"Sixty pounds a year, Dean, not much, but still you're a beginner--it

will give you time to think," said Mr. Fletcher, handing him the

letter. John wrote accepting the offer. There were vigorous

protests from Vernley and Marsh. At the end of the term, after a

terrible wrenching from the school, his friends, the Fletchers, and

all the beloved corners and places and daily events of four happy

years, he went down with Vernley to his home. The latter still

believed that John would accompany him to King's. Marsh had gone

home with the same belief. Vernley's faith was based on the ability

of his father to bring John round to common sense. There was a talk

one afternoon in the library that brought a lump into John's throat,

and a mist into his eyes, as he listened to the self-effacing

generosity and kindly plans of the big, bluff man sitting in front of

him. But he remained true to his decision. Mr. Vernley mopped his

brow, hot with the attempt to suggest, as delicately as possible, a

way out, and afraid all the time of hurting the boy's feelings. John

thanked him in a voice that trembled.

"Well, well, John, you're an obstinate boy, but I won't worry you.

You can do me a great favour by keeping an eye on Bobbie, and you

won't--and I'll owe you a grudge all my life. But if you do want to

give me real pleasure--then come to me whenever you will--I won't say

more than that. You understand, my boy, don't you?" and with that he

placed a kindly hand on the lad's shoulder. "And--'pon my word, I

admire your grit--you're the right stuff!"

Dismay, blank dismay, was written on Vernley's face when he heard of

the result. It was no use appealing to John--the latter had heard

him to the limit of his patience. Vernley went to Muriel. She could

act when others failed. To his amazement she did not agree.

"Scissors is quite right. You can say what you like, or put it how

you like, but it's charity, and John would know it, and you would

know--and it might make a difference. I think you're blind."

"But why?" cried Vernley, plaintively.

"John refuses to be helped simply because he thinks so much of

us--he's not going to jeopardise his friendship by indebtedness or

reasonable gratitude. But you men never can see these things. Only

a woman understands."

"Rot!" said Vernley, but he began to understand. That night he wrote

to Marsh. "I shouldn't mention it any more, Scissors can't be

shaken--the Governor's failed, and if your Governor tried he might

suspect a plot and throw us all over. Perhaps we'll have a chance

later. School teaching's a hell of a life." True to his advice,

Marsh dropped his own scheme, in which his father had concurred.

When John arrived to spend September at the Vicarage the choice John

had made was not opposed. They had a jolly holiday, jolly in so far

as John, with the momentous events of the last two months in his

mind, could be light-hearted. Often he looked into the future and

sometimes was seized by despair at its hopelessness. It was not the

task confronting him. Earning a living was the common lot of men,

and the one in which they found most happiness. It was his

loneliness, the apparent futility of his life. He was alone. That

was the awful thought. This great, passionate world, and of all its

millions, not one inseparably bound to him, to rise or fall with his

success or failure! Ungenerous, perhaps, this thought. He had

friends, such friends too! But the possession of friendship meant

independence; he was not going to be behind and be pulled along in

the race of life. They should have no cause to be sorry for him;

rather would he have them eager to know him, to cherish his

friendship the more for the success that he brought with it. He was

of a class that found it easier to do a favour than receive one. He

spent his life seeking, not a way out, but a way through. He was now

braced for the contest, and the sternness of it exhilarated him with

the freshness of a morning sea. He was diving from a great height of

sunlit friendship into the cold sea of life.

CHAPTER III

I

In the art prospectus, printed on a glazed paper with many choice

illustrations, Chawley School was a perfect place. The school, once

a manor, celebrated for its architectural beauty, was situated in a

magnificent park of five acres, with an ornamental lake and a drive

one mile long. The gardens in front of the house were extensive and

well kept. One of the illustrations showed fifty small boys, all

dressed alike, in grey shorts and blue flannel jackets, with grey

socks with red tops, and straw hats with red bands, squatted on the

splendid lawn, all showing bended bare knees and round happy faces.

In their midst were three masters, one middle-aged and two quite

young, and a lady. The letterpress under this charming picture of

sunlit foliage and smiling humanity, said "Afternoon Tea." The

prospectus also mentioned the covered swimming pool in the grounds,

the boys' own garden, the large airy dormitories and class rooms. It

then drew rapturous attention to the staff. The school was run by

the Rev. Shayle Tobin, M.A., Scholar of Balliol College, Oxford, with

a double first, a blue for cricket, and for some years famous as a

half-back.

One Sunday morning, six head boys, conscious of leadership and the

great world of a public school approaching, shuffled their feet in

the Manor pew in the village church. Behind them in other pews sat

other little boys, more angelic in appearance and devilish in action.

They were all dressed alike, in black Eton jackets, white collars,

grey trousers and shoes. Even at the tender age of ten to thirteen

their faces gave promise or otherwise. The new young assistant

master who sat guarding them in the third pew found himself studying,

during the dreary sermon, the shapes of the heads ranged in front of

him like turnips on a table. There were long heads, round heads,

oval, pointed, blunt, flat and dinted. Handsome, well-made, ugly,

emaciated, intelligent, stupid, good-natured, deceitful, mischievous

and lovable. John Dean ranged up and down the row. This was his

first Sunday morning in church. It was his Sunday on duty; the other

assistant master had gone into Southampton.

The young assistant master was not the only critical person letting

his thoughts wander from the Harvest Festival Sermon. John gazed

abstractedly at the figure of the Rev. Samuel Piggin, ringed round

with bunches of carrots, a few grapes and six tomatoes balanced on

the top of a sheaf of wheat, which demonstrated God's bounty, despite

a ruinously wet summer and a harvest, half of which lay rotting in

the fields.

Miss Piggin, twenty-nine years of age, with spectacles, and ardent in

romance, was quite thrilled by the first glimpse, as she turned to

the East in the recital of the Creed, of the handsome young master.

His profile would have enhanced the wrapper of those shilling

reprints to which, for want of romance, she was addicted. Nor was

she alone in her sudden interest. Several young ladies sitting

behind John found great fascination in the clean curve from the nape

of the neck up to the wavy brown head. Other younger ladies,

favourably placed in the side pews, could not have been more

fascinated had Apollo himself renounced his pagan origin and come to

church. The proud mouth, the dark eyes, the fine brow surmounted by

a wavy mass of chestnut hair, the whole poised on an athlete's

shoulders, were attractions against which the sermon competed in

vain. The doctor's daughter, for three years determined to be a

missionary's wife, found her gaze wandering from the altar to the

school pew.

One little boy with a freckled face and a genius for mischief, ceased

making chewed pellets from a hymn sheet when he noticed the rapt

attention directed towards the pew in which he sat. He nudged the

boy at his side, and both, suddenly conscious of the suppressed

excitement that flowed over them, sniggered and brought a reproof

from their new master. Something in the freckled boy's mute mirth as

he looked at him, caused John to turn round, when he met the troubled

gaze of a dozen pairs of amorous eyes. He quickly turned again and

felt the blood mounting to his neck and face. The little boys

sniggered again. John made a mental note not to the little boys'

advantage. Miss Piggin also made one--to call when her father paid

his formal visit; and not to be outwitted, the doctor's daughter

decided she would motor in with her father on Monday morning, when he

paid his usual visit to examine all the boys at the beginning of term.

Hitherto missionaries had absorbed her hero-worship, but then,

assistant masters, as a class, had not seemed attractive. The former

master drank, to the scandal of the village, which met him in the bar

of the "Red Cow" where he grossly libelled all those, and their

wives, who kept preparatory schools. His predecessor had a squint,

the one before was lame, and the one before him was an old man of

sixty, who had suddenly and most inconveniently died of bronchitis in

term time. Sixty pounds a year and free board somewhat limited the

available supply of assistant masters. Messrs. Sloggart and

Slingsby, the scholastic agents, had told the Rev. Mr. Tobin that

they were afraid he would have to add another ten pounds.

John liked Mr. Tobin on first contact. He was a man of about fifty

years of age, with, a tanned face and kindly blue eyes. The famous

athlete was fast disappearing in a bulky schoolmaster, who added

weight each term with considerable anxiety, coupled with a feeling

that his appearance at least was a good advertisement of the school.

He had a genuine love of boys and worked hard with them, being strict

and kind, with a determination to do his best for them! The boys, in

fact, were watched day and night; convicts would not have had closer

attention, and the same supervision extended to the two assistant

masters.

Mr. Tobin had little imagination, and the whole of it had been

expended in the prospectus.

The grounds of Chawley School were certainly extensive. The former

tenant, like the present, had found them too much so, and let them go

wild. The lawns on the front part of the house were kept tidy;

elsewhere the walks were weed-grown. The ornamental lake stank, and

might have been the death place of Shelley's "Sensitive Plant." The

prospectus mentioned boating on the lake as one of the diversions of

the fortunate boys. The only boat was an old punt, one end of which

had been long submerged among the water lilies. It was the floating

end that appeared in the prospectus photograph. Afternoon tea on the

lawn was also slightly different from the photograph. Three quarters

of the boys had never been on the lawn. Every Sunday, as a reward,

six top form boys, with the assistant master, were invited to tea

with Mrs. Tobin on the lawn. A fear of her presence was mingled with

the love of her cake, and had the boys had a free will in the matter

they had rather not have been rewarded.

Mrs. Tobin was a tall woman of about forty-eight years. She was cold

and looked at people with eagle eyes. Her voice was deep, her

features gaunt, framed in straight brown hair brushed severely back.

She had the full equipment of a bishopric's conventions and never

forgot her very reverend origin. She was the business woman, and

constantly reminded her husband of the fact. She knew that to make a

school pay, it required at least fifty boys. All over that number

represented profit. Chawley School had forty-nine boys. She lived

her days as though on the edge of a precipice. Mr. Tobin, as became

a sportsman, delighted in feeding his boys, and invited them to a

second helping of favourite puddings. Fortunate youngsters who sat

at his end of the table! At Mrs. Tobin's end a second request did

not bring a refusal, but, "Are you sure you have not had sufficient?"

John, who struggled desperately with his pies, found a problem in the

differential calculus easier than the elementary mathematics required

for cutting a pie into fourteen portions to the satisfaction of

twelve hungry boys.

Often, when his fourteenth turn came he received a small piece of pie

crust as his share. Sawley, a sharp little fellow who sat at John's

right, soon noticed this and generously offered his share. "We get

more than usual now, sir," he explained. "Why don't you serve

yourself first? The other masters always did."

"Masters?" queried John. "Why how many masters have you had?"

The boy smiled, then looked cautiously round to Mrs. Tobin's table.

"Six, sir," he whispered.

"And how long have you been here?"

"Six terms, sir."

John's heart sank.

"I don't expect you'll stay--will you, sir?" asked the boy in a burst

of confidence.

John snubbed him, in duty bound. So he was one of a procession! He

began to understand the bubbling curiosity which his arrival had

aroused. His arrival! That had marked the end of a long mood of

despondency which began as soon as he had left the cheerful faces of

the Marshs. The misery he had endured in the three-mile ride from

the station to the school! Peering out of the window he watched the

long road with its straggling cottages, brown and gold in their

autumnal creepers. Then the village stores with a fat man looking

curiously at the school cab, next a rise and on the other side a

glimpse, through the trees, of Chawley School, fronted by a broad

stream and bordered by rook-haunted elm trees. As the cab drew up at

the main door, the Rev. Shayle Tobin came to greet him. His box was

taken up and he followed the head master into the wide hall. There

was no furniture in it except a round mahogany table with an electro

plate card tray, and a hat stand. The head-master's living

apartments opened off on the right, and a wide corridor traversed the

whole length of the building. John was led to the left, which

contained the class rooms. If anything more had been needed to

depress him the room, somewhat grandly called the Masters' Common

Room, would have done it.

"We have not had time to get straight yet. The Matron will make this

more comfortable soon," Tobin said. There was certainly room for

improvement. A worn carpet covered the floor. On the left side

stood a small table covered with a crimson cloth stained with ink.

The wall paper was a faded, patternless drab colour. There were two

chairs, one a basket chair with a short leg, the other a stiff

Sheraton. There were no pictures on the walls, the fire grate had

two broken bars and no fender.

The head-master next led the way to John's bedroom. This appeared to

be a great improvement. The size of the room, in contrast to the

Common Room, made John feel more lonely than ever, and he shuddered

when he thought of winter mornings. But it was well furnished in a

heavy mid-Victorian manner. There was a white, marble-topped wash

stand with a red-flowered jug and basin, a large swinging mirror and

wardrobe. The carpet was faded but good. This at least was an

endurable room and he could live in it.

It was shortly before tea on the first day of term that John met his

colleague. Gerald Woodman, a scholar of St. John's College, Oxford,

was tall and heavily built for his twenty-five years. He appeared

much older because of his great reserve and a perpetual melancholy.

He had dark hair and dark eyes, an enormous appetite and no

sentiment. In his short life he had arrived at a creed of absolute

cynicism. He talked with reluctance, but John found later that at

heart he was a good fellow whose foibles were the inheritance of a

period of religious mania. He was now a robust atheist. The Church

no longer seemed a desirable refuge; he had become a schoolmaster.

Although fourteen stone in weight, he was possessed by a fear of

starvation and deplored his thinness; when in cricket flannels, his

thighs wobbled so much that all the boys grinned, but even this did

not reassure him.

John had recently passed through the brief pimply period inseparable

from youth, and in desperation one day bought a bottle containing

five hundred blood pills. As if alarmed at the prospect, the pimples

immediately disappeared. Mr. Woodman saw the pills on John's

dressing table and asked if he might have a few to set his blood in

order. John gave him them. Those pills probably saved the first

assistant master from a second nervous breakdown. He swallowed five

after each meal and declared with deep satisfaction that he was

putting on weight; he was optimistic until the bottle was finished,

when his habitual melancholy returned.

Their first evening at Chawley School was spent in a conference with

the Head-master who drew up the curriculum. The hours were arranged

between them. John received one afternoon per week off duty and the

alternate Sundays. The class hours were 8:30 a.m. to 11, a break of

half an hour during which they supervised games, then 11:30 to 1 p.m.

An hour for lunch, then work until 3 p.m. Games followed until five,

a period during which John changed into football shorts and raced

about the field in a scrimmage of shouting boys. He enjoyed this and

quite forgot all his woes. Tea was at five, a blessed interval of

one hour's peace, then school again until 7:30, when the boys went up

to bed. Dinner, in the household apartments, with Mrs. Tobin in an

evening gown and facetiously cheerful, was at eight. After dinner

the two masters left the rosy warmth of the dining room for their own

bare quarters, where the interval between dinner and bedtime was

spent in the correction of the day's exercise books; a monotonous

routine, dulling the senses, and demoralizing human beings with its

hopelessness. There was no sense of advancement. The end of the

term came slowly, then the holidays, then term again, with the same

subjects to drill into the same reluctant little boys.

Mr. Woodman, in a voice of deepest melancholy, foretold all this on

the first night. When he learned that John was new to his profession

he smiled at him like a butcher on a good sheep delivered for

slaughter.

"Whatever made you do it?" he asked. "Do anything, be a scavenger, a

policeman--you will at least retain your self respect. You will not

have to endure the chilliness of schoolmasters' wives, the scorn of

parents, the buffoonery of boys. We are fools out of motley,

something masquerading as gentlemen on the stipend of stevedores. My

God, Dean, pack your trunk and flee to-night. This is the end of all

things. Have you dreams, ambitions, hope, courage, youth? Abandon

all who enter this profession!"

John remonstrated. There was the great opportunity of forming

character, surely it was a noble thing to teach the young, to gain

the confidence, if not the affection of boys, to watch them grow in

intelligence, to trace the operations of their fresh minds slowly

opening on a wonderful world? Mr. Woodman listened patiently to

John's panegyric, and peered at him over the top of the gold-rimmed

spectacles he wore when correcting exercise books in the jumping

incandescent light.

"Dear me! This is almost pathetic! Your innocence moves me. I hope

you will pardon my saying you must be very young. Eighteen? Ah!

that is a blessed age, but you have yet to learn what boys are. Let

me warn you and save you much pain. They are devils incarnate. And

don't cherish any illusion about being a schoolmaster. We are a race

of pariahs. At forty we have no feelings left; we are desiccated

text books. At fifty we are old fools haunting the doorsteps of the

scholastic agents or short-sightedly sitting on the prepared pins of

our loving pupils. Don't think you will receive any gratitude for

your labour; you won't. Your cheque at the end of term wipes out all

obligations. After three years' close attention, they are not even

your boys. They pass on to a public school and repudiate you. Boys

are sent to preparatory schools by lazy parents who wish to get rid

of the responsibility of their offspring, or by upstarts who want to

start the new generation in the grooves of social respectability.

They will hold you in utter contempt because you cannot do anything

better than bring up their children for them. Epictetus was a prince

in comparison with the modern schoolmaster!"

Woodman's theory, nevertheless, was not strictly applied. He was

firm with his boys, made them work hard and was a martinet in detail,

but he was a sportsman and the boys responded to his sense of fair

play. As for John, by the third day of term, he was devoted to them,

although hating more and more the dreary routine of his life. It was

fascinating to study this dozen or so of young lives given into his

keeping, to note the amazing divergence of character which manifested

itself so early. John found himself looking through them to the

parents beyond. He had a perfect index to the home life and the

characters that had influenced them. The generous boy and the

greedy, the frank and the secretive, the imaginative and the stolid,

the sharp and the dull, the graceful, the strong, the quick, the

ugly, the slow, the boy of bright honour, and the boy with a tendency

to deceit, the potential coward or hero--they were all here in

embryo. Education after all was only a wind that could bend the

branches, it could not change the nature of the plant.

II

At the end of the first week, John was in a highly nervous condition.

The monotony of the work, the regularity of the hours, the seclusion

in a small world, the absence of all friends and his isolation miles

away from all who knew him and with whom he could talk intimately,

preyed upon his mind until one evening he reached a point of frenzy.

He banged down a pile of exercise books, kicked a cushion vigorously,

and then swore at the wall, from the other side of which came sounds

of a small boy practising Czerny's One Hundred and One Exercises for

the pianoforte. Woodman watched this outburst of wild rage with

amusement.

"Beat your wings, my poor little moth! You will soon tire and

subside--we have all passed along that _via dolorosa_," he commented.

"It is unendurable!" cried John, flinging himself in a chair.

"The capacity of man to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous

fortu--"

"Oh, shut up!" snapped John. Woodman regarded him sympathetically.

He had grown to like this bright lad, so freshly enthusiastic, and

bit by bit he had learned his story. In exchange he had shown John

some of the poetry which he wrote secretly. Strangely enough it was

highly sentimental, the safety valve of suppressed romanticism.

"Come on to the lake," he urged. John followed. It was their

favourite pastime. They had resurrected the old punt, and in danger

of a wetting, they often pushed it along through the thick water

lilies that bent under its prow, and slowly closed again on the track

they made. Meanwhile, the rooks, watching them from the elms above,

cawed loudly, and the water hens showed alarm. The two masters

became incredibly young once they were in the punt. They rocked it

to see how near shipwreck they could go; they sang in a loud voice

all the absurd ditties they could remember. Had their young charges

seen and heard them, it would have been an amazing revelation of the

humanity of masters out of school. As it was, Mr. Tobin complained

that some of their noise had carried across the lawns to the open

dormitory windows. But they simply had to sing; it was their one

outlet of pent up youth within them. They would punt about until the

dusk had given place to darkness, when the elms seemed gigantic and a

rising moon peered in between the branches and watched the rippling

reflection of her light. Around them all was quiet save for the

weird squeal of a weasel in the woodland or the melancholy hoot of an

owl.

One evening John was more noisy than ever, and Woodman threatened to

capsize him, but there was good reason for this exhilaration. The

mail had brought an acceptance of a long poem from the Editor of the

_British Review_. He had written in competition with Woodman, who

urged him to send it to an editor. With no faith, but some hope,

John obeyed. His surprise, when the acceptance came, was unbounded.

It was a long satirical story in the manner of Masefield. John had

feared it was too long, for it took twenty pages, and here were the

proof sheets and the offer of three guineas for his work! Those

proof sheets kept him in a state of elation for several days. He had

never seen himself in print except in the school magazine, and here

was a great review printing his work! John cashed the cheque and

ordered one pound's worth of copies of the review when it came out,

which he distributed among his friends at some cost. Then he must

see the reviewers' comments, and another guinea went to a

press-cutting agency, which sent all the advertisements containing

his name, and one criticism, if the slightly disparaging dismissal

could be termed a criticism--"Mr. John Dean contributes some verses

of a satirical nature." The net profit on the transaction was five

shillings and sixpence which John invested in paper and envelopes.

He had tasted printers' ink. John had seen a way out. He subscribed

to the _Bookman_, devoured the _Times Literary Supplement_, and

enquired the cost of joining the Society of Authors.

By the middle of November, with its dark winter nights when the wind

howled among the chimneys, swayed the leafless branches, scurried

along the cold flags of the corridors and rattled the shutters of the

school-room windows, John had reached a point of nervous desperation.

One night he beat his hands on the walls of his room in mere foolish

impotence of rage. Even the placid Woodman, swallowing blood pills

and putting on weight, became alarmed. There was an intensity in

John's despair that made him apprehensive. It was in vain that he

encouraged his literary work and discussed the novel which John had

begun as a distraction, but had now discarded. He dragged him out

for long walks down the bleak country lanes, but could not get him to

talk. He was thin, with rings under his eyes, and the rose-red of

healthy youth in his cheeks had given place to a hectic flush. He

had moments of hilarious mirth, as alarming and as unnatural as his

despair, and one night he had aroused Woodman in his bedroom,

declaring he could not sleep alone in his room any longer and begged

to be allowed to sleep on the couch. Woodman assented gladly but he

was awakened later by a sound of sobbing in the darkness. He lit a

candle and leaned up on his elbow.

"Dean--my dear fellow--you must not go on like this--you'll make

yourself ill."

He heard John clear his voice.

"I know--I'm a fool--I'm horribly ashamed of myself--but--but, oh, my

God, I am wretched."

"Why, you silly old thing, this morning you were making your boys

yell with laughter."

"And got snubbed by Tobin for it," retorted John. "Put out the

light, Woodman--I'll behave--and thanks awfully."

Woodman doused the candle with the matchbox. In the morning John was

normal again. Neither made any allusion to the scene in the night.

It was a bad dream.

CHAPTER IV

There were now rapid phases to John's character. He was beginning to

apprehend all the wonderful interests of the world, interests from

which he was being boxed up. He longed for the sound of a woman's

voice and a glimpse of beauty; a violent nostalgia seized him. The

mention of Asia Minor in the geography lesson--and he was leagues

away swinging his bare legs on a verandah shaded with almond blossom,

hearing the singing of the stream down the gorge at Amasia, watching

the light silver, the waterfall as the moon came over the mountain

cliff and flooded the valley. He recalled his father reading to him;

he could hear the clatter of his pony's hoofs in the courtyard, hear

Ali calling him out to play, Ali his bosom friend, whose last gift

now lay on his chest, whence he had never removed it. Or he would be

suddenly transported to Sedley by the sight of a familiar dictionary,

and again sit working and chattering with Vernley and Marsh in their

study. His longing for his friends increased with the passing days.

Vernley wrote faithfully, chronicling doings at Cambridge, sometimes

unconsciously causing pain by the enthusiastic mention of a new name,

which John felt was taking the place of his own.

As anticipated, Marsh was a great success. In the freer atmosphere

of the university he had blossomed into a man of power and influence.

He had already made a brilliant debut at the Union, and prophets

talked of him as a future President--"Marsh says the office would be

yours for the asking, there is no one here who could stand up with

you--and I agree; why on earth don't you come, you dear old obstinate

Scissors!" John was almost persuaded, but pride held him back. He

must work out his own salvation--a memory of Browning helped him:

"_But after they will know me. If I stoop

Into a dark tremendous sea of doubt,

It is but for a time; I press God's lamp

Close to my heart; its splendour, soon or late,

Will pierce the gloom; I shall emerge one day._"

Was he a coward? He had a fear of poverty, and an almost desperate

fear of the future at times. He was immersed in the poetry of

Shelley and Keats, and soon was longing ardently to die of

consumption in Italy, long before he would be twenty-six. In another

mood his ambition carried him to dizzy heights. Recollections of

talks with Mr. Ribble came back. Downing Street was not such an

impossibility after all. He could speak. What had Vernley said in

his last letter? And Mr. Steer had written to him about his article

on "The Rise of Naturalism in English Poetry" which had appeared in

the _Blue Review_, and asked him to be sure to call when next in

London, in order that he might meet "some of your contemporaries"!

From that day on London began to call him. That was the battlefield.

Woodman agreed. "This is a dead end," he said, "but useful for the

future."

"Useful, how?" asked John.

"You're getting material to write about. Think what a story's here

for you one day, when you look back. You'll smile then."

Gradually John's mood of desperation passed. The problems of life

was yet to be solved or attempted, but he was young. He had intense

ambition, good health, friends, and certain qualities which secured

him notice. He became aware that he possessed what men call a

personality; there was something that made persons ready to do him a

service, and this asset was the latest of his discoveries. At the

Vicarage, Miss Piggin had proved her friendship. She left him books;

she knew something about art, having spent two terms at Newlyn; at

least she knew the various schools of art, the names of the galleries

in London, and the queer methods employed for achieving success.

For the first time he heard of the Vorticiste and the mad young men

of the Backyard Gallery, which specialised in chimneyscapes and

exalted the hideous. She told him of energetic young James Squilson,

one part artist, and two parts publicist, the one part being good,

the others impudent. The good was at present carefully hidden, while

his monstrosities had created sufficient of an outcry to make those

beardless Jews, Messrs. Riverton, give him a one-man show at the

Trafford Galleries. This exhibition, Miss Piggin said, was a great

success. Society flocked to it and declared it unique. It bought

enigmatical canvases at fifty guineas each, which were cheap,

considering they were fashionable and provocative of discussions at

dinner parties. Major Slade, a charming man, who liked having

artists to dinner, bought several and felt like a connoisseur for six

months, which was as long as he liked any sensation. Squilson's

third exhibition cooled Slade's waning enthusiasm. The perverse

fellow had become an artist. His paintings might have been accepted

by the Royal Academy. When Squilson declared, to the horror of

society, that he would not object to being accepted, Slade dropped

him and gave away his works as wedding presents.

Miss Piggin was musical also; she played Bach and cultivated an

enthusiasm for Scriabine. John found that his musical intelligence

ceased after Debussy--Ravel was his breaking point, although

Stravinsky's _L'oiseau de Feu_ seemed to give him a prospect of a new

land where the animals were articulate.

John became rather a frequent visitor to the Vicarage. Mr. Woodman

was asked to dinner also, but he was asked as a companion, and was

useful in occupying Piggin's attention. Miss Piggin, accustomed to

the role of hostess since her mother's death, devoted her attention

to John. Formerly on festive occasions she had asked her friend, the

the doctor's daughter, to assist her. She decided that she could

manage well enough with such obliging young men. Miss Piggin also

found a new incentive to dress rather better than usual. The sleepy

life of a country Vicarage had caused her to become somewhat lax in

the past; it was no use being a fashion plate when there was no one

to notice. Now, however, she made a surprising resurrection; even

the village publican commented on it, as also poor little Miss Timis,

called in to do the sewing.

Although Miss Piggin was well aware that nature had not been lavish

at her birth, she knew that fashion has given woman a good frame for

an indifferent picture. Short sighted, out of doors she wore

spectacles, but these were discarded in the evening. She was

troubled with chilblains on her hands, it is true, but she had a

wonderfully fresh complexion for a young woman of nearly thirty.

John in fact thought she was about twenty-three, though she seemed to

have seen a lot in her short life. But she could talk and had an

eager interest in literature, of which she was no mean critic. As an

artist she was sufficiently good to merit her asking John to sit to

her, which he did, getting an ache in the neck, while she made a very

idealised drawing of him. It was a little trying, for the sitting

which he had been told would require a few hours, ran into weeks.

Miss Piggin seemed everlastingly taking out the next day what she had

achieved with such elation the previous day. The eyes and the mouth

caused the most trouble. These required several visits from the

easel for close study. His hair was comparatively easy, for she

could arrange it to fall as it suited her. She told John he had

sensitive nostrils and a perfect, but sensuous mouth.

"Not sensual?" he said laughing.

"It might become that--yet," she replied.

It was good fun and he liked the little teas they made in the studio,

with the aid of a gas ring. Afterwards he insisted on washing up

while she dried the tea things. It was a domestic moment and it gave

Miss Piggin a thrill; he looked so fascinating with his sleeves

rolled up above the elbows. Once, when he dozed while sitting, she

had hoped that he would fall fast asleep. She would just kiss his

head as it lay, with its tumbled hair, on the side of the chair. But

he aroused himself, and Miss Piggin was grateful that she was saved

from being so foolish.

She held John from a nervous breakdown. She took him for lone walks

and encouraged him to talk. He found his idea of going to London to

write, eagerly supported. What to write he hardly knew. Miss Piggin

suggested journalism. She had met quite a lot of journalists near

her rooms at Hampstead. They seemed very jolly and not hard-worked.

It was true they had small private incomes or self-sacrificing

parents. She gave John the address of a boarding house in Pimlico.

If he went to London, he would find it cheap but not nasty.

It was on one of these walks one day an incident occurred that

thrilled her with a revelation of the male in action. They were on a

narrow and muddy road when a cart came into view, with a red-faced

youth lolling on the top of a load. Although there was no space for

the two walkers to stand in, he drove his cart forward, jamming them

up against the wall and spattering them with mud. Miss Piggin gave a

cry of despair at the sight of her muddy skirt. With a quick

movement John ran to the horse's head, seized the rein and pulled up

the cart.

"Why don't you look where you are going?" he shouted angrily.

The lout blinked at him.

"Shut yer ---- mouth."

John flushed and tightened his grip.

"You'll get down and apologise to the lady," he said firmly. Another

flow of indecent language.

"Let go that ---- rein!" finished the carter.

"I shall not. Come down!" retorted John.

The carter raised his whip and brought the lash down across John's

shoulders and neck. The horse reared, John started forward, seized

the dangling leg of his aggressor, and brought him sprawling down

into the muddy road. He was up in a minute bellowing obscenely with

rage. John dodged the blow directed at his mouth.

"I'll fight yer! I'll fight yer, yer--" yelled the carter stamping

around. John slipped off his coat and waistcoat; the carter followed

suit.

"Oh, Mr. Dean, please, please!" implored Miss Piggin from the mound

on which she had taken refuge. John's answer was to fling his

discarded clothes into her arms. She looked around, meaning to

shriek, but as no one was in sight it seemed useless. Meanwhile the

battle had begun. The antagonists were as different in appearance as

they were in method. The carter was a heavily built youth of about

twenty. He was sandy-haired with a tanned face and neck. His arms

were muscular, and the gaping shirt revealed a hairy chest. He was a

fellow not likely to be knocked out, especially by the lightly built,

slim youth, who looked almost delicate in contrast.

Could this determined, lithe fighter make any impression on an

opponent so firmly built and muscular? Miss Piggin thought not, and

began to think of intervention with her umbrella; but she might poke

the wrong person. She was cheered to notice how quick her champion

was. It was a contest between speed with intelligence and strength

with obstinacy. Mr. Dean might set the pace, but would he wear down

this bulwark of seasoned flesh? They had both received blows, and

the nose of the slim youth was bleeding. The other, however, was

also bleeding at the mouth. Miss Piggin felt faint and yet thrilled

at the sight of these flushed youths, their hair falling into their

eyes, one breathing hard, and the other looking implacably fierce.

It reminded her of a fight she had witnessed between two stags on

Exmoor. There was something exhilarating in the spectacle, though

horrible.

Considerable in-fighting followed which evidently distressed the

carter. Although Miss Piggin could not determine who was getting the

blows--they were bent down together--the carter was letting forth

"oughs" and "ahs" either as expressions of satisfaction or of

receipt. The carter had opened with a wild but weighty swinging of

the arms, which the other cautiously avoided. One blow from those

sculpturesque forearms would have rendered him hors-de-combat. He

waited his opportunity, backing slowly until he secured a favourable

opening. One fist landed over the carter's eye. He grunted but his

progress was not impeded. The next moment they had clinched, for

which Miss Piggin felt grateful. She would have left them in this

harmless position, if she could, until she had returned with the

village constable. She now stood with bated breath, for when they

broke away some one would receive a blow.

Here John's small supply of ringcraft, gathered in Sedley gymnasium,

came into play. He used the clinch to rest himself upon the bulk of

the carter, who pushed him around, tiring himself. Then seizing a

propitious moment, he threw off his assailant's arms, feinted to the

left cheek, and swung in with a sharp upper cut with the right. It

caught the carter neatly under the chin, lifted him and sent his head

back. He went down heavily with a lost balance. John walked round

till his opponent was ready to rise. His blood was up, there was a

grim expression on his face, and Miss Piggin, catching a glimpse of

his steely eyes, cold and fierce under the mop of disordered hair,

changed in her alarm. She feared now for the life of the carter,

raised up on his elbow and contemplating things.

"Oh, Mr. Dean!" she whimpered.

He continued to walk round as though he had not heard. The carter

painfully rose to his feet, and then with a torrent of abuse, rushed

in mad fury at the waiting foe. A right from the shoulder caught

John on the chest, breaking his guard, and sent him down to his knees

with its sheer strength. The carter had no code to obey and was

ready to follow up his advantage, but in this he was unwary. John

waited until he stood over him, and with a crouching spring came up

under the raw fellow's guard, reaching his chin again with some

force. Shaken and somewhat dismayed with this surprising return of

an apparently beaten adversary, he began to retreat, and John, still

full of battle, saw his chance. There was some swift in-fighting

which Miss Piggin could not follow, because now the amount of blood

visible on both antagonists made her feel ill. She turned her head

away. When she looked again, it was all over, John stood surveying

the huddled up form of the beaten youth.

"Can you get up?" he asked coolly. The voice was almost cruel in its

tone, thought Miss Piggin. Then John stooped and pulled the sullen

fellow to his feet. They stood facing one another for a long

interval.

"Will you shake hands?" said John, extending his. There was no

response for a moment.

"Yer...." snarled the carter, his eyes still full of battle.

"I'm sorry then," said John unrolling his sleeves. There must have

been something crossing the slow brain of the carter. His eyes

changed expression.

"Yer've won ... boss," he said slowly. John heard the changed tone

and again held out his hand. The carter took it.

But peace had left them both strange spectacles. The horse even

seemed a little afraid of its master, and turned its head as he

approached. He was wiping his face, which had begun to swell, with a

red handkerchief. John was doing likewise. The absurdity of the

whole affair was intensified in the process. Miss Piggin now

approached and offered a diminutive handkerchief, which John

accepted, for his own was soaked by a persistent nose. The right eye

was slowly closing up.

Without further comment the carter took his horse's head and led it

off down the road. As John looked up and caught Miss Piggin's

piteous expression, he could not help laughing.

"I suppose I look a beautiful object?"

"Oh, Mr. Dean!" was all she could say. If only he would faint now,

all was safe! Her womanly instinct for nursing the brave rose within

her. She would dearly have loved to hold him in her arms and bathe

his face, and tidy his hair. But romance gave place to the practical.

"You must come to the Vicarage first--you can't return like that."

"No--I can't--but I want washing now before it dries," he replied.

There was a canal bordering the next field; the road led over the

canal bridge. The Vicarage was two miles away.

"I'm going to swim in the canal!" he said.

Miss Pilgrim shivered at the idea. "It's terribly cold!" she cried.

"You will get a chill."

"It's the tonic I want," he replied. "You stand on the bridge. I

can strip underneath if you'll keep watch."

He led the way, and left her on the bridge. What an amazing man! A

minute or so later she heard a splash, and shivered sympathetically

in the cold November wind. She could not help just looking over the

bridge a moment, and caught a glimpse of white shoulders, a dark

head, and the strong arms thrashing the grey water into a foamy

track. Then he turned and she looked away.

When he came up and joined her on the bridge later, he looked

marvellously refreshed. It was true his eye had closed up but most

of the horror of the battle had been the blood.

"But how have you dried yourself?" she asked, as he squeezed his hair

with his hands.

He laughed at her with his merry eye--the right one, still visible.

"On my shirt."

She blushed crimson. Men had shirts, as she knew, but it was awkward

to be told so by men. They walked home through the barren copse,

burning red on the horizon where the sun left the winter day. For

one person these were the woods of Broceliande, and her heart warmed

towards the young knight fresh from the battle.

Mr. Woodman's expression, at the appearance of John just in time for

tea in the study, was a mixture of surprise and disapproval.

"My dear fellow--" he began. "You have not been fighting? An

assistant master! Whatever will Tobin say? Don't eat all that

toast--here's the fork, make your own--he will want a full

explanation of that eye. What an eye!"

John briefly recounted the episode.

"I should leave out Miss Piggin," said Woodman.

"Why?"

"Tobin strongly disapproves of masters walking about the country with

young ladies, and as for fighting for them like bulls in a herd..."

"Oh, stop ragging. What's the best for a black eye?"

BOOK IV

LIFE

CHAPTER I

I

Two young men stood on a country platform saying good-bye to each

other. One was bound for Cambridge, the other for London. Two

trunks were in charge of the porter, but neither of these belonged to

the bronzed young fellow who took his seat in the train. For

although London was his destination, he had as much foreknowledge of

his actual resting place in that metropolis as had Mr. Richard

Whittington many years before him. The latter was supposed to have

brought a cat with him; the young man in the carriage had no cat. He

had health and ambition, also one hundred and twenty pounds in the

bank. He had been able to save the whole of his salary for the

second and final term at Chawley School, which he had left at Easter,

to the sorrow of the boys, who had marked their adoration with some

tears, and a presentation set of "Shelley's Poems." He had taken a

bold step, highly applauded by Mr. Gerald Woodman. He had sacrificed

an income of sixty pounds a year, with board, lodging and washing,

for the uncertainty of London.

But there was no regret in his heart on this lovely spring morning.

The song of the lark mounting to a southern cloud, the sense of

budding things in hedge and tree, the sharp air, and the exuberance

of his friend, Bobbie Vernley, all augured well for the adventure.

"You have given me a great time, Bobbie," he said, looking on the

good-natured face of his friend. "Don't forget to tell Marsh to

write, and let me have all the news. I will write as soon as I get

my rooms."

There was a slamming of doors, the screech of the engine whistle, a

final handshake, a look in Vernley's eyes that told him much, and

they were parted again.

John sat back in the seat and watched the familiar station glide

away. Somehow this place always marked the beginning and end of

things. When next he came how would he stand--a success or a

failure? He had weighed anchor and was putting to sea. He had

youth, one hundred and twenty pounds, and determination.

Opening a note book, he glanced through a list of addresses which

gave him a little comfort. He knew a few persons in London. There

was Mr. Steer, and a renewal of his acquaintance warmed him with

joyous expectation. There was Mrs. Graham, to whom he was

confidential, and who, looking in upon his dreams knew to what starry

pinnacles he aspired. Muriel had insisted on an early call on Mr.

Ribble, but John felt doubtful. A busy politician would find

courtesy and kindliness heavily taxed if every stray youth seeing

London rang his door bell. But he made one promise to call formally.

There was a hope of companionship in the presence in town of Lindon,

who had just left Balliol to study at the Royal Academy of Music, but

a certain shyness still hung over his relations with that brilliant

person. There was something he never quite understood, a reservation

in manner, if not in speech, which told John theirs could never be an

equal friendship. Somehow he always felt the debtor to Lindon,

perhaps owing to his manner. Despite his cordiality, his obvious

liking of John's company, the latter always felt diffident; perhaps

now he would learn to know Lindon better, relieved of the halo of a

schoolboy's worship.

Interleaving his note book was Miss Piggin's card, and on it, in a

pointed Italian hand, the address of a boarding house she

recommended. "Mrs. Perdie, 108, Mariton Street, S.W." In his

pocket, John carried another specimen of Miss Piggin's handwriting,

on the flyleaf of "The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft," calmly

setting forth the inscription--"To John Narcissus Dean from Elsa

Piggin, in memory of walks and talks." Some of the letters had run,

Miss Piggin explained, owing to the dew dripping from some roses just

gathered, on her writing desk. The warmth of her pillow overnight

had somewhat crinkled the dried page, but this Miss Piggin did not

attempt to explain. She carefully hid from all eyes that, with his

departure, Romance died. Henceforth, she accepted Fate with gentle

compliance. No more rebellions, never again the false hope of

Springtime; even photographs were resolutely put away, John's

included, but she permitted one small snapshot taken on the football

field, to remain on her dressing table. He had such a handsome leg,

and her soul craved beauty. For the rest she was unwearied in

attention to her father. He found clean nibs in his pens, his

note-books carefully dusted and replaced. She had a great scheme

that afternoon for the Ladies' Sewing Meeting, which foretold long

months of patient work--an altar cloth, embroidered with scenes from

the life of St. John. Appropriately therefore, the opening lesson

was read from the Gospel according to St. John. She began it with

loving reverence. St. John was such a beautiful name, she thought.

And John? Alas! he too dreamed, of a fair face, the laughter of

maidenhood, the sudden shaking of curls beautiful in their agitation.

Those last moments in the hall, awaiting the arrival of Tod with his

car, were painful almost. One by one they had said good-bye. Mr.

Vernley, red-faced, cheerful, friendly; Mrs. Vernley, motherly to the

last, then Kitty, off for her morning ride, and Alice about to retire

to her voice production; and then they were alone for a few precious

moments.

"You will write?"

"Every day, darling," he vowed.

"I shall always think of you."

"Always?"

"Always!" she promised.

Their hands are locked--silence, and tears in Muriel's eyes.

"I shall soon be on my feet."

"I know."

"Muriel!"

"John, dearest!"

"London is nearer than Chawley."

"Yes, John, but--"

"But?"

"It is so new, such an adventure."

"That thrills me--our day draws nearer, our day, Muriel." There is

another pause. Bobbie bangs the door open before approaching.

"Car's coming round, Scissors," he shouts. "Good-bye, Muriel, old

thing! Remember me to the nuns!" He strides up and kisses her

soundly on the cheek, sees tears in her eyes; she feels the

reassuring pressure of her brother's hands upon her arms. And then

they are gone.

As the train drew in through the panorama of chimney-pots, factory

roofs and gasometers, it was her face John saw, over the wretchedness

of the bewildering city. In the station he awoke to the reality of

the things under the girders and glazed roofs. He carried only a

bag; his trunk would be forwarded when he found rooms. He stood on

the platform hesitating a moment. London frightened him. It was so

vast and self-centred, so busy with people who had apparently solved

the problem he had to solve. Where should he begin, and how would it

all end? For the moment he had one rule, strict economy. He made

his way slowly up the incline out of Liverpool Street Station, and

asked a policeman the best means of reaching Mariton Street. "Where

is it?" he asked the genial fellow whose robust countenance cheered

him.

"Pimlico! No. 6 bus to Charing Cross, change to 24, that'll take you

down to Mariton Street." John thanked him and clambered to the top

of the bus. He watched the traffic, human and vehicular, streaming

down Bishopsgate. At the Bank, he could not suppress a thrill as he

looked on the restless tide surging into the vortex before the

Mansion House. St. Paul's, lifting its sun-struck dome into the

morning air, pigeon-haunted, floated away behind, and the short

descent under the viaduct brought them to Ludgate Circus. There,

narrow, mazed with telegraph wires, jammed with buses, cars, lorries,

and hurrying humanity, rose Fleet Street. An incommunicable wonder

stole in on the boy's heart. Here was the battle ground whereon he

would throw down his gauge. The roar in his ears might have been

applause, or was it the laughter of ridicule? The gold-lettered

sign-boards announced the tributary channels on either hand. Names

familiar on the breakfast table; names of power and wonder leapt

forth from these insignificant buildings, behind those walls sat the

men who held the world in leash. The fall of empires, the death of

monarchs, the ruin of men, the fame that sprang upon them; all these

things found their historians here. Man-made, this world was hedged

round with the divinity of power. Within those drab buildings beat

the pulse of Time. Mercury, wing-footed, swept down those narrow

stairways, and leapt forth from fourth-storey dwellings of the

Olympian "We."

It was soon passed. The roaring bus soared up the gradient towards

the Griffin and Shield at the City entrance of Temple Bar. Beyond, a

widening way diverged in two crescents around the pinnacled church.

High up on the right, the solemn solidity of the Law Courts, its

clock hung from the tower far over the narrow street; a swerve and a

new vista. The Strand leading onwards past the wedge of the

Australia House, the pillared colonnade of the Gaiety Theatre, and

the narrows, with hotels and theatres on either hand. Then the

railed front of Charing Cross, a brief right hand glimpse of St.

Martin's Church, and John descended. Around the corner broke the

wonder of the world, Trafalgar Square, flanked by the National

Gallery, white against the blue sky, cumulus-banked with summits of

sunlit snow. Aloft, Nelson, dark and solitary, looking riverwards

far over the head of the unfortunate monarch, superbly seated and

orientated; the four lions, symbols of British solidarity and regal

magnificence, in whose ears the song of the nation's traffic sounded

by day and by night, guardians of the hub of empire; and listeners,

perforce, to the revolt of humanity.

Long stood the youth, gazing upon this scene, watching the brilliance

of the fountains with their scintillating jets, about whose spray

naked urchins as if strewn from a garland of Correggio, shouted and

splashed. Into his heart stole the magic of the place. Here was the

visible pulse of the nation, the England in which he lived, an

Englishman. Here was the dream, tangible, carried in the hearts of a

thousand pioneers across the wastes of far places, the music

accompanying the hymn of duty, the thought that built the empire

imperishable in the love of her children. He looked on the Roman

magnificence of the Admiralty Arch, caught a swift translation of a

Venetian moment when a cloudless azure dome encupped the towered

church; and then, with a start, he returned to the business of the

day. A few minutes later one view crowded out another, until amid

ecstasy and wonder, he seemed to be riding through history.

Whitehall, broad, official, stately; the sudden leap to sight of

Westminster Hall; the familiar homeliness of the Abbey; the tracery

of the Houses of Parliament; the clock tower and the bridge, and ere

the tumult subsided in his heart, followed the long

cathedral-greyness of Victoria Street, ending in the vulgar rout of

traffic about the railed courtyard of Victoria Station. John laughed

to himself, swaying on the bus. Was he seeking lodgings or El Dorado?

When the bell rang for the fifth time that morning, Mrs. Perdie let

forth a protest.

"Sure there's no peace in a basement kitchen," she moaned, wiping her

hands dry after peeling potatoes for the evening meal. It was no use

expecting Annie to answer the bell; she was on the fourth floor

making the young gentlemen's beds, and lost that moment in

contemplation of a gaudy pair of pyjamas. So while Annie speculated

on the cost of a blouse made out of the same silk, Mrs. Perdie

climbed the stairs and opened the door to another exquisite young

man. But she had a trained eye, and the first words of enquiry told

her that this was the genuine article, the product which Mrs. Perdie,

proud of being a connoisseur by virtue of seventeen years' service in

the best families, reverenced and made adjustable terms for. The

mention of Miss Piggin's name immediately confirmed her impression.

Warmly she invited the young gentleman into the drawing room,

hastening to draw up the Venetian blinds and apologising for her

appearance.

"I'm not like this of a night-time. You see, when they are all out I

give a hand to the maid." Then she was silent a space, while she

absorbed the vision of the young man seated before her. A visit from

Phoebus Apollo himself--the original of the plaster statue on the

shelf over the aspidistra--would not have silenced her so effectively.

"I knew at once he was of quality," she confided to Annie later.

"His hands, gloves and shoes--you can never go wrong there. You

can't be sure of accent. Some people are regular parrots. And he

was that shy I could have hugged him. Didn't like to ask how much,

he didn't, or what it included. Different to that brazen pair on the

fourth floor."

The interview was indeed somewhat painful to John. He had heard

warning stories of the rapacity of landladies, of their dirty rooms,

bad food and subtle extras. The most familiar jokes were based on

the experiences of unfortunate lodgers. He had expected to find Mrs.

Perdie rat-faced, with a withered neck and untidy wisps of hair.

This round-faced woman with the pleasant smile and a straight-forward

air was not the original of the caricatures; moreover he saw no

cringing cat. There was not even a bunch of wax grapes under a glass

dome, which Tod assured him monopolised the mantelpiece in all

boarding houses.

At her invitation he made a tour of the bedrooms, and heard as he

mounted the stairs, the separate histories of the occupants of each

room. She halted on the third floor and led the way into a back

bedroom. It was well-furnished as a bed-sitting room. A writing

table stood under the window, which looked out on the wide expanse of

a factory yard. The sky was cut by a huge chimney, belonging to the

Army Clothing Factory, but this was not unpleasant, for it bore a

slight resemblance to the Campanile of St. Mark's, Venice; at least

with a blue sky an hour after sunset, the illusion was not

impossible. There was a large mirrored wardrobe, a bed with a purple

eiderdown, a boxed-in wash-stand, a small table, an easy chair and a

gas stove.

"Gas is extra, sir, there's a shilling slot meter in the recess so

that you only pay for what you burn. The bath room, with a geyser,

is on the landing. This room and board, is two guineas a week,

laundry and boot cleaning extra. There's breakfast and dinner in the

evening, with midday dinner and tea on Sundays. All our guests have

lunch out. I'm sure I could make you comfortable, sir."

Looking at the woman, John felt sure too. He was glad to have

settled the problem so easily. Before he went, Mrs. Perdie gave him

a latch key--a sign of confidence in view of the smallness of his

bag, and in return he insisted on paying her a week in advance which

caused her to say to Annie, "only a gentleman would think of

that--handsome-like. There's nothing like the quality."

When she showed John out, he was reminded that dinner was at seven,

and buses ran every ten minutes from the corner.

"I don't know your name, sir," said Mrs. Perdie finally, as the young

man put on his hat.

"Dean--John Dean," replied John with a smile.

Mrs. Perdie smiled back as she closed the door, "Bless 'im," she said

to the cat, which then appeared. "I wonder what he does--and such

nice teeth and manners!"

When Annie descended from her dreams of glory, with a few loose

feathers in her hair, Mrs. Perdie was rubbing a serviette ring.

"Annie--there's a new gentleman comin' in to-night; set a clean

napkin and this ring between Miss Simpson and Captain Fisher, and get

the back bedroom ready. Take the best towel up."

II

When John returned to Mariton Street that evening, the beauty of

London burned in his blood. He had given himself up to pleasant

vagabondage all that day, abandoning the quest of livelihood. On the

morrow he would begin that grim task. So after sending the address

for his luggage to be forwarded, noon found him walking along the

road by the garden wall of Buckingham Palace, towards Hyde Park. It

was sunny, and the pleasant hum of traffic, the bright-faced

messenger boys, the nurse girls with their well-dressed children, the

crescendo of an approaching bus, the lovely elegance of the lady

whose car went parkwards for an airing, the stately fronts of the

houses, the sun-gleamed masses of clouds that backed the dark figure

of the charioteer on the quadriga near Green Park--all these things

were part of this wonderful song of life. It was almost incredible

that he should seek a niche in all this splendour. Those people

around him seemed so well established; had they ever begun, or had

they been mere victims of circumstances?

He watched a couple of riders turn in at Hyde Park Corner; a

fresh-faced young man, stolid with good food and no worry,

accompanied a fragile girl, whose well-tailored riding habit for a

moment called up another figure he knew well in similar attire. He

followed in at the gates and turned to the left, wondering if ever he

and Muriel would ride together down that glorious stretch. He sat

down on one of the chairs and watched the riders. Children

accompanied by grooms, elderly army officers, a very stout lady who

appeared to break down the fetlocks of her mount, a tall girl in

black top-boots, who galloped, with splendid hands, and laughed back

at two young men who made desperate efforts to keep with her.

Then his attention was attracted by an elegant apparition, which

alighted like a bird of paradise from a car on the edge of the curb.

It was a boy-officer in the Scots Guards. He was very tall and

languid, but held himself stiffly erect as though there was a cavity

between his shoulder blades which he wished to keep closed. It was

difficult to know how he ever washed his face, so rigid were the

arms. His hat which had a brass peak and a red and white diced band,

half buried his face, the chin receding underneath a hairless upper

lip, delicate and curved. His painfully erect carriage seemed

derived more from mechanism within than from the operation of will.

His tunic suggested a theatrical tailor, so flawlessly did it fit,

with an exaggerated waist-line that made an hour-glass of a human

trunk. And as if in fear that it was just possible some one might

mistake the young elegant for an ordinary officer in an ordinary

regiment, the tailor had descended from fashion to eccentricity in

the cut of the trousers, which, receiving inspiration from golfing

breeches, bulged below the knees, where they were caught up by

puttees that wound about two stick-like legs ending in enormous

booted feet. The young man was evidently delighted with himself. He

turned round three times in the sunshine, like a parrot on a perch.

Then it happened that a square-shouldered country youth, in a coarse

copy of the same uniform, but with ruder brass embellishments,

saluted and passed. The immediate effect was wonderful, if

startling; a swift spasm, as of a Titan struggling with tetanus,

galvanised the young officer into movement. By a terrific jerk, he

succeeded in bringing his out-turned palm behind his right ear where

it locked for a moment before being hurled downwards to its former

rigidity, the disturbed flesh subsiding again into calm dignity. A

few minutes later he was joined by a brother officer, an even more

splendid figure wrapped in a long greatcoat of gorgeous blue,

double-breasted and broad lapelled, with two vertical rows of buttons

and a glimpse of scarlet lining within, where it gaped about his

knees. The waist line was identical, a similar hat hid a similar

face. One felt there might be a thousand of these in a box somewhere.

The Comédie Humaine continued. Two seats away from him a rather

stout lady, accompanied by three Pomeranian dogs, seated herself.

She was half-buried in furs above the waist, and half-naked below,

but apparently suffered no discomfort. John could not help looking

at her ankles, which were shapely, a diamond watch-bangle encircling

the right. The lady noticed John's gaze and did not seem to mind,

for she smiled. Slightly embarrassed, he thought it right to smile

back, transferring his gaze to the Pomeranians, in suggestion that

they were amusing. The exchange of smiles, however, made him aware

that the lady was of indeterminable age, but had a very fresh

complexion. The wind also told him that she liked expensive perfume.

He continued to watch the horses and the people, and caught whiffs of

conversation. He heard, from the young men, that certain things, he

could not hear what, were "rather priceless" and "topping." One

voice was ecstatic over Pavlova, "but Novikoff!" exclaimed an adoring

feminine voice, "you've seen the Bacchanale?" Presently a long

purple limousine drew up to the edge of the curb. The lady with the

dogs rose and went towards it, the chauffeur opening the door. She

was just entering the car when one of the leashes dropped from her

hands. The dog immediately ran off in the direction of John.

"Naughty Topsie!" she called. "Come here!"

But Topsie welcomed liberty and sped on, John in pursuit. He soon

retrieved the runaway and towed it back.

"Thank you so much," said the lady sweetly. "Topsie is such a

rebel--I love dogs, don't you?"

"Yes," said John. He thought she looked critically at him.

"Have you got one?" she asked.

"No--I have just left school--it is difficult there."

"Oh--and are you starting business; I suppose you're quite thrilled!"

She laughed again and John responded.

"I have not started yet--I have just come to London to-day."

"All alone?" asked the lady, arching her eyebrows.

"Yes."

"But how romantic! You sound like Dick Whittington, without a cat or

a dog!" She laughed again at her joke. He noticed she had beautiful

small teeth; a rope of pearls lay on her throat.

"Do you know London?" she asked again.

"No--I have never stayed here for any time," he answered. The

chauffeur still waited with his hand on the door.

"This park is very lovely," she said, gathering her furs about her.

"You should see it--will you drive through it with me?"

The invitation was so gracious and alluring John could not refuse; he

followed the lady into the car, and with the dogs in their laps, they

glided forward. It was a luxuriously appointed car. Three silver

sconces held flowers whose perfume competed with that of the lady.

The chauffeur in front wore a cerise uniform, with a broad green

collar. Inside they were quite silent for a few minutes. John's

shyness overcame him, while the lady, reclining on an air cushion,

arranged her furs and played with the collars of the dogs on her lap.

John knew that he was being closely scrutinised, and he resolved not

to reveal any more of his personal history. This close contact

showed that his companion's age was about thirty-five, and the fresh

complexion had not been acquired in the open air. She made no secret

of this, for she lifted her half veil, opened a vanity bag, took out

what appeared to be a silver pencil, and raising a small mirror,

carefully attended to her lips, which reddened in the process. John

wondered who she was. There was a little pile of visiting cards in

the wallet under the motor watch but they were upside down so he

could not read them. She was evidently a wealthy woman, and in some

respects reminded him of Mrs. Graham, who also had a green jade

vanity bag. Mrs. Graham, however, on the one occasion when she used

its contents, told him to turn his head away. The lady in the car,

having completed her toilet, raised a lorgnette, looked out of the

window for a few moments, dropped it, and addressed John.

"London can be a very lonely place," she said. "I know, because my

husband is in India with his regiment."

John hesitated in reply. He could not just say, "Oh," and if he said

"I'm sorry," it would be stupid. So he simply said, "Yes."

"Have you many friends here?" she asked. The question was kindly.

He chatted brightly. Her first impression was correct, she thought,

looking at him. He was a very handsome youth. When he looked down

she saw how the long lashes swept his cheek, and when looking at her

his eyes had wonderful depth. She liked the fine line of his

profile, and the well-shaped, sloping ear; his hands too were

fascinating, being strong and veinless. And in every movement and

line, there was the symmetry of thoughtless youth, which was

delightful. After a short time he, too, was admiring her intensely.

She had an alluring voice--and he could not help noticing the ankles

and small feet, so beautifully shod.

They turned and twisted, caught a glimpse of a sheet of water, an

ornamental garden and bridge, then turned again, running parallel

with a main road, whose roar could be heard behind the screen of

trees. The watch hands pointed to ten minutes to one.

"I am lunching in Cumberland Place at one," she said. "Can I drop

you on your way?"

He had no way, but did not care to confess it.

"At the gates will do, thank you."

When the car drew up near Marble Arch, she took a card from the

wallet.

"This is my name and address. Since you are new to London, let me

offer you hospitality. Will you not dine with me one evening at my

house?"

He thanked her.

"Shall we say Thursday at seven? It will be quite _en famille_. You

will be the only guest." She showed her beautiful teeth when he

assented, and held out a diminutive gloved hand as he stepped out of

the car.

"Good-bye," she smiled, as he raised his hat, a glance taking in the

sweep of his brow with its clustered hair. The door closed, she

leaned back with a parting glance, and as the car lurched forward, he

replaced his hat. He looked calm enough, but there was tumult

within. For a few moments he gave no thought to lunch. What a

wonderful place London was! Then he became conscious of the large,

neat-lettered card in his hand. "Lady Evelyn Warsett, 607, Queen

Anne's Gate, S.W.," he read. Also he remembered he had not told her

his name.

When John returned that evening to Mariton Street the dinner gong was

creating pandemonium in the hall below, and there followed an opening

of doors, a creaking of stairs and a babble of voices. He halted on

the threshold of the dining room, dreading his entry into this

strange circle. But Mrs. Perdie was waiting for him and piloted him

to his place at the table, where she introduced him to Miss Simpson

on his right, and Capt. Fisher on his left. The captain was very

curt and ignored him throughout dinner. Miss Simpson was assiduous

in polite attentions and small talk. When she discovered he had been

in Asia Minor, life suddenly brightened for her. She had lived a

year at Samsoon, with her brother, then the Consul, now a Governor in

India. The Captain sniffed and fidgeted. He hated all his talk

about Asia and India. He had spent most of his life on the Gold

Coast, and knew it was not so fashionable.

When dinner was over the young men lingered behind.

"Perhaps you would like to have a smoke?" suggested Mrs. Perdie,

going out and leaving John with the other boarders. He now looked

more particularly at his companions. They had crossed to one of the

windows where they began to bewilder the parrot by blowing smoke into

its face. Presently one of them seemed aware that John was in the

room. Pulling out a silver cigarette case he opened it and held it

towards him.

"Have a gasper?" he drawled genially.

John presumed he meant a cigarette, and took one. The donor extended

an elegantly ringed hand to light his own. There was an excessive

length of cuff. John's eye moved along the arm, and noted the

carefully knotted tie. The clothes were ultra-fashionable, the cut

of the waist being much exaggerated. The trousers had a razor-edge

crease and the patent boots, narrow and pointed, were topped by brown

canvas spats. But despite the elegance there was something too

pronounced in everything. The cloth was just too light in colour,

too loud in check, the cameo ring too large, the pearl pin too pearly

to be genuine. Even the hair was curled until it suggested a wig

rather than a natural covering, and the skin had a curious poreless

texture. But all these might have passed unnoticed by a less

critical eye than John's, fresh to impressions after the plain

severity of schooldays, had not the voice, and accent deliberately

assumed, been so truly remarkable. It was a high-pitched voice, that

rather sang than spoke. He turned from time to time to his

companion, to whom, to John's amazement, he alluded as "my

dear"--John wondering if that was the fashionable pet name in London.

The friend was of similar type, but he talked less and giggled more.

The teeth were profusely stopped with gold, and while they talked, he

extracted a piece of washleather from his yellow waistcoat pocket and

polished his nails. He was the younger by about two years.

"Mrs. Perdie didn't introduce us," said the elder--"my card."

John took the piece of pasteboard and read it. In Roman printed type

it ran "Reginald de Courtrai. Greenroom Club, W.C."

"You are French?" asked John.

"By descent--my grandfather was a Courtrai de Courtrai."

"Oh--I'm afraid I haven't a card yet--my name's Dean."

"Have you come to business?"

"No--I have not long left Sedley."

The companion also held out a card. John accepted it and read,

"Vernon Wellington, Greenroom Club, W.C."

"I bet Reggie at dinner you were a public school boy," said the

donor. "Good old public schools we always say! Glad you've come.

We are trying to put some tone into this house. Lord, it needs it,

look at this!" He waved his hand derisively towards a

red-blue-and-gold china shepherdess on the mantelpiece.

"Fine place, Sedley," commented Mr. de Courtrai, puffing out smoke,

one leg crossed in the arm chair. "Eton,--Harrow,--Sedley--I think I

should have chosen Sedley had I not been educated on the continent.

There's a fine tone about Sedley, what do you say, old dear?"

The old dear agreed. "My people insisted on me going to a private

school. Thought me too delicate. Always regretted it." He adjusted

his tie carefully, glanced at himself in the mirror and smoothed his

hair with a thin white hand. "You're new to London I suppose?"

"Yes--I arrived to-day--but I shall like it."

De Courtrai blew more smoke into the air.

"You must get some cards--really, my dear."

"And a club," added Wellington. "Every fellah must have a club.

We'd put you up, but ours is for the profession."

"Profession?" asked John. He was eager to know what they were. He

had never met any one quite like this.

"We're on the stage," replied Wellington.

"Oh--it must be very interesting work, acting."

"We aren't actors; we're in the ballet--the Empire. We're opening

next Monday--'Scheherezade.'" De Courtrai stroked his ankle. "A

superb spectacle, you must come."

John had never seen a ballet and he could not imagine the parts

played by these young exquisites. He remembered two pictures by an

artist called Degas, on which Mr. Vernley set great value. They were

of ladies in short fluffy skirts with stumpy legs, on one of which

they stood, stork-like. Bobbie said they were ballet-girls, and that

Tod had once run one, whereupon John naïvely asked "Which won?"

causing Vernley to collapse in shrieks of merriment. He had never

heard of men doing ballet dancing. Perhaps they had something to do

with the scenery. He did not care to hint at this, however, and said

how much he would like to see the ballet.

"He'd better come on Wednesday, my dear," said de Courtrai,

addressing Wellington, "when we're doing 'Carnival.' He'll fall in

love with Harlequin, won't he?"

Mr. Wellington giggled and exclaimed--

"S'nice!"

"Is she very beautiful?" asked John.

They opened their eyes wide. Mr. Wellington again giggled, put his

hand delicately on his hips, shook himself and exclaimed, "Chase me!"

"My dear!" exclaimed de Courtrai, dabbing his nose with a

highly-scented handkerchief, "It isn't a she, it's a he!" They

laughed again, in a high-pitched key which jarred on the young man,

and they saw that he resented their mirth.

"You mustn't mind, old thing," de Courtrai exclaimed apologetically,

touching John's arm. "You're really rather sweet."

John got up.

"I'm afraid I must go and unpack now."

"Can we help?" volunteered Wellington.

"No, thanks, I haven't much," he replied and went out. He could hear

them giggling as he went upstairs to his room, and felt furious with

them for making such a fool of him. How was he to know that

Harlequin wasn't a ballet-girl? He would talk less in future, and

not ask so many questions. But he disliked their manner although

they had been very friendly.

Half an hour later there was a tap on his door. With his head deep

in the almost empty trunk, John paused. The tap was repeated. In

reply to his call Wellington and de Courtrai entered, the latter

carrying a cup.

"We've brought you some coffee we've made in our room. Ma Perdie

won't make it without a shilling extra."

"Oh, thank you," said John taking the cup. They paused.

"Won't you sit down?--at least, there's only two chairs; I'll sit on

the bed."

They sat down and John sipped the coffee. It was made from essence

and sickly sweet, but he had to drink it.

"You're very jolly in here," said de Courtrai thrusting his feet out

towards the gas fire. "A nice warm room--we're at the top. You're

getting your knick-knacks about, I see."

"Yes--just a few I've brought."

Suddenly from the other side of the room came a loud "Ooh!" It was

from Wellington who had been walking round on a tour of inspection.

He had halted at John's ivory brushes, with his father's monogram and

crest.

"What charming brushes!" he sang. "Look, my dear, aren't they just

too lovely!" He carried the tray to de Courtrai.

The latter looked.

"Yes, I believe they're heavier than mine. But Welly, you mustn't be

so rude."

"Oh, it's all right," said John weakly. The next exclamation came

from de Courtrai, who suddenly saw the portraits on the dressing

table.

"Who's this?" he asked picking up Vernley's portrait.

"My friend."

"What a sweet face!"

John could hardly agree, and he thought with a smile, what Vernley

would have said if he had heard himself called "sweet."

"And this?" Wellington picked up Marsh's photograph.

"Another friend," replied John briefly. Next to it stood a portrait

of Muriel. He didn't want them to probe all his secrets. He was a

fool for putting it out.

But de Courtrai's eyes travelled over it without notice, to a Sedley

group.

"Who's this with the ball?"

"Oh--that's Lindon, the Captain."

"What a wonderful figure!"

"Yes--he weighed twelve-stone-four. He was stroke in the first eight

too," said John, "and he's a fine pianist."

"You can tell he's an artist by his eyes," exclaimed Wellington. "I

never make a mistake that way; do I, my dear!" He giggled and sat

down.

"Never, Welly--you've a gift for the s'nice and s'naughty."

"Go h'on!" giggled Wellington, dabbing his face. John stared, de

Courtrai saw the wonder in his eyes.

"We must hobble off--we're in the way--well see you again."

"Don't forget Wednesday," cried Wellington in the doorway.

"Ta-ta!" called de Courtrai. The door closed.

What a pair! John didn't know whether to laugh or be angry. They

were very vulgar and inquisitive, but also very friendly. He would

not encourage them, however. He resumed his unpacking. An hour

later he had finished, and was preparing for bed, when there was

another tap on the door. This time he pretended not to hear; he did

not want them in again. But when the tap was repeated, he went to

the door and opened it. In the darkness of the landing, he could not

see who it was.

Captain Fisher paused on the threshold. He had come out of the

darkness and stood blinking in the light. John waited, for he seemed

about to say something. There was a long pause, a clearing of the

throat, then--

"Permit me to introduce myself, sir, I am Captain Fisher, Fisher of

the 3rd Foot, sir. Twelve years China Station, twelve Malta, six

Gold Coast--damn it. Glad to know you, sir!" he stammered, then

bowed low.

Embarrassed, John bowed also.

"Those were days, sir,--days--days of--" he put a hand on the lintel

as though the memory was too much for him. "Egad, sir, they _were_

days. Fisher was a boy, sir, Lavington will tell you, sir--General

Lavington, God bless him--ninety-two to-day, sir--we've drunk his

health at the 'Rag' to-night. A great Speeeech ... a wunnerful man

... ninety-two, not much longer, sir, any of us. An' here we are, in

a Perdiferous house--pardon me, it's a great night--with foreign

meat, cats, parrots and a shilling in the slot. If any had a' known

on China station that Charlie Fisher would have been living in this

manag--menag--caravanserai, as Omar would say--You've seen 'em,

sir,--the blighted blossom of India! Ha! Ha! An' the eunuchs--yes,

sir, that's what they are! Pouff!" Here Captain Fisher steadied

himself from a fitful gust of indignation. "Now there's a gel out

to-night--

_Take a pair of sparklin' eyes

an' a--_"

hummed the Captain. "You'll see her, sir, what a glorious vision!

Wants breaking, sir! A high stepper like her father's fillies, but

what a head--what a--I'm a connoisseur too, in my day, Dandy Fisher

they call me. China Station twelve years, twelve years Malta, Gold

Coast--"

"So you said, sir," interrupted John, breaking the circle.

"You're a fine lad," exclaimed the Captain, looking at him keenly.

"Just such a lad as mine, God bless 'im. What's y'name?"

"Dean, sir--John Dean."

"John--ha! so's mine--God bless him--dear ol' John--dear ol' John."

He swayed a little, as he surveyed his waistcoat. "He was your age

too, and his hair too--just such hair--the gels loved him--dear ol'

John."

"Is he--is he dead, sir?" asked John.

The old man straightened himself proudly.

"For his King and Country, sir--in the Boer War--an' a V.C., sir,--a

V.C.--God bless 'im." A tear trickled down his nose. "The last to

leave me--the last. General Lavington said to-night--ninety-two,

sir, he is, he referred to John, he knew 'im--signed his first

papers, sir--dear ol' John. Come and have a drink, me lad." Captain

Fisher turned and put a shaking hand on the banisters.

"Not to-night, sir, thank you, it's late."

"So 'tis--so 'tis. Good night, my lad. God bless you!"

"Good night, sir!" John waited until the broken old man reached his

room, and then closed his door.

With a last look round his little room, John swiftly undressed, stood

pyjama clad and barefooted a moment after brushing his hair, looking

out on the bright moonlight night, and the quaint caricature of the

Campanile. Then he turned off the light and leapt into bed. But not

to sleep. This was his first day, and he now slept for the first

night in the city he had come to conquer; so far he had done little

conquering, he thought, as he reviewed the events of this day. The

moonlight flooded his room, making it still more unfamiliar. He

watched the swiftly fading glow of the gas fire, and his eye caught

the portrait of Muriel, illuminated in a direct beam of moonlight on

the mantelpiece. Mastered by an impulse, he threw back the clothes

and put a foot on the cold floor, then sprang out and took the

portrait from its place. For a long moment he looked at it in the

dimness, then pressed his lips to the cold glass, and was about to

get into bed, when he did what he had not done for a long time. He

had never given any serious thought to religion; perhaps he was

instinctively rather than formally religious. The times when he had

sat in school chapel had been irksome, though occasionally a hymn,

and the high fresh voices of the choir had stirred him,

aesthetically, not spiritually. But to-night he felt very lonely,

and just a little afraid. Moreover there was a new faith in his

fervent love for Muriel, which somehow required expression. So

quietly he slipped down to his knees, buried his face in his hands,

and prayed in a somewhat disordered fashion for something which he

could hardly define. Then standing up again, he looked at the

photograph, wondering whether the head he saw, in reality lying on a

pillow in a quiet country room, flooded with light from this same

moon, would realise anything of what he had just done and said. He

turned to replace the frame, then, on a thought, put it under his

pillow and got into bed. Two minutes later, quiet breathing in a

silent room told of a dreaming head, smiling for some reason, buried

deep in the pillow. He was oblivious even of Capt. Fisher's deep

bassoon in a room above.

CHAPTER II

I

He had never experienced anything like this before, and after the

dismal events of the day, the exhilaration he felt was heightened by

reaction. The stall in which he sat was luxurious. It was good to

see around him so many prosperous, well-groomed men, and smiling,

richly clad, or half-clad women. Then the lights, streaming on the

gilding, the brass rails, the tall proscenium, and the gaudily

panelled ceiling, with its naked nymphs, rosy limbed, floating from

pursuing youths on banks of fleecy cumulus,--all tended to awaken the

senses. But oh! the music and the ballet! that wild spontaneous rush

of thistledown feet and lovely limbs, the glitter, the elaborately

evolved design, the swift riot of colour swimming on a sea of soft

melody that poured out over the darkened auditorium! From the white

beauty of "Lés Sylphides," dreamlike, as a stirring of lilies on a

moonlit pool, they had passed to the happy flirtations of "Carnival."

John, in ecstasy, forgot the sick misery of his heart, forgot those

cold refusals, the reluctant opening of numerous doors, the frigid

examination of self-confident men, the waiting, the snubbing, the

insolence of office boys and porters; his deep hatred of Fleet

Street, his apprehension of fruitless days, all passed away as he

peered into these glades of music and loveliness. With the blaze of

prodigal splendour in "Scheherezade," the swift change of music from

revelry to terror, the hurrying and scurrying of silk-clad women, the

stern dignity of the departing Sultan, John's head swam. He almost

forgot to look for Wellington and de Courtrai in that rapturous

release of the captives and the licentious abandon of the women on

their entry. It was with difficulty that he penetrated their

disguise, for the effeminate dandies of Mariton Street were

half-naked dusky men with muscular torsos who leapt and danced with

fierce exultation before their adoring lovers. John could hardly

realise that these superb athletes, masters of rhythm and gesture,

were the two vulgar youths who, despite his coolness, had shown him

nothing but kindness, with such insistence, that he had accepted

their pressing invitations to this performance. And his amazement

passed to unbounded admiration when de Courtrai died from a stroke of

the Sultan's scimitar, in a magnificent somersault that laid his body

prone at the feet of his terrified mistress. The curtain fell to a

tumult of applause.

The long interval enabled John to explore the promenade at the back.

He stood in a corner and watched the parade, and wondered if it was

always the same, night after night--what kind of lives these people

lived, where their money came from, their nationality, for there were

overdressed young Jews with patent-button boots and silver-topped

canes, elegant dandies with waisted coats, girlish-looking youths

that smirked and simpered, heavy-jowled men with pendulous stomachs

and evil gloating eyes under bald, shiny heads. The women too,

French, German and Russian, dark, fair, loud-voiced, high-heeled,

arrayed in furs, small-footed and mincing, they passed, with quick

eyes and mechanical smiles, or sulky stare and--

"Penny for your thoughts, dearie," said a girl in a large white

stole, as she laid a kid-gloved hand on John's arm.

He started more in fear than surprise.

"Lord love us--I shan't bite yer!" she laughed. "So shy! and a

pretty boy too," she added, giving her fur a twitch while she looked

audaciously into his eyes with a frank stare. "How do you keep your

complexion, lovey? That ain't Ligett's one and six in cardboard

boxes, I know."

John smiled, almost unintentionally. She could only be about

eighteen, and despite the hard mouth, she had innocent, kind eyes.

"That's right--you're a regular Adonis with that showcase smile," she

exclaimed. Several persons were watching them. John coloured with

self-consciousness.

"Gawd! I wish I could do that--an' I did once, dearie, before the

dirty work on the cross roads. But I don't mind a Martini before

Strumitovski waves his stick again."

What could he do? To say "No" might provoke an outburst. He moved

towards the bar, her hand still on his arm. He felt a thousand eyes

turn on them, heard a thousand whispers. He was sure the bar-maid

smirked satirically when he ordered two Martinis. He had never had a

cocktail in his life, and didn't know whether to drink or eat the red

cherry in the amber liquid. His companion led the way and he saw she

expected another, although he had not swallowed half of the bitter

stuff. He ordered two more, and while they talked a warm glow crept

over him, and with it a feeling of distance. He seemed to be talking

to her down a corridor. There was a loud ringing of a bell above the

babel.

"Where are you sitting?" she said, propelling him out. Before he

could answer some one called "Dean!" rather excitedly. The voice was

familiar, and turning, in the crush at the door, he saw Lindon.

"What on earth are you--?" began Lindon joyously. Then, suddenly he

saw the gloved hand on John's arm and swiftly glanced at his

companion. Lindon winked expressively. "See you later, Scissors,"

he called. "I'm at Jules, Jermyn Street," and then disappeared.

Utter confusion fell upon John. He strode fiercely along.

"Lord! do you owe him a fiver?" simpered the girl.

"No--certainly not, it's you!" he returned fiercely.

She did not flinch, accustomed perhaps to such remarks. John,

although slightly drunk, was aware of his cruelty and felt penitent.

"Don't flare, dearie," she said quietly.

He halted at the corner where he turned for the gangway.

"Good-bye," he said, somewhat ungallantly, to which she responded by

detaching her arm.

"Aren't you coming home with me, boysie?" she asked plaintively, her

eyes very serious.

"No--thanks, not to-night--I don't--I--" but he could not say it.

She divined it, however.

"I know you don't--and I'll not be the first. You shy darling!" she

cried impulsively, taking his face between her hands and kissing his

mouth. A moment later she had gone, leaving nothing but a faint

odour of stale scent. Pale now, John leaned on the wall while the

blood surged to his brain, then, with a heart thumping tumultuously,

he found his way back to his seat. The rest of the ballet passed

unheeded; his mind was tracking that plaintive little face through

the dark house.

When the curtain fell on the final divertissement, in accordance with

instructions John found his way round to the stage door, in a dark

back street, where stood several luxurious motor cars, a small group

of young men and women, autograph hunters chiefly, a tout or two, all

kept outside the stage door, blazing with light, by a hoarse-voiced

man in livery, to whom in turn, each member of the company called

"Good night, Billy." At last Wellington and de Courtrai appeared and

with them, three young ladies of the ballet, called Fluffy, Pop and

Pansy respectively. On the programme they had Russian names, as had

his two friends, but their accents betrayed familiarity with Balham.

They were pupils in the _corps de ballet_, and for ten

minutes--during which they all walked towards Piccadilly Circus,

there was an animated discussion of the performance, its errors, and

the wickedness of the conductor who had taken the last score through

in seven-eight time, causing a collapse of the principals the moment

the final curtain had fallen, whereupon he had been summoned to the

wings by Lydia Lamanipoff and had his face well slapped for his

insolence. Pop declared that it would end that "affair" which had

been a subject of current gossip ever since Lydia had thrown over

Tamanski for biting her shoulder in the "Bacchanale."

John was swept along in the crowd, his own little group noisily

laughing and talking, Pansy hanging on his right arm, while her other

fondled a Pekinese dog with an enormous blue bow. They turned in at

a restaurant on the corner of a street, descended some marble steps

that wound round a lift, and suddenly John, pulled through a couple

of swing doors, halted amazed in a marble panelled room, over-lit,

with innumerable small tables surrounded by men and women.

Wellington made his way down the centre of the room, glancing at

himself in the large mirrors on his left and enjoying the sensation

their entrance caused. He commandeered a table down at the bottom,

near the noisy waitresses' buffet; above the babble of voices rose

the discordance of an orchestra on a dais. Its chief function

appeared to be that of creating as much noise as possible, including

antics at the piano and on a small drum and an organ. Wellington and

de Courtrai appeared to be well-known, for several dandified youths,

distinguished by spats, cuffs, side-whiskers or monocles, came over

to speak to them, and all were very convivial, ending their remarks

with, "Won't you introduce me?" Handshaking was a great ceremony,

accompanied with "How d'ye do?" to which was allied its inseparable

bromide, "Pleased to meet you."

Pop distinguished herself by ordering steak and chips and a bottle of

stout; Pansy had a more delicate taste, ordering sardines on toast,

which de Courtrai declared was a specialty in this hall of many

tables. Bewildered, John ordered the recommended dish, refused a

cigarette from a pale gentleman who insisted upon talking across

Pansy to him, and was suffocated with the heat and tobacco smoke.

The conversation was still of Lydia and her loves, punctuated by long

stories of the ladies, and other ladies' furs and "fellahs." John,

desperate for a theme of conversation, began by praising the

Pekinese, and then narrated his experience with the lady and her

three dogs in the park. To his surprise it awakened immediate and

deep interest. At the end, the girls giggled and Wellington

exclaimed, "Chase me!"

"It's thumbs up," said de Courtrai, wisely.

"What a cheek!" asserted Pansy, rolling her eyes; Pop declaring,

"It's a shime to lead awy the young,"--whereupon there was loud

laughter.

"Mind what you drink," said Fluffy impressively.

"I should take Welly as chaperon," advised Pansy.

John, getting redder and redder, partly in anger at his own naïve

foolishness, partly at their insinuations, declared he was not going

at all.

"What!" they all screamed in amazement.

"Wish I'd the chance," commented de Courtrai, adjusting his tie. "I

want some one to take a motherly interest in me."

There was another bellow of laughter. All eyes were turned on their

table. John wished he could get away. But they sat on until the

lights began to go out, and when at last they were in the street

again, John discovered, to his dismay, they were not bound for home

but for Pop's flat off Jermyn Street. He suggested going home alone.

"Rubbish, the fun's just beginning," cried Fluffy, taking his arm.

He was swept along with them. Pop led the way, herded them into a

small lift that ran up out of a dark hall in the street. It halted

on the fourth floor, where they all emerged.

"Wonder if the Colonel's in," said Pop, turning the key. They all

followed and the question was answered in the diminutive hall by the

emergence from a brilliantly lit room of the Colonel himself. He was

big fat man, with a treble chin and thin lips. His eyes were beady

and their sockets were sunken and baggy. On his enormous stomach he

displayed a heavy gold chain, and as if to augment the size of the

foundations of such an enormous superstructure, he wore white spats.

A diamond glittered on his finger, six black hairs trailed across his

gleaming head, and his teeth were stopped with gold. Anyone more

unlike a colonel, John had never seen. When John, later, asked de

Courtrai for his regiment, the wise young man laughed.

"Oh--he's one of the Nuts," answered de Courtrai.

Certainly he was. He kissed the three girls in a fatherly way,

poured for them all a whiskey and soda, offered John a cigar, and

finally sprang amazingly on to the lid of the baby grand piano, where

he dangled his enormous legs. Pop disappeared into an adjoining

room. Then it was her home thought John, for she emerged a few

minutes later in a kimono, with slippers on and her hair down. She

curled up on a cushion by the fireplace, lit a cigarette, and looked

up admiringly at the Colonel. He had now dismounted, to permit

Fluffy to sing, Wellington accompanying, after which the latter

played with a skill and touch that surprised John. When Pop had

contributed, "Keep on loving me," to which refrain the Colonel pursed

his lips frequently, they called for John to perform. He pleaded

excuse, but they would not listen.

"I don't know anything, really," he urged, but they forced him down

to the piano.

"What is it?" asked Fluffy as he played the opening bars.

"_O Lovely Night._"

Pop looked at Wellington.

"My--he's rapid, ain't he?" she said, but John did not hear.

There was a strange stillness as he sang. Even Fluffy stared into

space, her pretty little face, under the rose shade, pensive. "Makes

me all shivery," she whispered, between the verses.

Why did he sing this, John was asking himself. It was quite out of

keeping with the atmosphere. He was a fool to court failure like

this, but he struggled through. No one spoke when he finished.

Finally Pop asked for another cigarette.

"You've got a lovely voice," said the Colonel. "Wish I could sing

like that. Could once, when a kid--in a choir," he said with a wry

smile, pouring out a whiskey and soda.

"Lor--you in a choir," smirked Fluffy, pushing a thin finger into his

pendulous stomach. The Colonel resented this familiarity.

"Yes, my gal, me in a choir--and solo tenor too, don't you forget

it!" He gulped down his drink and sighed. Pop put her arms round

his neck and kissed his bald head.

"Did 'ums den," she crooned, and they all laughed.

Soon afterwards they left, Pop and the Colonel standing in the

doorway until the lift had gone down. Later, walking down Mariton

Street, after they had parted from Fluffy and Pansy, de Courtrai

discussed the girls.

"Orl right, of course, but, as you know, not ladies."

"Is the Colonel Pop's father?" asked John.

His two companions halted and stared at him.

"My dear child--" began de Courtrai.

"Dean's my name."

De Courtrai gaped.

"Really if you resent our--" Wellington drawled.

"I do resent being made a fool," said John, hotly.

The conversation was strained for the rest of the walk home.

The Viennese clock in the drawing-room struck three as they lighted

their candles in the hall.

II

The following morning, in a contemplative hour in bed, John was

conscience smitten. He was on the road to ruin, exactly as in the

books he had scoffed at. Flashy companions, the stage, the stage

door, actresses, fast places of resort, doubtful flats, men of loose

morals, and drink--yes, three drinks, two in the bar--the bar!--and

one at the Colonel's, and then, as ended all vulgar affairs, a

quarrel on the way home. What would Muriel think if she knew? Was

this the way he was winning through? He had been in London four days

and was on the downward path. Penitent, he sprang out of bed, and to

strengthen his will, denied himself even a dash of warm water in his

bath. At breakfast de Courtrai and Wellington were missing, for

which he was grateful. It was good to talk with the Irish girl,

enjoy her bright laughter and the fresh look in her eyes; what a

contrast to those bedizened ladies of the ballet. Mrs. Perdie was in

her most motherly mood; she came up specially from the kitchen to

have a look at Mr. John.

"I wondered if you were coming in, Mr. Dean--I was awake with my

lumbago--but there you are. It's a strange young man who can resist

the night air of London!"

He felt inclined to resent her comment, but it was so good-natured

that he laughed in reply. The real mother emerged half an hour later

when she met him alone in the hall, where he came to enquire after

his laundry.

"You'll soon lose that lovely colour of yours, Mr. Dean, in this

whirlpool, if you deny yourself proper rest. I've seen many a bright

young gentleman go dull through coming home with the milk. Perhaps I

shouldn't say it, but lor, Mr. Perdie always said I was mother-mad,

an' p'raps I am. You'll not wear yourself out chasing the moon down,

will you?"

Her good-natured face wore an anxious look.

"An' it's not for me to say really, but them young gentlemen upstairs

are not your kind, and I'm sorry if I'm presuming, Mr. Dean," she

said, wiping her hands on her apron.

"Not at all--I appreciate your anxiety, Mrs. Perdie," answered John.

"I shan't use my latchkey very often, you'll find."

"There, sir, I felt I must say it, seeing you might ha' been my own

son, sort of fashion, an' I'm easy now." She disappeared suddenly

below.

At ten-thirty that morning, John sat in the office of the _New

Review_. He had with him a letter of introduction from Mr. Vernley

to Melton Cane, the editor. For one hour he sat in the waiting-room

overlooking Covent Garden, while he listened to the whirr of the

typewriter in the next room. A door on his right opened into the

editor's den, wherein sat the assistant editor reading manuscripts,

which he took ceaselessly out of a big tin box. The reader was a

tall heavy man, with sandy hair and a fresh complexion. He had

chatted pleasantly with John and told him poetry was a drug on the

market, and they were choked with it.

"Ever since we discovered Mayfield's narrative epic, we've been

inundated with plagiaries of his work. I wade through them until I

sink in despair."

"But I haven't brought any poetry," explained John.

The big man gave a sigh of relief.

"You look like a poet--which made me think there was no hope for

you--all those who look the part write dreadful rubbish. You saw

that schoolgirls-dream come in a few minutes ago?" He alluded to a

magnificent, leonine-headed youth with flaming tie and dark cloak

whom John had taken for one of the great on earth. "Here's the stuff

he's left--without a stamped addressed envelope for return--

_My soul is bitter within me,

Long nights have I contemplated

The ego that is mine

And questioned to what immortality

Destined I go--_

I can tell him at once--the waste paper basket."

The offending manuscript joined the pile of the rejected.

"You do write?" asked the assistant editor.

"A little."

"Prose or poetry?"

"Prose."

"Ah! there's some hope, but not much. Are you aware, my dear boy,

that only three out of every hundred novels bring their authors

royalties, and that only one of those three provides a decent income?

Do you know that editors rely on big names, their directors' literary

shareholders and occasionally, when they have been out of town too

long and must go to press, the literary agent?"

John did not know this. The assistant editor stood up and yawned.

"One day I'm going to run a school of authorship. Having been a hack

for ten years with the income of a typist, I shall tell the aspirants

how to become authors, and get testimonials from all the editors in

whose papers I shall advertise my prospectus. Have a cigarette?"

John took one. They smoked in silence for a while. The assistant

editor pointed to a portrait on the wall. "That poor devil committed

suicide in Brussels last week. He had a net income of £4 per month

from this _Review_. Why do people write poetry, why do they write at

all? Literature is not a profession, it's a form of vagrancy."

"You've been a vagrant?" said John.

"How did you know?"

"I read your travel books and liked them."

"Oh--well, I'm off for good this time. I'm going to Capri where I

shall sleep all day and talk all night. Been to Capri? No? Well,

it's a good place to fade away in. Are you going to wait for Cane?"

"Yes."

"He'll come in with a rush and go out with one. He's lunching with

the Irish Secretary. He's in such a hurry that he's never sure

whether he is in Constantinople, Berlin or Paris. His pet theory

just now is the German menace; have you anything on the German

menace?"

"No--I've--"

"That's the line at present. Last month we were Malthusian, this, we

are standing for strong language in modern verse, next the German

menace--we don't know what after that; the menace may run to two

numbers. You will notice I am discreet. That is half my charm.

It's now twelve, I think you'd better wait half an hour, and then

come out to lunch with me."

"Oh thank you, but--"

"No, it's not kind of me, as you think. You keep me from being bored

with myself. Presently you shall tell me all the ambitions of your

white young soul, all the sinks you are going to flush with your

flood of zeal, the heights of fame you will scale, the way you

propose to pay for board and lodgings, how you'll persuade the

publisher you are the infallible boom he is waiting for. But you

shall not read me any of your poetry."

"I don't write poetry. I told you I didn't," began John.

"Almost I am persuaded," said the assistant editor. "But you will;

the symptoms are there It is a mental measles you cannot escape." He

stacked up the unread manuscripts. "There are poets in that pile who

can write like Keats, like Shelley, like Byron, like Wordsworth, and

they do it just as well. They've been born too late. What they

can't do is to write like themselves. There are over thirty

Swinburnes here, and enough suggested immorality to poison the

Vatican library. Most of it is written by young ladies."

At this moment Mr. Cane came in. He was a little man, going bald,

with scrubby moustache. John was about to retire, but he bade him

stay. Rapidly he glanced through half a dozen letters on his desk,

dictated social acceptances to his typist and then turned to John.

"Now--what can I do?"

John presented his letter. Cane read it quickly.

"You want work, I see. There's none worth having in the literary

world. You're well informed, I'm told. Do you know Elverton Thomas?"

"I've heard of him."

"He wants a secretary who can get points for his speeches. If you

like, I'll give you a letter to him at the House of Commons."

"It isn't what I want, thank you," said John.

"We don't always get what we want," snapped Cane. "I can't do

anything else for you," he added with an air of ending the matter.

"You can if you will, Mr. Cane, please. You know Mr. Walsh."

"Well?"

"I want to see him."

"Newspaper editors are very busy men."

"They've always time for good business," urged John.

"H'm--how old are you?--you can get what you want, I see."

"Nineteen, with lots of drive in me."

"You want to get on a newspaper?"

"Yes--I'm determined to."

"I'll ring up Walsh. Go to his office at five to-day. He'll be in

then."

"Thank you very much."

Cane stood up, buttoned his coat, put on a glove.

"I'm going now," he said to his assistant. "I'll sign those cheques

this afternoon. Send back Professor Railing's articles on

Shakespeare--there's nothing bar his resurrection could make a noise

for him." He strode to the door.

"How's Mr. Vernley?" he asked John.

"Very well, sir, thank you."

"And Muriel?--a bright child that!"

A light leapt in John's eyes. The other man understood at once and

gave him the first warm human look.

"Oh--she's very well, sir."

The door closed, he was gone.

"There! what do you think of him?" asked the assistant, somewhat

proudly, John thought. "He'll play bridge at the Reform until four,

dance at Murray's during tea, and rush back here before dressing for

the opera. And those simpletons," with a wave towards the pile of

the rejected, "think he spends his time discovering them for the next

number. Our next specialty in verse--is a mechanic poet. There have

been navy poets, tramp poets, fishermen poets, postmen poets, porter

poets, but no one's found a mechanic poet. I have, and strange to

say he doesn't write about lathes, cams or beltings. He's gone back

to pure Greek. Here's 'Iphigenia in Balham.' Victorian bricks and

mortar mixed with ancient Greece. We've prevailed on the Bishop of

London to quote it next month. That'll start the _Church News_; an

interview in the _Daily Mail_ with the new poet, and we are well into

a second edition. Now let's go to lunch. I don't know your name.

I'll call you Narcissus--listening to my echoes."

"That's a lucky shot," said John. "That is my nickname. Dean's my

name."

"Ha!" said the assistant editor. "You are a reincarnation. I must

take you to a lady friend of mine. She will see the aura of a

chlamys under your flannel shirt. My name, too, is strange--not what

you would think for a moment. Not poetical or suggestive, scarcely

practical even--just Smith--you start at the revelation. It is

distinguished only by having neither a 'y' nor an 'e'. We belong to

the original Smiths--the blacksmiths. Ready?"

Crossing the Strand, John began to wonder if this was the inevitable

end of all attempts to do work in London. It was good-natured of

this stranger to take him out. He was amused at his torrential witty

chatter, but it was not solving the all-pressing problem of getting a

living.