walked home, chatting and laughing. At their own front door the +butler handed George a telegram. He opened it and read: + +"Must come down to consult you on important business--shall arrive at +Perth about 9.30.--Amelia Tressady." + +Letty, who was looking over George's shoulder, gave a little cry +of dismay. + +Then, to avoid the butler's eyes and ears, they turned hurriedly into +George's smoking-room which opened off the hall, and shut the door. + +"George! she has come to get more money out of you!" cried Letty, anger +and annoyance written in every line of her little frowning face. + +"Well, darling, she can't get blood out of a stone!" said George, +crushing the telegram in his hand and throwing it away. "It is a little +too bad of my mother, I think, to spoil our honeymoon time like this. +However, it can't be helped. Will you tell them to get her room ready?" + + + + +CHAPTER IX + + +"Now, my dear George! I do think I may claim at least that you should +remember I am your _mother_!"--the speaker raised a fan from her knee, +and used it with some vehemence. "Of course I can't help seeing that you +don't treat me as you ought to do. I don't want to complain of Letty--I +daresay she was taken by surprise--but all I can say as to her reception +of me last night is, that it wasn't pretty--that's all; it wasn't +_pretty_. My room felt like an ice-house--Justine tells me nobody has +slept there for months--and no fire until just the moment I arrived; +and--and no flowers on the dressing-table--no little _attentions_, in +fact. I can only say it was not what I am accustomed to. My feelings +overcame me; that poor dear Justine will tell you what a state she found +me in. She cried herself, to see me so upset." + +Lady Tressady was sitting upright on the straight-backed sofa of +George's smoking-room. George, who was walking up and down the room, +thought, with discomfort, as he glanced at her from time to time, that +she looked curiously old and dishevelled. She had thrown a piece of +white lace round her head, in place of the more elaborate preparation +for the world's gaze that she was wont to make. Her dress--a study in +purples--had been a marvel, but was now old, and even tattered; the +ruffles at her wrist were tumbled; and the pencilling under her still +fine eyes had been neglected. George, between his wife's dumb anger and +his mother's folly, had passed through disagreeable times already since +Lady Tressady's arrival, and was now once more endeavouring to get to +the bottom of her affairs. + +"You forget, mother," he said, in answer to Lady Tressady's complaint, +"that the house is not mounted for visitors, and that you gave us very +short notice." + +Nevertheless he winced inwardly as he spoke at the thought of Letty's +behaviour the night before. + +Lady Tressady bridled. + +"We will not discuss it, if you please," she said, with an attempt at +dignity. "I should have thought that you and Letty might have known I +should not have broken in on your honeymoon without most _pressing_ +reasons. George!"--her voice trembled, she put her lace handkerchief to +her eyes--"I am an unfortunate and miserable woman, and if you--my own +darling son--don't come to my rescue, I--I don't know what I may be +driven to do!" + +George took the remark calmly, having probably heard it before. He went +on walking up and down. + +"It's no good, mother, dealing in generalities, I am afraid. You promised +me this morning to come to business. If you will kindly tell me at once +what is the matter, and what is the _figure_, I shall be obliged to you." + +Lady Tressady hesitated, the lace on her breast fluttering. Then, in +desperation, she confessed herself first reluctantly, then in a torrent. + +During the last two years, then, she said, she had been trying her luck +for the first time in--well, in speculation! + +"Speculation!" said George, looking at her in amazement. "In what?" + +Lady Tressady tried again to preserve her dignity. She had been +investing, she said--trying to increase her income on the Stock Exchange. +She had done it quite as much for George's sake as her own, that she +might improve her position a little, and be less of a burden upon him. +Everybody did it! Several of her best women-friends were as clever at it +as any man, and often doubled their allowances for the year. She, of +course, had done it under the _best_ advice. George knew that she had +friends in the City who would do anything--positively _anything_--for +her. But somehow-- + +Then her tone dropped. Her foot in its French shoe began to fidget on the +stool before her. + +Somehow, she had got into the hands of a reptile--there! No other word +described the creature in the least--a sort of financial agent, who had +treated her unspeakably, disgracefully. She had trusted him implicitly, +and the result was that she now owed the reptile who, on the strength of +her name, her son, and her aristocratic connections, had advanced her +money for these adventures, a sum-- + +"Well, the truth is I am afraid to say what it is," said Lady Tressady, +allowing herself for once a cry of nature, and again raising a shaky hand +to her eyes. + +"How much?" said George, standing over her, cigarette in hand. + +"Well--four thousand pounds!" said Lady Tressady, her eyes blinking +involuntarily as she looked up at him. + +"_Four thousand pounds!_" exclaimed George. "Preposterous!" + +And, raising his hand, he flung his cigarette violently into the fire and +resumed his walk, hands thrust into his pockets. + +Lady Tressady looked tearfully at his long, slim figure as he walked +away, conscious, however, even at this agitated moment, of the quick +thought that he had inherited some of her elegance. + +"George!" + +"Yes--wait a moment--mother"--he faced round upon her decidedly. "Let me +tell you at once, that at the present moment it is quite impossible for +me to find that sum of money." + +Lady Tressady flushed passionately like a thwarted child. + +"Very well, then," she said--"very well. Then it will be bankruptcy--and +I hope you and Letty will like the scandal!" + +"So he threatens bankruptcy?" + +"Do you think I should have come down here except for something like +that?" she cried. "Look at his letters!" + +And she took a tumbled roll out of the bag on her arm and gave it to him. +George threw himself into a chair, and tried to get some idea of the +correspondence; while Lady Tressady kept up a stream of plaintive chatter +he could only endeavour not to hear. + +As far as he could judge on a first inspection, the papers concerned a +long series of risky transactions,--financial gambling of the most +pronounced sort,--whereof the few gains had been long since buried deep +in scandalous losses. The outrageous folly of some of the ventures and +the magnitude of the sums involved made him curse inwardly. It was the +first escapade of the kind he could remember in his mother's history, +and, given her character, he could only regard it as adding a new and +real danger to his life and Letty's. + +Then another consideration struck him. + +"How on earth did you come to know so much about the ins and outs of +Stock Exchange business," he asked her suddenly, with surprise, in the +midst of his reading. "You never confided in me. I never supposed you +took an interest in such things." + +In truth, he would have supposed her mentally incapable of the kind of +gambling finance these papers bore witness of. She had never been known +to do a sum or present an account correctly in her life; and he had +often, in his own mind, accepted her density in these directions as a +certain excuse for her debts. Yet this correspondence showed here and +there a degree of financial legerdemain of which any City swindler +might have been proud--so far, at least, as he could judge from his +hasty survey. + +Lady Tressady drew herself up sharply in answer to his remark, though not +without a flutter of the eyelids which caught his attention. + +"Of course, my dear George, I always knew you thought your mother a +fool. As a matter of fact, all my friends tell me that I have a _very_ +clear head." + +George could not restrain, himself from laughing aloud. + +"In face of this?" he said, holding up the final batch of letters, which +contained Mr. Shapetsky's last formidable account; various imperious +missives from a "sharp-practice" solicitor, whose name happened to be +disreputably known to George Tressady; together with repeated and most +explicit assurances on the part both of agent and lawyer, that if +arrangements were not made at once by Lady Tressady for meeting at least +half Mr. Shapetsky's bill--which had now been running some eighteen +months--and securing the other half, legal steps would be taken +immediately. + +Lady Tressady at first met her son's sarcasm in angry silence, then broke +into shrill denunciation of Shapetsky's "villanies." How could decent +people, people in society, protect themselves against such creatures! + +George walked to the window, and stood looking out into the April garden. +Presently he turned, and interrupted his mother. + +"I notice, mother, that these transactions have been going on for nearly +two years. Do you remember, when I gave you that large sum at Christmas, +you said it would 'all but' clear you; and when I gave you another large +sum last month, you professed to be entirely cleared? Yet all the time +you were receiving these letters, and you owed this fellow almost as +much as you do now. Do you think it was worth while to mislead me in +that way?" + +He stood leaning against the window, his fingers drumming on the sill. +The contrast between the youth of the figure and the absence of youth in +face and voice was curious. Perhaps Lady Tressady felt vaguely that he +looked like a boy and spoke like a master, for her pride rose. + +"You have no right to speak to me like that, George! I did everything for +the best. I always do everything for the best. It is my misfortune to be +so--so confiding, so hopeful. I must always believe in someone--that's +what makes my friends so _extremely_ fond of me. You and your poor +darling father were never the least like me--" And she went off into a +tearful comparison between her own character and the characters of her +husband and son--in which of course it was not she that suffered. + +George did not heed her. He was once more staring out of window, thinking +hard. So far as he could see, the money, or the greater part of it, would +have to be found. The man, of course, was a scoundrel, but of the sort +that keeps within the law; and Lady Tressady's monstrous folly had given +him an easy prey. When he thought of the many sacrifices he had made for +his mother, of her ample allowance, her incorrigible vanity and +greed--and then of the natural desires of his young wife--his heart +burned within him. + +"Well, I can only tell you," he said at last, turning round upon her, +"that I see no way out. How is that man's claim to be met? I don't know. +Even if I _could_ meet it--which I see no chance of doing--by crippling +myself for some time, how should I be at liberty to do it? My wife and +her needs have now the first claim upon me." + +"Very well," said Lady Tressady, proudly, raising her handkerchief, +however, to hide her trembling lips. + +"Let me remind you," he continued, ceremoniously, "that the whole of this +place is in bad condition, except the few rooms we have just done up, and +that money _must_ be spent upon it--it is only fair to Letty that it +should be spent. Let me remind you also, that you are a good deal +responsible for this state of things." + +Lady Tressady moved uneasily. George was now speaking in his usual +half-nonchalant tone, and he had provided himself with another cigarette. +But his eye held her. + +"You will remember that you promised me while I was abroad to live here +and look after the house. I arranged money affairs with you, and other +affairs, upon that basis. But it appears that during the four years I was +away you were here altogether, at different times, about three months. +Yet you made me believe you were here; if I remember right, you dated +your letters from here. And of course, in four years, an old house that +is totally neglected goes to the bad." + +"Who has been telling you such falsehoods?" cried Lady Tressady. "I was +here a great deal more than that--a great deal more!" + +But the scarlet colour, do what she would, was dyeing her still delicate +skin, and her eyes alternately obstinate and shuffling, tried to take +themselves out of the range of George's. + +As for George, as he stood there coolly smoking, he was struck--or, +rather, the critical mind in him was struck--by a sudden perception of +the meanness of aspect which sordid cares of the kind his mother was now +plunged in can give to the human face. He felt the rise of a familiar +disgust. How many scenes of ugly battle over money matters could he not +remember in his boyhood between his father and mother! And later--in +India--what things he had known women do for money or dress! He thought +scornfully of a certain intriguing lady of his acquaintance at +Madras--who had borrowed money of him--to whom he had given ball-dresses; +and of another, whose selfish extravagance had ruined one of the best of +men. Did all women tend to be of this make, however poetic might be their +outward seeming? + +Aloud, he said quietly, in answer to his mother's protest: + +"I think you will find that is about accurate. I mention it merely to +show you how it is that I find myself now plunged in so many expenses. +And, now, doesn't it strike you as a _little_ hard that I should be +called upon to strip and cripple myself still further--_not_ to give my +wife the comforts and conveniences I long to give her, but to pay such +debts as those?" + +Involuntarily he struck his hand on the papers lying in the chair where +he had been sitting. + +Lady Tressady, too, rose from her seat. + +"George, if you are going to be _violent_ towards your mother, I had +better go," she said, with an attempt at dignity. "I suppose Letty has +been gossiping with her servants about me. Oh! I knew what to expect!" +cried Lady Tressady, gathering up fan and handkerchief from the sofa +behind her with a hand that shook. "I always said from the beginning that +she would set you against me! She has never treated me as--as a +daughter--never! And that is my weakness--I must be cared for--I must be +treated with--with tenderness." + +"I wouldn't give way, mother, if I were you," said George, quite +unmoved by the show of tears. "I think, if you will reflect upon it, +that it is Letty and I who have the most cause to give way. If you will +allow me, I will go and have a talk with her. I believe she is sitting +in the garden." + +His mother turned sullenly away from him, and he left the room. + + * * * * * + +As he passed through the long oak-panelled hall that led to the garden, +he was seized with an odd sense of pity for himself. This odious scene +behind him, and now this wrestle with Letty that must be gone +through--were these the joys of the honeymoon? + +Letty was not in the garden. But as he passed into the wood on the +farther side of the hill he saw her sitting under a tree halfway down the +slope, with some embroidery in her hand. The April sun was shining into +the wood. A larch beyond Letty was already green, and the twigs of the +oak beneath which she sat made a reddish glow in the bright air. Patches +of primroses and anemones starred the ground about her, and trails of +periwinkle touched her dress. She was stooping, and her little hand went +rapidly--impatiently--to and fro. + +The contrast between this fresh youth amid the spring and that unlovely, +reluctant age he had just left behind him in the smoking-room struck him +sharply. His brow cleared. + +As she heard his step she looked round eagerly. "Well?" she said, +pushing aside her work. + +He threw himself down beside her. + +"Darling, I have had my talk. It is pretty bad--worse than we had even +imagined!" + +Then he told her his mother's story. She could hardly contain herself, as +she listened, as he mentioned the total figure of the debts. It was +evidently with difficulty that she prevented herself from interrupting +him at every word. And when he had barely finished she broke out: + +"And what did you say?" + +George hesitated. + +"I told her, of course, that it was monstrous and absurd to expect that +we could pay such a sum." + +Letty's breath came fast. His voice and manner did not satisfy her at +all. + +"Monstrous? I should think it was! Do you know how she has run up +this debt?" + +George looked at her in surprise. Her little face was quivering under the +suppressed energy of what she was going to say. + +"No!--do you?" + +"Yes!--I know all about it. I said to my maid last night--I hope, George, +you won't mind, but you know Grier has been an age with me, and knows all +my secrets--I told her she must make friends with your mother's maid, and +see what she could find out. I felt we _must_, in self-defence. And of +course Grier got it all out of Justine. I knew she would! Justine is a +little fool; and she doesn't mean to stay much longer with Lady Tressady, +so she didn't mind speaking. It is exactly as I supposed! Lady Tressady +didn't begin speculating for herself at all--but for--somebody--else! Do +you remember that absurd-looking singer who gave a 'musical sketch' one +day that your mother gave a party in Eccleston Square--in February?" + +She looked at him with eagerness, an ugly, half-shrinking innuendo in her +expression. + +George had suddenly moved away, and was sitting now some little distance +from his wife, his eyes bent on the ground. However, at her question he +made a sign of assent. + +"You do remember? Well," said Letty, triumphantly, "it is he who is at +the bottom of it all. I _knew_ there must be somebody. It appears that he +has been getting money out of her for years--that he used to come and +spend hours, when she had that little house in Bruton Street, when you +were away--I don't believe you ever heard of it--flattering her, and +toadying her, paying her compliments on her dress and her appearance, +fetching and carrying for her--and of course living upon her! He used to +arrange all her parties. Justine says that he used even to make her order +all his favourite wines--_such_ bills as there used to be for wine! He +has a wife and children somewhere, and of course the whole family lived +upon your mother. It was he made her begin speculating. Justine says he +has lost all he ever had himself that way, and your mother couldn't, in +fact, '_lend'_ him"--Letty laughed scornfully--"money fast enough. It was +he brought her across that odious creature Shapetsky--isn't that his +name? And that's the whole story. If there have been any gains, he has +made off with them--leaving her, of course, to get out of the rest. +Justine says that for months there was nothing but business, as she calls +it, talked in the house--and she knew, for she used to help wait at +dinner. And such a crew of people as used to be about the place!" + +She looked at him, struck at last by his silence and his attitude, or +pausing for some comment, some appreciation of her cleverness in +ferreting it all out. + +But he did not speak, and she was puzzled. The angry triumph in her eyes +faltered. She put out her hand and touched him on the arm. + +"What is it, George? I thought--it would be more satisfactory to us both +to know the truth." + +He looked up quickly. + +"And all this your maid got out of Justine? You asked her?" + +She was struck, offended, by his expression. It was so cool and +strange--even, she could have imagined, contemptuous. + +"Yes, I did," she said passionately. "I thought I was quite justified. We +must protect ourselves." + +He was silent again. + +"I think," he said at last, drily, she watching him--"I think we will +keep Justine and Grier out of it, if you please." + +She took her work, and laid it down again, her mouth trembling. + +"So you had rather be deceived?" + +"I had rather be deceived than listen behind doors," he said, beginning +in a light tone, which, however, passed immediately into one of +bitterness. "Besides, there is nothing new. For people like my mother +there is always some adventurer or adventuress in the background--there +always used to be in old days. She never meant any serious harm; she was +first plundered, then we. My father used to be for ever turning some +impostor or other out of doors. Now I suppose it is my turn." + +This time it was Letty who kept silence. Her needle passed rapidly to and +fro. George glanced at her queerly. Then he rose and came to stand near +her, leaning against the tree. + +"You know, Letty, we shall have to pay that money," he said suddenly, +pulling at his moustache. + +Letty made an exclamation under her breath, but went on working faster +than before. + +He slipped down to the moss beside her, and caught her hand. + +"Are you angry with me?" + +"If you insult me by accusing me of listening behind doors you can't +wonder," said Letty, snatching her hand away, her breast heaving. + +He felt a bitter inclination to laugh, but he restrained it, and did +his best to make peace. In the midst of his propitiations Letty +turned upon him. + +"Of course, I know you think I did it all for selfishness," she said, +half crying, "because I want new furniture and new dresses. I don't; I +want to protect you from being--being--plundered like this. How can you +do what you ought as a member of Parliament? how can we ever keep +ourselves out of debt if--if--? How _can_ you pay this money?" she wound +up, her eyes flaming. + +"Well, you know," he said, hesitating--"you know I suggested yesterday +we should sell some land to do up the house. I am afraid we must sell the +laud, and pay this scoundrel--a proportion, at all events. Of course, +what I should _like_ to do would be to put him--and the other--to instant +death, with appropriate tortures! Short of that, I can only take the +matter out of my mother's hands, get a sharp solicitor on my side to +match _his_ rascal, and make the best bargain I can." + +Letty rolled up her work with energy, two tears of anger on her cheeks. +"She _ought_ to suffer!" she cried, her voice trembling--"she _ought_ +to suffer!" + +"You mean that we ought to let her be made a bankrupt?" he said coolly. +"Well, no doubt it would be salutary. Only, I am afraid it would be +rather more disagreeable to us than to her. Suppose we consider the +situation. Two young married people--charming house--charming +wife--husband just beginning in politics--people inclined to be friends. +Then you go to dine with them in Brook Street--excellent little French +dinner--bride bewitching. Next morning you see the bankruptcy of the +host's mamma in the 'Times.' 'And he's the only son, isn't he?--he must +be well off. They say she's been dreadfully extravagant. But, hang it! +you know, a man's mother!--and a widow--no, I can't stand that. Sha'n't +dine with them again!' There! do you see, darling? Do you really want to +rub all the bloom off the peach?" + +He had hardly finished his little speech before the odiousness of it +struck himself. + +"Am I come to talking to her like _this_?" he asked himself in a kind of +astonishment. + +But Letty, apparently, was not astonished. + +"Everybody would understand if you refused to ruin yourself by going on +paying these frightful debts. I am sure _something_ could be done," she +said, half choked. + +George shook his head. + +"But everybody wouldn't want to understand. The dear world loves a +scandal--doesn't really _like_ being amiable to newcomers at all. You +would make a bad start, dear--and all the world would pity mamma." + +"Oh! if you are only thinking what people would say," cried Letty. + +"No," said George, reflectively, but with a mild change of tone. "Damn +people! I can pull myself to pieces so much better than they can. You +see, darling, you're such an optimist. Now, if you'd only just believe, +as I do, that the world is a radically bad place, you wouldn't be so +surprised when things of this sort happen. Eh, little person, has it been +a radically bad place this last fortnight?" + +He laid his cheek against her shoulder, rubbing it gently up and down. +But something hard and scornful lay behind his caress--something he did +not mean to inquire into. + +"Then you told your mother," said Letty, after a pause, still looking +straight before her, "that you would clear her?" + +"Not at all. I said we could do nothing. I laid it on about the house. +And all the time I knew perfectly well in my protesting soul, that if +this man's claim is sustainable we should _have_ to pay up. And I imagine +that mamma knew it too. You can get out of anybody's debts but your +mother's--that's apparently what it comes to. Queer thing, civilisation! +Well now"--he sprang to his feet--"let's go and get it over." + +Letty also rose. + +"I can't see her again," she said quickly. "I sha'n't come down to lunch. +Will she go by the three-o'clock train?" + +"I will arrange it," said George. + +They walked through the wood together silently. As they came in sight of +the house Letty's face quivered again with restrained passion--or tears. +George, whose _sangfroid_ was never disturbed outwardly for long, had by +now resigned himself, and had, moreover, recovered that tolerance of +woman's various weaknesses which was in him the fruit of a wide, and at +bottom hostile, induction. He set himself to cheer her up. Perhaps, after +all, if he could sell a particular piece of land which he owned near a +neighbouring large town, and sell it well,--he had had offers for it +before,--he might be able to clear his mother, and still let Letty work +her will on the house. She mustn't take a gloomy view of things--he would +do his best. So that by the time they got into the drawing-room she had +let her hand slip doubtfully into his again for a moment. + +But nothing would induce her to appear at lunch. Lady Tressady, having +handed over all Shapetsky's papers and all her responsibilities to +George, graciously told him that she could understand Letty's annoyance, +and didn't wish for a moment to intrude upon her. She then called on +Justine to curl her hair, put on a blue shot silk with marvellous pink +fronts just arrived from Paris, and came down to lunch with her son in +her most smiling mood. She took no notice of his monosyllables, and in +the hall, while the butler discreetly retired, she kissed him with tears, +saying that she had always known his generosity would come to the rescue +of his poor darling mamma. + +"You will oblige me, mother, by not trying it again too soon," was +George's ironical reply as he put her into the carriage. + + * * * * * + +In the afternoon Letty was languid and depressed. She would not talk on +general topics, and George shrank in nervous disgust from reopening the +subjects of the morning. Finally, she chose to be tucked up on the sofa +with a novel, and gave George free leave to go out. + +It surprised him to find as he walked quickly down the hill, delighting +in the April sun, that he was glad to be alone. But he did not in the +least try to fling the thought away from him, as many a lover would have +done. The events, the feelings of the day, had been alike jarring and +hateful; he meant to escape from them. + +But he could not escape from them all at once. A fresh and unexpected +debt of somewhere about four thousand pounds does not sit lightly on a +comparatively poor man. In spite of his philosophy for Letty's benefit, +he must needs harass himself anew about his money affairs, planning and +reckoning. How many more such surprises would his mother spring upon +him--and how was he to control her? He realised now something of the +life-long burden his dull old father had borne--a burden which the +absences of school, college, and travel had hitherto spared himself. What +was he to appeal to in her? There seemed to be nothing--neither will nor +conscience. She was like the women without backs in the fairy-tale. + +Then, with one breath he said to himself that he must kick out that +singer-fellow, and with the next, that he would not touch any of his +mother's crew with a barge-pole. Though he never pleaded ideals in +public, he had been all his life something of a moral epicure, taking +"moral" as relating rather to manners than to deeper things. He had done +his best not to soil himself by contact with certain types--among men +especially. Of women he was less critical and less observant. + +As to this ugly feud opening between his mother and his wife, it had +quite ceased to amuse him. Now that his marriage was a reality, the daily +corrosion of such a thing was becoming plain. And who was there in the +world to bear the brunt of it but he? He saw himself between the +two--eternally trying to make peace--and his face lengthened. + +And if Letty would only leave the thing to him!--would only keep her +little white self out of it! He wished he could get her to send away that +woman Grier--a forward second-rate creature, much too ready to meddle in +what did not concern her. + +Then, with a shake of his thin shoulders, he passionately drove it all +out of his thoughts. + +Let him go to the village, sound the feeling there if he could, and do +his employer's business. His troubles as a pit-owner seemed likely to be +bad enough, but they did not canker one like domestic miseries. They were +a man's natural affairs; to think of them came as a relief to him. + + * * * * * + +He had but a disappointing round, however. + +In the first place he went to look up some of the older "hewers," men who +had been for years in the employ of the Tressadys. Two or three of them +had just come back from the early shift, and their wives, at any rate, +were pleased and flattered by George's call. But the men sat like stocks +and stones while he talked. Scarcely a word could be got out of them, and +George felt himself in an atmosphere of storm, guessing at dangers, +everywhere present, though not yet let loose--like the foul gases in the +pits under his feet. + +He behaved with a good deal of dignity, stifling his pride here and there +sufficiently to talk simply and well of the general state of trade, the +conditions of the coal industry in the West Mercian district, the +position of the masters, the published accounts of one or two large +companies in the district, and so on. But in the end he only felt his own +auger rising in answer to the sullenness of the men. Their sallow faces +and eyes weakened by long years of the pit expressed little--but what +there was spelt war. + +Nor did his visits to what might be called his own side give him much +more satisfaction. + +One man, a brawny "fireman," whom George had been long taught to regard +as one of the props of law and order in the district, was effusively and +honestly glad to see his employer. His wife hurried the tea, and George +drank and ate as heartily as his own luncheon would let him in company +with Macgregor and his very neat and smiling family. Nothing could be +more satisfactory than Macgregor's general denunciations of the Union and +its agent. Burrows, in his opinion, was a "drunken, low-livin scoundrel," +who got his bread by making mischief; the Union was entering upon a great +mistake in resisting the masters' proposals; and if it weren't for the +public-house and idleness there wasn't a man in Perth that couldn't live +_well_, ten per cent. reduction and all considered. Nevertheless, he did +not conceal his belief that battle was approaching, and would break out, +if not now, at any rate in the late summer or autumn. Times, too, were +going to be specially bad for the non-society men. The membership of the +Union had been running up fast; there had been a row that very morning at +the pit where he worked, the Union men refusing to go down in the same +cage with the blacklegs. He and his mates would have to put their backs +into it. Never fear but they would! Bullying might be trusted only to +make them the more "orkard." + +Nothing could have been more soothing than such talk to the average +employer in search of congenial opinions. But George was not the average +employer, and the fastidious element in him began soon to make him +uncomfortable. Sobriety is, no doubt, admirable, but he had no sooner +detected a teetotal cant in his companion than that particular axiom +ceased to matter to him. And to think poorly of Burrows might be a +salutary feature in a man's character, but it should be for some +respectable reason. George fidgeted on his chair while Macgregor told +the usual cock-and-bull stories of monstrous hotel-bills seen sticking +out of Burrows's tail-pockets, and there deciphered by a gaping +populace; and his mental discomfort reached its climax when Macgregor +wound up with the remark: + +"And _that_, Sir George, is where the money goes to!--not to the poor +starving women and children, I can tell yer, whose husbands are keepin +him in luxury. I've always said it. _Where's the accounts?_ I've never +seen no balance-sheet--_never!_" he repeated solemnly. They do say as +there's one to be seen at the 'lodge'--" + +"Why, of course there is, Macgregor," said George, with a nervous laugh, +as he got up to depart; "all the big Unions publish their accounts." + +The fireman's obstinate mouth and stubbly hair only expressed a more +pronounced scepticism. + +"Well, I shouldn't believe in em," he said, "if they did. I've niver seen +a balance-sheet, and I don't suppose I ever shall. Well, good-bye to you, +Sir George, and thank you kindly. Yo take my word, sir, if it weren't for +the public-house the men could afford to lose a trifle now and again to +let the masters make their fair profit!" + +And he looked behind him complacently at his neat cottage and +well-clothed children. + +But George walked away, impatient. + +"_His_ wages won't go down, anyway," he said to himself--for the wages of +the "firemen," whose work is of the nature of superintendence, hardly +vary with the state of trade. "And what suspicious idiocy about the +accounts!" + +His last visit was the least fortunate of any. The fireman in question, +Mark Dowse, Macgregor's chief rival in the village, was a keen Radical, +and George found him chuckling over his newspaper, and the defeat of the +Tory candidate in a recently decided County Council election. He received +his visitor with a surprise which George thought not untinged with +insolence. Some political talk followed, in which Dowse's Yorkshire wit +scored more than once at his employer's expense. Dowse, indeed, let +himself go. He was on the point of taking the examination for an +under-manager's certificate and leaving the valley. Hence there were no +strong reasons for servility, and he might talk as he pleased to a young +"swell" who had sold himself to reaction. George lost his temper +somewhat, was furiously ashamed of himself, and could only think of +getting out of the man's company with dignity. + +He was by no means clear, however, as he walked away from the cottage, +that he had succeeded in doing so. What was the good of trying to make +friends with these fellows? Neither in agreement nor in opposition had +he any common ground with them. Other people might have the gifts for +managing them; it seemed to him that it would be better for him to +take up the line at once that he had none. Fontenoy was right. Nothing +but a state of enmity was possible--veiled enmity at some times, open +at others. + +What were those voices on the slope above him? + +He was walking along a road which skirted his own group of pits. To his +left rose a long slope of refuse, partly grown over, ending in the "bank" +whereon stood the engine-house and winding-apparatus. A pathway climbed +the slope and made the natural ascent to the pit for people dwelling in +the scattered cottages on the farther side of it. + +Two men, he saw, were standing high up on the pathway, violently +disputing. One was Madan, his own manager, an excellent man of business +and a bitter Tory. The other was Valentine Burrows. + +As Tressady neared the road-entrance to the pathway the two men parted. +Madan climbed on towards the pit. Burrows ran down the path. + +As he approached the gate, and saw Tressady passing on the road, the +agent called: + +"Sir George Tressady!" + +George stopped. + +Burrows came quickly up to him, his face crimson. + +"Is it by your orders, Sir George, that Mr. Madan insults and browbeats +me when he meets me on a perfectly harmless errand to one of the men in +your engine-house?" + +"Perhaps Mr. Madan was not so sure as you were, Mr. Burrows, that the +errand _was_ a harmless one," said George, with a cool smile. + +By this time, however, Burrows was biting his lip, and very conscious +that he had made an impulsive mistake. + +"Don't imagine for a moment," he said hotly, "that Madan's opinion of +anything I may be doing matters one brass farthing to me! Only I give you +and him fair warning that if he blackguards me again in the way he has +done several times lately, I shall have him bound over." + +"He might survive it," said George. "But how will you manage it? You have +had ill-luck, rather, with the magistrates--haven't you?" + +He stood drawn up to his full height, thin, venomous, alert, rather +enjoying the encounter, which "let off the steam" of his previous +irritations. + +Burrows threw him a furious look. + +"You think that a damaging thing to say, do you, Sir George? Perhaps the +day will come--not so far off, neither--when the magistrates will be no +longer your creatures, but ours. Then we shall see!" + +"Well, prophecy is cheap," said George. "Console yourself with it, by +all means." + +The two men measured each other eye to eye. + +Then, unexpectedly, after the relief of his outburst, the philosopher's +instincts which were so oddly interwoven with the rest of Tressady's +nature reasserted themselves. + +"Look here," he said, in another manner, advancing a step. "I think this +is all great nonsense. If Madan has exceeded his duty, I will see to it. +And, meanwhile, don't you think it would be more worthy of us, as a +couple of rational beings, if, now we have met, we had a few serious +words on the state of things in this valley? You and I fought a square +fight at Malford--you at least said as much. Why can't we fight a square +fight here?" + +Burrows eyed him doubtfully. He was leaning on his stick, recovering +breath and composure. George noticed that since the Malford election, +even he had lost youth and looks. He had the drunkard's skin and the +drunkard's eyes. Yet there were still the make and proportions of the +handsome athlete. He was now a man of about thirty-two; but in his first +youth he had carried the miner's pick for some four or five years, and +during the same period had been one of the most famous football-players +of the county. As George knew, he was still the idol of the local clubs, +and capable in his sober spells of amazing feats both of strength and +endurance. + +"Well, I have no objection to some conversation with you," said Burrows, +at last, slowly. + +"Let's walk on, then," said George. + +And they walked past the gate of Ferth, towards the railway-station, +which was some two miles off. + +About an hour later the two men returned along the same road. Both had an +air of tension; both were rather pale. + +"Well, it comes to this," said George, as he stopped beside his own gate, +"you believe our case--the badness of trade, the disappearance of +profits, pressure of contracts, and all the rest of it--and you still +refuse on your part to bear the smallest fraction of the burden? You will +claim all you can get in good times--you will give back nothing in bad?" + +"That is so," said Burrows, deliberately; "that is so, _precisely_. We +will take no risks; we give our labour and in return the workman must +live. Make the consumer pay, or pay yourselves out of your good +years"--he turned imperceptibly towards the barrack-like house on the +hill. "We don't care a ha'porth which it is!--only don't you come on +the man who risks his life, and works like a galley-slave five days a +week for a pittance of five-and-twenty shillings, or thereabouts, to +pay--for he _won't_. He's tired of it. Not till you starve him into it, +at any rate!" + +George laughed. + +"One of the best men in the village has been giving me his opinion this +afternoon that there isn't a man in that place"--he pointed to it--"that +couldn't live, and live well--aye, and take the masters' terms +to-morrow--but for the drink!" + +His keen look ran over Burrows from head to foot. + +"And I know who _that_ is," said Burrows, with a sneer. "Well, I can tell +you what the rest of the men in that place think, and it's this: that the +man in that village who _doesn't_ drink is a mean skunk, who's betraying +his own flesh and blood to the capitalists! Oh! you may preach at us till +you're black in the face, but drink we _shall_ till we get the control of +our own labour. For, look here! Directly we cease to drink--directly we +become good boys on your precious terms--the standard of life falls, down +come wages, and _you_ sweep off our beer-money to spend on your +champagne. Thank you, Sir George! but we're not such fools as we +look--and that don't suit us! Good-day to you." + +And he haughtily touched his hat in response to George's movement, and +walked quickly away. + + * * * * * + +George slowly mounted his own hill. The chequered April day was +declining, and the dipping sun was flooding the western plain with quiet +light. Rooks were circling round the hill, filling the air with +long-drawn sound. A cuckoo was calling on a tree near at hand, and the +evening was charged with spring scents--scents of leaf and grass, of +earth and rain. Below, in an oak copse across the road, a stream rushed; +and from a distance came the familiar rattle and thud of the pits. + +George stood still a moment under a ragged group of Scotch firs--one of +the few things at Ferth that he loved--and gazed across the Cheshire +border to the distant lines of Welsh hills. The excitement of his talk +with Burrows was subsiding, leaving behind it the obstinate resolve of +the natural man. He should tell his uncles there was nothing for it but +to fight it out. Some blood must be let; somebody must be master. + +What poor limited fools, after all, were the best of the working men--how +incapable of working out any serious problem, of looking beyond their own +noses and the next meal! Was he to spend his life in chronic battle with +them--a set of semi-civilised barbarians--his countrymen in nothing but +the name? And for what cause--to what cry? That he might defend against +the toilers of this wide valley a certain elegant house in Brook Street, +and find the means to go on paying his mother's debts?--such debts as he +carried the evidence of, at that moment, in his pocket. + +Suddenly there swept over his mind with pricking force the thought of +Mary Batchelor at her door, blind with weeping and pain--of the poor boy, +dead in his prime. Did those two figures stand for the _realities_ at +the base of things--the common labours, affections, agonies, which +uphold the world? + +His own life looked somehow poor and mean to him as he turned back to it. +The Socialist of course--Burrows--would say that he and Letty and his +mother were merely living, and dressing, and enjoying themselves, paying +butlers, and starting carriages out of the labour and pain of +others--that Jamie Batchelor and his like risked and brutalised their +strong young lives that Lady Tressady and her like might "jig and amble" +through theirs. + +Pure ignorant fanaticism, no doubt! But he was not so ready as usual to +shelter himself under the big words of controversy. Fontenoy's favourite +arguments had momentarily no savour for a kind of moral nausea. + +"I begin to see it was a 'cursed spite' that drove me into the business +at all," he said to himself, as he stood under the trees. + +What he was really suffering from was an impatience of new +conditions--perhaps surprise that he was not more equal to them. Till his +return home--till now, almost--he had been an employer and a coal-owner +by proxy. Other people had worked for him, had solved his problems for +him. Then a transient impulse had driven him home--made him accept +Fontenoy's offer--worse luck!--at least, Letty apart! The hopefulness and +elation about himself, his new activities, and his Parliamentary +prospects, that had been his predominant mood in London seemed to him at +this moment of depression mere folly. What he really felt, he declared to +himself, was a sort of cowardly shrinking from life and its tests--the +recognition that at bottom he was a weakling, without faiths, without +true identity. + +Then the quick thought-process, as it flowed on, told him that there are +two things that protect men of his stamp from their own lack of moral +stamina: perpetual change of scene, that turns the world into a +spectacle--and love. He thought with hunger of his travel-years; holding +away from him, as it were, for a moment the thought of his marriage. + +But only for a moment. It was but a few weeks since a woman's life had +given itself wholly into his hands. He was still thrilling under the +emotion and astonishment of it. Tender, melting thoughts flowed upon him. +His little Letty! Had he ever thought her perfect, free from natural +covetousness and weaknesses? What folly! _He_ to ask for the grand style +in character! + +He looked at his watch. How long he had left her! Let him hurry, and make +his peace. + +However, just as he was turning, his attention was caught by something +that was passing on the opposite hillside. The light from the west was +shining full on a white cottage with a sloping garden. The cottage +belonged to the Wesleyan minister of the place, and had been rented by +Burrows for the last six months. And just as George was turning away he +saw Burrows come out of the door with a burden--a child, or a woman +little larger than a child--in his arms. He carried her to an armchair +which had been placed on the little grass-plat. The figure was almost +lost in the chair, and sat motionless while Burrows brought cushions and +a stool. Then a baby came to play on the grass, and Burrows hung over the +back of the chair, bending so as to talk to the person in it. + +"Dying?" said George to himself. "Poor devil! he must hate something." + + * * * * * + +He sped up the hill, and found Letty still on the sofa and in the last +pages of her novel. She did not resent his absence apparently,--a +freedom, so far, from small exaction for which he inwardly thanked her. +Still, from the moment that she raised her eyes as he came in, he saw +that if she was not angry with him for leaving her alone, her mind was +still as sore as ever against him and fortune on other accounts--and his +revived ardour drooped. He gave her an account of his adventures, but she +was neither inquiring nor sympathetic; and her manner all the evening had +a nervous dryness that took away the pleasure of their _tête-à-tête._ Any +old friend of Letty's, indeed, could hardly have failed to ask what had +become of that small tinkling charm of manner, that girlish flippancy and +repartee, that had counted for so much in George's first impressions of +her? They were no sooner engaged than it had begun to wane. Was it like +the bird or the flower, that adorns itself only for the wooing time, and +sinks into relative dinginess when the mating effort is over? + +On this particular evening, indeed, she was really absorbed half the time +in gloomy thoughts of Lady Tressady's behaviour and the poorness of her +own prospects. She lay on the sofa again after dinner--her white slimness +and bright hair showing delicately against the cushions--playing still +with her novel, while George read the newspapers. Sometimes she glanced +at him unsteadily, with a pinching of the lips. But it was not her way to +invite a scene. + +Late at night he went up to his dressing-room. + +As he entered it Letty was talking to her maid. He stopped involuntarily +in the darkness of his own room, and listened. What a contrast between +this Letty and the Letty of the drawing-room! They were chattering fast, +discussing Lady Tressady, and Lady Tressady's gowns, and Lady Tressady's +affairs. What eagerness, what malice, what feminine subtlety and +acuteuess! After listening for a few seconds, it seemed to him as though +a score of new and ugly lights had been thrown alike upon his mother and +on human nature. He stole away again without revealing himself. + +When he returned the room was nearly dark, and Letty was lying high +against her pillows, waiting for him. Suddenly, after she had sent her +maid away, she had felt depressed and miserable, and had begun to cry. +And for some reason hardly clear to herself she had lain pining for +George's footstep. When he came in she looked at him with eyes still +wet, reproaching him gently for being late. + +In the dim light, surrounded with lace and whiteness, she was a pretty +vision; and George stood beside her, responding and caressing. + +But that black depth in his nature, of which he had spoken to her--which +he had married to forget--was, none the less, all ruffled and vocal. For +the first time since Letty had consented to marry him he did not think or +say to himself, as he looked at her, that he was a lucky man, and had +done everything for the best. + + + + +CHAPTER X + + +Thus, with the end of the honeymoon, whatever hopes or illusions George +Tressady had allowed himself in marrying, were already much bedimmed. His +love-dream had been meagre and ordinary enough. But even so, it had not +maintained itself. + +Nevertheless, such impressions and emotions pass. The iron fact of +marriage outstays them, tends always to modify, and, at first, to +conquer them. + +Upon the Tressadys' return to London, Letty, at any rate, endeavoured +to forget her great defeat of the honeymoon in the excitement of +furnishing the house in Brook Street. Certainly there could be no +question, in spite of all her high speech to Miss Tulloch and others, +that in her first encounter with Lady Tressady, Lady Tressady had won +easily. Letty had forgotten to reckon on the hard realities of the +filial relation, and could only think of them now, partly with +exasperation, partly with despair. + +Lady Tressady, however, was for the moment somewhat subdued, and on the +return of the young people to town she did her best to propitiate Letty. +In Letty's eyes, indeed, her offence was beyond reparation. But, for the +moment, there was outward amity at least between them; which for Letty +meant chiefly that she was conscious of making all her purchases for the +house and planning all her housekeeping arrangements under a constant +critical inspection; and, moreover, that she was liable to find all her +afternoon-teas with particular friends, or those persons of whom she +wished to make particular friends, broken up by the advent of the +overdressed and be-rouged lady, who first put the guests to flight, and +was then out of temper because they fled. + +Meanwhile George found the Shapetsky matter extremely harassing. He put +on a clever lawyer; but the Shapetsky would have scorned to be +overmatched by anybody else's abilities, and very little abatement could +be obtained. Moreover, the creditor's temper had been roughened by a +somewhat unfortunate letter George had written in a hurry from Perth, and +he showed every sign of carrying matters with as high a hand as possible. + +Meanwhile, George was discovering, like any other landowner, how easy it +is to talk of selling land, how difficult to sell it. The buyer who would +once have bought was not now forthcoming; the few people who nibbled +were, naturally, thinking more of their own purses than Tressady's; and +George grew red with indignation over some of the offers submitted to him +by his country solicitor. With the payment of a first large instalment to +Shapetsky out of his ordinary account, he began to be really pressed for +money, just as the expenses of the Brook Street settling-in were at their +height. This pecuniary strain had a marked effect upon him. It brought +out certain features of character which he no doubt inherited from his +father. Old Sir William had always shown a scrupulous and petty temper +in money matters. He could not increase his possessions: for that he had +apparently neither brains nor judgment; nor could he even protect himself +from the more serious losses of business, for George found heavy debts in +existence--mortgages on the pits and so forth--when he succeeded. But as +the head of a household Sir William showed extraordinary tenacity and +spirit in the defence of his petty cash; and the exasperating +extravagance of the wife whom, in a moment of infatuation, he had been +cajoled into marrying, intensified and embittered a natural +characteristic. + +George so far resembled him that both at school and college he had been a +rather careful and abstemious boy. Probably the spectacle of his mother's +adventures had revealed to him very early the humiliations of the debtor. +At any rate, during his four years abroad he had never exceeded the +modest yearly sum he had reserved for himself on leaving England; and the +frugality of his personal expenditure had counted for something in the +estimates formed of him during his travels by competent persons. + +Nevertheless, at this beginning of household life he was still young and +callow in all that concerned the management of money; and it had never +occurred to him that his somewhat uncertain income of about four thousand +a year would not be amply sufficient for anything that he and Letty might +need; for housekeeping, for children--if children came--for political +expenses, and even for those supplementary presents to his mother which +he had all along recognised as inevitable. Now, however, what with the +difficulty he found in settling the Shapetsky affair, what with Letty's +demands for the house, and his revived dread of what his mother might be +doing, together with his overdrawn account and the position of his +colliery property, a secret fear of embarrassment and disaster began to +torment him, the offspring of a temperament which had never perhaps +possessed any real buoyancy. + +Occasionally, under the stimulus of this fear, he would leave the House +of Commons on a Wednesday or Saturday afternoon, walk to Warwick Square, +and appear precipitately in his mother's drawing-room, for the purpose of +examining the guests--or possible harpies--who might be gathered there. +He did his best once or twice to dislodge the "singer-fellow"--an elderly +gentleman with a flabby face and long hair, who seemed to George to be +equally boneless, physically and morally. Nevertheless, he was not to be +dislodged. The singer, indeed, treated the young legislator with a +mixture of deference and artistic; condescension, which was amusing or +enraging as you chose to take it. And once, when George attempted very +plain language with his mother, Lady Tressady went into hysterics, and +vowed that she would not be parted from her friends, not even by the +brutality of young married people who had everything they wanted, while +she was a poor lone widow, whose life was not worth living. The whole +affair was, so to speak, sordidly innocent. Mr. Fullerton--such was the +gentleman's name--wanted creature-comforts and occasional loans; Lady +Tressady wanted company, compliments, and "musical sketches'" for her +little tea-parties. Mrs. Fullerton was as ready as her husband to supply +the two former; and even the children, a fair-haired, lethargic crew, +painfully like their boneless father in Tressady's opinion, took their +share in the general exploitation of Tressady's mamma. Lady Tressady +meanwhile posed as the benefactor of genius in distress; and vowed, +moreover, that "poor dear Fullertori" was in no way responsible for her +recent misfortunes. The "reptile," and the "reptile" only, was to blame. + +After one of these skirmishes with his mother, George, ruffled and +disgusted, took his way home, to find Letty eagerly engaged in choosing +silk curtains for the drawing-room. + +"Oh! how lucky!" she cried, when she saw him. "Now you can help me +decide--_such_ a business!" + +And she led him into the drawing-room, where lengths of pink and green +brocade were pinned against the wall in conspicuous places. + +George admired, and gave his verdict in favour of a particular green. +Then he stooped to read the ticket on the corner of the pattern, and his +face fell. + +"How much will you want of this stuff, Letty?" he asked her. + +"Oh! for the two rooms, nearly fifty yards," said Letty, carelessly, +opening another bundle of patterns as she spoke. + +"It is twenty-six shillings a yard!" said George, rather gloomily, as he +fell, tired, into an armchair. + +"Well, yes, it _is_ dear. But then, it is so good that it will last an +age. I think I must have some of it for the sofa, too," said Letty, +pondering. + +George made no reply. + +Presently Letty looked up. + +"Why, George?--George, what _is_ the matter? Don't you want anything +pretty for this room? You never take any interest in it at all." + +"I'm only thinking, darling, what fortunes the upholsterers must make," +said George, his hands penthouse over his eyes. + +Letty pouted and flushed. The next minute she came to sit on the edge +of his chair. She was dressed--rather overdressed, perhaps--in a pale +blue dress whereof the inventive ruffles and laces pleased her own +critical mind extremely. George, well accustomed by now to the items in +his mother's bills, felt uncomfortably, as he looked at the elegance +beside him, that it was a question of guineas--many guineas. Then he +hated himself for not simply admiring her--his pretty little bride--in +her new finery. What was wrong with him? This beastly money had put +everything awry! + +Letty guessed shrewdly at what was the matter. She bit her lip, and +looked ready to cry. + +"Well, it is hard," she said, in a low, emphatic voice, "that we can't +please ourselves in a few trifles of this sort--when one thinks _why_!" + +George took her hand, and kissed it affectionately. + +"Darling, only just for a little--till I get out of this brute's +clutches. There are such pretty, cheap things nowadays--aren't there?" + +"Oh! if you want to have a South Kensington drawing-room," said Letty, +indignantly, "with four-penny muslin curtains and art pots, you can do +_that_ for nothing. But I'd rather go back to horsehair and a mahogany +table in the middle at once!" + +"You needn't wear 'greenery-yallery' gowns, you know." said George, +laughing; "that's the one unpardonable thing. Though, if you did wear +them, you'd become them." + +And he held her at arm's length that he might properly admire her +new dress. + +Letty, however, was not to be flattered out of her lawful dues in the +matter of curtains--that Lady Tressady's debts might be paid the sooner. +She threw herself into a long wrestle with George, half angry, half +plaintive, and in the end she wrung out of him much more considerable +matters than the brocades originally in dispute. Then George went down to +his study, pricked in his conscience, and vaguely sore with Letty. Why? +Women in his eyes were made for silken gauds and trinkets: it was the +price that men were bound to pay them for their society. He had watched +the same sort of process that had now been applied to himself many times +already in one or more of the Anglo-Indian households with which he had +grown familiar, and had been philosophically amused by it. But the little +comedy, transferred to his own hearth, seemed somehow to have lost humour +and point. + + * * * * * + +Still, with two young people, under thirty, just entering upon that +fateful second act of the play of life which makes or mars us all, +moments of dissatisfaction and depression--even with Shapetskys and Lady +Tressadys in the background--were but rare specks in the general sum of +pleasure. George had fallen once more under the Parliamentary illusion, +as soon as he was again within reach of the House of Commons and in +frequent contact with Fontenoy. The link between him and his strange +leader grew daily stronger as they sat side by side, through some +hard-fought weeks of Supply, throwing the force of their little group now +on the side of the Government, now on that of the Opposition, always +vigilant, and often successful. George became necessary to Fontenoy in a +hundred ways; for the younger man had a mass of _connaissances_,--to use +the irreplaceable French word,--the result of his more normal training +and his four years of intelligent travel, which Fontenoy was almost +wholly without. Many a blunder did George save his chief; and no one +could have offered his brains for the picking with a heartier goodwill. +On the other hand, the instinctive strength and acuteness of Fontenoy's +judgment were unmatched, according to Tressady's belief, in the House of +Commons. He was hardly ever deceived in a man, or in the significant +points of a situation. His followers never dreamt of questioning his +verdict on a point of tactics. They followed him blindly; and if the gods +sent defeat, no one blamed Fontenoy. But in success his grunt of approval +or congratulation rewarded the curled young aristocrats who made the +nucleus of his party as nothing else did; while none of his band ever +affronted or overrode him with impunity. He wielded a natural kingship, +and, the more battered and gnarled became his physical presence, the more +remarkable was his moral ascendency. + +One discouragement, however, he and his group suffered during the weeks +between Easter and Whitsuntide. They were hungry for battle, and the +best of the battle was for the moment denied them; for, owing to a number +of controverted votes in Supply and the slipping-in of two or three +inevitable debates on pressing matters of current interest, the Second +Reading of the Maxwell Bill was postponed till after Whitsuntide, when it +was certainly to take precedence. There was a good deal of grumbling in +the House, led by Fontenoy; but the Government could only vow that they +had no choice, and that their adversaries could not possibly be more +eager to fight than they were to be fought. + +Life, then, on this public side, though not so keen as it would be +presently, was still rich and stirring. And meanwhile society showed +itself gracious to the bride and bridegroom. Letty's marriage had made +her unusually popular for the time with her own acquaintance. For it +might be called success; yet it was not of too dazzling a degree. What, +therefore, with George's public and Parliamentary relations, the calls of +officials, the attentions of personal friends, and the good offices of +Mrs. Watton, who was loftily determined to "launch" her niece, Letty was +always well pleased with the look of her hall-table and the cards upon it +when she returned home in her new brougham from her afternoon round. She +left them there for George to see, and it delighted her particularly if +Lady Tressady came in during the interval. + +Meanwhile they dined with many folk, and made preliminary acquaintance +with the great ones of the land. Letty's vanity Dwelled within her as she +read over the list of her engagements. Nevertheless, she often came home +from her dinner-parties flat and disappointed. She did not feel that she +made way; and she found herself constantly watching the triumphs of other +women with annoyance or perplexity. What was wrong with her? Her dress +was irreproachable, and, stirred by this great roaring world, she +recalled for it the little airs and graces she had almost ceased to spend +on George. But she constantly found herself, as she thought, neglected; +while the slightest word or look of some happy person in a simple gown, +near by, had power to bring about her that flattering crowd of talkers +and of courtiers for which Letty pined. + +The Maxwells called very early on the newly wedded pair, and left an +invitation to dinner with their cards. But, to Letty's chagrin, she and +George were already engaged for the evening named, and when they duly +presented themselves at St. James's Square on a Sunday afternoon, it was +to find that the Maxwells were in the country. Once or twice in some +crowded room Letty or George had a few hurried words with Lady Maxwell, +and Marcella would try to plan a meeting. But what with her engagements +and theirs, nothing that she suggested could be done. + +"Ah! well, after Whitsuntide," she said, smiling, to Letty one evening +that they had interchanged a few words of polite regret on the stairs at +some official party. "I will write to you in the country, if I may. Ferth +Place, is it not?" + +"No," said Letty, with easy dignity; "we shall not be at home,--not at +first, at any rate. We are going for two or three days to Mrs. Allison, +at Castle Luton." + +"Are you? You will have a pleasant time. Such a glorious old house!" + +And Lady Maxwell swept on; not so fast, however, but that she found time +to have a few words of Parliamentary chat with Tressady on the landing. + +Letty made her little speech about Castle Luton with a delightful sense +of playing the rare and favoured part. Nothing in her London career, so +far, had pleased her so much as Mrs. Allison's call and Mrs. Allison's +invitation. For, although on the few occasions when she had seen this +gentle, white-haired lady, Letty had never felt for one moment at ease +with her, still, there could be no question that Mrs. Allison was, +socially, distinction itself. She had a following among all parties. +For although she was Fontenoy's friend and inspirer, a strong +Church-woman, and a great aristocrat, she had that delicate, +long-descended charm which shuts the lions' mouths, and makes it +possible for certain women to rule in any company. Even those who were +most convinced that the Mrs. Allisons of this world are the chief +obstacles in the path of progress, deliberated when they were asked to +Castle Luton, and fell--protesting. And for a certain world, high-born, +cultivated, and virtuous, she was almost a figure of legend, so +widespread was the feeling she inspired, and so many were the +associations and recollections that clustered about her. + +So that when her cards, those of her son Lord Ancoats, and a little +accompanying note in thin French handwriting--Mrs. Allison had been +brought up in Paris--arrived, Letty had a start of pleasure. "To meet a +few friends of mine"--that meant, of course, one of _the_ parties. She +supposed it was Lord Fontenoy's doing. He was said to ask whom he would +to Castle Luton. Under the influence of this idea, at any rate, she bore +herself towards her husband's chief at their next meeting with an +effusion which made Fontenoy supremely uncomfortable. + +The week before Whitsuntide happened to be one of special annoyance for +Tressady. His reports from Ferth were steadily more discouraging; his +attempts to sell his land made no way; and he saw plainly that, if he was +to keep their London life going, to provide for Shapetsky's claims, and +to give Letty what she wanted for renovations at Ferth, he would have to +sell some of the very small list of good securities left him by his +father. Most young men in his place, perhaps, would have taken such a +thing with indifference; he brooded over it. "I am beginning to spend my +capital as income," he said to himself. "The strike will be on in July; +next half-year I shall get almost nothing from the pits; rents won't come +to much; Letty wants all kinds of things. How long will it be before I, +too, am in debt, like my mother, borrowing from this person and that?" + +Then he would make stern resolutions of economy, only to be baffled by +Letty's determination to have everything that other people had; above +all, not to allow her own life to be stinted because he had so foolishly +adopted his mother's debts. She said little; or said it with smiles and a +bridal standing on her rights not to be answered. But her persistence in +a particular kind of claim, and her new refusal to be taken into his +confidence and made the partner of his anxieties, raised a miserable +feeling in his mind as the weeks went on. + +"No!" she said to herself, all the time resenting bitterly what had +happened at Ferth; "if I let him talk to me about it, I shall be giving +in, and letting _her_ trample on me! If George will be so weak, he must +find the money somehow. Of course he can! I am not in the _least_ +extravagant. I am only doing what everybody expects me to do." + +Meanwhile this state of things did not make Lady Tressady any more +welcome in Brook Street, and there were symptoms of grievances and +quarrels of another sort. Lady Tressady heard that the young couple had +already given one or two tiny dinner-parties, and to none of them had she +been invited. One day that George had been obliged to go to Warwick +Square to consult her on business, he was suddenly overwhelmed with +reproaches on this point. + +"I suppose Letty thinks I should spoil her parties! She is ashamed of me, +perhaps"--Lady Tressady gave an angry laugh. "Oh! very well; but I should +like you and her to understand, George, that I have been a good deal more +admired in my time than ever Letty need expect to be!" + +And George's mother, in a surprising yellow tea-gown, threw herself back +on her chair, bridling with wrath and emotion. George declared, with good +temper, that he and Letty were well aware of his mother's triumphs; +whereupon Lady Tressady, becoming tearful, said she knew it wasn't a +pretty thing to say--of course it wasn't--but if one was treated unkindly +by one's only son and his wife, what could one do but assert oneself? + +George soothed her as best he could, and on his return home said +tentatively to Letty, that he believed it would please his mother if they +were to ask her to a small impromptu dinner of Parliamentary friends +which they were planning for the following Friday. + +"George!" exclaimed Letty, her eyes gleaming, "we can't ask her! I don't +want to say anything disagreeable, but you must see that people don't +like her--her dress is so _extraordinary_, and her manners--it sets +people against the house. I do think it's too bad that--" + +She turned aside with a sudden sob. George kissed her, and sympathised +with her; for he himself was never at ease now for an instant while his +mother was in the room. But the widening of the breach which Letty's +refusal brought about only made his own position between the two women +the more disagreeable to a man whose ideal of a home was that it should +be a place of perpetual soothing and amusement. + +On the very morning of their departure for Castle Luton matters reached a +small crisis. Letty, tired with some festivity of the night before, took +her breakfast in bed; and George, going upstairs toward the middle of the +morning to make some arrangement with her for the journey, found her just +come down, and walking up and down the drawing-room, her pale pink dress +sweeping the floor, her hands clasped behind her. She was very pale, and +her small lips were tightly drawn. + +He looked at her with astonishment. + +"What is the matter, darling?" + +"Oh! nothing," said Letty, trying to speak with sarcasm. "Nothing at all. +I have only just been listening to an account of the way in which your +mother speaks of me to her friends. I ought to be flattered, of course, +that she notices me at all! But I think I shall have to ask you to +_request_ her to put off her visit to Ferth a little. It could hardly +give either of us much enjoyment." + +George first pulled his moustaches, then tried, as usual, to banter or +kiss her into composure. Above all, he desired not to know what Lady +Tressady had said. But Letty was determined he should know. "She was +heard "--she began passionately, holding him at arm's length--"she was +heard saying to a _whole roomful_ of people yesterday, that I was +'pretty, of course--rather pretty--but _so_ second rate--and so +provincial! It was such a pity dear George had not waited till he had +been a few months in London. Still, of course, one could only make the +best of it!'" + +Letty mimicked her mother-in-law's drawling voice, two red spots burning +on either cheek the while, and her little fingers gripping George's arm. + +"I don't believe she ever said such things. Who told you so?" said +George, stiffening, his arm dropping from her waist. + +Letty tossed her head. + +"Never mind! I _ought_ to know, and it doesn't really matter how I know. +She _did_ say them." + +"Yes, it does matter," said George, quickly, walking away to the other +side of the room. "Letty! if you would only send away that woman Grier, +you can't think how much happier we should both be." + +Letty stood still, opening her blue eyes wide. + +"You want me--to get rid--of Grier," she said, "my own particular pet +maid? And why--please?" + +George had the courage to stick to his point, and the result was a heated +and angry scene--their first real quarrel--which ended in Letty's rushing +upstairs in tears, and declaring she would go _no_where. _He_ might go to +Castle Luton, if he pleased; she was far too agitated and exhausted to +face a houseful of strangers. + +The inevitable reconciliation, with its usual accompaniments of headache +and eau de cologne, took time, and they only just completed their +preparations and caught their appointed train. + +Meanwhile the storm of the day had taken all savour from Letty's +expectations, and made George feel the whole business an effort and a +weariness. Letty sat pale and silent in her corner, devoured with regrets +that she had not put on a thicker veil to hide the ravages of the +morning; while George turned over the pages of a political biography, and +could not prevent his mind from falling back again and again into dark +places of dread and depression. + + * * * * * + +"You are my earliest guests," said Mrs. Allison, as she placed a chair +for Letty beside herself, on the lawn at Castle Luton. "Except, indeed, +that Lady Maxwell and her little boy are here somewhere, roaming about. +But none of our other friends could get down till later. I am glad we +shall have a little quiet time before they come." + +"Lady Maxwell!" said Letty. "I had no idea they were coming. Oh, what a +lovely day! and how beautiful it all is!" she cried, as she sat down and +looked round her. The colour came back into her cheeks. She forgot her +determination to keep her veil down, and raised it eagerly. + +Mrs. Allison smiled. + +"We never look so well as in May--the river is so full, and the swans are +so white. Ah! I see Edgar has already taken Sir George to make friends +with them." + +And Letty, looking across the broad green lawn, saw the flash of a +brimming river and a cluster of white swans, beside which stood her +husband and a young man in a serge suit, who was feeding the swans with +bread--Lord Ancoats, no doubt, the happy owner of all this splendour. To +the left of their figures rose a stone bridge with a high, carved +parapet, and beyond the river she saw green hills and woods against a +radiant sky. Then, to her right was this wonderful yellowish pile of the +old house. She began to admire and exclaim about it with a great energy +and effusion, trying hard to say the correct and cultivated thing, and, +in fact, repeating with a good deal of exactness what she had heard said +of it by others. + +Her hostess listened to her praises with a gentle smile. Gentleness, +indeed, a rather sad gentleness, was the characteristic of Mrs. Allison. +It seemed to make an atmosphere about her--her delicate blanched head and +soft face, her small figure, her plain black dress, her hands in their +white ruffles. Her friends called it saintliness. At any rate, it set her +apart, giving her a peculiar ethereal dignity which made her formidable +in society to many persons who were not liable to shyness. Letty from the +beginning had felt her formidable. + +Yet nothing could be kinder or simpler than her manner. In response to +Letty's enthusiasms she let herself be drawn at once into speaking of her +own love for the house, and on to pointing out its features. + +"I am always telling these things to newcomers," she said, smiling. "And +I am not clever enough to make variations. But I don't mind, somehow, how +often I go through it. You see, this front is Tudor, and the south front +is a hundred years later, and both of them, they say, are the finest of +their kind. Isn't it wonderful that two men, a hundred years apart, +should each have left such a noble thing behind him. One inspired the +other. And then we--we poor moderns come after, and must cherish what +they left us as we best can. It's a great responsibility, don't you +think? to live in a beautiful house." + +"I'm afraid I don't know much about it," said Letty, laughing; "we live +in such a very ugly one." + +Mrs. Allison looked sympathetic. + +"Oh! but then, ugly ones have character; or they are pretty inside, or +the people one loves have lived in them. That would make any place a +House Beautiful. Aren't you near Perth?" + +"Yes; and I am afraid you'll think me _dreadfully_ discontented," +said Letty, with one of her little laughing airs; "but there really +isn't anything to make up in our barrack of a place. It's like a +blackened brick set up on end at the top of a hill. And then the +villages are so hideous." + +"Ah! I know that coal-country," said Mrs. Allison, gravely--"and I know +the people. Have you made friends with them yet?" + +"We were only there for our honeymoon. George says that next month the +whole place will be out on strike. So just now they hate us--they will +hardly look at us in the street. But, of course, we shall give away +things at Christmas." + +Mrs. Allison's lip twitched, and she shot a glance at the bride which +betrayed, for all her gentleness, the woman of a large world and much +converse with mankind. What a curious, hard little face was Lady +Tressady's under the outer softness of line and hue, and what an amazing +costume! Mrs. Allison had no quarrel with beautiful gowns, but the +elaboration, or, as one might say, the research of Letty's dress struck +her unpleasantly. The time that it must have taken to think out! + +Aloud she said: + +"Ah! the strike. Yes, I fear it is inevitable. Ancoats has some property +not very far from you, and we get reports. Poor fellows! if it weren't +for the wretched agitators who mislead them--but there, we mustn't talk +of these things. I see Lady Maxwell coming." + +And Mrs. Allison waved her hand to a tall figure in white with a child +beside it that had just emerged on the far distance of the lawn. + +"Is Lord Maxwell here, too?" asked Letty. + +"He is coming later. It seems strange, perhaps, that you should find them +here this Sunday, for Lord Fontenoy comes to-morrow, and the great fight +will be on so soon. But when I found that they were free, and that +Maxwell would like to come, I was only too glad. After all, rival +politicians in England can still meet each other, even at a crisis. +Besides, Maxwell is a relation of ours, and he was my boy's guardian--the +kindest possible guardian. Politics apart, I have the greatest respect +for him. And her too. Why is it always the best people in the world that +do the most mischief?" + +At the mention of Lord Fontenoy it had been Letty's turn to throw a +quick side look at Mrs. Allison. But the name was spoken in the quietest +and most natural way; and yet, if one analysed the tone, in a way that +did imply something exceptional, which, however, all the world knew, or +might know. + +"Is Lady Maxwell an old friend of yours, too?" asked Letty, longing to +pursue the subject, and vexed to see how fast the mother and child were +approaching. + +"Only since her marriage. To see her and Maxwell together is really a +poem. If only she wouldn't identify herself so hotly, dear woman! with +everything he does and wishes in politics. There is no getting her to +hear a word of reason. She is another Maxwell in petticoats. And it +always seems to me so unfair. Maxwell without beauty and without +petticoats is quite enough to fight! Look at that little fellow with his +flowers!--such an oddity of a child!" + +Then she raised her voice. + +"My dear, what a ramble you must have made. Come and have a shady chair +and some tea." + +For answer Marcella, laughing, held up a glorious bunch of cuckoo-pint +and marsh marigold, while little Hallin at her skirts waved another +trophy of almost equal size. The mother's dark face was flushed with +exercise and pleasure. As she moved over the grass, the long folds of a +white dress falling about her, the flowers in her hand, the child beside +her, she made a vision of beauty lovely in itself and lovely in all that +it suggested. Frank joy and strength, happiness, purity of heart--these +entered with her. One could almost see their dim heavenly shapes in the +air about her. + +Neither Letty nor Mrs. Allison could take their eyes from her. Perhaps +she knew it. But if she did, it made no difference to her perfect ease of +bearing. She greeted Letty kindly. + +"You didn't expect to see me here, did you, Lady Tressady? But it is the +unexpected that happens." + +Then she put her hand on Mrs. Allison's shoulder, bending her height to +her small hostess. + +"What a day, and what a place! Hallin and I have been over hill and dale. +But he is getting such a botanist, the little monkey! He will hardly +forgive me because I forgot one of the flowers we found out yesterday in +his botany book." + +"She said it was 'Robin-run-in-the-'edge,' and it isn't--it's 'edge +mustard," said Hallin, severely, holding up a little feathery stalk. + +Mrs. Allison shook her head, endeavouring to suit her look to the gravity +of the offence. + +"Mother must learn her lessons better, mustn't she? Go and shake hands, +little man, with Lady Tressady." + +Hallin went gravely to do as he was told. Then he stood on one foot, and +looked Letty over with a considering eye. + +"Are you going to a party?" he said suddenly, putting out a small and +grimy finger, and pointing to her dress. + +"Hallin! come here and have your tea," said his mother, hastily. Then she +turned to Letty with the smile that had so often won Maxwell a friend. + +"I am sorry to say that he has a rooted objection to anything that isn't +rags in the way of clothes. He entirely declined to take me across the +river till I had rolled up my lace cloak and put it in a bush. And he +won't really be friends with me again till we have both got back to the +scarecrow garments we wear at home." + +"Oh! children are so much happier when they are dirty," said Letty, +graciously, pleased to feel herself on these easy terms with her two +companions. "What beautiful flowers he has! and what an astonishing +little botanist he seems to be!" + +And she seated herself beside Hallin, using all her blandishments to make +friends with him, which, however, did not prove to be an easy matter. For +when she praised his flowers, Hallin only said, with his mouth full: "Oh! +but mammy's bunch is _hever_ so much bigger;" and when she offered him +cake, the child would sturdily put the cake away, and hold it and her at +arm's length till his mute look across the table had won his mother's nod +of permission. + +Letty at last thought him an odd, ill-mannered child, and gave up +courting him, greatly to Hallin's satisfaction. He edged closer and +closer to his mother, established himself finally in her pocket, and +browsed on all the good things with which Mrs. Allison provided him, +undisturbed. + +"How late they are!" said Marcella, looking at her watch. "Tell me +the names again, dear lady"--she bent forward, and laid her hand +affectionately on Mrs. Allison's knee. "Your parties are always a +work of art." + +Mrs. Allison flushed a little, as though she liked the compliment, and +ran laughingly through the names. + +"Lord and Lady Maxwell." + +"Ah!" said Marcella, "the least said about them the soonest +mended. Go on." + +"Lord and Lady Cathedine." + +Marcella made a face. + +"Poor little thing! I always think of the remark about the Queen in +'Alice in Wonderland.' 'A little kindness, and putting her hair in +curl-papers, would do wonders for her.' She is so limp and thin and +melancholy. As for him--isn't there a race or a prize-fight we can +send him to?" + +Mrs. Allison tapped her lightly on the lips. + +"I won't go on unless my guests are taken prettily." + +Marcella kissed the delicate wrinkled hand. + +"I'll be good. What do you keep such an air here for? It gets into +one's head." + +Letty Tressady, indeed, was looking on with a feeling of astonishment. +These merry, childlike airs had absolutely no place in her conception of +Lady Maxwell. Nor could she know that Mrs. Allison was one of the very +few people in the world to whom Marcella was ever drawn to show them. + +"Sir Philip Wentworth," pursued Mrs. Allison, smiling. "Say anything +malicious about him, if you can!" + +"Don't provoke me. What a mercy I brought a volume of 'Indian Studies' in +my bag! I will go up early, before dinner, and finish them." + +"Then there is Madeleine Penley, and Elizabeth Kent." + +A quick involuntary expression crossed Marcella's face. Then she drew +herself up with dignity, and crossed her hands primly on her lap. + +"Let me understand. Are you going to protect me from Lady Kent this time? +Because, last time you threw me to the wolves in the most dastardly way." + +Mrs. Allison laughed out. + +"On the contrary, we all enjoyed your skirmish with her in November so +much, we shall do our best to provoke another in May." + +Marcella shook her head. + +"I haven't the energy to quarrel with a fly. And as for Aldous--please +warn his lady at dinner that he may go to sleep upon her shoulder!" + +"You poor thing!"--Mrs. Allison put out a sympathetic hand. "Are you so +tired? Why will you turn the world upside down?" + +Marcella took the hand lightly in both hers. + +"Why will you fight reform?" + +And the eyes of the two women met, not without a sudden grave passion. +Then Marcella dropped the hand, and said, smiling: + +"Castle Luton isn't full yet. Who else?" + +"Oh! some young folk--Charlie Naseby." + +"A nice boy--a very nice boy--not half such a coxcomb as he looks. Then +the Levens--I know the Levens are coming, for Betty told me that she got +out of two other engagements as soon as you asked her." + +"Oh! and, by the way, Mr. Watton--Harding Watton," said Mrs. Allison, +turning slightly towards Lady Tressady. + +The exclamation on Lady Maxwell's lips was checked by something she saw +on her hostess's face, and Letty eagerly struck in: + +"Harding coming?--my cousin? I am so glad. I suppose I oughtn't to say +it, but he is such a _clever_, such an _agreeable_, creature. But you +know the Wattons, don't you, Lady Maxwell?" + +Marcella was busying herself with Hallin's tea. + +"I know Edward Watton," she said, turning her beautiful clear look on +Letty. "He is a real friend of mine." + +"Oh! but Harding is _much_ the cleverer," said Letty. And pleased both +to find the ball of talk in her hands, and to have the chance of +glorifying a relation in this world of people so much bigger than +herself, she plunged into an extravagant account--all adjectives and +superlatives--of Harding Watton's charms and abilities, to which Lady +Maxwell listened in silence. + +"Tactless!" thought Mrs. Allison, with vexation, but she did not know +how to stop the stream. In truth, since she had given Lord Fontenoy +leave to invite Harding Watton she had had time to forget the +invitation, and she was sorry now to think of his housing with the +Maxwells. For Watton had been recently Lord Fontenoy's henchman and +agent in a newspaper attack upon the Bill, and upon Maxwell personally, +that even Mrs. Allison had thought violent and unfair. Well, it was not +her fault. But Lady Tressady ought to have better information and better +sense than to be chattering like this. She was just about to interpose, +when Marcella held up her hand. + +"I hear the carriages!" + +The hostess hastened towards the house, and Marcella followed her, with +Hallin at her skirts. Letty looked after Lady Maxwell with the same +mixture of admiration and jealous envy she had felt several times +before. "I don't feel that I shall get on with her," she said to +herself, impatiently. "But I don't think I want to. George took her +measure at once." + +Part of this reflection, however, was not true. Letty's ambition would +have been very glad to "get on" with Marcella Maxwell. + + * * * * * + +Just as his wife was ready for dinner, and Grier had disappeared, George +entered Letty's room. She was standing before a tall glass, putting the +last touches to her dress--smoothing here, pinning there, turning to this +side and to that. George, unseen himself, stood and watched her--her +alternate looks of anxiety and satisfaction, her grace, the shimmering +folds of the magnificent wedding-dress in which she had adorned herself. + +He, however, was neither happy nor gay. But he had come in feeling that +he must make an effort--many efforts, if their young married life was to +be brought back to that level of ease and pleasure which he had once +taken for granted, and which now seemed so hard to maintain. If that ease +and pleasure were ultimately to fail him, what should he do? He shrank +impatiently from the idea. Then he would scoff at himself. How often had +he read and heard that the first year of marriage is the most difficult. +Of course it must be so. Two individualities cannot fuse without turmoil, +without heat. Let him only make his effort. + +So he walked up to her and caught her in his arms. + +"Oh, George!--my hair!--and my flowers!" + +"Never mind," he said, almost with roughness. "Put your head there. Say +you hate the thought of our day, as I do! Say there shall never be one +like it again! Promise me!" + +She felt the beating of his heart beneath her cheek. But she stood +silent. His appeal, his unwonted agitation, revived in her all the anger +and irritation that had begun to prey upon her thoughts. It was all very +well, but why were they so pinched and uncomfortable? Why must +everybody--Mrs. Allison, Lady Maxwell, a hundred others--have more +wealth, more scope, more consideration than she? It was partly his fault. + +So she gradually drew herself away, pushing him softly with her small +gloved hand. + +"I am sure I hate quarrelling," she said. "But there! Oh, George! don't +let's talk of it any more! And look what you have done to my poor hair. +You dear, naughty boy!" + +But though she called him "Dear," she frowned as she took off her gloves +that she might mend what he had done. + +George thrust his hands into his pockets, walked to the window, and +waited. As he descended the great stairs in her wake he wished Castle +Luton and its guests at the deuce. What pleasure was to be got out of +grimacing and posing at these country-house parties? And now, according +to Letty, the Maxwells were here. A great _gêne_ for everybody! + + + + +CHAPTER XI + + +"That lady sitting by Sir George? What! Lady Maxwell? No--the other side? +Oh! that's Lady Leven. Don't you know her? She's tremendous fun!" + +And the dark-eyed, rosy-cheeked young man who was sitting beside Letty +nodded and smiled across the table to Betty Leven, merely by way of +reminding her of his existence. They had greeted before dinner--a +greeting of comrades. + +Then he turned back, with sudden decorum, to this Lady Tressady, whom he +had been commissioned to take in to dinner. "Quite pretty, but +rather--well, ordinary!" he said to himself, with a critical coolness +bred of much familiarity with the best things of Vanity Fair. He had been +Ancoats's friend at Cambridge, and was now disporting himself in the +Guards, but still more--as Letty of course assumed--in the heart of the +English well-born world. She knew that he was Lord Naseby, and that some +day he would be a marquis. A halo, therefore, shone about him. At the +same time, she had a long experience of young men, and, if she flattered +him, it was only indirectly, by a sort of teasing aggression that did not +allow him to take his attention from her. + +"I declare you are better than any peerage!" she said to him presently, +when he had given her a short biography, first of Lord Cathedine, who was +sitting opposite, then of various other members of the company. "I should +like to tie you to my fan when I go out to dinner." + +"Would you?" said the young man, drily. "Oh! you will soon know all you +want to know." + +"How are poor little people from Yorkshire to find their way about in +this big world? You are all so dreadfully absorbed in each other. In the +first place, you all marry each other." + +"Do we?--though I don't quite understand who 'we' means. Well, one +must marry somebody, I suppose, and cousins are less trouble than +other people." + +Involuntarily, the young man's eyes travelled along the table to a fair +girl on the opposite side, dazzlingly dressed in black. She was wielding +a large fan of black feathers, which threw both hair and complexion into +amazing relief; and she seemed to be amusing herself in a nervous, +spasmodic way with Sir Frank Leven. Letty noticed his glance. + +"Oh! you have not earned your testimonial yet, not by any manner of +means," she said. "That is Lady Madeleine Penley, isn't it? Is she a +relation of Mrs. Allison's?" + +"She is a cousin. That is her mother, Lady Kent, sitting beside poor +Ancoats. Such an old character! By the end of dinner she will have got to +the bottom of Ancoats, or know the reason why." + +"Is Lord Ancoats such a mystery?" said Letty, running an inquisitive +eye over the black front, sharp nose, and gorgeously bejewelled neck +of a somewhat noisy and forbidding old lady sitting on the right hand +of the host. + +Young Naseby's expression in answer rather piqued her. There was a quick +flash of something that was instantly suppressed, and the youth said +composedly, + +"Oh! we are all mysteries for Lady Kent." + +But Letty noticed that his eyes strayed back to Lord Ancoats, and then +again to Lady Madeleine. He seemed to be observing them, and Letty's +sharpness at once took the hint. No doubt the handsome, large-featured +girl was here to be "looked at." Probably a good many maidens would be +passed in review before this young Sultan made his choice! By the way he +must be a good deal older than George had imagined. Clearly he left +college some time ago. What a curious face he had--a small, crumpled +face, with very prominent blue eyes; curly hair of a reddish colour, +piled high, as though for effect, above his white brow; together with a +sharp chin and pointed moustache, which gave him the air of an old French +portrait. He was short in stature, but at the same time agile and +strongly built. He wore one or two fine old rings, which drew attention +to the delicacy of his hands; and his manner struck her as at once morose +and excitable. Letty regarded him with involuntary respect as the son of +Mrs. Allison--much more as the master of Castle Luton and fifty thousand +a year. But if he had not been the master of Castle Luton she would have +probably thought, and said, that he had a disagreeable Bohemian air. + +"Haven't you really made acquaintance with Lady Kent?" said Lord Naseby, +returning to the charge his laziness was somewhat at a loss for +conversation. "I should have thought she was the person one could least +escape knowing in the three kingdoms." + +"I have seen her, of course," said Letty, lightly, though, alas! untruly. +"But I am afraid you can hardly realise that I have only been three short +seasons in London--two with an old aunt, who never goes out, in Cavendish +Square, poor dull old dear! and another with Mrs. Watton, of Malford." + +"Oh! with Mrs. Watton, of Malford," said Lord Naseby, vaguely. Then he +became suddenly aware that Lady Leven, on the other side of the table, +was beckoning to him. He leant across, and they exchanged a merry war of +words about something of which Letty knew nothing. + +Letty, rather incensed, thought him a puppy, drew herself up, and looked +round at the ex-Governor beside her. She saw a fine head, the worn yellow +face and whitened hair of a man who has suffered under a hot climate, and +an agreeable, though somewhat courtly, smile. Sir Philip Wentworth was +not troubled with the boyish fastidiousness of Lord Naseby. He perceived +merely that a pretty young woman wished to make friends with him, and met +her wish at once. Moreover, he identified her as the wife of that +"promising and well-informed fellow, Tressady," with whom he had first +made friends in India, and had now--just before dinner--renewed +acquaintance in the most cordial fashion. + +He talked graciously to the wife, then, of Tressady's abilities and +Tressady's career. Letty at first liked it. Then she was seized with a +curious sense of discomfort. + +Her eyes wandered towards the head of the table, where George was +talking--why! actually talking earnestly, and as though he were enjoying +himself, to Lady Maxwell, whose noble head and neck, rising from a silver +white dress, challenged a great Genoese Vandyck of a Marehesa Balbi which +was hanging just behind her, and challenged it victoriously. + +So other people thought and said these things of George? Letty +was for a moment sharply conscious that they had not occupied much +place in her mind since her marriage, or, for the matter of that, +since her engagement. She had taken it for granted that he was +"distinguished"--that was part of the bargain. Only, she never seemed as +yet to have had either time or thought to give to those parts and +elements in his life which led people to talk of him as this old Indian +was doing. + +Curtains, carpets, gowns, cabinets; additions to Ferth; her own effect in +society; how to keep Lady Tressady in her place--of all these things she +had thought, and thought much. But George's honourable ambitions, the +esteem in which he was held, the place he was to make for himself in the +world of men--in thinking of _these_ her mind was all stiff and +unpractised. She was conscious first of a moral prick, then of a certain +irritation with other people. + +Yet she could not help watching George wistfully. He looked tired and +pale, in spite of the animation of his talk. Well! no doubt she looked +pale too. Some of the words and phrases of their quarrel flashed across +her. In this beautiful room, with its famous pictures and its historical +associations, amid this accumulated art and wealth, the whole thing was +peculiarly odious to remember. Under the eyes of Vandyck's Marchesa one +would have liked to think of oneself as always dignified and refined, +always elegant and calm. + +Then Letty had a revulsion, and laughed at herself. + +"As if these people didn't have tempers, and quarrel about money! Of +course they do! And if they don't--well, we all know how easy it is to be +amiable on fifty thousand a year." + + * * * * * + +After dinner Mrs. Allison led the way to the "Green Drawing-room." This +room, hung with Gainsborough portraits, was one of the sights of the +house, and tonight Marcella Maxwell especially looked round her on +entering it, with enchantment. + +"You happy people!" she said to Mrs. Allison. "I never come into this +room without anxiously asking myself whether I am fit to make one of the +company. I look at my dress, or I am doubtful about my manners, or I wish +someone had taught me to dance the minuet!" + +"Yes," said Betty Leven, running up to a vast picture, a life-size family +group, which covered the greater part of the farther wall of the room. +"What a vulgar, insignificant chit one feels oneself without cap or +powder!--without those ruffles, or those tippets, or those quilted +petticoats! Mrs. Allison, _may_ my maid come down to-morrow while we are +at dinner and take the pattern of those ruffles? No--no! she sha'n't! +Sacrilege! You pretty thing!" she said, addressing a figure--the figure +of a girl in white with thin virginal arms and bust, who seemed to be +coming out of the picture, almost to be already out of it and in the +room. "Come and talk to me. Don't think any more of your father and +mother there. You have been curtsying to them for a hundred years; and +they are rather dull, stupid people, after all. Come and tell us secrets. +Tell us what you have seen in this room--all the foolish people making +love, and the sad people saying good-bye." + +Betty was kneeling on a carved chair, her pretty arms leaning on the back +of it, her eyes fixed half-in laughter, half in sentiment, on the figure +in the picture. + +Lady Maxwell suddenly moved closer to her, and Letty heard her say in a +low voice, as she put her hand on Lady Leven's arm: + +"Don't, Betty! _don't!_ It was in this room he proposed to her, and +it was in this room he said goodbye. Maxwell has often told me. I +believe she never comes in here alone--only for ceremony and when +there is a crowd." + +A look of consternation crossed Lady Leven's lively little face. She +glanced shyly towards Mrs. Allison. That lady had moved hastily away from +the group in front of the picture. She was sitting by herself, looking +straight before her, with a certain stiffness, her thin hands crossed on +her knee. Betty impetuously went towards her, and was soon sitting on a +stool beside her, chattering to her and amusing her. + +Meanwhile Marcella invited Lady Tressady to come and sit with her on a +sofa beneath the great picture. + +Letty followed her, settled her satin skirts in their most graceful +folds, put one little foot on a Louis Quinze footstool which seemed +to invite it, and then began to inform herself about the house and +the family. + +At the beginning of their talk it was clear that Lady Maxwell wished to +ingratiate herself. A friendly observer would have thought that she was +trying to make a stranger feel more at ease in this house and circle, +where she herself was a familiar guest. Betty Leven, catching sight of +the pair from the other side of the room, said to herself, with inward +amusement, that Marcella was "realising the wife." + +At any rate, for some time Lady Maxwell talked with sympathy, with +effusion even, to her companion. In the first place she told her the +story of their hostess. + +Thirty years before, Mrs. Allison, the daughter and heiress of a +Leicestershire squire, had married Henry Allison, old Lord Ancoats's +second son, a young captain in the Guards. They enjoyed three years of +life together; then the chances of a soldier's career, as interpreted by +two high-minded people, took Henry Allison out to an obscure African +coast, to fight one of the innumerable "little wars" of his country. He +fell, struck by a spear, in a single-file march through some nameless +swamp; and a few days afterwards the words of a Foreign Office telegram +broke a pining woman's heart. + +Old Lord Ancoats's death, which followed within a month or two, was +hastened by the shock of his son's loss; and before the year was out the +eldest son, who was sickly and unmarried, also died, and Mrs. Allison's +boy, a child of two, became the owner of Castle Luton. The mother saw +herself called upon to fight down her grief, to relinquish the +quasi-religious life she had entered upon, and instead to take her boy to +the kingdom he was to rule, and bring him up there. + +"And for twenty-two years she has lived a wonderful life here," said +Marcella; "she has been practically the queen of a whole countryside, +doing whatever she pleased, the mother and friend and saint of everybody. +It has been all very paternal and beautiful, and--abominably Tory and +tyrannous! Many people, I suppose, think it perfect. Perhaps I don't. But +then, I know very well I can't possibly disagree with her a tenth part as +strongly as she disagrees with me." + +"Oh! but she admires you so much," cried Letty, with effusion; "she +thinks you mean so nobly!" + +Marcella opened her eyes, involuntarily wondering a little what Lady +Tressady might know about it. + +"Oh! we don't hate each other," she said, rather drily, "in spite of +politics. And my husband was Ancoats's guardian." + +"Dear me!" said Letty. "I should think it wasn't easy to be guardian to +fifty thousand a year." + +Marcella did not answer--did not, indeed, hear. Her look had stolen +across to Mrs. Allison--a sad, affectionate look, in no way meant for +Lady Tressady. But Letty noticed it. + +"I suppose she adores him," she said. + +Marcella sighed. + +"There was never anything like it. It frightens one to see." + +"And that, of course, is why she won't marry Lord Fontenoy?" + +Marcella started, and drew away from her companion. + +"I don't know," she said stiffly; "and I am sure that no one ever dared +to ask her." + +"Oh! but of course it's what everyone says," said Letty, gay and +unabashed. "That's what makes it so exciting to come here, when one knows +Lord Fontenoy so very well." + +Marcella met this remark with a discouraging silence. + +Letty, however, was determined this time to make her impression. She +plunged into a lively and often audacious gossip about every person in +the room in turn, asking a number of intimate or impertinent questions, +and yet very seldom waiting for Marcella's reply, so anxious was she to +show off her own information and make her own comments. She let Marcella +understand that she suspected a great deal, in the matter of that +handsome Lady Madeleine. It was _immensely_ interesting, of course; but +wasn't Lord Ancoats a trifle wild?--she bent over and whispered in +Marcella's ears; was it likely that he would settle himself so +soon?--didn't one hear sad tales of his theatrical friends and the rest? +And what could one expect! As if a young man in such a position was not +certain to have his fling! And his mother would have to put up with it. +After all, men quieted down at last. Look at Lord Cathedine! + +And with an air of boundless knowledge she touched upon the incidents of +Lord Cathedine's career, hashing up, with skilful deductions of her own, +all that Lord Naseby had said or hinted to her at dinner. Poor Lady +Cathedine! didn't she look a walking skeleton, with her strange, +melancholy face, and every bone showing? Well, who could wonder! And when +one thought of their money difficulties, too! + +Lady Tressady lifted her white shoulders in compassion. + +By this time Marcella's black eyes were wandering insistently round the +room, searching for means of escape. Betty, far away, noticed her air, +and concluded that the "realisation" was making rapid, too rapid, +progress. Presently, with a smiling shake of her little head, she left +her own seat and went to her friend's assistance. + +At the same moment Mrs. Allison, driven by her conscience as a hostess, +got up for the purpose of introducing Lady Tressady to a lady in grey who +had been sitting quiet, and, as Mrs. Allison feared, lonely, in a corner, +looking over some photographs. Marcella, who had also risen, put out a +hand to Betty, and the two moved away together. + + * * * * * + +They stopped on the threshold of a large window at the side of the room, +which stood wide open to the night. Outside, beyond a broad flight of +steps, stretched a formal Dutch garden. Its numberless small beds, +forming stiff scrolls and circles on a ground of white gravel, lay in +bright moonlight. Even the colours of the hyacinths and tulips with which +they were planted could be seen, and the strong scent from them filled +the still air. At the far end of this flat-patterned place a group of +tall cypress and ilex, black against the sky, struck a note of Italy and +the South; while, through the yew hedges which closed in the little +garden, broad archways pierced at intervals revealed far breadths of +silvery English lawn and the distant gleam of the river. + +"Well, my dear," said Betty, laughing, and slipping her arm through +Marcella's as they stood in the opening of the window, "I see you have +been doing your duty for once. Let me pat you on the back. All the more +that I gather you are not exactly enchanted with Lady Tressady. You +really should keep your face in order. From the other end of the room I +know exactly what you think of the person you are talking to." + +"Do you?" said Marcella, penitently. "I wish you didn't." + +"Well you may wish it, for it doesn't help the political lady to get what +she wants. However, I don't think that Lady Tressady has found out yet +that you don't like her. She isn't thin-skinned. If you had looked like +that when you were talking to me, I would have paid you out somehow. What +is the matter with her?" + +"Oh! I don't know," said Marcella, impatiently, raising her shoulders. +"But she jarred. I pined to get away--I don't think I ever want to talk +to her again." + +"No," said Betty, ruminating; "I'll tell you what it is--she isn't a +gentleman! Don't interrupt me! I mean exactly what I say--_she isn't a +gentleman_. She would do and say all the things that a nice man squirms +at. I always have the oddest fancy about that kind of person. I see them +as they must be at night--all the fine clothes gone--just a little black +soul scrawled between the bedclothes!" + +"_You_ to call me censorious!" said Marcella, laughing, and pinching her +friend's arm. + +"My dear, as I have often before remarked to you, _I_ am not a great +lady, with a political campaign to tight. If you knew your business, you +would make friends with the mammon of unrighteousness in the shape of +Lady Tressadys. _I_ may do what I please--I have only a husband to +manage!" and Betty's light voice dropped into a sigh. + +"Poor Betty!" said Marcella, patting her hand. "Is Frank as +discontented as ever?" + +"He told me yesterday he hated his existence, and thought he would try +whether the Serpentine would drown him. I said I was agreeable, only he +would never achieve it without me. I should have to 'tice away the police +while he looked for the right spot. So he has promised to take me into +partnership, and it's all right so far." + +Then Betty fell to sighing in earnest. + +"It's all very well 'chaffing,' but I am a miserable woman. Frank says +I have ruined his life; that it's all my ambition; that he might have +made a decent country gentleman if I hadn't sown the seed of every vice +in him by driving him into politics. Pleasant, isn't it, for a model +wife like me?" + +"You'll have to let him give it up," said Marcella, smiling; "I don't +believe he'll ever reconcile himself to the grind and the town life." + +Betty clenched her small hands. + +"My dear! I never promised to marry a sporting boor, and I can't yet +make up my mind to sink to it. Don't let's talk of it! I only hope he'll +vote straight in the next few months. But the thought of being kept +through August drives him desperate already. Ah! here they are--plagues +of the human race!--" and she waved an accusing hand towards the incoming +stream of gentlemen. "Now, I'll prophesy, and you watch. Lady Tressady +will make two friends here--Harding Watton--oh! I forgot, he's her +cousin!--and Lord Cathedine. Mark my words. By the way--" Betty caught +Marcella's arm and spoke eagerly into her friend's ear. Her eyes +meanwhile glanced over her shoulder towards Lady Madeleine and her +mother, who were seated on the further side of the room. + +Marcella's look followed Betty's, but she showed no readiness to answer +Betty's questions. When Letty had made her astonishing remarks on the +subject of Madeleine Penley, Lady Maxwell had tried to stop her with a +hauteur which would have abashed most women, though it had but small +effect on the bride. And now, even to Betty, who was Madeleine Penley's +friend, Marcella was not communicative; although when Betty was carried +off by Lord Naseby who came in search of her as soon as he entered the +drawing-room, the elder woman stood for a moment by the window, watching +the girl they had been talking of with a soft serious look. + +But the softness passed. A slight incident disturbed it. For the +spectator saw Lady Kent, who was sitting beside her daughter, raise a +gigantic fan and beckon to Lord Ancoats. He came unwillingly, and she +made some bantering remark. Lady Madeleine meanwhile was bending over a +book of photographs, with a flushed cheek and a look of constraint. +Ancoats stood near her for a moment uneasily, frowning and pulling at his +moustache. Then with an abrupt word to Lady Kent, he turned away and +threw himself on a sofa beside Lord Cathedine. Lady Madeleine bent lower +over her book, her beautiful hair making a spot of fire in the room. +Marcella caught the expression of her profile, and her own face took a +look of pain. She would have liked to go instantly to the girl's side, +with some tenderness, some caress. But that gorgon Lady Kent, now looking +extremely fierce, was in the way, and moreover other young men had +arrived to take the place Ancoats had apparently refused. + +Meanwhile Letty saw the arrival of the gentlemen with delight. She had +found but small entertainment in the lady to whom Mrs. Allison had +introduced her. Miss Paston, the sister of Lord Ancoats's agent, was a +pleasant-looking spinster of thirty-five in a Quakerish dress of grey +silk. Her face bore witness that she was capable and refined. But Letty +felt no desire whatever to explore capability and refinement. She had not +come to Castle Luton to make herself agreeable to Miss Paston. + +So the conversation languished. Letty yawned a little, and flourished her +fan a great deal, till the appearance of the men brought back the flush +to her cheek and animation to her eye. She drew herself up at once, +hungry for notice and success. Mrs. Hawkins, the vicar's wife at +Malford, would have been avenged could she have watched her old tyrant +under these chastening circumstances. + +Harding Watton crossed the room when he saw his cousin, and took the +corner of the sofa beside her. Letty received him graciously, though she +was perhaps disappointed that it was not Lord Ancoats or Lord Cathedine. +Looking round before she gave herself to conversation with him, she saw +that George was standing near the open window with Lord Maxwell and Sir +Philip Wentworth, the ex-Governor. They were talking of India, and Sir +Philip had his hand on George's arm. + +"Yes, I saw Dalliousie go," he said eagerly. "I was only a lad of twenty, +but I can't think of it now without a lump in my throat. When he limped +on to the Hooghly landing-stage on his crutches we couldn't cheer him--I +shall never forget that sudden silence! In eight years he had made a new +India, and there we saw him,--our little hero,--dying of his work at +forty-six before our eyes! ... Well, I couldn't have imagined that a +young man like you would have known or cared so much about that time. +What a talk we have had! Thank you!" + +And the veteran tightened his grip cordially for a moment on Tressady's +arm, then dropped it and walked away. + +Tressady threw his wife a bright glance, as though to ask her how she +fared. Letty smiled graciously in reply, feeling a sudden softening +pleasure in being so thought of. As her eyes met her husband's she saw +Marcella Maxwell, who was still standing by the window, turn towards +George and call to him. George moved forward with alacrity. Then he and +Lady Maxwell slowly walked down the steps to the garden, and disappeared +through one of the archways to the left. + +"That great lady and George seem at last to have made friends," said +Harding Watton to Letty, in a laughing undertone. "I have no doubt she is +trying to win him over. Well she may! Before the next few weeks are over +the Government will be in a fix with this Bill; and not even their +'beautiful lady' will help them out. Maxwell looks as glum as an owl +to-night." + +Letty laughed. The situation pleased her vanity a good deal. The +thought of Lady Maxwell humiliated and defeated--partly by George's +means--was decidedly agreeable to her. Which would seem to show that +she was, after all, more sensitive or more quick-eyed than Betty Leven +had been ready to allow. + + * * * * * + +Meanwhile Marcella and George Tressady were strolling slowly towards the +river, along a path that crossed the great lawns. In front of them the +stretches of grass, bathed in silvery light and air, ran into far +distances of shade under majestic trees just thickening to a June wealth +of foliage. Below, these distant tree-masses made sharp capes and +promontories on the white grass; above, their rounded tops rose dark +against a blue, light-breathing sky. At one point the river pierced the +blackness of the wood, and in the space thus made the spire of a noble +church shot heavenward. Swans floated dimly along the stream and under +the bridge. The air was fresh, but the rawness of spring was gone. It was +the last week of May; the "high midsummer pomps" were near--a heavenly +prophecy in wood and field. + +And not even Tressady's prejudice--which, indeed, was already +vanishing--could fail to see in the beautiful woman beside him the +fitting voice and spirit of such a scene. + +To-night he said to himself that one must needs believe her simple, in +spite of report. During their companionship this evening she had shown +him more and more plainly that she liked his society; her manner towards +him, indeed, had by now a soft surrender and friendliness that no man +could possibly have met with roughness, least of all a man young and +ambitious. But at the same time he noticed again, as he had once noticed +with anger, that she was curiously free from the usual feminine arts and +wiles. After their long talk at dinner, indeed, he began, in spite of +himself, to feel her not merely an intellectual comrade,--that he had +been conscious of from the first,--but rather a most winning and +attaching companion. It was a sentiment of friendly ease, that seemed to +bring with it a great relief from tension. The sordid cares and frictions +of the last few weeks, and the degrading memories of the day itself, +alike ceased to wear him. + +Yet all the time he said to himself, with inward amusement, that he must +take care! They had not talked directly of the Bill at dinner, but they +had talked round and about it incessantly. It was clear that the Maxwells +were personally very anxious; and George knew well that the public +position of the Ministry was daily becoming more difficult. There had +been a marked cooling on the subject of the Bill among their own +supporters; one or two London members originally pledged to it were even +believed to be wavering; and this campaign lately started by Fontenoy and +Watton against two of the leading clauses of the measure, in a London +"daily," bought for the purpose, had been so far extremely damaging. The +situation was threatening indeed, and Maxwell might well look harassed. + +Yet Tressady had detected no bitterness in Lady Maxwell's mood. Her +temper rather seemed to him very strenuous, very eager, and a little sad. +Altogether, he had been touched, he knew not exactly why, by his +conversation with her. "We are going to win," he said to himself, "and +she knows it." Yet to think thus gave him, for the first time, no +particular pleasure. + +As they strolled along they talked a little of some of the topics that +had been started at dinner, topics semi-political and semi-social, till +suddenly Lady Maxwell said, with a change of voice: + +"I heard some of your conversation with Sir Philip just now. How +differently you talk when you talk of India!" + +"I wonder what that means," said George, smiling. "It means, at any rate, +that when I am not talking of India, but of English labour, or the poor, +you think I talk like a brute." + +"I shouldn't put it like that," she said quietly. "But when you talk of +India, and people like the Lawrences or Lord Dalhousie, then it is that +one sees what you really admire--what stirs you--what makes you feel." + +"Well, ought I not to feel? Is there to be no gratitude towards the +people that have made one's country?" + +He looked down, upon her gaily, perfectly conscious of his own +tickled vanity. To be observed and analysed by such a critic was in +itself flattery. + +"That have made one's country?" she repeated, not without a touch of +irony. Then suddenly she became silent. + +George thrust his hands into his pockets and waited a little. + +"Well?" he said presently. "Well? I am waiting to hear you prove that +the Dalhousies and the Lawrences have done nothing for the country, +compared to--what shall we say?--some trade-union secretary whom you +particularly admire." + +She laughed, but he did not immediately draw his answer. They had reached +the river-bank and the steps of the little bridge. Marcella mounted the +bridge and paused midway across it, hanging over the parapet. He followed +her, and both stood gazing at the house. It rose from the grass like some +fabric of yellowish ivory cut and scrolled and fretted by its Tudor +architect, who had been also a goldsmith. There were lights like jewels +in its latticed windows; the dark fulness of the trees, disposed by an +artist-hand, enwrapped or fell away from it as the eye required; and on +the dazzling lawns, crossed by soft bands of shadow, scattered forms +moved up and down--women in trailing dresses, and black-coated men. +There were occasional sallies of talk and laughter, and from the open +window of the drawing-room came the notes of a violin. + +"Brahms!" said Marcella, with delight. "Nothing but music and he could +express this night--or the river--or the rising glow and bloom of +everything." + +As she spoke George felt a quick gust of pleasure and romance sweep +across him. It was as though senses that had been for long on the +defensive, tired, or teased merely by the world, gave way in a moment to +joy and poetry. He looked from the face beside him to the pictured scene +in which they stood--the soft air filled his lungs--what ailed him?--he +only knew that after many weeks he was, somehow, happy and buoyant again! + +Lady Maxwell, however, soon forgot the music and the moonlight. + +"That have made one's country?" she repeated, pausing on the words. +"And of course that house appeals to you in the same way? Famous people +have lived in it--people who belong to history. But for _me_, the real +making of one's country is done out of sight, in garrets and workshops +and coalpits, by people who die every minute--forgotten--swept into +heaps like autumn leaves, their lives mere soil and foothold for the +generation that comes after them. All yesterday morning, for instance, +I spent trying to feed a woman I know. She is a shirtmaker; she has +four children, and her husband is a docker out of work. She had sewed +herself sick and blind. She couldn't eat, and she couldn't sleep. But +she had kept the children alive--and the man. Her life will flicker +out in a month or two; but the children's lives will have taken root, +and the man will be eating and earning again. What use would your +Dalhousies and Lawrences be to England without her and the hundreds of +thousands like her?" + +"And yet it is you," cried George, unable to forbear the chance she gave +him, "who would take away from this very woman the power of feeding her +children and saving her husband--who would spoil all the lives in the +clumsy attempt to mend one of them. How can you quote me such an +instance! It amazes me." + +"Not at all. I have only to use my instance for another purpose, in +another way. You are thinking of the Bill, of course? But all we do is to +say to some of these victims, 'Your sacrifice, as it stands, is _too_ +costly; the State in its own interest cannot go on exacting or allowing +it. We will help you to serve the community in ways that shall exhaust +and wound it less.'" + +"And as a first step, drive you all comfortably into the workhouse!" said +George. "Don't omit that." + +"Many individuals must suffer," she said steadily. "But there will be +friends to help--friends that will strain every nerve to help." + +All her heart showed itself in voice and emphasis. Almost for the first +time in their evening's talk her natural passionateness came to +sight--the Southern, impulsive temper, that so often made people laugh at +or dislike her. Under the lace shawl she had thrown round her on coming +out he saw the quick rise and fall of the breast, the nervous clasp of +the hands lying on the stonework of the bridge. These were her prophetess +airs again. To-night they still amused him, but in a gentler and more +friendly way. + +"And so, according to your own account, you will protect your tailoress +and unmake your country. I am sorry for your dilemma," he said, laughing. + +"Ah! well,"--she shrugged her shoulders with a sigh,--"don't let's talk +of it. It's all too pressing--and sore--and hot. And to think of the +weeks that are just coming on!" + +George, hanging over the parapet beside her, felt reply a little +awkward, and said nothing. For a minute or two the night made itself +heard, the gentle slipping of the river, the fitful breathings from the +trees. A swan passed and repassed below them, and an owl called from the +distant woods. + +Presently Marcella lifted a white finger and pointed to the house. + +"One wouldn't want a better parable," she said. "It's like the State as +you see it--magnificent, inspiring, a thing of pomp and dignity. But we +women, who have to drive and keep going a house like that--_we_ know what +it all rests upon. It rests upon a few tired kitchen-maids and boot-boys +and scullery-girls, hurrying, panting creatures, whom a guest never sees, +who really run it all. I know, for I have tried to unearth them, to +organise them, to make sure that no one was fainting while we were +feasting. But it is incredibly hard; half the human race believes itself +born to make things easy for the other half. It comes natural to them to +ache and toil while we sit in easy chairs. What they resent is that we +should try to change it." + +"Goodness!" said George, pulling at his moustaches. "I don't recognise my +own experience of the ordinary domestic polity in that summary." + +"I daresay. You have to do with the upper servant, who is always a +greater tyrant than his master," she retorted, her voice expressing a +curious medley of laughter and feeling. "I am speaking of the people +that are not seen, like the tailoress and shirtmaker, in your +drum-and-trumpet State." + +"Well, you may be right," said George, drily. "But I confess--if I may +be quite frank--that I don't altogether trust you to judge. I want at +least, before I strike the balance between my Dalhousie and your +tailoress, to hear what those people have to say who have not crippled +their minds--by pity!" + +"Pity!" she said, her lip trembling in spite of herself. "Pity!--you +count pity a disease?" + +"As you--and others--practise it," he replied coolly, turning round upon +her. "It is no good; the world can't be run by pity. At least, living +always seems to me a great brutal, rushing, rough-and-tumble business, +which has to be carried on whether we like it or no. To be too careful, +too gingerly over the separate life, brings it all to a standstill. +Meddle too much, and the Demiurge who set the machine going turns sulky +and stops working. Then the nation goes to pieces--till some strong +ruffian without a scruple puts it together again." + +"What do you mean by the Demiurge?" + +He laughed. + +"Why do you make me explain my flights? Well, I suppose, the natural +daimonic power in things, which keeps them going and set them off; which +is not us, or like us, and cares nothing for us." + +His light voice developed a sudden energy during his little speech. + +"Ah!" said Marcella, wistfully. "Yes, if one thought that, I could +understand. But, even so, if the power behind things cares nothing for +us, I should only regard it as challenging us to care more for each +other. Do you mind my asking you a few plain questions? Do you know +anything personally of the London poor? I mean, have you any real friends +among them, whose lives you know?" + +"Well, I sit with Fontenoy while he receives deputations from all those +tailoresses and shirtmakers and fur-sewers that _you_ want to put in +order. The harassed widow streams through his room perpetually--wailing +to be let alone!" + +Marcella made a sound of amused scorn. + +"Oh! you think that nothing," said George, indignant. "I vow I could draw +every type of widow that London contains--I know them intimately." + +She shook her head. + +"I give up London. Then, in the North, aren't you a coal-owner? Do you +know your miners?" + +"Yes, and I detest them!" said George, shortly; "pig-headed brutes! They +will be on strike next month, and I shall be defrauded of my lawful +income till their lordships choose to go back. Pity _me_, if you +please--not them!" + +"So I do," she said with spirit--"if you hate the men by whom you live!" + +There was silence. Then suddenly George said, in another tone: + +"But sometimes, I don't deny, the beggars wring it out of one--your pity. +I saw a mother last week--Suppose we stroll on a little. I want to see +how the river gets out of the wood." + +They descended the bridge, and turned again into the river-path. George +told the story of Mary Batchelor in his half-ironic way, yet so that here +and there Marcella shivered. Then gradually, as though it were a relief +to him to talk, he slipped into a half-humorous, half-serious discussion +of his mine-owner's position and its difficulties. Incidentally and +unconsciously a good deal of his history betrayed itself in his talk: his +bringing-up, his mother; the various problems started in his mind since +his return from India; even his relations to his wife. Once or twice it +flashed across him that he was confessing himself with an extraordinary +frankness to a woman he had made up his mind to dislike. But the +reflection did not stop him. The balmy night, the solitude, this +loveliness that walked beside him so willingly and kindly--with every +step they struck his defences from him; they drew; they penetrated. + +With her, too, everything was simple and natural. She had felt his +attraction at their first meeting; she had determined to make a friend of +him; and she was succeeding. As he disclosed himself she felt a strange +compassion for him. It was plain to her woman's instinct that he was at +heart lonely and uncompanioned. Well, what wonder with that hard, mean +little being for a wife! Had she captured him, or had he thrown himself +away upon her in mere wantonness, out of that defiance of sentiment which +appeared to be his favourite _parti-pris?_ In any case, it seemed to this +happy wife that he had done the one fatal and irreparable thing; and she +was genuinely sorry for him. She felt him very young, too. As far as she +could gather, he was about two years her junior; but her feeling made the +gap much greater. + +Yet, of course, the situation,--Maxwell, Fontenoy,--all that those names +implied to him and her, made a thrilling under-note in both their minds. +She never forgot her husband and his straits; and in George's mind +Fontenoy's rugged figure stood sentinel. Given the circumstances, both +her temperament and her affections drove her inevitably into trying, +first to attract, then to move and influence her companion. And given the +circumstances, he could but yield himself bit by bit to her woman's +charm; while full all the time of a confident scorn for her politics. + +Insensibly, the stress upon them drew them back to London and to current +affairs, and at last she said to him, with vehemence: + +"You _must_ see these people in the flesh--and not in your house, but in +theirs. Or, first come and meet them in mine?" + +"Why, please, should you think St. James's Square a palace of truth +compared to Carlton House Terrace?" he asked her, with amusement. +Fontenoy lived in Carlton House Terrace. + +"I am not inviting you to St. James's Square," she said quietly. "That +house is only my home for one set of purposes. Just now my true home is +not there at all. It is in the Mile End Road." + +George asked to be informed, and opened his eyes at her account of the +way in which she still divided her time between the West End and the +East, spending always one or two nights a week among the trades and the +work-people she had come to know so intimately, whose cause she was +fighting with such persistence. + +"Maxwell doesn't come now," she said. "He is too busy, and his work there +is done. But I go because I love the people, and to talk with them and +live with them part of every week keeps one's mind clear as to what one +wants, and why. Well,"--her voice showed that she smiled,--"will you +come? My old maid shall give you coffee, and you shall meet a roomful of +tailors and shirtmakers. You shall see what people look like in the +flesh--not on paper--after working fourteen hours at a stretch, in a room +where you and I could not breathe!" + +"Charming!"--he bowed ironically. "Of course I will come." + +They had paused under the shadow of a grove of beech-trees, and were +looking back towards the moonlit garden and the house. Suddenly George +said, in an odd voice: + +"Do you mind my saying it? You know, nobody is ever +converted--politically--nowadays." + +In the darkness her flush could not be seen. But he felt the mingled +pride and soreness in her voice, under its forced brightness. + +"I know. How long is it since a speech turned a vote in the House of +Commons! One wonders why people take the trouble to speak. Shall we go +back? Ah! there is someone pursuing us--my husband and Ancoats!" + +And two figures, dark for an instant against the brightness of the lawns, +plunged into the shadow of the wood. + +"You wanderers!" said Maxwell, as he distinguished his wife's white +dress. "Is this path quite safe in this darkness? Suppose we get +out of it." + +The river, indeed, beneath a steep bank, ran close beside them, and +the trees meeting overhead all but shut out the moon. Maxwell, in some +anxiety, caught his wife's arm, and made her pause till his eye should +be once more certain of the path. Meanwhile Ancoats and Tressady +walked quickly back to the lawn, Ancoats talking and laughing with +unusual vigour. + + * * * * * + +The Maxwells did not hurry themselves. As they emerged from the wood +Marcella slipped her hand into her husband's. It was her characteristic +caress. The slim, strong hand loved to feel itself in the shelter of +his; while to him that seeking touch was the symbol of all that she +brought him--the inventive, inexhaustible arts of a passion which was a +kind of genius. + +"Don't go in!" she pleaded. "Why should we?" + +"No!--why should we?" he repeated, sighing. "Why are we here at +all?--that is what I have been asking myself all the evening. And now +more than ever since my walk with that boy Ancoats." + +"Tell me about it," she said eagerly. "Could you get nothing out of +him?" + +Maxwell shrugged his shoulders. + +"Nothing. He vows that everything is all right; that he knows a pack of +slanderers have been 'yelping at him,' and he wishes both they and his +mother would let him alone." + +"His mother!" cried Marcella, outraged. + +"Well, I suppose I said to him the kind of thing you would evidently like +to say. But with no result. He merely laughed, and chattered about +everything under the sun--his race-horses, new plays, politics--Heaven +knows what! He is in an excited state--feverish, restless, and, I should +think, unhappy. But he would tell nothing--to me." + +"How much do you think she knows?" + +"His mother? Nothing, I should say. Every now and then I detect a note of +extra anxiety when she talks to him; and there is evidently something in +her mind, some impression from his manner, perhaps, which is driving her +more keenly than ever towards this marriage. But I don't believe a single +one of the stories that have reached us has reached her. And now--here is +this poor girl--and even my dull eyes have noticed that to-night he has +purposely, markedly, avoided her." + +Marcella felt her cheek flame. + +"And when one thinks of his behaviour in the winter!" she cried. + +They wandered on along a path that skirted the wood, talking anxiously +about the matter which had in truth brought them to Castle Luton. In +spite of the comparative gentleness of English political relations, +neither Maxwell nor Marcella, perhaps, would willingly have become +Charlotte Allison's guests at a moment when her house was actually the +headquarters of a violent and effective opposition to Maxwell's policy, +when moreover the leader of that opposition was likely to be of the +party. But about a fortnight before Whitsuntide some tales of young +Ancoats had suddenly reached Maxwell's ears, with such effect that on his +next meeting with Ancoats's mother he practically invited himself and +Marcella--greatly to Mrs. Allison's surprise--to Castle Luton for +Whitsuntide. + +For the boy had been Maxwell's ward, and Henry Allison had been the +intimate friend and comrade of Maxwell's father. And Maxwell's feeling +for his father, and for his father's friends, was of such a kind that his +guardian's duties had gone deep with him. He had done his best for the +boy, and since Ancoats had reached his majority his ex-guardian had still +kept him anxiously in mind. + +Of late indeed Ancoats had troubled himself very little about his +guardian, or his guardian's anxieties. He seemed to have been devoting a +large share of his mind to the avoidance of his mother's old friends; and +the Maxwells, for months, in spite of many efforts on their part, had +seen little or nothing of him. Maxwell for various reasons had begun to +suspect a number of uncomfortable things with regard to the young +fellow's friends and pleasures. Yet nothing could be taken hold of till +this sudden emergence of a particular group of stories, coupling +Ancoats's name with that of a notorious little actress whose adventures +had already provided a certain class of newspaper with abundant copy. + +Then Maxwell, who cared personally very little for the red-haired youth +himself, took alarm for the mother's sake. For in the case of Mrs. +Allison a scandal of the kind suggested meant a tragedy. Her passion for +her son was almost a tragedy already, so closely mingled in it were the +feelings of the mother and those of the Christian, to whom "vice" is not +an amusement, but an agony. + + * * * * * + +Yet, as Marcella said and felt, it was a hard fate that had forced +Maxwell to concern himself with Ancoats's love-affairs at this +particular moment. + +"Don't think of it," she said at last, urgently, as they walked along. +"It is too bad; as if there were not enough!" + +Maxwell stood still, with a little smile, and put his arm round her +shoulders. + +"Dear, I shall soon have time enough, probably, to think about Ancoats's +affairs or anything else. Do you know that I was planning this morning +what we would do when we go out? Shall we slip over to the Australian +colonies in the autumn? I would give a good deal to see them for myself." + +She gave a low cry of pain. + +"Why are you so depressed to-night? Is there any fresh news?" + +"Yes. And, altogether, things look increasingly bad for us, and +increasingly well for them. It will be extraordinarily close +anyway--probably a matter of a vote or two." And he gave her a summary +of his after-dinner conversation with Lord Cathedine, a keen ally of +Fontenoy's in the Lords, and none the less a shrewd fellow because he +happened to be also a detestable person. + +Marcella heard the news of one or two fresh defections from the +Government with amazement and indignation. She stood there in the +darkness, leaning against the man she loved, her heart beating fast and +stormily. How could the world thus misconceive and thwart him? And what +could she do? Her mind ran passionately through a hundred schemes, +refusing to submit--to see him baffled and defeated. + + + + +CHAPTER XII + + +To Lord Ancoats himself this party of his mother's was an oppression +and a nuisance. He had only been induced to preside over it with +difficulty; and his mother had been both hurt and puzzled by his +reluctance to play the host. + +If you had asked Maxwell's opinion on the point, he would have told you +that Ancoats's bringing up had a good deal to do with the present +anxieties of Ancoats's mother. He--Maxwell--had done his best, but he had +been overmatched. + +First and foremost, Ancoats had been to no public school. It was not the +custom of the family; and Mrs. Allison could not be induced to break the +tradition. There was accordingly a succession of tutors, whose +Church-principles at least were sound. And Ancoats showed himself for a +time an impressionable, mystical boy, entirely in sympathy with his +mother. His confirmation was a great family emotion, and when he was +seventeen Mrs. Allison had difficulty in making him take food enough in +Lent to keep him in health. Maxwell was beginning to wonder where it +would end, when the lad was sent to Cambridge, and the transformation +scene that might always perhaps have been expected, began. + +He had been two years at Trinity when he went to pay the Maxwells a +visit at the Court. Maxwell could hardly believe his eyes or ears. The +boy who at nineteen was an authority on church music and ancient "uses," +by twenty-one talked and thought of nothing in heaven or earth but the +stage and French _bric-à-brac._ His conversation swarmed with the names +of actors, singers, and dancers; but they were names that meant nothing +except to the initiated. They were the small people of the small +theatres; and Ancoats was a Triton among them, not at all, so he +carefully informed his kindred, because of his wealth and title, but +because he too was an artist, and could sing, revel, write, and dance +with the best of them. + +For some time Maxwell was able to console Mrs. Allison with the +historical reflection that more than one son of the Oxford Movement had +found in a passion for the stage a ready means of annoying the English +Puritan. When it came, however, to the young man's producing risky plays +of his own composing at extremely costly _matinées_, there was nothing +for it but to interfere. Maxwell at last persuaded him to give up the +farce of Cambridge and go abroad. But Ancoats would only go with a man of +his own sort; and their time was mostly spent in Paris, where Ancoats +divided his hard-spent existence between the furious pursuit of Louis +Quinze _bibelots_ and the patronage of two or three minor theatres. To be +the king of a first night, raining applause and bouquets from his +stage-box, seemed to give him infinite content; but his vanity was hardly +less flattered by the compliments say of M. Tournonville, the well-known +dealer on the Quai Voltaire, who would bow himself before the young +Englishman with the admiring cry, "Mon Dieu! milord, que vous êtes fin +connoisseur!" while the dealer's assistant grinned among the shadows of +the back-shop. + +At last, at twenty-four, he must needs return to England for his coming +of age under his grandfather's will and the taking over of his estate. +Under the sobering influence of these events, his class and his mother +seemed for a time to recover him. He refurnished a certain number of +rooms at Castle Luton, and made a special marvel of his own room, which +was hung thick with Boucher, Greuze, and Watteau engravings, littered +with miniatures and trinkets, and encumbered here and there with +portfolios of drawings which he was not anxious to unlock in his +mother's presence. + +Moreover, he was again affectionate to his mother, and occasionally even +went to church with her. The instincts of the English aristocrat +reappeared amid the accomplishments of the _petit-maître,_ and poor Mrs. +Allison's spirits revived. Then the golden-haired Lady Madeleine was +asked to stay at Castle Luton. When she came Ancoats devoted himself with +extraordinary docility. He drew her, made songs for her, and devised +French charades to act with her; he even went so far as to compare her +with enthusiasm to the latest and most wonderful "Salome" just exhibited +in the Salon by the latest and most wonderful of the impressionists. But +Lady Madeleine fortunately had not seen the picture. + +Then suddenly, one morning, Ancoats went up to town without notice and +remained there. After a while his mother pursued him thither; but Ancoats +was restless at sight of her, and she was not long in London, though +long enough to show the Maxwells and others that her heart was anxiously +set upon Lady Madeleine as a daughter-in-law. + +This then--taken together with the stories now besprinkling the +newspapers--was the situation. Naturally, Ancoats's affairs, as he +himself was irritably aware, were now, in one way or another, occupying +the secret thoughts or the private conversations of most of his +mother's guests. + +For instance-- + + * * * * * + +"Are you nice?" said Betty Leven, suddenly, to young Lord Naseby, in the +middle of Sunday morning. "Are you in a charitable, charming, humble, and +trusting frame of mind? Because, if not, I shall go away--I have had too +much of Lady Kent!" + +Charlie Naseby laughed. He was sitting reading in the shade at the edge +of one of the Castle Luton lawns. For some time past he had been watching +Betty Leven and Lady Kent, as they talked under a cedar-tree some little +distance from him. Lady Kent conversed with her whole bellicose +person--her cap, her chin, her nose, her spreading and impressive +shoulders. And from her gestures young Naseby guessed that she had been +talking to Betty Leven rather more in character than usual. + +He felt a certain curiosity about the _tête-à-tête._ So that when Betty +left her companion and came tripping over the lawn to the house, the +young man lifted his face and gave her a smiling nod, as though to invite +her to come and visit him on the way. Betty came, and then as she stood +in front of him delivered the home question already reported. + +"Am I nice?" repeated young Naseby. "Far from it. I have not been to +church, and I have been reading a French novel of which I do not even +propose to tell you the name." + +And he promptly slipped his volume into his pocket. + +"Which is worst?" said Betty, pensively: "to break the fourth +Commandment or the ninth? Lady Kent, of course, has been trampling on +them both. But the ninth is her particular victim. She calls it 'getting +to the roots of things.'" + +"Whose roots has she been delving at this morning?" said Naseby. + +Betty looked behind her, saw that Lady Kent had gone into the house, +and let herself drop into the corner of Naseby's bench with a sigh +of fatigue. + +"One feels as though one were a sort of house-dog tussling with a +burglar. I have been keeping her off all my friends' secrets by main +force; so she had to fall back on George Tressady, and tell me ugly tales +of his mamma." + +"George Tressady! Why on earth should she do him an ill turn? I don't +believe she ever saw him before." + +Betty pressed her lips. She and Charlie Naseby had been friends since +they wore round pinafores and sat on high nursery chairs side by side. + +"One needn't go to the roots of things," she said, severely, "but one +should have eyes in one's head. Has it ever occurred to you that Ancoats +has taken a special fancy to Sir George--that he sat talking to him last +night till all hours, and that he has been walking about with him the +whole of this morning, instead of walking about--well! with somebody +else--as he was meant to do? Why do men behave in this ridiculous manner? +Women, of course. But _men!_ It's like a trout that won't let itself be +landed. And what's the good? It's only prolonging the agony." + +"Not at all," said Naseby, laughing. "There's always the chance of +slipping the hook." Then his lively face became suddenly serious. "But +it's time, I think," he added, almost with vehemence, "that Lady Kent +stopped trying to land Ancoats. In the first place, it's no good. He +won't be landed against his will. In the next--well, I only know," he +broke off, "that if I had a sister in love with Ancoats at the present +moment, I'd carry her off to the North Pole rather than let her be talked +about with him!" + +Betty opened her eyes. + +"Then there _is_ something in the stories!" she cried. "Of course, +Frank told me there was nothing. And the Maxwells have not said a +word. And _now_ I understand why Lady Kent has been dinning it into +my ears--I could only be thankful Mrs. Allison was safe at church--that +Ancoats should marry early. 'Oh! my dear, it's always been the only +hope for them!'" Betty mimicked Lady Kent's deep voice and important +manner: "'Why, there was the grandfather--_his_ wife had a time!--I +could tell you things about _him_!--oh! and her too.--And even Henry +Allison!--' There, of course, I stopped her." + +"Old ghoul!" said Naseby, in disgust. "So she knows. And yet--good +Heavens! where does that charming girl come from?" + +He knocked the end off his cigarette, and returned it to his mouth with a +rather unsteady hand. + +"Knows?--knows what?" said Betty. There was a pink flush, perhaps of +alarm, on her pretty cheek, but her eyes said plainly that if there were +risks she must run them. + +Naseby hesitated. The natural reticence of one young man about another +held him back--and he was Ancoats's friend. But he liked Lady Madeleine, +and her mother's ugly manoeuvres in the sight of gods and men filled him +with a restless ill-temper. + +"You say the Maxwells have told you nothing?" he said at last. "But all +the same I am pretty certain that Maxwell is here for nothing else. What +on earth should he be doing in this _galère_ just now! Look at him and +Fontenoy! They've been pacing that lime-walk for a good hour. No one ever +saw such a spectacle before. Of course something's up!" + +Betty followed his eyes, and caught the figures of the two men between +the trunks as they moved through the light and shadow of the +lime-walk--Fontenoy's massive head sunk in his shoulders, his hands +clasped behind his back; Maxwell's taller and alerter form beside him. +Fontenoy had, in fact, arrived that morning from town, just too late to +accompany Mrs. Allison and her flock to church; and Maxwell and he had +been together since the moment when Ancoats, having brought his guest +into the garden, had gone off himself on a walk with Tressady. + +"Ancoats and Tressady came back past here," Naseby went on. "Ancoats +stood still, with his hands on his sides, and looked at those two. His +expression was not amiable. 'Something hatching,' he said to Tressady. +I suppose Ancoats got his sneer from his actor-friends--none of us +could do it without practice. 'Shall we go and pull the chief out of +that?' But they didn't go. Ancoats turned sulky, and went into the +house by himself." + +"I'm glad I don't have to keep that youth straight," said Betty, +devoutly. "Perhaps I don't care enough about him to try. But his mother's +a darling saint!--and if he breaks her heart he ought to be hung." + +"She knows nothing--I believe--" said Naseby, quickly. + +"Strange!" cried Betty. "I wonder if it pays to be a saint. I shall know +everything about _my_ boy when he's that age." + +"Oh! will you?" said Naseby, looking at her with a mocking eye. + +"Yes, sir, I shall. Your secrets are not so difficult to know, if one +_wants_ to know them. Heaven forbid, however, that I should want to know +anything about any of you till Bertie is grown up! Now, please tell me +everything. Who is the lady?" + +"Heaven forbid I should tell you!" said Naseby, drily. + +"Don't trifle any more," said Betty, laying a remonstrating hand on his +arm; "they will be home from church directly." + +"Well, I won't tell you any names," said Naseby, reluctantly. "Of +course, it's an actress--a very small one. And, of course, she's a bad +lot--and pretty." + +"Why, there's no of course about it--about either of them!" said Betty, +with more indignation than grammar. She also had dramatic friends, and +was sensitive on the point. + +Naseby protested that if he must argue the ethics of the stage before he +told his tale, the tale would remain untold. Then Betty, subdued, fell +into an attitude of meek listening, hands on lap. The tale when told +indeed proved to be a very ordinary affair, marked out perhaps a trifle +from the ruck by the facts that there was another pretender in the field +with whom Ancoats had already had one scene in public, and would probably +have more; that Ancoats being Ancoats, something mad and conspicuous was +to be expected, which would bring the matter inevitably to his mother's +ears; and that Mrs. Allison was Mrs. Allison. + +"Can he marry her?" said Betty, quickly. + +"Thank Heaven! no. There is a husband somewhere in Chili. So that it +doesn't seem to be a question of driving Mrs. Allison out of Castle +Luton. But--well, between ourselves, it would be a pity to give Ancoats +so fine a chance of going to the bad, as he'll get, if this young woman +lays hold of him. He mightn't recover it." + +Betty sat silent a moment. All her gaiety had passed away. There was a +fierceness in her blue eyes. + +"And that's what we bring them up for!" she exclaimed at last--"that they +may do all these ugly, stale, stupid things over again. Oh! I'm not +thinking so much, of the morals!"--she turned to Naseby with a defiant +look. "I am thinking of the hateful cruelty and unkindness!" + +"To his mother?" said Naseby. He shrugged his shoulders. + +Betty allowed herself an outburst. Her little hand trembled on her knee. +Naseby did not reply. Not that he disagreed; far from it. Under his young +and careless manner he was already a person of settled character, +cherishing a number of strong convictions. But since it had become the +fashion to talk as frankly of a matter of this kind to your married-women +friends as to anybody else, he thought that the women should take it with +more equanimity. + +Betty, indeed, regained her composure very quickly, like a stream when +the gust has passed. They fell into a keen, practical discussion of the +affair. Who had influence with Ancoats? What man? Naseby shook his +head. The difference in age between Ancoats and Maxwell was too great, +and the men too unlike in temperament. He himself had done what he +could, in vain, and Ancoats now told him nothing; for the rest, he +thought Ancoats had very few friends amid his innumerable acquaintance, +and such as he had, of a third-rate dramatic sort, not likely to be of +much use at this moment. + +"I haven't seen him take to any fellow of his own kind as much as he has +taken to George Tressady these two days, since he left Cambridge. But +that's no good, of course--it's too new." + +The two sat side by side, pondering. Suddenly Naseby said, smiling, with +a change of expression: + +"This party is really quite interesting. Look there!" + +Betty looked, and saw George Tressady, with his hands in his pockets, +lounging along a distant path beside Marcella Maxwell. + +"Well!" said Betty, "what then?" + +Naseby gave his mouth a twist. + +"Nothing; only it's odd. I ran across them just now--I was playing ball +with that jolly little imp, Hallin. You never saw two people more +absorbed. Of course he's _sous le charme_--we all are. Our English +politics are rather rum, aren't they? They don't indulge in this amiable +country-house business in a South American republic, you know. They +prefer shooting." + +"And you evidently think it a healthier state of things. Wait till we +come to something nearer to _our_ hearths and bosoms than Factory Acts," +said Betty, with the wisdom of her kind. "All the same, Lord Fontenoy is +in earnest." + +"Oh yes, Fontenoy is in earnest. So, I suppose, is Tressady. So--good +Heavens!--is Maxwell. I say, here comes the church party." + +And from a side-door in a venerable wall, beyond which could be seen the +tower of a little church, there emerged a small group of people--Mrs. +Allison, Lady Cathedine, and Madeleine Penley in front, escorted by the +white-haired Sir Philip; and behind, Lady Tressady, between Harding +Watton and Lord Cathedine. + +"Cathedine!" cried Naseby, staring at the group. "Cathedine been +to church?" + +"For the purpose, I suppose, of disappointing poor Laura, who might have +hoped to get rid of him," said Betty, sharply. "No!--if I were Mrs. +Allison I should draw the line at Lord Cathedine." + +"Nobody need see any more of Cathedine than they want," said Naseby, +calmly; "and, of course, he behaves himself here. Moreover, there is no +doubt at all about his brains. They say Fontenoy expects to make great +use of him in the Lords." + +"By the way," said Betty, turning round upon him, "where are you?" + +"Well, thank God! I'm not in Parliament," was Naseby's smiling reply. "So +don't trouble me for opinions. I have none. Except that, speaking +generally, I should like Lady Maxwell to get what she wants." + +Betty threw him a sly glance, wondering if she might tease him about the +news she heard of him from Marcella. + +She had no time, however, to attack him, for Mrs. Allison approached. + + * * * * * + +"What is the matter with her?--with Madeleine?--with all of them?" +thought Betty, suddenly. + +For Mrs. Allison, pale and discomposed, did not return, did not +apparently notice Lady Leven's greeting. She walked hastily past them, +and would have gone at once into the house but that, turning her head, +she perceived Lord Fontenoy hurrying towards her from the lime-walk. With +an obvious effort she controlled herself, and went to meet him, leaning +heavily on her silver-topped stick. + +The others paused, no one having, as it seemed, anything to say. Letty +poked the gravel with her parasol; Sir Philip made a telescope of his +hands, and fixed it upon Maxwell, who was coming slowly across the lawn; +while Lady Madeleine turned a handsome, bewildered face on Betty. + +Betty took her aside to look at a flower on the house. + +"What's the matter?" said Lady Leven, under her breath. + +"I don't know," said the other. "Something dreadful happened on the way +home. There was a girl--" + +But she broke off suddenly. Ancoats had just opened and shut the +garden-door, and was coming to join his guests. + +"Poor dear!" thought Betty to herself, with a leap of pity. It was so +evident the girl's whole nature thrilled to the approaching step. She +turned her head towards Ancoats, as though against her will, her tall +form drawn erect, in unconscious tension. + +Ancoats's quick eyes ran over the group. + +"He thinks we have been talking about him," was Betty's quick reflection, +which was probably not far from the truth. For the young man's face at +once assumed a lowering expression, and, walking up to Lady Tressady, +whom as yet he had noticed no more than civility required, he asked +whether she would like to see the "houses" and the rose-garden. + +Letty, delighted by the attention, said Yes in her gayest way, and +Ancoats at once led her off. He walked quickly, and their figures soon +disappeared among the trees. + +Madeleine Penley gazed after them. Betty, who had a miserable feeling +that the girl was betraying herself to men like Harding Watton or Lord +Cathedine,--a feeling which was, however, the creation of her own nervous +excitement,--tried to draw her away. But Lady Madeleine did not seem to +understand. She stood mechanically buttoning and unbuttoning her long +gloves. "Yes, I'm coming," she said, but she did not move. + +Then Betty saw that Lord Naseby had approached her; and it seemed to the +observer that all the young man's vivid face was suffused with something +at once soft and fierce. + +"The thorn-blossom on the hill is a perfect show just now, Lady +Madeleine," he said. "Come and look at it. There will be just time +before lunch." + +The girl looked at him. The colour rushed to her cheeks, and she walked +submissively away beside him. + + * * * * * + +Meanwhile Letty and Ancoats pursued their way towards the greenhouses and +walled gardens. Letty tripped along, hardly able to keep up with her +companion's stride, but chattering fast all the time. At every turn of +the view she overflowed with praise and wonder; nor could anything have +been at once more enthusiastic or more impertinent than the questions +with which she plied him as to his gardeners, his estate, and his +affairs, in the intervals of panegyric. + +Ancoats at first hardly listened to her. A perfunctory "Yes" or "No" +seemed to be all that the situation demanded. Then, when he did +sufficiently emerge from the tempest of his own thoughts to catch some of +the things she was saying, his irritable temper rebelled at once. What +had Tressady been about?--ill-bred, tiresome woman! + +His manner stiffened; he stalked along in front of her, doing his bare +host's duty, and warding off her conversation as much as possible; while +Letty, on her side, soon felt the familiar chill and mortification +creeping over her. Why, she wondered angrily, should he have asked her to +walk with him if he could not be a more agreeable companion? + +Towards the end of the lime-walk they came across Mrs. Allison and Lord +Fontenoy. As they passed the older pair the pale mother lifted her eyes +to her son with a tremulous smile. + +But Ancoats made no response, nor had he any greeting for Fontenoy. He +carried his companion quickly on, till they found themselves in a +wilderness of walled gardens opening one into another, each, as it +seemed, more miraculously ordered and more abundantly stocked than its +neighbour. + +"I wonder you know your way," laughed Letty. "And who can possibly +consume all this?" + +"I haven't an idea," said Ancoats, abruptly, as he opened the door of the +tenth vinery. "I wish you'd tell me." + +Letty raised her eyebrows with a little cry of protest. + +"Oh! but it makes the whole place so magnificent, so complete." + +"What is there magnificent in having too much?" said Ancoats, shortly. +"I believe the day of these huge country places, with all their dull +greenhouses and things, is done." + +Much he cared, indeed, about his gardeners and his grapes! He was in the +mood to feel his whole inheritance a burden round his neck. But at the +same time to revile his own wealth gave him a pungent sense of playing +the artist. + +"Have you argued that with Lord Fontenoy?" she inquired archly. + +"I should not take the trouble," he said, with careless hauteur. +"Ah!"--Letty's vanity winced under his involuntary accent of relief--"I +see your husband and Lady Maxwell." + +Marcella and George came towards them. They were strolling along a broad +flowery border, which was at the moment a blaze of paeonies of all +shades, interspersed with tall pyramidal growths of honeysuckle. Marcella +was loitering here and there, burying her face in the fragrance of the +honeysuckle, or drawing her companion's attention in delight to the +glowing clumps of paeonies Hallin hovered round them, now putting his +hand confidingly into Tressady's, now tugging at his mother's dress, and +now gravely wooing the friendship of a fine St. Bernard that made one of +the party. George, with his hands in his pockets, walked or paused as the +others chose; and it struck Letty at once that he was talking with +unusual freedom and zest. + +Yes, it was true, indeed, as Harding said--they had made friends. As she +looked at them the first movement of a jealous temper stirred in Letty. +She was angry with Lady Maxwell's beauty, and angry with George's +enjoyment. It was like the great lady all over to slight the wife and +annex the husband. George certainly might have taken the trouble to come +and look for her on their return from church! + +So, while Ancoats talked stiffly with Marcella, the bride, a few paces +off, let George understand through her bantering manner that she was out +of humour. + +"But, dear, I had no notion you would be let out so soon," pleaded +George. "That good man really can't earn his pay." + +"Oh! but of course you knew it was High Church--all split up into little +bits," said Letty, unappeased. "But naturally--" + +She was about to add some jealous sarcasm when it was arrested by the +arrival of Sir Philip Wentworth and Watton, whose figures appeared in a +side-archway close to her. + +"Ah! well guessed," said Sir Philip. "I thought we should find you among +the paeonies. Lady Tressady, did you ever see such a show? Ancoats, is +your head gardener visible on a Sunday? I ask with trembling, for there +is no more magnificent member of creation. But if I _could_ get at him, +to ask him about an orchid I saw in one of your houses yesterday, I +should be grateful." + +"Come into the next garden, then," said Ancoats, "where the orchid-houses +are. If he isn't there, we'll send for him." + +"Then, Lady Tressady, you must come and see me through," said Sir Philip, +gallantly. "I want to quarrel with him about a label--and you remember +Dizzy's saying--'a head gardener is always opinionated'? Are you coming, +Lady Maxwell?" + +Marcella shook her head, smiling. + +"I am afraid I hate hothouses," she said. + +"My dear lady, don't pine for the life according to nature at Castle +Luton!" said Sir Philip, raising a finger. "The best of hothouses, like +the best of anything, demands a thrill." + +Marcella shrugged her shoulders. + +"I get more thrill out of the paeonies." + +Sir Philip laughed, and he and Watton carried off Letty, whose vanity was +once more happy in their society; while Ancoats, glad of the pretext, +hurried along in front to find the great Mr. Newmarch. + + * * * * * + +"I believe there are some wonderful irises out in the Friar's Garden," +said Marcella. "Mrs. Allison told me there was a show of them somewhere. +Let me see if I can find the way. And Hallin would like the goldfish in +the fountain." + +Her two companions followed her gladly, and she led them through devious +paths till there was a shout from Hallin, and the most poetic corner of a +famous garden revealed itself. Amid the ruins of a cloister that had once +formed part of the dissolved Cistercian priory on whose confiscated lands +Castle Luton had arisen, a rich medley of flowers was in full and perfect +bloom. Irises in every ravishing shade of purple, lilac, and gold, +carpets of daffodils and narcissus, covered the ground, and ran into each +corner and cranny of the old wall. Yellow banksia and white clematis +climbed the crumbling shafts, or made new tracery for the empty windows, +and where the ruin ended, yew hedges, adorned at top with a whole +procession of birds and beasts, began. The flowery space thus enclosed +was broken in the centre by an old fountain; and as one sat on a stone +seat beside it, one looked through an archway, cut through the darkness +of the yews, to the blue river and the hills. + +The little place breathed perfume and delight. But Marcella did not, +somehow, give it the attention it deserved. She sat down absently on the +bench by the fountain, and presently, as George and Hallin were poking +among the goldfish, she turned to her companion with the abrupt question: + +"You didn't know Ancoats, I think, before this visit, did you?" + +"Only as one knows the merest acquaintance. Fontenoy introduced me to him +at the club." + +Marcella sighed. She seemed to be arguing something with herself. At +last, with a quick look towards the approaches of the garden, she said in +a low voice: + +"I think you must know that his friends are not happy about him?" + +It so happened that Watton had found opportunity to show Tressady that +morning a paragraph from one of the numerous papers that batten on the +British peer, his dress, his morals, and his sport. The paragraph, +without names, without even initials, contained an outline of Lord +Ancoats's affairs which Harding, who knew everything of a scandalous +nature, declared to be well informed. It had made George whistle; and +afterwards he had watched Mrs. Allison go to church with a new interest +in her proceedings. + +So that when Marcella threw out her hesitating question, he said at +once: + +"I know what the papers are beginning to say--that is, I have seen a +paragraph--" + +"Oh! those newspapers!" she said in distress. "We are all afraid of some +madness, and any increase of talk may hasten it. There is no one who can +control him, and of late he has not even tried to conceal things." + +"It is a determined face," said George. "I am afraid he will take his +way. How is it that he comes to be so unlike his mother?" + +"How is it that adoration and sacrifice count for so little?" said +Marcella, sadly. "She has given him all the best of her life." + +And she drew a rapid sketch of the youth's career and the mother's +devotion. + +George listened in silence. What she said showed him that in his +conversations with Ancoats that young man had been talking round and +about his own case a good deal! and when she paused he said drily: + +"Poor Mrs. Allison! But, you know, there must be some crumples in the +rose-leaves of the great." + +She looked at him with a momentary astonishment. + +"Why should one think of her as 'great'? Would not any mother suffer? +First of all he is so changed; it is so difficult to get at him--his +friends are so unlike hers--he is so wrapped up in London, so apathetic +about his estate. All the religious sympathy that meant so much to her is +gone. And now he threatens her with this--what shall I call it?"--her lip +curled--"this entanglement. If it goes on, how shall we keep her from +breaking her heart over it? Poor thing! poor mothers!" + +She raised her white hand, and let it fall upon her knee with one of the +free, instinctive gestures that made her beauty so expressive. + +But George would not yield himself to her feeling. + +"Ancoats will get through it--somehow--as other men do," he said +stubbornly, "and she must get through it too--and _not_ break her heart." + +Marcella was silent. He turned towards her after a moment. + +"You think that a brutal doctrine? But if you'll let me say it, life and +ease and good temper are really not the brittle things women make them! +Why do they put all their treasure into that one bag they call their +affections? There is plenty else in life--there is indeed! It shows +poverty of mind!" + +He laughed, and taking up a pebble dropped it sharply among the goldfish. + +"Alack!" said Marcella, caressing her child's head as he stood playing +beside her. "Hallin, I can't have you kiss my hand like that. Sir George +says it's poverty of mind." + +"It ain't," said Hallin, promptly. But his remark had a deplorable lack +of unction, for the goldfish, startled by George's pebble, were at that +moment performing evolutions of the greatest interest, and his black eyes +were greedily bent upon them. + +Both laughed, and George let her remark alone. But his few words left +on Marcella a painful impression, which renewed her compassion of the +night before. This young fellow, just married, protesting against an +over-exaltation of the affections!--it struck her as half tragic, half +grotesque. And, of course, it was explained by the idiosyncrasies of +that little person in a Paris gown now walking about somewhere with +Sir Philip! + +Yet, just as she had again allowed herself to think of him as someone far +younger and less mature than herself, he quietly renewed the +conversation, so far as it concerned Ancoats, talking with a caustic good +sense, a shrewd perception, and at bottom with a good feeling, that first +astonished her, and then mastered her friendship more and more. She found +herself yielding him a fuller and fuller confidence, appealing to him, +taking pleasure in anything that woke the humour of the sharp, long face, +or that rare blink of the blue eyes that meant a leap of some responsive +sympathy he could not quite conceal. + +And for him it was all pleasure, though he never stopped to think of it. +The lines of her slender form, as she sat with such careless dignity +beside him, her lovely eyes, the turns of her head, the softening tones +of her voice, the sense of an emerging bond that had in it nothing +ignoble, nothing to be ashamed of, together with the child's simple +liking for him, and the mere physical delight of this morning of late +May--the rush and splendour of its white, thunderous clouds, its +penetrating, scented air: each and all played their part in the rise of a +new emotion he would not have analysed if he could. + +He was particularly glad that in this fresh day of growing intimacy she +had as yet talked politics or "questions" of any sort so little! It made +it all the more possible to escape from, to wholly overthrow in his +mind, that first hostile image of her, impressed--strange unreason on his +part!--by that first meeting with her in the crowd round the injured +child, and in the hospital ward. Had she started any subject of mere +controversy he would have held his own as stoutly as ever. But so long as +she let them lie, _herself_, the woman, insensibly argued for her, and +wore down his earlier mood. + +So long, indeed, as he forgot Maxwell's part in it all! But it was not +possible to forget it long. For the wife's passion, in spite of a noble +reticence, shone through her whole personality in a way that alternately +touched and challenged her new friend. No; let him remember that +Maxwell's ways of looking at things were none the less pestilent because +_she_ put them into words. + + * * * * * + +After luncheon Betty Leven found herself in a corner of the Green +Drawing-room. On the other side of it Mrs. Allison and Lord Fontenoy were +seated together, with Sir Philip Wentworth not far off. Lord Fontenoy was +describing his week in Parliament. Betty, who knew and generally shunned +him, raised her eyebrows occasionally, as she caught the animated voice, +the queer laughs, and fluent expositions, which the presence of his muse +was drawing from this most ungainly of worshippers. His talk, indeed, was +one long invocation; and the little white-haired lady in the armchair was +doing her best to play Melpomene. Her speech was very soft. But it made +for battle; and Fontenoy was never so formidable as when he was fresh +from Castle Luton. + +Betty's thoughts, however, had once more slipped away from her immediate +neighbours, and were pursuing more exciting matters,--the state of +Madeleine Penley's heart and the wiles of that witch-woman in London, who +must be somehow plucked like a burr from Ancoats's skirts,--when Marcella +entered the room, hat in hand. + +"Whither away, fair lady?" cried Betty; "come and talk to me." + +"Hallin will be in the river," said Marcella, irresolute. + +"If he is, Sir George will fish him out. Besides, I believe Sir George +and Ancoats have gone for a walk, and Hallin with them. I heard Maxwell +tell Hallin he might go." + +Marcella turned an uncertain look upon Lord Fontenoy and Mrs. Allison. +But directly Maxwell's wife entered the room, Maxwell's enemy had dropped +his talk of political affairs, and he was now showing Sir Philip a +portfolio of Mrs. Allison's sketches, with a subdued ardour that brought +a kindly smile to Marcella's lip. In general, Fontenoy had neither eye +nor ear for anything artistic; moreover, he spoke barbarous French, and +no other European tongue; while of letters he had scarcely a tincture. +But when it became a question of Mrs. Allison's accomplishments, her +drawing, her embroidery, still more her admirable French and excellent +Italian, the books she had read, and the poetry she knew by heart, he was +all appreciation--one might almost say, all feeling. It was Cymon and +Iphigenia in a modern and middle-aged key. + +His mien he fashioned and his tongue he filed. + +And did a blunder come, Iphigenia gently and deftly put it to rights. + +"Where is Madeleine?" asked Betty, as Marcella approached her sofa. + +"Walking with Lord Naseby, I think." + +"What was the matter on the way from church?" asked Betty, in a low +voice, raising her face to her friend. + +Marcella, looked gravely down upon her. + +"If you come into the garden I will tell you. Madeleine told me." + +Betty, all curiosity, followed her friend through the open window to a +seat in the Dutch garden outside. + +"It was a terrible thing that happened," said Marcella, sitting erect, +and speaking with a manner of suppressed energy that Betty knew well; +"one of the things that make my blood boil when I come here. You know how +she rules the village?"--She turned imperceptibly towards the distant +drawing-room, where Mrs. Allison's white head was still visible. "Not +only must all the cottages be beautiful, but all the people must reach a +certain standard of virtue. If a man drinks, he must go; if a girl loses +her character, she and her child must go. It was such a girl that threw +herself in the way of the party this morning. Her mother would not part +with her; so the decree went forth--the whole family must go. They say +the girl has never been right in her head since the baby's birth; she +raved and wept this morning, said her parents could find no work +elsewhere--they must die, she and her child must die. Mrs. Allison tried +to stop her, but couldn't; then she hurriedly sent the others on, and +stayed behind herself--only for a minute or two; she overtook Madeleine +almost immediately. Madeleine is sure she was inexorable; so am I; she +always is. I once argued with her about a case of the kind--a _cruel_ +case! 'Those are the sins that make me _shudder!_' she said, and one +could make no impression on her whatever. You see how exhausted she looks +this afternoon. She will wear herself out, probably, praying and weeping +over the girl." + +Betty threw up her hands. + +"My dear!--when she knows--" + +"It may perfectly well kill her," said Marcella, steadily. Then, after a +pause, Betty saw her face flush from brow to chin, and she added, in a +low and passionate voice: "Nevertheless, from all tyrannies and cruelties +in the name of Christ, good Lord, deliver us!" + +The two lingered together for some time without speaking. Both were +thinking of much the same things, but both were tired with the endless +talking of a country-house Sunday, and the rest was welcome. + +And presently Marcella rambled away from her friend, and spent an hour +pacing by herself in a glade beside the river. + +And there her mind instantly shook itself from every care but one--the +yearning over her husband and his work. + +Two years of labour--she caught her breath with a little sob--labour +which had aged and marked the labourer; and now, was it really to be +believed, that after all the toil, after so much hope and promise of +success, everything was to be wrecked at last? + +She gave herself once more to eager forecasts and combinations. As to +individuals--she recalled Tressady's blunt warning with a smile and a +wince. But it did not prevent her from falling into a reverie of which +he, or someone like him, was the centre. Types, incidents, scenes, rose +before her--if they could only be pressed upon, _burnt into_ such a mind, +as they had been burnt into her mind and Maxwell's! That was the whole +difficulty--lack of vision, lack of realisation. Men were to have the +deciding voice in this thing, who had no clear conception of how poverty +and misery live, no true knowledge of this vast tragedy of labour +perpetually acted, in our midst, no rebellion of heart against conditions +of life for other men they themselves would die a thousand times rather +than accept. She saw herself, in a kind of despair, driving such persons +through streets, and into houses she knew, forcing them to look, and +_feel_. Even now, at the last moment-- + +How much better she had come to know this interesting, limited being, +George Tressady, during these twenty-four hours! She liked his youth, his +sincerity--even the stubbornness with which he disclaimed inconvenient +enthusiasms; and she was inevitably flattered by the way in which his +evident prejudice against herself had broken down. + +His marriage was a misfortune, a calamity! She thought of it with the +instinctive repulsion of one who has never known any temptation to the +small vulgarities of life. One could have nothing to say to a little +being like that. But all the more reason for befriending the man! + + * * * * * + +An hour or two later Tressady found himself strolling home along the +flowery bank of the river. It was not long since he had parted from Lady +Maxwell and Hallin, and on leaving them he had turned back for a while +towards the woods on the hill, on the pretext that he wanted more of a +walk. Now, however, he was hurrying towards the house, that there might +be time for a chat with Letty before dressing. She would think he had +been away too long. But he had proposed to take her on the river after +tea, and she had preferred a walk with Lord Cathedine. + +Since then--He looked round him at the river and the hills. There was a +flush of sunset through the air, and the blue of the river was interlaced +with rosy or golden reflections from a sky piled with stormy cloud and +aglow with every "visionary majesty" of light and colour. The great +cloud-masses were driving in a tragic splendour through the west; and hue +and form alike, throughout the wide heaven, seemed to him to breathe a +marvellous harmony and poetry, to make one vibrating "word" of beauty. +Had some god suddenly gifted him with new senses and new eyes? Never had +he felt so much joy in Nature, such a lifting up to things awful and +divine. Why? Because a beautiful woman had been walking beside +him?--because he had been talking with her of things that he, at least, +rarely talked of--realities of feeling, or thought, or memory, that no +woman had ever shared with him before? + +How had she drawn him to such openness, such indiscretions? He was half +ashamed, and then forgot his discomfort in the sudden, eager glancing of +the mind to the future, to the opportunities of the day just coming--for +Mrs. Allison's party was to last till Whit Tuesday--to the hours and +places in London where he was to meet her on those social errands of +hers. What a warm, true heart! What a woman, through all her dreams and +mistakes, and therefore how adorable! + + * * * * * + +He quickened his pace as the light failed. Presently he saw a figure +coming towards him, emerging from the trees that skirted the main lawn. +It was Fontenoy, and Fontenoy's supporter must needs recollect himself as +quickly as possible. He had not seen much of his leader during the day. +But he knew well that Fontenoy never forgot his _rôle_, and there were +several points, newly arisen within the last forty-eight hours, on which +he might have expected before this to be called to counsel. + +But Fontenoy, when he came up with the wanderer, seemed to have no great +mind for talk. He had evidently been pacing and thinking by himself, and +when he was fullest of thought he was as a rule most silent and +inarticulate. + +"You are late; so am I," he said, as he turned back with Tressady. + +George assented. + +"I have been thinking out one or two points of tactics." + +But instead of discussing them he sank into silence again. George let him +alone, knowing his ways. + +Presently he said, raising his powerful head with a jerk, "But tactics +are not of such importance as they were. I think the thing is +done--_done!_" he repeated with emphasis. + +George shrugged his shoulders. + +"I don't know. We may be too sanguine. It is not possible that Maxwell +should be easily beaten." + +Fontenoy laughed--a strange, high laugh, like a jay's, that seemed to +have no relation to his massive frame, and died suddenly away. + +"But we shall beat him," he said quietly; "and her, too. A well-meaning +woman--but what a foolish one!" + +George made no reply. + +"Though I am bound to say," Fontenoy went on quickly, "that in private +matters no man could be kinder and show a sounder judgment than Maxwell. +And I believe Mrs. Allison feels the same with regard to her." + +His look first softened, then frowned; and as he turned his eyes towards +the house, George guessed what subject it was that he and Maxwell had +discussed under the limes in the morning. + + * * * * * + +He found Letty in very good spirits, owing, as far as he could judge, to +the civilities and attentions of Lord Cathedine. Moreover, she was more +at ease in her surroundings, and less daunted by Mrs. Allison. + +"And of course, to-morrow," she said, as she put on her diamonds, "it +will be nicer still. We shall all know each other so much better." + +In her good-humour she had forgotten her twinge of jealousy, and did not +even inquire with whom he had been wandering so long. + +But Letty was disappointed of her last day at Castle Luton. For the +party broke up suddenly, and by ten o'clock on Monday morning all +Mrs. Allison's guests but Lord Fontenoy and the Maxwells had left +Castle Luton. + +It was on this wise. + +After dinner on Sunday night Ancoats, who had been particularly silent +and irritable at table, suddenly proposed to show his guests the house. +Accordingly, he led them through its famous rooms and corridors, turned +on the electric light to show the pictures, and acted cicerone to the +china and the books. + +Then, suddenly it was noticed that he had somehow slipped away, and that +Madeleine Penley, too, was missing. The party straggled back to the +drawing-room without their host. + +Ancoats, however, reappeared alone in about half an hour. He was +extremely pale, and those who knew him well, and were perforce observing +him at the moment, like Maxwell and Marcella, drew the conclusion that he +was in a state of violent though suppressed excitement. His mother, +however, strange to say, noticed nothing. But she was clearly exhausted +and depressed, and she gave an early signal for the ladies' withdrawal. + +The great house sank into quietness. But about an hour after Marcella and +Betty had parted at Betty's door, Betty heard a quick knock, and opened +it in haste. + +"Mrs. Allison is ill!" said Marcella in a low, rapid voice. "I think +everyone ought to go quite early to-morrow. Will you tell Frank? I am +going to Lady Tressady. The gentlemen haven't come up." + +Betty caught her arm. "Tell me--" + +"Oh! my dear," cried Marcella, under her breath, "Ancoats and Madeleine +had an explanation in his room. He told her everything--that child! She +went to Mrs. Allison--he asked her to! Then the maid came for me in +terror. It has been a heart-attack--she has often had them. She is rather +better. But _do_ let everybody go!" and she wrung her hands. "Maxwell and +I must stay and see what can be done." + +Betty flew to ring for her maid and look up trains. Lady Maxwell went on +to Letty Tressady's room. + +But on the way, in the half-dark passage, she came across George Tressady +coming up from the smoking-room. So she gave her news of Mrs. Allison's +sudden illness to him, begging him to tell his wife, and to convey their +hostess's regrets and apologies for this untoward break-up of the party. +It was the reappearance of an old ailment, she said, and with quiet would +disappear. + +George heard her with concern, and though his mind was active with +conjectures, asked not a single question. Only, when she said good-night +to him, he held her hand a friendly instant. + +"We shall be off as early as possible, so it is goodbye. But we shall +meet in town--as you suggested?" + +"Please!" she said, and hurried off. + +But just as he reached his own door, he turned with a long breath towards +the passage where he had just seen her. It seemed that he saw her +still--her white face and dress, the trouble and pity under her quiet +manner, her pure sweetness and dignity. He said to himself, with a sort +of pride, that he had made a friend, a friend whose sympathy, whose heart +and mind, he was now to explore. + +Who was to make difficulties? Letty? But already as he stood there, with +his hand upon the handle of her door, his mind, in a kind of flashing +dream, was already making division of his life between the woman he had +married with such careless haste and this other, who at highest thought +of him with a passing kindness, and at lowest regarded him as a mere pawn +in the political game. + +What could he win by this friendship, that would injure Letty? Nothing! +absolutely nothing. + + +END OF VOLUME I + + + + + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Sir George Tressady, Vol. I, by Mrs. Humphry Ward + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SIR GEORGE TRESSADY, VOL. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Sir George Tressady, Vol. I + +Author: Mrs. Humphry Ward + +Posting Date: December 10, 2011 [EBook #9633] +Release Date: January, 2006 +First Posted: October 11, 2003 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SIR GEORGE TRESSADY, VOL. I *** + + + + +Produced by Andrew Templeton, Juliet Sutherland, Mary +Meehan, and Project Gutenberg Distributed Proofreaders + + + + + + + + + + + +SIR GEORGE TRESSADY, VOLUME I + +IN TWO VOLUMES + +BY + +MRS. HUMPHRY WARD + +AUTHOR OF "MARCELLA," "THE HISTORY OF DAVID GRIEVE," +"ROBERT ELSMEKE," ETC. + + + + + + +To my Brother and friend + +WILLIAM THOMAS ARNOLD + +I INSCRIBE THIS BOOK + + + + + + + +VOLUME I. + + + + +PART I + + + +CHAPTER I + + +"Well, that's over, thank Heaven!" + +The young man speaking drew in his head from the carriage-window. But +instead of sitting down he turned with a joyous, excited gesture and +lifted the flap over the little window in the back of the landau, +supporting himself, as he stooped to look, by a hand on his companion's +shoulder. Through this peephole he saw, as the horses trotted away, the +crowd in the main street of Market Malford, still huzzaing and waving, +the wild glare of half a dozen torches on the faces and the moving forms, +the closed shops on either hand, the irregular roofs and chimneys +sharp-cut against a wintry sky, and in the far distance the little +lantern belfry and taller mass of the new town-hall. + +"I'm much astonished the horses didn't bolt!" said the man addressed. +"That bay mare would have lost all the temper she's got in another +moment. It's a good thing we made them shut the carriage--it has turned +abominably cold. Hadn't you better sit down?" + +And Lord Fontenoy made a movement as though to withdraw from the hand on +his shoulder. + +The owner of the hand flung himself down on the seat, with a word of +apology, took off his hat, and drew a long breath of fatigue. At the same +moment a sudden look of disgust effaced the smile with which he had taken +his last glimpse at the crowd. + +"All very well!--but what one wants after this business is _a moral tub_! +The lies I've told during the last three weeks--the bunkum I've +talked!--it's a feeling of positive dirt! And the worst of it is, however +you may scrub your mind afterwards, some of it must stick." + +He took out a cigarette, and lit it at his companion's with a rather +unsteady hand. He had a thin, long face and fair hair; and one would have +guessed him some ten years younger than the man beside him. + +"Certainly--it will stick," said the other. "Election promises nowadays +are sharply looked after. I heard no bunkum. As far as I know, our party +doesn't talk any. We leave that to the Government!" + +Sir George Tressady, the young man addressed, shrugged his shoulders. His +mouth was still twitching under the influence of nervous excitement. But +as they rolled along between the dark hedges, the carriage-lamps shining +on their wet branches, green yet, in spite of November, he began to +recover a half-cynical self-control. The poll for the Market Malford +Division of West Mercia had been declared that afternoon, between two and +three o'clock, after a hotly contested election; he, as the successful +candidate by a very narrow majority, had since addressed a shouting mob +from the balcony of the Greyhound Hotel, had suffered the usual taking +out of horses and triumphal dragging through the town, and was now +returning with his supporter and party-leader, Lord Fontenoy, to the +great Tory mansion which had sent them forth in the morning, and had been +Tressady's headquarters during the greater part of the fight. + +"Did you ever see anyone so down as Burrows?" he said presently, with a +little leap of laughter. "By George! it _is_ hard lines. I suppose he +thought himself safe, what with the work he'd done in the division and +the hold he had on the miners. Then a confounded stranger turns up, and +the chance of seventeen ignorant voters kicks you out! He could hardly +bring himself to shake hands with me. I had come rather to admire him, +hadn't you?" + +Lord Fontenoy nodded. + +"I thought his speeches showed ability," he said indifferently, "only of +a kind that must be kept out of Parliament--that's all. Sorry you have +qualms--quite unnecessary, I assure you! At the present moment, either +Burrows and his like knock under, or you and your like. This time--by +seventeen votes--Burrows knocks under. Thank the Lord! say I"--and the +speaker opened the window an instant to knock off the end of his cigar. + +Tressady made no reply. But again a look, half-chagrined, +half-reflective, puckered his brow, which was smooth, white, and boyish +under his straight, fair hair; whereas the rest of the face was subtly +lined, and browned as though by travel and varied living. The nose and +mouth, though not handsome, were small and delicately cut, while the +long, pointed chin, slightly protruding, made those who disliked him say +that he was like those innumerable portraits of Philip IV., by and after +Velasquez, which bestrew the collections of Europe. But if the Hapsburg +chin had to be admitted, nothing could be more modern, intelligent, +alert, than the rest of him. + +The two rolled along a while in silence. They were passing through an +undulating midland country, dimly seen under the stars. At frequent +intervals rose high mounds, with tall chimneys and huddled buildings +beside them or upon them which marked the sites of collieries; while the +lights also, which had begun to twinkle over the face of the land, showed +that it was thickly inhabited. + +Suddenly the carriage rattled into a village, and Tressady looked out. + +"I say, Fontenoy, here's a crowd! Do you suppose they know? Why, +Gregson's taken us another way round!" + +Lord Fontenoy let down his window, and identified the small mining +village of Battage. + +"Why did you bring us this way, Gregson?" he said to the coachman. + +The man, a Londoner, turned, and spoke in a low voice. "I thought we +might find some rioting going on in Marraby, my lord. And now I see +there's lots o' them out here!" + +Indeed, with the words he had to check his horses. The village street was +full from end to end with miners just come up from work. Fontenoy at once +perceived that the news of the election had arrived. The men were massed +in large groups, talking and discussing, with evident and angry +excitement, and as soon as the well-known liveries on the box of the new +member's carriage were identified there was an instant rush towards it. +Some of the men had already gone into their houses on either hand, but at +the sound of the wheels and the uproar they came rushing out again. A +howling hubbub arose, a confused sound of booing and groaning, and the +carriage was soon surrounded by grimed men, gesticulating and shouting. + +"Yer bloated parasites, yer!" cried a young fellow, catching at the +door-handle on Lord Fontenoy's side; "we'll make a d----d end o' yer +afore we've done wi' yer. Who asked yer to come meddlin in +Malford--d----n yer!" + +"Whativer do we want wi' the loikes o' yo representin us!" shouted +another man, pointing at Tressady. "Look at 'im; ee can't walk, ee can't; +mus be druv, poor hinnercent! When did yo iver do a day's work, eh? Look +at my 'ands! Them's the 'ands for honest men--ain't they, you fellers?" + +There was a roar of laughter and approval from the crowd, and up went a +forest of begrimed hands, flourishing and waving. + +George calmly put down the carriage-window, and, leaning his arms upon +it, put his head out. He flung some good-humoured banter at some of +the nearest men, and two or three responded. But the majority of the +faces were lowering and fierce, and the horses were becoming +inconveniently crowded. + +"Get on, Gregson," said Fontenoy, opening the front window of the +brougham. + +"If they'll let me, your lordship," said Gregson, rather pale, +raising his whip. + +The horses made a sudden start forward. There was a yell from the crowd, +and three or four men had just dashed for the horses' heads, when a shout +of a different kind ascended. + +"Burrows! 'Ere's Burrows! Three cheers for Burrows!" + +And some distance behind them, at the corner of the village street, +Tressady suddenly perceived a tall dogcart drawing up with two men in it. +It was already surrounded by a cheering and tumultuous assembly, and one +of the men in the cart was shaking hands right and left. + +George drew in his head, with a laugh. "This is dramatic. They've stopped +the horses, and here's Burrows!" + +Fontenoy shrugged his shoulders. "They'll blackguard us a bit, I suppose, +and let us go. Burrows 'll keep them in order." + +"What d'yer mean by it, heh, dash yer!" shouted a huge man, as he sprang +on the step of the carriage and shook a black fist in Tressady's +face--"thrustin yer d----d carkiss where yer ain't wanted? We wanted +'_im_, and we've worked for 'im. This is a workin-class district, an +we've a _right_ to 'im. Do yer 'ear?" + +"Then you should have given him seventeen more votes," said George, +composedly, as he thrust his hands into his pockets. "It's the fortunes +of war--your turn next time. I say, suppose you tell your fellows to let +our man get on. We've had a long day, and we're hungry. Ah"--to +Fontenoy--"here's Burrows coming!" + +Fontenoy turned, and saw that the dogcart had drawn up alongside them, +and that one of the men was standing on the step of it, holding on to the +rail of the cart. + +He was a tall, finely built man, and as he looked down on the carriage, +and on Tressady leaning over the window, the light from a street-lamp +near showed a handsome face blanched with excitement and fatigue. + +"Now, my friends," he said, raising his arm, and addressing the crowd, +"you let Sir George go home to his dinner. He's beaten us, and so far as +I know _he's_ fought fair, whatever some of his friends may have done for +him. I'm going home to have a bite of something and a wash. I'm done. But +if any of you like to come round to the club--eight o'clock--I'll tell +you a thing or two about this election. Now goodnight to you, Sir George. +We'll beat you yet, trust us. Fall back there!" + +He pointed peremptorily to the men holding the horses. They and the crowd +instantly obeyed him. + +The carriage swept on, followed by the hooting and groans of the whole +community, men, women, and children, who were now massed along the street +on either hand. + +"It's easy to see this man Gregson's a new hand," said Fontenoy, with an +accent of annoyance, as they got clear of the village. "I believe the +Wattons have only just imported him, otherwise he'd never have avoided +Marraby, and come round by Battage." + +"Battage has some special connection with Burrows, hasn't it? I had +forgotten." + +"Of course. He was check-weigher at the Acme pit here for years, before +they made him district secretary of the union." + +"That's why they gave me such a hot meeting here a fortnight ago!--I +remember now; but one thing drives another out of one's head. Well, +I daresay you and I'll have plenty more to do with Burrows before +we've done." + +Tressady threw himself back in his corner with a yawn. + +Fontenoy laughed. + +"There'll be another big strike some time next year," he said +drily--"bound to be, as far as I can see. We shall all have plenty to do +with Burrows then." + +"All right," said Tressady, indistinctly, pulling his hat over his eyes. +"Burrows or anybody else may blow me up next year, so long as they let me +go to sleep now." + +However, he did not find it so easy to go to sleep. His pulses were still +tingling under the emotions of the day and the stimulus of the hubbub +they had just passed through. His mind raced backwards and forwards over +the incidents and excitements of the last six months, over the scenes of +his canvass--and over some other scenes of a different kind which had +taken place in the country-house whither he and Fontenoy were returning. + +But he did his best to feign sleep. His one desire was that Fontenoy +should not talk to him. Fontenoy, however, was not easily taken in, and +no sooner did George make his first restless movement under the rug he +had drawn over him, than his companion broke silence. + +"By the way, what did you think of that memorandum of mine on Maxwell's +bill?" + +George fidgeted and mumbled. Fontenoy, undaunted, began to harangue on +certain minutiae of factory law with a monotonous zest of voice and +gesture which seemed to Tressady nothing short of amazing. + +He watched the speaker a minute or two through his half-shut eyes. So +this was his leader to be--the man who had made him member for Market +Malford. + +Eight years before, when George Tressady had first entered Christchurch, +he had found that place of tempered learning alive with traditions on the +subject of "Dicky Fontenoy." And such traditions--good Heavens! +Subsequently, at most race-meetings, large and small, and at various +clubs, theatres, and places of public resort, the younger man had had his +opportunities of observing the elder, and had used them always with +relish, and sometimes with admiration. He himself had no desire to follow +in Fontenoy's footsteps. Other elements ruled in him, which drew him +other ways. But there was a magnificence about the impetuosity, or rather +the doggedness with which Fontenoy had plunged into the business of +ruining himself, which stirred the imagination. On the last occasion, +some three and a half years before this Market Malford election, when +Tressady had seen Fontenoy before starting himself on a long Eastern +tour, he had been conscious of a lively curiosity as to what might have +happened to "Dicky" by the time he came back again. The eldest sons of +peers do not generally come to the workhouse; but there are aristocratic +substitutes which, relatively, are not much less disagreeable; and George +hardly saw how they were to be escaped. + +And now--not four years!--and here sat Dicky Fontenoy, haranguing on the +dull clauses of a technical act, throat hoarse with the speaking of the +last three weeks, eyes cavernous with anxiety and overwork, the creator +and leader of a political party which did not exist when Tressady left +England, and now bade fair to hold the balance of power in English +government! The surprises of fate and character! Tressady pondered them a +little in a sleepy way; but the fatigue of many days asserted itself. +Even his companion was soon obliged to give him up as a listener. Lord +Fontenoy ceased to talk; yet every now and then, as some jolt of the +carriage made George open his eyes, he saw the broad-shouldered figure +beside him, sitting in the same attitude, erect and tireless, the same +half-peevish pugnacity giving expression to mouth and eye. + + * * * * * + +"Come, wake up, Tressady! Here we are!" + +There was a vindictive eagerness in Fontenoy's voice. Ease was no longer +welcome to him, whether in himself or as a spectacle in other men. +George, startled from a momentary profundity of sleep, staggered to his +feet, and clutched at various bags and rugs. + +The carriage was standing under the pillared porch of Malford House, and +the great house-doors, thrown back upon an inner flight of marble steps, +gave passage to a blaze of light. George, descending, had just shaken +himself awake, and handed the things he held to a footman, when there was +a sudden uproar from within. A crowd of figures--men and women, the men +cheering, the women clapping and laughing--ran down the inner steps +towards him. He was surrounded, embraced, slapped on the back, and +finally carried triumphantly into the hall. + +"Bring him in!" said an exultant voice; "and stand back, please, and let +his mother get at him." + +The laughing group fell back, and George, blinking, radiant, and abashed, +found himself in the arms of an exceedingly sprightly and youthful dame, +with pale, frizzled hair, and the figure of seventeen. + +"Oh, you dear, great, foolish thing!" said the lady, with the voice and +the fervour, moreover, of seventeen. "So you've got in--you've done it! +Well, I should never have spoken to you again if you hadn't! And I +suppose you'd have minded that a little--from your own mother. Goodness! +how cold he is!" + +And she flew at him with little pecking kisses, retreating every now and +again to look at him, and then closing upon him again in ecstasy, till +George, at the end of his patience, held her off with a strong arm. + +"Now, mother, that's enough. Have the others been home long?" he +asked, addressing a smiling young man in knickerbockers who, with his +hands in his pockets, was standing beside the hero of the occasion +surveying the scene. + +"Oh! about half an hour. They reported you'd have some difficulty +in getting out of the clutches of the crowd. We hardly expected +you so soon." + +"How's Miss Sewell's headache? Does she know?" + +The expression of the young man's eye, which was bent on Tressady, +changed ever so slightly as he replied: + +"Oh yes, she knows. As soon as the others got back Mrs. Watton went up to +tell her. She didn't show at lunch." + +"Mrs. Watton came to tell _me_--naughty man!" said the lady whom George +had addressed as his mother, tapping the speaker on the arm with her fan. +"Mothers first, if you please, especially when they're cripples like me, +and can't go and see their dear darlings' triumphs with their own eyes. +And _I_ told Miss Sewell." + +She put her head on one side, and looked archly at her son. Her high +gown, a work of the most approved Parisian art, was so cut as to show +much more throat than usual, and, in addition, a row of very fine pearls. +Her very elegant waist and bust were defined by a sort of Empire sash; +her complexion did her maid and, indeed, her years, infinite credit. + +George flushed slightly at his mother's words, and was turning away from +her when he was gripped by the owner of the house, Squire Watton, an +eloquent and soft-hearted old gentleman who, having in George's opinion +already overdone it greatly at the town-hall in the way of hand-shaking +and congratulations, was now most unreasonably prepared to overdo it +again. Lady Tressady joined in with little shrieks and sallies, the other +guests of the house gathered round, and the hero of the day was once +more lost to sight and hearing amid the general hubbub of talk and +laughter--for the young man in knickerbockers, at any rate, who stood a +little way off from the rest. + +"I wonder when she'll condescend to come down," he said to himself, +examining his boots with a speculative smile. "Of course it was mere +caprice that she didn't go to Malford; she meant it to annoy." + +"I say, do let me get warm," said Tressady at last, breaking from his +tormentors, and coming up to the open log fire, in front of which the +young man stood. "Where's Fontenoy vanished to?" + +"Went up to write letters directly he had swallowed a cup of tea," said +the young man, whose name was Bayle; "and called Marks to go with him." +(Marks was Lord Fontenoy's private secretary.) + +George Tressady threw up his hands in disgust. + +"It's absurd. He never allows himself an hour's peace. If he expects me +to grind as he does, he'll soon regret that he lent a hand to put me into +Parliament. Well, I'm stiff all over, and as tired as a rat. I'll go and +have a warm bath before dinner." + +But still he lingered, warming his hands over the blaze, and every now +and then scanning the gallery which ran round the big hall. Bayle chatted +to Mm about some of the incidents of the day. George answered at random. +He did, indeed, look tired out, and his expression was restless and +discontented. + +Suddenly there was a cry from the group of young men and maidens who were +amusing themselves in the centre of the hall. + +"Why, there's Letty! and as fresh as paint." + +George turned abruptly. Bayle saw his manner stiffen and his eye kindle. + +A young girl was slowly coming down the great staircase which led to the +hall. She was in a soft black dress with a blue sash, and a knot of blue +at her throat--a childish slip of a dress, which answered to her small +rounded form, her curly head, and the hand slipping along the marble +rail. She came down silently smiling, taking each step with great +deliberation, in spite of the outbreak of half-derisive sympathy with +which she was greeted from her friends below. Her bright eyes glanced +from face to face--from the mocking inquirers immediately beneath her to +George Tressady standing by the fire. + +At the moment when she reached the last step Tressady found it necessary +to put another log on a fire already piled to repletion. + +Meanwhile Miss Sewell went straight towards the new member and held +out her hand. + +"I am so glad, Sir George; let me congratulate you." + +George put down his log, and then looked at his fingers critically. + +"I am very sorry, Miss Sewell, but I am not fit to touch. I hope your +headache is better." + +Miss Sewell dropped her hand meekly, shot him a glance which was not +meek, and said demurely: + +"Oh! my headaches do what they're told. You see, I was determined to come +down and congratulate you." + +"I see," he repeated, making her a little bow. "I hope my ailments, when +I get them, will be as docile. So my mother told you?" + +"I didn't want telling," she said placidly. "I knew it was all safe." + +"Then you knew what only the gods knew--for I only got in by +seventeen votes." + +"Yes, so I heard. I was very sorry for Burrows." + +She put one foot on the stone fender, raised her pretty dress with one +hand, and leant the other lightly against the mantelpiece. The attitude +was full of grace, and the little sighing voice fitted the curves of a +mouth which seemed always ready to laugh, yet seldom laughed frankly. + +As she made her remark about Burrows Tressady smiled. + +"My prophetic soul was right," he said deliberately; "I knew you would be +sorry for Burrows." + +"Well, it _is_ hard on him, isn't it? You can't deny you're a +carpet-bagger, can you?" + +"Why should I? I'm proud of it." + +Then he looked round him. The rest of the party--not without whispers and +smothered laughter--had withdrawn from them. Some of the ladies had +already gone up to dress. The men had wandered away into a little library +and smoking-room which opened on the hall. Only the squire, safe in a +capacious armchair a little way off, was absorbed in a local paper and +the last humours of the election. + +Satisfied with his glance, Tressady put his hands into his pockets, and +leant back against the fireplace, in a way to give himself fuller command +of Miss Sewell's countenance. + +"Do you never give your friends any better sympathy than you have given +me in this affair, Miss Sewell?" he said suddenly, as their eyes met. + +She made a little face. + +"Why, I've been an angel!" she said, poking at a prominent log +with her foot. + +George laughed. + +"Then our ideas of angels agree no better than the rest. Why didn't you +come and hear the poll declared, after promising me you would be there?" + +"Because I had a headache, Sir George." + +He responded with a little inclination, as though ceremoniously accepting +her statement. + +"May I ask at what time your headache began?" + +"Let me see," she said, laughing; "I think it was directly after +breakfast." + +"Yes. It declared itself, if I remember right, immediately after certain +remarks of mine about a Captain Addison?" + +He looked straight before him, with a detached air. + +"Yes," said Letty, thoughtfully; "it was a curious coincidence, +wasn't it?" + +There was a moment's silence. Then she broke into infectious laughter. + +"Don't you know," she said, laying her hand on his shoulder--"don't you +know that you're a most foolish and wasteful person? We get along +capitally, you and I--we've had a rattling time all this week--and then +you will go and make uncivil remarks about my friends--in public, too! +You actually think I'm going to let you tell Aunt Watton how to manage +me! You get me into no end of a fuss--it'll take me weeks to undo the +mischief you've been making--and then you expect me to take it like a +lamb! Now, do I look like a lamb?" + +All this time she was holding him tight by the arm, and her dimpled face, +alive with mirth and malice, was so close to his that a moment's wild +impulse flashed through him to kiss her there and then. But the impulse +passed. He and Letty Sewell had known each other for about three weeks. +They were not engaged--far from it. And these--the hand on the arm, and +the rest--were Letty Sewell's ways. + +Instead of kissing her, then, he scanned her deliberately. + +"_I_ never saw anyone more plainly given over to obstinacy and pride," +he said quietly; "I told you some plain facts about the character of a +man whom I know, and you don't, whereupon you sulk all day, you break +all your promises about coming to Malford, and when I come back you call +me names." + +She raised her eyebrows and withdrew her hand. + +"Well, it's plain, isn't it? that I must have been in a great rage. It +was very dull upstairs, though I did write reams to my best friend all +about you--a very candid account--I shall have to soften it down. By the +way, are you ever going to dress for dinner?" + +George started, and looked at his watch. + +"Are we alone? Is anyone coming from outside?" + +"Only a few 'locals,' just to celebrate the occasion. I know the +clergyman's wife's coming, for she told me she had been copying one of my +frocks, and wanted me to tell her what I thought." + +George laughed. + +"Poor lady!" + +"I don't _think_ I shall be nice to her," said Letty, playing with a +flower on the mantelpiece. "Dowdy people make me feel wicked. Well, _I_ +must dress." + +It was now his turn to lay a detaining hand. + +"Are you sorry?" he said, bending over to her. His bright grey eyes had +shaken off fatigue. + +"For what? Because you got in?" + +Her face overflowed with laughter. He let her go. She linked her arm in +that of the daughter of the house--Miss Florence Watton--who was crossing +the hall at the moment, and the two went upstairs together, she throwing +back one triumphant glance at him from the landing. + +George stood watching them till they disappeared. His expression was +neither soft nor angry. There was in it a mocking self-possession which +showed that he too had been playing a part--mingled, perhaps, with a +certain perplexity. + + + + +CHAPTER II + + +George Tressady came down very late for dinner, and found his hostess on +the verge of annoyance. Mrs. Watton was a large, commanding woman, who +seldom thought it worth while to disguise any disapproval she might +feel--and she had a great deal of that commodity to expend, both on +persons and institutions. + +George hastened to propitiate her with the usual futilities: he had +supposed that he was in excellent time, his watch had been playing +tricks, and so on. + +Mrs. Watton, who, after all, on this great day beheld in the new member +the visible triumph of her dearest principles, received these excuses at +first with stiffness, but soon thawed. + +"Oh, you _naughty_ boy, you naughty, mendacious boy!" said a +sprightly voice in Tressady's ear. "'Excellent time,' indeed! I saw +you--for shame!" + +And Lady Tressady flounced away from her son, laughing over her +shoulder in one of her accustomed poses. She wore white muslin over +cherry-coloured silk. The display of neck and shoulders could hardly +have been more lavish; and the rouge on her cheeks had been overdone, +which rarely happened. George turned from her hurriedly to speak to +Lord Fontenoy. + +"What a fool that woman is!" thought Mrs. Watton to herself, as her +sharp eye followed her guest. "She will make George positively dislike +her soon--and all the time she is bound to get him to pay her debts, or +there will be a smash. What! dinner? John, will you please take Lady +Tressady; Harding, will you take Mrs. Hawkins"--pointing her second son +towards a lady in black sitting stiffly on the edge of an ottoman; "Mr. +Hawkins takes Florence; Sir George"--she waved her hand towards Miss +Sewell. "Now, Lord Fontenoy, you must take me; and the rest of you sort +yourselves." + +As the young people, mostly cousins, laughingly did what they were told, +Sir George held out his arm to Miss Sewell. + +"I am very sorry for you," he said, as they passed into the dining-room. + +"Oh! I knew it would be my turn," said Letty, with resignation. "You see, +you took Florrie last night, and Aunt Watton the night before." + +George settled himself deliberately in his chair, and turned to study his +companion. + +"Do you mind warning me, to begin with, how I can avoid giving you a +headache? Since this morning my nerve has gone--I want directions." + +"Well--" said Letty, pondering, "let us lay down the subjects we _may_ +talk about first. For instance, you may talk of Mrs. Hawkins." + +She gave an imperceptible nod which directed his eyes to the thin woman +sitting opposite, to whom Harding Watton, a fashionable and fastidious +youth, was paying but scant attention. + +George examined her. + +"I don't want to," he said shortly; "besides, she would last us no +time at all." + +"Oh!--on the contrary," said Letty, with malice sparkling in her brown +eye, "she would last me a good twenty minutes. She has got on my gown." + +"I didn't recognise it," said George, studying the thin lady again. + +"I wouldn't mind," said Letty, in the same tone of reflection, "if Mrs. +Hawkins didn't think it her duty to lecture me in the intervals of +copying my frocks. If I disapproved of anybody, I don't think I should +send my nurse to ask their maid for patterns." + +"I notice you take disapproval very calmly." + +"Callously, you mean. Well, it is my misfortune. I always feel myself so +much more reasonable than the people who disapprove." + +"This morning, then, you thought me a fool?" + +"Oh no! Only--well--I _knew_, you see, that I knew better. _I_ was +reasonable, and--" + +"Oh! don't finish," said George, hastily; "and don't suppose that I shall +ever give you any more good advice." + +"Won't you?" + +Her mocking look sent a challenge, which he met with outward firmness. +Meanwhile he was inwardly haunted by a phrase he had once heard a woman +apply to the mental capacities of her best friend. "Her _mind_?--her +mind, my dear, is a shallow chaos!" The words made a neat label, he +scoffingly thought, for his own present sensations. For he could not +persuade himself that there was much profundity in his feelings towards +Miss Sewell, whatever reckless possibilities life might seem to hold at +times; when, for instance, she wore that particular pink gown in which +she was attired to-night, or when her little impertinent airs suited her +as well as they were suiting her just now. Something cool and critical in +him was judging her all the time. Ten years hence, he made himself +reflect, she would probably have no prettiness left. Whereas now, what +with bloom and grace, what with small proportions and movements light as +air, what with an inventive refinement in dress and personal adornment +that never failed, all Letty Sewell's defects of feature or expression +were easily lost in a general aspect which most men found dazzling and +perturbing enough. Letty, at any rate within her own circle, had never +yet been without partners, or lovers, or any other form of girlish +excitement that she desired, and had been generally supposed--though she +herself was aware of some strong evidence to the contrary--to be capable +of getting anything she had set her mind upon. She had set her mind, as +the spectators in this particular case had speedily divined, upon +enslaving young George Tressady. And she had not failed. For even during +these last stirring days it had been tolerably clear that she and his +election had divided Tressady's mind between them, with a balance, +perhaps, to her side. As to the _measure_ of her success, however, that +was still doubtful--to herself and him most of all. + +To-night, at any rate, he could not detach himself from her. He tried +repeatedly to talk to the girl on his left, a noble-faced child fresh out +of the schoolroom, who in three years' time would be as much Letty +Sewell's superior in beauty as in other things. But the effort was too +great. The strenuous business of the day had but left him--in fatigue and +reaction--the more athirst for amusement and the gratification of another +set of powers. He turned back to Letty, and through course after course +they chattered and sparred, discussing people, plays and books, or +rather, under cover of these, a number of those topics on the borderland +of passion whereby men and women make their first snatches at +intimacy--till Mrs. Watton's sharp grey eyes smiled behind her fan, and +the attention of her neighbour, Lord Fontenoy--an uneasy attention--was +again and again drawn to the pair. + +Meanwhile, during the first half of dinner, a chair immediately opposite +to Tressady's place remained vacant. It was being kept for the eldest son +of the house, his mother explaining carelessly to Lord Fontenoy that she +believed he was "Out parishing somewhere, as usual." + +However, with the appearance of the pheasants the door from the +drawing-room opened, and a slim dark-haired man slipped in. He took his +place noiselessly, with a smile of greeting to George and his +neighbour, and bade the butler in a whisper aside bring him any course +that might be going. + +"Nonsense, Edward!" said his mother's loud voice from the head of the +table; "don't be ridiculous. Morris, bring back that hare _entree_ and +the mutton for Mr. Edward." + +The newcomer raised his eyebrows mildly, smiled, and submitted. + +"Where have you been, Edward?" said Tressady; "I haven't seen you since +the town-hall." + +"I have been at a rehearsal. There is a parish concert next week, and I +conduct these functions." + +"The concerts are always bad," said Mrs. Watton, curtly. + +Edward Watton shrugged his shoulder. He had a charming timid air, +contradicted now and then by a look of enthusiastic resolution in the +eyes. + +"All the more reason for rehearsal," he said. "However, really, they +won't do badly this time." + +"Edward is one of the persons," said Mrs. Watton in a low aside to Lord +Fontenoy, "who think you can make friends with people--the lower +orders--by shaking hands with them, showing them Burne-Jones's pictures, +and singing 'The Messiah' with them. I had the same idea once. Everybody +had. It was like the measles. But the sensible persons have got over it." + +"Thank you, mamma," said Watton, making her a smiling bow. + +Lady Tressady interrupted her talk with the squire at the other end of +the table to observe what was going on. She had been chattering very +fast in a shrill, affected voice, with a gesticulation so free and +French, and a face so close to his, that the nervous and finicking +squire had been every moment afraid lest the next should find her white +fingers in his very eyes. He felt an inward spasm of relief when he saw +her attention diverted. + +"Is that Mr. Edward talking his Radicalism?" she asked, putting up a +gold eyeglass--"his dear, wicked Radicalism? Ah! we all know where Mr. +Edward got it." + +The table laughed. Harding Watton looked particularly amused. + +"Egeria was in this neighbourhood last week," he said, addressing Lady +Tressady. "Edward rode over to see her. Since then he has joined two new +societies, and ordered six new books on the Labour Question." + +Edward flushed a little, but went on eating his dinner without any other +sign of disturbance. + +"If you mean Lady Maxwell," he said good-humouredly, "I can only be sorry +for the rest of you that you don't know her." + +He raised his handsome head with a bright air of challenge that became +him, but at the same time exasperated his mother. + +"That _woman!_" said Mrs. Watton with ponderous force, throwing up her +hands as she spoke. Then she turned to Lord Fontenoy. "Don't _you_ regard +her as the source of half the mischievous work done by this precious +Government in the last two years?" she asked him imperiously. + +A half-contemptuous smile crossed Lord Fontenoy's worn face. + +"Well, really, I'm not inclined to make Lady Maxwell the scapegoat. Let +them bear their own misdeeds." + +"Besides, what worse can you say of English Ministers than that they +should be led by a woman?" said Mr. Watton, from the bottom of the table, +in a piping voice. "In my young days such a state of things would have +been unheard of. No offence, my dear, no offence," he added hastily, +glancing at his wife. + +Letty glanced at George, and put up a handkerchief to hide her own +merriment. + +Mrs. Watton looked impatient. + +"Plenty of English Cabinet Ministers have been led by women before now," +she said drily; "and no blame to them or anybody else. Only in the old +days you knew where you were. Women were corrupt--as they were meant to +be--for their husbands and brothers and sons. They wanted something for +somebody--and got it. Now they are corrupt--like Lady Maxwell--for what +they are pleased to call 'causes,' and it is that which will take the +nation to ruin." + +At this there was an incautious protest from Edward Watton against the +word "corrupt," followed by a confirmatory clamour from his mother and +brother which seemed to fill the dining-room. Lady Tressady threw in +affected comments from time to time, trying hard to hold her own in the +conversation by a liberal use of fan and Christian names, and little +personal audacities applied to each speaker in turn. Only Edward Watton, +however, occasionally took civil or smiling notice of her; the others +ignored her. They were engaged in a congenial task, the hunting of the +one disaffected and insubordinate member of their pack, and had for the +moment no attention to spare for other people. + +"I shall see the great lady, I suppose, in a week or two," said George to +Miss Sewell, under cover of the noise. "It is curious that I should never +have seen her." + +"Who? Lady Maxwell?" + +"Yes. You remember I have been four years out of England. She was in +town, I suppose, the year before I left, but I never came across her." + +"I prophesy you will like her enormously," said Letty, with decision. "At +least, I know that's what happens to me when Aunt Watton abuses anybody. +I couldn't dislike them afterwards if I tried." + +"That, allow me to impress upon you, is _not_ my disposition! I am a +human being--I am influenced by my friends." + +He turned round towards her so as to appropriate her again. + +"Oh! you are not at all the poor creature you paint yourself!" said +Letty, shaking her head. "In reality, you are the most obstinate +person I know--you can never let a subject alone--you never know when +you're beaten." + +"Beaten?" said George, reflectively; "by a headache? Well, there is no +disgrace in that. One will probably 'live to fight another day.' Do you +mean to say that you will take no notice--no notice--of all that array of +facts I laid before you this morning on the subject of Captain Addison?" + +"I shall be kind to you, and forget them. Now, do listen to Aunt Watton! +It is your duty. Aunt Watton is accustomed to be listened to, and you +haven't heard it all a hundred times before, as I have." + +Mrs. Watton, indeed, was haranguing her end of the table on a subject +that clearly excited her. Contempt and antagonism gave a fine energy to a +head and face already sufficiently expressive. Both were on a large +scale, but without commonness. The old-lace coif she wore suited her +waved and grizzled hair, and was carried with conscious dignity; the +hand, which lay beside her on the table, though long and bony, was full +of nervous distinction. Mrs. Watton was, and looked, a tyrant--but a +tyrant of ability. + +"A neighbour of theirs in Brookshire," she was saying, "was giving me +last week the most extraordinary account of the doings at Mellor. She was +the heiress of that house at Mellor"--here she addressed young Bayle, +who, as a comparative stranger in the house, might be supposed to be +ignorant of facts which everybody else knew--"a tumbledown place with an +income of about two thousand a year. Directly she married she put a +Socialist of the most unscrupulous type--so they tell me--into +possession. The man has established what they call a 'standard rate' of +wages for the estate--practically double the normal rate--coerced all the +farmers, and made the neighbours furious. They say the whole district is +in a ferment. It used to be the quietest part of the world imaginable, +and now she has set it all by the ears. _She_, having married thirty +thousand a year, can afford her little amusements; other people, who must +live by their land, have their lives worried out of them." + +"She tells me that the system works on the whole extremely well," said +Edward Watton, whose heightened colour alone betrayed the irritation of +his mother's chronic aggression, "and that Maxwell is not at all unlikely +to adopt it on his own estate." + +Mrs. Watton threw up her hands again. + +"The _idiocy_ of that man! Till he married her he was a man of sense. And +now she leads him by the nose, and whatever tune he calls, the Government +must dance to, because of his power in the House of Lords." + +"And the worst of it is," said Harding Watton, with an unpleasant laugh, +"that if she were not a handsome woman, her influence would not be half +what it is. She uses her beauty in the most unscrupulous way." + +"I believe that to be _entirely_ untrue," said Edward Watton, with +emphasis, looking at his brother with hostility. + +George Tressady interrupted. He had an affection for Edward Watton, and +cordially disliked Harding. "Is she really so handsome?" he asked, +bending forward and addressing his hostess. + +Mrs. Watton scornfully took no notice. + +"Well, an old diplomat told me the other day," said Lord Fontenoy--but +with a cold unwillingness, as though he disliked the subject--"that she +was the most beautiful woman, he thought, that had been seen in London +since Lady Blessington's time." + +"Lady Blessington! dear, dear!--Lady Blessington!" said Lady Tressady +with malicious emphasis--an unfortunate comparison, don't you think? Not +many people would like to be regarded as Lady Blessington's successor." + +"In any other respect than beauty," said Edward Watton, haughtily, with +the same tension as before, "the comparison, of course, would be +ridiculous." + +Harding shrugged his shoulders, and, tilting his chair back, said in the +ear of a shy young man who sat next him: + +"In my opinion, the Count d'Orsay is only a question of time! However, +one mustn't say that to Edward." + +Harding read memoirs, and considered himself a man of general +cultivation. The young man addressed, who read no printed matter outside +the sporting papers that he could help, and had no idea as to who Lady +Blessington and Count d'Orsay might be, smiled vaguely, and said nothing. + +"My dear," said the squire, plaintively, "isn't this room extremely hot?" + +There was a ripple of meaning laughter from all the young people, to many +of whom this particular quarrel was already tiresomely familiar. Mr. +Watton, who never understood anything, looked round with an inquiring +air. Mrs. Watton condescended to take the hint and retire. + +In the drawing-room afterwards Mrs. Watton first allotted a +duty-conversation of some ten minutes in length, and dealing strictly +with the affairs of the parish, to Mrs. Hawkins, who, as clergyman's +wife, had a definite official place in the Malford House circle, quite +irrespective of any individuality she might happen to possess. Mrs. +Hawkins was plain, self-conscious, and in no way interesting to Mrs. +Watton, who never took the smallest trouble to approach her in any other +capacity than that upon which she had entered by marrying the incumbent +of the squire's home living. But the civilities and respects that were +recognised as belonging to her station she received. + +This however, alas! was not enough for Mrs. Hawkins, who was full of +ambitions, which had a bad manner, a plague of shyness, and a narrow +income, were perpetually thwarting. As soon as the ten minutes were over, +and Mrs. Watton, who was nothing if not political, and saw no occasion to +make a stranger of the vicar's wife, had plunged into the evening papers +brought her by the footman, Mrs. Hawkins threw herself on Letty Sewell. +She was effusively grateful--too grateful--for the patterns lent her by +Miss Sewell's maid. + +"Did she lend you some patterns?" said Letty, raising her brows. "Dear +me; I didn't know." + +And her eyes ran cooly over Mrs. Hawkins's attire, which did, indeed, +present a village imitation of the delicate gown in which Miss Sewell had +robed herself for the evening. + +Mrs. Hawkins coloured. + +"I specially told my nurse," she said hastily, "that of course your leave +must be asked. But my nurse and your maid seem to have made friends. Of +course my nurse has plenty of time for dressmaking with only one child of +four to look after, and--and--one really gets no new ideas in a poky +place like this. But I would not have taken a liberty for the world." + +Her pride and _mauvaise honte_ together made both voice and manner +particularly unattractive. Letty was seized with the same temper that +little boys show towards flies. + +"Of course I am delighted!" she said indifferently. "It's so nice and +good to have one's things made at home. Your nurse must be a treasure." + +All the time her gaze was diligently inspecting every ill-cut seam and +tortured trimming of the homemade triumph before her. The ear of the +vicar's wife, always morbidly sensitive in that particular drawing-room, +caught a tone of insult in every light word. A passionate resentment +flamed up in her, and she determined to hold her own. + +"Are you going in for more visits when you leave here?" she inquired. + +"Yes, two or three," said Letty, turning her delicate head unwittingly. +She had been throwing blandishments to Mrs. Watton's dog, a grey Aberdeen +terrier, who stood on the rug quietly regarding her. + +"You spend most of the year in visits, don't you?" + +"Well, a good deal of it," said Letty. + +"Don't you find it dreadfully time-wasting? Does it leave you leisure +for _any_ serious occupations at all? I am afraid it would make _me_ +terribly idle!" + +Mrs. Hawkins laughed, attempting a tone of banter. + +Letty put up a small hand to hide a sudden yawn, which, however, was +visible enough. + +"Would it?" she said, with an impertinence which hardly tried to +conceal itself. "Evelyn, do look at that dog. Doesn't he remind you of +Mr. Bayley?" + +She beckoned to the handsome child of sixteen who had sat on George +Tressady's left hand at dinner, and, taking up a pinch of rose-leaves +that had dropped from a vase beside her, she flung them at the dog, +calling him to her. Instead of going to her, however, the dog slowly +curled himself up on the rug, and, laying his nose along his front paws, +stared at her steadily with the expression of one mounting guard. + +"He never will make friends with you, Letty. Isn't it odd?" said Evelyn, +laughing, and stooping to stroke the creature. + +"Never mind; other dogs will. Did you see that adorable black Spitz of +Lady Arthur's? She has promised to give me one." + +The two cousins fell into a chatter about their county neighbours, mostly +rich and aristocratic people, of whom Mrs. Hawkins knew little or +nothing. Evelyn Watton, whose instincts were quick and generous, tried +again and again to draw the vicar's wife into the conversation. Letty was +determined to exclude her. She lay back against the sofa, chatting her +liveliest, the whiteness of her neck and cheek shining against the red of +the damask behind, one foot lightly crossed over the other, showing her +costly little slippers with their paste buckles. She sparkled with jewels +as much as a girl may--more, indeed, in Mrs. Hawkins's opinion, than a +girl should. From head to foot she breathed affluence, seduction, +success--only the seduction was not for Mrs. Hawkins and her like. + +The vicar's wife sat flushed and erect on her chair, disdaining after a +time to make any further effort, but inwardly intolerably sore. She could +not despise Letty Sewell, unfortunately, since Letty's advantages were +just those that she herself most desired. But there was something else in +her mind than small jealousy. When Letty had been a brilliant child in +short frocks, the vicar's wife, who was scarcely six years older, had +opened her heart, had tried to make herself loved by Mrs. Watton's niece. +There had been a moment when they had been "Madge" and "Letty" to each +other, even since Letty had "come out." Now, whenever Mrs. Hawkins +attempted the Christian name, it stuck in her throat; it seemed, even to +herself, a familiarity that had nothing to go upon; while with every +succeeding visit to Malford, Letty had dropped her former friend more +decidedly, and "Madge" was heard no more. + +The gentlemen, deep in election incident and gossip, were, in the view +chiefly of the successful candidate, unreasonably long in leaving the +dining-room. When they appeared at last, George Tressady once more +made an attempt to talk to someone else than Letty Sewell, and once +more failed. + +"I want you to tell me something about Miss Sewell," said Lord Fontenoy +presently in Mrs. Watton's ear. He had been sitting silent beside her on +the sofa for some little time, apparently toying with the evening papers, +which Mrs. Watton had relinquished to him. + +Mrs. Watton looked up, followed the direction of his eyes towards a +settee in a distant corner of the room, and showed a half-impatient +amusement. + +"Letty? Oh! Letty's my niece--the daughter of my brother, Walter Sewell, +of Helbeck. They live in Yorkshire. My brother has my father's place--a +small estate, and rents very irregular. I often wonder how they manage to +dress that child as they do. However, she has always had her own way +since she was a foot high. As for my poor brother, he has been an +invalid for the last ten years, and neither he nor his wife--oh! such a +stupid woman!"--Mrs. Watton's energetic hands and eyes once more, called +Heaven to witness--"have ever counted for much, I should say, in Letty's +career. There is another sister, a little delicate, silent thing, that +looks after them. Oh! Letty isn't stupid; I should think not. I suppose +you're alarmed about Sir George. You needn't be. She does it with +everybody." + +The candid aunt pursued the conversation a little further, in the same +tone of a half-caustic indulgence. At the end of it, however, Lord +Fontenoy was still uneasy. He had only migrated to Malford House for the +declaration of the poll, having spent the canvassing weeks mainly in +another part of the division. And now, on this triumphant evening, he was +conscious of a sudden sense of defective information, which was +disagreeable and damping. + + * * * * * + +When bedtime came, Letty lingered in the drawing-room a little behind the +other ladies, on the plea of gathering up some trifles that belonged to +her. So that when George Tressady went out with her to light her candle +for her in the gallery, they found themselves alone. + +He had fallen into a sudden silence, which made her sweep him a look of +scrutiny as she took her candlestick. The slim yet virile figure drawn to +its full height, the significant, long-chinned face, pleased her senses. +He might be plain--she supposed he was--but he was, nevertheless, +distinguished, and extraordinarily alive. + +"I believe you are tired to death," she said to him. "Why don't you +go to bed?" + +She spoke with the freedom of one accustomed to advise all her male +acquaintance for their good. George laughed. + +"Tired? Not I. I was before dinner. Look here, Miss Sewell, I've got a +question to ask." + +"Ask it." + +"You don't want to spoil my great day, do you? You do repent that +headache?" + +They looked at each other, dancing laughter in each pair of eyes, +combined in his with an excited insistence. + +"Good-night, Sir George," she said, holding out her hand. + +He retained it. + +"You do?" he said, bending over her. + +She liked the situation, and made no immediate effort to change it. + +"Ask me a month hence, when I have proved your statements." + +"Then you admit it was all pretence?" + +"I admit nothing," she said joyously. "I protected my friend." + +"Yes, by injuring and offending another friend. Would it please you if I +said I missed you _very_ much at Malford to-day?" + +"I will tell you to-morrow--it is so late! Please let me have my hand." + +He took no notice, and they went hand-in-hand, she drawing him, to the +foot of the stairs. + +"George!" said a shrill, hesitating voice from overhead. + +George looked up, and saw his mother. He and Letty started apart, and in +another second Letty had glided upstairs and disappeared. + +"Yes, mother," said George, impatiently. + +"Will you come here?" + +He mounted, and found Lady Tressady a little discomposed, but as +affected as usual. + +"Oh, George! it was so dark--I didn't see--I didn't know. George, will +you have half an hour's talk with me after breakfast to-morrow? Oh, +George, my dear boy, my _dear_ boy! Your poor mammy understands!" + +She laid one hand on his shoulder and, lifting her feather fan in the +other, shook it with playful meaning in the direction whither Letty +had departed. + +George hastily withdrew himself. "Of course I will have a talk with you, +mother. As for anything else, I don't know what you mean. But you really +must let me go to bed; I am much too tired to talk now. Good-night." + +Lady Tressady went back to her room, smiling but anxious. + +"She has caught him!" she said to herself; "barefaced little flirt! It is +not altogether the best thing for me. But it may dispose him to be +generous, if--if I can play my cards." + +Letty Sewell meanwhile had reached the quiet of a luxurious bedroom, and +summoned her maid to her assistance. When the maid departed, the mistress +held long counsel with herself over the fire: the general position of her +affairs; what she desired; what other people intended; her will, and the +chances, of getting it. Her thoughts dealt with these various problems in +a skilled and business-like way. To a particular form of self-examination +Letty was well accustomed, and it had become by now a strong agent in the +development of individuality, as self-examination of another sort is said +to be by other kinds of people. + +She herself was pleasantly conscious of real agitation. George Tressady +had touched her feelings, thrilled her nerves, more than--Yes! she said +to herself decidedly, more than anybody else, more than "the rest." She +thought of "the rest," one after the other--thought of them +contemptuously. Yet, certainly few girls in her own set and part of the +country had enjoyed a better time--few, perhaps, had dared so many +adventures. Her mother had never interfered with her; and she herself had +not been afraid to be "talked about." Dances, picnics, moonlight walks; +the joys of outrageous "sitting-out," and hot rivalries with prettier +girls; of impertinences towards the men who didn't matter, and pretty +flatteries towards the men who did--it was all pleasant enough to think +of. She could not reproach herself with having missed any chances, any +opportunities her own will might have given her. + +And yet--well, she was tired of it!--out of love altogether with her +maiden state and its opportunities. She had come to Malford House in a +state of soreness, which partly accounted, perhaps, for such airs as she +had been showing to poor Mrs. Hawkins. During the past year a particular +marriage--the marriage of her neighbourhood--had seemed intermittently +within her reach. She had played every card she knew--and she had failed! +Failed, too, in the most humiliating way. For the bride, indeed, was +chosen; but it was not Letty Sewell, but one of Letty's girl-neighbours. + +To-night, almost for the first time, she could bear to think of it; she +could even smile at it. Vanity and ambition alone had been concerned, and +to-night these wild beasts of the heart were soothed and placable. + +Well, it was no great match, of course--if it came off. All that Aunt +Watton knew about the Tressadys had been long since extracted from her by +her niece. And with Tressady himself Letty's artless questions had been +very effective. She knew almost all that she wished to know. No doubt +Ferth was a very second-rate "place"; and, since those horrid miners had +become so troublesome, his income as a coal-owner could not be what his +father's had been--three or four thousand a year, she supposed--more, +perhaps, in good years. It was not much. + +Still--she pressed her hands on her eyes--he was _distinguished_; she saw +that plainly already. He would be welcome anywhere. + +"And we are _not_ distinguished--that is just it. We are small people, in +a rather dull set. And I have had hard work to make anything of it. Aunt +Watton was very lucky to marry as she did. Of course, she _made_ Uncle +Watton marry her; but that was a chance--and papa always says nobody else +could have done it!" + +She fell happily thinking of Tressady's skirmishes with her, her face +dimpling with amusement. Captain Addison! How amazed he would be could he +know the use to which she had put his name and his very hesitating +attentions. But he would never know; and meanwhile Sir George had been +really pricked--really jealous! She laughed to herself--a low laugh of +pure pleasure. + +Yes--she had made up her mind. With a sigh, she put away from her all +other and loftier ambitions. She supposed that she had not money or +family enough. One must face the facts. George Tressady would take her +socially into another _milieu_ than her own, and a higher one. She told +herself that she had always pined for Parliament, politics, and eminent +people. Why should she not succeed in that world as well as in the +Helbeck world? Of course she would succeed! + +There was his mother--silly, painted old lady! She was naturally the +_great_ drawback; and Aunt Watton said she was absurdly extravagant, and +would ruin Tressady if it went on. All the more reason why he should be +protected. Letty drew herself sharply together in her pretty white +dressing-gown, with the feeling that mothers of that kind must and could +be kept in their place. + +A house in town, of course--and _not_ in Warwick Square, where, +apparently, the Tressadys owned a house, which had been let, and was now +once more in Sir George's hands. That might do for Lady Tressady--if, +indeed, she could afford it when her son had married and taken other +claims upon him. + +Letty allowed her thoughts to wander dreamily on, envisaging the London +life that was to be: the young member, Lord Fontenoy's special friend and +_protege_--the young member's wife making her way among great people, +giving charming little parties at Ferth-- + +All very well! But what, please, were the facts on his side? She buried +her small chin deep in her hands as she tried, frowning, to think it out. +Certainly he was very much drawn, very much taken. She had watched him, +sometimes, trying to keep away from her--and her lips parted in a broad +smile as she recalled the triumph of his sudden returns and submissions. +She believed he had a curious temper--easily depressed, for all his +coolness. But he had never been depressed in her company. + +Still, _nothing_ was certain. All that had happened might melt away into +nothingness with the greatest ease if--well! if the right steps were not +taken. He was no novice, any more than she; he must have had scores of +"affairs" by now, with that manner of his. Such men were always capable +of second thoughts, of tardy retreats--and especially if there were the +smallest thought of persecution, of pursuit. + +She believed--she was nearly certain--he would have a reaction to-morrow, +perhaps because his mother had caught them together. Next morning he +would be just a little bored by the thought of it--a little bored by +having to begin again where he had left off. Without great tact and skill +the whole edifice might tumble together like a house of cards. Had she +the courage to make difficulties--to put a water-ditch across his path? + +It was close on midnight when Letty at last raised her little chin from +the hands that held it and rang the bell that communicated with her +maid's room, but cautiously, so as not to disturb the rest of the +sleeping house. + +"If Grier _is_ asleep, she must wake up, that's all!" + +Two or three minutes afterwards a dishevelled maid startled out of her +first slumber appeared, to ask whether her mistress was ill. + +"No, Grier, but I wanted to tell you that I have changed my mind about +staying here till Saturday. I am going to-morrow morning by the 9.30 +train. You can order a fly first thing, and bring me my breakfast early." + +The maid, groaning at the thought of the boxes that would have to be +packed in this inconceivable hurry, ventured to protest. + +"Never mind, you can get the housemaid to help you," said Miss Sewell, +decidedly. "I don't mind what you give her. Now go to bed, Grier. I'm +sorry I woke you up; you look as tired as an owl." + +Then she stood still, looking at herself--hands clasped lightly before +her--in the long glass. + +"'Letty went by the nine o'clock train,'" she said aloud, smiling, and +mocking her own white reflection. "'Dear me! How sudden! how +extraordinary! Yes, but that's like her. H'm--' Then he must write to me, +for I shall write _him_ a civil little note asking for that book I lent +him. Oh! I _hope_ Aunt Watton and his mother will bore him to death!" + +She broke out into a merry laugh; then, sweeping her mass of pretty hair +to one side, she began rapidly to coil it up for the night, her fingers +working as fast as her thoughts, which were busy with one ingenious plan +after another for her next meeting with George Tressady. + + + + +CHAPTER III + + +During this same space of time, which for Miss Sewell's maid ended so +disagreeably, George Tressady was engaged in a curious conversation. + +He had excused himself from smoking, on the ground of fatigue, +immediately after his parting from Letty. But he had only nominally gone +to bed. He too found it difficult to tear himself from thinking and the +fire, and had not begun to undress when he heard a knock at his door. On +his reply, Lord Fontenoy entered. + +"May I come in, Tressady?" + +"By all means." + +George, however, stared at his invader in some astonishment. His +relations with Fontenoy were not personally intimate. + +"Well, I'm glad to find you still up, for I had a few words on my mind to +say to you before I go off to-morrow. Can you spare me ten minutes?" + +"Certainly; do sit down. Only--well, I'm afraid I'm pretty well done. If +it's anything important, I can't promise to take it in." + +Lord Fontenoy for a moment made no reply. He stood by the fire, looking +at the cigarette he still held, in silence. George watched him with +repressed annoyance. + +"It's been a very hot fight, this," said Fontenoy at last, slowly, "and +you've won it well. All our band have prospered in the matter of +elections. But this contest of yours has been, I think, the most +conspicuous that any of us have fought. Your speeches have made a +mark--one can see that from the way in which the Press has begun to take +them, political beginner though you are. In the House you will be, I +think, our best speaker--of course with time and experience. As for me, +if you give me a fortnight to prepare in, I can make out something. +Otherwise I am no use. _You_ will take a good debating place from the +beginning. Well, it is only what I expected." + +The speaker stopped. George, fidgeting in his chair, said nothing; and +presently Fontenoy resumed: + +"I trust you will not think what I am going to say an intrusion, but--you +remember my letters to you in India?" + +George nodded. + +"They put the case strongly, I think," Fontenoy went on, "but, in my +opinion, not strongly enough. This wretched Government is in power by the +help of a tyranny--a tyranny of Labour. They call themselves +Conservatives--they are really State Socialists, and the mere catspaws of +the revolutionary Socialists. You and I are in Parliament to break down +that tyranny, if we can. This year and next will be all-important. If we +can hold Maxwell and his friends in check for a time--if we can put some +backbone into the party of freedom--if we can rally and call up the +forces we have in the country, the thing will be done. We shall have +established the counterpoise--we shall very likely turn the next +election, and liberty--or what still remains of it!--will be saved for a +generation. But to succeed, the effort, the sacrifice, from each one of +us, will have to be _enormous_." + +Fontenoy paused, and looked at his companion. George was lying back in +an armchair with his eyes shut. Why on earth--so he was +thinking--should Fontenoy have chosen this particular hour and this +particular night to _debiter_ these very stale things, that he had +already served up in innumerable speeches and almost every letter that +George had received from him? + +"I don't suppose it will be child's-play," he said, stifling a +yawn--"hope I shall feel keener after a night's rest!" He looked up +with a smile. + +Fontenoy dropped his cigarette into the fender and stood silent a moment, +his hands clasped behind his back. + +"Look here, Tressady!" he said at last, turning to his companion; "you +remember how affairs stood with me when you left England? I didn't know +much of you, but I believe, like many of my juniors, you knew a great +deal about me?" + +George made the sign of assent expected of him. + +"I knew something about you, certainly," he said, smiling; "it was not +difficult." + +Fontenoy smiled too, though without geniality. Geniality had become +impossible to a man always overworked and on edge. + +"I was a fool," he said quickly--"an open and notorious fool. But I +enjoyed my life. I don't suppose anyone ever enjoyed life more. Every day +of my former existence gave the lie to the good people who tell you that +to be happy you must be virtuous. I was idle, extravagant, and vicious, +and I was one of the happiest of men. As to my racing and my horses, they +were a constant delight to me. I can't think now of those mornings on the +Heath--the gallops of my colts--the change and excitement of it all, +without longing for it to come back again. Yet I have never owned a +horse, or seen a race, or made a bet, for the last three years. I never +go into society, except for political purposes; and I scarcely ever touch +wine. In fact, I have thrown overboard everything that once gave _me_ +pleasure and amusement so completely that I have, perhaps, some right to +press upon the party that follows me my conviction that unless each and +all of us give up private ease and comfort as I have done--unless we are +contented, as the Parnellites were, to be bores in the House and +nuisances to ourselves--to peg away in season and out of season--to give +up everything for the cause, we may just as well not go into the fight at +all--for we shall do nothing with it." + +George clasped his hands round his knee, and stared stubbornly into the +fire. Sermonising was all very well, but Fontenoy did too much of it; +nobody need suppose that he would have done what he had done, unless, on +the whole, it had given him more pleasure to do it than not to do it. + +"Well," he said, looking up at last with a laugh, "I wonder what you +_mean_--really. Do you mean, for instance, that I oughtn't to get +myself married?" + +His offhand manner covered a good deal of irritation. He made a shrewd +guess at the idea in Fontenoy's mind, and meant to show that he would not +be dictated to. + +Fontenoy also laughed, with as little geniality as before. Then he +applied himself to a deliberate answer. + +"_This_ is what I mean. If you, just elected--at the beginning of this +critical session--were to give your best mind to anything else in the +world than the fight before us, I should regard you as, for the time, at +any rate, lost to us--as, so far, betraying us." + +The colour rushed into George's cheeks. + +"Upon my word!" he said, springing up--"upon my word, you are a +taskmaster!" + +Fontenoy hastened to reply, in a different tone, "I only want to keep the +machine in order." + +George paced up and down for a few moments without speaking. Presently +he paused. + +"Look here, Fontenoy! I cannot look at the matter as you do, and we may +as well understand each other. To me, this election of mine is, after +all, an ordinary affair. I take it, and what is to come after it, just as +other men do. I have accepted your party and your programme, and I mean +to stick to them. I see that the political situation is difficult and +exciting, and I don't intend to shirk. But I am no more going to slay my +private life and interests at the altar of politics than my father did +when he was in Parliament. If the revolution is coming, it will come in +spite of you and me. And, moreover--if you will let me say so--I am +convinced that your modes of procedure are not even profitable to the +cause in the long run. No man can work as you do, without rest and +without distraction. You will break down, and then, where will the +'cause' be?" + +Lord Fontenoy surveyed the speaker with a curious, calculating look. It +was as though, with as much rapidity as his mind was capable of, he +balanced a number of pros and cons against each other, and finally +decided to let the matter drop, perhaps not without some regret for +having raised it. + +"Ah! well," he said, "I have no doubt that what I have said appears to +you mere meddlesomeness. If so, you will change your view, and you will +forgive me. I must trust the compulsion of the situation. You will +realise it, as I have done, when you get well into the fight. There is +something in this Labour tyranny which rouses all a man's passions, bad +and good. If it does not rouse yours, I have been much mistaken in my +estimate of you. As for me, don't waste your concern. There are few +stronger men than I. You forget, too--" + +There was a pause. Of late years, since his transformation in fact, Lord +Fontenoy's stiff reserve about himself had been rarely broken through. At +this moment, however, George, looking up, saw that his companion was in +some way moved by a kind of sombre and personal emotion. + +"You forget," the speaker resumed, "that I learnt nothing either at +school or college, and that a man who wants to lead a party must, some +time or other, pay for that precious privilege. When you left England, +the only financial statement I could understand was a betting-book. I +knew no history except what one gets from living among people who have +been making it, and even that I was too lazy to profit by. I couldn't +understand the simplest economical argument, and I _hated_ trouble of all +kinds. Nothing but the toil of a galley-slave could have enabled me to do +what I have done. You would be astonished sometimes if you could look in +upon me at night and see what I am doing--what I am obliged to do to keep +up the most elementary appearances." + +George was touched. The tone of the speaker had passed suddenly into one +of plain dignity, in spite of, perhaps because of, the half-bitter +humility that mingled with it. + +"I know you make one ashamed," he said sincerely, though awkwardly. +"Well, don't distrust me; I'll do my best." + +"Good-night," said Lord Fontenoy, and held out his hand. He had gained no +promises, and George had shown and felt annoyance. Yet the friendship +between the two men had sensibly advanced. + + * * * * * + +George shut the door upon him, and came back to the fire to ponder this +odd quarter of an hour. + +His experience certainly contained no more extraordinary fact than this +conversion of a gambler and a spendthrift into the passionate leader of +an arduous cause. Only one quality linked the man he remembered with the +politician he had now pledged himself to follow--the quality of +intensity. Dicky Fontenoy in his follies had been neither gay nor +lovable, but his fierce will, his extravagant and reckless force, had +given him the command of men softer than himself. That will and that +force were still there, steeled and concentrated. But George Tressady was +sometimes restlessly doubtful as to how far he himself was prepared to +submit to them. + +His personal acquaintance with Fontenoy was of comparatively recent date. +He himself had been for some four years away from England, to which he +had only returned about three months before the Market Malford election. +A letter from Fontenoy had been the immediate cause of his return; but +before it arrived the two men had been in no direct communication. + +The circumstances of Tressady's long absence concern his later story, and +were on this wise. His father, Sir William, the owner of Ferth Place, in +West Mercia, died in the year that George, his only surviving child and +the son of his old age, left college. The son, finding his father's debts +considerable and his own distaste for the law, to which he had been +destined, amazingly increased by his newly acquired freedom to do what he +liked with himself, turned his mind at once towards travelling. Travel he +must if he was ever to take up public and parliamentary life, and for no +other profession--so he announced--did he feel the smallest vocation. +Moreover, economy was absolutely necessary. During his absence the London +house could be let, and Lady Tressady could live quietly at Ferth upon an +allowance, while his uncles looked after the colliery property. + +Lady Tressady made no difficulty, except as to the figure first named for +the proposed allowance, which she declared was absurd. The uncles, +elderly business men, could not understand why the younger generation +should not go into harness at once without indulgences, as they +themselves had done; but George got his way, and had much reason to show +for it. He had not been idle at college, though perhaps at no time +industrious enough. Influenced by natural ambition and an able tutor, he +had won some distinction, and he was now a man full of odds and ends of +ideas, of nascent interests, curiosities, and opinions, strongly +influenced moreover already, though he said less about it than about +other things, by the desire for political distinction. While still at +college he had been especially attracted--owing mainly to the chances of +an undergraduate friendship--by a group of Eastern problems bearing upon +England's future in Asia; and he was no sooner free to govern himself and +his moderate income than there flamed up in him the Englishman's passion +to see, to touch, to handle, coupled with the young man's natural desire +to go where it was dangerous to go, and where other men were not going. +His friend--the son of an eminent geographer, possessed by inheritance of +the explorer's instincts--was just leaving England for Asia Minor, +Armenia, and Persia. George made up his mind, hastily but firmly, to go +with him, and his family had to put up with it. + +The year, however, for which the young fellow had stipulated went by; two +others were added to it; and a fourth began to run its course--still +George showed but faint signs of returning. According to his letters +home, he had wandered through Persia, India, and Ceylon; had found +friends and amusement everywhere; and in the latter colony had even +served eight months as private secretary to the Governor, who had taken +a fancy to him, and had been suddenly bereft by a boating accident of the +indispensable young man who was accustomed to direct the hospitalities of +Government House before Tressady's advent. Thence he went to China and +Japan, made a trip from Pekin into Mongolia, landed on Formosa, fell in +with some French naval officers at Saigon, spending with them some of the +gayest and maddest weeks of his life; explored Siam, and finally returned +by way of Burmah to Calcutta, with the dim intention this time of some +day, before long, taking ship for home. + +Meanwhile during the last months of his stay in Ceylon he had written +some signed articles for an important English newspaper, which, together +with the natural liking felt by the many important persons he had come to +know in the East for an intelligent and promising young fellow, endowed +with brains, family, and good manners, served to bring him considerably +into notice. The tone of the articles was strongly English and +Imperialist. The first of them came out immediately before his visit to +Saigon, and Tressady thanked his lucky stars that the foreign reading of +his French friends was, perhaps, not so extensive as their practical +acquaintance with life. He was, however, proud of his first literary +achievement, and it served to crystallise in him a number of ideas and +sentiments which had previously represented rather the prejudices of a +traveller accustomed to find his race in the ascendant, and to be well +received by its official class than any reasoned political theory. As he +went on writing, conviction, grew with statement, became a faith, +ultimately a passion--till, as he turned homewards, he seemed to himself +to have attained a philosophy sufficient to steer the rest of life by. It +was the common philosophy of the educated and fastidious observer; and it +rested on ideas of the greatness of England and the infinity of England's +mission, on the rights of ability to govern as contrasted with the +squalid possibilities of democracy, on the natural kingship of the higher +races, and on a profound personal admiration for the virtues of the +administrator and the soldier. + +Now, no man in whom these perceptions take strong root early, need expect +to love popular government. Tressady read his English newspapers with +increasing disgust. On that little England in those far seas all +depended, and England meant the English working-man with his flatteries +of either party. He blundered and blustered at home, while the Empire, +its services and its defences, by which alone all this pullulating +"street folk" existed for a day, were in danger of starvation and +hindrance abroad, to meet the unreasonable fancies of a degenerate race. +A deep hatred of mob-rule rooted itself in Tressady, passing gradually, +during his last three months in India, into a growing inclination to +return and take his place in the fight--to have his say. "Government to +the competent--_not_ to the many," might have been the summary of his +three years' experience. + +Nor were private influences wanting. He was a West Mercian landowner in a +coal-mining district, and owned a group of pits on the borders of his +estate. His uncles, who had shares in the property, reported to him +periodically during his absence. With every quarter it seemed to Tressady +that the reports grew worse and the dividends less. His uncles' letters, +indeed, were full of anxieties and complaints. After a long period of +peace in the coal-trade, it looked as though a time of hot war between +masters and men was approaching. "We have to thrash them every fifteen +years," wrote one of the uncles, "and the time is nearly up." + +The unreason, brutality, and extravagance of the men; the tyranny of the +Union; the growing insolence of the Union officials--Tressady's letters +from home after a time spoke of little else. And Tressady's bankbook +meanwhile formed a disagreeable comment on the correspondence. The pits +were almost running at a loss; yet neither party had made up their minds +to the trial of strength. + +Tressady was still lingering in Bombay--though supposed to be on his way +home--when Lord Fontenoy's letter reached him. + +The writer referred slightly to their previous acquaintance, and to a +remote family connection between himself and Tressady; dwelt in +flattering terms on the reports which had reached him from many quarters +of Tressady's opinions and abilities; described the genesis and aims of +the new Parliamentary party, of which the writer was the founder and +head; and finally urged him to come home at once, and to stand for +Parliament as a candidate for the Market Malford division, where the +influence of Fontenoy's family was considerable. Since the general +election, which had taken place in June, and had returned a moderate +Conservative Government to power, the member for Market Malford had +become incurably ill. The seat might be vacant at any moment. Fontenoy +asked for a telegram, and urged the next steamer. + +Tressady had already--partly from private talk, partly from the +newspapers--learnt the main outlines of Lord Fontenoy's later story. The +first political speech of Fontenoy's he had ever read made a +half-farcical impression on him--let Dicky stick to his two-year-olds! +The second he read twice over, and alike in it, in certain party +manifestoes from the same hand printed in the newspapers, and in the +letter he had now received, there spoke something for which it seemed to +him he had been waiting. The style was rough and halting, but Tressady +felt in it the note and power of a leader. + +He took an hour's walk through the streets of Bombay to think it +over, then sent his telegram, and booked his passage on his way home +to luncheon. + +Such, in brief outline, had been the origin of the two men's +acquaintance. Since George's return they had been constantly together. +Fontenoy had thrown his whole colossal power of work into the struggle +for the Market Malford seat, and George owed him much. + + * * * * * + +After he was left to himself on this particular night, Tressady was for +long restless and wakeful. In spite of resistance, Fontenoy's talk and +Fontenoy's personality had nevertheless restored for the moment an +earlier balance of mind. The interests of ambition and the intellect +returned in force. Letty Sewell had, no doubt, made life very agreeable +to him during the past three weeks; but, after all--was it worth while? + +Her little figure danced before the inward eye as his fire sank into +darkness; fragments of her chatter ran through his mind. He began to be +rather ashamed of himself. Fontenoy was right. It was not the moment. No +doubt he must marry some day; he had come home, indeed, with the vague +intention of marrying; but the world was wide, and women many. That he +had very little romance in his temperament was probably due to his +mother. His childish experiences of her character, and of her relations +to his father, had left him no room, alas! for the natural childish +opinion that all grown-ups, and especially all mothers, are saints. In +India he had amused himself a good deal; but his adventures had, on the +whole, confirmed his boyish bias. If he had been forced to put his inmost +opinions about women into words, the result would have been +crude--perhaps brutal; which did not prevent him from holding a very +strong and vivid conviction of the pleasure to be got from their society. + +Accordingly, he woke up next morning precisely in the mood that Letty, +for her own reasons, had foreseen. It worried him to think that for two +or three days more he and Letty Sewell must still be thrown together in +close relations. He and his mother were waiting on at Malford for a day +or two till some workmen should be out of his own house, which lay +twenty miles away, at the farther edge of the Market Malford division. +Meanwhile a couple of shooting-parties had been arranged, mainly for +his entertainment. Still, was there no urgent business that required +him in town? + +He sauntered in to breakfast a little before ten. Only Evelyn Watton and +her mother were visible, most of the men having already gone off to a +distant meet. + +"Now sit down and entertain us, Sir George," said Mrs. Watton, holding +out her hand to him with an odd expression. "We're as dull as ditch +water--the men have all gone--Florrie's in bed with a chill--and Letty +departed by the 9.30 train." + +George's start, as he took his coffee from her, did not escape her. + +"Miss Sewell gone? But why this suddenness?" he inquired. "I thought Miss +Letty was to be here to the end of the week." + +Mrs. Watton raised her shoulders. "She sent a note in to me at half-past +eight to say her mother wasn't well, and she was wanted at home. She just +rushed in to say good-bye to me, chattered a great deal, kissed everybody +a great deal--and I know no more. I hear she had breakfast and a fly, +which is all I troubled myself about. I never interfere with the modern +young woman." + +Then she raised her eyeglass, and looked hard and curiously at Tressady. +His face told her nothing, however, and as she was the least sympathetic +of women, she soon forgot her own curiosity. + +Evelyn Watton, a vision of fresh girlhood in her morning frock, glanced +shyly at him once or twice as she gave him scones and mustard. She was +passing through a moment of poetry and happy dreams. All human beings +walked glorified in her eyes, especially if they were young. Letty was +not wholly to her taste, and had never been a particular friend. But she +thought ill of no one, and her little heart must needs flutter tenderly +in the presence of anything that suggested love and marriage. It had +delighted her to watch George and Letty together. Now, why had Letty +rushed away like this? _She_ thought with concern, thrilling all the +time, that Sir George looked grave and depressed. + +George, however, was not depressed--or thought he was not. He walked into +the library after breakfast, whistling, and quoting to himself: + +And there be they +Who kissed his wings which brought him yesterday, +And thank his wings to-day that he is flown. + +He prided himself on his memory of some modern poets, and the lines +pleased him particularly. + +He had no sooner done quoting, however, than his mother peered into the +room, claiming the business talk that had been promised. From that talk +George emerged irritable and silent. His mother's extravagance was really +preposterous!--not to be borne. For four years now he had been free from +the constant daily friction of money troubles which had spoilt his youth +and robbed him of all power of respecting his mother. And he had hugged +his freedom. But all the time it seemed he had been hugging illusion, and +the troubles had been merely piling up for his return! Her present +claims--and he knew very well that they were not the whole--would exhaust +all his available balance at his bankers'. + +Lady Tressady, for her part, thought, with indignant despair, that he had +not behaved at all as an only son should--especially an only son just +returned to a widowed mother after four years' absence. How could anyone +suppose that in four years there would be no debts--on such a pittance of +an income? Some money, indeed, he had promised her; but not nearly +enough, and not immediately. He "must look into things at home." Lady +Tressady was enraged with herself and him that she had not succeeded +better in making him understand how pressing, how _urgent_, matters were. + +She _must_, indeed, bring it home to him that there might be a scandal at +any moment. That odious livery-stable man, two or three dressmakers--in +these directions every phase and shift of the debtor's long _finesse_ had +been exhausted long ago. Even _she_ was at her wits' end. + +As for other matters--But from these her thoughts turned hurriedly away. +Luck would change, of course, sometime; it must change! No need to say +anything about _that_ just yet, especially while George's temper was in +such a queer state. + +It was very odd--most annoying! As a baby even he had never been +caressing or sweet like other people's babies. And now, really!--why +_her_ son should have such unattractive ways! + +But, manoeuvre as she would, George would not be drawn into further +discussion. She could only show him offended airs, and rack her brains +morning and night as to how best to help herself. + +Meanwhile George had never been so little pleased with living as +during these few days. He was overwhelmed with congratulations; and, +to judge from the newspapers, "all England," as Lady Tressady said, +"was talking of him." It seemed to him ridiculous that a man should +derive so little entertainment from such a fact. Nevertheless, his +dulness remained, and refused to be got rid of. He discussed with +himself, of course, for a new set of reasons, the possibility of +evading the shooting-parties, and departing. But he was deeply pledged +to stay; and he was under considerable obligations to the Wattons. So +he stayed; but he shot so as to increase his own dissatisfaction with +the universe, and to make the other men in the house wonder what might +be the general value of an Indian sporting reputation when it came to +dealing with the British pheasant. + +Then he turned to business. He tried to read some Parliamentary reports +bearing on a coming measure, and full of notes by Fontenoy, which +Fontenoy had left with him. But it only ended in his putting them hastily +aside, lest in the mood of obscure contradiction that possessed him he +should destroy his opinions before he had taken his seat. + +On the day before the last "shoot," among the letters his servant brought +him in the early morning, was one that he tore open in a hurry, tossing +the rest aside. + +It was from Miss Sewell, requesting, prettily, in as few words as +possible, that he would return her a book she had lent him. + +"My mother," she wrote, "has almost recovered from her sudden attack of +chill. I trust the shooting-parties have amused you, and that you have +read _all_ Lord Fontenoy's Blue Books." + +George wrote a reply before he went down to breakfast--a piece of +ordinary small-talk, that seemed to him the most wretched stuff +conceivable. But he pulled two pens to pieces before he achieved it. + +Then he went out for a long walk alone, pondering what was the matter +with him. Had that little witch dropped the old familiar poison into his +veins after all? Certainly some women made life vivacity and pleasure, +while others--his mother or Mrs. Watton, for instance--made it fatigue +or tedium. + +Ever since his boyhood Tressady had been conscious of intermittent +assaults of melancholy, fits of some inner disgust, which hung the world +in black, crippled his will, made him hate himself and despise his +neighbours. It was, possibly, some half-conscious dread lest this morbid +speck in his nature should gain upon the rest that made him so hungry for +travel and change of scene after he left college. It explained many +surprises, many apparent ficklenesses in his life. During the three weeks +that he had spent in the same house with Letty Sewell he had never once +been conscious of this lurking element of his life. And now, after four +days, he found himself positively pining for her voice, the rustle of her +delicate dress, her defiant, provocative ways that kept a man on the +alert--still more, her smiling silences that seemed to challenge all his +powers, the touch of her small cool hand that crushed so easily in his. + +What had she left the house for in that wilful way? He did not believe +her excuses. Yet he was mystified. Did she realise that things were +becoming serious, and did she not mean them to be serious? If so, who or +what hindered? + +As for Fontenoy-- + +Tressady quickened his step impatiently as he recalled that harassed and +toiling figure. Politics or no politics, _he_ would live his life! +Besides, it was obviously to his profit to marry. How could he ever make +a common household with his mother? He meant to do his duty by her, but +she annoyed and abashed him twenty times a day. He would be far happier +married, far better able to do his work. He was not passionately in +love--not at all. But--for it was no good fencing with himself any +longer--he desired Letty Sewell's companionship more than he had desired +anything for a long time. He wanted the right to carry off the little +musical box, with all its tunes, and set it playing in his own house, to +keep him gay. Why not? He could house it prettily, and reward it well. + +As for the rest, he decided, without thinking about it, that Letty Sewell +was well born and bred. She had, of course, all the little refinements a +fastidious taste might desire in a woman. She would never discredit a man +in society. On the contrary, she would be a great strength to him there. +And she must be sweet-tempered, or that pretty child Evelyn Watton would +not be so fond of her. + +That pretty child, meanwhile, was absorbed in the excitement of her own +small _role_. Tressady, who had only made duty-conversation with her +before, had found out somehow that she was sympathetic--that she would +talk to him charmingly about Letty. After a very little pretending, he +let himself go; and Evelyn dreamt at night of his confidences, her heart, +without knowing it, leaping forward to the time when a man would look at +her so, for her own sake--not another's. She forgot that she had ever +criticised Letty, thought her vain or selfish. Nay, she made a heroine of +her forthwith; she remembered all sorts of delightful things to say of +her, simply that she might keep the young member talking in a corner, +that she might still enjoy the delicious pride of feeling that she +knew--she was helping it on. + +After the big "shoot," for instance, when all the other gentlemen were +stiff and sleepy, George spent the whole evening in chattering to Evelyn, +or, rather, in making her chatter. Lady Tressady loitered near them once +or twice. She heard the names "Letty," "Miss Sewell," passing and +repassing--one talker catching up the other. Over any topic that included +Miss Sewell they lingered; when anything was begun that did not concern +her, it dropped at once, like a ball ill thrown. The mother went away +smiling rather sourly. + +She watched her son, indeed, cat-like all these days, trying to discover +what had happened--what his real mind was. She did not wish for a +daughter-in-law at all, and she had even a secret fear of Letty Sewell +in that capacity. But somehow George must be managed, her own needs must +be met. She felt that she might be undoing the future; but the present +drove her on. + +On the following morning, from one of Mrs. Watton's numerous letters +there dropped out the fact that Letty Sewell was expected immediately at +a country house in North Mercia whereof a certain Mrs. Corfield was +mistress--a house only distant some twenty miles from the Tressadys' +estate of Ferth Place. + +"My sister-in-law has recovered with remarkable rapidity," said Mrs. +Watton, raising a sarcastic eye. "Do you know anything of the Corfields, +Sir George?" + +"Nothing at all," said George. "One hears of them sometimes from +neighbours. They are said to be very lively folk. Miss Sewell will have a +gay time." + +"Corfield?" said Lady Tressady, her head on one side and her cup balanced +in two jewelled hands. "What! _Aspasia Corfield_! Why, my dear +George--one of my oldest friends!" + +George laughed--the short, grating laugh his mother so often evoked. + +"Beg pardon, mother; I can only answer for myself. To the best of my +belief I never saw her, either at Ferth or anywhere else." + +"Why, Aspasia Corfield and I," said Lady Tressady with languid +reflectiveness--"Aspasia Corfield and I copied each other's dresses, +and bought our hats at the same place, when we were eighteen. I haven't +seen her for an eternity. But Aspasia used to be a _dear_ girl--and so +fond of me!" + +She put down her cup with a sigh, intended as a reproach to George. +George only buried himself the deeper in his morning's letters. + +Mrs. Watton, behind her newspaper, glanced grimly from the mother +to the son. + +"I wonder if that woman has a single real old friend in the world. How +is George Tressady going to put up with her?" + +The Wattons themselves had been on friendly terms with Tressady's father +for many years. Since Sir William's death and George's absence, however, +Mrs. Watton had not troubled herself much about Lady Tressady, in which +she believed she was only following suit with the rest of West Mercia. +But now that George had reappeared as a promising politician, his +mother--till he married--had to be to some extent accepted along with +him. Mrs. Watton accordingly had thought it her duty to invite her for +the election, not without an active sense of martyrdom. "She always has +bored me to tears since I first saw Sir William trailing her about," she +would remark to Letty. "Where did he pick her up? The marvel is that she +has kept respectable. She has never looked it. I always feel inclined to +ask her at breakfast why she dresses for dinner twelve hours too soon!" + +Very soon after the little conversation about the Corfields Lady Tressady +withdrew to her room, sat thoughtful for a while, with her writing-block +on her knee, then wrote a letter. She was perfectly aware of the fact +that since George had come back to her she was likely to be welcome once +more in many houses that for years had shown no particular desire to +receive her. She took the situation very easily. It was seldom her way to +be bitter. She was only determined to amuse herself, to enjoy her life in +her own way. If people disapproved of her, she thought them fools, but it +did not prevent her from trying to make it up with them next day, if she +saw an opening and it seemed worth while. + +"There!" she said to herself as she sealed the letter, and looked at it +with admiration, "I really have a knack for doing those things. I should +think Aspasia Corfield would ask him by return--me, too, if she has any +decency, though she _has_ dropped me for fifteen years. She has a tribe +of daughters.--_Why_ I should play Miss Sewell's game like this I don't +know! Well, one must try something." + +That same afternoon mother and son took their departure for Ferth Place. + +George, who had only spent a few weeks at Ferth since his return from +India, should have found plenty to do both indoors and out. The house +struck him as singularly dingy and out of order. Changes were +imperatively demanded in the garden and in the estate. His business as a +colliery-owner was in a tangled and critical condition. And meanwhile +Fontenoy plied him incessantly with a political correspondence which of +itself made large demands upon intelligence and energy. + +Nevertheless he shuffled out of everything, unless it were the +correspondence with Fontenoy. As to the notion that all the languor could +be due merely to an unsatisfied craving for Letty Sewell's society, when +it presented itself he still fought with it. The Indian climate might +have somehow affected him. An English winter is soon forgotten, and has +to be re-learnt like a distasteful lesson. + +About a week after their arrival at Ferth George was sitting at his +solitary breakfast when his mother came floating into the room, preceded +by a rattle of bangles, a flutter of streamers, and the barking of +little dogs. + +She held various newly opened letters, and, running up to him, she laid +her hands on his shoulders. + +"Now"--thought George to himself with annoyance, "she is going to be +arch!" + +"Oh! you silly boy!" she said, holding him, with her head on one side. +"Who's been cross and nasty to his poor old mammy? Who wants cheering up +a bit before he settles down to his horrid work? Who would take his +mammy to a nice party at a nice house, if he were prettily asked--eh? +who would?" + +She pinched his cheek before he could escape. + +"Well, mother, of course you will do what you like," said George, walking +off to supply himself with ham. "I shall not leave home again, just yet." + +Lady Tressady smiled. + +"Well, anyhow, you can read Aspasia Corfield's letter," she said, holding +it out to him. "You know, really, that house isn't bad. They took over +the Dryburghs' _chef_, and Aspasia knows how to pick her people." + +"Aspasia!" The tone of patronising intimacy! George blushed, if his +mother did not. + +Yet he took the letter. He read it, then put it down, and walked to the +window to look at a crowd of birds that had been collecting round a plate +of food he had just put out upon the snow. + +"Well, will you go?" said his mother. + +"If you particularly wish it," he said, after a pause, in an +embarrassed voice. + +Lady Tressady's dimples were in full play as she settled herself into her +seat and began to gather a supply of provisions. But as he returned to +his place, and she glanced at him, she saw that he was not in a mood to +be bantered, and understood that he was not going to let her force his +confidence, however shrewdly she might guess at his affairs. So she +controlled herself, and began to chatter about the Corfields and their +party. He responded, and by the end of breakfast they were on much better +terms than they had been for some weeks. + +That morning also he wrote a cheque for her immediate necessities, which +made her--for the time--a happy woman; and she overwhelmed him with +grateful tears and embraces, which he did his best to bear. + +Early in December he and she became the Corfields' guests. They found a +large party collected, and Letty Sewell happily established as the spoilt +child of the house. At the first touch of her hand, the first glance of +her eyes, George's cloud dispersed. + +"Why did you run away?" George asked her on the first possible occasion. + +Letty laughed, fenced with the question for four days, during which +George was never dull for a single instant, and then capitulated. She +allowed him to propose to her, and was graciously pleased to accept him. + +The following week Tressady went down with Letty to her home at Helbeck. +He found an invalid father, a remarkably foolish, inconsequent mother, +and a younger sister, Elsie, on whom, as it seemed to him, the burdens of +the house mainly rested. + +The father, who was suffering from a slow but incurable disease, had the +remains of much natural ability and acuteness. He was well content with +Tressady as a son-in-law; though in the few interviews that Tressady was +able to have with him on the question of settlements the young man took +pains to state his money affairs as carefully and modestly as possible. +Letty was not often in her father's room, and Mr. Sewell treated her, +when she did come, rather like an agreeable guest than a daughter. But he +was evidently extremely proud of her--as also was the mother--and he +would talk much to George, when his health allowed it, of her good looks +and her social success. + +With the younger sister Tressady did not find it easy to make friends. + +She was plain, sickly, and rather silent. She seemed to have scientific +tastes and to be a great reader. And, so far as he could judge, the two +sisters were not intimate. + +"Don't hate me for taking her away!" he said, as he was bidding good-bye +to Elsie, and glancing over her shoulder at Letty on the stairs. + +The girl's quiet eyes were crossed by a momentary look of amusement. Then +she controlled herself, and said gently: + +"We didn't expect to keep her! Good-bye." + + + + +CHAPTER IV + + +"Oh, Tully, look at my cloak! You've let it fall! Hold my fan, please, +and give me the opera-glasses." + +The speaker was Miss Sewell. She and an elderly lady were sitting side by +side in the stalls, about halfway down St. James's Hall. The occasion was +a popular concert, and, as Joachim was to play, every seat in the hall +was rapidly filling up. + +Letty rose as she asked for the opera-glasses, and scanned the crowds +streaming in through the side-doors. + +"No--no signs of him! He must have been kept at the House, after all," +she said, with annoyance. "Really, Tully, I do think you might have got a +programme all this time! Why do you leave everything to me?" + +"My dear!" said her companion, protesting, "you didn't tell me to." + +"Well, I don't see why I should _tell_ you everything. Of course I want a +programme. Is that he? No! What a nuisance!" + +"Sir George must have been detained," murmured her companion, timidly. + +"What a very original thing to say, wasn't it, Tully?" remarked Miss +Sewell, with sarcasm, as she sat down again. + +The lady addressed was silent, instinctively waiting till Letty's nerves +should have quieted down. She was a Miss Tulloch, a former governess of +the Sewells, and now often employed by Letty, when she was in town, as a +convenient chaperon. Letty was accustomed to stay with an aunt in +Cavendish Square, an old lady who did not go out in the evenings. A +chaperon therefore was indispensable, and Maria Tulloch could always be +had. She existed somewhere in West Kensington, on an income of seventy +pounds a year. Letty took her freely to the opera and the theatre, to +concerts and galleries, and occasionally gave her a dress she did not +want. Miss Tulloch clung to the connection as her only chance of relief +from the boarding-house routine she detested, and was always abjectly +ready to do as she was told. She saw nothing she was not meant to see, +and she could be shaken off at a moment's notice. For the rest, she came +of a stock of gentlefolk; and her invariable black dress, her bits of +carefully treasured lace, the weak refinement of her face, and her timid +manner did no discredit to the brilliant creature beside her. + +When the first number of the programme was over, Letty got up once more, +opera-glass in hand, to search among the late-comers for her missing +lover. She nodded to many acquaintances, but George Tressady was not to +be seen; and she sat down finally in no mood either to listen or to +enjoy, though the magician of the evening was already at work. + +"There's something very special, isn't there, you want to see Sir George +about to-night?" Tully inquired humbly when the next pause occurred. + +"Of course there is!" said Letty, crossly. "You do ask such +foolish questions, Tully. If I don't see him to-night, he may let +that house in Brook Street slip. There are several people after +it--the agents told me." + +"And he thinks it too expensive?" + +"Only because of _her_. If she makes him pay her that preposterous +allowance, of course it will be too expensive. But I don't mean him +to pay it." + +"Lady Tressady is terribly extravagant," murmured Miss Tulloch. + +"Well, so long as she isn't extravagant with his money--_our_ money--I +don't care a rap," said Letty; "only she sha'n't spend all her own and +all ours too, which is what she has been doing. When George was away he +let her live at Ferth, and spend almost all the income, except five +hundred a year that he kept for himself. And _then_ she got so shamefully +into debt that he doesn't know when he shall ever clear her. He gave her +money at Christmas, and again, I am _sure_, just lately. Well! all I know +is that it must be _stopped_. I don't know that I shall be able to do +much till I'm married, but I mean to make him take this house." + +"Is Lady Tressady nice to you? She is in town, isn't she?" + +"Oh yes! she's in town. Nice?" said Letty, with a little laugh. "She +can't bear me, of course; but we're quite civil." + +"I thought she tried to bring it on?" said the confidante, anxious, above +all things, to be sympathetic. + +"Well, she brought him to the Corfields, and let me know she had. I don't +know why she did it. I suppose she wanted to get something out of him. +Ah! _there_ he is!" + +And Letty stood up, smiling and beckoning, while Tressady's tall thin +figure made its way along the central passage. + +"Horrid House! What made you so late?" she said, as he sat down between +her and Miss Tulloch. + +George Tressady looked at her with delight. The shrewish contractions in +the face, which had been very evident to Tully a few minutes before, had +all disappeared, and the sharp slight lines of it seemed to George the +height of delicacy. At sight of him colour and eyes had brightened. Yet +at the same time there was not a trace of the raw girl about her. She +knew very well that he had no taste for _ingenues_, and she was neither +nervous nor sentimental in his company. + +"Do you suppose I should have stayed a second longer than I was obliged?" +he asked her, smiling, pressing her little hand under pretence of taking +her programme. + +The first notes of a new Brahms quartette mounted, thin and sweet, into +the air. The musical portion of the audience, having come for this +particular morsel, prepared themselves eagerly for the tasting and trying +of it. George and Letty tried to say a few things more to each other +before yielding to the general silence, but an old gentleman in front +turned upon them a face of such disdain and fury they must needs laugh +and desist. + +Not that George was unwilling. He was tired; and silence with Letty +beside him was not only repose, but pleasure. Moreover, he derived a +certain honest pleasure of a mixed sort from music. It suggested literary +or pictorial ideas to him which stirred him, and gave him a sense of +enjoyment. Now, as the playing flowed on, it called up delightful images +in his brain: of woody places, of whirling forms, of quiet rivers, of +thin trees Corot-like against the sky--scenes of pleading, of frolic, +reproachful pain, dissolving joy. With it all mingled his own story, his +own feeling; his pride of possession in this white creature touching him; +his sense of youth, of opening life, of a crowded stage whereon his "cue" +had just been given, his "call" sounded. He listened with eagerness, +welcoming each fancy as it floated past, conscious of a grain of +self-abandonment even--a rare mood with him. He was not absorbed in love +by any means; the music spoke to him of a hundred other kindling or +enchanting things. Nevertheless it made it doubly pleasant to be there, +with Letty beside him. He was quite satisfied with himself and her; quite +certain that he had done everything for the best. All this the music in +some way emphasised--made clear. + +When it was over, and the applause was subsiding, Letty said in his ear: +"Have you settled about the house?" + +He smiled down upon her, not hearing what she said, but admiring her +dress, its little complication and subtleties, the violets that perfumed +every movement, the slim fingers holding the fan. Her mere ways of +personal adornment were to him like pleasant talk. They surprised and +amused him--stood between him and ennui. + +She repeated her question. + +A frown crossed his brow, and the face changed wholly. + +"Ah!--it is so difficult to see one's way," he said, with a little sigh +of annoyance. + +Letty played with her fan, and was silent. + +"Do you so much prefer it to the others?" he asked her. + +Letty looked up with astonishment. + +"Why, it is a house!" she said, lifting her eyebrows; "and the others--" + +"Hovels? Well, you are about right. The small London house is an +abomination. Perhaps I can make them take less premium." + +Letty shook her head. + +"It is not at all a dear house," she said decidedly. + +He still frowned, with the look of one recalled to an annoyance he had +shaken off. + +"Well, darling, if you wish it so much, that settles it. Promise to be +still nice to me when we go through the Bankruptcy Court!" + +"We will let lodgings, and I will do the waiting," said Letty, just +laying her hand lightly against his for an instant. "Just think! That +house would draw like anything. Of course, we will only take the eldest +sons of peers. By the way, do you see Lord Fontenoy?" + +They were in the middle of the "interval," and almost everyone about +them, including Miss Tulloch, was standing up, talking or examining their +neighbours. + +George craned his neck round Miss Tulloch, and saw Fontenoy sitting +beside a lady, on the other side of the middle gangway. + +"Who is the lady?" Letty inquired. "I saw her with him the other night at +the Foreign Office." + +George smiled. + +"_That_--if you want to know--is Fontenoy's story!" + +"Oh, but tell me at once!" said Letty, imperiously. "But he hasn't got a +story, or a heart. He's only stuffed with blue-book." + +"So I thought till a few weeks ago. But I know a good deal more now about +Master Fontenoy than I did." + +"But who is she?" + +"She is a Mrs. Allison. Isn't that white hair beautiful? And her +face--half saint, I always think--you might take her for a +mother-abbess--and half princess. Did you ever see such diamonds?" + +George pulled his moustaches, and grinned as he looked across at +Fontenoy. + +"Tell me quick!" said Letty, tapping him on the arm--"Is she a +widow?--and is he going to marry her? Why didn't you tell me before?--why +didn't you tell me at Malford?" + +"Because I didn't know," said George, laughing. "Oh! it's a strange +story--too long to tell now. She is a widow, but he is not going to marry +her, apparently. She has a grown-up son, who hasn't yet found himself a +wife, and thinks it isn't fair to him. If Fontenoy wants to introduce +her, don't refuse. She is the mistress of Castle Luton, and has +delightful parties. Yes!--if I'd known at Malford what I know now!" + +And he laughed again, remembering Fontenoy's nocturnal incursion upon +him, and its apparent object. Who would have imagined that the preacher +of that occasion had ever given one serious thought to woman and woman's +arts--least of all that he was the creation and slave of a woman! + +Letty's curiosity was piqued, and she would have plied George with +questions, but that she suddenly perceived that Fontenoy had risen, and +was coming across to them. + +"Gracious!" she said; "here he comes. I can't think why; he +doesn't like me." + +Fontenoy, however, when he had made his way to them, greeted Miss Sewell +with as much apparent cordiality as he showed to anyone else. He had +received George's news of the marriage with all decorum, and had since +sent a handsome wedding-present to the bride-elect. Letty, however, was +never at ease with him, which, indeed, was the case with most women. + +He stood beside the _fiances_ for a minute or two, exchanging a few +commonplaces with Letty on the performers and the audience; then he +turned to George with a change of look. + +"No need for us to go back to-night, I think?" + +"What, to the House? Dear, no! Grooby and Havershon may be trusted to +drone the evening out, I should hope, with no trouble to anybody but +themselves. The Government are just keeping a house, that's all. Have you +been grinding at your speech all day?" + +Fontenoy shrugged his shoulders. + +"I sha'n't get anything out that I want to say. Are you coming to the +House on Friday, Miss Sewell?" + +"Friday?" said Letty, looking puzzled. + +George laughed. + +"I told you. You must plead trousseau if you want to save yourself!" + +Amusement shone in his blue eyes as they passed from Letty to Fontenoy. +He had long ago discovered that Letty was incapable of any serious +interest in his public life. It did not disturb him at all. But it +tickled his sense of humour that Letty would have to talk politics all +the same, and to talk them with people like Fontenoy. + +"Oh! you mean your Resolution!" cried Letty. "Isn't it a Resolution? Yes, +of course I'm coming. It's very absurd, for I don't know anything about +it. But George says I must, and till I promise to obey, you see, I don't +mind being obedient!" + +Archness, however, was thrown away on Fontenoy. He stood beside her, +awkward and irresponsive. Not being allowed to be womanish, she could +only try once more to be political. + +"It's to be a great attack on Mr. Dowson, isn't it?" she asked him. "You +and George are mad about some things he has been doing? He's Home +Secretary, isn't he? Yes, of _course_! And he's been driving trade away, +and tyrannising over the manufacturers? I _wish_ you'd explain it to me! +I ask George, and he tells me not to talk shop." + +"Oh, for goodness' sake," groaned George, "let it alone! I came to meet +you and hear Joachim. However, I may as well warn you, Letty, that I +sha'n't have time to be married once Fontenoy's anti-Maxwell campaign +begins; and it will go on till the Day of Judgment." + +"Why anti-Maxwell," said Letty, puzzled. "I thought it was Mr. Dowson you +are going to attack?" + +George, a little vexed that she should require it, began to explain that +as Maxwell was "only a miserable peer," he could have nothing to do with +the House of Commons, and that Dowson was the official mouthpiece of the +Maxwell group and policy in the Lower House. "The hands were the hands of +Esau," etc. Letty meanwhile, conscious that she was not showing to +advantage, flushed, began to play nervously with her fan, and wished that +George would leave off. + +Fontenoy did nothing to assist George's political lesson. He stood +impassive, till suddenly he tried to look across his immediate +neighbours, and then said, turning to Letty: + +"The Maxwells, I see, are here to-night." He nodded towards a group on +the left, some two or three benches behind them. "Are you an admirer of +Lady Maxwell's, Miss Sewell?--you've seen her, of course?" + +"Oh yes, _often_!" said Letty, annoyed by the question, standing, +however, eagerly on tiptoe. "I know her, too, a little; but she never +remembers me. She was at the Foreign Office on Saturday, with such a +_hideous_ dress on--it spoilt her completely." + +"Hideous!" said Fontenoy, with a puzzled look. "Some artist--I forget +who--came and raved to me about it; said it was like some Florentine +picture--I forget what--don't think I ever heard of it." + +Letty looked contemptuous. Her expression said that in this matter, at +any rate, she knew what she was talking about. Nevertheless her eyes +followed the dark head Fontenoy had pointed out to her. + +Lady Maxwell was at the moment the centre of a large group of people, +mostly men, all of whom seemed to be eager to get a word with her, and +she was talking with great animation, appealing from time to time to a +tall, broad-shouldered gentleman, with greyish hair, who stood, smiling +and silent, at the edge of the group. Letty noticed that many glasses +from the balcony were directed to this particular knot of persons; that +everybody near them, or rather every woman, was watching Lady Maxwell, or +trying to get a better view of her. The girl felt a secret pang of envy +and dislike. + +The figure of a well-known accompanist appeared suddenly at the head of +the staircase leading from the artists' room. The interval was over, and +the audience began to subside into attention. + +Fontenoy bowed and took his leave. + +"You see, he _didn't_ introduce me," said Letty, not without chagrin, +as she settled down. "And how plain he is! I think him uglier every +time I see him." + +George made a vague sound of assent, but did not really agree with her in +the least. Fontenoy's air of overwork was more decided than ever; his +eyes had almost sunk out of sight; the complexion of his broad strong +face had reddened and coarsened from lack of exercise and sleep; his +brown hair was thinning and grizzling fast. Nevertheless a man saw much +to admire in the ungainly head and long-limbed frame, and did not think +any the better of a woman's intelligence for failing to perceive it. + +After the concert, as George and Letty stood together in the crowded +vestibule, he said to her, with a smile: + +"So I take that house?" + +"If you want to do anything disagreeable," she retorted, quickly, "don't +_ask_ me. Do it, and then wait till I am good-tempered again!" + +"What a tempting prospect! Do you know that when you put on that +particular hood that I would take Buckingham Palace to please you? Do you +know also that my mother will think us very extravagant?" + +"Ah, we can't all be economical!" said Letty. + +He saw the little toss of the head and sharpening of the lips. They only +amused him. Though he had never, so far, discussed his mother and her +affairs with Letty in any detail, he understood perfectly well that her +feeling about this particular house in some way concerned his mother, and +that Letty and Lady Tressady were rapidly coming to dislike each other. +Well, why should Letty pretend? He liked her the better for not +pretending. + +There was a movement in the crowd about them, and Letty, looking up, +suddenly found herself close to a tall lady, whose dark eyes were +bent upon her. + +"How do you do, Miss Sewell?" + +Letty, a little fluttered, gave her hand and replied. Lady Maxwell +glanced across her at the tall young man, with the fair, irregular face. +George bowed involuntarily, and she slightly responded. Then she was +swept on by her own party. + +"Have you sent for your carriage?" George heard someone say to her. + +"No; I am going home in a hansom. I've tired out both the horses +to-day. Aldous is going down to the club to see if he can hear anything +about Devizes." + +"Oh! the election?" + +She nodded, then caught sight of her husband at the door beckoning, and +hurried on. + +"What a head!" said George, looking after her with admiration. + +"Yes," said Letty, unwillingly. "It's the hair that's so splendid, the +long black waves of it. How ridiculous to talk of tiring out her +horses--that's just like her! As though she mightn't have fifty horses if +she liked! Oh, George, there's our man! Quick, Tully!" + +They made their way out. In the press George put his arm half round +Letty, shielding her. The touch of her light form, the nearness of her +delicate face, enchanted him. When their carriage had rolled away, and he +turned homewards along Piccadilly, he walked absently for a time, +conscious only of pulsing pleasure. + +It was a mild February night. After a long frost, and a grudging thaw, +westerly winds were setting in, and Spring could be foreseen. It had been +pouring with rain during the concert, but was now fair, the rushing +clouds leaving behind them, as they passed, great torn spaces of blue, +where the stars shone. + +Gusts of warm moist air swept through the street. As George's moment of +intoxication gradually subsided, he felt the physical charm of the soft +buffeting wind. How good seemed all living!--youth and capacity--this +roaring multitudinous London--the future with its chances! This common +pleasant chance of marriage amongst them--he was glad he had put out his +hand to it. His wife that was to be was no saint and no philosopher. He +thanked the fates! He at least asked for neither--on the hearth. "Praise, +blame, love, kisses"--for all of those, life with Letty would give scope; +yet for none of them in excess. There would be plenty of room left for +other things, other passions--the passion of political power, for +instance, the art of dealing with and commanding other men. He, the +novice, the beginner, to talk of "commanding!" Yet already he felt his +foot upon the ladder. Fontenoy consulted him, and confided in him more +and more. In spite of his engagement, he was informing himself rapidly on +a hundred questions, and the mental wrestle of every day was +exhilarating. Their small group in the House, compact, tireless, +audacious, was growing in importance and in the attention it extorted +from the public. Never had the whole tribe of factory inspectors shown a +more hawk-like, a more inquisitorial, a more intolerable vigilance than +during the past twelve months. All the persons concerned with matches and +white-lead, with certain chemical or metal-working industries, with +"season" dressmaking or tailoring, were up in arms, rallying to +Fontenoy's support with loud wrath and lamentations, claiming to speak +not only for themselves, but for their "hands," in the angry protest +that things had gone and were going a great deal too far, that trade was +simply being harassed out of the country. A Whiggish group of +manufacturers on the Liberal side were all with Fontenoy; while the +Socialists, on whom the Government should have been able in such a matter +to count to the death, had a special grievance against the Cabinet at the +moment, and were sulking in their tents. The attack and defence would +probably take two nights; for the Government, admitting the gravity of +the assault, had agreed, in case the debate should not be concluded on +Friday, to give up Monday to it. Altogether the affair would make a +noise. George would probably get in his maiden speech on the second +night, and was, in truth, devoting a great deal of his mind to the +prospect; though to Letty he had persistently laughed at it and belittled +it, refusing altogether to let her come and hear him. + +Then, after Easter would come Maxwell's Bill, and the fat in the fire! +Poor little Letty!--she would get but few of the bridal observances due +to her when _that_ struggle began. But first would come Easter and their +wedding; that one short fortnight, when he would carry her off--soft, +willing prey!--to the country, draw a "wind-warm space" about himself and +her, and minister to all her whims. + +He turned down St. James's Street, passed Marlborough House, and +entered the Mall, on the way to Warwick Square, where he was living +with his mother. + +Suddenly he became aware of a crowd, immediately in front of him, in the +direction of Buckingham Palace. A hansom and horse were standing in the +roadway; the driver, crimson and hatless, was bandying words with one of +the policemen, who had his notebook open, and from the middle of the +crowd came a sound of wailing. + +He walked up to the edge of the circle. + +"Anybody hurt?" he said to the policeman, as the man shut his notebook. + +"Little girl run over, sir." + +"Can I be of any assistance? Is there an ambulance coming?" + +"No, sir. There was a lady in the hansom. She's just now bandaging the +child's leg, and says she'll take it to the hospital." + +George mounted on one of the seats under the trees that stood handy, and +looked over the heads of the crowd to the space in the centre which the +other policeman was keeping clear. A little girl lay on the ground, or +rather on a heap of coats; another girl, apparently about sixteen, stood +near her, crying bitterly, and a lady-- + +"Goodness!" said Tressady; and, jumping down, he touched the policeman on +the shoulder. + +"Can you get me through? I think I could be some help. That lady"--he +spoke a word in the policeman's ear. + +The man touched his hat. + +"Stand back, please!" he said, addressing the crowd, "and let this +gentleman through." + +The crowd divided unwillingly. But at the same moment it parted from the +inside, and a little procession came through, both policemen joining +their energies to make a free passage for it. In front walked the +policeman carrying the little girl, a child apparently of about twelve +years old. Her right foot lay stiffly across his arm, held straight and +still in an impromptu splint of umbrellas and handkerchiefs. Immediately +behind came the lady whom George had caught sight of, holding the other +girl's hand in hers. She was bareheaded and in evening dress. Her +opera-cloak, with its heavy sable collar, showed beneath it a dress of +some light-coloured satin, which had already suffered deplorably from the +puddles of the road, and, as she neared the lamp beneath which the cab +had stopped, the diamonds on her wrists sparkled in the light. During her +passage through the crowd, George perceived that one or two people +recognised her, and that a murmur ran from mouth to mouth. + +Of anything of the sort she herself was totally unconscious. George saw +at once that she, not the policeman, was in command. She gave him +directions, as they approached the cab, in a quick, imperative voice +which left no room for hesitation. + +"The driver is drunk," he heard her say; "who will drive?" + +"One of us will drive, ma'am." + +"What--the other man? Ask him to take the reins at once, please, before I +get in. The horse is fresh, and might start. That's right. Now, when I +say the word, give me the child." + +She settled herself in the cab. George saw the policeman somewhat +embarrassed, for a moment, with his burden. He came forward to his help, +and between them they handed in the child, placing her carefully on her +protector's knee. + +Then, standing at the open door of the cab, George raised his hat. "Can I +be of any further assistance to you, Lady Maxwell? I saw you just now at +the concert." + +She turned in some astonishment as she heard her name, and looked at the +speaker. Then, very quickly, she seemed to understand. + +"I don't know," she said, pondering. "Yes! you could help me. I am going +to take the child to hospital. But there is this other girl. Could you +take her home--she is very much upset? No!--first, could you bring her +after me to St. George's? She wants to see where we put her sister." + +"I will call another cab, and be there as soon as you." + +"Thank you. Just let me speak to the sister a moment, please." + +He put the weeping girl forward, and Lady Maxwell bent across the burden +on her knee to say a few words to her--soft, quick words in another +voice. The girl understood, her face cleared a little, and she let +Tressady take charge of her. + +One of the policemen mounted the box of the hansom, amid the "chaff" of +the crowd, and the cab started. A few hats were raised in George's +neighbourhood, and there was something of a cheer. + +"I tell yer," said a voice, "I knowed her fust sight--seed her picture +lots o' times in the papers, and in the winders too. My word, ain't she +good-lookin! And did yer see all them diamonds?" + +"Come along!" said George, impatiently, hurrying his charge into the +four-wheeler the other policeman had just stopped for them. + +In a few more seconds he, the girl, and the policeman were pursuing Lady +Maxwell's hansom at the best speed of an indifferent horse. George tried +to say a few consoling things to his neighbour; and the girl, reassured +by his kind manner, found her tongue, and began to chatter in a tearful +voice about the how and when of the accident: about the elder sister in a +lodging in Crawford Street, Tottenham Court Road, whom she and the little +one had been visiting; the grandmother in Westminster with whom they +lived; poor Lizzie's place in a laundry, which now she must lose; how the +lady had begged handkerchiefs and umbrellas from the crowd to tie up +Lizzie's leg with--and so on through a number of other details incoherent +or plaintive. + +George heard her absently. His mind all the time was absorbed in the +dramatic or ironic aspects of what he had just seen. For dramatic they +were--though perhaps a little cheap. Could he, could anyone, have made +acquaintance with this particular woman in more characteristic fashion? +He laughed to think how he would tell the story to Fontenoy. The +beautiful creature in her diamonds, kneeling on her satin dress in the +mud, to bind up a little laundrymaid's leg--it was so extravagantly in +keeping with Marcella Maxwell that it amused one like an overdone +coincidence in a clumsy play. + +What made her so beautiful? The face had marked defects; but in colour, +expression, subtlety of line incomparable! On the other hand, the +manner--no!--he shrugged his shoulders. The remembrance of its +mannish--or should it be, rather, boyish?--energy and assurance somehow +set him on edge. + +In the end, they were not much behind the hansom; for the hospital porter +was only just in the act of taking the injured child from Lady Maxwell as +Tressady dismounted and went forward again to see what he could do. + +But, somewhat to his chagrin, he was not wanted. Lady Maxwell and the +porter did everything. As they went into the hospital, George caught a +few of the things she was saying to the porter as she supported the +child's leg. She spoke in a rapid, professional way, and the man +answered, as the policeman had done, with a deference and understanding +which were clearly not due only to her "grand air" and her evening dress. +George was puzzled. + +He and the elder sister followed her into the waiting-room. The +house-surgeon and a nurse were summoned, and the injured leg was put into +a splint there and then. The patient moaned and cried most of the time, +and Tressady had hard work to keep the sister quiet. Then nurse and +doctor lifted the child. + +"They are going to put her to bed," said Lady Maxwell, turning to George. +"I am going up with them. Would you kindly wait? The sister"--she dropped +her business tone, and, smiling, touched the elder girl on the arm--"can +come up when the little one is undressed." + +The little procession swept away, and George was left with his charge. As +soon as the small sister was out of sight, the elder one began to +chatter again out of sheer excitement, crying at intervals. George did +not heed her much. He walked up and down, with his hands in his pockets, +conscious of a curious irritability. He did not think a woman should take +a strange man's service quite so coolly. + +At the end of another quarter of an hour a nurse appeared to summon the +sister. Tressady was told he might come too if he would, and his charge +threw him a quick, timid look, as though asking him not to desert her in +this unknown and formidable place. So they followed the nurse up white +stone stairs, and through half-lit corridors, where all was silent, save +that once a sound of delirious shrieking and talking reached them +through a closed door, and made the sister's consumptive little face +turn whiter still. + +At last the nurse, putting her finger on her lip, turned a handle, and +George was conscious of a sudden feeling of pleasure. + +They were standing on the threshold of a children's ward. On either hand +was a range of beds, bluish-white between the yellow picture-covered +walls and the middle-way of spotless floor. Far away, at the other end, a +great fire glowed. On a bare table in the centre, laden with bottles and +various surgical necessaries, stood a shaded lamp, and beside it the +chair where the night-nurse had been sitting. In the beds were sleeping +children of various ages, some burrowing, face downward, animal-like, +into their pillows; others lying on their backs, painfully straight and +still. The air was warm, yet light, and there was the inevitable smell of +antiseptics. Something in the fire-lit space and comfort of the great +room, its ordered lines and colours, the gentleness of the shaded light +as contrasted with the dim figures in the beds, seemed to make a poem of +it--a poem of human tenderness. + +Two or three beds away to the right, Lady Maxwell was standing with the +night-nurse of the ward. The little girl had been undressed, and was +lying quiet, with a drawn, piteous face that turned eagerly as her sister +came in. The whole scene was new and touching to Tressady. Yet, after the +first impression, his attention was perforce held by Lady Maxwell, and he +saw the rest only in relation to her. She had slipped off her heavy +cloak, in order, perhaps, that she might help in the undressing of the +child. Beneath, she wore a little shawl or cape of some delicate lace +over her low dress. The dress itself was of a pale shade of green; the +mire and mud with which it was bedabbled no longer showed in the half +light; and the satin folds glistened dimly as she moved. The poetic +dignity of the head, so finely wreathed with its black hair, of the full +throat and falling shoulders, received a sort of special emphasis from +the wide spaces, the pale colours and level lines of the ward. Tressady +was conscious again of the dramatic significant note as he watched her, +yet without any softening of his nascent feeling of antagonism. + +She turned and beckoned to the sister as they entered: + +"Come and see how comfortable she is! And then you must give this lady +your name and address." + +The girl timidly approached. Whilst she was occupied with her sister and +with the nurse, Lady Maxwell suddenly looked round, and saw Tressady +standing by the table a yard or two from her. + +A momentary expression of astonishment crossed her face. He saw that, in +her absorption with the case and the two sisters, she had clean forgotten +all about him. But in a flash she remembered, and smiled. + +"So you are really going to take her home? That is very kind of you. It +will make all the difference to the grandmother that somebody should go +and explain. You see, they leave her in the splint for the night, and +to-morrow they will put the leg in plaster. Probably they won't keep her +in hospital more than about three weeks, for they are very full." + +"You seem to know all about it!" + +"I was a nurse myself once, for a time," she said, but with a certain +stiffness which seemed to mark the transition from the professional to +the great lady. + +"Ah! I should have remembered that. I had heard it from Edward Watton." + +She looked up quickly. He felt that for the first time she took notice of +him as an individual. + +"You know Mr. Watton? I think you are Sir George Tressady, are you not? +You got in for Market Malford in November? I recollect. I didn't like +your speeches." + +She laughed. So did he. + +"Yes, I got in just in time for a fighting session." + +Her laugh disappeared. + +"An odious fight!" she said gravely. + +"I am not so sure. That depends on whether you like fighting, and how +certain you are of your cause!" + +She hesitated a moment; then she said: + +"How can Lord Fontenoy be certain of his cause!" + +The slight note of scorn roused him. + +"Isn't that what all parties say of their opponents?" + +She glanced at him again, curiously. He was evidently quite +young--younger than herself, she guessed. But his careless ease and +experience of bearing, contrasted with his thin boy's figure, attracted +her. Her lip softened reluctantly into a smile. + +"Perhaps," she said. "Only sometimes, you know, it must be true! Well, +evidently we can't discuss it here at one o'clock in the morning--and +there is the nurse making signs to me. It is really very good of you. If +you are in our neighbourhood on Sunday, will you report?" + +"Certainly--with the greatest pleasure. I will come and give you a full +account of my mission." + +She held out a slim hand. The sister, red-eyed with crying, was handed +over to him, and he and she were soon in a cab, speeding towards the +Westminster mews whither she directed him. + +Well, was Maxwell to be so greatly envied? Tressady was not sure. Such a +woman, he thought, for all her beauty, would not have greatly stirred his +own pulses. + + + + +CHAPTER V + + +The week which had opened thus for Tressady promised to be one of lively +interest for such persons as were either concerned in or took notice of +the House of Commons and its doings. Fontenoy's onslaught upon the +administration of the Home Office, and, through the Home Secretary, on +the Maxwell group and influence, had been long expected, and was known to +have been ably prepared. Its possible results were already keenly +discussed. Even if it were a damaging attack, it was not supposed that it +could have any immediate effect on the state of parties or the strength +of the Government. But after Easter Maxwell's factory Bill--a special +Factory Act for East London, touching the grown man for the first time, +and absolutely prohibiting home-work in certain specified industries--was +to be brought forward, and could not fail to provide Maxwell's +adversaries with many chances of red and glorious battle. It was +disputable from end to end; it had already broken up one Government; it +was strongly pressed and fiercely opposed; and on the fate of each clause +in Committee might hang the life or death of the Ministry--not so much +because of the intrinsic importance of the matter, as because Maxwell was +indispensable to the Cabinet, and it was known that neither Maxwell nor +his close friend and henchman, Dowson, the Home Secretary, would accept +defeat on any of the really vital points of the Bill. + +The general situation was a curious one. Some two years before this time +a strong and long-lived Tory Government had come to an end. Since then +all had been confusion in English politics. A weak Liberal Government, +undermined by Socialist rebellion, had lasted but a short time, to be +followed by an equally precarious Tory Ministry, in which Lord +Maxwell--after an absence from politics of some four years or +so--returned to his party, only to break it up. For he succeeded in +imposing upon them a measure in which his own deepest convictions and +feelings were concerned, and which had behind it the support of all the +more important trade unions. Upon that measure the Ministry fell; but +during their short administration Maxwell had made so great an impression +upon his own side that when they returned, as they did return, with an +enlarged majority, the Maxwell Bill retained one of the foremost places +in their programme, and might be said, indeed, at the present moment to +hold the centre of the political field. + +That field, in the eyes of any middle-aged observer, was in strange +disarray. The old Liberal party had been almost swept away; only a few +waifs and strays remained, the exponents of a programme that nobody +wanted, and of cries that stirred nobody's blood. A large Independent +Labour and Socialist party filled the empty benches of the Liberals--a +revolutionary, enthusiastic crew, of whom the country was a little +frightened, and who were, if the truth were known, a little frightened +at themselves. They had a coherent programme, and represented a +formidable "domination" in English life. And that English life itself, in +all that concerned the advance and transformation of labour, was in a +singularly tossed and troubled state. After a long period of stagnation +and comparative industrial peace, storms at home, answering to storms on +the Continent, had been let loose, and forces both of reaction and of +revolution were making themselves felt in new forms and under the command +of new masters. + +At the head of the party of reaction stood Fontenoy. Some four years +before the present session the circumstances of a great strike in the +Midlands--together, no doubt, with some other influence--had first drawn +him into public life, had cut him off from racing and all his natural +pleasures. The strike affected his father's vast domain in North Mercia; +it was marked by an unusual violence on the part of the men and their +leaders; and Fontenoy, driven, sorely against his will, to take a part by +the fact that his father, the hard and competent administrator of an +enormous fortune, happened at the moment to be struck down by illness, +found himself before many weeks were over taking it with passion, and +emerged from the struggle a changed man. Property must be upheld; +low-born disorder and greed must be put down. He sold his race-horses, +and proceeded forthwith to throw into the formation of a new party all +the doggedness, the astuteness, and the audacity he had been accustomed +to lavish upon the intrigues and the triumphs of the Turf. + +And now in this new Parliament his immense labour was beginning to tell. +The men who followed him had grown in number and improved in quality. +They abhorred equally a temporising conservatism and a plundering +democracy. They stood frankly for birth and wealth, the Church and the +expert. They were the apostles of resistance and negation; they were +sworn to oppose any further meddling with trade and the personal liberty +of master and workman, and to undo, if they could, some of the meddling +that had been already carried through. A certain academic quality +prevailed among them, which made them peculiarly sensitive to the +absurdities of men who had not been to Oxford or Cambridge; while some, +like Tressady, had been travellers, and wore an Imperialist heart upon +their sleeve. The group possessed an unusual share of debating and +oratorical ability, and they had never attracted so much attention as now +that they were about to make the Maxwell Bill their prey. + +Meanwhile, for the initiated, the situation possessed one or two points +of special interest. Lady Maxwell, indeed, was by this time scarcely less +of a political force than her husband. Was her position an illustration +of some new power in women's hands, or was it merely an example of +something as well known to the Pharaohs as to the nineteenth century--the +ability of any woman with a certain physique to get her way? That this +particular woman's way happened to be also her husband's way made the +case less interesting for some observers. On the other hand, her obvious +wifely devotion attracted simple souls to whom the meddling of women in +politics would have been nothing but repellent had it not been +recommended to them by the facts that Marcella Maxwell was held to be +good as well as beautiful; that she loved her husband; and was the +excellent mother of a fine son. + +Of her devotion, in the case of this particular Bill, there was neither +concealment nor doubt. She was known to have given her husband every +assistance in the final drafting of the measure: she had seen for herself +the working of every trade that it affected; she had innumerable friends +among wage-earners of all sorts, to whom she gave half her social life; +and both among them and in the drawing-rooms of the rich she fought her +husband's cause unceasingly, by the help of beauty, wits, and something +else--a broad impulsiveness and charm--which might be vilified or +scorned, but could hardly be matched, by the enemy. + +Meanwhile Lord Maxwell was a comparatively ineffective speaker, and +passed in social life for a reserved and difficult personality. His +friends put no one else beside him; and his colleagues in the Cabinet +were well aware that he represented the keystone in their arch. But +the man in the street, whether of the aristocratic or plebeian sort, +knew comparatively little about him. All of which, combined with the +special knowledge of an inner circle, helped still more to concentrate +public attention on the convictions, the temperament, and the beauty +of his wife. + +Amid a situation charged with these personal or dramatic elements the +Friday so keenly awaited by Fontenoy and his party arrived. + +Immediately after question-time Fontenoy made his speech. In reply, the +Home Secretary, suave, statistical, and conciliatory, poured a stream of +facts and reports upon the House. The more repulsive they were, the +softer and more mincing grew his voice in dealing with them. Fontenoy had +excited his audience, Dowson succeeded in making it shudder. +Nevertheless, the effect of the evening lay with Fontenoy. + +George stayed to hear the official defence to its end. Then he hurried +upstairs in search of Letty, who, with Miss Tulloch, was in the Speaker's +private gallery. As he went he thought of Fontenoy's speech, its halting +opening, the savage force of its peroration. His pulses tingled: +"Magnificent!" he said to himself; "_magnificent!_ We have found a man!" + +Letty was eagerly waiting for him, and they walked down the corridor +together. "Well?" he said, thrusting his hands deep into his pockets, and +looking down upon her with a smile. "Well?" + +Letty saw that she was expected to praise, and she did her best, his +smile still bent upon her. He was perfectly aware all the time of the +fatuity of what she was saying. She had caught up since her engagement a +certain number of political phrases, and it amused him to note the cheap +and tinkling use she made of them. Nevertheless she was chatting, +smiling, gesticulating, for his pleasure. She was posing for him, using +her grey eyes in these expressive ways, all for him. He thought her the +most entertaining plaything; though it did occur to him sometimes that +when they were married he would give her instruction. + +"Ah, well, you liked it--that's good!" he said at last, interrupting her. +"We've begun well, any way. It'll be rather hard, though, to have to +speak after that on Monday!" + +"As if you need be afraid! You're not, you know--it's only mock modesty. +Do you know that Lady Maxwell was sitting two from me?" + +"No! Well, how did she like Fontenoy?" + +"She never moved after he got up. She pressed her face against that +horrid grating, and stared at him all the time. I thought she was very +flushed--but that may have been the heat--and in a very bad temper," +added Letty, maliciously. "I talked to her a little about your +adventure." + +"Did she remember my existence?" + +"Oh dear, yes! She said she expected you on Sunday. She never asked _me_ +to come." Letty looked arch. "But then one doesn't expect her to have +pretty manners. People say she is shy. But, of course, that is only your +friends' way of saying that you're rude." + +"She wasn't rude to you?" said George, outwardly eager, inwardly +sceptical. "Shall I not go on Sunday?" + +"But of course you must go. We shall have to know them. She's not a +woman's woman--that's all. Now, are we going to get some dinner, for +Tully and I are famishing?" + +"Come along, then, and I'll collect the party." + +George had asked a few of his acquaintance in the House to meet his +betrothed, together with an old General Tressady and his wife who were +his distant cousins. The party were to assemble in the room of an +under-secretary much given to such hospitable functions; and thither +accordingly George led the way. + +The room, when they reached it, was already fairly full of people, and +alive with talk. + +"Another party!" said George, looking round him. "Benson is great at this +sort of thing." + +"Do you see Lady Maxwell?" said Letty, in his ear. + +George looked to his right, and perceived the lady in question. She also +recognised him at once, and bowed, but without rising. She was the centre +of a group of people, who were gathered round her and the small table on +which she was leaning, and they were so deeply absorbed in the +conversation that had been going on that they hardly noticed the entrance +of Tressady and his companion. + +"Leven has a party, you see," said the under-secretary. "Blaythwaite was +to have taken them in--couldn't at the last moment; so they had to come +in here. This is _your_ side of the room! But none of your guests have +come yet. Dinner at the House in the winter is a poor sort of business, +Miss Sewell. We want the Terrace for these occasions." + +He led the young girl to a sofa at the further end of the room, and made +himself agreeable, to him the easiest process in the world. He was a +fashionable and charming person, in the most irreproachable of +frock-coats, and Letty was soon at her ease with him, and mistress of +all her usual arts and graces. + +"You know Lady Maxwell?" he said to her, with a slight motion of the head +towards the distant group. + +Letty replied; and while she and her companion chattered, George, who was +standing behind them, watched the other party. + +They were apparently in the thick of an argument, and Lady Maxwell, whose +hands were lightly clasped on the table in front of her, was leaning +forward with the look of one who had just shot her bolt, and was waiting +to see how it would strike. + +It struck apparently in the direction of her _vis-a-vis,_ Sir Frank +Leven, for he bent over to her, making a quick reply in a half-petulant +boy's voice. He had been three years in the House, but had still the air +of an Eton "swell" in his last half. + +Lady Maxwell listened to what he had to say, a sort of silent passion in +her face all the time--a noble passion nobly restrained. + +When he stopped, George caught her reply. + +"He has neither _seen_ nor _felt_--every sentence showed it--that is all +one can say. How can one take his judgment?" + +George's mouth twitched. He slipped, smiling, into a place beside Letty. +"Did you hear that?" he inquired. + +"Fontenoy's speech, of course," said the under-secretary, looking round. +"She's pitching into Leven, I suppose. He's as cranky and unsound as he +can be. Shouldn't wonder if you got him before long." + +He nodded good-temperedly to Tressady, then got up to speak to a man on +the edge of the further group. + +"How amusing!" said George, his satirical eyes still watching Lady +Maxwell. "How much that set has 'seen and felt' of sweaters, and +white-lead workers, and that ilk! Don't they look like it?" + +"Who are they?" + +Letty was now using all her eyes to find out, and especially for the +purpose of carrying away a mental photograph of Lady Maxwell's black hat +and dress. + +"Oh! the Maxwells' particular friends in the House--most of them as well +provided with family and goods as they make 'em: a philanthropic, +idealist lot, that yearns for the people, and will be the first to be +kicked downstairs when the people gets its own. However, they aren't all +quite happy in their minds. Frank Leven there, as Benson says, is +decidedly shaky. He is the member for the Maxwells' division--Maxwell, of +course, put him in. He has a house there, I believe, and he married Lady +Maxwell's great friend, Miss Macdonald--an ambitious little party, they +say, who simply insisted on his going into Parliament. Oh, then, Bennett +is there--do you see?--the little dark man with a frock-coat and +spectacles? He's Lady Maxwell's link with the Independents--oldest +workman member--been in the House a long time, so that by now he isn't +quite as one-eyed and one-eared as the rest of them. I suppose she hopes +to make use of him at critical moments--she takes care to have tools of +all sorts. Gracious--listen!" + +There was, indeed, a very storm of discussion sweeping through the rival +party. Lady Maxwell's penetrating but not loud voice seemed to pervade +it, and her eyes and face, as she glanced from one speaker to another, +drew alternately the shafts and the sympathy of the rest. + +Tressady made a face. + +"I say, Letty, promise me one thing!" His hand stole towards hers. Tully +discreetly looked the other way. "Promise me not to be a political woman, +there's a dear!" + +Letty hastily withdrew her fingers, having no mind at all for caresses +in public. + +"But I _must_ be a political woman--I shall have to be! I know heaps of +girls and married women who get up everything in the papers--all the +stupidest things--not because they know anything about it, or because +they care a rap, but because some of their men friends happen to be +members; and when they come to see you, you must know what to talk to +them about." + +"Must you?" said George, "How odd! As though one went to tea with a woman +for the sake of talking about the very same things you have been doing +all day, and are probably sick to death of already." + +"Never mind," said Letty, with her little air of sharp wisdom. "I _know_ +they do it, and I shall have to do it too. I shall pick it up." + +"Will you? Of course you will! Only, when I've got a big Bill on, let me +do a little of it for myself--give me some of the credit!" + +Letty laughed maliciously. + +"I don't know why you've taken such a dislike to her," she said, but in +rather a contented tone, as her eye once more travelled across to Lady +Maxwell. "Does she trample on her husband, after all?" + +Tressady gave an impatient shrug. + +"Trample on him? Goodness, no! That's all part of the play, too--wifely +affection and the rest of it. Why can't she keep out of sight a little? +We don't want the women meddling." + +"Thank you, my domestic tyrant!" said Letty, making him a little bow. + +"How much tyranny will you want before you accept those sentiments?" he +asked her, smiling tenderly into her eyes. Both had a moment's pleasant +thrill; then George sprang up. + +"Ah, here they are at last!--the General, and all the lot. Now, I hope, +we shall get some dinner." + +Tressady had, of course, to introduce his elderly cousins and his three +or four political friends to his future wife; and, amid the small flutter +of the performance, the break-up and disappearance of the rival party +passed unnoticed. When Tressady's guests entered the dining-room which +looks on the terrace, and made their way to the top table reserved for +them, the Leven dinner, near the door, was already half through. + +George's little banquet passed merrily enough. The grey-haired General +and his wife turned out to be agreeable and well-bred people, quite able +to repay George's hospitality by the dropping of little compliments on +the subject of Letty into his half-yielded ear. For his way of taking +such things was always a trifle cynical. He believed that people say +habitually twice what they mean, whether in praise or blame; and he did +not feel that his own view of Letty was much affected by what other +people thought of her. + +So, at least, he would have said. In reality, he got a good deal of +pleasure out of his _fiancee's_ success. Letty, indeed, was enjoying +herself greatly. This political world, as she had expected, satisfied her +instinct for social importance better than any world she had yet known. +She was determined to get on in it; nor, apparently, was there likely to +be any difficulty in the matter. George's friends thought her a pretty, +lively creature, and showed the usual inclination of the male sex to +linger in her society. She mostly wanted to be informed as to the House +and its ways. It was all so new to her!--she said. But her ignorance was +not insipid; her questions had flavour. There was much talk and laughter; +Letty felt herself the mistress of the table, and her social ambitions +swelled within her. + +Suddenly George's attention was recalled to the Maxwell table by the +break-up of the group around it. He saw Lady Maxwell rise and look +round her as though in search of someone. Her eyes fell upon him, and +he involuntarily rose at the same instant to meet the step she made +towards him. + +"I must say another word of thanks to you"--she held out her hand. "That +girl and her grandmother were most grateful to you." + +"Ah, well!--I must come and make my report. Sunday, I think you said?" + +She assented. Then her expression altered: + +"When do you speak?" + +The question fell out abruptly, and took George by surprise. + +"I? On Monday, I believe, if I get my turn. But I fear the British Empire +will go on if I don't!" + +She threw a glance of scrutiny at his thin, whimsical face, with its fair +moustache and sunburnt skin. + +"I hear you are a good speaker," she said simply. "And you are entirely +with Lord Fontenoy?" + +He bowed lightly, his hands on his sides. + +"You'll agree our case was well put? The worst of it--" + +Then he stopped. He saw that Lady Maxwell had ceased to listen to him. +She turned her head towards the door, and, without even saying good-bye +to him, she hurried away from him towards the further end of the room. + +"Maxwell, I see!" said Tressady to himself, with a shrug, as he returned +to his seat. "Not flattering--but rather pretty, all the same!" + +He was thinking of the quick change that had remade the face while he was +talking to her--a change as lovely as it was unconscious. + +Lord Maxwell, indeed, had just entered the dining-room in search of his +wife, and he and she now left it together, while the rest of the Leven +party gradually dispersed. Letty also announced that she must go home. + +"Let me just go back into the House and see what is going on," said +George. "Ten to one I sha'n't be wanted, and I could see you home." + +He hurried off, only to return in a minute with the news that the debate +was given up to a succession of superfluous people, and he was free, at +any rate for an hour. Letty, Miss Tulloch, and he accordingly made their +way to Palace Yard. A bright moon shone in their faces as they emerged +into the open air, which was still mild and spring-like, as it had been +all the week. + +"I say--send Miss Tulloch home in a cab!" George pleaded in Letty's ear, +"and walk with me a bit. Come and look at the moon over the river. I will +bring you back to the bridge and put you in a cab." + +Letty looked astonished and demure. "Aunt Charlotte would be +shocked," she said. + +George grew impatient, and Letty, pleased with his impatience, at last +yielded. Tully, the most complaisant of chaperons, was put into a hansom +and despatched. + +As the pair reached the entrance of Palace Yard they were overtaken by a +brougham, which drew up an instant in the gateway itself, till it should +find an opening in the traffic outside. + +"Look!" said George, pressing Letty's arm. + +She looked round hurriedly, and, as the lamps of the gateway shone into +the carriage, she caught a vivid glimpse of the people inside it. Their +faces were turned towards each other as though in intimate +conversation--that was all. The lady's hands were crossed on her knee; +the man held a despatch-box. In a minute they were gone; but both Letty +and George were left with the same impression--the sense of something +exquisite surprised. It had already visited George that evening, only a +few minutes earlier, in connection with the same woman's face. + +Letty laughed, rather consciously. + +George looked down upon her as he guided her through the gate. + +"Some people seem to find it pleasant to be together!" he said, with a +vibration in his voice. "But why did we look?" he added, discontentedly. + +"How could we help it, you silly boy?" + +They walked to wards the bridge and down the steps, happy in each other, +and freshened by the night breeze. Over the river the moon, hung full and +white, and beneath it everything--the silver tracks on the water, the +blaze of light at Charing Cross Station, the lamps on Westminster Bridge +and in the passing steamers, a train of barges, even the darkness of the +Surrey shore--had a gentle and poetic air. The vast city had, as it were, +veiled her greatness and her tragedy; she offered herself kindly and +protectingly to these two--to their happiness and their youth. + +George made his companion wait beside the parapet and look, while he +himself drew in the air with a sort of hunger. + +"To think of the hours we spend in this climate," he said, "caged up in +abominable places like the House of Commons!" + +The traveller's distaste for the monotony of town and indoor life spoke +in his vehemence. Letty raised her eyebrows. + +"I am very glad of my furs, thank you! You seem to forget that it is +February." + +"Never mind!--since Monday it has had the feel of April. Did you see my +mother to-day?" + +"Yes. She caught me just after luncheon, and we talked for an hour." + +"Poor darling! I ought to have been there to protect you. But she vowed +she would have her say about that house." + +He looked down upon her, trying to see her expression in the shifting +light. He had gone through a disagreeable little scene with his mother at +breakfast. She had actually lectured him on the rashness of taking the +Brook Street house!--he understanding the whole time that what the odd +performance really meant was, that if he took it he would have a smaller +margin of income wherefrom to supplement her allowance. + +"Oh, it was all right!" said Letty, composedly. "She declared we should +get into difficulties at once, that I could have no idea of the value +of money, that you always _had_ been extravagant, that everybody would +be astonished at our doing such a thing, etcetera, etcetera. I +_think_--you don't mind?--I think she cried a little. But she wasn't +really very unhappy." + +"What did you say?" + +"Well, I suggested that when we were married, we and she should both set +up account-books; and I promised faithfully that if she would let us see +hers, we would let her see ours." + +George threw back his head with a gurgle of laughter. + +"Well?" + +"She was afraid," said Letty, demurely, "that I didn't take things +seriously enough. Then I asked her to come and see my gowns." + +"And that, I suppose, appeased her?" + +"Not at all. She turned up her nose at everything, by way of punishing +me. You see, she had on a new-Worth--the third since Christmas. My poor +little trousseau rags had no chance." + +"H'm!" said George, meditatively. "I wonder how my mamma is going to +manage when we are married," he added, after a pause. + +Letty made no reply. She was walking firmly and briskly; her eyes, full +of a sparkling decision, looked straight before her; her little mouth was +close set. Meanwhile through George's mind there passed a number of +fragmentary answers to his own question. His feeling towards his mother +was wholly abnormal; he had no sense of any unseemliness in the +conversation about her which was gradually growing common between himself +and Letty; and he meant to draw strict lines in the future. At the same +time, there was the tie of old habit, and of that uneasy and unwelcome +responsibility with regard to her which had descended upon him at the +time of his father's death. He could not honestly regard himself as an +affectionate son; but the filial relationship, even in its most imperfect +aspect, has a way of imposing itself. + +"Ah, well! I daresay we shall pull through," he said, dismissing the +familiar worry with a long breath. "Why, how far we have come!" he added, +looking back at Charing Cross and the Westminster towers. "And how +extraordinarily mild it is! We can't turn back yet, and you'll be tired +if I race you on in this way. Look, Letty, there's a seat! Would you be +afraid--just five minutes?" + +Letty looked doubtful. + +"It's so absurdly late. George, you _are_ funny! Suppose somebody came by +who knew us?" + +He opened his eyes. + +"And why not? But see! there isn't a carriage, and hardly a person, in +sight. Just a minute!" + +Most unwillingly Letty let herself be persuaded. It seemed to her a +foolish and extravagant thing to do; and there was now no need for either +folly or extravagance. Since her engagement she had dropped a good many +of the small audacities of the social sort she had so freely allowed +herself before it. It was as though, indeed, now that these audacities +had served their purpose, some stronger and perhaps inherited instincts +emerged in her, obscuring the earlier self. George was sometimes +astonished by an ultra-conventional note, of which certainly he had heard +nothing in their first days of intimacy at Malford. + +However, she sat down beside him, protesting. But he had no sooner stolen +her hand, than the moonlight showed her a dark, absent look creeping over +his face. And to her amazement he began to talk about the House of +Commons, about the Home Secretary's speech, of all things in the world! +He seemed to be harking back to Mr. Dowson's arguments, to some of the +stories the Home Secretary had told of those wretched people who +apparently enjoy dying of overwork and phosphorus, and white-lead, who +positively will die of them, unless the inspectors are always harrying +them. He still held her hand, but she saw he was not thinking of her; +and a sudden pique rose in her small mind. Generally, she accepted his +love-making very coolly--just as it came, or did not come. But to-night +she asked herself with irritation--for what had he led her into his silly +escapade, but to make love to her? And now here were her fingers slipping +out of his, while he harangued her on things she knew and cared nothing +about, in a voice and manner he might have addressed to anybody! + +"Well, I don't understand--I really _don't!_" she interrupted sharply. "I +thought you were all against the Government--I thought you didn't believe +a word they say!" + +He laughed. + +"The difference between them and us, darling, is only that _they_ think +the world can be mended by Act of Parliament, and _we_ think it can't. Do +what you will, _we_ say the world is, and must be, a wretched hole for +the majority of those that live in it; _they_ suppose they can cure it by +quack meddlings and tyrannies." + +He looked straight before him, absorbed, and she was struck with the +harsh melancholy of his face. + +What on earth had he kept her here for to talk this kind of talk! + +"George, I really _must_ go!" she began, flushing, and drawing her +hand away. + +Instantly he turned to her, his look brightening and melting. + +"Must you? Well, the world sha'n't be a wretched hole for us, shall it, +darling? We'll make a little nest in it--we'll forget what we can't +help--we'll be happy as long as the fates let us--won't we, Letty?" + +His arm slipped round behind her. He caught her hands. + +He had recollected himself. Nevertheless Letty was keenly conscious that +it was all most absurd, this sitting on a seat in a public thoroughfare +late at night, and behaving like any 'Arry and 'Arriet. + +"Why, of course we shall be happy," she said, rising with decision as she +spoke; "only somehow I don't always understand you, George. I wish I knew +what you were really thinking about." + +"_You!_" he said, laughing, and drawing her hand within his arm, as they +turned backwards towards the bridge. + +She shook her head doubtfully. Whereupon he awoke fully to the situation, +and during the short remainder of their walk he wooed and flattered her +as usual. But when he had put her safely into a hansom at the corner of +the bridge, and smiled good-bye to her, he turned to walk back to the +House in much sudden flatness of mood. Her little restless egotisms of +mind and manner had chilled him unawares. Had Fontenoy's speech been so +fine, after all? Were politics--was anything--quite worth while? It +seemed to him that all emotions were small, all crises disappointing. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + + +The following Sunday, somewhere towards five o'clock, George rang the +bell of the Maxwells' house in St. James's Square. It was a very fine +house, and George's eye, as he stood waiting, ran over the facade with an +amused, investigating look. + +He allowed himself the same expression once or twice in the hall, as one +mute and splendid person relieved him of his coat, and another, equally +mute and equally unsurpassable, waited for him on the stairs, while +across a passage beyond the hall he saw two red-liveried footmen +carrying tea. + +"When one is a friend of the people," he pondered as he went upstairs, +"is one limited in horses but not in flunkeys? These things are obscure." + +He was ushered first into a stately outer drawing-room, filled with +old French furniture and fine pictures; then the butler lifted a +velvet curtain, pronounced the visitor's name with a voice and +emphasis as perfectly trained as the rest of him, and stood aside for +George to enter. + +He found himself on the threshold of a charming room looking west, and +lit by some last beams of February sun. The pale-green walls were covered +with a medley of prints and sketches. A large writing-table, untidily +heaped with papers, stood conspicuous on the blue self-coloured carpet, +which over a great part of the floor was pleasantly void and bare. Flat +earthenware pans, planted with hyacinths and narcissus, stood here and +there, and filled the air with spring scents. Books ran round the lower +walls, or lay piled where-ever there was a space for them; while about +the fire at the further end was gathered a circle of chintz-covered +chairs--chairs of all shapes and sizes, meant for talking. The whole +impression of the pretty, disorderly place, compared with the stately +drawing-room behind it, was one of intimity and freedom; the room made a +friend of you as you entered. + +Half a dozen people were sitting with Lady Maxwell when Tressady was +announced. She rose to meet him with great cordiality, introduced him to +little Lady Leven, an elfish creature in a cloud of fair hair, and with a +pleasant "You know all the rest," offered him a chair beside herself and +the tea-table. + +"The rest" were Frank Leven, Edward Watton, Bayle, the Foreign Office +private secretary who had been staying at Malford House at the time of +Tressady's election, and Bennett, the "small, dark man" whom George had +pointed out to Letty in the House as a Labour member, and one of the +Maxwells' particular friends. + +"Well?" said Lady Maxwell, turning to her new visitor as she handed him +some tea, "were you as much taken with the grandmother as the grandmother +was taken with you? She told me she had never seen a 'more haffable +gentleman, nor one as she'd a been more willin to ha done for'!" + +George laughed. "I see," he said, "that my report has been anticipated." + +"Yes--I have been there. I have found a 'case' in them indeed--alack! The +granny--I am afraid she is an unseemly old woman--and the elder girl both +work for the Jew son-in-law on the first floor--homework of the most +abominable kind--that girl will be dead in a year if it goes on." + +George was rapidly conscious of two contradictory impressions--one of +pleasure, one of annoyance--pleasure in her tall, slim presence, her +white hand, and all the other flashing points of a beauty not to be +denied--and irritation that she should have talked "shop" to him with her +first breath. Could one never escape this altruistic chatter? + +But he was not left to grapple with it alone, for Lady Leven looked +up quickly. + +"Mr. Watton, will you please take Lady Maxwell's tea away if she mentions +the word 'case' again? We gave her fair warning." + +Lady Maxwell hastily clasped both her hands round her tea-cup. + +"Betty, we have discussed the opera for at least twenty minutes." + +"Yes--at peril of our lives!" said Lady Leven. "I never talked so fast +before. One felt as though one _must_ say everything one had to say about +Melba and the de Reszkes, all in one breath--before one's poor little +subject was torn from one--one would never have such a chance again." + +Lady Maxwell laughed, but coloured too. + +"Am I such a nuisance?" she said, dropping her hands on her knee with a +little sigh. Then she turned to Tressady. + +"But Lady Leven really makes it out worse than it is. We haven't even +_approached_ a Factory Act all the afternoon." + +Lady Leven sprang forward in her chair. "Because! _because_, my dear, we +simply declined to let you. We made a league--didn't we, Mr. +Bennett?--even you joined it." + +Bennett smiled. + +"Lady Maxwell overworks herself--we all know that," he said, his look, at +once kind, honest, and perennially embarrassed, passing from Lady Leven +to his hostess. + +"Oh, don't sympathise, for Heaven's sake!" cried Betty. "Wage war upon +her--it's our only hope." + +"Don't you think Sunday at least ought to be frivolous?" said Tressady, +smiling, to Lady Maxwell. + +"Well, personally, I like to talk about what interests me on Sunday as +well as on other days," she said with a frank simplicity; "but I know I +ought to be kept in order--I become a terrible bore." + +Frank Leven roused himself from the sofa on which he had languidly +subsided. + +"Bores?" he said indignantly, "we're all bores. We all have been bores +since people began to think about what they're pleased to call 'social +work.' Why should I love my neighbour?--I'd much rather hate him. I +generally do." + +"Doesn't it all depend," said Tressady, "on whether he happens to be able +to make it disagreeable for you in return?" + +"That's just it," said Betty Leven, eagerly. "I agree with Frank--it's +all so stupid, this 'loving' everybody. It makes one positively hot. We +sit under a clergyman, Frank and I, who talks of nothing every Sunday but +love--_love_--like that, long-drawn-out--how our politics should be +'love,' and our shopping should be 'love'--till we long simply to +bastinado somebody. I want to have a little real nice cruelty--something +sharp and interesting. I should like to stick pins into my maid, only +unfortunately, as she has more than once pointed out to me, it would be +so much easier for her to stick them into me!" + +"You want the time of Miss Austen's novels back again," said young Bayle, +stooping to her, with his measured and agreeable smile--"before even the +clergy had a mission." + +"Ah! but it would be no good," said Lady Leven, sighing, "if _she_ +were there!" + +She threw out her small hand towards her hostess, and everybody laughed. + +Up to the moment of the laugh, Lady Maxwell had been lying back in her +chair listening, the beautiful mouth absently merry, and the eyes +speaking--Tressady thought--of quite other things, of some hidden +converse of her own, going on in the brain behind the eyes. A certain +prophetess-air seemed natural to her. Nevertheless, that first impression +of her he had carried away from the hospital scene was being somehow +blurred and broken up. + +She joined in the laugh against herself; then, with a little nod towards +her assailant, she said to Edward Watton, who was sitting on her right +hand. "_You're_ not taken in, I know." + +"Oh, if you mean that I go in for 'cases' and 'causes' too," cried Lady +Leven, interrupting, "of course I do--I can't be left alone. I must dance +as my generation pipes." + +"Which means," said her husband, drily, "that she went for two days +filling soda-water bottles the week before last, and a day's shirt-making +last week. From the first, I was told that she would probably return to +me with an eye knocked out, she being totally inexperienced and absurdly +rash. As to the second, to judge from the description she gave me of the +den she had been sitting in when she came home, and the headache she had +next day, I still expect typhoid. The fortnight isn't up till Wednesday." + +There was a shout of mingled laughter and inquiry. + +"How did you do it?--and whom did you bribe?" said Bayle to Lady Leven. + +"I didn't bribe anybody," she said indignantly. "You don't understand. My +friends introduced me." + +Then, drawn out by him, she plunged into a lively account of her workshop +experiences, interrupted every now and then by the sarcastic comments of +her husband and the amusement of the two younger men who had brought +their chairs close to her. Betty Leven ranked high among the lively +chatterboxes of her day and set. + +Lady Maxwell, however, had not laughed at Frank Leven's speech. Rather, +as he spoke of his wife's experiences, her face had clouded, as though +the blight of some too familiar image, some sad ever-present vision, had +descended upon her. + +Beimett also did not laugh. He watched the Levens indulgently for a few +minutes, then insensibly he, Lady Maxwell, Edward Watton, and Tressady +drew together into a circle of their own. + +"Do you gather that Lord Fontenoy's speech on Friday has been much +taken up in the country?" said Bennett, bending forward and addressing +Lady Maxwell. Tressady, who was observing him, noticed that his dress +was precisely the "Sunday best" of the respectable workman, and was, +moreover, reminded by the expression of the eyes and brow that Bennett +was said to have been a well-known "local preacher" in his +north-country youth. + +Lady Maxwell smiled, and pointed to Tressady. + +"Here," she said, "is Lord Fontenoy's first-lieutenant." + +Bennett looked at George. + +"I should be glad," he said, "to know what Sir George thinks?" + +"Why, certainly--we think it has been very warmly taken up," said George, +promptly--"to judge from the newspapers, the letters that have been +pouring in, and the petitions that seem to be preparing." + +Lady Maxwell's eyes gleamed. She looked at Bennett silently a moment, +then she said: + +"Isn't it amazing to you how strong an impossible case can be made to +look?" + +"It is inevitable," said Bennett, with a little shrug, "quite +inevitable. These social experiments of ours are so young--there is +always a strong case to be made out against any of them, and there will +be for years to come." + +"Well and good," said George; "then we cavillers are inevitable too. +Don't attack us--praise us rather; by your own confession, we are as much +a part of the game as you are." + +Bennett smiled slightly, but did not in reality quite follow. Lady +Maxwell bent forward. + +"Do you know whether Lord Fontenoy has any _personal_ knowledge of the +trades he was speaking about?" she said, in her rich eager voice; "that +is what I want so much to find out." + +George was nettled by both the question and the manner. + +"I regard Fontenoy as a very competent person," he said drily. "I imagine +he did his best to inform himself. But there was not much need; the +persons concerned--whom you think you are protecting--were so very eager +to inform us!" + +Lady Maxwell flushed. + +"And you think that settles it--the eagerness of the cheap life to be +allowed to maim and waste itself? But again and again English law has +stepped in to prevent it--and again and again everybody has been +thankful." + +"It is all a question of balance, of course," said George. "Must a +few unwise people be allowed to kill themselves--or thousands lose +their liberty?" + +His blue eyes scanned her beautiful impetuous face with a certain cool +hardness. Internally he was more and more in revolt against a "monstrous +regiment of women" and the influence upon the most complex economic +problems of such a personality as that before him. + +But his word "liberty" pricked her. The look of feeling passed away. Her +eyes kindled as sharply and drily as his own. + +"Freedom?--let me quote you Cromwell! 'Every sectary saith, "O give me +liberty!" But give it him, and to the best of his power he will yield it +to no one else.' So with your careless or brutal employer--give him +liberty, and no one else shall get it." + +"Only by metaphor--not legally," said George, stubbornly. "So long as men +are not slaves by law there is always a chance for freedom. Any way _we_ +stand for freedom--as an end, not a means. It is not the business of the +State to make people happy--not at all!--at least that is our view--but +it _is_ the business of the State to keep them free." + +"Ah!" said Bennett, with a long breath, "there you've hit the nail--the +whole difference between you and us." + +George nodded. Lady Maxwell did not speak immediately. But George was +conscious that he was being observed, closely considered. Their glances +crossed an instant, in antagonism, certainly, if not in dislike. + +"How long is it since you came home from India?" she asked him suddenly. + +"About six months." + +"And you were, I think, a long time abroad?" + +"Nearly four years. Does that make you think I have not had much time to +get up the things I am going to vote about?" said the young man, +laughing. "I don't know! On the broadest issues of politics, one makes up +one's mind as well in Asia as in Europe--better perhaps." + +"On the Empire, I suppose--and England's place in the world? That's a +side which--I know--I remember much too little. You think our life +depends on a governing class--and that _we_ and democracy are weakening +that class too much?" + +"That's about it. And for democracy it is all right. But _you_--you are +the traitors!" + +His thrust, however, did not rouse her to any corresponding rhetoric. She +smiled merely, and began to question him about his travels. She did it +with great deftness, so that after an answer or two both his temper and +manner insensibly softened, and he found himself talking with ease and +success. His mixed personality revealed itself--his capacity for certain +veiled enthusiasms, his respect for power, for knowledge, his pessimist +beliefs as to the average lot of men. + +Bennett, who listened easily, was glad to help her make her guest talk. +Frank Leven left the group near the sofa and came to listen, too. +Tressady was more and more spurred, carried out of himself. Lady +Maxwell's fine eyes and stately ways were humanised after all by a quick +responsiveness, which for most people, however critical, made +conversation with her draw like a magnet. Her intelligence, too, was +competent, left the mere feminine behind in these connections that +Tressady offered her, no less than in others. She had not lived in the +world of high politics for nearly five years for nothing; so that +unconsciously, and indeed quite against his will, Tressady found himself +talking to her, after a while, as though she had been a man and an equal, +while at the same time taking more pains than he would ever have taken +for a man. + +"Well, you _have_ seen a lot!" said Frank Leven at last, with a rather +envious sigh. + +Bennett's modest face suddenly reddened. + +"If only Sir George will use his eyes to as good purpose at home--" he +said involuntarily, then stopped. Few men were more unready and awkward +in conversation; yet when roused he was one of the best platform speakers +of his day. + +George laughed. + +"One sees best what appeals to one, I am afraid," he said, only to be +instantly conscious that he had made a rather stupid admission in face of +the enemy. + +Lady Maxwell's lip twitched; he saw the flash of some quick thought cross +her face. But she said nothing. + +Only when he got up to go, she bade him notice that she was always at +home on Sundays, and would be glad that he should remember it. He made a +rather cold and perfunctory reply. Inwardly he said to himself, "Why does +she say nothing of Letty, whom she knows--and of our marriage--if she +wants to make friends?" + +Nevertheless, he left the house with the feeling of one who has passed +an hour not of the common sort. He had done himself justice, made his +mark. And as for her--in spite of his flashes of dislike he carried +away a strong impression of something passionate and vivid that clung +to the memory. Or was it merely eyes and pose, that astonishingly +beautiful colour, and touch of classic dignity which she got--so the +world said--from some remote strain of Italian blood? Most probably! +All the same, she had fewer of the ordinary womanly arts than he had +imagined. How easy it would have been to send that message to Letty she +had not sent! He thought simply that for a clever woman she might have +been more adroit. + + * * * * * + +The door had no sooner closed behind Tressady than Betty Leven, with +a quick look after him, bent across to her hostess, and said in a +stage whisper: + +"Who? Post me up, please." + +"One of Fontenoy's gang," said her husband, before Lady Maxwell could +answer. "A new member, and as sharp as needles. He's been exactly to all +the places where I want to go, Betty, and you won't let me." + +He glanced at his wife with a certain sharpness. For Tressady had spoken +in passing of nilghai-shooting in the Himalayas, and the remark had +brought the flush of an habitual discontent to the young man's cheek. + +Betty merely held out a white child's wrist. + +"Button my glove, please, and don't talk. I have got ever so many +questions to ask Marcella." + +Leven applied himself rather sulkily to his task while Betty pursued her +inquiries. + +"Isn't he going to marry Letty Sewell?" + +"Yes," said Lady Maxwell, opening her eyes rather wide. "Do you +know her?" + +"Why, my dear, she's Mr. Watton's cousin--isn't she?" said Betty, turning +towards that young man. "I saw her once at your mother's." + +"Certainly she is my cousin," said that young man, smiling, "and she is +going to marry Tressady at Easter. So much I can vouch for, though I +don't know her so well, perhaps, as the rest of my family do." + +"Oh!" said Betty, drily, releasing her husband and crossing her small +hands across her knee. "That means--Miss Sewell isn't one of Mr. Watton's +_favourite_ cousins. You don't mind talking about your cousins, do you? +You may blacken the character of all mine. Is she nice?" + +"Who--Letty? Why, of course she is nice," said Edward Watton, laughing. +"All young ladies are." + +"Oh goodness!" said Betty, shaking her halo of gold hair. "Commend me to +cousins for letting one down easy." + +"Too bad, Lady Leven!" said Watton, getting up to escape. "Why not ask +Bayle? He knows all things. Let me hand you over to him. He will sing you +all my cousin's charms." + +"Delighted!" said Bayle as he, too, rose--"only unfortunately I ought at +this moment to be at Wimbledon." + +He had the air of a typical official, well dressed, suave, and infinitely +self-possessed, as he held out his hand--deprecatingly--to Lady Leven. + +"Oh! you private secretaries!" said Betty, pouting and turning +away from him. + +"Don't abolish us," he said, pleading. "We must live." + +"_Je n'en vois pas la necessite!_" said Betty, over her shoulder. + +"Betty, what a babe you are!" cried her husband, as Bayle, Watton, and +Bennett all disappeared together. + +"Not at all!" cried Betty. "I wanted to get some truth out of somebody. +For, of course, the real truth is that this Miss Sewell is--" + +"Is what?" said Leven, lost in admiration all the time, as Lady Maxwell +saw, of his wife's dainty grace and rose-leaf colour. + +"Well--a--_minx!_" said Betty, with innocent slowness, +opening her blue eyes very wide; "a mischievous--rather +pretty--hard-hearted--flirting--little minx!" + +"Really, Betty!" cried Lady Maxwell. "Where have you seen her?" + +"Oh, I saw her last year several times at the Wattons' and other places," +said Betty, composedly. "And so did you too, please, madam. I remember +very well one day Mrs. Watton brought her into the Winterbournes' when +you and I were there, and she chattered a great deal." + +"Oh yes!--I had forgotten." + +"Well, my dear, you'll soon have to remember her! so you needn't talk +in that lofty tone. For they're going to be married at Easter, and if +you want to make friends with the young man, you'll have to realise +the wife!" + +"Married at Easter? How do you know?" + +"In the first place Mr. Watton said so, in the next there are such +things as newspapers. But of course you didn't notice such trifles, you +never do." + +"Betty, you're very cross with me to-day!" Lady Maxwell looked up at her +friend with a little pleading air. + +"Oh no! only for your good. I know you're thinking of nothing in the +world but how to make that man take a reasonable view of Maxwell's Bill. +And I want to impress upon you that _he's_ probably thinking a great deal +more about getting married than about Factory Bills. You see, _your_ +getting married was a kind of accident. But other people are different. +And oh, dear, you do know so little about them when they don't live hi +four pair backs! There, don't defend yourself--you sha'n't!" + +And, stooping, Betty stifled her friend's possible protest by +kissing her. + +"Now then, come along, Frank--you've got your speech to write--and I've +got to copy it out. Don't swear! you know you're going to have two whole +days' golfing next week. Good-bye, Marcella! My love to Aldous--and tell +him not to be so late next time I come to tea. Good-bye!" + +And off she swept, pausing, however, on the landing to open the door +again and put in an eager face. + +"Oh! and, by the way, the young man has a mother--Frank reminded me. His +womenkind don't seem to be his strong point--but as she doesn't earn +_even_ four-and-sixpence a week--very sadly the contrary--I won't tell +you any more now, or you'll forget. Next time!" + +When Marcella Maxwell was at last left alone, she began to pace slowly up +and down the large bare room, as it was very much her wont to do. + +She was thinking of George Tressady, and of the personality his talk had +seemed to reveal. + +"His heart is all in _power_--in what he takes for magnificence." she +said to herself. "He talks as if he had no humanity, and did not care a +rap for anybody. But it is a pose--I _think_ it is a pose. He is +interesting--he will develop. One would like--to show him things." + +After another pensive turn or two she stopped beside a photograph that +stood upon her writing-table. It was a photograph of her husband--a tall, +smoothfaced man, with pleasant eyes, features of no particular emphasis, +and the free carriage of the country-bred Englishman. As she looked at it +her face relaxed unconsciously, inevitably; under the stimulus of some +habitual and secret joy. It was for his sake, for his sake only that she +was still thinking of George Tressady, still pondering the young man's +character and remarks. + +So much at least was true--no other member of Fontenoy's party had as +yet given her even the chance of arguing with him. Once or twice in +society she had tried to approach Fontenoy himself, to get somehow into +touch with him. But she had made no way. Lord Fontenoy had simply turned +his square-jawed face and red-rimmed eyes upon her with a stupid +irresponsive air, which Marcella knew perfectly well to be a mask, while +it protected him none the less effectively for that against both her +eloquence and her charm. The other members of the party were young +aristocrats, either of the ultra-exclusive or of the sporting type. She +had made her attempts here and there among them, but with no more +success. And once or twice, when she had pushed her attack to close +quarters, she had been suddenly conscious of an underlying insolence in +her opponent--a quick glance of bold or sensual eyes which seemed to +relegate the mere woman to her place. + +But this young Tressady, for all his narrowness and bitterness, was of a +different stamp--or she thought so. + +She began to pace up and down again, lost in reverie, till after a few +minutes she came slowly to a stop before a long Louis Quinze +mirror--her hands clasped in front of her, her eyes half consciously +studying what she saw. + +Her own beauty invariably gave her pleasure--though very seldom for the +reasons that would have affected other women. She felt instinctively that +it made life easier for her than it could otherwise have been; that it +provided her with a natural and profitable "opening" in any game she +might wish to play; and that even among the workmen, unionist leaders, +and officials of the East End it had helped her again and again to score +the points that she wanted to make. She was accustomed to be looked at, +to be the centre, to feel things yielding before her; and without +thinking it out, she knew perfectly well what it was she gained by this +"fair seeming show" of eye and lip and form. Somehow it made nothing seem +impossible to her; it gave her a dazzling self-confidence. + +The handle of the door turned. She looked round with a smiling start, +and waited. + +A tall man in a grey suit came in, crossed the room quickly, and put his +arms round her. She leant back against his shoulder, putting up one hand +to touch his cheek caressingly. + +"Why, how late you are! Betty left reproaches for you." + +"I had a walk with Dowson. Then two or three people caught me on the +way back--Rashdell among others." (Lord Rashdell was Foreign +Secretary.) "There are some interesting telegrams from Paris--I copied +them out for you." + +The country happened to be at the moment in the midst of one of its +periodical difficulties with France. There had been a good deal of +diplomatic friction, and a certain amount of anxiety at the Foreign +Office. Marcella lit the silver kettle again and made her man some fresh +tea, while he told her the news, and they discussed the various points of +the telegrams he had copied for her, with a comrade's freedom and +vivacity. Then she said: + +"Well, I have had an interesting time too! That young Tressady has +been to tea." + +"Oh! has he? They say there is a lot of stuff in him, and he may do us a +great deal of mischief. How did you find him?" + +"Oh, very clever, very limited--and a mass of prejudices," she said, +laughing. "I never saw an odder mixture of knowledge and ignorance." + +"What? Knowledge of India and the East?--that kind of thing?" + +She nodded. + +"Knowledge of everything except the subject he has come home to fight +about! Do you know, Aldous--" + +She paused. She was sitting on a stool beside him, her arm upon his knee. + +"What do I know?" he said, his hand seeking hers. + +"Well, I can't help feeling that that man might live and learn. He isn't +a mere obstructive block--like the rest." + +Maxwell laughed. + +"Then Fontenoy is not as shrewd as usual. They say he regards him as +their best recruit." + +"Never mind. I rather wish you'd try to make friends with him." + +Maxwell, however, helped himself to cake and made no response. On the two +or three occasions on which he had met George Tressady, he had been +conscious, if the truth were told, of a certain vague antipathy to the +young man. + +Marcella pondered. + +"No," she said, "no--I don't think after all he's your sort. Suppose _I_ +see what can be done!" + +And she got up with her flashing smile--half love, half fun--and +crossed the room to summon her little boy, Hallin, for his evening +play. Maxwell looked after her, not heeding at all what she was saying, +heeding only herself, her voice, the atmosphere of charm and life she +carried with her. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + + +Marcella Maxwell, however, had not been easily wooed by the man who now +filled all the horizon of her life. At the time when Aldous Raeburn, as +he then was--the grandson and heir of old Lord Maxwell--came across her +first she was a handsome, undeveloped girl, of a type not uncommon in our +modern world, belonging by birth to the country-squire class, and by the +chances of a few years of student life in London to the youth that takes +nothing on authority, and puts to fierce question whatever it finds +already on its path--Governments, Churches, the powers of family and +wealth--that takes, moreover, its social pity for the only standard, and +spends that pity only on one sort and type of existence. She accepted +Raeburn, then the best _parti_ in the county, without understanding or +loving him, simply that she might use his power and wealth for certain +social ends to which the crude philanthropy of her youth had pledged +itself. Naturally, they were no sooner engaged than Raeburn found himself +launched upon a long wrestle with the girl who had thus--in the +selfishness of her passionate idealist youth--opened her relation to him +with a deliberate affront to the heart offered her. The engagement had +stormy passages, and was for a time wholly broken off. Aldous was made +bitterly jealous, or miserably unhappy. Marcella left the old house in +the neighbourhood of the Maxwell property, where her lover had first seen +and courted her. She plunged into London life, and into nursing, that +common outlet for the woman at war with herself or society. She suffered +and struggled, and once or twice she came very near to throwing away all +her chances of happiness. But in the end, Maxwell tamed her; Maxwell +recovered her. The rise of love in the unruly, impetuous creature, when +the rise came, was like the sudden growth of some great forest flower. It +spread with transforming beauty over the whole nature, till at last the +girl who had once looked upon him as the mere tool of her own moral +ambitions threw herself upon Maxwell's heart with a self-abandoning +passion and penitence, which her developed powers and her adorable beauty +made a veritable intoxication. + +And Maxwell was worthy that she should do this thing. When he and +Marcella first met, he was a man of thirty, very able, very reserved, and +often painfully diffident as to his own powers and future. He was the +only young representative of a famous stock, and had grown up from his +childhood under the shadow of great sorrows and heavy responsibilities. +The stuff of the poet and the thinker lay hidden behind his shy manners; +and he loved Marcella Boyce with all the delicacy, all the idealising +respect, that passion generates in natures so strong and so highly +tempered. At the same time, he had little buoyancy or gaiety; he had a +belief in his class, and a constitutional dislike of change, which were +always fighting in his mind with the energies of moral debate; and he +acquiesced very easily--perhaps indifferently--in many outward +conventions and prejudices. + +The crisis through which Marcella put him developed and matured the man. +To the influences of love, moreover, were added the influences of +friendship--of such a friendship as our modern time but seldom rears to +perfection. In Raeburn's college days, a man of rare and delicate powers +had possessed himself of Raeburn's tenacious affection, and had +thenceforward played the leader to Raeburn's strength, physical and +moral, availing himself freely, wherever his own failed him, of the +powers and capacities of his friend. For he himself bore in him from his +youth up the seeds of physical failure and early death. It was partly the +marvellous struggle in him of soul with body that subdued to him the +homage of the stronger man. And it was clearly his influence that broke +up and fired Raeburn's slower and more distrustful temper, informing an +inbred Toryism, a natural passion for tradition, and the England of +tradition with that "repining restlessness" which is the best spur of +noble living. + +Hallin was a lecturer and an economist; a man who lived in the perception +of the great paradox that in our modern world political power has gone to +the workman, while yet socially and intellectually he remains little less +weak, or starved, or subject than before. When he died he left to Raeburn +a legacy of feelings and ideas, all largely concerned with this contrast +between the huge and growing "tyranny" of the working class and the +individual helplessness or bareness of the working man. And it was these +feelings and ideas which from the beginning made a link between Raeburn +and the young revolts and compassions of Marcella Boyce. They were at one +in their love of Edward Hallin; and after Hallin's death, in their sore +and tender wish to make his thoughts tell upon the English world. + + * * * * * + +The Maxwells had now been married some five years, years of almost +incredible happiness. The equal comradeship of marriage at its best and +finest, all the daily disciplines, the profound and painless lessons of +love, the covetous bliss of parentage, the constant anxieties of power +nobly understood, had harmonised the stormy nature of the woman, and had +transformed the somewhat pessimist and scrupulous character of the man. +Not that life with Marcella Maxwell was always easy. Now as ever she +remained on the moral side a creature of strain and effort, tormented by +ideals not to be realised, and eager to drive herself and others in a +breathless pursuit of them. + +But if in some sort she seemed to be always dragging those that loved her +through the heart of a tempest, the tempest had such golden moments! No +wife had ever more capacity for all the delicacies and depths of passion +towards the man of her choice. All the anxieties she brought with her, +all the perplexities and difficulties she imposed, had never yet seemed +to Maxwell anything but divinely worth while. So far, indeed, he had +never even remotely allowed himself to put the question. Her faults were +her; and she was his light of life. + +For some time after their marriage, which took place about a year after +his accession to the title and estates, they had lived at the stately +house in Brookshire belonging to the Maxwells, and Marcella had thrown +herself into the management of a large household and property with +characteristic energy and originality. She had tried new ways of choosing +and governing her servants; new ways of entertaining the poor, and of +making Maxwell Court the centre, not of one class, but of all. She ran up +a fair score of blunders, but not one of them was the blunder of meanness +or vulgarity. Her nature was inventive and poetic, and the rich +fulfilment that had overtaken her own personal desires did but sting her +eager passion to give and to serve. + +Meanwhile the family house in town was sold, and what with the birth of +her son, and the multiplicity of the rural interests to which she had set +her hand, Marcella felt no need of London. But towards the end of the +second year she perceived--though he said little about it--that there was +in her husband's mind a strong and persistent drawing towards his former +political interests and associations. The late Lord Maxwell had sat in +several Conservative cabinets, and his grandson, after a distinguished +career in the House as a private member, had accepted a subordinate place +in the Government only a few months before his grandfather's death +transferred him to the Lords. After that event, a scrupulous conscience +had forced him to take landowning as a profession and an arduous one. The +Premier made him flattering advances, and his friends remonstrated, but +he had none the less relinquished office, and buried himself on his land. + +Now, however, after some three years' hard and unremitting work, the +estate was in excellent condition; the "new ways" of the new owners had +been well started; and both Maxwell and Marcella had fitting lieutenants +who could be left in charge. Moreover, matters were being agitated at +the moment in politics which had special significance for the man's +idealist and reflective mind. His country friends and neighbours hardly +understood why. + +For it was merely a question of certain further measures of factory +reform. A group of labour leaders were pressing upon the public and the +Government a proposal to pass a special Factory Act for certain +districts and trades of East London. In spite of Commissions, in spite +of recent laws, "sweating," so it was urged, was as bad as ever--nay, in +certain localities and industries was more frightful and more oppressive +than ever. The waste of life and health involved in the great clothing +industries of East London, for instance, which had provoked law after +law, inquiry after inquiry, still went--so it was maintained--its +hideous way. + +"Have courage!" cried the reformers. "Take, at last, the only effectual +step. Make it penal to practise certain trades in the houses of the +people--drive them all into factories of a certain size, where alone +these degraded industries can be humanised and controlled. Above all, +make up your mind to a legal working day for East London men as well as +East London women. Try the great experiment first of all in this +omnivorous, inarticulate London, this dustbin for the rubbish of all +nations. Here the problem is worst--here the victims are weakest and +most manageable. London will bear what would stir a riot in Birmingham or +Leeds. Make the experiment as partial and as tentative as you +please--give the Home Office power to extend or revoke it at will--but +_try it_!" + +The change proposed was itself of vast importance, and was, moreover, but +a prelude to things still more far-reaching. But, critical as it was, +Maxwell was prepared for it. During the later years of his friend +Hallin's life the two men had constantly discussed the industrial +consequences of democracy with unflagging eagerness and intelligence. To +both it seemed not only inevitable, but the object of the citizen's +dearest hopes, that the rule of the people should bring with it, in +ever-ascending degree, the ordering and moralising of the worker's toil. +Yet neither had the smallest belief that any of the great civilised +communities would ever see the State the sole landlord and the sole +capitalist; or that Collectivism as a system has, or deserves to have, +any serious prospects in the world. To both, possession--private and +personal possession--from the child's first toy, or the tiny garden where +it sows its passionately watched seeds, to the great business or the +great estate, is one of the first and chiefest elements of human +training, not to be escaped by human effort, or only at such a cost of +impoverishment and disaster that mankind would but take the +step--supposing it conceivable that it should take it--to retrace it +instantly. + +Maxwell's _heart_, however, was much less concerned with this belief, +tenaciously as he held it, than with its relative--the limitation of +private possession by the authority of the common conscience. That "we +are not our own" has not, indeed, been left to Lassalle or Marx to +discover. But if you could have moved this quiet Englishman to speak, he +would have said--his strong, brooding face all kindled and alive--that +the enormous industrial development of the past century has shown us the +forces at work in the evolution of human societies on a gigantic scale, +and by thus magnifying them has given us a new understanding of them. The +vast extension of the individual will and power which science has brought +to humanity during the last hundred years was always present to him as +food for a natural exultation--a kind of pledge of the boundless +prospects of the race. On the other hand the struggle of society brought +face to face with this huge increment of the individual power, forced to +deal with it for its own higher and mysterious ends, to moralise and +socialise it lest it should destroy itself and the State together; the +slow steps by which the modern community has succeeded in asserting +itself against the individual, in protecting the weak from his weakness, +the poor from his poverty, in defending the woman and child from the +fierce claims of capital, in forcing upon trade after trade the axiom +that no man may lawfully build his wealth upon the exhaustion and +degradation of his fellow--these things stirred in him the far deeper +enthusiasms of the moral nature. Nay more! Together with all the other +main facts which mark the long travail of man's ethical and social life, +they were among the only "evidences" of religion a critical mind allowed +itself--the most striking signs of something "greater than we know" +working among the dust and ugliness of our common day. Attack wealth as +wealth, possession as possession, and civilisation is undone. But bring +the force of the social conscience to bear as keenly and ardently as you +may, upon the separate activities of factory and household, farm and +office; and from the results you will only get a richer individual +freedom, one more illustration of the divinest law man serves--that he +must "die to live," must surrender to obtain. + +Such at least was Maxwell's persuasion; though as a practical man he +admitted, of course, many limitations of time, occasion, and degree. And +long companionship with him had impressed the same faith also on +Marcella. With the natural conceit of the shrewd woman, she would +probably have maintained that her social creed came entirely of +mother-wit and her own exertions--her experiences in London, reading, +and the rest. In reality it was in her the pure birth of a pure passion. +She had learnt it while she was learning to love Aldous Raeburn; and it +need astonish no one that the more dependent all her various +philosophies of life had become on the mere personal influence and joy +of marriage, the more agile had she grown in all that concerned the mere +intellectual defence of them. She could argue better and think better; +but at bottom, if the truth were told, they were Maxwell's arguments and +Maxwell's thoughts. + +So that when this particular agitation began, and he grew restless in his +silent way, she grew restless too. They took down the old worn +portfolios of Hallin's papers and letters, and looked through them, night +after night, as they sat alone together in the great library of the +Court. Both Marcella and Aldous could remember the writing of many of +these innumerable drafts of Acts, these endless memoranda on special +points, and must needs try, for love's sake, to forget the terrible +strain and effort with which a dying man had put them together. She was +led by them to think of the many workmen friends she had made during the +year of her nursing life; while he had remembrances of much personal work +and investigation of his own, undertaken during the time of his +under-secretaryship, to add to hers. Another Liberal government was +slipping to its fall--if a Conservative government came in, with a +possible opening in it for Aldous Maxwell, what then? Was the chance to +be seized? + +One May twilight, just before dinner, as the two were strolling up and +down the great terrace just in front of the Court, Aldous paused and +looked at the majestic house beside them. + +"What's the good of talking about these things while we live _there_?" he +said, with a gesture towards the house, half impatient, half humorous. + +Marcella laughed. Then she sprang away from him, considering, a sudden +brightness in her eye. She had an idea. + +The idea after all was a very simple one. But the probability is that, +had she not been there to carry him through, Maxwell would have neither +found it nor followed it. However that may be, in a very few days she had +clothed it with fact, and made so real a thing of it that she was amazed +at her own success. She and Maxwell had settled themselves in a small +furnished house in the Mile End Road, and Maxwell was once more studying +the problems of his measure that was to be in the midst of the +populations to whom it applied. The house had been recently let in +"apartments" by a young tradesman and his wife, well known to Marcella. +In his artisan days the man had been her friend, and for a time her +patient. She knew how to put her hand on him at once. + +They spent five months in the little house, while the London that knew +them in St. James's Square looked on, and made the comments--half amused, +half inquisitive--that the act seemed to invite. There was of course no +surprise. Nothing surprises the London of to-day. Or if there were any, +it was all Marcella's. In spite of her passionate sympathy with the +multitude who live in disagreeable homes on about a pound a week, she +herself was very sensitive to the neighbourhood of beautiful things, to +the charm of old homes, cool woods, green lawns, and the rise and fall of +Brookshire hills. Against her wish, she had thought of sacrifice in +thinking of the Mile End Road in August. + +But there was no sacrifice. Frankly, these five months were among the +happiest of her life. She and Maxwell were constantly together, from +morning till night, doing the things that were congenial to them, and +seeing the things that interested them. They went in and out of every +factory and workshop in which certain trades were practised, within a +three-mile radius; they became the intimate friends of every factory +inspector and every trade-union official in the place. Luckily, Maxwell's +shyness--at least in Mile End--was not of the sort that can be readily +mistaken for a haughty mind. He was always ready to be informed; his +diffident kindness asked to be set at ease; while in any real ardour of +debate his trained capacity and his stores of knowledge would put even +the expert on his mettle. + +As for Marcella, it was her idiosyncrasy that these tailors, furriers, +machinists, shirtmakers, by whom she was surrounded in East London, +stirred her imagination far more readily than the dwellers in great +houses and the wearers of fine raiment had ever stirred it. And +Marcella, in the kindled sympathetic state, was always delightful to +herself and others. She revelled in the little house and its ugly, +druggetted rooms; in the absence of all the usual paraphernalia of their +life; in her undisturbed possession of the husband who was at once her +lover and the best company she knew or could desire. On the few days +when he left her for the day on some errand in which she could not +share, to meet him at the train in the evening like any small clerk's +wife, to help him carry the books and papers with which he was generally +laden along the hot and dingy street, to make him tea from her little +spirit kettle, and then to hear the news of the day in the shade of the +little smutty back-garden, while the German charwoman who cooked for +them had her way with the dinner--there was not an incident in the whole +trivial procession that did not amuse and delight her. She renewed her +youth; she escaped from the burdensome "glories of our birth, and +state"; from that teasing "duty to our equals" on which only the wisest +preachers have ever laid sufficient stress; and her one trouble was that +the little masquerade must end. + +One other drawback indeed, one more blight upon a golden time, there was. +Not even Marcella could make up her mind to transplant little Hallin, her +only child, from Maxwell Court to East London. It was springtime, and the +woods about the Court were breaking into sheets of white and blue. +Marcella must needs leave the boy to his flowers and his "grandame +earth," sadly warned thereto by the cheeks of other little boys in and +about the Mile End Road. But every Friday night she and Maxwell said +good-bye to the two little workhouse girls, and the German charwoman, and +the village boy from Mellor, who supplied them with all the service they +wanted in Mile End, took with them the ancient maid who had been +Marcella's mother's maid, and fled home to Brookshire. So on Saturday +mornings it generally happened that little Hallin went out to inform his +particular friend among the garden boys, that "Mummy had tum ome," and +that he was not therefore so much his own master as usual. He explained +that he had to show mummy "_eaps_ of things"--the two new kittens, the +"edge-sparrer's nest," and the "ump they'd made in the churchyard over +old Tom Collins from the parish ouses," the sore place on the pony's +shoulder, the "ole that mummy's orse had kicked in the stable door," and +a host of other curiosities. By way of linking the child with the soil +and its people, Marcella had taken care to give him nursemaids from the +village. And the village being only some thirty miles from London, talked +in the main the language of London, a language which it soon communicated +to the tongue of Maxwell's heir. Marcella tried to school her boy in +vain. Hallin chattered, laughed, broadened his a's and dropped all his +h's into a bottomless limbo none the less. + +What days of joy those Saturdays were for mother and child! All the +morning and till about four o'clock, he and she would be inseparable, +trailing about together over field and wood, she one of the handsomest +of women, he one of the plainest of children--a little square-faced +chubby fellow, with eyes monstrously black and big, fat cheeks that +hung a little over the firm chin, a sallow complexion, and a large +humorous mouth. + +But in the late afternoon, alas! Hallin was apt to find the world grow +tiresome. For against all his advice "mummy" would allow herself to be +clad by Annette, the maid, in a frock of state; carriages would drive up +from the 5.10 train; and presently in the lengthening evening the great +lawns of the Court would be dotted with strolling groups, or the red +drawing-room, with its Romneys and Gainsboroughs, would be filled with +talk and laughter circling round mummy at the tea-table; so that all that +was left to Hallin was that seat on mummy's knee--his big, dark head +pressed disconsolately against her breast, his thumb in his mouth for +comfort--which no boy of any spirit would ever consent to occupy, so long +as there was any chance of goading a slack companion into things better +worth while. + +Marcella herself was no less rebellious at heart, and would have asked +nothing better than to be left free to spend her weekly holiday in +roaming an April world with Hallin. But our country being what it is, the +plans that are made in Mile End or Shoreditch have to be adopted by +Mayfair or Mayfair's equivalent; otherwise they are apt to find an +inglorious tomb in the portfolios that bred them. We have still, it +seems, a "ruling class"; and in spite of democracy it is still this +"ruling class" that matters. Maxwell was perfectly aware of it; and these +Sundays to him were the mere complements of the Mile End weekdays. +Marcella ruefully admitted that English life was so, and she did her +best. But on Monday mornings she was generally left protesting in her +inmost soul against half the women whom these peers and politicians, +these administrators and journalists, brought with them, or wondering +anxiously whether her particular share in the social effort just over +might not have done Aldous more harm than good. She understood vaguely, +without vanity, that she was a power in this English society, that she +had many warm friends, especially among men of the finer and abler sort. +But when a woman loved her, and insisted, as it were, on making her know +it--and, after all, the experience was not a rare one--Marcella received +the overture with a kind of grateful surprise. She was accustomed, +without knowing why, to feel herself ill at ease with certain types of +women; even in her own house she was often aware of being furtively +watched by hostile eyes; or she found herself suddenly the goal of some +sharp little pleasantry that pricked like a stiletto. She supposed that +she was often forgetful and indiscreet. Perhaps the large court she held +so easily on these occasions beneath the trees or in the great +drawing-rooms of the old house had more to do with the matter. If so, she +never guessed the riddle. In society she was conscious of one aim, and +one aim only. Its very simplicity made other women incredulous, while it +kept herself in the dark. + +However, by dint of great pains, she had not yet done Aldous any harm +that counted. During all the time of their East End sojourn, a Liberal +government, embarrassed by large schemes it had not force enough to +carry, was sinking towards inevitable collapse. When the crash came, a +weak Conservative government, in which Aldous Maxwell occupied a +prominent post, accepted office for a time without a dissolution. They +came in on a cry of "industrial reform," and, by way of testing their own +party and the country, adopted the Factory Bill for East London, which +had now, by the common consent of all the workers upon it, passed into +Maxwell's hands. The Bill rent the party in twain; but the Ministry had +the courage to go to the country with a programme in which the Maxwell +Bill held a prominent place. Trade-unionism rallied to their support; the +forces both of reaction and of progress fought for them, in strangely +mingled ways; and they were returned with a sufficient, though not large, +majority. Lord Ardagh, the veteran leader of the party, became Premier. +Maxwell was made President of the Council, while his old friend and +associate, Henry Dowson, became Home Secretary, and thereby responsible +for the conduct of the long-expected Bill through the Commons. + +When Maxwell came back to her on the afternoon of his decisive interview +with Lord Ardagh, she was waiting for him in that same inner room where +Tressady paid his first visit. At the sound of her husband's step +outside, she sprang up, and they met half-way, her hands clasped in his, +against his breast, her face looking up at him. + +"Dear wife! at last we have our chance--our real chance," he said to her. + +She clung to him, and there was a moment of high emotion, in which +thoughts of the past and of the dead mingled with the natural ambition of +two people in the prime of life and power. Then Maxwell laughed and drew +a long breath. + +"The eggs have been all put into my basket in the most generous manner. +We stand or fall by the Bill. But it will be a hard fight." + +And, in his acute, deliberate way, he began to sum up the forces against +him--to speculate on the action of this group and that--Fontenoy's group +first and foremost. + +Marcella listened, her beautiful hand pensive against her cheek, her +eyes on his. Half trembling, she realised what failure, if after all +failure should come, would mean to him. Something infinitely tender and +maternal spoke in her, pledging her to the utmost help that love and a +woman could give. + + * * * * * + +Such for Maxwell and his wife had been the antecedents of a +memorable session. + +And now the session was here--was in full stream, indeed, rushing +towards the main battle still to come. On the second night of Fontenoy's +debate, George Tressady duly caught the Speaker's eye, and made a very +fair maiden speech, which earned him a good deal more praise, both from +his party and the press, than he--in a disgusted mood--thought at all +reasonable. He had misplaced half his notes, and, in his own opinion, +made a mess of his main argument. He remarked to Fontenoy afterwards that +he had better hang himself, and stalked home after the division pleased +with one thing only--that he had not allowed Letty to come. + +In reality he had done nothing to mar the reputation that was beginning +to attach to him. Fontenoy was content; and the scantiness of the +majority by which the Resolution was defeated served at once to make the +prospects of the Maxwell Bill, which was to be brought in after Easter, +more doubtful, and to sharpen the temper of its foes. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + +"Goodness!--what an ugly place it is! It wants five thousand spent on it +at once to make it tolerable!" + +The remark was Letty Tressady's. She was standing disconsolate on the +lawn at Ferth, scanning the old-fashioned house to which George had +brought her just five days before. They had been married a fortnight, and +were still to spend another week in the country before going back to +London and to Parliament. But already Letty had made up her mind that +Ferth _must_ be rebuilt and refurnished, or she could never endure it. + +She threw herself down on a garden seat with a sigh, still studying the +house. It was a straight barrack-like building, very high for its +breadth, erected early in the last century by an architect who, finding +that he was to be allowed but a very scanty sum for his performance, +determined with considerable strength of mind to spend all that he had +for decoration upon the inside rather than the outside of his mansion. +Accordingly the inside had charm--though even so much Letty could not now +be got to confess; panellings, mantelpieces, and doorways showed the work +of a man of taste. But outside all that had been aimed at was the +provision of a central block of building carried up to a considerable +height so as to give the rooms demanded, while it economised in +foundations and general space; an outer wall pierced with the plainest +openings possible at regular intervals; a high-pitched roof to keep out +the rain, whereof the original warm tiles had been long since replaced by +the chilliest Welsh slates; and two low and disfiguring wings which held +the servants and the kitchens. The stucco with which the house had been +originally covered had blackened under the influence of time, weather, +and the smoke from the Tressady coalpits. Altogether, what with its +pitchy colour, its mean windows, its factory-like plainness and height, +Ferth Place had no doubt a cheerless and repellent air, which was +increased by its immediate surroundings. For it stood on the very summit +of a high hill, whereon the trees were few and windbeaten; while the +carriage drives and the paths that climbed the hill were all of them a +coaly black. The flower garden behind the house was small and neglected; +neither shrubberies nor kitchen garden, nor the small park, had any +character or stateliness; everything bore the stamp of bygone possessors +who had been rich neither in money nor in fancy; who had been quite +content to live small lives in a small way. + +Ferth's new mistress thought bitterly of them, as she sat looking at +their handiwork. What could be done with such a place? How could she have +London people to stay there? Why, their very maids would strike! And, +pray, what was a country house worth, without the usual country-house +amenities and accessories? + +Yet she already began to feel fretted and hampered about money. The +inside of the house had been to some extent renovated. She had helped +George to choose papers and curtains for the rooms that were to be her +special domain, while they were in London together before Easter. But she +knew that George had at one time meant to do much more than had actually +been done; and he had been in a mood of lover-like apology on the first +day of their arrival. "Darling, I had hoped to buy you a hundred pretty +things!--but times is bad--dreadful bad!" he had said to her with a +laugh. "We will do it by degrees--you won't mind?" + +Then she had tried to make him tell her why it was that he had abandoned +some of the schemes of improvement that had certainly been in his mind +during the first weeks of their engagement. But he had not been very +communicative, and had put the blame mostly, as she understood him, on +the "beastly pits" and the very low dividends they had been earning +during the past six months. + +Letty, however, did not in the least believe that the comparatively +pinched state of their finances, which, bride as she was, she was already +brooding over, was wholly or even mainly due to the pits. She set her +little white teeth in sudden anger as she said to herself that it was +_not_ the pits--it was Lady Tressady! George was crippled now because of +the large sums his mother had not been ashamed to wring from him during +the last six months. Letty--George's wife--was to go without comforts and +conveniences, without the means of seeing her friends and taking her +proper position in the world, because George's mother--a ridiculous, +painted old woman, who went in for flirtations and French gowns, when she +ought to be subsiding quietly into caps and Bath chairs--would sponge +upon his very moderate income, and take what did not belong to her. + +"I am _certain_ there is something in the background!" said Letty to +herself, as she sat looking at the ugly house--"something that she is +ashamed of, and that she doesn't tell George. She _couldn't_ spend all +that money on dress! I believe she is a wicked old woman--she has the +most extraordinary creatures at her parties." + +The girl's delicate face stiffened vindictively as she fell brooding for +the hundredth time over Lady Tressady's enormities. + +Then suddenly the garden door opened, and Letty, looking up, saw that +George was on the threshold, waving his hand to her. He had left her that +morning--almost for the first time since their marriage--to go and see +his principal agent and discuss the position of affairs. + +As he approached her, she noticed instantly that he was looking tired and +ruffled. But the sight of her smoothed his brow. He threw himself down on +the grass at her feet, and pressed his lips to the delicately tended hand +that lay upon her lap. + +"Have you missed me, madame?" he said, peremptorily. + +Preoccupied as she was, Letty must needs flush and smile, so well she +knew from his eager eye that she pleased him, that he noticed the pretty +gown she had put on for luncheon, and that all the petting his absence +had withdrawn from her for an hour or two had come back to her. Other +women--more or less of her type--had found his ways beguiling before +now. He took courtship as an art, and had his own rooted ideas as to how +women should be treated. Neither too gingerly nor too sentimentally--but, +above all, with variety! + +He repeated his question insistently; whereupon Letty said, with her pert +brightness, thinking all the time of the house, "I'm _not_ going to make +you vain. Besides, I have been frightfully busy." + +"You're not going to make me vain? But I choose to be vain. I'll go away +for the whole afternoon if I'm not made vain this instant. Ah! that's +better. Do you know that you have the softest little curl on your soft +little neck, and that your hair has caught the sun on it this morning?" + +Letty instinctively put up a hand to tuck away the curl. But he seized +the hand. "Little vandal!--What have you been busy with?" + +"Oh! I have been over the house with Mrs. Matthews," said Letty, in +another tone. "George, it's _dreadful_--the number of things that want +doing. Do you know, _positively_, we could not put up more than two +couples, if we tried ever so. And as for the state of the attics! Now do +listen, George!" + +And, holding his hand tight in her eagerness, she went through a vehement +catalogue of all that was wanted--new furniture, new decoration, new +grates, a new hot-water system, the raising of the wings, and so on to +the alteration of the stables and the replanning of the garden. She had +no sooner begun upon her list than George's look of worry returned. He +got up from the grass, and sat on the bench beside her. + +"Well, I'm sorry you dislike the place so much," he said, when her breath +failed her, staring rather gloomily at his despised mansion. "Of course, +it's quite true--it is an ugly hole. But the worst of it is, darling, I +don't quite see how we're to do all this you talk about. I don't bring +any good news from the pits, alas!" + +He turned quickly towards her. The thought flashed through his +mind--could he be justly charged with having married her on false +pretences as to his affairs? No! There had been no misrepresentation of +his income or his risks. Everything had been plainly and honestly stated +to her father, and therefore to her. For Letty knew all that she wanted +to know, and had managed her family since she was a baby. + +Letty flushed at his last words. + +"Do you mean to say," she said with emphasis, "that those men are really +going to strike?" + +"I am afraid so. We _must_ enforce a reduction, to avoid working at sheer +loss, and the men vow they'll come out." + +"They want you to make them a present of the mines, I suppose!" said +Letty, bitterly. "Why, the tales I hear of their extravagance and +laziness! Mrs. Matthews says they'll have none but the best cuts of meat, +that they all of them have an harmonium or a piano in the house, that +their houses are _stuffed_ with furniture--and the amount of money they +spend in betting on their dogs and their football matches is perfectly +sickening. And now, I suppose they'll ruin themselves and us, rather than +allow you to make a decent profit!" + +"That's about it," said George, flinging himself back on the bench. +"That's about it." + +There was a pause of silence. The eyes of both were turned to the +colliery village far below, at the foot of the hill. From this high +stretch of garden one looked across the valley and its straggling line of +houses, to the pits on the further hillside, the straight black line of +the "bank," the pulley wheels, and tall chimneys against the sky. To the +left, along the ascending valley, similar chimneys and "banks" were +scattered at long intervals, while to the right the valley dipped in +sharp wooded undulations to a blue plain bounded by far Welsh hills. The +immediate neighbourhood of Ferth, for a coal country, had a woodland +charm and wildness which often surprised a stranger. There were untouched +copses, and little rivers and fern-covered hills, which still held their +own against the ever-encroaching mounds of "spoil" thrown out by the +mines. Only the villages were invariably ugly. They were the modern +creations of the coal, and had therefore no history and no originality. +Their monotonous rows of red cottages were like fragments from some dingy +town suburb, and the brick meeting-houses in which they abounded did +nothing to abate the general unloveliness. + +This view from the Ferth hill was one which had great familiarity for +Tressady, and yet no charm. As a boy he had had no love for his home and +very few acquaintances in the village. His mother hated the place and the +people. She had married very young--for the sake of money and +position--to his dull old father, who nevertheless managed to keep his +flighty wife in order by dint of a dumb, continuous stubbornness and +tyranny, which would have overborne a stronger nature than Lady +Tressady's. She was always struggling to get away from Ferth; he to keep +her tied there. He was never at ease away from his estate and his pits; +she felt herself ten years younger as soon as she had lost sight of the +grim black house on its hilltop. + +And this one opinion of hers she was able to impress upon her +son--George, too, was always glad to turn his back on Ferth and its +people. The colliers seemed to him a brutal crew, given over to coarse +sports, coarse pleasures, and an odious religion. As to their supposed +grievances and hardships, his intimate conviction as a boy had always +been that the miner got the utmost both out of his employers and out of +society that he was worth. + +"Upon my word, I often think," he said at last, his inward reverie +finding speech, "I often think it was a great pity my grandfather +discovered the coal at all! In the long run I believe we should have done +better without it. We should not at any rate have been bound up with +these hordes, with whom you can no more reason than with so many blocks +of their own coal!" + +Letty made no answer. She had turned back towards the house. Suddenly +she said, with an energy that startled him, + +"George, what _are_ we to do with that place? It gives me a nightmare. +The extraordinary thing is the way that everything in it has gone to +ruin. Did your mother really live here while you were away?" + +George's expression darkened. + +"I always used to suppose she was here," he said. "That was our bargain. +But I begin to believe now that she was mostly in London. One can't +wonder at it--she always hated the place." + +"Of course she was in London!" thought Letty to herself, "spending piles +of money, running shamefully into debt, and letting the house go to +pieces. Why, the linen hasn't been darned for years!" + +Aloud she said: + +"Mrs. Matthews says a charwoman and a little girl from the village used +to be left alone in the house for months, to play any sort of games, with +nobody to look after them--_nobody_--while you were away!" + +George looked at his wife--and then would only slip his arm round her +for answer. + +"Darling! you don't know how I've been worried all the morning--don't +let's make worry at home. After all it _is_ rather nice to be here +together, isn't it?--and we shall do--we sha'n't starve! Perhaps we shall +pull through with the pits after all--it is difficult to believe the men +will make such fools of themselves--and--well! you know my angel mother +can't always be swooping upon us as she has done lately. Let's just be +patient a little--very likely I can sell a few bits of land before long +that will give us some money in hand--and then this small person shall +bedizen herself and the house as much as she pleases. And meanwhile, +_madame ma femme_, let me point out to you that your George never +professed to be anything but a very bad match for you!" + +Letty remembered all his facts and figures perfectly. Only somehow she +had regarded them with the optimism natural to a girl who is determined +to be married. She had promptly forgotten the adverse chances he had +insisted upon, and she had converted all his averages into minima. No, +she could not say she had not been warned; but nevertheless the result +promised to be quite different from what she had expected. + +However, with her husband's arm round her, it was not easy to maintain +her ill-humour, and she yielded. They wandered on into the wood which +fringed the hill on its further side, she coquetting, he courting and +flattering her in a hundred ways. Her soft new dress, her dainty +lightness and freshness, made harmony in his senses with the April day, +the building rooks, the breaths of sudden perfume from field and wood, +the delicate green that was creeping over the copses, softening all the +edges of the black scars left by the pits. The bridal illusion returned. +George eagerly--hungrily--gave himself up to it. And Letty, though +conscious all the while of a restless feeling at the back of her mind +that they were losing time, must needs submit. + +However, when the luncheon gong had sounded and they were strolling +back to the house, he bethought himself, knit his brows again, and +said to her: + +"Do you know, darling, Dalling told me this morning"--Dalling was the +Tressadys' principal agent--"that he thought it would be a good thing if +we could make friends with some of the people here? The Union are not--or +_were_ not--quite so strong in this valley as they are in some other +parts. That's why that fellow Burrows--confound him!--has come to live +here of late. It might be possible to make some of the more intelligent +fellows hear reason. My uncles have always managed the thing with a very +high hand--very natural!--the men _are_ a set of rough, ungrateful +brutes, who talk impossible stuff, and never remember anything that's +done for them--but after all, if one has to make a living out of them, +one may as well learn how to drive them, and what they want to be at. +Suppose you come and show yourself in the village this afternoon?" + +Letty looked extremely doubtful. + +"I really don't get on very well with poor people, George. It's very +dreadful, I know, but there!--I'm not Lady Maxwell--and I can't help it. +Of course, with the poor people at home in our own cottages it's +different--they always curtsy and are very respectful--but Mrs. Matthews +says the people here are so independent, and think nothing of being rude +to you if they don't like you." + +George laughed. + +"Go and call upon them in that dress and see! I'll eat my hat if +anybody's rude. Beside, I shall be there to protect you. We won't go, of +course, to any of the strong Union people. But there are two or +three--an old nurse of mine I really used to be rather fond of--and a +fireman that's a good sort--and one or two others. I believe it would +amuse you." + +Letty was quite certain that it would not amuse her at all. However, she +assented unwillingly, and they went in to lunch. + + * * * * * + +So in the afternoon the husband and wife sallied forth. Letty felt that +she was being taken through an ordeal, and that George was rather foolish +to wish it. However, she did her best to be cheerful, and to please +George she still wore the pretty Paris frock of the morning, though it +seemed to her absurd to be trailing it through a village street with only +colliers and their wives to look at it. + +"What ill luck," said George, suddenly, as they descended their own hill, +"that that fellow Burrows should have settled down here, in one's very +pocket, like this!" + +"Yes, you had enough of him at Malford, didn't you?" said Letty. "I don't +yet understand how he comes to be here." + +George explained that about the preceding Christmas there had been, +temporarily, strong signs of decline in the Union strength of the Perth +district. A great many miners had quietly seceded; one of the periodical +waves of suspicion as to funds and management to which all trade unions +are liable had swept over the neighbourhood; and wholesale desertion from +the Union standard seemed likely. In hot haste the Central Committee +sent down Burrows as organising agent. The good fight he had made against +Tressady at the Market Malford election had given him prestige; and he +had both presence and speaking power. He had been four months at Perth, +speaking all over the district, and now, instead of leaving the Union, +the men had been crowding into it, and were just as hot--so it was +said--for a trial of strength with the masters as their comrades in other +parts of the county. + +"And before Burrows has done with us, I should say he'll have cost the +masters in this district hundreds of thousands. I call him dear at the +money!" said George, finally, with a dismal cheerfulness. + +He was really full of Burrows, and of the general news of the district +which his agent had been that morning pouring into his ear. But he had +done his best not to talk about either at luncheon. Letty had a curious +way of making the bearer of unpleasant tidings feel that it was somehow +all his own fault that things should be so; and George, even in this dawn +of marriage, was beginning, half consciously, to recognise two or three +such peculiarities of hers. + +"What I cannot understand," said Letty, vigorously, "is why such people +as Mr. Burrows are _allowed_ to go about making the mischief he does." + +George laughed, but nevertheless repressed a sudden feeling of +irritation. The inept remark of a pretty woman generally only amused him. +But this Burrows matter was beginning to touch him home. + +"You see we happen to be a free country," he said drily, "and Burrows and +his like happen to be running us just now. Maxwell & Co. are in the +shafts. Burrows sits up aloft and whips on the team. The extraordinary +thing is that nothing personal makes any difference. The people here know +perfectly well that Burrows drinks--that the woman he lives with is not +his wife--" + +"George!" cried Letty, "how _can_ you say such dreadful things!" + +"Sorry, my darling! but the world is not a nice place. He picked her up +somehow--they say she was a commercial traveller's wife--left on his +hands at a country inn. Anyway she's not divorced, and the husband's +alive. She looks like a walking skeleton, and is probably going to die. +Nevertheless they say Burrows adores her. And as for my +resentments--don't be shocked--I'm inclined to like Burrows all the +better for _that_ little affair. But then I'm not pious, like the people +here. However, they don't mind--and they don't mind the drink--and they +believe he spends their money on magnificent dinners at hotels--and they +don't mind that. They don't mind anything--they shout themselves hoarse +whenever Burrows speaks--they're as proud as Punch if he shakes hands +with them--and then they tell the most gruesome tales of him behind his +back, and like him all the better, apparently, for being a scoundrel. +Queer but true. Well, here we are--now, darling, you may expect to be +stared at!" + +For they had entered on the village street, and Ferth Magna, by some +quick freemasonry, had become suddenly conscious of the bride and +bridegroom. Here and there a begrimed man in his shirt-sleeves would +open his front door cautiously and look at them; the children and +womenkind stood boldly on the doorsteps and stared; while the people in +the little shops ran back into the street, parcels and baskets in hand. +The men working the morning shift had just come back from the pits, and +their wives were preparing to wash their blackened lords, before the +whole family sat down to tea. But both tea and ablutions were forgotten, +so long as the owner of Ferth Place and the new Lady Tressady were in +sight. The village eyes took note of everything; of the young man's +immaculate serge suit and tan waistcoat, his thin, bronzed face and fair +moustache; of the bride's grey gown, the knot of airy pink at her +throat, the coils of bright brown hair on which her hat was set, and the +buckles on her pretty shoes. Then the village retreated within doors +again; and each house buzzed and gossiped its fill. There had been a +certain amount of not very cordial response to George's salutations; but +to Letty's thinking the women had eyed her with an unpleasant and rather +hostile boldness. + +"Mary Batchelor's house is down here," said George, turning into a +side lane, not without a feeling of relief. "I hope we sha'n't find +her out--no, there she is. You can't call these people affectionate, +can you?" + +They were close on a group of three brick cottages all close together. +Their doors were all open. In one cottage a stout collier's wife was +toiling through her wash. At the door of another the sewing-machine agent +was waiting for his weekly payment; while on the threshold of the third +stood an elderly tottering woman shading her eyes from the light as she +tried to make out the features of the approaching couple. + +"Why, Mary!" said George, "you haven't forgotten me? I have brought my +wife to see you." + +And he held out his hand with a boyish kindness. + +The old woman looked at them both in a bewildered way. Her face, with its +long chin and powerful nose, was blanched and drawn, her grey hair +straggling from under her worn black-ribboned cap; and her black dress +had a neglected air, which drew George's attention. Mary Batchelor, so +long as he remembered her, whether as his old nurse, or in later days as +the Bible-woman of the village, had always been remarkable for a peculiar +dignity and neatness. + +"Mary, is there anything wrong?" he asked her, holding her hand. + +"Coom yer ways in," said the old woman, grasping his arm, and taking no +notice of Letty. "He's gone--he'll not freeten nobody--he wor here three +days afore they buried him. I could no let him go--but it's three weeks +now sen they put him away." + +"Why, Mary, what is it? Not _James_!--not your son!" said George, letting +her guide him into the cottage. + +"Aye, it's James--it's my son," she repeated drearily. "Will +yer be takkin a cheer--an perhaps"--she looked round uncertainly, +first at Letty, then at the wet floor where she had been feebly +scrubbing--"perhaps the leddy ull be sittin down. I'm nobbut in a +muddle. But I don't seem to get forard wi my work a mornins--not sen +they put im away." + +And she dropped into a chair herself, with a long sigh--forgetting her +visitors apparently--her large and bony hands, scarred with their life's +work, lying along her knees. + +George stood beside her silent a moment. + +"I hardly like to say I hadn't heard," he said at last, gently. "You'll +think I _ought_ to have heard. But I didn't know. I have been in town and +very busy." + +"Aye," said Mary, without looking up, "aye, an yer've been gettin +married. I knew as yer didn't mean nothin onkind." + +Then she stopped again--till suddenly, with a furtive gesture, she +raised her apron, and drew it across her eyes, which had the look of +perennial tears. + +On the other side of the cottage meanwhile a boy of about fourteen was +sitting. He had just done his afternoon's wash, and was resting himself +by the fire, enjoying a thumbed football almanac. He had not risen when +the visitors entered, and while his grandmother was speaking his lips +still moved dumbly, as he went on adding up the football scores. He was a +sickly, rather repulsive lad with a callous expression. + +"Let me wait outside, George," said Letty, hurriedly. + +Some instinct in her shrank from the poor mother and her story. But +George begged her to stay, and she sat down nervously by the door, trying +to protect her pretty skirt from the wet boards. + +"Will you tell me how it was?" said George, sitting down himself in front +of the bowed mother, and bending towards her. "Was it in the pit? Jamie +wasn't one of our men, I know. Wasn't it for Mr. Morrison he worked?" + +Mrs. Batchelor made a sign of assent. Then she raised her head quickly, +and a flash of some passionate convulsion passed through her face. + +"It wor John Burgess as done it," she said, staring at George. "It wor +him as took the boy's life. But he's gone himsel--so theer--I'll not say +no more. It wor Jamie's first week o hewin--he'd been a loader this three +year, an taken a turn at the hewin now an again--an five weeks sen John +Burgess--he wor butty for Mr. Morrison, yer know, in the Owd Pit--took +him on, an the lad wor arnin six an sixpence a day. An he wor that +pleased yo cud see it shinin out ov im. And it wor on the Tuesday as he +went on the afternoon shift. I saw im go, an he wor down'earted. An I +fell a cryin as he went up the street, for I knew why he wor down'earted, +an I asked the Lord to elp him. And about six o'clock they come +runnin--an they towd me there'd bin an accident, an they wor bringin +im--an he wor alive--an I must bear up. They'd found him kneelin in his +place with his arm up, an the pick in it--just as the blast had took +him--An his poor back--oh! my God--scorched off him--_scorched off him_." + +A shudder ran through her. But she recovered herself and went on, still +gazing intently at Tressady, her gaunt hand raised as though for +attention. + +"An they braat him in, an they laid him on that settle"--she pointed to +the bench by the fire--"an the doctors didn't interfere--there wor nowt +to do--they left me alone wi un. But he come to, a minute after they laid +im down--an I ses, 'Jamie, ow did it appen' an he ses, 'Mother, it wor +John Burgess--ee opened my lamp for to light hissen as had gone out--an +I don't know no more.' An then after a bit he ses, 'Mother, don't you +fret--I'm glad I'm goin--I'd got the drink in me,' he ses. An then he +give two three little breaths, as though he wor pantin--an I kiss him." + +She stopped, her face working, her trembling hands pressed hard against +each other on her knee. Letty felt the tears leap to her eyes in a rush +that startled herself. + +"An he would a bin twenty-one year old, come next August--an allus a lad +as yer couldn't help gettin fond on--not sen he were a little un. An when +he wor layin there, I ses to myself, 'He's the third as the coal-gettin +ha took from me.' An I minded my feyther an uncle--how they was braat +home both togither, when I wor nobbut thirteen years old--not a scar on +em, nobbut a little blood on my feyther's forehead--but stone dead, both +on em--from the afterdamp. Theer was thirty-six men killed in that +explosion--an I recolleck how old Mr. Morrison--Mr. Walter's father--sent +the coffins round--an how the men went on because they warn't good ones. +Not a man would go down the pit till they was changed--if a man got the +life choked out of im, they thowt the least the masters could do was to +give un a dacent coffin to lie in. But theer--nobody helped me wi +Jamie--I buried him mysel--an it wor all o the best." + +She dried her eyes again, sighing plaintively. George said what kind and +consoling things he could think of. Mary Batchelor put up her hand and +touched him on the arm as he leant over her. + +"Aye, I knew yo'd be sorry--an yor wife--" + +She turned feebly towards Letty, trying with her blurred and tear-dimmed +sight to make out what Sir George's bride might be like. She looked for a +moment at the small, elegant person in the corner,--at the sheaf of +nodding rosebuds on the hat--the bracelets--the pink cheeks under the +dainty veil,--looked with a curious aloofness, as though from a great +distance. Then, evidently, another thought struck her like a lash. She +ceased to see or think of Letty. Her grip tightened on George's arm. + +"An I'm allus thinkin," she said, with a passionate sob, "of that what he +said about the drink. He'd allus bin a sober lad, till this lasst winter +it did seem as though he cudna keep hiself from it--it kep creepin on +im--an several times lately he'd broke out very bad, pay-days--an he knew +I'd been frettin. And who was ter blame--I ast yo, or onybody--who was it +ter blame?" + +Her voice rose to a kind of cry. + +"His feyther died ov it, and his grandfeyther afore that. His +grandfeyther wor found dead i the roadside, after they'd made him +blind-drunk at owd Morse's public-house, where the butty wor reckonin +with im an his mates. But he'd never ha gone near the drink if they'd +hadn't druv him to't, for he wasn't inclined that way. But the butty as +gave him work kep the public, an if yer didn't drink, yer didn't get no +work. You must drink yoursel sick o Saturdays, or theer'd be no work for +you o Mondays. 'Noa, yer can sit at ome,' they'd say to un, 'ef yer so +damned pertickler.' I ast yor pardon, sir, for the bad word, but that's +ow they'd say it. I've often heerd owd John say as he'd a been glad to ha +given the butty back a shillin ov is pay to be let off the drink. An +Willum, that's my usband, he wor allus at it too--an the doctor towd me +one day, as Willum lay a-dyin, as it ran in the blood--an Jamie heard +im--I know he did--for I fouu im on the stairs--listenin." + +She paused again, lost in a mist of incoherent memories, the tears +falling slowly. + +After a minute's silence, George said--not indeed knowing what to +say--"We're _very_ sorry for you, Mary--my wife and I--we wish we +could do anything to help you. I am afraid it can't make any difference +to you--I expect it makes it all the worse--to think that accidents are +so much fewer--that so much has been done. And yet times are mended, +aren't they?" + +Mary made no answer. + +George sat looking at her, conscious, as he seldom was, of raw youth and +unreadiness--conscious, too, of Letty's presence in a strange, hindering +way--as of something that both blunted emotion and made one rather +ashamed to show it. + +He could only pursue the lame topic of improvement, of changed times. The +disappearance of old abuses, of "butties" and "tommy-shops"; the greater +care for life; the accident laws; the inspectors. He found himself +growing eloquent at last, yet all the time regarding himself, as it were, +from a distance--ironically. + +Mary Batchelor listened to him for a while, her head bent with something +of the submission of the old servant, till something he said roused +again the quick shudder, the look of anguished protest. + +"Aye, I dessay it's aw reet, Mr. George--I dessay it is--what yer say. +The inspectors is very cliver--an the wages is paid proper. But +theer--say what yer will! I've a son on the railway out Lichfield +way--an he's allus taakin about is long hours--they're killing im, he +says--an I allus ses to im, 'Yer may jest thank the Lord, Harry, as yer +not in the pits.' He never gets no pity out o me. An soomtimes I wakes +in the morning, an I thinks o the men, cropin away in the dark--down +theer--under me and my bed--for they do say the pits now runs right +under Ferth village--an I think to mysel--how long will it be before yo +poor fellers is laying like my Jim? Yer may be reet about the +accidents, Mr. George--but I _know_, ef yer wor to go fro house to +house i this village--it would be like tis in the Bible--I've often +thowt o them words--'_Theer was not a house_--no, nary one!--_where +there was not one dead_.'" + +She hung her head again, muttering to herself. George made out with +difficulty that she was going through one phantom scene after another--of +burning, wounds, and sudden death. One or two of the phrases--of the +fragmentary details that dropped out without name or place--made his +flesh creep. He was afraid lest Letty should hear them, and was just +putting out his hand for his hat, when Mrs. Batchelor gripped his arm +again. Her face--so white and large-featured--had the gleam of something +like a miserable smile upon it. + +"Aye, an the men theirsels ud say jest as you do. 'Lor. Mrs. Batchelor,' +they'd say, 'why, the pits is as safe as a church'--an they'd +_laff_--Jamie ud laff at me times. But it's the _women_, Mr. George, as +knows--it's the women that ave to wash the bodies." + +A great trembling ran through her again. George instinctively rose, and +motioned to Letty to go. She too rose, but she did not go. She stood by +the door, her wide grey eyes fixed with a kind of fascination on the +speaker; while behind her a ring of children could be seen in the street, +staring at the pretty lady. + +Mary Batchelor saw nothing but Tressady, whom she was still holding by +the arm--looking up to him. + +"Aye, but I didna disturb my Jamie, yer know. Noa!--I left im i the owd +coat they'd thrown over im i the pit--I dursn't ha touched is back. Noa, +I _dursn't_. But I made his shroud mysen, an I put it ower his poor +workin clothes, an I washed his face, an is hands an feet--an then I +kissed him, an I said, 'Jamie, yo mun go an tell the Lord as yo ha done +your best, an He ha dealt hardly by you!--an that's the treuth--He ha +dealt hardly by yer!'" + +She gave a loud sob, and bowed her head on her hands a moment. Then, +pushing back her grey locks from her face, she rose, struggling for +composure. + +"Aye, aye, Mr. George--aye, aye, I'll not keep yer no longer." + +But as she took his hand, she added passionately: + +"An I towd the vicar I couldn't be Bible-woman no more. Theer's somethin +broken in me sen Jamie died. I must keep things to mysen--I ain't got +nuthin good to say to others--I'm allus _grievin_ at the Lord. Good-bye +to yer--good-bye to yer." + +Her voice had grown absent, indifferent. But when George asked her, just +as they were leaving the cottage, who was the boy sitting by the fire, +her face darkened. She came hurriedly to the door with them, and said in +George's ear: + +"He's my darter's child--my darter by my first usband. His feyther an +mother are gone, an he come up from West Bromwich to live wi me. But he +isn't no comfort to me. He don't take no notice of anybody. He set like +that, with his football, when Jamie lay a-dyin. I'd as lief be shut on +him. But theer--I've got to put up wi im." + +Letty meanwhile had approached the boy and looked at him curiously. + +"Do you work in the pits too?" she asked him. + +The boy stared at her. + +"Yes," he said. + +"Do you like it?" + +He gave a rough laugh. + +"I reckon yo've got to like it," he said. And turning his back on his +questioner, he went back to his almanac. + +"Don't let us do any more visiting," said George, impatiently, as they +emerged into the main street. "I'm out of love with the village. We'll do +our blandishments another day. Let's go a little further up the valley +and get away from the houses." + +Letty assented, and they walked along the village, she looking curiously +into the open doors of the houses, by way of return for the inquisitive +attention once more lavished upon herself and George. + +"The houses are _quite_ comfortable," she said presently. "And I looked +into Mrs. Batchelor's back room while you were talking. It was just as +Mrs. Matthews said--such good carpets and curtains, two chests of +drawers, and an harmonium--and pictures--and flowers in the windows. +George! what are 'butties'?" + +"'Butties' are sub-contractors," he said absently--"men who contract with +the pit-owners to get the coal, either on a large or a small scale--now +mostly on a small scale. They engage and pay the colliers in some pits, +in others the owners deal direct." + +"And what is a 'tommy-shop'?" + +"'Tommy' is the local word for 'truck'--paying in kind instead of in +money. You see, the butties and the owners between them used to own the +public-houses and the provision-shops, and the amount of coin of the +realm the men got in wages in the bad old times was infinitesimal. They +were expected to drink the butty's beer, and consume the butty's +provisions--at the butty's prices, of course--and the butty kept the +accounts. Oh! it was an abomination! but of course it was done away with +long ago." + +"Of course it was!" said Letty, indignantly. "They never remember what's +done for them. Did you see what _excellent_ teas there were laid out in +some of the houses--and those girls with their hats smothered in +feathers? Why, I should never dream of wearing so many!" + +She was once more her quick, shrewd self. All trace of the tears that had +surprised her while Mary Batchelor was describing her son's death had +passed away. Her half-malicious eyes glanced to right and left, peering +into the secrets of the village. + +"And these are the people that talk of starving!" she said to George, +scornfully, as they emerged into the open road. "Why, anyone can see--" + +George, suddenly returned from a reverie, understood what she was saying, +and remarked, with an odd look: + +"You think their houses aren't so bad? One is always a little +surprised--don't you think?--when the poor are comfortable? One takes it +as something to one's own credit--I detect it in myself scores of times. +Well!--one seems to say--they _could_ have done without it--one might +have kept it for oneself--what a fine generous fellow I am!" + +He laughed. + +"I didn't mean that at all," said Letty, protesting. + +"Didn't you? Well, after all, darling--you see, you don't have to live in +those houses, nice as they are--and you don't have to do your own +scrubbing. Ferth may be a vile hole, but I suppose you could put a score +of these houses inside it--and I'm a pauper, but I can provide you with +two housemaids. I say, why do you walk so far away from me?" + +And in spite of her resistance, he took her hand, put it through his arm, +and held it there. + +"Look at me, darling," he said imperiously. "How _can_ anyone spy upon us +with these trees and high walls? I want to see how pretty and fresh you +look--I want to forget that poor thing and her tale. Do you know that +somewhere--far down in me--there's a sort of black pool--and when +anything stirs it up--for the moment I want to hang myself--the world +seems such an awful place! It got stirred up just now--not while she was +talking--but just as I looked back at that miserable old soul, standing +at her door. She used to be such a jolly old thing--always happy in her +Bible--and in Jamie, I suppose--quite sure that she was going to a nice +heaven, and would only have to wait a little bit, till Jamie got there +too. She seemed to know all about the Almighty's plans for herself and +everybody else. Her drunken husband was dead; my father left her a bit of +money, so did an old uncle, I believe. She'd gossip and pray and preach +with anybody. And now she'll weep and pine like that till she dies--and +she isn't sure even about heaven any more--and instead of Jamie, she's +got that oafish lad, that changeling, hung round her neck--to kick her +and ill-treat her in another year or two. Well! and do you ever think +that something like that has got to happen to all of us--something +hideous--some torture--something that'll make us wish we'd never been +born? Darling, am I a mad sort of a fool? Stop here--in the shade--give +me a kiss!" + +And he made her pause at a shady corner in the road, between two oak +copses on either hand--a river babbling at the foot of one of them. He +put his arm round her, and stooping kissed her red lips with a kind of +covetous passion. Then, still holding her, he looked out from the trees +to the upper valley with its scattered villages, its chimneys and +engine-houses. + +"It struck me--what she said of the men under our feet. They're at it +now, Letty, hewing and sweating. Why are they there, and you and I here? +I'm _precious_ glad, aren't you? But I'm not going to make believe that +there's no difference. Don't let's he hypocrites, whatever we are." + +Letty was perplexed and a little troubled. He had only shown her this +excitability once before--on that odd uncomfortable night when he made +her sit with him on the Embankment. Whenever it came it seemed to upset +her dominant impression of him. But yet it excited her too--it appealed +to something undeveloped--some yearning, protecting instinct which was +new to her. + +She suddenly put up her hand and touched his hair. + +"You talk so oddly, George. I think sometimes"--she laughed with a pretty +gaiety--"you'll go bodily over to Lady Maxwell and her 'set' some day!" + +George made a contemptuous sound. + +"May the Lord preserve us from quacks," he said lightly. "One had better +be a hypocrite. Look, little woman, there is a shower coming. Shall we +turn home?" + +They walked home, chatting and laughing. At their own front door the +butler handed George a telegram. He opened it and read: + +"Must come down to consult you on important business--shall arrive at +Perth about 9.30.--Amelia Tressady." + +Letty, who was looking over George's shoulder, gave a little cry +of dismay. + +Then, to avoid the butler's eyes and ears, they turned hurriedly into +George's smoking-room which opened off the hall, and shut the door. + +"George! she has come to get more money out of you!" cried Letty, anger +and annoyance written in every line of her little frowning face. + +"Well, darling, she can't get blood out of a stone!" said George, +crushing the telegram in his hand and throwing it away. "It is a little +too bad of my mother, I think, to spoil our honeymoon time like this. +However, it can't be helped. Will you tell them to get her room ready?" + + + + +CHAPTER IX + + +"Now, my dear George! I do think I may claim at least that you should +remember I am your _mother_!"--the speaker raised a fan from her knee, +and used it with some vehemence. "Of course I can't help seeing that you +don't treat me as you ought to do. I don't want to complain of Letty--I +daresay she was taken by surprise--but all I can say as to her reception +of me last night is, that it wasn't pretty--that's all; it wasn't +_pretty_. My room felt like an ice-house--Justine tells me nobody has +slept there for months--and no fire until just the moment I arrived; +and--and no flowers on the dressing-table--no little _attentions_, in +fact. I can only say it was not what I am accustomed to. My feelings +overcame me; that poor dear Justine will tell you what a state she found +me in. She cried herself, to see me so upset." + +Lady Tressady was sitting upright on the straight-backed sofa of +George's smoking-room. George, who was walking up and down the room, +thought, with discomfort, as he glanced at her from time to time, that +she looked curiously old and dishevelled. She had thrown a piece of +white lace round her head, in place of the more elaborate preparation +for the world's gaze that she was wont to make. Her dress--a study in +purples--had been a marvel, but was now old, and even tattered; the +ruffles at her wrist were tumbled; and the pencilling under her still +fine eyes had been neglected. George, between his wife's dumb anger and +his mother's folly, had passed through disagreeable times already since +Lady Tressady's arrival, and was now once more endeavouring to get to +the bottom of her affairs. + +"You forget, mother," he said, in answer to Lady Tressady's complaint, +"that the house is not mounted for visitors, and that you gave us very +short notice." + +Nevertheless he winced inwardly as he spoke at the thought of Letty's +behaviour the night before. + +Lady Tressady bridled. + +"We will not discuss it, if you please," she said, with an attempt at +dignity. "I should have thought that you and Letty might have known I +should not have broken in on your honeymoon without most _pressing_ +reasons. George!"--her voice trembled, she put her lace handkerchief to +her eyes--"I am an unfortunate and miserable woman, and if you--my own +darling son--don't come to my rescue, I--I don't know what I may be +driven to do!" + +George took the remark calmly, having probably heard it before. He went +on walking up and down. + +"It's no good, mother, dealing in generalities, I am afraid. You promised +me this morning to come to business. If you will kindly tell me at once +what is the matter, and what is the _figure_, I shall be obliged to you." + +Lady Tressady hesitated, the lace on her breast fluttering. Then, in +desperation, she confessed herself first reluctantly, then in a torrent. + +During the last two years, then, she said, she had been trying her luck +for the first time in--well, in speculation! + +"Speculation!" said George, looking at her in amazement. "In what?" + +Lady Tressady tried again to preserve her dignity. She had been +investing, she said--trying to increase her income on the Stock Exchange. +She had done it quite as much for George's sake as her own, that she +might improve her position a little, and be less of a burden upon him. +Everybody did it! Several of her best women-friends were as clever at it +as any man, and often doubled their allowances for the year. She, of +course, had done it under the _best_ advice. George knew that she had +friends in the City who would do anything--positively _anything_--for +her. But somehow-- + +Then her tone dropped. Her foot in its French shoe began to fidget on the +stool before her. + +Somehow, she had got into the hands of a reptile--there! No other word +described the creature in the least--a sort of financial agent, who had +treated her unspeakably, disgracefully. She had trusted him implicitly, +and the result was that she now owed the reptile who, on the strength of +her name, her son, and her aristocratic connections, had advanced her +money for these adventures, a sum-- + +"Well, the truth is I am afraid to say what it is," said Lady Tressady, +allowing herself for once a cry of nature, and again raising a shaky hand +to her eyes. + +"How much?" said George, standing over her, cigarette in hand. + +"Well--four thousand pounds!" said Lady Tressady, her eyes blinking +involuntarily as she looked up at him. + +"_Four thousand pounds!_" exclaimed George. "Preposterous!" + +And, raising his hand, he flung his cigarette violently into the fire and +resumed his walk, hands thrust into his pockets. + +Lady Tressady looked tearfully at his long, slim figure as he walked +away, conscious, however, even at this agitated moment, of the quick +thought that he had inherited some of her elegance. + +"George!" + +"Yes--wait a moment--mother"--he faced round upon her decidedly. "Let me +tell you at once, that at the present moment it is quite impossible for +me to find that sum of money." + +Lady Tressady flushed passionately like a thwarted child. + +"Very well, then," she said--"very well. Then it will be bankruptcy--and +I hope you and Letty will like the scandal!" + +"So he threatens bankruptcy?" + +"Do you think I should have come down here except for something like +that?" she cried. "Look at his letters!" + +And she took a tumbled roll out of the bag on her arm and gave it to him. +George threw himself into a chair, and tried to get some idea of the +correspondence; while Lady Tressady kept up a stream of plaintive chatter +he could only endeavour not to hear. + +As far as he could judge on a first inspection, the papers concerned a +long series of risky transactions,--financial gambling of the most +pronounced sort,--whereof the few gains had been long since buried deep +in scandalous losses. The outrageous folly of some of the ventures and +the magnitude of the sums involved made him curse inwardly. It was the +first escapade of the kind he could remember in his mother's history, +and, given her character, he could only regard it as adding a new and +real danger to his life and Letty's. + +Then another consideration struck him. + +"How on earth did you come to know so much about the ins and outs of +Stock Exchange business," he asked her suddenly, with surprise, in the +midst of his reading. "You never confided in me. I never supposed you +took an interest in such things." + +In truth, he would have supposed her mentally incapable of the kind of +gambling finance these papers bore witness of. She had never been known +to do a sum or present an account correctly in her life; and he had +often, in his own mind, accepted her density in these directions as a +certain excuse for her debts. Yet this correspondence showed here and +there a degree of financial legerdemain of which any City swindler +might have been proud--so far, at least, as he could judge from his +hasty survey. + +Lady Tressady drew herself up sharply in answer to his remark, though not +without a flutter of the eyelids which caught his attention. + +"Of course, my dear George, I always knew you thought your mother a +fool. As a matter of fact, all my friends tell me that I have a _very_ +clear head." + +George could not restrain, himself from laughing aloud. + +"In face of this?" he said, holding up the final batch of letters, which +contained Mr. Shapetsky's last formidable account; various imperious +missives from a "sharp-practice" solicitor, whose name happened to be +disreputably known to George Tressady; together with repeated and most +explicit assurances on the part both of agent and lawyer, that if +arrangements were not made at once by Lady Tressady for meeting at least +half Mr. Shapetsky's bill--which had now been running some eighteen +months--and securing the other half, legal steps would be taken +immediately. + +Lady Tressady at first met her son's sarcasm in angry silence, then broke +into shrill denunciation of Shapetsky's "villanies." How could decent +people, people in society, protect themselves against such creatures! + +George walked to the window, and stood looking out into the April garden. +Presently he turned, and interrupted his mother. + +"I notice, mother, that these transactions have been going on for nearly +two years. Do you remember, when I gave you that large sum at Christmas, +you said it would 'all but' clear you; and when I gave you another large +sum last month, you professed to be entirely cleared? Yet all the time +you were receiving these letters, and you owed this fellow almost as +much as you do now. Do you think it was worth while to mislead me in +that way?" + +He stood leaning against the window, his fingers drumming on the sill. +The contrast between the youth of the figure and the absence of youth in +face and voice was curious. Perhaps Lady Tressady felt vaguely that he +looked like a boy and spoke like a master, for her pride rose. + +"You have no right to speak to me like that, George! I did everything for +the best. I always do everything for the best. It is my misfortune to be +so--so confiding, so hopeful. I must always believe in someone--that's +what makes my friends so _extremely_ fond of me. You and your poor +darling father were never the least like me--" And she went off into a +tearful comparison between her own character and the characters of her +husband and son--in which of course it was not she that suffered. + +George did not heed her. He was once more staring out of window, thinking +hard. So far as he could see, the money, or the greater part of it, would +have to be found. The man, of course, was a scoundrel, but of the sort +that keeps within the law; and Lady Tressady's monstrous folly had given +him an easy prey. When he thought of the many sacrifices he had made for +his mother, of her ample allowance, her incorrigible vanity and +greed--and then of the natural desires of his young wife--his heart +burned within him. + +"Well, I can only tell you," he said at last, turning round upon her, +"that I see no way out. How is that man's claim to be met? I don't know. +Even if I _could_ meet it--which I see no chance of doing--by crippling +myself for some time, how should I be at liberty to do it? My wife and +her needs have now the first claim upon me." + +"Very well," said Lady Tressady, proudly, raising her handkerchief, +however, to hide her trembling lips. + +"Let me remind you," he continued, ceremoniously, "that the whole of this +place is in bad condition, except the few rooms we have just done up, and +that money _must_ be spent upon it--it is only fair to Letty that it +should be spent. Let me remind you also, that you are a good deal +responsible for this state of things." + +Lady Tressady moved uneasily. George was now speaking in his usual +half-nonchalant tone, and he had provided himself with another cigarette. +But his eye held her. + +"You will remember that you promised me while I was abroad to live here +and look after the house. I arranged money affairs with you, and other +affairs, upon that basis. But it appears that during the four years I was +away you were here altogether, at different times, about three months. +Yet you made me believe you were here; if I remember right, you dated +your letters from here. And of course, in four years, an old house that +is totally neglected goes to the bad." + +"Who has been telling you such falsehoods?" cried Lady Tressady. "I was +here a great deal more than that--a great deal more!" + +But the scarlet colour, do what she would, was dyeing her still delicate +skin, and her eyes alternately obstinate and shuffling, tried to take +themselves out of the range of George's. + +As for George, as he stood there coolly smoking, he was struck--or, +rather, the critical mind in him was struck--by a sudden perception of +the meanness of aspect which sordid cares of the kind his mother was now +plunged in can give to the human face. He felt the rise of a familiar +disgust. How many scenes of ugly battle over money matters could he not +remember in his boyhood between his father and mother! And later--in +India--what things he had known women do for money or dress! He thought +scornfully of a certain intriguing lady of his acquaintance at +Madras--who had borrowed money of him--to whom he had given ball-dresses; +and of another, whose selfish extravagance had ruined one of the best of +men. Did all women tend to be of this make, however poetic might be their +outward seeming? + +Aloud, he said quietly, in answer to his mother's protest: + +"I think you will find that is about accurate. I mention it merely to +show you how it is that I find myself now plunged in so many expenses. +And, now, doesn't it strike you as a _little_ hard that I should be +called upon to strip and cripple myself still further--_not_ to give my +wife the comforts and conveniences I long to give her, but to pay such +debts as those?" + +Involuntarily he struck his hand on the papers lying in the chair where +he had been sitting. + +Lady Tressady, too, rose from her seat. + +"George, if you are going to be _violent_ towards your mother, I had +better go," she said, with an attempt at dignity. "I suppose Letty has +been gossiping with her servants about me. Oh! I knew what to expect!" +cried Lady Tressady, gathering up fan and handkerchief from the sofa +behind her with a hand that shook. "I always said from the beginning that +she would set you against me! She has never treated me as--as a +daughter--never! And that is my weakness--I must be cared for--I must be +treated with--with tenderness." + +"I wouldn't give way, mother, if I were you," said George, quite +unmoved by the show of tears. "I think, if you will reflect upon it, +that it is Letty and I who have the most cause to give way. If you will +allow me, I will go and have a talk with her. I believe she is sitting +in the garden." + +His mother turned sullenly away from him, and he left the room. + + * * * * * + +As he passed through the long oak-panelled hall that led to the garden, +he was seized with an odd sense of pity for himself. This odious scene +behind him, and now this wrestle with Letty that must be gone +through--were these the joys of the honeymoon? + +Letty was not in the garden. But as he passed into the wood on the +farther side of the hill he saw her sitting under a tree halfway down the +slope, with some embroidery in her hand. The April sun was shining into +the wood. A larch beyond Letty was already green, and the twigs of the +oak beneath which she sat made a reddish glow in the bright air. Patches +of primroses and anemones starred the ground about her, and trails of +periwinkle touched her dress. She was stooping, and her little hand went +rapidly--impatiently--to and fro. + +The contrast between this fresh youth amid the spring and that unlovely, +reluctant age he had just left behind him in the smoking-room struck him +sharply. His brow cleared. + +As she heard his step she looked round eagerly. "Well?" she said, +pushing aside her work. + +He threw himself down beside her. + +"Darling, I have had my talk. It is pretty bad--worse than we had even +imagined!" + +Then he told her his mother's story. She could hardly contain herself, as +she listened, as he mentioned the total figure of the debts. It was +evidently with difficulty that she prevented herself from interrupting +him at every word. And when he had barely finished she broke out: + +"And what did you say?" + +George hesitated. + +"I told her, of course, that it was monstrous and absurd to expect that +we could pay such a sum." + +Letty's breath came fast. His voice and manner did not satisfy her at +all. + +"Monstrous? I should think it was! Do you know how she has run up +this debt?" + +George looked at her in surprise. Her little face was quivering under the +suppressed energy of what she was going to say. + +"No!--do you?" + +"Yes!--I know all about it. I said to my maid last night--I hope, George, +you won't mind, but you know Grier has been an age with me, and knows all +my secrets--I told her she must make friends with your mother's maid, and +see what she could find out. I felt we _must_, in self-defence. And of +course Grier got it all out of Justine. I knew she would! Justine is a +little fool; and she doesn't mean to stay much longer with Lady Tressady, +so she didn't mind speaking. It is exactly as I supposed! Lady Tressady +didn't begin speculating for herself at all--but for--somebody--else! Do +you remember that absurd-looking singer who gave a 'musical sketch' one +day that your mother gave a party in Eccleston Square--in February?" + +She looked at him with eagerness, an ugly, half-shrinking innuendo in her +expression. + +George had suddenly moved away, and was sitting now some little distance +from his wife, his eyes bent on the ground. However, at her question he +made a sign of assent. + +"You do remember? Well," said Letty, triumphantly, "it is he who is at +the bottom of it all. I _knew_ there must be somebody. It appears that he +has been getting money out of her for years--that he used to come and +spend hours, when she had that little house in Bruton Street, when you +were away--I don't believe you ever heard of it--flattering her, and +toadying her, paying her compliments on her dress and her appearance, +fetching and carrying for her--and of course living upon her! He used to +arrange all her parties. Justine says that he used even to make her order +all his favourite wines--_such_ bills as there used to be for wine! He +has a wife and children somewhere, and of course the whole family lived +upon your mother. It was he made her begin speculating. Justine says he +has lost all he ever had himself that way, and your mother couldn't, in +fact, '_lend'_ him"--Letty laughed scornfully--"money fast enough. It was +he brought her across that odious creature Shapetsky--isn't that his +name? And that's the whole story. If there have been any gains, he has +made off with them--leaving her, of course, to get out of the rest. +Justine says that for months there was nothing but business, as she calls +it, talked in the house--and she knew, for she used to help wait at +dinner. And such a crew of people as used to be about the place!" + +She looked at him, struck at last by his silence and his attitude, or +pausing for some comment, some appreciation of her cleverness in +ferreting it all out. + +But he did not speak, and she was puzzled. The angry triumph in her eyes +faltered. She put out her hand and touched him on the arm. + +"What is it, George? I thought--it would be more satisfactory to us both +to know the truth." + +He looked up quickly. + +"And all this your maid got out of Justine? You asked her?" + +She was struck, offended, by his expression. It was so cool and +strange--even, she could have imagined, contemptuous. + +"Yes, I did," she said passionately. "I thought I was quite justified. We +must protect ourselves." + +He was silent again. + +"I think," he said at last, drily, she watching him--"I think we will +keep Justine and Grier out of it, if you please." + +She took her work, and laid it down again, her mouth trembling. + +"So you had rather be deceived?" + +"I had rather be deceived than listen behind doors," he said, beginning +in a light tone, which, however, passed immediately into one of +bitterness. "Besides, there is nothing new. For people like my mother +there is always some adventurer or adventuress in the background--there +always used to be in old days. She never meant any serious harm; she was +first plundered, then we. My father used to be for ever turning some +impostor or other out of doors. Now I suppose it is my turn." + +This time it was Letty who kept silence. Her needle passed rapidly to and +fro. George glanced at her queerly. Then he rose and came to stand near +her, leaning against the tree. + +"You know, Letty, we shall have to pay that money," he said suddenly, +pulling at his moustache. + +Letty made an exclamation under her breath, but went on working faster +than before. + +He slipped down to the moss beside her, and caught her hand. + +"Are you angry with me?" + +"If you insult me by accusing me of listening behind doors you can't +wonder," said Letty, snatching her hand away, her breast heaving. + +He felt a bitter inclination to laugh, but he restrained it, and did +his best to make peace. In the midst of his propitiations Letty +turned upon him. + +"Of course, I know you think I did it all for selfishness," she said, +half crying, "because I want new furniture and new dresses. I don't; I +want to protect you from being--being--plundered like this. How can you +do what you ought as a member of Parliament? how can we ever keep +ourselves out of debt if--if--? How _can_ you pay this money?" she wound +up, her eyes flaming. + +"Well, you know," he said, hesitating--"you know I suggested yesterday +we should sell some land to do up the house. I am afraid we must sell the +laud, and pay this scoundrel--a proportion, at all events. Of course, +what I should _like_ to do would be to put him--and the other--to instant +death, with appropriate tortures! Short of that, I can only take the +matter out of my mother's hands, get a sharp solicitor on my side to +match _his_ rascal, and make the best bargain I can." + +Letty rolled up her work with energy, two tears of anger on her cheeks. +"She _ought_ to suffer!" she cried, her voice trembling--"she _ought_ +to suffer!" + +"You mean that we ought to let her be made a bankrupt?" he said coolly. +"Well, no doubt it would be salutary. Only, I am afraid it would be +rather more disagreeable to us than to her. Suppose we consider the +situation. Two young married people--charming house--charming +wife--husband just beginning in politics--people inclined to be friends. +Then you go to dine with them in Brook Street--excellent little French +dinner--bride bewitching. Next morning you see the bankruptcy of the +host's mamma in the 'Times.' 'And he's the only son, isn't he?--he must +be well off. They say she's been dreadfully extravagant. But, hang it! +you know, a man's mother!--and a widow--no, I can't stand that. Sha'n't +dine with them again!' There! do you see, darling? Do you really want to +rub all the bloom off the peach?" + +He had hardly finished his little speech before the odiousness of it +struck himself. + +"Am I come to talking to her like _this_?" he asked himself in a kind of +astonishment. + +But Letty, apparently, was not astonished. + +"Everybody would understand if you refused to ruin yourself by going on +paying these frightful debts. I am sure _something_ could be done," she +said, half choked. + +George shook his head. + +"But everybody wouldn't want to understand. The dear world loves a +scandal--doesn't really _like_ being amiable to newcomers at all. You +would make a bad start, dear--and all the world would pity mamma." + +"Oh! if you are only thinking what people would say," cried Letty. + +"No," said George, reflectively, but with a mild change of tone. "Damn +people! I can pull myself to pieces so much better than they can. You +see, darling, you're such an optimist. Now, if you'd only just believe, +as I do, that the world is a radically bad place, you wouldn't be so +surprised when things of this sort happen. Eh, little person, has it been +a radically bad place this last fortnight?" + +He laid his cheek against her shoulder, rubbing it gently up and down. +But something hard and scornful lay behind his caress--something he did +not mean to inquire into. + +"Then you told your mother," said Letty, after a pause, still looking +straight before her, "that you would clear her?" + +"Not at all. I said we could do nothing. I laid it on about the house. +And all the time I knew perfectly well in my protesting soul, that if +this man's claim is sustainable we should _have_ to pay up. And I imagine +that mamma knew it too. You can get out of anybody's debts but your +mother's--that's apparently what it comes to. Queer thing, civilisation! +Well now"--he sprang to his feet--"let's go and get it over." + +Letty also rose. + +"I can't see her again," she said quickly. "I sha'n't come down to lunch. +Will she go by the three-o'clock train?" + +"I will arrange it," said George. + +They walked through the wood together silently. As they came in sight of +the house Letty's face quivered again with restrained passion--or tears. +George, whose _sangfroid_ was never disturbed outwardly for long, had by +now resigned himself, and had, moreover, recovered that tolerance of +woman's various weaknesses which was in him the fruit of a wide, and at +bottom hostile, induction. He set himself to cheer her up. Perhaps, after +all, if he could sell a particular piece of land which he owned near a +neighbouring large town, and sell it well,--he had had offers for it +before,--he might be able to clear his mother, and still let Letty work +her will on the house. She mustn't take a gloomy view of things--he would +do his best. So that by the time they got into the drawing-room she had +let her hand slip doubtfully into his again for a moment. + +But nothing would induce her to appear at lunch. Lady Tressady, having +handed over all Shapetsky's papers and all her responsibilities to +George, graciously told him that she could understand Letty's annoyance, +and didn't wish for a moment to intrude upon her. She then called on +Justine to curl her hair, put on a blue shot silk with marvellous pink +fronts just arrived from Paris, and came down to lunch with her son in +her most smiling mood. She took no notice of his monosyllables, and in +the hall, while the butler discreetly retired, she kissed him with tears, +saying that she had always known his generosity would come to the rescue +of his poor darling mamma. + +"You will oblige me, mother, by not trying it again too soon," was +George's ironical reply as he put her into the carriage. + + * * * * * + +In the afternoon Letty was languid and depressed. She would not talk on +general topics, and George shrank in nervous disgust from reopening the +subjects of the morning. Finally, she chose to be tucked up on the sofa +with a novel, and gave George free leave to go out. + +It surprised him to find as he walked quickly down the hill, delighting +in the April sun, that he was glad to be alone. But he did not in the +least try to fling the thought away from him, as many a lover would have +done. The events, the feelings of the day, had been alike jarring and +hateful; he meant to escape from them. + +But he could not escape from them all at once. A fresh and unexpected +debt of somewhere about four thousand pounds does not sit lightly on a +comparatively poor man. In spite of his philosophy for Letty's benefit, +he must needs harass himself anew about his money affairs, planning and +reckoning. How many more such surprises would his mother spring upon +him--and how was he to control her? He realised now something of the +life-long burden his dull old father had borne--a burden which the +absences of school, college, and travel had hitherto spared himself. What +was he to appeal to in her? There seemed to be nothing--neither will nor +conscience. She was like the women without backs in the fairy-tale. + +Then, with one breath he said to himself that he must kick out that +singer-fellow, and with the next, that he would not touch any of his +mother's crew with a barge-pole. Though he never pleaded ideals in +public, he had been all his life something of a moral epicure, taking +"moral" as relating rather to manners than to deeper things. He had done +his best not to soil himself by contact with certain types--among men +especially. Of women he was less critical and less observant. + +As to this ugly feud opening between his mother and his wife, it had +quite ceased to amuse him. Now that his marriage was a reality, the daily +corrosion of such a thing was becoming plain. And who was there in the +world to bear the brunt of it but he? He saw himself between the +two--eternally trying to make peace--and his face lengthened. + +And if Letty would only leave the thing to him!--would only keep her +little white self out of it! He wished he could get her to send away that +woman Grier--a forward second-rate creature, much too ready to meddle in +what did not concern her. + +Then, with a shake of his thin shoulders, he passionately drove it all +out of his thoughts. + +Let him go to the village, sound the feeling there if he could, and do +his employer's business. His troubles as a pit-owner seemed likely to be +bad enough, but they did not canker one like domestic miseries. They were +a man's natural affairs; to think of them came as a relief to him. + + * * * * * + +He had but a disappointing round, however. + +In the first place he went to look up some of the older "hewers," men who +had been for years in the employ of the Tressadys. Two or three of them +had just come back from the early shift, and their wives, at any rate, +were pleased and flattered by George's call. But the men sat like stocks +and stones while he talked. Scarcely a word could be got out of them, and +George felt himself in an atmosphere of storm, guessing at dangers, +everywhere present, though not yet let loose--like the foul gases in the +pits under his feet. + +He behaved with a good deal of dignity, stifling his pride here and there +sufficiently to talk simply and well of the general state of trade, the +conditions of the coal industry in the West Mercian district, the +position of the masters, the published accounts of one or two large +companies in the district, and so on. But in the end he only felt his own +auger rising in answer to the sullenness of the men. Their sallow faces +and eyes weakened by long years of the pit expressed little--but what +there was spelt war. + +Nor did his visits to what might be called his own side give him much +more satisfaction. + +One man, a brawny "fireman," whom George had been long taught to regard +as one of the props of law and order in the district, was effusively and +honestly glad to see his employer. His wife hurried the tea, and George +drank and ate as heartily as his own luncheon would let him in company +with Macgregor and his very neat and smiling family. Nothing could be +more satisfactory than Macgregor's general denunciations of the Union and +its agent. Burrows, in his opinion, was a "drunken, low-livin scoundrel," +who got his bread by making mischief; the Union was entering upon a great +mistake in resisting the masters' proposals; and if it weren't for the +public-house and idleness there wasn't a man in Perth that couldn't live +_well_, ten per cent. reduction and all considered. Nevertheless, he did +not conceal his belief that battle was approaching, and would break out, +if not now, at any rate in the late summer or autumn. Times, too, were +going to be specially bad for the non-society men. The membership of the +Union had been running up fast; there had been a row that very morning at +the pit where he worked, the Union men refusing to go down in the same +cage with the blacklegs. He and his mates would have to put their backs +into it. Never fear but they would! Bullying might be trusted only to +make them the more "orkard." + +Nothing could have been more soothing than such talk to the average +employer in search of congenial opinions. But George was not the average +employer, and the fastidious element in him began soon to make him +uncomfortable. Sobriety is, no doubt, admirable, but he had no sooner +detected a teetotal cant in his companion than that particular axiom +ceased to matter to him. And to think poorly of Burrows might be a +salutary feature in a man's character, but it should be for some +respectable reason. George fidgeted on his chair while Macgregor told +the usual cock-and-bull stories of monstrous hotel-bills seen sticking +out of Burrows's tail-pockets, and there deciphered by a gaping +populace; and his mental discomfort reached its climax when Macgregor +wound up with the remark: + +"And _that_, Sir George, is where the money goes to!--not to the poor +starving women and children, I can tell yer, whose husbands are keepin +him in luxury. I've always said it. _Where's the accounts?_ I've never +seen no balance-sheet--_never!_" he repeated solemnly. They do say as +there's one to be seen at the 'lodge'--" + +"Why, of course there is, Macgregor," said George, with a nervous laugh, +as he got up to depart; "all the big Unions publish their accounts." + +The fireman's obstinate mouth and stubbly hair only expressed a more +pronounced scepticism. + +"Well, I shouldn't believe in em," he said, "if they did. I've niver seen +a balance-sheet, and I don't suppose I ever shall. Well, good-bye to you, +Sir George, and thank you kindly. Yo take my word, sir, if it weren't for +the public-house the men could afford to lose a trifle now and again to +let the masters make their fair profit!" + +And he looked behind him complacently at his neat cottage and +well-clothed children. + +But George walked away, impatient. + +"_His_ wages won't go down, anyway," he said to himself--for the wages of +the "firemen," whose work is of the nature of superintendence, hardly +vary with the state of trade. "And what suspicious idiocy about the +accounts!" + +His last visit was the least fortunate of any. The fireman in question, +Mark Dowse, Macgregor's chief rival in the village, was a keen Radical, +and George found him chuckling over his newspaper, and the defeat of the +Tory candidate in a recently decided County Council election. He received +his visitor with a surprise which George thought not untinged with +insolence. Some political talk followed, in which Dowse's Yorkshire wit +scored more than once at his employer's expense. Dowse, indeed, let +himself go. He was on the point of taking the examination for an +under-manager's certificate and leaving the valley. Hence there were no +strong reasons for servility, and he might talk as he pleased to a young +"swell" who had sold himself to reaction. George lost his temper +somewhat, was furiously ashamed of himself, and could only think of +getting out of the man's company with dignity. + +He was by no means clear, however, as he walked away from the cottage, +that he had succeeded in doing so. What was the good of trying to make +friends with these fellows? Neither in agreement nor in opposition had +he any common ground with them. Other people might have the gifts for +managing them; it seemed to him that it would be better for him to +take up the line at once that he had none. Fontenoy was right. Nothing +but a state of enmity was possible--veiled enmity at some times, open +at others. + +What were those voices on the slope above him? + +He was walking along a road which skirted his own group of pits. To his +left rose a long slope of refuse, partly grown over, ending in the "bank" +whereon stood the engine-house and winding-apparatus. A pathway climbed +the slope and made the natural ascent to the pit for people dwelling in +the scattered cottages on the farther side of it. + +Two men, he saw, were standing high up on the pathway, violently +disputing. One was Madan, his own manager, an excellent man of business +and a bitter Tory. The other was Valentine Burrows. + +As Tressady neared the road-entrance to the pathway the two men parted. +Madan climbed on towards the pit. Burrows ran down the path. + +As he approached the gate, and saw Tressady passing on the road, the +agent called: + +"Sir George Tressady!" + +George stopped. + +Burrows came quickly up to him, his face crimson. + +"Is it by your orders, Sir George, that Mr. Madan insults and browbeats +me when he meets me on a perfectly harmless errand to one of the men in +your engine-house?" + +"Perhaps Mr. Madan was not so sure as you were, Mr. Burrows, that the +errand _was_ a harmless one," said George, with a cool smile. + +By this time, however, Burrows was biting his lip, and very conscious +that he had made an impulsive mistake. + +"Don't imagine for a moment," he said hotly, "that Madan's opinion of +anything I may be doing matters one brass farthing to me! Only I give you +and him fair warning that if he blackguards me again in the way he has +done several times lately, I shall have him bound over." + +"He might survive it," said George. "But how will you manage it? You have +had ill-luck, rather, with the magistrates--haven't you?" + +He stood drawn up to his full height, thin, venomous, alert, rather +enjoying the encounter, which "let off the steam" of his previous +irritations. + +Burrows threw him a furious look. + +"You think that a damaging thing to say, do you, Sir George? Perhaps the +day will come--not so far off, neither--when the magistrates will be no +longer your creatures, but ours. Then we shall see!" + +"Well, prophecy is cheap," said George. "Console yourself with it, by +all means." + +The two men measured each other eye to eye. + +Then, unexpectedly, after the relief of his outburst, the philosopher's +instincts which were so oddly interwoven with the rest of Tressady's +nature reasserted themselves. + +"Look here," he said, in another manner, advancing a step. "I think this +is all great nonsense. If Madan has exceeded his duty, I will see to it. +And, meanwhile, don't you think it would be more worthy of us, as a +couple of rational beings, if, now we have met, we had a few serious +words on the state of things in this valley? You and I fought a square +fight at Malford--you at least said as much. Why can't we fight a square +fight here?" + +Burrows eyed him doubtfully. He was leaning on his stick, recovering +breath and composure. George noticed that since the Malford election, +even he had lost youth and looks. He had the drunkard's skin and the +drunkard's eyes. Yet there were still the make and proportions of the +handsome athlete. He was now a man of about thirty-two; but in his first +youth he had carried the miner's pick for some four or five years, and +during the same period had been one of the most famous football-players +of the county. As George knew, he was still the idol of the local clubs, +and capable in his sober spells of amazing feats both of strength and +endurance. + +"Well, I have no objection to some conversation with you," said Burrows, +at last, slowly. + +"Let's walk on, then," said George. + +And they walked past the gate of Ferth, towards the railway-station, +which was some two miles off. + +About an hour later the two men returned along the same road. Both had an +air of tension; both were rather pale. + +"Well, it comes to this," said George, as he stopped beside his own gate, +"you believe our case--the badness of trade, the disappearance of +profits, pressure of contracts, and all the rest of it--and you still +refuse on your part to bear the smallest fraction of the burden? You will +claim all you can get in good times--you will give back nothing in bad?" + +"That is so," said Burrows, deliberately; "that is so, _precisely_. We +will take no risks; we give our labour and in return the workman must +live. Make the consumer pay, or pay yourselves out of your good +years"--he turned imperceptibly towards the barrack-like house on the +hill. "We don't care a ha'porth which it is!--only don't you come on +the man who risks his life, and works like a galley-slave five days a +week for a pittance of five-and-twenty shillings, or thereabouts, to +pay--for he _won't_. He's tired of it. Not till you starve him into it, +at any rate!" + +George laughed. + +"One of the best men in the village has been giving me his opinion this +afternoon that there isn't a man in that place"--he pointed to it--"that +couldn't live, and live well--aye, and take the masters' terms +to-morrow--but for the drink!" + +His keen look ran over Burrows from head to foot. + +"And I know who _that_ is," said Burrows, with a sneer. "Well, I can tell +you what the rest of the men in that place think, and it's this: that the +man in that village who _doesn't_ drink is a mean skunk, who's betraying +his own flesh and blood to the capitalists! Oh! you may preach at us till +you're black in the face, but drink we _shall_ till we get the control of +our own labour. For, look here! Directly we cease to drink--directly we +become good boys on your precious terms--the standard of life falls, down +come wages, and _you_ sweep off our beer-money to spend on your +champagne. Thank you, Sir George! but we're not such fools as we +look--and that don't suit us! Good-day to you." + +And he haughtily touched his hat in response to George's movement, and +walked quickly away. + + * * * * * + +George slowly mounted his own hill. The chequered April day was +declining, and the dipping sun was flooding the western plain with quiet +light. Rooks were circling round the hill, filling the air with +long-drawn sound. A cuckoo was calling on a tree near at hand, and the +evening was charged with spring scents--scents of leaf and grass, of +earth and rain. Below, in an oak copse across the road, a stream rushed; +and from a distance came the familiar rattle and thud of the pits. + +George stood still a moment under a ragged group of Scotch firs--one of +the few things at Ferth that he loved--and gazed across the Cheshire +border to the distant lines of Welsh hills. The excitement of his talk +with Burrows was subsiding, leaving behind it the obstinate resolve of +the natural man. He should tell his uncles there was nothing for it but +to fight it out. Some blood must be let; somebody must be master. + +What poor limited fools, after all, were the best of the working men--how +incapable of working out any serious problem, of looking beyond their own +noses and the next meal! Was he to spend his life in chronic battle with +them--a set of semi-civilised barbarians--his countrymen in nothing but +the name? And for what cause--to what cry? That he might defend against +the toilers of this wide valley a certain elegant house in Brook Street, +and find the means to go on paying his mother's debts?--such debts as he +carried the evidence of, at that moment, in his pocket. + +Suddenly there swept over his mind with pricking force the thought of +Mary Batchelor at her door, blind with weeping and pain--of the poor boy, +dead in his prime. Did those two figures stand for the _realities_ at +the base of things--the common labours, affections, agonies, which +uphold the world? + +His own life looked somehow poor and mean to him as he turned back to it. +The Socialist of course--Burrows--would say that he and Letty and his +mother were merely living, and dressing, and enjoying themselves, paying +butlers, and starting carriages out of the labour and pain of +others--that Jamie Batchelor and his like risked and brutalised their +strong young lives that Lady Tressady and her like might "jig and amble" +through theirs. + +Pure ignorant fanaticism, no doubt! But he was not so ready as usual to +shelter himself under the big words of controversy. Fontenoy's favourite +arguments had momentarily no savour for a kind of moral nausea. + +"I begin to see it was a 'cursed spite' that drove me into the business +at all," he said to himself, as he stood under the trees. + +What he was really suffering from was an impatience of new +conditions--perhaps surprise that he was not more equal to them. Till his +return home--till now, almost--he had been an employer and a coal-owner +by proxy. Other people had worked for him, had solved his problems for +him. Then a transient impulse had driven him home--made him accept +Fontenoy's offer--worse luck!--at least, Letty apart! The hopefulness and +elation about himself, his new activities, and his Parliamentary +prospects, that had been his predominant mood in London seemed to him at +this moment of depression mere folly. What he really felt, he declared to +himself, was a sort of cowardly shrinking from life and its tests--the +recognition that at bottom he was a weakling, without faiths, without +true identity. + +Then the quick thought-process, as it flowed on, told him that there are +two things that protect men of his stamp from their own lack of moral +stamina: perpetual change of scene, that turns the world into a +spectacle--and love. He thought with hunger of his travel-years; holding +away from him, as it were, for a moment the thought of his marriage. + +But only for a moment. It was but a few weeks since a woman's life had +given itself wholly into his hands. He was still thrilling under the +emotion and astonishment of it. Tender, melting thoughts flowed upon him. +His little Letty! Had he ever thought her perfect, free from natural +covetousness and weaknesses? What folly! _He_ to ask for the grand style +in character! + +He looked at his watch. How long he had left her! Let him hurry, and make +his peace. + +However, just as he was turning, his attention was caught by something +that was passing on the opposite hillside. The light from the west was +shining full on a white cottage with a sloping garden. The cottage +belonged to the Wesleyan minister of the place, and had been rented by +Burrows for the last six months. And just as George was turning away he +saw Burrows come out of the door with a burden--a child, or a woman +little larger than a child--in his arms. He carried her to an armchair +which had been placed on the little grass-plat. The figure was almost +lost in the chair, and sat motionless while Burrows brought cushions and +a stool. Then a baby came to play on the grass, and Burrows hung over the +back of the chair, bending so as to talk to the person in it. + +"Dying?" said George to himself. "Poor devil! he must hate something." + + * * * * * + +He sped up the hill, and found Letty still on the sofa and in the last +pages of her novel. She did not resent his absence apparently,--a +freedom, so far, from small exaction for which he inwardly thanked her. +Still, from the moment that she raised her eyes as he came in, he saw +that if she was not angry with him for leaving her alone, her mind was +still as sore as ever against him and fortune on other accounts--and his +revived ardour drooped. He gave her an account of his adventures, but she +was neither inquiring nor sympathetic; and her manner all the evening had +a nervous dryness that took away the pleasure of their _tete-a-tete._ Any +old friend of Letty's, indeed, could hardly have failed to ask what had +become of that small tinkling charm of manner, that girlish flippancy and +repartee, that had counted for so much in George's first impressions of +her? They were no sooner engaged than it had begun to wane. Was it like +the bird or the flower, that adorns itself only for the wooing time, and +sinks into relative dinginess when the mating effort is over? + +On this particular evening, indeed, she was really absorbed half the time +in gloomy thoughts of Lady Tressady's behaviour and the poorness of her +own prospects. She lay on the sofa again after dinner--her white slimness +and bright hair showing delicately against the cushions--playing still +with her novel, while George read the newspapers. Sometimes she glanced +at him unsteadily, with a pinching of the lips. But it was not her way to +invite a scene. + +Late at night he went up to his dressing-room. + +As he entered it Letty was talking to her maid. He stopped involuntarily +in the darkness of his own room, and listened. What a contrast between +this Letty and the Letty of the drawing-room! They were chattering fast, +discussing Lady Tressady, and Lady Tressady's gowns, and Lady Tressady's +affairs. What eagerness, what malice, what feminine subtlety and +acuteuess! After listening for a few seconds, it seemed to him as though +a score of new and ugly lights had been thrown alike upon his mother and +on human nature. He stole away again without revealing himself. + +When he returned the room was nearly dark, and Letty was lying high +against her pillows, waiting for him. Suddenly, after she had sent her +maid away, she had felt depressed and miserable, and had begun to cry. +And for some reason hardly clear to herself she had lain pining for +George's footstep. When he came in she looked at him with eyes still +wet, reproaching him gently for being late. + +In the dim light, surrounded with lace and whiteness, she was a pretty +vision; and George stood beside her, responding and caressing. + +But that black depth in his nature, of which he had spoken to her--which +he had married to forget--was, none the less, all ruffled and vocal. For +the first time since Letty had consented to marry him he did not think or +say to himself, as he looked at her, that he was a lucky man, and had +done everything for the best. + + + + +CHAPTER X + + +Thus, with the end of the honeymoon, whatever hopes or illusions George +Tressady had allowed himself in marrying, were already much bedimmed. His +love-dream had been meagre and ordinary enough. But even so, it had not +maintained itself. + +Nevertheless, such impressions and emotions pass. The iron fact of +marriage outstays them, tends always to modify, and, at first, to +conquer them. + +Upon the Tressadys' return to London, Letty, at any rate, endeavoured +to forget her great defeat of the honeymoon in the excitement of +furnishing the house in Brook Street. Certainly there could be no +question, in spite of all her high speech to Miss Tulloch and others, +that in her first encounter with Lady Tressady, Lady Tressady had won +easily. Letty had forgotten to reckon on the hard realities of the +filial relation, and could only think of them now, partly with +exasperation, partly with despair. + +Lady Tressady, however, was for the moment somewhat subdued, and on the +return of the young people to town she did her best to propitiate Letty. +In Letty's eyes, indeed, her offence was beyond reparation. But, for the +moment, there was outward amity at least between them; which for Letty +meant chiefly that she was conscious of making all her purchases for the +house and planning all her housekeeping arrangements under a constant +critical inspection; and, moreover, that she was liable to find all her +afternoon-teas with particular friends, or those persons of whom she +wished to make particular friends, broken up by the advent of the +overdressed and be-rouged lady, who first put the guests to flight, and +was then out of temper because they fled. + +Meanwhile George found the Shapetsky matter extremely harassing. He put +on a clever lawyer; but the Shapetsky would have scorned to be +overmatched by anybody else's abilities, and very little abatement could +be obtained. Moreover, the creditor's temper had been roughened by a +somewhat unfortunate letter George had written in a hurry from Perth, and +he showed every sign of carrying matters with as high a hand as possible. + +Meanwhile, George was discovering, like any other landowner, how easy it +is to talk of selling land, how difficult to sell it. The buyer who would +once have bought was not now forthcoming; the few people who nibbled +were, naturally, thinking more of their own purses than Tressady's; and +George grew red with indignation over some of the offers submitted to him +by his country solicitor. With the payment of a first large instalment to +Shapetsky out of his ordinary account, he began to be really pressed for +money, just as the expenses of the Brook Street settling-in were at their +height. This pecuniary strain had a marked effect upon him. It brought +out certain features of character which he no doubt inherited from his +father. Old Sir William had always shown a scrupulous and petty temper +in money matters. He could not increase his possessions: for that he had +apparently neither brains nor judgment; nor could he even protect himself +from the more serious losses of business, for George found heavy debts in +existence--mortgages on the pits and so forth--when he succeeded. But as +the head of a household Sir William showed extraordinary tenacity and +spirit in the defence of his petty cash; and the exasperating +extravagance of the wife whom, in a moment of infatuation, he had been +cajoled into marrying, intensified and embittered a natural +characteristic. + +George so far resembled him that both at school and college he had been a +rather careful and abstemious boy. Probably the spectacle of his mother's +adventures had revealed to him very early the humiliations of the debtor. +At any rate, during his four years abroad he had never exceeded the +modest yearly sum he had reserved for himself on leaving England; and the +frugality of his personal expenditure had counted for something in the +estimates formed of him during his travels by competent persons. + +Nevertheless, at this beginning of household life he was still young and +callow in all that concerned the management of money; and it had never +occurred to him that his somewhat uncertain income of about four thousand +a year would not be amply sufficient for anything that he and Letty might +need; for housekeeping, for children--if children came--for political +expenses, and even for those supplementary presents to his mother which +he had all along recognised as inevitable. Now, however, what with the +difficulty he found in settling the Shapetsky affair, what with Letty's +demands for the house, and his revived dread of what his mother might be +doing, together with his overdrawn account and the position of his +colliery property, a secret fear of embarrassment and disaster began to +torment him, the offspring of a temperament which had never perhaps +possessed any real buoyancy. + +Occasionally, under the stimulus of this fear, he would leave the House +of Commons on a Wednesday or Saturday afternoon, walk to Warwick Square, +and appear precipitately in his mother's drawing-room, for the purpose of +examining the guests--or possible harpies--who might be gathered there. +He did his best once or twice to dislodge the "singer-fellow"--an elderly +gentleman with a flabby face and long hair, who seemed to George to be +equally boneless, physically and morally. Nevertheless, he was not to be +dislodged. The singer, indeed, treated the young legislator with a +mixture of deference and artistic; condescension, which was amusing or +enraging as you chose to take it. And once, when George attempted very +plain language with his mother, Lady Tressady went into hysterics, and +vowed that she would not be parted from her friends, not even by the +brutality of young married people who had everything they wanted, while +she was a poor lone widow, whose life was not worth living. The whole +affair was, so to speak, sordidly innocent. Mr. Fullerton--such was the +gentleman's name--wanted creature-comforts and occasional loans; Lady +Tressady wanted company, compliments, and "musical sketches'" for her +little tea-parties. Mrs. Fullerton was as ready as her husband to supply +the two former; and even the children, a fair-haired, lethargic crew, +painfully like their boneless father in Tressady's opinion, took their +share in the general exploitation of Tressady's mamma. Lady Tressady +meanwhile posed as the benefactor of genius in distress; and vowed, +moreover, that "poor dear Fullertori" was in no way responsible for her +recent misfortunes. The "reptile," and the "reptile" only, was to blame. + +After one of these skirmishes with his mother, George, ruffled and +disgusted, took his way home, to find Letty eagerly engaged in choosing +silk curtains for the drawing-room. + +"Oh! how lucky!" she cried, when she saw him. "Now you can help me +decide--_such_ a business!" + +And she led him into the drawing-room, where lengths of pink and green +brocade were pinned against the wall in conspicuous places. + +George admired, and gave his verdict in favour of a particular green. +Then he stooped to read the ticket on the corner of the pattern, and his +face fell. + +"How much will you want of this stuff, Letty?" he asked her. + +"Oh! for the two rooms, nearly fifty yards," said Letty, carelessly, +opening another bundle of patterns as she spoke. + +"It is twenty-six shillings a yard!" said George, rather gloomily, as he +fell, tired, into an armchair. + +"Well, yes, it _is_ dear. But then, it is so good that it will last an +age. I think I must have some of it for the sofa, too," said Letty, +pondering. + +George made no reply. + +Presently Letty looked up. + +"Why, George?--George, what _is_ the matter? Don't you want anything +pretty for this room? You never take any interest in it at all." + +"I'm only thinking, darling, what fortunes the upholsterers must make," +said George, his hands penthouse over his eyes. + +Letty pouted and flushed. The next minute she came to sit on the edge +of his chair. She was dressed--rather overdressed, perhaps--in a pale +blue dress whereof the inventive ruffles and laces pleased her own +critical mind extremely. George, well accustomed by now to the items in +his mother's bills, felt uncomfortably, as he looked at the elegance +beside him, that it was a question of guineas--many guineas. Then he +hated himself for not simply admiring her--his pretty little bride--in +her new finery. What was wrong with him? This beastly money had put +everything awry! + +Letty guessed shrewdly at what was the matter. She bit her lip, and +looked ready to cry. + +"Well, it is hard," she said, in a low, emphatic voice, "that we can't +please ourselves in a few trifles of this sort--when one thinks _why_!" + +George took her hand, and kissed it affectionately. + +"Darling, only just for a little--till I get out of this brute's +clutches. There are such pretty, cheap things nowadays--aren't there?" + +"Oh! if you want to have a South Kensington drawing-room," said Letty, +indignantly, "with four-penny muslin curtains and art pots, you can do +_that_ for nothing. But I'd rather go back to horsehair and a mahogany +table in the middle at once!" + +"You needn't wear 'greenery-yallery' gowns, you know." said George, +laughing; "that's the one unpardonable thing. Though, if you did wear +them, you'd become them." + +And he held her at arm's length that he might properly admire her +new dress. + +Letty, however, was not to be flattered out of her lawful dues in the +matter of curtains--that Lady Tressady's debts might be paid the sooner. +She threw herself into a long wrestle with George, half angry, half +plaintive, and in the end she wrung out of him much more considerable +matters than the brocades originally in dispute. Then George went down to +his study, pricked in his conscience, and vaguely sore with Letty. Why? +Women in his eyes were made for silken gauds and trinkets: it was the +price that men were bound to pay them for their society. He had watched +the same sort of process that had now been applied to himself many times +already in one or more of the Anglo-Indian households with which he had +grown familiar, and had been philosophically amused by it. But the little +comedy, transferred to his own hearth, seemed somehow to have lost humour +and point. + + * * * * * + +Still, with two young people, under thirty, just entering upon that +fateful second act of the play of life which makes or mars us all, +moments of dissatisfaction and depression--even with Shapetskys and Lady +Tressadys in the background--were but rare specks in the general sum of +pleasure. George had fallen once more under the Parliamentary illusion, +as soon as he was again within reach of the House of Commons and in +frequent contact with Fontenoy. The link between him and his strange +leader grew daily stronger as they sat side by side, through some +hard-fought weeks of Supply, throwing the force of their little group now +on the side of the Government, now on that of the Opposition, always +vigilant, and often successful. George became necessary to Fontenoy in a +hundred ways; for the younger man had a mass of _connaissances_,--to use +the irreplaceable French word,--the result of his more normal training +and his four years of intelligent travel, which Fontenoy was almost +wholly without. Many a blunder did George save his chief; and no one +could have offered his brains for the picking with a heartier goodwill. +On the other hand, the instinctive strength and acuteness of Fontenoy's +judgment were unmatched, according to Tressady's belief, in the House of +Commons. He was hardly ever deceived in a man, or in the significant +points of a situation. His followers never dreamt of questioning his +verdict on a point of tactics. They followed him blindly; and if the gods +sent defeat, no one blamed Fontenoy. But in success his grunt of approval +or congratulation rewarded the curled young aristocrats who made the +nucleus of his party as nothing else did; while none of his band ever +affronted or overrode him with impunity. He wielded a natural kingship, +and, the more battered and gnarled became his physical presence, the more +remarkable was his moral ascendency. + +One discouragement, however, he and his group suffered during the weeks +between Easter and Whitsuntide. They were hungry for battle, and the +best of the battle was for the moment denied them; for, owing to a number +of controverted votes in Supply and the slipping-in of two or three +inevitable debates on pressing matters of current interest, the Second +Reading of the Maxwell Bill was postponed till after Whitsuntide, when it +was certainly to take precedence. There was a good deal of grumbling in +the House, led by Fontenoy; but the Government could only vow that they +had no choice, and that their adversaries could not possibly be more +eager to fight than they were to be fought. + +Life, then, on this public side, though not so keen as it would be +presently, was still rich and stirring. And meanwhile society showed +itself gracious to the bride and bridegroom. Letty's marriage had made +her unusually popular for the time with her own acquaintance. For it +might be called success; yet it was not of too dazzling a degree. What, +therefore, with George's public and Parliamentary relations, the calls of +officials, the attentions of personal friends, and the good offices of +Mrs. Watton, who was loftily determined to "launch" her niece, Letty was +always well pleased with the look of her hall-table and the cards upon it +when she returned home in her new brougham from her afternoon round. She +left them there for George to see, and it delighted her particularly if +Lady Tressady came in during the interval. + +Meanwhile they dined with many folk, and made preliminary acquaintance +with the great ones of the land. Letty's vanity Dwelled within her as she +read over the list of her engagements. Nevertheless, she often came home +from her dinner-parties flat and disappointed. She did not feel that she +made way; and she found herself constantly watching the triumphs of other +women with annoyance or perplexity. What was wrong with her? Her dress +was irreproachable, and, stirred by this great roaring world, she +recalled for it the little airs and graces she had almost ceased to spend +on George. But she constantly found herself, as she thought, neglected; +while the slightest word or look of some happy person in a simple gown, +near by, had power to bring about her that flattering crowd of talkers +and of courtiers for which Letty pined. + +The Maxwells called very early on the newly wedded pair, and left an +invitation to dinner with their cards. But, to Letty's chagrin, she and +George were already engaged for the evening named, and when they duly +presented themselves at St. James's Square on a Sunday afternoon, it was +to find that the Maxwells were in the country. Once or twice in some +crowded room Letty or George had a few hurried words with Lady Maxwell, +and Marcella would try to plan a meeting. But what with her engagements +and theirs, nothing that she suggested could be done. + +"Ah! well, after Whitsuntide," she said, smiling, to Letty one evening +that they had interchanged a few words of polite regret on the stairs at +some official party. "I will write to you in the country, if I may. Ferth +Place, is it not?" + +"No," said Letty, with easy dignity; "we shall not be at home,--not at +first, at any rate. We are going for two or three days to Mrs. Allison, +at Castle Luton." + +"Are you? You will have a pleasant time. Such a glorious old house!" + +And Lady Maxwell swept on; not so fast, however, but that she found time +to have a few words of Parliamentary chat with Tressady on the landing. + +Letty made her little speech about Castle Luton with a delightful sense +of playing the rare and favoured part. Nothing in her London career, so +far, had pleased her so much as Mrs. Allison's call and Mrs. Allison's +invitation. For, although on the few occasions when she had seen this +gentle, white-haired lady, Letty had never felt for one moment at ease +with her, still, there could be no question that Mrs. Allison was, +socially, distinction itself. She had a following among all parties. +For although she was Fontenoy's friend and inspirer, a strong +Church-woman, and a great aristocrat, she had that delicate, +long-descended charm which shuts the lions' mouths, and makes it +possible for certain women to rule in any company. Even those who were +most convinced that the Mrs. Allisons of this world are the chief +obstacles in the path of progress, deliberated when they were asked to +Castle Luton, and fell--protesting. And for a certain world, high-born, +cultivated, and virtuous, she was almost a figure of legend, so +widespread was the feeling she inspired, and so many were the +associations and recollections that clustered about her. + +So that when her cards, those of her son Lord Ancoats, and a little +accompanying note in thin French handwriting--Mrs. Allison had been +brought up in Paris--arrived, Letty had a start of pleasure. "To meet a +few friends of mine"--that meant, of course, one of _the_ parties. She +supposed it was Lord Fontenoy's doing. He was said to ask whom he would +to Castle Luton. Under the influence of this idea, at any rate, she bore +herself towards her husband's chief at their next meeting with an +effusion which made Fontenoy supremely uncomfortable. + +The week before Whitsuntide happened to be one of special annoyance for +Tressady. His reports from Ferth were steadily more discouraging; his +attempts to sell his land made no way; and he saw plainly that, if he was +to keep their London life going, to provide for Shapetsky's claims, and +to give Letty what she wanted for renovations at Ferth, he would have to +sell some of the very small list of good securities left him by his +father. Most young men in his place, perhaps, would have taken such a +thing with indifference; he brooded over it. "I am beginning to spend my +capital as income," he said to himself. "The strike will be on in July; +next half-year I shall get almost nothing from the pits; rents won't come +to much; Letty wants all kinds of things. How long will it be before I, +too, am in debt, like my mother, borrowing from this person and that?" + +Then he would make stern resolutions of economy, only to be baffled by +Letty's determination to have everything that other people had; above +all, not to allow her own life to be stinted because he had so foolishly +adopted his mother's debts. She said little; or said it with smiles and a +bridal standing on her rights not to be answered. But her persistence in +a particular kind of claim, and her new refusal to be taken into his +confidence and made the partner of his anxieties, raised a miserable +feeling in his mind as the weeks went on. + +"No!" she said to herself, all the time resenting bitterly what had +happened at Ferth; "if I let him talk to me about it, I shall be giving +in, and letting _her_ trample on me! If George will be so weak, he must +find the money somehow. Of course he can! I am not in the _least_ +extravagant. I am only doing what everybody expects me to do." + +Meanwhile this state of things did not make Lady Tressady any more +welcome in Brook Street, and there were symptoms of grievances and +quarrels of another sort. Lady Tressady heard that the young couple had +already given one or two tiny dinner-parties, and to none of them had she +been invited. One day that George had been obliged to go to Warwick +Square to consult her on business, he was suddenly overwhelmed with +reproaches on this point. + +"I suppose Letty thinks I should spoil her parties! She is ashamed of me, +perhaps"--Lady Tressady gave an angry laugh. "Oh! very well; but I should +like you and her to understand, George, that I have been a good deal more +admired in my time than ever Letty need expect to be!" + +And George's mother, in a surprising yellow tea-gown, threw herself back +on her chair, bridling with wrath and emotion. George declared, with good +temper, that he and Letty were well aware of his mother's triumphs; +whereupon Lady Tressady, becoming tearful, said she knew it wasn't a +pretty thing to say--of course it wasn't--but if one was treated unkindly +by one's only son and his wife, what could one do but assert oneself? + +George soothed her as best he could, and on his return home said +tentatively to Letty, that he believed it would please his mother if they +were to ask her to a small impromptu dinner of Parliamentary friends +which they were planning for the following Friday. + +"George!" exclaimed Letty, her eyes gleaming, "we can't ask her! I don't +want to say anything disagreeable, but you must see that people don't +like her--her dress is so _extraordinary_, and her manners--it sets +people against the house. I do think it's too bad that--" + +She turned aside with a sudden sob. George kissed her, and sympathised +with her; for he himself was never at ease now for an instant while his +mother was in the room. But the widening of the breach which Letty's +refusal brought about only made his own position between the two women +the more disagreeable to a man whose ideal of a home was that it should +be a place of perpetual soothing and amusement. + +On the very morning of their departure for Castle Luton matters reached a +small crisis. Letty, tired with some festivity of the night before, took +her breakfast in bed; and George, going upstairs toward the middle of the +morning to make some arrangement with her for the journey, found her just +come down, and walking up and down the drawing-room, her pale pink dress +sweeping the floor, her hands clasped behind her. She was very pale, and +her small lips were tightly drawn. + +He looked at her with astonishment. + +"What is the matter, darling?" + +"Oh! nothing," said Letty, trying to speak with sarcasm. "Nothing at all. +I have only just been listening to an account of the way in which your +mother speaks of me to her friends. I ought to be flattered, of course, +that she notices me at all! But I think I shall have to ask you to +_request_ her to put off her visit to Ferth a little. It could hardly +give either of us much enjoyment." + +George first pulled his moustaches, then tried, as usual, to banter or +kiss her into composure. Above all, he desired not to know what Lady +Tressady had said. But Letty was determined he should know. "She was +heard "--she began passionately, holding him at arm's length--"she was +heard saying to a _whole roomful_ of people yesterday, that I was +'pretty, of course--rather pretty--but _so_ second rate--and so +provincial! It was such a pity dear George had not waited till he had +been a few months in London. Still, of course, one could only make the +best of it!'" + +Letty mimicked her mother-in-law's drawling voice, two red spots burning +on either cheek the while, and her little fingers gripping George's arm. + +"I don't believe she ever said such things. Who told you so?" said +George, stiffening, his arm dropping from her waist. + +Letty tossed her head. + +"Never mind! I _ought_ to know, and it doesn't really matter how I know. +She _did_ say them." + +"Yes, it does matter," said George, quickly, walking away to the other +side of the room. "Letty! if you would only send away that woman Grier, +you can't think how much happier we should both be." + +Letty stood still, opening her blue eyes wide. + +"You want me--to get rid--of Grier," she said, "my own particular pet +maid? And why--please?" + +George had the courage to stick to his point, and the result was a heated +and angry scene--their first real quarrel--which ended in Letty's rushing +upstairs in tears, and declaring she would go _no_where. _He_ might go to +Castle Luton, if he pleased; she was far too agitated and exhausted to +face a houseful of strangers. + +The inevitable reconciliation, with its usual accompaniments of headache +and eau de cologne, took time, and they only just completed their +preparations and caught their appointed train. + +Meanwhile the storm of the day had taken all savour from Letty's +expectations, and made George feel the whole business an effort and a +weariness. Letty sat pale and silent in her corner, devoured with regrets +that she had not put on a thicker veil to hide the ravages of the +morning; while George turned over the pages of a political biography, and +could not prevent his mind from falling back again and again into dark +places of dread and depression. + + * * * * * + +"You are my earliest guests," said Mrs. Allison, as she placed a chair +for Letty beside herself, on the lawn at Castle Luton. "Except, indeed, +that Lady Maxwell and her little boy are here somewhere, roaming about. +But none of our other friends could get down till later. I am glad we +shall have a little quiet time before they come." + +"Lady Maxwell!" said Letty. "I had no idea they were coming. Oh, what a +lovely day! and how beautiful it all is!" she cried, as she sat down and +looked round her. The colour came back into her cheeks. She forgot her +determination to keep her veil down, and raised it eagerly. + +Mrs. Allison smiled. + +"We never look so well as in May--the river is so full, and the swans are +so white. Ah! I see Edgar has already taken Sir George to make friends +with them." + +And Letty, looking across the broad green lawn, saw the flash of a +brimming river and a cluster of white swans, beside which stood her +husband and a young man in a serge suit, who was feeding the swans with +bread--Lord Ancoats, no doubt, the happy owner of all this splendour. To +the left of their figures rose a stone bridge with a high, carved +parapet, and beyond the river she saw green hills and woods against a +radiant sky. Then, to her right was this wonderful yellowish pile of the +old house. She began to admire and exclaim about it with a great energy +and effusion, trying hard to say the correct and cultivated thing, and, +in fact, repeating with a good deal of exactness what she had heard said +of it by others. + +Her hostess listened to her praises with a gentle smile. Gentleness, +indeed, a rather sad gentleness, was the characteristic of Mrs. Allison. +It seemed to make an atmosphere about her--her delicate blanched head and +soft face, her small figure, her plain black dress, her hands in their +white ruffles. Her friends called it saintliness. At any rate, it set her +apart, giving her a peculiar ethereal dignity which made her formidable +in society to many persons who were not liable to shyness. Letty from the +beginning had felt her formidable. + +Yet nothing could be kinder or simpler than her manner. In response to +Letty's enthusiasms she let herself be drawn at once into speaking of her +own love for the house, and on to pointing out its features. + +"I am always telling these things to newcomers," she said, smiling. "And +I am not clever enough to make variations. But I don't mind, somehow, how +often I go through it. You see, this front is Tudor, and the south front +is a hundred years later, and both of them, they say, are the finest of +their kind. Isn't it wonderful that two men, a hundred years apart, +should each have left such a noble thing behind him. One inspired the +other. And then we--we poor moderns come after, and must cherish what +they left us as we best can. It's a great responsibility, don't you +think? to live in a beautiful house." + +"I'm afraid I don't know much about it," said Letty, laughing; "we live +in such a very ugly one." + +Mrs. Allison looked sympathetic. + +"Oh! but then, ugly ones have character; or they are pretty inside, or +the people one loves have lived in them. That would make any place a +House Beautiful. Aren't you near Perth?" + +"Yes; and I am afraid you'll think me _dreadfully_ discontented," +said Letty, with one of her little laughing airs; "but there really +isn't anything to make up in our barrack of a place. It's like a +blackened brick set up on end at the top of a hill. And then the +villages are so hideous." + +"Ah! I know that coal-country," said Mrs. Allison, gravely--"and I know +the people. Have you made friends with them yet?" + +"We were only there for our honeymoon. George says that next month the +whole place will be out on strike. So just now they hate us--they will +hardly look at us in the street. But, of course, we shall give away +things at Christmas." + +Mrs. Allison's lip twitched, and she shot a glance at the bride which +betrayed, for all her gentleness, the woman of a large world and much +converse with mankind. What a curious, hard little face was Lady +Tressady's under the outer softness of line and hue, and what an amazing +costume! Mrs. Allison had no quarrel with beautiful gowns, but the +elaboration, or, as one might say, the research of Letty's dress struck +her unpleasantly. The time that it must have taken to think out! + +Aloud she said: + +"Ah! the strike. Yes, I fear it is inevitable. Ancoats has some property +not very far from you, and we get reports. Poor fellows! if it weren't +for the wretched agitators who mislead them--but there, we mustn't talk +of these things. I see Lady Maxwell coming." + +And Mrs. Allison waved her hand to a tall figure in white with a child +beside it that had just emerged on the far distance of the lawn. + +"Is Lord Maxwell here, too?" asked Letty. + +"He is coming later. It seems strange, perhaps, that you should find them +here this Sunday, for Lord Fontenoy comes to-morrow, and the great fight +will be on so soon. But when I found that they were free, and that +Maxwell would like to come, I was only too glad. After all, rival +politicians in England can still meet each other, even at a crisis. +Besides, Maxwell is a relation of ours, and he was my boy's guardian--the +kindest possible guardian. Politics apart, I have the greatest respect +for him. And her too. Why is it always the best people in the world that +do the most mischief?" + +At the mention of Lord Fontenoy it had been Letty's turn to throw a +quick side look at Mrs. Allison. But the name was spoken in the quietest +and most natural way; and yet, if one analysed the tone, in a way that +did imply something exceptional, which, however, all the world knew, or +might know. + +"Is Lady Maxwell an old friend of yours, too?" asked Letty, longing to +pursue the subject, and vexed to see how fast the mother and child were +approaching. + +"Only since her marriage. To see her and Maxwell together is really a +poem. If only she wouldn't identify herself so hotly, dear woman! with +everything he does and wishes in politics. There is no getting her to +hear a word of reason. She is another Maxwell in petticoats. And it +always seems to me so unfair. Maxwell without beauty and without +petticoats is quite enough to fight! Look at that little fellow with his +flowers!--such an oddity of a child!" + +Then she raised her voice. + +"My dear, what a ramble you must have made. Come and have a shady chair +and some tea." + +For answer Marcella, laughing, held up a glorious bunch of cuckoo-pint +and marsh marigold, while little Hallin at her skirts waved another +trophy of almost equal size. The mother's dark face was flushed with +exercise and pleasure. As she moved over the grass, the long folds of a +white dress falling about her, the flowers in her hand, the child beside +her, she made a vision of beauty lovely in itself and lovely in all that +it suggested. Frank joy and strength, happiness, purity of heart--these +entered with her. One could almost see their dim heavenly shapes in the +air about her. + +Neither Letty nor Mrs. Allison could take their eyes from her. Perhaps +she knew it. But if she did, it made no difference to her perfect ease of +bearing. She greeted Letty kindly. + +"You didn't expect to see me here, did you, Lady Tressady? But it is the +unexpected that happens." + +Then she put her hand on Mrs. Allison's shoulder, bending her height to +her small hostess. + +"What a day, and what a place! Hallin and I have been over hill and dale. +But he is getting such a botanist, the little monkey! He will hardly +forgive me because I forgot one of the flowers we found out yesterday in +his botany book." + +"She said it was 'Robin-run-in-the-'edge,' and it isn't--it's 'edge +mustard," said Hallin, severely, holding up a little feathery stalk. + +Mrs. Allison shook her head, endeavouring to suit her look to the gravity +of the offence. + +"Mother must learn her lessons better, mustn't she? Go and shake hands, +little man, with Lady Tressady." + +Hallin went gravely to do as he was told. Then he stood on one foot, and +looked Letty over with a considering eye. + +"Are you going to a party?" he said suddenly, putting out a small and +grimy finger, and pointing to her dress. + +"Hallin! come here and have your tea," said his mother, hastily. Then she +turned to Letty with the smile that had so often won Maxwell a friend. + +"I am sorry to say that he has a rooted objection to anything that isn't +rags in the way of clothes. He entirely declined to take me across the +river till I had rolled up my lace cloak and put it in a bush. And he +won't really be friends with me again till we have both got back to the +scarecrow garments we wear at home." + +"Oh! children are so much happier when they are dirty," said Letty, +graciously, pleased to feel herself on these easy terms with her two +companions. "What beautiful flowers he has! and what an astonishing +little botanist he seems to be!" + +And she seated herself beside Hallin, using all her blandishments to make +friends with him, which, however, did not prove to be an easy matter. For +when she praised his flowers, Hallin only said, with his mouth full: "Oh! +but mammy's bunch is _hever_ so much bigger;" and when she offered him +cake, the child would sturdily put the cake away, and hold it and her at +arm's length till his mute look across the table had won his mother's nod +of permission. + +Letty at last thought him an odd, ill-mannered child, and gave up +courting him, greatly to Hallin's satisfaction. He edged closer and +closer to his mother, established himself finally in her pocket, and +browsed on all the good things with which Mrs. Allison provided him, +undisturbed. + +"How late they are!" said Marcella, looking at her watch. "Tell me +the names again, dear lady"--she bent forward, and laid her hand +affectionately on Mrs. Allison's knee. "Your parties are always a +work of art." + +Mrs. Allison flushed a little, as though she liked the compliment, and +ran laughingly through the names. + +"Lord and Lady Maxwell." + +"Ah!" said Marcella, "the least said about them the soonest +mended. Go on." + +"Lord and Lady Cathedine." + +Marcella made a face. + +"Poor little thing! I always think of the remark about the Queen in +'Alice in Wonderland.' 'A little kindness, and putting her hair in +curl-papers, would do wonders for her.' She is so limp and thin and +melancholy. As for him--isn't there a race or a prize-fight we can +send him to?" + +Mrs. Allison tapped her lightly on the lips. + +"I won't go on unless my guests are taken prettily." + +Marcella kissed the delicate wrinkled hand. + +"I'll be good. What do you keep such an air here for? It gets into +one's head." + +Letty Tressady, indeed, was looking on with a feeling of astonishment. +These merry, childlike airs had absolutely no place in her conception of +Lady Maxwell. Nor could she know that Mrs. Allison was one of the very +few people in the world to whom Marcella was ever drawn to show them. + +"Sir Philip Wentworth," pursued Mrs. Allison, smiling. "Say anything +malicious about him, if you can!" + +"Don't provoke me. What a mercy I brought a volume of 'Indian Studies' in +my bag! I will go up early, before dinner, and finish them." + +"Then there is Madeleine Penley, and Elizabeth Kent." + +A quick involuntary expression crossed Marcella's face. Then she drew +herself up with dignity, and crossed her hands primly on her lap. + +"Let me understand. Are you going to protect me from Lady Kent this time? +Because, last time you threw me to the wolves in the most dastardly way." + +Mrs. Allison laughed out. + +"On the contrary, we all enjoyed your skirmish with her in November so +much, we shall do our best to provoke another in May." + +Marcella shook her head. + +"I haven't the energy to quarrel with a fly. And as for Aldous--please +warn his lady at dinner that he may go to sleep upon her shoulder!" + +"You poor thing!"--Mrs. Allison put out a sympathetic hand. "Are you so +tired? Why will you turn the world upside down?" + +Marcella took the hand lightly in both hers. + +"Why will you fight reform?" + +And the eyes of the two women met, not without a sudden grave passion. +Then Marcella dropped the hand, and said, smiling: + +"Castle Luton isn't full yet. Who else?" + +"Oh! some young folk--Charlie Naseby." + +"A nice boy--a very nice boy--not half such a coxcomb as he looks. Then +the Levens--I know the Levens are coming, for Betty told me that she got +out of two other engagements as soon as you asked her." + +"Oh! and, by the way, Mr. Watton--Harding Watton," said Mrs. Allison, +turning slightly towards Lady Tressady. + +The exclamation on Lady Maxwell's lips was checked by something she saw +on her hostess's face, and Letty eagerly struck in: + +"Harding coming?--my cousin? I am so glad. I suppose I oughtn't to say +it, but he is such a _clever_, such an _agreeable_, creature. But you +know the Wattons, don't you, Lady Maxwell?" + +Marcella was busying herself with Hallin's tea. + +"I know Edward Watton," she said, turning her beautiful clear look on +Letty. "He is a real friend of mine." + +"Oh! but Harding is _much_ the cleverer," said Letty. And pleased both +to find the ball of talk in her hands, and to have the chance of +glorifying a relation in this world of people so much bigger than +herself, she plunged into an extravagant account--all adjectives and +superlatives--of Harding Watton's charms and abilities, to which Lady +Maxwell listened in silence. + +"Tactless!" thought Mrs. Allison, with vexation, but she did not know +how to stop the stream. In truth, since she had given Lord Fontenoy +leave to invite Harding Watton she had had time to forget the +invitation, and she was sorry now to think of his housing with the +Maxwells. For Watton had been recently Lord Fontenoy's henchman and +agent in a newspaper attack upon the Bill, and upon Maxwell personally, +that even Mrs. Allison had thought violent and unfair. Well, it was not +her fault. But Lady Tressady ought to have better information and better +sense than to be chattering like this. She was just about to interpose, +when Marcella held up her hand. + +"I hear the carriages!" + +The hostess hastened towards the house, and Marcella followed her, with +Hallin at her skirts. Letty looked after Lady Maxwell with the same +mixture of admiration and jealous envy she had felt several times +before. "I don't feel that I shall get on with her," she said to +herself, impatiently. "But I don't think I want to. George took her +measure at once." + +Part of this reflection, however, was not true. Letty's ambition would +have been very glad to "get on" with Marcella Maxwell. + + * * * * * + +Just as his wife was ready for dinner, and Grier had disappeared, George +entered Letty's room. She was standing before a tall glass, putting the +last touches to her dress--smoothing here, pinning there, turning to this +side and to that. George, unseen himself, stood and watched her--her +alternate looks of anxiety and satisfaction, her grace, the shimmering +folds of the magnificent wedding-dress in which she had adorned herself. + +He, however, was neither happy nor gay. But he had come in feeling that +he must make an effort--many efforts, if their young married life was to +be brought back to that level of ease and pleasure which he had once +taken for granted, and which now seemed so hard to maintain. If that ease +and pleasure were ultimately to fail him, what should he do? He shrank +impatiently from the idea. Then he would scoff at himself. How often had +he read and heard that the first year of marriage is the most difficult. +Of course it must be so. Two individualities cannot fuse without turmoil, +without heat. Let him only make his effort. + +So he walked up to her and caught her in his arms. + +"Oh, George!--my hair!--and my flowers!" + +"Never mind," he said, almost with roughness. "Put your head there. Say +you hate the thought of our day, as I do! Say there shall never be one +like it again! Promise me!" + +She felt the beating of his heart beneath her cheek. But she stood +silent. His appeal, his unwonted agitation, revived in her all the anger +and irritation that had begun to prey upon her thoughts. It was all very +well, but why were they so pinched and uncomfortable? Why must +everybody--Mrs. Allison, Lady Maxwell, a hundred others--have more +wealth, more scope, more consideration than she? It was partly his fault. + +So she gradually drew herself away, pushing him softly with her small +gloved hand. + +"I am sure I hate quarrelling," she said. "But there! Oh, George! don't +let's talk of it any more! And look what you have done to my poor hair. +You dear, naughty boy!" + +But though she called him "Dear," she frowned as she took off her gloves +that she might mend what he had done. + +George thrust his hands into his pockets, walked to the window, and +waited. As he descended the great stairs in her wake he wished Castle +Luton and its guests at the deuce. What pleasure was to be got out of +grimacing and posing at these country-house parties? And now, according +to Letty, the Maxwells were here. A great _gene_ for everybody! + + + + +CHAPTER XI + + +"That lady sitting by Sir George? What! Lady Maxwell? No--the other side? +Oh! that's Lady Leven. Don't you know her? She's tremendous fun!" + +And the dark-eyed, rosy-cheeked young man who was sitting beside Letty +nodded and smiled across the table to Betty Leven, merely by way of +reminding her of his existence. They had greeted before dinner--a +greeting of comrades. + +Then he turned back, with sudden decorum, to this Lady Tressady, whom he +had been commissioned to take in to dinner. "Quite pretty, but +rather--well, ordinary!" he said to himself, with a critical coolness +bred of much familiarity with the best things of Vanity Fair. He had been +Ancoats's friend at Cambridge, and was now disporting himself in the +Guards, but still more--as Letty of course assumed--in the heart of the +English well-born world. She knew that he was Lord Naseby, and that some +day he would be a marquis. A halo, therefore, shone about him. At the +same time, she had a long experience of young men, and, if she flattered +him, it was only indirectly, by a sort of teasing aggression that did not +allow him to take his attention from her. + +"I declare you are better than any peerage!" she said to him presently, +when he had given her a short biography, first of Lord Cathedine, who was +sitting opposite, then of various other members of the company. "I should +like to tie you to my fan when I go out to dinner." + +"Would you?" said the young man, drily. "Oh! you will soon know all you +want to know." + +"How are poor little people from Yorkshire to find their way about in +this big world? You are all so dreadfully absorbed in each other. In the +first place, you all marry each other." + +"Do we?--though I don't quite understand who 'we' means. Well, one +must marry somebody, I suppose, and cousins are less trouble than +other people." + +Involuntarily, the young man's eyes travelled along the table to a fair +girl on the opposite side, dazzlingly dressed in black. She was wielding +a large fan of black feathers, which threw both hair and complexion into +amazing relief; and she seemed to be amusing herself in a nervous, +spasmodic way with Sir Frank Leven. Letty noticed his glance. + +"Oh! you have not earned your testimonial yet, not by any manner of +means," she said. "That is Lady Madeleine Penley, isn't it? Is she a +relation of Mrs. Allison's?" + +"She is a cousin. That is her mother, Lady Kent, sitting beside poor +Ancoats. Such an old character! By the end of dinner she will have got to +the bottom of Ancoats, or know the reason why." + +"Is Lord Ancoats such a mystery?" said Letty, running an inquisitive +eye over the black front, sharp nose, and gorgeously bejewelled neck +of a somewhat noisy and forbidding old lady sitting on the right hand +of the host. + +Young Naseby's expression in answer rather piqued her. There was a quick +flash of something that was instantly suppressed, and the youth said +composedly, + +"Oh! we are all mysteries for Lady Kent." + +But Letty noticed that his eyes strayed back to Lord Ancoats, and then +again to Lady Madeleine. He seemed to be observing them, and Letty's +sharpness at once took the hint. No doubt the handsome, large-featured +girl was here to be "looked at." Probably a good many maidens would be +passed in review before this young Sultan made his choice! By the way he +must be a good deal older than George had imagined. Clearly he left +college some time ago. What a curious face he had--a small, crumpled +face, with very prominent blue eyes; curly hair of a reddish colour, +piled high, as though for effect, above his white brow; together with a +sharp chin and pointed moustache, which gave him the air of an old French +portrait. He was short in stature, but at the same time agile and +strongly built. He wore one or two fine old rings, which drew attention +to the delicacy of his hands; and his manner struck her as at once morose +and excitable. Letty regarded him with involuntary respect as the son of +Mrs. Allison--much more as the master of Castle Luton and fifty thousand +a year. But if he had not been the master of Castle Luton she would have +probably thought, and said, that he had a disagreeable Bohemian air. + +"Haven't you really made acquaintance with Lady Kent?" said Lord Naseby, +returning to the charge his laziness was somewhat at a loss for +conversation. "I should have thought she was the person one could least +escape knowing in the three kingdoms." + +"I have seen her, of course," said Letty, lightly, though, alas! untruly. +"But I am afraid you can hardly realise that I have only been three short +seasons in London--two with an old aunt, who never goes out, in Cavendish +Square, poor dull old dear! and another with Mrs. Watton, of Malford." + +"Oh! with Mrs. Watton, of Malford," said Lord Naseby, vaguely. Then he +became suddenly aware that Lady Leven, on the other side of the table, +was beckoning to him. He leant across, and they exchanged a merry war of +words about something of which Letty knew nothing. + +Letty, rather incensed, thought him a puppy, drew herself up, and looked +round at the ex-Governor beside her. She saw a fine head, the worn yellow +face and whitened hair of a man who has suffered under a hot climate, and +an agreeable, though somewhat courtly, smile. Sir Philip Wentworth was +not troubled with the boyish fastidiousness of Lord Naseby. He perceived +merely that a pretty young woman wished to make friends with him, and met +her wish at once. Moreover, he identified her as the wife of that +"promising and well-informed fellow, Tressady," with whom he had first +made friends in India, and had now--just before dinner--renewed +acquaintance in the most cordial fashion. + +He talked graciously to the wife, then, of Tressady's abilities and +Tressady's career. Letty at first liked it. Then she was seized with a +curious sense of discomfort. + +Her eyes wandered towards the head of the table, where George was +talking--why! actually talking earnestly, and as though he were enjoying +himself, to Lady Maxwell, whose noble head and neck, rising from a silver +white dress, challenged a great Genoese Vandyck of a Marehesa Balbi which +was hanging just behind her, and challenged it victoriously. + +So other people thought and said these things of George? Letty +was for a moment sharply conscious that they had not occupied much +place in her mind since her marriage, or, for the matter of that, +since her engagement. She had taken it for granted that he was +"distinguished"--that was part of the bargain. Only, she never seemed as +yet to have had either time or thought to give to those parts and +elements in his life which led people to talk of him as this old Indian +was doing. + +Curtains, carpets, gowns, cabinets; additions to Ferth; her own effect in +society; how to keep Lady Tressady in her place--of all these things she +had thought, and thought much. But George's honourable ambitions, the +esteem in which he was held, the place he was to make for himself in the +world of men--in thinking of _these_ her mind was all stiff and +unpractised. She was conscious first of a moral prick, then of a certain +irritation with other people. + +Yet she could not help watching George wistfully. He looked tired and +pale, in spite of the animation of his talk. Well! no doubt she looked +pale too. Some of the words and phrases of their quarrel flashed across +her. In this beautiful room, with its famous pictures and its historical +associations, amid this accumulated art and wealth, the whole thing was +peculiarly odious to remember. Under the eyes of Vandyck's Marchesa one +would have liked to think of oneself as always dignified and refined, +always elegant and calm. + +Then Letty had a revulsion, and laughed at herself. + +"As if these people didn't have tempers, and quarrel about money! Of +course they do! And if they don't--well, we all know how easy it is to be +amiable on fifty thousand a year." + + * * * * * + +After dinner Mrs. Allison led the way to the "Green Drawing-room." This +room, hung with Gainsborough portraits, was one of the sights of the +house, and tonight Marcella Maxwell especially looked round her on +entering it, with enchantment. + +"You happy people!" she said to Mrs. Allison. "I never come into this +room without anxiously asking myself whether I am fit to make one of the +company. I look at my dress, or I am doubtful about my manners, or I wish +someone had taught me to dance the minuet!" + +"Yes," said Betty Leven, running up to a vast picture, a life-size family +group, which covered the greater part of the farther wall of the room. +"What a vulgar, insignificant chit one feels oneself without cap or +powder!--without those ruffles, or those tippets, or those quilted +petticoats! Mrs. Allison, _may_ my maid come down to-morrow while we are +at dinner and take the pattern of those ruffles? No--no! she sha'n't! +Sacrilege! You pretty thing!" she said, addressing a figure--the figure +of a girl in white with thin virginal arms and bust, who seemed to be +coming out of the picture, almost to be already out of it and in the +room. "Come and talk to me. Don't think any more of your father and +mother there. You have been curtsying to them for a hundred years; and +they are rather dull, stupid people, after all. Come and tell us secrets. +Tell us what you have seen in this room--all the foolish people making +love, and the sad people saying good-bye." + +Betty was kneeling on a carved chair, her pretty arms leaning on the back +of it, her eyes fixed half-in laughter, half in sentiment, on the figure +in the picture. + +Lady Maxwell suddenly moved closer to her, and Letty heard her say in a +low voice, as she put her hand on Lady Leven's arm: + +"Don't, Betty! _don't!_ It was in this room he proposed to her, and +it was in this room he said goodbye. Maxwell has often told me. I +believe she never comes in here alone--only for ceremony and when +there is a crowd." + +A look of consternation crossed Lady Leven's lively little face. She +glanced shyly towards Mrs. Allison. That lady had moved hastily away from +the group in front of the picture. She was sitting by herself, looking +straight before her, with a certain stiffness, her thin hands crossed on +her knee. Betty impetuously went towards her, and was soon sitting on a +stool beside her, chattering to her and amusing her. + +Meanwhile Marcella invited Lady Tressady to come and sit with her on a +sofa beneath the great picture. + +Letty followed her, settled her satin skirts in their most graceful +folds, put one little foot on a Louis Quinze footstool which seemed +to invite it, and then began to inform herself about the house and +the family. + +At the beginning of their talk it was clear that Lady Maxwell wished to +ingratiate herself. A friendly observer would have thought that she was +trying to make a stranger feel more at ease in this house and circle, +where she herself was a familiar guest. Betty Leven, catching sight of +the pair from the other side of the room, said to herself, with inward +amusement, that Marcella was "realising the wife." + +At any rate, for some time Lady Maxwell talked with sympathy, with +effusion even, to her companion. In the first place she told her the +story of their hostess. + +Thirty years before, Mrs. Allison, the daughter and heiress of a +Leicestershire squire, had married Henry Allison, old Lord Ancoats's +second son, a young captain in the Guards. They enjoyed three years of +life together; then the chances of a soldier's career, as interpreted by +two high-minded people, took Henry Allison out to an obscure African +coast, to fight one of the innumerable "little wars" of his country. He +fell, struck by a spear, in a single-file march through some nameless +swamp; and a few days afterwards the words of a Foreign Office telegram +broke a pining woman's heart. + +Old Lord Ancoats's death, which followed within a month or two, was +hastened by the shock of his son's loss; and before the year was out the +eldest son, who was sickly and unmarried, also died, and Mrs. Allison's +boy, a child of two, became the owner of Castle Luton. The mother saw +herself called upon to fight down her grief, to relinquish the +quasi-religious life she had entered upon, and instead to take her boy to +the kingdom he was to rule, and bring him up there. + +"And for twenty-two years she has lived a wonderful life here," said +Marcella; "she has been practically the queen of a whole countryside, +doing whatever she pleased, the mother and friend and saint of everybody. +It has been all very paternal and beautiful, and--abominably Tory and +tyrannous! Many people, I suppose, think it perfect. Perhaps I don't. But +then, I know very well I can't possibly disagree with her a tenth part as +strongly as she disagrees with me." + +"Oh! but she admires you so much," cried Letty, with effusion; "she +thinks you mean so nobly!" + +Marcella opened her eyes, involuntarily wondering a little what Lady +Tressady might know about it. + +"Oh! we don't hate each other," she said, rather drily, "in spite of +politics. And my husband was Ancoats's guardian." + +"Dear me!" said Letty. "I should think it wasn't easy to be guardian to +fifty thousand a year." + +Marcella did not answer--did not, indeed, hear. Her look had stolen +across to Mrs. Allison--a sad, affectionate look, in no way meant for +Lady Tressady. But Letty noticed it. + +"I suppose she adores him," she said. + +Marcella sighed. + +"There was never anything like it. It frightens one to see." + +"And that, of course, is why she won't marry Lord Fontenoy?" + +Marcella started, and drew away from her companion. + +"I don't know," she said stiffly; "and I am sure that no one ever dared +to ask her." + +"Oh! but of course it's what everyone says," said Letty, gay and +unabashed. "That's what makes it so exciting to come here, when one knows +Lord Fontenoy so very well." + +Marcella met this remark with a discouraging silence. + +Letty, however, was determined this time to make her impression. She +plunged into a lively and often audacious gossip about every person in +the room in turn, asking a number of intimate or impertinent questions, +and yet very seldom waiting for Marcella's reply, so anxious was she to +show off her own information and make her own comments. She let Marcella +understand that she suspected a great deal, in the matter of that +handsome Lady Madeleine. It was _immensely_ interesting, of course; but +wasn't Lord Ancoats a trifle wild?--she bent over and whispered in +Marcella's ears; was it likely that he would settle himself so +soon?--didn't one hear sad tales of his theatrical friends and the rest? +And what could one expect! As if a young man in such a position was not +certain to have his fling! And his mother would have to put up with it. +After all, men quieted down at last. Look at Lord Cathedine! + +And with an air of boundless knowledge she touched upon the incidents of +Lord Cathedine's career, hashing up, with skilful deductions of her own, +all that Lord Naseby had said or hinted to her at dinner. Poor Lady +Cathedine! didn't she look a walking skeleton, with her strange, +melancholy face, and every bone showing? Well, who could wonder! And when +one thought of their money difficulties, too! + +Lady Tressady lifted her white shoulders in compassion. + +By this time Marcella's black eyes were wandering insistently round the +room, searching for means of escape. Betty, far away, noticed her air, +and concluded that the "realisation" was making rapid, too rapid, +progress. Presently, with a smiling shake of her little head, she left +her own seat and went to her friend's assistance. + +At the same moment Mrs. Allison, driven by her conscience as a hostess, +got up for the purpose of introducing Lady Tressady to a lady in grey who +had been sitting quiet, and, as Mrs. Allison feared, lonely, in a corner, +looking over some photographs. Marcella, who had also risen, put out a +hand to Betty, and the two moved away together. + + * * * * * + +They stopped on the threshold of a large window at the side of the room, +which stood wide open to the night. Outside, beyond a broad flight of +steps, stretched a formal Dutch garden. Its numberless small beds, +forming stiff scrolls and circles on a ground of white gravel, lay in +bright moonlight. Even the colours of the hyacinths and tulips with which +they were planted could be seen, and the strong scent from them filled +the still air. At the far end of this flat-patterned place a group of +tall cypress and ilex, black against the sky, struck a note of Italy and +the South; while, through the yew hedges which closed in the little +garden, broad archways pierced at intervals revealed far breadths of +silvery English lawn and the distant gleam of the river. + +"Well, my dear," said Betty, laughing, and slipping her arm through +Marcella's as they stood in the opening of the window, "I see you have +been doing your duty for once. Let me pat you on the back. All the more +that I gather you are not exactly enchanted with Lady Tressady. You +really should keep your face in order. From the other end of the room I +know exactly what you think of the person you are talking to." + +"Do you?" said Marcella, penitently. "I wish you didn't." + +"Well you may wish it, for it doesn't help the political lady to get what +she wants. However, I don't think that Lady Tressady has found out yet +that you don't like her. She isn't thin-skinned. If you had looked like +that when you were talking to me, I would have paid you out somehow. What +is the matter with her?" + +"Oh! I don't know," said Marcella, impatiently, raising her shoulders. +"But she jarred. I pined to get away--I don't think I ever want to talk +to her again." + +"No," said Betty, ruminating; "I'll tell you what it is--she isn't a +gentleman! Don't interrupt me! I mean exactly what I say--_she isn't a +gentleman_. She would do and say all the things that a nice man squirms +at. I always have the oddest fancy about that kind of person. I see them +as they must be at night--all the fine clothes gone--just a little black +soul scrawled between the bedclothes!" + +"_You_ to call me censorious!" said Marcella, laughing, and pinching her +friend's arm. + +"My dear, as I have often before remarked to you, _I_ am not a great +lady, with a political campaign to tight. If you knew your business, you +would make friends with the mammon of unrighteousness in the shape of +Lady Tressadys. _I_ may do what I please--I have only a husband to +manage!" and Betty's light voice dropped into a sigh. + +"Poor Betty!" said Marcella, patting her hand. "Is Frank as +discontented as ever?" + +"He told me yesterday he hated his existence, and thought he would try +whether the Serpentine would drown him. I said I was agreeable, only he +would never achieve it without me. I should have to 'tice away the police +while he looked for the right spot. So he has promised to take me into +partnership, and it's all right so far." + +Then Betty fell to sighing in earnest. + +"It's all very well 'chaffing,' but I am a miserable woman. Frank says +I have ruined his life; that it's all my ambition; that he might have +made a decent country gentleman if I hadn't sown the seed of every vice +in him by driving him into politics. Pleasant, isn't it, for a model +wife like me?" + +"You'll have to let him give it up," said Marcella, smiling; "I don't +believe he'll ever reconcile himself to the grind and the town life." + +Betty clenched her small hands. + +"My dear! I never promised to marry a sporting boor, and I can't yet +make up my mind to sink to it. Don't let's talk of it! I only hope he'll +vote straight in the next few months. But the thought of being kept +through August drives him desperate already. Ah! here they are--plagues +of the human race!--" and she waved an accusing hand towards the incoming +stream of gentlemen. "Now, I'll prophesy, and you watch. Lady Tressady +will make two friends here--Harding Watton--oh! I forgot, he's her +cousin!--and Lord Cathedine. Mark my words. By the way--" Betty caught +Marcella's arm and spoke eagerly into her friend's ear. Her eyes +meanwhile glanced over her shoulder towards Lady Madeleine and her +mother, who were seated on the further side of the room. + +Marcella's look followed Betty's, but she showed no readiness to answer +Betty's questions. When Letty had made her astonishing remarks on the +subject of Madeleine Penley, Lady Maxwell had tried to stop her with a +hauteur which would have abashed most women, though it had but small +effect on the bride. And now, even to Betty, who was Madeleine Penley's +friend, Marcella was not communicative; although when Betty was carried +off by Lord Naseby who came in search of her as soon as he entered the +drawing-room, the elder woman stood for a moment by the window, watching +the girl they had been talking of with a soft serious look. + +But the softness passed. A slight incident disturbed it. For the +spectator saw Lady Kent, who was sitting beside her daughter, raise a +gigantic fan and beckon to Lord Ancoats. He came unwillingly, and she +made some bantering remark. Lady Madeleine meanwhile was bending over a +book of photographs, with a flushed cheek and a look of constraint. +Ancoats stood near her for a moment uneasily, frowning and pulling at his +moustache. Then with an abrupt word to Lady Kent, he turned away and +threw himself on a sofa beside Lord Cathedine. Lady Madeleine bent lower +over her book, her beautiful hair making a spot of fire in the room. +Marcella caught the expression of her profile, and her own face took a +look of pain. She would have liked to go instantly to the girl's side, +with some tenderness, some caress. But that gorgon Lady Kent, now looking +extremely fierce, was in the way, and moreover other young men had +arrived to take the place Ancoats had apparently refused. + +Meanwhile Letty saw the arrival of the gentlemen with delight. She had +found but small entertainment in the lady to whom Mrs. Allison had +introduced her. Miss Paston, the sister of Lord Ancoats's agent, was a +pleasant-looking spinster of thirty-five in a Quakerish dress of grey +silk. Her face bore witness that she was capable and refined. But Letty +felt no desire whatever to explore capability and refinement. She had not +come to Castle Luton to make herself agreeable to Miss Paston. + +So the conversation languished. Letty yawned a little, and flourished her +fan a great deal, till the appearance of the men brought back the flush +to her cheek and animation to her eye. She drew herself up at once, +hungry for notice and success. Mrs. Hawkins, the vicar's wife at +Malford, would have been avenged could she have watched her old tyrant +under these chastening circumstances. + +Harding Watton crossed the room when he saw his cousin, and took the +corner of the sofa beside her. Letty received him graciously, though she +was perhaps disappointed that it was not Lord Ancoats or Lord Cathedine. +Looking round before she gave herself to conversation with him, she saw +that George was standing near the open window with Lord Maxwell and Sir +Philip Wentworth, the ex-Governor. They were talking of India, and Sir +Philip had his hand on George's arm. + +"Yes, I saw Dalliousie go," he said eagerly. "I was only a lad of twenty, +but I can't think of it now without a lump in my throat. When he limped +on to the Hooghly landing-stage on his crutches we couldn't cheer him--I +shall never forget that sudden silence! In eight years he had made a new +India, and there we saw him,--our little hero,--dying of his work at +forty-six before our eyes! ... Well, I couldn't have imagined that a +young man like you would have known or cared so much about that time. +What a talk we have had! Thank you!" + +And the veteran tightened his grip cordially for a moment on Tressady's +arm, then dropped it and walked away. + +Tressady threw his wife a bright glance, as though to ask her how she +fared. Letty smiled graciously in reply, feeling a sudden softening +pleasure in being so thought of. As her eyes met her husband's she saw +Marcella Maxwell, who was still standing by the window, turn towards +George and call to him. George moved forward with alacrity. Then he and +Lady Maxwell slowly walked down the steps to the garden, and disappeared +through one of the archways to the left. + +"That great lady and George seem at last to have made friends," said +Harding Watton to Letty, in a laughing undertone. "I have no doubt she is +trying to win him over. Well she may! Before the next few weeks are over +the Government will be in a fix with this Bill; and not even their +'beautiful lady' will help them out. Maxwell looks as glum as an owl +to-night." + +Letty laughed. The situation pleased her vanity a good deal. The +thought of Lady Maxwell humiliated and defeated--partly by George's +means--was decidedly agreeable to her. Which would seem to show that +she was, after all, more sensitive or more quick-eyed than Betty Leven +had been ready to allow. + + * * * * * + +Meanwhile Marcella and George Tressady were strolling slowly towards the +river, along a path that crossed the great lawns. In front of them the +stretches of grass, bathed in silvery light and air, ran into far +distances of shade under majestic trees just thickening to a June wealth +of foliage. Below, these distant tree-masses made sharp capes and +promontories on the white grass; above, their rounded tops rose dark +against a blue, light-breathing sky. At one point the river pierced the +blackness of the wood, and in the space thus made the spire of a noble +church shot heavenward. Swans floated dimly along the stream and under +the bridge. The air was fresh, but the rawness of spring was gone. It was +the last week of May; the "high midsummer pomps" were near--a heavenly +prophecy in wood and field. + +And not even Tressady's prejudice--which, indeed, was already +vanishing--could fail to see in the beautiful woman beside him the +fitting voice and spirit of such a scene. + +To-night he said to himself that one must needs believe her simple, in +spite of report. During their companionship this evening she had shown +him more and more plainly that she liked his society; her manner towards +him, indeed, had by now a soft surrender and friendliness that no man +could possibly have met with roughness, least of all a man young and +ambitious. But at the same time he noticed again, as he had once noticed +with anger, that she was curiously free from the usual feminine arts and +wiles. After their long talk at dinner, indeed, he began, in spite of +himself, to feel her not merely an intellectual comrade,--that he had +been conscious of from the first,--but rather a most winning and +attaching companion. It was a sentiment of friendly ease, that seemed to +bring with it a great relief from tension. The sordid cares and frictions +of the last few weeks, and the degrading memories of the day itself, +alike ceased to wear him. + +Yet all the time he said to himself, with inward amusement, that he must +take care! They had not talked directly of the Bill at dinner, but they +had talked round and about it incessantly. It was clear that the Maxwells +were personally very anxious; and George knew well that the public +position of the Ministry was daily becoming more difficult. There had +been a marked cooling on the subject of the Bill among their own +supporters; one or two London members originally pledged to it were even +believed to be wavering; and this campaign lately started by Fontenoy and +Watton against two of the leading clauses of the measure, in a London +"daily," bought for the purpose, had been so far extremely damaging. The +situation was threatening indeed, and Maxwell might well look harassed. + +Yet Tressady had detected no bitterness in Lady Maxwell's mood. Her +temper rather seemed to him very strenuous, very eager, and a little sad. +Altogether, he had been touched, he knew not exactly why, by his +conversation with her. "We are going to win," he said to himself, "and +she knows it." Yet to think thus gave him, for the first time, no +particular pleasure. + +As they strolled along they talked a little of some of the topics that +had been started at dinner, topics semi-political and semi-social, till +suddenly Lady Maxwell said, with a change of voice: + +"I heard some of your conversation with Sir Philip just now. How +differently you talk when you talk of India!" + +"I wonder what that means," said George, smiling. "It means, at any rate, +that when I am not talking of India, but of English labour, or the poor, +you think I talk like a brute." + +"I shouldn't put it like that," she said quietly. "But when you talk of +India, and people like the Lawrences or Lord Dalhousie, then it is that +one sees what you really admire--what stirs you--what makes you feel." + +"Well, ought I not to feel? Is there to be no gratitude towards the +people that have made one's country?" + +He looked down, upon her gaily, perfectly conscious of his own +tickled vanity. To be observed and analysed by such a critic was in +itself flattery. + +"That have made one's country?" she repeated, not without a touch of +irony. Then suddenly she became silent. + +George thrust his hands into his pockets and waited a little. + +"Well?" he said presently. "Well? I am waiting to hear you prove that +the Dalhousies and the Lawrences have done nothing for the country, +compared to--what shall we say?--some trade-union secretary whom you +particularly admire." + +She laughed, but he did not immediately draw his answer. They had reached +the river-bank and the steps of the little bridge. Marcella mounted the +bridge and paused midway across it, hanging over the parapet. He followed +her, and both stood gazing at the house. It rose from the grass like some +fabric of yellowish ivory cut and scrolled and fretted by its Tudor +architect, who had been also a goldsmith. There were lights like jewels +in its latticed windows; the dark fulness of the trees, disposed by an +artist-hand, enwrapped or fell away from it as the eye required; and on +the dazzling lawns, crossed by soft bands of shadow, scattered forms +moved up and down--women in trailing dresses, and black-coated men. +There were occasional sallies of talk and laughter, and from the open +window of the drawing-room came the notes of a violin. + +"Brahms!" said Marcella, with delight. "Nothing but music and he could +express this night--or the river--or the rising glow and bloom of +everything." + +As she spoke George felt a quick gust of pleasure and romance sweep +across him. It was as though senses that had been for long on the +defensive, tired, or teased merely by the world, gave way in a moment to +joy and poetry. He looked from the face beside him to the pictured scene +in which they stood--the soft air filled his lungs--what ailed him?--he +only knew that after many weeks he was, somehow, happy and buoyant again! + +Lady Maxwell, however, soon forgot the music and the moonlight. + +"That have made one's country?" she repeated, pausing on the words. +"And of course that house appeals to you in the same way? Famous people +have lived in it--people who belong to history. But for _me_, the real +making of one's country is done out of sight, in garrets and workshops +and coalpits, by people who die every minute--forgotten--swept into +heaps like autumn leaves, their lives mere soil and foothold for the +generation that comes after them. All yesterday morning, for instance, +I spent trying to feed a woman I know. She is a shirtmaker; she has +four children, and her husband is a docker out of work. She had sewed +herself sick and blind. She couldn't eat, and she couldn't sleep. But +she had kept the children alive--and the man. Her life will flicker +out in a month or two; but the children's lives will have taken root, +and the man will be eating and earning again. What use would your +Dalhousies and Lawrences be to England without her and the hundreds of +thousands like her?" + +"And yet it is you," cried George, unable to forbear the chance she gave +him, "who would take away from this very woman the power of feeding her +children and saving her husband--who would spoil all the lives in the +clumsy attempt to mend one of them. How can you quote me such an +instance! It amazes me." + +"Not at all. I have only to use my instance for another purpose, in +another way. You are thinking of the Bill, of course? But all we do is to +say to some of these victims, 'Your sacrifice, as it stands, is _too_ +costly; the State in its own interest cannot go on exacting or allowing +it. We will help you to serve the community in ways that shall exhaust +and wound it less.'" + +"And as a first step, drive you all comfortably into the workhouse!" said +George. "Don't omit that." + +"Many individuals must suffer," she said steadily. "But there will be +friends to help--friends that will strain every nerve to help." + +All her heart showed itself in voice and emphasis. Almost for the first +time in their evening's talk her natural passionateness came to +sight--the Southern, impulsive temper, that so often made people laugh at +or dislike her. Under the lace shawl she had thrown round her on coming +out he saw the quick rise and fall of the breast, the nervous clasp of +the hands lying on the stonework of the bridge. These were her prophetess +airs again. To-night they still amused him, but in a gentler and more +friendly way. + +"And so, according to your own account, you will protect your tailoress +and unmake your country. I am sorry for your dilemma," he said, laughing. + +"Ah! well,"--she shrugged her shoulders with a sigh,--"don't let's talk +of it. It's all too pressing--and sore--and hot. And to think of the +weeks that are just coming on!" + +George, hanging over the parapet beside her, felt reply a little +awkward, and said nothing. For a minute or two the night made itself +heard, the gentle slipping of the river, the fitful breathings from the +trees. A swan passed and repassed below them, and an owl called from the +distant woods. + +Presently Marcella lifted a white finger and pointed to the house. + +"One wouldn't want a better parable," she said. "It's like the State as +you see it--magnificent, inspiring, a thing of pomp and dignity. But we +women, who have to drive and keep going a house like that--_we_ know what +it all rests upon. It rests upon a few tired kitchen-maids and boot-boys +and scullery-girls, hurrying, panting creatures, whom a guest never sees, +who really run it all. I know, for I have tried to unearth them, to +organise them, to make sure that no one was fainting while we were +feasting. But it is incredibly hard; half the human race believes itself +born to make things easy for the other half. It comes natural to them to +ache and toil while we sit in easy chairs. What they resent is that we +should try to change it." + +"Goodness!" said George, pulling at his moustaches. "I don't recognise my +own experience of the ordinary domestic polity in that summary." + +"I daresay. You have to do with the upper servant, who is always a +greater tyrant than his master," she retorted, her voice expressing a +curious medley of laughter and feeling. "I am speaking of the people +that are not seen, like the tailoress and shirtmaker, in your +drum-and-trumpet State." + +"Well, you may be right," said George, drily. "But I confess--if I may +be quite frank--that I don't altogether trust you to judge. I want at +least, before I strike the balance between my Dalhousie and your +tailoress, to hear what those people have to say who have not crippled +their minds--by pity!" + +"Pity!" she said, her lip trembling in spite of herself. "Pity!--you +count pity a disease?" + +"As you--and others--practise it," he replied coolly, turning round upon +her. "It is no good; the world can't be run by pity. At least, living +always seems to me a great brutal, rushing, rough-and-tumble business, +which has to be carried on whether we like it or no. To be too careful, +too gingerly over the separate life, brings it all to a standstill. +Meddle too much, and the Demiurge who set the machine going turns sulky +and stops working. Then the nation goes to pieces--till some strong +ruffian without a scruple puts it together again." + +"What do you mean by the Demiurge?" + +He laughed. + +"Why do you make me explain my flights? Well, I suppose, the natural +daimonic power in things, which keeps them going and set them off; which +is not us, or like us, and cares nothing for us." + +His light voice developed a sudden energy during his little speech. + +"Ah!" said Marcella, wistfully. "Yes, if one thought that, I could +understand. But, even so, if the power behind things cares nothing for +us, I should only regard it as challenging us to care more for each +other. Do you mind my asking you a few plain questions? Do you know +anything personally of the London poor? I mean, have you any real friends +among them, whose lives you know?" + +"Well, I sit with Fontenoy while he receives deputations from all those +tailoresses and shirtmakers and fur-sewers that _you_ want to put in +order. The harassed widow streams through his room perpetually--wailing +to be let alone!" + +Marcella made a sound of amused scorn. + +"Oh! you think that nothing," said George, indignant. "I vow I could draw +every type of widow that London contains--I know them intimately." + +She shook her head. + +"I give up London. Then, in the North, aren't you a coal-owner? Do you +know your miners?" + +"Yes, and I detest them!" said George, shortly; "pig-headed brutes! They +will be on strike next month, and I shall be defrauded of my lawful +income till their lordships choose to go back. Pity _me_, if you +please--not them!" + +"So I do," she said with spirit--"if you hate the men by whom you live!" + +There was silence. Then suddenly George said, in another tone: + +"But sometimes, I don't deny, the beggars wring it out of one--your pity. +I saw a mother last week--Suppose we stroll on a little. I want to see +how the river gets out of the wood." + +They descended the bridge, and turned again into the river-path. George +told the story of Mary Batchelor in his half-ironic way, yet so that here +and there Marcella shivered. Then gradually, as though it were a relief +to him to talk, he slipped into a half-humorous, half-serious discussion +of his mine-owner's position and its difficulties. Incidentally and +unconsciously a good deal of his history betrayed itself in his talk: his +bringing-up, his mother; the various problems started in his mind since +his return from India; even his relations to his wife. Once or twice it +flashed across him that he was confessing himself with an extraordinary +frankness to a woman he had made up his mind to dislike. But the +reflection did not stop him. The balmy night, the solitude, this +loveliness that walked beside him so willingly and kindly--with every +step they struck his defences from him; they drew; they penetrated. + +With her, too, everything was simple and natural. She had felt his +attraction at their first meeting; she had determined to make a friend of +him; and she was succeeding. As he disclosed himself she felt a strange +compassion for him. It was plain to her woman's instinct that he was at +heart lonely and uncompanioned. Well, what wonder with that hard, mean +little being for a wife! Had she captured him, or had he thrown himself +away upon her in mere wantonness, out of that defiance of sentiment which +appeared to be his favourite _parti-pris?_ In any case, it seemed to this +happy wife that he had done the one fatal and irreparable thing; and she +was genuinely sorry for him. She felt him very young, too. As far as she +could gather, he was about two years her junior; but her feeling made the +gap much greater. + +Yet, of course, the situation,--Maxwell, Fontenoy,--all that those names +implied to him and her, made a thrilling under-note in both their minds. +She never forgot her husband and his straits; and in George's mind +Fontenoy's rugged figure stood sentinel. Given the circumstances, both +her temperament and her affections drove her inevitably into trying, +first to attract, then to move and influence her companion. And given the +circumstances, he could but yield himself bit by bit to her woman's +charm; while full all the time of a confident scorn for her politics. + +Insensibly, the stress upon them drew them back to London and to current +affairs, and at last she said to him, with vehemence: + +"You _must_ see these people in the flesh--and not in your house, but in +theirs. Or, first come and meet them in mine?" + +"Why, please, should you think St. James's Square a palace of truth +compared to Carlton House Terrace?" he asked her, with amusement. +Fontenoy lived in Carlton House Terrace. + +"I am not inviting you to St. James's Square," she said quietly. "That +house is only my home for one set of purposes. Just now my true home is +not there at all. It is in the Mile End Road." + +George asked to be informed, and opened his eyes at her account of the +way in which she still divided her time between the West End and the +East, spending always one or two nights a week among the trades and the +work-people she had come to know so intimately, whose cause she was +fighting with such persistence. + +"Maxwell doesn't come now," she said. "He is too busy, and his work there +is done. But I go because I love the people, and to talk with them and +live with them part of every week keeps one's mind clear as to what one +wants, and why. Well,"--her voice showed that she smiled,--"will you +come? My old maid shall give you coffee, and you shall meet a roomful of +tailors and shirtmakers. You shall see what people look like in the +flesh--not on paper--after working fourteen hours at a stretch, in a room +where you and I could not breathe!" + +"Charming!"--he bowed ironically. "Of course I will come." + +They had paused under the shadow of a grove of beech-trees, and were +looking back towards the moonlit garden and the house. Suddenly George +said, in an odd voice: + +"Do you mind my saying it? You know, nobody is ever +converted--politically--nowadays." + +In the darkness her flush could not be seen. But he felt the mingled +pride and soreness in her voice, under its forced brightness. + +"I know. How long is it since a speech turned a vote in the House of +Commons! One wonders why people take the trouble to speak. Shall we go +back? Ah! there is someone pursuing us--my husband and Ancoats!" + +And two figures, dark for an instant against the brightness of the lawns, +plunged into the shadow of the wood. + +"You wanderers!" said Maxwell, as he distinguished his wife's white +dress. "Is this path quite safe in this darkness? Suppose we get +out of it." + +The river, indeed, beneath a steep bank, ran close beside them, and +the trees meeting overhead all but shut out the moon. Maxwell, in some +anxiety, caught his wife's arm, and made her pause till his eye should +be once more certain of the path. Meanwhile Ancoats and Tressady +walked quickly back to the lawn, Ancoats talking and laughing with +unusual vigour. + + * * * * * + +The Maxwells did not hurry themselves. As they emerged from the wood +Marcella slipped her hand into her husband's. It was her characteristic +caress. The slim, strong hand loved to feel itself in the shelter of +his; while to him that seeking touch was the symbol of all that she +brought him--the inventive, inexhaustible arts of a passion which was a +kind of genius. + +"Don't go in!" she pleaded. "Why should we?" + +"No!--why should we?" he repeated, sighing. "Why are we here at +all?--that is what I have been asking myself all the evening. And now +more than ever since my walk with that boy Ancoats." + +"Tell me about it," she said eagerly. "Could you get nothing out of +him?" + +Maxwell shrugged his shoulders. + +"Nothing. He vows that everything is all right; that he knows a pack of +slanderers have been 'yelping at him,' and he wishes both they and his +mother would let him alone." + +"His mother!" cried Marcella, outraged. + +"Well, I suppose I said to him the kind of thing you would evidently like +to say. But with no result. He merely laughed, and chattered about +everything under the sun--his race-horses, new plays, politics--Heaven +knows what! He is in an excited state--feverish, restless, and, I should +think, unhappy. But he would tell nothing--to me." + +"How much do you think she knows?" + +"His mother? Nothing, I should say. Every now and then I detect a note of +extra anxiety when she talks to him; and there is evidently something in +her mind, some impression from his manner, perhaps, which is driving her +more keenly than ever towards this marriage. But I don't believe a single +one of the stories that have reached us has reached her. And now--here is +this poor girl--and even my dull eyes have noticed that to-night he has +purposely, markedly, avoided her." + +Marcella felt her cheek flame. + +"And when one thinks of his behaviour in the winter!" she cried. + +They wandered on along a path that skirted the wood, talking anxiously +about the matter which had in truth brought them to Castle Luton. In +spite of the comparative gentleness of English political relations, +neither Maxwell nor Marcella, perhaps, would willingly have become +Charlotte Allison's guests at a moment when her house was actually the +headquarters of a violent and effective opposition to Maxwell's policy, +when moreover the leader of that opposition was likely to be of the +party. But about a fortnight before Whitsuntide some tales of young +Ancoats had suddenly reached Maxwell's ears, with such effect that on his +next meeting with Ancoats's mother he practically invited himself and +Marcella--greatly to Mrs. Allison's surprise--to Castle Luton for +Whitsuntide. + +For the boy had been Maxwell's ward, and Henry Allison had been the +intimate friend and comrade of Maxwell's father. And Maxwell's feeling +for his father, and for his father's friends, was of such a kind that his +guardian's duties had gone deep with him. He had done his best for the +boy, and since Ancoats had reached his majority his ex-guardian had still +kept him anxiously in mind. + +Of late indeed Ancoats had troubled himself very little about his +guardian, or his guardian's anxieties. He seemed to have been devoting a +large share of his mind to the avoidance of his mother's old friends; and +the Maxwells, for months, in spite of many efforts on their part, had +seen little or nothing of him. Maxwell for various reasons had begun to +suspect a number of uncomfortable things with regard to the young +fellow's friends and pleasures. Yet nothing could be taken hold of till +this sudden emergence of a particular group of stories, coupling +Ancoats's name with that of a notorious little actress whose adventures +had already provided a certain class of newspaper with abundant copy. + +Then Maxwell, who cared personally very little for the red-haired youth +himself, took alarm for the mother's sake. For in the case of Mrs. +Allison a scandal of the kind suggested meant a tragedy. Her passion for +her son was almost a tragedy already, so closely mingled in it were the +feelings of the mother and those of the Christian, to whom "vice" is not +an amusement, but an agony. + + * * * * * + +Yet, as Marcella said and felt, it was a hard fate that had forced +Maxwell to concern himself with Ancoats's love-affairs at this +particular moment. + +"Don't think of it," she said at last, urgently, as they walked along. +"It is too bad; as if there were not enough!" + +Maxwell stood still, with a little smile, and put his arm round her +shoulders. + +"Dear, I shall soon have time enough, probably, to think about Ancoats's +affairs or anything else. Do you know that I was planning this morning +what we would do when we go out? Shall we slip over to the Australian +colonies in the autumn? I would give a good deal to see them for myself." + +She gave a low cry of pain. + +"Why are you so depressed to-night? Is there any fresh news?" + +"Yes. And, altogether, things look increasingly bad for us, and +increasingly well for them. It will be extraordinarily close +anyway--probably a matter of a vote or two." And he gave her a summary +of his after-dinner conversation with Lord Cathedine, a keen ally of +Fontenoy's in the Lords, and none the less a shrewd fellow because he +happened to be also a detestable person. + +Marcella heard the news of one or two fresh defections from the +Government with amazement and indignation. She stood there in the +darkness, leaning against the man she loved, her heart beating fast and +stormily. How could the world thus misconceive and thwart him? And what +could she do? Her mind ran passionately through a hundred schemes, +refusing to submit--to see him baffled and defeated. + + + + +CHAPTER XII + + +To Lord Ancoats himself this party of his mother's was an oppression +and a nuisance. He had only been induced to preside over it with +difficulty; and his mother had been both hurt and puzzled by his +reluctance to play the host. + +If you had asked Maxwell's opinion on the point, he would have told you +that Ancoats's bringing up had a good deal to do with the present +anxieties of Ancoats's mother. He--Maxwell--had done his best, but he had +been overmatched. + +First and foremost, Ancoats had been to no public school. It was not the +custom of the family; and Mrs. Allison could not be induced to break the +tradition. There was accordingly a succession of tutors, whose +Church-principles at least were sound. And Ancoats showed himself for a +time an impressionable, mystical boy, entirely in sympathy with his +mother. His confirmation was a great family emotion, and when he was +seventeen Mrs. Allison had difficulty in making him take food enough in +Lent to keep him in health. Maxwell was beginning to wonder where it +would end, when the lad was sent to Cambridge, and the transformation +scene that might always perhaps have been expected, began. + +He had been two years at Trinity when he went to pay the Maxwells a +visit at the Court. Maxwell could hardly believe his eyes or ears. The +boy who at nineteen was an authority on church music and ancient "uses," +by twenty-one talked and thought of nothing in heaven or earth but the +stage and French _bric-a-brac._ His conversation swarmed with the names +of actors, singers, and dancers; but they were names that meant nothing +except to the initiated. They were the small people of the small +theatres; and Ancoats was a Triton among them, not at all, so he +carefully informed his kindred, because of his wealth and title, but +because he too was an artist, and could sing, revel, write, and dance +with the best of them. + +For some time Maxwell was able to console Mrs. Allison with the +historical reflection that more than one son of the Oxford Movement had +found in a passion for the stage a ready means of annoying the English +Puritan. When it came, however, to the young man's producing risky plays +of his own composing at extremely costly _matinees_, there was nothing +for it but to interfere. Maxwell at last persuaded him to give up the +farce of Cambridge and go abroad. But Ancoats would only go with a man of +his own sort; and their time was mostly spent in Paris, where Ancoats +divided his hard-spent existence between the furious pursuit of Louis +Quinze _bibelots_ and the patronage of two or three minor theatres. To be +the king of a first night, raining applause and bouquets from his +stage-box, seemed to give him infinite content; but his vanity was hardly +less flattered by the compliments say of M. Tournonville, the well-known +dealer on the Quai Voltaire, who would bow himself before the young +Englishman with the admiring cry, "Mon Dieu! milord, que vous etes fin +connoisseur!" while the dealer's assistant grinned among the shadows of +the back-shop. + +At last, at twenty-four, he must needs return to England for his coming +of age under his grandfather's will and the taking over of his estate. +Under the sobering influence of these events, his class and his mother +seemed for a time to recover him. He refurnished a certain number of +rooms at Castle Luton, and made a special marvel of his own room, which +was hung thick with Boucher, Greuze, and Watteau engravings, littered +with miniatures and trinkets, and encumbered here and there with +portfolios of drawings which he was not anxious to unlock in his +mother's presence. + +Moreover, he was again affectionate to his mother, and occasionally even +went to church with her. The instincts of the English aristocrat +reappeared amid the accomplishments of the _petit-maitre,_ and poor Mrs. +Allison's spirits revived. Then the golden-haired Lady Madeleine was +asked to stay at Castle Luton. When she came Ancoats devoted himself with +extraordinary docility. He drew her, made songs for her, and devised +French charades to act with her; he even went so far as to compare her +with enthusiasm to the latest and most wonderful "Salome" just exhibited +in the Salon by the latest and most wonderful of the impressionists. But +Lady Madeleine fortunately had not seen the picture. + +Then suddenly, one morning, Ancoats went up to town without notice and +remained there. After a while his mother pursued him thither; but Ancoats +was restless at sight of her, and she was not long in London, though +long enough to show the Maxwells and others that her heart was anxiously +set upon Lady Madeleine as a daughter-in-law. + +This then--taken together with the stories now besprinkling the +newspapers--was the situation. Naturally, Ancoats's affairs, as he +himself was irritably aware, were now, in one way or another, occupying +the secret thoughts or the private conversations of most of his +mother's guests. + +For instance-- + + * * * * * + +"Are you nice?" said Betty Leven, suddenly, to young Lord Naseby, in the +middle of Sunday morning. "Are you in a charitable, charming, humble, and +trusting frame of mind? Because, if not, I shall go away--I have had too +much of Lady Kent!" + +Charlie Naseby laughed. He was sitting reading in the shade at the edge +of one of the Castle Luton lawns. For some time past he had been watching +Betty Leven and Lady Kent, as they talked under a cedar-tree some little +distance from him. Lady Kent conversed with her whole bellicose +person--her cap, her chin, her nose, her spreading and impressive +shoulders. And from her gestures young Naseby guessed that she had been +talking to Betty Leven rather more in character than usual. + +He felt a certain curiosity about the _tete-a-tete._ So that when Betty +left her companion and came tripping over the lawn to the house, the +young man lifted his face and gave her a smiling nod, as though to invite +her to come and visit him on the way. Betty came, and then as she stood +in front of him delivered the home question already reported. + +"Am I nice?" repeated young Naseby. "Far from it. I have not been to +church, and I have been reading a French novel of which I do not even +propose to tell you the name." + +And he promptly slipped his volume into his pocket. + +"Which is worst?" said Betty, pensively: "to break the fourth +Commandment or the ninth? Lady Kent, of course, has been trampling on +them both. But the ninth is her particular victim. She calls it 'getting +to the roots of things.'" + +"Whose roots has she been delving at this morning?" said Naseby. + +Betty looked behind her, saw that Lady Kent had gone into the house, +and let herself drop into the corner of Naseby's bench with a sigh +of fatigue. + +"One feels as though one were a sort of house-dog tussling with a +burglar. I have been keeping her off all my friends' secrets by main +force; so she had to fall back on George Tressady, and tell me ugly tales +of his mamma." + +"George Tressady! Why on earth should she do him an ill turn? I don't +believe she ever saw him before." + +Betty pressed her lips. She and Charlie Naseby had been friends since +they wore round pinafores and sat on high nursery chairs side by side. + +"One needn't go to the roots of things," she said, severely, "but one +should have eyes in one's head. Has it ever occurred to you that Ancoats +has taken a special fancy to Sir George--that he sat talking to him last +night till all hours, and that he has been walking about with him the +whole of this morning, instead of walking about--well! with somebody +else--as he was meant to do? Why do men behave in this ridiculous manner? +Women, of course. But _men!_ It's like a trout that won't let itself be +landed. And what's the good? It's only prolonging the agony." + +"Not at all," said Naseby, laughing. "There's always the chance of +slipping the hook." Then his lively face became suddenly serious. "But +it's time, I think," he added, almost with vehemence, "that Lady Kent +stopped trying to land Ancoats. In the first place, it's no good. He +won't be landed against his will. In the next--well, I only know," he +broke off, "that if I had a sister in love with Ancoats at the present +moment, I'd carry her off to the North Pole rather than let her be talked +about with him!" + +Betty opened her eyes. + +"Then there _is_ something in the stories!" she cried. "Of course, +Frank told me there was nothing. And the Maxwells have not said a +word. And _now_ I understand why Lady Kent has been dinning it into +my ears--I could only be thankful Mrs. Allison was safe at church--that +Ancoats should marry early. 'Oh! my dear, it's always been the only +hope for them!'" Betty mimicked Lady Kent's deep voice and important +manner: "'Why, there was the grandfather--_his_ wife had a time!--I +could tell you things about _him_!--oh! and her too.--And even Henry +Allison!--' There, of course, I stopped her." + +"Old ghoul!" said Naseby, in disgust. "So she knows. And yet--good +Heavens! where does that charming girl come from?" + +He knocked the end off his cigarette, and returned it to his mouth with a +rather unsteady hand. + +"Knows?--knows what?" said Betty. There was a pink flush, perhaps of +alarm, on her pretty cheek, but her eyes said plainly that if there were +risks she must run them. + +Naseby hesitated. The natural reticence of one young man about another +held him back--and he was Ancoats's friend. But he liked Lady Madeleine, +and her mother's ugly manoeuvres in the sight of gods and men filled him +with a restless ill-temper. + +"You say the Maxwells have told you nothing?" he said at last. "But all +the same I am pretty certain that Maxwell is here for nothing else. What +on earth should he be doing in this _galere_ just now! Look at him and +Fontenoy! They've been pacing that lime-walk for a good hour. No one ever +saw such a spectacle before. Of course something's up!" + +Betty followed his eyes, and caught the figures of the two men between +the trunks as they moved through the light and shadow of the +lime-walk--Fontenoy's massive head sunk in his shoulders, his hands +clasped behind his back; Maxwell's taller and alerter form beside him. +Fontenoy had, in fact, arrived that morning from town, just too late to +accompany Mrs. Allison and her flock to church; and Maxwell and he had +been together since the moment when Ancoats, having brought his guest +into the garden, had gone off himself on a walk with Tressady. + +"Ancoats and Tressady came back past here," Naseby went on. "Ancoats +stood still, with his hands on his sides, and looked at those two. His +expression was not amiable. 'Something hatching,' he said to Tressady. +I suppose Ancoats got his sneer from his actor-friends--none of us +could do it without practice. 'Shall we go and pull the chief out of +that?' But they didn't go. Ancoats turned sulky, and went into the +house by himself." + +"I'm glad I don't have to keep that youth straight," said Betty, +devoutly. "Perhaps I don't care enough about him to try. But his mother's +a darling saint!--and if he breaks her heart he ought to be hung." + +"She knows nothing--I believe--" said Naseby, quickly. + +"Strange!" cried Betty. "I wonder if it pays to be a saint. I shall know +everything about _my_ boy when he's that age." + +"Oh! will you?" said Naseby, looking at her with a mocking eye. + +"Yes, sir, I shall. Your secrets are not so difficult to know, if one +_wants_ to know them. Heaven forbid, however, that I should want to know +anything about any of you till Bertie is grown up! Now, please tell me +everything. Who is the lady?" + +"Heaven forbid I should tell you!" said Naseby, drily. + +"Don't trifle any more," said Betty, laying a remonstrating hand on his +arm; "they will be home from church directly." + +"Well, I won't tell you any names," said Naseby, reluctantly. "Of +course, it's an actress--a very small one. And, of course, she's a bad +lot--and pretty." + +"Why, there's no of course about it--about either of them!" said Betty, +with more indignation than grammar. She also had dramatic friends, and +was sensitive on the point. + +Naseby protested that if he must argue the ethics of the stage before he +told his tale, the tale would remain untold. Then Betty, subdued, fell +into an attitude of meek listening, hands on lap. The tale when told +indeed proved to be a very ordinary affair, marked out perhaps a trifle +from the ruck by the facts that there was another pretender in the field +with whom Ancoats had already had one scene in public, and would probably +have more; that Ancoats being Ancoats, something mad and conspicuous was +to be expected, which would bring the matter inevitably to his mother's +ears; and that Mrs. Allison was Mrs. Allison. + +"Can he marry her?" said Betty, quickly. + +"Thank Heaven! no. There is a husband somewhere in Chili. So that it +doesn't seem to be a question of driving Mrs. Allison out of Castle +Luton. But--well, between ourselves, it would be a pity to give Ancoats +so fine a chance of going to the bad, as he'll get, if this young woman +lays hold of him. He mightn't recover it." + +Betty sat silent a moment. All her gaiety had passed away. There was a +fierceness in her blue eyes. + +"And that's what we bring them up for!" she exclaimed at last--"that they +may do all these ugly, stale, stupid things over again. Oh! I'm not +thinking so much, of the morals!"--she turned to Naseby with a defiant +look. "I am thinking of the hateful cruelty and unkindness!" + +"To his mother?" said Naseby. He shrugged his shoulders. + +Betty allowed herself an outburst. Her little hand trembled on her knee. +Naseby did not reply. Not that he disagreed; far from it. Under his young +and careless manner he was already a person of settled character, +cherishing a number of strong convictions. But since it had become the +fashion to talk as frankly of a matter of this kind to your married-women +friends as to anybody else, he thought that the women should take it with +more equanimity. + +Betty, indeed, regained her composure very quickly, like a stream when +the gust has passed. They fell into a keen, practical discussion of the +affair. Who had influence with Ancoats? What man? Naseby shook his +head. The difference in age between Ancoats and Maxwell was too great, +and the men too unlike in temperament. He himself had done what he +could, in vain, and Ancoats now told him nothing; for the rest, he +thought Ancoats had very few friends amid his innumerable acquaintance, +and such as he had, of a third-rate dramatic sort, not likely to be of +much use at this moment. + +"I haven't seen him take to any fellow of his own kind as much as he has +taken to George Tressady these two days, since he left Cambridge. But +that's no good, of course--it's too new." + +The two sat side by side, pondering. Suddenly Naseby said, smiling, with +a change of expression: + +"This party is really quite interesting. Look there!" + +Betty looked, and saw George Tressady, with his hands in his pockets, +lounging along a distant path beside Marcella Maxwell. + +"Well!" said Betty, "what then?" + +Naseby gave his mouth a twist. + +"Nothing; only it's odd. I ran across them just now--I was playing ball +with that jolly little imp, Hallin. You never saw two people more +absorbed. Of course he's _sous le charme_--we all are. Our English +politics are rather rum, aren't they? They don't indulge in this amiable +country-house business in a South American republic, you know. They +prefer shooting." + +"And you evidently think it a healthier state of things. Wait till we +come to something nearer to _our_ hearths and bosoms than Factory Acts," +said Betty, with the wisdom of her kind. "All the same, Lord Fontenoy is +in earnest." + +"Oh yes, Fontenoy is in earnest. So, I suppose, is Tressady. So--good +Heavens!--is Maxwell. I say, here comes the church party." + +And from a side-door in a venerable wall, beyond which could be seen the +tower of a little church, there emerged a small group of people--Mrs. +Allison, Lady Cathedine, and Madeleine Penley in front, escorted by the +white-haired Sir Philip; and behind, Lady Tressady, between Harding +Watton and Lord Cathedine. + +"Cathedine!" cried Naseby, staring at the group. "Cathedine been +to church?" + +"For the purpose, I suppose, of disappointing poor Laura, who might have +hoped to get rid of him," said Betty, sharply. "No!--if I were Mrs. +Allison I should draw the line at Lord Cathedine." + +"Nobody need see any more of Cathedine than they want," said Naseby, +calmly; "and, of course, he behaves himself here. Moreover, there is no +doubt at all about his brains. They say Fontenoy expects to make great +use of him in the Lords." + +"By the way," said Betty, turning round upon him, "where are you?" + +"Well, thank God! I'm not in Parliament," was Naseby's smiling reply. "So +don't trouble me for opinions. I have none. Except that, speaking +generally, I should like Lady Maxwell to get what she wants." + +Betty threw him a sly glance, wondering if she might tease him about the +news she heard of him from Marcella. + +She had no time, however, to attack him, for Mrs. Allison approached. + + * * * * * + +"What is the matter with her?--with Madeleine?--with all of them?" +thought Betty, suddenly. + +For Mrs. Allison, pale and discomposed, did not return, did not +apparently notice Lady Leven's greeting. She walked hastily past them, +and would have gone at once into the house but that, turning her head, +she perceived Lord Fontenoy hurrying towards her from the lime-walk. With +an obvious effort she controlled herself, and went to meet him, leaning +heavily on her silver-topped stick. + +The others paused, no one having, as it seemed, anything to say. Letty +poked the gravel with her parasol; Sir Philip made a telescope of his +hands, and fixed it upon Maxwell, who was coming slowly across the lawn; +while Lady Madeleine turned a handsome, bewildered face on Betty. + +Betty took her aside to look at a flower on the house. + +"What's the matter?" said Lady Leven, under her breath. + +"I don't know," said the other. "Something dreadful happened on the way +home. There was a girl--" + +But she broke off suddenly. Ancoats had just opened and shut the +garden-door, and was coming to join his guests. + +"Poor dear!" thought Betty to herself, with a leap of pity. It was so +evident the girl's whole nature thrilled to the approaching step. She +turned her head towards Ancoats, as though against her will, her tall +form drawn erect, in unconscious tension. + +Ancoats's quick eyes ran over the group. + +"He thinks we have been talking about him," was Betty's quick reflection, +which was probably not far from the truth. For the young man's face at +once assumed a lowering expression, and, walking up to Lady Tressady, +whom as yet he had noticed no more than civility required, he asked +whether she would like to see the "houses" and the rose-garden. + +Letty, delighted by the attention, said Yes in her gayest way, and +Ancoats at once led her off. He walked quickly, and their figures soon +disappeared among the trees. + +Madeleine Penley gazed after them. Betty, who had a miserable feeling +that the girl was betraying herself to men like Harding Watton or Lord +Cathedine,--a feeling which was, however, the creation of her own nervous +excitement,--tried to draw her away. But Lady Madeleine did not seem to +understand. She stood mechanically buttoning and unbuttoning her long +gloves. "Yes, I'm coming," she said, but she did not move. + +Then Betty saw that Lord Naseby had approached her; and it seemed to the +observer that all the young man's vivid face was suffused with something +at once soft and fierce. + +"The thorn-blossom on the hill is a perfect show just now, Lady +Madeleine," he said. "Come and look at it. There will be just time +before lunch." + +The girl looked at him. The colour rushed to her cheeks, and she walked +submissively away beside him. + + * * * * * + +Meanwhile Letty and Ancoats pursued their way towards the greenhouses and +walled gardens. Letty tripped along, hardly able to keep up with her +companion's stride, but chattering fast all the time. At every turn of +the view she overflowed with praise and wonder; nor could anything have +been at once more enthusiastic or more impertinent than the questions +with which she plied him as to his gardeners, his estate, and his +affairs, in the intervals of panegyric. + +Ancoats at first hardly listened to her. A perfunctory "Yes" or "No" +seemed to be all that the situation demanded. Then, when he did +sufficiently emerge from the tempest of his own thoughts to catch some of +the things she was saying, his irritable temper rebelled at once. What +had Tressady been about?--ill-bred, tiresome woman! + +His manner stiffened; he stalked along in front of her, doing his bare +host's duty, and warding off her conversation as much as possible; while +Letty, on her side, soon felt the familiar chill and mortification +creeping over her. Why, she wondered angrily, should he have asked her to +walk with him if he could not be a more agreeable companion? + +Towards the end of the lime-walk they came across Mrs. Allison and Lord +Fontenoy. As they passed the older pair the pale mother lifted her eyes +to her son with a tremulous smile. + +But Ancoats made no response, nor had he any greeting for Fontenoy. He +carried his companion quickly on, till they found themselves in a +wilderness of walled gardens opening one into another, each, as it +seemed, more miraculously ordered and more abundantly stocked than its +neighbour. + +"I wonder you know your way," laughed Letty. "And who can possibly +consume all this?" + +"I haven't an idea," said Ancoats, abruptly, as he opened the door of the +tenth vinery. "I wish you'd tell me." + +Letty raised her eyebrows with a little cry of protest. + +"Oh! but it makes the whole place so magnificent, so complete." + +"What is there magnificent in having too much?" said Ancoats, shortly. +"I believe the day of these huge country places, with all their dull +greenhouses and things, is done." + +Much he cared, indeed, about his gardeners and his grapes! He was in the +mood to feel his whole inheritance a burden round his neck. But at the +same time to revile his own wealth gave him a pungent sense of playing +the artist. + +"Have you argued that with Lord Fontenoy?" she inquired archly. + +"I should not take the trouble," he said, with careless hauteur. +"Ah!"--Letty's vanity winced under his involuntary accent of relief--"I +see your husband and Lady Maxwell." + +Marcella and George came towards them. They were strolling along a broad +flowery border, which was at the moment a blaze of paeonies of all +shades, interspersed with tall pyramidal growths of honeysuckle. Marcella +was loitering here and there, burying her face in the fragrance of the +honeysuckle, or drawing her companion's attention in delight to the +glowing clumps of paeonies Hallin hovered round them, now putting his +hand confidingly into Tressady's, now tugging at his mother's dress, and +now gravely wooing the friendship of a fine St. Bernard that made one of +the party. George, with his hands in his pockets, walked or paused as the +others chose; and it struck Letty at once that he was talking with +unusual freedom and zest. + +Yes, it was true, indeed, as Harding said--they had made friends. As she +looked at them the first movement of a jealous temper stirred in Letty. +She was angry with Lady Maxwell's beauty, and angry with George's +enjoyment. It was like the great lady all over to slight the wife and +annex the husband. George certainly might have taken the trouble to come +and look for her on their return from church! + +So, while Ancoats talked stiffly with Marcella, the bride, a few paces +off, let George understand through her bantering manner that she was out +of humour. + +"But, dear, I had no notion you would be let out so soon," pleaded +George. "That good man really can't earn his pay." + +"Oh! but of course you knew it was High Church--all split up into little +bits," said Letty, unappeased. "But naturally--" + +She was about to add some jealous sarcasm when it was arrested by the +arrival of Sir Philip Wentworth and Watton, whose figures appeared in a +side-archway close to her. + +"Ah! well guessed," said Sir Philip. "I thought we should find you among +the paeonies. Lady Tressady, did you ever see such a show? Ancoats, is +your head gardener visible on a Sunday? I ask with trembling, for there +is no more magnificent member of creation. But if I _could_ get at him, +to ask him about an orchid I saw in one of your houses yesterday, I +should be grateful." + +"Come into the next garden, then," said Ancoats, "where the orchid-houses +are. If he isn't there, we'll send for him." + +"Then, Lady Tressady, you must come and see me through," said Sir Philip, +gallantly. "I want to quarrel with him about a label--and you remember +Dizzy's saying--'a head gardener is always opinionated'? Are you coming, +Lady Maxwell?" + +Marcella shook her head, smiling. + +"I am afraid I hate hothouses," she said. + +"My dear lady, don't pine for the life according to nature at Castle +Luton!" said Sir Philip, raising a finger. "The best of hothouses, like +the best of anything, demands a thrill." + +Marcella shrugged her shoulders. + +"I get more thrill out of the paeonies." + +Sir Philip laughed, and he and Watton carried off Letty, whose vanity was +once more happy in their society; while Ancoats, glad of the pretext, +hurried along in front to find the great Mr. Newmarch. + + * * * * * + +"I believe there are some wonderful irises out in the Friar's Garden," +said Marcella. "Mrs. Allison told me there was a show of them somewhere. +Let me see if I can find the way. And Hallin would like the goldfish in +the fountain." + +Her two companions followed her gladly, and she led them through devious +paths till there was a shout from Hallin, and the most poetic corner of a +famous garden revealed itself. Amid the ruins of a cloister that had once +formed part of the dissolved Cistercian priory on whose confiscated lands +Castle Luton had arisen, a rich medley of flowers was in full and perfect +bloom. Irises in every ravishing shade of purple, lilac, and gold, +carpets of daffodils and narcissus, covered the ground, and ran into each +corner and cranny of the old wall. Yellow banksia and white clematis +climbed the crumbling shafts, or made new tracery for the empty windows, +and where the ruin ended, yew hedges, adorned at top with a whole +procession of birds and beasts, began. The flowery space thus enclosed +was broken in the centre by an old fountain; and as one sat on a stone +seat beside it, one looked through an archway, cut through the darkness +of the yews, to the blue river and the hills. + +The little place breathed perfume and delight. But Marcella did not, +somehow, give it the attention it deserved. She sat down absently on the +bench by the fountain, and presently, as George and Hallin were poking +among the goldfish, she turned to her companion with the abrupt question: + +"You didn't know Ancoats, I think, before this visit, did you?" + +"Only as one knows the merest acquaintance. Fontenoy introduced me to him +at the club." + +Marcella sighed. She seemed to be arguing something with herself. At +last, with a quick look towards the approaches of the garden, she said in +a low voice: + +"I think you must know that his friends are not happy about him?" + +It so happened that Watton had found opportunity to show Tressady that +morning a paragraph from one of the numerous papers that batten on the +British peer, his dress, his morals, and his sport. The paragraph, +without names, without even initials, contained an outline of Lord +Ancoats's affairs which Harding, who knew everything of a scandalous +nature, declared to be well informed. It had made George whistle; and +afterwards he had watched Mrs. Allison go to church with a new interest +in her proceedings. + +So that when Marcella threw out her hesitating question, he said at +once: + +"I know what the papers are beginning to say--that is, I have seen a +paragraph--" + +"Oh! those newspapers!" she said in distress. "We are all afraid of some +madness, and any increase of talk may hasten it. There is no one who can +control him, and of late he has not even tried to conceal things." + +"It is a determined face," said George. "I am afraid he will take his +way. How is it that he comes to be so unlike his mother?" + +"How is it that adoration and sacrifice count for so little?" said +Marcella, sadly. "She has given him all the best of her life." + +And she drew a rapid sketch of the youth's career and the mother's +devotion. + +George listened in silence. What she said showed him that in his +conversations with Ancoats that young man had been talking round and +about his own case a good deal! and when she paused he said drily: + +"Poor Mrs. Allison! But, you know, there must be some crumples in the +rose-leaves of the great." + +She looked at him with a momentary astonishment. + +"Why should one think of her as 'great'? Would not any mother suffer? +First of all he is so changed; it is so difficult to get at him--his +friends are so unlike hers--he is so wrapped up in London, so apathetic +about his estate. All the religious sympathy that meant so much to her is +gone. And now he threatens her with this--what shall I call it?"--her lip +curled--"this entanglement. If it goes on, how shall we keep her from +breaking her heart over it? Poor thing! poor mothers!" + +She raised her white hand, and let it fall upon her knee with one of the +free, instinctive gestures that made her beauty so expressive. + +But George would not yield himself to her feeling. + +"Ancoats will get through it--somehow--as other men do," he said +stubbornly, "and she must get through it too--and _not_ break her heart." + +Marcella was silent. He turned towards her after a moment. + +"You think that a brutal doctrine? But if you'll let me say it, life and +ease and good temper are really not the brittle things women make them! +Why do they put all their treasure into that one bag they call their +affections? There is plenty else in life--there is indeed! It shows +poverty of mind!" + +He laughed, and taking up a pebble dropped it sharply among the goldfish. + +"Alack!" said Marcella, caressing her child's head as he stood playing +beside her. "Hallin, I can't have you kiss my hand like that. Sir George +says it's poverty of mind." + +"It ain't," said Hallin, promptly. But his remark had a deplorable lack +of unction, for the goldfish, startled by George's pebble, were at that +moment performing evolutions of the greatest interest, and his black eyes +were greedily bent upon them. + +Both laughed, and George let her remark alone. But his few words left +on Marcella a painful impression, which renewed her compassion of the +night before. This young fellow, just married, protesting against an +over-exaltation of the affections!--it struck her as half tragic, half +grotesque. And, of course, it was explained by the idiosyncrasies of +that little person in a Paris gown now walking about somewhere with +Sir Philip! + +Yet, just as she had again allowed herself to think of him as someone far +younger and less mature than herself, he quietly renewed the +conversation, so far as it concerned Ancoats, talking with a caustic good +sense, a shrewd perception, and at bottom with a good feeling, that first +astonished her, and then mastered her friendship more and more. She found +herself yielding him a fuller and fuller confidence, appealing to him, +taking pleasure in anything that woke the humour of the sharp, long face, +or that rare blink of the blue eyes that meant a leap of some responsive +sympathy he could not quite conceal. + +And for him it was all pleasure, though he never stopped to think of it. +The lines of her slender form, as she sat with such careless dignity +beside him, her lovely eyes, the turns of her head, the softening tones +of her voice, the sense of an emerging bond that had in it nothing +ignoble, nothing to be ashamed of, together with the child's simple +liking for him, and the mere physical delight of this morning of late +May--the rush and splendour of its white, thunderous clouds, its +penetrating, scented air: each and all played their part in the rise of a +new emotion he would not have analysed if he could. + +He was particularly glad that in this fresh day of growing intimacy she +had as yet talked politics or "questions" of any sort so little! It made +it all the more possible to escape from, to wholly overthrow in his +mind, that first hostile image of her, impressed--strange unreason on his +part!--by that first meeting with her in the crowd round the injured +child, and in the hospital ward. Had she started any subject of mere +controversy he would have held his own as stoutly as ever. But so long as +she let them lie, _herself_, the woman, insensibly argued for her, and +wore down his earlier mood. + +So long, indeed, as he forgot Maxwell's part in it all! But it was not +possible to forget it long. For the wife's passion, in spite of a noble +reticence, shone through her whole personality in a way that alternately +touched and challenged her new friend. No; let him remember that +Maxwell's ways of looking at things were none the less pestilent because +_she_ put them into words. + + * * * * * + +After luncheon Betty Leven found herself in a corner of the Green +Drawing-room. On the other side of it Mrs. Allison and Lord Fontenoy were +seated together, with Sir Philip Wentworth not far off. Lord Fontenoy was +describing his week in Parliament. Betty, who knew and generally shunned +him, raised her eyebrows occasionally, as she caught the animated voice, +the queer laughs, and fluent expositions, which the presence of his muse +was drawing from this most ungainly of worshippers. His talk, indeed, was +one long invocation; and the little white-haired lady in the armchair was +doing her best to play Melpomene. Her speech was very soft. But it made +for battle; and Fontenoy was never so formidable as when he was fresh +from Castle Luton. + +Betty's thoughts, however, had once more slipped away from her immediate +neighbours, and were pursuing more exciting matters,--the state of +Madeleine Penley's heart and the wiles of that witch-woman in London, who +must be somehow plucked like a burr from Ancoats's skirts,--when Marcella +entered the room, hat in hand. + +"Whither away, fair lady?" cried Betty; "come and talk to me." + +"Hallin will be in the river," said Marcella, irresolute. + +"If he is, Sir George will fish him out. Besides, I believe Sir George +and Ancoats have gone for a walk, and Hallin with them. I heard Maxwell +tell Hallin he might go." + +Marcella turned an uncertain look upon Lord Fontenoy and Mrs. Allison. +But directly Maxwell's wife entered the room, Maxwell's enemy had dropped +his talk of political affairs, and he was now showing Sir Philip a +portfolio of Mrs. Allison's sketches, with a subdued ardour that brought +a kindly smile to Marcella's lip. In general, Fontenoy had neither eye +nor ear for anything artistic; moreover, he spoke barbarous French, and +no other European tongue; while of letters he had scarcely a tincture. +But when it became a question of Mrs. Allison's accomplishments, her +drawing, her embroidery, still more her admirable French and excellent +Italian, the books she had read, and the poetry she knew by heart, he was +all appreciation--one might almost say, all feeling. It was Cymon and +Iphigenia in a modern and middle-aged key. + +His mien he fashioned and his tongue he filed. + +And did a blunder come, Iphigenia gently and deftly put it to rights. + +"Where is Madeleine?" asked Betty, as Marcella approached her sofa. + +"Walking with Lord Naseby, I think." + +"What was the matter on the way from church?" asked Betty, in a low +voice, raising her face to her friend. + +Marcella, looked gravely down upon her. + +"If you come into the garden I will tell you. Madeleine told me." + +Betty, all curiosity, followed her friend through the open window to a +seat in the Dutch garden outside. + +"It was a terrible thing that happened," said Marcella, sitting erect, +and speaking with a manner of suppressed energy that Betty knew well; +"one of the things that make my blood boil when I come here. You know how +she rules the village?"--She turned imperceptibly towards the distant +drawing-room, where Mrs. Allison's white head was still visible. "Not +only must all the cottages be beautiful, but all the people must reach a +certain standard of virtue. If a man drinks, he must go; if a girl loses +her character, she and her child must go. It was such a girl that threw +herself in the way of the party this morning. Her mother would not part +with her; so the decree went forth--the whole family must go. They say +the girl has never been right in her head since the baby's birth; she +raved and wept this morning, said her parents could find no work +elsewhere--they must die, she and her child must die. Mrs. Allison tried +to stop her, but couldn't; then she hurriedly sent the others on, and +stayed behind herself--only for a minute or two; she overtook Madeleine +almost immediately. Madeleine is sure she was inexorable; so am I; she +always is. I once argued with her about a case of the kind--a _cruel_ +case! 'Those are the sins that make me _shudder!_' she said, and one +could make no impression on her whatever. You see how exhausted she looks +this afternoon. She will wear herself out, probably, praying and weeping +over the girl." + +Betty threw up her hands. + +"My dear!--when she knows--" + +"It may perfectly well kill her," said Marcella, steadily. Then, after a +pause, Betty saw her face flush from brow to chin, and she added, in a +low and passionate voice: "Nevertheless, from all tyrannies and cruelties +in the name of Christ, good Lord, deliver us!" + +The two lingered together for some time without speaking. Both were +thinking of much the same things, but both were tired with the endless +talking of a country-house Sunday, and the rest was welcome. + +And presently Marcella rambled away from her friend, and spent an hour +pacing by herself in a glade beside the river. + +And there her mind instantly shook itself from every care but one--the +yearning over her husband and his work. + +Two years of labour--she caught her breath with a little sob--labour +which had aged and marked the labourer; and now, was it really to be +believed, that after all the toil, after so much hope and promise of +success, everything was to be wrecked at last? + +She gave herself once more to eager forecasts and combinations. As to +individuals--she recalled Tressady's blunt warning with a smile and a +wince. But it did not prevent her from falling into a reverie of which +he, or someone like him, was the centre. Types, incidents, scenes, rose +before her--if they could only be pressed upon, _burnt into_ such a mind, +as they had been burnt into her mind and Maxwell's! That was the whole +difficulty--lack of vision, lack of realisation. Men were to have the +deciding voice in this thing, who had no clear conception of how poverty +and misery live, no true knowledge of this vast tragedy of labour +perpetually acted, in our midst, no rebellion of heart against conditions +of life for other men they themselves would die a thousand times rather +than accept. She saw herself, in a kind of despair, driving such persons +through streets, and into houses she knew, forcing them to look, and +_feel_. Even now, at the last moment-- + +How much better she had come to know this interesting, limited being, +George Tressady, during these twenty-four hours! She liked his youth, his +sincerity--even the stubbornness with which he disclaimed inconvenient +enthusiasms; and she was inevitably flattered by the way in which his +evident prejudice against herself had broken down. + +His marriage was a misfortune, a calamity! She thought of it with the +instinctive repulsion of one who has never known any temptation to the +small vulgarities of life. One could have nothing to say to a little +being like that. But all the more reason for befriending the man! + + * * * * * + +An hour or two later Tressady found himself strolling home along the +flowery bank of the river. It was not long since he had parted from Lady +Maxwell and Hallin, and on leaving them he had turned back for a while +towards the woods on the hill, on the pretext that he wanted more of a +walk. Now, however, he was hurrying towards the house, that there might +be time for a chat with Letty before dressing. She would think he had +been away too long. But he had proposed to take her on the river after +tea, and she had preferred a walk with Lord Cathedine. + +Since then--He looked round him at the river and the hills. There was a +flush of sunset through the air, and the blue of the river was interlaced +with rosy or golden reflections from a sky piled with stormy cloud and +aglow with every "visionary majesty" of light and colour. The great +cloud-masses were driving in a tragic splendour through the west; and hue +and form alike, throughout the wide heaven, seemed to him to breathe a +marvellous harmony and poetry, to make one vibrating "word" of beauty. +Had some god suddenly gifted him with new senses and new eyes? Never had +he felt so much joy in Nature, such a lifting up to things awful and +divine. Why? Because a beautiful woman had been walking beside +him?--because he had been talking with her of things that he, at least, +rarely talked of--realities of feeling, or thought, or memory, that no +woman had ever shared with him before? + +How had she drawn him to such openness, such indiscretions? He was half +ashamed, and then forgot his discomfort in the sudden, eager glancing of +the mind to the future, to the opportunities of the day just coming--for +Mrs. Allison's party was to last till Whit Tuesday--to the hours and +places in London where he was to meet her on those social errands of +hers. What a warm, true heart! What a woman, through all her dreams and +mistakes, and therefore how adorable! + + * * * * * + +He quickened his pace as the light failed. Presently he saw a figure +coming towards him, emerging from the trees that skirted the main lawn. +It was Fontenoy, and Fontenoy's supporter must needs recollect himself as +quickly as possible. He had not seen much of his leader during the day. +But he knew well that Fontenoy never forgot his _role_, and there were +several points, newly arisen within the last forty-eight hours, on which +he might have expected before this to be called to counsel. + +But Fontenoy, when he came up with the wanderer, seemed to have no great +mind for talk. He had evidently been pacing and thinking by himself, and +when he was fullest of thought he was as a rule most silent and +inarticulate. + +"You are late; so am I," he said, as he turned back with Tressady. + +George assented. + +"I have been thinking out one or two points of tactics." + +But instead of discussing them he sank into silence again. George let him +alone, knowing his ways. + +Presently he said, raising his powerful head with a jerk, "But tactics +are not of such importance as they were. I think the thing is +done--_done!_" he repeated with emphasis. + +George shrugged his shoulders. + +"I don't know. We may be too sanguine. It is not possible that Maxwell +should be easily beaten." + +Fontenoy laughed--a strange, high laugh, like a jay's, that seemed to +have no relation to his massive frame, and died suddenly away. + +"But we shall beat him," he said quietly; "and her, too. A well-meaning +woman--but what a foolish one!" + +George made no reply. + +"Though I am bound to say," Fontenoy went on quickly, "that in private +matters no man could be kinder and show a sounder judgment than Maxwell. +And I believe Mrs. Allison feels the same with regard to her." + +His look first softened, then frowned; and as he turned his eyes towards +the house, George guessed what subject it was that he and Maxwell had +discussed under the limes in the morning. + + * * * * * + +He found Letty in very good spirits, owing, as far as he could judge, to +the civilities and attentions of Lord Cathedine. Moreover, she was more +at ease in her surroundings, and less daunted by Mrs. Allison. + +"And of course, to-morrow," she said, as she put on her diamonds, "it +will be nicer still. We shall all know each other so much better." + +In her good-humour she had forgotten her twinge of jealousy, and did not +even inquire with whom he had been wandering so long. + +But Letty was disappointed of her last day at Castle Luton. For the +party broke up suddenly, and by ten o'clock on Monday morning all +Mrs. Allison's guests but Lord Fontenoy and the Maxwells had left +Castle Luton. + +It was on this wise. + +After dinner on Sunday night Ancoats, who had been particularly silent +and irritable at table, suddenly proposed to show his guests the house. +Accordingly, he led them through its famous rooms and corridors, turned +on the electric light to show the pictures, and acted cicerone to the +china and the books. + +Then, suddenly it was noticed that he had somehow slipped away, and that +Madeleine Penley, too, was missing. The party straggled back to the +drawing-room without their host. + +Ancoats, however, reappeared alone in about half an hour. He was +extremely pale, and those who knew him well, and were perforce observing +him at the moment, like Maxwell and Marcella, drew the conclusion that he +was in a state of violent though suppressed excitement. His mother, +however, strange to say, noticed nothing. But she was clearly exhausted +and depressed, and she gave an early signal for the ladies' withdrawal. + +The great house sank into quietness. But about an hour after Marcella and +Betty had parted at Betty's door, Betty heard a quick knock, and opened +it in haste. + +"Mrs. Allison is ill!" said Marcella in a low, rapid voice. "I think +everyone ought to go quite early to-morrow. Will you tell Frank? I am +going to Lady Tressady. The gentlemen haven't come up." + +Betty caught her arm. "Tell me--" + +"Oh! my dear," cried Marcella, under her breath, "Ancoats and Madeleine +had an explanation in his room. He told her everything--that child! She +went to Mrs. Allison--he asked her to! Then the maid came for me in +terror. It has been a heart-attack--she has often had them. She is rather +better. But _do_ let everybody go!" and she wrung her hands. "Maxwell and +I must stay and see what can be done." + +Betty flew to ring for her maid and look up trains. Lady Maxwell went on +to Letty Tressady's room. + +But on the way, in the half-dark passage, she came across George Tressady +coming up from the smoking-room. So she gave her news of Mrs. Allison's +sudden illness to him, begging him to tell his wife, and to convey their +hostess's regrets and apologies for this untoward break-up of the party. +It was the reappearance of an old ailment, she said, and with quiet would +disappear. + +George heard her with concern, and though his mind was active with +conjectures, asked not a single question. Only, when she said good-night +to him, he held her hand a friendly instant. + +"We shall be off as early as possible, so it is goodbye. But we shall +meet in town--as you suggested?" + +"Please!" she said, and hurried off. + +But just as he reached his own door, he turned with a long breath towards +the passage where he had just seen her. It seemed that he saw her +still--her white face and dress, the trouble and pity under her quiet +manner, her pure sweetness and dignity. He said to himself, with a sort +of pride, that he had made a friend, a friend whose sympathy, whose heart +and mind, he was now to explore. + +Who was to make difficulties? Letty? But already as he stood there, with +his hand upon the handle of her door, his mind, in a kind of flashing +dream, was already making division of his life between the woman he had +married with such careless haste and this other, who at highest thought +of him with a passing kindness, and at lowest regarded him as a mere pawn +in the political game. + +What could he win by this friendship, that would injure Letty? Nothing! +absolutely nothing. + + +END OF VOLUME I + + + + + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Sir George Tressady, Vol. I, by Mrs. Humphry Ward + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SIR GEORGE TRESSADY, VOL. 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I *** + + + + +E-text prepared by Andrew Templeton, Juliet Sutherland, Mary Meehan, and +Project Gutenberg Distributed Proofreaders + + + + + + + +Note: This book was originally published as two separate + volumes. This Project Gutenberg edition preserves the + two-volume format primarily because of the length of + the novel. This is Volume I. Volume II can be found at + http://www.ibiblio.org/gutenberg/etext05/7sgt210.txt or + http://www.ibiblio.org/gutenberg/etext05/7sgt210.zip. + http://www.ibiblio.org/gutenberg/etext05/8sgt210.txt + http://www.ibiblio.org/gutenberg/etext05/8sgt210.zip + + + + + + + +SIR GEORGE TRESSADY, VOLUME I + +IN TWO VOLUMES + +BY + +MRS. HUMPHRY WARD + +AUTHOR OF "MARCELLA," "THE HISTORY OF DAVID GRIEVE," +"ROBERT ELSMEKE," ETC. + + + + + + +To my Brother and friend + +WILLIAM THOMAS ARNOLD + +I INSCRIBE THIS BOOK + + + + + + + +VOLUME I. + + + + +PART I + + + +CHAPTER I + + +"Well, that's over, thank Heaven!" + +The young man speaking drew in his head from the carriage-window. But +instead of sitting down he turned with a joyous, excited gesture and +lifted the flap over the little window in the back of the landau, +supporting himself, as he stooped to look, by a hand on his companion's +shoulder. Through this peephole he saw, as the horses trotted away, the +crowd in the main street of Market Malford, still huzzaing and waving, +the wild glare of half a dozen torches on the faces and the moving forms, +the closed shops on either hand, the irregular roofs and chimneys +sharp-cut against a wintry sky, and in the far distance the little +lantern belfry and taller mass of the new town-hall. + +"I'm much astonished the horses didn't bolt!" said the man addressed. +"That bay mare would have lost all the temper she's got in another +moment. It's a good thing we made them shut the carriage--it has turned +abominably cold. Hadn't you better sit down?" + +And Lord Fontenoy made a movement as though to withdraw from the hand on +his shoulder. + +The owner of the hand flung himself down on the seat, with a word of +apology, took off his hat, and drew a long breath of fatigue. At the same +moment a sudden look of disgust effaced the smile with which he had taken +his last glimpse at the crowd. + +"All very well!--but what one wants after this business is _a moral tub_! +The lies I've told during the last three weeks--the bunkum I've +talked!--it's a feeling of positive dirt! And the worst of it is, however +you may scrub your mind afterwards, some of it must stick." + +He took out a cigarette, and lit it at his companion's with a rather +unsteady hand. He had a thin, long face and fair hair; and one would have +guessed him some ten years younger than the man beside him. + +"Certainly--it will stick," said the other. "Election promises nowadays +are sharply looked after. I heard no bunkum. As far as I know, our party +doesn't talk any. We leave that to the Government!" + +Sir George Tressady, the young man addressed, shrugged his shoulders. His +mouth was still twitching under the influence of nervous excitement. But +as they rolled along between the dark hedges, the carriage-lamps shining +on their wet branches, green yet, in spite of November, he began to +recover a half-cynical self-control. The poll for the Market Malford +Division of West Mercia had been declared that afternoon, between two and +three o'clock, after a hotly contested election; he, as the successful +candidate by a very narrow majority, had since addressed a shouting mob +from the balcony of the Greyhound Hotel, had suffered the usual taking +out of horses and triumphal dragging through the town, and was now +returning with his supporter and party-leader, Lord Fontenoy, to the +great Tory mansion which had sent them forth in the morning, and had been +Tressady's headquarters during the greater part of the fight. + +"Did you ever see anyone so down as Burrows?" he said presently, with a +little leap of laughter. "By George! it _is_ hard lines. I suppose he +thought himself safe, what with the work he'd done in the division and +the hold he had on the miners. Then a confounded stranger turns up, and +the chance of seventeen ignorant voters kicks you out! He could hardly +bring himself to shake hands with me. I had come rather to admire him, +hadn't you?" + +Lord Fontenoy nodded. + +"I thought his speeches showed ability," he said indifferently, "only of +a kind that must be kept out of Parliament--that's all. Sorry you have +qualms--quite unnecessary, I assure you! At the present moment, either +Burrows and his like knock under, or you and your like. This time--by +seventeen votes--Burrows knocks under. Thank the Lord! say I"--and the +speaker opened the window an instant to knock off the end of his cigar. + +Tressady made no reply. But again a look, half-chagrined, +half-reflective, puckered his brow, which was smooth, white, and boyish +under his straight, fair hair; whereas the rest of the face was subtly +lined, and browned as though by travel and varied living. The nose and +mouth, though not handsome, were small and delicately cut, while the +long, pointed chin, slightly protruding, made those who disliked him say +that he was like those innumerable portraits of Philip IV., by and after +Velasquez, which bestrew the collections of Europe. But if the Hapsburg +chin had to be admitted, nothing could be more modern, intelligent, +alert, than the rest of him. + +The two rolled along a while in silence. They were passing through an +undulating midland country, dimly seen under the stars. At frequent +intervals rose high mounds, with tall chimneys and huddled buildings +beside them or upon them which marked the sites of collieries; while the +lights also, which had begun to twinkle over the face of the land, showed +that it was thickly inhabited. + +Suddenly the carriage rattled into a village, and Tressady looked out. + +"I say, Fontenoy, here's a crowd! Do you suppose they know? Why, +Gregson's taken us another way round!" + +Lord Fontenoy let down his window, and identified the small mining +village of Battage. + +"Why did you bring us this way, Gregson?" he said to the coachman. + +The man, a Londoner, turned, and spoke in a low voice. "I thought we +might find some rioting going on in Marraby, my lord. And now I see +there's lots o' them out here!" + +Indeed, with the words he had to check his horses. The village street was +full from end to end with miners just come up from work. Fontenoy at once +perceived that the news of the election had arrived. The men were massed +in large groups, talking and discussing, with evident and angry +excitement, and as soon as the well-known liveries on the box of the new +member's carriage were identified there was an instant rush towards it. +Some of the men had already gone into their houses on either hand, but at +the sound of the wheels and the uproar they came rushing out again. A +howling hubbub arose, a confused sound of booing and groaning, and the +carriage was soon surrounded by grimed men, gesticulating and shouting. + +"Yer bloated parasites, yer!" cried a young fellow, catching at the +door-handle on Lord Fontenoy's side; "we'll make a d----d end o' yer +afore we've done wi' yer. Who asked yer to come meddlin in +Malford--d----n yer!" + +"Whativer do we want wi' the loikes o' yo representin us!" shouted +another man, pointing at Tressady. "Look at 'im; ee can't walk, ee can't; +mus be druv, poor hinnercent! When did yo iver do a day's work, eh? Look +at my 'ands! Them's the 'ands for honest men--ain't they, you fellers?" + +There was a roar of laughter and approval from the crowd, and up went a +forest of begrimed hands, flourishing and waving. + +George calmly put down the carriage-window, and, leaning his arms upon +it, put his head out. He flung some good-humoured banter at some of +the nearest men, and two or three responded. But the majority of the +faces were lowering and fierce, and the horses were becoming +inconveniently crowded. + +"Get on, Gregson," said Fontenoy, opening the front window of the +brougham. + +"If they'll let me, your lordship," said Gregson, rather pale, +raising his whip. + +The horses made a sudden start forward. There was a yell from the crowd, +and three or four men had just dashed for the horses' heads, when a shout +of a different kind ascended. + +"Burrows! 'Ere's Burrows! Three cheers for Burrows!" + +And some distance behind them, at the corner of the village street, +Tressady suddenly perceived a tall dogcart drawing up with two men in it. +It was already surrounded by a cheering and tumultuous assembly, and one +of the men in the cart was shaking hands right and left. + +George drew in his head, with a laugh. "This is dramatic. They've stopped +the horses, and here's Burrows!" + +Fontenoy shrugged his shoulders. "They'll blackguard us a bit, I suppose, +and let us go. Burrows 'll keep them in order." + +"What d'yer mean by it, heh, dash yer!" shouted a huge man, as he sprang +on the step of the carriage and shook a black fist in Tressady's +face--"thrustin yer d----d carkiss where yer ain't wanted? We wanted +'_im_, and we've worked for 'im. This is a workin-class district, an +we've a _right_ to 'im. Do yer 'ear?" + +"Then you should have given him seventeen more votes," said George, +composedly, as he thrust his hands into his pockets. "It's the fortunes +of war--your turn next time. I say, suppose you tell your fellows to let +our man get on. We've had a long day, and we're hungry. Ah"--to +Fontenoy--"here's Burrows coming!" + +Fontenoy turned, and saw that the dogcart had drawn up alongside them, +and that one of the men was standing on the step of it, holding on to the +rail of the cart. + +He was a tall, finely built man, and as he looked down on the carriage, +and on Tressady leaning over the window, the light from a street-lamp +near showed a handsome face blanched with excitement and fatigue. + +"Now, my friends," he said, raising his arm, and addressing the crowd, +"you let Sir George go home to his dinner. He's beaten us, and so far as +I know _he's_ fought fair, whatever some of his friends may have done for +him. I'm going home to have a bite of something and a wash. I'm done. But +if any of you like to come round to the club--eight o'clock--I'll tell +you a thing or two about this election. Now goodnight to you, Sir George. +We'll beat you yet, trust us. Fall back there!" + +He pointed peremptorily to the men holding the horses. They and the crowd +instantly obeyed him. + +The carriage swept on, followed by the hooting and groans of the whole +community, men, women, and children, who were now massed along the street +on either hand. + +"It's easy to see this man Gregson's a new hand," said Fontenoy, with an +accent of annoyance, as they got clear of the village. "I believe the +Wattons have only just imported him, otherwise he'd never have avoided +Marraby, and come round by Battage." + +"Battage has some special connection with Burrows, hasn't it? I had +forgotten." + +"Of course. He was check-weigher at the Acme pit here for years, before +they made him district secretary of the union." + +"That's why they gave me such a hot meeting here a fortnight ago!--I +remember now; but one thing drives another out of one's head. Well, +I daresay you and I'll have plenty more to do with Burrows before +we've done." + +Tressady threw himself back in his corner with a yawn. + +Fontenoy laughed. + +"There'll be another big strike some time next year," he said +drily--"bound to be, as far as I can see. We shall all have plenty to do +with Burrows then." + +"All right," said Tressady, indistinctly, pulling his hat over his eyes. +"Burrows or anybody else may blow me up next year, so long as they let me +go to sleep now." + +However, he did not find it so easy to go to sleep. His pulses were still +tingling under the emotions of the day and the stimulus of the hubbub +they had just passed through. His mind raced backwards and forwards over +the incidents and excitements of the last six months, over the scenes of +his canvass--and over some other scenes of a different kind which had +taken place in the country-house whither he and Fontenoy were returning. + +But he did his best to feign sleep. His one desire was that Fontenoy +should not talk to him. Fontenoy, however, was not easily taken in, and +no sooner did George make his first restless movement under the rug he +had drawn over him, than his companion broke silence. + +"By the way, what did you think of that memorandum of mine on Maxwell's +bill?" + +George fidgeted and mumbled. Fontenoy, undaunted, began to harangue on +certain minutiae of factory law with a monotonous zest of voice and +gesture which seemed to Tressady nothing short of amazing. + +He watched the speaker a minute or two through his half-shut eyes. So +this was his leader to be--the man who had made him member for Market +Malford. + +Eight years before, when George Tressady had first entered Christchurch, +he had found that place of tempered learning alive with traditions on the +subject of "Dicky Fontenoy." And such traditions--good Heavens! +Subsequently, at most race-meetings, large and small, and at various +clubs, theatres, and places of public resort, the younger man had had his +opportunities of observing the elder, and had used them always with +relish, and sometimes with admiration. He himself had no desire to follow +in Fontenoy's footsteps. Other elements ruled in him, which drew him +other ways. But there was a magnificence about the impetuosity, or rather +the doggedness with which Fontenoy had plunged into the business of +ruining himself, which stirred the imagination. On the last occasion, +some three and a half years before this Market Malford election, when +Tressady had seen Fontenoy before starting himself on a long Eastern +tour, he had been conscious of a lively curiosity as to what might have +happened to "Dicky" by the time he came back again. The eldest sons of +peers do not generally come to the workhouse; but there are aristocratic +substitutes which, relatively, are not much less disagreeable; and George +hardly saw how they were to be escaped. + +And now--not four years!--and here sat Dicky Fontenoy, haranguing on the +dull clauses of a technical act, throat hoarse with the speaking of the +last three weeks, eyes cavernous with anxiety and overwork, the creator +and leader of a political party which did not exist when Tressady left +England, and now bade fair to hold the balance of power in English +government! The surprises of fate and character! Tressady pondered them a +little in a sleepy way; but the fatigue of many days asserted itself. +Even his companion was soon obliged to give him up as a listener. Lord +Fontenoy ceased to talk; yet every now and then, as some jolt of the +carriage made George open his eyes, he saw the broad-shouldered figure +beside him, sitting in the same attitude, erect and tireless, the same +half-peevish pugnacity giving expression to mouth and eye. + + * * * * * + +"Come, wake up, Tressady! Here we are!" + +There was a vindictive eagerness in Fontenoy's voice. Ease was no longer +welcome to him, whether in himself or as a spectacle in other men. +George, startled from a momentary profundity of sleep, staggered to his +feet, and clutched at various bags and rugs. + +The carriage was standing under the pillared porch of Malford House, and +the great house-doors, thrown back upon an inner flight of marble steps, +gave passage to a blaze of light. George, descending, had just shaken +himself awake, and handed the things he held to a footman, when there was +a sudden uproar from within. A crowd of figures--men and women, the men +cheering, the women clapping and laughing--ran down the inner steps +towards him. He was surrounded, embraced, slapped on the back, and +finally carried triumphantly into the hall. + +"Bring him in!" said an exultant voice; "and stand back, please, and let +his mother get at him." + +The laughing group fell back, and George, blinking, radiant, and abashed, +found himself in the arms of an exceedingly sprightly and youthful dame, +with pale, frizzled hair, and the figure of seventeen. + +"Oh, you dear, great, foolish thing!" said the lady, with the voice and +the fervour, moreover, of seventeen. "So you've got in--you've done it! +Well, I should never have spoken to you again if you hadn't! And I +suppose you'd have minded that a little--from your own mother. Goodness! +how cold he is!" + +And she flew at him with little pecking kisses, retreating every now and +again to look at him, and then closing upon him again in ecstasy, till +George, at the end of his patience, held her off with a strong arm. + +"Now, mother, that's enough. Have the others been home long?" he +asked, addressing a smiling young man in knickerbockers who, with his +hands in his pockets, was standing beside the hero of the occasion +surveying the scene. + +"Oh! about half an hour. They reported you'd have some difficulty +in getting out of the clutches of the crowd. We hardly expected +you so soon." + +"How's Miss Sewell's headache? Does she know?" + +The expression of the young man's eye, which was bent on Tressady, +changed ever so slightly as he replied: + +"Oh yes, she knows. As soon as the others got back Mrs. Watton went up to +tell her. She didn't show at lunch." + +"Mrs. Watton came to tell _me_--naughty man!" said the lady whom George +had addressed as his mother, tapping the speaker on the arm with her fan. +"Mothers first, if you please, especially when they're cripples like me, +and can't go and see their dear darlings' triumphs with their own eyes. +And _I_ told Miss Sewell." + +She put her head on one side, and looked archly at her son. Her high +gown, a work of the most approved Parisian art, was so cut as to show +much more throat than usual, and, in addition, a row of very fine pearls. +Her very elegant waist and bust were defined by a sort of Empire sash; +her complexion did her maid and, indeed, her years, infinite credit. + +George flushed slightly at his mother's words, and was turning away from +her when he was gripped by the owner of the house, Squire Watton, an +eloquent and soft-hearted old gentleman who, having in George's opinion +already overdone it greatly at the town-hall in the way of hand-shaking +and congratulations, was now most unreasonably prepared to overdo it +again. Lady Tressady joined in with little shrieks and sallies, the other +guests of the house gathered round, and the hero of the day was once +more lost to sight and hearing amid the general hubbub of talk and +laughter--for the young man in knickerbockers, at any rate, who stood a +little way off from the rest. + +"I wonder when she'll condescend to come down," he said to himself, +examining his boots with a speculative smile. "Of course it was mere +caprice that she didn't go to Malford; she meant it to annoy." + +"I say, do let me get warm," said Tressady at last, breaking from his +tormentors, and coming up to the open log fire, in front of which the +young man stood. "Where's Fontenoy vanished to?" + +"Went up to write letters directly he had swallowed a cup of tea," said +the young man, whose name was Bayle; "and called Marks to go with him." +(Marks was Lord Fontenoy's private secretary.) + +George Tressady threw up his hands in disgust. + +"It's absurd. He never allows himself an hour's peace. If he expects me +to grind as he does, he'll soon regret that he lent a hand to put me into +Parliament. Well, I'm stiff all over, and as tired as a rat. I'll go and +have a warm bath before dinner." + +But still he lingered, warming his hands over the blaze, and every now +and then scanning the gallery which ran round the big hall. Bayle chatted +to Mm about some of the incidents of the day. George answered at random. +He did, indeed, look tired out, and his expression was restless and +discontented. + +Suddenly there was a cry from the group of young men and maidens who were +amusing themselves in the centre of the hall. + +"Why, there's Letty! and as fresh as paint." + +George turned abruptly. Bayle saw his manner stiffen and his eye kindle. + +A young girl was slowly coming down the great staircase which led to the +hall. She was in a soft black dress with a blue sash, and a knot of blue +at her throat--a childish slip of a dress, which answered to her small +rounded form, her curly head, and the hand slipping along the marble +rail. She came down silently smiling, taking each step with great +deliberation, in spite of the outbreak of half-derisive sympathy with +which she was greeted from her friends below. Her bright eyes glanced +from face to face--from the mocking inquirers immediately beneath her to +George Tressady standing by the fire. + +At the moment when she reached the last step Tressady found it necessary +to put another log on a fire already piled to repletion. + +Meanwhile Miss Sewell went straight towards the new member and held +out her hand. + +"I am so glad, Sir George; let me congratulate you." + +George put down his log, and then looked at his fingers critically. + +"I am very sorry, Miss Sewell, but I am not fit to touch. I hope your +headache is better." + +Miss Sewell dropped her hand meekly, shot him a glance which was not +meek, and said demurely: + +"Oh! my headaches do what they're told. You see, I was determined to come +down and congratulate you." + +"I see," he repeated, making her a little bow. "I hope my ailments, when +I get them, will be as docile. So my mother told you?" + +"I didn't want telling," she said placidly. "I knew it was all safe." + +"Then you knew what only the gods knew--for I only got in by +seventeen votes." + +"Yes, so I heard. I was very sorry for Burrows." + +She put one foot on the stone fender, raised her pretty dress with one +hand, and leant the other lightly against the mantelpiece. The attitude +was full of grace, and the little sighing voice fitted the curves of a +mouth which seemed always ready to laugh, yet seldom laughed frankly. + +As she made her remark about Burrows Tressady smiled. + +"My prophetic soul was right," he said deliberately; "I knew you would be +sorry for Burrows." + +"Well, it _is_ hard on him, isn't it? You can't deny you're a +carpet-bagger, can you?" + +"Why should I? I'm proud of it." + +Then he looked round him. The rest of the party--not without whispers and +smothered laughter--had withdrawn from them. Some of the ladies had +already gone up to dress. The men had wandered away into a little library +and smoking-room which opened on the hall. Only the squire, safe in a +capacious armchair a little way off, was absorbed in a local paper and +the last humours of the election. + +Satisfied with his glance, Tressady put his hands into his pockets, and +leant back against the fireplace, in a way to give himself fuller command +of Miss Sewell's countenance. + +"Do you never give your friends any better sympathy than you have given +me in this affair, Miss Sewell?" he said suddenly, as their eyes met. + +She made a little face. + +"Why, I've been an angel!" she said, poking at a prominent log +with her foot. + +George laughed. + +"Then our ideas of angels agree no better than the rest. Why didn't you +come and hear the poll declared, after promising me you would be there?" + +"Because I had a headache, Sir George." + +He responded with a little inclination, as though ceremoniously accepting +her statement. + +"May I ask at what time your headache began?" + +"Let me see," she said, laughing; "I think it was directly after +breakfast." + +"Yes. It declared itself, if I remember right, immediately after certain +remarks of mine about a Captain Addison?" + +He looked straight before him, with a detached air. + +"Yes," said Letty, thoughtfully; "it was a curious coincidence, +wasn't it?" + +There was a moment's silence. Then she broke into infectious laughter. + +"Don't you know," she said, laying her hand on his shoulder--"don't you +know that you're a most foolish and wasteful person? We get along +capitally, you and I--we've had a rattling time all this week--and then +you will go and make uncivil remarks about my friends--in public, too! +You actually think I'm going to let you tell Aunt Watton how to manage +me! You get me into no end of a fuss--it'll take me weeks to undo the +mischief you've been making--and then you expect me to take it like a +lamb! Now, do I look like a lamb?" + +All this time she was holding him tight by the arm, and her dimpled face, +alive with mirth and malice, was so close to his that a moment's wild +impulse flashed through him to kiss her there and then. But the impulse +passed. He and Letty Sewell had known each other for about three weeks. +They were not engaged--far from it. And these--the hand on the arm, and +the rest--were Letty Sewell's ways. + +Instead of kissing her, then, he scanned her deliberately. + +"_I_ never saw anyone more plainly given over to obstinacy and pride," +he said quietly; "I told you some plain facts about the character of a +man whom I know, and you don't, whereupon you sulk all day, you break +all your promises about coming to Malford, and when I come back you call +me names." + +She raised her eyebrows and withdrew her hand. + +"Well, it's plain, isn't it? that I must have been in a great rage. It +was very dull upstairs, though I did write reams to my best friend all +about you--a very candid account--I shall have to soften it down. By the +way, are you ever going to dress for dinner?" + +George started, and looked at his watch. + +"Are we alone? Is anyone coming from outside?" + +"Only a few 'locals,' just to celebrate the occasion. I know the +clergyman's wife's coming, for she told me she had been copying one of my +frocks, and wanted me to tell her what I thought." + +George laughed. + +"Poor lady!" + +"I don't _think_ I shall be nice to her," said Letty, playing with a +flower on the mantelpiece. "Dowdy people make me feel wicked. Well, _I_ +must dress." + +It was now his turn to lay a detaining hand. + +"Are you sorry?" he said, bending over to her. His bright grey eyes had +shaken off fatigue. + +"For what? Because you got in?" + +Her face overflowed with laughter. He let her go. She linked her arm in +that of the daughter of the house--Miss Florence Watton--who was crossing +the hall at the moment, and the two went upstairs together, she throwing +back one triumphant glance at him from the landing. + +George stood watching them till they disappeared. His expression was +neither soft nor angry. There was in it a mocking self-possession which +showed that he too had been playing a part--mingled, perhaps, with a +certain perplexity. + + + + +CHAPTER II + + +George Tressady came down very late for dinner, and found his hostess on +the verge of annoyance. Mrs. Watton was a large, commanding woman, who +seldom thought it worth while to disguise any disapproval she might +feel--and she had a great deal of that commodity to expend, both on +persons and institutions. + +George hastened to propitiate her with the usual futilities: he had +supposed that he was in excellent time, his watch had been playing +tricks, and so on. + +Mrs. Watton, who, after all, on this great day beheld in the new member +the visible triumph of her dearest principles, received these excuses at +first with stiffness, but soon thawed. + +"Oh, you _naughty_ boy, you naughty, mendacious boy!" said a +sprightly voice in Tressady's ear. "'Excellent time,' indeed! I saw +you--for shame!" + +And Lady Tressady flounced away from her son, laughing over her +shoulder in one of her accustomed poses. She wore white muslin over +cherry-coloured silk. The display of neck and shoulders could hardly +have been more lavish; and the rouge on her cheeks had been overdone, +which rarely happened. George turned from her hurriedly to speak to +Lord Fontenoy. + +"What a fool that woman is!" thought Mrs. Watton to herself, as her +sharp eye followed her guest. "She will make George positively dislike +her soon--and all the time she is bound to get him to pay her debts, or +there will be a smash. What! dinner? John, will you please take Lady +Tressady; Harding, will you take Mrs. Hawkins"--pointing her second son +towards a lady in black sitting stiffly on the edge of an ottoman; "Mr. +Hawkins takes Florence; Sir George"--she waved her hand towards Miss +Sewell. "Now, Lord Fontenoy, you must take me; and the rest of you sort +yourselves." + +As the young people, mostly cousins, laughingly did what they were told, +Sir George held out his arm to Miss Sewell. + +"I am very sorry for you," he said, as they passed into the dining-room. + +"Oh! I knew it would be my turn," said Letty, with resignation. "You see, +you took Florrie last night, and Aunt Watton the night before." + +George settled himself deliberately in his chair, and turned to study his +companion. + +"Do you mind warning me, to begin with, how I can avoid giving you a +headache? Since this morning my nerve has gone--I want directions." + +"Well--" said Letty, pondering, "let us lay down the subjects we _may_ +talk about first. For instance, you may talk of Mrs. Hawkins." + +She gave an imperceptible nod which directed his eyes to the thin woman +sitting opposite, to whom Harding Watton, a fashionable and fastidious +youth, was paying but scant attention. + +George examined her. + +"I don't want to," he said shortly; "besides, she would last us no +time at all." + +"Oh!--on the contrary," said Letty, with malice sparkling in her brown +eye, "she would last me a good twenty minutes. She has got on my gown." + +"I didn't recognise it," said George, studying the thin lady again. + +"I wouldn't mind," said Letty, in the same tone of reflection, "if Mrs. +Hawkins didn't think it her duty to lecture me in the intervals of +copying my frocks. If I disapproved of anybody, I don't think I should +send my nurse to ask their maid for patterns." + +"I notice you take disapproval very calmly." + +"Callously, you mean. Well, it is my misfortune. I always feel myself so +much more reasonable than the people who disapprove." + +"This morning, then, you thought me a fool?" + +"Oh no! Only--well--I _knew_, you see, that I knew better. _I_ was +reasonable, and--" + +"Oh! don't finish," said George, hastily; "and don't suppose that I shall +ever give you any more good advice." + +"Won't you?" + +Her mocking look sent a challenge, which he met with outward firmness. +Meanwhile he was inwardly haunted by a phrase he had once heard a woman +apply to the mental capacities of her best friend. "Her _mind_?--her +mind, my dear, is a shallow chaos!" The words made a neat label, he +scoffingly thought, for his own present sensations. For he could not +persuade himself that there was much profundity in his feelings towards +Miss Sewell, whatever reckless possibilities life might seem to hold at +times; when, for instance, she wore that particular pink gown in which +she was attired to-night, or when her little impertinent airs suited her +as well as they were suiting her just now. Something cool and critical in +him was judging her all the time. Ten years hence, he made himself +reflect, she would probably have no prettiness left. Whereas now, what +with bloom and grace, what with small proportions and movements light as +air, what with an inventive refinement in dress and personal adornment +that never failed, all Letty Sewell's defects of feature or expression +were easily lost in a general aspect which most men found dazzling and +perturbing enough. Letty, at any rate within her own circle, had never +yet been without partners, or lovers, or any other form of girlish +excitement that she desired, and had been generally supposed--though she +herself was aware of some strong evidence to the contrary--to be capable +of getting anything she had set her mind upon. She had set her mind, as +the spectators in this particular case had speedily divined, upon +enslaving young George Tressady. And she had not failed. For even during +these last stirring days it had been tolerably clear that she and his +election had divided Tressady's mind between them, with a balance, +perhaps, to her side. As to the _measure_ of her success, however, that +was still doubtful--to herself and him most of all. + +To-night, at any rate, he could not detach himself from her. He tried +repeatedly to talk to the girl on his left, a noble-faced child fresh out +of the schoolroom, who in three years' time would be as much Letty +Sewell's superior in beauty as in other things. But the effort was too +great. The strenuous business of the day had but left him--in fatigue and +reaction--the more athirst for amusement and the gratification of another +set of powers. He turned back to Letty, and through course after course +they chattered and sparred, discussing people, plays and books, or +rather, under cover of these, a number of those topics on the borderland +of passion whereby men and women make their first snatches at +intimacy--till Mrs. Watton's sharp grey eyes smiled behind her fan, and +the attention of her neighbour, Lord Fontenoy--an uneasy attention--was +again and again drawn to the pair. + +Meanwhile, during the first half of dinner, a chair immediately opposite +to Tressady's place remained vacant. It was being kept for the eldest son +of the house, his mother explaining carelessly to Lord Fontenoy that she +believed he was "Out parishing somewhere, as usual." + +However, with the appearance of the pheasants the door from the +drawing-room opened, and a slim dark-haired man slipped in. He took his +place noiselessly, with a smile of greeting to George and his +neighbour, and bade the butler in a whisper aside bring him any course +that might be going. + +"Nonsense, Edward!" said his mother's loud voice from the head of the +table; "don't be ridiculous. Morris, bring back that hare _entree_ and +the mutton for Mr. Edward." + +The newcomer raised his eyebrows mildly, smiled, and submitted. + +"Where have you been, Edward?" said Tressady; "I haven't seen you since +the town-hall." + +"I have been at a rehearsal. There is a parish concert next week, and I +conduct these functions." + +"The concerts are always bad," said Mrs. Watton, curtly. + +Edward Watton shrugged his shoulder. He had a charming timid air, +contradicted now and then by a look of enthusiastic resolution in the +eyes. + +"All the more reason for rehearsal," he said. "However, really, they +won't do badly this time." + +"Edward is one of the persons," said Mrs. Watton in a low aside to Lord +Fontenoy, "who think you can make friends with people--the lower +orders--by shaking hands with them, showing them Burne-Jones's pictures, +and singing 'The Messiah' with them. I had the same idea once. Everybody +had. It was like the measles. But the sensible persons have got over it." + +"Thank you, mamma," said Watton, making her a smiling bow. + +Lady Tressady interrupted her talk with the squire at the other end of +the table to observe what was going on. She had been chattering very +fast in a shrill, affected voice, with a gesticulation so free and +French, and a face so close to his, that the nervous and finicking +squire had been every moment afraid lest the next should find her white +fingers in his very eyes. He felt an inward spasm of relief when he saw +her attention diverted. + +"Is that Mr. Edward talking his Radicalism?" she asked, putting up a +gold eyeglass--"his dear, wicked Radicalism? Ah! we all know where Mr. +Edward got it." + +The table laughed. Harding Watton looked particularly amused. + +"Egeria was in this neighbourhood last week," he said, addressing Lady +Tressady. "Edward rode over to see her. Since then he has joined two new +societies, and ordered six new books on the Labour Question." + +Edward flushed a little, but went on eating his dinner without any other +sign of disturbance. + +"If you mean Lady Maxwell," he said good-humouredly, "I can only be sorry +for the rest of you that you don't know her." + +He raised his handsome head with a bright air of challenge that became +him, but at the same time exasperated his mother. + +"That _woman!_" said Mrs. Watton with ponderous force, throwing up her +hands as she spoke. Then she turned to Lord Fontenoy. "Don't _you_ regard +her as the source of half the mischievous work done by this precious +Government in the last two years?" she asked him imperiously. + +A half-contemptuous smile crossed Lord Fontenoy's worn face. + +"Well, really, I'm not inclined to make Lady Maxwell the scapegoat. Let +them bear their own misdeeds." + +"Besides, what worse can you say of English Ministers than that they +should be led by a woman?" said Mr. Watton, from the bottom of the table, +in a piping voice. "In my young days such a state of things would have +been unheard of. No offence, my dear, no offence," he added hastily, +glancing at his wife. + +Letty glanced at George, and put up a handkerchief to hide her own +merriment. + +Mrs. Watton looked impatient. + +"Plenty of English Cabinet Ministers have been led by women before now," +she said drily; "and no blame to them or anybody else. Only in the old +days you knew where you were. Women were corrupt--as they were meant to +be--for their husbands and brothers and sons. They wanted something for +somebody--and got it. Now they are corrupt--like Lady Maxwell--for what +they are pleased to call 'causes,' and it is that which will take the +nation to ruin." + +At this there was an incautious protest from Edward Watton against the +word "corrupt," followed by a confirmatory clamour from his mother and +brother which seemed to fill the dining-room. Lady Tressady threw in +affected comments from time to time, trying hard to hold her own in the +conversation by a liberal use of fan and Christian names, and little +personal audacities applied to each speaker in turn. Only Edward Watton, +however, occasionally took civil or smiling notice of her; the others +ignored her. They were engaged in a congenial task, the hunting of the +one disaffected and insubordinate member of their pack, and had for the +moment no attention to spare for other people. + +"I shall see the great lady, I suppose, in a week or two," said George to +Miss Sewell, under cover of the noise. "It is curious that I should never +have seen her." + +"Who? Lady Maxwell?" + +"Yes. You remember I have been four years out of England. She was in +town, I suppose, the year before I left, but I never came across her." + +"I prophesy you will like her enormously," said Letty, with decision. "At +least, I know that's what happens to me when Aunt Watton abuses anybody. +I couldn't dislike them afterwards if I tried." + +"That, allow me to impress upon you, is _not_ my disposition! I am a +human being--I am influenced by my friends." + +He turned round towards her so as to appropriate her again. + +"Oh! you are not at all the poor creature you paint yourself!" said +Letty, shaking her head. "In reality, you are the most obstinate +person I know--you can never let a subject alone--you never know when +you're beaten." + +"Beaten?" said George, reflectively; "by a headache? Well, there is no +disgrace in that. One will probably 'live to fight another day.' Do you +mean to say that you will take no notice--no notice--of all that array of +facts I laid before you this morning on the subject of Captain Addison?" + +"I shall be kind to you, and forget them. Now, do listen to Aunt Watton! +It is your duty. Aunt Watton is accustomed to be listened to, and you +haven't heard it all a hundred times before, as I have." + +Mrs. Watton, indeed, was haranguing her end of the table on a subject +that clearly excited her. Contempt and antagonism gave a fine energy to a +head and face already sufficiently expressive. Both were on a large +scale, but without commonness. The old-lace coif she wore suited her +waved and grizzled hair, and was carried with conscious dignity; the +hand, which lay beside her on the table, though long and bony, was full +of nervous distinction. Mrs. Watton was, and looked, a tyrant--but a +tyrant of ability. + +"A neighbour of theirs in Brookshire," she was saying, "was giving me +last week the most extraordinary account of the doings at Mellor. She was +the heiress of that house at Mellor"--here she addressed young Bayle, +who, as a comparative stranger in the house, might be supposed to be +ignorant of facts which everybody else knew--"a tumbledown place with an +income of about two thousand a year. Directly she married she put a +Socialist of the most unscrupulous type--so they tell me--into +possession. The man has established what they call a 'standard rate' of +wages for the estate--practically double the normal rate--coerced all the +farmers, and made the neighbours furious. They say the whole district is +in a ferment. It used to be the quietest part of the world imaginable, +and now she has set it all by the ears. _She_, having married thirty +thousand a year, can afford her little amusements; other people, who must +live by their land, have their lives worried out of them." + +"She tells me that the system works on the whole extremely well," said +Edward Watton, whose heightened colour alone betrayed the irritation of +his mother's chronic aggression, "and that Maxwell is not at all unlikely +to adopt it on his own estate." + +Mrs. Watton threw up her hands again. + +"The _idiocy_ of that man! Till he married her he was a man of sense. And +now she leads him by the nose, and whatever tune he calls, the Government +must dance to, because of his power in the House of Lords." + +"And the worst of it is," said Harding Watton, with an unpleasant laugh, +"that if she were not a handsome woman, her influence would not be half +what it is. She uses her beauty in the most unscrupulous way." + +"I believe that to be _entirely_ untrue," said Edward Watton, with +emphasis, looking at his brother with hostility. + +George Tressady interrupted. He had an affection for Edward Watton, and +cordially disliked Harding. "Is she really so handsome?" he asked, +bending forward and addressing his hostess. + +Mrs. Watton scornfully took no notice. + +"Well, an old diplomat told me the other day," said Lord Fontenoy--but +with a cold unwillingness, as though he disliked the subject--"that she +was the most beautiful woman, he thought, that had been seen in London +since Lady Blessington's time." + +"Lady Blessington! dear, dear!--Lady Blessington!" said Lady Tressady +with malicious emphasis--an unfortunate comparison, don't you think? Not +many people would like to be regarded as Lady Blessington's successor." + +"In any other respect than beauty," said Edward Watton, haughtily, with +the same tension as before, "the comparison, of course, would be +ridiculous." + +Harding shrugged his shoulders, and, tilting his chair back, said in the +ear of a shy young man who sat next him: + +"In my opinion, the Count d'Orsay is only a question of time! However, +one mustn't say that to Edward." + +Harding read memoirs, and considered himself a man of general +cultivation. The young man addressed, who read no printed matter outside +the sporting papers that he could help, and had no idea as to who Lady +Blessington and Count d'Orsay might be, smiled vaguely, and said nothing. + +"My dear," said the squire, plaintively, "isn't this room extremely hot?" + +There was a ripple of meaning laughter from all the young people, to many +of whom this particular quarrel was already tiresomely familiar. Mr. +Watton, who never understood anything, looked round with an inquiring +air. Mrs. Watton condescended to take the hint and retire. + +In the drawing-room afterwards Mrs. Watton first allotted a +duty-conversation of some ten minutes in length, and dealing strictly +with the affairs of the parish, to Mrs. Hawkins, who, as clergyman's +wife, had a definite official place in the Malford House circle, quite +irrespective of any individuality she might happen to possess. Mrs. +Hawkins was plain, self-conscious, and in no way interesting to Mrs. +Watton, who never took the smallest trouble to approach her in any other +capacity than that upon which she had entered by marrying the incumbent +of the squire's home living. But the civilities and respects that were +recognised as belonging to her station she received. + +This however, alas! was not enough for Mrs. Hawkins, who was full of +ambitions, which had a bad manner, a plague of shyness, and a narrow +income, were perpetually thwarting. As soon as the ten minutes were over, +and Mrs. Watton, who was nothing if not political, and saw no occasion to +make a stranger of the vicar's wife, had plunged into the evening papers +brought her by the footman, Mrs. Hawkins threw herself on Letty Sewell. +She was effusively grateful--too grateful--for the patterns lent her by +Miss Sewell's maid. + +"Did she lend you some patterns?" said Letty, raising her brows. "Dear +me; I didn't know." + +And her eyes ran cooly over Mrs. Hawkins's attire, which did, indeed, +present a village imitation of the delicate gown in which Miss Sewell had +robed herself for the evening. + +Mrs. Hawkins coloured. + +"I specially told my nurse," she said hastily, "that of course your leave +must be asked. But my nurse and your maid seem to have made friends. Of +course my nurse has plenty of time for dressmaking with only one child of +four to look after, and--and--one really gets no new ideas in a poky +place like this. But I would not have taken a liberty for the world." + +Her pride and _mauvaise honte_ together made both voice and manner +particularly unattractive. Letty was seized with the same temper that +little boys show towards flies. + +"Of course I am delighted!" she said indifferently. "It's so nice and +good to have one's things made at home. Your nurse must be a treasure." + +All the time her gaze was diligently inspecting every ill-cut seam and +tortured trimming of the homemade triumph before her. The ear of the +vicar's wife, always morbidly sensitive in that particular drawing-room, +caught a tone of insult in every light word. A passionate resentment +flamed up in her, and she determined to hold her own. + +"Are you going in for more visits when you leave here?" she inquired. + +"Yes, two or three," said Letty, turning her delicate head unwittingly. +She had been throwing blandishments to Mrs. Watton's dog, a grey Aberdeen +terrier, who stood on the rug quietly regarding her. + +"You spend most of the year in visits, don't you?" + +"Well, a good deal of it," said Letty. + +"Don't you find it dreadfully time-wasting? Does it leave you leisure +for _any_ serious occupations at all? I am afraid it would make _me_ +terribly idle!" + +Mrs. Hawkins laughed, attempting a tone of banter. + +Letty put up a small hand to hide a sudden yawn, which, however, was +visible enough. + +"Would it?" she said, with an impertinence which hardly tried to +conceal itself. "Evelyn, do look at that dog. Doesn't he remind you of +Mr. Bayley?" + +She beckoned to the handsome child of sixteen who had sat on George +Tressady's left hand at dinner, and, taking up a pinch of rose-leaves +that had dropped from a vase beside her, she flung them at the dog, +calling him to her. Instead of going to her, however, the dog slowly +curled himself up on the rug, and, laying his nose along his front paws, +stared at her steadily with the expression of one mounting guard. + +"He never will make friends with you, Letty. Isn't it odd?" said Evelyn, +laughing, and stooping to stroke the creature. + +"Never mind; other dogs will. Did you see that adorable black Spitz of +Lady Arthur's? She has promised to give me one." + +The two cousins fell into a chatter about their county neighbours, mostly +rich and aristocratic people, of whom Mrs. Hawkins knew little or +nothing. Evelyn Watton, whose instincts were quick and generous, tried +again and again to draw the vicar's wife into the conversation. Letty was +determined to exclude her. She lay back against the sofa, chatting her +liveliest, the whiteness of her neck and cheek shining against the red of +the damask behind, one foot lightly crossed over the other, showing her +costly little slippers with their paste buckles. She sparkled with jewels +as much as a girl may--more, indeed, in Mrs. Hawkins's opinion, than a +girl should. From head to foot she breathed affluence, seduction, +success--only the seduction was not for Mrs. Hawkins and her like. + +The vicar's wife sat flushed and erect on her chair, disdaining after a +time to make any further effort, but inwardly intolerably sore. She could +not despise Letty Sewell, unfortunately, since Letty's advantages were +just those that she herself most desired. But there was something else in +her mind than small jealousy. When Letty had been a brilliant child in +short frocks, the vicar's wife, who was scarcely six years older, had +opened her heart, had tried to make herself loved by Mrs. Watton's niece. +There had been a moment when they had been "Madge" and "Letty" to each +other, even since Letty had "come out." Now, whenever Mrs. Hawkins +attempted the Christian name, it stuck in her throat; it seemed, even to +herself, a familiarity that had nothing to go upon; while with every +succeeding visit to Malford, Letty had dropped her former friend more +decidedly, and "Madge" was heard no more. + +The gentlemen, deep in election incident and gossip, were, in the view +chiefly of the successful candidate, unreasonably long in leaving the +dining-room. When they appeared at last, George Tressady once more +made an attempt to talk to someone else than Letty Sewell, and once +more failed. + +"I want you to tell me something about Miss Sewell," said Lord Fontenoy +presently in Mrs. Watton's ear. He had been sitting silent beside her on +the sofa for some little time, apparently toying with the evening papers, +which Mrs. Watton had relinquished to him. + +Mrs. Watton looked up, followed the direction of his eyes towards a +settee in a distant corner of the room, and showed a half-impatient +amusement. + +"Letty? Oh! Letty's my niece--the daughter of my brother, Walter Sewell, +of Helbeck. They live in Yorkshire. My brother has my father's place--a +small estate, and rents very irregular. I often wonder how they manage to +dress that child as they do. However, she has always had her own way +since she was a foot high. As for my poor brother, he has been an +invalid for the last ten years, and neither he nor his wife--oh! such a +stupid woman!"--Mrs. Watton's energetic hands and eyes once more, called +Heaven to witness--"have ever counted for much, I should say, in Letty's +career. There is another sister, a little delicate, silent thing, that +looks after them. Oh! Letty isn't stupid; I should think not. I suppose +you're alarmed about Sir George. You needn't be. She does it with +everybody." + +The candid aunt pursued the conversation a little further, in the same +tone of a half-caustic indulgence. At the end of it, however, Lord +Fontenoy was still uneasy. He had only migrated to Malford House for the +declaration of the poll, having spent the canvassing weeks mainly in +another part of the division. And now, on this triumphant evening, he was +conscious of a sudden sense of defective information, which was +disagreeable and damping. + + * * * * * + +When bedtime came, Letty lingered in the drawing-room a little behind the +other ladies, on the plea of gathering up some trifles that belonged to +her. So that when George Tressady went out with her to light her candle +for her in the gallery, they found themselves alone. + +He had fallen into a sudden silence, which made her sweep him a look of +scrutiny as she took her candlestick. The slim yet virile figure drawn to +its full height, the significant, long-chinned face, pleased her senses. +He might be plain--she supposed he was--but he was, nevertheless, +distinguished, and extraordinarily alive. + +"I believe you are tired to death," she said to him. "Why don't you +go to bed?" + +She spoke with the freedom of one accustomed to advise all her male +acquaintance for their good. George laughed. + +"Tired? Not I. I was before dinner. Look here, Miss Sewell, I've got a +question to ask." + +"Ask it." + +"You don't want to spoil my great day, do you? You do repent that +headache?" + +They looked at each other, dancing laughter in each pair of eyes, +combined in his with an excited insistence. + +"Good-night, Sir George," she said, holding out her hand. + +He retained it. + +"You do?" he said, bending over her. + +She liked the situation, and made no immediate effort to change it. + +"Ask me a month hence, when I have proved your statements." + +"Then you admit it was all pretence?" + +"I admit nothing," she said joyously. "I protected my friend." + +"Yes, by injuring and offending another friend. Would it please you if I +said I missed you _very_ much at Malford to-day?" + +"I will tell you to-morrow--it is so late! Please let me have my hand." + +He took no notice, and they went hand-in-hand, she drawing him, to the +foot of the stairs. + +"George!" said a shrill, hesitating voice from overhead. + +George looked up, and saw his mother. He and Letty started apart, and in +another second Letty had glided upstairs and disappeared. + +"Yes, mother," said George, impatiently. + +"Will you come here?" + +He mounted, and found Lady Tressady a little discomposed, but as +affected as usual. + +"Oh, George! it was so dark--I didn't see--I didn't know. George, will +you have half an hour's talk with me after breakfast to-morrow? Oh, +George, my dear boy, my _dear_ boy! Your poor mammy understands!" + +She laid one hand on his shoulder and, lifting her feather fan in the +other, shook it with playful meaning in the direction whither Letty +had departed. + +George hastily withdrew himself. "Of course I will have a talk with you, +mother. As for anything else, I don't know what you mean. But you really +must let me go to bed; I am much too tired to talk now. Good-night." + +Lady Tressady went back to her room, smiling but anxious. + +"She has caught him!" she said to herself; "barefaced little flirt! It is +not altogether the best thing for me. But it may dispose him to be +generous, if--if I can play my cards." + +Letty Sewell meanwhile had reached the quiet of a luxurious bedroom, and +summoned her maid to her assistance. When the maid departed, the mistress +held long counsel with herself over the fire: the general position of her +affairs; what she desired; what other people intended; her will, and the +chances, of getting it. Her thoughts dealt with these various problems in +a skilled and business-like way. To a particular form of self-examination +Letty was well accustomed, and it had become by now a strong agent in the +development of individuality, as self-examination of another sort is said +to be by other kinds of people. + +She herself was pleasantly conscious of real agitation. George Tressady +had touched her feelings, thrilled her nerves, more than--Yes! she said +to herself decidedly, more than anybody else, more than "the rest." She +thought of "the rest," one after the other--thought of them +contemptuously. Yet, certainly few girls in her own set and part of the +country had enjoyed a better time--few, perhaps, had dared so many +adventures. Her mother had never interfered with her; and she herself had +not been afraid to be "talked about." Dances, picnics, moonlight walks; +the joys of outrageous "sitting-out," and hot rivalries with prettier +girls; of impertinences towards the men who didn't matter, and pretty +flatteries towards the men who did--it was all pleasant enough to think +of. She could not reproach herself with having missed any chances, any +opportunities her own will might have given her. + +And yet--well, she was tired of it!--out of love altogether with her +maiden state and its opportunities. She had come to Malford House in a +state of soreness, which partly accounted, perhaps, for such airs as she +had been showing to poor Mrs. Hawkins. During the past year a particular +marriage--the marriage of her neighbourhood--had seemed intermittently +within her reach. She had played every card she knew--and she had failed! +Failed, too, in the most humiliating way. For the bride, indeed, was +chosen; but it was not Letty Sewell, but one of Letty's girl-neighbours. + +To-night, almost for the first time, she could bear to think of it; she +could even smile at it. Vanity and ambition alone had been concerned, and +to-night these wild beasts of the heart were soothed and placable. + +Well, it was no great match, of course--if it came off. All that Aunt +Watton knew about the Tressadys had been long since extracted from her by +her niece. And with Tressady himself Letty's artless questions had been +very effective. She knew almost all that she wished to know. No doubt +Ferth was a very second-rate "place"; and, since those horrid miners had +become so troublesome, his income as a coal-owner could not be what his +father's had been--three or four thousand a year, she supposed--more, +perhaps, in good years. It was not much. + +Still--she pressed her hands on her eyes--he was _distinguished_; she saw +that plainly already. He would be welcome anywhere. + +"And we are _not_ distinguished--that is just it. We are small people, in +a rather dull set. And I have had hard work to make anything of it. Aunt +Watton was very lucky to marry as she did. Of course, she _made_ Uncle +Watton marry her; but that was a chance--and papa always says nobody else +could have done it!" + +She fell happily thinking of Tressady's skirmishes with her, her face +dimpling with amusement. Captain Addison! How amazed he would be could he +know the use to which she had put his name and his very hesitating +attentions. But he would never know; and meanwhile Sir George had been +really pricked--really jealous! She laughed to herself--a low laugh of +pure pleasure. + +Yes--she had made up her mind. With a sigh, she put away from her all +other and loftier ambitions. She supposed that she had not money or +family enough. One must face the facts. George Tressady would take her +socially into another _milieu_ than her own, and a higher one. She told +herself that she had always pined for Parliament, politics, and eminent +people. Why should she not succeed in that world as well as in the +Helbeck world? Of course she would succeed! + +There was his mother--silly, painted old lady! She was naturally the +_great_ drawback; and Aunt Watton said she was absurdly extravagant, and +would ruin Tressady if it went on. All the more reason why he should be +protected. Letty drew herself sharply together in her pretty white +dressing-gown, with the feeling that mothers of that kind must and could +be kept in their place. + +A house in town, of course--and _not_ in Warwick Square, where, +apparently, the Tressadys owned a house, which had been let, and was now +once more in Sir George's hands. That might do for Lady Tressady--if, +indeed, she could afford it when her son had married and taken other +claims upon him. + +Letty allowed her thoughts to wander dreamily on, envisaging the London +life that was to be: the young member, Lord Fontenoy's special friend and +_protege_--the young member's wife making her way among great people, +giving charming little parties at Ferth-- + +All very well! But what, please, were the facts on his side? She buried +her small chin deep in her hands as she tried, frowning, to think it out. +Certainly he was very much drawn, very much taken. She had watched him, +sometimes, trying to keep away from her--and her lips parted in a broad +smile as she recalled the triumph of his sudden returns and submissions. +She believed he had a curious temper--easily depressed, for all his +coolness. But he had never been depressed in her company. + +Still, _nothing_ was certain. All that had happened might melt away into +nothingness with the greatest ease if--well! if the right steps were not +taken. He was no novice, any more than she; he must have had scores of +"affairs" by now, with that manner of his. Such men were always capable +of second thoughts, of tardy retreats--and especially if there were the +smallest thought of persecution, of pursuit. + +She believed--she was nearly certain--he would have a reaction to-morrow, +perhaps because his mother had caught them together. Next morning he +would be just a little bored by the thought of it--a little bored by +having to begin again where he had left off. Without great tact and skill +the whole edifice might tumble together like a house of cards. Had she +the courage to make difficulties--to put a water-ditch across his path? + +It was close on midnight when Letty at last raised her little chin from +the hands that held it and rang the bell that communicated with her +maid's room, but cautiously, so as not to disturb the rest of the +sleeping house. + +"If Grier _is_ asleep, she must wake up, that's all!" + +Two or three minutes afterwards a dishevelled maid startled out of her +first slumber appeared, to ask whether her mistress was ill. + +"No, Grier, but I wanted to tell you that I have changed my mind about +staying here till Saturday. I am going to-morrow morning by the 9.30 +train. You can order a fly first thing, and bring me my breakfast early." + +The maid, groaning at the thought of the boxes that would have to be +packed in this inconceivable hurry, ventured to protest. + +"Never mind, you can get the housemaid to help you," said Miss Sewell, +decidedly. "I don't mind what you give her. Now go to bed, Grier. I'm +sorry I woke you up; you look as tired as an owl." + +Then she stood still, looking at herself--hands clasped lightly before +her--in the long glass. + +"'Letty went by the nine o'clock train,'" she said aloud, smiling, and +mocking her own white reflection. "'Dear me! How sudden! how +extraordinary! Yes, but that's like her. H'm--' Then he must write to me, +for I shall write _him_ a civil little note asking for that book I lent +him. Oh! I _hope_ Aunt Watton and his mother will bore him to death!" + +She broke out into a merry laugh; then, sweeping her mass of pretty hair +to one side, she began rapidly to coil it up for the night, her fingers +working as fast as her thoughts, which were busy with one ingenious plan +after another for her next meeting with George Tressady. + + + + +CHAPTER III + + +During this same space of time, which for Miss Sewell's maid ended so +disagreeably, George Tressady was engaged in a curious conversation. + +He had excused himself from smoking, on the ground of fatigue, +immediately after his parting from Letty. But he had only nominally gone +to bed. He too found it difficult to tear himself from thinking and the +fire, and had not begun to undress when he heard a knock at his door. On +his reply, Lord Fontenoy entered. + +"May I come in, Tressady?" + +"By all means." + +George, however, stared at his invader in some astonishment. His +relations with Fontenoy were not personally intimate. + +"Well, I'm glad to find you still up, for I had a few words on my mind to +say to you before I go off to-morrow. Can you spare me ten minutes?" + +"Certainly; do sit down. Only--well, I'm afraid I'm pretty well done. If +it's anything important, I can't promise to take it in." + +Lord Fontenoy for a moment made no reply. He stood by the fire, looking +at the cigarette he still held, in silence. George watched him with +repressed annoyance. + +"It's been a very hot fight, this," said Fontenoy at last, slowly, "and +you've won it well. All our band have prospered in the matter of +elections. But this contest of yours has been, I think, the most +conspicuous that any of us have fought. Your speeches have made a +mark--one can see that from the way in which the Press has begun to take +them, political beginner though you are. In the House you will be, I +think, our best speaker--of course with time and experience. As for me, +if you give me a fortnight to prepare in, I can make out something. +Otherwise I am no use. _You_ will take a good debating place from the +beginning. Well, it is only what I expected." + +The speaker stopped. George, fidgeting in his chair, said nothing; and +presently Fontenoy resumed: + +"I trust you will not think what I am going to say an intrusion, but--you +remember my letters to you in India?" + +George nodded. + +"They put the case strongly, I think," Fontenoy went on, "but, in my +opinion, not strongly enough. This wretched Government is in power by the +help of a tyranny--a tyranny of Labour. They call themselves +Conservatives--they are really State Socialists, and the mere catspaws of +the revolutionary Socialists. You and I are in Parliament to break down +that tyranny, if we can. This year and next will be all-important. If we +can hold Maxwell and his friends in check for a time--if we can put some +backbone into the party of freedom--if we can rally and call up the +forces we have in the country, the thing will be done. We shall have +established the counterpoise--we shall very likely turn the next +election, and liberty--or what still remains of it!--will be saved for a +generation. But to succeed, the effort, the sacrifice, from each one of +us, will have to be _enormous_." + +Fontenoy paused, and looked at his companion. George was lying back in +an armchair with his eyes shut. Why on earth--so he was +thinking--should Fontenoy have chosen this particular hour and this +particular night to _debiter_ these very stale things, that he had +already served up in innumerable speeches and almost every letter that +George had received from him? + +"I don't suppose it will be child's-play," he said, stifling a +yawn--"hope I shall feel keener after a night's rest!" He looked up +with a smile. + +Fontenoy dropped his cigarette into the fender and stood silent a moment, +his hands clasped behind his back. + +"Look here, Tressady!" he said at last, turning to his companion; "you +remember how affairs stood with me when you left England? I didn't know +much of you, but I believe, like many of my juniors, you knew a great +deal about me?" + +George made the sign of assent expected of him. + +"I knew something about you, certainly," he said, smiling; "it was not +difficult." + +Fontenoy smiled too, though without geniality. Geniality had become +impossible to a man always overworked and on edge. + +"I was a fool," he said quickly--"an open and notorious fool. But I +enjoyed my life. I don't suppose anyone ever enjoyed life more. Every day +of my former existence gave the lie to the good people who tell you that +to be happy you must be virtuous. I was idle, extravagant, and vicious, +and I was one of the happiest of men. As to my racing and my horses, they +were a constant delight to me. I can't think now of those mornings on the +Heath--the gallops of my colts--the change and excitement of it all, +without longing for it to come back again. Yet I have never owned a +horse, or seen a race, or made a bet, for the last three years. I never +go into society, except for political purposes; and I scarcely ever touch +wine. In fact, I have thrown overboard everything that once gave _me_ +pleasure and amusement so completely that I have, perhaps, some right to +press upon the party that follows me my conviction that unless each and +all of us give up private ease and comfort as I have done--unless we are +contented, as the Parnellites were, to be bores in the House and +nuisances to ourselves--to peg away in season and out of season--to give +up everything for the cause, we may just as well not go into the fight at +all--for we shall do nothing with it." + +George clasped his hands round his knee, and stared stubbornly into the +fire. Sermonising was all very well, but Fontenoy did too much of it; +nobody need suppose that he would have done what he had done, unless, on +the whole, it had given him more pleasure to do it than not to do it. + +"Well," he said, looking up at last with a laugh, "I wonder what you +_mean_--really. Do you mean, for instance, that I oughtn't to get +myself married?" + +His offhand manner covered a good deal of irritation. He made a shrewd +guess at the idea in Fontenoy's mind, and meant to show that he would not +be dictated to. + +Fontenoy also laughed, with as little geniality as before. Then he +applied himself to a deliberate answer. + +"_This_ is what I mean. If you, just elected--at the beginning of this +critical session--were to give your best mind to anything else in the +world than the fight before us, I should regard you as, for the time, at +any rate, lost to us--as, so far, betraying us." + +The colour rushed into George's cheeks. + +"Upon my word!" he said, springing up--"upon my word, you are a +taskmaster!" + +Fontenoy hastened to reply, in a different tone, "I only want to keep the +machine in order." + +George paced up and down for a few moments without speaking. Presently +he paused. + +"Look here, Fontenoy! I cannot look at the matter as you do, and we may +as well understand each other. To me, this election of mine is, after +all, an ordinary affair. I take it, and what is to come after it, just as +other men do. I have accepted your party and your programme, and I mean +to stick to them. I see that the political situation is difficult and +exciting, and I don't intend to shirk. But I am no more going to slay my +private life and interests at the altar of politics than my father did +when he was in Parliament. If the revolution is coming, it will come in +spite of you and me. And, moreover--if you will let me say so--I am +convinced that your modes of procedure are not even profitable to the +cause in the long run. No man can work as you do, without rest and +without distraction. You will break down, and then, where will the +'cause' be?" + +Lord Fontenoy surveyed the speaker with a curious, calculating look. It +was as though, with as much rapidity as his mind was capable of, he +balanced a number of pros and cons against each other, and finally +decided to let the matter drop, perhaps not without some regret for +having raised it. + +"Ah! well," he said, "I have no doubt that what I have said appears to +you mere meddlesomeness. If so, you will change your view, and you will +forgive me. I must trust the compulsion of the situation. You will +realise it, as I have done, when you get well into the fight. There is +something in this Labour tyranny which rouses all a man's passions, bad +and good. If it does not rouse yours, I have been much mistaken in my +estimate of you. As for me, don't waste your concern. There are few +stronger men than I. You forget, too--" + +There was a pause. Of late years, since his transformation in fact, Lord +Fontenoy's stiff reserve about himself had been rarely broken through. At +this moment, however, George, looking up, saw that his companion was in +some way moved by a kind of sombre and personal emotion. + +"You forget," the speaker resumed, "that I learnt nothing either at +school or college, and that a man who wants to lead a party must, some +time or other, pay for that precious privilege. When you left England, +the only financial statement I could understand was a betting-book. I +knew no history except what one gets from living among people who have +been making it, and even that I was too lazy to profit by. I couldn't +understand the simplest economical argument, and I _hated_ trouble of all +kinds. Nothing but the toil of a galley-slave could have enabled me to do +what I have done. You would be astonished sometimes if you could look in +upon me at night and see what I am doing--what I am obliged to do to keep +up the most elementary appearances." + +George was touched. The tone of the speaker had passed suddenly into one +of plain dignity, in spite of, perhaps because of, the half-bitter +humility that mingled with it. + +"I know you make one ashamed," he said sincerely, though awkwardly. +"Well, don't distrust me; I'll do my best." + +"Good-night," said Lord Fontenoy, and held out his hand. He had gained no +promises, and George had shown and felt annoyance. Yet the friendship +between the two men had sensibly advanced. + + * * * * * + +George shut the door upon him, and came back to the fire to ponder this +odd quarter of an hour. + +His experience certainly contained no more extraordinary fact than this +conversion of a gambler and a spendthrift into the passionate leader of +an arduous cause. Only one quality linked the man he remembered with the +politician he had now pledged himself to follow--the quality of +intensity. Dicky Fontenoy in his follies had been neither gay nor +lovable, but his fierce will, his extravagant and reckless force, had +given him the command of men softer than himself. That will and that +force were still there, steeled and concentrated. But George Tressady was +sometimes restlessly doubtful as to how far he himself was prepared to +submit to them. + +His personal acquaintance with Fontenoy was of comparatively recent date. +He himself had been for some four years away from England, to which he +had only returned about three months before the Market Malford election. +A letter from Fontenoy had been the immediate cause of his return; but +before it arrived the two men had been in no direct communication. + +The circumstances of Tressady's long absence concern his later story, and +were on this wise. His father, Sir William, the owner of Ferth Place, in +West Mercia, died in the year that George, his only surviving child and +the son of his old age, left college. The son, finding his father's debts +considerable and his own distaste for the law, to which he had been +destined, amazingly increased by his newly acquired freedom to do what he +liked with himself, turned his mind at once towards travelling. Travel he +must if he was ever to take up public and parliamentary life, and for no +other profession--so he announced--did he feel the smallest vocation. +Moreover, economy was absolutely necessary. During his absence the London +house could be let, and Lady Tressady could live quietly at Ferth upon an +allowance, while his uncles looked after the colliery property. + +Lady Tressady made no difficulty, except as to the figure first named for +the proposed allowance, which she declared was absurd. The uncles, +elderly business men, could not understand why the younger generation +should not go into harness at once without indulgences, as they +themselves had done; but George got his way, and had much reason to show +for it. He had not been idle at college, though perhaps at no time +industrious enough. Influenced by natural ambition and an able tutor, he +had won some distinction, and he was now a man full of odds and ends of +ideas, of nascent interests, curiosities, and opinions, strongly +influenced moreover already, though he said less about it than about +other things, by the desire for political distinction. While still at +college he had been especially attracted--owing mainly to the chances of +an undergraduate friendship--by a group of Eastern problems bearing upon +England's future in Asia; and he was no sooner free to govern himself and +his moderate income than there flamed up in him the Englishman's passion +to see, to touch, to handle, coupled with the young man's natural desire +to go where it was dangerous to go, and where other men were not going. +His friend--the son of an eminent geographer, possessed by inheritance of +the explorer's instincts--was just leaving England for Asia Minor, +Armenia, and Persia. George made up his mind, hastily but firmly, to go +with him, and his family had to put up with it. + +The year, however, for which the young fellow had stipulated went by; two +others were added to it; and a fourth began to run its course--still +George showed but faint signs of returning. According to his letters +home, he had wandered through Persia, India, and Ceylon; had found +friends and amusement everywhere; and in the latter colony had even +served eight months as private secretary to the Governor, who had taken +a fancy to him, and had been suddenly bereft by a boating accident of the +indispensable young man who was accustomed to direct the hospitalities of +Government House before Tressady's advent. Thence he went to China and +Japan, made a trip from Pekin into Mongolia, landed on Formosa, fell in +with some French naval officers at Saigon, spending with them some of the +gayest and maddest weeks of his life; explored Siam, and finally returned +by way of Burmah to Calcutta, with the dim intention this time of some +day, before long, taking ship for home. + +Meanwhile during the last months of his stay in Ceylon he had written +some signed articles for an important English newspaper, which, together +with the natural liking felt by the many important persons he had come to +know in the East for an intelligent and promising young fellow, endowed +with brains, family, and good manners, served to bring him considerably +into notice. The tone of the articles was strongly English and +Imperialist. The first of them came out immediately before his visit to +Saigon, and Tressady thanked his lucky stars that the foreign reading of +his French friends was, perhaps, not so extensive as their practical +acquaintance with life. He was, however, proud of his first literary +achievement, and it served to crystallise in him a number of ideas and +sentiments which had previously represented rather the prejudices of a +traveller accustomed to find his race in the ascendant, and to be well +received by its official class than any reasoned political theory. As he +went on writing, conviction, grew with statement, became a faith, +ultimately a passion--till, as he turned homewards, he seemed to himself +to have attained a philosophy sufficient to steer the rest of life by. It +was the common philosophy of the educated and fastidious observer; and it +rested on ideas of the greatness of England and the infinity of England's +mission, on the rights of ability to govern as contrasted with the +squalid possibilities of democracy, on the natural kingship of the higher +races, and on a profound personal admiration for the virtues of the +administrator and the soldier. + +Now, no man in whom these perceptions take strong root early, need expect +to love popular government. Tressady read his English newspapers with +increasing disgust. On that little England in those far seas all +depended, and England meant the English working-man with his flatteries +of either party. He blundered and blustered at home, while the Empire, +its services and its defences, by which alone all this pullulating +"street folk" existed for a day, were in danger of starvation and +hindrance abroad, to meet the unreasonable fancies of a degenerate race. +A deep hatred of mob-rule rooted itself in Tressady, passing gradually, +during his last three months in India, into a growing inclination to +return and take his place in the fight--to have his say. "Government to +the competent--_not_ to the many," might have been the summary of his +three years' experience. + +Nor were private influences wanting. He was a West Mercian landowner in a +coal-mining district, and owned a group of pits on the borders of his +estate. His uncles, who had shares in the property, reported to him +periodically during his absence. With every quarter it seemed to Tressady +that the reports grew worse and the dividends less. His uncles' letters, +indeed, were full of anxieties and complaints. After a long period of +peace in the coal-trade, it looked as though a time of hot war between +masters and men was approaching. "We have to thrash them every fifteen +years," wrote one of the uncles, "and the time is nearly up." + +The unreason, brutality, and extravagance of the men; the tyranny of the +Union; the growing insolence of the Union officials--Tressady's letters +from home after a time spoke of little else. And Tressady's bankbook +meanwhile formed a disagreeable comment on the correspondence. The pits +were almost running at a loss; yet neither party had made up their minds +to the trial of strength. + +Tressady was still lingering in Bombay--though supposed to be on his way +home--when Lord Fontenoy's letter reached him. + +The writer referred slightly to their previous acquaintance, and to a +remote family connection between himself and Tressady; dwelt in +flattering terms on the reports which had reached him from many quarters +of Tressady's opinions and abilities; described the genesis and aims of +the new Parliamentary party, of which the writer was the founder and +head; and finally urged him to come home at once, and to stand for +Parliament as a candidate for the Market Malford division, where the +influence of Fontenoy's family was considerable. Since the general +election, which had taken place in June, and had returned a moderate +Conservative Government to power, the member for Market Malford had +become incurably ill. The seat might be vacant at any moment. Fontenoy +asked for a telegram, and urged the next steamer. + +Tressady had already--partly from private talk, partly from the +newspapers--learnt the main outlines of Lord Fontenoy's later story. The +first political speech of Fontenoy's he had ever read made a +half-farcical impression on him--let Dicky stick to his two-year-olds! +The second he read twice over, and alike in it, in certain party +manifestoes from the same hand printed in the newspapers, and in the +letter he had now received, there spoke something for which it seemed to +him he had been waiting. The style was rough and halting, but Tressady +felt in it the note and power of a leader. + +He took an hour's walk through the streets of Bombay to think it +over, then sent his telegram, and booked his passage on his way home +to luncheon. + +Such, in brief outline, had been the origin of the two men's +acquaintance. Since George's return they had been constantly together. +Fontenoy had thrown his whole colossal power of work into the struggle +for the Market Malford seat, and George owed him much. + + * * * * * + +After he was left to himself on this particular night, Tressady was for +long restless and wakeful. In spite of resistance, Fontenoy's talk and +Fontenoy's personality had nevertheless restored for the moment an +earlier balance of mind. The interests of ambition and the intellect +returned in force. Letty Sewell had, no doubt, made life very agreeable +to him during the past three weeks; but, after all--was it worth while? + +Her little figure danced before the inward eye as his fire sank into +darkness; fragments of her chatter ran through his mind. He began to be +rather ashamed of himself. Fontenoy was right. It was not the moment. No +doubt he must marry some day; he had come home, indeed, with the vague +intention of marrying; but the world was wide, and women many. That he +had very little romance in his temperament was probably due to his +mother. His childish experiences of her character, and of her relations +to his father, had left him no room, alas! for the natural childish +opinion that all grown-ups, and especially all mothers, are saints. In +India he had amused himself a good deal; but his adventures had, on the +whole, confirmed his boyish bias. If he had been forced to put his inmost +opinions about women into words, the result would have been +crude--perhaps brutal; which did not prevent him from holding a very +strong and vivid conviction of the pleasure to be got from their society. + +Accordingly, he woke up next morning precisely in the mood that Letty, +for her own reasons, had foreseen. It worried him to think that for two +or three days more he and Letty Sewell must still be thrown together in +close relations. He and his mother were waiting on at Malford for a day +or two till some workmen should be out of his own house, which lay +twenty miles away, at the farther edge of the Market Malford division. +Meanwhile a couple of shooting-parties had been arranged, mainly for +his entertainment. Still, was there no urgent business that required +him in town? + +He sauntered in to breakfast a little before ten. Only Evelyn Watton and +her mother were visible, most of the men having already gone off to a +distant meet. + +"Now sit down and entertain us, Sir George," said Mrs. Watton, holding +out her hand to him with an odd expression. "We're as dull as ditch +water--the men have all gone--Florrie's in bed with a chill--and Letty +departed by the 9.30 train." + +George's start, as he took his coffee from her, did not escape her. + +"Miss Sewell gone? But why this suddenness?" he inquired. "I thought Miss +Letty was to be here to the end of the week." + +Mrs. Watton raised her shoulders. "She sent a note in to me at half-past +eight to say her mother wasn't well, and she was wanted at home. She just +rushed in to say good-bye to me, chattered a great deal, kissed everybody +a great deal--and I know no more. I hear she had breakfast and a fly, +which is all I troubled myself about. I never interfere with the modern +young woman." + +Then she raised her eyeglass, and looked hard and curiously at Tressady. +His face told her nothing, however, and as she was the least sympathetic +of women, she soon forgot her own curiosity. + +Evelyn Watton, a vision of fresh girlhood in her morning frock, glanced +shyly at him once or twice as she gave him scones and mustard. She was +passing through a moment of poetry and happy dreams. All human beings +walked glorified in her eyes, especially if they were young. Letty was +not wholly to her taste, and had never been a particular friend. But she +thought ill of no one, and her little heart must needs flutter tenderly +in the presence of anything that suggested love and marriage. It had +delighted her to watch George and Letty together. Now, why had Letty +rushed away like this? _She_ thought with concern, thrilling all the +time, that Sir George looked grave and depressed. + +George, however, was not depressed--or thought he was not. He walked into +the library after breakfast, whistling, and quoting to himself: + +And there be they +Who kissed his wings which brought him yesterday, +And thank his wings to-day that he is flown. + +He prided himself on his memory of some modern poets, and the lines +pleased him particularly. + +He had no sooner done quoting, however, than his mother peered into the +room, claiming the business talk that had been promised. From that talk +George emerged irritable and silent. His mother's extravagance was really +preposterous!--not to be borne. For four years now he had been free from +the constant daily friction of money troubles which had spoilt his youth +and robbed him of all power of respecting his mother. And he had hugged +his freedom. But all the time it seemed he had been hugging illusion, and +the troubles had been merely piling up for his return! Her present +claims--and he knew very well that they were not the whole--would exhaust +all his available balance at his bankers'. + +Lady Tressady, for her part, thought, with indignant despair, that he had +not behaved at all as an only son should--especially an only son just +returned to a widowed mother after four years' absence. How could anyone +suppose that in four years there would be no debts--on such a pittance of +an income? Some money, indeed, he had promised her; but not nearly +enough, and not immediately. He "must look into things at home." Lady +Tressady was enraged with herself and him that she had not succeeded +better in making him understand how pressing, how _urgent_, matters were. + +She _must_, indeed, bring it home to him that there might be a scandal at +any moment. That odious livery-stable man, two or three dressmakers--in +these directions every phase and shift of the debtor's long _finesse_ had +been exhausted long ago. Even _she_ was at her wits' end. + +As for other matters--But from these her thoughts turned hurriedly away. +Luck would change, of course, sometime; it must change! No need to say +anything about _that_ just yet, especially while George's temper was in +such a queer state. + +It was very odd--most annoying! As a baby even he had never been +caressing or sweet like other people's babies. And now, really!--why +_her_ son should have such unattractive ways! + +But, manoeuvre as she would, George would not be drawn into further +discussion. She could only show him offended airs, and rack her brains +morning and night as to how best to help herself. + +Meanwhile George had never been so little pleased with living as +during these few days. He was overwhelmed with congratulations; and, +to judge from the newspapers, "all England," as Lady Tressady said, +"was talking of him." It seemed to him ridiculous that a man should +derive so little entertainment from such a fact. Nevertheless, his +dulness remained, and refused to be got rid of. He discussed with +himself, of course, for a new set of reasons, the possibility of +evading the shooting-parties, and departing. But he was deeply pledged +to stay; and he was under considerable obligations to the Wattons. So +he stayed; but he shot so as to increase his own dissatisfaction with +the universe, and to make the other men in the house wonder what might +be the general value of an Indian sporting reputation when it came to +dealing with the British pheasant. + +Then he turned to business. He tried to read some Parliamentary reports +bearing on a coming measure, and full of notes by Fontenoy, which +Fontenoy had left with him. But it only ended in his putting them hastily +aside, lest in the mood of obscure contradiction that possessed him he +should destroy his opinions before he had taken his seat. + +On the day before the last "shoot," among the letters his servant brought +him in the early morning, was one that he tore open in a hurry, tossing +the rest aside. + +It was from Miss Sewell, requesting, prettily, in as few words as +possible, that he would return her a book she had lent him. + +"My mother," she wrote, "has almost recovered from her sudden attack of +chill. I trust the shooting-parties have amused you, and that you have +read _all_ Lord Fontenoy's Blue Books." + +George wrote a reply before he went down to breakfast--a piece of +ordinary small-talk, that seemed to him the most wretched stuff +conceivable. But he pulled two pens to pieces before he achieved it. + +Then he went out for a long walk alone, pondering what was the matter +with him. Had that little witch dropped the old familiar poison into his +veins after all? Certainly some women made life vivacity and pleasure, +while others--his mother or Mrs. Watton, for instance--made it fatigue +or tedium. + +Ever since his boyhood Tressady had been conscious of intermittent +assaults of melancholy, fits of some inner disgust, which hung the world +in black, crippled his will, made him hate himself and despise his +neighbours. It was, possibly, some half-conscious dread lest this morbid +speck in his nature should gain upon the rest that made him so hungry for +travel and change of scene after he left college. It explained many +surprises, many apparent ficklenesses in his life. During the three weeks +that he had spent in the same house with Letty Sewell he had never once +been conscious of this lurking element of his life. And now, after four +days, he found himself positively pining for her voice, the rustle of her +delicate dress, her defiant, provocative ways that kept a man on the +alert--still more, her smiling silences that seemed to challenge all his +powers, the touch of her small cool hand that crushed so easily in his. + +What had she left the house for in that wilful way? He did not believe +her excuses. Yet he was mystified. Did she realise that things were +becoming serious, and did she not mean them to be serious? If so, who or +what hindered? + +As for Fontenoy-- + +Tressady quickened his step impatiently as he recalled that harassed and +toiling figure. Politics or no politics, _he_ would live his life! +Besides, it was obviously to his profit to marry. How could he ever make +a common household with his mother? He meant to do his duty by her, but +she annoyed and abashed him twenty times a day. He would be far happier +married, far better able to do his work. He was not passionately in +love--not at all. But--for it was no good fencing with himself any +longer--he desired Letty Sewell's companionship more than he had desired +anything for a long time. He wanted the right to carry off the little +musical box, with all its tunes, and set it playing in his own house, to +keep him gay. Why not? He could house it prettily, and reward it well. + +As for the rest, he decided, without thinking about it, that Letty Sewell +was well born and bred. She had, of course, all the little refinements a +fastidious taste might desire in a woman. She would never discredit a man +in society. On the contrary, she would be a great strength to him there. +And she must be sweet-tempered, or that pretty child Evelyn Watton would +not be so fond of her. + +That pretty child, meanwhile, was absorbed in the excitement of her own +small _role_. Tressady, who had only made duty-conversation with her +before, had found out somehow that she was sympathetic--that she would +talk to him charmingly about Letty. After a very little pretending, he +let himself go; and Evelyn dreamt at night of his confidences, her heart, +without knowing it, leaping forward to the time when a man would look at +her so, for her own sake--not another's. She forgot that she had ever +criticised Letty, thought her vain or selfish. Nay, she made a heroine of +her forthwith; she remembered all sorts of delightful things to say of +her, simply that she might keep the young member talking in a corner, +that she might still enjoy the delicious pride of feeling that she +knew--she was helping it on. + +After the big "shoot," for instance, when all the other gentlemen were +stiff and sleepy, George spent the whole evening in chattering to Evelyn, +or, rather, in making her chatter. Lady Tressady loitered near them once +or twice. She heard the names "Letty," "Miss Sewell," passing and +repassing--one talker catching up the other. Over any topic that included +Miss Sewell they lingered; when anything was begun that did not concern +her, it dropped at once, like a ball ill thrown. The mother went away +smiling rather sourly. + +She watched her son, indeed, cat-like all these days, trying to discover +what had happened--what his real mind was. She did not wish for a +daughter-in-law at all, and she had even a secret fear of Letty Sewell +in that capacity. But somehow George must be managed, her own needs must +be met. She felt that she might be undoing the future; but the present +drove her on. + +On the following morning, from one of Mrs. Watton's numerous letters +there dropped out the fact that Letty Sewell was expected immediately at +a country house in North Mercia whereof a certain Mrs. Corfield was +mistress--a house only distant some twenty miles from the Tressadys' +estate of Ferth Place. + +"My sister-in-law has recovered with remarkable rapidity," said Mrs. +Watton, raising a sarcastic eye. "Do you know anything of the Corfields, +Sir George?" + +"Nothing at all," said George. "One hears of them sometimes from +neighbours. They are said to be very lively folk. Miss Sewell will have a +gay time." + +"Corfield?" said Lady Tressady, her head on one side and her cup balanced +in two jewelled hands. "What! _Aspasia Corfield_! Why, my dear +George--one of my oldest friends!" + +George laughed--the short, grating laugh his mother so often evoked. + +"Beg pardon, mother; I can only answer for myself. To the best of my +belief I never saw her, either at Ferth or anywhere else." + +"Why, Aspasia Corfield and I," said Lady Tressady with languid +reflectiveness--"Aspasia Corfield and I copied each other's dresses, +and bought our hats at the same place, when we were eighteen. I haven't +seen her for an eternity. But Aspasia used to be a _dear_ girl--and so +fond of me!" + +She put down her cup with a sigh, intended as a reproach to George. +George only buried himself the deeper in his morning's letters. + +Mrs. Watton, behind her newspaper, glanced grimly from the mother +to the son. + +"I wonder if that woman has a single real old friend in the world. How +is George Tressady going to put up with her?" + +The Wattons themselves had been on friendly terms with Tressady's father +for many years. Since Sir William's death and George's absence, however, +Mrs. Watton had not troubled herself much about Lady Tressady, in which +she believed she was only following suit with the rest of West Mercia. +But now that George had reappeared as a promising politician, his +mother--till he married--had to be to some extent accepted along with +him. Mrs. Watton accordingly had thought it her duty to invite her for +the election, not without an active sense of martyrdom. "She always has +bored me to tears since I first saw Sir William trailing her about," she +would remark to Letty. "Where did he pick her up? The marvel is that she +has kept respectable. She has never looked it. I always feel inclined to +ask her at breakfast why she dresses for dinner twelve hours too soon!" + +Very soon after the little conversation about the Corfields Lady Tressady +withdrew to her room, sat thoughtful for a while, with her writing-block +on her knee, then wrote a letter. She was perfectly aware of the fact +that since George had come back to her she was likely to be welcome once +more in many houses that for years had shown no particular desire to +receive her. She took the situation very easily. It was seldom her way to +be bitter. She was only determined to amuse herself, to enjoy her life in +her own way. If people disapproved of her, she thought them fools, but it +did not prevent her from trying to make it up with them next day, if she +saw an opening and it seemed worth while. + +"There!" she said to herself as she sealed the letter, and looked at it +with admiration, "I really have a knack for doing those things. I should +think Aspasia Corfield would ask him by return--me, too, if she has any +decency, though she _has_ dropped me for fifteen years. She has a tribe +of daughters.--_Why_ I should play Miss Sewell's game like this I don't +know! Well, one must try something." + +That same afternoon mother and son took their departure for Ferth Place. + +George, who had only spent a few weeks at Ferth since his return from +India, should have found plenty to do both indoors and out. The house +struck him as singularly dingy and out of order. Changes were +imperatively demanded in the garden and in the estate. His business as a +colliery-owner was in a tangled and critical condition. And meanwhile +Fontenoy plied him incessantly with a political correspondence which of +itself made large demands upon intelligence and energy. + +Nevertheless he shuffled out of everything, unless it were the +correspondence with Fontenoy. As to the notion that all the languor could +be due merely to an unsatisfied craving for Letty Sewell's society, when +it presented itself he still fought with it. The Indian climate might +have somehow affected him. An English winter is soon forgotten, and has +to be re-learnt like a distasteful lesson. + +About a week after their arrival at Ferth George was sitting at his +solitary breakfast when his mother came floating into the room, preceded +by a rattle of bangles, a flutter of streamers, and the barking of +little dogs. + +She held various newly opened letters, and, running up to him, she laid +her hands on his shoulders. + +"Now"--thought George to himself with annoyance, "she is going to be +arch!" + +"Oh! you silly boy!" she said, holding him, with her head on one side. +"Who's been cross and nasty to his poor old mammy? Who wants cheering up +a bit before he settles down to his horrid work? Who would take his +mammy to a nice party at a nice house, if he were prettily asked--eh? +who would?" + +She pinched his cheek before he could escape. + +"Well, mother, of course you will do what you like," said George, walking +off to supply himself with ham. "I shall not leave home again, just yet." + +Lady Tressady smiled. + +"Well, anyhow, you can read Aspasia Corfield's letter," she said, holding +it out to him. "You know, really, that house isn't bad. They took over +the Dryburghs' _chef_, and Aspasia knows how to pick her people." + +"Aspasia!" The tone of patronising intimacy! George blushed, if his +mother did not. + +Yet he took the letter. He read it, then put it down, and walked to the +window to look at a crowd of birds that had been collecting round a plate +of food he had just put out upon the snow. + +"Well, will you go?" said his mother. + +"If you particularly wish it," he said, after a pause, in an +embarrassed voice. + +Lady Tressady's dimples were in full play as she settled herself into her +seat and began to gather a supply of provisions. But as he returned to +his place, and she glanced at him, she saw that he was not in a mood to +be bantered, and understood that he was not going to let her force his +confidence, however shrewdly she might guess at his affairs. So she +controlled herself, and began to chatter about the Corfields and their +party. He responded, and by the end of breakfast they were on much better +terms than they had been for some weeks. + +That morning also he wrote a cheque for her immediate necessities, which +made her--for the time--a happy woman; and she overwhelmed him with +grateful tears and embraces, which he did his best to bear. + +Early in December he and she became the Corfields' guests. They found a +large party collected, and Letty Sewell happily established as the spoilt +child of the house. At the first touch of her hand, the first glance of +her eyes, George's cloud dispersed. + +"Why did you run away?" George asked her on the first possible occasion. + +Letty laughed, fenced with the question for four days, during which +George was never dull for a single instant, and then capitulated. She +allowed him to propose to her, and was graciously pleased to accept him. + +The following week Tressady went down with Letty to her home at Helbeck. +He found an invalid father, a remarkably foolish, inconsequent mother, +and a younger sister, Elsie, on whom, as it seemed to him, the burdens of +the house mainly rested. + +The father, who was suffering from a slow but incurable disease, had the +remains of much natural ability and acuteness. He was well content with +Tressady as a son-in-law; though in the few interviews that Tressady was +able to have with him on the question of settlements the young man took +pains to state his money affairs as carefully and modestly as possible. +Letty was not often in her father's room, and Mr. Sewell treated her, +when she did come, rather like an agreeable guest than a daughter. But he +was evidently extremely proud of her--as also was the mother--and he +would talk much to George, when his health allowed it, of her good looks +and her social success. + +With the younger sister Tressady did not find it easy to make friends. + +She was plain, sickly, and rather silent. She seemed to have scientific +tastes and to be a great reader. And, so far as he could judge, the two +sisters were not intimate. + +"Don't hate me for taking her away!" he said, as he was bidding good-bye +to Elsie, and glancing over her shoulder at Letty on the stairs. + +The girl's quiet eyes were crossed by a momentary look of amusement. Then +she controlled herself, and said gently: + +"We didn't expect to keep her! Good-bye." + + + + +CHAPTER IV + + +"Oh, Tully, look at my cloak! You've let it fall! Hold my fan, please, +and give me the opera-glasses." + +The speaker was Miss Sewell. She and an elderly lady were sitting side by +side in the stalls, about halfway down St. James's Hall. The occasion was +a popular concert, and, as Joachim was to play, every seat in the hall +was rapidly filling up. + +Letty rose as she asked for the opera-glasses, and scanned the crowds +streaming in through the side-doors. + +"No--no signs of him! He must have been kept at the House, after all," +she said, with annoyance. "Really, Tully, I do think you might have got a +programme all this time! Why do you leave everything to me?" + +"My dear!" said her companion, protesting, "you didn't tell me to." + +"Well, I don't see why I should _tell_ you everything. Of course I want a +programme. Is that he? No! What a nuisance!" + +"Sir George must have been detained," murmured her companion, timidly. + +"What a very original thing to say, wasn't it, Tully?" remarked Miss +Sewell, with sarcasm, as she sat down again. + +The lady addressed was silent, instinctively waiting till Letty's nerves +should have quieted down. She was a Miss Tulloch, a former governess of +the Sewells, and now often employed by Letty, when she was in town, as a +convenient chaperon. Letty was accustomed to stay with an aunt in +Cavendish Square, an old lady who did not go out in the evenings. A +chaperon therefore was indispensable, and Maria Tulloch could always be +had. She existed somewhere in West Kensington, on an income of seventy +pounds a year. Letty took her freely to the opera and the theatre, to +concerts and galleries, and occasionally gave her a dress she did not +want. Miss Tulloch clung to the connection as her only chance of relief +from the boarding-house routine she detested, and was always abjectly +ready to do as she was told. She saw nothing she was not meant to see, +and she could be shaken off at a moment's notice. For the rest, she came +of a stock of gentlefolk; and her invariable black dress, her bits of +carefully treasured lace, the weak refinement of her face, and her timid +manner did no discredit to the brilliant creature beside her. + +When the first number of the programme was over, Letty got up once more, +opera-glass in hand, to search among the late-comers for her missing +lover. She nodded to many acquaintances, but George Tressady was not to +be seen; and she sat down finally in no mood either to listen or to +enjoy, though the magician of the evening was already at work. + +"There's something very special, isn't there, you want to see Sir George +about to-night?" Tully inquired humbly when the next pause occurred. + +"Of course there is!" said Letty, crossly. "You do ask such +foolish questions, Tully. If I don't see him to-night, he may let +that house in Brook Street slip. There are several people after +it--the agents told me." + +"And he thinks it too expensive?" + +"Only because of _her_. If she makes him pay her that preposterous +allowance, of course it will be too expensive. But I don't mean him +to pay it." + +"Lady Tressady is terribly extravagant," murmured Miss Tulloch. + +"Well, so long as she isn't extravagant with his money--_our_ money--I +don't care a rap," said Letty; "only she sha'n't spend all her own and +all ours too, which is what she has been doing. When George was away he +let her live at Ferth, and spend almost all the income, except five +hundred a year that he kept for himself. And _then_ she got so shamefully +into debt that he doesn't know when he shall ever clear her. He gave her +money at Christmas, and again, I am _sure_, just lately. Well! all I know +is that it must be _stopped_. I don't know that I shall be able to do +much till I'm married, but I mean to make him take this house." + +"Is Lady Tressady nice to you? She is in town, isn't she?" + +"Oh yes! she's in town. Nice?" said Letty, with a little laugh. "She +can't bear me, of course; but we're quite civil." + +"I thought she tried to bring it on?" said the confidante, anxious, above +all things, to be sympathetic. + +"Well, she brought him to the Corfields, and let me know she had. I don't +know why she did it. I suppose she wanted to get something out of him. +Ah! _there_ he is!" + +And Letty stood up, smiling and beckoning, while Tressady's tall thin +figure made its way along the central passage. + +"Horrid House! What made you so late?" she said, as he sat down between +her and Miss Tulloch. + +George Tressady looked at her with delight. The shrewish contractions in +the face, which had been very evident to Tully a few minutes before, had +all disappeared, and the sharp slight lines of it seemed to George the +height of delicacy. At sight of him colour and eyes had brightened. Yet +at the same time there was not a trace of the raw girl about her. She +knew very well that he had no taste for _ingenues_, and she was neither +nervous nor sentimental in his company. + +"Do you suppose I should have stayed a second longer than I was obliged?" +he asked her, smiling, pressing her little hand under pretence of taking +her programme. + +The first notes of a new Brahms quartette mounted, thin and sweet, into +the air. The musical portion of the audience, having come for this +particular morsel, prepared themselves eagerly for the tasting and trying +of it. George and Letty tried to say a few things more to each other +before yielding to the general silence, but an old gentleman in front +turned upon them a face of such disdain and fury they must needs laugh +and desist. + +Not that George was unwilling. He was tired; and silence with Letty +beside him was not only repose, but pleasure. Moreover, he derived a +certain honest pleasure of a mixed sort from music. It suggested literary +or pictorial ideas to him which stirred him, and gave him a sense of +enjoyment. Now, as the playing flowed on, it called up delightful images +in his brain: of woody places, of whirling forms, of quiet rivers, of +thin trees Corot-like against the sky--scenes of pleading, of frolic, +reproachful pain, dissolving joy. With it all mingled his own story, his +own feeling; his pride of possession in this white creature touching him; +his sense of youth, of opening life, of a crowded stage whereon his "cue" +had just been given, his "call" sounded. He listened with eagerness, +welcoming each fancy as it floated past, conscious of a grain of +self-abandonment even--a rare mood with him. He was not absorbed in love +by any means; the music spoke to him of a hundred other kindling or +enchanting things. Nevertheless it made it doubly pleasant to be there, +with Letty beside him. He was quite satisfied with himself and her; quite +certain that he had done everything for the best. All this the music in +some way emphasised--made clear. + +When it was over, and the applause was subsiding, Letty said in his ear: +"Have you settled about the house?" + +He smiled down upon her, not hearing what she said, but admiring her +dress, its little complication and subtleties, the violets that perfumed +every movement, the slim fingers holding the fan. Her mere ways of +personal adornment were to him like pleasant talk. They surprised and +amused him--stood between him and ennui. + +She repeated her question. + +A frown crossed his brow, and the face changed wholly. + +"Ah!--it is so difficult to see one's way," he said, with a little sigh +of annoyance. + +Letty played with her fan, and was silent. + +"Do you so much prefer it to the others?" he asked her. + +Letty looked up with astonishment. + +"Why, it is a house!" she said, lifting her eyebrows; "and the others--" + +"Hovels? Well, you are about right. The small London house is an +abomination. Perhaps I can make them take less premium." + +Letty shook her head. + +"It is not at all a dear house," she said decidedly. + +He still frowned, with the look of one recalled to an annoyance he had +shaken off. + +"Well, darling, if you wish it so much, that settles it. Promise to be +still nice to me when we go through the Bankruptcy Court!" + +"We will let lodgings, and I will do the waiting," said Letty, just +laying her hand lightly against his for an instant. "Just think! That +house would draw like anything. Of course, we will only take the eldest +sons of peers. By the way, do you see Lord Fontenoy?" + +They were in the middle of the "interval," and almost everyone about +them, including Miss Tulloch, was standing up, talking or examining their +neighbours. + +George craned his neck round Miss Tulloch, and saw Fontenoy sitting +beside a lady, on the other side of the middle gangway. + +"Who is the lady?" Letty inquired. "I saw her with him the other night at +the Foreign Office." + +George smiled. + +"_That_--if you want to know--is Fontenoy's story!" + +"Oh, but tell me at once!" said Letty, imperiously. "But he hasn't got a +story, or a heart. He's only stuffed with blue-book." + +"So I thought till a few weeks ago. But I know a good deal more now about +Master Fontenoy than I did." + +"But who is she?" + +"She is a Mrs. Allison. Isn't that white hair beautiful? And her +face--half saint, I always think--you might take her for a +mother-abbess--and half princess. Did you ever see such diamonds?" + +George pulled his moustaches, and grinned as he looked across at +Fontenoy. + +"Tell me quick!" said Letty, tapping him on the arm--"Is she a +widow?--and is he going to marry her? Why didn't you tell me before?--why +didn't you tell me at Malford?" + +"Because I didn't know," said George, laughing. "Oh! it's a strange +story--too long to tell now. She is a widow, but he is not going to marry +her, apparently. She has a grown-up son, who hasn't yet found himself a +wife, and thinks it isn't fair to him. If Fontenoy wants to introduce +her, don't refuse. She is the mistress of Castle Luton, and has +delightful parties. Yes!--if I'd known at Malford what I know now!" + +And he laughed again, remembering Fontenoy's nocturnal incursion upon +him, and its apparent object. Who would have imagined that the preacher +of that occasion had ever given one serious thought to woman and woman's +arts--least of all that he was the creation and slave of a woman! + +Letty's curiosity was piqued, and she would have plied George with +questions, but that she suddenly perceived that Fontenoy had risen, and +was coming across to them. + +"Gracious!" she said; "here he comes. I can't think why; he +doesn't like me." + +Fontenoy, however, when he had made his way to them, greeted Miss Sewell +with as much apparent cordiality as he showed to anyone else. He had +received George's news of the marriage with all decorum, and had since +sent a handsome wedding-present to the bride-elect. Letty, however, was +never at ease with him, which, indeed, was the case with most women. + +He stood beside the _fiances_ for a minute or two, exchanging a few +commonplaces with Letty on the performers and the audience; then he +turned to George with a change of look. + +"No need for us to go back to-night, I think?" + +"What, to the House? Dear, no! Grooby and Havershon may be trusted to +drone the evening out, I should hope, with no trouble to anybody but +themselves. The Government are just keeping a house, that's all. Have you +been grinding at your speech all day?" + +Fontenoy shrugged his shoulders. + +"I sha'n't get anything out that I want to say. Are you coming to the +House on Friday, Miss Sewell?" + +"Friday?" said Letty, looking puzzled. + +George laughed. + +"I told you. You must plead trousseau if you want to save yourself!" + +Amusement shone in his blue eyes as they passed from Letty to Fontenoy. +He had long ago discovered that Letty was incapable of any serious +interest in his public life. It did not disturb him at all. But it +tickled his sense of humour that Letty would have to talk politics all +the same, and to talk them with people like Fontenoy. + +"Oh! you mean your Resolution!" cried Letty. "Isn't it a Resolution? Yes, +of course I'm coming. It's very absurd, for I don't know anything about +it. But George says I must, and till I promise to obey, you see, I don't +mind being obedient!" + +Archness, however, was thrown away on Fontenoy. He stood beside her, +awkward and irresponsive. Not being allowed to be womanish, she could +only try once more to be political. + +"It's to be a great attack on Mr. Dowson, isn't it?" she asked him. "You +and George are mad about some things he has been doing? He's Home +Secretary, isn't he? Yes, of _course_! And he's been driving trade away, +and tyrannising over the manufacturers? I _wish_ you'd explain it to me! +I ask George, and he tells me not to talk shop." + +"Oh, for goodness' sake," groaned George, "let it alone! I came to meet +you and hear Joachim. However, I may as well warn you, Letty, that I +sha'n't have time to be married once Fontenoy's anti-Maxwell campaign +begins; and it will go on till the Day of Judgment." + +"Why anti-Maxwell," said Letty, puzzled. "I thought it was Mr. Dowson you +are going to attack?" + +George, a little vexed that she should require it, began to explain that +as Maxwell was "only a miserable peer," he could have nothing to do with +the House of Commons, and that Dowson was the official mouthpiece of the +Maxwell group and policy in the Lower House. "The hands were the hands of +Esau," etc. Letty meanwhile, conscious that she was not showing to +advantage, flushed, began to play nervously with her fan, and wished that +George would leave off. + +Fontenoy did nothing to assist George's political lesson. He stood +impassive, till suddenly he tried to look across his immediate +neighbours, and then said, turning to Letty: + +"The Maxwells, I see, are here to-night." He nodded towards a group on +the left, some two or three benches behind them. "Are you an admirer of +Lady Maxwell's, Miss Sewell?--you've seen her, of course?" + +"Oh yes, _often_!" said Letty, annoyed by the question, standing, +however, eagerly on tiptoe. "I know her, too, a little; but she never +remembers me. She was at the Foreign Office on Saturday, with such a +_hideous_ dress on--it spoilt her completely." + +"Hideous!" said Fontenoy, with a puzzled look. "Some artist--I forget +who--came and raved to me about it; said it was like some Florentine +picture--I forget what--don't think I ever heard of it." + +Letty looked contemptuous. Her expression said that in this matter, at +any rate, she knew what she was talking about. Nevertheless her eyes +followed the dark head Fontenoy had pointed out to her. + +Lady Maxwell was at the moment the centre of a large group of people, +mostly men, all of whom seemed to be eager to get a word with her, and +she was talking with great animation, appealing from time to time to a +tall, broad-shouldered gentleman, with greyish hair, who stood, smiling +and silent, at the edge of the group. Letty noticed that many glasses +from the balcony were directed to this particular knot of persons; that +everybody near them, or rather every woman, was watching Lady Maxwell, or +trying to get a better view of her. The girl felt a secret pang of envy +and dislike. + +The figure of a well-known accompanist appeared suddenly at the head of +the staircase leading from the artists' room. The interval was over, and +the audience began to subside into attention. + +Fontenoy bowed and took his leave. + +"You see, he _didn't_ introduce me," said Letty, not without chagrin, +as she settled down. "And how plain he is! I think him uglier every +time I see him." + +George made a vague sound of assent, but did not really agree with her in +the least. Fontenoy's air of overwork was more decided than ever; his +eyes had almost sunk out of sight; the complexion of his broad strong +face had reddened and coarsened from lack of exercise and sleep; his +brown hair was thinning and grizzling fast. Nevertheless a man saw much +to admire in the ungainly head and long-limbed frame, and did not think +any the better of a woman's intelligence for failing to perceive it. + +After the concert, as George and Letty stood together in the crowded +vestibule, he said to her, with a smile: + +"So I take that house?" + +"If you want to do anything disagreeable," she retorted, quickly, "don't +_ask_ me. Do it, and then wait till I am good-tempered again!" + +"What a tempting prospect! Do you know that when you put on that +particular hood that I would take Buckingham Palace to please you? Do you +know also that my mother will think us very extravagant?" + +"Ah, we can't all be economical!" said Letty. + +He saw the little toss of the head and sharpening of the lips. They only +amused him. Though he had never, so far, discussed his mother and her +affairs with Letty in any detail, he understood perfectly well that her +feeling about this particular house in some way concerned his mother, and +that Letty and Lady Tressady were rapidly coming to dislike each other. +Well, why should Letty pretend? He liked her the better for not +pretending. + +There was a movement in the crowd about them, and Letty, looking up, +suddenly found herself close to a tall lady, whose dark eyes were +bent upon her. + +"How do you do, Miss Sewell?" + +Letty, a little fluttered, gave her hand and replied. Lady Maxwell +glanced across her at the tall young man, with the fair, irregular face. +George bowed involuntarily, and she slightly responded. Then she was +swept on by her own party. + +"Have you sent for your carriage?" George heard someone say to her. + +"No; I am going home in a hansom. I've tired out both the horses +to-day. Aldous is going down to the club to see if he can hear anything +about Devizes." + +"Oh! the election?" + +She nodded, then caught sight of her husband at the door beckoning, and +hurried on. + +"What a head!" said George, looking after her with admiration. + +"Yes," said Letty, unwillingly. "It's the hair that's so splendid, the +long black waves of it. How ridiculous to talk of tiring out her +horses--that's just like her! As though she mightn't have fifty horses if +she liked! Oh, George, there's our man! Quick, Tully!" + +They made their way out. In the press George put his arm half round +Letty, shielding her. The touch of her light form, the nearness of her +delicate face, enchanted him. When their carriage had rolled away, and he +turned homewards along Piccadilly, he walked absently for a time, +conscious only of pulsing pleasure. + +It was a mild February night. After a long frost, and a grudging thaw, +westerly winds were setting in, and Spring could be foreseen. It had been +pouring with rain during the concert, but was now fair, the rushing +clouds leaving behind them, as they passed, great torn spaces of blue, +where the stars shone. + +Gusts of warm moist air swept through the street. As George's moment of +intoxication gradually subsided, he felt the physical charm of the soft +buffeting wind. How good seemed all living!--youth and capacity--this +roaring multitudinous London--the future with its chances! This common +pleasant chance of marriage amongst them--he was glad he had put out his +hand to it. His wife that was to be was no saint and no philosopher. He +thanked the fates! He at least asked for neither--on the hearth. "Praise, +blame, love, kisses"--for all of those, life with Letty would give scope; +yet for none of them in excess. There would be plenty of room left for +other things, other passions--the passion of political power, for +instance, the art of dealing with and commanding other men. He, the +novice, the beginner, to talk of "commanding!" Yet already he felt his +foot upon the ladder. Fontenoy consulted him, and confided in him more +and more. In spite of his engagement, he was informing himself rapidly on +a hundred questions, and the mental wrestle of every day was +exhilarating. Their small group in the House, compact, tireless, +audacious, was growing in importance and in the attention it extorted +from the public. Never had the whole tribe of factory inspectors shown a +more hawk-like, a more inquisitorial, a more intolerable vigilance than +during the past twelve months. All the persons concerned with matches and +white-lead, with certain chemical or metal-working industries, with +"season" dressmaking or tailoring, were up in arms, rallying to +Fontenoy's support with loud wrath and lamentations, claiming to speak +not only for themselves, but for their "hands," in the angry protest +that things had gone and were going a great deal too far, that trade was +simply being harassed out of the country. A Whiggish group of +manufacturers on the Liberal side were all with Fontenoy; while the +Socialists, on whom the Government should have been able in such a matter +to count to the death, had a special grievance against the Cabinet at the +moment, and were sulking in their tents. The attack and defence would +probably take two nights; for the Government, admitting the gravity of +the assault, had agreed, in case the debate should not be concluded on +Friday, to give up Monday to it. Altogether the affair would make a +noise. George would probably get in his maiden speech on the second +night, and was, in truth, devoting a great deal of his mind to the +prospect; though to Letty he had persistently laughed at it and belittled +it, refusing altogether to let her come and hear him. + +Then, after Easter would come Maxwell's Bill, and the fat in the fire! +Poor little Letty!--she would get but few of the bridal observances due +to her when _that_ struggle began. But first would come Easter and their +wedding; that one short fortnight, when he would carry her off--soft, +willing prey!--to the country, draw a "wind-warm space" about himself and +her, and minister to all her whims. + +He turned down St. James's Street, passed Marlborough House, and +entered the Mall, on the way to Warwick Square, where he was living +with his mother. + +Suddenly he became aware of a crowd, immediately in front of him, in the +direction of Buckingham Palace. A hansom and horse were standing in the +roadway; the driver, crimson and hatless, was bandying words with one of +the policemen, who had his notebook open, and from the middle of the +crowd came a sound of wailing. + +He walked up to the edge of the circle. + +"Anybody hurt?" he said to the policeman, as the man shut his notebook. + +"Little girl run over, sir." + +"Can I be of any assistance? Is there an ambulance coming?" + +"No, sir. There was a lady in the hansom. She's just now bandaging the +child's leg, and says she'll take it to the hospital." + +George mounted on one of the seats under the trees that stood handy, and +looked over the heads of the crowd to the space in the centre which the +other policeman was keeping clear. A little girl lay on the ground, or +rather on a heap of coats; another girl, apparently about sixteen, stood +near her, crying bitterly, and a lady-- + +"Goodness!" said Tressady; and, jumping down, he touched the policeman on +the shoulder. + +"Can you get me through? I think I could be some help. That lady"--he +spoke a word in the policeman's ear. + +The man touched his hat. + +"Stand back, please!" he said, addressing the crowd, "and let this +gentleman through." + +The crowd divided unwillingly. But at the same moment it parted from the +inside, and a little procession came through, both policemen joining +their energies to make a free passage for it. In front walked the +policeman carrying the little girl, a child apparently of about twelve +years old. Her right foot lay stiffly across his arm, held straight and +still in an impromptu splint of umbrellas and handkerchiefs. Immediately +behind came the lady whom George had caught sight of, holding the other +girl's hand in hers. She was bareheaded and in evening dress. Her +opera-cloak, with its heavy sable collar, showed beneath it a dress of +some light-coloured satin, which had already suffered deplorably from the +puddles of the road, and, as she neared the lamp beneath which the cab +had stopped, the diamonds on her wrists sparkled in the light. During her +passage through the crowd, George perceived that one or two people +recognised her, and that a murmur ran from mouth to mouth. + +Of anything of the sort she herself was totally unconscious. George saw +at once that she, not the policeman, was in command. She gave him +directions, as they approached the cab, in a quick, imperative voice +which left no room for hesitation. + +"The driver is drunk," he heard her say; "who will drive?" + +"One of us will drive, ma'am." + +"What--the other man? Ask him to take the reins at once, please, before I +get in. The horse is fresh, and might start. That's right. Now, when I +say the word, give me the child." + +She settled herself in the cab. George saw the policeman somewhat +embarrassed, for a moment, with his burden. He came forward to his help, +and between them they handed in the child, placing her carefully on her +protector's knee. + +Then, standing at the open door of the cab, George raised his hat. "Can I +be of any further assistance to you, Lady Maxwell? I saw you just now at +the concert." + +She turned in some astonishment as she heard her name, and looked at the +speaker. Then, very quickly, she seemed to understand. + +"I don't know," she said, pondering. "Yes! you could help me. I am going +to take the child to hospital. But there is this other girl. Could you +take her home--she is very much upset? No!--first, could you bring her +after me to St. George's? She wants to see where we put her sister." + +"I will call another cab, and be there as soon as you." + +"Thank you. Just let me speak to the sister a moment, please." + +He put the weeping girl forward, and Lady Maxwell bent across the burden +on her knee to say a few words to her--soft, quick words in another +voice. The girl understood, her face cleared a little, and she let +Tressady take charge of her. + +One of the policemen mounted the box of the hansom, amid the "chaff" of +the crowd, and the cab started. A few hats were raised in George's +neighbourhood, and there was something of a cheer. + +"I tell yer," said a voice, "I knowed her fust sight--seed her picture +lots o' times in the papers, and in the winders too. My word, ain't she +good-lookin! And did yer see all them diamonds?" + +"Come along!" said George, impatiently, hurrying his charge into the +four-wheeler the other policeman had just stopped for them. + +In a few more seconds he, the girl, and the policeman were pursuing Lady +Maxwell's hansom at the best speed of an indifferent horse. George tried +to say a few consoling things to his neighbour; and the girl, reassured +by his kind manner, found her tongue, and began to chatter in a tearful +voice about the how and when of the accident: about the elder sister in a +lodging in Crawford Street, Tottenham Court Road, whom she and the little +one had been visiting; the grandmother in Westminster with whom they +lived; poor Lizzie's place in a laundry, which now she must lose; how the +lady had begged handkerchiefs and umbrellas from the crowd to tie up +Lizzie's leg with--and so on through a number of other details incoherent +or plaintive. + +George heard her absently. His mind all the time was absorbed in the +dramatic or ironic aspects of what he had just seen. For dramatic they +were--though perhaps a little cheap. Could he, could anyone, have made +acquaintance with this particular woman in more characteristic fashion? +He laughed to think how he would tell the story to Fontenoy. The +beautiful creature in her diamonds, kneeling on her satin dress in the +mud, to bind up a little laundrymaid's leg--it was so extravagantly in +keeping with Marcella Maxwell that it amused one like an overdone +coincidence in a clumsy play. + +What made her so beautiful? The face had marked defects; but in colour, +expression, subtlety of line incomparable! On the other hand, the +manner--no!--he shrugged his shoulders. The remembrance of its +mannish--or should it be, rather, boyish?--energy and assurance somehow +set him on edge. + +In the end, they were not much behind the hansom; for the hospital porter +was only just in the act of taking the injured child from Lady Maxwell as +Tressady dismounted and went forward again to see what he could do. + +But, somewhat to his chagrin, he was not wanted. Lady Maxwell and the +porter did everything. As they went into the hospital, George caught a +few of the things she was saying to the porter as she supported the +child's leg. She spoke in a rapid, professional way, and the man +answered, as the policeman had done, with a deference and understanding +which were clearly not due only to her "grand air" and her evening dress. +George was puzzled. + +He and the elder sister followed her into the waiting-room. The +house-surgeon and a nurse were summoned, and the injured leg was put into +a splint there and then. The patient moaned and cried most of the time, +and Tressady had hard work to keep the sister quiet. Then nurse and +doctor lifted the child. + +"They are going to put her to bed," said Lady Maxwell, turning to George. +"I am going up with them. Would you kindly wait? The sister"--she dropped +her business tone, and, smiling, touched the elder girl on the arm--"can +come up when the little one is undressed." + +The little procession swept away, and George was left with his charge. As +soon as the small sister was out of sight, the elder one began to +chatter again out of sheer excitement, crying at intervals. George did +not heed her much. He walked up and down, with his hands in his pockets, +conscious of a curious irritability. He did not think a woman should take +a strange man's service quite so coolly. + +At the end of another quarter of an hour a nurse appeared to summon the +sister. Tressady was told he might come too if he would, and his charge +threw him a quick, timid look, as though asking him not to desert her in +this unknown and formidable place. So they followed the nurse up white +stone stairs, and through half-lit corridors, where all was silent, save +that once a sound of delirious shrieking and talking reached them +through a closed door, and made the sister's consumptive little face +turn whiter still. + +At last the nurse, putting her finger on her lip, turned a handle, and +George was conscious of a sudden feeling of pleasure. + +They were standing on the threshold of a children's ward. On either hand +was a range of beds, bluish-white between the yellow picture-covered +walls and the middle-way of spotless floor. Far away, at the other end, a +great fire glowed. On a bare table in the centre, laden with bottles and +various surgical necessaries, stood a shaded lamp, and beside it the +chair where the night-nurse had been sitting. In the beds were sleeping +children of various ages, some burrowing, face downward, animal-like, +into their pillows; others lying on their backs, painfully straight and +still. The air was warm, yet light, and there was the inevitable smell of +antiseptics. Something in the fire-lit space and comfort of the great +room, its ordered lines and colours, the gentleness of the shaded light +as contrasted with the dim figures in the beds, seemed to make a poem of +it--a poem of human tenderness. + +Two or three beds away to the right, Lady Maxwell was standing with the +night-nurse of the ward. The little girl had been undressed, and was +lying quiet, with a drawn, piteous face that turned eagerly as her sister +came in. The whole scene was new and touching to Tressady. Yet, after the +first impression, his attention was perforce held by Lady Maxwell, and he +saw the rest only in relation to her. She had slipped off her heavy +cloak, in order, perhaps, that she might help in the undressing of the +child. Beneath, she wore a little shawl or cape of some delicate lace +over her low dress. The dress itself was of a pale shade of green; the +mire and mud with which it was bedabbled no longer showed in the half +light; and the satin folds glistened dimly as she moved. The poetic +dignity of the head, so finely wreathed with its black hair, of the full +throat and falling shoulders, received a sort of special emphasis from +the wide spaces, the pale colours and level lines of the ward. Tressady +was conscious again of the dramatic significant note as he watched her, +yet without any softening of his nascent feeling of antagonism. + +She turned and beckoned to the sister as they entered: + +"Come and see how comfortable she is! And then you must give this lady +your name and address." + +The girl timidly approached. Whilst she was occupied with her sister and +with the nurse, Lady Maxwell suddenly looked round, and saw Tressady +standing by the table a yard or two from her. + +A momentary expression of astonishment crossed her face. He saw that, in +her absorption with the case and the two sisters, she had clean forgotten +all about him. But in a flash she remembered, and smiled. + +"So you are really going to take her home? That is very kind of you. It +will make all the difference to the grandmother that somebody should go +and explain. You see, they leave her in the splint for the night, and +to-morrow they will put the leg in plaster. Probably they won't keep her +in hospital more than about three weeks, for they are very full." + +"You seem to know all about it!" + +"I was a nurse myself once, for a time," she said, but with a certain +stiffness which seemed to mark the transition from the professional to +the great lady. + +"Ah! I should have remembered that. I had heard it from Edward Watton." + +She looked up quickly. He felt that for the first time she took notice of +him as an individual. + +"You know Mr. Watton? I think you are Sir George Tressady, are you not? +You got in for Market Malford in November? I recollect. I didn't like +your speeches." + +She laughed. So did he. + +"Yes, I got in just in time for a fighting session." + +Her laugh disappeared. + +"An odious fight!" she said gravely. + +"I am not so sure. That depends on whether you like fighting, and how +certain you are of your cause!" + +She hesitated a moment; then she said: + +"How can Lord Fontenoy be certain of his cause!" + +The slight note of scorn roused him. + +"Isn't that what all parties say of their opponents?" + +She glanced at him again, curiously. He was evidently quite +young--younger than herself, she guessed. But his careless ease and +experience of bearing, contrasted with his thin boy's figure, attracted +her. Her lip softened reluctantly into a smile. + +"Perhaps," she said. "Only sometimes, you know, it must be true! Well, +evidently we can't discuss it here at one o'clock in the morning--and +there is the nurse making signs to me. It is really very good of you. If +you are in our neighbourhood on Sunday, will you report?" + +"Certainly--with the greatest pleasure. I will come and give you a full +account of my mission." + +She held out a slim hand. The sister, red-eyed with crying, was handed +over to him, and he and she were soon in a cab, speeding towards the +Westminster mews whither she directed him. + +Well, was Maxwell to be so greatly envied? Tressady was not sure. Such a +woman, he thought, for all her beauty, would not have greatly stirred his +own pulses. + + + + +CHAPTER V + + +The week which had opened thus for Tressady promised to be one of lively +interest for such persons as were either concerned in or took notice of +the House of Commons and its doings. Fontenoy's onslaught upon the +administration of the Home Office, and, through the Home Secretary, on +the Maxwell group and influence, had been long expected, and was known to +have been ably prepared. Its possible results were already keenly +discussed. Even if it were a damaging attack, it was not supposed that it +could have any immediate effect on the state of parties or the strength +of the Government. But after Easter Maxwell's factory Bill--a special +Factory Act for East London, touching the grown man for the first time, +and absolutely prohibiting home-work in certain specified industries--was +to be brought forward, and could not fail to provide Maxwell's +adversaries with many chances of red and glorious battle. It was +disputable from end to end; it had already broken up one Government; it +was strongly pressed and fiercely opposed; and on the fate of each clause +in Committee might hang the life or death of the Ministry--not so much +because of the intrinsic importance of the matter, as because Maxwell was +indispensable to the Cabinet, and it was known that neither Maxwell nor +his close friend and henchman, Dowson, the Home Secretary, would accept +defeat on any of the really vital points of the Bill. + +The general situation was a curious one. Some two years before this time +a strong and long-lived Tory Government had come to an end. Since then +all had been confusion in English politics. A weak Liberal Government, +undermined by Socialist rebellion, had lasted but a short time, to be +followed by an equally precarious Tory Ministry, in which Lord +Maxwell--after an absence from politics of some four years or +so--returned to his party, only to break it up. For he succeeded in +imposing upon them a measure in which his own deepest convictions and +feelings were concerned, and which had behind it the support of all the +more important trade unions. Upon that measure the Ministry fell; but +during their short administration Maxwell had made so great an impression +upon his own side that when they returned, as they did return, with an +enlarged majority, the Maxwell Bill retained one of the foremost places +in their programme, and might be said, indeed, at the present moment to +hold the centre of the political field. + +That field, in the eyes of any middle-aged observer, was in strange +disarray. The old Liberal party had been almost swept away; only a few +waifs and strays remained, the exponents of a programme that nobody +wanted, and of cries that stirred nobody's blood. A large Independent +Labour and Socialist party filled the empty benches of the Liberals--a +revolutionary, enthusiastic crew, of whom the country was a little +frightened, and who were, if the truth were known, a little frightened +at themselves. They had a coherent programme, and represented a +formidable "domination" in English life. And that English life itself, in +all that concerned the advance and transformation of labour, was in a +singularly tossed and troubled state. After a long period of stagnation +and comparative industrial peace, storms at home, answering to storms on +the Continent, had been let loose, and forces both of reaction and of +revolution were making themselves felt in new forms and under the command +of new masters. + +At the head of the party of reaction stood Fontenoy. Some four years +before the present session the circumstances of a great strike in the +Midlands--together, no doubt, with some other influence--had first drawn +him into public life, had cut him off from racing and all his natural +pleasures. The strike affected his father's vast domain in North Mercia; +it was marked by an unusual violence on the part of the men and their +leaders; and Fontenoy, driven, sorely against his will, to take a part by +the fact that his father, the hard and competent administrator of an +enormous fortune, happened at the moment to be struck down by illness, +found himself before many weeks were over taking it with passion, and +emerged from the struggle a changed man. Property must be upheld; +low-born disorder and greed must be put down. He sold his race-horses, +and proceeded forthwith to throw into the formation of a new party all +the doggedness, the astuteness, and the audacity he had been accustomed +to lavish upon the intrigues and the triumphs of the Turf. + +And now in this new Parliament his immense labour was beginning to tell. +The men who followed him had grown in number and improved in quality. +They abhorred equally a temporising conservatism and a plundering +democracy. They stood frankly for birth and wealth, the Church and the +expert. They were the apostles of resistance and negation; they were +sworn to oppose any further meddling with trade and the personal liberty +of master and workman, and to undo, if they could, some of the meddling +that had been already carried through. A certain academic quality +prevailed among them, which made them peculiarly sensitive to the +absurdities of men who had not been to Oxford or Cambridge; while some, +like Tressady, had been travellers, and wore an Imperialist heart upon +their sleeve. The group possessed an unusual share of debating and +oratorical ability, and they had never attracted so much attention as now +that they were about to make the Maxwell Bill their prey. + +Meanwhile, for the initiated, the situation possessed one or two points +of special interest. Lady Maxwell, indeed, was by this time scarcely less +of a political force than her husband. Was her position an illustration +of some new power in women's hands, or was it merely an example of +something as well known to the Pharaohs as to the nineteenth century--the +ability of any woman with a certain physique to get her way? That this +particular woman's way happened to be also her husband's way made the +case less interesting for some observers. On the other hand, her obvious +wifely devotion attracted simple souls to whom the meddling of women in +politics would have been nothing but repellent had it not been +recommended to them by the facts that Marcella Maxwell was held to be +good as well as beautiful; that she loved her husband; and was the +excellent mother of a fine son. + +Of her devotion, in the case of this particular Bill, there was neither +concealment nor doubt. She was known to have given her husband every +assistance in the final drafting of the measure: she had seen for herself +the working of every trade that it affected; she had innumerable friends +among wage-earners of all sorts, to whom she gave half her social life; +and both among them and in the drawing-rooms of the rich she fought her +husband's cause unceasingly, by the help of beauty, wits, and something +else--a broad impulsiveness and charm--which might be vilified or +scorned, but could hardly be matched, by the enemy. + +Meanwhile Lord Maxwell was a comparatively ineffective speaker, and +passed in social life for a reserved and difficult personality. His +friends put no one else beside him; and his colleagues in the Cabinet +were well aware that he represented the keystone in their arch. But +the man in the street, whether of the aristocratic or plebeian sort, +knew comparatively little about him. All of which, combined with the +special knowledge of an inner circle, helped still more to concentrate +public attention on the convictions, the temperament, and the beauty +of his wife. + +Amid a situation charged with these personal or dramatic elements the +Friday so keenly awaited by Fontenoy and his party arrived. + +Immediately after question-time Fontenoy made his speech. In reply, the +Home Secretary, suave, statistical, and conciliatory, poured a stream of +facts and reports upon the House. The more repulsive they were, the +softer and more mincing grew his voice in dealing with them. Fontenoy had +excited his audience, Dowson succeeded in making it shudder. +Nevertheless, the effect of the evening lay with Fontenoy. + +George stayed to hear the official defence to its end. Then he hurried +upstairs in search of Letty, who, with Miss Tulloch, was in the Speaker's +private gallery. As he went he thought of Fontenoy's speech, its halting +opening, the savage force of its peroration. His pulses tingled: +"Magnificent!" he said to himself; "_magnificent!_ We have found a man!" + +Letty was eagerly waiting for him, and they walked down the corridor +together. "Well?" he said, thrusting his hands deep into his pockets, and +looking down upon her with a smile. "Well?" + +Letty saw that she was expected to praise, and she did her best, his +smile still bent upon her. He was perfectly aware all the time of the +fatuity of what she was saying. She had caught up since her engagement a +certain number of political phrases, and it amused him to note the cheap +and tinkling use she made of them. Nevertheless she was chatting, +smiling, gesticulating, for his pleasure. She was posing for him, using +her grey eyes in these expressive ways, all for him. He thought her the +most entertaining plaything; though it did occur to him sometimes that +when they were married he would give her instruction. + +"Ah, well, you liked it--that's good!" he said at last, interrupting her. +"We've begun well, any way. It'll be rather hard, though, to have to +speak after that on Monday!" + +"As if you need be afraid! You're not, you know--it's only mock modesty. +Do you know that Lady Maxwell was sitting two from me?" + +"No! Well, how did she like Fontenoy?" + +"She never moved after he got up. She pressed her face against that +horrid grating, and stared at him all the time. I thought she was very +flushed--but that may have been the heat--and in a very bad temper," +added Letty, maliciously. "I talked to her a little about your +adventure." + +"Did she remember my existence?" + +"Oh dear, yes! She said she expected you on Sunday. She never asked _me_ +to come." Letty looked arch. "But then one doesn't expect her to have +pretty manners. People say she is shy. But, of course, that is only your +friends' way of saying that you're rude." + +"She wasn't rude to you?" said George, outwardly eager, inwardly +sceptical. "Shall I not go on Sunday?" + +"But of course you must go. We shall have to know them. She's not a +woman's woman--that's all. Now, are we going to get some dinner, for +Tully and I are famishing?" + +"Come along, then, and I'll collect the party." + +George had asked a few of his acquaintance in the House to meet his +betrothed, together with an old General Tressady and his wife who were +his distant cousins. The party were to assemble in the room of an +under-secretary much given to such hospitable functions; and thither +accordingly George led the way. + +The room, when they reached it, was already fairly full of people, and +alive with talk. + +"Another party!" said George, looking round him. "Benson is great at this +sort of thing." + +"Do you see Lady Maxwell?" said Letty, in his ear. + +George looked to his right, and perceived the lady in question. She also +recognised him at once, and bowed, but without rising. She was the centre +of a group of people, who were gathered round her and the small table on +which she was leaning, and they were so deeply absorbed in the +conversation that had been going on that they hardly noticed the entrance +of Tressady and his companion. + +"Leven has a party, you see," said the under-secretary. "Blaythwaite was +to have taken them in--couldn't at the last moment; so they had to come +in here. This is _your_ side of the room! But none of your guests have +come yet. Dinner at the House in the winter is a poor sort of business, +Miss Sewell. We want the Terrace for these occasions." + +He led the young girl to a sofa at the further end of the room, and made +himself agreeable, to him the easiest process in the world. He was a +fashionable and charming person, in the most irreproachable of +frock-coats, and Letty was soon at her ease with him, and mistress of +all her usual arts and graces. + +"You know Lady Maxwell?" he said to her, with a slight motion of the head +towards the distant group. + +Letty replied; and while she and her companion chattered, George, who was +standing behind them, watched the other party. + +They were apparently in the thick of an argument, and Lady Maxwell, whose +hands were lightly clasped on the table in front of her, was leaning +forward with the look of one who had just shot her bolt, and was waiting +to see how it would strike. + +It struck apparently in the direction of her _vis-a-vis,_ Sir Frank +Leven, for he bent over to her, making a quick reply in a half-petulant +boy's voice. He had been three years in the House, but had still the air +of an Eton "swell" in his last half. + +Lady Maxwell listened to what he had to say, a sort of silent passion in +her face all the time--a noble passion nobly restrained. + +When he stopped, George caught her reply. + +"He has neither _seen_ nor _felt_--every sentence showed it--that is all +one can say. How can one take his judgment?" + +George's mouth twitched. He slipped, smiling, into a place beside Letty. +"Did you hear that?" he inquired. + +"Fontenoy's speech, of course," said the under-secretary, looking round. +"She's pitching into Leven, I suppose. He's as cranky and unsound as he +can be. Shouldn't wonder if you got him before long." + +He nodded good-temperedly to Tressady, then got up to speak to a man on +the edge of the further group. + +"How amusing!" said George, his satirical eyes still watching Lady +Maxwell. "How much that set has 'seen and felt' of sweaters, and +white-lead workers, and that ilk! Don't they look like it?" + +"Who are they?" + +Letty was now using all her eyes to find out, and especially for the +purpose of carrying away a mental photograph of Lady Maxwell's black hat +and dress. + +"Oh! the Maxwells' particular friends in the House--most of them as well +provided with family and goods as they make 'em: a philanthropic, +idealist lot, that yearns for the people, and will be the first to be +kicked downstairs when the people gets its own. However, they aren't all +quite happy in their minds. Frank Leven there, as Benson says, is +decidedly shaky. He is the member for the Maxwells' division--Maxwell, of +course, put him in. He has a house there, I believe, and he married Lady +Maxwell's great friend, Miss Macdonald--an ambitious little party, they +say, who simply insisted on his going into Parliament. Oh, then, Bennett +is there--do you see?--the little dark man with a frock-coat and +spectacles? He's Lady Maxwell's link with the Independents--oldest +workman member--been in the House a long time, so that by now he isn't +quite as one-eyed and one-eared as the rest of them. I suppose she hopes +to make use of him at critical moments--she takes care to have tools of +all sorts. Gracious--listen!" + +There was, indeed, a very storm of discussion sweeping through the rival +party. Lady Maxwell's penetrating but not loud voice seemed to pervade +it, and her eyes and face, as she glanced from one speaker to another, +drew alternately the shafts and the sympathy of the rest. + +Tressady made a face. + +"I say, Letty, promise me one thing!" His hand stole towards hers. Tully +discreetly looked the other way. "Promise me not to be a political woman, +there's a dear!" + +Letty hastily withdrew her fingers, having no mind at all for caresses +in public. + +"But I _must_ be a political woman--I shall have to be! I know heaps of +girls and married women who get up everything in the papers--all the +stupidest things--not because they know anything about it, or because +they care a rap, but because some of their men friends happen to be +members; and when they come to see you, you must know what to talk to +them about." + +"Must you?" said George, "How odd! As though one went to tea with a woman +for the sake of talking about the very same things you have been doing +all day, and are probably sick to death of already." + +"Never mind," said Letty, with her little air of sharp wisdom. "I _know_ +they do it, and I shall have to do it too. I shall pick it up." + +"Will you? Of course you will! Only, when I've got a big Bill on, let me +do a little of it for myself--give me some of the credit!" + +Letty laughed maliciously. + +"I don't know why you've taken such a dislike to her," she said, but in +rather a contented tone, as her eye once more travelled across to Lady +Maxwell. "Does she trample on her husband, after all?" + +Tressady gave an impatient shrug. + +"Trample on him? Goodness, no! That's all part of the play, too--wifely +affection and the rest of it. Why can't she keep out of sight a little? +We don't want the women meddling." + +"Thank you, my domestic tyrant!" said Letty, making him a little bow. + +"How much tyranny will you want before you accept those sentiments?" he +asked her, smiling tenderly into her eyes. Both had a moment's pleasant +thrill; then George sprang up. + +"Ah, here they are at last!--the General, and all the lot. Now, I hope, +we shall get some dinner." + +Tressady had, of course, to introduce his elderly cousins and his three +or four political friends to his future wife; and, amid the small flutter +of the performance, the break-up and disappearance of the rival party +passed unnoticed. When Tressady's guests entered the dining-room which +looks on the terrace, and made their way to the top table reserved for +them, the Leven dinner, near the door, was already half through. + +George's little banquet passed merrily enough. The grey-haired General +and his wife turned out to be agreeable and well-bred people, quite able +to repay George's hospitality by the dropping of little compliments on +the subject of Letty into his half-yielded ear. For his way of taking +such things was always a trifle cynical. He believed that people say +habitually twice what they mean, whether in praise or blame; and he did +not feel that his own view of Letty was much affected by what other +people thought of her. + +So, at least, he would have said. In reality, he got a good deal of +pleasure out of his _fiancee's_ success. Letty, indeed, was enjoying +herself greatly. This political world, as she had expected, satisfied her +instinct for social importance better than any world she had yet known. +She was determined to get on in it; nor, apparently, was there likely to +be any difficulty in the matter. George's friends thought her a pretty, +lively creature, and showed the usual inclination of the male sex to +linger in her society. She mostly wanted to be informed as to the House +and its ways. It was all so new to her!--she said. But her ignorance was +not insipid; her questions had flavour. There was much talk and laughter; +Letty felt herself the mistress of the table, and her social ambitions +swelled within her. + +Suddenly George's attention was recalled to the Maxwell table by the +break-up of the group around it. He saw Lady Maxwell rise and look +round her as though in search of someone. Her eyes fell upon him, and +he involuntarily rose at the same instant to meet the step she made +towards him. + +"I must say another word of thanks to you"--she held out her hand. "That +girl and her grandmother were most grateful to you." + +"Ah, well!--I must come and make my report. Sunday, I think you said?" + +She assented. Then her expression altered: + +"When do you speak?" + +The question fell out abruptly, and took George by surprise. + +"I? On Monday, I believe, if I get my turn. But I fear the British Empire +will go on if I don't!" + +She threw a glance of scrutiny at his thin, whimsical face, with its fair +moustache and sunburnt skin. + +"I hear you are a good speaker," she said simply. "And you are entirely +with Lord Fontenoy?" + +He bowed lightly, his hands on his sides. + +"You'll agree our case was well put? The worst of it--" + +Then he stopped. He saw that Lady Maxwell had ceased to listen to him. +She turned her head towards the door, and, without even saying good-bye +to him, she hurried away from him towards the further end of the room. + +"Maxwell, I see!" said Tressady to himself, with a shrug, as he returned +to his seat. "Not flattering--but rather pretty, all the same!" + +He was thinking of the quick change that had remade the face while he was +talking to her--a change as lovely as it was unconscious. + +Lord Maxwell, indeed, had just entered the dining-room in search of his +wife, and he and she now left it together, while the rest of the Leven +party gradually dispersed. Letty also announced that she must go home. + +"Let me just go back into the House and see what is going on," said +George. "Ten to one I sha'n't be wanted, and I could see you home." + +He hurried off, only to return in a minute with the news that the debate +was given up to a succession of superfluous people, and he was free, at +any rate for an hour. Letty, Miss Tulloch, and he accordingly made their +way to Palace Yard. A bright moon shone in their faces as they emerged +into the open air, which was still mild and spring-like, as it had been +all the week. + +"I say--send Miss Tulloch home in a cab!" George pleaded in Letty's ear, +"and walk with me a bit. Come and look at the moon over the river. I will +bring you back to the bridge and put you in a cab." + +Letty looked astonished and demure. "Aunt Charlotte would be +shocked," she said. + +George grew impatient, and Letty, pleased with his impatience, at last +yielded. Tully, the most complaisant of chaperons, was put into a hansom +and despatched. + +As the pair reached the entrance of Palace Yard they were overtaken by a +brougham, which drew up an instant in the gateway itself, till it should +find an opening in the traffic outside. + +"Look!" said George, pressing Letty's arm. + +She looked round hurriedly, and, as the lamps of the gateway shone into +the carriage, she caught a vivid glimpse of the people inside it. Their +faces were turned towards each other as though in intimate +conversation--that was all. The lady's hands were crossed on her knee; +the man held a despatch-box. In a minute they were gone; but both Letty +and George were left with the same impression--the sense of something +exquisite surprised. It had already visited George that evening, only a +few minutes earlier, in connection with the same woman's face. + +Letty laughed, rather consciously. + +George looked down upon her as he guided her through the gate. + +"Some people seem to find it pleasant to be together!" he said, with a +vibration in his voice. "But why did we look?" he added, discontentedly. + +"How could we help it, you silly boy?" + +They walked to wards the bridge and down the steps, happy in each other, +and freshened by the night breeze. Over the river the moon, hung full and +white, and beneath it everything--the silver tracks on the water, the +blaze of light at Charing Cross Station, the lamps on Westminster Bridge +and in the passing steamers, a train of barges, even the darkness of the +Surrey shore--had a gentle and poetic air. The vast city had, as it were, +veiled her greatness and her tragedy; she offered herself kindly and +protectingly to these two--to their happiness and their youth. + +George made his companion wait beside the parapet and look, while he +himself drew in the air with a sort of hunger. + +"To think of the hours we spend in this climate," he said, "caged up in +abominable places like the House of Commons!" + +The traveller's distaste for the monotony of town and indoor life spoke +in his vehemence. Letty raised her eyebrows. + +"I am very glad of my furs, thank you! You seem to forget that it is +February." + +"Never mind!--since Monday it has had the feel of April. Did you see my +mother to-day?" + +"Yes. She caught me just after luncheon, and we talked for an hour." + +"Poor darling! I ought to have been there to protect you. But she vowed +she would have her say about that house." + +He looked down upon her, trying to see her expression in the shifting +light. He had gone through a disagreeable little scene with his mother at +breakfast. She had actually lectured him on the rashness of taking the +Brook Street house!--he understanding the whole time that what the odd +performance really meant was, that if he took it he would have a smaller +margin of income wherefrom to supplement her allowance. + +"Oh, it was all right!" said Letty, composedly. "She declared we should +get into difficulties at once, that I could have no idea of the value +of money, that you always _had_ been extravagant, that everybody would +be astonished at our doing such a thing, etcetera, etcetera. I +_think_--you don't mind?--I think she cried a little. But she wasn't +really very unhappy." + +"What did you say?" + +"Well, I suggested that when we were married, we and she should both set +up account-books; and I promised faithfully that if she would let us see +hers, we would let her see ours." + +George threw back his head with a gurgle of laughter. + +"Well?" + +"She was afraid," said Letty, demurely, "that I didn't take things +seriously enough. Then I asked her to come and see my gowns." + +"And that, I suppose, appeased her?" + +"Not at all. She turned up her nose at everything, by way of punishing +me. You see, she had on a new-Worth--the third since Christmas. My poor +little trousseau rags had no chance." + +"H'm!" said George, meditatively. "I wonder how my mamma is going to +manage when we are married," he added, after a pause. + +Letty made no reply. She was walking firmly and briskly; her eyes, full +of a sparkling decision, looked straight before her; her little mouth was +close set. Meanwhile through George's mind there passed a number of +fragmentary answers to his own question. His feeling towards his mother +was wholly abnormal; he had no sense of any unseemliness in the +conversation about her which was gradually growing common between himself +and Letty; and he meant to draw strict lines in the future. At the same +time, there was the tie of old habit, and of that uneasy and unwelcome +responsibility with regard to her which had descended upon him at the +time of his father's death. He could not honestly regard himself as an +affectionate son; but the filial relationship, even in its most imperfect +aspect, has a way of imposing itself. + +"Ah, well! I daresay we shall pull through," he said, dismissing the +familiar worry with a long breath. "Why, how far we have come!" he added, +looking back at Charing Cross and the Westminster towers. "And how +extraordinarily mild it is! We can't turn back yet, and you'll be tired +if I race you on in this way. Look, Letty, there's a seat! Would you be +afraid--just five minutes?" + +Letty looked doubtful. + +"It's so absurdly late. George, you _are_ funny! Suppose somebody came by +who knew us?" + +He opened his eyes. + +"And why not? But see! there isn't a carriage, and hardly a person, in +sight. Just a minute!" + +Most unwillingly Letty let herself be persuaded. It seemed to her a +foolish and extravagant thing to do; and there was now no need for either +folly or extravagance. Since her engagement she had dropped a good many +of the small audacities of the social sort she had so freely allowed +herself before it. It was as though, indeed, now that these audacities +had served their purpose, some stronger and perhaps inherited instincts +emerged in her, obscuring the earlier self. George was sometimes +astonished by an ultra-conventional note, of which certainly he had heard +nothing in their first days of intimacy at Malford. + +However, she sat down beside him, protesting. But he had no sooner stolen +her hand, than the moonlight showed her a dark, absent look creeping over +his face. And to her amazement he began to talk about the House of +Commons, about the Home Secretary's speech, of all things in the world! +He seemed to be harking back to Mr. Dowson's arguments, to some of the +stories the Home Secretary had told of those wretched people who +apparently enjoy dying of overwork and phosphorus, and white-lead, who +positively will die of them, unless the inspectors are always harrying +them. He still held her hand, but she saw he was not thinking of her; +and a sudden pique rose in her small mind. Generally, she accepted his +love-making very coolly--just as it came, or did not come. But to-night +she asked herself with irritation--for what had he led her into his silly +escapade, but to make love to her? And now here were her fingers slipping +out of his, while he harangued her on things she knew and cared nothing +about, in a voice and manner he might have addressed to anybody! + +"Well, I don't understand--I really _don't!_" she interrupted sharply. "I +thought you were all against the Government--I thought you didn't believe +a word they say!" + +He laughed. + +"The difference between them and us, darling, is only that _they_ think +the world can be mended by Act of Parliament, and _we_ think it can't. Do +what you will, _we_ say the world is, and must be, a wretched hole for +the majority of those that live in it; _they_ suppose they can cure it by +quack meddlings and tyrannies." + +He looked straight before him, absorbed, and she was struck with the +harsh melancholy of his face. + +What on earth had he kept her here for to talk this kind of talk! + +"George, I really _must_ go!" she began, flushing, and drawing her +hand away. + +Instantly he turned to her, his look brightening and melting. + +"Must you? Well, the world sha'n't be a wretched hole for us, shall it, +darling? We'll make a little nest in it--we'll forget what we can't +help--we'll be happy as long as the fates let us--won't we, Letty?" + +His arm slipped round behind her. He caught her hands. + +He had recollected himself. Nevertheless Letty was keenly conscious that +it was all most absurd, this sitting on a seat in a public thoroughfare +late at night, and behaving like any 'Arry and 'Arriet. + +"Why, of course we shall be happy," she said, rising with decision as she +spoke; "only somehow I don't always understand you, George. I wish I knew +what you were really thinking about." + +"_You!_" he said, laughing, and drawing her hand within his arm, as they +turned backwards towards the bridge. + +She shook her head doubtfully. Whereupon he awoke fully to the situation, +and during the short remainder of their walk he wooed and flattered her +as usual. But when he had put her safely into a hansom at the corner of +the bridge, and smiled good-bye to her, he turned to walk back to the +House in much sudden flatness of mood. Her little restless egotisms of +mind and manner had chilled him unawares. Had Fontenoy's speech been so +fine, after all? Were politics--was anything--quite worth while? It +seemed to him that all emotions were small, all crises disappointing. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + + +The following Sunday, somewhere towards five o'clock, George rang the +bell of the Maxwells' house in St. James's Square. It was a very fine +house, and George's eye, as he stood waiting, ran over the facade with an +amused, investigating look. + +He allowed himself the same expression once or twice in the hall, as one +mute and splendid person relieved him of his coat, and another, equally +mute and equally unsurpassable, waited for him on the stairs, while +across a passage beyond the hall he saw two red-liveried footmen +carrying tea. + +"When one is a friend of the people," he pondered as he went upstairs, +"is one limited in horses but not in flunkeys? These things are obscure." + +He was ushered first into a stately outer drawing-room, filled with +old French furniture and fine pictures; then the butler lifted a +velvet curtain, pronounced the visitor's name with a voice and +emphasis as perfectly trained as the rest of him, and stood aside for +George to enter. + +He found himself on the threshold of a charming room looking west, and +lit by some last beams of February sun. The pale-green walls were covered +with a medley of prints and sketches. A large writing-table, untidily +heaped with papers, stood conspicuous on the blue self-coloured carpet, +which over a great part of the floor was pleasantly void and bare. Flat +earthenware pans, planted with hyacinths and narcissus, stood here and +there, and filled the air with spring scents. Books ran round the lower +walls, or lay piled where-ever there was a space for them; while about +the fire at the further end was gathered a circle of chintz-covered +chairs--chairs of all shapes and sizes, meant for talking. The whole +impression of the pretty, disorderly place, compared with the stately +drawing-room behind it, was one of intimity and freedom; the room made a +friend of you as you entered. + +Half a dozen people were sitting with Lady Maxwell when Tressady was +announced. She rose to meet him with great cordiality, introduced him to +little Lady Leven, an elfish creature in a cloud of fair hair, and with a +pleasant "You know all the rest," offered him a chair beside herself and +the tea-table. + +"The rest" were Frank Leven, Edward Watton, Bayle, the Foreign Office +private secretary who had been staying at Malford House at the time of +Tressady's election, and Bennett, the "small, dark man" whom George had +pointed out to Letty in the House as a Labour member, and one of the +Maxwells' particular friends. + +"Well?" said Lady Maxwell, turning to her new visitor as she handed him +some tea, "were you as much taken with the grandmother as the grandmother +was taken with you? She told me she had never seen a 'more haffable +gentleman, nor one as she'd a been more willin to ha done for'!" + +George laughed. "I see," he said, "that my report has been anticipated." + +"Yes--I have been there. I have found a 'case' in them indeed--alack! The +granny--I am afraid she is an unseemly old woman--and the elder girl both +work for the Jew son-in-law on the first floor--homework of the most +abominable kind--that girl will be dead in a year if it goes on." + +George was rapidly conscious of two contradictory impressions--one of +pleasure, one of annoyance--pleasure in her tall, slim presence, her +white hand, and all the other flashing points of a beauty not to be +denied--and irritation that she should have talked "shop" to him with her +first breath. Could one never escape this altruistic chatter? + +But he was not left to grapple with it alone, for Lady Leven looked +up quickly. + +"Mr. Watton, will you please take Lady Maxwell's tea away if she mentions +the word 'case' again? We gave her fair warning." + +Lady Maxwell hastily clasped both her hands round her tea-cup. + +"Betty, we have discussed the opera for at least twenty minutes." + +"Yes--at peril of our lives!" said Lady Leven. "I never talked so fast +before. One felt as though one _must_ say everything one had to say about +Melba and the de Reszkes, all in one breath--before one's poor little +subject was torn from one--one would never have such a chance again." + +Lady Maxwell laughed, but coloured too. + +"Am I such a nuisance?" she said, dropping her hands on her knee with a +little sigh. Then she turned to Tressady. + +"But Lady Leven really makes it out worse than it is. We haven't even +_approached_ a Factory Act all the afternoon." + +Lady Leven sprang forward in her chair. "Because! _because_, my dear, we +simply declined to let you. We made a league--didn't we, Mr. +Bennett?--even you joined it." + +Bennett smiled. + +"Lady Maxwell overworks herself--we all know that," he said, his look, at +once kind, honest, and perennially embarrassed, passing from Lady Leven +to his hostess. + +"Oh, don't sympathise, for Heaven's sake!" cried Betty. "Wage war upon +her--it's our only hope." + +"Don't you think Sunday at least ought to be frivolous?" said Tressady, +smiling, to Lady Maxwell. + +"Well, personally, I like to talk about what interests me on Sunday as +well as on other days," she said with a frank simplicity; "but I know I +ought to be kept in order--I become a terrible bore." + +Frank Leven roused himself from the sofa on which he had languidly +subsided. + +"Bores?" he said indignantly, "we're all bores. We all have been bores +since people began to think about what they're pleased to call 'social +work.' Why should I love my neighbour?--I'd much rather hate him. I +generally do." + +"Doesn't it all depend," said Tressady, "on whether he happens to be able +to make it disagreeable for you in return?" + +"That's just it," said Betty Leven, eagerly. "I agree with Frank--it's +all so stupid, this 'loving' everybody. It makes one positively hot. We +sit under a clergyman, Frank and I, who talks of nothing every Sunday but +love--_love_--like that, long-drawn-out--how our politics should be +'love,' and our shopping should be 'love'--till we long simply to +bastinado somebody. I want to have a little real nice cruelty--something +sharp and interesting. I should like to stick pins into my maid, only +unfortunately, as she has more than once pointed out to me, it would be +so much easier for her to stick them into me!" + +"You want the time of Miss Austen's novels back again," said young Bayle, +stooping to her, with his measured and agreeable smile--"before even the +clergy had a mission." + +"Ah! but it would be no good," said Lady Leven, sighing, "if _she_ +were there!" + +She threw out her small hand towards her hostess, and everybody laughed. + +Up to the moment of the laugh, Lady Maxwell had been lying back in her +chair listening, the beautiful mouth absently merry, and the eyes +speaking--Tressady thought--of quite other things, of some hidden +converse of her own, going on in the brain behind the eyes. A certain +prophetess-air seemed natural to her. Nevertheless, that first impression +of her he had carried away from the hospital scene was being somehow +blurred and broken up. + +She joined in the laugh against herself; then, with a little nod towards +her assailant, she said to Edward Watton, who was sitting on her right +hand. "_You're_ not taken in, I know." + +"Oh, if you mean that I go in for 'cases' and 'causes' too," cried Lady +Leven, interrupting, "of course I do--I can't be left alone. I must dance +as my generation pipes." + +"Which means," said her husband, drily, "that she went for two days +filling soda-water bottles the week before last, and a day's shirt-making +last week. From the first, I was told that she would probably return to +me with an eye knocked out, she being totally inexperienced and absurdly +rash. As to the second, to judge from the description she gave me of the +den she had been sitting in when she came home, and the headache she had +next day, I still expect typhoid. The fortnight isn't up till Wednesday." + +There was a shout of mingled laughter and inquiry. + +"How did you do it?--and whom did you bribe?" said Bayle to Lady Leven. + +"I didn't bribe anybody," she said indignantly. "You don't understand. My +friends introduced me." + +Then, drawn out by him, she plunged into a lively account of her workshop +experiences, interrupted every now and then by the sarcastic comments of +her husband and the amusement of the two younger men who had brought +their chairs close to her. Betty Leven ranked high among the lively +chatterboxes of her day and set. + +Lady Maxwell, however, had not laughed at Frank Leven's speech. Rather, +as he spoke of his wife's experiences, her face had clouded, as though +the blight of some too familiar image, some sad ever-present vision, had +descended upon her. + +Beimett also did not laugh. He watched the Levens indulgently for a few +minutes, then insensibly he, Lady Maxwell, Edward Watton, and Tressady +drew together into a circle of their own. + +"Do you gather that Lord Fontenoy's speech on Friday has been much +taken up in the country?" said Bennett, bending forward and addressing +Lady Maxwell. Tressady, who was observing him, noticed that his dress +was precisely the "Sunday best" of the respectable workman, and was, +moreover, reminded by the expression of the eyes and brow that Bennett +was said to have been a well-known "local preacher" in his +north-country youth. + +Lady Maxwell smiled, and pointed to Tressady. + +"Here," she said, "is Lord Fontenoy's first-lieutenant." + +Bennett looked at George. + +"I should be glad," he said, "to know what Sir George thinks?" + +"Why, certainly--we think it has been very warmly taken up," said George, +promptly--"to judge from the newspapers, the letters that have been +pouring in, and the petitions that seem to be preparing." + +Lady Maxwell's eyes gleamed. She looked at Bennett silently a moment, +then she said: + +"Isn't it amazing to you how strong an impossible case can be made to +look?" + +"It is inevitable," said Bennett, with a little shrug, "quite +inevitable. These social experiments of ours are so young--there is +always a strong case to be made out against any of them, and there will +be for years to come." + +"Well and good," said George; "then we cavillers are inevitable too. +Don't attack us--praise us rather; by your own confession, we are as much +a part of the game as you are." + +Bennett smiled slightly, but did not in reality quite follow. Lady +Maxwell bent forward. + +"Do you know whether Lord Fontenoy has any _personal_ knowledge of the +trades he was speaking about?" she said, in her rich eager voice; "that +is what I want so much to find out." + +George was nettled by both the question and the manner. + +"I regard Fontenoy as a very competent person," he said drily. "I imagine +he did his best to inform himself. But there was not much need; the +persons concerned--whom you think you are protecting--were so very eager +to inform us!" + +Lady Maxwell flushed. + +"And you think that settles it--the eagerness of the cheap life to be +allowed to maim and waste itself? But again and again English law has +stepped in to prevent it--and again and again everybody has been +thankful." + +"It is all a question of balance, of course," said George. "Must a +few unwise people be allowed to kill themselves--or thousands lose +their liberty?" + +His blue eyes scanned her beautiful impetuous face with a certain cool +hardness. Internally he was more and more in revolt against a "monstrous +regiment of women" and the influence upon the most complex economic +problems of such a personality as that before him. + +But his word "liberty" pricked her. The look of feeling passed away. Her +eyes kindled as sharply and drily as his own. + +"Freedom?--let me quote you Cromwell! 'Every sectary saith, "O give me +liberty!" But give it him, and to the best of his power he will yield it +to no one else.' So with your careless or brutal employer--give him +liberty, and no one else shall get it." + +"Only by metaphor--not legally," said George, stubbornly. "So long as men +are not slaves by law there is always a chance for freedom. Any way _we_ +stand for freedom--as an end, not a means. It is not the business of the +State to make people happy--not at all!--at least that is our view--but +it _is_ the business of the State to keep them free." + +"Ah!" said Bennett, with a long breath, "there you've hit the nail--the +whole difference between you and us." + +George nodded. Lady Maxwell did not speak immediately. But George was +conscious that he was being observed, closely considered. Their glances +crossed an instant, in antagonism, certainly, if not in dislike. + +"How long is it since you came home from India?" she asked him suddenly. + +"About six months." + +"And you were, I think, a long time abroad?" + +"Nearly four years. Does that make you think I have not had much time to +get up the things I am going to vote about?" said the young man, +laughing. "I don't know! On the broadest issues of politics, one makes up +one's mind as well in Asia as in Europe--better perhaps." + +"On the Empire, I suppose--and England's place in the world? That's a +side which--I know--I remember much too little. You think our life +depends on a governing class--and that _we_ and democracy are weakening +that class too much?" + +"That's about it. And for democracy it is all right. But _you_--you are +the traitors!" + +His thrust, however, did not rouse her to any corresponding rhetoric. She +smiled merely, and began to question him about his travels. She did it +with great deftness, so that after an answer or two both his temper and +manner insensibly softened, and he found himself talking with ease and +success. His mixed personality revealed itself--his capacity for certain +veiled enthusiasms, his respect for power, for knowledge, his pessimist +beliefs as to the average lot of men. + +Bennett, who listened easily, was glad to help her make her guest talk. +Frank Leven left the group near the sofa and came to listen, too. +Tressady was more and more spurred, carried out of himself. Lady +Maxwell's fine eyes and stately ways were humanised after all by a quick +responsiveness, which for most people, however critical, made +conversation with her draw like a magnet. Her intelligence, too, was +competent, left the mere feminine behind in these connections that +Tressady offered her, no less than in others. She had not lived in the +world of high politics for nearly five years for nothing; so that +unconsciously, and indeed quite against his will, Tressady found himself +talking to her, after a while, as though she had been a man and an equal, +while at the same time taking more pains than he would ever have taken +for a man. + +"Well, you _have_ seen a lot!" said Frank Leven at last, with a rather +envious sigh. + +Bennett's modest face suddenly reddened. + +"If only Sir George will use his eyes to as good purpose at home--" he +said involuntarily, then stopped. Few men were more unready and awkward +in conversation; yet when roused he was one of the best platform speakers +of his day. + +George laughed. + +"One sees best what appeals to one, I am afraid," he said, only to be +instantly conscious that he had made a rather stupid admission in face of +the enemy. + +Lady Maxwell's lip twitched; he saw the flash of some quick thought cross +her face. But she said nothing. + +Only when he got up to go, she bade him notice that she was always at +home on Sundays, and would be glad that he should remember it. He made a +rather cold and perfunctory reply. Inwardly he said to himself, "Why does +she say nothing of Letty, whom she knows--and of our marriage--if she +wants to make friends?" + +Nevertheless, he left the house with the feeling of one who has passed +an hour not of the common sort. He had done himself justice, made his +mark. And as for her--in spite of his flashes of dislike he carried +away a strong impression of something passionate and vivid that clung +to the memory. Or was it merely eyes and pose, that astonishingly +beautiful colour, and touch of classic dignity which she got--so the +world said--from some remote strain of Italian blood? Most probably! +All the same, she had fewer of the ordinary womanly arts than he had +imagined. How easy it would have been to send that message to Letty she +had not sent! He thought simply that for a clever woman she might have +been more adroit. + + * * * * * + +The door had no sooner closed behind Tressady than Betty Leven, with +a quick look after him, bent across to her hostess, and said in a +stage whisper: + +"Who? Post me up, please." + +"One of Fontenoy's gang," said her husband, before Lady Maxwell could +answer. "A new member, and as sharp as needles. He's been exactly to all +the places where I want to go, Betty, and you won't let me." + +He glanced at his wife with a certain sharpness. For Tressady had spoken +in passing of nilghai-shooting in the Himalayas, and the remark had +brought the flush of an habitual discontent to the young man's cheek. + +Betty merely held out a white child's wrist. + +"Button my glove, please, and don't talk. I have got ever so many +questions to ask Marcella." + +Leven applied himself rather sulkily to his task while Betty pursued her +inquiries. + +"Isn't he going to marry Letty Sewell?" + +"Yes," said Lady Maxwell, opening her eyes rather wide. "Do you +know her?" + +"Why, my dear, she's Mr. Watton's cousin--isn't she?" said Betty, turning +towards that young man. "I saw her once at your mother's." + +"Certainly she is my cousin," said that young man, smiling, "and she is +going to marry Tressady at Easter. So much I can vouch for, though I +don't know her so well, perhaps, as the rest of my family do." + +"Oh!" said Betty, drily, releasing her husband and crossing her small +hands across her knee. "That means--Miss Sewell isn't one of Mr. Watton's +_favourite_ cousins. You don't mind talking about your cousins, do you? +You may blacken the character of all mine. Is she nice?" + +"Who--Letty? Why, of course she is nice," said Edward Watton, laughing. +"All young ladies are." + +"Oh goodness!" said Betty, shaking her halo of gold hair. "Commend me to +cousins for letting one down easy." + +"Too bad, Lady Leven!" said Watton, getting up to escape. "Why not ask +Bayle? He knows all things. Let me hand you over to him. He will sing you +all my cousin's charms." + +"Delighted!" said Bayle as he, too, rose--"only unfortunately I ought at +this moment to be at Wimbledon." + +He had the air of a typical official, well dressed, suave, and infinitely +self-possessed, as he held out his hand--deprecatingly--to Lady Leven. + +"Oh! you private secretaries!" said Betty, pouting and turning +away from him. + +"Don't abolish us," he said, pleading. "We must live." + +"_Je n'en vois pas la necessite!_" said Betty, over her shoulder. + +"Betty, what a babe you are!" cried her husband, as Bayle, Watton, and +Bennett all disappeared together. + +"Not at all!" cried Betty. "I wanted to get some truth out of somebody. +For, of course, the real truth is that this Miss Sewell is--" + +"Is what?" said Leven, lost in admiration all the time, as Lady Maxwell +saw, of his wife's dainty grace and rose-leaf colour. + +"Well--a--_minx!_" said Betty, with innocent slowness, +opening her blue eyes very wide; "a mischievous--rather +pretty--hard-hearted--flirting--little minx!" + +"Really, Betty!" cried Lady Maxwell. "Where have you seen her?" + +"Oh, I saw her last year several times at the Wattons' and other places," +said Betty, composedly. "And so did you too, please, madam. I remember +very well one day Mrs. Watton brought her into the Winterbournes' when +you and I were there, and she chattered a great deal." + +"Oh yes!--I had forgotten." + +"Well, my dear, you'll soon have to remember her! so you needn't talk +in that lofty tone. For they're going to be married at Easter, and if +you want to make friends with the young man, you'll have to realise +the wife!" + +"Married at Easter? How do you know?" + +"In the first place Mr. Watton said so, in the next there are such +things as newspapers. But of course you didn't notice such trifles, you +never do." + +"Betty, you're very cross with me to-day!" Lady Maxwell looked up at her +friend with a little pleading air. + +"Oh no! only for your good. I know you're thinking of nothing in the +world but how to make that man take a reasonable view of Maxwell's Bill. +And I want to impress upon you that _he's_ probably thinking a great deal +more about getting married than about Factory Bills. You see, _your_ +getting married was a kind of accident. But other people are different. +And oh, dear, you do know so little about them when they don't live hi +four pair backs! There, don't defend yourself--you sha'n't!" + +And, stooping, Betty stifled her friend's possible protest by +kissing her. + +"Now then, come along, Frank--you've got your speech to write--and I've +got to copy it out. Don't swear! you know you're going to have two whole +days' golfing next week. Good-bye, Marcella! My love to Aldous--and tell +him not to be so late next time I come to tea. Good-bye!" + +And off she swept, pausing, however, on the landing to open the door +again and put in an eager face. + +"Oh! and, by the way, the young man has a mother--Frank reminded me. His +womenkind don't seem to be his strong point--but as she doesn't earn +_even_ four-and-sixpence a week--very sadly the contrary--I won't tell +you any more now, or you'll forget. Next time!" + +When Marcella Maxwell was at last left alone, she began to pace slowly up +and down the large bare room, as it was very much her wont to do. + +She was thinking of George Tressady, and of the personality his talk had +seemed to reveal. + +"His heart is all in _power_--in what he takes for magnificence." she +said to herself. "He talks as if he had no humanity, and did not care a +rap for anybody. But it is a pose--I _think_ it is a pose. He is +interesting--he will develop. One would like--to show him things." + +After another pensive turn or two she stopped beside a photograph that +stood upon her writing-table. It was a photograph of her husband--a tall, +smoothfaced man, with pleasant eyes, features of no particular emphasis, +and the free carriage of the country-bred Englishman. As she looked at it +her face relaxed unconsciously, inevitably; under the stimulus of some +habitual and secret joy. It was for his sake, for his sake only that she +was still thinking of George Tressady, still pondering the young man's +character and remarks. + +So much at least was true--no other member of Fontenoy's party had as +yet given her even the chance of arguing with him. Once or twice in +society she had tried to approach Fontenoy himself, to get somehow into +touch with him. But she had made no way. Lord Fontenoy had simply turned +his square-jawed face and red-rimmed eyes upon her with a stupid +irresponsive air, which Marcella knew perfectly well to be a mask, while +it protected him none the less effectively for that against both her +eloquence and her charm. The other members of the party were young +aristocrats, either of the ultra-exclusive or of the sporting type. She +had made her attempts here and there among them, but with no more +success. And once or twice, when she had pushed her attack to close +quarters, she had been suddenly conscious of an underlying insolence in +her opponent--a quick glance of bold or sensual eyes which seemed to +relegate the mere woman to her place. + +But this young Tressady, for all his narrowness and bitterness, was of a +different stamp--or she thought so. + +She began to pace up and down again, lost in reverie, till after a few +minutes she came slowly to a stop before a long Louis Quinze +mirror--her hands clasped in front of her, her eyes half consciously +studying what she saw. + +Her own beauty invariably gave her pleasure--though very seldom for the +reasons that would have affected other women. She felt instinctively that +it made life easier for her than it could otherwise have been; that it +provided her with a natural and profitable "opening" in any game she +might wish to play; and that even among the workmen, unionist leaders, +and officials of the East End it had helped her again and again to score +the points that she wanted to make. She was accustomed to be looked at, +to be the centre, to feel things yielding before her; and without +thinking it out, she knew perfectly well what it was she gained by this +"fair seeming show" of eye and lip and form. Somehow it made nothing seem +impossible to her; it gave her a dazzling self-confidence. + +The handle of the door turned. She looked round with a smiling start, +and waited. + +A tall man in a grey suit came in, crossed the room quickly, and put his +arms round her. She leant back against his shoulder, putting up one hand +to touch his cheek caressingly. + +"Why, how late you are! Betty left reproaches for you." + +"I had a walk with Dowson. Then two or three people caught me on the +way back--Rashdell among others." (Lord Rashdell was Foreign +Secretary.) "There are some interesting telegrams from Paris--I copied +them out for you." + +The country happened to be at the moment in the midst of one of its +periodical difficulties with France. There had been a good deal of +diplomatic friction, and a certain amount of anxiety at the Foreign +Office. Marcella lit the silver kettle again and made her man some fresh +tea, while he told her the news, and they discussed the various points of +the telegrams he had copied for her, with a comrade's freedom and +vivacity. Then she said: + +"Well, I have had an interesting time too! That young Tressady has +been to tea." + +"Oh! has he? They say there is a lot of stuff in him, and he may do us a +great deal of mischief. How did you find him?" + +"Oh, very clever, very limited--and a mass of prejudices," she said, +laughing. "I never saw an odder mixture of knowledge and ignorance." + +"What? Knowledge of India and the East?--that kind of thing?" + +She nodded. + +"Knowledge of everything except the subject he has come home to fight +about! Do you know, Aldous--" + +She paused. She was sitting on a stool beside him, her arm upon his knee. + +"What do I know?" he said, his hand seeking hers. + +"Well, I can't help feeling that that man might live and learn. He isn't +a mere obstructive block--like the rest." + +Maxwell laughed. + +"Then Fontenoy is not as shrewd as usual. They say he regards him as +their best recruit." + +"Never mind. I rather wish you'd try to make friends with him." + +Maxwell, however, helped himself to cake and made no response. On the two +or three occasions on which he had met George Tressady, he had been +conscious, if the truth were told, of a certain vague antipathy to the +young man. + +Marcella pondered. + +"No," she said, "no--I don't think after all he's your sort. Suppose _I_ +see what can be done!" + +And she got up with her flashing smile--half love, half fun--and +crossed the room to summon her little boy, Hallin, for his evening +play. Maxwell looked after her, not heeding at all what she was saying, +heeding only herself, her voice, the atmosphere of charm and life she +carried with her. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + + +Marcella Maxwell, however, had not been easily wooed by the man who now +filled all the horizon of her life. At the time when Aldous Raeburn, as +he then was--the grandson and heir of old Lord Maxwell--came across her +first she was a handsome, undeveloped girl, of a type not uncommon in our +modern world, belonging by birth to the country-squire class, and by the +chances of a few years of student life in London to the youth that takes +nothing on authority, and puts to fierce question whatever it finds +already on its path--Governments, Churches, the powers of family and +wealth--that takes, moreover, its social pity for the only standard, and +spends that pity only on one sort and type of existence. She accepted +Raeburn, then the best _parti_ in the county, without understanding or +loving him, simply that she might use his power and wealth for certain +social ends to which the crude philanthropy of her youth had pledged +itself. Naturally, they were no sooner engaged than Raeburn found himself +launched upon a long wrestle with the girl who had thus--in the +selfishness of her passionate idealist youth--opened her relation to him +with a deliberate affront to the heart offered her. The engagement had +stormy passages, and was for a time wholly broken off. Aldous was made +bitterly jealous, or miserably unhappy. Marcella left the old house in +the neighbourhood of the Maxwell property, where her lover had first seen +and courted her. She plunged into London life, and into nursing, that +common outlet for the woman at war with herself or society. She suffered +and struggled, and once or twice she came very near to throwing away all +her chances of happiness. But in the end, Maxwell tamed her; Maxwell +recovered her. The rise of love in the unruly, impetuous creature, when +the rise came, was like the sudden growth of some great forest flower. It +spread with transforming beauty over the whole nature, till at last the +girl who had once looked upon him as the mere tool of her own moral +ambitions threw herself upon Maxwell's heart with a self-abandoning +passion and penitence, which her developed powers and her adorable beauty +made a veritable intoxication. + +And Maxwell was worthy that she should do this thing. When he and +Marcella first met, he was a man of thirty, very able, very reserved, and +often painfully diffident as to his own powers and future. He was the +only young representative of a famous stock, and had grown up from his +childhood under the shadow of great sorrows and heavy responsibilities. +The stuff of the poet and the thinker lay hidden behind his shy manners; +and he loved Marcella Boyce with all the delicacy, all the idealising +respect, that passion generates in natures so strong and so highly +tempered. At the same time, he had little buoyancy or gaiety; he had a +belief in his class, and a constitutional dislike of change, which were +always fighting in his mind with the energies of moral debate; and he +acquiesced very easily--perhaps indifferently--in many outward +conventions and prejudices. + +The crisis through which Marcella put him developed and matured the man. +To the influences of love, moreover, were added the influences of +friendship--of such a friendship as our modern time but seldom rears to +perfection. In Raeburn's college days, a man of rare and delicate powers +had possessed himself of Raeburn's tenacious affection, and had +thenceforward played the leader to Raeburn's strength, physical and +moral, availing himself freely, wherever his own failed him, of the +powers and capacities of his friend. For he himself bore in him from his +youth up the seeds of physical failure and early death. It was partly the +marvellous struggle in him of soul with body that subdued to him the +homage of the stronger man. And it was clearly his influence that broke +up and fired Raeburn's slower and more distrustful temper, informing an +inbred Toryism, a natural passion for tradition, and the England of +tradition with that "repining restlessness" which is the best spur of +noble living. + +Hallin was a lecturer and an economist; a man who lived in the perception +of the great paradox that in our modern world political power has gone to +the workman, while yet socially and intellectually he remains little less +weak, or starved, or subject than before. When he died he left to Raeburn +a legacy of feelings and ideas, all largely concerned with this contrast +between the huge and growing "tyranny" of the working class and the +individual helplessness or bareness of the working man. And it was these +feelings and ideas which from the beginning made a link between Raeburn +and the young revolts and compassions of Marcella Boyce. They were at one +in their love of Edward Hallin; and after Hallin's death, in their sore +and tender wish to make his thoughts tell upon the English world. + + * * * * * + +The Maxwells had now been married some five years, years of almost +incredible happiness. The equal comradeship of marriage at its best and +finest, all the daily disciplines, the profound and painless lessons of +love, the covetous bliss of parentage, the constant anxieties of power +nobly understood, had harmonised the stormy nature of the woman, and had +transformed the somewhat pessimist and scrupulous character of the man. +Not that life with Marcella Maxwell was always easy. Now as ever she +remained on the moral side a creature of strain and effort, tormented by +ideals not to be realised, and eager to drive herself and others in a +breathless pursuit of them. + +But if in some sort she seemed to be always dragging those that loved her +through the heart of a tempest, the tempest had such golden moments! No +wife had ever more capacity for all the delicacies and depths of passion +towards the man of her choice. All the anxieties she brought with her, +all the perplexities and difficulties she imposed, had never yet seemed +to Maxwell anything but divinely worth while. So far, indeed, he had +never even remotely allowed himself to put the question. Her faults were +her; and she was his light of life. + +For some time after their marriage, which took place about a year after +his accession to the title and estates, they had lived at the stately +house in Brookshire belonging to the Maxwells, and Marcella had thrown +herself into the management of a large household and property with +characteristic energy and originality. She had tried new ways of choosing +and governing her servants; new ways of entertaining the poor, and of +making Maxwell Court the centre, not of one class, but of all. She ran up +a fair score of blunders, but not one of them was the blunder of meanness +or vulgarity. Her nature was inventive and poetic, and the rich +fulfilment that had overtaken her own personal desires did but sting her +eager passion to give and to serve. + +Meanwhile the family house in town was sold, and what with the birth of +her son, and the multiplicity of the rural interests to which she had set +her hand, Marcella felt no need of London. But towards the end of the +second year she perceived--though he said little about it--that there was +in her husband's mind a strong and persistent drawing towards his former +political interests and associations. The late Lord Maxwell had sat in +several Conservative cabinets, and his grandson, after a distinguished +career in the House as a private member, had accepted a subordinate place +in the Government only a few months before his grandfather's death +transferred him to the Lords. After that event, a scrupulous conscience +had forced him to take landowning as a profession and an arduous one. The +Premier made him flattering advances, and his friends remonstrated, but +he had none the less relinquished office, and buried himself on his land. + +Now, however, after some three years' hard and unremitting work, the +estate was in excellent condition; the "new ways" of the new owners had +been well started; and both Maxwell and Marcella had fitting lieutenants +who could be left in charge. Moreover, matters were being agitated at +the moment in politics which had special significance for the man's +idealist and reflective mind. His country friends and neighbours hardly +understood why. + +For it was merely a question of certain further measures of factory +reform. A group of labour leaders were pressing upon the public and the +Government a proposal to pass a special Factory Act for certain +districts and trades of East London. In spite of Commissions, in spite +of recent laws, "sweating," so it was urged, was as bad as ever--nay, in +certain localities and industries was more frightful and more oppressive +than ever. The waste of life and health involved in the great clothing +industries of East London, for instance, which had provoked law after +law, inquiry after inquiry, still went--so it was maintained--its +hideous way. + +"Have courage!" cried the reformers. "Take, at last, the only effectual +step. Make it penal to practise certain trades in the houses of the +people--drive them all into factories of a certain size, where alone +these degraded industries can be humanised and controlled. Above all, +make up your mind to a legal working day for East London men as well as +East London women. Try the great experiment first of all in this +omnivorous, inarticulate London, this dustbin for the rubbish of all +nations. Here the problem is worst--here the victims are weakest and +most manageable. London will bear what would stir a riot in Birmingham or +Leeds. Make the experiment as partial and as tentative as you +please--give the Home Office power to extend or revoke it at will--but +_try it_!" + +The change proposed was itself of vast importance, and was, moreover, but +a prelude to things still more far-reaching. But, critical as it was, +Maxwell was prepared for it. During the later years of his friend +Hallin's life the two men had constantly discussed the industrial +consequences of democracy with unflagging eagerness and intelligence. To +both it seemed not only inevitable, but the object of the citizen's +dearest hopes, that the rule of the people should bring with it, in +ever-ascending degree, the ordering and moralising of the worker's toil. +Yet neither had the smallest belief that any of the great civilised +communities would ever see the State the sole landlord and the sole +capitalist; or that Collectivism as a system has, or deserves to have, +any serious prospects in the world. To both, possession--private and +personal possession--from the child's first toy, or the tiny garden where +it sows its passionately watched seeds, to the great business or the +great estate, is one of the first and chiefest elements of human +training, not to be escaped by human effort, or only at such a cost of +impoverishment and disaster that mankind would but take the +step--supposing it conceivable that it should take it--to retrace it +instantly. + +Maxwell's _heart_, however, was much less concerned with this belief, +tenaciously as he held it, than with its relative--the limitation of +private possession by the authority of the common conscience. That "we +are not our own" has not, indeed, been left to Lassalle or Marx to +discover. But if you could have moved this quiet Englishman to speak, he +would have said--his strong, brooding face all kindled and alive--that +the enormous industrial development of the past century has shown us the +forces at work in the evolution of human societies on a gigantic scale, +and by thus magnifying them has given us a new understanding of them. The +vast extension of the individual will and power which science has brought +to humanity during the last hundred years was always present to him as +food for a natural exultation--a kind of pledge of the boundless +prospects of the race. On the other hand the struggle of society brought +face to face with this huge increment of the individual power, forced to +deal with it for its own higher and mysterious ends, to moralise and +socialise it lest it should destroy itself and the State together; the +slow steps by which the modern community has succeeded in asserting +itself against the individual, in protecting the weak from his weakness, +the poor from his poverty, in defending the woman and child from the +fierce claims of capital, in forcing upon trade after trade the axiom +that no man may lawfully build his wealth upon the exhaustion and +degradation of his fellow--these things stirred in him the far deeper +enthusiasms of the moral nature. Nay more! Together with all the other +main facts which mark the long travail of man's ethical and social life, +they were among the only "evidences" of religion a critical mind allowed +itself--the most striking signs of something "greater than we know" +working among the dust and ugliness of our common day. Attack wealth as +wealth, possession as possession, and civilisation is undone. But bring +the force of the social conscience to bear as keenly and ardently as you +may, upon the separate activities of factory and household, farm and +office; and from the results you will only get a richer individual +freedom, one more illustration of the divinest law man serves--that he +must "die to live," must surrender to obtain. + +Such at least was Maxwell's persuasion; though as a practical man he +admitted, of course, many limitations of time, occasion, and degree. And +long companionship with him had impressed the same faith also on +Marcella. With the natural conceit of the shrewd woman, she would +probably have maintained that her social creed came entirely of +mother-wit and her own exertions--her experiences in London, reading, +and the rest. In reality it was in her the pure birth of a pure passion. +She had learnt it while she was learning to love Aldous Raeburn; and it +need astonish no one that the more dependent all her various +philosophies of life had become on the mere personal influence and joy +of marriage, the more agile had she grown in all that concerned the mere +intellectual defence of them. She could argue better and think better; +but at bottom, if the truth were told, they were Maxwell's arguments and +Maxwell's thoughts. + +So that when this particular agitation began, and he grew restless in his +silent way, she grew restless too. They took down the old worn +portfolios of Hallin's papers and letters, and looked through them, night +after night, as they sat alone together in the great library of the +Court. Both Marcella and Aldous could remember the writing of many of +these innumerable drafts of Acts, these endless memoranda on special +points, and must needs try, for love's sake, to forget the terrible +strain and effort with which a dying man had put them together. She was +led by them to think of the many workmen friends she had made during the +year of her nursing life; while he had remembrances of much personal work +and investigation of his own, undertaken during the time of his +under-secretaryship, to add to hers. Another Liberal government was +slipping to its fall--if a Conservative government came in, with a +possible opening in it for Aldous Maxwell, what then? Was the chance to +be seized? + +One May twilight, just before dinner, as the two were strolling up and +down the great terrace just in front of the Court, Aldous paused and +looked at the majestic house beside them. + +"What's the good of talking about these things while we live _there_?" he +said, with a gesture towards the house, half impatient, half humorous. + +Marcella laughed. Then she sprang away from him, considering, a sudden +brightness in her eye. She had an idea. + +The idea after all was a very simple one. But the probability is that, +had she not been there to carry him through, Maxwell would have neither +found it nor followed it. However that may be, in a very few days she had +clothed it with fact, and made so real a thing of it that she was amazed +at her own success. She and Maxwell had settled themselves in a small +furnished house in the Mile End Road, and Maxwell was once more studying +the problems of his measure that was to be in the midst of the +populations to whom it applied. The house had been recently let in +"apartments" by a young tradesman and his wife, well known to Marcella. +In his artisan days the man had been her friend, and for a time her +patient. She knew how to put her hand on him at once. + +They spent five months in the little house, while the London that knew +them in St. James's Square looked on, and made the comments--half amused, +half inquisitive--that the act seemed to invite. There was of course no +surprise. Nothing surprises the London of to-day. Or if there were any, +it was all Marcella's. In spite of her passionate sympathy with the +multitude who live in disagreeable homes on about a pound a week, she +herself was very sensitive to the neighbourhood of beautiful things, to +the charm of old homes, cool woods, green lawns, and the rise and fall of +Brookshire hills. Against her wish, she had thought of sacrifice in +thinking of the Mile End Road in August. + +But there was no sacrifice. Frankly, these five months were among the +happiest of her life. She and Maxwell were constantly together, from +morning till night, doing the things that were congenial to them, and +seeing the things that interested them. They went in and out of every +factory and workshop in which certain trades were practised, within a +three-mile radius; they became the intimate friends of every factory +inspector and every trade-union official in the place. Luckily, Maxwell's +shyness--at least in Mile End--was not of the sort that can be readily +mistaken for a haughty mind. He was always ready to be informed; his +diffident kindness asked to be set at ease; while in any real ardour of +debate his trained capacity and his stores of knowledge would put even +the expert on his mettle. + +As for Marcella, it was her idiosyncrasy that these tailors, furriers, +machinists, shirtmakers, by whom she was surrounded in East London, +stirred her imagination far more readily than the dwellers in great +houses and the wearers of fine raiment had ever stirred it. And +Marcella, in the kindled sympathetic state, was always delightful to +herself and others. She revelled in the little house and its ugly, +druggetted rooms; in the absence of all the usual paraphernalia of their +life; in her undisturbed possession of the husband who was at once her +lover and the best company she knew or could desire. On the few days +when he left her for the day on some errand in which she could not +share, to meet him at the train in the evening like any small clerk's +wife, to help him carry the books and papers with which he was generally +laden along the hot and dingy street, to make him tea from her little +spirit kettle, and then to hear the news of the day in the shade of the +little smutty back-garden, while the German charwoman who cooked for +them had her way with the dinner--there was not an incident in the whole +trivial procession that did not amuse and delight her. She renewed her +youth; she escaped from the burdensome "glories of our birth, and +state"; from that teasing "duty to our equals" on which only the wisest +preachers have ever laid sufficient stress; and her one trouble was that +the little masquerade must end. + +One other drawback indeed, one more blight upon a golden time, there was. +Not even Marcella could make up her mind to transplant little Hallin, her +only child, from Maxwell Court to East London. It was springtime, and the +woods about the Court were breaking into sheets of white and blue. +Marcella must needs leave the boy to his flowers and his "grandame +earth," sadly warned thereto by the cheeks of other little boys in and +about the Mile End Road. But every Friday night she and Maxwell said +good-bye to the two little workhouse girls, and the German charwoman, and +the village boy from Mellor, who supplied them with all the service they +wanted in Mile End, took with them the ancient maid who had been +Marcella's mother's maid, and fled home to Brookshire. So on Saturday +mornings it generally happened that little Hallin went out to inform his +particular friend among the garden boys, that "Mummy had tum ome," and +that he was not therefore so much his own master as usual. He explained +that he had to show mummy "_eaps_ of things"--the two new kittens, the +"edge-sparrer's nest," and the "ump they'd made in the churchyard over +old Tom Collins from the parish ouses," the sore place on the pony's +shoulder, the "ole that mummy's orse had kicked in the stable door," and +a host of other curiosities. By way of linking the child with the soil +and its people, Marcella had taken care to give him nursemaids from the +village. And the village being only some thirty miles from London, talked +in the main the language of London, a language which it soon communicated +to the tongue of Maxwell's heir. Marcella tried to school her boy in +vain. Hallin chattered, laughed, broadened his a's and dropped all his +h's into a bottomless limbo none the less. + +What days of joy those Saturdays were for mother and child! All the +morning and till about four o'clock, he and she would be inseparable, +trailing about together over field and wood, she one of the handsomest +of women, he one of the plainest of children--a little square-faced +chubby fellow, with eyes monstrously black and big, fat cheeks that +hung a little over the firm chin, a sallow complexion, and a large +humorous mouth. + +But in the late afternoon, alas! Hallin was apt to find the world grow +tiresome. For against all his advice "mummy" would allow herself to be +clad by Annette, the maid, in a frock of state; carriages would drive up +from the 5.10 train; and presently in the lengthening evening the great +lawns of the Court would be dotted with strolling groups, or the red +drawing-room, with its Romneys and Gainsboroughs, would be filled with +talk and laughter circling round mummy at the tea-table; so that all that +was left to Hallin was that seat on mummy's knee--his big, dark head +pressed disconsolately against her breast, his thumb in his mouth for +comfort--which no boy of any spirit would ever consent to occupy, so long +as there was any chance of goading a slack companion into things better +worth while. + +Marcella herself was no less rebellious at heart, and would have asked +nothing better than to be left free to spend her weekly holiday in +roaming an April world with Hallin. But our country being what it is, the +plans that are made in Mile End or Shoreditch have to be adopted by +Mayfair or Mayfair's equivalent; otherwise they are apt to find an +inglorious tomb in the portfolios that bred them. We have still, it +seems, a "ruling class"; and in spite of democracy it is still this +"ruling class" that matters. Maxwell was perfectly aware of it; and these +Sundays to him were the mere complements of the Mile End weekdays. +Marcella ruefully admitted that English life was so, and she did her +best. But on Monday mornings she was generally left protesting in her +inmost soul against half the women whom these peers and politicians, +these administrators and journalists, brought with them, or wondering +anxiously whether her particular share in the social effort just over +might not have done Aldous more harm than good. She understood vaguely, +without vanity, that she was a power in this English society, that she +had many warm friends, especially among men of the finer and abler sort. +But when a woman loved her, and insisted, as it were, on making her know +it--and, after all, the experience was not a rare one--Marcella received +the overture with a kind of grateful surprise. She was accustomed, +without knowing why, to feel herself ill at ease with certain types of +women; even in her own house she was often aware of being furtively +watched by hostile eyes; or she found herself suddenly the goal of some +sharp little pleasantry that pricked like a stiletto. She supposed that +she was often forgetful and indiscreet. Perhaps the large court she held +so easily on these occasions beneath the trees or in the great +drawing-rooms of the old house had more to do with the matter. If so, she +never guessed the riddle. In society she was conscious of one aim, and +one aim only. Its very simplicity made other women incredulous, while it +kept herself in the dark. + +However, by dint of great pains, she had not yet done Aldous any harm +that counted. During all the time of their East End sojourn, a Liberal +government, embarrassed by large schemes it had not force enough to +carry, was sinking towards inevitable collapse. When the crash came, a +weak Conservative government, in which Aldous Maxwell occupied a +prominent post, accepted office for a time without a dissolution. They +came in on a cry of "industrial reform," and, by way of testing their own +party and the country, adopted the Factory Bill for East London, which +had now, by the common consent of all the workers upon it, passed into +Maxwell's hands. The Bill rent the party in twain; but the Ministry had +the courage to go to the country with a programme in which the Maxwell +Bill held a prominent place. Trade-unionism rallied to their support; the +forces both of reaction and of progress fought for them, in strangely +mingled ways; and they were returned with a sufficient, though not large, +majority. Lord Ardagh, the veteran leader of the party, became Premier. +Maxwell was made President of the Council, while his old friend and +associate, Henry Dowson, became Home Secretary, and thereby responsible +for the conduct of the long-expected Bill through the Commons. + +When Maxwell came back to her on the afternoon of his decisive interview +with Lord Ardagh, she was waiting for him in that same inner room where +Tressady paid his first visit. At the sound of her husband's step +outside, she sprang up, and they met half-way, her hands clasped in his, +against his breast, her face looking up at him. + +"Dear wife! at last we have our chance--our real chance," he said to her. + +She clung to him, and there was a moment of high emotion, in which +thoughts of the past and of the dead mingled with the natural ambition of +two people in the prime of life and power. Then Maxwell laughed and drew +a long breath. + +"The eggs have been all put into my basket in the most generous manner. +We stand or fall by the Bill. But it will be a hard fight." + +And, in his acute, deliberate way, he began to sum up the forces against +him--to speculate on the action of this group and that--Fontenoy's group +first and foremost. + +Marcella listened, her beautiful hand pensive against her cheek, her +eyes on his. Half trembling, she realised what failure, if after all +failure should come, would mean to him. Something infinitely tender and +maternal spoke in her, pledging her to the utmost help that love and a +woman could give. + + * * * * * + +Such for Maxwell and his wife had been the antecedents of a +memorable session. + +And now the session was here--was in full stream, indeed, rushing +towards the main battle still to come. On the second night of Fontenoy's +debate, George Tressady duly caught the Speaker's eye, and made a very +fair maiden speech, which earned him a good deal more praise, both from +his party and the press, than he--in a disgusted mood--thought at all +reasonable. He had misplaced half his notes, and, in his own opinion, +made a mess of his main argument. He remarked to Fontenoy afterwards that +he had better hang himself, and stalked home after the division pleased +with one thing only--that he had not allowed Letty to come. + +In reality he had done nothing to mar the reputation that was beginning +to attach to him. Fontenoy was content; and the scantiness of the +majority by which the Resolution was defeated served at once to make the +prospects of the Maxwell Bill, which was to be brought in after Easter, +more doubtful, and to sharpen the temper of its foes. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + +"Goodness!--what an ugly place it is! It wants five thousand spent on it +at once to make it tolerable!" + +The remark was Letty Tressady's. She was standing disconsolate on the +lawn at Ferth, scanning the old-fashioned house to which George had +brought her just five days before. They had been married a fortnight, and +were still to spend another week in the country before going back to +London and to Parliament. But already Letty had made up her mind that +Ferth _must_ be rebuilt and refurnished, or she could never endure it. + +She threw herself down on a garden seat with a sigh, still studying the +house. It was a straight barrack-like building, very high for its +breadth, erected early in the last century by an architect who, finding +that he was to be allowed but a very scanty sum for his performance, +determined with considerable strength of mind to spend all that he had +for decoration upon the inside rather than the outside of his mansion. +Accordingly the inside had charm--though even so much Letty could not now +be got to confess; panellings, mantelpieces, and doorways showed the work +of a man of taste. But outside all that had been aimed at was the +provision of a central block of building carried up to a considerable +height so as to give the rooms demanded, while it economised in +foundations and general space; an outer wall pierced with the plainest +openings possible at regular intervals; a high-pitched roof to keep out +the rain, whereof the original warm tiles had been long since replaced by +the chilliest Welsh slates; and two low and disfiguring wings which held +the servants and the kitchens. The stucco with which the house had been +originally covered had blackened under the influence of time, weather, +and the smoke from the Tressady coalpits. Altogether, what with its +pitchy colour, its mean windows, its factory-like plainness and height, +Ferth Place had no doubt a cheerless and repellent air, which was +increased by its immediate surroundings. For it stood on the very summit +of a high hill, whereon the trees were few and windbeaten; while the +carriage drives and the paths that climbed the hill were all of them a +coaly black. The flower garden behind the house was small and neglected; +neither shrubberies nor kitchen garden, nor the small park, had any +character or stateliness; everything bore the stamp of bygone possessors +who had been rich neither in money nor in fancy; who had been quite +content to live small lives in a small way. + +Ferth's new mistress thought bitterly of them, as she sat looking at +their handiwork. What could be done with such a place? How could she have +London people to stay there? Why, their very maids would strike! And, +pray, what was a country house worth, without the usual country-house +amenities and accessories? + +Yet she already began to feel fretted and hampered about money. The +inside of the house had been to some extent renovated. She had helped +George to choose papers and curtains for the rooms that were to be her +special domain, while they were in London together before Easter. But she +knew that George had at one time meant to do much more than had actually +been done; and he had been in a mood of lover-like apology on the first +day of their arrival. "Darling, I had hoped to buy you a hundred pretty +things!--but times is bad--dreadful bad!" he had said to her with a +laugh. "We will do it by degrees--you won't mind?" + +Then she had tried to make him tell her why it was that he had abandoned +some of the schemes of improvement that had certainly been in his mind +during the first weeks of their engagement. But he had not been very +communicative, and had put the blame mostly, as she understood him, on +the "beastly pits" and the very low dividends they had been earning +during the past six months. + +Letty, however, did not in the least believe that the comparatively +pinched state of their finances, which, bride as she was, she was already +brooding over, was wholly or even mainly due to the pits. She set her +little white teeth in sudden anger as she said to herself that it was +_not_ the pits--it was Lady Tressady! George was crippled now because of +the large sums his mother had not been ashamed to wring from him during +the last six months. Letty--George's wife--was to go without comforts and +conveniences, without the means of seeing her friends and taking her +proper position in the world, because George's mother--a ridiculous, +painted old woman, who went in for flirtations and French gowns, when she +ought to be subsiding quietly into caps and Bath chairs--would sponge +upon his very moderate income, and take what did not belong to her. + +"I am _certain_ there is something in the background!" said Letty to +herself, as she sat looking at the ugly house--"something that she is +ashamed of, and that she doesn't tell George. She _couldn't_ spend all +that money on dress! I believe she is a wicked old woman--she has the +most extraordinary creatures at her parties." + +The girl's delicate face stiffened vindictively as she fell brooding for +the hundredth time over Lady Tressady's enormities. + +Then suddenly the garden door opened, and Letty, looking up, saw that +George was on the threshold, waving his hand to her. He had left her that +morning--almost for the first time since their marriage--to go and see +his principal agent and discuss the position of affairs. + +As he approached her, she noticed instantly that he was looking tired and +ruffled. But the sight of her smoothed his brow. He threw himself down on +the grass at her feet, and pressed his lips to the delicately tended hand +that lay upon her lap. + +"Have you missed me, madame?" he said, peremptorily. + +Preoccupied as she was, Letty must needs flush and smile, so well she +knew from his eager eye that she pleased him, that he noticed the pretty +gown she had put on for luncheon, and that all the petting his absence +had withdrawn from her for an hour or two had come back to her. Other +women--more or less of her type--had found his ways beguiling before +now. He took courtship as an art, and had his own rooted ideas as to how +women should be treated. Neither too gingerly nor too sentimentally--but, +above all, with variety! + +He repeated his question insistently; whereupon Letty said, with her pert +brightness, thinking all the time of the house, "I'm _not_ going to make +you vain. Besides, I have been frightfully busy." + +"You're not going to make me vain? But I choose to be vain. I'll go away +for the whole afternoon if I'm not made vain this instant. Ah! that's +better. Do you know that you have the softest little curl on your soft +little neck, and that your hair has caught the sun on it this morning?" + +Letty instinctively put up a hand to tuck away the curl. But he seized +the hand. "Little vandal!--What have you been busy with?" + +"Oh! I have been over the house with Mrs. Matthews," said Letty, in +another tone. "George, it's _dreadful_--the number of things that want +doing. Do you know, _positively_, we could not put up more than two +couples, if we tried ever so. And as for the state of the attics! Now do +listen, George!" + +And, holding his hand tight in her eagerness, she went through a vehement +catalogue of all that was wanted--new furniture, new decoration, new +grates, a new hot-water system, the raising of the wings, and so on to +the alteration of the stables and the replanning of the garden. She had +no sooner begun upon her list than George's look of worry returned. He +got up from the grass, and sat on the bench beside her. + +"Well, I'm sorry you dislike the place so much," he said, when her breath +failed her, staring rather gloomily at his despised mansion. "Of course, +it's quite true--it is an ugly hole. But the worst of it is, darling, I +don't quite see how we're to do all this you talk about. I don't bring +any good news from the pits, alas!" + +He turned quickly towards her. The thought flashed through his +mind--could he be justly charged with having married her on false +pretences as to his affairs? No! There had been no misrepresentation of +his income or his risks. Everything had been plainly and honestly stated +to her father, and therefore to her. For Letty knew all that she wanted +to know, and had managed her family since she was a baby. + +Letty flushed at his last words. + +"Do you mean to say," she said with emphasis, "that those men are really +going to strike?" + +"I am afraid so. We _must_ enforce a reduction, to avoid working at sheer +loss, and the men vow they'll come out." + +"They want you to make them a present of the mines, I suppose!" said +Letty, bitterly. "Why, the tales I hear of their extravagance and +laziness! Mrs. Matthews says they'll have none but the best cuts of meat, +that they all of them have an harmonium or a piano in the house, that +their houses are _stuffed_ with furniture--and the amount of money they +spend in betting on their dogs and their football matches is perfectly +sickening. And now, I suppose they'll ruin themselves and us, rather than +allow you to make a decent profit!" + +"That's about it," said George, flinging himself back on the bench. +"That's about it." + +There was a pause of silence. The eyes of both were turned to the +colliery village far below, at the foot of the hill. From this high +stretch of garden one looked across the valley and its straggling line of +houses, to the pits on the further hillside, the straight black line of +the "bank," the pulley wheels, and tall chimneys against the sky. To the +left, along the ascending valley, similar chimneys and "banks" were +scattered at long intervals, while to the right the valley dipped in +sharp wooded undulations to a blue plain bounded by far Welsh hills. The +immediate neighbourhood of Ferth, for a coal country, had a woodland +charm and wildness which often surprised a stranger. There were untouched +copses, and little rivers and fern-covered hills, which still held their +own against the ever-encroaching mounds of "spoil" thrown out by the +mines. Only the villages were invariably ugly. They were the modern +creations of the coal, and had therefore no history and no originality. +Their monotonous rows of red cottages were like fragments from some dingy +town suburb, and the brick meeting-houses in which they abounded did +nothing to abate the general unloveliness. + +This view from the Ferth hill was one which had great familiarity for +Tressady, and yet no charm. As a boy he had had no love for his home and +very few acquaintances in the village. His mother hated the place and the +people. She had married very young--for the sake of money and +position--to his dull old father, who nevertheless managed to keep his +flighty wife in order by dint of a dumb, continuous stubbornness and +tyranny, which would have overborne a stronger nature than Lady +Tressady's. She was always struggling to get away from Ferth; he to keep +her tied there. He was never at ease away from his estate and his pits; +she felt herself ten years younger as soon as she had lost sight of the +grim black house on its hilltop. + +And this one opinion of hers she was able to impress upon her +son--George, too, was always glad to turn his back on Ferth and its +people. The colliers seemed to him a brutal crew, given over to coarse +sports, coarse pleasures, and an odious religion. As to their supposed +grievances and hardships, his intimate conviction as a boy had always +been that the miner got the utmost both out of his employers and out of +society that he was worth. + +"Upon my word, I often think," he said at last, his inward reverie +finding speech, "I often think it was a great pity my grandfather +discovered the coal at all! In the long run I believe we should have done +better without it. We should not at any rate have been bound up with +these hordes, with whom you can no more reason than with so many blocks +of their own coal!" + +Letty made no answer. She had turned back towards the house. Suddenly +she said, with an energy that startled him, + +"George, what _are_ we to do with that place? It gives me a nightmare. +The extraordinary thing is the way that everything in it has gone to +ruin. Did your mother really live here while you were away?" + +George's expression darkened. + +"I always used to suppose she was here," he said. "That was our bargain. +But I begin to believe now that she was mostly in London. One can't +wonder at it--she always hated the place." + +"Of course she was in London!" thought Letty to herself, "spending piles +of money, running shamefully into debt, and letting the house go to +pieces. Why, the linen hasn't been darned for years!" + +Aloud she said: + +"Mrs. Matthews says a charwoman and a little girl from the village used +to be left alone in the house for months, to play any sort of games, with +nobody to look after them--_nobody_--while you were away!" + +George looked at his wife--and then would only slip his arm round her +for answer. + +"Darling! you don't know how I've been worried all the morning--don't +let's make worry at home. After all it _is_ rather nice to be here +together, isn't it?--and we shall do--we sha'n't starve! Perhaps we shall +pull through with the pits after all--it is difficult to believe the men +will make such fools of themselves--and--well! you know my angel mother +can't always be swooping upon us as she has done lately. Let's just be +patient a little--very likely I can sell a few bits of land before long +that will give us some money in hand--and then this small person shall +bedizen herself and the house as much as she pleases. And meanwhile, +_madame ma femme_, let me point out to you that your George never +professed to be anything but a very bad match for you!" + +Letty remembered all his facts and figures perfectly. Only somehow she +had regarded them with the optimism natural to a girl who is determined +to be married. She had promptly forgotten the adverse chances he had +insisted upon, and she had converted all his averages into minima. No, +she could not say she had not been warned; but nevertheless the result +promised to be quite different from what she had expected. + +However, with her husband's arm round her, it was not easy to maintain +her ill-humour, and she yielded. They wandered on into the wood which +fringed the hill on its further side, she coquetting, he courting and +flattering her in a hundred ways. Her soft new dress, her dainty +lightness and freshness, made harmony in his senses with the April day, +the building rooks, the breaths of sudden perfume from field and wood, +the delicate green that was creeping over the copses, softening all the +edges of the black scars left by the pits. The bridal illusion returned. +George eagerly--hungrily--gave himself up to it. And Letty, though +conscious all the while of a restless feeling at the back of her mind +that they were losing time, must needs submit. + +However, when the luncheon gong had sounded and they were strolling +back to the house, he bethought himself, knit his brows again, and +said to her: + +"Do you know, darling, Dalling told me this morning"--Dalling was the +Tressadys' principal agent--"that he thought it would be a good thing if +we could make friends with some of the people here? The Union are not--or +_were_ not--quite so strong in this valley as they are in some other +parts. That's why that fellow Burrows--confound him!--has come to live +here of late. It might be possible to make some of the more intelligent +fellows hear reason. My uncles have always managed the thing with a very +high hand--very natural!--the men _are_ a set of rough, ungrateful +brutes, who talk impossible stuff, and never remember anything that's +done for them--but after all, if one has to make a living out of them, +one may as well learn how to drive them, and what they want to be at. +Suppose you come and show yourself in the village this afternoon?" + +Letty looked extremely doubtful. + +"I really don't get on very well with poor people, George. It's very +dreadful, I know, but there!--I'm not Lady Maxwell--and I can't help it. +Of course, with the poor people at home in our own cottages it's +different--they always curtsy and are very respectful--but Mrs. Matthews +says the people here are so independent, and think nothing of being rude +to you if they don't like you." + +George laughed. + +"Go and call upon them in that dress and see! I'll eat my hat if +anybody's rude. Beside, I shall be there to protect you. We won't go, of +course, to any of the strong Union people. But there are two or +three--an old nurse of mine I really used to be rather fond of--and a +fireman that's a good sort--and one or two others. I believe it would +amuse you." + +Letty was quite certain that it would not amuse her at all. However, she +assented unwillingly, and they went in to lunch. + + * * * * * + +So in the afternoon the husband and wife sallied forth. Letty felt that +she was being taken through an ordeal, and that George was rather foolish +to wish it. However, she did her best to be cheerful, and to please +George she still wore the pretty Paris frock of the morning, though it +seemed to her absurd to be trailing it through a village street with only +colliers and their wives to look at it. + +"What ill luck," said George, suddenly, as they descended their own hill, +"that that fellow Burrows should have settled down here, in one's very +pocket, like this!" + +"Yes, you had enough of him at Malford, didn't you?" said Letty. "I don't +yet understand how he comes to be here." + +George explained that about the preceding Christmas there had been, +temporarily, strong signs of decline in the Union strength of the Perth +district. A great many miners had quietly seceded; one of the periodical +waves of suspicion as to funds and management to which all trade unions +are liable had swept over the neighbourhood; and wholesale desertion from +the Union standard seemed likely. In hot haste the Central Committee +sent down Burrows as organising agent. The good fight he had made against +Tressady at the Market Malford election had given him prestige; and he +had both presence and speaking power. He had been four months at Perth, +speaking all over the district, and now, instead of leaving the Union, +the men had been crowding into it, and were just as hot--so it was +said--for a trial of strength with the masters as their comrades in other +parts of the county. + +"And before Burrows has done with us, I should say he'll have cost the +masters in this district hundreds of thousands. I call him dear at the +money!" said George, finally, with a dismal cheerfulness. + +He was really full of Burrows, and of the general news of the district +which his agent had been that morning pouring into his ear. But he had +done his best not to talk about either at luncheon. Letty had a curious +way of making the bearer of unpleasant tidings feel that it was somehow +all his own fault that things should be so; and George, even in this dawn +of marriage, was beginning, half consciously, to recognise two or three +such peculiarities of hers. + +"What I cannot understand," said Letty, vigorously, "is why such people +as Mr. Burrows are _allowed_ to go about making the mischief he does." + +George laughed, but nevertheless repressed a sudden feeling of +irritation. The inept remark of a pretty woman generally only amused him. +But this Burrows matter was beginning to touch him home. + +"You see we happen to be a free country," he said drily, "and Burrows and +his like happen to be running us just now. Maxwell & Co. are in the +shafts. Burrows sits up aloft and whips on the team. The extraordinary +thing is that nothing personal makes any difference. The people here know +perfectly well that Burrows drinks--that the woman he lives with is not +his wife--" + +"George!" cried Letty, "how _can_ you say such dreadful things!" + +"Sorry, my darling! but the world is not a nice place. He picked her up +somehow--they say she was a commercial traveller's wife--left on his +hands at a country inn. Anyway she's not divorced, and the husband's +alive. She looks like a walking skeleton, and is probably going to die. +Nevertheless they say Burrows adores her. And as for my +resentments--don't be shocked--I'm inclined to like Burrows all the +better for _that_ little affair. But then I'm not pious, like the people +here. However, they don't mind--and they don't mind the drink--and they +believe he spends their money on magnificent dinners at hotels--and they +don't mind that. They don't mind anything--they shout themselves hoarse +whenever Burrows speaks--they're as proud as Punch if he shakes hands +with them--and then they tell the most gruesome tales of him behind his +back, and like him all the better, apparently, for being a scoundrel. +Queer but true. Well, here we are--now, darling, you may expect to be +stared at!" + +For they had entered on the village street, and Ferth Magna, by some +quick freemasonry, had become suddenly conscious of the bride and +bridegroom. Here and there a begrimed man in his shirt-sleeves would +open his front door cautiously and look at them; the children and +womenkind stood boldly on the doorsteps and stared; while the people in +the little shops ran back into the street, parcels and baskets in hand. +The men working the morning shift had just come back from the pits, and +their wives were preparing to wash their blackened lords, before the +whole family sat down to tea. But both tea and ablutions were forgotten, +so long as the owner of Ferth Place and the new Lady Tressady were in +sight. The village eyes took note of everything; of the young man's +immaculate serge suit and tan waistcoat, his thin, bronzed face and fair +moustache; of the bride's grey gown, the knot of airy pink at her +throat, the coils of bright brown hair on which her hat was set, and the +buckles on her pretty shoes. Then the village retreated within doors +again; and each house buzzed and gossiped its fill. There had been a +certain amount of not very cordial response to George's salutations; but +to Letty's thinking the women had eyed her with an unpleasant and rather +hostile boldness. + +"Mary Batchelor's house is down here," said George, turning into a +side lane, not without a feeling of relief. "I hope we sha'n't find +her out--no, there she is. You can't call these people affectionate, +can you?" + +They were close on a group of three brick cottages all close together. +Their doors were all open. In one cottage a stout collier's wife was +toiling through her wash. At the door of another the sewing-machine agent +was waiting for his weekly payment; while on the threshold of the third +stood an elderly tottering woman shading her eyes from the light as she +tried to make out the features of the approaching couple. + +"Why, Mary!" said George, "you haven't forgotten me? I have brought my +wife to see you." + +And he held out his hand with a boyish kindness. + +The old woman looked at them both in a bewildered way. Her face, with its +long chin and powerful nose, was blanched and drawn, her grey hair +straggling from under her worn black-ribboned cap; and her black dress +had a neglected air, which drew George's attention. Mary Batchelor, so +long as he remembered her, whether as his old nurse, or in later days as +the Bible-woman of the village, had always been remarkable for a peculiar +dignity and neatness. + +"Mary, is there anything wrong?" he asked her, holding her hand. + +"Coom yer ways in," said the old woman, grasping his arm, and taking no +notice of Letty. "He's gone--he'll not freeten nobody--he wor here three +days afore they buried him. I could no let him go--but it's three weeks +now sen they put him away." + +"Why, Mary, what is it? Not _James_!--not your son!" said George, letting +her guide him into the cottage. + +"Aye, it's James--it's my son," she repeated drearily. "Will +yer be takkin a cheer--an perhaps"--she looked round uncertainly, +first at Letty, then at the wet floor where she had been feebly +scrubbing--"perhaps the leddy ull be sittin down. I'm nobbut in a +muddle. But I don't seem to get forard wi my work a mornins--not sen +they put im away." + +And she dropped into a chair herself, with a long sigh--forgetting her +visitors apparently--her large and bony hands, scarred with their life's +work, lying along her knees. + +George stood beside her silent a moment. + +"I hardly like to say I hadn't heard," he said at last, gently. "You'll +think I _ought_ to have heard. But I didn't know. I have been in town and +very busy." + +"Aye," said Mary, without looking up, "aye, an yer've been gettin +married. I knew as yer didn't mean nothin onkind." + +Then she stopped again--till suddenly, with a furtive gesture, she +raised her apron, and drew it across her eyes, which had the look of +perennial tears. + +On the other side of the cottage meanwhile a boy of about fourteen was +sitting. He had just done his afternoon's wash, and was resting himself +by the fire, enjoying a thumbed football almanac. He had not risen when +the visitors entered, and while his grandmother was speaking his lips +still moved dumbly, as he went on adding up the football scores. He was a +sickly, rather repulsive lad with a callous expression. + +"Let me wait outside, George," said Letty, hurriedly. + +Some instinct in her shrank from the poor mother and her story. But +George begged her to stay, and she sat down nervously by the door, trying +to protect her pretty skirt from the wet boards. + +"Will you tell me how it was?" said George, sitting down himself in front +of the bowed mother, and bending towards her. "Was it in the pit? Jamie +wasn't one of our men, I know. Wasn't it for Mr. Morrison he worked?" + +Mrs. Batchelor made a sign of assent. Then she raised her head quickly, +and a flash of some passionate convulsion passed through her face. + +"It wor John Burgess as done it," she said, staring at George. "It wor +him as took the boy's life. But he's gone himsel--so theer--I'll not say +no more. It wor Jamie's first week o hewin--he'd been a loader this three +year, an taken a turn at the hewin now an again--an five weeks sen John +Burgess--he wor butty for Mr. Morrison, yer know, in the Owd Pit--took +him on, an the lad wor arnin six an sixpence a day. An he wor that +pleased yo cud see it shinin out ov im. And it wor on the Tuesday as he +went on the afternoon shift. I saw im go, an he wor down'earted. An I +fell a cryin as he went up the street, for I knew why he wor down'earted, +an I asked the Lord to elp him. And about six o'clock they come +runnin--an they towd me there'd bin an accident, an they wor bringin +im--an he wor alive--an I must bear up. They'd found him kneelin in his +place with his arm up, an the pick in it--just as the blast had took +him--An his poor back--oh! my God--scorched off him--_scorched off him_." + +A shudder ran through her. But she recovered herself and went on, still +gazing intently at Tressady, her gaunt hand raised as though for +attention. + +"An they braat him in, an they laid him on that settle"--she pointed to +the bench by the fire--"an the doctors didn't interfere--there wor nowt +to do--they left me alone wi un. But he come to, a minute after they laid +im down--an I ses, 'Jamie, ow did it appen' an he ses, 'Mother, it wor +John Burgess--ee opened my lamp for to light hissen as had gone out--an +I don't know no more.' An then after a bit he ses, 'Mother, don't you +fret--I'm glad I'm goin--I'd got the drink in me,' he ses. An then he +give two three little breaths, as though he wor pantin--an I kiss him." + +She stopped, her face working, her trembling hands pressed hard against +each other on her knee. Letty felt the tears leap to her eyes in a rush +that startled herself. + +"An he would a bin twenty-one year old, come next August--an allus a lad +as yer couldn't help gettin fond on--not sen he were a little un. An when +he wor layin there, I ses to myself, 'He's the third as the coal-gettin +ha took from me.' An I minded my feyther an uncle--how they was braat +home both togither, when I wor nobbut thirteen years old--not a scar on +em, nobbut a little blood on my feyther's forehead--but stone dead, both +on em--from the afterdamp. Theer was thirty-six men killed in that +explosion--an I recolleck how old Mr. Morrison--Mr. Walter's father--sent +the coffins round--an how the men went on because they warn't good ones. +Not a man would go down the pit till they was changed--if a man got the +life choked out of im, they thowt the least the masters could do was to +give un a dacent coffin to lie in. But theer--nobody helped me wi +Jamie--I buried him mysel--an it wor all o the best." + +She dried her eyes again, sighing plaintively. George said what kind and +consoling things he could think of. Mary Batchelor put up her hand and +touched him on the arm as he leant over her. + +"Aye, I knew yo'd be sorry--an yor wife--" + +She turned feebly towards Letty, trying with her blurred and tear-dimmed +sight to make out what Sir George's bride might be like. She looked for a +moment at the small, elegant person in the corner,--at the sheaf of +nodding rosebuds on the hat--the bracelets--the pink cheeks under the +dainty veil,--looked with a curious aloofness, as though from a great +distance. Then, evidently, another thought struck her like a lash. She +ceased to see or think of Letty. Her grip tightened on George's arm. + +"An I'm allus thinkin," she said, with a passionate sob, "of that what he +said about the drink. He'd allus bin a sober lad, till this lasst winter +it did seem as though he cudna keep hiself from it--it kep creepin on +im--an several times lately he'd broke out very bad, pay-days--an he knew +I'd been frettin. And who was ter blame--I ast yo, or onybody--who was it +ter blame?" + +Her voice rose to a kind of cry. + +"His feyther died ov it, and his grandfeyther afore that. His +grandfeyther wor found dead i the roadside, after they'd made him +blind-drunk at owd Morse's public-house, where the butty wor reckonin +with im an his mates. But he'd never ha gone near the drink if they'd +hadn't druv him to't, for he wasn't inclined that way. But the butty as +gave him work kep the public, an if yer didn't drink, yer didn't get no +work. You must drink yoursel sick o Saturdays, or theer'd be no work for +you o Mondays. 'Noa, yer can sit at ome,' they'd say to un, 'ef yer so +damned pertickler.' I ast yor pardon, sir, for the bad word, but that's +ow they'd say it. I've often heerd owd John say as he'd a been glad to ha +given the butty back a shillin ov is pay to be let off the drink. An +Willum, that's my usband, he wor allus at it too--an the doctor towd me +one day, as Willum lay a-dyin, as it ran in the blood--an Jamie heard +im--I know he did--for I fouu im on the stairs--listenin." + +She paused again, lost in a mist of incoherent memories, the tears +falling slowly. + +After a minute's silence, George said--not indeed knowing what to +say--"We're _very_ sorry for you, Mary--my wife and I--we wish we +could do anything to help you. I am afraid it can't make any difference +to you--I expect it makes it all the worse--to think that accidents are +so much fewer--that so much has been done. And yet times are mended, +aren't they?" + +Mary made no answer. + +George sat looking at her, conscious, as he seldom was, of raw youth and +unreadiness--conscious, too, of Letty's presence in a strange, hindering +way--as of something that both blunted emotion and made one rather +ashamed to show it. + +He could only pursue the lame topic of improvement, of changed times. The +disappearance of old abuses, of "butties" and "tommy-shops"; the greater +care for life; the accident laws; the inspectors. He found himself +growing eloquent at last, yet all the time regarding himself, as it were, +from a distance--ironically. + +Mary Batchelor listened to him for a while, her head bent with something +of the submission of the old servant, till something he said roused +again the quick shudder, the look of anguished protest. + +"Aye, I dessay it's aw reet, Mr. George--I dessay it is--what yer say. +The inspectors is very cliver--an the wages is paid proper. But +theer--say what yer will! I've a son on the railway out Lichfield +way--an he's allus taakin about is long hours--they're killing im, he +says--an I allus ses to im, 'Yer may jest thank the Lord, Harry, as yer +not in the pits.' He never gets no pity out o me. An soomtimes I wakes +in the morning, an I thinks o the men, cropin away in the dark--down +theer--under me and my bed--for they do say the pits now runs right +under Ferth village--an I think to mysel--how long will it be before yo +poor fellers is laying like my Jim? Yer may be reet about the +accidents, Mr. George--but I _know_, ef yer wor to go fro house to +house i this village--it would be like tis in the Bible--I've often +thowt o them words--'_Theer was not a house_--no, nary one!--_where +there was not one dead_.'" + +She hung her head again, muttering to herself. George made out with +difficulty that she was going through one phantom scene after another--of +burning, wounds, and sudden death. One or two of the phrases--of the +fragmentary details that dropped out without name or place--made his +flesh creep. He was afraid lest Letty should hear them, and was just +putting out his hand for his hat, when Mrs. Batchelor gripped his arm +again. Her face--so white and large-featured--had the gleam of something +like a miserable smile upon it. + +"Aye, an the men theirsels ud say jest as you do. 'Lor. Mrs. Batchelor,' +they'd say, 'why, the pits is as safe as a church'--an they'd +_laff_--Jamie ud laff at me times. But it's the _women_, Mr. George, as +knows--it's the women that ave to wash the bodies." + +A great trembling ran through her again. George instinctively rose, and +motioned to Letty to go. She too rose, but she did not go. She stood by +the door, her wide grey eyes fixed with a kind of fascination on the +speaker; while behind her a ring of children could be seen in the street, +staring at the pretty lady. + +Mary Batchelor saw nothing but Tressady, whom she was still holding by +the arm--looking up to him. + +"Aye, but I didna disturb my Jamie, yer know. Noa!--I left im i the owd +coat they'd thrown over im i the pit--I dursn't ha touched is back. Noa, +I _dursn't_. But I made his shroud mysen, an I put it ower his poor +workin clothes, an I washed his face, an is hands an feet--an then I +kissed him, an I said, 'Jamie, yo mun go an tell the Lord as yo ha done +your best, an He ha dealt hardly by you!--an that's the treuth--He ha +dealt hardly by yer!'" + +She gave a loud sob, and bowed her head on her hands a moment. Then, +pushing back her grey locks from her face, she rose, struggling for +composure. + +"Aye, aye, Mr. George--aye, aye, I'll not keep yer no longer." + +But as she took his hand, she added passionately: + +"An I towd the vicar I couldn't be Bible-woman no more. Theer's somethin +broken in me sen Jamie died. I must keep things to mysen--I ain't got +nuthin good to say to others--I'm allus _grievin_ at the Lord. Good-bye +to yer--good-bye to yer." + +Her voice had grown absent, indifferent. But when George asked her, just +as they were leaving the cottage, who was the boy sitting by the fire, +her face darkened. She came hurriedly to the door with them, and said in +George's ear: + +"He's my darter's child--my darter by my first usband. His feyther an +mother are gone, an he come up from West Bromwich to live wi me. But he +isn't no comfort to me. He don't take no notice of anybody. He set like +that, with his football, when Jamie lay a-dyin. I'd as lief be shut on +him. But theer--I've got to put up wi im." + +Letty meanwhile had approached the boy and looked at him curiously. + +"Do you work in the pits too?" she asked him. + +The boy stared at her. + +"Yes," he said. + +"Do you like it?" + +He gave a rough laugh. + +"I reckon yo've got to like it," he said. And turning his back on his +questioner, he went back to his almanac. + +"Don't let us do any more visiting," said George, impatiently, as they +emerged into the main street. "I'm out of love with the village. We'll do +our blandishments another day. Let's go a little further up the valley +and get away from the houses." + +Letty assented, and they walked along the village, she looking curiously +into the open doors of the houses, by way of return for the inquisitive +attention once more lavished upon herself and George. + +"The houses are _quite_ comfortable," she said presently. "And I looked +into Mrs. Batchelor's back room while you were talking. It was just as +Mrs. Matthews said--such good carpets and curtains, two chests of +drawers, and an harmonium--and pictures--and flowers in the windows. +George! what are 'butties'?" + +"'Butties' are sub-contractors," he said absently--"men who contract with +the pit-owners to get the coal, either on a large or a small scale--now +mostly on a small scale. They engage and pay the colliers in some pits, +in others the owners deal direct." + +"And what is a 'tommy-shop'?" + +"'Tommy' is the local word for 'truck'--paying in kind instead of in +money. You see, the butties and the owners between them used to own the +public-houses and the provision-shops, and the amount of coin of the +realm the men got in wages in the bad old times was infinitesimal. They +were expected to drink the butty's beer, and consume the butty's +provisions--at the butty's prices, of course--and the butty kept the +accounts. Oh! it was an abomination! but of course it was done away with +long ago." + +"Of course it was!" said Letty, indignantly. "They never remember what's +done for them. Did you see what _excellent_ teas there were laid out in +some of the houses--and those girls with their hats smothered in +feathers? Why, I should never dream of wearing so many!" + +She was once more her quick, shrewd self. All trace of the tears that had +surprised her while Mary Batchelor was describing her son's death had +passed away. Her half-malicious eyes glanced to right and left, peering +into the secrets of the village. + +"And these are the people that talk of starving!" she said to George, +scornfully, as they emerged into the open road. "Why, anyone can see--" + +George, suddenly returned from a reverie, understood what she was saying, +and remarked, with an odd look: + +"You think their houses aren't so bad? One is always a little +surprised--don't you think?--when the poor are comfortable? One takes it +as something to one's own credit--I detect it in myself scores of times. +Well!--one seems to say--they _could_ have done without it--one might +have kept it for oneself--what a fine generous fellow I am!" + +He laughed. + +"I didn't mean that at all," said Letty, protesting. + +"Didn't you? Well, after all, darling--you see, you don't have to live in +those houses, nice as they are--and you don't have to do your own +scrubbing. Ferth may be a vile hole, but I suppose you could put a score +of these houses inside it--and I'm a pauper, but I can provide you with +two housemaids. I say, why do you walk so far away from me?" + +And in spite of her resistance, he took her hand, put it through his arm, +and held it there. + +"Look at me, darling," he said imperiously. "How _can_ anyone spy upon us +with these trees and high walls? I want to see how pretty and fresh you +look--I want to forget that poor thing and her tale. Do you know that +somewhere--far down in me--there's a sort of black pool--and when +anything stirs it up--for the moment I want to hang myself--the world +seems such an awful place! It got stirred up just now--not while she was +talking--but just as I looked back at that miserable old soul, standing +at her door. She used to be such a jolly old thing--always happy in her +Bible--and in Jamie, I suppose--quite sure that she was going to a nice +heaven, and would only have to wait a little bit, till Jamie got there +too. She seemed to know all about the Almighty's plans for herself and +everybody else. Her drunken husband was dead; my father left her a bit of +money, so did an old uncle, I believe. She'd gossip and pray and preach +with anybody. And now she'll weep and pine like that till she dies--and +she isn't sure even about heaven any more--and instead of Jamie, she's +got that oafish lad, that changeling, hung round her neck--to kick her +and ill-treat her in another year or two. Well! and do you ever think +that something like that has got to happen to all of us--something +hideous--some torture--something that'll make us wish we'd never been +born? Darling, am I a mad sort of a fool? Stop here--in the shade--give +me a kiss!" + +And he made her pause at a shady corner in the road, between two oak +copses on either hand--a river babbling at the foot of one of them. He +put his arm round her, and stooping kissed her red lips with a kind of +covetous passion. Then, still holding her, he looked out from the trees +to the upper valley with its scattered villages, its chimneys and +engine-houses. + +"It struck me--what she said of the men under our feet. They're at it +now, Letty, hewing and sweating. Why are they there, and you and I here? +I'm _precious_ glad, aren't you? But I'm not going to make believe that +there's no difference. Don't let's he hypocrites, whatever we are." + +Letty was perplexed and a little troubled. He had only shown her this +excitability once before--on that odd uncomfortable night when he made +her sit with him on the Embankment. Whenever it came it seemed to upset +her dominant impression of him. But yet it excited her too--it appealed +to something undeveloped--some yearning, protecting instinct which was +new to her. + +She suddenly put up her hand and touched his hair. + +"You talk so oddly, George. I think sometimes"--she laughed with a pretty +gaiety--"you'll go bodily over to Lady Maxwell and her 'set' some day!" + +George made a contemptuous sound. + +"May the Lord preserve us from quacks," he said lightly. "One had better +be a hypocrite. Look, little woman, there is a shower coming. Shall we +turn home?" + +They walked home, chatting and laughing. At their own front door the +butler handed George a telegram. He opened it and read: + +"Must come down to consult you on important business--shall arrive at +Perth about 9.30.--Amelia Tressady." + +Letty, who was looking over George's shoulder, gave a little cry +of dismay. + +Then, to avoid the butler's eyes and ears, they turned hurriedly into +George's smoking-room which opened off the hall, and shut the door. + +"George! she has come to get more money out of you!" cried Letty, anger +and annoyance written in every line of her little frowning face. + +"Well, darling, she can't get blood out of a stone!" said George, +crushing the telegram in his hand and throwing it away. "It is a little +too bad of my mother, I think, to spoil our honeymoon time like this. +However, it can't be helped. Will you tell them to get her room ready?" + + + + +CHAPTER IX + + +"Now, my dear George! I do think I may claim at least that you should +remember I am your _mother_!"--the speaker raised a fan from her knee, +and used it with some vehemence. "Of course I can't help seeing that you +don't treat me as you ought to do. I don't want to complain of Letty--I +daresay she was taken by surprise--but all I can say as to her reception +of me last night is, that it wasn't pretty--that's all; it wasn't +_pretty_. My room felt like an ice-house--Justine tells me nobody has +slept there for months--and no fire until just the moment I arrived; +and--and no flowers on the dressing-table--no little _attentions_, in +fact. I can only say it was not what I am accustomed to. My feelings +overcame me; that poor dear Justine will tell you what a state she found +me in. She cried herself, to see me so upset." + +Lady Tressady was sitting upright on the straight-backed sofa of +George's smoking-room. George, who was walking up and down the room, +thought, with discomfort, as he glanced at her from time to time, that +she looked curiously old and dishevelled. She had thrown a piece of +white lace round her head, in place of the more elaborate preparation +for the world's gaze that she was wont to make. Her dress--a study in +purples--had been a marvel, but was now old, and even tattered; the +ruffles at her wrist were tumbled; and the pencilling under her still +fine eyes had been neglected. George, between his wife's dumb anger and +his mother's folly, had passed through disagreeable times already since +Lady Tressady's arrival, and was now once more endeavouring to get to +the bottom of her affairs. + +"You forget, mother," he said, in answer to Lady Tressady's complaint, +"that the house is not mounted for visitors, and that you gave us very +short notice." + +Nevertheless he winced inwardly as he spoke at the thought of Letty's +behaviour the night before. + +Lady Tressady bridled. + +"We will not discuss it, if you please," she said, with an attempt at +dignity. "I should have thought that you and Letty might have known I +should not have broken in on your honeymoon without most _pressing_ +reasons. George!"--her voice trembled, she put her lace handkerchief to +her eyes--"I am an unfortunate and miserable woman, and if you--my own +darling son--don't come to my rescue, I--I don't know what I may be +driven to do!" + +George took the remark calmly, having probably heard it before. He went +on walking up and down. + +"It's no good, mother, dealing in generalities, I am afraid. You promised +me this morning to come to business. If you will kindly tell me at once +what is the matter, and what is the _figure_, I shall be obliged to you." + +Lady Tressady hesitated, the lace on her breast fluttering. Then, in +desperation, she confessed herself first reluctantly, then in a torrent. + +During the last two years, then, she said, she had been trying her luck +for the first time in--well, in speculation! + +"Speculation!" said George, looking at her in amazement. "In what?" + +Lady Tressady tried again to preserve her dignity. She had been +investing, she said--trying to increase her income on the Stock Exchange. +She had done it quite as much for George's sake as her own, that she +might improve her position a little, and be less of a burden upon him. +Everybody did it! Several of her best women-friends were as clever at it +as any man, and often doubled their allowances for the year. She, of +course, had done it under the _best_ advice. George knew that she had +friends in the City who would do anything--positively _anything_--for +her. But somehow-- + +Then her tone dropped. Her foot in its French shoe began to fidget on the +stool before her. + +Somehow, she had got into the hands of a reptile--there! No other word +described the creature in the least--a sort of financial agent, who had +treated her unspeakably, disgracefully. She had trusted him implicitly, +and the result was that she now owed the reptile who, on the strength of +her name, her son, and her aristocratic connections, had advanced her +money for these adventures, a sum-- + +"Well, the truth is I am afraid to say what it is," said Lady Tressady, +allowing herself for once a cry of nature, and again raising a shaky hand +to her eyes. + +"How much?" said George, standing over her, cigarette in hand. + +"Well--four thousand pounds!" said Lady Tressady, her eyes blinking +involuntarily as she looked up at him. + +"_Four thousand pounds!_" exclaimed George. "Preposterous!" + +And, raising his hand, he flung his cigarette violently into the fire and +resumed his walk, hands thrust into his pockets. + +Lady Tressady looked tearfully at his long, slim figure as he walked +away, conscious, however, even at this agitated moment, of the quick +thought that he had inherited some of her elegance. + +"George!" + +"Yes--wait a moment--mother"--he faced round upon her decidedly. "Let me +tell you at once, that at the present moment it is quite impossible for +me to find that sum of money." + +Lady Tressady flushed passionately like a thwarted child. + +"Very well, then," she said--"very well. Then it will be bankruptcy--and +I hope you and Letty will like the scandal!" + +"So he threatens bankruptcy?" + +"Do you think I should have come down here except for something like +that?" she cried. "Look at his letters!" + +And she took a tumbled roll out of the bag on her arm and gave it to him. +George threw himself into a chair, and tried to get some idea of the +correspondence; while Lady Tressady kept up a stream of plaintive chatter +he could only endeavour not to hear. + +As far as he could judge on a first inspection, the papers concerned a +long series of risky transactions,--financial gambling of the most +pronounced sort,--whereof the few gains had been long since buried deep +in scandalous losses. The outrageous folly of some of the ventures and +the magnitude of the sums involved made him curse inwardly. It was the +first escapade of the kind he could remember in his mother's history, +and, given her character, he could only regard it as adding a new and +real danger to his life and Letty's. + +Then another consideration struck him. + +"How on earth did you come to know so much about the ins and outs of +Stock Exchange business," he asked her suddenly, with surprise, in the +midst of his reading. "You never confided in me. I never supposed you +took an interest in such things." + +In truth, he would have supposed her mentally incapable of the kind of +gambling finance these papers bore witness of. She had never been known +to do a sum or present an account correctly in her life; and he had +often, in his own mind, accepted her density in these directions as a +certain excuse for her debts. Yet this correspondence showed here and +there a degree of financial legerdemain of which any City swindler +might have been proud--so far, at least, as he could judge from his +hasty survey. + +Lady Tressady drew herself up sharply in answer to his remark, though not +without a flutter of the eyelids which caught his attention. + +"Of course, my dear George, I always knew you thought your mother a +fool. As a matter of fact, all my friends tell me that I have a _very_ +clear head." + +George could not restrain, himself from laughing aloud. + +"In face of this?" he said, holding up the final batch of letters, which +contained Mr. Shapetsky's last formidable account; various imperious +missives from a "sharp-practice" solicitor, whose name happened to be +disreputably known to George Tressady; together with repeated and most +explicit assurances on the part both of agent and lawyer, that if +arrangements were not made at once by Lady Tressady for meeting at least +half Mr. Shapetsky's bill--which had now been running some eighteen +months--and securing the other half, legal steps would be taken +immediately. + +Lady Tressady at first met her son's sarcasm in angry silence, then broke +into shrill denunciation of Shapetsky's "villanies." How could decent +people, people in society, protect themselves against such creatures! + +George walked to the window, and stood looking out into the April garden. +Presently he turned, and interrupted his mother. + +"I notice, mother, that these transactions have been going on for nearly +two years. Do you remember, when I gave you that large sum at Christmas, +you said it would 'all but' clear you; and when I gave you another large +sum last month, you professed to be entirely cleared? Yet all the time +you were receiving these letters, and you owed this fellow almost as +much as you do now. Do you think it was worth while to mislead me in +that way?" + +He stood leaning against the window, his fingers drumming on the sill. +The contrast between the youth of the figure and the absence of youth in +face and voice was curious. Perhaps Lady Tressady felt vaguely that he +looked like a boy and spoke like a master, for her pride rose. + +"You have no right to speak to me like that, George! I did everything for +the best. I always do everything for the best. It is my misfortune to be +so--so confiding, so hopeful. I must always believe in someone--that's +what makes my friends so _extremely_ fond of me. You and your poor +darling father were never the least like me--" And she went off into a +tearful comparison between her own character and the characters of her +husband and son--in which of course it was not she that suffered. + +George did not heed her. He was once more staring out of window, thinking +hard. So far as he could see, the money, or the greater part of it, would +have to be found. The man, of course, was a scoundrel, but of the sort +that keeps within the law; and Lady Tressady's monstrous folly had given +him an easy prey. When he thought of the many sacrifices he had made for +his mother, of her ample allowance, her incorrigible vanity and +greed--and then of the natural desires of his young wife--his heart +burned within him. + +"Well, I can only tell you," he said at last, turning round upon her, +"that I see no way out. How is that man's claim to be met? I don't know. +Even if I _could_ meet it--which I see no chance of doing--by crippling +myself for some time, how should I be at liberty to do it? My wife and +her needs have now the first claim upon me." + +"Very well," said Lady Tressady, proudly, raising her handkerchief, +however, to hide her trembling lips. + +"Let me remind you," he continued, ceremoniously, "that the whole of this +place is in bad condition, except the few rooms we have just done up, and +that money _must_ be spent upon it--it is only fair to Letty that it +should be spent. Let me remind you also, that you are a good deal +responsible for this state of things." + +Lady Tressady moved uneasily. George was now speaking in his usual +half-nonchalant tone, and he had provided himself with another cigarette. +But his eye held her. + +"You will remember that you promised me while I was abroad to live here +and look after the house. I arranged money affairs with you, and other +affairs, upon that basis. But it appears that during the four years I was +away you were here altogether, at different times, about three months. +Yet you made me believe you were here; if I remember right, you dated +your letters from here. And of course, in four years, an old house that +is totally neglected goes to the bad." + +"Who has been telling you such falsehoods?" cried Lady Tressady. "I was +here a great deal more than that--a great deal more!" + +But the scarlet colour, do what she would, was dyeing her still delicate +skin, and her eyes alternately obstinate and shuffling, tried to take +themselves out of the range of George's. + +As for George, as he stood there coolly smoking, he was struck--or, +rather, the critical mind in him was struck--by a sudden perception of +the meanness of aspect which sordid cares of the kind his mother was now +plunged in can give to the human face. He felt the rise of a familiar +disgust. How many scenes of ugly battle over money matters could he not +remember in his boyhood between his father and mother! And later--in +India--what things he had known women do for money or dress! He thought +scornfully of a certain intriguing lady of his acquaintance at +Madras--who had borrowed money of him--to whom he had given ball-dresses; +and of another, whose selfish extravagance had ruined one of the best of +men. Did all women tend to be of this make, however poetic might be their +outward seeming? + +Aloud, he said quietly, in answer to his mother's protest: + +"I think you will find that is about accurate. I mention it merely to +show you how it is that I find myself now plunged in so many expenses. +And, now, doesn't it strike you as a _little_ hard that I should be +called upon to strip and cripple myself still further--_not_ to give my +wife the comforts and conveniences I long to give her, but to pay such +debts as those?" + +Involuntarily he struck his hand on the papers lying in the chair where +he had been sitting. + +Lady Tressady, too, rose from her seat. + +"George, if you are going to be _violent_ towards your mother, I had +better go," she said, with an attempt at dignity. "I suppose Letty has +been gossiping with her servants about me. Oh! I knew what to expect!" +cried Lady Tressady, gathering up fan and handkerchief from the sofa +behind her with a hand that shook. "I always said from the beginning that +she would set you against me! She has never treated me as--as a +daughter--never! And that is my weakness--I must be cared for--I must be +treated with--with tenderness." + +"I wouldn't give way, mother, if I were you," said George, quite +unmoved by the show of tears. "I think, if you will reflect upon it, +that it is Letty and I who have the most cause to give way. If you will +allow me, I will go and have a talk with her. I believe she is sitting +in the garden." + +His mother turned sullenly away from him, and he left the room. + + * * * * * + +As he passed through the long oak-panelled hall that led to the garden, +he was seized with an odd sense of pity for himself. This odious scene +behind him, and now this wrestle with Letty that must be gone +through--were these the joys of the honeymoon? + +Letty was not in the garden. But as he passed into the wood on the +farther side of the hill he saw her sitting under a tree halfway down the +slope, with some embroidery in her hand. The April sun was shining into +the wood. A larch beyond Letty was already green, and the twigs of the +oak beneath which she sat made a reddish glow in the bright air. Patches +of primroses and anemones starred the ground about her, and trails of +periwinkle touched her dress. She was stooping, and her little hand went +rapidly--impatiently--to and fro. + +The contrast between this fresh youth amid the spring and that unlovely, +reluctant age he had just left behind him in the smoking-room struck him +sharply. His brow cleared. + +As she heard his step she looked round eagerly. "Well?" she said, +pushing aside her work. + +He threw himself down beside her. + +"Darling, I have had my talk. It is pretty bad--worse than we had even +imagined!" + +Then he told her his mother's story. She could hardly contain herself, as +she listened, as he mentioned the total figure of the debts. It was +evidently with difficulty that she prevented herself from interrupting +him at every word. And when he had barely finished she broke out: + +"And what did you say?" + +George hesitated. + +"I told her, of course, that it was monstrous and absurd to expect that +we could pay such a sum." + +Letty's breath came fast. His voice and manner did not satisfy her at +all. + +"Monstrous? I should think it was! Do you know how she has run up +this debt?" + +George looked at her in surprise. Her little face was quivering under the +suppressed energy of what she was going to say. + +"No!--do you?" + +"Yes!--I know all about it. I said to my maid last night--I hope, George, +you won't mind, but you know Grier has been an age with me, and knows all +my secrets--I told her she must make friends with your mother's maid, and +see what she could find out. I felt we _must_, in self-defence. And of +course Grier got it all out of Justine. I knew she would! Justine is a +little fool; and she doesn't mean to stay much longer with Lady Tressady, +so she didn't mind speaking. It is exactly as I supposed! Lady Tressady +didn't begin speculating for herself at all--but for--somebody--else! Do +you remember that absurd-looking singer who gave a 'musical sketch' one +day that your mother gave a party in Eccleston Square--in February?" + +She looked at him with eagerness, an ugly, half-shrinking innuendo in her +expression. + +George had suddenly moved away, and was sitting now some little distance +from his wife, his eyes bent on the ground. However, at her question he +made a sign of assent. + +"You do remember? Well," said Letty, triumphantly, "it is he who is at +the bottom of it all. I _knew_ there must be somebody. It appears that he +has been getting money out of her for years--that he used to come and +spend hours, when she had that little house in Bruton Street, when you +were away--I don't believe you ever heard of it--flattering her, and +toadying her, paying her compliments on her dress and her appearance, +fetching and carrying for her--and of course living upon her! He used to +arrange all her parties. Justine says that he used even to make her order +all his favourite wines--_such_ bills as there used to be for wine! He +has a wife and children somewhere, and of course the whole family lived +upon your mother. It was he made her begin speculating. Justine says he +has lost all he ever had himself that way, and your mother couldn't, in +fact, '_lend'_ him"--Letty laughed scornfully--"money fast enough. It was +he brought her across that odious creature Shapetsky--isn't that his +name? And that's the whole story. If there have been any gains, he has +made off with them--leaving her, of course, to get out of the rest. +Justine says that for months there was nothing but business, as she calls +it, talked in the house--and she knew, for she used to help wait at +dinner. And such a crew of people as used to be about the place!" + +She looked at him, struck at last by his silence and his attitude, or +pausing for some comment, some appreciation of her cleverness in +ferreting it all out. + +But he did not speak, and she was puzzled. The angry triumph in her eyes +faltered. She put out her hand and touched him on the arm. + +"What is it, George? I thought--it would be more satisfactory to us both +to know the truth." + +He looked up quickly. + +"And all this your maid got out of Justine? You asked her?" + +She was struck, offended, by his expression. It was so cool and +strange--even, she could have imagined, contemptuous. + +"Yes, I did," she said passionately. "I thought I was quite justified. We +must protect ourselves." + +He was silent again. + +"I think," he said at last, drily, she watching him--"I think we will +keep Justine and Grier out of it, if you please." + +She took her work, and laid it down again, her mouth trembling. + +"So you had rather be deceived?" + +"I had rather be deceived than listen behind doors," he said, beginning +in a light tone, which, however, passed immediately into one of +bitterness. "Besides, there is nothing new. For people like my mother +there is always some adventurer or adventuress in the background--there +always used to be in old days. She never meant any serious harm; she was +first plundered, then we. My father used to be for ever turning some +impostor or other out of doors. Now I suppose it is my turn." + +This time it was Letty who kept silence. Her needle passed rapidly to and +fro. George glanced at her queerly. Then he rose and came to stand near +her, leaning against the tree. + +"You know, Letty, we shall have to pay that money," he said suddenly, +pulling at his moustache. + +Letty made an exclamation under her breath, but went on working faster +than before. + +He slipped down to the moss beside her, and caught her hand. + +"Are you angry with me?" + +"If you insult me by accusing me of listening behind doors you can't +wonder," said Letty, snatching her hand away, her breast heaving. + +He felt a bitter inclination to laugh, but he restrained it, and did +his best to make peace. In the midst of his propitiations Letty +turned upon him. + +"Of course, I know you think I did it all for selfishness," she said, +half crying, "because I want new furniture and new dresses. I don't; I +want to protect you from being--being--plundered like this. How can you +do what you ought as a member of Parliament? how can we ever keep +ourselves out of debt if--if--? How _can_ you pay this money?" she wound +up, her eyes flaming. + +"Well, you know," he said, hesitating--"you know I suggested yesterday +we should sell some land to do up the house. I am afraid we must sell the +laud, and pay this scoundrel--a proportion, at all events. Of course, +what I should _like_ to do would be to put him--and the other--to instant +death, with appropriate tortures! Short of that, I can only take the +matter out of my mother's hands, get a sharp solicitor on my side to +match _his_ rascal, and make the best bargain I can." + +Letty rolled up her work with energy, two tears of anger on her cheeks. +"She _ought_ to suffer!" she cried, her voice trembling--"she _ought_ +to suffer!" + +"You mean that we ought to let her be made a bankrupt?" he said coolly. +"Well, no doubt it would be salutary. Only, I am afraid it would be +rather more disagreeable to us than to her. Suppose we consider the +situation. Two young married people--charming house--charming +wife--husband just beginning in politics--people inclined to be friends. +Then you go to dine with them in Brook Street--excellent little French +dinner--bride bewitching. Next morning you see the bankruptcy of the +host's mamma in the 'Times.' 'And he's the only son, isn't he?--he must +be well off. They say she's been dreadfully extravagant. But, hang it! +you know, a man's mother!--and a widow--no, I can't stand that. Sha'n't +dine with them again!' There! do you see, darling? Do you really want to +rub all the bloom off the peach?" + +He had hardly finished his little speech before the odiousness of it +struck himself. + +"Am I come to talking to her like _this_?" he asked himself in a kind of +astonishment. + +But Letty, apparently, was not astonished. + +"Everybody would understand if you refused to ruin yourself by going on +paying these frightful debts. I am sure _something_ could be done," she +said, half choked. + +George shook his head. + +"But everybody wouldn't want to understand. The dear world loves a +scandal--doesn't really _like_ being amiable to newcomers at all. You +would make a bad start, dear--and all the world would pity mamma." + +"Oh! if you are only thinking what people would say," cried Letty. + +"No," said George, reflectively, but with a mild change of tone. "Damn +people! I can pull myself to pieces so much better than they can. You +see, darling, you're such an optimist. Now, if you'd only just believe, +as I do, that the world is a radically bad place, you wouldn't be so +surprised when things of this sort happen. Eh, little person, has it been +a radically bad place this last fortnight?" + +He laid his cheek against her shoulder, rubbing it gently up and down. +But something hard and scornful lay behind his caress--something he did +not mean to inquire into. + +"Then you told your mother," said Letty, after a pause, still looking +straight before her, "that you would clear her?" + +"Not at all. I said we could do nothing. I laid it on about the house. +And all the time I knew perfectly well in my protesting soul, that if +this man's claim is sustainable we should _have_ to pay up. And I imagine +that mamma knew it too. You can get out of anybody's debts but your +mother's--that's apparently what it comes to. Queer thing, civilisation! +Well now"--he sprang to his feet--"let's go and get it over." + +Letty also rose. + +"I can't see her again," she said quickly. "I sha'n't come down to lunch. +Will she go by the three-o'clock train?" + +"I will arrange it," said George. + +They walked through the wood together silently. As they came in sight of +the house Letty's face quivered again with restrained passion--or tears. +George, whose _sangfroid_ was never disturbed outwardly for long, had by +now resigned himself, and had, moreover, recovered that tolerance of +woman's various weaknesses which was in him the fruit of a wide, and at +bottom hostile, induction. He set himself to cheer her up. Perhaps, after +all, if he could sell a particular piece of land which he owned near a +neighbouring large town, and sell it well,--he had had offers for it +before,--he might be able to clear his mother, and still let Letty work +her will on the house. She mustn't take a gloomy view of things--he would +do his best. So that by the time they got into the drawing-room she had +let her hand slip doubtfully into his again for a moment. + +But nothing would induce her to appear at lunch. Lady Tressady, having +handed over all Shapetsky's papers and all her responsibilities to +George, graciously told him that she could understand Letty's annoyance, +and didn't wish for a moment to intrude upon her. She then called on +Justine to curl her hair, put on a blue shot silk with marvellous pink +fronts just arrived from Paris, and came down to lunch with her son in +her most smiling mood. She took no notice of his monosyllables, and in +the hall, while the butler discreetly retired, she kissed him with tears, +saying that she had always known his generosity would come to the rescue +of his poor darling mamma. + +"You will oblige me, mother, by not trying it again too soon," was +George's ironical reply as he put her into the carriage. + + * * * * * + +In the afternoon Letty was languid and depressed. She would not talk on +general topics, and George shrank in nervous disgust from reopening the +subjects of the morning. Finally, she chose to be tucked up on the sofa +with a novel, and gave George free leave to go out. + +It surprised him to find as he walked quickly down the hill, delighting +in the April sun, that he was glad to be alone. But he did not in the +least try to fling the thought away from him, as many a lover would have +done. The events, the feelings of the day, had been alike jarring and +hateful; he meant to escape from them. + +But he could not escape from them all at once. A fresh and unexpected +debt of somewhere about four thousand pounds does not sit lightly on a +comparatively poor man. In spite of his philosophy for Letty's benefit, +he must needs harass himself anew about his money affairs, planning and +reckoning. How many more such surprises would his mother spring upon +him--and how was he to control her? He realised now something of the +life-long burden his dull old father had borne--a burden which the +absences of school, college, and travel had hitherto spared himself. What +was he to appeal to in her? There seemed to be nothing--neither will nor +conscience. She was like the women without backs in the fairy-tale. + +Then, with one breath he said to himself that he must kick out that +singer-fellow, and with the next, that he would not touch any of his +mother's crew with a barge-pole. Though he never pleaded ideals in +public, he had been all his life something of a moral epicure, taking +"moral" as relating rather to manners than to deeper things. He had done +his best not to soil himself by contact with certain types--among men +especially. Of women he was less critical and less observant. + +As to this ugly feud opening between his mother and his wife, it had +quite ceased to amuse him. Now that his marriage was a reality, the daily +corrosion of such a thing was becoming plain. And who was there in the +world to bear the brunt of it but he? He saw himself between the +two--eternally trying to make peace--and his face lengthened. + +And if Letty would only leave the thing to him!--would only keep her +little white self out of it! He wished he could get her to send away that +woman Grier--a forward second-rate creature, much too ready to meddle in +what did not concern her. + +Then, with a shake of his thin shoulders, he passionately drove it all +out of his thoughts. + +Let him go to the village, sound the feeling there if he could, and do +his employer's business. His troubles as a pit-owner seemed likely to be +bad enough, but they did not canker one like domestic miseries. They were +a man's natural affairs; to think of them came as a relief to him. + + * * * * * + +He had but a disappointing round, however. + +In the first place he went to look up some of the older "hewers," men who +had been for years in the employ of the Tressadys. Two or three of them +had just come back from the early shift, and their wives, at any rate, +were pleased and flattered by George's call. But the men sat like stocks +and stones while he talked. Scarcely a word could be got out of them, and +George felt himself in an atmosphere of storm, guessing at dangers, +everywhere present, though not yet let loose--like the foul gases in the +pits under his feet. + +He behaved with a good deal of dignity, stifling his pride here and there +sufficiently to talk simply and well of the general state of trade, the +conditions of the coal industry in the West Mercian district, the +position of the masters, the published accounts of one or two large +companies in the district, and so on. But in the end he only felt his own +auger rising in answer to the sullenness of the men. Their sallow faces +and eyes weakened by long years of the pit expressed little--but what +there was spelt war. + +Nor did his visits to what might be called his own side give him much +more satisfaction. + +One man, a brawny "fireman," whom George had been long taught to regard +as one of the props of law and order in the district, was effusively and +honestly glad to see his employer. His wife hurried the tea, and George +drank and ate as heartily as his own luncheon would let him in company +with Macgregor and his very neat and smiling family. Nothing could be +more satisfactory than Macgregor's general denunciations of the Union and +its agent. Burrows, in his opinion, was a "drunken, low-livin scoundrel," +who got his bread by making mischief; the Union was entering upon a great +mistake in resisting the masters' proposals; and if it weren't for the +public-house and idleness there wasn't a man in Perth that couldn't live +_well_, ten per cent. reduction and all considered. Nevertheless, he did +not conceal his belief that battle was approaching, and would break out, +if not now, at any rate in the late summer or autumn. Times, too, were +going to be specially bad for the non-society men. The membership of the +Union had been running up fast; there had been a row that very morning at +the pit where he worked, the Union men refusing to go down in the same +cage with the blacklegs. He and his mates would have to put their backs +into it. Never fear but they would! Bullying might be trusted only to +make them the more "orkard." + +Nothing could have been more soothing than such talk to the average +employer in search of congenial opinions. But George was not the average +employer, and the fastidious element in him began soon to make him +uncomfortable. Sobriety is, no doubt, admirable, but he had no sooner +detected a teetotal cant in his companion than that particular axiom +ceased to matter to him. And to think poorly of Burrows might be a +salutary feature in a man's character, but it should be for some +respectable reason. George fidgeted on his chair while Macgregor told +the usual cock-and-bull stories of monstrous hotel-bills seen sticking +out of Burrows's tail-pockets, and there deciphered by a gaping +populace; and his mental discomfort reached its climax when Macgregor +wound up with the remark: + +"And _that_, Sir George, is where the money goes to!--not to the poor +starving women and children, I can tell yer, whose husbands are keepin +him in luxury. I've always said it. _Where's the accounts?_ I've never +seen no balance-sheet--_never!_" he repeated solemnly. They do say as +there's one to be seen at the 'lodge'--" + +"Why, of course there is, Macgregor," said George, with a nervous laugh, +as he got up to depart; "all the big Unions publish their accounts." + +The fireman's obstinate mouth and stubbly hair only expressed a more +pronounced scepticism. + +"Well, I shouldn't believe in em," he said, "if they did. I've niver seen +a balance-sheet, and I don't suppose I ever shall. Well, good-bye to you, +Sir George, and thank you kindly. Yo take my word, sir, if it weren't for +the public-house the men could afford to lose a trifle now and again to +let the masters make their fair profit!" + +And he looked behind him complacently at his neat cottage and +well-clothed children. + +But George walked away, impatient. + +"_His_ wages won't go down, anyway," he said to himself--for the wages of +the "firemen," whose work is of the nature of superintendence, hardly +vary with the state of trade. "And what suspicious idiocy about the +accounts!" + +His last visit was the least fortunate of any. The fireman in question, +Mark Dowse, Macgregor's chief rival in the village, was a keen Radical, +and George found him chuckling over his newspaper, and the defeat of the +Tory candidate in a recently decided County Council election. He received +his visitor with a surprise which George thought not untinged with +insolence. Some political talk followed, in which Dowse's Yorkshire wit +scored more than once at his employer's expense. Dowse, indeed, let +himself go. He was on the point of taking the examination for an +under-manager's certificate and leaving the valley. Hence there were no +strong reasons for servility, and he might talk as he pleased to a young +"swell" who had sold himself to reaction. George lost his temper +somewhat, was furiously ashamed of himself, and could only think of +getting out of the man's company with dignity. + +He was by no means clear, however, as he walked away from the cottage, +that he had succeeded in doing so. What was the good of trying to make +friends with these fellows? Neither in agreement nor in opposition had +he any common ground with them. Other people might have the gifts for +managing them; it seemed to him that it would be better for him to +take up the line at once that he had none. Fontenoy was right. Nothing +but a state of enmity was possible--veiled enmity at some times, open +at others. + +What were those voices on the slope above him? + +He was walking along a road which skirted his own group of pits. To his +left rose a long slope of refuse, partly grown over, ending in the "bank" +whereon stood the engine-house and winding-apparatus. A pathway climbed +the slope and made the natural ascent to the pit for people dwelling in +the scattered cottages on the farther side of it. + +Two men, he saw, were standing high up on the pathway, violently +disputing. One was Madan, his own manager, an excellent man of business +and a bitter Tory. The other was Valentine Burrows. + +As Tressady neared the road-entrance to the pathway the two men parted. +Madan climbed on towards the pit. Burrows ran down the path. + +As he approached the gate, and saw Tressady passing on the road, the +agent called: + +"Sir George Tressady!" + +George stopped. + +Burrows came quickly up to him, his face crimson. + +"Is it by your orders, Sir George, that Mr. Madan insults and browbeats +me when he meets me on a perfectly harmless errand to one of the men in +your engine-house?" + +"Perhaps Mr. Madan was not so sure as you were, Mr. Burrows, that the +errand _was_ a harmless one," said George, with a cool smile. + +By this time, however, Burrows was biting his lip, and very conscious +that he had made an impulsive mistake. + +"Don't imagine for a moment," he said hotly, "that Madan's opinion of +anything I may be doing matters one brass farthing to me! Only I give you +and him fair warning that if he blackguards me again in the way he has +done several times lately, I shall have him bound over." + +"He might survive it," said George. "But how will you manage it? You have +had ill-luck, rather, with the magistrates--haven't you?" + +He stood drawn up to his full height, thin, venomous, alert, rather +enjoying the encounter, which "let off the steam" of his previous +irritations. + +Burrows threw him a furious look. + +"You think that a damaging thing to say, do you, Sir George? Perhaps the +day will come--not so far off, neither--when the magistrates will be no +longer your creatures, but ours. Then we shall see!" + +"Well, prophecy is cheap," said George. "Console yourself with it, by +all means." + +The two men measured each other eye to eye. + +Then, unexpectedly, after the relief of his outburst, the philosopher's +instincts which were so oddly interwoven with the rest of Tressady's +nature reasserted themselves. + +"Look here," he said, in another manner, advancing a step. "I think this +is all great nonsense. If Madan has exceeded his duty, I will see to it. +And, meanwhile, don't you think it would be more worthy of us, as a +couple of rational beings, if, now we have met, we had a few serious +words on the state of things in this valley? You and I fought a square +fight at Malford--you at least said as much. Why can't we fight a square +fight here?" + +Burrows eyed him doubtfully. He was leaning on his stick, recovering +breath and composure. George noticed that since the Malford election, +even he had lost youth and looks. He had the drunkard's skin and the +drunkard's eyes. Yet there were still the make and proportions of the +handsome athlete. He was now a man of about thirty-two; but in his first +youth he had carried the miner's pick for some four or five years, and +during the same period had been one of the most famous football-players +of the county. As George knew, he was still the idol of the local clubs, +and capable in his sober spells of amazing feats both of strength and +endurance. + +"Well, I have no objection to some conversation with you," said Burrows, +at last, slowly. + +"Let's walk on, then," said George. + +And they walked past the gate of Ferth, towards the railway-station, +which was some two miles off. + +About an hour later the two men returned along the same road. Both had an +air of tension; both were rather pale. + +"Well, it comes to this," said George, as he stopped beside his own gate, +"you believe our case--the badness of trade, the disappearance of +profits, pressure of contracts, and all the rest of it--and you still +refuse on your part to bear the smallest fraction of the burden? You will +claim all you can get in good times--you will give back nothing in bad?" + +"That is so," said Burrows, deliberately; "that is so, _precisely_. We +will take no risks; we give our labour and in return the workman must +live. Make the consumer pay, or pay yourselves out of your good +years"--he turned imperceptibly towards the barrack-like house on the +hill. "We don't care a ha'porth which it is!--only don't you come on +the man who risks his life, and works like a galley-slave five days a +week for a pittance of five-and-twenty shillings, or thereabouts, to +pay--for he _won't_. He's tired of it. Not till you starve him into it, +at any rate!" + +George laughed. + +"One of the best men in the village has been giving me his opinion this +afternoon that there isn't a man in that place"--he pointed to it--"that +couldn't live, and live well--aye, and take the masters' terms +to-morrow--but for the drink!" + +His keen look ran over Burrows from head to foot. + +"And I know who _that_ is," said Burrows, with a sneer. "Well, I can tell +you what the rest of the men in that place think, and it's this: that the +man in that village who _doesn't_ drink is a mean skunk, who's betraying +his own flesh and blood to the capitalists! Oh! you may preach at us till +you're black in the face, but drink we _shall_ till we get the control of +our own labour. For, look here! Directly we cease to drink--directly we +become good boys on your precious terms--the standard of life falls, down +come wages, and _you_ sweep off our beer-money to spend on your +champagne. Thank you, Sir George! but we're not such fools as we +look--and that don't suit us! Good-day to you." + +And he haughtily touched his hat in response to George's movement, and +walked quickly away. + + * * * * * + +George slowly mounted his own hill. The chequered April day was +declining, and the dipping sun was flooding the western plain with quiet +light. Rooks were circling round the hill, filling the air with +long-drawn sound. A cuckoo was calling on a tree near at hand, and the +evening was charged with spring scents--scents of leaf and grass, of +earth and rain. Below, in an oak copse across the road, a stream rushed; +and from a distance came the familiar rattle and thud of the pits. + +George stood still a moment under a ragged group of Scotch firs--one of +the few things at Ferth that he loved--and gazed across the Cheshire +border to the distant lines of Welsh hills. The excitement of his talk +with Burrows was subsiding, leaving behind it the obstinate resolve of +the natural man. He should tell his uncles there was nothing for it but +to fight it out. Some blood must be let; somebody must be master. + +What poor limited fools, after all, were the best of the working men--how +incapable of working out any serious problem, of looking beyond their own +noses and the next meal! Was he to spend his life in chronic battle with +them--a set of semi-civilised barbarians--his countrymen in nothing but +the name? And for what cause--to what cry? That he might defend against +the toilers of this wide valley a certain elegant house in Brook Street, +and find the means to go on paying his mother's debts?--such debts as he +carried the evidence of, at that moment, in his pocket. + +Suddenly there swept over his mind with pricking force the thought of +Mary Batchelor at her door, blind with weeping and pain--of the poor boy, +dead in his prime. Did those two figures stand for the _realities_ at +the base of things--the common labours, affections, agonies, which +uphold the world? + +His own life looked somehow poor and mean to him as he turned back to it. +The Socialist of course--Burrows--would say that he and Letty and his +mother were merely living, and dressing, and enjoying themselves, paying +butlers, and starting carriages out of the labour and pain of +others--that Jamie Batchelor and his like risked and brutalised their +strong young lives that Lady Tressady and her like might "jig and amble" +through theirs. + +Pure ignorant fanaticism, no doubt! But he was not so ready as usual to +shelter himself under the big words of controversy. Fontenoy's favourite +arguments had momentarily no savour for a kind of moral nausea. + +"I begin to see it was a 'cursed spite' that drove me into the business +at all," he said to himself, as he stood under the trees. + +What he was really suffering from was an impatience of new +conditions--perhaps surprise that he was not more equal to them. Till his +return home--till now, almost--he had been an employer and a coal-owner +by proxy. Other people had worked for him, had solved his problems for +him. Then a transient impulse had driven him home--made him accept +Fontenoy's offer--worse luck!--at least, Letty apart! The hopefulness and +elation about himself, his new activities, and his Parliamentary +prospects, that had been his predominant mood in London seemed to him at +this moment of depression mere folly. What he really felt, he declared to +himself, was a sort of cowardly shrinking from life and its tests--the +recognition that at bottom he was a weakling, without faiths, without +true identity. + +Then the quick thought-process, as it flowed on, told him that there are +two things that protect men of his stamp from their own lack of moral +stamina: perpetual change of scene, that turns the world into a +spectacle--and love. He thought with hunger of his travel-years; holding +away from him, as it were, for a moment the thought of his marriage. + +But only for a moment. It was but a few weeks since a woman's life had +given itself wholly into his hands. He was still thrilling under the +emotion and astonishment of it. Tender, melting thoughts flowed upon him. +His little Letty! Had he ever thought her perfect, free from natural +covetousness and weaknesses? What folly! _He_ to ask for the grand style +in character! + +He looked at his watch. How long he had left her! Let him hurry, and make +his peace. + +However, just as he was turning, his attention was caught by something +that was passing on the opposite hillside. The light from the west was +shining full on a white cottage with a sloping garden. The cottage +belonged to the Wesleyan minister of the place, and had been rented by +Burrows for the last six months. And just as George was turning away he +saw Burrows come out of the door with a burden--a child, or a woman +little larger than a child--in his arms. He carried her to an armchair +which had been placed on the little grass-plat. The figure was almost +lost in the chair, and sat motionless while Burrows brought cushions and +a stool. Then a baby came to play on the grass, and Burrows hung over the +back of the chair, bending so as to talk to the person in it. + +"Dying?" said George to himself. "Poor devil! he must hate something." + + * * * * * + +He sped up the hill, and found Letty still on the sofa and in the last +pages of her novel. She did not resent his absence apparently,--a +freedom, so far, from small exaction for which he inwardly thanked her. +Still, from the moment that she raised her eyes as he came in, he saw +that if she was not angry with him for leaving her alone, her mind was +still as sore as ever against him and fortune on other accounts--and his +revived ardour drooped. He gave her an account of his adventures, but she +was neither inquiring nor sympathetic; and her manner all the evening had +a nervous dryness that took away the pleasure of their _tete-a-tete._ Any +old friend of Letty's, indeed, could hardly have failed to ask what had +become of that small tinkling charm of manner, that girlish flippancy and +repartee, that had counted for so much in George's first impressions of +her? They were no sooner engaged than it had begun to wane. Was it like +the bird or the flower, that adorns itself only for the wooing time, and +sinks into relative dinginess when the mating effort is over? + +On this particular evening, indeed, she was really absorbed half the time +in gloomy thoughts of Lady Tressady's behaviour and the poorness of her +own prospects. She lay on the sofa again after dinner--her white slimness +and bright hair showing delicately against the cushions--playing still +with her novel, while George read the newspapers. Sometimes she glanced +at him unsteadily, with a pinching of the lips. But it was not her way to +invite a scene. + +Late at night he went up to his dressing-room. + +As he entered it Letty was talking to her maid. He stopped involuntarily +in the darkness of his own room, and listened. What a contrast between +this Letty and the Letty of the drawing-room! They were chattering fast, +discussing Lady Tressady, and Lady Tressady's gowns, and Lady Tressady's +affairs. What eagerness, what malice, what feminine subtlety and +acuteuess! After listening for a few seconds, it seemed to him as though +a score of new and ugly lights had been thrown alike upon his mother and +on human nature. He stole away again without revealing himself. + +When he returned the room was nearly dark, and Letty was lying high +against her pillows, waiting for him. Suddenly, after she had sent her +maid away, she had felt depressed and miserable, and had begun to cry. +And for some reason hardly clear to herself she had lain pining for +George's footstep. When he came in she looked at him with eyes still +wet, reproaching him gently for being late. + +In the dim light, surrounded with lace and whiteness, she was a pretty +vision; and George stood beside her, responding and caressing. + +But that black depth in his nature, of which he had spoken to her--which +he had married to forget--was, none the less, all ruffled and vocal. For +the first time since Letty had consented to marry him he did not think or +say to himself, as he looked at her, that he was a lucky man, and had +done everything for the best. + + + + +CHAPTER X + + +Thus, with the end of the honeymoon, whatever hopes or illusions George +Tressady had allowed himself in marrying, were already much bedimmed. His +love-dream had been meagre and ordinary enough. But even so, it had not +maintained itself. + +Nevertheless, such impressions and emotions pass. The iron fact of +marriage outstays them, tends always to modify, and, at first, to +conquer them. + +Upon the Tressadys' return to London, Letty, at any rate, endeavoured +to forget her great defeat of the honeymoon in the excitement of +furnishing the house in Brook Street. Certainly there could be no +question, in spite of all her high speech to Miss Tulloch and others, +that in her first encounter with Lady Tressady, Lady Tressady had won +easily. Letty had forgotten to reckon on the hard realities of the +filial relation, and could only think of them now, partly with +exasperation, partly with despair. + +Lady Tressady, however, was for the moment somewhat subdued, and on the +return of the young people to town she did her best to propitiate Letty. +In Letty's eyes, indeed, her offence was beyond reparation. But, for the +moment, there was outward amity at least between them; which for Letty +meant chiefly that she was conscious of making all her purchases for the +house and planning all her housekeeping arrangements under a constant +critical inspection; and, moreover, that she was liable to find all her +afternoon-teas with particular friends, or those persons of whom she +wished to make particular friends, broken up by the advent of the +overdressed and be-rouged lady, who first put the guests to flight, and +was then out of temper because they fled. + +Meanwhile George found the Shapetsky matter extremely harassing. He put +on a clever lawyer; but the Shapetsky would have scorned to be +overmatched by anybody else's abilities, and very little abatement could +be obtained. Moreover, the creditor's temper had been roughened by a +somewhat unfortunate letter George had written in a hurry from Perth, and +he showed every sign of carrying matters with as high a hand as possible. + +Meanwhile, George was discovering, like any other landowner, how easy it +is to talk of selling land, how difficult to sell it. The buyer who would +once have bought was not now forthcoming; the few people who nibbled +were, naturally, thinking more of their own purses than Tressady's; and +George grew red with indignation over some of the offers submitted to him +by his country solicitor. With the payment of a first large instalment to +Shapetsky out of his ordinary account, he began to be really pressed for +money, just as the expenses of the Brook Street settling-in were at their +height. This pecuniary strain had a marked effect upon him. It brought +out certain features of character which he no doubt inherited from his +father. Old Sir William had always shown a scrupulous and petty temper +in money matters. He could not increase his possessions: for that he had +apparently neither brains nor judgment; nor could he even protect himself +from the more serious losses of business, for George found heavy debts in +existence--mortgages on the pits and so forth--when he succeeded. But as +the head of a household Sir William showed extraordinary tenacity and +spirit in the defence of his petty cash; and the exasperating +extravagance of the wife whom, in a moment of infatuation, he had been +cajoled into marrying, intensified and embittered a natural +characteristic. + +George so far resembled him that both at school and college he had been a +rather careful and abstemious boy. Probably the spectacle of his mother's +adventures had revealed to him very early the humiliations of the debtor. +At any rate, during his four years abroad he had never exceeded the +modest yearly sum he had reserved for himself on leaving England; and the +frugality of his personal expenditure had counted for something in the +estimates formed of him during his travels by competent persons. + +Nevertheless, at this beginning of household life he was still young and +callow in all that concerned the management of money; and it had never +occurred to him that his somewhat uncertain income of about four thousand +a year would not be amply sufficient for anything that he and Letty might +need; for housekeeping, for children--if children came--for political +expenses, and even for those supplementary presents to his mother which +he had all along recognised as inevitable. Now, however, what with the +difficulty he found in settling the Shapetsky affair, what with Letty's +demands for the house, and his revived dread of what his mother might be +doing, together with his overdrawn account and the position of his +colliery property, a secret fear of embarrassment and disaster began to +torment him, the offspring of a temperament which had never perhaps +possessed any real buoyancy. + +Occasionally, under the stimulus of this fear, he would leave the House +of Commons on a Wednesday or Saturday afternoon, walk to Warwick Square, +and appear precipitately in his mother's drawing-room, for the purpose of +examining the guests--or possible harpies--who might be gathered there. +He did his best once or twice to dislodge the "singer-fellow"--an elderly +gentleman with a flabby face and long hair, who seemed to George to be +equally boneless, physically and morally. Nevertheless, he was not to be +dislodged. The singer, indeed, treated the young legislator with a +mixture of deference and artistic; condescension, which was amusing or +enraging as you chose to take it. And once, when George attempted very +plain language with his mother, Lady Tressady went into hysterics, and +vowed that she would not be parted from her friends, not even by the +brutality of young married people who had everything they wanted, while +she was a poor lone widow, whose life was not worth living. The whole +affair was, so to speak, sordidly innocent. Mr. Fullerton--such was the +gentleman's name--wanted creature-comforts and occasional loans; Lady +Tressady wanted company, compliments, and "musical sketches'" for her +little tea-parties. Mrs. Fullerton was as ready as her husband to supply +the two former; and even the children, a fair-haired, lethargic crew, +painfully like their boneless father in Tressady's opinion, took their +share in the general exploitation of Tressady's mamma. Lady Tressady +meanwhile posed as the benefactor of genius in distress; and vowed, +moreover, that "poor dear Fullertori" was in no way responsible for her +recent misfortunes. The "reptile," and the "reptile" only, was to blame. + +After one of these skirmishes with his mother, George, ruffled and +disgusted, took his way home, to find Letty eagerly engaged in choosing +silk curtains for the drawing-room. + +"Oh! how lucky!" she cried, when she saw him. "Now you can help me +decide--_such_ a business!" + +And she led him into the drawing-room, where lengths of pink and green +brocade were pinned against the wall in conspicuous places. + +George admired, and gave his verdict in favour of a particular green. +Then he stooped to read the ticket on the corner of the pattern, and his +face fell. + +"How much will you want of this stuff, Letty?" he asked her. + +"Oh! for the two rooms, nearly fifty yards," said Letty, carelessly, +opening another bundle of patterns as she spoke. + +"It is twenty-six shillings a yard!" said George, rather gloomily, as he +fell, tired, into an armchair. + +"Well, yes, it _is_ dear. But then, it is so good that it will last an +age. I think I must have some of it for the sofa, too," said Letty, +pondering. + +George made no reply. + +Presently Letty looked up. + +"Why, George?--George, what _is_ the matter? Don't you want anything +pretty for this room? You never take any interest in it at all." + +"I'm only thinking, darling, what fortunes the upholsterers must make," +said George, his hands penthouse over his eyes. + +Letty pouted and flushed. The next minute she came to sit on the edge +of his chair. She was dressed--rather overdressed, perhaps--in a pale +blue dress whereof the inventive ruffles and laces pleased her own +critical mind extremely. George, well accustomed by now to the items in +his mother's bills, felt uncomfortably, as he looked at the elegance +beside him, that it was a question of guineas--many guineas. Then he +hated himself for not simply admiring her--his pretty little bride--in +her new finery. What was wrong with him? This beastly money had put +everything awry! + +Letty guessed shrewdly at what was the matter. She bit her lip, and +looked ready to cry. + +"Well, it is hard," she said, in a low, emphatic voice, "that we can't +please ourselves in a few trifles of this sort--when one thinks _why_!" + +George took her hand, and kissed it affectionately. + +"Darling, only just for a little--till I get out of this brute's +clutches. There are such pretty, cheap things nowadays--aren't there?" + +"Oh! if you want to have a South Kensington drawing-room," said Letty, +indignantly, "with four-penny muslin curtains and art pots, you can do +_that_ for nothing. But I'd rather go back to horsehair and a mahogany +table in the middle at once!" + +"You needn't wear 'greenery-yallery' gowns, you know." said George, +laughing; "that's the one unpardonable thing. Though, if you did wear +them, you'd become them." + +And he held her at arm's length that he might properly admire her +new dress. + +Letty, however, was not to be flattered out of her lawful dues in the +matter of curtains--that Lady Tressady's debts might be paid the sooner. +She threw herself into a long wrestle with George, half angry, half +plaintive, and in the end she wrung out of him much more considerable +matters than the brocades originally in dispute. Then George went down to +his study, pricked in his conscience, and vaguely sore with Letty. Why? +Women in his eyes were made for silken gauds and trinkets: it was the +price that men were bound to pay them for their society. He had watched +the same sort of process that had now been applied to himself many times +already in one or more of the Anglo-Indian households with which he had +grown familiar, and had been philosophically amused by it. But the little +comedy, transferred to his own hearth, seemed somehow to have lost humour +and point. + + * * * * * + +Still, with two young people, under thirty, just entering upon that +fateful second act of the play of life which makes or mars us all, +moments of dissatisfaction and depression--even with Shapetskys and Lady +Tressadys in the background--were but rare specks in the general sum of +pleasure. George had fallen once more under the Parliamentary illusion, +as soon as he was again within reach of the House of Commons and in +frequent contact with Fontenoy. The link between him and his strange +leader grew daily stronger as they sat side by side, through some +hard-fought weeks of Supply, throwing the force of their little group now +on the side of the Government, now on that of the Opposition, always +vigilant, and often successful. George became necessary to Fontenoy in a +hundred ways; for the younger man had a mass of _connaissances_,--to use +the irreplaceable French word,--the result of his more normal training +and his four years of intelligent travel, which Fontenoy was almost +wholly without. Many a blunder did George save his chief; and no one +could have offered his brains for the picking with a heartier goodwill. +On the other hand, the instinctive strength and acuteness of Fontenoy's +judgment were unmatched, according to Tressady's belief, in the House of +Commons. He was hardly ever deceived in a man, or in the significant +points of a situation. His followers never dreamt of questioning his +verdict on a point of tactics. They followed him blindly; and if the gods +sent defeat, no one blamed Fontenoy. But in success his grunt of approval +or congratulation rewarded the curled young aristocrats who made the +nucleus of his party as nothing else did; while none of his band ever +affronted or overrode him with impunity. He wielded a natural kingship, +and, the more battered and gnarled became his physical presence, the more +remarkable was his moral ascendency. + +One discouragement, however, he and his group suffered during the weeks +between Easter and Whitsuntide. They were hungry for battle, and the +best of the battle was for the moment denied them; for, owing to a number +of controverted votes in Supply and the slipping-in of two or three +inevitable debates on pressing matters of current interest, the Second +Reading of the Maxwell Bill was postponed till after Whitsuntide, when it +was certainly to take precedence. There was a good deal of grumbling in +the House, led by Fontenoy; but the Government could only vow that they +had no choice, and that their adversaries could not possibly be more +eager to fight than they were to be fought. + +Life, then, on this public side, though not so keen as it would be +presently, was still rich and stirring. And meanwhile society showed +itself gracious to the bride and bridegroom. Letty's marriage had made +her unusually popular for the time with her own acquaintance. For it +might be called success; yet it was not of too dazzling a degree. What, +therefore, with George's public and Parliamentary relations, the calls of +officials, the attentions of personal friends, and the good offices of +Mrs. Watton, who was loftily determined to "launch" her niece, Letty was +always well pleased with the look of her hall-table and the cards upon it +when she returned home in her new brougham from her afternoon round. She +left them there for George to see, and it delighted her particularly if +Lady Tressady came in during the interval. + +Meanwhile they dined with many folk, and made preliminary acquaintance +with the great ones of the land. Letty's vanity Dwelled within her as she +read over the list of her engagements. Nevertheless, she often came home +from her dinner-parties flat and disappointed. She did not feel that she +made way; and she found herself constantly watching the triumphs of other +women with annoyance or perplexity. What was wrong with her? Her dress +was irreproachable, and, stirred by this great roaring world, she +recalled for it the little airs and graces she had almost ceased to spend +on George. But she constantly found herself, as she thought, neglected; +while the slightest word or look of some happy person in a simple gown, +near by, had power to bring about her that flattering crowd of talkers +and of courtiers for which Letty pined. + +The Maxwells called very early on the newly wedded pair, and left an +invitation to dinner with their cards. But, to Letty's chagrin, she and +George were already engaged for the evening named, and when they duly +presented themselves at St. James's Square on a Sunday afternoon, it was +to find that the Maxwells were in the country. Once or twice in some +crowded room Letty or George had a few hurried words with Lady Maxwell, +and Marcella would try to plan a meeting. But what with her engagements +and theirs, nothing that she suggested could be done. + +"Ah! well, after Whitsuntide," she said, smiling, to Letty one evening +that they had interchanged a few words of polite regret on the stairs at +some official party. "I will write to you in the country, if I may. Ferth +Place, is it not?" + +"No," said Letty, with easy dignity; "we shall not be at home,--not at +first, at any rate. We are going for two or three days to Mrs. Allison, +at Castle Luton." + +"Are you? You will have a pleasant time. Such a glorious old house!" + +And Lady Maxwell swept on; not so fast, however, but that she found time +to have a few words of Parliamentary chat with Tressady on the landing. + +Letty made her little speech about Castle Luton with a delightful sense +of playing the rare and favoured part. Nothing in her London career, so +far, had pleased her so much as Mrs. Allison's call and Mrs. Allison's +invitation. For, although on the few occasions when she had seen this +gentle, white-haired lady, Letty had never felt for one moment at ease +with her, still, there could be no question that Mrs. Allison was, +socially, distinction itself. She had a following among all parties. +For although she was Fontenoy's friend and inspirer, a strong +Church-woman, and a great aristocrat, she had that delicate, +long-descended charm which shuts the lions' mouths, and makes it +possible for certain women to rule in any company. Even those who were +most convinced that the Mrs. Allisons of this world are the chief +obstacles in the path of progress, deliberated when they were asked to +Castle Luton, and fell--protesting. And for a certain world, high-born, +cultivated, and virtuous, she was almost a figure of legend, so +widespread was the feeling she inspired, and so many were the +associations and recollections that clustered about her. + +So that when her cards, those of her son Lord Ancoats, and a little +accompanying note in thin French handwriting--Mrs. Allison had been +brought up in Paris--arrived, Letty had a start of pleasure. "To meet a +few friends of mine"--that meant, of course, one of _the_ parties. She +supposed it was Lord Fontenoy's doing. He was said to ask whom he would +to Castle Luton. Under the influence of this idea, at any rate, she bore +herself towards her husband's chief at their next meeting with an +effusion which made Fontenoy supremely uncomfortable. + +The week before Whitsuntide happened to be one of special annoyance for +Tressady. His reports from Ferth were steadily more discouraging; his +attempts to sell his land made no way; and he saw plainly that, if he was +to keep their London life going, to provide for Shapetsky's claims, and +to give Letty what she wanted for renovations at Ferth, he would have to +sell some of the very small list of good securities left him by his +father. Most young men in his place, perhaps, would have taken such a +thing with indifference; he brooded over it. "I am beginning to spend my +capital as income," he said to himself. "The strike will be on in July; +next half-year I shall get almost nothing from the pits; rents won't come +to much; Letty wants all kinds of things. How long will it be before I, +too, am in debt, like my mother, borrowing from this person and that?" + +Then he would make stern resolutions of economy, only to be baffled by +Letty's determination to have everything that other people had; above +all, not to allow her own life to be stinted because he had so foolishly +adopted his mother's debts. She said little; or said it with smiles and a +bridal standing on her rights not to be answered. But her persistence in +a particular kind of claim, and her new refusal to be taken into his +confidence and made the partner of his anxieties, raised a miserable +feeling in his mind as the weeks went on. + +"No!" she said to herself, all the time resenting bitterly what had +happened at Ferth; "if I let him talk to me about it, I shall be giving +in, and letting _her_ trample on me! If George will be so weak, he must +find the money somehow. Of course he can! I am not in the _least_ +extravagant. I am only doing what everybody expects me to do." + +Meanwhile this state of things did not make Lady Tressady any more +welcome in Brook Street, and there were symptoms of grievances and +quarrels of another sort. Lady Tressady heard that the young couple had +already given one or two tiny dinner-parties, and to none of them had she +been invited. One day that George had been obliged to go to Warwick +Square to consult her on business, he was suddenly overwhelmed with +reproaches on this point. + +"I suppose Letty thinks I should spoil her parties! She is ashamed of me, +perhaps"--Lady Tressady gave an angry laugh. "Oh! very well; but I should +like you and her to understand, George, that I have been a good deal more +admired in my time than ever Letty need expect to be!" + +And George's mother, in a surprising yellow tea-gown, threw herself back +on her chair, bridling with wrath and emotion. George declared, with good +temper, that he and Letty were well aware of his mother's triumphs; +whereupon Lady Tressady, becoming tearful, said she knew it wasn't a +pretty thing to say--of course it wasn't--but if one was treated unkindly +by one's only son and his wife, what could one do but assert oneself? + +George soothed her as best he could, and on his return home said +tentatively to Letty, that he believed it would please his mother if they +were to ask her to a small impromptu dinner of Parliamentary friends +which they were planning for the following Friday. + +"George!" exclaimed Letty, her eyes gleaming, "we can't ask her! I don't +want to say anything disagreeable, but you must see that people don't +like her--her dress is so _extraordinary_, and her manners--it sets +people against the house. I do think it's too bad that--" + +She turned aside with a sudden sob. George kissed her, and sympathised +with her; for he himself was never at ease now for an instant while his +mother was in the room. But the widening of the breach which Letty's +refusal brought about only made his own position between the two women +the more disagreeable to a man whose ideal of a home was that it should +be a place of perpetual soothing and amusement. + +On the very morning of their departure for Castle Luton matters reached a +small crisis. Letty, tired with some festivity of the night before, took +her breakfast in bed; and George, going upstairs toward the middle of the +morning to make some arrangement with her for the journey, found her just +come down, and walking up and down the drawing-room, her pale pink dress +sweeping the floor, her hands clasped behind her. She was very pale, and +her small lips were tightly drawn. + +He looked at her with astonishment. + +"What is the matter, darling?" + +"Oh! nothing," said Letty, trying to speak with sarcasm. "Nothing at all. +I have only just been listening to an account of the way in which your +mother speaks of me to her friends. I ought to be flattered, of course, +that she notices me at all! But I think I shall have to ask you to +_request_ her to put off her visit to Ferth a little. It could hardly +give either of us much enjoyment." + +George first pulled his moustaches, then tried, as usual, to banter or +kiss her into composure. Above all, he desired not to know what Lady +Tressady had said. But Letty was determined he should know. "She was +heard "--she began passionately, holding him at arm's length--"she was +heard saying to a _whole roomful_ of people yesterday, that I was +'pretty, of course--rather pretty--but _so_ second rate--and so +provincial! It was such a pity dear George had not waited till he had +been a few months in London. Still, of course, one could only make the +best of it!'" + +Letty mimicked her mother-in-law's drawling voice, two red spots burning +on either cheek the while, and her little fingers gripping George's arm. + +"I don't believe she ever said such things. Who told you so?" said +George, stiffening, his arm dropping from her waist. + +Letty tossed her head. + +"Never mind! I _ought_ to know, and it doesn't really matter how I know. +She _did_ say them." + +"Yes, it does matter," said George, quickly, walking away to the other +side of the room. "Letty! if you would only send away that woman Grier, +you can't think how much happier we should both be." + +Letty stood still, opening her blue eyes wide. + +"You want me--to get rid--of Grier," she said, "my own particular pet +maid? And why--please?" + +George had the courage to stick to his point, and the result was a heated +and angry scene--their first real quarrel--which ended in Letty's rushing +upstairs in tears, and declaring she would go _no_where. _He_ might go to +Castle Luton, if he pleased; she was far too agitated and exhausted to +face a houseful of strangers. + +The inevitable reconciliation, with its usual accompaniments of headache +and eau de cologne, took time, and they only just completed their +preparations and caught their appointed train. + +Meanwhile the storm of the day had taken all savour from Letty's +expectations, and made George feel the whole business an effort and a +weariness. Letty sat pale and silent in her corner, devoured with regrets +that she had not put on a thicker veil to hide the ravages of the +morning; while George turned over the pages of a political biography, and +could not prevent his mind from falling back again and again into dark +places of dread and depression. + + * * * * * + +"You are my earliest guests," said Mrs. Allison, as she placed a chair +for Letty beside herself, on the lawn at Castle Luton. "Except, indeed, +that Lady Maxwell and her little boy are here somewhere, roaming about. +But none of our other friends could get down till later. I am glad we +shall have a little quiet time before they come." + +"Lady Maxwell!" said Letty. "I had no idea they were coming. Oh, what a +lovely day! and how beautiful it all is!" she cried, as she sat down and +looked round her. The colour came back into her cheeks. She forgot her +determination to keep her veil down, and raised it eagerly. + +Mrs. Allison smiled. + +"We never look so well as in May--the river is so full, and the swans are +so white. Ah! I see Edgar has already taken Sir George to make friends +with them." + +And Letty, looking across the broad green lawn, saw the flash of a +brimming river and a cluster of white swans, beside which stood her +husband and a young man in a serge suit, who was feeding the swans with +bread--Lord Ancoats, no doubt, the happy owner of all this splendour. To +the left of their figures rose a stone bridge with a high, carved +parapet, and beyond the river she saw green hills and woods against a +radiant sky. Then, to her right was this wonderful yellowish pile of the +old house. She began to admire and exclaim about it with a great energy +and effusion, trying hard to say the correct and cultivated thing, and, +in fact, repeating with a good deal of exactness what she had heard said +of it by others. + +Her hostess listened to her praises with a gentle smile. Gentleness, +indeed, a rather sad gentleness, was the characteristic of Mrs. Allison. +It seemed to make an atmosphere about her--her delicate blanched head and +soft face, her small figure, her plain black dress, her hands in their +white ruffles. Her friends called it saintliness. At any rate, it set her +apart, giving her a peculiar ethereal dignity which made her formidable +in society to many persons who were not liable to shyness. Letty from the +beginning had felt her formidable. + +Yet nothing could be kinder or simpler than her manner. In response to +Letty's enthusiasms she let herself be drawn at once into speaking of her +own love for the house, and on to pointing out its features. + +"I am always telling these things to newcomers," she said, smiling. "And +I am not clever enough to make variations. But I don't mind, somehow, how +often I go through it. You see, this front is Tudor, and the south front +is a hundred years later, and both of them, they say, are the finest of +their kind. Isn't it wonderful that two men, a hundred years apart, +should each have left such a noble thing behind him. One inspired the +other. And then we--we poor moderns come after, and must cherish what +they left us as we best can. It's a great responsibility, don't you +think? to live in a beautiful house." + +"I'm afraid I don't know much about it," said Letty, laughing; "we live +in such a very ugly one." + +Mrs. Allison looked sympathetic. + +"Oh! but then, ugly ones have character; or they are pretty inside, or +the people one loves have lived in them. That would make any place a +House Beautiful. Aren't you near Perth?" + +"Yes; and I am afraid you'll think me _dreadfully_ discontented," +said Letty, with one of her little laughing airs; "but there really +isn't anything to make up in our barrack of a place. It's like a +blackened brick set up on end at the top of a hill. And then the +villages are so hideous." + +"Ah! I know that coal-country," said Mrs. Allison, gravely--"and I know +the people. Have you made friends with them yet?" + +"We were only there for our honeymoon. George says that next month the +whole place will be out on strike. So just now they hate us--they will +hardly look at us in the street. But, of course, we shall give away +things at Christmas." + +Mrs. Allison's lip twitched, and she shot a glance at the bride which +betrayed, for all her gentleness, the woman of a large world and much +converse with mankind. What a curious, hard little face was Lady +Tressady's under the outer softness of line and hue, and what an amazing +costume! Mrs. Allison had no quarrel with beautiful gowns, but the +elaboration, or, as one might say, the research of Letty's dress struck +her unpleasantly. The time that it must have taken to think out! + +Aloud she said: + +"Ah! the strike. Yes, I fear it is inevitable. Ancoats has some property +not very far from you, and we get reports. Poor fellows! if it weren't +for the wretched agitators who mislead them--but there, we mustn't talk +of these things. I see Lady Maxwell coming." + +And Mrs. Allison waved her hand to a tall figure in white with a child +beside it that had just emerged on the far distance of the lawn. + +"Is Lord Maxwell here, too?" asked Letty. + +"He is coming later. It seems strange, perhaps, that you should find them +here this Sunday, for Lord Fontenoy comes to-morrow, and the great fight +will be on so soon. But when I found that they were free, and that +Maxwell would like to come, I was only too glad. After all, rival +politicians in England can still meet each other, even at a crisis. +Besides, Maxwell is a relation of ours, and he was my boy's guardian--the +kindest possible guardian. Politics apart, I have the greatest respect +for him. And her too. Why is it always the best people in the world that +do the most mischief?" + +At the mention of Lord Fontenoy it had been Letty's turn to throw a +quick side look at Mrs. Allison. But the name was spoken in the quietest +and most natural way; and yet, if one analysed the tone, in a way that +did imply something exceptional, which, however, all the world knew, or +might know. + +"Is Lady Maxwell an old friend of yours, too?" asked Letty, longing to +pursue the subject, and vexed to see how fast the mother and child were +approaching. + +"Only since her marriage. To see her and Maxwell together is really a +poem. If only she wouldn't identify herself so hotly, dear woman! with +everything he does and wishes in politics. There is no getting her to +hear a word of reason. She is another Maxwell in petticoats. And it +always seems to me so unfair. Maxwell without beauty and without +petticoats is quite enough to fight! Look at that little fellow with his +flowers!--such an oddity of a child!" + +Then she raised her voice. + +"My dear, what a ramble you must have made. Come and have a shady chair +and some tea." + +For answer Marcella, laughing, held up a glorious bunch of cuckoo-pint +and marsh marigold, while little Hallin at her skirts waved another +trophy of almost equal size. The mother's dark face was flushed with +exercise and pleasure. As she moved over the grass, the long folds of a +white dress falling about her, the flowers in her hand, the child beside +her, she made a vision of beauty lovely in itself and lovely in all that +it suggested. Frank joy and strength, happiness, purity of heart--these +entered with her. One could almost see their dim heavenly shapes in the +air about her. + +Neither Letty nor Mrs. Allison could take their eyes from her. Perhaps +she knew it. But if she did, it made no difference to her perfect ease of +bearing. She greeted Letty kindly. + +"You didn't expect to see me here, did you, Lady Tressady? But it is the +unexpected that happens." + +Then she put her hand on Mrs. Allison's shoulder, bending her height to +her small hostess. + +"What a day, and what a place! Hallin and I have been over hill and dale. +But he is getting such a botanist, the little monkey! He will hardly +forgive me because I forgot one of the flowers we found out yesterday in +his botany book." + +"She said it was 'Robin-run-in-the-'edge,' and it isn't--it's 'edge +mustard," said Hallin, severely, holding up a little feathery stalk. + +Mrs. Allison shook her head, endeavouring to suit her look to the gravity +of the offence. + +"Mother must learn her lessons better, mustn't she? Go and shake hands, +little man, with Lady Tressady." + +Hallin went gravely to do as he was told. Then he stood on one foot, and +looked Letty over with a considering eye. + +"Are you going to a party?" he said suddenly, putting out a small and +grimy finger, and pointing to her dress. + +"Hallin! come here and have your tea," said his mother, hastily. Then she +turned to Letty with the smile that had so often won Maxwell a friend. + +"I am sorry to say that he has a rooted objection to anything that isn't +rags in the way of clothes. He entirely declined to take me across the +river till I had rolled up my lace cloak and put it in a bush. And he +won't really be friends with me again till we have both got back to the +scarecrow garments we wear at home." + +"Oh! children are so much happier when they are dirty," said Letty, +graciously, pleased to feel herself on these easy terms with her two +companions. "What beautiful flowers he has! and what an astonishing +little botanist he seems to be!" + +And she seated herself beside Hallin, using all her blandishments to make +friends with him, which, however, did not prove to be an easy matter. For +when she praised his flowers, Hallin only said, with his mouth full: "Oh! +but mammy's bunch is _hever_ so much bigger;" and when she offered him +cake, the child would sturdily put the cake away, and hold it and her at +arm's length till his mute look across the table had won his mother's nod +of permission. + +Letty at last thought him an odd, ill-mannered child, and gave up +courting him, greatly to Hallin's satisfaction. He edged closer and +closer to his mother, established himself finally in her pocket, and +browsed on all the good things with which Mrs. Allison provided him, +undisturbed. + +"How late they are!" said Marcella, looking at her watch. "Tell me +the names again, dear lady"--she bent forward, and laid her hand +affectionately on Mrs. Allison's knee. "Your parties are always a +work of art." + +Mrs. Allison flushed a little, as though she liked the compliment, and +ran laughingly through the names. + +"Lord and Lady Maxwell." + +"Ah!" said Marcella, "the least said about them the soonest +mended. Go on." + +"Lord and Lady Cathedine." + +Marcella made a face. + +"Poor little thing! I always think of the remark about the Queen in +'Alice in Wonderland.' 'A little kindness, and putting her hair in +curl-papers, would do wonders for her.' She is so limp and thin and +melancholy. As for him--isn't there a race or a prize-fight we can +send him to?" + +Mrs. Allison tapped her lightly on the lips. + +"I won't go on unless my guests are taken prettily." + +Marcella kissed the delicate wrinkled hand. + +"I'll be good. What do you keep such an air here for? It gets into +one's head." + +Letty Tressady, indeed, was looking on with a feeling of astonishment. +These merry, childlike airs had absolutely no place in her conception of +Lady Maxwell. Nor could she know that Mrs. Allison was one of the very +few people in the world to whom Marcella was ever drawn to show them. + +"Sir Philip Wentworth," pursued Mrs. Allison, smiling. "Say anything +malicious about him, if you can!" + +"Don't provoke me. What a mercy I brought a volume of 'Indian Studies' in +my bag! I will go up early, before dinner, and finish them." + +"Then there is Madeleine Penley, and Elizabeth Kent." + +A quick involuntary expression crossed Marcella's face. Then she drew +herself up with dignity, and crossed her hands primly on her lap. + +"Let me understand. Are you going to protect me from Lady Kent this time? +Because, last time you threw me to the wolves in the most dastardly way." + +Mrs. Allison laughed out. + +"On the contrary, we all enjoyed your skirmish with her in November so +much, we shall do our best to provoke another in May." + +Marcella shook her head. + +"I haven't the energy to quarrel with a fly. And as for Aldous--please +warn his lady at dinner that he may go to sleep upon her shoulder!" + +"You poor thing!"--Mrs. Allison put out a sympathetic hand. "Are you so +tired? Why will you turn the world upside down?" + +Marcella took the hand lightly in both hers. + +"Why will you fight reform?" + +And the eyes of the two women met, not without a sudden grave passion. +Then Marcella dropped the hand, and said, smiling: + +"Castle Luton isn't full yet. Who else?" + +"Oh! some young folk--Charlie Naseby." + +"A nice boy--a very nice boy--not half such a coxcomb as he looks. Then +the Levens--I know the Levens are coming, for Betty told me that she got +out of two other engagements as soon as you asked her." + +"Oh! and, by the way, Mr. Watton--Harding Watton," said Mrs. Allison, +turning slightly towards Lady Tressady. + +The exclamation on Lady Maxwell's lips was checked by something she saw +on her hostess's face, and Letty eagerly struck in: + +"Harding coming?--my cousin? I am so glad. I suppose I oughtn't to say +it, but he is such a _clever_, such an _agreeable_, creature. But you +know the Wattons, don't you, Lady Maxwell?" + +Marcella was busying herself with Hallin's tea. + +"I know Edward Watton," she said, turning her beautiful clear look on +Letty. "He is a real friend of mine." + +"Oh! but Harding is _much_ the cleverer," said Letty. And pleased both +to find the ball of talk in her hands, and to have the chance of +glorifying a relation in this world of people so much bigger than +herself, she plunged into an extravagant account--all adjectives and +superlatives--of Harding Watton's charms and abilities, to which Lady +Maxwell listened in silence. + +"Tactless!" thought Mrs. Allison, with vexation, but she did not know +how to stop the stream. In truth, since she had given Lord Fontenoy +leave to invite Harding Watton she had had time to forget the +invitation, and she was sorry now to think of his housing with the +Maxwells. For Watton had been recently Lord Fontenoy's henchman and +agent in a newspaper attack upon the Bill, and upon Maxwell personally, +that even Mrs. Allison had thought violent and unfair. Well, it was not +her fault. But Lady Tressady ought to have better information and better +sense than to be chattering like this. She was just about to interpose, +when Marcella held up her hand. + +"I hear the carriages!" + +The hostess hastened towards the house, and Marcella followed her, with +Hallin at her skirts. Letty looked after Lady Maxwell with the same +mixture of admiration and jealous envy she had felt several times +before. "I don't feel that I shall get on with her," she said to +herself, impatiently. "But I don't think I want to. George took her +measure at once." + +Part of this reflection, however, was not true. Letty's ambition would +have been very glad to "get on" with Marcella Maxwell. + + * * * * * + +Just as his wife was ready for dinner, and Grier had disappeared, George +entered Letty's room. She was standing before a tall glass, putting the +last touches to her dress--smoothing here, pinning there, turning to this +side and to that. George, unseen himself, stood and watched her--her +alternate looks of anxiety and satisfaction, her grace, the shimmering +folds of the magnificent wedding-dress in which she had adorned herself. + +He, however, was neither happy nor gay. But he had come in feeling that +he must make an effort--many efforts, if their young married life was to +be brought back to that level of ease and pleasure which he had once +taken for granted, and which now seemed so hard to maintain. If that ease +and pleasure were ultimately to fail him, what should he do? He shrank +impatiently from the idea. Then he would scoff at himself. How often had +he read and heard that the first year of marriage is the most difficult. +Of course it must be so. Two individualities cannot fuse without turmoil, +without heat. Let him only make his effort. + +So he walked up to her and caught her in his arms. + +"Oh, George!--my hair!--and my flowers!" + +"Never mind," he said, almost with roughness. "Put your head there. Say +you hate the thought of our day, as I do! Say there shall never be one +like it again! Promise me!" + +She felt the beating of his heart beneath her cheek. But she stood +silent. His appeal, his unwonted agitation, revived in her all the anger +and irritation that had begun to prey upon her thoughts. It was all very +well, but why were they so pinched and uncomfortable? Why must +everybody--Mrs. Allison, Lady Maxwell, a hundred others--have more +wealth, more scope, more consideration than she? It was partly his fault. + +So she gradually drew herself away, pushing him softly with her small +gloved hand. + +"I am sure I hate quarrelling," she said. "But there! Oh, George! don't +let's talk of it any more! And look what you have done to my poor hair. +You dear, naughty boy!" + +But though she called him "Dear," she frowned as she took off her gloves +that she might mend what he had done. + +George thrust his hands into his pockets, walked to the window, and +waited. As he descended the great stairs in her wake he wished Castle +Luton and its guests at the deuce. What pleasure was to be got out of +grimacing and posing at these country-house parties? And now, according +to Letty, the Maxwells were here. A great _gene_ for everybody! + + + + +CHAPTER XI + + +"That lady sitting by Sir George? What! Lady Maxwell? No--the other side? +Oh! that's Lady Leven. Don't you know her? She's tremendous fun!" + +And the dark-eyed, rosy-cheeked young man who was sitting beside Letty +nodded and smiled across the table to Betty Leven, merely by way of +reminding her of his existence. They had greeted before dinner--a +greeting of comrades. + +Then he turned back, with sudden decorum, to this Lady Tressady, whom he +had been commissioned to take in to dinner. "Quite pretty, but +rather--well, ordinary!" he said to himself, with a critical coolness +bred of much familiarity with the best things of Vanity Fair. He had been +Ancoats's friend at Cambridge, and was now disporting himself in the +Guards, but still more--as Letty of course assumed--in the heart of the +English well-born world. She knew that he was Lord Naseby, and that some +day he would be a marquis. A halo, therefore, shone about him. At the +same time, she had a long experience of young men, and, if she flattered +him, it was only indirectly, by a sort of teasing aggression that did not +allow him to take his attention from her. + +"I declare you are better than any peerage!" she said to him presently, +when he had given her a short biography, first of Lord Cathedine, who was +sitting opposite, then of various other members of the company. "I should +like to tie you to my fan when I go out to dinner." + +"Would you?" said the young man, drily. "Oh! you will soon know all you +want to know." + +"How are poor little people from Yorkshire to find their way about in +this big world? You are all so dreadfully absorbed in each other. In the +first place, you all marry each other." + +"Do we?--though I don't quite understand who 'we' means. Well, one +must marry somebody, I suppose, and cousins are less trouble than +other people." + +Involuntarily, the young man's eyes travelled along the table to a fair +girl on the opposite side, dazzlingly dressed in black. She was wielding +a large fan of black feathers, which threw both hair and complexion into +amazing relief; and she seemed to be amusing herself in a nervous, +spasmodic way with Sir Frank Leven. Letty noticed his glance. + +"Oh! you have not earned your testimonial yet, not by any manner of +means," she said. "That is Lady Madeleine Penley, isn't it? Is she a +relation of Mrs. Allison's?" + +"She is a cousin. That is her mother, Lady Kent, sitting beside poor +Ancoats. Such an old character! By the end of dinner she will have got to +the bottom of Ancoats, or know the reason why." + +"Is Lord Ancoats such a mystery?" said Letty, running an inquisitive +eye over the black front, sharp nose, and gorgeously bejewelled neck +of a somewhat noisy and forbidding old lady sitting on the right hand +of the host. + +Young Naseby's expression in answer rather piqued her. There was a quick +flash of something that was instantly suppressed, and the youth said +composedly, + +"Oh! we are all mysteries for Lady Kent." + +But Letty noticed that his eyes strayed back to Lord Ancoats, and then +again to Lady Madeleine. He seemed to be observing them, and Letty's +sharpness at once took the hint. No doubt the handsome, large-featured +girl was here to be "looked at." Probably a good many maidens would be +passed in review before this young Sultan made his choice! By the way he +must be a good deal older than George had imagined. Clearly he left +college some time ago. What a curious face he had--a small, crumpled +face, with very prominent blue eyes; curly hair of a reddish colour, +piled high, as though for effect, above his white brow; together with a +sharp chin and pointed moustache, which gave him the air of an old French +portrait. He was short in stature, but at the same time agile and +strongly built. He wore one or two fine old rings, which drew attention +to the delicacy of his hands; and his manner struck her as at once morose +and excitable. Letty regarded him with involuntary respect as the son of +Mrs. Allison--much more as the master of Castle Luton and fifty thousand +a year. But if he had not been the master of Castle Luton she would have +probably thought, and said, that he had a disagreeable Bohemian air. + +"Haven't you really made acquaintance with Lady Kent?" said Lord Naseby, +returning to the charge his laziness was somewhat at a loss for +conversation. "I should have thought she was the person one could least +escape knowing in the three kingdoms." + +"I have seen her, of course," said Letty, lightly, though, alas! untruly. +"But I am afraid you can hardly realise that I have only been three short +seasons in London--two with an old aunt, who never goes out, in Cavendish +Square, poor dull old dear! and another with Mrs. Watton, of Malford." + +"Oh! with Mrs. Watton, of Malford," said Lord Naseby, vaguely. Then he +became suddenly aware that Lady Leven, on the other side of the table, +was beckoning to him. He leant across, and they exchanged a merry war of +words about something of which Letty knew nothing. + +Letty, rather incensed, thought him a puppy, drew herself up, and looked +round at the ex-Governor beside her. She saw a fine head, the worn yellow +face and whitened hair of a man who has suffered under a hot climate, and +an agreeable, though somewhat courtly, smile. Sir Philip Wentworth was +not troubled with the boyish fastidiousness of Lord Naseby. He perceived +merely that a pretty young woman wished to make friends with him, and met +her wish at once. Moreover, he identified her as the wife of that +"promising and well-informed fellow, Tressady," with whom he had first +made friends in India, and had now--just before dinner--renewed +acquaintance in the most cordial fashion. + +He talked graciously to the wife, then, of Tressady's abilities and +Tressady's career. Letty at first liked it. Then she was seized with a +curious sense of discomfort. + +Her eyes wandered towards the head of the table, where George was +talking--why! actually talking earnestly, and as though he were enjoying +himself, to Lady Maxwell, whose noble head and neck, rising from a silver +white dress, challenged a great Genoese Vandyck of a Marehesa Balbi which +was hanging just behind her, and challenged it victoriously. + +So other people thought and said these things of George? Letty +was for a moment sharply conscious that they had not occupied much +place in her mind since her marriage, or, for the matter of that, +since her engagement. She had taken it for granted that he was +"distinguished"--that was part of the bargain. Only, she never seemed as +yet to have had either time or thought to give to those parts and +elements in his life which led people to talk of him as this old Indian +was doing. + +Curtains, carpets, gowns, cabinets; additions to Ferth; her own effect in +society; how to keep Lady Tressady in her place--of all these things she +had thought, and thought much. But George's honourable ambitions, the +esteem in which he was held, the place he was to make for himself in the +world of men--in thinking of _these_ her mind was all stiff and +unpractised. She was conscious first of a moral prick, then of a certain +irritation with other people. + +Yet she could not help watching George wistfully. He looked tired and +pale, in spite of the animation of his talk. Well! no doubt she looked +pale too. Some of the words and phrases of their quarrel flashed across +her. In this beautiful room, with its famous pictures and its historical +associations, amid this accumulated art and wealth, the whole thing was +peculiarly odious to remember. Under the eyes of Vandyck's Marchesa one +would have liked to think of oneself as always dignified and refined, +always elegant and calm. + +Then Letty had a revulsion, and laughed at herself. + +"As if these people didn't have tempers, and quarrel about money! Of +course they do! And if they don't--well, we all know how easy it is to be +amiable on fifty thousand a year." + + * * * * * + +After dinner Mrs. Allison led the way to the "Green Drawing-room." This +room, hung with Gainsborough portraits, was one of the sights of the +house, and tonight Marcella Maxwell especially looked round her on +entering it, with enchantment. + +"You happy people!" she said to Mrs. Allison. "I never come into this +room without anxiously asking myself whether I am fit to make one of the +company. I look at my dress, or I am doubtful about my manners, or I wish +someone had taught me to dance the minuet!" + +"Yes," said Betty Leven, running up to a vast picture, a life-size family +group, which covered the greater part of the farther wall of the room. +"What a vulgar, insignificant chit one feels oneself without cap or +powder!--without those ruffles, or those tippets, or those quilted +petticoats! Mrs. Allison, _may_ my maid come down to-morrow while we are +at dinner and take the pattern of those ruffles? No--no! she sha'n't! +Sacrilege! You pretty thing!" she said, addressing a figure--the figure +of a girl in white with thin virginal arms and bust, who seemed to be +coming out of the picture, almost to be already out of it and in the +room. "Come and talk to me. Don't think any more of your father and +mother there. You have been curtsying to them for a hundred years; and +they are rather dull, stupid people, after all. Come and tell us secrets. +Tell us what you have seen in this room--all the foolish people making +love, and the sad people saying good-bye." + +Betty was kneeling on a carved chair, her pretty arms leaning on the back +of it, her eyes fixed half-in laughter, half in sentiment, on the figure +in the picture. + +Lady Maxwell suddenly moved closer to her, and Letty heard her say in a +low voice, as she put her hand on Lady Leven's arm: + +"Don't, Betty! _don't!_ It was in this room he proposed to her, and +it was in this room he said goodbye. Maxwell has often told me. I +believe she never comes in here alone--only for ceremony and when +there is a crowd." + +A look of consternation crossed Lady Leven's lively little face. She +glanced shyly towards Mrs. Allison. That lady had moved hastily away from +the group in front of the picture. She was sitting by herself, looking +straight before her, with a certain stiffness, her thin hands crossed on +her knee. Betty impetuously went towards her, and was soon sitting on a +stool beside her, chattering to her and amusing her. + +Meanwhile Marcella invited Lady Tressady to come and sit with her on a +sofa beneath the great picture. + +Letty followed her, settled her satin skirts in their most graceful +folds, put one little foot on a Louis Quinze footstool which seemed +to invite it, and then began to inform herself about the house and +the family. + +At the beginning of their talk it was clear that Lady Maxwell wished to +ingratiate herself. A friendly observer would have thought that she was +trying to make a stranger feel more at ease in this house and circle, +where she herself was a familiar guest. Betty Leven, catching sight of +the pair from the other side of the room, said to herself, with inward +amusement, that Marcella was "realising the wife." + +At any rate, for some time Lady Maxwell talked with sympathy, with +effusion even, to her companion. In the first place she told her the +story of their hostess. + +Thirty years before, Mrs. Allison, the daughter and heiress of a +Leicestershire squire, had married Henry Allison, old Lord Ancoats's +second son, a young captain in the Guards. They enjoyed three years of +life together; then the chances of a soldier's career, as interpreted by +two high-minded people, took Henry Allison out to an obscure African +coast, to fight one of the innumerable "little wars" of his country. He +fell, struck by a spear, in a single-file march through some nameless +swamp; and a few days afterwards the words of a Foreign Office telegram +broke a pining woman's heart. + +Old Lord Ancoats's death, which followed within a month or two, was +hastened by the shock of his son's loss; and before the year was out the +eldest son, who was sickly and unmarried, also died, and Mrs. Allison's +boy, a child of two, became the owner of Castle Luton. The mother saw +herself called upon to fight down her grief, to relinquish the +quasi-religious life she had entered upon, and instead to take her boy to +the kingdom he was to rule, and bring him up there. + +"And for twenty-two years she has lived a wonderful life here," said +Marcella; "she has been practically the queen of a whole countryside, +doing whatever she pleased, the mother and friend and saint of everybody. +It has been all very paternal and beautiful, and--abominably Tory and +tyrannous! Many people, I suppose, think it perfect. Perhaps I don't. But +then, I know very well I can't possibly disagree with her a tenth part as +strongly as she disagrees with me." + +"Oh! but she admires you so much," cried Letty, with effusion; "she +thinks you mean so nobly!" + +Marcella opened her eyes, involuntarily wondering a little what Lady +Tressady might know about it. + +"Oh! we don't hate each other," she said, rather drily, "in spite of +politics. And my husband was Ancoats's guardian." + +"Dear me!" said Letty. "I should think it wasn't easy to be guardian to +fifty thousand a year." + +Marcella did not answer--did not, indeed, hear. Her look had stolen +across to Mrs. Allison--a sad, affectionate look, in no way meant for +Lady Tressady. But Letty noticed it. + +"I suppose she adores him," she said. + +Marcella sighed. + +"There was never anything like it. It frightens one to see." + +"And that, of course, is why she won't marry Lord Fontenoy?" + +Marcella started, and drew away from her companion. + +"I don't know," she said stiffly; "and I am sure that no one ever dared +to ask her." + +"Oh! but of course it's what everyone says," said Letty, gay and +unabashed. "That's what makes it so exciting to come here, when one knows +Lord Fontenoy so very well." + +Marcella met this remark with a discouraging silence. + +Letty, however, was determined this time to make her impression. She +plunged into a lively and often audacious gossip about every person in +the room in turn, asking a number of intimate or impertinent questions, +and yet very seldom waiting for Marcella's reply, so anxious was she to +show off her own information and make her own comments. She let Marcella +understand that she suspected a great deal, in the matter of that +handsome Lady Madeleine. It was _immensely_ interesting, of course; but +wasn't Lord Ancoats a trifle wild?--she bent over and whispered in +Marcella's ears; was it likely that he would settle himself so +soon?--didn't one hear sad tales of his theatrical friends and the rest? +And what could one expect! As if a young man in such a position was not +certain to have his fling! And his mother would have to put up with it. +After all, men quieted down at last. Look at Lord Cathedine! + +And with an air of boundless knowledge she touched upon the incidents of +Lord Cathedine's career, hashing up, with skilful deductions of her own, +all that Lord Naseby had said or hinted to her at dinner. Poor Lady +Cathedine! didn't she look a walking skeleton, with her strange, +melancholy face, and every bone showing? Well, who could wonder! And when +one thought of their money difficulties, too! + +Lady Tressady lifted her white shoulders in compassion. + +By this time Marcella's black eyes were wandering insistently round the +room, searching for means of escape. Betty, far away, noticed her air, +and concluded that the "realisation" was making rapid, too rapid, +progress. Presently, with a smiling shake of her little head, she left +her own seat and went to her friend's assistance. + +At the same moment Mrs. Allison, driven by her conscience as a hostess, +got up for the purpose of introducing Lady Tressady to a lady in grey who +had been sitting quiet, and, as Mrs. Allison feared, lonely, in a corner, +looking over some photographs. Marcella, who had also risen, put out a +hand to Betty, and the two moved away together. + + * * * * * + +They stopped on the threshold of a large window at the side of the room, +which stood wide open to the night. Outside, beyond a broad flight of +steps, stretched a formal Dutch garden. Its numberless small beds, +forming stiff scrolls and circles on a ground of white gravel, lay in +bright moonlight. Even the colours of the hyacinths and tulips with which +they were planted could be seen, and the strong scent from them filled +the still air. At the far end of this flat-patterned place a group of +tall cypress and ilex, black against the sky, struck a note of Italy and +the South; while, through the yew hedges which closed in the little +garden, broad archways pierced at intervals revealed far breadths of +silvery English lawn and the distant gleam of the river. + +"Well, my dear," said Betty, laughing, and slipping her arm through +Marcella's as they stood in the opening of the window, "I see you have +been doing your duty for once. Let me pat you on the back. All the more +that I gather you are not exactly enchanted with Lady Tressady. You +really should keep your face in order. From the other end of the room I +know exactly what you think of the person you are talking to." + +"Do you?" said Marcella, penitently. "I wish you didn't." + +"Well you may wish it, for it doesn't help the political lady to get what +she wants. However, I don't think that Lady Tressady has found out yet +that you don't like her. She isn't thin-skinned. If you had looked like +that when you were talking to me, I would have paid you out somehow. What +is the matter with her?" + +"Oh! I don't know," said Marcella, impatiently, raising her shoulders. +"But she jarred. I pined to get away--I don't think I ever want to talk +to her again." + +"No," said Betty, ruminating; "I'll tell you what it is--she isn't a +gentleman! Don't interrupt me! I mean exactly what I say--_she isn't a +gentleman_. She would do and say all the things that a nice man squirms +at. I always have the oddest fancy about that kind of person. I see them +as they must be at night--all the fine clothes gone--just a little black +soul scrawled between the bedclothes!" + +"_You_ to call me censorious!" said Marcella, laughing, and pinching her +friend's arm. + +"My dear, as I have often before remarked to you, _I_ am not a great +lady, with a political campaign to tight. If you knew your business, you +would make friends with the mammon of unrighteousness in the shape of +Lady Tressadys. _I_ may do what I please--I have only a husband to +manage!" and Betty's light voice dropped into a sigh. + +"Poor Betty!" said Marcella, patting her hand. "Is Frank as +discontented as ever?" + +"He told me yesterday he hated his existence, and thought he would try +whether the Serpentine would drown him. I said I was agreeable, only he +would never achieve it without me. I should have to 'tice away the police +while he looked for the right spot. So he has promised to take me into +partnership, and it's all right so far." + +Then Betty fell to sighing in earnest. + +"It's all very well 'chaffing,' but I am a miserable woman. Frank says +I have ruined his life; that it's all my ambition; that he might have +made a decent country gentleman if I hadn't sown the seed of every vice +in him by driving him into politics. Pleasant, isn't it, for a model +wife like me?" + +"You'll have to let him give it up," said Marcella, smiling; "I don't +believe he'll ever reconcile himself to the grind and the town life." + +Betty clenched her small hands. + +"My dear! I never promised to marry a sporting boor, and I can't yet +make up my mind to sink to it. Don't let's talk of it! I only hope he'll +vote straight in the next few months. But the thought of being kept +through August drives him desperate already. Ah! here they are--plagues +of the human race!--" and she waved an accusing hand towards the incoming +stream of gentlemen. "Now, I'll prophesy, and you watch. Lady Tressady +will make two friends here--Harding Watton--oh! I forgot, he's her +cousin!--and Lord Cathedine. Mark my words. By the way--" Betty caught +Marcella's arm and spoke eagerly into her friend's ear. Her eyes +meanwhile glanced over her shoulder towards Lady Madeleine and her +mother, who were seated on the further side of the room. + +Marcella's look followed Betty's, but she showed no readiness to answer +Betty's questions. When Letty had made her astonishing remarks on the +subject of Madeleine Penley, Lady Maxwell had tried to stop her with a +hauteur which would have abashed most women, though it had but small +effect on the bride. And now, even to Betty, who was Madeleine Penley's +friend, Marcella was not communicative; although when Betty was carried +off by Lord Naseby who came in search of her as soon as he entered the +drawing-room, the elder woman stood for a moment by the window, watching +the girl they had been talking of with a soft serious look. + +But the softness passed. A slight incident disturbed it. For the +spectator saw Lady Kent, who was sitting beside her daughter, raise a +gigantic fan and beckon to Lord Ancoats. He came unwillingly, and she +made some bantering remark. Lady Madeleine meanwhile was bending over a +book of photographs, with a flushed cheek and a look of constraint. +Ancoats stood near her for a moment uneasily, frowning and pulling at his +moustache. Then with an abrupt word to Lady Kent, he turned away and +threw himself on a sofa beside Lord Cathedine. Lady Madeleine bent lower +over her book, her beautiful hair making a spot of fire in the room. +Marcella caught the expression of her profile, and her own face took a +look of pain. She would have liked to go instantly to the girl's side, +with some tenderness, some caress. But that gorgon Lady Kent, now looking +extremely fierce, was in the way, and moreover other young men had +arrived to take the place Ancoats had apparently refused. + +Meanwhile Letty saw the arrival of the gentlemen with delight. She had +found but small entertainment in the lady to whom Mrs. Allison had +introduced her. Miss Paston, the sister of Lord Ancoats's agent, was a +pleasant-looking spinster of thirty-five in a Quakerish dress of grey +silk. Her face bore witness that she was capable and refined. But Letty +felt no desire whatever to explore capability and refinement. She had not +come to Castle Luton to make herself agreeable to Miss Paston. + +So the conversation languished. Letty yawned a little, and flourished her +fan a great deal, till the appearance of the men brought back the flush +to her cheek and animation to her eye. She drew herself up at once, +hungry for notice and success. Mrs. Hawkins, the vicar's wife at +Malford, would have been avenged could she have watched her old tyrant +under these chastening circumstances. + +Harding Watton crossed the room when he saw his cousin, and took the +corner of the sofa beside her. Letty received him graciously, though she +was perhaps disappointed that it was not Lord Ancoats or Lord Cathedine. +Looking round before she gave herself to conversation with him, she saw +that George was standing near the open window with Lord Maxwell and Sir +Philip Wentworth, the ex-Governor. They were talking of India, and Sir +Philip had his hand on George's arm. + +"Yes, I saw Dalliousie go," he said eagerly. "I was only a lad of twenty, +but I can't think of it now without a lump in my throat. When he limped +on to the Hooghly landing-stage on his crutches we couldn't cheer him--I +shall never forget that sudden silence! In eight years he had made a new +India, and there we saw him,--our little hero,--dying of his work at +forty-six before our eyes! ... Well, I couldn't have imagined that a +young man like you would have known or cared so much about that time. +What a talk we have had! Thank you!" + +And the veteran tightened his grip cordially for a moment on Tressady's +arm, then dropped it and walked away. + +Tressady threw his wife a bright glance, as though to ask her how she +fared. Letty smiled graciously in reply, feeling a sudden softening +pleasure in being so thought of. As her eyes met her husband's she saw +Marcella Maxwell, who was still standing by the window, turn towards +George and call to him. George moved forward with alacrity. Then he and +Lady Maxwell slowly walked down the steps to the garden, and disappeared +through one of the archways to the left. + +"That great lady and George seem at last to have made friends," said +Harding Watton to Letty, in a laughing undertone. "I have no doubt she is +trying to win him over. Well she may! Before the next few weeks are over +the Government will be in a fix with this Bill; and not even their +'beautiful lady' will help them out. Maxwell looks as glum as an owl +to-night." + +Letty laughed. The situation pleased her vanity a good deal. The +thought of Lady Maxwell humiliated and defeated--partly by George's +means--was decidedly agreeable to her. Which would seem to show that +she was, after all, more sensitive or more quick-eyed than Betty Leven +had been ready to allow. + + * * * * * + +Meanwhile Marcella and George Tressady were strolling slowly towards the +river, along a path that crossed the great lawns. In front of them the +stretches of grass, bathed in silvery light and air, ran into far +distances of shade under majestic trees just thickening to a June wealth +of foliage. Below, these distant tree-masses made sharp capes and +promontories on the white grass; above, their rounded tops rose dark +against a blue, light-breathing sky. At one point the river pierced the +blackness of the wood, and in the space thus made the spire of a noble +church shot heavenward. Swans floated dimly along the stream and under +the bridge. The air was fresh, but the rawness of spring was gone. It was +the last week of May; the "high midsummer pomps" were near--a heavenly +prophecy in wood and field. + +And not even Tressady's prejudice--which, indeed, was already +vanishing--could fail to see in the beautiful woman beside him the +fitting voice and spirit of such a scene. + +To-night he said to himself that one must needs believe her simple, in +spite of report. During their companionship this evening she had shown +him more and more plainly that she liked his society; her manner towards +him, indeed, had by now a soft surrender and friendliness that no man +could possibly have met with roughness, least of all a man young and +ambitious. But at the same time he noticed again, as he had once noticed +with anger, that she was curiously free from the usual feminine arts and +wiles. After their long talk at dinner, indeed, he began, in spite of +himself, to feel her not merely an intellectual comrade,--that he had +been conscious of from the first,--but rather a most winning and +attaching companion. It was a sentiment of friendly ease, that seemed to +bring with it a great relief from tension. The sordid cares and frictions +of the last few weeks, and the degrading memories of the day itself, +alike ceased to wear him. + +Yet all the time he said to himself, with inward amusement, that he must +take care! They had not talked directly of the Bill at dinner, but they +had talked round and about it incessantly. It was clear that the Maxwells +were personally very anxious; and George knew well that the public +position of the Ministry was daily becoming more difficult. There had +been a marked cooling on the subject of the Bill among their own +supporters; one or two London members originally pledged to it were even +believed to be wavering; and this campaign lately started by Fontenoy and +Watton against two of the leading clauses of the measure, in a London +"daily," bought for the purpose, had been so far extremely damaging. The +situation was threatening indeed, and Maxwell might well look harassed. + +Yet Tressady had detected no bitterness in Lady Maxwell's mood. Her +temper rather seemed to him very strenuous, very eager, and a little sad. +Altogether, he had been touched, he knew not exactly why, by his +conversation with her. "We are going to win," he said to himself, "and +she knows it." Yet to think thus gave him, for the first time, no +particular pleasure. + +As they strolled along they talked a little of some of the topics that +had been started at dinner, topics semi-political and semi-social, till +suddenly Lady Maxwell said, with a change of voice: + +"I heard some of your conversation with Sir Philip just now. How +differently you talk when you talk of India!" + +"I wonder what that means," said George, smiling. "It means, at any rate, +that when I am not talking of India, but of English labour, or the poor, +you think I talk like a brute." + +"I shouldn't put it like that," she said quietly. "But when you talk of +India, and people like the Lawrences or Lord Dalhousie, then it is that +one sees what you really admire--what stirs you--what makes you feel." + +"Well, ought I not to feel? Is there to be no gratitude towards the +people that have made one's country?" + +He looked down, upon her gaily, perfectly conscious of his own +tickled vanity. To be observed and analysed by such a critic was in +itself flattery. + +"That have made one's country?" she repeated, not without a touch of +irony. Then suddenly she became silent. + +George thrust his hands into his pockets and waited a little. + +"Well?" he said presently. "Well? I am waiting to hear you prove that +the Dalhousies and the Lawrences have done nothing for the country, +compared to--what shall we say?--some trade-union secretary whom you +particularly admire." + +She laughed, but he did not immediately draw his answer. They had reached +the river-bank and the steps of the little bridge. Marcella mounted the +bridge and paused midway across it, hanging over the parapet. He followed +her, and both stood gazing at the house. It rose from the grass like some +fabric of yellowish ivory cut and scrolled and fretted by its Tudor +architect, who had been also a goldsmith. There were lights like jewels +in its latticed windows; the dark fulness of the trees, disposed by an +artist-hand, enwrapped or fell away from it as the eye required; and on +the dazzling lawns, crossed by soft bands of shadow, scattered forms +moved up and down--women in trailing dresses, and black-coated men. +There were occasional sallies of talk and laughter, and from the open +window of the drawing-room came the notes of a violin. + +"Brahms!" said Marcella, with delight. "Nothing but music and he could +express this night--or the river--or the rising glow and bloom of +everything." + +As she spoke George felt a quick gust of pleasure and romance sweep +across him. It was as though senses that had been for long on the +defensive, tired, or teased merely by the world, gave way in a moment to +joy and poetry. He looked from the face beside him to the pictured scene +in which they stood--the soft air filled his lungs--what ailed him?--he +only knew that after many weeks he was, somehow, happy and buoyant again! + +Lady Maxwell, however, soon forgot the music and the moonlight. + +"That have made one's country?" she repeated, pausing on the words. +"And of course that house appeals to you in the same way? Famous people +have lived in it--people who belong to history. But for _me_, the real +making of one's country is done out of sight, in garrets and workshops +and coalpits, by people who die every minute--forgotten--swept into +heaps like autumn leaves, their lives mere soil and foothold for the +generation that comes after them. All yesterday morning, for instance, +I spent trying to feed a woman I know. She is a shirtmaker; she has +four children, and her husband is a docker out of work. She had sewed +herself sick and blind. She couldn't eat, and she couldn't sleep. But +she had kept the children alive--and the man. Her life will flicker +out in a month or two; but the children's lives will have taken root, +and the man will be eating and earning again. What use would your +Dalhousies and Lawrences be to England without her and the hundreds of +thousands like her?" + +"And yet it is you," cried George, unable to forbear the chance she gave +him, "who would take away from this very woman the power of feeding her +children and saving her husband--who would spoil all the lives in the +clumsy attempt to mend one of them. How can you quote me such an +instance! It amazes me." + +"Not at all. I have only to use my instance for another purpose, in +another way. You are thinking of the Bill, of course? But all we do is to +say to some of these victims, 'Your sacrifice, as it stands, is _too_ +costly; the State in its own interest cannot go on exacting or allowing +it. We will help you to serve the community in ways that shall exhaust +and wound it less.'" + +"And as a first step, drive you all comfortably into the workhouse!" said +George. "Don't omit that." + +"Many individuals must suffer," she said steadily. "But there will be +friends to help--friends that will strain every nerve to help." + +All her heart showed itself in voice and emphasis. Almost for the first +time in their evening's talk her natural passionateness came to +sight--the Southern, impulsive temper, that so often made people laugh at +or dislike her. Under the lace shawl she had thrown round her on coming +out he saw the quick rise and fall of the breast, the nervous clasp of +the hands lying on the stonework of the bridge. These were her prophetess +airs again. To-night they still amused him, but in a gentler and more +friendly way. + +"And so, according to your own account, you will protect your tailoress +and unmake your country. I am sorry for your dilemma," he said, laughing. + +"Ah! well,"--she shrugged her shoulders with a sigh,--"don't let's talk +of it. It's all too pressing--and sore--and hot. And to think of the +weeks that are just coming on!" + +George, hanging over the parapet beside her, felt reply a little +awkward, and said nothing. For a minute or two the night made itself +heard, the gentle slipping of the river, the fitful breathings from the +trees. A swan passed and repassed below them, and an owl called from the +distant woods. + +Presently Marcella lifted a white finger and pointed to the house. + +"One wouldn't want a better parable," she said. "It's like the State as +you see it--magnificent, inspiring, a thing of pomp and dignity. But we +women, who have to drive and keep going a house like that--_we_ know what +it all rests upon. It rests upon a few tired kitchen-maids and boot-boys +and scullery-girls, hurrying, panting creatures, whom a guest never sees, +who really run it all. I know, for I have tried to unearth them, to +organise them, to make sure that no one was fainting while we were +feasting. But it is incredibly hard; half the human race believes itself +born to make things easy for the other half. It comes natural to them to +ache and toil while we sit in easy chairs. What they resent is that we +should try to change it." + +"Goodness!" said George, pulling at his moustaches. "I don't recognise my +own experience of the ordinary domestic polity in that summary." + +"I daresay. You have to do with the upper servant, who is always a +greater tyrant than his master," she retorted, her voice expressing a +curious medley of laughter and feeling. "I am speaking of the people +that are not seen, like the tailoress and shirtmaker, in your +drum-and-trumpet State." + +"Well, you may be right," said George, drily. "But I confess--if I may +be quite frank--that I don't altogether trust you to judge. I want at +least, before I strike the balance between my Dalhousie and your +tailoress, to hear what those people have to say who have not crippled +their minds--by pity!" + +"Pity!" she said, her lip trembling in spite of herself. "Pity!--you +count pity a disease?" + +"As you--and others--practise it," he replied coolly, turning round upon +her. "It is no good; the world can't be run by pity. At least, living +always seems to me a great brutal, rushing, rough-and-tumble business, +which has to be carried on whether we like it or no. To be too careful, +too gingerly over the separate life, brings it all to a standstill. +Meddle too much, and the Demiurge who set the machine going turns sulky +and stops working. Then the nation goes to pieces--till some strong +ruffian without a scruple puts it together again." + +"What do you mean by the Demiurge?" + +He laughed. + +"Why do you make me explain my flights? Well, I suppose, the natural +daimonic power in things, which keeps them going and set them off; which +is not us, or like us, and cares nothing for us." + +His light voice developed a sudden energy during his little speech. + +"Ah!" said Marcella, wistfully. "Yes, if one thought that, I could +understand. But, even so, if the power behind things cares nothing for +us, I should only regard it as challenging us to care more for each +other. Do you mind my asking you a few plain questions? Do you know +anything personally of the London poor? I mean, have you any real friends +among them, whose lives you know?" + +"Well, I sit with Fontenoy while he receives deputations from all those +tailoresses and shirtmakers and fur-sewers that _you_ want to put in +order. The harassed widow streams through his room perpetually--wailing +to be let alone!" + +Marcella made a sound of amused scorn. + +"Oh! you think that nothing," said George, indignant. "I vow I could draw +every type of widow that London contains--I know them intimately." + +She shook her head. + +"I give up London. Then, in the North, aren't you a coal-owner? Do you +know your miners?" + +"Yes, and I detest them!" said George, shortly; "pig-headed brutes! They +will be on strike next month, and I shall be defrauded of my lawful +income till their lordships choose to go back. Pity _me_, if you +please--not them!" + +"So I do," she said with spirit--"if you hate the men by whom you live!" + +There was silence. Then suddenly George said, in another tone: + +"But sometimes, I don't deny, the beggars wring it out of one--your pity. +I saw a mother last week--Suppose we stroll on a little. I want to see +how the river gets out of the wood." + +They descended the bridge, and turned again into the river-path. George +told the story of Mary Batchelor in his half-ironic way, yet so that here +and there Marcella shivered. Then gradually, as though it were a relief +to him to talk, he slipped into a half-humorous, half-serious discussion +of his mine-owner's position and its difficulties. Incidentally and +unconsciously a good deal of his history betrayed itself in his talk: his +bringing-up, his mother; the various problems started in his mind since +his return from India; even his relations to his wife. Once or twice it +flashed across him that he was confessing himself with an extraordinary +frankness to a woman he had made up his mind to dislike. But the +reflection did not stop him. The balmy night, the solitude, this +loveliness that walked beside him so willingly and kindly--with every +step they struck his defences from him; they drew; they penetrated. + +With her, too, everything was simple and natural. She had felt his +attraction at their first meeting; she had determined to make a friend of +him; and she was succeeding. As he disclosed himself she felt a strange +compassion for him. It was plain to her woman's instinct that he was at +heart lonely and uncompanioned. Well, what wonder with that hard, mean +little being for a wife! Had she captured him, or had he thrown himself +away upon her in mere wantonness, out of that defiance of sentiment which +appeared to be his favourite _parti-pris?_ In any case, it seemed to this +happy wife that he had done the one fatal and irreparable thing; and she +was genuinely sorry for him. She felt him very young, too. As far as she +could gather, he was about two years her junior; but her feeling made the +gap much greater. + +Yet, of course, the situation,--Maxwell, Fontenoy,--all that those names +implied to him and her, made a thrilling under-note in both their minds. +She never forgot her husband and his straits; and in George's mind +Fontenoy's rugged figure stood sentinel. Given the circumstances, both +her temperament and her affections drove her inevitably into trying, +first to attract, then to move and influence her companion. And given the +circumstances, he could but yield himself bit by bit to her woman's +charm; while full all the time of a confident scorn for her politics. + +Insensibly, the stress upon them drew them back to London and to current +affairs, and at last she said to him, with vehemence: + +"You _must_ see these people in the flesh--and not in your house, but in +theirs. Or, first come and meet them in mine?" + +"Why, please, should you think St. James's Square a palace of truth +compared to Carlton House Terrace?" he asked her, with amusement. +Fontenoy lived in Carlton House Terrace. + +"I am not inviting you to St. James's Square," she said quietly. "That +house is only my home for one set of purposes. Just now my true home is +not there at all. It is in the Mile End Road." + +George asked to be informed, and opened his eyes at her account of the +way in which she still divided her time between the West End and the +East, spending always one or two nights a week among the trades and the +work-people she had come to know so intimately, whose cause she was +fighting with such persistence. + +"Maxwell doesn't come now," she said. "He is too busy, and his work there +is done. But I go because I love the people, and to talk with them and +live with them part of every week keeps one's mind clear as to what one +wants, and why. Well,"--her voice showed that she smiled,--"will you +come? My old maid shall give you coffee, and you shall meet a roomful of +tailors and shirtmakers. You shall see what people look like in the +flesh--not on paper--after working fourteen hours at a stretch, in a room +where you and I could not breathe!" + +"Charming!"--he bowed ironically. "Of course I will come." + +They had paused under the shadow of a grove of beech-trees, and were +looking back towards the moonlit garden and the house. Suddenly George +said, in an odd voice: + +"Do you mind my saying it? You know, nobody is ever +converted--politically--nowadays." + +In the darkness her flush could not be seen. But he felt the mingled +pride and soreness in her voice, under its forced brightness. + +"I know. How long is it since a speech turned a vote in the House of +Commons! One wonders why people take the trouble to speak. Shall we go +back? Ah! there is someone pursuing us--my husband and Ancoats!" + +And two figures, dark for an instant against the brightness of the lawns, +plunged into the shadow of the wood. + +"You wanderers!" said Maxwell, as he distinguished his wife's white +dress. "Is this path quite safe in this darkness? Suppose we get +out of it." + +The river, indeed, beneath a steep bank, ran close beside them, and +the trees meeting overhead all but shut out the moon. Maxwell, in some +anxiety, caught his wife's arm, and made her pause till his eye should +be once more certain of the path. Meanwhile Ancoats and Tressady +walked quickly back to the lawn, Ancoats talking and laughing with +unusual vigour. + + * * * * * + +The Maxwells did not hurry themselves. As they emerged from the wood +Marcella slipped her hand into her husband's. It was her characteristic +caress. The slim, strong hand loved to feel itself in the shelter of +his; while to him that seeking touch was the symbol of all that she +brought him--the inventive, inexhaustible arts of a passion which was a +kind of genius. + +"Don't go in!" she pleaded. "Why should we?" + +"No!--why should we?" he repeated, sighing. "Why are we here at +all?--that is what I have been asking myself all the evening. And now +more than ever since my walk with that boy Ancoats." + +"Tell me about it," she said eagerly. "Could you get nothing out of +him?" + +Maxwell shrugged his shoulders. + +"Nothing. He vows that everything is all right; that he knows a pack of +slanderers have been 'yelping at him,' and he wishes both they and his +mother would let him alone." + +"His mother!" cried Marcella, outraged. + +"Well, I suppose I said to him the kind of thing you would evidently like +to say. But with no result. He merely laughed, and chattered about +everything under the sun--his race-horses, new plays, politics--Heaven +knows what! He is in an excited state--feverish, restless, and, I should +think, unhappy. But he would tell nothing--to me." + +"How much do you think she knows?" + +"His mother? Nothing, I should say. Every now and then I detect a note of +extra anxiety when she talks to him; and there is evidently something in +her mind, some impression from his manner, perhaps, which is driving her +more keenly than ever towards this marriage. But I don't believe a single +one of the stories that have reached us has reached her. And now--here is +this poor girl--and even my dull eyes have noticed that to-night he has +purposely, markedly, avoided her." + +Marcella felt her cheek flame. + +"And when one thinks of his behaviour in the winter!" she cried. + +They wandered on along a path that skirted the wood, talking anxiously +about the matter which had in truth brought them to Castle Luton. In +spite of the comparative gentleness of English political relations, +neither Maxwell nor Marcella, perhaps, would willingly have become +Charlotte Allison's guests at a moment when her house was actually the +headquarters of a violent and effective opposition to Maxwell's policy, +when moreover the leader of that opposition was likely to be of the +party. But about a fortnight before Whitsuntide some tales of young +Ancoats had suddenly reached Maxwell's ears, with such effect that on his +next meeting with Ancoats's mother he practically invited himself and +Marcella--greatly to Mrs. Allison's surprise--to Castle Luton for +Whitsuntide. + +For the boy had been Maxwell's ward, and Henry Allison had been the +intimate friend and comrade of Maxwell's father. And Maxwell's feeling +for his father, and for his father's friends, was of such a kind that his +guardian's duties had gone deep with him. He had done his best for the +boy, and since Ancoats had reached his majority his ex-guardian had still +kept him anxiously in mind. + +Of late indeed Ancoats had troubled himself very little about his +guardian, or his guardian's anxieties. He seemed to have been devoting a +large share of his mind to the avoidance of his mother's old friends; and +the Maxwells, for months, in spite of many efforts on their part, had +seen little or nothing of him. Maxwell for various reasons had begun to +suspect a number of uncomfortable things with regard to the young +fellow's friends and pleasures. Yet nothing could be taken hold of till +this sudden emergence of a particular group of stories, coupling +Ancoats's name with that of a notorious little actress whose adventures +had already provided a certain class of newspaper with abundant copy. + +Then Maxwell, who cared personally very little for the red-haired youth +himself, took alarm for the mother's sake. For in the case of Mrs. +Allison a scandal of the kind suggested meant a tragedy. Her passion for +her son was almost a tragedy already, so closely mingled in it were the +feelings of the mother and those of the Christian, to whom "vice" is not +an amusement, but an agony. + + * * * * * + +Yet, as Marcella said and felt, it was a hard fate that had forced +Maxwell to concern himself with Ancoats's love-affairs at this +particular moment. + +"Don't think of it," she said at last, urgently, as they walked along. +"It is too bad; as if there were not enough!" + +Maxwell stood still, with a little smile, and put his arm round her +shoulders. + +"Dear, I shall soon have time enough, probably, to think about Ancoats's +affairs or anything else. Do you know that I was planning this morning +what we would do when we go out? Shall we slip over to the Australian +colonies in the autumn? I would give a good deal to see them for myself." + +She gave a low cry of pain. + +"Why are you so depressed to-night? Is there any fresh news?" + +"Yes. And, altogether, things look increasingly bad for us, and +increasingly well for them. It will be extraordinarily close +anyway--probably a matter of a vote or two." And he gave her a summary +of his after-dinner conversation with Lord Cathedine, a keen ally of +Fontenoy's in the Lords, and none the less a shrewd fellow because he +happened to be also a detestable person. + +Marcella heard the news of one or two fresh defections from the +Government with amazement and indignation. She stood there in the +darkness, leaning against the man she loved, her heart beating fast and +stormily. How could the world thus misconceive and thwart him? And what +could she do? Her mind ran passionately through a hundred schemes, +refusing to submit--to see him baffled and defeated. + + + + +CHAPTER XII + + +To Lord Ancoats himself this party of his mother's was an oppression +and a nuisance. He had only been induced to preside over it with +difficulty; and his mother had been both hurt and puzzled by his +reluctance to play the host. + +If you had asked Maxwell's opinion on the point, he would have told you +that Ancoats's bringing up had a good deal to do with the present +anxieties of Ancoats's mother. He--Maxwell--had done his best, but he had +been overmatched. + +First and foremost, Ancoats had been to no public school. It was not the +custom of the family; and Mrs. Allison could not be induced to break the +tradition. There was accordingly a succession of tutors, whose +Church-principles at least were sound. And Ancoats showed himself for a +time an impressionable, mystical boy, entirely in sympathy with his +mother. His confirmation was a great family emotion, and when he was +seventeen Mrs. Allison had difficulty in making him take food enough in +Lent to keep him in health. Maxwell was beginning to wonder where it +would end, when the lad was sent to Cambridge, and the transformation +scene that might always perhaps have been expected, began. + +He had been two years at Trinity when he went to pay the Maxwells a +visit at the Court. Maxwell could hardly believe his eyes or ears. The +boy who at nineteen was an authority on church music and ancient "uses," +by twenty-one talked and thought of nothing in heaven or earth but the +stage and French _bric-a-brac._ His conversation swarmed with the names +of actors, singers, and dancers; but they were names that meant nothing +except to the initiated. They were the small people of the small +theatres; and Ancoats was a Triton among them, not at all, so he +carefully informed his kindred, because of his wealth and title, but +because he too was an artist, and could sing, revel, write, and dance +with the best of them. + +For some time Maxwell was able to console Mrs. Allison with the +historical reflection that more than one son of the Oxford Movement had +found in a passion for the stage a ready means of annoying the English +Puritan. When it came, however, to the young man's producing risky plays +of his own composing at extremely costly _matinees_, there was nothing +for it but to interfere. Maxwell at last persuaded him to give up the +farce of Cambridge and go abroad. But Ancoats would only go with a man of +his own sort; and their time was mostly spent in Paris, where Ancoats +divided his hard-spent existence between the furious pursuit of Louis +Quinze _bibelots_ and the patronage of two or three minor theatres. To be +the king of a first night, raining applause and bouquets from his +stage-box, seemed to give him infinite content; but his vanity was hardly +less flattered by the compliments say of M. Tournonville, the well-known +dealer on the Quai Voltaire, who would bow himself before the young +Englishman with the admiring cry, "Mon Dieu! milord, que vous etes fin +connoisseur!" while the dealer's assistant grinned among the shadows of +the back-shop. + +At last, at twenty-four, he must needs return to England for his coming +of age under his grandfather's will and the taking over of his estate. +Under the sobering influence of these events, his class and his mother +seemed for a time to recover him. He refurnished a certain number of +rooms at Castle Luton, and made a special marvel of his own room, which +was hung thick with Boucher, Greuze, and Watteau engravings, littered +with miniatures and trinkets, and encumbered here and there with +portfolios of drawings which he was not anxious to unlock in his +mother's presence. + +Moreover, he was again affectionate to his mother, and occasionally even +went to church with her. The instincts of the English aristocrat +reappeared amid the accomplishments of the _petit-maitre,_ and poor Mrs. +Allison's spirits revived. Then the golden-haired Lady Madeleine was +asked to stay at Castle Luton. When she came Ancoats devoted himself with +extraordinary docility. He drew her, made songs for her, and devised +French charades to act with her; he even went so far as to compare her +with enthusiasm to the latest and most wonderful "Salome" just exhibited +in the Salon by the latest and most wonderful of the impressionists. But +Lady Madeleine fortunately had not seen the picture. + +Then suddenly, one morning, Ancoats went up to town without notice and +remained there. After a while his mother pursued him thither; but Ancoats +was restless at sight of her, and she was not long in London, though +long enough to show the Maxwells and others that her heart was anxiously +set upon Lady Madeleine as a daughter-in-law. + +This then--taken together with the stories now besprinkling the +newspapers--was the situation. Naturally, Ancoats's affairs, as he +himself was irritably aware, were now, in one way or another, occupying +the secret thoughts or the private conversations of most of his +mother's guests. + +For instance-- + + * * * * * + +"Are you nice?" said Betty Leven, suddenly, to young Lord Naseby, in the +middle of Sunday morning. "Are you in a charitable, charming, humble, and +trusting frame of mind? Because, if not, I shall go away--I have had too +much of Lady Kent!" + +Charlie Naseby laughed. He was sitting reading in the shade at the edge +of one of the Castle Luton lawns. For some time past he had been watching +Betty Leven and Lady Kent, as they talked under a cedar-tree some little +distance from him. Lady Kent conversed with her whole bellicose +person--her cap, her chin, her nose, her spreading and impressive +shoulders. And from her gestures young Naseby guessed that she had been +talking to Betty Leven rather more in character than usual. + +He felt a certain curiosity about the _tete-a-tete._ So that when Betty +left her companion and came tripping over the lawn to the house, the +young man lifted his face and gave her a smiling nod, as though to invite +her to come and visit him on the way. Betty came, and then as she stood +in front of him delivered the home question already reported. + +"Am I nice?" repeated young Naseby. "Far from it. I have not been to +church, and I have been reading a French novel of which I do not even +propose to tell you the name." + +And he promptly slipped his volume into his pocket. + +"Which is worst?" said Betty, pensively: "to break the fourth +Commandment or the ninth? Lady Kent, of course, has been trampling on +them both. But the ninth is her particular victim. She calls it 'getting +to the roots of things.'" + +"Whose roots has she been delving at this morning?" said Naseby. + +Betty looked behind her, saw that Lady Kent had gone into the house, +and let herself drop into the corner of Naseby's bench with a sigh +of fatigue. + +"One feels as though one were a sort of house-dog tussling with a +burglar. I have been keeping her off all my friends' secrets by main +force; so she had to fall back on George Tressady, and tell me ugly tales +of his mamma." + +"George Tressady! Why on earth should she do him an ill turn? I don't +believe she ever saw him before." + +Betty pressed her lips. She and Charlie Naseby had been friends since +they wore round pinafores and sat on high nursery chairs side by side. + +"One needn't go to the roots of things," she said, severely, "but one +should have eyes in one's head. Has it ever occurred to you that Ancoats +has taken a special fancy to Sir George--that he sat talking to him last +night till all hours, and that he has been walking about with him the +whole of this morning, instead of walking about--well! with somebody +else--as he was meant to do? Why do men behave in this ridiculous manner? +Women, of course. But _men!_ It's like a trout that won't let itself be +landed. And what's the good? It's only prolonging the agony." + +"Not at all," said Naseby, laughing. "There's always the chance of +slipping the hook." Then his lively face became suddenly serious. "But +it's time, I think," he added, almost with vehemence, "that Lady Kent +stopped trying to land Ancoats. In the first place, it's no good. He +won't be landed against his will. In the next--well, I only know," he +broke off, "that if I had a sister in love with Ancoats at the present +moment, I'd carry her off to the North Pole rather than let her be talked +about with him!" + +Betty opened her eyes. + +"Then there _is_ something in the stories!" she cried. "Of course, +Frank told me there was nothing. And the Maxwells have not said a +word. And _now_ I understand why Lady Kent has been dinning it into +my ears--I could only be thankful Mrs. Allison was safe at church--that +Ancoats should marry early. 'Oh! my dear, it's always been the only +hope for them!'" Betty mimicked Lady Kent's deep voice and important +manner: "'Why, there was the grandfather--_his_ wife had a time!--I +could tell you things about _him_!--oh! and her too.--And even Henry +Allison!--' There, of course, I stopped her." + +"Old ghoul!" said Naseby, in disgust. "So she knows. And yet--good +Heavens! where does that charming girl come from?" + +He knocked the end off his cigarette, and returned it to his mouth with a +rather unsteady hand. + +"Knows?--knows what?" said Betty. There was a pink flush, perhaps of +alarm, on her pretty cheek, but her eyes said plainly that if there were +risks she must run them. + +Naseby hesitated. The natural reticence of one young man about another +held him back--and he was Ancoats's friend. But he liked Lady Madeleine, +and her mother's ugly manoeuvres in the sight of gods and men filled him +with a restless ill-temper. + +"You say the Maxwells have told you nothing?" he said at last. "But all +the same I am pretty certain that Maxwell is here for nothing else. What +on earth should he be doing in this _galere_ just now! Look at him and +Fontenoy! They've been pacing that lime-walk for a good hour. No one ever +saw such a spectacle before. Of course something's up!" + +Betty followed his eyes, and caught the figures of the two men between +the trunks as they moved through the light and shadow of the +lime-walk--Fontenoy's massive head sunk in his shoulders, his hands +clasped behind his back; Maxwell's taller and alerter form beside him. +Fontenoy had, in fact, arrived that morning from town, just too late to +accompany Mrs. Allison and her flock to church; and Maxwell and he had +been together since the moment when Ancoats, having brought his guest +into the garden, had gone off himself on a walk with Tressady. + +"Ancoats and Tressady came back past here," Naseby went on. "Ancoats +stood still, with his hands on his sides, and looked at those two. His +expression was not amiable. 'Something hatching,' he said to Tressady. +I suppose Ancoats got his sneer from his actor-friends--none of us +could do it without practice. 'Shall we go and pull the chief out of +that?' But they didn't go. Ancoats turned sulky, and went into the +house by himself." + +"I'm glad I don't have to keep that youth straight," said Betty, +devoutly. "Perhaps I don't care enough about him to try. But his mother's +a darling saint!--and if he breaks her heart he ought to be hung." + +"She knows nothing--I believe--" said Naseby, quickly. + +"Strange!" cried Betty. "I wonder if it pays to be a saint. I shall know +everything about _my_ boy when he's that age." + +"Oh! will you?" said Naseby, looking at her with a mocking eye. + +"Yes, sir, I shall. Your secrets are not so difficult to know, if one +_wants_ to know them. Heaven forbid, however, that I should want to know +anything about any of you till Bertie is grown up! Now, please tell me +everything. Who is the lady?" + +"Heaven forbid I should tell you!" said Naseby, drily. + +"Don't trifle any more," said Betty, laying a remonstrating hand on his +arm; "they will be home from church directly." + +"Well, I won't tell you any names," said Naseby, reluctantly. "Of +course, it's an actress--a very small one. And, of course, she's a bad +lot--and pretty." + +"Why, there's no of course about it--about either of them!" said Betty, +with more indignation than grammar. She also had dramatic friends, and +was sensitive on the point. + +Naseby protested that if he must argue the ethics of the stage before he +told his tale, the tale would remain untold. Then Betty, subdued, fell +into an attitude of meek listening, hands on lap. The tale when told +indeed proved to be a very ordinary affair, marked out perhaps a trifle +from the ruck by the facts that there was another pretender in the field +with whom Ancoats had already had one scene in public, and would probably +have more; that Ancoats being Ancoats, something mad and conspicuous was +to be expected, which would bring the matter inevitably to his mother's +ears; and that Mrs. Allison was Mrs. Allison. + +"Can he marry her?" said Betty, quickly. + +"Thank Heaven! no. There is a husband somewhere in Chili. So that it +doesn't seem to be a question of driving Mrs. Allison out of Castle +Luton. But--well, between ourselves, it would be a pity to give Ancoats +so fine a chance of going to the bad, as he'll get, if this young woman +lays hold of him. He mightn't recover it." + +Betty sat silent a moment. All her gaiety had passed away. There was a +fierceness in her blue eyes. + +"And that's what we bring them up for!" she exclaimed at last--"that they +may do all these ugly, stale, stupid things over again. Oh! I'm not +thinking so much, of the morals!"--she turned to Naseby with a defiant +look. "I am thinking of the hateful cruelty and unkindness!" + +"To his mother?" said Naseby. He shrugged his shoulders. + +Betty allowed herself an outburst. Her little hand trembled on her knee. +Naseby did not reply. Not that he disagreed; far from it. Under his young +and careless manner he was already a person of settled character, +cherishing a number of strong convictions. But since it had become the +fashion to talk as frankly of a matter of this kind to your married-women +friends as to anybody else, he thought that the women should take it with +more equanimity. + +Betty, indeed, regained her composure very quickly, like a stream when +the gust has passed. They fell into a keen, practical discussion of the +affair. Who had influence with Ancoats? What man? Naseby shook his +head. The difference in age between Ancoats and Maxwell was too great, +and the men too unlike in temperament. He himself had done what he +could, in vain, and Ancoats now told him nothing; for the rest, he +thought Ancoats had very few friends amid his innumerable acquaintance, +and such as he had, of a third-rate dramatic sort, not likely to be of +much use at this moment. + +"I haven't seen him take to any fellow of his own kind as much as he has +taken to George Tressady these two days, since he left Cambridge. But +that's no good, of course--it's too new." + +The two sat side by side, pondering. Suddenly Naseby said, smiling, with +a change of expression: + +"This party is really quite interesting. Look there!" + +Betty looked, and saw George Tressady, with his hands in his pockets, +lounging along a distant path beside Marcella Maxwell. + +"Well!" said Betty, "what then?" + +Naseby gave his mouth a twist. + +"Nothing; only it's odd. I ran across them just now--I was playing ball +with that jolly little imp, Hallin. You never saw two people more +absorbed. Of course he's _sous le charme_--we all are. Our English +politics are rather rum, aren't they? They don't indulge in this amiable +country-house business in a South American republic, you know. They +prefer shooting." + +"And you evidently think it a healthier state of things. Wait till we +come to something nearer to _our_ hearths and bosoms than Factory Acts," +said Betty, with the wisdom of her kind. "All the same, Lord Fontenoy is +in earnest." + +"Oh yes, Fontenoy is in earnest. So, I suppose, is Tressady. So--good +Heavens!--is Maxwell. I say, here comes the church party." + +And from a side-door in a venerable wall, beyond which could be seen the +tower of a little church, there emerged a small group of people--Mrs. +Allison, Lady Cathedine, and Madeleine Penley in front, escorted by the +white-haired Sir Philip; and behind, Lady Tressady, between Harding +Watton and Lord Cathedine. + +"Cathedine!" cried Naseby, staring at the group. "Cathedine been +to church?" + +"For the purpose, I suppose, of disappointing poor Laura, who might have +hoped to get rid of him," said Betty, sharply. "No!--if I were Mrs. +Allison I should draw the line at Lord Cathedine." + +"Nobody need see any more of Cathedine than they want," said Naseby, +calmly; "and, of course, he behaves himself here. Moreover, there is no +doubt at all about his brains. They say Fontenoy expects to make great +use of him in the Lords." + +"By the way," said Betty, turning round upon him, "where are you?" + +"Well, thank God! I'm not in Parliament," was Naseby's smiling reply. "So +don't trouble me for opinions. I have none. Except that, speaking +generally, I should like Lady Maxwell to get what she wants." + +Betty threw him a sly glance, wondering if she might tease him about the +news she heard of him from Marcella. + +She had no time, however, to attack him, for Mrs. Allison approached. + + * * * * * + +"What is the matter with her?--with Madeleine?--with all of them?" +thought Betty, suddenly. + +For Mrs. Allison, pale and discomposed, did not return, did not +apparently notice Lady Leven's greeting. She walked hastily past them, +and would have gone at once into the house but that, turning her head, +she perceived Lord Fontenoy hurrying towards her from the lime-walk. With +an obvious effort she controlled herself, and went to meet him, leaning +heavily on her silver-topped stick. + +The others paused, no one having, as it seemed, anything to say. Letty +poked the gravel with her parasol; Sir Philip made a telescope of his +hands, and fixed it upon Maxwell, who was coming slowly across the lawn; +while Lady Madeleine turned a handsome, bewildered face on Betty. + +Betty took her aside to look at a flower on the house. + +"What's the matter?" said Lady Leven, under her breath. + +"I don't know," said the other. "Something dreadful happened on the way +home. There was a girl--" + +But she broke off suddenly. Ancoats had just opened and shut the +garden-door, and was coming to join his guests. + +"Poor dear!" thought Betty to herself, with a leap of pity. It was so +evident the girl's whole nature thrilled to the approaching step. She +turned her head towards Ancoats, as though against her will, her tall +form drawn erect, in unconscious tension. + +Ancoats's quick eyes ran over the group. + +"He thinks we have been talking about him," was Betty's quick reflection, +which was probably not far from the truth. For the young man's face at +once assumed a lowering expression, and, walking up to Lady Tressady, +whom as yet he had noticed no more than civility required, he asked +whether she would like to see the "houses" and the rose-garden. + +Letty, delighted by the attention, said Yes in her gayest way, and +Ancoats at once led her off. He walked quickly, and their figures soon +disappeared among the trees. + +Madeleine Penley gazed after them. Betty, who had a miserable feeling +that the girl was betraying herself to men like Harding Watton or Lord +Cathedine,--a feeling which was, however, the creation of her own nervous +excitement,--tried to draw her away. But Lady Madeleine did not seem to +understand. She stood mechanically buttoning and unbuttoning her long +gloves. "Yes, I'm coming," she said, but she did not move. + +Then Betty saw that Lord Naseby had approached her; and it seemed to the +observer that all the young man's vivid face was suffused with something +at once soft and fierce. + +"The thorn-blossom on the hill is a perfect show just now, Lady +Madeleine," he said. "Come and look at it. There will be just time +before lunch." + +The girl looked at him. The colour rushed to her cheeks, and she walked +submissively away beside him. + + * * * * * + +Meanwhile Letty and Ancoats pursued their way towards the greenhouses and +walled gardens. Letty tripped along, hardly able to keep up with her +companion's stride, but chattering fast all the time. At every turn of +the view she overflowed with praise and wonder; nor could anything have +been at once more enthusiastic or more impertinent than the questions +with which she plied him as to his gardeners, his estate, and his +affairs, in the intervals of panegyric. + +Ancoats at first hardly listened to her. A perfunctory "Yes" or "No" +seemed to be all that the situation demanded. Then, when he did +sufficiently emerge from the tempest of his own thoughts to catch some of +the things she was saying, his irritable temper rebelled at once. What +had Tressady been about?--ill-bred, tiresome woman! + +His manner stiffened; he stalked along in front of her, doing his bare +host's duty, and warding off her conversation as much as possible; while +Letty, on her side, soon felt the familiar chill and mortification +creeping over her. Why, she wondered angrily, should he have asked her to +walk with him if he could not be a more agreeable companion? + +Towards the end of the lime-walk they came across Mrs. Allison and Lord +Fontenoy. As they passed the older pair the pale mother lifted her eyes +to her son with a tremulous smile. + +But Ancoats made no response, nor had he any greeting for Fontenoy. He +carried his companion quickly on, till they found themselves in a +wilderness of walled gardens opening one into another, each, as it +seemed, more miraculously ordered and more abundantly stocked than its +neighbour. + +"I wonder you know your way," laughed Letty. "And who can possibly +consume all this?" + +"I haven't an idea," said Ancoats, abruptly, as he opened the door of the +tenth vinery. "I wish you'd tell me." + +Letty raised her eyebrows with a little cry of protest. + +"Oh! but it makes the whole place so magnificent, so complete." + +"What is there magnificent in having too much?" said Ancoats, shortly. +"I believe the day of these huge country places, with all their dull +greenhouses and things, is done." + +Much he cared, indeed, about his gardeners and his grapes! He was in the +mood to feel his whole inheritance a burden round his neck. But at the +same time to revile his own wealth gave him a pungent sense of playing +the artist. + +"Have you argued that with Lord Fontenoy?" she inquired archly. + +"I should not take the trouble," he said, with careless hauteur. +"Ah!"--Letty's vanity winced under his involuntary accent of relief--"I +see your husband and Lady Maxwell." + +Marcella and George came towards them. They were strolling along a broad +flowery border, which was at the moment a blaze of paeonies of all +shades, interspersed with tall pyramidal growths of honeysuckle. Marcella +was loitering here and there, burying her face in the fragrance of the +honeysuckle, or drawing her companion's attention in delight to the +glowing clumps of paeonies Hallin hovered round them, now putting his +hand confidingly into Tressady's, now tugging at his mother's dress, and +now gravely wooing the friendship of a fine St. Bernard that made one of +the party. George, with his hands in his pockets, walked or paused as the +others chose; and it struck Letty at once that he was talking with +unusual freedom and zest. + +Yes, it was true, indeed, as Harding said--they had made friends. As she +looked at them the first movement of a jealous temper stirred in Letty. +She was angry with Lady Maxwell's beauty, and angry with George's +enjoyment. It was like the great lady all over to slight the wife and +annex the husband. George certainly might have taken the trouble to come +and look for her on their return from church! + +So, while Ancoats talked stiffly with Marcella, the bride, a few paces +off, let George understand through her bantering manner that she was out +of humour. + +"But, dear, I had no notion you would be let out so soon," pleaded +George. "That good man really can't earn his pay." + +"Oh! but of course you knew it was High Church--all split up into little +bits," said Letty, unappeased. "But naturally--" + +She was about to add some jealous sarcasm when it was arrested by the +arrival of Sir Philip Wentworth and Watton, whose figures appeared in a +side-archway close to her. + +"Ah! well guessed," said Sir Philip. "I thought we should find you among +the paeonies. Lady Tressady, did you ever see such a show? Ancoats, is +your head gardener visible on a Sunday? I ask with trembling, for there +is no more magnificent member of creation. But if I _could_ get at him, +to ask him about an orchid I saw in one of your houses yesterday, I +should be grateful." + +"Come into the next garden, then," said Ancoats, "where the orchid-houses +are. If he isn't there, we'll send for him." + +"Then, Lady Tressady, you must come and see me through," said Sir Philip, +gallantly. "I want to quarrel with him about a label--and you remember +Dizzy's saying--'a head gardener is always opinionated'? Are you coming, +Lady Maxwell?" + +Marcella shook her head, smiling. + +"I am afraid I hate hothouses," she said. + +"My dear lady, don't pine for the life according to nature at Castle +Luton!" said Sir Philip, raising a finger. "The best of hothouses, like +the best of anything, demands a thrill." + +Marcella shrugged her shoulders. + +"I get more thrill out of the paeonies." + +Sir Philip laughed, and he and Watton carried off Letty, whose vanity was +once more happy in their society; while Ancoats, glad of the pretext, +hurried along in front to find the great Mr. Newmarch. + + * * * * * + +"I believe there are some wonderful irises out in the Friar's Garden," +said Marcella. "Mrs. Allison told me there was a show of them somewhere. +Let me see if I can find the way. And Hallin would like the goldfish in +the fountain." + +Her two companions followed her gladly, and she led them through devious +paths till there was a shout from Hallin, and the most poetic corner of a +famous garden revealed itself. Amid the ruins of a cloister that had once +formed part of the dissolved Cistercian priory on whose confiscated lands +Castle Luton had arisen, a rich medley of flowers was in full and perfect +bloom. Irises in every ravishing shade of purple, lilac, and gold, +carpets of daffodils and narcissus, covered the ground, and ran into each +corner and cranny of the old wall. Yellow banksia and white clematis +climbed the crumbling shafts, or made new tracery for the empty windows, +and where the ruin ended, yew hedges, adorned at top with a whole +procession of birds and beasts, began. The flowery space thus enclosed +was broken in the centre by an old fountain; and as one sat on a stone +seat beside it, one looked through an archway, cut through the darkness +of the yews, to the blue river and the hills. + +The little place breathed perfume and delight. But Marcella did not, +somehow, give it the attention it deserved. She sat down absently on the +bench by the fountain, and presently, as George and Hallin were poking +among the goldfish, she turned to her companion with the abrupt question: + +"You didn't know Ancoats, I think, before this visit, did you?" + +"Only as one knows the merest acquaintance. Fontenoy introduced me to him +at the club." + +Marcella sighed. She seemed to be arguing something with herself. At +last, with a quick look towards the approaches of the garden, she said in +a low voice: + +"I think you must know that his friends are not happy about him?" + +It so happened that Watton had found opportunity to show Tressady that +morning a paragraph from one of the numerous papers that batten on the +British peer, his dress, his morals, and his sport. The paragraph, +without names, without even initials, contained an outline of Lord +Ancoats's affairs which Harding, who knew everything of a scandalous +nature, declared to be well informed. It had made George whistle; and +afterwards he had watched Mrs. Allison go to church with a new interest +in her proceedings. + +So that when Marcella threw out her hesitating question, he said at +once: + +"I know what the papers are beginning to say--that is, I have seen a +paragraph--" + +"Oh! those newspapers!" she said in distress. "We are all afraid of some +madness, and any increase of talk may hasten it. There is no one who can +control him, and of late he has not even tried to conceal things." + +"It is a determined face," said George. "I am afraid he will take his +way. How is it that he comes to be so unlike his mother?" + +"How is it that adoration and sacrifice count for so little?" said +Marcella, sadly. "She has given him all the best of her life." + +And she drew a rapid sketch of the youth's career and the mother's +devotion. + +George listened in silence. What she said showed him that in his +conversations with Ancoats that young man had been talking round and +about his own case a good deal! and when she paused he said drily: + +"Poor Mrs. Allison! But, you know, there must be some crumples in the +rose-leaves of the great." + +She looked at him with a momentary astonishment. + +"Why should one think of her as 'great'? Would not any mother suffer? +First of all he is so changed; it is so difficult to get at him--his +friends are so unlike hers--he is so wrapped up in London, so apathetic +about his estate. All the religious sympathy that meant so much to her is +gone. And now he threatens her with this--what shall I call it?"--her lip +curled--"this entanglement. If it goes on, how shall we keep her from +breaking her heart over it? Poor thing! poor mothers!" + +She raised her white hand, and let it fall upon her knee with one of the +free, instinctive gestures that made her beauty so expressive. + +But George would not yield himself to her feeling. + +"Ancoats will get through it--somehow--as other men do," he said +stubbornly, "and she must get through it too--and _not_ break her heart." + +Marcella was silent. He turned towards her after a moment. + +"You think that a brutal doctrine? But if you'll let me say it, life and +ease and good temper are really not the brittle things women make them! +Why do they put all their treasure into that one bag they call their +affections? There is plenty else in life--there is indeed! It shows +poverty of mind!" + +He laughed, and taking up a pebble dropped it sharply among the goldfish. + +"Alack!" said Marcella, caressing her child's head as he stood playing +beside her. "Hallin, I can't have you kiss my hand like that. Sir George +says it's poverty of mind." + +"It ain't," said Hallin, promptly. But his remark had a deplorable lack +of unction, for the goldfish, startled by George's pebble, were at that +moment performing evolutions of the greatest interest, and his black eyes +were greedily bent upon them. + +Both laughed, and George let her remark alone. But his few words left +on Marcella a painful impression, which renewed her compassion of the +night before. This young fellow, just married, protesting against an +over-exaltation of the affections!--it struck her as half tragic, half +grotesque. And, of course, it was explained by the idiosyncrasies of +that little person in a Paris gown now walking about somewhere with +Sir Philip! + +Yet, just as she had again allowed herself to think of him as someone far +younger and less mature than herself, he quietly renewed the +conversation, so far as it concerned Ancoats, talking with a caustic good +sense, a shrewd perception, and at bottom with a good feeling, that first +astonished her, and then mastered her friendship more and more. She found +herself yielding him a fuller and fuller confidence, appealing to him, +taking pleasure in anything that woke the humour of the sharp, long face, +or that rare blink of the blue eyes that meant a leap of some responsive +sympathy he could not quite conceal. + +And for him it was all pleasure, though he never stopped to think of it. +The lines of her slender form, as she sat with such careless dignity +beside him, her lovely eyes, the turns of her head, the softening tones +of her voice, the sense of an emerging bond that had in it nothing +ignoble, nothing to be ashamed of, together with the child's simple +liking for him, and the mere physical delight of this morning of late +May--the rush and splendour of its white, thunderous clouds, its +penetrating, scented air: each and all played their part in the rise of a +new emotion he would not have analysed if he could. + +He was particularly glad that in this fresh day of growing intimacy she +had as yet talked politics or "questions" of any sort so little! It made +it all the more possible to escape from, to wholly overthrow in his +mind, that first hostile image of her, impressed--strange unreason on his +part!--by that first meeting with her in the crowd round the injured +child, and in the hospital ward. Had she started any subject of mere +controversy he would have held his own as stoutly as ever. But so long as +she let them lie, _herself_, the woman, insensibly argued for her, and +wore down his earlier mood. + +So long, indeed, as he forgot Maxwell's part in it all! But it was not +possible to forget it long. For the wife's passion, in spite of a noble +reticence, shone through her whole personality in a way that alternately +touched and challenged her new friend. No; let him remember that +Maxwell's ways of looking at things were none the less pestilent because +_she_ put them into words. + + * * * * * + +After luncheon Betty Leven found herself in a corner of the Green +Drawing-room. On the other side of it Mrs. Allison and Lord Fontenoy were +seated together, with Sir Philip Wentworth not far off. Lord Fontenoy was +describing his week in Parliament. Betty, who knew and generally shunned +him, raised her eyebrows occasionally, as she caught the animated voice, +the queer laughs, and fluent expositions, which the presence of his muse +was drawing from this most ungainly of worshippers. His talk, indeed, was +one long invocation; and the little white-haired lady in the armchair was +doing her best to play Melpomene. Her speech was very soft. But it made +for battle; and Fontenoy was never so formidable as when he was fresh +from Castle Luton. + +Betty's thoughts, however, had once more slipped away from her immediate +neighbours, and were pursuing more exciting matters,--the state of +Madeleine Penley's heart and the wiles of that witch-woman in London, who +must be somehow plucked like a burr from Ancoats's skirts,--when Marcella +entered the room, hat in hand. + +"Whither away, fair lady?" cried Betty; "come and talk to me." + +"Hallin will be in the river," said Marcella, irresolute. + +"If he is, Sir George will fish him out. Besides, I believe Sir George +and Ancoats have gone for a walk, and Hallin with them. I heard Maxwell +tell Hallin he might go." + +Marcella turned an uncertain look upon Lord Fontenoy and Mrs. Allison. +But directly Maxwell's wife entered the room, Maxwell's enemy had dropped +his talk of political affairs, and he was now showing Sir Philip a +portfolio of Mrs. Allison's sketches, with a subdued ardour that brought +a kindly smile to Marcella's lip. In general, Fontenoy had neither eye +nor ear for anything artistic; moreover, he spoke barbarous French, and +no other European tongue; while of letters he had scarcely a tincture. +But when it became a question of Mrs. Allison's accomplishments, her +drawing, her embroidery, still more her admirable French and excellent +Italian, the books she had read, and the poetry she knew by heart, he was +all appreciation--one might almost say, all feeling. It was Cymon and +Iphigenia in a modern and middle-aged key. + +His mien he fashioned and his tongue he filed. + +And did a blunder come, Iphigenia gently and deftly put it to rights. + +"Where is Madeleine?" asked Betty, as Marcella approached her sofa. + +"Walking with Lord Naseby, I think." + +"What was the matter on the way from church?" asked Betty, in a low +voice, raising her face to her friend. + +Marcella, looked gravely down upon her. + +"If you come into the garden I will tell you. Madeleine told me." + +Betty, all curiosity, followed her friend through the open window to a +seat in the Dutch garden outside. + +"It was a terrible thing that happened," said Marcella, sitting erect, +and speaking with a manner of suppressed energy that Betty knew well; +"one of the things that make my blood boil when I come here. You know how +she rules the village?"--She turned imperceptibly towards the distant +drawing-room, where Mrs. Allison's white head was still visible. "Not +only must all the cottages be beautiful, but all the people must reach a +certain standard of virtue. If a man drinks, he must go; if a girl loses +her character, she and her child must go. It was such a girl that threw +herself in the way of the party this morning. Her mother would not part +with her; so the decree went forth--the whole family must go. They say +the girl has never been right in her head since the baby's birth; she +raved and wept this morning, said her parents could find no work +elsewhere--they must die, she and her child must die. Mrs. Allison tried +to stop her, but couldn't; then she hurriedly sent the others on, and +stayed behind herself--only for a minute or two; she overtook Madeleine +almost immediately. Madeleine is sure she was inexorable; so am I; she +always is. I once argued with her about a case of the kind--a _cruel_ +case! 'Those are the sins that make me _shudder!_' she said, and one +could make no impression on her whatever. You see how exhausted she looks +this afternoon. She will wear herself out, probably, praying and weeping +over the girl." + +Betty threw up her hands. + +"My dear!--when she knows--" + +"It may perfectly well kill her," said Marcella, steadily. Then, after a +pause, Betty saw her face flush from brow to chin, and she added, in a +low and passionate voice: "Nevertheless, from all tyrannies and cruelties +in the name of Christ, good Lord, deliver us!" + +The two lingered together for some time without speaking. Both were +thinking of much the same things, but both were tired with the endless +talking of a country-house Sunday, and the rest was welcome. + +And presently Marcella rambled away from her friend, and spent an hour +pacing by herself in a glade beside the river. + +And there her mind instantly shook itself from every care but one--the +yearning over her husband and his work. + +Two years of labour--she caught her breath with a little sob--labour +which had aged and marked the labourer; and now, was it really to be +believed, that after all the toil, after so much hope and promise of +success, everything was to be wrecked at last? + +She gave herself once more to eager forecasts and combinations. As to +individuals--she recalled Tressady's blunt warning with a smile and a +wince. But it did not prevent her from falling into a reverie of which +he, or someone like him, was the centre. Types, incidents, scenes, rose +before her--if they could only be pressed upon, _burnt into_ such a mind, +as they had been burnt into her mind and Maxwell's! That was the whole +difficulty--lack of vision, lack of realisation. Men were to have the +deciding voice in this thing, who had no clear conception of how poverty +and misery live, no true knowledge of this vast tragedy of labour +perpetually acted, in our midst, no rebellion of heart against conditions +of life for other men they themselves would die a thousand times rather +than accept. She saw herself, in a kind of despair, driving such persons +through streets, and into houses she knew, forcing them to look, and +_feel_. Even now, at the last moment-- + +How much better she had come to know this interesting, limited being, +George Tressady, during these twenty-four hours! She liked his youth, his +sincerity--even the stubbornness with which he disclaimed inconvenient +enthusiasms; and she was inevitably flattered by the way in which his +evident prejudice against herself had broken down. + +His marriage was a misfortune, a calamity! She thought of it with the +instinctive repulsion of one who has never known any temptation to the +small vulgarities of life. One could have nothing to say to a little +being like that. But all the more reason for befriending the man! + + * * * * * + +An hour or two later Tressady found himself strolling home along the +flowery bank of the river. It was not long since he had parted from Lady +Maxwell and Hallin, and on leaving them he had turned back for a while +towards the woods on the hill, on the pretext that he wanted more of a +walk. Now, however, he was hurrying towards the house, that there might +be time for a chat with Letty before dressing. She would think he had +been away too long. But he had proposed to take her on the river after +tea, and she had preferred a walk with Lord Cathedine. + +Since then--He looked round him at the river and the hills. There was a +flush of sunset through the air, and the blue of the river was interlaced +with rosy or golden reflections from a sky piled with stormy cloud and +aglow with every "visionary majesty" of light and colour. The great +cloud-masses were driving in a tragic splendour through the west; and hue +and form alike, throughout the wide heaven, seemed to him to breathe a +marvellous harmony and poetry, to make one vibrating "word" of beauty. +Had some god suddenly gifted him with new senses and new eyes? Never had +he felt so much joy in Nature, such a lifting up to things awful and +divine. Why? Because a beautiful woman had been walking beside +him?--because he had been talking with her of things that he, at least, +rarely talked of--realities of feeling, or thought, or memory, that no +woman had ever shared with him before? + +How had she drawn him to such openness, such indiscretions? He was half +ashamed, and then forgot his discomfort in the sudden, eager glancing of +the mind to the future, to the opportunities of the day just coming--for +Mrs. Allison's party was to last till Whit Tuesday--to the hours and +places in London where he was to meet her on those social errands of +hers. What a warm, true heart! What a woman, through all her dreams and +mistakes, and therefore how adorable! + + * * * * * + +He quickened his pace as the light failed. Presently he saw a figure +coming towards him, emerging from the trees that skirted the main lawn. +It was Fontenoy, and Fontenoy's supporter must needs recollect himself as +quickly as possible. He had not seen much of his leader during the day. +But he knew well that Fontenoy never forgot his _role_, and there were +several points, newly arisen within the last forty-eight hours, on which +he might have expected before this to be called to counsel. + +But Fontenoy, when he came up with the wanderer, seemed to have no great +mind for talk. He had evidently been pacing and thinking by himself, and +when he was fullest of thought he was as a rule most silent and +inarticulate. + +"You are late; so am I," he said, as he turned back with Tressady. + +George assented. + +"I have been thinking out one or two points of tactics." + +But instead of discussing them he sank into silence again. George let him +alone, knowing his ways. + +Presently he said, raising his powerful head with a jerk, "But tactics +are not of such importance as they were. I think the thing is +done--_done!_" he repeated with emphasis. + +George shrugged his shoulders. + +"I don't know. We may be too sanguine. It is not possible that Maxwell +should be easily beaten." + +Fontenoy laughed--a strange, high laugh, like a jay's, that seemed to +have no relation to his massive frame, and died suddenly away. + +"But we shall beat him," he said quietly; "and her, too. A well-meaning +woman--but what a foolish one!" + +George made no reply. + +"Though I am bound to say," Fontenoy went on quickly, "that in private +matters no man could be kinder and show a sounder judgment than Maxwell. +And I believe Mrs. Allison feels the same with regard to her." + +His look first softened, then frowned; and as he turned his eyes towards +the house, George guessed what subject it was that he and Maxwell had +discussed under the limes in the morning. + + * * * * * + +He found Letty in very good spirits, owing, as far as he could judge, to +the civilities and attentions of Lord Cathedine. Moreover, she was more +at ease in her surroundings, and less daunted by Mrs. Allison. + +"And of course, to-morrow," she said, as she put on her diamonds, "it +will be nicer still. We shall all know each other so much better." + +In her good-humour she had forgotten her twinge of jealousy, and did not +even inquire with whom he had been wandering so long. + +But Letty was disappointed of her last day at Castle Luton. For the +party broke up suddenly, and by ten o'clock on Monday morning all +Mrs. Allison's guests but Lord Fontenoy and the Maxwells had left +Castle Luton. + +It was on this wise. + +After dinner on Sunday night Ancoats, who had been particularly silent +and irritable at table, suddenly proposed to show his guests the house. +Accordingly, he led them through its famous rooms and corridors, turned +on the electric light to show the pictures, and acted cicerone to the +china and the books. + +Then, suddenly it was noticed that he had somehow slipped away, and that +Madeleine Penley, too, was missing. The party straggled back to the +drawing-room without their host. + +Ancoats, however, reappeared alone in about half an hour. He was +extremely pale, and those who knew him well, and were perforce observing +him at the moment, like Maxwell and Marcella, drew the conclusion that he +was in a state of violent though suppressed excitement. His mother, +however, strange to say, noticed nothing. But she was clearly exhausted +and depressed, and she gave an early signal for the ladies' withdrawal. + +The great house sank into quietness. But about an hour after Marcella and +Betty had parted at Betty's door, Betty heard a quick knock, and opened +it in haste. + +"Mrs. Allison is ill!" said Marcella in a low, rapid voice. "I think +everyone ought to go quite early to-morrow. Will you tell Frank? I am +going to Lady Tressady. The gentlemen haven't come up." + +Betty caught her arm. "Tell me--" + +"Oh! my dear," cried Marcella, under her breath, "Ancoats and Madeleine +had an explanation in his room. He told her everything--that child! She +went to Mrs. Allison--he asked her to! Then the maid came for me in +terror. It has been a heart-attack--she has often had them. She is rather +better. But _do_ let everybody go!" and she wrung her hands. "Maxwell and +I must stay and see what can be done." + +Betty flew to ring for her maid and look up trains. Lady Maxwell went on +to Letty Tressady's room. + +But on the way, in the half-dark passage, she came across George Tressady +coming up from the smoking-room. So she gave her news of Mrs. Allison's +sudden illness to him, begging him to tell his wife, and to convey their +hostess's regrets and apologies for this untoward break-up of the party. +It was the reappearance of an old ailment, she said, and with quiet would +disappear. + +George heard her with concern, and though his mind was active with +conjectures, asked not a single question. Only, when she said good-night +to him, he held her hand a friendly instant. + +"We shall be off as early as possible, so it is goodbye. But we shall +meet in town--as you suggested?" + +"Please!" she said, and hurried off. + +But just as he reached his own door, he turned with a long breath towards +the passage where he had just seen her. It seemed that he saw her +still--her white face and dress, the trouble and pity under her quiet +manner, her pure sweetness and dignity. He said to himself, with a sort +of pride, that he had made a friend, a friend whose sympathy, whose heart +and mind, he was now to explore. + +Who was to make difficulties? Letty? But already as he stood there, with +his hand upon the handle of her door, his mind, in a kind of flashing +dream, was already making division of his life between the woman he had +married with such careless haste and this other, who at highest thought +of him with a passing kindness, and at lowest regarded him as a mere pawn +in the political game. + +What could he win by this friendship, that would injure Letty? Nothing! +absolutely nothing. + + +END OF VOLUME I + + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, SIR GEORGE TRESSADY, VOL. 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I *** + + + + +E-text prepared by Andrew Templeton, Juliet Sutherland, Mary Meehan, and +Project Gutenberg Distributed Proofreaders + + + + + + + +Note: This book was originally published as two separate + volumes. This Project Gutenberg edition preserves the + two-volume format primarily because of the length of + the novel. This is Volume I. Volume II can be found at + http://www.ibiblio.org/gutenberg/etext05/7sgt210.txt or + http://www.ibiblio.org/gutenberg/etext05/7sgt210.zip. + http://www.ibiblio.org/gutenberg/etext05/8sgt210.txt + http://www.ibiblio.org/gutenberg/etext05/8sgt210.zip + + + + + + + +SIR GEORGE TRESSADY, VOLUME I + +IN TWO VOLUMES + +BY + +MRS. HUMPHRY WARD + +AUTHOR OF "MARCELLA," "THE HISTORY OF DAVID GRIEVE," +"ROBERT ELSMEKE," ETC. + + + + + + +To my Brother and friend + +WILLIAM THOMAS ARNOLD + +I INSCRIBE THIS BOOK + + + + + + + +VOLUME I. + + + + +PART I + + + +CHAPTER I + + +"Well, that's over, thank Heaven!" + +The young man speaking drew in his head from the carriage-window. But +instead of sitting down he turned with a joyous, excited gesture and +lifted the flap over the little window in the back of the landau, +supporting himself, as he stooped to look, by a hand on his companion's +shoulder. Through this peephole he saw, as the horses trotted away, the +crowd in the main street of Market Malford, still huzzaing and waving, +the wild glare of half a dozen torches on the faces and the moving forms, +the closed shops on either hand, the irregular roofs and chimneys +sharp-cut against a wintry sky, and in the far distance the little +lantern belfry and taller mass of the new town-hall. + +"I'm much astonished the horses didn't bolt!" said the man addressed. +"That bay mare would have lost all the temper she's got in another +moment. It's a good thing we made them shut the carriage--it has turned +abominably cold. Hadn't you better sit down?" + +And Lord Fontenoy made a movement as though to withdraw from the hand on +his shoulder. + +The owner of the hand flung himself down on the seat, with a word of +apology, took off his hat, and drew a long breath of fatigue. At the same +moment a sudden look of disgust effaced the smile with which he had taken +his last glimpse at the crowd. + +"All very well!--but what one wants after this business is _a moral tub_! +The lies I've told during the last three weeks--the bunkum I've +talked!--it's a feeling of positive dirt! And the worst of it is, however +you may scrub your mind afterwards, some of it must stick." + +He took out a cigarette, and lit it at his companion's with a rather +unsteady hand. He had a thin, long face and fair hair; and one would have +guessed him some ten years younger than the man beside him. + +"Certainly--it will stick," said the other. "Election promises nowadays +are sharply looked after. I heard no bunkum. As far as I know, our party +doesn't talk any. We leave that to the Government!" + +Sir George Tressady, the young man addressed, shrugged his shoulders. His +mouth was still twitching under the influence of nervous excitement. But +as they rolled along between the dark hedges, the carriage-lamps shining +on their wet branches, green yet, in spite of November, he began to +recover a half-cynical self-control. The poll for the Market Malford +Division of West Mercia had been declared that afternoon, between two and +three o'clock, after a hotly contested election; he, as the successful +candidate by a very narrow majority, had since addressed a shouting mob +from the balcony of the Greyhound Hotel, had suffered the usual taking +out of horses and triumphal dragging through the town, and was now +returning with his supporter and party-leader, Lord Fontenoy, to the +great Tory mansion which had sent them forth in the morning, and had been +Tressady's headquarters during the greater part of the fight. + +"Did you ever see anyone so down as Burrows?" he said presently, with a +little leap of laughter. "By George! it _is_ hard lines. I suppose he +thought himself safe, what with the work he'd done in the division and +the hold he had on the miners. Then a confounded stranger turns up, and +the chance of seventeen ignorant voters kicks you out! He could hardly +bring himself to shake hands with me. I had come rather to admire him, +hadn't you?" + +Lord Fontenoy nodded. + +"I thought his speeches showed ability," he said indifferently, "only of +a kind that must be kept out of Parliament--that's all. Sorry you have +qualms--quite unnecessary, I assure you! At the present moment, either +Burrows and his like knock under, or you and your like. This time--by +seventeen votes--Burrows knocks under. Thank the Lord! say I"--and the +speaker opened the window an instant to knock off the end of his cigar. + +Tressady made no reply. But again a look, half-chagrined, +half-reflective, puckered his brow, which was smooth, white, and boyish +under his straight, fair hair; whereas the rest of the face was subtly +lined, and browned as though by travel and varied living. The nose and +mouth, though not handsome, were small and delicately cut, while the +long, pointed chin, slightly protruding, made those who disliked him say +that he was like those innumerable portraits of Philip IV., by and after +Velasquez, which bestrew the collections of Europe. But if the Hapsburg +chin had to be admitted, nothing could be more modern, intelligent, +alert, than the rest of him. + +The two rolled along a while in silence. They were passing through an +undulating midland country, dimly seen under the stars. At frequent +intervals rose high mounds, with tall chimneys and huddled buildings +beside them or upon them which marked the sites of collieries; while the +lights also, which had begun to twinkle over the face of the land, showed +that it was thickly inhabited. + +Suddenly the carriage rattled into a village, and Tressady looked out. + +"I say, Fontenoy, here's a crowd! Do you suppose they know? Why, +Gregson's taken us another way round!" + +Lord Fontenoy let down his window, and identified the small mining +village of Battage. + +"Why did you bring us this way, Gregson?" he said to the coachman. + +The man, a Londoner, turned, and spoke in a low voice. "I thought we +might find some rioting going on in Marraby, my lord. And now I see +there's lots o' them out here!" + +Indeed, with the words he had to check his horses. The village street was +full from end to end with miners just come up from work. Fontenoy at once +perceived that the news of the election had arrived. The men were massed +in large groups, talking and discussing, with evident and angry +excitement, and as soon as the well-known liveries on the box of the new +member's carriage were identified there was an instant rush towards it. +Some of the men had already gone into their houses on either hand, but at +the sound of the wheels and the uproar they came rushing out again. A +howling hubbub arose, a confused sound of booing and groaning, and the +carriage was soon surrounded by grimed men, gesticulating and shouting. + +"Yer bloated parasites, yer!" cried a young fellow, catching at the +door-handle on Lord Fontenoy's side; "we'll make a d----d end o' yer +afore we've done wi' yer. Who asked yer to come meddlin in +Malford--d----n yer!" + +"Whativer do we want wi' the loikes o' yo representin us!" shouted +another man, pointing at Tressady. "Look at 'im; ee can't walk, ee can't; +mus be druv, poor hinnercent! When did yo iver do a day's work, eh? Look +at my 'ands! Them's the 'ands for honest men--ain't they, you fellers?" + +There was a roar of laughter and approval from the crowd, and up went a +forest of begrimed hands, flourishing and waving. + +George calmly put down the carriage-window, and, leaning his arms upon +it, put his head out. He flung some good-humoured banter at some of +the nearest men, and two or three responded. But the majority of the +faces were lowering and fierce, and the horses were becoming +inconveniently crowded. + +"Get on, Gregson," said Fontenoy, opening the front window of the +brougham. + +"If they'll let me, your lordship," said Gregson, rather pale, +raising his whip. + +The horses made a sudden start forward. There was a yell from the crowd, +and three or four men had just dashed for the horses' heads, when a shout +of a different kind ascended. + +"Burrows! 'Ere's Burrows! Three cheers for Burrows!" + +And some distance behind them, at the corner of the village street, +Tressady suddenly perceived a tall dogcart drawing up with two men in it. +It was already surrounded by a cheering and tumultuous assembly, and one +of the men in the cart was shaking hands right and left. + +George drew in his head, with a laugh. "This is dramatic. They've stopped +the horses, and here's Burrows!" + +Fontenoy shrugged his shoulders. "They'll blackguard us a bit, I suppose, +and let us go. Burrows 'll keep them in order." + +"What d'yer mean by it, heh, dash yer!" shouted a huge man, as he sprang +on the step of the carriage and shook a black fist in Tressady's +face--"thrustin yer d----d carkiss where yer ain't wanted? We wanted +'_im_, and we've worked for 'im. This is a workin-class district, an +we've a _right_ to 'im. Do yer 'ear?" + +"Then you should have given him seventeen more votes," said George, +composedly, as he thrust his hands into his pockets. "It's the fortunes +of war--your turn next time. I say, suppose you tell your fellows to let +our man get on. We've had a long day, and we're hungry. Ah"--to +Fontenoy--"here's Burrows coming!" + +Fontenoy turned, and saw that the dogcart had drawn up alongside them, +and that one of the men was standing on the step of it, holding on to the +rail of the cart. + +He was a tall, finely built man, and as he looked down on the carriage, +and on Tressady leaning over the window, the light from a street-lamp +near showed a handsome face blanched with excitement and fatigue. + +"Now, my friends," he said, raising his arm, and addressing the crowd, +"you let Sir George go home to his dinner. He's beaten us, and so far as +I know _he's_ fought fair, whatever some of his friends may have done for +him. I'm going home to have a bite of something and a wash. I'm done. But +if any of you like to come round to the club--eight o'clock--I'll tell +you a thing or two about this election. Now goodnight to you, Sir George. +We'll beat you yet, trust us. Fall back there!" + +He pointed peremptorily to the men holding the horses. They and the crowd +instantly obeyed him. + +The carriage swept on, followed by the hooting and groans of the whole +community, men, women, and children, who were now massed along the street +on either hand. + +"It's easy to see this man Gregson's a new hand," said Fontenoy, with an +accent of annoyance, as they got clear of the village. "I believe the +Wattons have only just imported him, otherwise he'd never have avoided +Marraby, and come round by Battage." + +"Battage has some special connection with Burrows, hasn't it? I had +forgotten." + +"Of course. He was check-weigher at the Acme pit here for years, before +they made him district secretary of the union." + +"That's why they gave me such a hot meeting here a fortnight ago!--I +remember now; but one thing drives another out of one's head. Well, +I daresay you and I'll have plenty more to do with Burrows before +we've done." + +Tressady threw himself back in his corner with a yawn. + +Fontenoy laughed. + +"There'll be another big strike some time next year," he said +drily--"bound to be, as far as I can see. We shall all have plenty to do +with Burrows then." + +"All right," said Tressady, indistinctly, pulling his hat over his eyes. +"Burrows or anybody else may blow me up next year, so long as they let me +go to sleep now." + +However, he did not find it so easy to go to sleep. His pulses were still +tingling under the emotions of the day and the stimulus of the hubbub +they had just passed through. His mind raced backwards and forwards over +the incidents and excitements of the last six months, over the scenes of +his canvass--and over some other scenes of a different kind which had +taken place in the country-house whither he and Fontenoy were returning. + +But he did his best to feign sleep. His one desire was that Fontenoy +should not talk to him. Fontenoy, however, was not easily taken in, and +no sooner did George make his first restless movement under the rug he +had drawn over him, than his companion broke silence. + +"By the way, what did you think of that memorandum of mine on Maxwell's +bill?" + +George fidgeted and mumbled. Fontenoy, undaunted, began to harangue on +certain minutiae of factory law with a monotonous zest of voice and +gesture which seemed to Tressady nothing short of amazing. + +He watched the speaker a minute or two through his half-shut eyes. So +this was his leader to be--the man who had made him member for Market +Malford. + +Eight years before, when George Tressady had first entered Christchurch, +he had found that place of tempered learning alive with traditions on the +subject of "Dicky Fontenoy." And such traditions--good Heavens! +Subsequently, at most race-meetings, large and small, and at various +clubs, theatres, and places of public resort, the younger man had had his +opportunities of observing the elder, and had used them always with +relish, and sometimes with admiration. He himself had no desire to follow +in Fontenoy's footsteps. Other elements ruled in him, which drew him +other ways. But there was a magnificence about the impetuosity, or rather +the doggedness with which Fontenoy had plunged into the business of +ruining himself, which stirred the imagination. On the last occasion, +some three and a half years before this Market Malford election, when +Tressady had seen Fontenoy before starting himself on a long Eastern +tour, he had been conscious of a lively curiosity as to what might have +happened to "Dicky" by the time he came back again. The eldest sons of +peers do not generally come to the workhouse; but there are aristocratic +substitutes which, relatively, are not much less disagreeable; and George +hardly saw how they were to be escaped. + +And now--not four years!--and here sat Dicky Fontenoy, haranguing on the +dull clauses of a technical act, throat hoarse with the speaking of the +last three weeks, eyes cavernous with anxiety and overwork, the creator +and leader of a political party which did not exist when Tressady left +England, and now bade fair to hold the balance of power in English +government! The surprises of fate and character! Tressady pondered them a +little in a sleepy way; but the fatigue of many days asserted itself. +Even his companion was soon obliged to give him up as a listener. Lord +Fontenoy ceased to talk; yet every now and then, as some jolt of the +carriage made George open his eyes, he saw the broad-shouldered figure +beside him, sitting in the same attitude, erect and tireless, the same +half-peevish pugnacity giving expression to mouth and eye. + + * * * * * + +"Come, wake up, Tressady! Here we are!" + +There was a vindictive eagerness in Fontenoy's voice. Ease was no longer +welcome to him, whether in himself or as a spectacle in other men. +George, startled from a momentary profundity of sleep, staggered to his +feet, and clutched at various bags and rugs. + +The carriage was standing under the pillared porch of Malford House, and +the great house-doors, thrown back upon an inner flight of marble steps, +gave passage to a blaze of light. George, descending, had just shaken +himself awake, and handed the things he held to a footman, when there was +a sudden uproar from within. A crowd of figures--men and women, the men +cheering, the women clapping and laughing--ran down the inner steps +towards him. He was surrounded, embraced, slapped on the back, and +finally carried triumphantly into the hall. + +"Bring him in!" said an exultant voice; "and stand back, please, and let +his mother get at him." + +The laughing group fell back, and George, blinking, radiant, and abashed, +found himself in the arms of an exceedingly sprightly and youthful dame, +with pale, frizzled hair, and the figure of seventeen. + +"Oh, you dear, great, foolish thing!" said the lady, with the voice and +the fervour, moreover, of seventeen. "So you've got in--you've done it! +Well, I should never have spoken to you again if you hadn't! And I +suppose you'd have minded that a little--from your own mother. Goodness! +how cold he is!" + +And she flew at him with little pecking kisses, retreating every now and +again to look at him, and then closing upon him again in ecstasy, till +George, at the end of his patience, held her off with a strong arm. + +"Now, mother, that's enough. Have the others been home long?" he +asked, addressing a smiling young man in knickerbockers who, with his +hands in his pockets, was standing beside the hero of the occasion +surveying the scene. + +"Oh! about half an hour. They reported you'd have some difficulty +in getting out of the clutches of the crowd. We hardly expected +you so soon." + +"How's Miss Sewell's headache? Does she know?" + +The expression of the young man's eye, which was bent on Tressady, +changed ever so slightly as he replied: + +"Oh yes, she knows. As soon as the others got back Mrs. Watton went up to +tell her. She didn't show at lunch." + +"Mrs. Watton came to tell _me_--naughty man!" said the lady whom George +had addressed as his mother, tapping the speaker on the arm with her fan. +"Mothers first, if you please, especially when they're cripples like me, +and can't go and see their dear darlings' triumphs with their own eyes. +And _I_ told Miss Sewell." + +She put her head on one side, and looked archly at her son. Her high +gown, a work of the most approved Parisian art, was so cut as to show +much more throat than usual, and, in addition, a row of very fine pearls. +Her very elegant waist and bust were defined by a sort of Empire sash; +her complexion did her maid and, indeed, her years, infinite credit. + +George flushed slightly at his mother's words, and was turning away from +her when he was gripped by the owner of the house, Squire Watton, an +eloquent and soft-hearted old gentleman who, having in George's opinion +already overdone it greatly at the town-hall in the way of hand-shaking +and congratulations, was now most unreasonably prepared to overdo it +again. Lady Tressady joined in with little shrieks and sallies, the other +guests of the house gathered round, and the hero of the day was once +more lost to sight and hearing amid the general hubbub of talk and +laughter--for the young man in knickerbockers, at any rate, who stood a +little way off from the rest. + +"I wonder when she'll condescend to come down," he said to himself, +examining his boots with a speculative smile. "Of course it was mere +caprice that she didn't go to Malford; she meant it to annoy." + +"I say, do let me get warm," said Tressady at last, breaking from his +tormentors, and coming up to the open log fire, in front of which the +young man stood. "Where's Fontenoy vanished to?" + +"Went up to write letters directly he had swallowed a cup of tea," said +the young man, whose name was Bayle; "and called Marks to go with him." +(Marks was Lord Fontenoy's private secretary.) + +George Tressady threw up his hands in disgust. + +"It's absurd. He never allows himself an hour's peace. If he expects me +to grind as he does, he'll soon regret that he lent a hand to put me into +Parliament. Well, I'm stiff all over, and as tired as a rat. I'll go and +have a warm bath before dinner." + +But still he lingered, warming his hands over the blaze, and every now +and then scanning the gallery which ran round the big hall. Bayle chatted +to Mm about some of the incidents of the day. George answered at random. +He did, indeed, look tired out, and his expression was restless and +discontented. + +Suddenly there was a cry from the group of young men and maidens who were +amusing themselves in the centre of the hall. + +"Why, there's Letty! and as fresh as paint." + +George turned abruptly. Bayle saw his manner stiffen and his eye kindle. + +A young girl was slowly coming down the great staircase which led to the +hall. She was in a soft black dress with a blue sash, and a knot of blue +at her throat--a childish slip of a dress, which answered to her small +rounded form, her curly head, and the hand slipping along the marble +rail. She came down silently smiling, taking each step with great +deliberation, in spite of the outbreak of half-derisive sympathy with +which she was greeted from her friends below. Her bright eyes glanced +from face to face--from the mocking inquirers immediately beneath her to +George Tressady standing by the fire. + +At the moment when she reached the last step Tressady found it necessary +to put another log on a fire already piled to repletion. + +Meanwhile Miss Sewell went straight towards the new member and held +out her hand. + +"I am so glad, Sir George; let me congratulate you." + +George put down his log, and then looked at his fingers critically. + +"I am very sorry, Miss Sewell, but I am not fit to touch. I hope your +headache is better." + +Miss Sewell dropped her hand meekly, shot him a glance which was not +meek, and said demurely: + +"Oh! my headaches do what they're told. You see, I was determined to come +down and congratulate you." + +"I see," he repeated, making her a little bow. "I hope my ailments, when +I get them, will be as docile. So my mother told you?" + +"I didn't want telling," she said placidly. "I knew it was all safe." + +"Then you knew what only the gods knew--for I only got in by +seventeen votes." + +"Yes, so I heard. I was very sorry for Burrows." + +She put one foot on the stone fender, raised her pretty dress with one +hand, and leant the other lightly against the mantelpiece. The attitude +was full of grace, and the little sighing voice fitted the curves of a +mouth which seemed always ready to laugh, yet seldom laughed frankly. + +As she made her remark about Burrows Tressady smiled. + +"My prophetic soul was right," he said deliberately; "I knew you would be +sorry for Burrows." + +"Well, it _is_ hard on him, isn't it? You can't deny you're a +carpet-bagger, can you?" + +"Why should I? I'm proud of it." + +Then he looked round him. The rest of the party--not without whispers and +smothered laughter--had withdrawn from them. Some of the ladies had +already gone up to dress. The men had wandered away into a little library +and smoking-room which opened on the hall. Only the squire, safe in a +capacious armchair a little way off, was absorbed in a local paper and +the last humours of the election. + +Satisfied with his glance, Tressady put his hands into his pockets, and +leant back against the fireplace, in a way to give himself fuller command +of Miss Sewell's countenance. + +"Do you never give your friends any better sympathy than you have given +me in this affair, Miss Sewell?" he said suddenly, as their eyes met. + +She made a little face. + +"Why, I've been an angel!" she said, poking at a prominent log +with her foot. + +George laughed. + +"Then our ideas of angels agree no better than the rest. Why didn't you +come and hear the poll declared, after promising me you would be there?" + +"Because I had a headache, Sir George." + +He responded with a little inclination, as though ceremoniously accepting +her statement. + +"May I ask at what time your headache began?" + +"Let me see," she said, laughing; "I think it was directly after +breakfast." + +"Yes. It declared itself, if I remember right, immediately after certain +remarks of mine about a Captain Addison?" + +He looked straight before him, with a detached air. + +"Yes," said Letty, thoughtfully; "it was a curious coincidence, +wasn't it?" + +There was a moment's silence. Then she broke into infectious laughter. + +"Don't you know," she said, laying her hand on his shoulder--"don't you +know that you're a most foolish and wasteful person? We get along +capitally, you and I--we've had a rattling time all this week--and then +you will go and make uncivil remarks about my friends--in public, too! +You actually think I'm going to let you tell Aunt Watton how to manage +me! You get me into no end of a fuss--it'll take me weeks to undo the +mischief you've been making--and then you expect me to take it like a +lamb! Now, do I look like a lamb?" + +All this time she was holding him tight by the arm, and her dimpled face, +alive with mirth and malice, was so close to his that a moment's wild +impulse flashed through him to kiss her there and then. But the impulse +passed. He and Letty Sewell had known each other for about three weeks. +They were not engaged--far from it. And these--the hand on the arm, and +the rest--were Letty Sewell's ways. + +Instead of kissing her, then, he scanned her deliberately. + +"_I_ never saw anyone more plainly given over to obstinacy and pride," +he said quietly; "I told you some plain facts about the character of a +man whom I know, and you don't, whereupon you sulk all day, you break +all your promises about coming to Malford, and when I come back you call +me names." + +She raised her eyebrows and withdrew her hand. + +"Well, it's plain, isn't it? that I must have been in a great rage. It +was very dull upstairs, though I did write reams to my best friend all +about you--a very candid account--I shall have to soften it down. By the +way, are you ever going to dress for dinner?" + +George started, and looked at his watch. + +"Are we alone? Is anyone coming from outside?" + +"Only a few 'locals,' just to celebrate the occasion. I know the +clergyman's wife's coming, for she told me she had been copying one of my +frocks, and wanted me to tell her what I thought." + +George laughed. + +"Poor lady!" + +"I don't _think_ I shall be nice to her," said Letty, playing with a +flower on the mantelpiece. "Dowdy people make me feel wicked. Well, _I_ +must dress." + +It was now his turn to lay a detaining hand. + +"Are you sorry?" he said, bending over to her. His bright grey eyes had +shaken off fatigue. + +"For what? Because you got in?" + +Her face overflowed with laughter. He let her go. She linked her arm in +that of the daughter of the house--Miss Florence Watton--who was crossing +the hall at the moment, and the two went upstairs together, she throwing +back one triumphant glance at him from the landing. + +George stood watching them till they disappeared. His expression was +neither soft nor angry. There was in it a mocking self-possession which +showed that he too had been playing a part--mingled, perhaps, with a +certain perplexity. + + + + +CHAPTER II + + +George Tressady came down very late for dinner, and found his hostess on +the verge of annoyance. Mrs. Watton was a large, commanding woman, who +seldom thought it worth while to disguise any disapproval she might +feel--and she had a great deal of that commodity to expend, both on +persons and institutions. + +George hastened to propitiate her with the usual futilities: he had +supposed that he was in excellent time, his watch had been playing +tricks, and so on. + +Mrs. Watton, who, after all, on this great day beheld in the new member +the visible triumph of her dearest principles, received these excuses at +first with stiffness, but soon thawed. + +"Oh, you _naughty_ boy, you naughty, mendacious boy!" said a +sprightly voice in Tressady's ear. "'Excellent time,' indeed! I saw +you--for shame!" + +And Lady Tressady flounced away from her son, laughing over her +shoulder in one of her accustomed poses. She wore white muslin over +cherry-coloured silk. The display of neck and shoulders could hardly +have been more lavish; and the rouge on her cheeks had been overdone, +which rarely happened. George turned from her hurriedly to speak to +Lord Fontenoy. + +"What a fool that woman is!" thought Mrs. Watton to herself, as her +sharp eye followed her guest. "She will make George positively dislike +her soon--and all the time she is bound to get him to pay her debts, or +there will be a smash. What! dinner? John, will you please take Lady +Tressady; Harding, will you take Mrs. Hawkins"--pointing her second son +towards a lady in black sitting stiffly on the edge of an ottoman; "Mr. +Hawkins takes Florence; Sir George"--she waved her hand towards Miss +Sewell. "Now, Lord Fontenoy, you must take me; and the rest of you sort +yourselves." + +As the young people, mostly cousins, laughingly did what they were told, +Sir George held out his arm to Miss Sewell. + +"I am very sorry for you," he said, as they passed into the dining-room. + +"Oh! I knew it would be my turn," said Letty, with resignation. "You see, +you took Florrie last night, and Aunt Watton the night before." + +George settled himself deliberately in his chair, and turned to study his +companion. + +"Do you mind warning me, to begin with, how I can avoid giving you a +headache? Since this morning my nerve has gone--I want directions." + +"Well--" said Letty, pondering, "let us lay down the subjects we _may_ +talk about first. For instance, you may talk of Mrs. Hawkins." + +She gave an imperceptible nod which directed his eyes to the thin woman +sitting opposite, to whom Harding Watton, a fashionable and fastidious +youth, was paying but scant attention. + +George examined her. + +"I don't want to," he said shortly; "besides, she would last us no +time at all." + +"Oh!--on the contrary," said Letty, with malice sparkling in her brown +eye, "she would last me a good twenty minutes. She has got on my gown." + +"I didn't recognise it," said George, studying the thin lady again. + +"I wouldn't mind," said Letty, in the same tone of reflection, "if Mrs. +Hawkins didn't think it her duty to lecture me in the intervals of +copying my frocks. If I disapproved of anybody, I don't think I should +send my nurse to ask their maid for patterns." + +"I notice you take disapproval very calmly." + +"Callously, you mean. Well, it is my misfortune. I always feel myself so +much more reasonable than the people who disapprove." + +"This morning, then, you thought me a fool?" + +"Oh no! Only--well--I _knew_, you see, that I knew better. _I_ was +reasonable, and--" + +"Oh! don't finish," said George, hastily; "and don't suppose that I shall +ever give you any more good advice." + +"Won't you?" + +Her mocking look sent a challenge, which he met with outward firmness. +Meanwhile he was inwardly haunted by a phrase he had once heard a woman +apply to the mental capacities of her best friend. "Her _mind_?--her +mind, my dear, is a shallow chaos!" The words made a neat label, he +scoffingly thought, for his own present sensations. For he could not +persuade himself that there was much profundity in his feelings towards +Miss Sewell, whatever reckless possibilities life might seem to hold at +times; when, for instance, she wore that particular pink gown in which +she was attired to-night, or when her little impertinent airs suited her +as well as they were suiting her just now. Something cool and critical in +him was judging her all the time. Ten years hence, he made himself +reflect, she would probably have no prettiness left. Whereas now, what +with bloom and grace, what with small proportions and movements light as +air, what with an inventive refinement in dress and personal adornment +that never failed, all Letty Sewell's defects of feature or expression +were easily lost in a general aspect which most men found dazzling and +perturbing enough. Letty, at any rate within her own circle, had never +yet been without partners, or lovers, or any other form of girlish +excitement that she desired, and had been generally supposed--though she +herself was aware of some strong evidence to the contrary--to be capable +of getting anything she had set her mind upon. She had set her mind, as +the spectators in this particular case had speedily divined, upon +enslaving young George Tressady. And she had not failed. For even during +these last stirring days it had been tolerably clear that she and his +election had divided Tressady's mind between them, with a balance, +perhaps, to her side. As to the _measure_ of her success, however, that +was still doubtful--to herself and him most of all. + +To-night, at any rate, he could not detach himself from her. He tried +repeatedly to talk to the girl on his left, a noble-faced child fresh out +of the schoolroom, who in three years' time would be as much Letty +Sewell's superior in beauty as in other things. But the effort was too +great. The strenuous business of the day had but left him--in fatigue and +reaction--the more athirst for amusement and the gratification of another +set of powers. He turned back to Letty, and through course after course +they chattered and sparred, discussing people, plays and books, or +rather, under cover of these, a number of those topics on the borderland +of passion whereby men and women make their first snatches at +intimacy--till Mrs. Watton's sharp grey eyes smiled behind her fan, and +the attention of her neighbour, Lord Fontenoy--an uneasy attention--was +again and again drawn to the pair. + +Meanwhile, during the first half of dinner, a chair immediately opposite +to Tressady's place remained vacant. It was being kept for the eldest son +of the house, his mother explaining carelessly to Lord Fontenoy that she +believed he was "Out parishing somewhere, as usual." + +However, with the appearance of the pheasants the door from the +drawing-room opened, and a slim dark-haired man slipped in. He took his +place noiselessly, with a smile of greeting to George and his +neighbour, and bade the butler in a whisper aside bring him any course +that might be going. + +"Nonsense, Edward!" said his mother's loud voice from the head of the +table; "don't be ridiculous. Morris, bring back that hare _entrée_ and +the mutton for Mr. Edward." + +The newcomer raised his eyebrows mildly, smiled, and submitted. + +"Where have you been, Edward?" said Tressady; "I haven't seen you since +the town-hall." + +"I have been at a rehearsal. There is a parish concert next week, and I +conduct these functions." + +"The concerts are always bad," said Mrs. Watton, curtly. + +Edward Watton shrugged his shoulder. He had a charming timid air, +contradicted now and then by a look of enthusiastic resolution in the +eyes. + +"All the more reason for rehearsal," he said. "However, really, they +won't do badly this time." + +"Edward is one of the persons," said Mrs. Watton in a low aside to Lord +Fontenoy, "who think you can make friends with people--the lower +orders--by shaking hands with them, showing them Burne-Jones's pictures, +and singing 'The Messiah' with them. I had the same idea once. Everybody +had. It was like the measles. But the sensible persons have got over it." + +"Thank you, mamma," said Watton, making her a smiling bow. + +Lady Tressady interrupted her talk with the squire at the other end of +the table to observe what was going on. She had been chattering very +fast in a shrill, affected voice, with a gesticulation so free and +French, and a face so close to his, that the nervous and finicking +squire had been every moment afraid lest the next should find her white +fingers in his very eyes. He felt an inward spasm of relief when he saw +her attention diverted. + +"Is that Mr. Edward talking his Radicalism?" she asked, putting up a +gold eyeglass--"his dear, wicked Radicalism? Ah! we all know where Mr. +Edward got it." + +The table laughed. Harding Watton looked particularly amused. + +"Egeria was in this neighbourhood last week," he said, addressing Lady +Tressady. "Edward rode over to see her. Since then he has joined two new +societies, and ordered six new books on the Labour Question." + +Edward flushed a little, but went on eating his dinner without any other +sign of disturbance. + +"If you mean Lady Maxwell," he said good-humouredly, "I can only be sorry +for the rest of you that you don't know her." + +He raised his handsome head with a bright air of challenge that became +him, but at the same time exasperated his mother. + +"That _woman!_" said Mrs. Watton with ponderous force, throwing up her +hands as she spoke. Then she turned to Lord Fontenoy. "Don't _you_ regard +her as the source of half the mischievous work done by this precious +Government in the last two years?" she asked him imperiously. + +A half-contemptuous smile crossed Lord Fontenoy's worn face. + +"Well, really, I'm not inclined to make Lady Maxwell the scapegoat. Let +them bear their own misdeeds." + +"Besides, what worse can you say of English Ministers than that they +should be led by a woman?" said Mr. Watton, from the bottom of the table, +in a piping voice. "In my young days such a state of things would have +been unheard of. No offence, my dear, no offence," he added hastily, +glancing at his wife. + +Letty glanced at George, and put up a handkerchief to hide her own +merriment. + +Mrs. Watton looked impatient. + +"Plenty of English Cabinet Ministers have been led by women before now," +she said drily; "and no blame to them or anybody else. Only in the old +days you knew where you were. Women were corrupt--as they were meant to +be--for their husbands and brothers and sons. They wanted something for +somebody--and got it. Now they are corrupt--like Lady Maxwell--for what +they are pleased to call 'causes,' and it is that which will take the +nation to ruin." + +At this there was an incautious protest from Edward Watton against the +word "corrupt," followed by a confirmatory clamour from his mother and +brother which seemed to fill the dining-room. Lady Tressady threw in +affected comments from time to time, trying hard to hold her own in the +conversation by a liberal use of fan and Christian names, and little +personal audacities applied to each speaker in turn. Only Edward Watton, +however, occasionally took civil or smiling notice of her; the others +ignored her. They were engaged in a congenial task, the hunting of the +one disaffected and insubordinate member of their pack, and had for the +moment no attention to spare for other people. + +"I shall see the great lady, I suppose, in a week or two," said George to +Miss Sewell, under cover of the noise. "It is curious that I should never +have seen her." + +"Who? Lady Maxwell?" + +"Yes. You remember I have been four years out of England. She was in +town, I suppose, the year before I left, but I never came across her." + +"I prophesy you will like her enormously," said Letty, with decision. "At +least, I know that's what happens to me when Aunt Watton abuses anybody. +I couldn't dislike them afterwards if I tried." + +"That, allow me to impress upon you, is _not_ my disposition! I am a +human being--I am influenced by my friends." + +He turned round towards her so as to appropriate her again. + +"Oh! you are not at all the poor creature you paint yourself!" said +Letty, shaking her head. "In reality, you are the most obstinate +person I know--you can never let a subject alone--you never know when +you're beaten." + +"Beaten?" said George, reflectively; "by a headache? Well, there is no +disgrace in that. One will probably 'live to fight another day.' Do you +mean to say that you will take no notice--no notice--of all that array of +facts I laid before you this morning on the subject of Captain Addison?" + +"I shall be kind to you, and forget them. Now, do listen to Aunt Watton! +It is your duty. Aunt Watton is accustomed to be listened to, and you +haven't heard it all a hundred times before, as I have." + +Mrs. Watton, indeed, was haranguing her end of the table on a subject +that clearly excited her. Contempt and antagonism gave a fine energy to a +head and face already sufficiently expressive. Both were on a large +scale, but without commonness. The old-lace coif she wore suited her +waved and grizzled hair, and was carried with conscious dignity; the +hand, which lay beside her on the table, though long and bony, was full +of nervous distinction. Mrs. Watton was, and looked, a tyrant--but a +tyrant of ability. + +"A neighbour of theirs in Brookshire," she was saying, "was giving me +last week the most extraordinary account of the doings at Mellor. She was +the heiress of that house at Mellor"--here she addressed young Bayle, +who, as a comparative stranger in the house, might be supposed to be +ignorant of facts which everybody else knew--"a tumbledown place with an +income of about two thousand a year. Directly she married she put a +Socialist of the most unscrupulous type--so they tell me--into +possession. The man has established what they call a 'standard rate' of +wages for the estate--practically double the normal rate--coerced all the +farmers, and made the neighbours furious. They say the whole district is +in a ferment. It used to be the quietest part of the world imaginable, +and now she has set it all by the ears. _She_, having married thirty +thousand a year, can afford her little amusements; other people, who must +live by their land, have their lives worried out of them." + +"She tells me that the system works on the whole extremely well," said +Edward Watton, whose heightened colour alone betrayed the irritation of +his mother's chronic aggression, "and that Maxwell is not at all unlikely +to adopt it on his own estate." + +Mrs. Watton threw up her hands again. + +"The _idiocy_ of that man! Till he married her he was a man of sense. And +now she leads him by the nose, and whatever tune he calls, the Government +must dance to, because of his power in the House of Lords." + +"And the worst of it is," said Harding Watton, with an unpleasant laugh, +"that if she were not a handsome woman, her influence would not be half +what it is. She uses her beauty in the most unscrupulous way." + +"I believe that to be _entirely_ untrue," said Edward Watton, with +emphasis, looking at his brother with hostility. + +George Tressady interrupted. He had an affection for Edward Watton, and +cordially disliked Harding. "Is she really so handsome?" he asked, +bending forward and addressing his hostess. + +Mrs. Watton scornfully took no notice. + +"Well, an old diplomat told me the other day," said Lord Fontenoy--but +with a cold unwillingness, as though he disliked the subject--"that she +was the most beautiful woman, he thought, that had been seen in London +since Lady Blessington's time." + +"Lady Blessington! dear, dear!--Lady Blessington!" said Lady Tressady +with malicious emphasis--an unfortunate comparison, don't you think? Not +many people would like to be regarded as Lady Blessington's successor." + +"In any other respect than beauty," said Edward Watton, haughtily, with +the same tension as before, "the comparison, of course, would be +ridiculous." + +Harding shrugged his shoulders, and, tilting his chair back, said in the +ear of a shy young man who sat next him: + +"In my opinion, the Count d'Orsay is only a question of time! However, +one mustn't say that to Edward." + +Harding read memoirs, and considered himself a man of general +cultivation. The young man addressed, who read no printed matter outside +the sporting papers that he could help, and had no idea as to who Lady +Blessington and Count d'Orsay might be, smiled vaguely, and said nothing. + +"My dear," said the squire, plaintively, "isn't this room extremely hot?" + +There was a ripple of meaning laughter from all the young people, to many +of whom this particular quarrel was already tiresomely familiar. Mr. +Watton, who never understood anything, looked round with an inquiring +air. Mrs. Watton condescended to take the hint and retire. + +In the drawing-room afterwards Mrs. Watton first allotted a +duty-conversation of some ten minutes in length, and dealing strictly +with the affairs of the parish, to Mrs. Hawkins, who, as clergyman's +wife, had a definite official place in the Malford House circle, quite +irrespective of any individuality she might happen to possess. Mrs. +Hawkins was plain, self-conscious, and in no way interesting to Mrs. +Watton, who never took the smallest trouble to approach her in any other +capacity than that upon which she had entered by marrying the incumbent +of the squire's home living. But the civilities and respects that were +recognised as belonging to her station she received. + +This however, alas! was not enough for Mrs. Hawkins, who was full of +ambitions, which had a bad manner, a plague of shyness, and a narrow +income, were perpetually thwarting. As soon as the ten minutes were over, +and Mrs. Watton, who was nothing if not political, and saw no occasion to +make a stranger of the vicar's wife, had plunged into the evening papers +brought her by the footman, Mrs. Hawkins threw herself on Letty Sewell. +She was effusively grateful--too grateful--for the patterns lent her by +Miss Sewell's maid. + +"Did she lend you some patterns?" said Letty, raising her brows. "Dear +me; I didn't know." + +And her eyes ran cooly over Mrs. Hawkins's attire, which did, indeed, +present a village imitation of the delicate gown in which Miss Sewell had +robed herself for the evening. + +Mrs. Hawkins coloured. + +"I specially told my nurse," she said hastily, "that of course your leave +must be asked. But my nurse and your maid seem to have made friends. Of +course my nurse has plenty of time for dressmaking with only one child of +four to look after, and--and--one really gets no new ideas in a poky +place like this. But I would not have taken a liberty for the world." + +Her pride and _mauvaise honte_ together made both voice and manner +particularly unattractive. Letty was seized with the same temper that +little boys show towards flies. + +"Of course I am delighted!" she said indifferently. "It's so nice and +good to have one's things made at home. Your nurse must be a treasure." + +All the time her gaze was diligently inspecting every ill-cut seam and +tortured trimming of the homemade triumph before her. The ear of the +vicar's wife, always morbidly sensitive in that particular drawing-room, +caught a tone of insult in every light word. A passionate resentment +flamed up in her, and she determined to hold her own. + +"Are you going in for more visits when you leave here?" she inquired. + +"Yes, two or three," said Letty, turning her delicate head unwittingly. +She had been throwing blandishments to Mrs. Watton's dog, a grey Aberdeen +terrier, who stood on the rug quietly regarding her. + +"You spend most of the year in visits, don't you?" + +"Well, a good deal of it," said Letty. + +"Don't you find it dreadfully time-wasting? Does it leave you leisure +for _any_ serious occupations at all? I am afraid it would make _me_ +terribly idle!" + +Mrs. Hawkins laughed, attempting a tone of banter. + +Letty put up a small hand to hide a sudden yawn, which, however, was +visible enough. + +"Would it?" she said, with an impertinence which hardly tried to +conceal itself. "Evelyn, do look at that dog. Doesn't he remind you of +Mr. Bayley?" + +She beckoned to the handsome child of sixteen who had sat on George +Tressady's left hand at dinner, and, taking up a pinch of rose-leaves +that had dropped from a vase beside her, she flung them at the dog, +calling him to her. Instead of going to her, however, the dog slowly +curled himself up on the rug, and, laying his nose along his front paws, +stared at her steadily with the expression of one mounting guard. + +"He never will make friends with you, Letty. Isn't it odd?" said Evelyn, +laughing, and stooping to stroke the creature. + +"Never mind; other dogs will. Did you see that adorable black Spitz of +Lady Arthur's? She has promised to give me one." + +The two cousins fell into a chatter about their county neighbours, mostly +rich and aristocratic people, of whom Mrs. Hawkins knew little or +nothing. Evelyn Watton, whose instincts were quick and generous, tried +again and again to draw the vicar's wife into the conversation. Letty was +determined to exclude her. She lay back against the sofa, chatting her +liveliest, the whiteness of her neck and cheek shining against the red of +the damask behind, one foot lightly crossed over the other, showing her +costly little slippers with their paste buckles. She sparkled with jewels +as much as a girl may--more, indeed, in Mrs. Hawkins's opinion, than a +girl should. From head to foot she breathed affluence, seduction, +success--only the seduction was not for Mrs. Hawkins and her like. + +The vicar's wife sat flushed and erect on her chair, disdaining after a +time to make any further effort, but inwardly intolerably sore. She could +not despise Letty Sewell, unfortunately, since Letty's advantages were +just those that she herself most desired. But there was something else in +her mind than small jealousy. When Letty had been a brilliant child in +short frocks, the vicar's wife, who was scarcely six years older, had +opened her heart, had tried to make herself loved by Mrs. Watton's niece. +There had been a moment when they had been "Madge" and "Letty" to each +other, even since Letty had "come out." Now, whenever Mrs. Hawkins +attempted the Christian name, it stuck in her throat; it seemed, even to +herself, a familiarity that had nothing to go upon; while with every +succeeding visit to Malford, Letty had dropped her former friend more +decidedly, and "Madge" was heard no more. + +The gentlemen, deep in election incident and gossip, were, in the view +chiefly of the successful candidate, unreasonably long in leaving the +dining-room. When they appeared at last, George Tressady once more +made an attempt to talk to someone else than Letty Sewell, and once +more failed. + +"I want you to tell me something about Miss Sewell," said Lord Fontenoy +presently in Mrs. Watton's ear. He had been sitting silent beside her on +the sofa for some little time, apparently toying with the evening papers, +which Mrs. Watton had relinquished to him. + +Mrs. Watton looked up, followed the direction of his eyes towards a +settee in a distant corner of the room, and showed a half-impatient +amusement. + +"Letty? Oh! Letty's my niece--the daughter of my brother, Walter Sewell, +of Helbeck. They live in Yorkshire. My brother has my father's place--a +small estate, and rents very irregular. I often wonder how they manage to +dress that child as they do. However, she has always had her own way +since she was a foot high. As for my poor brother, he has been an +invalid for the last ten years, and neither he nor his wife--oh! such a +stupid woman!"--Mrs. Watton's energetic hands and eyes once more, called +Heaven to witness--"have ever counted for much, I should say, in Letty's +career. There is another sister, a little delicate, silent thing, that +looks after them. Oh! Letty isn't stupid; I should think not. I suppose +you're alarmed about Sir George. You needn't be. She does it with +everybody." + +The candid aunt pursued the conversation a little further, in the same +tone of a half-caustic indulgence. At the end of it, however, Lord +Fontenoy was still uneasy. He had only migrated to Malford House for the +declaration of the poll, having spent the canvassing weeks mainly in +another part of the division. And now, on this triumphant evening, he was +conscious of a sudden sense of defective information, which was +disagreeable and damping. + + * * * * * + +When bedtime came, Letty lingered in the drawing-room a little behind the +other ladies, on the plea of gathering up some trifles that belonged to +her. So that when George Tressady went out with her to light her candle +for her in the gallery, they found themselves alone. + +He had fallen into a sudden silence, which made her sweep him a look of +scrutiny as she took her candlestick. The slim yet virile figure drawn to +its full height, the significant, long-chinned face, pleased her senses. +He might be plain--she supposed he was--but he was, nevertheless, +distinguished, and extraordinarily alive. + +"I believe you are tired to death," she said to him. "Why don't you +go to bed?" + +She spoke with the freedom of one accustomed to advise all her male +acquaintance for their good. George laughed. + +"Tired? Not I. I was before dinner. Look here, Miss Sewell, I've got a +question to ask." + +"Ask it." + +"You don't want to spoil my great day, do you? You do repent that +headache?" + +They looked at each other, dancing laughter in each pair of eyes, +combined in his with an excited insistence. + +"Good-night, Sir George," she said, holding out her hand. + +He retained it. + +"You do?" he said, bending over her. + +She liked the situation, and made no immediate effort to change it. + +"Ask me a month hence, when I have proved your statements." + +"Then you admit it was all pretence?" + +"I admit nothing," she said joyously. "I protected my friend." + +"Yes, by injuring and offending another friend. Would it please you if I +said I missed you _very_ much at Malford to-day?" + +"I will tell you to-morrow--it is so late! Please let me have my hand." + +He took no notice, and they went hand-in-hand, she drawing him, to the +foot of the stairs. + +"George!" said a shrill, hesitating voice from overhead. + +George looked up, and saw his mother. He and Letty started apart, and in +another second Letty had glided upstairs and disappeared. + +"Yes, mother," said George, impatiently. + +"Will you come here?" + +He mounted, and found Lady Tressady a little discomposed, but as +affected as usual. + +"Oh, George! it was so dark--I didn't see--I didn't know. George, will +you have half an hour's talk with me after breakfast to-morrow? Oh, +George, my dear boy, my _dear_ boy! Your poor mammy understands!" + +She laid one hand on his shoulder and, lifting her feather fan in the +other, shook it with playful meaning in the direction whither Letty +had departed. + +George hastily withdrew himself. "Of course I will have a talk with you, +mother. As for anything else, I don't know what you mean. But you really +must let me go to bed; I am much too tired to talk now. Good-night." + +Lady Tressady went back to her room, smiling but anxious. + +"She has caught him!" she said to herself; "barefaced little flirt! It is +not altogether the best thing for me. But it may dispose him to be +generous, if--if I can play my cards." + +Letty Sewell meanwhile had reached the quiet of a luxurious bedroom, and +summoned her maid to her assistance. When the maid departed, the mistress +held long counsel with herself over the fire: the general position of her +affairs; what she desired; what other people intended; her will, and the +chances, of getting it. Her thoughts dealt with these various problems in +a skilled and business-like way. To a particular form of self-examination +Letty was well accustomed, and it had become by now a strong agent in the +development of individuality, as self-examination of another sort is said +to be by other kinds of people. + +She herself was pleasantly conscious of real agitation. George Tressady +had touched her feelings, thrilled her nerves, more than--Yes! she said +to herself decidedly, more than anybody else, more than "the rest." She +thought of "the rest," one after the other--thought of them +contemptuously. Yet, certainly few girls in her own set and part of the +country had enjoyed a better time--few, perhaps, had dared so many +adventures. Her mother had never interfered with her; and she herself had +not been afraid to be "talked about." Dances, picnics, moonlight walks; +the joys of outrageous "sitting-out," and hot rivalries with prettier +girls; of impertinences towards the men who didn't matter, and pretty +flatteries towards the men who did--it was all pleasant enough to think +of. She could not reproach herself with having missed any chances, any +opportunities her own will might have given her. + +And yet--well, she was tired of it!--out of love altogether with her +maiden state and its opportunities. She had come to Malford House in a +state of soreness, which partly accounted, perhaps, for such airs as she +had been showing to poor Mrs. Hawkins. During the past year a particular +marriage--the marriage of her neighbourhood--had seemed intermittently +within her reach. She had played every card she knew--and she had failed! +Failed, too, in the most humiliating way. For the bride, indeed, was +chosen; but it was not Letty Sewell, but one of Letty's girl-neighbours. + +To-night, almost for the first time, she could bear to think of it; she +could even smile at it. Vanity and ambition alone had been concerned, and +to-night these wild beasts of the heart were soothed and placable. + +Well, it was no great match, of course--if it came off. All that Aunt +Watton knew about the Tressadys had been long since extracted from her by +her niece. And with Tressady himself Letty's artless questions had been +very effective. She knew almost all that she wished to know. No doubt +Ferth was a very second-rate "place"; and, since those horrid miners had +become so troublesome, his income as a coal-owner could not be what his +father's had been--three or four thousand a year, she supposed--more, +perhaps, in good years. It was not much. + +Still--she pressed her hands on her eyes--he was _distinguished_; she saw +that plainly already. He would be welcome anywhere. + +"And we are _not_ distinguished--that is just it. We are small people, in +a rather dull set. And I have had hard work to make anything of it. Aunt +Watton was very lucky to marry as she did. Of course, she _made_ Uncle +Watton marry her; but that was a chance--and papa always says nobody else +could have done it!" + +She fell happily thinking of Tressady's skirmishes with her, her face +dimpling with amusement. Captain Addison! How amazed he would be could he +know the use to which she had put his name and his very hesitating +attentions. But he would never know; and meanwhile Sir George had been +really pricked--really jealous! She laughed to herself--a low laugh of +pure pleasure. + +Yes--she had made up her mind. With a sigh, she put away from her all +other and loftier ambitions. She supposed that she had not money or +family enough. One must face the facts. George Tressady would take her +socially into another _milieu_ than her own, and a higher one. She told +herself that she had always pined for Parliament, politics, and eminent +people. Why should she not succeed in that world as well as in the +Helbeck world? Of course she would succeed! + +There was his mother--silly, painted old lady! She was naturally the +_great_ drawback; and Aunt Watton said she was absurdly extravagant, and +would ruin Tressady if it went on. All the more reason why he should be +protected. Letty drew herself sharply together in her pretty white +dressing-gown, with the feeling that mothers of that kind must and could +be kept in their place. + +A house in town, of course--and _not_ in Warwick Square, where, +apparently, the Tressadys owned a house, which had been let, and was now +once more in Sir George's hands. That might do for Lady Tressady--if, +indeed, she could afford it when her son had married and taken other +claims upon him. + +Letty allowed her thoughts to wander dreamily on, envisaging the London +life that was to be: the young member, Lord Fontenoy's special friend and +_protégé_--the young member's wife making her way among great people, +giving charming little parties at Ferth-- + +All very well! But what, please, were the facts on his side? She buried +her small chin deep in her hands as she tried, frowning, to think it out. +Certainly he was very much drawn, very much taken. She had watched him, +sometimes, trying to keep away from her--and her lips parted in a broad +smile as she recalled the triumph of his sudden returns and submissions. +She believed he had a curious temper--easily depressed, for all his +coolness. But he had never been depressed in her company. + +Still, _nothing_ was certain. All that had happened might melt away into +nothingness with the greatest ease if--well! if the right steps were not +taken. He was no novice, any more than she; he must have had scores of +"affairs" by now, with that manner of his. Such men were always capable +of second thoughts, of tardy retreats--and especially if there were the +smallest thought of persecution, of pursuit. + +She believed--she was nearly certain--he would have a reaction to-morrow, +perhaps because his mother had caught them together. Next morning he +would be just a little bored by the thought of it--a little bored by +having to begin again where he had left off. Without great tact and skill +the whole edifice might tumble together like a house of cards. Had she +the courage to make difficulties--to put a water-ditch across his path? + +It was close on midnight when Letty at last raised her little chin from +the hands that held it and rang the bell that communicated with her +maid's room, but cautiously, so as not to disturb the rest of the +sleeping house. + +"If Grier _is_ asleep, she must wake up, that's all!" + +Two or three minutes afterwards a dishevelled maid startled out of her +first slumber appeared, to ask whether her mistress was ill. + +"No, Grier, but I wanted to tell you that I have changed my mind about +staying here till Saturday. I am going to-morrow morning by the 9.30 +train. You can order a fly first thing, and bring me my breakfast early." + +The maid, groaning at the thought of the boxes that would have to be +packed in this inconceivable hurry, ventured to protest. + +"Never mind, you can get the housemaid to help you," said Miss Sewell, +decidedly. "I don't mind what you give her. Now go to bed, Grier. I'm +sorry I woke you up; you look as tired as an owl." + +Then she stood still, looking at herself--hands clasped lightly before +her--in the long glass. + +"'Letty went by the nine o'clock train,'" she said aloud, smiling, and +mocking her own white reflection. "'Dear me! How sudden! how +extraordinary! Yes, but that's like her. H'm--' Then he must write to me, +for I shall write _him_ a civil little note asking for that book I lent +him. Oh! I _hope_ Aunt Watton and his mother will bore him to death!" + +She broke out into a merry laugh; then, sweeping her mass of pretty hair +to one side, she began rapidly to coil it up for the night, her fingers +working as fast as her thoughts, which were busy with one ingenious plan +after another for her next meeting with George Tressady. + + + + +CHAPTER III + + +During this same space of time, which for Miss Sewell's maid ended so +disagreeably, George Tressady was engaged in a curious conversation. + +He had excused himself from smoking, on the ground of fatigue, +immediately after his parting from Letty. But he had only nominally gone +to bed. He too found it difficult to tear himself from thinking and the +fire, and had not begun to undress when he heard a knock at his door. On +his reply, Lord Fontenoy entered. + +"May I come in, Tressady?" + +"By all means." + +George, however, stared at his invader in some astonishment. His +relations with Fontenoy were not personally intimate. + +"Well, I'm glad to find you still up, for I had a few words on my mind to +say to you before I go off to-morrow. Can you spare me ten minutes?" + +"Certainly; do sit down. Only--well, I'm afraid I'm pretty well done. If +it's anything important, I can't promise to take it in." + +Lord Fontenoy for a moment made no reply. He stood by the fire, looking +at the cigarette he still held, in silence. George watched him with +repressed annoyance. + +"It's been a very hot fight, this," said Fontenoy at last, slowly, "and +you've won it well. All our band have prospered in the matter of +elections. But this contest of yours has been, I think, the most +conspicuous that any of us have fought. Your speeches have made a +mark--one can see that from the way in which the Press has begun to take +them, political beginner though you are. In the House you will be, I +think, our best speaker--of course with time and experience. As for me, +if you give me a fortnight to prepare in, I can make out something. +Otherwise I am no use. _You_ will take a good debating place from the +beginning. Well, it is only what I expected." + +The speaker stopped. George, fidgeting in his chair, said nothing; and +presently Fontenoy resumed: + +"I trust you will not think what I am going to say an intrusion, but--you +remember my letters to you in India?" + +George nodded. + +"They put the case strongly, I think," Fontenoy went on, "but, in my +opinion, not strongly enough. This wretched Government is in power by the +help of a tyranny--a tyranny of Labour. They call themselves +Conservatives--they are really State Socialists, and the mere catspaws of +the revolutionary Socialists. You and I are in Parliament to break down +that tyranny, if we can. This year and next will be all-important. If we +can hold Maxwell and his friends in check for a time--if we can put some +backbone into the party of freedom--if we can rally and call up the +forces we have in the country, the thing will be done. We shall have +established the counterpoise--we shall very likely turn the next +election, and liberty--or what still remains of it!--will be saved for a +generation. But to succeed, the effort, the sacrifice, from each one of +us, will have to be _enormous_." + +Fontenoy paused, and looked at his companion. George was lying back in +an armchair with his eyes shut. Why on earth--so he was +thinking--should Fontenoy have chosen this particular hour and this +particular night to _débiter_ these very stale things, that he had +already served up in innumerable speeches and almost every letter that +George had received from him? + +"I don't suppose it will be child's-play," he said, stifling a +yawn--"hope I shall feel keener after a night's rest!" He looked up +with a smile. + +Fontenoy dropped his cigarette into the fender and stood silent a moment, +his hands clasped behind his back. + +"Look here, Tressady!" he said at last, turning to his companion; "you +remember how affairs stood with me when you left England? I didn't know +much of you, but I believe, like many of my juniors, you knew a great +deal about me?" + +George made the sign of assent expected of him. + +"I knew something about you, certainly," he said, smiling; "it was not +difficult." + +Fontenoy smiled too, though without geniality. Geniality had become +impossible to a man always overworked and on edge. + +"I was a fool," he said quickly--"an open and notorious fool. But I +enjoyed my life. I don't suppose anyone ever enjoyed life more. Every day +of my former existence gave the lie to the good people who tell you that +to be happy you must be virtuous. I was idle, extravagant, and vicious, +and I was one of the happiest of men. As to my racing and my horses, they +were a constant delight to me. I can't think now of those mornings on the +Heath--the gallops of my colts--the change and excitement of it all, +without longing for it to come back again. Yet I have never owned a +horse, or seen a race, or made a bet, for the last three years. I never +go into society, except for political purposes; and I scarcely ever touch +wine. In fact, I have thrown overboard everything that once gave _me_ +pleasure and amusement so completely that I have, perhaps, some right to +press upon the party that follows me my conviction that unless each and +all of us give up private ease and comfort as I have done--unless we are +contented, as the Parnellites were, to be bores in the House and +nuisances to ourselves--to peg away in season and out of season--to give +up everything for the cause, we may just as well not go into the fight at +all--for we shall do nothing with it." + +George clasped his hands round his knee, and stared stubbornly into the +fire. Sermonising was all very well, but Fontenoy did too much of it; +nobody need suppose that he would have done what he had done, unless, on +the whole, it had given him more pleasure to do it than not to do it. + +"Well," he said, looking up at last with a laugh, "I wonder what you +_mean_--really. Do you mean, for instance, that I oughtn't to get +myself married?" + +His offhand manner covered a good deal of irritation. He made a shrewd +guess at the idea in Fontenoy's mind, and meant to show that he would not +be dictated to. + +Fontenoy also laughed, with as little geniality as before. Then he +applied himself to a deliberate answer. + +"_This_ is what I mean. If you, just elected--at the beginning of this +critical session--were to give your best mind to anything else in the +world than the fight before us, I should regard you as, for the time, at +any rate, lost to us--as, so far, betraying us." + +The colour rushed into George's cheeks. + +"Upon my word!" he said, springing up--"upon my word, you are a +taskmaster!" + +Fontenoy hastened to reply, in a different tone, "I only want to keep the +machine in order." + +George paced up and down for a few moments without speaking. Presently +he paused. + +"Look here, Fontenoy! I cannot look at the matter as you do, and we may +as well understand each other. To me, this election of mine is, after +all, an ordinary affair. I take it, and what is to come after it, just as +other men do. I have accepted your party and your programme, and I mean +to stick to them. I see that the political situation is difficult and +exciting, and I don't intend to shirk. But I am no more going to slay my +private life and interests at the altar of politics than my father did +when he was in Parliament. If the revolution is coming, it will come in +spite of you and me. And, moreover--if you will let me say so--I am +convinced that your modes of procedure are not even profitable to the +cause in the long run. No man can work as you do, without rest and +without distraction. You will break down, and then, where will the +'cause' be?" + +Lord Fontenoy surveyed the speaker with a curious, calculating look. It +was as though, with as much rapidity as his mind was capable of, he +balanced a number of pros and cons against each other, and finally +decided to let the matter drop, perhaps not without some regret for +having raised it. + +"Ah! well," he said, "I have no doubt that what I have said appears to +you mere meddlesomeness. If so, you will change your view, and you will +forgive me. I must trust the compulsion of the situation. You will +realise it, as I have done, when you get well into the fight. There is +something in this Labour tyranny which rouses all a man's passions, bad +and good. If it does not rouse yours, I have been much mistaken in my +estimate of you. As for me, don't waste your concern. There are few +stronger men than I. You forget, too--" + +There was a pause. Of late years, since his transformation in fact, Lord +Fontenoy's stiff reserve about himself had been rarely broken through. At +this moment, however, George, looking up, saw that his companion was in +some way moved by a kind of sombre and personal emotion. + +"You forget," the speaker resumed, "that I learnt nothing either at +school or college, and that a man who wants to lead a party must, some +time or other, pay for that precious privilege. When you left England, +the only financial statement I could understand was a betting-book. I +knew no history except what one gets from living among people who have +been making it, and even that I was too lazy to profit by. I couldn't +understand the simplest economical argument, and I _hated_ trouble of all +kinds. Nothing but the toil of a galley-slave could have enabled me to do +what I have done. You would be astonished sometimes if you could look in +upon me at night and see what I am doing--what I am obliged to do to keep +up the most elementary appearances." + +George was touched. The tone of the speaker had passed suddenly into one +of plain dignity, in spite of, perhaps because of, the half-bitter +humility that mingled with it. + +"I know you make one ashamed," he said sincerely, though awkwardly. +"Well, don't distrust me; I'll do my best." + +"Good-night," said Lord Fontenoy, and held out his hand. He had gained no +promises, and George had shown and felt annoyance. Yet the friendship +between the two men had sensibly advanced. + + * * * * * + +George shut the door upon him, and came back to the fire to ponder this +odd quarter of an hour. + +His experience certainly contained no more extraordinary fact than this +conversion of a gambler and a spendthrift into the passionate leader of +an arduous cause. Only one quality linked the man he remembered with the +politician he had now pledged himself to follow--the quality of +intensity. Dicky Fontenoy in his follies had been neither gay nor +lovable, but his fierce will, his extravagant and reckless force, had +given him the command of men softer than himself. That will and that +force were still there, steeled and concentrated. But George Tressady was +sometimes restlessly doubtful as to how far he himself was prepared to +submit to them. + +His personal acquaintance with Fontenoy was of comparatively recent date. +He himself had been for some four years away from England, to which he +had only returned about three months before the Market Malford election. +A letter from Fontenoy had been the immediate cause of his return; but +before it arrived the two men had been in no direct communication. + +The circumstances of Tressady's long absence concern his later story, and +were on this wise. His father, Sir William, the owner of Ferth Place, in +West Mercia, died in the year that George, his only surviving child and +the son of his old age, left college. The son, finding his father's debts +considerable and his own distaste for the law, to which he had been +destined, amazingly increased by his newly acquired freedom to do what he +liked with himself, turned his mind at once towards travelling. Travel he +must if he was ever to take up public and parliamentary life, and for no +other profession--so he announced--did he feel the smallest vocation. +Moreover, economy was absolutely necessary. During his absence the London +house could be let, and Lady Tressady could live quietly at Ferth upon an +allowance, while his uncles looked after the colliery property. + +Lady Tressady made no difficulty, except as to the figure first named for +the proposed allowance, which she declared was absurd. The uncles, +elderly business men, could not understand why the younger generation +should not go into harness at once without indulgences, as they +themselves had done; but George got his way, and had much reason to show +for it. He had not been idle at college, though perhaps at no time +industrious enough. Influenced by natural ambition and an able tutor, he +had won some distinction, and he was now a man full of odds and ends of +ideas, of nascent interests, curiosities, and opinions, strongly +influenced moreover already, though he said less about it than about +other things, by the desire for political distinction. While still at +college he had been especially attracted--owing mainly to the chances of +an undergraduate friendship--by a group of Eastern problems bearing upon +England's future in Asia; and he was no sooner free to govern himself and +his moderate income than there flamed up in him the Englishman's passion +to see, to touch, to handle, coupled with the young man's natural desire +to go where it was dangerous to go, and where other men were not going. +His friend--the son of an eminent geographer, possessed by inheritance of +the explorer's instincts--was just leaving England for Asia Minor, +Armenia, and Persia. George made up his mind, hastily but firmly, to go +with him, and his family had to put up with it. + +The year, however, for which the young fellow had stipulated went by; two +others were added to it; and a fourth began to run its course--still +George showed but faint signs of returning. According to his letters +home, he had wandered through Persia, India, and Ceylon; had found +friends and amusement everywhere; and in the latter colony had even +served eight months as private secretary to the Governor, who had taken +a fancy to him, and had been suddenly bereft by a boating accident of the +indispensable young man who was accustomed to direct the hospitalities of +Government House before Tressady's advent. Thence he went to China and +Japan, made a trip from Pekin into Mongolia, landed on Formosa, fell in +with some French naval officers at Saigon, spending with them some of the +gayest and maddest weeks of his life; explored Siam, and finally returned +by way of Burmah to Calcutta, with the dim intention this time of some +day, before long, taking ship for home. + +Meanwhile during the last months of his stay in Ceylon he had written +some signed articles for an important English newspaper, which, together +with the natural liking felt by the many important persons he had come to +know in the East for an intelligent and promising young fellow, endowed +with brains, family, and good manners, served to bring him considerably +into notice. The tone of the articles was strongly English and +Imperialist. The first of them came out immediately before his visit to +Saigon, and Tressady thanked his lucky stars that the foreign reading of +his French friends was, perhaps, not so extensive as their practical +acquaintance with life. He was, however, proud of his first literary +achievement, and it served to crystallise in him a number of ideas and +sentiments which had previously represented rather the prejudices of a +traveller accustomed to find his race in the ascendant, and to be well +received by its official class than any reasoned political theory. As he +went on writing, conviction, grew with statement, became a faith, +ultimately a passion--till, as he turned homewards, he seemed to himself +to have attained a philosophy sufficient to steer the rest of life by. It +was the common philosophy of the educated and fastidious observer; and it +rested on ideas of the greatness of England and the infinity of England's +mission, on the rights of ability to govern as contrasted with the +squalid possibilities of democracy, on the natural kingship of the higher +races, and on a profound personal admiration for the virtues of the +administrator and the soldier. + +Now, no man in whom these perceptions take strong root early, need expect +to love popular government. Tressady read his English newspapers with +increasing disgust. On that little England in those far seas all +depended, and England meant the English working-man with his flatteries +of either party. He blundered and blustered at home, while the Empire, +its services and its defences, by which alone all this pullulating +"street folk" existed for a day, were in danger of starvation and +hindrance abroad, to meet the unreasonable fancies of a degenerate race. +A deep hatred of mob-rule rooted itself in Tressady, passing gradually, +during his last three months in India, into a growing inclination to +return and take his place in the fight--to have his say. "Government to +the competent--_not_ to the many," might have been the summary of his +three years' experience. + +Nor were private influences wanting. He was a West Mercian landowner in a +coal-mining district, and owned a group of pits on the borders of his +estate. His uncles, who had shares in the property, reported to him +periodically during his absence. With every quarter it seemed to Tressady +that the reports grew worse and the dividends less. His uncles' letters, +indeed, were full of anxieties and complaints. After a long period of +peace in the coal-trade, it looked as though a time of hot war between +masters and men was approaching. "We have to thrash them every fifteen +years," wrote one of the uncles, "and the time is nearly up." + +The unreason, brutality, and extravagance of the men; the tyranny of the +Union; the growing insolence of the Union officials--Tressady's letters +from home after a time spoke of little else. And Tressady's bankbook +meanwhile formed a disagreeable comment on the correspondence. The pits +were almost running at a loss; yet neither party had made up their minds +to the trial of strength. + +Tressady was still lingering in Bombay--though supposed to be on his way +home--when Lord Fontenoy's letter reached him. + +The writer referred slightly to their previous acquaintance, and to a +remote family connection between himself and Tressady; dwelt in +flattering terms on the reports which had reached him from many quarters +of Tressady's opinions and abilities; described the genesis and aims of +the new Parliamentary party, of which the writer was the founder and +head; and finally urged him to come home at once, and to stand for +Parliament as a candidate for the Market Malford division, where the +influence of Fontenoy's family was considerable. Since the general +election, which had taken place in June, and had returned a moderate +Conservative Government to power, the member for Market Malford had +become incurably ill. The seat might be vacant at any moment. Fontenoy +asked for a telegram, and urged the next steamer. + +Tressady had already--partly from private talk, partly from the +newspapers--learnt the main outlines of Lord Fontenoy's later story. The +first political speech of Fontenoy's he had ever read made a +half-farcical impression on him--let Dicky stick to his two-year-olds! +The second he read twice over, and alike in it, in certain party +manifestoes from the same hand printed in the newspapers, and in the +letter he had now received, there spoke something for which it seemed to +him he had been waiting. The style was rough and halting, but Tressady +felt in it the note and power of a leader. + +He took an hour's walk through the streets of Bombay to think it +over, then sent his telegram, and booked his passage on his way home +to luncheon. + +Such, in brief outline, had been the origin of the two men's +acquaintance. Since George's return they had been constantly together. +Fontenoy had thrown his whole colossal power of work into the struggle +for the Market Malford seat, and George owed him much. + + * * * * * + +After he was left to himself on this particular night, Tressady was for +long restless and wakeful. In spite of resistance, Fontenoy's talk and +Fontenoy's personality had nevertheless restored for the moment an +earlier balance of mind. The interests of ambition and the intellect +returned in force. Letty Sewell had, no doubt, made life very agreeable +to him during the past three weeks; but, after all--was it worth while? + +Her little figure danced before the inward eye as his fire sank into +darkness; fragments of her chatter ran through his mind. He began to be +rather ashamed of himself. Fontenoy was right. It was not the moment. No +doubt he must marry some day; he had come home, indeed, with the vague +intention of marrying; but the world was wide, and women many. That he +had very little romance in his temperament was probably due to his +mother. His childish experiences of her character, and of her relations +to his father, had left him no room, alas! for the natural childish +opinion that all grown-ups, and especially all mothers, are saints. In +India he had amused himself a good deal; but his adventures had, on the +whole, confirmed his boyish bias. If he had been forced to put his inmost +opinions about women into words, the result would have been +crude--perhaps brutal; which did not prevent him from holding a very +strong and vivid conviction of the pleasure to be got from their society. + +Accordingly, he woke up next morning precisely in the mood that Letty, +for her own reasons, had foreseen. It worried him to think that for two +or three days more he and Letty Sewell must still be thrown together in +close relations. He and his mother were waiting on at Malford for a day +or two till some workmen should be out of his own house, which lay +twenty miles away, at the farther edge of the Market Malford division. +Meanwhile a couple of shooting-parties had been arranged, mainly for +his entertainment. Still, was there no urgent business that required +him in town? + +He sauntered in to breakfast a little before ten. Only Evelyn Watton and +her mother were visible, most of the men having already gone off to a +distant meet. + +"Now sit down and entertain us, Sir George," said Mrs. Watton, holding +out her hand to him with an odd expression. "We're as dull as ditch +water--the men have all gone--Florrie's in bed with a chill--and Letty +departed by the 9.30 train." + +George's start, as he took his coffee from her, did not escape her. + +"Miss Sewell gone? But why this suddenness?" he inquired. "I thought Miss +Letty was to be here to the end of the week." + +Mrs. Watton raised her shoulders. "She sent a note in to me at half-past +eight to say her mother wasn't well, and she was wanted at home. She just +rushed in to say good-bye to me, chattered a great deal, kissed everybody +a great deal--and I know no more. I hear she had breakfast and a fly, +which is all I troubled myself about. I never interfere with the modern +young woman." + +Then she raised her eyeglass, and looked hard and curiously at Tressady. +His face told her nothing, however, and as she was the least sympathetic +of women, she soon forgot her own curiosity. + +Evelyn Watton, a vision of fresh girlhood in her morning frock, glanced +shyly at him once or twice as she gave him scones and mustard. She was +passing through a moment of poetry and happy dreams. All human beings +walked glorified in her eyes, especially if they were young. Letty was +not wholly to her taste, and had never been a particular friend. But she +thought ill of no one, and her little heart must needs flutter tenderly +in the presence of anything that suggested love and marriage. It had +delighted her to watch George and Letty together. Now, why had Letty +rushed away like this? _She_ thought with concern, thrilling all the +time, that Sir George looked grave and depressed. + +George, however, was not depressed--or thought he was not. He walked into +the library after breakfast, whistling, and quoting to himself: + +And there be they +Who kissed his wings which brought him yesterday, +And thank his wings to-day that he is flown. + +He prided himself on his memory of some modern poets, and the lines +pleased him particularly. + +He had no sooner done quoting, however, than his mother peered into the +room, claiming the business talk that had been promised. From that talk +George emerged irritable and silent. His mother's extravagance was really +preposterous!--not to be borne. For four years now he had been free from +the constant daily friction of money troubles which had spoilt his youth +and robbed him of all power of respecting his mother. And he had hugged +his freedom. But all the time it seemed he had been hugging illusion, and +the troubles had been merely piling up for his return! Her present +claims--and he knew very well that they were not the whole--would exhaust +all his available balance at his bankers'. + +Lady Tressady, for her part, thought, with indignant despair, that he had +not behaved at all as an only son should--especially an only son just +returned to a widowed mother after four years' absence. How could anyone +suppose that in four years there would be no debts--on such a pittance of +an income? Some money, indeed, he had promised her; but not nearly +enough, and not immediately. He "must look into things at home." Lady +Tressady was enraged with herself and him that she had not succeeded +better in making him understand how pressing, how _urgent_, matters were. + +She _must_, indeed, bring it home to him that there might be a scandal at +any moment. That odious livery-stable man, two or three dressmakers--in +these directions every phase and shift of the debtor's long _finesse_ had +been exhausted long ago. Even _she_ was at her wits' end. + +As for other matters--But from these her thoughts turned hurriedly away. +Luck would change, of course, sometime; it must change! No need to say +anything about _that_ just yet, especially while George's temper was in +such a queer state. + +It was very odd--most annoying! As a baby even he had never been +caressing or sweet like other people's babies. And now, really!--why +_her_ son should have such unattractive ways! + +But, manoeuvre as she would, George would not be drawn into further +discussion. She could only show him offended airs, and rack her brains +morning and night as to how best to help herself. + +Meanwhile George had never been so little pleased with living as +during these few days. He was overwhelmed with congratulations; and, +to judge from the newspapers, "all England," as Lady Tressady said, +"was talking of him." It seemed to him ridiculous that a man should +derive so little entertainment from such a fact. Nevertheless, his +dulness remained, and refused to be got rid of. He discussed with +himself, of course, for a new set of reasons, the possibility of +evading the shooting-parties, and departing. But he was deeply pledged +to stay; and he was under considerable obligations to the Wattons. So +he stayed; but he shot so as to increase his own dissatisfaction with +the universe, and to make the other men in the house wonder what might +be the general value of an Indian sporting reputation when it came to +dealing with the British pheasant. + +Then he turned to business. He tried to read some Parliamentary reports +bearing on a coming measure, and full of notes by Fontenoy, which +Fontenoy had left with him. But it only ended in his putting them hastily +aside, lest in the mood of obscure contradiction that possessed him he +should destroy his opinions before he had taken his seat. + +On the day before the last "shoot," among the letters his servant brought +him in the early morning, was one that he tore open in a hurry, tossing +the rest aside. + +It was from Miss Sewell, requesting, prettily, in as few words as +possible, that he would return her a book she had lent him. + +"My mother," she wrote, "has almost recovered from her sudden attack of +chill. I trust the shooting-parties have amused you, and that you have +read _all_ Lord Fontenoy's Blue Books." + +George wrote a reply before he went down to breakfast--a piece of +ordinary small-talk, that seemed to him the most wretched stuff +conceivable. But he pulled two pens to pieces before he achieved it. + +Then he went out for a long walk alone, pondering what was the matter +with him. Had that little witch dropped the old familiar poison into his +veins after all? Certainly some women made life vivacity and pleasure, +while others--his mother or Mrs. Watton, for instance--made it fatigue +or tedium. + +Ever since his boyhood Tressady had been conscious of intermittent +assaults of melancholy, fits of some inner disgust, which hung the world +in black, crippled his will, made him hate himself and despise his +neighbours. It was, possibly, some half-conscious dread lest this morbid +speck in his nature should gain upon the rest that made him so hungry for +travel and change of scene after he left college. It explained many +surprises, many apparent ficklenesses in his life. During the three weeks +that he had spent in the same house with Letty Sewell he had never once +been conscious of this lurking element of his life. And now, after four +days, he found himself positively pining for her voice, the rustle of her +delicate dress, her defiant, provocative ways that kept a man on the +alert--still more, her smiling silences that seemed to challenge all his +powers, the touch of her small cool hand that crushed so easily in his. + +What had she left the house for in that wilful way? He did not believe +her excuses. Yet he was mystified. Did she realise that things were +becoming serious, and did she not mean them to be serious? If so, who or +what hindered? + +As for Fontenoy-- + +Tressady quickened his step impatiently as he recalled that harassed and +toiling figure. Politics or no politics, _he_ would live his life! +Besides, it was obviously to his profit to marry. How could he ever make +a common household with his mother? He meant to do his duty by her, but +she annoyed and abashed him twenty times a day. He would be far happier +married, far better able to do his work. He was not passionately in +love--not at all. But--for it was no good fencing with himself any +longer--he desired Letty Sewell's companionship more than he had desired +anything for a long time. He wanted the right to carry off the little +musical box, with all its tunes, and set it playing in his own house, to +keep him gay. Why not? He could house it prettily, and reward it well. + +As for the rest, he decided, without thinking about it, that Letty Sewell +was well born and bred. She had, of course, all the little refinements a +fastidious taste might desire in a woman. She would never discredit a man +in society. On the contrary, she would be a great strength to him there. +And she must be sweet-tempered, or that pretty child Evelyn Watton would +not be so fond of her. + +That pretty child, meanwhile, was absorbed in the excitement of her own +small _rôle_. Tressady, who had only made duty-conversation with her +before, had found out somehow that she was sympathetic--that she would +talk to him charmingly about Letty. After a very little pretending, he +let himself go; and Evelyn dreamt at night of his confidences, her heart, +without knowing it, leaping forward to the time when a man would look at +her so, for her own sake--not another's. She forgot that she had ever +criticised Letty, thought her vain or selfish. Nay, she made a heroine of +her forthwith; she remembered all sorts of delightful things to say of +her, simply that she might keep the young member talking in a corner, +that she might still enjoy the delicious pride of feeling that she +knew--she was helping it on. + +After the big "shoot," for instance, when all the other gentlemen were +stiff and sleepy, George spent the whole evening in chattering to Evelyn, +or, rather, in making her chatter. Lady Tressady loitered near them once +or twice. She heard the names "Letty," "Miss Sewell," passing and +repassing--one talker catching up the other. Over any topic that included +Miss Sewell they lingered; when anything was begun that did not concern +her, it dropped at once, like a ball ill thrown. The mother went away +smiling rather sourly. + +She watched her son, indeed, cat-like all these days, trying to discover +what had happened--what his real mind was. She did not wish for a +daughter-in-law at all, and she had even a secret fear of Letty Sewell +in that capacity. But somehow George must be managed, her own needs must +be met. She felt that she might be undoing the future; but the present +drove her on. + +On the following morning, from one of Mrs. Watton's numerous letters +there dropped out the fact that Letty Sewell was expected immediately at +a country house in North Mercia whereof a certain Mrs. Corfield was +mistress--a house only distant some twenty miles from the Tressadys' +estate of Ferth Place. + +"My sister-in-law has recovered with remarkable rapidity," said Mrs. +Watton, raising a sarcastic eye. "Do you know anything of the Corfields, +Sir George?" + +"Nothing at all," said George. "One hears of them sometimes from +neighbours. They are said to be very lively folk. Miss Sewell will have a +gay time." + +"Corfield?" said Lady Tressady, her head on one side and her cup balanced +in two jewelled hands. "What! _Aspasia Corfield_! Why, my dear +George--one of my oldest friends!" + +George laughed--the short, grating laugh his mother so often evoked. + +"Beg pardon, mother; I can only answer for myself. To the best of my +belief I never saw her, either at Ferth or anywhere else." + +"Why, Aspasia Corfield and I," said Lady Tressady with languid +reflectiveness--"Aspasia Corfield and I copied each other's dresses, +and bought our hats at the same place, when we were eighteen. I haven't +seen her for an eternity. But Aspasia used to be a _dear_ girl--and so +fond of me!" + +She put down her cup with a sigh, intended as a reproach to George. +George only buried himself the deeper in his morning's letters. + +Mrs. Watton, behind her newspaper, glanced grimly from the mother +to the son. + +"I wonder if that woman has a single real old friend in the world. How +is George Tressady going to put up with her?" + +The Wattons themselves had been on friendly terms with Tressady's father +for many years. Since Sir William's death and George's absence, however, +Mrs. Watton had not troubled herself much about Lady Tressady, in which +she believed she was only following suit with the rest of West Mercia. +But now that George had reappeared as a promising politician, his +mother--till he married--had to be to some extent accepted along with +him. Mrs. Watton accordingly had thought it her duty to invite her for +the election, not without an active sense of martyrdom. "She always has +bored me to tears since I first saw Sir William trailing her about," she +would remark to Letty. "Where did he pick her up? The marvel is that she +has kept respectable. She has never looked it. I always feel inclined to +ask her at breakfast why she dresses for dinner twelve hours too soon!" + +Very soon after the little conversation about the Corfields Lady Tressady +withdrew to her room, sat thoughtful for a while, with her writing-block +on her knee, then wrote a letter. She was perfectly aware of the fact +that since George had come back to her she was likely to be welcome once +more in many houses that for years had shown no particular desire to +receive her. She took the situation very easily. It was seldom her way to +be bitter. She was only determined to amuse herself, to enjoy her life in +her own way. If people disapproved of her, she thought them fools, but it +did not prevent her from trying to make it up with them next day, if she +saw an opening and it seemed worth while. + +"There!" she said to herself as she sealed the letter, and looked at it +with admiration, "I really have a knack for doing those things. I should +think Aspasia Corfield would ask him by return--me, too, if she has any +decency, though she _has_ dropped me for fifteen years. She has a tribe +of daughters.--_Why_ I should play Miss Sewell's game like this I don't +know! Well, one must try something." + +That same afternoon mother and son took their departure for Ferth Place. + +George, who had only spent a few weeks at Ferth since his return from +India, should have found plenty to do both indoors and out. The house +struck him as singularly dingy and out of order. Changes were +imperatively demanded in the garden and in the estate. His business as a +colliery-owner was in a tangled and critical condition. And meanwhile +Fontenoy plied him incessantly with a political correspondence which of +itself made large demands upon intelligence and energy. + +Nevertheless he shuffled out of everything, unless it were the +correspondence with Fontenoy. As to the notion that all the languor could +be due merely to an unsatisfied craving for Letty Sewell's society, when +it presented itself he still fought with it. The Indian climate might +have somehow affected him. An English winter is soon forgotten, and has +to be re-learnt like a distasteful lesson. + +About a week after their arrival at Ferth George was sitting at his +solitary breakfast when his mother came floating into the room, preceded +by a rattle of bangles, a flutter of streamers, and the barking of +little dogs. + +She held various newly opened letters, and, running up to him, she laid +her hands on his shoulders. + +"Now"--thought George to himself with annoyance, "she is going to be +arch!" + +"Oh! you silly boy!" she said, holding him, with her head on one side. +"Who's been cross and nasty to his poor old mammy? Who wants cheering up +a bit before he settles down to his horrid work? Who would take his +mammy to a nice party at a nice house, if he were prettily asked--eh? +who would?" + +She pinched his cheek before he could escape. + +"Well, mother, of course you will do what you like," said George, walking +off to supply himself with ham. "I shall not leave home again, just yet." + +Lady Tressady smiled. + +"Well, anyhow, you can read Aspasia Corfield's letter," she said, holding +it out to him. "You know, really, that house isn't bad. They took over +the Dryburghs' _chef_, and Aspasia knows how to pick her people." + +"Aspasia!" The tone of patronising intimacy! George blushed, if his +mother did not. + +Yet he took the letter. He read it, then put it down, and walked to the +window to look at a crowd of birds that had been collecting round a plate +of food he had just put out upon the snow. + +"Well, will you go?" said his mother. + +"If you particularly wish it," he said, after a pause, in an +embarrassed voice. + +Lady Tressady's dimples were in full play as she settled herself into her +seat and began to gather a supply of provisions. But as he returned to +his place, and she glanced at him, she saw that he was not in a mood to +be bantered, and understood that he was not going to let her force his +confidence, however shrewdly she might guess at his affairs. So she +controlled herself, and began to chatter about the Corfields and their +party. He responded, and by the end of breakfast they were on much better +terms than they had been for some weeks. + +That morning also he wrote a cheque for her immediate necessities, which +made her--for the time--a happy woman; and she overwhelmed him with +grateful tears and embraces, which he did his best to bear. + +Early in December he and she became the Corfields' guests. They found a +large party collected, and Letty Sewell happily established as the spoilt +child of the house. At the first touch of her hand, the first glance of +her eyes, George's cloud dispersed. + +"Why did you run away?" George asked her on the first possible occasion. + +Letty laughed, fenced with the question for four days, during which +George was never dull for a single instant, and then capitulated. She +allowed him to propose to her, and was graciously pleased to accept him. + +The following week Tressady went down with Letty to her home at Helbeck. +He found an invalid father, a remarkably foolish, inconsequent mother, +and a younger sister, Elsie, on whom, as it seemed to him, the burdens of +the house mainly rested. + +The father, who was suffering from a slow but incurable disease, had the +remains of much natural ability and acuteness. He was well content with +Tressady as a son-in-law; though in the few interviews that Tressady was +able to have with him on the question of settlements the young man took +pains to state his money affairs as carefully and modestly as possible. +Letty was not often in her father's room, and Mr. Sewell treated her, +when she did come, rather like an agreeable guest than a daughter. But he +was evidently extremely proud of her--as also was the mother--and he +would talk much to George, when his health allowed it, of her good looks +and her social success. + +With the younger sister Tressady did not find it easy to make friends. + +She was plain, sickly, and rather silent. She seemed to have scientific +tastes and to be a great reader. And, so far as he could judge, the two +sisters were not intimate. + +"Don't hate me for taking her away!" he said, as he was bidding good-bye +to Elsie, and glancing over her shoulder at Letty on the stairs. + +The girl's quiet eyes were crossed by a momentary look of amusement. Then +she controlled herself, and said gently: + +"We didn't expect to keep her! Good-bye." + + + + +CHAPTER IV + + +"Oh, Tully, look at my cloak! You've let it fall! Hold my fan, please, +and give me the opera-glasses." + +The speaker was Miss Sewell. She and an elderly lady were sitting side by +side in the stalls, about halfway down St. James's Hall. The occasion was +a popular concert, and, as Joachim was to play, every seat in the hall +was rapidly filling up. + +Letty rose as she asked for the opera-glasses, and scanned the crowds +streaming in through the side-doors. + +"No--no signs of him! He must have been kept at the House, after all," +she said, with annoyance. "Really, Tully, I do think you might have got a +programme all this time! Why do you leave everything to me?" + +"My dear!" said her companion, protesting, "you didn't tell me to." + +"Well, I don't see why I should _tell_ you everything. Of course I want a +programme. Is that he? No! What a nuisance!" + +"Sir George must have been detained," murmured her companion, timidly. + +"What a very original thing to say, wasn't it, Tully?" remarked Miss +Sewell, with sarcasm, as she sat down again. + +The lady addressed was silent, instinctively waiting till Letty's nerves +should have quieted down. She was a Miss Tulloch, a former governess of +the Sewells, and now often employed by Letty, when she was in town, as a +convenient chaperon. Letty was accustomed to stay with an aunt in +Cavendish Square, an old lady who did not go out in the evenings. A +chaperon therefore was indispensable, and Maria Tulloch could always be +had. She existed somewhere in West Kensington, on an income of seventy +pounds a year. Letty took her freely to the opera and the theatre, to +concerts and galleries, and occasionally gave her a dress she did not +want. Miss Tulloch clung to the connection as her only chance of relief +from the boarding-house routine she detested, and was always abjectly +ready to do as she was told. She saw nothing she was not meant to see, +and she could be shaken off at a moment's notice. For the rest, she came +of a stock of gentlefolk; and her invariable black dress, her bits of +carefully treasured lace, the weak refinement of her face, and her timid +manner did no discredit to the brilliant creature beside her. + +When the first number of the programme was over, Letty got up once more, +opera-glass in hand, to search among the late-comers for her missing +lover. She nodded to many acquaintances, but George Tressady was not to +be seen; and she sat down finally in no mood either to listen or to +enjoy, though the magician of the evening was already at work. + +"There's something very special, isn't there, you want to see Sir George +about to-night?" Tully inquired humbly when the next pause occurred. + +"Of course there is!" said Letty, crossly. "You do ask such +foolish questions, Tully. If I don't see him to-night, he may let +that house in Brook Street slip. There are several people after +it--the agents told me." + +"And he thinks it too expensive?" + +"Only because of _her_. If she makes him pay her that preposterous +allowance, of course it will be too expensive. But I don't mean him +to pay it." + +"Lady Tressady is terribly extravagant," murmured Miss Tulloch. + +"Well, so long as she isn't extravagant with his money--_our_ money--I +don't care a rap," said Letty; "only she sha'n't spend all her own and +all ours too, which is what she has been doing. When George was away he +let her live at Ferth, and spend almost all the income, except five +hundred a year that he kept for himself. And _then_ she got so shamefully +into debt that he doesn't know when he shall ever clear her. He gave her +money at Christmas, and again, I am _sure_, just lately. Well! all I know +is that it must be _stopped_. I don't know that I shall be able to do +much till I'm married, but I mean to make him take this house." + +"Is Lady Tressady nice to you? She is in town, isn't she?" + +"Oh yes! she's in town. Nice?" said Letty, with a little laugh. "She +can't bear me, of course; but we're quite civil." + +"I thought she tried to bring it on?" said the confidante, anxious, above +all things, to be sympathetic. + +"Well, she brought him to the Corfields, and let me know she had. I don't +know why she did it. I suppose she wanted to get something out of him. +Ah! _there_ he is!" + +And Letty stood up, smiling and beckoning, while Tressady's tall thin +figure made its way along the central passage. + +"Horrid House! What made you so late?" she said, as he sat down between +her and Miss Tulloch. + +George Tressady looked at her with delight. The shrewish contractions in +the face, which had been very evident to Tully a few minutes before, had +all disappeared, and the sharp slight lines of it seemed to George the +height of delicacy. At sight of him colour and eyes had brightened. Yet +at the same time there was not a trace of the raw girl about her. She +knew very well that he had no taste for _ingénues_, and she was neither +nervous nor sentimental in his company. + +"Do you suppose I should have stayed a second longer than I was obliged?" +he asked her, smiling, pressing her little hand under pretence of taking +her programme. + +The first notes of a new Brahms quartette mounted, thin and sweet, into +the air. The musical portion of the audience, having come for this +particular morsel, prepared themselves eagerly for the tasting and trying +of it. George and Letty tried to say a few things more to each other +before yielding to the general silence, but an old gentleman in front +turned upon them a face of such disdain and fury they must needs laugh +and desist. + +Not that George was unwilling. He was tired; and silence with Letty +beside him was not only repose, but pleasure. Moreover, he derived a +certain honest pleasure of a mixed sort from music. It suggested literary +or pictorial ideas to him which stirred him, and gave him a sense of +enjoyment. Now, as the playing flowed on, it called up delightful images +in his brain: of woody places, of whirling forms, of quiet rivers, of +thin trees Corot-like against the sky--scenes of pleading, of frolic, +reproachful pain, dissolving joy. With it all mingled his own story, his +own feeling; his pride of possession in this white creature touching him; +his sense of youth, of opening life, of a crowded stage whereon his "cue" +had just been given, his "call" sounded. He listened with eagerness, +welcoming each fancy as it floated past, conscious of a grain of +self-abandonment even--a rare mood with him. He was not absorbed in love +by any means; the music spoke to him of a hundred other kindling or +enchanting things. Nevertheless it made it doubly pleasant to be there, +with Letty beside him. He was quite satisfied with himself and her; quite +certain that he had done everything for the best. All this the music in +some way emphasised--made clear. + +When it was over, and the applause was subsiding, Letty said in his ear: +"Have you settled about the house?" + +He smiled down upon her, not hearing what she said, but admiring her +dress, its little complication and subtleties, the violets that perfumed +every movement, the slim fingers holding the fan. Her mere ways of +personal adornment were to him like pleasant talk. They surprised and +amused him--stood between him and ennui. + +She repeated her question. + +A frown crossed his brow, and the face changed wholly. + +"Ah!--it is so difficult to see one's way," he said, with a little sigh +of annoyance. + +Letty played with her fan, and was silent. + +"Do you so much prefer it to the others?" he asked her. + +Letty looked up with astonishment. + +"Why, it is a house!" she said, lifting her eyebrows; "and the others--" + +"Hovels? Well, you are about right. The small London house is an +abomination. Perhaps I can make them take less premium." + +Letty shook her head. + +"It is not at all a dear house," she said decidedly. + +He still frowned, with the look of one recalled to an annoyance he had +shaken off. + +"Well, darling, if you wish it so much, that settles it. Promise to be +still nice to me when we go through the Bankruptcy Court!" + +"We will let lodgings, and I will do the waiting," said Letty, just +laying her hand lightly against his for an instant. "Just think! That +house would draw like anything. Of course, we will only take the eldest +sons of peers. By the way, do you see Lord Fontenoy?" + +They were in the middle of the "interval," and almost everyone about +them, including Miss Tulloch, was standing up, talking or examining their +neighbours. + +George craned his neck round Miss Tulloch, and saw Fontenoy sitting +beside a lady, on the other side of the middle gangway. + +"Who is the lady?" Letty inquired. "I saw her with him the other night at +the Foreign Office." + +George smiled. + +"_That_--if you want to know--is Fontenoy's story!" + +"Oh, but tell me at once!" said Letty, imperiously. "But he hasn't got a +story, or a heart. He's only stuffed with blue-book." + +"So I thought till a few weeks ago. But I know a good deal more now about +Master Fontenoy than I did." + +"But who is she?" + +"She is a Mrs. Allison. Isn't that white hair beautiful? And her +face--half saint, I always think--you might take her for a +mother-abbess--and half princess. Did you ever see such diamonds?" + +George pulled his moustaches, and grinned as he looked across at +Fontenoy. + +"Tell me quick!" said Letty, tapping him on the arm--"Is she a +widow?--and is he going to marry her? Why didn't you tell me before?--why +didn't you tell me at Malford?" + +"Because I didn't know," said George, laughing. "Oh! it's a strange +story--too long to tell now. She is a widow, but he is not going to marry +her, apparently. She has a grown-up son, who hasn't yet found himself a +wife, and thinks it isn't fair to him. If Fontenoy wants to introduce +her, don't refuse. She is the mistress of Castle Luton, and has +delightful parties. Yes!--if I'd known at Malford what I know now!" + +And he laughed again, remembering Fontenoy's nocturnal incursion upon +him, and its apparent object. Who would have imagined that the preacher +of that occasion had ever given one serious thought to woman and woman's +arts--least of all that he was the creation and slave of a woman! + +Letty's curiosity was piqued, and she would have plied George with +questions, but that she suddenly perceived that Fontenoy had risen, and +was coming across to them. + +"Gracious!" she said; "here he comes. I can't think why; he +doesn't like me." + +Fontenoy, however, when he had made his way to them, greeted Miss Sewell +with as much apparent cordiality as he showed to anyone else. He had +received George's news of the marriage with all decorum, and had since +sent a handsome wedding-present to the bride-elect. Letty, however, was +never at ease with him, which, indeed, was the case with most women. + +He stood beside the _fiances_ for a minute or two, exchanging a few +commonplaces with Letty on the performers and the audience; then he +turned to George with a change of look. + +"No need for us to go back to-night, I think?" + +"What, to the House? Dear, no! Grooby and Havershon may be trusted to +drone the evening out, I should hope, with no trouble to anybody but +themselves. The Government are just keeping a house, that's all. Have you +been grinding at your speech all day?" + +Fontenoy shrugged his shoulders. + +"I sha'n't get anything out that I want to say. Are you coming to the +House on Friday, Miss Sewell?" + +"Friday?" said Letty, looking puzzled. + +George laughed. + +"I told you. You must plead trousseau if you want to save yourself!" + +Amusement shone in his blue eyes as they passed from Letty to Fontenoy. +He had long ago discovered that Letty was incapable of any serious +interest in his public life. It did not disturb him at all. But it +tickled his sense of humour that Letty would have to talk politics all +the same, and to talk them with people like Fontenoy. + +"Oh! you mean your Resolution!" cried Letty. "Isn't it a Resolution? Yes, +of course I'm coming. It's very absurd, for I don't know anything about +it. But George says I must, and till I promise to obey, you see, I don't +mind being obedient!" + +Archness, however, was thrown away on Fontenoy. He stood beside her, +awkward and irresponsive. Not being allowed to be womanish, she could +only try once more to be political. + +"It's to be a great attack on Mr. Dowson, isn't it?" she asked him. "You +and George are mad about some things he has been doing? He's Home +Secretary, isn't he? Yes, of _course_! And he's been driving trade away, +and tyrannising over the manufacturers? I _wish_ you'd explain it to me! +I ask George, and he tells me not to talk shop." + +"Oh, for goodness' sake," groaned George, "let it alone! I came to meet +you and hear Joachim. However, I may as well warn you, Letty, that I +sha'n't have time to be married once Fontenoy's anti-Maxwell campaign +begins; and it will go on till the Day of Judgment." + +"Why anti-Maxwell," said Letty, puzzled. "I thought it was Mr. Dowson you +are going to attack?" + +George, a little vexed that she should require it, began to explain that +as Maxwell was "only a miserable peer," he could have nothing to do with +the House of Commons, and that Dowson was the official mouthpiece of the +Maxwell group and policy in the Lower House. "The hands were the hands of +Esau," etc. Letty meanwhile, conscious that she was not showing to +advantage, flushed, began to play nervously with her fan, and wished that +George would leave off. + +Fontenoy did nothing to assist George's political lesson. He stood +impassive, till suddenly he tried to look across his immediate +neighbours, and then said, turning to Letty: + +"The Maxwells, I see, are here to-night." He nodded towards a group on +the left, some two or three benches behind them. "Are you an admirer of +Lady Maxwell's, Miss Sewell?--you've seen her, of course?" + +"Oh yes, _often_!" said Letty, annoyed by the question, standing, +however, eagerly on tiptoe. "I know her, too, a little; but she never +remembers me. She was at the Foreign Office on Saturday, with such a +_hideous_ dress on--it spoilt her completely." + +"Hideous!" said Fontenoy, with a puzzled look. "Some artist--I forget +who--came and raved to me about it; said it was like some Florentine +picture--I forget what--don't think I ever heard of it." + +Letty looked contemptuous. Her expression said that in this matter, at +any rate, she knew what she was talking about. Nevertheless her eyes +followed the dark head Fontenoy had pointed out to her. + +Lady Maxwell was at the moment the centre of a large group of people, +mostly men, all of whom seemed to be eager to get a word with her, and +she was talking with great animation, appealing from time to time to a +tall, broad-shouldered gentleman, with greyish hair, who stood, smiling +and silent, at the edge of the group. Letty noticed that many glasses +from the balcony were directed to this particular knot of persons; that +everybody near them, or rather every woman, was watching Lady Maxwell, or +trying to get a better view of her. The girl felt a secret pang of envy +and dislike. + +The figure of a well-known accompanist appeared suddenly at the head of +the staircase leading from the artists' room. The interval was over, and +the audience began to subside into attention. + +Fontenoy bowed and took his leave. + +"You see, he _didn't_ introduce me," said Letty, not without chagrin, +as she settled down. "And how plain he is! I think him uglier every +time I see him." + +George made a vague sound of assent, but did not really agree with her in +the least. Fontenoy's air of overwork was more decided than ever; his +eyes had almost sunk out of sight; the complexion of his broad strong +face had reddened and coarsened from lack of exercise and sleep; his +brown hair was thinning and grizzling fast. Nevertheless a man saw much +to admire in the ungainly head and long-limbed frame, and did not think +any the better of a woman's intelligence for failing to perceive it. + +After the concert, as George and Letty stood together in the crowded +vestibule, he said to her, with a smile: + +"So I take that house?" + +"If you want to do anything disagreeable," she retorted, quickly, "don't +_ask_ me. Do it, and then wait till I am good-tempered again!" + +"What a tempting prospect! Do you know that when you put on that +particular hood that I would take Buckingham Palace to please you? Do you +know also that my mother will think us very extravagant?" + +"Ah, we can't all be economical!" said Letty. + +He saw the little toss of the head and sharpening of the lips. They only +amused him. Though he had never, so far, discussed his mother and her +affairs with Letty in any detail, he understood perfectly well that her +feeling about this particular house in some way concerned his mother, and +that Letty and Lady Tressady were rapidly coming to dislike each other. +Well, why should Letty pretend? He liked her the better for not +pretending. + +There was a movement in the crowd about them, and Letty, looking up, +suddenly found herself close to a tall lady, whose dark eyes were +bent upon her. + +"How do you do, Miss Sewell?" + +Letty, a little fluttered, gave her hand and replied. Lady Maxwell +glanced across her at the tall young man, with the fair, irregular face. +George bowed involuntarily, and she slightly responded. Then she was +swept on by her own party. + +"Have you sent for your carriage?" George heard someone say to her. + +"No; I am going home in a hansom. I've tired out both the horses +to-day. Aldous is going down to the club to see if he can hear anything +about Devizes." + +"Oh! the election?" + +She nodded, then caught sight of her husband at the door beckoning, and +hurried on. + +"What a head!" said George, looking after her with admiration. + +"Yes," said Letty, unwillingly. "It's the hair that's so splendid, the +long black waves of it. How ridiculous to talk of tiring out her +horses--that's just like her! As though she mightn't have fifty horses if +she liked! Oh, George, there's our man! Quick, Tully!" + +They made their way out. In the press George put his arm half round +Letty, shielding her. The touch of her light form, the nearness of her +delicate face, enchanted him. When their carriage had rolled away, and he +turned homewards along Piccadilly, he walked absently for a time, +conscious only of pulsing pleasure. + +It was a mild February night. After a long frost, and a grudging thaw, +westerly winds were setting in, and Spring could be foreseen. It had been +pouring with rain during the concert, but was now fair, the rushing +clouds leaving behind them, as they passed, great torn spaces of blue, +where the stars shone. + +Gusts of warm moist air swept through the street. As George's moment of +intoxication gradually subsided, he felt the physical charm of the soft +buffeting wind. How good seemed all living!--youth and capacity--this +roaring multitudinous London--the future with its chances! This common +pleasant chance of marriage amongst them--he was glad he had put out his +hand to it. His wife that was to be was no saint and no philosopher. He +thanked the fates! He at least asked for neither--on the hearth. "Praise, +blame, love, kisses"--for all of those, life with Letty would give scope; +yet for none of them in excess. There would be plenty of room left for +other things, other passions--the passion of political power, for +instance, the art of dealing with and commanding other men. He, the +novice, the beginner, to talk of "commanding!" Yet already he felt his +foot upon the ladder. Fontenoy consulted him, and confided in him more +and more. In spite of his engagement, he was informing himself rapidly on +a hundred questions, and the mental wrestle of every day was +exhilarating. Their small group in the House, compact, tireless, +audacious, was growing in importance and in the attention it extorted +from the public. Never had the whole tribe of factory inspectors shown a +more hawk-like, a more inquisitorial, a more intolerable vigilance than +during the past twelve months. All the persons concerned with matches and +white-lead, with certain chemical or metal-working industries, with +"season" dressmaking or tailoring, were up in arms, rallying to +Fontenoy's support with loud wrath and lamentations, claiming to speak +not only for themselves, but for their "hands," in the angry protest +that things had gone and were going a great deal too far, that trade was +simply being harassed out of the country. A Whiggish group of +manufacturers on the Liberal side were all with Fontenoy; while the +Socialists, on whom the Government should have been able in such a matter +to count to the death, had a special grievance against the Cabinet at the +moment, and were sulking in their tents. The attack and defence would +probably take two nights; for the Government, admitting the gravity of +the assault, had agreed, in case the debate should not be concluded on +Friday, to give up Monday to it. Altogether the affair would make a +noise. George would probably get in his maiden speech on the second +night, and was, in truth, devoting a great deal of his mind to the +prospect; though to Letty he had persistently laughed at it and belittled +it, refusing altogether to let her come and hear him. + +Then, after Easter would come Maxwell's Bill, and the fat in the fire! +Poor little Letty!--she would get but few of the bridal observances due +to her when _that_ struggle began. But first would come Easter and their +wedding; that one short fortnight, when he would carry her off--soft, +willing prey!--to the country, draw a "wind-warm space" about himself and +her, and minister to all her whims. + +He turned down St. James's Street, passed Marlborough House, and +entered the Mall, on the way to Warwick Square, where he was living +with his mother. + +Suddenly he became aware of a crowd, immediately in front of him, in the +direction of Buckingham Palace. A hansom and horse were standing in the +roadway; the driver, crimson and hatless, was bandying words with one of +the policemen, who had his notebook open, and from the middle of the +crowd came a sound of wailing. + +He walked up to the edge of the circle. + +"Anybody hurt?" he said to the policeman, as the man shut his notebook. + +"Little girl run over, sir." + +"Can I be of any assistance? Is there an ambulance coming?" + +"No, sir. There was a lady in the hansom. She's just now bandaging the +child's leg, and says she'll take it to the hospital." + +George mounted on one of the seats under the trees that stood handy, and +looked over the heads of the crowd to the space in the centre which the +other policeman was keeping clear. A little girl lay on the ground, or +rather on a heap of coats; another girl, apparently about sixteen, stood +near her, crying bitterly, and a lady-- + +"Goodness!" said Tressady; and, jumping down, he touched the policeman on +the shoulder. + +"Can you get me through? I think I could be some help. That lady"--he +spoke a word in the policeman's ear. + +The man touched his hat. + +"Stand back, please!" he said, addressing the crowd, "and let this +gentleman through." + +The crowd divided unwillingly. But at the same moment it parted from the +inside, and a little procession came through, both policemen joining +their energies to make a free passage for it. In front walked the +policeman carrying the little girl, a child apparently of about twelve +years old. Her right foot lay stiffly across his arm, held straight and +still in an impromptu splint of umbrellas and handkerchiefs. Immediately +behind came the lady whom George had caught sight of, holding the other +girl's hand in hers. She was bareheaded and in evening dress. Her +opera-cloak, with its heavy sable collar, showed beneath it a dress of +some light-coloured satin, which had already suffered deplorably from the +puddles of the road, and, as she neared the lamp beneath which the cab +had stopped, the diamonds on her wrists sparkled in the light. During her +passage through the crowd, George perceived that one or two people +recognised her, and that a murmur ran from mouth to mouth. + +Of anything of the sort she herself was totally unconscious. George saw +at once that she, not the policeman, was in command. She gave him +directions, as they approached the cab, in a quick, imperative voice +which left no room for hesitation. + +"The driver is drunk," he heard her say; "who will drive?" + +"One of us will drive, ma'am." + +"What--the other man? Ask him to take the reins at once, please, before I +get in. The horse is fresh, and might start. That's right. Now, when I +say the word, give me the child." + +She settled herself in the cab. George saw the policeman somewhat +embarrassed, for a moment, with his burden. He came forward to his help, +and between them they handed in the child, placing her carefully on her +protector's knee. + +Then, standing at the open door of the cab, George raised his hat. "Can I +be of any further assistance to you, Lady Maxwell? I saw you just now at +the concert." + +She turned in some astonishment as she heard her name, and looked at the +speaker. Then, very quickly, she seemed to understand. + +"I don't know," she said, pondering. "Yes! you could help me. I am going +to take the child to hospital. But there is this other girl. Could you +take her home--she is very much upset? No!--first, could you bring her +after me to St. George's? She wants to see where we put her sister." + +"I will call another cab, and be there as soon as you." + +"Thank you. Just let me speak to the sister a moment, please." + +He put the weeping girl forward, and Lady Maxwell bent across the burden +on her knee to say a few words to her--soft, quick words in another +voice. The girl understood, her face cleared a little, and she let +Tressady take charge of her. + +One of the policemen mounted the box of the hansom, amid the "chaff" of +the crowd, and the cab started. A few hats were raised in George's +neighbourhood, and there was something of a cheer. + +"I tell yer," said a voice, "I knowed her fust sight--seed her picture +lots o' times in the papers, and in the winders too. My word, ain't she +good-lookin! And did yer see all them diamonds?" + +"Come along!" said George, impatiently, hurrying his charge into the +four-wheeler the other policeman had just stopped for them. + +In a few more seconds he, the girl, and the policeman were pursuing Lady +Maxwell's hansom at the best speed of an indifferent horse. George tried +to say a few consoling things to his neighbour; and the girl, reassured +by his kind manner, found her tongue, and began to chatter in a tearful +voice about the how and when of the accident: about the elder sister in a +lodging in Crawford Street, Tottenham Court Road, whom she and the little +one had been visiting; the grandmother in Westminster with whom they +lived; poor Lizzie's place in a laundry, which now she must lose; how the +lady had begged handkerchiefs and umbrellas from the crowd to tie up +Lizzie's leg with--and so on through a number of other details incoherent +or plaintive. + +George heard her absently. His mind all the time was absorbed in the +dramatic or ironic aspects of what he had just seen. For dramatic they +were--though perhaps a little cheap. Could he, could anyone, have made +acquaintance with this particular woman in more characteristic fashion? +He laughed to think how he would tell the story to Fontenoy. The +beautiful creature in her diamonds, kneeling on her satin dress in the +mud, to bind up a little laundrymaid's leg--it was so extravagantly in +keeping with Marcella Maxwell that it amused one like an overdone +coincidence in a clumsy play. + +What made her so beautiful? The face had marked defects; but in colour, +expression, subtlety of line incomparable! On the other hand, the +manner--no!--he shrugged his shoulders. The remembrance of its +mannish--or should it be, rather, boyish?--energy and assurance somehow +set him on edge. + +In the end, they were not much behind the hansom; for the hospital porter +was only just in the act of taking the injured child from Lady Maxwell as +Tressady dismounted and went forward again to see what he could do. + +But, somewhat to his chagrin, he was not wanted. Lady Maxwell and the +porter did everything. As they went into the hospital, George caught a +few of the things she was saying to the porter as she supported the +child's leg. She spoke in a rapid, professional way, and the man +answered, as the policeman had done, with a deference and understanding +which were clearly not due only to her "grand air" and her evening dress. +George was puzzled. + +He and the elder sister followed her into the waiting-room. The +house-surgeon and a nurse were summoned, and the injured leg was put into +a splint there and then. The patient moaned and cried most of the time, +and Tressady had hard work to keep the sister quiet. Then nurse and +doctor lifted the child. + +"They are going to put her to bed," said Lady Maxwell, turning to George. +"I am going up with them. Would you kindly wait? The sister"--she dropped +her business tone, and, smiling, touched the elder girl on the arm--"can +come up when the little one is undressed." + +The little procession swept away, and George was left with his charge. As +soon as the small sister was out of sight, the elder one began to +chatter again out of sheer excitement, crying at intervals. George did +not heed her much. He walked up and down, with his hands in his pockets, +conscious of a curious irritability. He did not think a woman should take +a strange man's service quite so coolly. + +At the end of another quarter of an hour a nurse appeared to summon the +sister. Tressady was told he might come too if he would, and his charge +threw him a quick, timid look, as though asking him not to desert her in +this unknown and formidable place. So they followed the nurse up white +stone stairs, and through half-lit corridors, where all was silent, save +that once a sound of delirious shrieking and talking reached them +through a closed door, and made the sister's consumptive little face +turn whiter still. + +At last the nurse, putting her finger on her lip, turned a handle, and +George was conscious of a sudden feeling of pleasure. + +They were standing on the threshold of a children's ward. On either hand +was a range of beds, bluish-white between the yellow picture-covered +walls and the middle-way of spotless floor. Far away, at the other end, a +great fire glowed. On a bare table in the centre, laden with bottles and +various surgical necessaries, stood a shaded lamp, and beside it the +chair where the night-nurse had been sitting. In the beds were sleeping +children of various ages, some burrowing, face downward, animal-like, +into their pillows; others lying on their backs, painfully straight and +still. The air was warm, yet light, and there was the inevitable smell of +antiseptics. Something in the fire-lit space and comfort of the great +room, its ordered lines and colours, the gentleness of the shaded light +as contrasted with the dim figures in the beds, seemed to make a poem of +it--a poem of human tenderness. + +Two or three beds away to the right, Lady Maxwell was standing with the +night-nurse of the ward. The little girl had been undressed, and was +lying quiet, with a drawn, piteous face that turned eagerly as her sister +came in. The whole scene was new and touching to Tressady. Yet, after the +first impression, his attention was perforce held by Lady Maxwell, and he +saw the rest only in relation to her. She had slipped off her heavy +cloak, in order, perhaps, that she might help in the undressing of the +child. Beneath, she wore a little shawl or cape of some delicate lace +over her low dress. The dress itself was of a pale shade of green; the +mire and mud with which it was bedabbled no longer showed in the half +light; and the satin folds glistened dimly as she moved. The poetic +dignity of the head, so finely wreathed with its black hair, of the full +throat and falling shoulders, received a sort of special emphasis from +the wide spaces, the pale colours and level lines of the ward. Tressady +was conscious again of the dramatic significant note as he watched her, +yet without any softening of his nascent feeling of antagonism. + +She turned and beckoned to the sister as they entered: + +"Come and see how comfortable she is! And then you must give this lady +your name and address." + +The girl timidly approached. Whilst she was occupied with her sister and +with the nurse, Lady Maxwell suddenly looked round, and saw Tressady +standing by the table a yard or two from her. + +A momentary expression of astonishment crossed her face. He saw that, in +her absorption with the case and the two sisters, she had clean forgotten +all about him. But in a flash she remembered, and smiled. + +"So you are really going to take her home? That is very kind of you. It +will make all the difference to the grandmother that somebody should go +and explain. You see, they leave her in the splint for the night, and +to-morrow they will put the leg in plaster. Probably they won't keep her +in hospital more than about three weeks, for they are very full." + +"You seem to know all about it!" + +"I was a nurse myself once, for a time," she said, but with a certain +stiffness which seemed to mark the transition from the professional to +the great lady. + +"Ah! I should have remembered that. I had heard it from Edward Watton." + +She looked up quickly. He felt that for the first time she took notice of +him as an individual. + +"You know Mr. Watton? I think you are Sir George Tressady, are you not? +You got in for Market Malford in November? I recollect. I didn't like +your speeches." + +She laughed. So did he. + +"Yes, I got in just in time for a fighting session." + +Her laugh disappeared. + +"An odious fight!" she said gravely. + +"I am not so sure. That depends on whether you like fighting, and how +certain you are of your cause!" + +She hesitated a moment; then she said: + +"How can Lord Fontenoy be certain of his cause!" + +The slight note of scorn roused him. + +"Isn't that what all parties say of their opponents?" + +She glanced at him again, curiously. He was evidently quite +young--younger than herself, she guessed. But his careless ease and +experience of bearing, contrasted with his thin boy's figure, attracted +her. Her lip softened reluctantly into a smile. + +"Perhaps," she said. "Only sometimes, you know, it must be true! Well, +evidently we can't discuss it here at one o'clock in the morning--and +there is the nurse making signs to me. It is really very good of you. If +you are in our neighbourhood on Sunday, will you report?" + +"Certainly--with the greatest pleasure. I will come and give you a full +account of my mission." + +She held out a slim hand. The sister, red-eyed with crying, was handed +over to him, and he and she were soon in a cab, speeding towards the +Westminster mews whither she directed him. + +Well, was Maxwell to be so greatly envied? Tressady was not sure. Such a +woman, he thought, for all her beauty, would not have greatly stirred his +own pulses. + + + + +CHAPTER V + + +The week which had opened thus for Tressady promised to be one of lively +interest for such persons as were either concerned in or took notice of +the House of Commons and its doings. Fontenoy's onslaught upon the +administration of the Home Office, and, through the Home Secretary, on +the Maxwell group and influence, had been long expected, and was known to +have been ably prepared. Its possible results were already keenly +discussed. Even if it were a damaging attack, it was not supposed that it +could have any immediate effect on the state of parties or the strength +of the Government. But after Easter Maxwell's factory Bill--a special +Factory Act for East London, touching the grown man for the first time, +and absolutely prohibiting home-work in certain specified industries--was +to be brought forward, and could not fail to provide Maxwell's +adversaries with many chances of red and glorious battle. It was +disputable from end to end; it had already broken up one Government; it +was strongly pressed and fiercely opposed; and on the fate of each clause +in Committee might hang the life or death of the Ministry--not so much +because of the intrinsic importance of the matter, as because Maxwell was +indispensable to the Cabinet, and it was known that neither Maxwell nor +his close friend and henchman, Dowson, the Home Secretary, would accept +defeat on any of the really vital points of the Bill. + +The general situation was a curious one. Some two years before this time +a strong and long-lived Tory Government had come to an end. Since then +all had been confusion in English politics. A weak Liberal Government, +undermined by Socialist rebellion, had lasted but a short time, to be +followed by an equally precarious Tory Ministry, in which Lord +Maxwell--after an absence from politics of some four years or +so--returned to his party, only to break it up. For he succeeded in +imposing upon them a measure in which his own deepest convictions and +feelings were concerned, and which had behind it the support of all the +more important trade unions. Upon that measure the Ministry fell; but +during their short administration Maxwell had made so great an impression +upon his own side that when they returned, as they did return, with an +enlarged majority, the Maxwell Bill retained one of the foremost places +in their programme, and might be said, indeed, at the present moment to +hold the centre of the political field. + +That field, in the eyes of any middle-aged observer, was in strange +disarray. The old Liberal party had been almost swept away; only a few +waifs and strays remained, the exponents of a programme that nobody +wanted, and of cries that stirred nobody's blood. A large Independent +Labour and Socialist party filled the empty benches of the Liberals--a +revolutionary, enthusiastic crew, of whom the country was a little +frightened, and who were, if the truth were known, a little frightened +at themselves. They had a coherent programme, and represented a +formidable "domination" in English life. And that English life itself, in +all that concerned the advance and transformation of labour, was in a +singularly tossed and troubled state. After a long period of stagnation +and comparative industrial peace, storms at home, answering to storms on +the Continent, had been let loose, and forces both of reaction and of +revolution were making themselves felt in new forms and under the command +of new masters. + +At the head of the party of reaction stood Fontenoy. Some four years +before the present session the circumstances of a great strike in the +Midlands--together, no doubt, with some other influence--had first drawn +him into public life, had cut him off from racing and all his natural +pleasures. The strike affected his father's vast domain in North Mercia; +it was marked by an unusual violence on the part of the men and their +leaders; and Fontenoy, driven, sorely against his will, to take a part by +the fact that his father, the hard and competent administrator of an +enormous fortune, happened at the moment to be struck down by illness, +found himself before many weeks were over taking it with passion, and +emerged from the struggle a changed man. Property must be upheld; +low-born disorder and greed must be put down. He sold his race-horses, +and proceeded forthwith to throw into the formation of a new party all +the doggedness, the astuteness, and the audacity he had been accustomed +to lavish upon the intrigues and the triumphs of the Turf. + +And now in this new Parliament his immense labour was beginning to tell. +The men who followed him had grown in number and improved in quality. +They abhorred equally a temporising conservatism and a plundering +democracy. They stood frankly for birth and wealth, the Church and the +expert. They were the apostles of resistance and negation; they were +sworn to oppose any further meddling with trade and the personal liberty +of master and workman, and to undo, if they could, some of the meddling +that had been already carried through. A certain academic quality +prevailed among them, which made them peculiarly sensitive to the +absurdities of men who had not been to Oxford or Cambridge; while some, +like Tressady, had been travellers, and wore an Imperialist heart upon +their sleeve. The group possessed an unusual share of debating and +oratorical ability, and they had never attracted so much attention as now +that they were about to make the Maxwell Bill their prey. + +Meanwhile, for the initiated, the situation possessed one or two points +of special interest. Lady Maxwell, indeed, was by this time scarcely less +of a political force than her husband. Was her position an illustration +of some new power in women's hands, or was it merely an example of +something as well known to the Pharaohs as to the nineteenth century--the +ability of any woman with a certain physique to get her way? That this +particular woman's way happened to be also her husband's way made the +case less interesting for some observers. On the other hand, her obvious +wifely devotion attracted simple souls to whom the meddling of women in +politics would have been nothing but repellent had it not been +recommended to them by the facts that Marcella Maxwell was held to be +good as well as beautiful; that she loved her husband; and was the +excellent mother of a fine son. + +Of her devotion, in the case of this particular Bill, there was neither +concealment nor doubt. She was known to have given her husband every +assistance in the final drafting of the measure: she had seen for herself +the working of every trade that it affected; she had innumerable friends +among wage-earners of all sorts, to whom she gave half her social life; +and both among them and in the drawing-rooms of the rich she fought her +husband's cause unceasingly, by the help of beauty, wits, and something +else--a broad impulsiveness and charm--which might be vilified or +scorned, but could hardly be matched, by the enemy. + +Meanwhile Lord Maxwell was a comparatively ineffective speaker, and +passed in social life for a reserved and difficult personality. His +friends put no one else beside him; and his colleagues in the Cabinet +were well aware that he represented the keystone in their arch. But +the man in the street, whether of the aristocratic or plebeian sort, +knew comparatively little about him. All of which, combined with the +special knowledge of an inner circle, helped still more to concentrate +public attention on the convictions, the temperament, and the beauty +of his wife. + +Amid a situation charged with these personal or dramatic elements the +Friday so keenly awaited by Fontenoy and his party arrived. + +Immediately after question-time Fontenoy made his speech. In reply, the +Home Secretary, suave, statistical, and conciliatory, poured a stream of +facts and reports upon the House. The more repulsive they were, the +softer and more mincing grew his voice in dealing with them. Fontenoy had +excited his audience, Dowson succeeded in making it shudder. +Nevertheless, the effect of the evening lay with Fontenoy. + +George stayed to hear the official defence to its end. Then he hurried +upstairs in search of Letty, who, with Miss Tulloch, was in the Speaker's +private gallery. As he went he thought of Fontenoy's speech, its halting +opening, the savage force of its peroration. His pulses tingled: +"Magnificent!" he said to himself; "_magnificent!_ We have found a man!" + +Letty was eagerly waiting for him, and they walked down the corridor +together. "Well?" he said, thrusting his hands deep into his pockets, and +looking down upon her with a smile. "Well?" + +Letty saw that she was expected to praise, and she did her best, his +smile still bent upon her. He was perfectly aware all the time of the +fatuity of what she was saying. She had caught up since her engagement a +certain number of political phrases, and it amused him to note the cheap +and tinkling use she made of them. Nevertheless she was chatting, +smiling, gesticulating, for his pleasure. She was posing for him, using +her grey eyes in these expressive ways, all for him. He thought her the +most entertaining plaything; though it did occur to him sometimes that +when they were married he would give her instruction. + +"Ah, well, you liked it--that's good!" he said at last, interrupting her. +"We've begun well, any way. It'll be rather hard, though, to have to +speak after that on Monday!" + +"As if you need be afraid! You're not, you know--it's only mock modesty. +Do you know that Lady Maxwell was sitting two from me?" + +"No! Well, how did she like Fontenoy?" + +"She never moved after he got up. She pressed her face against that +horrid grating, and stared at him all the time. I thought she was very +flushed--but that may have been the heat--and in a very bad temper," +added Letty, maliciously. "I talked to her a little about your +adventure." + +"Did she remember my existence?" + +"Oh dear, yes! She said she expected you on Sunday. She never asked _me_ +to come." Letty looked arch. "But then one doesn't expect her to have +pretty manners. People say she is shy. But, of course, that is only your +friends' way of saying that you're rude." + +"She wasn't rude to you?" said George, outwardly eager, inwardly +sceptical. "Shall I not go on Sunday?" + +"But of course you must go. We shall have to know them. She's not a +woman's woman--that's all. Now, are we going to get some dinner, for +Tully and I are famishing?" + +"Come along, then, and I'll collect the party." + +George had asked a few of his acquaintance in the House to meet his +betrothed, together with an old General Tressady and his wife who were +his distant cousins. The party were to assemble in the room of an +under-secretary much given to such hospitable functions; and thither +accordingly George led the way. + +The room, when they reached it, was already fairly full of people, and +alive with talk. + +"Another party!" said George, looking round him. "Benson is great at this +sort of thing." + +"Do you see Lady Maxwell?" said Letty, in his ear. + +George looked to his right, and perceived the lady in question. She also +recognised him at once, and bowed, but without rising. She was the centre +of a group of people, who were gathered round her and the small table on +which she was leaning, and they were so deeply absorbed in the +conversation that had been going on that they hardly noticed the entrance +of Tressady and his companion. + +"Leven has a party, you see," said the under-secretary. "Blaythwaite was +to have taken them in--couldn't at the last moment; so they had to come +in here. This is _your_ side of the room! But none of your guests have +come yet. Dinner at the House in the winter is a poor sort of business, +Miss Sewell. We want the Terrace for these occasions." + +He led the young girl to a sofa at the further end of the room, and made +himself agreeable, to him the easiest process in the world. He was a +fashionable and charming person, in the most irreproachable of +frock-coats, and Letty was soon at her ease with him, and mistress of +all her usual arts and graces. + +"You know Lady Maxwell?" he said to her, with a slight motion of the head +towards the distant group. + +Letty replied; and while she and her companion chattered, George, who was +standing behind them, watched the other party. + +They were apparently in the thick of an argument, and Lady Maxwell, whose +hands were lightly clasped on the table in front of her, was leaning +forward with the look of one who had just shot her bolt, and was waiting +to see how it would strike. + +It struck apparently in the direction of her _vis-à-vis,_ Sir Frank +Leven, for he bent over to her, making a quick reply in a half-petulant +boy's voice. He had been three years in the House, but had still the air +of an Eton "swell" in his last half. + +Lady Maxwell listened to what he had to say, a sort of silent passion in +her face all the time--a noble passion nobly restrained. + +When he stopped, George caught her reply. + +"He has neither _seen_ nor _felt_--every sentence showed it--that is all +one can say. How can one take his judgment?" + +George's mouth twitched. He slipped, smiling, into a place beside Letty. +"Did you hear that?" he inquired. + +"Fontenoy's speech, of course," said the under-secretary, looking round. +"She's pitching into Leven, I suppose. He's as cranky and unsound as he +can be. Shouldn't wonder if you got him before long." + +He nodded good-temperedly to Tressady, then got up to speak to a man on +the edge of the further group. + +"How amusing!" said George, his satirical eyes still watching Lady +Maxwell. "How much that set has 'seen and felt' of sweaters, and +white-lead workers, and that ilk! Don't they look like it?" + +"Who are they?" + +Letty was now using all her eyes to find out, and especially for the +purpose of carrying away a mental photograph of Lady Maxwell's black hat +and dress. + +"Oh! the Maxwells' particular friends in the House--most of them as well +provided with family and goods as they make 'em: a philanthropic, +idealist lot, that yearns for the people, and will be the first to be +kicked downstairs when the people gets its own. However, they aren't all +quite happy in their minds. Frank Leven there, as Benson says, is +decidedly shaky. He is the member for the Maxwells' division--Maxwell, of +course, put him in. He has a house there, I believe, and he married Lady +Maxwell's great friend, Miss Macdonald--an ambitious little party, they +say, who simply insisted on his going into Parliament. Oh, then, Bennett +is there--do you see?--the little dark man with a frock-coat and +spectacles? He's Lady Maxwell's link with the Independents--oldest +workman member--been in the House a long time, so that by now he isn't +quite as one-eyed and one-eared as the rest of them. I suppose she hopes +to make use of him at critical moments--she takes care to have tools of +all sorts. Gracious--listen!" + +There was, indeed, a very storm of discussion sweeping through the rival +party. Lady Maxwell's penetrating but not loud voice seemed to pervade +it, and her eyes and face, as she glanced from one speaker to another, +drew alternately the shafts and the sympathy of the rest. + +Tressady made a face. + +"I say, Letty, promise me one thing!" His hand stole towards hers. Tully +discreetly looked the other way. "Promise me not to be a political woman, +there's a dear!" + +Letty hastily withdrew her fingers, having no mind at all for caresses +in public. + +"But I _must_ be a political woman--I shall have to be! I know heaps of +girls and married women who get up everything in the papers--all the +stupidest things--not because they know anything about it, or because +they care a rap, but because some of their men friends happen to be +members; and when they come to see you, you must know what to talk to +them about." + +"Must you?" said George, "How odd! As though one went to tea with a woman +for the sake of talking about the very same things you have been doing +all day, and are probably sick to death of already." + +"Never mind," said Letty, with her little air of sharp wisdom. "I _know_ +they do it, and I shall have to do it too. I shall pick it up." + +"Will you? Of course you will! Only, when I've got a big Bill on, let me +do a little of it for myself--give me some of the credit!" + +Letty laughed maliciously. + +"I don't know why you've taken such a dislike to her," she said, but in +rather a contented tone, as her eye once more travelled across to Lady +Maxwell. "Does she trample on her husband, after all?" + +Tressady gave an impatient shrug. + +"Trample on him? Goodness, no! That's all part of the play, too--wifely +affection and the rest of it. Why can't she keep out of sight a little? +We don't want the women meddling." + +"Thank you, my domestic tyrant!" said Letty, making him a little bow. + +"How much tyranny will you want before you accept those sentiments?" he +asked her, smiling tenderly into her eyes. Both had a moment's pleasant +thrill; then George sprang up. + +"Ah, here they are at last!--the General, and all the lot. Now, I hope, +we shall get some dinner." + +Tressady had, of course, to introduce his elderly cousins and his three +or four political friends to his future wife; and, amid the small flutter +of the performance, the break-up and disappearance of the rival party +passed unnoticed. When Tressady's guests entered the dining-room which +looks on the terrace, and made their way to the top table reserved for +them, the Leven dinner, near the door, was already half through. + +George's little banquet passed merrily enough. The grey-haired General +and his wife turned out to be agreeable and well-bred people, quite able +to repay George's hospitality by the dropping of little compliments on +the subject of Letty into his half-yielded ear. For his way of taking +such things was always a trifle cynical. He believed that people say +habitually twice what they mean, whether in praise or blame; and he did +not feel that his own view of Letty was much affected by what other +people thought of her. + +So, at least, he would have said. In reality, he got a good deal of +pleasure out of his _fiancée's_ success. Letty, indeed, was enjoying +herself greatly. This political world, as she had expected, satisfied her +instinct for social importance better than any world she had yet known. +She was determined to get on in it; nor, apparently, was there likely to +be any difficulty in the matter. George's friends thought her a pretty, +lively creature, and showed the usual inclination of the male sex to +linger in her society. She mostly wanted to be informed as to the House +and its ways. It was all so new to her!--she said. But her ignorance was +not insipid; her questions had flavour. There was much talk and laughter; +Letty felt herself the mistress of the table, and her social ambitions +swelled within her. + +Suddenly George's attention was recalled to the Maxwell table by the +break-up of the group around it. He saw Lady Maxwell rise and look +round her as though in search of someone. Her eyes fell upon him, and +he involuntarily rose at the same instant to meet the step she made +towards him. + +"I must say another word of thanks to you"--she held out her hand. "That +girl and her grandmother were most grateful to you." + +"Ah, well!--I must come and make my report. Sunday, I think you said?" + +She assented. Then her expression altered: + +"When do you speak?" + +The question fell out abruptly, and took George by surprise. + +"I? On Monday, I believe, if I get my turn. But I fear the British Empire +will go on if I don't!" + +She threw a glance of scrutiny at his thin, whimsical face, with its fair +moustache and sunburnt skin. + +"I hear you are a good speaker," she said simply. "And you are entirely +with Lord Fontenoy?" + +He bowed lightly, his hands on his sides. + +"You'll agree our case was well put? The worst of it--" + +Then he stopped. He saw that Lady Maxwell had ceased to listen to him. +She turned her head towards the door, and, without even saying good-bye +to him, she hurried away from him towards the further end of the room. + +"Maxwell, I see!" said Tressady to himself, with a shrug, as he returned +to his seat. "Not flattering--but rather pretty, all the same!" + +He was thinking of the quick change that had remade the face while he was +talking to her--a change as lovely as it was unconscious. + +Lord Maxwell, indeed, had just entered the dining-room in search of his +wife, and he and she now left it together, while the rest of the Leven +party gradually dispersed. Letty also announced that she must go home. + +"Let me just go back into the House and see what is going on," said +George. "Ten to one I sha'n't be wanted, and I could see you home." + +He hurried off, only to return in a minute with the news that the debate +was given up to a succession of superfluous people, and he was free, at +any rate for an hour. Letty, Miss Tulloch, and he accordingly made their +way to Palace Yard. A bright moon shone in their faces as they emerged +into the open air, which was still mild and spring-like, as it had been +all the week. + +"I say--send Miss Tulloch home in a cab!" George pleaded in Letty's ear, +"and walk with me a bit. Come and look at the moon over the river. I will +bring you back to the bridge and put you in a cab." + +Letty looked astonished and demure. "Aunt Charlotte would be +shocked," she said. + +George grew impatient, and Letty, pleased with his impatience, at last +yielded. Tully, the most complaisant of chaperons, was put into a hansom +and despatched. + +As the pair reached the entrance of Palace Yard they were overtaken by a +brougham, which drew up an instant in the gateway itself, till it should +find an opening in the traffic outside. + +"Look!" said George, pressing Letty's arm. + +She looked round hurriedly, and, as the lamps of the gateway shone into +the carriage, she caught a vivid glimpse of the people inside it. Their +faces were turned towards each other as though in intimate +conversation--that was all. The lady's hands were crossed on her knee; +the man held a despatch-box. In a minute they were gone; but both Letty +and George were left with the same impression--the sense of something +exquisite surprised. It had already visited George that evening, only a +few minutes earlier, in connection with the same woman's face. + +Letty laughed, rather consciously. + +George looked down upon her as he guided her through the gate. + +"Some people seem to find it pleasant to be together!" he said, with a +vibration in his voice. "But why did we look?" he added, discontentedly. + +"How could we help it, you silly boy?" + +They walked to wards the bridge and down the steps, happy in each other, +and freshened by the night breeze. Over the river the moon, hung full and +white, and beneath it everything--the silver tracks on the water, the +blaze of light at Charing Cross Station, the lamps on Westminster Bridge +and in the passing steamers, a train of barges, even the darkness of the +Surrey shore--had a gentle and poetic air. The vast city had, as it were, +veiled her greatness and her tragedy; she offered herself kindly and +protectingly to these two--to their happiness and their youth. + +George made his companion wait beside the parapet and look, while he +himself drew in the air with a sort of hunger. + +"To think of the hours we spend in this climate," he said, "caged up in +abominable places like the House of Commons!" + +The traveller's distaste for the monotony of town and indoor life spoke +in his vehemence. Letty raised her eyebrows. + +"I am very glad of my furs, thank you! You seem to forget that it is +February." + +"Never mind!--since Monday it has had the feel of April. Did you see my +mother to-day?" + +"Yes. She caught me just after luncheon, and we talked for an hour." + +"Poor darling! I ought to have been there to protect you. But she vowed +she would have her say about that house." + +He looked down upon her, trying to see her expression in the shifting +light. He had gone through a disagreeable little scene with his mother at +breakfast. She had actually lectured him on the rashness of taking the +Brook Street house!--he understanding the whole time that what the odd +performance really meant was, that if he took it he would have a smaller +margin of income wherefrom to supplement her allowance. + +"Oh, it was all right!" said Letty, composedly. "She declared we should +get into difficulties at once, that I could have no idea of the value +of money, that you always _had_ been extravagant, that everybody would +be astonished at our doing such a thing, etcetera, etcetera. I +_think_--you don't mind?--I think she cried a little. But she wasn't +really very unhappy." + +"What did you say?" + +"Well, I suggested that when we were married, we and she should both set +up account-books; and I promised faithfully that if she would let us see +hers, we would let her see ours." + +George threw back his head with a gurgle of laughter. + +"Well?" + +"She was afraid," said Letty, demurely, "that I didn't take things +seriously enough. Then I asked her to come and see my gowns." + +"And that, I suppose, appeased her?" + +"Not at all. She turned up her nose at everything, by way of punishing +me. You see, she had on a new-Worth--the third since Christmas. My poor +little trousseau rags had no chance." + +"H'm!" said George, meditatively. "I wonder how my mamma is going to +manage when we are married," he added, after a pause. + +Letty made no reply. She was walking firmly and briskly; her eyes, full +of a sparkling decision, looked straight before her; her little mouth was +close set. Meanwhile through George's mind there passed a number of +fragmentary answers to his own question. His feeling towards his mother +was wholly abnormal; he had no sense of any unseemliness in the +conversation about her which was gradually growing common between himself +and Letty; and he meant to draw strict lines in the future. At the same +time, there was the tie of old habit, and of that uneasy and unwelcome +responsibility with regard to her which had descended upon him at the +time of his father's death. He could not honestly regard himself as an +affectionate son; but the filial relationship, even in its most imperfect +aspect, has a way of imposing itself. + +"Ah, well! I daresay we shall pull through," he said, dismissing the +familiar worry with a long breath. "Why, how far we have come!" he added, +looking back at Charing Cross and the Westminster towers. "And how +extraordinarily mild it is! We can't turn back yet, and you'll be tired +if I race you on in this way. Look, Letty, there's a seat! Would you be +afraid--just five minutes?" + +Letty looked doubtful. + +"It's so absurdly late. George, you _are_ funny! Suppose somebody came by +who knew us?" + +He opened his eyes. + +"And why not? But see! there isn't a carriage, and hardly a person, in +sight. Just a minute!" + +Most unwillingly Letty let herself be persuaded. It seemed to her a +foolish and extravagant thing to do; and there was now no need for either +folly or extravagance. Since her engagement she had dropped a good many +of the small audacities of the social sort she had so freely allowed +herself before it. It was as though, indeed, now that these audacities +had served their purpose, some stronger and perhaps inherited instincts +emerged in her, obscuring the earlier self. George was sometimes +astonished by an ultra-conventional note, of which certainly he had heard +nothing in their first days of intimacy at Malford. + +However, she sat down beside him, protesting. But he had no sooner stolen +her hand, than the moonlight showed her a dark, absent look creeping over +his face. And to her amazement he began to talk about the House of +Commons, about the Home Secretary's speech, of all things in the world! +He seemed to be harking back to Mr. Dowson's arguments, to some of the +stories the Home Secretary had told of those wretched people who +apparently enjoy dying of overwork and phosphorus, and white-lead, who +positively will die of them, unless the inspectors are always harrying +them. He still held her hand, but she saw he was not thinking of her; +and a sudden pique rose in her small mind. Generally, she accepted his +love-making very coolly--just as it came, or did not come. But to-night +she asked herself with irritation--for what had he led her into his silly +escapade, but to make love to her? And now here were her fingers slipping +out of his, while he harangued her on things she knew and cared nothing +about, in a voice and manner he might have addressed to anybody! + +"Well, I don't understand--I really _don't!_" she interrupted sharply. "I +thought you were all against the Government--I thought you didn't believe +a word they say!" + +He laughed. + +"The difference between them and us, darling, is only that _they_ think +the world can be mended by Act of Parliament, and _we_ think it can't. Do +what you will, _we_ say the world is, and must be, a wretched hole for +the majority of those that live in it; _they_ suppose they can cure it by +quack meddlings and tyrannies." + +He looked straight before him, absorbed, and she was struck with the +harsh melancholy of his face. + +What on earth had he kept her here for to talk this kind of talk! + +"George, I really _must_ go!" she began, flushing, and drawing her +hand away. + +Instantly he turned to her, his look brightening and melting. + +"Must you? Well, the world sha'n't be a wretched hole for us, shall it, +darling? We'll make a little nest in it--we'll forget what we can't +help--we'll be happy as long as the fates let us--won't we, Letty?" + +His arm slipped round behind her. He caught her hands. + +He had recollected himself. Nevertheless Letty was keenly conscious that +it was all most absurd, this sitting on a seat in a public thoroughfare +late at night, and behaving like any 'Arry and 'Arriet. + +"Why, of course we shall be happy," she said, rising with decision as she +spoke; "only somehow I don't always understand you, George. I wish I knew +what you were really thinking about." + +"_You!_" he said, laughing, and drawing her hand within his arm, as they +turned backwards towards the bridge. + +She shook her head doubtfully. Whereupon he awoke fully to the situation, +and during the short remainder of their walk he wooed and flattered her +as usual. But when he had put her safely into a hansom at the corner of +the bridge, and smiled good-bye to her, he turned to walk back to the +House in much sudden flatness of mood. Her little restless egotisms of +mind and manner had chilled him unawares. Had Fontenoy's speech been so +fine, after all? Were politics--was anything--quite worth while? It +seemed to him that all emotions were small, all crises disappointing. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + + +The following Sunday, somewhere towards five o'clock, George rang the +bell of the Maxwells' house in St. James's Square. It was a very fine +house, and George's eye, as he stood waiting, ran over the facade with an +amused, investigating look. + +He allowed himself the same expression once or twice in the hall, as one +mute and splendid person relieved him of his coat, and another, equally +mute and equally unsurpassable, waited for him on the stairs, while +across a passage beyond the hall he saw two red-liveried footmen +carrying tea. + +"When one is a friend of the people," he pondered as he went upstairs, +"is one limited in horses but not in flunkeys? These things are obscure." + +He was ushered first into a stately outer drawing-room, filled with +old French furniture and fine pictures; then the butler lifted a +velvet curtain, pronounced the visitor's name with a voice and +emphasis as perfectly trained as the rest of him, and stood aside for +George to enter. + +He found himself on the threshold of a charming room looking west, and +lit by some last beams of February sun. The pale-green walls were covered +with a medley of prints and sketches. A large writing-table, untidily +heaped with papers, stood conspicuous on the blue self-coloured carpet, +which over a great part of the floor was pleasantly void and bare. Flat +earthenware pans, planted with hyacinths and narcissus, stood here and +there, and filled the air with spring scents. Books ran round the lower +walls, or lay piled where-ever there was a space for them; while about +the fire at the further end was gathered a circle of chintz-covered +chairs--chairs of all shapes and sizes, meant for talking. The whole +impression of the pretty, disorderly place, compared with the stately +drawing-room behind it, was one of intimity and freedom; the room made a +friend of you as you entered. + +Half a dozen people were sitting with Lady Maxwell when Tressady was +announced. She rose to meet him with great cordiality, introduced him to +little Lady Leven, an elfish creature in a cloud of fair hair, and with a +pleasant "You know all the rest," offered him a chair beside herself and +the tea-table. + +"The rest" were Frank Leven, Edward Watton, Bayle, the Foreign Office +private secretary who had been staying at Malford House at the time of +Tressady's election, and Bennett, the "small, dark man" whom George had +pointed out to Letty in the House as a Labour member, and one of the +Maxwells' particular friends. + +"Well?" said Lady Maxwell, turning to her new visitor as she handed him +some tea, "were you as much taken with the grandmother as the grandmother +was taken with you? She told me she had never seen a 'more haffable +gentleman, nor one as she'd a been more willin to ha done for'!" + +George laughed. "I see," he said, "that my report has been anticipated." + +"Yes--I have been there. I have found a 'case' in them indeed--alack! The +granny--I am afraid she is an unseemly old woman--and the elder girl both +work for the Jew son-in-law on the first floor--homework of the most +abominable kind--that girl will be dead in a year if it goes on." + +George was rapidly conscious of two contradictory impressions--one of +pleasure, one of annoyance--pleasure in her tall, slim presence, her +white hand, and all the other flashing points of a beauty not to be +denied--and irritation that she should have talked "shop" to him with her +first breath. Could one never escape this altruistic chatter? + +But he was not left to grapple with it alone, for Lady Leven looked +up quickly. + +"Mr. Watton, will you please take Lady Maxwell's tea away if she mentions +the word 'case' again? We gave her fair warning." + +Lady Maxwell hastily clasped both her hands round her tea-cup. + +"Betty, we have discussed the opera for at least twenty minutes." + +"Yes--at peril of our lives!" said Lady Leven. "I never talked so fast +before. One felt as though one _must_ say everything one had to say about +Melba and the de Reszkes, all in one breath--before one's poor little +subject was torn from one--one would never have such a chance again." + +Lady Maxwell laughed, but coloured too. + +"Am I such a nuisance?" she said, dropping her hands on her knee with a +little sigh. Then she turned to Tressady. + +"But Lady Leven really makes it out worse than it is. We haven't even +_approached_ a Factory Act all the afternoon." + +Lady Leven sprang forward in her chair. "Because! _because_, my dear, we +simply declined to let you. We made a league--didn't we, Mr. +Bennett?--even you joined it." + +Bennett smiled. + +"Lady Maxwell overworks herself--we all know that," he said, his look, at +once kind, honest, and perennially embarrassed, passing from Lady Leven +to his hostess. + +"Oh, don't sympathise, for Heaven's sake!" cried Betty. "Wage war upon +her--it's our only hope." + +"Don't you think Sunday at least ought to be frivolous?" said Tressady, +smiling, to Lady Maxwell. + +"Well, personally, I like to talk about what interests me on Sunday as +well as on other days," she said with a frank simplicity; "but I know I +ought to be kept in order--I become a terrible bore." + +Frank Leven roused himself from the sofa on which he had languidly +subsided. + +"Bores?" he said indignantly, "we're all bores. We all have been bores +since people began to think about what they're pleased to call 'social +work.' Why should I love my neighbour?--I'd much rather hate him. I +generally do." + +"Doesn't it all depend," said Tressady, "on whether he happens to be able +to make it disagreeable for you in return?" + +"That's just it," said Betty Leven, eagerly. "I agree with Frank--it's +all so stupid, this 'loving' everybody. It makes one positively hot. We +sit under a clergyman, Frank and I, who talks of nothing every Sunday but +love--_love_--like that, long-drawn-out--how our politics should be +'love,' and our shopping should be 'love'--till we long simply to +bastinado somebody. I want to have a little real nice cruelty--something +sharp and interesting. I should like to stick pins into my maid, only +unfortunately, as she has more than once pointed out to me, it would be +so much easier for her to stick them into me!" + +"You want the time of Miss Austen's novels back again," said young Bayle, +stooping to her, with his measured and agreeable smile--"before even the +clergy had a mission." + +"Ah! but it would be no good," said Lady Leven, sighing, "if _she_ +were there!" + +She threw out her small hand towards her hostess, and everybody laughed. + +Up to the moment of the laugh, Lady Maxwell had been lying back in her +chair listening, the beautiful mouth absently merry, and the eyes +speaking--Tressady thought--of quite other things, of some hidden +converse of her own, going on in the brain behind the eyes. A certain +prophetess-air seemed natural to her. Nevertheless, that first impression +of her he had carried away from the hospital scene was being somehow +blurred and broken up. + +She joined in the laugh against herself; then, with a little nod towards +her assailant, she said to Edward Watton, who was sitting on her right +hand. "_You're_ not taken in, I know." + +"Oh, if you mean that I go in for 'cases' and 'causes' too," cried Lady +Leven, interrupting, "of course I do--I can't be left alone. I must dance +as my generation pipes." + +"Which means," said her husband, drily, "that she went for two days +filling soda-water bottles the week before last, and a day's shirt-making +last week. From the first, I was told that she would probably return to +me with an eye knocked out, she being totally inexperienced and absurdly +rash. As to the second, to judge from the description she gave me of the +den she had been sitting in when she came home, and the headache she had +next day, I still expect typhoid. The fortnight isn't up till Wednesday." + +There was a shout of mingled laughter and inquiry. + +"How did you do it?--and whom did you bribe?" said Bayle to Lady Leven. + +"I didn't bribe anybody," she said indignantly. "You don't understand. My +friends introduced me." + +Then, drawn out by him, she plunged into a lively account of her workshop +experiences, interrupted every now and then by the sarcastic comments of +her husband and the amusement of the two younger men who had brought +their chairs close to her. Betty Leven ranked high among the lively +chatterboxes of her day and set. + +Lady Maxwell, however, had not laughed at Frank Leven's speech. Rather, +as he spoke of his wife's experiences, her face had clouded, as though +the blight of some too familiar image, some sad ever-present vision, had +descended upon her. + +Beimett also did not laugh. He watched the Levens indulgently for a few +minutes, then insensibly he, Lady Maxwell, Edward Watton, and Tressady +drew together into a circle of their own. + +"Do you gather that Lord Fontenoy's speech on Friday has been much +taken up in the country?" said Bennett, bending forward and addressing +Lady Maxwell. Tressady, who was observing him, noticed that his dress +was precisely the "Sunday best" of the respectable workman, and was, +moreover, reminded by the expression of the eyes and brow that Bennett +was said to have been a well-known "local preacher" in his +north-country youth. + +Lady Maxwell smiled, and pointed to Tressady. + +"Here," she said, "is Lord Fontenoy's first-lieutenant." + +Bennett looked at George. + +"I should be glad," he said, "to know what Sir George thinks?" + +"Why, certainly--we think it has been very warmly taken up," said George, +promptly--"to judge from the newspapers, the letters that have been +pouring in, and the petitions that seem to be preparing." + +Lady Maxwell's eyes gleamed. She looked at Bennett silently a moment, +then she said: + +"Isn't it amazing to you how strong an impossible case can be made to +look?" + +"It is inevitable," said Bennett, with a little shrug, "quite +inevitable. These social experiments of ours are so young--there is +always a strong case to be made out against any of them, and there will +be for years to come." + +"Well and good," said George; "then we cavillers are inevitable too. +Don't attack us--praise us rather; by your own confession, we are as much +a part of the game as you are." + +Bennett smiled slightly, but did not in reality quite follow. Lady +Maxwell bent forward. + +"Do you know whether Lord Fontenoy has any _personal_ knowledge of the +trades he was speaking about?" she said, in her rich eager voice; "that +is what I want so much to find out." + +George was nettled by both the question and the manner. + +"I regard Fontenoy as a very competent person," he said drily. "I imagine +he did his best to inform himself. But there was not much need; the +persons concerned--whom you think you are protecting--were so very eager +to inform us!" + +Lady Maxwell flushed. + +"And you think that settles it--the eagerness of the cheap life to be +allowed to maim and waste itself? But again and again English law has +stepped in to prevent it--and again and again everybody has been +thankful." + +"It is all a question of balance, of course," said George. "Must a +few unwise people be allowed to kill themselves--or thousands lose +their liberty?" + +His blue eyes scanned her beautiful impetuous face with a certain cool +hardness. Internally he was more and more in revolt against a "monstrous +regiment of women" and the influence upon the most complex economic +problems of such a personality as that before him. + +But his word "liberty" pricked her. The look of feeling passed away. Her +eyes kindled as sharply and drily as his own. + +"Freedom?--let me quote you Cromwell! 'Every sectary saith, "O give me +liberty!" But give it him, and to the best of his power he will yield it +to no one else.' So with your careless or brutal employer--give him +liberty, and no one else shall get it." + +"Only by metaphor--not legally," said George, stubbornly. "So long as men +are not slaves by law there is always a chance for freedom. Any way _we_ +stand for freedom--as an end, not a means. It is not the business of the +State to make people happy--not at all!--at least that is our view--but +it _is_ the business of the State to keep them free." + +"Ah!" said Bennett, with a long breath, "there you've hit the nail--the +whole difference between you and us." + +George nodded. Lady Maxwell did not speak immediately. But George was +conscious that he was being observed, closely considered. Their glances +crossed an instant, in antagonism, certainly, if not in dislike. + +"How long is it since you came home from India?" she asked him suddenly. + +"About six months." + +"And you were, I think, a long time abroad?" + +"Nearly four years. Does that make you think I have not had much time to +get up the things I am going to vote about?" said the young man, +laughing. "I don't know! On the broadest issues of politics, one makes up +one's mind as well in Asia as in Europe--better perhaps." + +"On the Empire, I suppose--and England's place in the world? That's a +side which--I know--I remember much too little. You think our life +depends on a governing class--and that _we_ and democracy are weakening +that class too much?" + +"That's about it. And for democracy it is all right. But _you_--you are +the traitors!" + +His thrust, however, did not rouse her to any corresponding rhetoric. She +smiled merely, and began to question him about his travels. She did it +with great deftness, so that after an answer or two both his temper and +manner insensibly softened, and he found himself talking with ease and +success. His mixed personality revealed itself--his capacity for certain +veiled enthusiasms, his respect for power, for knowledge, his pessimist +beliefs as to the average lot of men. + +Bennett, who listened easily, was glad to help her make her guest talk. +Frank Leven left the group near the sofa and came to listen, too. +Tressady was more and more spurred, carried out of himself. Lady +Maxwell's fine eyes and stately ways were humanised after all by a quick +responsiveness, which for most people, however critical, made +conversation with her draw like a magnet. Her intelligence, too, was +competent, left the mere feminine behind in these connections that +Tressady offered her, no less than in others. She had not lived in the +world of high politics for nearly five years for nothing; so that +unconsciously, and indeed quite against his will, Tressady found himself +talking to her, after a while, as though she had been a man and an equal, +while at the same time taking more pains than he would ever have taken +for a man. + +"Well, you _have_ seen a lot!" said Frank Leven at last, with a rather +envious sigh. + +Bennett's modest face suddenly reddened. + +"If only Sir George will use his eyes to as good purpose at home--" he +said involuntarily, then stopped. Few men were more unready and awkward +in conversation; yet when roused he was one of the best platform speakers +of his day. + +George laughed. + +"One sees best what appeals to one, I am afraid," he said, only to be +instantly conscious that he had made a rather stupid admission in face of +the enemy. + +Lady Maxwell's lip twitched; he saw the flash of some quick thought cross +her face. But she said nothing. + +Only when he got up to go, she bade him notice that she was always at +home on Sundays, and would be glad that he should remember it. He made a +rather cold and perfunctory reply. Inwardly he said to himself, "Why does +she say nothing of Letty, whom she knows--and of our marriage--if she +wants to make friends?" + +Nevertheless, he left the house with the feeling of one who has passed +an hour not of the common sort. He had done himself justice, made his +mark. And as for her--in spite of his flashes of dislike he carried +away a strong impression of something passionate and vivid that clung +to the memory. Or was it merely eyes and pose, that astonishingly +beautiful colour, and touch of classic dignity which she got--so the +world said--from some remote strain of Italian blood? Most probably! +All the same, she had fewer of the ordinary womanly arts than he had +imagined. How easy it would have been to send that message to Letty she +had not sent! He thought simply that for a clever woman she might have +been more adroit. + + * * * * * + +The door had no sooner closed behind Tressady than Betty Leven, with +a quick look after him, bent across to her hostess, and said in a +stage whisper: + +"Who? Post me up, please." + +"One of Fontenoy's gang," said her husband, before Lady Maxwell could +answer. "A new member, and as sharp as needles. He's been exactly to all +the places where I want to go, Betty, and you won't let me." + +He glanced at his wife with a certain sharpness. For Tressady had spoken +in passing of nilghai-shooting in the Himalayas, and the remark had +brought the flush of an habitual discontent to the young man's cheek. + +Betty merely held out a white child's wrist. + +"Button my glove, please, and don't talk. I have got ever so many +questions to ask Marcella." + +Leven applied himself rather sulkily to his task while Betty pursued her +inquiries. + +"Isn't he going to marry Letty Sewell?" + +"Yes," said Lady Maxwell, opening her eyes rather wide. "Do you +know her?" + +"Why, my dear, she's Mr. Watton's cousin--isn't she?" said Betty, turning +towards that young man. "I saw her once at your mother's." + +"Certainly she is my cousin," said that young man, smiling, "and she is +going to marry Tressady at Easter. So much I can vouch for, though I +don't know her so well, perhaps, as the rest of my family do." + +"Oh!" said Betty, drily, releasing her husband and crossing her small +hands across her knee. "That means--Miss Sewell isn't one of Mr. Watton's +_favourite_ cousins. You don't mind talking about your cousins, do you? +You may blacken the character of all mine. Is she nice?" + +"Who--Letty? Why, of course she is nice," said Edward Watton, laughing. +"All young ladies are." + +"Oh goodness!" said Betty, shaking her halo of gold hair. "Commend me to +cousins for letting one down easy." + +"Too bad, Lady Leven!" said Watton, getting up to escape. "Why not ask +Bayle? He knows all things. Let me hand you over to him. He will sing you +all my cousin's charms." + +"Delighted!" said Bayle as he, too, rose--"only unfortunately I ought at +this moment to be at Wimbledon." + +He had the air of a typical official, well dressed, suave, and infinitely +self-possessed, as he held out his hand--deprecatingly--to Lady Leven. + +"Oh! you private secretaries!" said Betty, pouting and turning +away from him. + +"Don't abolish us," he said, pleading. "We must live." + +"_Je n'en vois pas la nécessité!_" said Betty, over her shoulder. + +"Betty, what a babe you are!" cried her husband, as Bayle, Watton, and +Bennett all disappeared together. + +"Not at all!" cried Betty. "I wanted to get some truth out of somebody. +For, of course, the real truth is that this Miss Sewell is--" + +"Is what?" said Leven, lost in admiration all the time, as Lady Maxwell +saw, of his wife's dainty grace and rose-leaf colour. + +"Well--a--_minx!_" said Betty, with innocent slowness, +opening her blue eyes very wide; "a mischievous--rather +pretty--hard-hearted--flirting--little minx!" + +"Really, Betty!" cried Lady Maxwell. "Where have you seen her?" + +"Oh, I saw her last year several times at the Wattons' and other places," +said Betty, composedly. "And so did you too, please, madam. I remember +very well one day Mrs. Watton brought her into the Winterbournes' when +you and I were there, and she chattered a great deal." + +"Oh yes!--I had forgotten." + +"Well, my dear, you'll soon have to remember her! so you needn't talk +in that lofty tone. For they're going to be married at Easter, and if +you want to make friends with the young man, you'll have to realise +the wife!" + +"Married at Easter? How do you know?" + +"In the first place Mr. Watton said so, in the next there are such +things as newspapers. But of course you didn't notice such trifles, you +never do." + +"Betty, you're very cross with me to-day!" Lady Maxwell looked up at her +friend with a little pleading air. + +"Oh no! only for your good. I know you're thinking of nothing in the +world but how to make that man take a reasonable view of Maxwell's Bill. +And I want to impress upon you that _he's_ probably thinking a great deal +more about getting married than about Factory Bills. You see, _your_ +getting married was a kind of accident. But other people are different. +And oh, dear, you do know so little about them when they don't live hi +four pair backs! There, don't defend yourself--you sha'n't!" + +And, stooping, Betty stifled her friend's possible protest by +kissing her. + +"Now then, come along, Frank--you've got your speech to write--and I've +got to copy it out. Don't swear! you know you're going to have two whole +days' golfing next week. Good-bye, Marcella! My love to Aldous--and tell +him not to be so late next time I come to tea. Good-bye!" + +And off she swept, pausing, however, on the landing to open the door +again and put in an eager face. + +"Oh! and, by the way, the young man has a mother--Frank reminded me. His +womenkind don't seem to be his strong point--but as she doesn't earn +_even_ four-and-sixpence a week--very sadly the contrary--I won't tell +you any more now, or you'll forget. Next time!" + +When Marcella Maxwell was at last left alone, she began to pace slowly up +and down the large bare room, as it was very much her wont to do. + +She was thinking of George Tressady, and of the personality his talk had +seemed to reveal. + +"His heart is all in _power_--in what he takes for magnificence." she +said to herself. "He talks as if he had no humanity, and did not care a +rap for anybody. But it is a pose--I _think_ it is a pose. He is +interesting--he will develop. One would like--to show him things." + +After another pensive turn or two she stopped beside a photograph that +stood upon her writing-table. It was a photograph of her husband--a tall, +smoothfaced man, with pleasant eyes, features of no particular emphasis, +and the free carriage of the country-bred Englishman. As she looked at it +her face relaxed unconsciously, inevitably; under the stimulus of some +habitual and secret joy. It was for his sake, for his sake only that she +was still thinking of George Tressady, still pondering the young man's +character and remarks. + +So much at least was true--no other member of Fontenoy's party had as +yet given her even the chance of arguing with him. Once or twice in +society she had tried to approach Fontenoy himself, to get somehow into +touch with him. But she had made no way. Lord Fontenoy had simply turned +his square-jawed face and red-rimmed eyes upon her with a stupid +irresponsive air, which Marcella knew perfectly well to be a mask, while +it protected him none the less effectively for that against both her +eloquence and her charm. The other members of the party were young +aristocrats, either of the ultra-exclusive or of the sporting type. She +had made her attempts here and there among them, but with no more +success. And once or twice, when she had pushed her attack to close +quarters, she had been suddenly conscious of an underlying insolence in +her opponent--a quick glance of bold or sensual eyes which seemed to +relegate the mere woman to her place. + +But this young Tressady, for all his narrowness and bitterness, was of a +different stamp--or she thought so. + +She began to pace up and down again, lost in reverie, till after a few +minutes she came slowly to a stop before a long Louis Quinze +mirror--her hands clasped in front of her, her eyes half consciously +studying what she saw. + +Her own beauty invariably gave her pleasure--though very seldom for the +reasons that would have affected other women. She felt instinctively that +it made life easier for her than it could otherwise have been; that it +provided her with a natural and profitable "opening" in any game she +might wish to play; and that even among the workmen, unionist leaders, +and officials of the East End it had helped her again and again to score +the points that she wanted to make. She was accustomed to be looked at, +to be the centre, to feel things yielding before her; and without +thinking it out, she knew perfectly well what it was she gained by this +"fair seeming show" of eye and lip and form. Somehow it made nothing seem +impossible to her; it gave her a dazzling self-confidence. + +The handle of the door turned. She looked round with a smiling start, +and waited. + +A tall man in a grey suit came in, crossed the room quickly, and put his +arms round her. She leant back against his shoulder, putting up one hand +to touch his cheek caressingly. + +"Why, how late you are! Betty left reproaches for you." + +"I had a walk with Dowson. Then two or three people caught me on the +way back--Rashdell among others." (Lord Rashdell was Foreign +Secretary.) "There are some interesting telegrams from Paris--I copied +them out for you." + +The country happened to be at the moment in the midst of one of its +periodical difficulties with France. There had been a good deal of +diplomatic friction, and a certain amount of anxiety at the Foreign +Office. Marcella lit the silver kettle again and made her man some fresh +tea, while he told her the news, and they discussed the various points of +the telegrams he had copied for her, with a comrade's freedom and +vivacity. Then she said: + +"Well, I have had an interesting time too! That young Tressady has +been to tea." + +"Oh! has he? They say there is a lot of stuff in him, and he may do us a +great deal of mischief. How did you find him?" + +"Oh, very clever, very limited--and a mass of prejudices," she said, +laughing. "I never saw an odder mixture of knowledge and ignorance." + +"What? Knowledge of India and the East?--that kind of thing?" + +She nodded. + +"Knowledge of everything except the subject he has come home to fight +about! Do you know, Aldous--" + +She paused. She was sitting on a stool beside him, her arm upon his knee. + +"What do I know?" he said, his hand seeking hers. + +"Well, I can't help feeling that that man might live and learn. He isn't +a mere obstructive block--like the rest." + +Maxwell laughed. + +"Then Fontenoy is not as shrewd as usual. They say he regards him as +their best recruit." + +"Never mind. I rather wish you'd try to make friends with him." + +Maxwell, however, helped himself to cake and made no response. On the two +or three occasions on which he had met George Tressady, he had been +conscious, if the truth were told, of a certain vague antipathy to the +young man. + +Marcella pondered. + +"No," she said, "no--I don't think after all he's your sort. Suppose _I_ +see what can be done!" + +And she got up with her flashing smile--half love, half fun--and +crossed the room to summon her little boy, Hallin, for his evening +play. Maxwell looked after her, not heeding at all what she was saying, +heeding only herself, her voice, the atmosphere of charm and life she +carried with her. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + + +Marcella Maxwell, however, had not been easily wooed by the man who now +filled all the horizon of her life. At the time when Aldous Raeburn, as +he then was--the grandson and heir of old Lord Maxwell--came across her +first she was a handsome, undeveloped girl, of a type not uncommon in our +modern world, belonging by birth to the country-squire class, and by the +chances of a few years of student life in London to the youth that takes +nothing on authority, and puts to fierce question whatever it finds +already on its path--Governments, Churches, the powers of family and +wealth--that takes, moreover, its social pity for the only standard, and +spends that pity only on one sort and type of existence. She accepted +Raeburn, then the best _parti_ in the county, without understanding or +loving him, simply that she might use his power and wealth for certain +social ends to which the crude philanthropy of her youth had pledged +itself. Naturally, they were no sooner engaged than Raeburn found himself +launched upon a long wrestle with the girl who had thus--in the +selfishness of her passionate idealist youth--opened her relation to him +with a deliberate affront to the heart offered her. The engagement had +stormy passages, and was for a time wholly broken off. Aldous was made +bitterly jealous, or miserably unhappy. Marcella left the old house in +the neighbourhood of the Maxwell property, where her lover had first seen +and courted her. She plunged into London life, and into nursing, that +common outlet for the woman at war with herself or society. She suffered +and struggled, and once or twice she came very near to throwing away all +her chances of happiness. But in the end, Maxwell tamed her; Maxwell +recovered her. The rise of love in the unruly, impetuous creature, when +the rise came, was like the sudden growth of some great forest flower. It +spread with transforming beauty over the whole nature, till at last the +girl who had once looked upon him as the mere tool of her own moral +ambitions threw herself upon Maxwell's heart with a self-abandoning +passion and penitence, which her developed powers and her adorable beauty +made a veritable intoxication. + +And Maxwell was worthy that she should do this thing. When he and +Marcella first met, he was a man of thirty, very able, very reserved, and +often painfully diffident as to his own powers and future. He was the +only young representative of a famous stock, and had grown up from his +childhood under the shadow of great sorrows and heavy responsibilities. +The stuff of the poet and the thinker lay hidden behind his shy manners; +and he loved Marcella Boyce with all the delicacy, all the idealising +respect, that passion generates in natures so strong and so highly +tempered. At the same time, he had little buoyancy or gaiety; he had a +belief in his class, and a constitutional dislike of change, which were +always fighting in his mind with the energies of moral debate; and he +acquiesced very easily--perhaps indifferently--in many outward +conventions and prejudices. + +The crisis through which Marcella put him developed and matured the man. +To the influences of love, moreover, were added the influences of +friendship--of such a friendship as our modern time but seldom rears to +perfection. In Raeburn's college days, a man of rare and delicate powers +had possessed himself of Raeburn's tenacious affection, and had +thenceforward played the leader to Raeburn's strength, physical and +moral, availing himself freely, wherever his own failed him, of the +powers and capacities of his friend. For he himself bore in him from his +youth up the seeds of physical failure and early death. It was partly the +marvellous struggle in him of soul with body that subdued to him the +homage of the stronger man. And it was clearly his influence that broke +up and fired Raeburn's slower and more distrustful temper, informing an +inbred Toryism, a natural passion for tradition, and the England of +tradition with that "repining restlessness" which is the best spur of +noble living. + +Hallin was a lecturer and an economist; a man who lived in the perception +of the great paradox that in our modern world political power has gone to +the workman, while yet socially and intellectually he remains little less +weak, or starved, or subject than before. When he died he left to Raeburn +a legacy of feelings and ideas, all largely concerned with this contrast +between the huge and growing "tyranny" of the working class and the +individual helplessness or bareness of the working man. And it was these +feelings and ideas which from the beginning made a link between Raeburn +and the young revolts and compassions of Marcella Boyce. They were at one +in their love of Edward Hallin; and after Hallin's death, in their sore +and tender wish to make his thoughts tell upon the English world. + + * * * * * + +The Maxwells had now been married some five years, years of almost +incredible happiness. The equal comradeship of marriage at its best and +finest, all the daily disciplines, the profound and painless lessons of +love, the covetous bliss of parentage, the constant anxieties of power +nobly understood, had harmonised the stormy nature of the woman, and had +transformed the somewhat pessimist and scrupulous character of the man. +Not that life with Marcella Maxwell was always easy. Now as ever she +remained on the moral side a creature of strain and effort, tormented by +ideals not to be realised, and eager to drive herself and others in a +breathless pursuit of them. + +But if in some sort she seemed to be always dragging those that loved her +through the heart of a tempest, the tempest had such golden moments! No +wife had ever more capacity for all the delicacies and depths of passion +towards the man of her choice. All the anxieties she brought with her, +all the perplexities and difficulties she imposed, had never yet seemed +to Maxwell anything but divinely worth while. So far, indeed, he had +never even remotely allowed himself to put the question. Her faults were +her; and she was his light of life. + +For some time after their marriage, which took place about a year after +his accession to the title and estates, they had lived at the stately +house in Brookshire belonging to the Maxwells, and Marcella had thrown +herself into the management of a large household and property with +characteristic energy and originality. She had tried new ways of choosing +and governing her servants; new ways of entertaining the poor, and of +making Maxwell Court the centre, not of one class, but of all. She ran up +a fair score of blunders, but not one of them was the blunder of meanness +or vulgarity. Her nature was inventive and poetic, and the rich +fulfilment that had overtaken her own personal desires did but sting her +eager passion to give and to serve. + +Meanwhile the family house in town was sold, and what with the birth of +her son, and the multiplicity of the rural interests to which she had set +her hand, Marcella felt no need of London. But towards the end of the +second year she perceived--though he said little about it--that there was +in her husband's mind a strong and persistent drawing towards his former +political interests and associations. The late Lord Maxwell had sat in +several Conservative cabinets, and his grandson, after a distinguished +career in the House as a private member, had accepted a subordinate place +in the Government only a few months before his grandfather's death +transferred him to the Lords. After that event, a scrupulous conscience +had forced him to take landowning as a profession and an arduous one. The +Premier made him flattering advances, and his friends remonstrated, but +he had none the less relinquished office, and buried himself on his land. + +Now, however, after some three years' hard and unremitting work, the +estate was in excellent condition; the "new ways" of the new owners had +been well started; and both Maxwell and Marcella had fitting lieutenants +who could be left in charge. Moreover, matters were being agitated at +the moment in politics which had special significance for the man's +idealist and reflective mind. His country friends and neighbours hardly +understood why. + +For it was merely a question of certain further measures of factory +reform. A group of labour leaders were pressing upon the public and the +Government a proposal to pass a special Factory Act for certain +districts and trades of East London. In spite of Commissions, in spite +of recent laws, "sweating," so it was urged, was as bad as ever--nay, in +certain localities and industries was more frightful and more oppressive +than ever. The waste of life and health involved in the great clothing +industries of East London, for instance, which had provoked law after +law, inquiry after inquiry, still went--so it was maintained--its +hideous way. + +"Have courage!" cried the reformers. "Take, at last, the only effectual +step. Make it penal to practise certain trades in the houses of the +people--drive them all into factories of a certain size, where alone +these degraded industries can be humanised and controlled. Above all, +make up your mind to a legal working day for East London men as well as +East London women. Try the great experiment first of all in this +omnivorous, inarticulate London, this dustbin for the rubbish of all +nations. Here the problem is worst--here the victims are weakest and +most manageable. London will bear what would stir a riot in Birmingham or +Leeds. Make the experiment as partial and as tentative as you +please--give the Home Office power to extend or revoke it at will--but +_try it_!" + +The change proposed was itself of vast importance, and was, moreover, but +a prelude to things still more far-reaching. But, critical as it was, +Maxwell was prepared for it. During the later years of his friend +Hallin's life the two men had constantly discussed the industrial +consequences of democracy with unflagging eagerness and intelligence. To +both it seemed not only inevitable, but the object of the citizen's +dearest hopes, that the rule of the people should bring with it, in +ever-ascending degree, the ordering and moralising of the worker's toil. +Yet neither had the smallest belief that any of the great civilised +communities would ever see the State the sole landlord and the sole +capitalist; or that Collectivism as a system has, or deserves to have, +any serious prospects in the world. To both, possession--private and +personal possession--from the child's first toy, or the tiny garden where +it sows its passionately watched seeds, to the great business or the +great estate, is one of the first and chiefest elements of human +training, not to be escaped by human effort, or only at such a cost of +impoverishment and disaster that mankind would but take the +step--supposing it conceivable that it should take it--to retrace it +instantly. + +Maxwell's _heart_, however, was much less concerned with this belief, +tenaciously as he held it, than with its relative--the limitation of +private possession by the authority of the common conscience. That "we +are not our own" has not, indeed, been left to Lassalle or Marx to +discover. But if you could have moved this quiet Englishman to speak, he +would have said--his strong, brooding face all kindled and alive--that +the enormous industrial development of the past century has shown us the +forces at work in the evolution of human societies on a gigantic scale, +and by thus magnifying them has given us a new understanding of them. The +vast extension of the individual will and power which science has brought +to humanity during the last hundred years was always present to him as +food for a natural exultation--a kind of pledge of the boundless +prospects of the race. On the other hand the struggle of society brought +face to face with this huge increment of the individual power, forced to +deal with it for its own higher and mysterious ends, to moralise and +socialise it lest it should destroy itself and the State together; the +slow steps by which the modern community has succeeded in asserting +itself against the individual, in protecting the weak from his weakness, +the poor from his poverty, in defending the woman and child from the +fierce claims of capital, in forcing upon trade after trade the axiom +that no man may lawfully build his wealth upon the exhaustion and +degradation of his fellow--these things stirred in him the far deeper +enthusiasms of the moral nature. Nay more! Together with all the other +main facts which mark the long travail of man's ethical and social life, +they were among the only "evidences" of religion a critical mind allowed +itself--the most striking signs of something "greater than we know" +working among the dust and ugliness of our common day. Attack wealth as +wealth, possession as possession, and civilisation is undone. But bring +the force of the social conscience to bear as keenly and ardently as you +may, upon the separate activities of factory and household, farm and +office; and from the results you will only get a richer individual +freedom, one more illustration of the divinest law man serves--that he +must "die to live," must surrender to obtain. + +Such at least was Maxwell's persuasion; though as a practical man he +admitted, of course, many limitations of time, occasion, and degree. And +long companionship with him had impressed the same faith also on +Marcella. With the natural conceit of the shrewd woman, she would +probably have maintained that her social creed came entirely of +mother-wit and her own exertions--her experiences in London, reading, +and the rest. In reality it was in her the pure birth of a pure passion. +She had learnt it while she was learning to love Aldous Raeburn; and it +need astonish no one that the more dependent all her various +philosophies of life had become on the mere personal influence and joy +of marriage, the more agile had she grown in all that concerned the mere +intellectual defence of them. She could argue better and think better; +but at bottom, if the truth were told, they were Maxwell's arguments and +Maxwell's thoughts. + +So that when this particular agitation began, and he grew restless in his +silent way, she grew restless too. They took down the old worn +portfolios of Hallin's papers and letters, and looked through them, night +after night, as they sat alone together in the great library of the +Court. Both Marcella and Aldous could remember the writing of many of +these innumerable drafts of Acts, these endless memoranda on special +points, and must needs try, for love's sake, to forget the terrible +strain and effort with which a dying man had put them together. She was +led by them to think of the many workmen friends she had made during the +year of her nursing life; while he had remembrances of much personal work +and investigation of his own, undertaken during the time of his +under-secretaryship, to add to hers. Another Liberal government was +slipping to its fall--if a Conservative government came in, with a +possible opening in it for Aldous Maxwell, what then? Was the chance to +be seized? + +One May twilight, just before dinner, as the two were strolling up and +down the great terrace just in front of the Court, Aldous paused and +looked at the majestic house beside them. + +"What's the good of talking about these things while we live _there_?" he +said, with a gesture towards the house, half impatient, half humorous. + +Marcella laughed. Then she sprang away from him, considering, a sudden +brightness in her eye. She had an idea. + +The idea after all was a very simple one. But the probability is that, +had she not been there to carry him through, Maxwell would have neither +found it nor followed it. However that may be, in a very few days she had +clothed it with fact, and made so real a thing of it that she was amazed +at her own success. She and Maxwell had settled themselves in a small +furnished house in the Mile End Road, and Maxwell was once more studying +the problems of his measure that was to be in the midst of the +populations to whom it applied. The house had been recently let in +"apartments" by a young tradesman and his wife, well known to Marcella. +In his artisan days the man had been her friend, and for a time her +patient. She knew how to put her hand on him at once. + +They spent five months in the little house, while the London that knew +them in St. James's Square looked on, and made the comments--half amused, +half inquisitive--that the act seemed to invite. There was of course no +surprise. Nothing surprises the London of to-day. Or if there were any, +it was all Marcella's. In spite of her passionate sympathy with the +multitude who live in disagreeable homes on about a pound a week, she +herself was very sensitive to the neighbourhood of beautiful things, to +the charm of old homes, cool woods, green lawns, and the rise and fall of +Brookshire hills. Against her wish, she had thought of sacrifice in +thinking of the Mile End Road in August. + +But there was no sacrifice. Frankly, these five months were among the +happiest of her life. She and Maxwell were constantly together, from +morning till night, doing the things that were congenial to them, and +seeing the things that interested them. They went in and out of every +factory and workshop in which certain trades were practised, within a +three-mile radius; they became the intimate friends of every factory +inspector and every trade-union official in the place. Luckily, Maxwell's +shyness--at least in Mile End--was not of the sort that can be readily +mistaken for a haughty mind. He was always ready to be informed; his +diffident kindness asked to be set at ease; while in any real ardour of +debate his trained capacity and his stores of knowledge would put even +the expert on his mettle. + +As for Marcella, it was her idiosyncrasy that these tailors, furriers, +machinists, shirtmakers, by whom she was surrounded in East London, +stirred her imagination far more readily than the dwellers in great +houses and the wearers of fine raiment had ever stirred it. And +Marcella, in the kindled sympathetic state, was always delightful to +herself and others. She revelled in the little house and its ugly, +druggetted rooms; in the absence of all the usual paraphernalia of their +life; in her undisturbed possession of the husband who was at once her +lover and the best company she knew or could desire. On the few days +when he left her for the day on some errand in which she could not +share, to meet him at the train in the evening like any small clerk's +wife, to help him carry the books and papers with which he was generally +laden along the hot and dingy street, to make him tea from her little +spirit kettle, and then to hear the news of the day in the shade of the +little smutty back-garden, while the German charwoman who cooked for +them had her way with the dinner--there was not an incident in the whole +trivial procession that did not amuse and delight her. She renewed her +youth; she escaped from the burdensome "glories of our birth, and +state"; from that teasing "duty to our equals" on which only the wisest +preachers have ever laid sufficient stress; and her one trouble was that +the little masquerade must end. + +One other drawback indeed, one more blight upon a golden time, there was. +Not even Marcella could make up her mind to transplant little Hallin, her +only child, from Maxwell Court to East London. It was springtime, and the +woods about the Court were breaking into sheets of white and blue. +Marcella must needs leave the boy to his flowers and his "grandame +earth," sadly warned thereto by the cheeks of other little boys in and +about the Mile End Road. But every Friday night she and Maxwell said +good-bye to the two little workhouse girls, and the German charwoman, and +the village boy from Mellor, who supplied them with all the service they +wanted in Mile End, took with them the ancient maid who had been +Marcella's mother's maid, and fled home to Brookshire. So on Saturday +mornings it generally happened that little Hallin went out to inform his +particular friend among the garden boys, that "Mummy had tum ome," and +that he was not therefore so much his own master as usual. He explained +that he had to show mummy "_eaps_ of things"--the two new kittens, the +"edge-sparrer's nest," and the "ump they'd made in the churchyard over +old Tom Collins from the parish ouses," the sore place on the pony's +shoulder, the "ole that mummy's orse had kicked in the stable door," and +a host of other curiosities. By way of linking the child with the soil +and its people, Marcella had taken care to give him nursemaids from the +village. And the village being only some thirty miles from London, talked +in the main the language of London, a language which it soon communicated +to the tongue of Maxwell's heir. Marcella tried to school her boy in +vain. Hallin chattered, laughed, broadened his a's and dropped all his +h's into a bottomless limbo none the less. + +What days of joy those Saturdays were for mother and child! All the +morning and till about four o'clock, he and she would be inseparable, +trailing about together over field and wood, she one of the handsomest +of women, he one of the plainest of children--a little square-faced +chubby fellow, with eyes monstrously black and big, fat cheeks that +hung a little over the firm chin, a sallow complexion, and a large +humorous mouth. + +But in the late afternoon, alas! Hallin was apt to find the world grow +tiresome. For against all his advice "mummy" would allow herself to be +clad by Annette, the maid, in a frock of state; carriages would drive up +from the 5.10 train; and presently in the lengthening evening the great +lawns of the Court would be dotted with strolling groups, or the red +drawing-room, with its Romneys and Gainsboroughs, would be filled with +talk and laughter circling round mummy at the tea-table; so that all that +was left to Hallin was that seat on mummy's knee--his big, dark head +pressed disconsolately against her breast, his thumb in his mouth for +comfort--which no boy of any spirit would ever consent to occupy, so long +as there was any chance of goading a slack companion into things better +worth while. + +Marcella herself was no less rebellious at heart, and would have asked +nothing better than to be left free to spend her weekly holiday in +roaming an April world with Hallin. But our country being what it is, the +plans that are made in Mile End or Shoreditch have to be adopted by +Mayfair or Mayfair's equivalent; otherwise they are apt to find an +inglorious tomb in the portfolios that bred them. We have still, it +seems, a "ruling class"; and in spite of democracy it is still this +"ruling class" that matters. Maxwell was perfectly aware of it; and these +Sundays to him were the mere complements of the Mile End weekdays. +Marcella ruefully admitted that English life was so, and she did her +best. But on Monday mornings she was generally left protesting in her +inmost soul against half the women whom these peers and politicians, +these administrators and journalists, brought with them, or wondering +anxiously whether her particular share in the social effort just over +might not have done Aldous more harm than good. She understood vaguely, +without vanity, that she was a power in this English society, that she +had many warm friends, especially among men of the finer and abler sort. +But when a woman loved her, and insisted, as it were, on making her know +it--and, after all, the experience was not a rare one--Marcella received +the overture with a kind of grateful surprise. She was accustomed, +without knowing why, to feel herself ill at ease with certain types of +women; even in her own house she was often aware of being furtively +watched by hostile eyes; or she found herself suddenly the goal of some +sharp little pleasantry that pricked like a stiletto. She supposed that +she was often forgetful and indiscreet. Perhaps the large court she held +so easily on these occasions beneath the trees or in the great +drawing-rooms of the old house had more to do with the matter. If so, she +never guessed the riddle. In society she was conscious of one aim, and +one aim only. Its very simplicity made other women incredulous, while it +kept herself in the dark. + +However, by dint of great pains, she had not yet done Aldous any harm +that counted. During all the time of their East End sojourn, a Liberal +government, embarrassed by large schemes it had not force enough to +carry, was sinking towards inevitable collapse. When the crash came, a +weak Conservative government, in which Aldous Maxwell occupied a +prominent post, accepted office for a time without a dissolution. They +came in on a cry of "industrial reform," and, by way of testing their own +party and the country, adopted the Factory Bill for East London, which +had now, by the common consent of all the workers upon it, passed into +Maxwell's hands. The Bill rent the party in twain; but the Ministry had +the courage to go to the country with a programme in which the Maxwell +Bill held a prominent place. Trade-unionism rallied to their support; the +forces both of reaction and of progress fought for them, in strangely +mingled ways; and they were returned with a sufficient, though not large, +majority. Lord Ardagh, the veteran leader of the party, became Premier. +Maxwell was made President of the Council, while his old friend and +associate, Henry Dowson, became Home Secretary, and thereby responsible +for the conduct of the long-expected Bill through the Commons. + +When Maxwell came back to her on the afternoon of his decisive interview +with Lord Ardagh, she was waiting for him in that same inner room where +Tressady paid his first visit. At the sound of her husband's step +outside, she sprang up, and they met half-way, her hands clasped in his, +against his breast, her face looking up at him. + +"Dear wife! at last we have our chance--our real chance," he said to her. + +She clung to him, and there was a moment of high emotion, in which +thoughts of the past and of the dead mingled with the natural ambition of +two people in the prime of life and power. Then Maxwell laughed and drew +a long breath. + +"The eggs have been all put into my basket in the most generous manner. +We stand or fall by the Bill. But it will be a hard fight." + +And, in his acute, deliberate way, he began to sum up the forces against +him--to speculate on the action of this group and that--Fontenoy's group +first and foremost. + +Marcella listened, her beautiful hand pensive against her cheek, her +eyes on his. Half trembling, she realised what failure, if after all +failure should come, would mean to him. Something infinitely tender and +maternal spoke in her, pledging her to the utmost help that love and a +woman could give. + + * * * * * + +Such for Maxwell and his wife had been the antecedents of a +memorable session. + +And now the session was here--was in full stream, indeed, rushing +towards the main battle still to come. On the second night of Fontenoy's +debate, George Tressady duly caught the Speaker's eye, and made a very +fair maiden speech, which earned him a good deal more praise, both from +his party and the press, than he--in a disgusted mood--thought at all +reasonable. He had misplaced half his notes, and, in his own opinion, +made a mess of his main argument. He remarked to Fontenoy afterwards that +he had better hang himself, and stalked home after the division pleased +with one thing only--that he had not allowed Letty to come. + +In reality he had done nothing to mar the reputation that was beginning +to attach to him. Fontenoy was content; and the scantiness of the +majority by which the Resolution was defeated served at once to make the +prospects of the Maxwell Bill, which was to be brought in after Easter, +more doubtful, and to sharpen the temper of its foes. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + +"Goodness!--what an ugly place it is! It wants five thousand spent on it +at once to make it tolerable!" + +The remark was Letty Tressady's. She was standing disconsolate on the +lawn at Ferth, scanning the old-fashioned house to which George had +brought her just five days before. They had been married a fortnight, and +were still to spend another week in the country before going back to +London and to Parliament. But already Letty had made up her mind that +Ferth _must_ be rebuilt and refurnished, or she could never endure it. + +She threw herself down on a garden seat with a sigh, still studying the +house. It was a straight barrack-like building, very high for its +breadth, erected early in the last century by an architect who, finding +that he was to be allowed but a very scanty sum for his performance, +determined with considerable strength of mind to spend all that he had +for decoration upon the inside rather than the outside of his mansion. +Accordingly the inside had charm--though even so much Letty could not now +be got to confess; panellings, mantelpieces, and doorways showed the work +of a man of taste. But outside all that had been aimed at was the +provision of a central block of building carried up to a considerable +height so as to give the rooms demanded, while it economised in +foundations and general space; an outer wall pierced with the plainest +openings possible at regular intervals; a high-pitched roof to keep out +the rain, whereof the original warm tiles had been long since replaced by +the chilliest Welsh slates; and two low and disfiguring wings which held +the servants and the kitchens. The stucco with which the house had been +originally covered had blackened under the influence of time, weather, +and the smoke from the Tressady coalpits. Altogether, what with its +pitchy colour, its mean windows, its factory-like plainness and height, +Ferth Place had no doubt a cheerless and repellent air, which was +increased by its immediate surroundings. For it stood on the very summit +of a high hill, whereon the trees were few and windbeaten; while the +carriage drives and the paths that climbed the hill were all of them a +coaly black. The flower garden behind the house was small and neglected; +neither shrubberies nor kitchen garden, nor the small park, had any +character or stateliness; everything bore the stamp of bygone possessors +who had been rich neither in money nor in fancy; who had been quite +content to live small lives in a small way. + +Ferth's new mistress thought bitterly of them, as she sat looking at +their handiwork. What could be done with such a place? How could she have +London people to stay there? Why, their very maids would strike! And, +pray, what was a country house worth, without the usual country-house +amenities and accessories? + +Yet she already began to feel fretted and hampered about money. The +inside of the house had been to some extent renovated. She had helped +George to choose papers and curtains for the rooms that were to be her +special domain, while they were in London together before Easter. But she +knew that George had at one time meant to do much more than had actually +been done; and he had been in a mood of lover-like apology on the first +day of their arrival. "Darling, I had hoped to buy you a hundred pretty +things!--but times is bad--dreadful bad!" he had said to her with a +laugh. "We will do it by degrees--you won't mind?" + +Then she had tried to make him tell her why it was that he had abandoned +some of the schemes of improvement that had certainly been in his mind +during the first weeks of their engagement. But he had not been very +communicative, and had put the blame mostly, as she understood him, on +the "beastly pits" and the very low dividends they had been earning +during the past six months. + +Letty, however, did not in the least believe that the comparatively +pinched state of their finances, which, bride as she was, she was already +brooding over, was wholly or even mainly due to the pits. She set her +little white teeth in sudden anger as she said to herself that it was +_not_ the pits--it was Lady Tressady! George was crippled now because of +the large sums his mother had not been ashamed to wring from him during +the last six months. Letty--George's wife--was to go without comforts and +conveniences, without the means of seeing her friends and taking her +proper position in the world, because George's mother--a ridiculous, +painted old woman, who went in for flirtations and French gowns, when she +ought to be subsiding quietly into caps and Bath chairs--would sponge +upon his very moderate income, and take what did not belong to her. + +"I am _certain_ there is something in the background!" said Letty to +herself, as she sat looking at the ugly house--"something that she is +ashamed of, and that she doesn't tell George. She _couldn't_ spend all +that money on dress! I believe she is a wicked old woman--she has the +most extraordinary creatures at her parties." + +The girl's delicate face stiffened vindictively as she fell brooding for +the hundredth time over Lady Tressady's enormities. + +Then suddenly the garden door opened, and Letty, looking up, saw that +George was on the threshold, waving his hand to her. He had left her that +morning--almost for the first time since their marriage--to go and see +his principal agent and discuss the position of affairs. + +As he approached her, she noticed instantly that he was looking tired and +ruffled. But the sight of her smoothed his brow. He threw himself down on +the grass at her feet, and pressed his lips to the delicately tended hand +that lay upon her lap. + +"Have you missed me, madame?" he said, peremptorily. + +Preoccupied as she was, Letty must needs flush and smile, so well she +knew from his eager eye that she pleased him, that he noticed the pretty +gown she had put on for luncheon, and that all the petting his absence +had withdrawn from her for an hour or two had come back to her. Other +women--more or less of her type--had found his ways beguiling before +now. He took courtship as an art, and had his own rooted ideas as to how +women should be treated. Neither too gingerly nor too sentimentally--but, +above all, with variety! + +He repeated his question insistently; whereupon Letty said, with her pert +brightness, thinking all the time of the house, "I'm _not_ going to make +you vain. Besides, I have been frightfully busy." + +"You're not going to make me vain? But I choose to be vain. I'll go away +for the whole afternoon if I'm not made vain this instant. Ah! that's +better. Do you know that you have the softest little curl on your soft +little neck, and that your hair has caught the sun on it this morning?" + +Letty instinctively put up a hand to tuck away the curl. But he seized +the hand. "Little vandal!--What have you been busy with?" + +"Oh! I have been over the house with Mrs. Matthews," said Letty, in +another tone. "George, it's _dreadful_--the number of things that want +doing. Do you know, _positively_, we could not put up more than two +couples, if we tried ever so. And as for the state of the attics! Now do +listen, George!" + +And, holding his hand tight in her eagerness, she went through a vehement +catalogue of all that was wanted--new furniture, new decoration, new +grates, a new hot-water system, the raising of the wings, and so on to +the alteration of the stables and the replanning of the garden. She had +no sooner begun upon her list than George's look of worry returned. He +got up from the grass, and sat on the bench beside her. + +"Well, I'm sorry you dislike the place so much," he said, when her breath +failed her, staring rather gloomily at his despised mansion. "Of course, +it's quite true--it is an ugly hole. But the worst of it is, darling, I +don't quite see how we're to do all this you talk about. I don't bring +any good news from the pits, alas!" + +He turned quickly towards her. The thought flashed through his +mind--could he be justly charged with having married her on false +pretences as to his affairs? No! There had been no misrepresentation of +his income or his risks. Everything had been plainly and honestly stated +to her father, and therefore to her. For Letty knew all that she wanted +to know, and had managed her family since she was a baby. + +Letty flushed at his last words. + +"Do you mean to say," she said with emphasis, "that those men are really +going to strike?" + +"I am afraid so. We _must_ enforce a reduction, to avoid working at sheer +loss, and the men vow they'll come out." + +"They want you to make them a present of the mines, I suppose!" said +Letty, bitterly. "Why, the tales I hear of their extravagance and +laziness! Mrs. Matthews says they'll have none but the best cuts of meat, +that they all of them have an harmonium or a piano in the house, that +their houses are _stuffed_ with furniture--and the amount of money they +spend in betting on their dogs and their football matches is perfectly +sickening. And now, I suppose they'll ruin themselves and us, rather than +allow you to make a decent profit!" + +"That's about it," said George, flinging himself back on the bench. +"That's about it." + +There was a pause of silence. The eyes of both were turned to the +colliery village far below, at the foot of the hill. From this high +stretch of garden one looked across the valley and its straggling line of +houses, to the pits on the further hillside, the straight black line of +the "bank," the pulley wheels, and tall chimneys against the sky. To the +left, along the ascending valley, similar chimneys and "banks" were +scattered at long intervals, while to the right the valley dipped in +sharp wooded undulations to a blue plain bounded by far Welsh hills. The +immediate neighbourhood of Ferth, for a coal country, had a woodland +charm and wildness which often surprised a stranger. There were untouched +copses, and little rivers and fern-covered hills, which still held their +own against the ever-encroaching mounds of "spoil" thrown out by the +mines. Only the villages were invariably ugly. They were the modern +creations of the coal, and had therefore no history and no originality. +Their monotonous rows of red cottages were like fragments from some dingy +town suburb, and the brick meeting-houses in which they abounded did +nothing to abate the general unloveliness. + +This view from the Ferth hill was one which had great familiarity for +Tressady, and yet no charm. As a boy he had had no love for his home and +very few acquaintances in the village. His mother hated the place and the +people. She had married very young--for the sake of money and +position--to his dull old father, who nevertheless managed to keep his +flighty wife in order by dint of a dumb, continuous stubbornness and +tyranny, which would have overborne a stronger nature than Lady +Tressady's. She was always struggling to get away from Ferth; he to keep +her tied there. He was never at ease away from his estate and his pits; +she felt herself ten years younger as soon as she had lost sight of the +grim black house on its hilltop. + +And this one opinion of hers she was able to impress upon her +son--George, too, was always glad to turn his back on Ferth and its +people. The colliers seemed to him a brutal crew, given over to coarse +sports, coarse pleasures, and an odious religion. As to their supposed +grievances and hardships, his intimate conviction as a boy had always +been that the miner got the utmost both out of his employers and out of +society that he was worth. + +"Upon my word, I often think," he said at last, his inward reverie +finding speech, "I often think it was a great pity my grandfather +discovered the coal at all! In the long run I believe we should have done +better without it. We should not at any rate have been bound up with +these hordes, with whom you can no more reason than with so many blocks +of their own coal!" + +Letty made no answer. She had turned back towards the house. Suddenly +she said, with an energy that startled him, + +"George, what _are_ we to do with that place? It gives me a nightmare. +The extraordinary thing is the way that everything in it has gone to +ruin. Did your mother really live here while you were away?" + +George's expression darkened. + +"I always used to suppose she was here," he said. "That was our bargain. +But I begin to believe now that she was mostly in London. One can't +wonder at it--she always hated the place." + +"Of course she was in London!" thought Letty to herself, "spending piles +of money, running shamefully into debt, and letting the house go to +pieces. Why, the linen hasn't been darned for years!" + +Aloud she said: + +"Mrs. Matthews says a charwoman and a little girl from the village used +to be left alone in the house for months, to play any sort of games, with +nobody to look after them--_nobody_--while you were away!" + +George looked at his wife--and then would only slip his arm round her +for answer. + +"Darling! you don't know how I've been worried all the morning--don't +let's make worry at home. After all it _is_ rather nice to be here +together, isn't it?--and we shall do--we sha'n't starve! Perhaps we shall +pull through with the pits after all--it is difficult to believe the men +will make such fools of themselves--and--well! you know my angel mother +can't always be swooping upon us as she has done lately. Let's just be +patient a little--very likely I can sell a few bits of land before long +that will give us some money in hand--and then this small person shall +bedizen herself and the house as much as she pleases. And meanwhile, +_madame ma femme_, let me point out to you that your George never +professed to be anything but a very bad match for you!" + +Letty remembered all his facts and figures perfectly. Only somehow she +had regarded them with the optimism natural to a girl who is determined +to be married. She had promptly forgotten the adverse chances he had +insisted upon, and she had converted all his averages into minima. No, +she could not say she had not been warned; but nevertheless the result +promised to be quite different from what she had expected. + +However, with her husband's arm round her, it was not easy to maintain +her ill-humour, and she yielded. They wandered on into the wood which +fringed the hill on its further side, she coquetting, he courting and +flattering her in a hundred ways. Her soft new dress, her dainty +lightness and freshness, made harmony in his senses with the April day, +the building rooks, the breaths of sudden perfume from field and wood, +the delicate green that was creeping over the copses, softening all the +edges of the black scars left by the pits. The bridal illusion returned. +George eagerly--hungrily--gave himself up to it. And Letty, though +conscious all the while of a restless feeling at the back of her mind +that they were losing time, must needs submit. + +However, when the luncheon gong had sounded and they were strolling +back to the house, he bethought himself, knit his brows again, and +said to her: + +"Do you know, darling, Dalling told me this morning"--Dalling was the +Tressadys' principal agent--"that he thought it would be a good thing if +we could make friends with some of the people here? The Union are not--or +_were_ not--quite so strong in this valley as they are in some other +parts. That's why that fellow Burrows--confound him!--has come to live +here of late. It might be possible to make some of the more intelligent +fellows hear reason. My uncles have always managed the thing with a very +high hand--very natural!--the men _are_ a set of rough, ungrateful +brutes, who talk impossible stuff, and never remember anything that's +done for them--but after all, if one has to make a living out of them, +one may as well learn how to drive them, and what they want to be at. +Suppose you come and show yourself in the village this afternoon?" + +Letty looked extremely doubtful. + +"I really don't get on very well with poor people, George. It's very +dreadful, I know, but there!--I'm not Lady Maxwell--and I can't help it. +Of course, with the poor people at home in our own cottages it's +different--they always curtsy and are very respectful--but Mrs. Matthews +says the people here are so independent, and think nothing of being rude +to you if they don't like you." + +George laughed. + +"Go and call upon them in that dress and see! I'll eat my hat if +anybody's rude. Beside, I shall be there to protect you. We won't go, of +course, to any of the strong Union people. But there are two or +three--an old nurse of mine I really used to be rather fond of--and a +fireman that's a good sort--and one or two others. I believe it would +amuse you." + +Letty was quite certain that it would not amuse her at all. However, she +assented unwillingly, and they went in to lunch. + + * * * * * + +So in the afternoon the husband and wife sallied forth. Letty felt that +she was being taken through an ordeal, and that George was rather foolish +to wish it. However, she did her best to be cheerful, and to please +George she still wore the pretty Paris frock of the morning, though it +seemed to her absurd to be trailing it through a village street with only +colliers and their wives to look at it. + +"What ill luck," said George, suddenly, as they descended their own hill, +"that that fellow Burrows should have settled down here, in one's very +pocket, like this!" + +"Yes, you had enough of him at Malford, didn't you?" said Letty. "I don't +yet understand how he comes to be here." + +George explained that about the preceding Christmas there had been, +temporarily, strong signs of decline in the Union strength of the Perth +district. A great many miners had quietly seceded; one of the periodical +waves of suspicion as to funds and management to which all trade unions +are liable had swept over the neighbourhood; and wholesale desertion from +the Union standard seemed likely. In hot haste the Central Committee +sent down Burrows as organising agent. The good fight he had made against +Tressady at the Market Malford election had given him prestige; and he +had both presence and speaking power. He had been four months at Perth, +speaking all over the district, and now, instead of leaving the Union, +the men had been crowding into it, and were just as hot--so it was +said--for a trial of strength with the masters as their comrades in other +parts of the county. + +"And before Burrows has done with us, I should say he'll have cost the +masters in this district hundreds of thousands. I call him dear at the +money!" said George, finally, with a dismal cheerfulness. + +He was really full of Burrows, and of the general news of the district +which his agent had been that morning pouring into his ear. But he had +done his best not to talk about either at luncheon. Letty had a curious +way of making the bearer of unpleasant tidings feel that it was somehow +all his own fault that things should be so; and George, even in this dawn +of marriage, was beginning, half consciously, to recognise two or three +such peculiarities of hers. + +"What I cannot understand," said Letty, vigorously, "is why such people +as Mr. Burrows are _allowed_ to go about making the mischief he does." + +George laughed, but nevertheless repressed a sudden feeling of +irritation. The inept remark of a pretty woman generally only amused him. +But this Burrows matter was beginning to touch him home. + +"You see we happen to be a free country," he said drily, "and Burrows and +his like happen to be running us just now. Maxwell & Co. are in the +shafts. Burrows sits up aloft and whips on the team. The extraordinary +thing is that nothing personal makes any difference. The people here know +perfectly well that Burrows drinks--that the woman he lives with is not +his wife--" + +"George!" cried Letty, "how _can_ you say such dreadful things!" + +"Sorry, my darling! but the world is not a nice place. He picked her up +somehow--they say she was a commercial traveller's wife--left on his +hands at a country inn. Anyway she's not divorced, and the husband's +alive. She looks like a walking skeleton, and is probably going to die. +Nevertheless they say Burrows adores her. And as for my +resentments--don't be shocked--I'm inclined to like Burrows all the +better for _that_ little affair. But then I'm not pious, like the people +here. However, they don't mind--and they don't mind the drink--and they +believe he spends their money on magnificent dinners at hotels--and they +don't mind that. They don't mind anything--they shout themselves hoarse +whenever Burrows speaks--they're as proud as Punch if he shakes hands +with them--and then they tell the most gruesome tales of him behind his +back, and like him all the better, apparently, for being a scoundrel. +Queer but true. Well, here we are--now, darling, you may expect to be +stared at!" + +For they had entered on the village street, and Ferth Magna, by some +quick freemasonry, had become suddenly conscious of the bride and +bridegroom. Here and there a begrimed man in his shirt-sleeves would +open his front door cautiously and look at them; the children and +womenkind stood boldly on the doorsteps and stared; while the people in +the little shops ran back into the street, parcels and baskets in hand. +The men working the morning shift had just come back from the pits, and +their wives were preparing to wash their blackened lords, before the +whole family sat down to tea. But both tea and ablutions were forgotten, +so long as the owner of Ferth Place and the new Lady Tressady were in +sight. The village eyes took note of everything; of the young man's +immaculate serge suit and tan waistcoat, his thin, bronzed face and fair +moustache; of the bride's grey gown, the knot of airy pink at her +throat, the coils of bright brown hair on which her hat was set, and the +buckles on her pretty shoes. Then the village retreated within doors +again; and each house buzzed and gossiped its fill. There had been a +certain amount of not very cordial response to George's salutations; but +to Letty's thinking the women had eyed her with an unpleasant and rather +hostile boldness. + +"Mary Batchelor's house is down here," said George, turning into a +side lane, not without a feeling of relief. "I hope we sha'n't find +her out--no, there she is. You can't call these people affectionate, +can you?" + +They were close on a group of three brick cottages all close together. +Their doors were all open. In one cottage a stout collier's wife was +toiling through her wash. At the door of another the sewing-machine agent +was waiting for his weekly payment; while on the threshold of the third +stood an elderly tottering woman shading her eyes from the light as she +tried to make out the features of the approaching couple. + +"Why, Mary!" said George, "you haven't forgotten me? I have brought my +wife to see you." + +And he held out his hand with a boyish kindness. + +The old woman looked at them both in a bewildered way. Her face, with its +long chin and powerful nose, was blanched and drawn, her grey hair +straggling from under her worn black-ribboned cap; and her black dress +had a neglected air, which drew George's attention. Mary Batchelor, so +long as he remembered her, whether as his old nurse, or in later days as +the Bible-woman of the village, had always been remarkable for a peculiar +dignity and neatness. + +"Mary, is there anything wrong?" he asked her, holding her hand. + +"Coom yer ways in," said the old woman, grasping his arm, and taking no +notice of Letty. "He's gone--he'll not freeten nobody--he wor here three +days afore they buried him. I could no let him go--but it's three weeks +now sen they put him away." + +"Why, Mary, what is it? Not _James_!--not your son!" said George, letting +her guide him into the cottage. + +"Aye, it's James--it's my son," she repeated drearily. "Will +yer be takkin a cheer--an perhaps"--she looked round uncertainly, +first at Letty, then at the wet floor where she had been feebly +scrubbing--"perhaps the leddy ull be sittin down. I'm nobbut in a +muddle. But I don't seem to get forard wi my work a mornins--not sen +they put im away." + +And she dropped into a chair herself, with a long sigh--forgetting her +visitors apparently--her large and bony hands, scarred with their life's +work, lying along her knees. + +George stood beside her silent a moment. + +"I hardly like to say I hadn't heard," he said at last, gently. "You'll +think I _ought_ to have heard. But I didn't know. I have been in town and +very busy." + +"Aye," said Mary, without looking up, "aye, an yer've been gettin +married. I knew as yer didn't mean nothin onkind." + +Then she stopped again--till suddenly, with a furtive gesture, she +raised her apron, and drew it across her eyes, which had the look of +perennial tears. + +On the other side of the cottage meanwhile a boy of about fourteen was +sitting. He had just done his afternoon's wash, and was resting himself +by the fire, enjoying a thumbed football almanac. He had not risen when +the visitors entered, and while his grandmother was speaking his lips +still moved dumbly, as he went on adding up the football scores. He was a +sickly, rather repulsive lad with a callous expression. + +"Let me wait outside, George," said Letty, hurriedly. + +Some instinct in her shrank from the poor mother and her story. But +George begged her to stay, and she sat down nervously by the door, trying +to protect her pretty skirt from the wet boards. + +"Will you tell me how it was?" said George, sitting down himself in front +of the bowed mother, and bending towards her. "Was it in the pit? Jamie +wasn't one of our men, I know. Wasn't it for Mr. Morrison he worked?" + +Mrs. Batchelor made a sign of assent. Then she raised her head quickly, +and a flash of some passionate convulsion passed through her face. + +"It wor John Burgess as done it," she said, staring at George. "It wor +him as took the boy's life. But he's gone himsel--so theer--I'll not say +no more. It wor Jamie's first week o hewin--he'd been a loader this three +year, an taken a turn at the hewin now an again--an five weeks sen John +Burgess--he wor butty for Mr. Morrison, yer know, in the Owd Pit--took +him on, an the lad wor arnin six an sixpence a day. An he wor that +pleased yo cud see it shinin out ov im. And it wor on the Tuesday as he +went on the afternoon shift. I saw im go, an he wor down'earted. An I +fell a cryin as he went up the street, for I knew why he wor down'earted, +an I asked the Lord to elp him. And about six o'clock they come +runnin--an they towd me there'd bin an accident, an they wor bringin +im--an he wor alive--an I must bear up. They'd found him kneelin in his +place with his arm up, an the pick in it--just as the blast had took +him--An his poor back--oh! my God--scorched off him--_scorched off him_." + +A shudder ran through her. But she recovered herself and went on, still +gazing intently at Tressady, her gaunt hand raised as though for +attention. + +"An they braat him in, an they laid him on that settle"--she pointed to +the bench by the fire--"an the doctors didn't interfere--there wor nowt +to do--they left me alone wi un. But he come to, a minute after they laid +im down--an I ses, 'Jamie, ow did it appen' an he ses, 'Mother, it wor +John Burgess--ee opened my lamp for to light hissen as had gone out--an +I don't know no more.' An then after a bit he ses, 'Mother, don't you +fret--I'm glad I'm goin--I'd got the drink in me,' he ses. An then he +give two three little breaths, as though he wor pantin--an I kiss him." + +She stopped, her face working, her trembling hands pressed hard against +each other on her knee. Letty felt the tears leap to her eyes in a rush +that startled herself. + +"An he would a bin twenty-one year old, come next August--an allus a lad +as yer couldn't help gettin fond on--not sen he were a little un. An when +he wor layin there, I ses to myself, 'He's the third as the coal-gettin +ha took from me.' An I minded my feyther an uncle--how they was braat +home both togither, when I wor nobbut thirteen years old--not a scar on +em, nobbut a little blood on my feyther's forehead--but stone dead, both +on em--from the afterdamp. Theer was thirty-six men killed in that +explosion--an I recolleck how old Mr. Morrison--Mr. Walter's father--sent +the coffins round--an how the men went on because they warn't good ones. +Not a man would go down the pit till they was changed--if a man got the +life choked out of im, they thowt the least the masters could do was to +give un a dacent coffin to lie in. But theer--nobody helped me wi +Jamie--I buried him mysel--an it wor all o the best." + +She dried her eyes again, sighing plaintively. George said what kind and +consoling things he could think of. Mary Batchelor put up her hand and +touched him on the arm as he leant over her. + +"Aye, I knew yo'd be sorry--an yor wife--" + +She turned feebly towards Letty, trying with her blurred and tear-dimmed +sight to make out what Sir George's bride might be like. She looked for a +moment at the small, elegant person in the corner,--at the sheaf of +nodding rosebuds on the hat--the bracelets--the pink cheeks under the +dainty veil,--looked with a curious aloofness, as though from a great +distance. Then, evidently, another thought struck her like a lash. She +ceased to see or think of Letty. Her grip tightened on George's arm. + +"An I'm allus thinkin," she said, with a passionate sob, "of that what he +said about the drink. He'd allus bin a sober lad, till this lasst winter +it did seem as though he cudna keep hiself from it--it kep creepin on +im--an several times lately he'd broke out very bad, pay-days--an he knew +I'd been frettin. And who was ter blame--I ast yo, or onybody--who was it +ter blame?" + +Her voice rose to a kind of cry. + +"His feyther died ov it, and his grandfeyther afore that. His +grandfeyther wor found dead i the roadside, after they'd made him +blind-drunk at owd Morse's public-house, where the butty wor reckonin +with im an his mates. But he'd never ha gone near the drink if they'd +hadn't druv him to't, for he wasn't inclined that way. But the butty as +gave him work kep the public, an if yer didn't drink, yer didn't get no +work. You must drink yoursel sick o Saturdays, or theer'd be no work for +you o Mondays. 'Noa, yer can sit at ome,' they'd say to un, 'ef yer so +damned pertickler.' I ast yor pardon, sir, for the bad word, but that's +ow they'd say it. I've often heerd owd John say as he'd a been glad to ha +given the butty back a shillin ov is pay to be let off the drink. An +Willum, that's my usband, he wor allus at it too--an the doctor towd me +one day, as Willum lay a-dyin, as it ran in the blood--an Jamie heard +im--I know he did--for I fouu im on the stairs--listenin." + +She paused again, lost in a mist of incoherent memories, the tears +falling slowly. + +After a minute's silence, George said--not indeed knowing what to +say--"We're _very_ sorry for you, Mary--my wife and I--we wish we +could do anything to help you. I am afraid it can't make any difference +to you--I expect it makes it all the worse--to think that accidents are +so much fewer--that so much has been done. And yet times are mended, +aren't they?" + +Mary made no answer. + +George sat looking at her, conscious, as he seldom was, of raw youth and +unreadiness--conscious, too, of Letty's presence in a strange, hindering +way--as of something that both blunted emotion and made one rather +ashamed to show it. + +He could only pursue the lame topic of improvement, of changed times. The +disappearance of old abuses, of "butties" and "tommy-shops"; the greater +care for life; the accident laws; the inspectors. He found himself +growing eloquent at last, yet all the time regarding himself, as it were, +from a distance--ironically. + +Mary Batchelor listened to him for a while, her head bent with something +of the submission of the old servant, till something he said roused +again the quick shudder, the look of anguished protest. + +"Aye, I dessay it's aw reet, Mr. George--I dessay it is--what yer say. +The inspectors is very cliver--an the wages is paid proper. But +theer--say what yer will! I've a son on the railway out Lichfield +way--an he's allus taakin about is long hours--they're killing im, he +says--an I allus ses to im, 'Yer may jest thank the Lord, Harry, as yer +not in the pits.' He never gets no pity out o me. An soomtimes I wakes +in the morning, an I thinks o the men, cropin away in the dark--down +theer--under me and my bed--for they do say the pits now runs right +under Ferth village--an I think to mysel--how long will it be before yo +poor fellers is laying like my Jim? Yer may be reet about the +accidents, Mr. George--but I _know_, ef yer wor to go fro house to +house i this village--it would be like tis in the Bible--I've often +thowt o them words--'_Theer was not a house_--no, nary one!--_where +there was not one dead_.'" + +She hung her head again, muttering to herself. George made out with +difficulty that she was going through one phantom scene after another--of +burning, wounds, and sudden death. One or two of the phrases--of the +fragmentary details that dropped out without name or place--made his +flesh creep. He was afraid lest Letty should hear them, and was just +putting out his hand for his hat, when Mrs. Batchelor gripped his arm +again. Her face--so white and large-featured--had the gleam of something +like a miserable smile upon it. + +"Aye, an the men theirsels ud say jest as you do. 'Lor. Mrs. Batchelor,' +they'd say, 'why, the pits is as safe as a church'--an they'd +_laff_--Jamie ud laff at me times. But it's the _women_, Mr. George, as +knows--it's the women that ave to wash the bodies." + +A great trembling ran through her again. George instinctively rose, and +motioned to Letty to go. She too rose, but she did not go. She stood by +the door, her wide grey eyes fixed with a kind of fascination on the +speaker; while behind her a ring of children could be seen in the street, +staring at the pretty lady. + +Mary Batchelor saw nothing but Tressady, whom she was still holding by +the arm--looking up to him. + +"Aye, but I didna disturb my Jamie, yer know. Noa!--I left im i the owd +coat they'd thrown over im i the pit--I dursn't ha touched is back. Noa, +I _dursn't_. But I made his shroud mysen, an I put it ower his poor +workin clothes, an I washed his face, an is hands an feet--an then I +kissed him, an I said, 'Jamie, yo mun go an tell the Lord as yo ha done +your best, an He ha dealt hardly by you!--an that's the treuth--He ha +dealt hardly by yer!'" + +She gave a loud sob, and bowed her head on her hands a moment. Then, +pushing back her grey locks from her face, she rose, struggling for +composure. + +"Aye, aye, Mr. George--aye, aye, I'll not keep yer no longer." + +But as she took his hand, she added passionately: + +"An I towd the vicar I couldn't be Bible-woman no more. Theer's somethin +broken in me sen Jamie died. I must keep things to mysen--I ain't got +nuthin good to say to others--I'm allus _grievin_ at the Lord. Good-bye +to yer--good-bye to yer." + +Her voice had grown absent, indifferent. But when George asked her, just +as they were leaving the cottage, who was the boy sitting by the fire, +her face darkened. She came hurriedly to the door with them, and said in +George's ear: + +"He's my darter's child--my darter by my first usband. His feyther an +mother are gone, an he come up from West Bromwich to live wi me. But he +isn't no comfort to me. He don't take no notice of anybody. He set like +that, with his football, when Jamie lay a-dyin. I'd as lief be shut on +him. But theer--I've got to put up wi im." + +Letty meanwhile had approached the boy and looked at him curiously. + +"Do you work in the pits too?" she asked him. + +The boy stared at her. + +"Yes," he said. + +"Do you like it?" + +He gave a rough laugh. + +"I reckon yo've got to like it," he said. And turning his back on his +questioner, he went back to his almanac. + +"Don't let us do any more visiting," said George, impatiently, as they +emerged into the main street. "I'm out of love with the village. We'll do +our blandishments another day. Let's go a little further up the valley +and get away from the houses." + +Letty assented, and they walked along the village, she looking curiously +into the open doors of the houses, by way of return for the inquisitive +attention once more lavished upon herself and George. + +"The houses are _quite_ comfortable," she said presently. "And I looked +into Mrs. Batchelor's back room while you were talking. It was just as +Mrs. Matthews said--such good carpets and curtains, two chests of +drawers, and an harmonium--and pictures--and flowers in the windows. +George! what are 'butties'?" + +"'Butties' are sub-contractors," he said absently--"men who contract with +the pit-owners to get the coal, either on a large or a small scale--now +mostly on a small scale. They engage and pay the colliers in some pits, +in others the owners deal direct." + +"And what is a 'tommy-shop'?" + +"'Tommy' is the local word for 'truck'--paying in kind instead of in +money. You see, the butties and the owners between them used to own the +public-houses and the provision-shops, and the amount of coin of the +realm the men got in wages in the bad old times was infinitesimal. They +were expected to drink the butty's beer, and consume the butty's +provisions--at the butty's prices, of course--and the butty kept the +accounts. Oh! it was an abomination! but of course it was done away with +long ago." + +"Of course it was!" said Letty, indignantly. "They never remember what's +done for them. Did you see what _excellent_ teas there were laid out in +some of the houses--and those girls with their hats smothered in +feathers? Why, I should never dream of wearing so many!" + +She was once more her quick, shrewd self. All trace of the tears that had +surprised her while Mary Batchelor was describing her son's death had +passed away. Her half-malicious eyes glanced to right and left, peering +into the secrets of the village. + +"And these are the people that talk of starving!" she said to George, +scornfully, as they emerged into the open road. "Why, anyone can see--" + +George, suddenly returned from a reverie, understood what she was saying, +and remarked, with an odd look: + +"You think their houses aren't so bad? One is always a little +surprised--don't you think?--when the poor are comfortable? One takes it +as something to one's own credit--I detect it in myself scores of times. +Well!--one seems to say--they _could_ have done without it--one might +have kept it for oneself--what a fine generous fellow I am!" + +He laughed. + +"I didn't mean that at all," said Letty, protesting. + +"Didn't you? Well, after all, darling--you see, you don't have to live in +those houses, nice as they are--and you don't have to do your own +scrubbing. Ferth may be a vile hole, but I suppose you could put a score +of these houses inside it--and I'm a pauper, but I can provide you with +two housemaids. I say, why do you walk so far away from me?" + +And in spite of her resistance, he took her hand, put it through his arm, +and held it there. + +"Look at me, darling," he said imperiously. "How _can_ anyone spy upon us +with these trees and high walls? I want to see how pretty and fresh you +look--I want to forget that poor thing and her tale. Do you know that +somewhere--far down in me--there's a sort of black pool--and when +anything stirs it up--for the moment I want to hang myself--the world +seems such an awful place! It got stirred up just now--not while she was +talking--but just as I looked back at that miserable old soul, standing +at her door. She used to be such a jolly old thing--always happy in her +Bible--and in Jamie, I suppose--quite sure that she was going to a nice +heaven, and would only have to wait a little bit, till Jamie got there +too. She seemed to know all about the Almighty's plans for herself and +everybody else. Her drunken husband was dead; my father left her a bit of +money, so did an old uncle, I believe. She'd gossip and pray and preach +with anybody. And now she'll weep and pine like that till she dies--and +she isn't sure even about heaven any more--and instead of Jamie, she's +got that oafish lad, that changeling, hung round her neck--to kick her +and ill-treat her in another year or two. Well! and do you ever think +that something like that has got to happen to all of us--something +hideous--some torture--something that'll make us wish we'd never been +born? Darling, am I a mad sort of a fool? Stop here--in the shade--give +me a kiss!" + +And he made her pause at a shady corner in the road, between two oak +copses on either hand--a river babbling at the foot of one of them. He +put his arm round her, and stooping kissed her red lips with a kind of +covetous passion. Then, still holding her, he looked out from the trees +to the upper valley with its scattered villages, its chimneys and +engine-houses. + +"It struck me--what she said of the men under our feet. They're at it +now, Letty, hewing and sweating. Why are they there, and you and I here? +I'm _precious_ glad, aren't you? But I'm not going to make believe that +there's no difference. Don't let's he hypocrites, whatever we are." + +Letty was perplexed and a little troubled. He had only shown her this +excitability once before--on that odd uncomfortable night when he made +her sit with him on the Embankment. Whenever it came it seemed to upset +her dominant impression of him. But yet it excited her too--it appealed +to something undeveloped--some yearning, protecting instinct which was +new to her. + +She suddenly put up her hand and touched his hair. + +"You talk so oddly, George. I think sometimes"--she laughed with a pretty +gaiety--"you'll go bodily over to Lady Maxwell and her 'set' some day!" + +George made a contemptuous sound. + +"May the Lord preserve us from quacks," he said lightly. "One had better +be a hypocrite. Look, little woman, there is a shower coming. Shall we +turn home?" + +They walked home, chatting and laughing. At their own front door the +butler handed George a telegram. He opened it and read: + +"Must come down to consult you on important business--shall arrive at +Perth about 9.30.--Amelia Tressady." + +Letty, who was looking over George's shoulder, gave a little cry +of dismay. + +Then, to avoid the butler's eyes and ears, they turned hurriedly into +George's smoking-room which opened off the hall, and shut the door. + +"George! she has come to get more money out of you!" cried Letty, anger +and annoyance written in every line of her little frowning face. + +"Well, darling, she can't get blood out of a stone!" said George, +crushing the telegram in his hand and throwing it away. "It is a little +too bad of my mother, I think, to spoil our honeymoon time like this. +However, it can't be helped. Will you tell them to get her room ready?" + + + + +CHAPTER IX + + +"Now, my dear George! I do think I may claim at least that you should +remember I am your _mother_!"--the speaker raised a fan from her knee, +and used it with some vehemence. "Of course I can't help seeing that you +don't treat me as you ought to do. I don't want to complain of Letty--I +daresay she was taken by surprise--but all I can say as to her reception +of me last night is, that it wasn't pretty--that's all; it wasn't +_pretty_. My room felt like an ice-house--Justine tells me nobody has +slept there for months--and no fire until just the moment I arrived; +and--and no flowers on the dressing-table--no little _attentions_, in +fact. I can only say it was not what I am accustomed to. My feelings +overcame me; that poor dear Justine will tell you what a state she found +me in. She cried herself, to see me so upset." + +Lady Tressady was sitting upright on the straight-backed sofa of +George's smoking-room. George, who was walking up and down the room, +thought, with discomfort, as he glanced at her from time to time, that +she looked curiously old and dishevelled. She had thrown a piece of +white lace round her head, in place of the more elaborate preparation +for the world's gaze that she was wont to make. Her dress--a study in +purples--had been a marvel, but was now old, and even tattered; the +ruffles at her wrist were tumbled; and the pencilling under her still +fine eyes had been neglected. George, between his wife's dumb anger and +his mother's folly, had passed through disagreeable times already since +Lady Tressady's arrival, and was now once more endeavouring to get to +the bottom of her affairs. + +"You forget, mother," he said, in answer to Lady Tressady's complaint, +"that the house is not mounted for visitors, and that you gave us very +short notice." + +Nevertheless he winced inwardly as he spoke at the thought of Letty's +behaviour the night before. + +Lady Tressady bridled. + +"We will not discuss it, if you please," she said, with an attempt at +dignity. "I should have thought that you and Letty might have known I +should not have broken in on your honeymoon without most _pressing_ +reasons. George!"--her voice trembled, she put her lace handkerchief to +her eyes--"I am an unfortunate and miserable woman, and if you--my own +darling son--don't come to my rescue, I--I don't know what I may be +driven to do!" + +George took the remark calmly, having probably heard it before. He went +on walking up and down. + +"It's no good, mother, dealing in generalities, I am afraid. You promised +me this morning to come to business. If you will kindly tell me at once +what is the matter, and what is the _figure_, I shall be obliged to you." + +Lady Tressady hesitated, the lace on her breast fluttering. Then, in +desperation, she confessed herself first reluctantly, then in a torrent. + +During the last two years, then, she said, she had been trying her luck +for the first time in--well, in speculation! + +"Speculation!" said George, looking at her in amazement. "In what?" + +Lady Tressady tried again to preserve her dignity. She had been +investing, she said--trying to increase her income on the Stock Exchange. +She had done it quite as much for George's sake as her own, that she +might improve her position a little, and be less of a burden upon him. +Everybody did it! Several of her best women-friends were as clever at it +as any man, and often doubled their allowances for the year. She, of +course, had done it under the _best_ advice. George knew that she had +friends in the City who would do anything--positively _anything_--for +her. But somehow-- + +Then her tone dropped. Her foot in its French shoe began to fidget on the +stool before her. + +Somehow, she had got into the hands of a reptile--there! No other word +described the creature in the least--a sort of financial agent, who had +treated her unspeakably, disgracefully. She had trusted him implicitly, +and the result was that she now owed the reptile who, on the strength of +her name, her son, and her aristocratic connections, had advanced her +money for these adventures, a sum-- + +"Well, the truth is I am afraid to say what it is," said Lady Tressady, +allowing herself for once a cry of nature, and again raising a shaky hand +to her eyes. + +"How much?" said George, standing over her, cigarette in hand. + +"Well--four thousand pounds!" said Lady Tressady, her eyes blinking +involuntarily as she looked up at him. + +"_Four thousand pounds!_" exclaimed George. "Preposterous!" + +And, raising his hand, he flung his cigarette violently into the fire and +resumed his walk, hands thrust into his pockets. + +Lady Tressady looked tearfully at his long, slim figure as he walked +away, conscious, however, even at this agitated moment, of the quick +thought that he had inherited some of her elegance. + +"George!" + +"Yes--wait a moment--mother"--he faced round upon her decidedly. "Let me +tell you at once, that at the present moment it is quite impossible for +me to find that sum of money." + +Lady Tressady flushed passionately like a thwarted child. + +"Very well, then," she said--"very well. Then it will be bankruptcy--and +I hope you and Letty will like the scandal!" + +"So he threatens bankruptcy?" + +"Do you think I should have come down here except for something like +that?" she cried. "Look at his letters!" + +And she took a tumbled roll out of the bag on her arm and gave it to him. +George threw himself into a chair, and tried to get some idea of the +correspondence; while Lady Tressady kept up a stream of plaintive chatter +he could only endeavour not to hear. + +As far as he could judge on a first inspection, the papers concerned a +long series of risky transactions,--financial gambling of the most +pronounced sort,--whereof the few gains had been long since buried deep +in scandalous losses. The outrageous folly of some of the ventures and +the magnitude of the sums involved made him curse inwardly. It was the +first escapade of the kind he could remember in his mother's history, +and, given her character, he could only regard it as adding a new and +real danger to his life and Letty's. + +Then another consideration struck him. + +"How on earth did you come to know so much about the ins and outs of +Stock Exchange business," he asked her suddenly, with surprise, in the +midst of his reading. "You never confided in me. I never supposed you +took an interest in such things." + +In truth, he would have supposed her mentally incapable of the kind of +gambling finance these papers bore witness of. She had never been known +to do a sum or present an account correctly in her life; and he had +often, in his own mind, accepted her density in these directions as a +certain excuse for her debts. Yet this correspondence showed here and +there a degree of financial legerdemain of which any City swindler +might have been proud--so far, at least, as he could judge from his +hasty survey. + +Lady Tressady drew herself up sharply in answer to his remark, though not +without a flutter of the eyelids which caught his attention. + +"Of course, my dear George, I always knew you thought your mother a +fool. As a matter of fact, all my friends tell me that I have a _very_ +clear head." + +George could not restrain, himself from laughing aloud. + +"In face of this?" he said, holding up the final batch of letters, which +contained Mr. Shapetsky's last formidable account; various imperious +missives from a "sharp-practice" solicitor, whose name happened to be +disreputably known to George Tressady; together with repeated and most +explicit assurances on the part both of agent and lawyer, that if +arrangements were not made at once by Lady Tressady for meeting at least +half Mr. Shapetsky's bill--which had now been running some eighteen +months--and securing the other half, legal steps would be taken +immediately. + +Lady Tressady at first met her son's sarcasm in angry silence, then broke +into shrill denunciation of Shapetsky's "villanies." How could decent +people, people in society, protect themselves against such creatures! + +George walked to the window, and stood looking out into the April garden. +Presently he turned, and interrupted his mother. + +"I notice, mother, that these transactions have been going on for nearly +two years. Do you remember, when I gave you that large sum at Christmas, +you said it would 'all but' clear you; and when I gave you another large +sum last month, you professed to be entirely cleared? Yet all the time +you were receiving these letters, and you owed this fellow almost as +much as you do now. Do you think it was worth while to mislead me in +that way?" + +He stood leaning against the window, his fingers drumming on the sill. +The contrast between the youth of the figure and the absence of youth in +face and voice was curious. Perhaps Lady Tressady felt vaguely that he +looked like a boy and spoke like a master, for her pride rose. + +"You have no right to speak to me like that, George! I did everything for +the best. I always do everything for the best. It is my misfortune to be +so--so confiding, so hopeful. I must always believe in someone--that's +what makes my friends so _extremely_ fond of me. You and your poor +darling father were never the least like me--" And she went off into a +tearful comparison between her own character and the characters of her +husband and son--in which of course it was not she that suffered. + +George did not heed her. He was once more staring out of window, thinking +hard. So far as he could see, the money, or the greater part of it, would +have to be found. The man, of course, was a scoundrel, but of the sort +that keeps within the law; and Lady Tressady's monstrous folly had given +him an easy prey. When he thought of the many sacrifices he had made for +his mother, of her ample allowance, her incorrigible vanity and +greed--and then of the natural desires of his young wife--his heart +burned within him. + +"Well, I can only tell you," he said at last, turning round upon her, +"that I see no way out. How is that man's claim to be met? I don't know. +Even if I _could_ meet it--which I see no chance of doing--by crippling +myself for some time, how should I be at liberty to do it? My wife and +her needs have now the first claim upon me." + +"Very well," said Lady Tressady, proudly, raising her handkerchief, +however, to hide her trembling lips. + +"Let me remind you," he continued, ceremoniously, "that the whole of this +place is in bad condition, except the few rooms we have just done up, and +that money _must_ be spent upon it--it is only fair to Letty that it +should be spent. Let me remind you also, that you are a good deal +responsible for this state of things." + +Lady Tressady moved uneasily. George was now speaking in his usual +half-nonchalant tone, and he had provided himself with another cigarette. +But his eye held her. + +"You will remember that you promised me while I was abroad to live here +and look after the house. I arranged money affairs with you, and other +affairs, upon that basis. But it appears that during the four years I was +away you were here altogether, at different times, about three months. +Yet you made me believe you were here; if I remember right, you dated +your letters from here. And of course, in four years, an old house that +is totally neglected goes to the bad." + +"Who has been telling you such falsehoods?" cried Lady Tressady. "I was +here a great deal more than that--a great deal more!" + +But the scarlet colour, do what she would, was dyeing her still delicate +skin, and her eyes alternately obstinate and shuffling, tried to take +themselves out of the range of George's. + +As for George, as he stood there coolly smoking, he was struck--or, +rather, the critical mind in him was struck--by a sudden perception of +the meanness of aspect which sordid cares of the kind his mother was now +plunged in can give to the human face. He felt the rise of a familiar +disgust. How many scenes of ugly battle over money matters could he not +remember in his boyhood between his father and mother! And later--in +India--what things he had known women do for money or dress! He thought +scornfully of a certain intriguing lady of his acquaintance at +Madras--who had borrowed money of him--to whom he had given ball-dresses; +and of another, whose selfish extravagance had ruined one of the best of +men. Did all women tend to be of this make, however poetic might be their +outward seeming? + +Aloud, he said quietly, in answer to his mother's protest: + +"I think you will find that is about accurate. I mention it merely to +show you how it is that I find myself now plunged in so many expenses. +And, now, doesn't it strike you as a _little_ hard that I should be +called upon to strip and cripple myself still further--_not_ to give my +wife the comforts and conveniences I long to give her, but to pay such +debts as those?" + +Involuntarily he struck his hand on the papers lying in the chair where +he had been sitting. + +Lady Tressady, too, rose from her seat. + +"George, if you are going to be _violent_ towards your mother, I had +better go," she said, with an attempt at dignity. "I suppose Letty has +been gossiping with her servants about me. Oh! I knew what to expect!" +cried Lady Tressady, gathering up fan and handkerchief from the sofa +behind her with a hand that shook. "I always said from the beginning that +she would set you against me! She has never treated me as--as a +daughter--never! And that is my weakness--I must be cared for--I must be +treated with--with tenderness." + +"I wouldn't give way, mother, if I were you," said George, quite +unmoved by the show of tears. "I think, if you will reflect upon it, +that it is Letty and I who have the most cause to give way. If you will +allow me, I will go and have a talk with her. I believe she is sitting +in the garden." + +His mother turned sullenly away from him, and he left the room. + + * * * * * + +As he passed through the long oak-panelled hall that led to the garden, +he was seized with an odd sense of pity for himself. This odious scene +behind him, and now this wrestle with Letty that must be gone +through--were these the joys of the honeymoon? + +Letty was not in the garden. But as he passed into the wood on the +farther side of the hill he saw her sitting under a tree halfway down the +slope, with some embroidery in her hand. The April sun was shining into +the wood. A larch beyond Letty was already green, and the twigs of the +oak beneath which she sat made a reddish glow in the bright air. Patches +of primroses and anemones starred the ground about her, and trails of +periwinkle touched her dress. She was stooping, and her little hand went +rapidly--impatiently--to and fro. + +The contrast between this fresh youth amid the spring and that unlovely, +reluctant age he had just left behind him in the smoking-room struck him +sharply. His brow cleared. + +As she heard his step she looked round eagerly. "Well?" she said, +pushing aside her work. + +He threw himself down beside her. + +"Darling, I have had my talk. It is pretty bad--worse than we had even +imagined!" + +Then he told her his mother's story. She could hardly contain herself, as +she listened, as he mentioned the total figure of the debts. It was +evidently with difficulty that she prevented herself from interrupting +him at every word. And when he had barely finished she broke out: + +"And what did you say?" + +George hesitated. + +"I told her, of course, that it was monstrous and absurd to expect that +we could pay such a sum." + +Letty's breath came fast. His voice and manner did not satisfy her at +all. + +"Monstrous? I should think it was! Do you know how she has run up +this debt?" + +George looked at her in surprise. Her little face was quivering under the +suppressed energy of what she was going to say. + +"No!--do you?" + +"Yes!--I know all about it. I said to my maid last night--I hope, George, +you won't mind, but you know Grier has been an age with me, and knows all +my secrets--I told her she must make friends with your mother's maid, and +see what she could find out. I felt we _must_, in self-defence. And of +course Grier got it all out of Justine. I knew she would! Justine is a +little fool; and she doesn't mean to stay much longer with Lady Tressady, +so she didn't mind speaking. It is exactly as I supposed! Lady Tressady +didn't begin speculating for herself at all--but for--somebody--else! Do +you remember that absurd-looking singer who gave a 'musical sketch' one +day that your mother gave a party in Eccleston Square--in February?" + +She looked at him with eagerness, an ugly, half-shrinking innuendo in her +expression. + +George had suddenly moved away, and was sitting now some little distance +from his wife, his eyes bent on the ground. However, at her question he +made a sign of assent. + +"You do remember? Well," said Letty, triumphantly, "it is he who is at +the bottom of it all. I _knew_ there must be somebody. It appears that he +has been getting money out of her for years--that he used to come and +spend hours, when she had that little house in Bruton Street, when you +were away--I don't believe you ever heard of it--flattering her, and +toadying her, paying her compliments on her dress and her appearance, +fetching and carrying for her--and of course living upon her! He used to +arrange all her parties. Justine says that he used even to make her order +all his favourite wines--_such_ bills as there used to be for wine! He +has a wife and children somewhere, and of course the whole family lived +upon your mother. It was he made her begin speculating. Justine says he +has lost all he ever had himself that way, and your mother couldn't, in +fact, '_lend'_ him"--Letty laughed scornfully--"money fast enough. It was +he brought her across that odious creature Shapetsky--isn't that his +name? And that's the whole story. If there have been any gains, he has +made off with them--leaving her, of course, to get out of the rest. +Justine says that for months there was nothing but business, as she calls +it, talked in the house--and she knew, for she used to help wait at +dinner. And such a crew of people as used to be about the place!" + +She looked at him, struck at last by his silence and his attitude, or +pausing for some comment, some appreciation of her cleverness in +ferreting it all out. + +But he did not speak, and she was puzzled. The angry triumph in her eyes +faltered. She put out her hand and touched him on the arm. + +"What is it, George? I thought--it would be more satisfactory to us both +to know the truth." + +He looked up quickly. + +"And all this your maid got out of Justine? You asked her?" + +She was struck, offended, by his expression. It was so cool and +strange--even, she could have imagined, contemptuous. + +"Yes, I did," she said passionately. "I thought I was quite justified. We +must protect ourselves." + +He was silent again. + +"I think," he said at last, drily, she watching him--"I think we will +keep Justine and Grier out of it, if you please." + +She took her work, and laid it down again, her mouth trembling. + +"So you had rather be deceived?" + +"I had rather be deceived than listen behind doors," he said, beginning +in a light tone, which, however, passed immediately into one of +bitterness. "Besides, there is nothing new. For people like my mother +there is always some adventurer or adventuress in the background--there +always used to be in old days. She never meant any serious harm; she was +first plundered, then we. My father used to be for ever turning some +impostor or other out of doors. Now I suppose it is my turn." + +This time it was Letty who kept silence. Her needle passed rapidly to and +fro. George glanced at her queerly. Then he rose and came to stand near +her, leaning against the tree. + +"You know, Letty, we shall have to pay that money," he said suddenly, +pulling at his moustache. + +Letty made an exclamation under her breath, but went on working faster +than before. + +He slipped down to the moss beside her, and caught her hand. + +"Are you angry with me?" + +"If you insult me by accusing me of listening behind doors you can't +wonder," said Letty, snatching her hand away, her breast heaving. + +He felt a bitter inclination to laugh, but he restrained it, and did +his best to make peace. In the midst of his propitiations Letty +turned upon him. + +"Of course, I know you think I did it all for selfishness," she said, +half crying, "because I want new furniture and new dresses. I don't; I +want to protect you from being--being--plundered like this. How can you +do what you ought as a member of Parliament? how can we ever keep +ourselves out of debt if--if--? How _can_ you pay this money?" she wound +up, her eyes flaming. + +"Well, you know," he said, hesitating--"you know I suggested yesterday +we should sell some land to do up the house. I am afraid we must sell the +laud, and pay this scoundrel--a proportion, at all events. Of course, +what I should _like_ to do would be to put him--and the other--to instant +death, with appropriate tortures! Short of that, I can only take the +matter out of my mother's hands, get a sharp solicitor on my side to +match _his_ rascal, and make the best bargain I can." + +Letty rolled up her work with energy, two tears of anger on her cheeks. +"She _ought_ to suffer!" she cried, her voice trembling--"she _ought_ +to suffer!" + +"You mean that we ought to let her be made a bankrupt?" he said coolly. +"Well, no doubt it would be salutary. Only, I am afraid it would be +rather more disagreeable to us than to her. Suppose we consider the +situation. Two young married people--charming house--charming +wife--husband just beginning in politics--people inclined to be friends. +Then you go to dine with them in Brook Street--excellent little French +dinner--bride bewitching. Next morning you see the bankruptcy of the +host's mamma in the 'Times.' 'And he's the only son, isn't he?--he must +be well off. They say she's been dreadfully extravagant. But, hang it! +you know, a man's mother!--and a widow--no, I can't stand that. Sha'n't +dine with them again!' There! do you see, darling? Do you really want to +rub all the bloom off the peach?" + +He had hardly finished his little speech before the odiousness of it +struck himself. + +"Am I come to talking to her like _this_?" he asked himself in a kind of +astonishment. + +But Letty, apparently, was not astonished. + +"Everybody would understand if you refused to ruin yourself by going on +paying these frightful debts. I am sure _something_ could be done," she +said, half choked. + +George shook his head. + +"But everybody wouldn't want to understand. The dear world loves a +scandal--doesn't really _like_ being amiable to newcomers at all. You +would make a bad start, dear--and all the world would pity mamma." + +"Oh! if you are only thinking what people would say," cried Letty. + +"No," said George, reflectively, but with a mild change of tone. "Damn +people! I can pull myself to pieces so much better than they can. You +see, darling, you're such an optimist. Now, if you'd only just believe, +as I do, that the world is a radically bad place, you wouldn't be so +surprised when things of this sort happen. Eh, little person, has it been +a radically bad place this last fortnight?" + +He laid his cheek against her shoulder, rubbing it gently up and down. +But something hard and scornful lay behind his caress--something he did +not mean to inquire into. + +"Then you told your mother," said Letty, after a pause, still looking +straight before her, "that you would clear her?" + +"Not at all. I said we could do nothing. I laid it on about the house. +And all the time I knew perfectly well in my protesting soul, that if +this man's claim is sustainable we should _have_ to pay up. And I imagine +that mamma knew it too. You can get out of anybody's debts but your +mother's--that's apparently what it comes to. Queer thing, civilisation! +Well now"--he sprang to his feet--"let's go and get it over." + +Letty also rose. + +"I can't see her again," she said quickly. "I sha'n't come down to lunch. +Will she go by the three-o'clock train?" + +"I will arrange it," said George. + +They walked through the wood together silently. As they came in sight of +the house Letty's face quivered again with restrained passion--or tears. +George, whose _sangfroid_ was never disturbed outwardly for long, had by +now resigned himself, and had, moreover, recovered that tolerance of +woman's various weaknesses which was in him the fruit of a wide, and at +bottom hostile, induction. He set himself to cheer her up. Perhaps, after +all, if he could sell a particular piece of land which he owned near a +neighbouring large town, and sell it well,--he had had offers for it +before,--he might be able to clear his mother, and still let Letty work +her will on the house. She mustn't take a gloomy view of things--he would +do his best. So that by the time they got into the drawing-room she had +let her hand slip doubtfully into his again for a moment. + +But nothing would induce her to appear at lunch. Lady Tressady, having +handed over all Shapetsky's papers and all her responsibilities to +George, graciously told him that she could understand Letty's annoyance, +and didn't wish for a moment to intrude upon her. She then called on +Justine to curl her hair, put on a blue shot silk with marvellous pink +fronts just arrived from Paris, and came down to lunch with her son in +her most smiling mood. She took no notice of his monosyllables, and in +the hall, while the butler discreetly retired, she kissed him with tears, +saying that she had always known his generosity would come to the rescue +of his poor darling mamma. + +"You will oblige me, mother, by not trying it again too soon," was +George's ironical reply as he put her into the carriage. + + * * * * * + +In the afternoon Letty was languid and depressed. She would not talk on +general topics, and George shrank in nervous disgust from reopening the +subjects of the morning. Finally, she chose to be tucked up on the sofa +with a novel, and gave George free leave to go out. + +It surprised him to find as he walked quickly down the hill, delighting +in the April sun, that he was glad to be alone. But he did not in the +least try to fling the thought away from him, as many a lover would have +done. The events, the feelings of the day, had been alike jarring and +hateful; he meant to escape from them. + +But he could not escape from them all at once. A fresh and unexpected +debt of somewhere about four thousand pounds does not sit lightly on a +comparatively poor man. In spite of his philosophy for Letty's benefit, +he must needs harass himself anew about his money affairs, planning and +reckoning. How many more such surprises would his mother spring upon +him--and how was he to control her? He realised now something of the +life-long burden his dull old father had borne--a burden which the +absences of school, college, and travel had hitherto spared himself. What +was he to appeal to in her? There seemed to be nothing--neither will nor +conscience. She was like the women without backs in the fairy-tale. + +Then, with one breath he said to himself that he must kick out that +singer-fellow, and with the next, that he would not touch any of his +mother's crew with a barge-pole. Though he never pleaded ideals in +public, he had been all his life something of a moral epicure, taking +"moral" as relating rather to manners than to deeper things. He had done +his best not to soil himself by contact with certain types--among men +especially. Of women he was less critical and less observant. + +As to this ugly feud opening between his mother and his wife, it had +quite ceased to amuse him. Now that his marriage was a reality, the daily +corrosion of such a thing was becoming plain. And who was there in the +world to bear the brunt of it but he? He saw himself between the +two--eternally trying to make peace--and his face lengthened. + +And if Letty would only leave the thing to him!--would only keep her +little white self out of it! He wished he could get her to send away that +woman Grier--a forward second-rate creature, much too ready to meddle in +what did not concern her. + +Then, with a shake of his thin shoulders, he passionately drove it all +out of his thoughts. + +Let him go to the village, sound the feeling there if he could, and do +his employer's business. His troubles as a pit-owner seemed likely to be +bad enough, but they did not canker one like domestic miseries. They were +a man's natural affairs; to think of them came as a relief to him. + + * * * * * + +He had but a disappointing round, however. + +In the first place he went to look up some of the older "hewers," men who +had been for years in the employ of the Tressadys. Two or three of them +had just come back from the early shift, and their wives, at any rate, +were pleased and flattered by George's call. But the men sat like stocks +and stones while he talked. Scarcely a word could be got out of them, and +George felt himself in an atmosphere of storm, guessing at dangers, +everywhere present, though not yet let loose--like the foul gases in the +pits under his feet. + +He behaved with a good deal of dignity, stifling his pride here and there +sufficiently to talk simply and well of the general state of trade, the +conditions of the coal industry in the West Mercian district, the +position of the masters, the published accounts of one or two large +companies in the district, and so on. But in the end he only felt his own +auger rising in answer to the sullenness of the men. Their sallow faces +and eyes weakened by long years of the pit expressed little--but what +there was spelt war. + +Nor did his visits to what might be called his own side give him much +more satisfaction. + +One man, a brawny "fireman," whom George had been long taught to regard +as one of the props of law and order in the district, was effusively and +honestly glad to see his employer. His wife hurried the tea, and George +drank and ate as heartily as his own luncheon would let him in company +with Macgregor and his very neat and smiling family. Nothing could be +more satisfactory than Macgregor's general denunciations of the Union and +its agent. Burrows, in his opinion, was a "drunken, low-livin scoundrel," +who got his bread by making mischief; the Union was entering upon a great +mistake in resisting the masters' proposals; and if it weren't for the +public-house and idleness there wasn't a man in Perth that couldn't live +_well_, ten per cent. reduction and all considered. Nevertheless, he did +not conceal his belief that battle was approaching, and would break out, +if not now, at any rate in the late summer or autumn. Times, too, were +going to be specially bad for the non-society men. The membership of the +Union had been running up fast; there had been a row that very morning at +the pit where he worked, the Union men refusing to go down in the same +cage with the blacklegs. He and his mates would have to put their backs +into it. Never fear but they would! Bullying might be trusted only to +make them the more "orkard." + +Nothing could have been more soothing than such talk to the average +employer in search of congenial opinions. But George was not the average +employer, and the fastidious element in him began soon to make him +uncomfortable. Sobriety is, no doubt, admirable, but he had no sooner +detected a teetotal cant in his companion than that particular axiom +ceased to matter to him. And to think poorly of Burrows might be a +salutary feature in a man's character, but it should be for some +respectable reason. George fidgeted on his chair while Macgregor told +the usual cock-and-bull stories of monstrous hotel-bills seen sticking +out of Burrows's tail-pockets, and there deciphered by a gaping +populace; and his mental discomfort reached its climax when Macgregor +wound up with the remark: + +"And _that_, Sir George, is where the money goes to!--not to the poor +starving women and children, I can tell yer, whose husbands are keepin +him in luxury. I've always said it. _Where's the accounts?_ I've never +seen no balance-sheet--_never!_" he repeated solemnly. They do say as +there's one to be seen at the 'lodge'--" + +"Why, of course there is, Macgregor," said George, with a nervous laugh, +as he got up to depart; "all the big Unions publish their accounts." + +The fireman's obstinate mouth and stubbly hair only expressed a more +pronounced scepticism. + +"Well, I shouldn't believe in em," he said, "if they did. I've niver seen +a balance-sheet, and I don't suppose I ever shall. Well, good-bye to you, +Sir George, and thank you kindly. Yo take my word, sir, if it weren't for +the public-house the men could afford to lose a trifle now and again to +let the masters make their fair profit!" + +And he looked behind him complacently at his neat cottage and +well-clothed children. + +But George walked away, impatient. + +"_His_ wages won't go down, anyway," he said to himself--for the wages of +the "firemen," whose work is of the nature of superintendence, hardly +vary with the state of trade. "And what suspicious idiocy about the +accounts!" + +His last visit was the least fortunate of any. The fireman in question, +Mark Dowse, Macgregor's chief rival in the village, was a keen Radical, +and George found him chuckling over his newspaper, and the defeat of the +Tory candidate in a recently decided County Council election. He received +his visitor with a surprise which George thought not untinged with +insolence. Some political talk followed, in which Dowse's Yorkshire wit +scored more than once at his employer's expense. Dowse, indeed, let +himself go. He was on the point of taking the examination for an +under-manager's certificate and leaving the valley. Hence there were no +strong reasons for servility, and he might talk as he pleased to a young +"swell" who had sold himself to reaction. George lost his temper +somewhat, was furiously ashamed of himself, and could only think of +getting out of the man's company with dignity. + +He was by no means clear, however, as he walked away from the cottage, +that he had succeeded in doing so. What was the good of trying to make +friends with these fellows? Neither in agreement nor in opposition had +he any common ground with them. Other people might have the gifts for +managing them; it seemed to him that it would be better for him to +take up the line at once that he had none. Fontenoy was right. Nothing +but a state of enmity was possible--veiled enmity at some times, open +at others. + +What were those voices on the slope above him? + +He was walking along a road which skirted his own group of pits. To his +left rose a long slope of refuse, partly grown over, ending in the "bank" +whereon stood the engine-house and winding-apparatus. A pathway climbed +the slope and made the natural ascent to the pit for people dwelling in +the scattered cottages on the farther side of it. + +Two men, he saw, were standing high up on the pathway, violently +disputing. One was Madan, his own manager, an excellent man of business +and a bitter Tory. The other was Valentine Burrows. + +As Tressady neared the road-entrance to the pathway the two men parted. +Madan climbed on towards the pit. Burrows ran down the path. + +As he approached the gate, and saw Tressady passing on the road, the +agent called: + +"Sir George Tressady!" + +George stopped. + +Burrows came quickly up to him, his face crimson. + +"Is it by your orders, Sir George, that Mr. Madan insults and browbeats +me when he meets me on a perfectly harmless errand to one of the men in +your engine-house?" + +"Perhaps Mr. Madan was not so sure as you were, Mr. Burrows, that the +errand _was_ a harmless one," said George, with a cool smile. + +By this time, however, Burrows was biting his lip, and very conscious +that he had made an impulsive mistake. + +"Don't imagine for a moment," he said hotly, "that Madan's opinion of +anything I may be doing matters one brass farthing to me! Only I give you +and him fair warning that if he blackguards me again in the way he has +done several times lately, I shall have him bound over." + +"He might survive it," said George. "But how will you manage it? You have +had ill-luck, rather, with the magistrates--haven't you?" + +He stood drawn up to his full height, thin, venomous, alert, rather +enjoying the encounter, which "let off the steam" of his previous +irritations. + +Burrows threw him a furious look. + +"You think that a damaging thing to say, do you, Sir George? Perhaps the +day will come--not so far off, neither--when the magistrates will be no +longer your creatures, but ours. Then we shall see!" + +"Well, prophecy is cheap," said George. "Console yourself with it, by +all means." + +The two men measured each other eye to eye. + +Then, unexpectedly, after the relief of his outburst, the philosopher's +instincts which were so oddly interwoven with the rest of Tressady's +nature reasserted themselves. + +"Look here," he said, in another manner, advancing a step. "I think this +is all great nonsense. If Madan has exceeded his duty, I will see to it. +And, meanwhile, don't you think it would be more worthy of us, as a +couple of rational beings, if, now we have met, we had a few serious +words on the state of things in this valley? You and I fought a square +fight at Malford--you at least said as much. Why can't we fight a square +fight here?" + +Burrows eyed him doubtfully. He was leaning on his stick, recovering +breath and composure. George noticed that since the Malford election, +even he had lost youth and looks. He had the drunkard's skin and the +drunkard's eyes. Yet there were still the make and proportions of the +handsome athlete. He was now a man of about thirty-two; but in his first +youth he had carried the miner's pick for some four or five years, and +during the same period had been one of the most famous football-players +of the county. As George knew, he was still the idol of the local clubs, +and capable in his sober spells of amazing feats both of strength and +endurance. + +"Well, I have no objection to some conversation with you," said Burrows, +at last, slowly. + +"Let's walk on, then," said George. + +And they walked past the gate of Ferth, towards the railway-station, +which was some two miles off. + +About an hour later the two men returned along the same road. Both had an +air of tension; both were rather pale. + +"Well, it comes to this," said George, as he stopped beside his own gate, +"you believe our case--the badness of trade, the disappearance of +profits, pressure of contracts, and all the rest of it--and you still +refuse on your part to bear the smallest fraction of the burden? You will +claim all you can get in good times--you will give back nothing in bad?" + +"That is so," said Burrows, deliberately; "that is so, _precisely_. We +will take no risks; we give our labour and in return the workman must +live. Make the consumer pay, or pay yourselves out of your good +years"--he turned imperceptibly towards the barrack-like house on the +hill. "We don't care a ha'porth which it is!--only don't you come on +the man who risks his life, and works like a galley-slave five days a +week for a pittance of five-and-twenty shillings, or thereabouts, to +pay--for he _won't_. He's tired of it. Not till you starve him into it, +at any rate!" + +George laughed. + +"One of the best men in the village has been giving me his opinion this +afternoon that there isn't a man in that place"--he pointed to it--"that +couldn't live, and live well--aye, and take the masters' terms +to-morrow--but for the drink!" + +His keen look ran over Burrows from head to foot. + +"And I know who _that_ is," said Burrows, with a sneer. "Well, I can tell +you what the rest of the men in that place think, and it's this: that the +man in that village who _doesn't_ drink is a mean skunk, who's betraying +his own flesh and blood to the capitalists! Oh! you may preach at us till +you're black in the face, but drink we _shall_ till we get the control of +our own labour. For, look here! Directly we cease to drink--directly we +become good boys on your precious terms--the standard of life falls, down +come wages, and _you_ sweep off our beer-money to spend on your +champagne. Thank you, Sir George! but we're not such fools as we +look--and that don't suit us! Good-day to you." + +And he haughtily touched his hat in response to George's movement, and +walked quickly away. + + * * * * * + +George slowly mounted his own hill. The chequered April day was +declining, and the dipping sun was flooding the western plain with quiet +light. Rooks were circling round the hill, filling the air with +long-drawn sound. A cuckoo was calling on a tree near at hand, and the +evening was charged with spring scents--scents of leaf and grass, of +earth and rain. Below, in an oak copse across the road, a stream rushed; +and from a distance came the familiar rattle and thud of the pits. + +George stood still a moment under a ragged group of Scotch firs--one of +the few things at Ferth that he loved--and gazed across the Cheshire +border to the distant lines of Welsh hills. The excitement of his talk +with Burrows was subsiding, leaving behind it the obstinate resolve of +the natural man. He should tell his uncles there was nothing for it but +to fight it out. Some blood must be let; somebody must be master. + +What poor limited fools, after all, were the best of the working men--how +incapable of working out any serious problem, of looking beyond their own +noses and the next meal! Was he to spend his life in chronic battle with +them--a set of semi-civilised barbarians--his countrymen in nothing but +the name? And for what cause--to what cry? That he might defend against +the toilers of this wide valley a certain elegant house in Brook Street, +and find the means to go on paying his mother's debts?--such debts as he +carried the evidence of, at that moment, in his pocket. + +Suddenly there swept over his mind with pricking force the thought of +Mary Batchelor at her door, blind with weeping and pain--of the poor boy, +dead in his prime. Did those two figures stand for the _realities_ at +the base of things--the common labours, affections, agonies, which +uphold the world? + +His own life looked somehow poor and mean to him as he turned back to it. +The Socialist of course--Burrows--would say that he and Letty and his +mother were merely living, and dressing, and enjoying themselves, paying +butlers, and starting carriages out of the labour and pain of +others--that Jamie Batchelor and his like risked and brutalised their +strong young lives that Lady Tressady and her like might "jig and amble" +through theirs. + +Pure ignorant fanaticism, no doubt! But he was not so ready as usual to +shelter himself under the big words of controversy. Fontenoy's favourite +arguments had momentarily no savour for a kind of moral nausea. + +"I begin to see it was a 'cursed spite' that drove me into the business +at all," he said to himself, as he stood under the trees. + +What he was really suffering from was an impatience of new +conditions--perhaps surprise that he was not more equal to them. Till his +return home--till now, almost--he had been an employer and a coal-owner +by proxy. Other people had worked for him, had solved his problems for +him. Then a transient impulse had driven him home--made him accept +Fontenoy's offer--worse luck!--at least, Letty apart! The hopefulness and +elation about himself, his new activities, and his Parliamentary +prospects, that had been his predominant mood in London seemed to him at +this moment of depression mere folly. What he really felt, he declared to +himself, was a sort of cowardly shrinking from life and its tests--the +recognition that at bottom he was a weakling, without faiths, without +true identity. + +Then the quick thought-process, as it flowed on, told him that there are +two things that protect men of his stamp from their own lack of moral +stamina: perpetual change of scene, that turns the world into a +spectacle--and love. He thought with hunger of his travel-years; holding +away from him, as it were, for a moment the thought of his marriage. + +But only for a moment. It was but a few weeks since a woman's life had +given itself wholly into his hands. He was still thrilling under the +emotion and astonishment of it. Tender, melting thoughts flowed upon him. +His little Letty! Had he ever thought her perfect, free from natural +covetousness and weaknesses? What folly! _He_ to ask for the grand style +in character! + +He looked at his watch. How long he had left her! Let him hurry, and make +his peace. + +However, just as he was turning, his attention was caught by something +that was passing on the opposite hillside. The light from the west was +shining full on a white cottage with a sloping garden. The cottage +belonged to the Wesleyan minister of the place, and had been rented by +Burrows for the last six months. And just as George was turning away he +saw Burrows come out of the door with a burden--a child, or a woman +little larger than a child--in his arms. He carried her to an armchair +which had been placed on the little grass-plat. The figure was almost +lost in the chair, and sat motionless while Burrows brought cushions and +a stool. Then a baby came to play on the grass, and Burrows hung over the +back of the chair, bending so as to talk to the person in it. + +"Dying?" said George to himself. "Poor devil! he must hate something." + + * * * * * + +He sped up the hill, and found Letty still on the sofa and in the last +pages of her novel. She did not resent his absence apparently,--a +freedom, so far, from small exaction for which he inwardly thanked her. +Still, from the moment that she raised her eyes as he came in, he saw +that if she was not angry with him for leaving her alone, her mind was +still as sore as ever against him and fortune on other accounts--and his +revived ardour drooped. He gave her an account of his adventures, but she +was neither inquiring nor sympathetic; and her manner all the evening had +a nervous dryness that took away the pleasure of their _tête-à-tête._ Any +old friend of Letty's, indeed, could hardly have failed to ask what had +become of that small tinkling charm of manner, that girlish flippancy and +repartee, that had counted for so much in George's first impressions of +her? They were no sooner engaged than it had begun to wane. Was it like +the bird or the flower, that adorns itself only for the wooing time, and +sinks into relative dinginess when the mating effort is over? + +On this particular evening, indeed, she was really absorbed half the time +in gloomy thoughts of Lady Tressady's behaviour and the poorness of her +own prospects. She lay on the sofa again after dinner--her white slimness +and bright hair showing delicately against the cushions--playing still +with her novel, while George read the newspapers. Sometimes she glanced +at him unsteadily, with a pinching of the lips. But it was not her way to +invite a scene. + +Late at night he went up to his dressing-room. + +As he entered it Letty was talking to her maid. He stopped involuntarily +in the darkness of his own room, and listened. What a contrast between +this Letty and the Letty of the drawing-room! They were chattering fast, +discussing Lady Tressady, and Lady Tressady's gowns, and Lady Tressady's +affairs. What eagerness, what malice, what feminine subtlety and +acuteuess! After listening for a few seconds, it seemed to him as though +a score of new and ugly lights had been thrown alike upon his mother and +on human nature. He stole away again without revealing himself. + +When he returned the room was nearly dark, and Letty was lying high +against her pillows, waiting for him. Suddenly, after she had sent her +maid away, she had felt depressed and miserable, and had begun to cry. +And for some reason hardly clear to herself she had lain pining for +George's footstep. When he came in she looked at him with eyes still +wet, reproaching him gently for being late. + +In the dim light, surrounded with lace and whiteness, she was a pretty +vision; and George stood beside her, responding and caressing. + +But that black depth in his nature, of which he had spoken to her--which +he had married to forget--was, none the less, all ruffled and vocal. For +the first time since Letty had consented to marry him he did not think or +say to himself, as he looked at her, that he was a lucky man, and had +done everything for the best. + + + + +CHAPTER X + + +Thus, with the end of the honeymoon, whatever hopes or illusions George +Tressady had allowed himself in marrying, were already much bedimmed. His +love-dream had been meagre and ordinary enough. But even so, it had not +maintained itself. + +Nevertheless, such impressions and emotions pass. The iron fact of +marriage outstays them, tends always to modify, and, at first, to +conquer them. + +Upon the Tressadys' return to London, Letty, at any rate, endeavoured +to forget her great defeat of the honeymoon in the excitement of +furnishing the house in Brook Street. Certainly there could be no +question, in spite of all her high speech to Miss Tulloch and others, +that in her first encounter with Lady Tressady, Lady Tressady had won +easily. Letty had forgotten to reckon on the hard realities of the +filial relation, and could only think of them now, partly with +exasperation, partly with despair. + +Lady Tressady, however, was for the moment somewhat subdued, and on the +return of the young people to town she did her best to propitiate Letty. +In Letty's eyes, indeed, her offence was beyond reparation. But, for the +moment, there was outward amity at least between them; which for Letty +meant chiefly that she was conscious of making all her purchases for the +house and planning all her housekeeping arrangements under a constant +critical inspection; and, moreover, that she was liable to find all her +afternoon-teas with particular friends, or those persons of whom she +wished to make particular friends, broken up by the advent of the +overdressed and be-rouged lady, who first put the guests to flight, and +was then out of temper because they fled. + +Meanwhile George found the Shapetsky matter extremely harassing. He put +on a clever lawyer; but the Shapetsky would have scorned to be +overmatched by anybody else's abilities, and very little abatement could +be obtained. Moreover, the creditor's temper had been roughened by a +somewhat unfortunate letter George had written in a hurry from Perth, and +he showed every sign of carrying matters with as high a hand as possible. + +Meanwhile, George was discovering, like any other landowner, how easy it +is to talk of selling land, how difficult to sell it. The buyer who would +once have bought was not now forthcoming; the few people who nibbled +were, naturally, thinking more of their own purses than Tressady's; and +George grew red with indignation over some of the offers submitted to him +by his country solicitor. With the payment of a first large instalment to +Shapetsky out of his ordinary account, he began to be really pressed for +money, just as the expenses of the Brook Street settling-in were at their +height. This pecuniary strain had a marked effect upon him. It brought +out certain features of character which he no doubt inherited from his +father. Old Sir William had always shown a scrupulous and petty temper +in money matters. He could not increase his possessions: for that he had +apparently neither brains nor judgment; nor could he even protect himself +from the more serious losses of business, for George found heavy debts in +existence--mortgages on the pits and so forth--when he succeeded. But as +the head of a household Sir William showed extraordinary tenacity and +spirit in the defence of his petty cash; and the exasperating +extravagance of the wife whom, in a moment of infatuation, he had been +cajoled into marrying, intensified and embittered a natural +characteristic. + +George so far resembled him that both at school and college he had been a +rather careful and abstemious boy. Probably the spectacle of his mother's +adventures had revealed to him very early the humiliations of the debtor. +At any rate, during his four years abroad he had never exceeded the +modest yearly sum he had reserved for himself on leaving England; and the +frugality of his personal expenditure had counted for something in the +estimates formed of him during his travels by competent persons. + +Nevertheless, at this beginning of household life he was still young and +callow in all that concerned the management of money; and it had never +occurred to him that his somewhat uncertain income of about four thousand +a year would not be amply sufficient for anything that he and Letty might +need; for housekeeping, for children--if children came--for political +expenses, and even for those supplementary presents to his mother which +he had all along recognised as inevitable. Now, however, what with the +difficulty he found in settling the Shapetsky affair, what with Letty's +demands for the house, and his revived dread of what his mother might be +doing, together with his overdrawn account and the position of his +colliery property, a secret fear of embarrassment and disaster began to +torment him, the offspring of a temperament which had never perhaps +possessed any real buoyancy. + +Occasionally, under the stimulus of this fear, he would leave the House +of Commons on a Wednesday or Saturday afternoon, walk to Warwick Square, +and appear precipitately in his mother's drawing-room, for the purpose of +examining the guests--or possible harpies--who might be gathered there. +He did his best once or twice to dislodge the "singer-fellow"--an elderly +gentleman with a flabby face and long hair, who seemed to George to be +equally boneless, physically and morally. Nevertheless, he was not to be +dislodged. The singer, indeed, treated the young legislator with a +mixture of deference and artistic; condescension, which was amusing or +enraging as you chose to take it. And once, when George attempted very +plain language with his mother, Lady Tressady went into hysterics, and +vowed that she would not be parted from her friends, not even by the +brutality of young married people who had everything they wanted, while +she was a poor lone widow, whose life was not worth living. The whole +affair was, so to speak, sordidly innocent. Mr. Fullerton--such was the +gentleman's name--wanted creature-comforts and occasional loans; Lady +Tressady wanted company, compliments, and "musical sketches'" for her +little tea-parties. Mrs. Fullerton was as ready as her husband to supply +the two former; and even the children, a fair-haired, lethargic crew, +painfully like their boneless father in Tressady's opinion, took their +share in the general exploitation of Tressady's mamma. Lady Tressady +meanwhile posed as the benefactor of genius in distress; and vowed, +moreover, that "poor dear Fullertori" was in no way responsible for her +recent misfortunes. The "reptile," and the "reptile" only, was to blame. + +After one of these skirmishes with his mother, George, ruffled and +disgusted, took his way home, to find Letty eagerly engaged in choosing +silk curtains for the drawing-room. + +"Oh! how lucky!" she cried, when she saw him. "Now you can help me +decide--_such_ a business!" + +And she led him into the drawing-room, where lengths of pink and green +brocade were pinned against the wall in conspicuous places. + +George admired, and gave his verdict in favour of a particular green. +Then he stooped to read the ticket on the corner of the pattern, and his +face fell. + +"How much will you want of this stuff, Letty?" he asked her. + +"Oh! for the two rooms, nearly fifty yards," said Letty, carelessly, +opening another bundle of patterns as she spoke. + +"It is twenty-six shillings a yard!" said George, rather gloomily, as he +fell, tired, into an armchair. + +"Well, yes, it _is_ dear. But then, it is so good that it will last an +age. I think I must have some of it for the sofa, too," said Letty, +pondering. + +George made no reply. + +Presently Letty looked up. + +"Why, George?--George, what _is_ the matter? Don't you want anything +pretty for this room? You never take any interest in it at all." + +"I'm only thinking, darling, what fortunes the upholsterers must make," +said George, his hands penthouse over his eyes. + +Letty pouted and flushed. The next minute she came to sit on the edge +of his chair. She was dressed--rather overdressed, perhaps--in a pale +blue dress whereof the inventive ruffles and laces pleased her own +critical mind extremely. George, well accustomed by now to the items in +his mother's bills, felt uncomfortably, as he looked at the elegance +beside him, that it was a question of guineas--many guineas. Then he +hated himself for not simply admiring her--his pretty little bride--in +her new finery. What was wrong with him? This beastly money had put +everything awry! + +Letty guessed shrewdly at what was the matter. She bit her lip, and +looked ready to cry. + +"Well, it is hard," she said, in a low, emphatic voice, "that we can't +please ourselves in a few trifles of this sort--when one thinks _why_!" + +George took her hand, and kissed it affectionately. + +"Darling, only just for a little--till I get out of this brute's +clutches. There are such pretty, cheap things nowadays--aren't there?" + +"Oh! if you want to have a South Kensington drawing-room," said Letty, +indignantly, "with four-penny muslin curtains and art pots, you can do +_that_ for nothing. But I'd rather go back to horsehair and a mahogany +table in the middle at once!" + +"You needn't wear 'greenery-yallery' gowns, you know." said George, +laughing; "that's the one unpardonable thing. Though, if you did wear +them, you'd become them." + +And he held her at arm's length that he might properly admire her +new dress. + +Letty, however, was not to be flattered out of her lawful dues in the +matter of curtains--that Lady Tressady's debts might be paid the sooner. +She threw herself into a long wrestle with George, half angry, half +plaintive, and in the end she wrung out of him much more considerable +matters than the brocades originally in dispute. Then George went down to +his study, pricked in his conscience, and vaguely sore with Letty. Why? +Women in his eyes were made for silken gauds and trinkets: it was the +price that men were bound to pay them for their society. He had watched +the same sort of process that had now been applied to himself many times +already in one or more of the Anglo-Indian households with which he had +grown familiar, and had been philosophically amused by it. But the little +comedy, transferred to his own hearth, seemed somehow to have lost humour +and point. + + * * * * * + +Still, with two young people, under thirty, just entering upon that +fateful second act of the play of life which makes or mars us all, +moments of dissatisfaction and depression--even with Shapetskys and Lady +Tressadys in the background--were but rare specks in the general sum of +pleasure. George had fallen once more under the Parliamentary illusion, +as soon as he was again within reach of the House of Commons and in +frequent contact with Fontenoy. The link between him and his strange +leader grew daily stronger as they sat side by side, through some +hard-fought weeks of Supply, throwing the force of their little group now +on the side of the Government, now on that of the Opposition, always +vigilant, and often successful. George became necessary to Fontenoy in a +hundred ways; for the younger man had a mass of _connaissances_,--to use +the irreplaceable French word,--the result of his more normal training +and his four years of intelligent travel, which Fontenoy was almost +wholly without. Many a blunder did George save his chief; and no one +could have offered his brains for the picking with a heartier goodwill. +On the other hand, the instinctive strength and acuteness of Fontenoy's +judgment were unmatched, according to Tressady's belief, in the House of +Commons. He was hardly ever deceived in a man, or in the significant +points of a situation. His followers never dreamt of questioning his +verdict on a point of tactics. They followed him blindly; and if the gods +sent defeat, no one blamed Fontenoy. But in success his grunt of approval +or congratulation rewarded the curled young aristocrats who made the +nucleus of his party as nothing else did; while none of his band ever +affronted or overrode him with impunity. He wielded a natural kingship, +and, the more battered and gnarled became his physical presence, the more +remarkable was his moral ascendency. + +One discouragement, however, he and his group suffered during the weeks +between Easter and Whitsuntide. They were hungry for battle, and the +best of the battle was for the moment denied them; for, owing to a number +of controverted votes in Supply and the slipping-in of two or three +inevitable debates on pressing matters of current interest, the Second +Reading of the Maxwell Bill was postponed till after Whitsuntide, when it +was certainly to take precedence. There was a good deal of grumbling in +the House, led by Fontenoy; but the Government could only vow that they +had no choice, and that their adversaries could not possibly be more +eager to fight than they were to be fought. + +Life, then, on this public side, though not so keen as it would be +presently, was still rich and stirring. And meanwhile society showed +itself gracious to the bride and bridegroom. Letty's marriage had made +her unusually popular for the time with her own acquaintance. For it +might be called success; yet it was not of too dazzling a degree. What, +therefore, with George's public and Parliamentary relations, the calls of +officials, the attentions of personal friends, and the good offices of +Mrs. Watton, who was loftily determined to "launch" her niece, Letty was +always well pleased with the look of her hall-table and the cards upon it +when she returned home in her new brougham from her afternoon round. She +left them there for George to see, and it delighted her particularly if +Lady Tressady came in during the interval. + +Meanwhile they dined with many folk, and made preliminary acquaintance +with the great ones of the land. Letty's vanity Dwelled within her as she +read over the list of her engagements. Nevertheless, she often came home +from her dinner-parties flat and disappointed. She did not feel that she +made way; and she found herself constantly watching the triumphs of other +women with annoyance or perplexity. What was wrong with her? Her dress +was irreproachable, and, stirred by this great roaring world, she +recalled for it the little airs and graces she had almost ceased to spend +on George. But she constantly found herself, as she thought, neglected; +while the slightest word or look of some happy person in a simple gown, +near by, had power to bring about her that flattering crowd of talkers +and of courtiers for which Letty pined. + +The Maxwells called very early on the newly wedded pair, and left an +invitation to dinner with their cards. But, to Letty's chagrin, she and +George were already engaged for the evening named, and when they duly +presented themselves at St. James's Square on a Sunday afternoon, it was +to find that the Maxwells were in the country. Once or twice in some +crowded room Letty or George had a few hurried words with Lady Maxwell, +and Marcella would try to plan a meeting. But what with her engagements +and theirs, nothing that she suggested could be done. + +"Ah! well, after Whitsuntide," she said, smiling, to Letty one evening +that they had interchanged a few words of polite regret on the stairs at +some official party. "I will write to you in the country, if I may. Ferth +Place, is it not?" + +"No," said Letty, with easy dignity; "we shall not be at home,--not at +first, at any rate. We are going for two or three days to Mrs. Allison, +at Castle Luton." + +"Are you? You will have a pleasant time. Such a glorious old house!" + +And Lady Maxwell swept on; not so fast, however, but that she found time +to have a few words of Parliamentary chat with Tressady on the landing. + +Letty made her little speech about Castle Luton with a delightful sense +of playing the rare and favoured part. Nothing in her London career, so +far, had pleased her so much as Mrs. Allison's call and Mrs. Allison's +invitation. For, although on the few occasions when she had seen this +gentle, white-haired lady, Letty had never felt for one moment at ease +with her, still, there could be no question that Mrs. Allison was, +socially, distinction itself. She had a following among all parties. +For although she was Fontenoy's friend and inspirer, a strong +Church-woman, and a great aristocrat, she had that delicate, +long-descended charm which shuts the lions' mouths, and makes it +possible for certain women to rule in any company. Even those who were +most convinced that the Mrs. Allisons of this world are the chief +obstacles in the path of progress, deliberated when they were asked to +Castle Luton, and fell--protesting. And for a certain world, high-born, +cultivated, and virtuous, she was almost a figure of legend, so +widespread was the feeling she inspired, and so many were the +associations and recollections that clustered about her. + +So that when her cards, those of her son Lord Ancoats, and a little +accompanying note in thin French handwriting--Mrs. Allison had been +brought up in Paris--arrived, Letty had a start of pleasure. "To meet a +few friends of mine"--that meant, of course, one of _the_ parties. She +supposed it was Lord Fontenoy's doing. He was said to ask whom he would +to Castle Luton. Under the influence of this idea, at any rate, she bore +herself towards her husband's chief at their next meeting with an +effusion which made Fontenoy supremely uncomfortable. + +The week before Whitsuntide happened to be one of special annoyance for +Tressady. His reports from Ferth were steadily more discouraging; his +attempts to sell his land made no way; and he saw plainly that, if he was +to keep their London life going, to provide for Shapetsky's claims, and +to give Letty what she wanted for renovations at Ferth, he would have to +sell some of the very small list of good securities left him by his +father. Most young men in his place, perhaps, would have taken such a +thing with indifference; he brooded over it. "I am beginning to spend my +capital as income," he said to himself. "The strike will be on in July; +next half-year I shall get almost nothing from the pits; rents won't come +to much; Letty wants all kinds of things. How long will it be before I, +too, am in debt, like my mother, borrowing from this person and that?" + +Then he would make stern resolutions of economy, only to be baffled by +Letty's determination to have everything that other people had; above +all, not to allow her own life to be stinted because he had so foolishly +adopted his mother's debts. She said little; or said it with smiles and a +bridal standing on her rights not to be answered. But her persistence in +a particular kind of claim, and her new refusal to be taken into his +confidence and made the partner of his anxieties, raised a miserable +feeling in his mind as the weeks went on. + +"No!" she said to herself, all the time resenting bitterly what had +happened at Ferth; "if I let him talk to me about it, I shall be giving +in, and letting _her_ trample on me! If George will be so weak, he must +find the money somehow. Of course he can! I am not in the _least_ +extravagant. I am only doing what everybody expects me to do." + +Meanwhile this state of things did not make Lady Tressady any more +welcome in Brook Street, and there were symptoms of grievances and +quarrels of another sort. Lady Tressady heard that the young couple had +already given one or two tiny dinner-parties, and to none of them had she +been invited. One day that George had been obliged to go to Warwick +Square to consult her on business, he was suddenly overwhelmed with +reproaches on this point. + +"I suppose Letty thinks I should spoil her parties! She is ashamed of me, +perhaps"--Lady Tressady gave an angry laugh. "Oh! very well; but I should +like you and her to understand, George, that I have been a good deal more +admired in my time than ever Letty need expect to be!" + +And George's mother, in a surprising yellow tea-gown, threw herself back +on her chair, bridling with wrath and emotion. George declared, with good +temper, that he and Letty were well aware of his mother's triumphs; +whereupon Lady Tressady, becoming tearful, said she knew it wasn't a +pretty thing to say--of course it wasn't--but if one was treated unkindly +by one's only son and his wife, what could one do but assert oneself? + +George soothed her as best he could, and on his return home said +tentatively to Letty, that he believed it would please his mother if they +were to ask her to a small impromptu dinner of Parliamentary friends +which they were planning for the following Friday. + +"George!" exclaimed Letty, her eyes gleaming, "we can't ask her! I don't +want to say anything disagreeable, but you must see that people don't +like her--her dress is so _extraordinary_, and her manners--it sets +people against the house. I do think it's too bad that--" + +She turned aside with a sudden sob. George kissed her, and sympathised +with her; for he himself was never at ease now for an instant while his +mother was in the room. But the widening of the breach which Letty's +refusal brought about only made his own position between the two women +the more disagreeable to a man whose ideal of a home was that it should +be a place of perpetual soothing and amusement. + +On the very morning of their departure for Castle Luton matters reached a +small crisis. Letty, tired with some festivity of the night before, took +her breakfast in bed; and George, going upstairs toward the middle of the +morning to make some arrangement with her for the journey, found her just +come down, and walking up and down the drawing-room, her pale pink dress +sweeping the floor, her hands clasped behind her. She was very pale, and +her small lips were tightly drawn. + +He looked at her with astonishment. + +"What is the matter, darling?" + +"Oh! nothing," said Letty, trying to speak with sarcasm. "Nothing at all. +I have only just been listening to an account of the way in which your +mother speaks of me to her friends. I ought to be flattered, of course, +that she notices me at all! But I think I shall have to ask you to +_request_ her to put off her visit to Ferth a little. It could hardly +give either of us much enjoyment." + +George first pulled his moustaches, then tried, as usual, to banter or +kiss her into composure. Above all, he desired not to know what Lady +Tressady had said. But Letty was determined he should know. "She was +heard "--she began passionately, holding him at arm's length--"she was +heard saying to a _whole roomful_ of people yesterday, that I was +'pretty, of course--rather pretty--but _so_ second rate--and so +provincial! It was such a pity dear George had not waited till he had +been a few months in London. Still, of course, one could only make the +best of it!'" + +Letty mimicked her mother-in-law's drawling voice, two red spots burning +on either cheek the while, and her little fingers gripping George's arm. + +"I don't believe she ever said such things. Who told you so?" said +George, stiffening, his arm dropping from her waist. + +Letty tossed her head. + +"Never mind! I _ought_ to know, and it doesn't really matter how I know. +She _did_ say them." + +"Yes, it does matter," said George, quickly, walking away to the other +side of the room. "Letty! if you would only send away that woman Grier, +you can't think how much happier we should both be." + +Letty stood still, opening her blue eyes wide. + +"You want me--to get rid--of Grier," she said, "my own particular pet +maid? And why--please?" + +George had the courage to stick to his point, and the result was a heated +and angry scene--their first real quarrel--which ended in Letty's rushing +upstairs in tears, and declaring she would go _no_where. _He_ might go to +Castle Luton, if he pleased; she was far too agitated and exhausted to +face a houseful of strangers. + +The inevitable reconciliation, with its usual accompaniments of headache +and eau de cologne, took time, and they only just completed their +preparations and caught their appointed train. + +Meanwhile the storm of the day had taken all savour from Letty's +expectations, and made George feel the whole business an effort and a +weariness. Letty sat pale and silent in her corner, devoured with regrets +that she had not put on a thicker veil to hide the ravages of the +morning; while George turned over the pages of a political biography, and +could not prevent his mind from falling back again and again into dark +places of dread and depression. + + * * * * * + +"You are my earliest guests," said Mrs. Allison, as she placed a chair +for Letty beside herself, on the lawn at Castle Luton. "Except, indeed, +that Lady Maxwell and her little boy are here somewhere, roaming about. +But none of our other friends could get down till later. I am glad we +shall have a little quiet time before they come." + +"Lady Maxwell!" said Letty. "I had no idea they were coming. Oh, what a +lovely day! and how beautiful it all is!" she cried, as she sat down and +looked round her. The colour came back into her cheeks. She forgot her +determination to keep her veil down, and raised it eagerly. + +Mrs. Allison smiled. + +"We never look so well as in May--the river is so full, and the swans are +so white. Ah! I see Edgar has already taken Sir George to make friends +with them." + +And Letty, looking across the broad green lawn, saw the flash of a +brimming river and a cluster of white swans, beside which stood her +husband and a young man in a serge suit, who was feeding the swans with +bread--Lord Ancoats, no doubt, the happy owner of all this splendour. To +the left of their figures rose a stone bridge with a high, carved +parapet, and beyond the river she saw green hills and woods against a +radiant sky. Then, to her right was this wonderful yellowish pile of the +old house. She began to admire and exclaim about it with a great energy +and effusion, trying hard to say the correct and cultivated thing, and, +in fact, repeating with a good deal of exactness what she had heard said +of it by others. + +Her hostess listened to her praises with a gentle smile. Gentleness, +indeed, a rather sad gentleness, was the characteristic of Mrs. Allison. +It seemed to make an atmosphere about her--her delicate blanched head and +soft face, her small figure, her plain black dress, her hands in their +white ruffles. Her friends called it saintliness. At any rate, it set her +apart, giving her a peculiar ethereal dignity which made her formidable +in society to many persons who were not liable to shyness. Letty from the +beginning had felt her formidable. + +Yet nothing could be kinder or simpler than her manner. In response to +Letty's enthusiasms she let herself be drawn at once into speaking of her +own love for the house, and on to pointing out its features. + +"I am always telling these things to newcomers," she said, smiling. "And +I am not clever enough to make variations. But I don't mind, somehow, how +often I go through it. You see, this front is Tudor, and the south front +is a hundred years later, and both of them, they say, are the finest of +their kind. Isn't it wonderful that two men, a hundred years apart, +should each have left such a noble thing behind him. One inspired the +other. And then we--we poor moderns come after, and must cherish what +they left us as we best can. It's a great responsibility, don't you +think? to live in a beautiful house." + +"I'm afraid I don't know much about it," said Letty, laughing; "we live +in such a very ugly one." + +Mrs. Allison looked sympathetic. + +"Oh! but then, ugly ones have character; or they are pretty inside, or +the people one loves have lived in them. That would make any place a +House Beautiful. Aren't you near Perth?" + +"Yes; and I am afraid you'll think me _dreadfully_ discontented," +said Letty, with one of her little laughing airs; "but there really +isn't anything to make up in our barrack of a place. It's like a +blackened brick set up on end at the top of a hill. And then the +villages are so hideous." + +"Ah! I know that coal-country," said Mrs. Allison, gravely--"and I know +the people. Have you made friends with them yet?" + +"We were only there for our honeymoon. George says that next month the +whole place will be out on strike. So just now they hate us--they will +hardly look at us in the street. But, of course, we shall give away +things at Christmas." + +Mrs. Allison's lip twitched, and she shot a glance at the bride which +betrayed, for all her gentleness, the woman of a large world and much +converse with mankind. What a curious, hard little face was Lady +Tressady's under the outer softness of line and hue, and what an amazing +costume! Mrs. Allison had no quarrel with beautiful gowns, but the +elaboration, or, as one might say, the research of Letty's dress struck +her unpleasantly. The time that it must have taken to think out! + +Aloud she said: + +"Ah! the strike. Yes, I fear it is inevitable. Ancoats has some property +not very far from you, and we get reports. Poor fellows! if it weren't +for the wretched agitators who mislead them--but there, we mustn't talk +of these things. I see Lady Maxwell coming." + +And Mrs. Allison waved her hand to a tall figure in white with a child +beside it that had just emerged on the far distance of the lawn. + +"Is Lord Maxwell here, too?" asked Letty. + +"He is coming later. It seems strange, perhaps, that you should find them +here this Sunday, for Lord Fontenoy comes to-morrow, and the great fight +will be on so soon. But when I found that they were free, and that +Maxwell would like to come, I was only too glad. After all, rival +politicians in England can still meet each other, even at a crisis. +Besides, Maxwell is a relation of ours, and he was my boy's guardian--the +kindest possible guardian. Politics apart, I have the greatest respect +for him. And her too. Why is it always the best people in the world that +do the most mischief?" + +At the mention of Lord Fontenoy it had been Letty's turn to throw a +quick side look at Mrs. Allison. But the name was spoken in the quietest +and most natural way; and yet, if one analysed the tone, in a way that +did imply something exceptional, which, however, all the world knew, or +might know. + +"Is Lady Maxwell an old friend of yours, too?" asked Letty, longing to +pursue the subject, and vexed to see how fast the mother and child were +approaching. + +"Only since her marriage. To see her and Maxwell together is really a +poem. If only she wouldn't identify herself so hotly, dear woman! with +everything he does and wishes in politics. There is no getting her to +hear a word of reason. She is another Maxwell in petticoats. And it +always seems to me so unfair. Maxwell without beauty and without +petticoats is quite enough to fight! Look at that little fellow with his +flowers!--such an oddity of a child!" + +Then she raised her voice. + +"My dear, what a ramble you must have made. Come and have a shady chair +and some tea." + +For answer Marcella, laughing, held up a glorious bunch of cuckoo-pint +and marsh marigold, while little Hallin at her skirts waved another +trophy of almost equal size. The mother's dark face was flushed with +exercise and pleasure. As she moved over the grass, the long folds of a +white dress falling about her, the flowers in her hand, the child beside +her, she made a vision of beauty lovely in itself and lovely in all that +it suggested. Frank joy and strength, happiness, purity of heart--these +entered with her. One could almost see their dim heavenly shapes in the +air about her. + +Neither Letty nor Mrs. Allison could take their eyes from her. Perhaps +she knew it. But if she did, it made no difference to her perfect ease of +bearing. She greeted Letty kindly. + +"You didn't expect to see me here, did you, Lady Tressady? But it is the +unexpected that happens." + +Then she put her hand on Mrs. Allison's shoulder, bending her height to +her small hostess. + +"What a day, and what a place! Hallin and I have been over hill and dale. +But he is getting such a botanist, the little monkey! He will hardly +forgive me because I forgot one of the flowers we found out yesterday in +his botany book." + +"She said it was 'Robin-run-in-the-'edge,' and it isn't--it's 'edge +mustard," said Hallin, severely, holding up a little feathery stalk. + +Mrs. Allison shook her head, endeavouring to suit her look to the gravity +of the offence. + +"Mother must learn her lessons better, mustn't she? Go and shake hands, +little man, with Lady Tressady." + +Hallin went gravely to do as he was told. Then he stood on one foot, and +looked Letty over with a considering eye. + +"Are you going to a party?" he said suddenly, putting out a small and +grimy finger, and pointing to her dress. + +"Hallin! come here and have your tea," said his mother, hastily. Then she +turned to Letty with the smile that had so often won Maxwell a friend. + +"I am sorry to say that he has a rooted objection to anything that isn't +rags in the way of clothes. He entirely declined to take me across the +river till I had rolled up my lace cloak and put it in a bush. And he +won't really be friends with me again till we have both got back to the +scarecrow garments we wear at home." + +"Oh! children are so much happier when they are dirty," said Letty, +graciously, pleased to feel herself on these easy terms with her two +companions. "What beautiful flowers he has! and what an astonishing +little botanist he seems to be!" + +And she seated herself beside Hallin, using all her blandishments to make +friends with him, which, however, did not prove to be an easy matter. For +when she praised his flowers, Hallin only said, with his mouth full: "Oh! +but mammy's bunch is _hever_ so much bigger;" and when she offered him +cake, the child would sturdily put the cake away, and hold it and her at +arm's length till his mute look across the table had won his mother's nod +of permission. + +Letty at last thought him an odd, ill-mannered child, and gave up +courting him, greatly to Hallin's satisfaction. He edged closer and +closer to his mother, established himself finally in her pocket, and +browsed on all the good things with which Mrs. Allison provided him, +undisturbed. + +"How late they are!" said Marcella, looking at her watch. "Tell me +the names again, dear lady"--she bent forward, and laid her hand +affectionately on Mrs. Allison's knee. "Your parties are always a +work of art." + +Mrs. Allison flushed a little, as though she liked the compliment, and +ran laughingly through the names. + +"Lord and Lady Maxwell." + +"Ah!" said Marcella, "the least said about them the soonest +mended. Go on." + +"Lord and Lady Cathedine." + +Marcella made a face. + +"Poor little thing! I always think of the remark about the Queen in +'Alice in Wonderland.' 'A little kindness, and putting her hair in +curl-papers, would do wonders for her.' She is so limp and thin and +melancholy. As for him--isn't there a race or a prize-fight we can +send him to?" + +Mrs. Allison tapped her lightly on the lips. + +"I won't go on unless my guests are taken prettily." + +Marcella kissed the delicate wrinkled hand. + +"I'll be good. What do you keep such an air here for? It gets into +one's head." + +Letty Tressady, indeed, was looking on with a feeling of astonishment. +These merry, childlike airs had absolutely no place in her conception of +Lady Maxwell. Nor could she know that Mrs. Allison was one of the very +few people in the world to whom Marcella was ever drawn to show them. + +"Sir Philip Wentworth," pursued Mrs. Allison, smiling. "Say anything +malicious about him, if you can!" + +"Don't provoke me. What a mercy I brought a volume of 'Indian Studies' in +my bag! I will go up early, before dinner, and finish them." + +"Then there is Madeleine Penley, and Elizabeth Kent." + +A quick involuntary expression crossed Marcella's face. Then she drew +herself up with dignity, and crossed her hands primly on her lap. + +"Let me understand. Are you going to protect me from Lady Kent this time? +Because, last time you threw me to the wolves in the most dastardly way." + +Mrs. Allison laughed out. + +"On the contrary, we all enjoyed your skirmish with her in November so +much, we shall do our best to provoke another in May." + +Marcella shook her head. + +"I haven't the energy to quarrel with a fly. And as for Aldous--please +warn his lady at dinner that he may go to sleep upon her shoulder!" + +"You poor thing!"--Mrs. Allison put out a sympathetic hand. "Are you so +tired? Why will you turn the world upside down?" + +Marcella took the hand lightly in both hers. + +"Why will you fight reform?" + +And the eyes of the two women met, not without a sudden grave passion. +Then Marcella dropped the hand, and said, smiling: + +"Castle Luton isn't full yet. Who else?" + +"Oh! some young folk--Charlie Naseby." + +"A nice boy--a very nice boy--not half such a coxcomb as he looks. Then +the Levens--I know the Levens are coming, for Betty told me that she got +out of two other engagements as soon as you asked her." + +"Oh! and, by the way, Mr. Watton--Harding Watton," said Mrs. Allison, +turning slightly towards Lady Tressady. + +The exclamation on Lady Maxwell's lips was checked by something she saw +on her hostess's face, and Letty eagerly struck in: + +"Harding coming?--my cousin? I am so glad. I suppose I oughtn't to say +it, but he is such a _clever_, such an _agreeable_, creature. But you +know the Wattons, don't you, Lady Maxwell?" + +Marcella was busying herself with Hallin's tea. + +"I know Edward Watton," she said, turning her beautiful clear look on +Letty. "He is a real friend of mine." + +"Oh! but Harding is _much_ the cleverer," said Letty. And pleased both +to find the ball of talk in her hands, and to have the chance of +glorifying a relation in this world of people so much bigger than +herself, she plunged into an extravagant account--all adjectives and +superlatives--of Harding Watton's charms and abilities, to which Lady +Maxwell listened in silence. + +"Tactless!" thought Mrs. Allison, with vexation, but she did not know +how to stop the stream. In truth, since she had given Lord Fontenoy +leave to invite Harding Watton she had had time to forget the +invitation, and she was sorry now to think of his housing with the +Maxwells. For Watton had been recently Lord Fontenoy's henchman and +agent in a newspaper attack upon the Bill, and upon Maxwell personally, +that even Mrs. Allison had thought violent and unfair. Well, it was not +her fault. But Lady Tressady ought to have better information and better +sense than to be chattering like this. She was just about to interpose, +when Marcella held up her hand. + +"I hear the carriages!" + +The hostess hastened towards the house, and Marcella followed her, with +Hallin at her skirts. Letty looked after Lady Maxwell with the same +mixture of admiration and jealous envy she had felt several times +before. "I don't feel that I shall get on with her," she said to +herself, impatiently. "But I don't think I want to. George took her +measure at once." + +Part of this reflection, however, was not true. Letty's ambition would +have been very glad to "get on" with Marcella Maxwell. + + * * * * * + +Just as his wife was ready for dinner, and Grier had disappeared, George +entered Letty's room. She was standing before a tall glass, putting the +last touches to her dress--smoothing here, pinning there, turning to this +side and to that. George, unseen himself, stood and watched her--her +alternate looks of anxiety and satisfaction, her grace, the shimmering +folds of the magnificent wedding-dress in which she had adorned herself. + +He, however, was neither happy nor gay. But he had come in feeling that +he must make an effort--many efforts, if their young married life was to +be brought back to that level of ease and pleasure which he had once +taken for granted, and which now seemed so hard to maintain. If that ease +and pleasure were ultimately to fail him, what should he do? He shrank +impatiently from the idea. Then he would scoff at himself. How often had +he read and heard that the first year of marriage is the most difficult. +Of course it must be so. Two individualities cannot fuse without turmoil, +without heat. Let him only make his effort. + +So he walked up to her and caught her in his arms. + +"Oh, George!--my hair!--and my flowers!" + +"Never mind," he said, almost with roughness. "Put your head there. Say +you hate the thought of our day, as I do! Say there shall never be one +like it again! Promise me!" + +She felt the beating of his heart beneath her cheek. But she stood +silent. His appeal, his unwonted agitation, revived in her all the anger +and irritation that had begun to prey upon her thoughts. It was all very +well, but why were they so pinched and uncomfortable? Why must +everybody--Mrs. Allison, Lady Maxwell, a hundred others--have more +wealth, more scope, more consideration than she? It was partly his fault. + +So she gradually drew herself away, pushing him softly with her small +gloved hand. + +"I am sure I hate quarrelling," she said. "But there! Oh, George! don't +let's talk of it any more! And look what you have done to my poor hair. +You dear, naughty boy!" + +But though she called him "Dear," she frowned as she took off her gloves +that she might mend what he had done. + +George thrust his hands into his pockets, walked to the window, and +waited. As he descended the great stairs in her wake he wished Castle +Luton and its guests at the deuce. What pleasure was to be got out of +grimacing and posing at these country-house parties? And now, according +to Letty, the Maxwells were here. A great _gêne_ for everybody! + + + + +CHAPTER XI + + +"That lady sitting by Sir George? What! Lady Maxwell? No--the other side? +Oh! that's Lady Leven. Don't you know her? She's tremendous fun!" + +And the dark-eyed, rosy-cheeked young man who was sitting beside Letty +nodded and smiled across the table to Betty Leven, merely by way of +reminding her of his existence. They had greeted before dinner--a +greeting of comrades. + +Then he turned back, with sudden decorum, to this Lady Tressady, whom he +had been commissioned to take in to dinner. "Quite pretty, but +rather--well, ordinary!" he said to himself, with a critical coolness +bred of much familiarity with the best things of Vanity Fair. He had been +Ancoats's friend at Cambridge, and was now disporting himself in the +Guards, but still more--as Letty of course assumed--in the heart of the +English well-born world. She knew that he was Lord Naseby, and that some +day he would be a marquis. A halo, therefore, shone about him. At the +same time, she had a long experience of young men, and, if she flattered +him, it was only indirectly, by a sort of teasing aggression that did not +allow him to take his attention from her. + +"I declare you are better than any peerage!" she said to him presently, +when he had given her a short biography, first of Lord Cathedine, who was +sitting opposite, then of various other members of the company. "I should +like to tie you to my fan when I go out to dinner." + +"Would you?" said the young man, drily. "Oh! you will soon know all you +want to know." + +"How are poor little people from Yorkshire to find their way about in +this big world? You are all so dreadfully absorbed in each other. In the +first place, you all marry each other." + +"Do we?--though I don't quite understand who 'we' means. Well, one +must marry somebody, I suppose, and cousins are less trouble than +other people." + +Involuntarily, the young man's eyes travelled along the table to a fair +girl on the opposite side, dazzlingly dressed in black. She was wielding +a large fan of black feathers, which threw both hair and complexion into +amazing relief; and she seemed to be amusing herself in a nervous, +spasmodic way with Sir Frank Leven. Letty noticed his glance. + +"Oh! you have not earned your testimonial yet, not by any manner of +means," she said. "That is Lady Madeleine Penley, isn't it? Is she a +relation of Mrs. Allison's?" + +"She is a cousin. That is her mother, Lady Kent, sitting beside poor +Ancoats. Such an old character! By the end of dinner she will have got to +the bottom of Ancoats, or know the reason why." + +"Is Lord Ancoats such a mystery?" said Letty, running an inquisitive +eye over the black front, sharp nose, and gorgeously bejewelled neck +of a somewhat noisy and forbidding old lady sitting on the right hand +of the host. + +Young Naseby's expression in answer rather piqued her. There was a quick +flash of something that was instantly suppressed, and the youth said +composedly, + +"Oh! we are all mysteries for Lady Kent." + +But Letty noticed that his eyes strayed back to Lord Ancoats, and then +again to Lady Madeleine. He seemed to be observing them, and Letty's +sharpness at once took the hint. No doubt the handsome, large-featured +girl was here to be "looked at." Probably a good many maidens would be +passed in review before this young Sultan made his choice! By the way he +must be a good deal older than George had imagined. Clearly he left +college some time ago. What a curious face he had--a small, crumpled +face, with very prominent blue eyes; curly hair of a reddish colour, +piled high, as though for effect, above his white brow; together with a +sharp chin and pointed moustache, which gave him the air of an old French +portrait. He was short in stature, but at the same time agile and +strongly built. He wore one or two fine old rings, which drew attention +to the delicacy of his hands; and his manner struck her as at once morose +and excitable. Letty regarded him with involuntary respect as the son of +Mrs. Allison--much more as the master of Castle Luton and fifty thousand +a year. But if he had not been the master of Castle Luton she would have +probably thought, and said, that he had a disagreeable Bohemian air. + +"Haven't you really made acquaintance with Lady Kent?" said Lord Naseby, +returning to the charge his laziness was somewhat at a loss for +conversation. "I should have thought she was the person one could least +escape knowing in the three kingdoms." + +"I have seen her, of course," said Letty, lightly, though, alas! untruly. +"But I am afraid you can hardly realise that I have only been three short +seasons in London--two with an old aunt, who never goes out, in Cavendish +Square, poor dull old dear! and another with Mrs. Watton, of Malford." + +"Oh! with Mrs. Watton, of Malford," said Lord Naseby, vaguely. Then he +became suddenly aware that Lady Leven, on the other side of the table, +was beckoning to him. He leant across, and they exchanged a merry war of +words about something of which Letty knew nothing. + +Letty, rather incensed, thought him a puppy, drew herself up, and looked +round at the ex-Governor beside her. She saw a fine head, the worn yellow +face and whitened hair of a man who has suffered under a hot climate, and +an agreeable, though somewhat courtly, smile. Sir Philip Wentworth was +not troubled with the boyish fastidiousness of Lord Naseby. He perceived +merely that a pretty young woman wished to make friends with him, and met +her wish at once. Moreover, he identified her as the wife of that +"promising and well-informed fellow, Tressady," with whom he had first +made friends in India, and had now--just before dinner--renewed +acquaintance in the most cordial fashion. + +He talked graciously to the wife, then, of Tressady's abilities and +Tressady's career. Letty at first liked it. Then she was seized with a +curious sense of discomfort. + +Her eyes wandered towards the head of the table, where George was +talking--why! actually talking earnestly, and as though he were enjoying +himself, to Lady Maxwell, whose noble head and neck, rising from a silver +white dress, challenged a great Genoese Vandyck of a Marehesa Balbi which +was hanging just behind her, and challenged it victoriously. + +So other people thought and said these things of George? Letty +was for a moment sharply conscious that they had not occupied much +place in her mind since her marriage, or, for the matter of that, +since her engagement. She had taken it for granted that he was +"distinguished"--that was part of the bargain. Only, she never seemed as +yet to have had either time or thought to give to those parts and +elements in his life which led people to talk of him as this old Indian +was doing. + +Curtains, carpets, gowns, cabinets; additions to Ferth; her own effect in +society; how to keep Lady Tressady in her place--of all these things she +had thought, and thought much. But George's honourable ambitions, the +esteem in which he was held, the place he was to make for himself in the +world of men--in thinking of _these_ her mind was all stiff and +unpractised. She was conscious first of a moral prick, then of a certain +irritation with other people. + +Yet she could not help watching George wistfully. He looked tired and +pale, in spite of the animation of his talk. Well! no doubt she looked +pale too. Some of the words and phrases of their quarrel flashed across +her. In this beautiful room, with its famous pictures and its historical +associations, amid this accumulated art and wealth, the whole thing was +peculiarly odious to remember. Under the eyes of Vandyck's Marchesa one +would have liked to think of oneself as always dignified and refined, +always elegant and calm. + +Then Letty had a revulsion, and laughed at herself. + +"As if these people didn't have tempers, and quarrel about money! Of +course they do! And if they don't--well, we all know how easy it is to be +amiable on fifty thousand a year." + + * * * * * + +After dinner Mrs. Allison led the way to the "Green Drawing-room." This +room, hung with Gainsborough portraits, was one of the sights of the +house, and tonight Marcella Maxwell especially looked round her on +entering it, with enchantment. + +"You happy people!" she said to Mrs. Allison. "I never come into this +room without anxiously asking myself whether I am fit to make one of the +company. I look at my dress, or I am doubtful about my manners, or I wish +someone had taught me to dance the minuet!" + +"Yes," said Betty Leven, running up to a vast picture, a life-size family +group, which covered the greater part of the farther wall of the room. +"What a vulgar, insignificant chit one feels oneself without cap or +powder!--without those ruffles, or those tippets, or those quilted +petticoats! Mrs. Allison, _may_ my maid come down to-morrow while we are +at dinner and take the pattern of those ruffles? No--no! she sha'n't! +Sacrilege! You pretty thing!" she said, addressing a figure--the figure +of a girl in white with thin virginal arms and bust, who seemed to be +coming out of the picture, almost to be already out of it and in the +room. "Come and talk to me. Don't think any more of your father and +mother there. You have been curtsying to them for a hundred years; and +they are rather dull, stupid people, after all. Come and tell us secrets. +Tell us what you have seen in this room--all the foolish people making +love, and the sad people saying good-bye." + +Betty was kneeling on a carved chair, her pretty arms leaning on the back +of it, her eyes fixed half-in laughter, half in sentiment, on the figure +in the picture. + +Lady Maxwell suddenly moved closer to her, and Letty heard her say in a +low voice, as she put her hand on Lady Leven's arm: + +"Don't, Betty! _don't!_ It was in this room he proposed to her, and +it was in this room he said goodbye. Maxwell has often told me. I +believe she never comes in here alone--only for ceremony and when +there is a crowd." + +A look of consternation crossed Lady Leven's lively little face. She +glanced shyly towards Mrs. Allison. That lady had moved hastily away from +the group in front of the picture. She was sitting by herself, looking +straight before her, with a certain stiffness, her thin hands crossed on +her knee. Betty impetuously went towards her, and was soon sitting on a +stool beside her, chattering to her and amusing her. + +Meanwhile Marcella invited Lady Tressady to come and sit with her on a +sofa beneath the great picture. + +Letty followed her, settled her satin skirts in their most graceful +folds, put one little foot on a Louis Quinze footstool which seemed +to invite it, and then began to inform herself about the house and +the family. + +At the beginning of their talk it was clear that Lady Maxwell wished to +ingratiate herself. A friendly observer would have thought that she was +trying to make a stranger feel more at ease in this house and circle, +where she herself was a familiar guest. Betty Leven, catching sight of +the pair from the other side of the room, said to herself, with inward +amusement, that Marcella was "realising the wife." + +At any rate, for some time Lady Maxwell talked with sympathy, with +effusion even, to her companion. In the first place she told her the +story of their hostess. + +Thirty years before, Mrs. Allison, the daughter and heiress of a +Leicestershire squire, had married Henry Allison, old Lord Ancoats's +second son, a young captain in the Guards. They enjoyed three years of +life together; then the chances of a soldier's career, as interpreted by +two high-minded people, took Henry Allison out to an obscure African +coast, to fight one of the innumerable "little wars" of his country. He +fell, struck by a spear, in a single-file march through some nameless +swamp; and a few days afterwards the words of a Foreign Office telegram +broke a pining woman's heart. + +Old Lord Ancoats's death, which followed within a month or two, was +hastened by the shock of his son's loss; and before the year was out the +eldest son, who was sickly and unmarried, also died, and Mrs. Allison's +boy, a child of two, became the owner of Castle Luton. The mother saw +herself called upon to fight down her grief, to relinquish the +quasi-religious life she had entered upon, and instead to take her boy to +the kingdom he was to rule, and bring him up there. + +"And for twenty-two years she has lived a wonderful life here," said +Marcella; "she has been practically the queen of a whole countryside, +doing whatever she pleased, the mother and friend and saint of everybody. +It has been all very paternal and beautiful, and--abominably Tory and +tyrannous! Many people, I suppose, think it perfect. Perhaps I don't. But +then, I know very well I can't possibly disagree with her a tenth part as +strongly as she disagrees with me." + +"Oh! but she admires you so much," cried Letty, with effusion; "she +thinks you mean so nobly!" + +Marcella opened her eyes, involuntarily wondering a little what Lady +Tressady might know about it. + +"Oh! we don't hate each other," she said, rather drily, "in spite of +politics. And my husband was Ancoats's guardian." + +"Dear me!" said Letty. "I should think it wasn't easy to be guardian to +fifty thousand a year." + +Marcella did not answer--did not, indeed, hear. Her look had stolen +across to Mrs. Allison--a sad, affectionate look, in no way meant for +Lady Tressady. But Letty noticed it. + +"I suppose she adores him," she said. + +Marcella sighed. + +"There was never anything like it. It frightens one to see." + +"And that, of course, is why she won't marry Lord Fontenoy?" + +Marcella started, and drew away from her companion. + +"I don't know," she said stiffly; "and I am sure that no one ever dared +to ask her." + +"Oh! but of course it's what everyone says," said Letty, gay and +unabashed. "That's what makes it so exciting to come here, when one knows +Lord Fontenoy so very well." + +Marcella met this remark with a discouraging silence. + +Letty, however, was determined this time to make her impression. She +plunged into a lively and often audacious gossip about every person in +the room in turn, asking a number of intimate or impertinent questions, +and yet very seldom waiting for Marcella's reply, so anxious was she to +show off her own information and make her own comments. She let Marcella +understand that she suspected a great deal, in the matter of that +handsome Lady Madeleine. It was _immensely_ interesting, of course; but +wasn't Lord Ancoats a trifle wild?--she bent over and whispered in +Marcella's ears; was it likely that he would settle himself so +soon?--didn't one hear sad tales of his theatrical friends and the rest? +And what could one expect! As if a young man in such a position was not +certain to have his fling! And his mother would have to put up with it. +After all, men quieted down at last. Look at Lord Cathedine! + +And with an air of boundless knowledge she touched upon the incidents of +Lord Cathedine's career, hashing up, with skilful deductions of her own, +all that Lord Naseby had said or hinted to her at dinner. Poor Lady +Cathedine! didn't she look a walking skeleton, with her strange, +melancholy face, and every bone showing? Well, who could wonder! And when +one thought of their money difficulties, too! + +Lady Tressady lifted her white shoulders in compassion. + +By this time Marcella's black eyes were wandering insistently round the +room, searching for means of escape. Betty, far away, noticed her air, +and concluded that the "realisation" was making rapid, too rapid, +progress. Presently, with a smiling shake of her little head, she left +her own seat and went to her friend's assistance. + +At the same moment Mrs. Allison, driven by her conscience as a hostess, +got up for the purpose of introducing Lady Tressady to a lady in grey who +had been sitting quiet, and, as Mrs. Allison feared, lonely, in a corner, +looking over some photographs. Marcella, who had also risen, put out a +hand to Betty, and the two moved away together. + + * * * * * + +They stopped on the threshold of a large window at the side of the room, +which stood wide open to the night. Outside, beyond a broad flight of +steps, stretched a formal Dutch garden. Its numberless small beds, +forming stiff scrolls and circles on a ground of white gravel, lay in +bright moonlight. Even the colours of the hyacinths and tulips with which +they were planted could be seen, and the strong scent from them filled +the still air. At the far end of this flat-patterned place a group of +tall cypress and ilex, black against the sky, struck a note of Italy and +the South; while, through the yew hedges which closed in the little +garden, broad archways pierced at intervals revealed far breadths of +silvery English lawn and the distant gleam of the river. + +"Well, my dear," said Betty, laughing, and slipping her arm through +Marcella's as they stood in the opening of the window, "I see you have +been doing your duty for once. Let me pat you on the back. All the more +that I gather you are not exactly enchanted with Lady Tressady. You +really should keep your face in order. From the other end of the room I +know exactly what you think of the person you are talking to." + +"Do you?" said Marcella, penitently. "I wish you didn't." + +"Well you may wish it, for it doesn't help the political lady to get what +she wants. However, I don't think that Lady Tressady has found out yet +that you don't like her. She isn't thin-skinned. If you had looked like +that when you were talking to me, I would have paid you out somehow. What +is the matter with her?" + +"Oh! I don't know," said Marcella, impatiently, raising her shoulders. +"But she jarred. I pined to get away--I don't think I ever want to talk +to her again." + +"No," said Betty, ruminating; "I'll tell you what it is--she isn't a +gentleman! Don't interrupt me! I mean exactly what I say--_she isn't a +gentleman_. She would do and say all the things that a nice man squirms +at. I always have the oddest fancy about that kind of person. I see them +as they must be at night--all the fine clothes gone--just a little black +soul scrawled between the bedclothes!" + +"_You_ to call me censorious!" said Marcella, laughing, and pinching her +friend's arm. + +"My dear, as I have often before remarked to you, _I_ am not a great +lady, with a political campaign to tight. If you knew your business, you +would make friends with the mammon of unrighteousness in the shape of +Lady Tressadys. _I_ may do what I please--I have only a husband to +manage!" and Betty's light voice dropped into a sigh. + +"Poor Betty!" said Marcella, patting her hand. "Is Frank as +discontented as ever?" + +"He told me yesterday he hated his existence, and thought he would try +whether the Serpentine would drown him. I said I was agreeable, only he +would never achieve it without me. I should have to 'tice away the police +while he looked for the right spot. So he has promised to take me into +partnership, and it's all right so far." + +Then Betty fell to sighing in earnest. + +"It's all very well 'chaffing,' but I am a miserable woman. Frank says +I have ruined his life; that it's all my ambition; that he might have +made a decent country gentleman if I hadn't sown the seed of every vice +in him by driving him into politics. Pleasant, isn't it, for a model +wife like me?" + +"You'll have to let him give it up," said Marcella, smiling; "I don't +believe he'll ever reconcile himself to the grind and the town life." + +Betty clenched her small hands. + +"My dear! I never promised to marry a sporting boor, and I can't yet +make up my mind to sink to it. Don't let's talk of it! I only hope he'll +vote straight in the next few months. But the thought of being kept +through August drives him desperate already. Ah! here they are--plagues +of the human race!--" and she waved an accusing hand towards the incoming +stream of gentlemen. "Now, I'll prophesy, and you watch. Lady Tressady +will make two friends here--Harding Watton--oh! I forgot, he's her +cousin!--and Lord Cathedine. Mark my words. By the way--" Betty caught +Marcella's arm and spoke eagerly into her friend's ear. Her eyes +meanwhile glanced over her shoulder towards Lady Madeleine and her +mother, who were seated on the further side of the room. + +Marcella's look followed Betty's, but she showed no readiness to answer +Betty's questions. When Letty had made her astonishing remarks on the +subject of Madeleine Penley, Lady Maxwell had tried to stop her with a +hauteur which would have abashed most women, though it had but small +effect on the bride. And now, even to Betty, who was Madeleine Penley's +friend, Marcella was not communicative; although when Betty was carried +off by Lord Naseby who came in search of her as soon as he entered the +drawing-room, the elder woman stood for a moment by the window, watching +the girl they had been talking of with a soft serious look. + +But the softness passed. A slight incident disturbed it. For the +spectator saw Lady Kent, who was sitting beside her daughter, raise a +gigantic fan and beckon to Lord Ancoats. He came unwillingly, and she +made some bantering remark. Lady Madeleine meanwhile was bending over a +book of photographs, with a flushed cheek and a look of constraint. +Ancoats stood near her for a moment uneasily, frowning and pulling at his +moustache. Then with an abrupt word to Lady Kent, he turned away and +threw himself on a sofa beside Lord Cathedine. Lady Madeleine bent lower +over her book, her beautiful hair making a spot of fire in the room. +Marcella caught the expression of her profile, and her own face took a +look of pain. She would have liked to go instantly to the girl's side, +with some tenderness, some caress. But that gorgon Lady Kent, now looking +extremely fierce, was in the way, and moreover other young men had +arrived to take the place Ancoats had apparently refused. + +Meanwhile Letty saw the arrival of the gentlemen with delight. She had +found but small entertainment in the lady to whom Mrs. Allison had +introduced her. Miss Paston, the sister of Lord Ancoats's agent, was a +pleasant-looking spinster of thirty-five in a Quakerish dress of grey +silk. Her face bore witness that she was capable and refined. But Letty +felt no desire whatever to explore capability and refinement. She had not +come to Castle Luton to make herself agreeable to Miss Paston. + +So the conversation languished. Letty yawned a little, and flourished her +fan a great deal, till the appearance of the men brought back the flush +to her cheek and animation to her eye. She drew herself up at once, +hungry for notice and success. Mrs. Hawkins, the vicar's wife at +Malford, would have been avenged could she have watched her old tyrant +under these chastening circumstances. + +Harding Watton crossed the room when he saw his cousin, and took the +corner of the sofa beside her. Letty received him graciously, though she +was perhaps disappointed that it was not Lord Ancoats or Lord Cathedine. +Looking round before she gave herself to conversation with him, she saw +that George was standing near the open window with Lord Maxwell and Sir +Philip Wentworth, the ex-Governor. They were talking of India, and Sir +Philip had his hand on George's arm. + +"Yes, I saw Dalliousie go," he said eagerly. "I was only a lad of twenty, +but I can't think of it now without a lump in my throat. When he limped +on to the Hooghly landing-stage on his crutches we couldn't cheer him--I +shall never forget that sudden silence! In eight years he had made a new +India, and there we saw him,--our little hero,--dying of his work at +forty-six before our eyes! ... Well, I couldn't have imagined that a +young man like you would have known or cared so much about that time. +What a talk we have had! Thank you!" + +And the veteran tightened his grip cordially for a moment on Tressady's +arm, then dropped it and walked away. + +Tressady threw his wife a bright glance, as though to ask her how she +fared. Letty smiled graciously in reply, feeling a sudden softening +pleasure in being so thought of. As her eyes met her husband's she saw +Marcella Maxwell, who was still standing by the window, turn towards +George and call to him. George moved forward with alacrity. Then he and +Lady Maxwell slowly walked down the steps to the garden, and disappeared +through one of the archways to the left. + +"That great lady and George seem at last to have made friends," said +Harding Watton to Letty, in a laughing undertone. "I have no doubt she is +trying to win him over. Well she may! Before the next few weeks are over +the Government will be in a fix with this Bill; and not even their +'beautiful lady' will help them out. Maxwell looks as glum as an owl +to-night." + +Letty laughed. The situation pleased her vanity a good deal. The +thought of Lady Maxwell humiliated and defeated--partly by George's +means--was decidedly agreeable to her. Which would seem to show that +she was, after all, more sensitive or more quick-eyed than Betty Leven +had been ready to allow. + + * * * * * + +Meanwhile Marcella and George Tressady were strolling slowly towards the +river, along a path that crossed the great lawns. In front of them the +stretches of grass, bathed in silvery light and air, ran into far +distances of shade under majestic trees just thickening to a June wealth +of foliage. Below, these distant tree-masses made sharp capes and +promontories on the white grass; above, their rounded tops rose dark +against a blue, light-breathing sky. At one point the river pierced the +blackness of the wood, and in the space thus made the spire of a noble +church shot heavenward. Swans floated dimly along the stream and under +the bridge. The air was fresh, but the rawness of spring was gone. It was +the last week of May; the "high midsummer pomps" were near--a heavenly +prophecy in wood and field. + +And not even Tressady's prejudice--which, indeed, was already +vanishing--could fail to see in the beautiful woman beside him the +fitting voice and spirit of such a scene. + +To-night he said to himself that one must needs believe her simple, in +spite of report. During their companionship this evening she had shown +him more and more plainly that she liked his society; her manner towards +him, indeed, had by now a soft surrender and friendliness that no man +could possibly have met with roughness, least of all a man young and +ambitious. But at the same time he noticed again, as he had once noticed +with anger, that she was curiously free from the usual feminine arts and +wiles. After their long talk at dinner, indeed, he began, in spite of +himself, to feel her not merely an intellectual comrade,--that he had +been conscious of from the first,--but rather a most winning and +attaching companion. It was a sentiment of friendly ease, that seemed to +bring with it a great relief from tension. The sordid cares and frictions +of the last few weeks, and the degrading memories of the day itself, +alike ceased to wear him. + +Yet all the time he said to himself, with inward amusement, that he must +take care! They had not talked directly of the Bill at dinner, but they +had talked round and about it incessantly. It was clear that the Maxwells +were personally very anxious; and George knew well that the public +position of the Ministry was daily becoming more difficult. There had +been a marked cooling on the subject of the Bill among their own +supporters; one or two London members originally pledged to it were even +believed to be wavering; and this campaign lately started by Fontenoy and +Watton against two of the leading clauses of the measure, in a London +"daily," bought for the purpose, had been so far extremely damaging. The +situation was threatening indeed, and Maxwell might well look harassed. + +Yet Tressady had detected no bitterness in Lady Maxwell's mood. Her +temper rather seemed to him very strenuous, very eager, and a little sad. +Altogether, he had been touched, he knew not exactly why, by his +conversation with her. "We are going to win," he said to himself, "and +she knows it." Yet to think thus gave him, for the first time, no +particular pleasure. + +As they strolled along they talked a little of some of the topics that +had been started at dinner, topics semi-political and semi-social, till +suddenly Lady Maxwell said, with a change of voice: + +"I heard some of your conversation with Sir Philip just now. How +differently you talk when you talk of India!" + +"I wonder what that means," said George, smiling. "It means, at any rate, +that when I am not talking of India, but of English labour, or the poor, +you think I talk like a brute." + +"I shouldn't put it like that," she said quietly. "But when you talk of +India, and people like the Lawrences or Lord Dalhousie, then it is that +one sees what you really admire--what stirs you--what makes you feel." + +"Well, ought I not to feel? Is there to be no gratitude towards the +people that have made one's country?" + +He looked down, upon her gaily, perfectly conscious of his own +tickled vanity. To be observed and analysed by such a critic was in +itself flattery. + +"That have made one's country?" she repeated, not without a touch of +irony. Then suddenly she became silent. + +George thrust his hands into his pockets and waited a little. + +"Well?" he said presently. "Well? I am waiting to hear you prove that +the Dalhousies and the Lawrences have done nothing for the country, +compared to--what shall we say?--some trade-union secretary whom you +particularly admire." + +She laughed, but he did not immediately draw his answer. They had reached +the river-bank and the steps of the little bridge. Marcella mounted the +bridge and paused midway across it, hanging over the parapet. He followed +her, and both stood gazing at the house. It rose from the grass like some +fabric of yellowish ivory cut and scrolled and fretted by its Tudor +architect, who had been also a goldsmith. There were lights like jewels +in its latticed windows; the dark fulness of the trees, disposed by an +artist-hand, enwrapped or fell away from it as the eye required; and on +the dazzling lawns, crossed by soft bands of shadow, scattered forms +moved up and down--women in trailing dresses, and black-coated men. +There were occasional sallies of talk and laughter, and from the open +window of the drawing-room came the notes of a violin. + +"Brahms!" said Marcella, with delight. "Nothing but music and he could +express this night--or the river--or the rising glow and bloom of +everything." + +As she spoke George felt a quick gust of pleasure and romance sweep +across him. It was as though senses that had been for long on the +defensive, tired, or teased merely by the world, gave way in a moment to +joy and poetry. He looked from the face beside him to the pictured scene +in which they stood--the soft air filled his lungs--what ailed him?--he +only knew that after many weeks he was, somehow, happy and buoyant again! + +Lady Maxwell, however, soon forgot the music and the moonlight. + +"That have made one's country?" she repeated, pausing on the words. +"And of course that house appeals to you in the same way? Famous people +have lived in it--people who belong to history. But for _me_, the real +making of one's country is done out of sight, in garrets and workshops +and coalpits, by people who die every minute--forgotten--swept into +heaps like autumn leaves, their lives mere soil and foothold for the +generation that comes after them. All yesterday morning, for instance, +I spent trying to feed a woman I know. She is a shirtmaker; she has +four children, and her husband is a docker out of work. She had sewed +herself sick and blind. She couldn't eat, and she couldn't sleep. But +she had kept the children alive--and the man. Her life will flicker +out in a month or two; but the children's lives will have taken root, +and the man will be eating and earning again. What use would your +Dalhousies and Lawrences be to England without her and the hundreds of +thousands like her?" + +"And yet it is you," cried George, unable to forbear the chance she gave +him, "who would take away from this very woman the power of feeding her +children and saving her husband--who would spoil all the lives in the +clumsy attempt to mend one of them. How can you quote me such an +instance! It amazes me." + +"Not at all. I have only to use my instance for another purpose, in +another way. You are thinking of the Bill, of course? But all we do is to +say to some of these victims, 'Your sacrifice, as it stands, is _too_ +costly; the State in its own interest cannot go on exacting or allowing +it. We will help you to serve the community in ways that shall exhaust +and wound it less.'" + +"And as a first step, drive you all comfortably into the workhouse!" said +George. "Don't omit that." + +"Many individuals must suffer," she said steadily. "But there will be +friends to help--friends that will strain every nerve to help." + +All her heart showed itself in voice and emphasis. Almost for the first +time in their evening's talk her natural passionateness came to +sight--the Southern, impulsive temper, that so often made people laugh at +or dislike her. Under the lace shawl she had thrown round her on coming +out he saw the quick rise and fall of the breast, the nervous clasp of +the hands lying on the stonework of the bridge. These were her prophetess +airs again. To-night they still amused him, but in a gentler and more +friendly way. + +"And so, according to your own account, you will protect your tailoress +and unmake your country. I am sorry for your dilemma," he said, laughing. + +"Ah! well,"--she shrugged her shoulders with a sigh,--"don't let's talk +of it. It's all too pressing--and sore--and hot. And to think of the +weeks that are just coming on!" + +George, hanging over the parapet beside her, felt reply a little +awkward, and said nothing. For a minute or two the night made itself +heard, the gentle slipping of the river, the fitful breathings from the +trees. A swan passed and repassed below them, and an owl called from the +distant woods. + +Presently Marcella lifted a white finger and pointed to the house. + +"One wouldn't want a better parable," she said. "It's like the State as +you see it--magnificent, inspiring, a thing of pomp and dignity. But we +women, who have to drive and keep going a house like that--_we_ know what +it all rests upon. It rests upon a few tired kitchen-maids and boot-boys +and scullery-girls, hurrying, panting creatures, whom a guest never sees, +who really run it all. I know, for I have tried to unearth them, to +organise them, to make sure that no one was fainting while we were +feasting. But it is incredibly hard; half the human race believes itself +born to make things easy for the other half. It comes natural to them to +ache and toil while we sit in easy chairs. What they resent is that we +should try to change it." + +"Goodness!" said George, pulling at his moustaches. "I don't recognise my +own experience of the ordinary domestic polity in that summary." + +"I daresay. You have to do with the upper servant, who is always a +greater tyrant than his master," she retorted, her voice expressing a +curious medley of laughter and feeling. "I am speaking of the people +that are not seen, like the tailoress and shirtmaker, in your +drum-and-trumpet State." + +"Well, you may be right," said George, drily. "But I confess--if I may +be quite frank--that I don't altogether trust you to judge. I want at +least, before I strike the balance between my Dalhousie and your +tailoress, to hear what those people have to say who have not crippled +their minds--by pity!" + +"Pity!" she said, her lip trembling in spite of herself. "Pity!--you +count pity a disease?" + +"As you--and others--practise it," he replied coolly, turning round upon +her. "It is no good; the world can't be run by pity. At least, living +always seems to me a great brutal, rushing, rough-and-tumble business, +which has to be carried on whether we like it or no. To be too careful, +too gingerly over the separate life, brings it all to a standstill. +Meddle too much, and the Demiurge who set the machine going turns sulky +and stops working. Then the nation goes to pieces--till some strong +ruffian without a scruple puts it together again." + +"What do you mean by the Demiurge?" + +He laughed. + +"Why do you make me explain my flights? Well, I suppose, the natural +daimonic power in things, which keeps them going and set them off; which +is not us, or like us, and cares nothing for us." + +His light voice developed a sudden energy during his little speech. + +"Ah!" said Marcella, wistfully. "Yes, if one thought that, I could +understand. But, even so, if the power behind things cares nothing for +us, I should only regard it as challenging us to care more for each +other. Do you mind my asking you a few plain questions? Do you know +anything personally of the London poor? I mean, have you any real friends +among them, whose lives you know?" + +"Well, I sit with Fontenoy while he receives deputations from all those +tailoresses and shirtmakers and fur-sewers that _you_ want to put in +order. The harassed widow streams through his room perpetually--wailing +to be let alone!" + +Marcella made a sound of amused scorn. + +"Oh! you think that nothing," said George, indignant. "I vow I could draw +every type of widow that London contains--I know them intimately." + +She shook her head. + +"I give up London. Then, in the North, aren't you a coal-owner? Do you +know your miners?" + +"Yes, and I detest them!" said George, shortly; "pig-headed brutes! They +will be on strike next month, and I shall be defrauded of my lawful +income till their lordships choose to go back. Pity _me_, if you +please--not them!" + +"So I do," she said with spirit--"if you hate the men by whom you live!" + +There was silence. Then suddenly George said, in another tone: + +"But sometimes, I don't deny, the beggars wring it out of one--your pity. +I saw a mother last week--Suppose we stroll on a little. I want to see +how the river gets out of the wood." + +They descended the bridge, and turned again into the river-path. George +told the story of Mary Batchelor in his half-ironic way, yet so that here +and there Marcella shivered. Then gradually, as though it were a relief +to him to talk, he slipped into a half-humorous, half-serious discussion +of his mine-owner's position and its difficulties. Incidentally and +unconsciously a good deal of his history betrayed itself in his talk: his +bringing-up, his mother; the various problems started in his mind since +his return from India; even his relations to his wife. Once or twice it +flashed across him that he was confessing himself with an extraordinary +frankness to a woman he had made up his mind to dislike. But the +reflection did not stop him. The balmy night, the solitude, this +loveliness that walked beside him so willingly and kindly--with every +step they struck his defences from him; they drew; they penetrated. + +With her, too, everything was simple and natural. She had felt his +attraction at their first meeting; she had determined to make a friend of +him; and she was succeeding. As he disclosed himself she felt a strange +compassion for him. It was plain to her woman's instinct that he was at +heart lonely and uncompanioned. Well, what wonder with that hard, mean +little being for a wife! Had she captured him, or had he thrown himself +away upon her in mere wantonness, out of that defiance of sentiment which +appeared to be his favourite _parti-pris?_ In any case, it seemed to this +happy wife that he had done the one fatal and irreparable thing; and she +was genuinely sorry for him. She felt him very young, too. As far as she +could gather, he was about two years her junior; but her feeling made the +gap much greater. + +Yet, of course, the situation,--Maxwell, Fontenoy,--all that those names +implied to him and her, made a thrilling under-note in both their minds. +She never forgot her husband and his straits; and in George's mind +Fontenoy's rugged figure stood sentinel. Given the circumstances, both +her temperament and her affections drove her inevitably into trying, +first to attract, then to move and influence her companion. And given the +circumstances, he could but yield himself bit by bit to her woman's +charm; while full all the time of a confident scorn for her politics. + +Insensibly, the stress upon them drew them back to London and to current +affairs, and at last she said to him, with vehemence: + +"You _must_ see these people in the flesh--and not in your house, but in +theirs. Or, first come and meet them in mine?" + +"Why, please, should you think St. James's Square a palace of truth +compared to Carlton House Terrace?" he asked her, with amusement. +Fontenoy lived in Carlton House Terrace. + +"I am not inviting you to St. James's Square," she said quietly. "That +house is only my home for one set of purposes. Just now my true home is +not there at all. It is in the Mile End Road." + +George asked to be informed, and opened his eyes at her account of the +way in which she still divided her time between the West End and the +East, spending always one or two nights a week among the trades and the +work-people she had come to know so intimately, whose cause she was +fighting with such persistence. + +"Maxwell doesn't come now," she said. "He is too busy, and his work there +is done. But I go because I love the people, and to talk with them and +live with them part of every week keeps one's mind clear as to what one +wants, and why. Well,"--her voice showed that she smiled,--"will you +come? My old maid shall give you coffee, and you shall meet a roomful of +tailors and shirtmakers. You shall see what people look like in the +flesh--not on paper--after working fourteen hours at a stretch, in a room +where you and I could not breathe!" + +"Charming!"--he bowed ironically. "Of course I will come." + +They had paused under the shadow of a grove of beech-trees, and were +looking back towards the moonlit garden and the house. Suddenly George +said, in an odd voice: + +"Do you mind my saying it? You know, nobody is ever +converted--politically--nowadays." + +In the darkness her flush could not be seen. But he felt the mingled +pride and soreness in her voice, under its forced brightness. + +"I know. How long is it since a speech turned a vote in the House of +Commons! One wonders why people take the trouble to speak. Shall we go +back? Ah! there is someone pursuing us--my husband and Ancoats!" + +And two figures, dark for an instant against the brightness of the lawns, +plunged into the shadow of the wood. + +"You wanderers!" said Maxwell, as he distinguished his wife's white +dress. "Is this path quite safe in this darkness? Suppose we get +out of it." + +The river, indeed, beneath a steep bank, ran close beside them, and +the trees meeting overhead all but shut out the moon. Maxwell, in some +anxiety, caught his wife's arm, and made her pause till his eye should +be once more certain of the path. Meanwhile Ancoats and Tressady +walked quickly back to the lawn, Ancoats talking and laughing with +unusual vigour. + + * * * * * + +The Maxwells did not hurry themselves. As they emerged from the wood +Marcella slipped her hand into her husband's. It was her characteristic +caress. The slim, strong hand loved to feel itself in the shelter of +his; while to him that seeking touch was the symbol of all that she +brought him--the inventive, inexhaustible arts of a passion which was a +kind of genius. + +"Don't go in!" she pleaded. "Why should we?" + +"No!--why should we?" he repeated, sighing. "Why are we here at +all?--that is what I have been asking myself all the evening. And now +more than ever since my walk with that boy Ancoats." + +"Tell me about it," she said eagerly. "Could you get nothing out of +him?" + +Maxwell shrugged his shoulders. + +"Nothing. He vows that everything is all right; that he knows a pack of +slanderers have been 'yelping at him,' and he wishes both they and his +mother would let him alone." + +"His mother!" cried Marcella, outraged. + +"Well, I suppose I said to him the kind of thing you would evidently like +to say. But with no result. He merely laughed, and chattered about +everything under the sun--his race-horses, new plays, politics--Heaven +knows what! He is in an excited state--feverish, restless, and, I should +think, unhappy. But he would tell nothing--to me." + +"How much do you think she knows?" + +"His mother? Nothing, I should say. Every now and then I detect a note of +extra anxiety when she talks to him; and there is evidently something in +her mind, some impression from his manner, perhaps, which is driving her +more keenly than ever towards this marriage. But I don't believe a single +one of the stories that have reached us has reached her. And now--here is +this poor girl--and even my dull eyes have noticed that to-night he has +purposely, markedly, avoided her." + +Marcella felt her cheek flame. + +"And when one thinks of his behaviour in the winter!" she cried. + +They wandered on along a path that skirted the wood, talking anxiously +about the matter which had in truth brought them to Castle Luton. In +spite of the comparative gentleness of English political relations, +neither Maxwell nor Marcella, perhaps, would willingly have become +Charlotte Allison's guests at a moment when her house was actually the +headquarters of a violent and effective opposition to Maxwell's policy, +when moreover the leader of that opposition was likely to be of the +party. But about a fortnight before Whitsuntide some tales of young +Ancoats had suddenly reached Maxwell's ears, with such effect that on his +next meeting with Ancoats's mother he practically invited himself and +Marcella--greatly to Mrs. Allison's surprise--to Castle Luton for +Whitsuntide. + +For the boy had been Maxwell's ward, and Henry Allison had been the +intimate friend and comrade of Maxwell's father. And Maxwell's feeling +for his father, and for his father's friends, was of such a kind that his +guardian's duties had gone deep with him. He had done his best for the +boy, and since Ancoats had reached his majority his ex-guardian had still +kept him anxiously in mind. + +Of late indeed Ancoats had troubled himself very little about his +guardian, or his guardian's anxieties. He seemed to have been devoting a +large share of his mind to the avoidance of his mother's old friends; and +the Maxwells, for months, in spite of many efforts on their part, had +seen little or nothing of him. Maxwell for various reasons had begun to +suspect a number of uncomfortable things with regard to the young +fellow's friends and pleasures. Yet nothing could be taken hold of till +this sudden emergence of a particular group of stories, coupling +Ancoats's name with that of a notorious little actress whose adventures +had already provided a certain class of newspaper with abundant copy. + +Then Maxwell, who cared personally very little for the red-haired youth +himself, took alarm for the mother's sake. For in the case of Mrs. +Allison a scandal of the kind suggested meant a tragedy. Her passion for +her son was almost a tragedy already, so closely mingled in it were the +feelings of the mother and those of the Christian, to whom "vice" is not +an amusement, but an agony. + + * * * * * + +Yet, as Marcella said and felt, it was a hard fate that had forced +Maxwell to concern himself with Ancoats's love-affairs at this +particular moment. + +"Don't think of it," she said at last, urgently, as they walked along. +"It is too bad; as if there were not enough!" + +Maxwell stood still, with a little smile, and put his arm round her +shoulders. + +"Dear, I shall soon have time enough, probably, to think about Ancoats's +affairs or anything else. Do you know that I was planning this morning +what we would do when we go out? Shall we slip over to the Australian +colonies in the autumn? I would give a good deal to see them for myself." + +She gave a low cry of pain. + +"Why are you so depressed to-night? Is there any fresh news?" + +"Yes. And, altogether, things look increasingly bad for us, and +increasingly well for them. It will be extraordinarily close +anyway--probably a matter of a vote or two." And he gave her a summary +of his after-dinner conversation with Lord Cathedine, a keen ally of +Fontenoy's in the Lords, and none the less a shrewd fellow because he +happened to be also a detestable person. + +Marcella heard the news of one or two fresh defections from the +Government with amazement and indignation. She stood there in the +darkness, leaning against the man she loved, her heart beating fast and +stormily. How could the world thus misconceive and thwart him? And what +could she do? Her mind ran passionately through a hundred schemes, +refusing to submit--to see him baffled and defeated. + + + + +CHAPTER XII + + +To Lord Ancoats himself this party of his mother's was an oppression +and a nuisance. He had only been induced to preside over it with +difficulty; and his mother had been both hurt and puzzled by his +reluctance to play the host. + +If you had asked Maxwell's opinion on the point, he would have told you +that Ancoats's bringing up had a good deal to do with the present +anxieties of Ancoats's mother. He--Maxwell--had done his best, but he had +been overmatched. + +First and foremost, Ancoats had been to no public school. It was not the +custom of the family; and Mrs. Allison could not be induced to break the +tradition. There was accordingly a succession of tutors, whose +Church-principles at least were sound. And Ancoats showed himself for a +time an impressionable, mystical boy, entirely in sympathy with his +mother. His confirmation was a great family emotion, and when he was +seventeen Mrs. Allison had difficulty in making him take food enough in +Lent to keep him in health. Maxwell was beginning to wonder where it +would end, when the lad was sent to Cambridge, and the transformation +scene that might always perhaps have been expected, began. + +He had been two years at Trinity when he went to pay the Maxwells a +visit at the Court. Maxwell could hardly believe his eyes or ears. The +boy who at nineteen was an authority on church music and ancient "uses," +by twenty-one talked and thought of nothing in heaven or earth but the +stage and French _bric-à-brac._ His conversation swarmed with the names +of actors, singers, and dancers; but they were names that meant nothing +except to the initiated. They were the small people of the small +theatres; and Ancoats was a Triton among them, not at all, so he +carefully informed his kindred, because of his wealth and title, but +because he too was an artist, and could sing, revel, write, and dance +with the best of them. + +For some time Maxwell was able to console Mrs. Allison with the +historical reflection that more than one son of the Oxford Movement had +found in a passion for the stage a ready means of annoying the English +Puritan. When it came, however, to the young man's producing risky plays +of his own composing at extremely costly _matinées_, there was nothing +for it but to interfere. Maxwell at last persuaded him to give up the +farce of Cambridge and go abroad. But Ancoats would only go with a man of +his own sort; and their time was mostly spent in Paris, where Ancoats +divided his hard-spent existence between the furious pursuit of Louis +Quinze _bibelots_ and the patronage of two or three minor theatres. To be +the king of a first night, raining applause and bouquets from his +stage-box, seemed to give him infinite content; but his vanity was hardly +less flattered by the compliments say of M. Tournonville, the well-known +dealer on the Quai Voltaire, who would bow himself before the young +Englishman with the admiring cry, "Mon Dieu! milord, que vous êtes fin +connoisseur!" while the dealer's assistant grinned among the shadows of +the back-shop. + +At last, at twenty-four, he must needs return to England for his coming +of age under his grandfather's will and the taking over of his estate. +Under the sobering influence of these events, his class and his mother +seemed for a time to recover him. He refurnished a certain number of +rooms at Castle Luton, and made a special marvel of his own room, which +was hung thick with Boucher, Greuze, and Watteau engravings, littered +with miniatures and trinkets, and encumbered here and there with +portfolios of drawings which he was not anxious to unlock in his +mother's presence. + +Moreover, he was again affectionate to his mother, and occasionally even +went to church with her. The instincts of the English aristocrat +reappeared amid the accomplishments of the _petit-maître,_ and poor Mrs. +Allison's spirits revived. Then the golden-haired Lady Madeleine was +asked to stay at Castle Luton. When she came Ancoats devoted himself with +extraordinary docility. He drew her, made songs for her, and devised +French charades to act with her; he even went so far as to compare her +with enthusiasm to the latest and most wonderful "Salome" just exhibited +in the Salon by the latest and most wonderful of the impressionists. But +Lady Madeleine fortunately had not seen the picture. + +Then suddenly, one morning, Ancoats went up to town without notice and +remained there. After a while his mother pursued him thither; but Ancoats +was restless at sight of her, and she was not long in London, though +long enough to show the Maxwells and others that her heart was anxiously +set upon Lady Madeleine as a daughter-in-law. + +This then--taken together with the stories now besprinkling the +newspapers--was the situation. Naturally, Ancoats's affairs, as he +himself was irritably aware, were now, in one way or another, occupying +the secret thoughts or the private conversations of most of his +mother's guests. + +For instance-- + + * * * * * + +"Are you nice?" said Betty Leven, suddenly, to young Lord Naseby, in the +middle of Sunday morning. "Are you in a charitable, charming, humble, and +trusting frame of mind? Because, if not, I shall go away--I have had too +much of Lady Kent!" + +Charlie Naseby laughed. He was sitting reading in the shade at the edge +of one of the Castle Luton lawns. For some time past he had been watching +Betty Leven and Lady Kent, as they talked under a cedar-tree some little +distance from him. Lady Kent conversed with her whole bellicose +person--her cap, her chin, her nose, her spreading and impressive +shoulders. And from her gestures young Naseby guessed that she had been +talking to Betty Leven rather more in character than usual. + +He felt a certain curiosity about the _tête-à-tête._ So that when Betty +left her companion and came tripping over the lawn to the house, the +young man lifted his face and gave her a smiling nod, as though to invite +her to come and visit him on the way. Betty came, and then as she stood +in front of him delivered the home question already reported. + +"Am I nice?" repeated young Naseby. "Far from it. I have not been to +church, and I have been reading a French novel of which I do not even +propose to tell you the name." + +And he promptly slipped his volume into his pocket. + +"Which is worst?" said Betty, pensively: "to break the fourth +Commandment or the ninth? Lady Kent, of course, has been trampling on +them both. But the ninth is her particular victim. She calls it 'getting +to the roots of things.'" + +"Whose roots has she been delving at this morning?" said Naseby. + +Betty looked behind her, saw that Lady Kent had gone into the house, +and let herself drop into the corner of Naseby's bench with a sigh +of fatigue. + +"One feels as though one were a sort of house-dog tussling with a +burglar. I have been keeping her off all my friends' secrets by main +force; so she had to fall back on George Tressady, and tell me ugly tales +of his mamma." + +"George Tressady! Why on earth should she do him an ill turn? I don't +believe she ever saw him before." + +Betty pressed her lips. She and Charlie Naseby had been friends since +they wore round pinafores and sat on high nursery chairs side by side. + +"One needn't go to the roots of things," she said, severely, "but one +should have eyes in one's head. Has it ever occurred to you that Ancoats +has taken a special fancy to Sir George--that he sat talking to him last +night till all hours, and that he has been walking about with him the +whole of this morning, instead of walking about--well! with somebody +else--as he was meant to do? Why do men behave in this ridiculous manner? +Women, of course. But _men!_ It's like a trout that won't let itself be +landed. And what's the good? It's only prolonging the agony." + +"Not at all," said Naseby, laughing. "There's always the chance of +slipping the hook." Then his lively face became suddenly serious. "But +it's time, I think," he added, almost with vehemence, "that Lady Kent +stopped trying to land Ancoats. In the first place, it's no good. He +won't be landed against his will. In the next--well, I only know," he +broke off, "that if I had a sister in love with Ancoats at the present +moment, I'd carry her off to the North Pole rather than let her be talked +about with him!" + +Betty opened her eyes. + +"Then there _is_ something in the stories!" she cried. "Of course, +Frank told me there was nothing. And the Maxwells have not said a +word. And _now_ I understand why Lady Kent has been dinning it into +my ears--I could only be thankful Mrs. Allison was safe at church--that +Ancoats should marry early. 'Oh! my dear, it's always been the only +hope for them!'" Betty mimicked Lady Kent's deep voice and important +manner: "'Why, there was the grandfather--_his_ wife had a time!--I +could tell you things about _him_!--oh! and her too.--And even Henry +Allison!--' There, of course, I stopped her." + +"Old ghoul!" said Naseby, in disgust. "So she knows. And yet--good +Heavens! where does that charming girl come from?" + +He knocked the end off his cigarette, and returned it to his mouth with a +rather unsteady hand. + +"Knows?--knows what?" said Betty. There was a pink flush, perhaps of +alarm, on her pretty cheek, but her eyes said plainly that if there were +risks she must run them. + +Naseby hesitated. The natural reticence of one young man about another +held him back--and he was Ancoats's friend. But he liked Lady Madeleine, +and her mother's ugly manoeuvres in the sight of gods and men filled him +with a restless ill-temper. + +"You say the Maxwells have told you nothing?" he said at last. "But all +the same I am pretty certain that Maxwell is here for nothing else. What +on earth should he be doing in this _galère_ just now! Look at him and +Fontenoy! They've been pacing that lime-walk for a good hour. No one ever +saw such a spectacle before. Of course something's up!" + +Betty followed his eyes, and caught the figures of the two men between +the trunks as they moved through the light and shadow of the +lime-walk--Fontenoy's massive head sunk in his shoulders, his hands +clasped behind his back; Maxwell's taller and alerter form beside him. +Fontenoy had, in fact, arrived that morning from town, just too late to +accompany Mrs. Allison and her flock to church; and Maxwell and he had +been together since the moment when Ancoats, having brought his guest +into the garden, had gone off himself on a walk with Tressady. + +"Ancoats and Tressady came back past here," Naseby went on. "Ancoats +stood still, with his hands on his sides, and looked at those two. His +expression was not amiable. 'Something hatching,' he said to Tressady. +I suppose Ancoats got his sneer from his actor-friends--none of us +could do it without practice. 'Shall we go and pull the chief out of +that?' But they didn't go. Ancoats turned sulky, and went into the +house by himself." + +"I'm glad I don't have to keep that youth straight," said Betty, +devoutly. "Perhaps I don't care enough about him to try. But his mother's +a darling saint!--and if he breaks her heart he ought to be hung." + +"She knows nothing--I believe--" said Naseby, quickly. + +"Strange!" cried Betty. "I wonder if it pays to be a saint. I shall know +everything about _my_ boy when he's that age." + +"Oh! will you?" said Naseby, looking at her with a mocking eye. + +"Yes, sir, I shall. Your secrets are not so difficult to know, if one +_wants_ to know them. Heaven forbid, however, that I should want to know +anything about any of you till Bertie is grown up! Now, please tell me +everything. Who is the lady?" + +"Heaven forbid I should tell you!" said Naseby, drily. + +"Don't trifle any more," said Betty, laying a remonstrating hand on his +arm; "they will be home from church directly." + +"Well, I won't tell you any names," said Naseby, reluctantly. "Of +course, it's an actress--a very small one. And, of course, she's a bad +lot--and pretty." + +"Why, there's no of course about it--about either of them!" said Betty, +with more indignation than grammar. She also had dramatic friends, and +was sensitive on the point. + +Naseby protested that if he must argue the ethics of the stage before he +told his tale, the tale would remain untold. Then Betty, subdued, fell +into an attitude of meek listening, hands on lap. The tale when told +indeed proved to be a very ordinary affair, marked out perhaps a trifle +from the ruck by the facts that there was another pretender in the field +with whom Ancoats had already had one scene in public, and would probably +have more; that Ancoats being Ancoats, something mad and conspicuous was +to be expected, which would bring the matter inevitably to his mother's +ears; and that Mrs. Allison was Mrs. Allison. + +"Can he marry her?" said Betty, quickly. + +"Thank Heaven! no. There is a husband somewhere in Chili. So that it +doesn't seem to be a question of driving Mrs. Allison out of Castle +Luton. But--well, between ourselves, it would be a pity to give Ancoats +so fine a chance of going to the bad, as he'll get, if this young woman +lays hold of him. He mightn't recover it." + +Betty sat silent a moment. All her gaiety had passed away. There was a +fierceness in her blue eyes. + +"And that's what we bring them up for!" she exclaimed at last--"that they +may do all these ugly, stale, stupid things over again. Oh! I'm not +thinking so much, of the morals!"--she turned to Naseby with a defiant +look. "I am thinking of the hateful cruelty and unkindness!" + +"To his mother?" said Naseby. He shrugged his shoulders. + +Betty allowed herself an outburst. Her little hand trembled on her knee. +Naseby did not reply. Not that he disagreed; far from it. Under his young +and careless manner he was already a person of settled character, +cherishing a number of strong convictions. But since it had become the +fashion to talk as frankly of a matter of this kind to your married-women +friends as to anybody else, he thought that the women should take it with +more equanimity. + +Betty, indeed, regained her composure very quickly, like a stream when +the gust has passed. They fell into a keen, practical discussion of the +affair. Who had influence with Ancoats? What man? Naseby shook his +head. The difference in age between Ancoats and Maxwell was too great, +and the men too unlike in temperament. He himself had done what he +could, in vain, and Ancoats now told him nothing; for the rest, he +thought Ancoats had very few friends amid his innumerable acquaintance, +and such as he had, of a third-rate dramatic sort, not likely to be of +much use at this moment. + +"I haven't seen him take to any fellow of his own kind as much as he has +taken to George Tressady these two days, since he left Cambridge. But +that's no good, of course--it's too new." + +The two sat side by side, pondering. Suddenly Naseby said, smiling, with +a change of expression: + +"This party is really quite interesting. Look there!" + +Betty looked, and saw George Tressady, with his hands in his pockets, +lounging along a distant path beside Marcella Maxwell. + +"Well!" said Betty, "what then?" + +Naseby gave his mouth a twist. + +"Nothing; only it's odd. I ran across them just now--I was playing ball +with that jolly little imp, Hallin. You never saw two people more +absorbed. Of course he's _sous le charme_--we all are. Our English +politics are rather rum, aren't they? They don't indulge in this amiable +country-house business in a South American republic, you know. They +prefer shooting." + +"And you evidently think it a healthier state of things. Wait till we +come to something nearer to _our_ hearths and bosoms than Factory Acts," +said Betty, with the wisdom of her kind. "All the same, Lord Fontenoy is +in earnest." + +"Oh yes, Fontenoy is in earnest. So, I suppose, is Tressady. So--good +Heavens!--is Maxwell. I say, here comes the church party." + +And from a side-door in a venerable wall, beyond which could be seen the +tower of a little church, there emerged a small group of people--Mrs. +Allison, Lady Cathedine, and Madeleine Penley in front, escorted by the +white-haired Sir Philip; and behind, Lady Tressady, between Harding +Watton and Lord Cathedine. + +"Cathedine!" cried Naseby, staring at the group. "Cathedine been +to church?" + +"For the purpose, I suppose, of disappointing poor Laura, who might have +hoped to get rid of him," said Betty, sharply. "No!--if I were Mrs. +Allison I should draw the line at Lord Cathedine." + +"Nobody need see any more of Cathedine than they want," said Naseby, +calmly; "and, of course, he behaves himself here. Moreover, there is no +doubt at all about his brains. They say Fontenoy expects to make great +use of him in the Lords." + +"By the way," said Betty, turning round upon him, "where are you?" + +"Well, thank God! I'm not in Parliament," was Naseby's smiling reply. "So +don't trouble me for opinions. I have none. Except that, speaking +generally, I should like Lady Maxwell to get what she wants." + +Betty threw him a sly glance, wondering if she might tease him about the +news she heard of him from Marcella. + +She had no time, however, to attack him, for Mrs. Allison approached. + + * * * * * + +"What is the matter with her?--with Madeleine?--with all of them?" +thought Betty, suddenly. + +For Mrs. Allison, pale and discomposed, did not return, did not +apparently notice Lady Leven's greeting. She walked hastily past them, +and would have gone at once into the house but that, turning her head, +she perceived Lord Fontenoy hurrying towards her from the lime-walk. With +an obvious effort she controlled herself, and went to meet him, leaning +heavily on her silver-topped stick. + +The others paused, no one having, as it seemed, anything to say. Letty +poked the gravel with her parasol; Sir Philip made a telescope of his +hands, and fixed it upon Maxwell, who was coming slowly across the lawn; +while Lady Madeleine turned a handsome, bewildered face on Betty. + +Betty took her aside to look at a flower on the house. + +"What's the matter?" said Lady Leven, under her breath. + +"I don't know," said the other. "Something dreadful happened on the way +home. There was a girl--" + +But she broke off suddenly. Ancoats had just opened and shut the +garden-door, and was coming to join his guests. + +"Poor dear!" thought Betty to herself, with a leap of pity. It was so +evident the girl's whole nature thrilled to the approaching step. She +turned her head towards Ancoats, as though against her will, her tall +form drawn erect, in unconscious tension. + +Ancoats's quick eyes ran over the group. + +"He thinks we have been talking about him," was Betty's quick reflection, +which was probably not far from the truth. For the young man's face at +once assumed a lowering expression, and, walking up to Lady Tressady, +whom as yet he had noticed no more than civility required, he asked +whether she would like to see the "houses" and the rose-garden. + +Letty, delighted by the attention, said Yes in her gayest way, and +Ancoats at once led her off. He walked quickly, and their figures soon +disappeared among the trees. + +Madeleine Penley gazed after them. Betty, who had a miserable feeling +that the girl was betraying herself to men like Harding Watton or Lord +Cathedine,--a feeling which was, however, the creation of her own nervous +excitement,--tried to draw her away. But Lady Madeleine did not seem to +understand. She stood mechanically buttoning and unbuttoning her long +gloves. "Yes, I'm coming," she said, but she did not move. + +Then Betty saw that Lord Naseby had approached her; and it seemed to the +observer that all the young man's vivid face was suffused with something +at once soft and fierce. + +"The thorn-blossom on the hill is a perfect show just now, Lady +Madeleine," he said. "Come and look at it. There will be just time +before lunch." + +The girl looked at him. The colour rushed to her cheeks, and she walked +submissively away beside him. + + * * * * * + +Meanwhile Letty and Ancoats pursued their way towards the greenhouses and +walled gardens. Letty tripped along, hardly able to keep up with her +companion's stride, but chattering fast all the time. At every turn of +the view she overflowed with praise and wonder; nor could anything have +been at once more enthusiastic or more impertinent than the questions +with which she plied him as to his gardeners, his estate, and his +affairs, in the intervals of panegyric. + +Ancoats at first hardly listened to her. A perfunctory "Yes" or "No" +seemed to be all that the situation demanded. Then, when he did +sufficiently emerge from the tempest of his own thoughts to catch some of +the things she was saying, his irritable temper rebelled at once. What +had Tressady been about?--ill-bred, tiresome woman! + +His manner stiffened; he stalked along in front of her, doing his bare +host's duty, and warding off her conversation as much as possible; while +Letty, on her side, soon felt the familiar chill and mortification +creeping over her. Why, she wondered angrily, should he have asked her to +walk with him if he could not be a more agreeable companion? + +Towards the end of the lime-walk they came across Mrs. Allison and Lord +Fontenoy. As they passed the older pair the pale mother lifted her eyes +to her son with a tremulous smile. + +But Ancoats made no response, nor had he any greeting for Fontenoy. He +carried his companion quickly on, till they found themselves in a +wilderness of walled gardens opening one into another, each, as it +seemed, more miraculously ordered and more abundantly stocked than its +neighbour. + +"I wonder you know your way," laughed Letty. "And who can possibly +consume all this?" + +"I haven't an idea," said Ancoats, abruptly, as he opened the door of the +tenth vinery. "I wish you'd tell me." + +Letty raised her eyebrows with a little cry of protest. + +"Oh! but it makes the whole place so magnificent, so complete." + +"What is there magnificent in having too much?" said Ancoats, shortly. +"I believe the day of these huge country places, with all their dull +greenhouses and things, is done." + +Much he cared, indeed, about his gardeners and his grapes! He was in the +mood to feel his whole inheritance a burden round his neck. But at the +same time to revile his own wealth gave him a pungent sense of playing +the artist. + +"Have you argued that with Lord Fontenoy?" she inquired archly. + +"I should not take the trouble," he said, with careless hauteur. +"Ah!"--Letty's vanity winced under his involuntary accent of relief--"I +see your husband and Lady Maxwell." + +Marcella and George came towards them. They were strolling along a broad +flowery border, which was at the moment a blaze of paeonies of all +shades, interspersed with tall pyramidal growths of honeysuckle. Marcella +was loitering here and there, burying her face in the fragrance of the +honeysuckle, or drawing her companion's attention in delight to the +glowing clumps of paeonies Hallin hovered round them, now putting his +hand confidingly into Tressady's, now tugging at his mother's dress, and +now gravely wooing the friendship of a fine St. Bernard that made one of +the party. George, with his hands in his pockets, walked or paused as the +others chose; and it struck Letty at once that he was talking with +unusual freedom and zest. + +Yes, it was true, indeed, as Harding said--they had made friends. As she +looked at them the first movement of a jealous temper stirred in Letty. +She was angry with Lady Maxwell's beauty, and angry with George's +enjoyment. It was like the great lady all over to slight the wife and +annex the husband. George certainly might have taken the trouble to come +and look for her on their return from church! + +So, while Ancoats talked stiffly with Marcella, the bride, a few paces +off, let George understand through her bantering manner that she was out +of humour. + +"But, dear, I had no notion you would be let out so soon," pleaded +George. "That good man really can't earn his pay." + +"Oh! but of course you knew it was High Church--all split up into little +bits," said Letty, unappeased. "But naturally--" + +She was about to add some jealous sarcasm when it was arrested by the +arrival of Sir Philip Wentworth and Watton, whose figures appeared in a +side-archway close to her. + +"Ah! well guessed," said Sir Philip. "I thought we should find you among +the paeonies. Lady Tressady, did you ever see such a show? Ancoats, is +your head gardener visible on a Sunday? I ask with trembling, for there +is no more magnificent member of creation. But if I _could_ get at him, +to ask him about an orchid I saw in one of your houses yesterday, I +should be grateful." + +"Come into the next garden, then," said Ancoats, "where the orchid-houses +are. If he isn't there, we'll send for him." + +"Then, Lady Tressady, you must come and see me through," said Sir Philip, +gallantly. "I want to quarrel with him about a label--and you remember +Dizzy's saying--'a head gardener is always opinionated'? Are you coming, +Lady Maxwell?" + +Marcella shook her head, smiling. + +"I am afraid I hate hothouses," she said. + +"My dear lady, don't pine for the life according to nature at Castle +Luton!" said Sir Philip, raising a finger. "The best of hothouses, like +the best of anything, demands a thrill." + +Marcella shrugged her shoulders. + +"I get more thrill out of the paeonies." + +Sir Philip laughed, and he and Watton carried off Letty, whose vanity was +once more happy in their society; while Ancoats, glad of the pretext, +hurried along in front to find the great Mr. Newmarch. + + * * * * * + +"I believe there are some wonderful irises out in the Friar's Garden," +said Marcella. "Mrs. Allison told me there was a show of them somewhere. +Let me see if I can find the way. And Hallin would like the goldfish in +the fountain." + +Her two companions followed her gladly, and she led them through devious +paths till there was a shout from Hallin, and the most poetic corner of a +famous garden revealed itself. Amid the ruins of a cloister that had once +formed part of the dissolved Cistercian priory on whose confiscated lands +Castle Luton had arisen, a rich medley of flowers was in full and perfect +bloom. Irises in every ravishing shade of purple, lilac, and gold, +carpets of daffodils and narcissus, covered the ground, and ran into each +corner and cranny of the old wall. Yellow banksia and white clematis +climbed the crumbling shafts, or made new tracery for the empty windows, +and where the ruin ended, yew hedges, adorned at top with a whole +procession of birds and beasts, began. The flowery space thus enclosed +was broken in the centre by an old fountain; and as one sat on a stone +seat beside it, one looked through an archway, cut through the darkness +of the yews, to the blue river and the hills. + +The little place breathed perfume and delight. But Marcella did not, +somehow, give it the attention it deserved. She sat down absently on the +bench by the fountain, and presently, as George and Hallin were poking +among the goldfish, she turned to her companion with the abrupt question: + +"You didn't know Ancoats, I think, before this visit, did you?" + +"Only as one knows the merest acquaintance. Fontenoy introduced me to him +at the club." + +Marcella sighed. She seemed to be arguing something with herself. At +last, with a quick look towards the approaches of the garden, she said in +a low voice: + +"I think you must know that his friends are not happy about him?" + +It so happened that Watton had found opportunity to show Tressady that +morning a paragraph from one of the numerous papers that batten on the +British peer, his dress, his morals, and his sport. The paragraph, +without names, without even initials, contained an outline of Lord +Ancoats's affairs which Harding, who knew everything of a scandalous +nature, declared to be well informed. It had made George whistle; and +afterwards he had watched Mrs. Allison go to church with a new interest +in her proceedings. + +So that when Marcella threw out her hesitating question, he said at +once: + +"I know what the papers are beginning to say--that is, I have seen a +paragraph--" + +"Oh! those newspapers!" she said in distress. "We are all afraid of some +madness, and any increase of talk may hasten it. There is no one who can +control him, and of late he has not even tried to conceal things." + +"It is a determined face," said George. "I am afraid he will take his +way. How is it that he comes to be so unlike his mother?" + +"How is it that adoration and sacrifice count for so little?" said +Marcella, sadly. "She has given him all the best of her life." + +And she drew a rapid sketch of the youth's career and the mother's +devotion. + +George listened in silence. What she said showed him that in his +conversations with Ancoats that young man had been talking round and +about his own case a good deal! and when she paused he said drily: + +"Poor Mrs. Allison! But, you know, there must be some crumples in the +rose-leaves of the great." + +She looked at him with a momentary astonishment. + +"Why should one think of her as 'great'? Would not any mother suffer? +First of all he is so changed; it is so difficult to get at him--his +friends are so unlike hers--he is so wrapped up in London, so apathetic +about his estate. All the religious sympathy that meant so much to her is +gone. And now he threatens her with this--what shall I call it?"--her lip +curled--"this entanglement. If it goes on, how shall we keep her from +breaking her heart over it? Poor thing! poor mothers!" + +She raised her white hand, and let it fall upon her knee with one of the +free, instinctive gestures that made her beauty so expressive. + +But George would not yield himself to her feeling. + +"Ancoats will get through it--somehow--as other men do," he said +stubbornly, "and she must get through it too--and _not_ break her heart." + +Marcella was silent. He turned towards her after a moment. + +"You think that a brutal doctrine? But if you'll let me say it, life and +ease and good temper are really not the brittle things women make them! +Why do they put all their treasure into that one bag they call their +affections? There is plenty else in life--there is indeed! It shows +poverty of mind!" + +He laughed, and taking up a pebble dropped it sharply among the goldfish. + +"Alack!" said Marcella, caressing her child's head as he stood playing +beside her. "Hallin, I can't have you kiss my hand like that. Sir George +says it's poverty of mind." + +"It ain't," said Hallin, promptly. But his remark had a deplorable lack +of unction, for the goldfish, startled by George's pebble, were at that +moment performing evolutions of the greatest interest, and his black eyes +were greedily bent upon them. + +Both laughed, and George let her remark alone. But his few words left +on Marcella a painful impression, which renewed her compassion of the +night before. This young fellow, just married, protesting against an +over-exaltation of the affections!--it struck her as half tragic, half +grotesque. And, of course, it was explained by the idiosyncrasies of +that little person in a Paris gown now walking about somewhere with +Sir Philip! + +Yet, just as she had again allowed herself to think of him as someone far +younger and less mature than herself, he quietly renewed the +conversation, so far as it concerned Ancoats, talking with a caustic good +sense, a shrewd perception, and at bottom with a good feeling, that first +astonished her, and then mastered her friendship more and more. She found +herself yielding him a fuller and fuller confidence, appealing to him, +taking pleasure in anything that woke the humour of the sharp, long face, +or that rare blink of the blue eyes that meant a leap of some responsive +sympathy he could not quite conceal. + +And for him it was all pleasure, though he never stopped to think of it. +The lines of her slender form, as she sat with such careless dignity +beside him, her lovely eyes, the turns of her head, the softening tones +of her voice, the sense of an emerging bond that had in it nothing +ignoble, nothing to be ashamed of, together with the child's simple +liking for him, and the mere physical delight of this morning of late +May--the rush and splendour of its white, thunderous clouds, its +penetrating, scented air: each and all played their part in the rise of a +new emotion he would not have analysed if he could. + +He was particularly glad that in this fresh day of growing intimacy she +had as yet talked politics or "questions" of any sort so little! It made +it all the more possible to escape from, to wholly overthrow in his +mind, that first hostile image of her, impressed--strange unreason on his +part!--by that first meeting with her in the crowd round the injured +child, and in the hospital ward. Had she started any subject of mere +controversy he would have held his own as stoutly as ever. But so long as +she let them lie, _herself_, the woman, insensibly argued for her, and +wore down his earlier mood. + +So long, indeed, as he forgot Maxwell's part in it all! But it was not +possible to forget it long. For the wife's passion, in spite of a noble +reticence, shone through her whole personality in a way that alternately +touched and challenged her new friend. No; let him remember that +Maxwell's ways of looking at things were none the less pestilent because +_she_ put them into words. + + * * * * * + +After luncheon Betty Leven found herself in a corner of the Green +Drawing-room. On the other side of it Mrs. Allison and Lord Fontenoy were +seated together, with Sir Philip Wentworth not far off. Lord Fontenoy was +describing his week in Parliament. Betty, who knew and generally shunned +him, raised her eyebrows occasionally, as she caught the animated voice, +the queer laughs, and fluent expositions, which the presence of his muse +was drawing from this most ungainly of worshippers. His talk, indeed, was +one long invocation; and the little white-haired lady in the armchair was +doing her best to play Melpomene. Her speech was very soft. But it made +for battle; and Fontenoy was never so formidable as when he was fresh +from Castle Luton. + +Betty's thoughts, however, had once more slipped away from her immediate +neighbours, and were pursuing more exciting matters,--the state of +Madeleine Penley's heart and the wiles of that witch-woman in London, who +must be somehow plucked like a burr from Ancoats's skirts,--when Marcella +entered the room, hat in hand. + +"Whither away, fair lady?" cried Betty; "come and talk to me." + +"Hallin will be in the river," said Marcella, irresolute. + +"If he is, Sir George will fish him out. Besides, I believe Sir George +and Ancoats have gone for a walk, and Hallin with them. I heard Maxwell +tell Hallin he might go." + +Marcella turned an uncertain look upon Lord Fontenoy and Mrs. Allison. +But directly Maxwell's wife entered the room, Maxwell's enemy had dropped +his talk of political affairs, and he was now showing Sir Philip a +portfolio of Mrs. Allison's sketches, with a subdued ardour that brought +a kindly smile to Marcella's lip. In general, Fontenoy had neither eye +nor ear for anything artistic; moreover, he spoke barbarous French, and +no other European tongue; while of letters he had scarcely a tincture. +But when it became a question of Mrs. Allison's accomplishments, her +drawing, her embroidery, still more her admirable French and excellent +Italian, the books she had read, and the poetry she knew by heart, he was +all appreciation--one might almost say, all feeling. It was Cymon and +Iphigenia in a modern and middle-aged key. + +His mien he fashioned and his tongue he filed. + +And did a blunder come, Iphigenia gently and deftly put it to rights. + +"Where is Madeleine?" asked Betty, as Marcella approached her sofa. + +"Walking with Lord Naseby, I think." + +"What was the matter on the way from church?" asked Betty, in a low +voice, raising her face to her friend. + +Marcella, looked gravely down upon her. + +"If you come into the garden I will tell you. Madeleine told me." + +Betty, all curiosity, followed her friend through the open window to a +seat in the Dutch garden outside. + +"It was a terrible thing that happened," said Marcella, sitting erect, +and speaking with a manner of suppressed energy that Betty knew well; +"one of the things that make my blood boil when I come here. You know how +she rules the village?"--She turned imperceptibly towards the distant +drawing-room, where Mrs. Allison's white head was still visible. "Not +only must all the cottages be beautiful, but all the people must reach a +certain standard of virtue. If a man drinks, he must go; if a girl loses +her character, she and her child must go. It was such a girl that threw +herself in the way of the party this morning. Her mother would not part +with her; so the decree went forth--the whole family must go. They say +the girl has never been right in her head since the baby's birth; she +raved and wept this morning, said her parents could find no work +elsewhere--they must die, she and her child must die. Mrs. Allison tried +to stop her, but couldn't; then she hurriedly sent the others on, and +stayed behind herself--only for a minute or two; she overtook Madeleine +almost immediately. Madeleine is sure she was inexorable; so am I; she +always is. I once argued with her about a case of the kind--a _cruel_ +case! 'Those are the sins that make me _shudder!_' she said, and one +could make no impression on her whatever. You see how exhausted she looks +this afternoon. She will wear herself out, probably, praying and weeping +over the girl." + +Betty threw up her hands. + +"My dear!--when she knows--" + +"It may perfectly well kill her," said Marcella, steadily. Then, after a +pause, Betty saw her face flush from brow to chin, and she added, in a +low and passionate voice: "Nevertheless, from all tyrannies and cruelties +in the name of Christ, good Lord, deliver us!" + +The two lingered together for some time without speaking. Both were +thinking of much the same things, but both were tired with the endless +talking of a country-house Sunday, and the rest was welcome. + +And presently Marcella rambled away from her friend, and spent an hour +pacing by herself in a glade beside the river. + +And there her mind instantly shook itself from every care but one--the +yearning over her husband and his work. + +Two years of labour--she caught her breath with a little sob--labour +which had aged and marked the labourer; and now, was it really to be +believed, that after all the toil, after so much hope and promise of +success, everything was to be wrecked at last? + +She gave herself once more to eager forecasts and combinations. As to +individuals--she recalled Tressady's blunt warning with a smile and a +wince. But it did not prevent her from falling into a reverie of which +he, or someone like him, was the centre. Types, incidents, scenes, rose +before her--if they could only be pressed upon, _burnt into_ such a mind, +as they had been burnt into her mind and Maxwell's! That was the whole +difficulty--lack of vision, lack of realisation. Men were to have the +deciding voice in this thing, who had no clear conception of how poverty +and misery live, no true knowledge of this vast tragedy of labour +perpetually acted, in our midst, no rebellion of heart against conditions +of life for other men they themselves would die a thousand times rather +than accept. She saw herself, in a kind of despair, driving such persons +through streets, and into houses she knew, forcing them to look, and +_feel_. Even now, at the last moment-- + +How much better she had come to know this interesting, limited being, +George Tressady, during these twenty-four hours! She liked his youth, his +sincerity--even the stubbornness with which he disclaimed inconvenient +enthusiasms; and she was inevitably flattered by the way in which his +evident prejudice against herself had broken down. + +His marriage was a misfortune, a calamity! She thought of it with the +instinctive repulsion of one who has never known any temptation to the +small vulgarities of life. One could have nothing to say to a little +being like that. But all the more reason for befriending the man! + + * * * * * + +An hour or two later Tressady found himself strolling home along the +flowery bank of the river. It was not long since he had parted from Lady +Maxwell and Hallin, and on leaving them he had turned back for a while +towards the woods on the hill, on the pretext that he wanted more of a +walk. Now, however, he was hurrying towards the house, that there might +be time for a chat with Letty before dressing. She would think he had +been away too long. But he had proposed to take her on the river after +tea, and she had preferred a walk with Lord Cathedine. + +Since then--He looked round him at the river and the hills. There was a +flush of sunset through the air, and the blue of the river was interlaced +with rosy or golden reflections from a sky piled with stormy cloud and +aglow with every "visionary majesty" of light and colour. The great +cloud-masses were driving in a tragic splendour through the west; and hue +and form alike, throughout the wide heaven, seemed to him to breathe a +marvellous harmony and poetry, to make one vibrating "word" of beauty. +Had some god suddenly gifted him with new senses and new eyes? Never had +he felt so much joy in Nature, such a lifting up to things awful and +divine. Why? Because a beautiful woman had been walking beside +him?--because he had been talking with her of things that he, at least, +rarely talked of--realities of feeling, or thought, or memory, that no +woman had ever shared with him before? + +How had she drawn him to such openness, such indiscretions? He was half +ashamed, and then forgot his discomfort in the sudden, eager glancing of +the mind to the future, to the opportunities of the day just coming--for +Mrs. Allison's party was to last till Whit Tuesday--to the hours and +places in London where he was to meet her on those social errands of +hers. What a warm, true heart! What a woman, through all her dreams and +mistakes, and therefore how adorable! + + * * * * * + +He quickened his pace as the light failed. Presently he saw a figure +coming towards him, emerging from the trees that skirted the main lawn. +It was Fontenoy, and Fontenoy's supporter must needs recollect himself as +quickly as possible. He had not seen much of his leader during the day. +But he knew well that Fontenoy never forgot his _rôle_, and there were +several points, newly arisen within the last forty-eight hours, on which +he might have expected before this to be called to counsel. + +But Fontenoy, when he came up with the wanderer, seemed to have no great +mind for talk. He had evidently been pacing and thinking by himself, and +when he was fullest of thought he was as a rule most silent and +inarticulate. + +"You are late; so am I," he said, as he turned back with Tressady. + +George assented. + +"I have been thinking out one or two points of tactics." + +But instead of discussing them he sank into silence again. George let him +alone, knowing his ways. + +Presently he said, raising his powerful head with a jerk, "But tactics +are not of such importance as they were. I think the thing is +done--_done!_" he repeated with emphasis. + +George shrugged his shoulders. + +"I don't know. We may be too sanguine. It is not possible that Maxwell +should be easily beaten." + +Fontenoy laughed--a strange, high laugh, like a jay's, that seemed to +have no relation to his massive frame, and died suddenly away. + +"But we shall beat him," he said quietly; "and her, too. A well-meaning +woman--but what a foolish one!" + +George made no reply. + +"Though I am bound to say," Fontenoy went on quickly, "that in private +matters no man could be kinder and show a sounder judgment than Maxwell. +And I believe Mrs. Allison feels the same with regard to her." + +His look first softened, then frowned; and as he turned his eyes towards +the house, George guessed what subject it was that he and Maxwell had +discussed under the limes in the morning. + + * * * * * + +He found Letty in very good spirits, owing, as far as he could judge, to +the civilities and attentions of Lord Cathedine. Moreover, she was more +at ease in her surroundings, and less daunted by Mrs. Allison. + +"And of course, to-morrow," she said, as she put on her diamonds, "it +will be nicer still. We shall all know each other so much better." + +In her good-humour she had forgotten her twinge of jealousy, and did not +even inquire with whom he had been wandering so long. + +But Letty was disappointed of her last day at Castle Luton. For the +party broke up suddenly, and by ten o'clock on Monday morning all +Mrs. Allison's guests but Lord Fontenoy and the Maxwells had left +Castle Luton. + +It was on this wise. + +After dinner on Sunday night Ancoats, who had been particularly silent +and irritable at table, suddenly proposed to show his guests the house. +Accordingly, he led them through its famous rooms and corridors, turned +on the electric light to show the pictures, and acted cicerone to the +china and the books. + +Then, suddenly it was noticed that he had somehow slipped away, and that +Madeleine Penley, too, was missing. The party straggled back to the +drawing-room without their host. + +Ancoats, however, reappeared alone in about half an hour. He was +extremely pale, and those who knew him well, and were perforce observing +him at the moment, like Maxwell and Marcella, drew the conclusion that he +was in a state of violent though suppressed excitement. His mother, +however, strange to say, noticed nothing. But she was clearly exhausted +and depressed, and she gave an early signal for the ladies' withdrawal. + +The great house sank into quietness. But about an hour after Marcella and +Betty had parted at Betty's door, Betty heard a quick knock, and opened +it in haste. + +"Mrs. Allison is ill!" said Marcella in a low, rapid voice. "I think +everyone ought to go quite early to-morrow. Will you tell Frank? I am +going to Lady Tressady. The gentlemen haven't come up." + +Betty caught her arm. "Tell me--" + +"Oh! my dear," cried Marcella, under her breath, "Ancoats and Madeleine +had an explanation in his room. He told her everything--that child! She +went to Mrs. Allison--he asked her to! Then the maid came for me in +terror. It has been a heart-attack--she has often had them. She is rather +better. But _do_ let everybody go!" and she wrung her hands. "Maxwell and +I must stay and see what can be done." + +Betty flew to ring for her maid and look up trains. Lady Maxwell went on +to Letty Tressady's room. + +But on the way, in the half-dark passage, she came across George Tressady +coming up from the smoking-room. So she gave her news of Mrs. Allison's +sudden illness to him, begging him to tell his wife, and to convey their +hostess's regrets and apologies for this untoward break-up of the party. +It was the reappearance of an old ailment, she said, and with quiet would +disappear. + +George heard her with concern, and though his mind was active with +conjectures, asked not a single question. Only, when she said good-night +to him, he held her hand a friendly instant. + +"We shall be off as early as possible, so it is goodbye. But we shall +meet in town--as you suggested?" + +"Please!" she said, and hurried off. + +But just as he reached his own door, he turned with a long breath towards +the passage where he had just seen her. It seemed that he saw her +still--her white face and dress, the trouble and pity under her quiet +manner, her pure sweetness and dignity. He said to himself, with a sort +of pride, that he had made a friend, a friend whose sympathy, whose heart +and mind, he was now to explore. + +Who was to make difficulties? Letty? But already as he stood there, with +his hand upon the handle of her door, his mind, in a kind of flashing +dream, was already making division of his life between the woman he had +married with such careless haste and this other, who at highest thought +of him with a passing kindness, and at lowest regarded him as a mere pawn +in the political game. + +What could he win by this friendship, that would injure Letty? Nothing! +absolutely nothing. + + +END OF VOLUME I + + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, SIR GEORGE TRESSADY, VOL. 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