CHAPTER I

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THE DRUNKARD

BY

GUY THORNE

AUTHOR OF "WHEN IT WAS DARK," "FIRST IT WAS

ORDAINED," "MADE IN HIS IMAGE," ETC., ETC.

New York

STURGIS & WALTON COMPANY

1912

COPYRIGHT, 1911

BY

STURGIS & WALTON COMPANY

Published January, 1912

Transcriber's Note: Inconsistencies in spelling, punctuation, and

hyphenation have been retained as printed. The cover of this ebook was

created by the transcriber and is hereby placed in the public domain.

DEDICATION

TO LOUIS TRACY, ESQUIRE

_My Dear Louis_:

It is more than a year ago now that I asked you to accept the

dedication of this story. It was on an evening when I was staying with

you at your Yorkshire house and we had just come in from shooting.

But I discussed the tale with you long before that. It was either--as

well as I can remember--at my place in the Isle of Wight, or when we

were all together in the Italian Alps. I like to think that it was at

that time I first asked your opinion and advice about this book upon

which I have laboured so long.

One night comes back to me very vividly--yes, that surely was the

night. Dinner was over. We were sitting in front of the brilliantly lit

hotel with coffee and cigarettes. You had met all my kind Italian

friends. Our wives were sitting together at one little table with

Signora Maerdi and Madame Riva Monico--to whom be greeting! My father

was at ours, and happy as a boy for all his white beard and skull-cap

of black velvet.

Your son, Dick, was dancing with the Italian girls in the bright salon

behind us, and the piano music tinkled out into the hot night. The

Alpine woods of ilex and pine rose up in the moonlight to where the

snow-capped mountains of St. Gothard hung glistening silver-green.

I ask you to take this book as a memorial of a happy, uninterrupted and

dignified friendship, not less valuable and gracious because your wife

and mine are friends also.

_Nil ego contulerim jucundo sanus amico!_

Yours ever sincerely,

GUY THORNE.

FOREWORD

The sixth chapter in the third book of this story can hardly be called

fiction. The notes upon which it is founded were placed in my

possession by a brilliant man of letters some short time before he

died. Serious students of the psychology of the Inebriate may use the

document certain that it is genuine.

I have to acknowledge my indebtedness to the illuminating study in

heredity of Dr. Archdall Reed, M.B., C.M., F.R.S.E. His book

"Alcoholism" ought to be read by every temperance reformer in Europe

and America.

"The Drink Problem," a book published by Messrs. Methuen and written in

concert by the greatest experts on the subject of Inebriety, has been

most helpful. I have not needed technical help to make my story, but I

have found that it gives ample corroboration of protracted

investigation and study.

My thanks are due to Mr. John Theodore Tussaud for assistance in the

writing of chapter four, book three.

Lastly, I should be ungrateful indeed, if I did not put down my sincere

thanks to my secretary Miss Ethel Paczensky for all she has done for me

during the making of this tale. The mere careful typewriting, revision

and arrangement of a long story which is to be published in America and

Europe, requires considerable skill. The fact that the loyal help and

sympathy of a young and acute mind have been so devotedly at my

service, merits more thanks and acknowledgment than can be easily

conveyed in a foreword.

G. T.

CONTENTS

PROLOGUE

PAGE

PART I A BOOK OF POEMS ARRIVES FOR DR. MORTON SIMS 3

PART II THE MURDERER 14

BOOK ONE

LOTHIAN IN LONDON

CHAPTER

I UNDER THE WAGGON-ROOF. A DINNER IN BRYANSTONE SQUARE 37

II GRAVELY UNFORTUNATE OCCURRENCE IN MRS. AMBERLEY'S DRAWING

ROOM 58

III SHAME IN "THE ROARING GALLANT TOWN" 76

IV LOTHIAN GOES TO THE LIBRARY OF PURE LITERATURE 103

V "FOR THE FIRST TIME, HE WAS GOING TO HAVE A GIRL FRIEND" 121

BOOK TWO

LOTHIAN IN NORFOLK

I VIGNETTE OF EARLY MORNING. "GILBERT IS COMING HOME!" 145

II AN EXHIBITION OF DOCTOR MORTON SIMS AND DOCTOR MEDLEY,

WITH AN ACCOUNT OF HOW LOTHIAN RETURNED TO MORTLAND

ROYAL 165

III PSYCHOLOGY OF THE INEBRIATE, AND THE LETTER OF JEWELLED

WORDS 204

IV DICKSON INGWORTH UNDER THE MICROSCOPE 237

V A QUARREL IN THE "MOST SELECT LOUNGE IN THE COUNTY" 246

VI AN _OMNES_ EXEUNT FROM MORTLAND ROYAL 269

BOOK THREE

FRUIT OF THE DEAD SEA

I THE GIRLS IN THE FOURTH STORY FLAT 283

II OVER THE RUBICON 295

III THIRST 318

IV THE CHAMBER OF HORRORS 330

V THE NIGHT JOURNEY FROM NICE WHEN MRS. DALY SPEAKS WORDS

OF FIRE 353

VI GILBERT LOTHIAN'S DIARY 367

VII INGWORTH REDUX: TOFTREES COMPLACENS 394

VIII THE AMNESIC DREAM-PHASE 409

IX A STARTLING EXPERIENCE FOR "WOG" 436

EPILOGUE

A YEAR LATER

WHAT OCCURRED AT THE EDWARD HALL IN KINGSWAY 453

PROLOGUE

PART I

A BOOK OF POEMS ARRIVES FOR DR. MORTON SIMS

"How many bards gild the lapses of time

A few of them have ever been the food

Of my delighted fancy."

--_Keats._

The rain came down through the London fog like ribands of lead as the

butler entered the library with tea, and pulling the heavy curtains

shut out the picture of the sombre winter's afternoon.

The man poked the fire into a blaze, switched on the electric lights,

and putting a late edition of the _Westminster Gazette_ upon the table,

left the room.

For five minutes the library remained empty. The fire crackled and

threw a glancing light upon the green and gold of the book shelves or

sent changing expressions over the faces of the portraits. The ghostly

blue flame which burnt under a brass kettle on the tea table sang like

a mosquito, and from the square outside came the patter of rain, the

drone of passing taxi-cabs, and the occasional beat of horses' hoofs

which made an odd flute-like noise upon the wet wood pavement.

Then the door opened and Dr. Morton Sims, the leading authority in

England upon Inebriety, entered his study.

The doctor was a slim man of medium height. His moustache and pointed

beard were grey and the hair was thinning upon his high forehead. His

movements were quick and alert without suggesting nervousness or hurry,

and a steady flame burned in brown eyes which were the most remarkable

feature of his face.

The doctor drew up a chair to the fire and made himself a cup of weak

tea, pouring a little lime-juice into it instead of milk. As he sipped

he gazed into the pink and amethyst heart of the fire. His eyes were

abstracted--turned inwards upon himself so to speak--and the

constriction of thought drew grey threads across his brow.

After about ten minutes, and when he had finished his single cup of

tea, Dr. Morton Sims opened the evening paper and glanced rapidly up

and down the broad, well-printed columns.

His eye fell upon a small paragraph at the bottom of the second

news-sheet which ran thus:--

"Hancock, the Hackney murderer, is to be executed to-morrow morning

in The North London Prison at eight o'clock. It is understood that

he has refused the ministrations of the Prison Chaplain and seems

indifferent to his fate."

The paper dropped from the doctor's hands and he sighed. The paragraph

might or might not be accurate--that remained to be seen--but it

suggested a curious train of thought to his mind. The man who was to

be hanged in a few hours had committed a murder marked by every

circumstance of callousness and cunning. The facts were so sinister and

cold that the horrible case had excited no sympathy whatever. Even the

silly faddists who generally make fools of themselves on such an

occasion in England had organised no petition for reprieve.

Morton Sims was one of those rare souls whose charity of mind, as well

as of action, was great. He always tried to take the other side, to

combat and resist the verdict passed by the world upon the unhappy and

discredited.

But in the case of this murderer even he could have had no sympathy, if

he had not known and understood something about the man which no one in

the country understood, and only a few people would have been capable

of realising if they had been enlightened.

It was his life-work to understand why deeds like this were done.

A clock upon the high mantel of polished oak struck five.

The doctor rose from his chair and stretched himself, and as he did

this the wrinkles faded from his forehead, while his eyes ceased to be

clouded by abstraction.

Morton Sims, in common with many successful men, had entire control

over his own mind. He perfectly understood the structure and the

working of the machine that secretes thought. In his mental context

correct muscular co-ordination, with due action of the reflexes,

enabled him to put aside a subject with the precision of a man closing

a cupboard door.

His mind was divided into thought-tight compartments.

It was so now. He wished to think of the murderer in North London

Prison no more at the moment, and immediately the subject passed away

from him.

At that moment the butler re-entered with some letters and a small

parcel upon a tray.

"The five o'clock post, sir," he said, putting the letters down upon

the table.

"Oh, very well, Proctor," the doctor answered. "Is everything arranged

for Miss Sims and Mrs. Daly?"

"Yes, sir. Fires are lit in both the bedrooms, and dinner is for

half-past six. The boat train from Liverpool gets in to Euston at a

quarter to. The brougham will be at the station in good time. They will

have a cold journey I expect, sir."

"No, I don't think so, Proctor. The Liverpool boat-trains are most

comfortable and they will have had tea. Very well, then."

The butler went away. Morton Sims looked at the clock. It was ten

minutes past five. His sister and her friend, who had arrived at

Liverpool from New York a few hours ago would not arrive in London

before six.

He looked at the four or five letters on the tray but did not open any

of them. The label upon the parcel bore handwriting that he knew. He

cut the string and opened that, taking from it a book bound in light

green and a letter.

Both were from his great friend Bishop Moultrie, late of Simla and now

rector of Great Petherwick in Norfolk, Canon of Norwich, and a sort of

unofficial second suffragan in that enormous diocese.

"My dear John," ran the letter, "Here is the book that I was

telling you of at the Athenæum last week. You may keep this copy,

and I have put your name in it. The author, Gilbert Lothian, lives

near me in Norfolk. I know him a little and he has presented me

with another copy himself.

You won't agree with some of the thoughts, one or two of the poems

you may even dislike. But on the whole you will be as pleased and

interested as I am and you will recognise a genuine new

inspiration--such a phenomenon now-a-days. Such verse must leave

every reader with a quickened sense of the beauty and compass of

human feeling, to say nothing of its special appeal to Xn thinkers.

Some of it is like George Herbert made musical. Lothian is Crashaw

born again, but born greater--sometimes a Crashaw who has been

listening to some one playing Chopin!

But read for yourself.

Give my regards to your sister when she returns. I hear from many

sources of the great mark her speeches have made at the American

Congress and I am anxiously hoping to meet Mrs. Daly during her

stay over here. She must be a splendid woman!

Helena sends all kind remembrances and hopes to see you here soon.

Yours affectionately,

W. D. MOULTRIE."

Three quarters of an hour were at his disposal. Morton Sims took up the

book, which bore the title "SURGIT AMARI" upon the cover, and began to

read.

Like many other members of his profession he was something of a man of

letters. For him the life-long pursuit of science had been humanised

and sweetened by art. Ever since his days at Harrow with his friend,

the Bishop, he had loved books.

He read very slowly the longish opening poem only, applying delicate

critical tests to every word; analytic and scientific still in the

temper of his mind, and distrusting the mere sensuous impression of a

first glance.

This new man, this Gilbert Lothian, would be great. He would make his

way by charm, the charm of voice, of jewel-like language, above all by

the intellectual charm of new, moving, luminous ideas.

At three minutes to six the doctor closed the book and waited. Almost

as the clock struck the hour, he heard his motor-brougham stop outside

the house, and hurrying out into the hall had opened the door before

the butler could reach it.

Two tall women in furs came into the hall.

The brother and sister kissed each other quietly, but their embrace was

a long one and there was something that vibrated deep down in the

voices of their greeting. Then Miss Morton Sims turned to the other

lady. "Forgive me, Julia," she said, in her clear bell-like voice--in

America they had said that her voice "tolled upon the ear"--"But I

haven't seen him for five months. John, here is Julia Daly at last!"

The doctor took his guest's hand. His face was bright and eager as he

looked at the American woman. She was tall, dressed with a kind of

sumptuous good taste, and the face under its masses of grey hair shone

with a Minerva-like wisdom and serenity.

"Welcome," the doctor said simply. "We have been friends so long, we

have corresponded so often, it is a great joy to me to meet you at

last!"

The three people entered the library for a moment, exchanging the happy

commonplaces of greeting, and then the two women went up to their

rooms.

"Dinner at half past six," the doctor called after them. "I knew you'd

want it. We can have a long talk then. At eight I have to go out upon

an important errand."

He stood in front of the library fire, thinking about the new arrivals

and smoking a cigarette.

His sister Edith had always lived with him, had shared his hopes, his

theories and his work. He was the great scientist slowly getting deep

down, discovering the laws which govern the vital question of

Alcoholism. She was the popular voice, one of the famous women leaders

of the Temperance movement, the most lucid, the least emotional of them

all. Her name was familiar to every one in England. Her brother gave

her the weapons with which she fought. His theories upon Temperance

Reform were quite opposed to the majority of those held by earnest

workers in the same field, but he and his sister were beginning to form

a strong party of influential people who thought with them. Mrs. Daly

was, in America, very much what Edith Morton Sims was in Great

Britain--perhaps even more widely known. Apart from her propaganda she

was one of the few great women orators living, and in her case also,

inspiration came from the English doctor, while she was making his

beliefs and schemes widely known in the United States.

As he waited in the library, the doctor thought that probably no man

had ever had such noble helpers as these two women to whom such great

gifts had been given. His heart was very full of love for his sister

that night, of gratitude and admiration for the stately lady who had

come to be his guest and whom he now met in the flesh for the first

time.

For the first part of dinner the ladies were very full of their recent

campaign in America.

There was an infinity of news to tell, experiences and impressions must

be recorded, progress reported. The eager sparkling talk of the two

women was delightful to the doctor, and he was especially pleased with

the conversation of Mrs. Daly. Every word she spoke fell with the right

ring and chimed, he seemed to have known her for years--as indeed he

had done, through the medium of her letters.

Conversation, which with people like these is a sort of music,

resembles the progress of harmonics in this also--that a lull arrives

with mathematical incidence when a certain stage is reached in the

progress of a theme.

It happened so now, at a certain stage of dinner. There was much more

to be said, but all three people had reached a momentary pause.

The butler came into the room just then, with a letter. "This has just

come by messenger from North London Prison, sir," he said, unable to

repress a faint gleam of curiosity in his eyes.

With a gesture of apology, the doctor opened the envelope. "Very well,"

he said, in a moment or two. "I need not write an answer. But go to the

library, Proctor, and ring up the North London Prison. Say Doctor

Morton Sims' thanks and he will be there punctually at half past

eight."

The servant withdrew and both the ladies looked inquiringly at the

doctor.

"It is a dreadful thing," he said, after a moment's hesitation, "but I

may as well tell you. It must go no further though. A wretched man is

to be executed to-morrow and I have to go and see him."

Edith shuddered.

"How frightful," she said, growing rather pale; "but why, John? How

does it concern you? Are you forced to go?"

He nodded. "I must go," he said, "though it is the most painful thing I

have ever had to do. It is Hancock, the Hackney murderer."

Two startled faces were turned to him now, and a new atmosphere

suddenly seemed to have come into the warm luxurious room, something

that was cold, something that had entered from outside.

"You don't know," he went on. "Of course you have been out of England

for some months. Well, it is this. Hancock is a youngish man of five

and twenty. He was a chemist at Hackney, and of quite exceptional

intelligence. He was at one time an assistant at Williamsons' in Oxford

Street, where some of my prescriptions are made up and where I buy

drugs for experimental purposes. I took rather an interest in him

several years ago. He passed all his examinations with credit and

became engaged to a really charming young woman, who was employed in a

big ladies' shop in Regent Street. He wanted to set up in business for

himself, very naturally, and I helped him with a money loan. He married

the girl, bought a business at Hackney, and became prosperous enough in

a moderate sort of way. He paid me back the hundred pounds I lent him

and from time to time I heard that things were going on very well. He

was respected in the district, and his wife especially was liked. She

was a good and religious woman and did a lot of work for a local

church. They appeared to be a most devoted couple."

The doctor stopped in his story and glanced at the set faces turned

towards him. He poured some water into a tumbler and drank it.

"Oh, it's a hideous story," he said, with some emotion and marked

distaste in his voice. "I won't go into the details. Hancock poisoned

his wife with the most calculating and wicked cunning. He had become

enamoured of a girl in the neighbourhood and he wanted to get rid of

his wife in order to marry her. His wife adored him. She had been a

perfect wife to him, but it made no difference. The thing was

discovered, as such things nearly always are, he was condemned to death

and will be hanged to-morrow morning at breakfast time."

"And you are going to see him _to-night_, John?"

"Yes. It is my duty. I owe it to my work, and to the wretched man too.

I was present at the trial. From the first I realised that there must

have been some definite toxic influence at work on the man's mind to

change him from an intelligent and well-meaning member of society into

a ghastly monster of crime. I was quite right. It was alcohol. He had

been secretly drinking for years, though, as strong-minded and cunning

inebriates do, he had managed to preserve appearances. As you know,

Edith, the Home Secretary is a friend of mine and interested in our

work. Hancock has expressed a wish to see me, to give me some definite

information about himself which will be of great use in my researches

into the psychology of alcoholism. With me, the Home Secretary realises

the value of such an opportunity, and as it is the convict's earnest

wish, I am given the fullest facilities for to-night. Of course the

matter is one of absolute privacy. There would be an outcry among the

sentimental section of the public if it were known. But it is my clear

duty to go."

There was a dead silence in the room. Mrs. Daly played uneasily with

her napkin ring. Suddenly it escaped her nervous fingers and rolled up

against a tumbler with a loud ringing sound. She started and seemed to

awake from a bitter dream.

"Again!" she said in a low voice that throbbed with pain. "At all

hours, in all places, we meet it! The scourge of humanity, the Fiend

Alcohol! The curse of the world!--how long, how long?"

PART II

THE MURDERER

"Ma femme est morte, je suis libre!

Je puis donc boire tout mon soûl.

Lorsque je rentrais sans un sou,

Ses cris me déchiraient la fibre."

--_Baudelaire._

The rain had ceased but the night was bitter cold, as Dr. Morton Sims'

motor went from his house in Russell Square towards the North London

Prison.

A pall of fog hung a few hundred feet above London. The brilliant

artificial lights of the streets glowed with a hard and rather ghastly

radiance. As the car rolled down this and that roaring thoroughfare,

the people in it seemed to Morton Sims to be walking like marionettes.

The driver in front moved mechanically like a clockwork puppet, the

town seemed fantastic and unreal to-night.

A heavy depression weighed upon the doctor's senses. His heart beat

slowly. Some other artery within him was throbbing like a funeral drum.

It had come upon him suddenly as he left the house. He had never, in

all his life, known anything like it before. Perhaps the mournful words

of the American woman had been the cause. Her deep contralto voice

tolled in his ears still. Some white cell in the brain was affected,

the nerves of his body were in revolt. The depression grew deeper and

deeper. A nameless malady of the soul was upon him, he had a sick

horror of his task. The hands in his fur gloves grew wet and there was

a salt taste in his mouth.

The car left ways that were familiar. Presently it turned into a street

of long houses. The street rose steeply before, and was outlined by a

long, double row of gas-lamps, stretching away to a point. It was quite

silent, and the note of the car's engine sank a full tone as the ascent

began.

Through the window in front, and to the left of the chauffeur, the

doctor could see the lamps running past him, and suddenly he became

aware of a vast blackness, darker than the houses, deeper than the sky,

coming to meet him. Incredibly huge and sinister, a precipice, a

mountain of stone, a nightmare castle whose grim towers were lost in

night, closed the long road and barred all progress onward.

It was the North London Prison, hideous by day, frightful by night, the

frontier citadel of a land of Death and gloom and shadows.

The doctor left his car and told the man to return in an hour and wait

for him.

He stood before a high arched gateway. In this gateway was a door

studded with sexagonal bosses of iron. Above the door was a gas-lamp.

Hanging to the side of this door was an iron rod terminating in a

handle of brass. This was the bell.

A sombre silence hung over everything. The roar of London seemed like a

sound heard in a vision. A thin night wind sighed like a ghost in the

doctor's ear as he stood before the ultimate reality of life, a reality

surpassing the reality of dreams.

He stretched out his arm and pulled the bell.

The smooth and sudden noise of oiled steel bars sliding in their

grooves was heard, and then a gentle "thud" as they came to rest. A

small wicket door in the great ones opened. A huge sombre figure filled

it and there was a little musical jingle of keys.

The visitor's voice was muffled as he spoke. In his own ears it sounded

strange.

"I am Dr. Morton Sims," he said. "I have a special permit from the Home

Secretary for an interview with the convict Hancock."

The figure moved aside. The doctor stepped in through the narrow

doorway. There was a sharp click, a jingle of keys, the thud of the

steel bars as they went home and a final snap, three times

repeated--snap--snap--snap.

A huge, bull-necked man in a dark uniform and a peaked cap, stood close

to the doctor--strangely close, he thought with a vague feeling of

discomfort. From an open doorway set in a stone wall, orange-coloured

light was pouring from a lit interior. Framed in the light were two

other dark figures in uniform.

Morton Sims stood immediately under the gate tower of the prison. A

lamp hung from the high groined roof. Beyond was another iron-studded

door, and on either side of this entrance hall were lit windows.

"You are expected, sir," said the giant with the keys. "Step this way

if you please."

Sims followed the janitor into a bare room, brilliantly illuminated by

gas. At the end near the door a fire of coke and coal was glowing. A

couple of warders, youngish military-looking men, with bristling

moustaches, were sitting on wooden chairs by the fire and reading

papers. They rose and saluted as the doctor came in.

At the other end of the room, an elderly man, clean shaved save for

short side whiskers which were turning grey, was sitting at a table on

which were writing materials and some books which looked like ledgers.

"Good-evening, sir," he said, deferentially, as Doctor Sims was taken

up to him. "You have your letter I suppose?"

Sims handed it to him, and pulling on a pair of spectacles the man read

it carefully. "I shall have to keep this, sir," he said, putting it

under a paper-weight. "My orders are to send you to the Medical Officer

at once. He will take you to the condemned cell and do all that is

necessary. The Governor sends his compliments and if you should wish to

see him after your interview he will be at your service."

"I don't think I shall want to trouble Colonel Wilde, thank you," said

the doctor.

"Very good, sir. Of course you can change your mind if you wish,

afterwards. But the Governor's time is certainly very much taken up. It

always is on the night before an execution. Jones, take this gentleman

to the Medical Officer."

Again the cold air, as Morton Sims left the room with one of the

warders. Again the sound of sliding bars and jingling keys, the soft

closing of heavy doors. Then a bare, whitewashed hall, with a long

counter like that of a cloak-room at a railway station, a weighing

machine, gaunt anthropometrical instruments standing against the walls,

and iron doors on every side--all seen under the dim light of gas-jets

half turned down.

"The reception room, sir," said the warder, in a quiet voice, unlocking

one of the doors, and showing a long corridor, much better lighted,

stretching away for a considerable distance. The man stepped through

with the noiseless footfall of a cat. The doctor followed him, and as

he did so his boots echoed upon the stone floor. The noise was

startling in this place of silence, and for the first time Sims

realised that his guide was wearing shoes soled with felt.

They went down the corridor, the warder's feet making a soft padding

sound, the steel chain that hung in a loop from his belt of black

leather shining in the gas light. Almost at the end of the passage they

came to a door--an ordinary varnished door with a brass handle--at

which the man rapped.

"Come in," cried a voice.

The warder held the door open. "The gentleman to see Hancock, sir," he

said.

The chief prison doctor, a youngish-looking, clean-shaved man, rose

from his chair. "Wait in the passage till I call you," he said.

"How-do-you-do, Dr. Morton Sims. We had your telephone message some

time ago. You are very punctual! Do sit down for a minute."

Sims sank into an armchair, with a little involuntary sigh of relief.

The room in which he found himself was comfortable and ordinary. A

carpet was on the floor, a bright fire burned upon the hearth, there

was a leather-covered writing table with books and a stethoscope upon

it. The place was normal.

"My name is Marriott, of 'Barts'," said the medical officer. "Do take

off your coat, sir, that fur must be frightfully hot in here and you

won't need it until you leave the prison again."

"Thank you, I will," Sims answered, and already his voice had regained

its usual calmness, his eyes their steady glow. Anticipation was over,

the deep depression was passing away. There was work to be done and his

nerves responded to the call upon them. "There is no hitch, I suppose?"

"None whatever. Hancock is waiting for you, and anxious to see you."

"It will be very painful," Sims answered in a thoughtful voice, looking

at the fire. "I knew the man in his younger days, poor, wretched

creature. Is he resigned?"

"I think so. We've done all we could for him; we always do. As far as I

can judge, and I have been present at nine executions, he will die

quite calmly. 'I shall be glad when it's over,' he said to me this

morning."

"And his physical condition?"

"Just beginning to improve. If I had him here for six months under the

second class regulations--I should not certify him for hard labour--I

could turn him out in fair average health. He's a confirmed alcoholic

subject, of course. It's been a case of ammonium bromide and milk diet

ever since his condemnation. For the first two days I feared delirium

tremens from the shock. But we tided over that. He'll be able to talk

to you all right, sir. He's extremely intelligent, and I should say

that the interview should prove of great value."

"He has absolutely refused to see the Chaplain? I read so in to-night's

paper."

"Yes. Some of them do you know. The religious sense isn't developed at

all in him. It will be all the easier for him to-morrow."

"How so?"

"So many of them become religious on the edge of the drop simply out of

funk--nervous collapse and a sort of clutching at a chance in the next

world. They often struggle and call out when they're being pinioned.

It's impossible to give them any sort of anæsthetic."

"Is that done then? I didn't know."

"It's not talked about, of course, sir. It's quite unofficial and it's

not generally known. But we nearly always give them something if it's

possible, and then they know nothing of what's happening."

Sims nodded. "The best way," he said sadly, "the lethal chamber would

be better still."

There was a momentary silence between the two men. The prison doctor

felt instinctively that his distinguished visitor shrank from the

ordeal before him and was bracing himself to go through with it. He was

unwilling to interrupt such a famous member of his profession. It was

an event to meet him, a thing which he would always remember.

Suddenly Sims rose from his chair. "Now, then," he said with a rather

wan smile, "take me to the poor fellow."

Dr. Marriott opened the door and made a sign to the waiting warder.

Together the three men went to the end of the passage.

Another door was unlocked and they found themselves in a low stone

hall, with a roof of heavily barred ground glass.

There was a door on each side of the place.

"That's the execution room," said Dr. Marriott in a whisper, pointing

to one of the doors. "The other's the condemned cell. It's only about

ten steps from one to the other. The convict, of course, never knows

that. But from the time he leaves his cell to the moment of death is

rarely more than forty-five seconds."

The voice of the prison doctor, though very low in key, was not subdued

by any note of awe. The machinery of Death had no terrors for him. He

spoke in a matter-of-fact way, with an unconscious note of the showman.

The curator of a museum might have shown his treasures thus to an

intelligent observer. For a second of time--so strange are the

operations of the memory cells--another and far distant scene grew

vivid in the mind of Morton Sims.

Once more he was paying his first visit to Rome, and had been driven

from his hotel upon the Pincio to the nine o'clock Mass at St. Peter's.

A suave guide had accompanied him, and among the curious crowd that

thronged the rails, had told in a complacent whisper of this or that

Monsignore who said or served the Mass.

Dr. Marriott went to the door opposite to the one he had pointed out as

the death-chamber.

He moved aside a hanging disc of metal on a level with his eyes, and

peered through a glass-covered spy-hole into the condemned cell.

After a scrutiny of some seconds, he slid the disc into its place and

rapped softly upon the door. Almost immediately it was opened a foot or

so, silently, as the door of a sick-room is opened by one who watches

within. There was a whispered confabulation, and a warder came out.

"This gentleman," said the Medical Officer, "as you have already been

informed by the Governor, is to have an interview with the convict

absolutely alone. You, and the man with you, are to sit just outside

the cell and to keep it under continual observation through the glass.

If you think it necessary you are to enter the cell at once. And at the

least gesture of this gentleman you will do so too. But otherwise, Dr.

Morton Sims is to be left alone with the prisoner for an hour. You

quite understand?"

"Perfectly, sir."

"You anticipate no trouble?--how is he?"

"Quiet as a lamb, sir. There's no fear of any trouble with him. He's

cheerful and he's been talking a lot about himself--about his violin

playing mostly, and a week he had in Paris. His hands are twitching a

bit, but less than usual with them."

"Very well. Jones will remain here and will fetch me at once if I am

wanted. Now take Dr. Morton Sims in."

The door was opened. A gust of hot air came from within as Morton Sims

hesitated for a moment upon the threshold.

The warm air, indeed, was upon his face, but once again the chill was

at his heart. Lean and icy fingers seemed to grope about it.

At the edge of what abysmal precipice, and the end of what sombre

perspective of Fate was he standing?

From youth upwards he had travelled the goodly highways of life. He had

walked in the clear light, the four winds of heaven had blown upon him.

Sunshine and Tempest, Dawn and Dusk, fair and foul weather had been his

portion in common with the rest of the wayfaring world.

But now he had strayed from out the bright and strenuous paths of men.

The brave high-road was far, far away. He had entered a strange and

unfamiliar lane. The darkness had deepened. He had come into a marsh of

miasmic mist lit up by pale fires that were not of heaven and where

dreadful presences thronged the purple gloom.

This was the end of all things. A life of shame closed here--through

that door where a living corpse was waiting for him "pent up in

murderers' hole."

He felt a kindly and deprecating hand upon his arm.

"You will find it quite ordinary, really, sir. You needn't hesitate in

the very least"--thus the consoling voice of Marriott.

Morton Sims walked into the cell.

Another warder who had been sitting there glided out. The door was

closed. The doctor found himself heartily shaking hands with someone

whom he did not seem to know.

And here again, as he was to remember exactly two years afterwards,

under circumstances of supreme mental anguish and with a sick

recognition of past experience, his sensation was without precedent.

Some one, was it not rather _something_? was shaking him warmly by the

hand. A strained voice was greeting him. Yet he felt as if he were

sawing at the arm of a great doll, not a live thing in which blood

still circulated and systole and diastole still kept the soul

co-ordinate and co-incident.

Then that also went. The precipitate of long control was dropped into

the clouded vessel of thought and it cleared again. The fantastic

imaginings, the natural horror of a kind and sensitive man at being

where he was, passed away.

The keen scientist stood in the cell now, alert to perform the duty for

which he was there.

The room was of a fair size. In one corner was a low bed, with a

blanket, sheet and pillow.

In the centre, a deal table stood. A wooden chair, from which the

convict had just risen, stood by the table, and upon it were a Bible,

some writing materials, and a novel--bound in the dark-green of the

prison library--by "Enid and Herbert Toftrees."

Hancock wore a drab prison suit, which was grotesquely ill-fitting. He

was of medium height, and about twenty-five years of age. He was fat,

with a broad-shouldered corpulence which would have been less

noticeable in a man who was some inches taller. His face was ordinarily

clean-shaven, but there was now a disfiguring stubble upon it, a three

weeks' growth which even the scissors of the prison-barber had not been

allowed to correct and which gave him a sordid and disgusting aspect.

The face was fattish, but even the bristling hairs, which squirted out

all over the lower part, could not quite disguise a curious suggestion

of contour about it. It should have been a pure oval, one would have

thought, and in the gas-light, as the head moved, it almost seemed to

have that for fugitive instants. It was a contour veiled by a dreadful

something that was, but ought not to have been there.

The eyes were grey and had a certain capability of expression. It was

now enigmatic and veiled.

The mouth was by far the most real and significant feature of the face.

In all faces, mouths generally are. The murderer's mouth was small. It

was clearly and definitely cut, with an undefinable hint of breeding in

it which nothing else about the man seemed to warrant. But despite the

approach to beauty which, in another face, it might have had, slyness

and egotism lurked in every curve.

. . . "So that's how it first began, Doctor. First one with one, then

one with another. You know!"

The conversation was in full swing now.

The doll had come to life--or it was not quite a doll yet and some of

the life that was ebbing from it still remained.

The voice was low, confidential, horribly "just between you and me."

But it was a pleased voice also, full of an eager and voluble

satisfaction,--the last chance of toxic insanity to explain itself!

The lurid swan-song of a conceited and poisoned man.

. . . "Business was going well. There seemed no prospect of a child

just then, so Mary got in with Church work at St. Philip's. That

brought a lot more customers to the shop too. Fancy soaps, scents and

toilette articles and all that. Dr. Mitchell of Hackney, was a

church-warden at St. Philip's and in time all his prescriptions came to

me. No one had a better chance than I did. And Mary was that good to

me." . . .

Two facile, miserable tears rolled from the man's glazing eyes. He

wiped them away with the back of his hand.

"You can't think, sir, being a bachelor. Anything I'd a mind to fancy!

Sweet-breads she could cook a treat, and Burgundy we used to

'ave--California wine, 'Big Bush' brand in flagons at two and eight.

And never before half-past seven. Late dinner you might have called it,

while my assistant was in the shop. And after that I'd play to her on

the violin. Nothing common, good music--'Orer pro Nobis' and 'Rousoh's

Dream.' You never heard me play did you? I was in the orchestra of the

Hackney Choral Society. I remember one day . . ."

"And then?" the Doctor said, gently.

He had already gathered something, but not all that he had come to

gather. The minutes were hurrying by.

The man looked up at the doctor with a sudden glance, almost of hatred.

For a single instant the abnormal egoism of the criminal, swelled out

upon the face and turned it into the mask of a devil.

Dr. Morton Sims spoke in a sharp, urgent voice.

"Why did you ask me to come here, Hancock?" he said. "You know that I

am glad to be here, if I can be of any use to you. But you don't seem

to want the sort of sympathetic help that the chaplain here could give

you far better than I can. What do you want to say to me? Have you

really anything to say? If you have, be a man and say it!"

There was a brief but horrible interlude.

"Well, you are cruel, doctor, not 'arf!--and me with only an hour or

two to live,"--the man said with a cringing and sinister grin.

The doctor frowned and looked at the man steadily. Then he asked a

sudden question.

"Who were your father and mother?" he said.

The convict looked at the doctor with startled eyes.

"Who told you?" he asked. "I thought nobody knew!"

"Answer my question, Hancock. Only a few minutes remain."

"Will it be of use, sir?"

"Of use?"

"In your work--It was so that I could leave a warning to others, that I

wanted to see you."

"Of great use, if you will tell me."

"Well, Doctor, I never thought to tell any one. It's always been a sore

point with me, but I wasn't born legitimate! I tried hard to make up

for it, and I did so too! No one was more respectable than I was in

Hackney, until the drink came along and took me."

"Yes? Yes?"--The hunter was on the trail now, Heredity? Reversion? At

last the game was flushed!--"Yes, tell me!"

"My father was a gentleman, Doctor. That's where I got my refined

tastes. And that's where I got my love of drink--damn him! God Almighty

curse him for the blood he gave me!"

"Yes? Yes?"

"My father was old Mr. Lothian, the solicitor of Grey's Inn Square. He

was a well-known gentleman. My mother was his housekeeper, Eliza

Hancock. My father was a widower when my mother went into his service.

He had another son, at one of the big schools for gentlemen. That was

his son by his real wife--Gilbert he was called, and what money was

left went to him. My father was a drunkard. He never was sober--what

you might rightly call sober--for years, I've heard . . . Mother died

soon after Mr. Lothian did. She left a hundred pounds with my Aunt, to

bring me up and educate me. Aunt Ellen--but I'm a gentleman's son,

Doctor!--drunken old swine he was too! What about my blood now? Wasn't

my veins swollen with drink from the first? Christ! _you_ ought to

know--you with your job to know--_Now_ are you happy? I'm not a _love_

child, I'm a _drink_ child, that's what I am! Son of old Mr. Lothian,

the gentleman-drunkard, brother of his son who's a gentleman somewhere,

I don't doubt! P'r'aps 'e mops it up 'imself!--shouldn't wonder,

this--brother of mine!"

The man's voice had risen into a hoarse scream. "Have you got what you

came to get?" he yelled. His eyes blazed, his mouth writhed.

There was a crash as the deal table was overturned, and he leapt at the

doctor.

In a second the room was full of people. Dark figures held down

something that yelled and struggled on the truckle bed.

It was done with wonderful deftness, quickness and experience. . . .

Morton Sims stood outside the closed door of the condemned cell. A

muffled noise reached him from within, the prison doctor was standing

by him and looking anxiously into his face.

--"I can't tell you how sorry I am, Dr. Morton Sims. I really can't

say enough. I had no idea that the latent toxic influence was so

strong. . . ."

On the other side of the little glass-roofed hall the door was open.

Another cell was shown, brilliantly lit. Two men, in their

shirt-sleeves, were bending over a square, black aperture in the wooden

floor. Some carpenters' tools were lying about.

An insignificant looking little man, with a fair moustache, was

standing in the doorway.

"That'll be quite satisfactory, thank you," he was saying, "with just a

drop of oil on the lever. And whatever you do, don't forget my chalk to

mark where he's to stand."

From behind the closed door of the condemned cell a strangulated,

muffled noise could still be heard.

"Not now!" said Dr. Marriott, as the executioner came up to him--"In

half an hour. Now Dr. Morton Sims, please come away to my room.

This must have been most distressing. I feel so much that it is my

fault." . . .

The two men stood at the Prison gate, Sims was shaking hands with the

younger doctor. "Thank you very much indeed," he was saying. "How could

you possibly have helped it?--You'll take steps--?"

"I'm going back to the cell now. It's incipient delirium tremens of

course--after all this time too! I shall inject hyoscene and he will

know nothing more at all. He will be practically carried to the

shed--Good-night! _Good_-night, sir. I hope I may have the pleasure

of meeting you again."

* * * * *

The luxurious car rolled away from the Citadel of Death and

Shadows--down the hill into London and into Life.

The man within it was thinking deeply, sorting out and tabulating his

impressions, sifting the irrelevant from what was of value, and making

a précis of what he had gained.

There were a dozen minor notes to be made in his book when he reached

home. The changing quality of the man's voice, the ebb and flow of

uncontrolled emotion, the latent fear--"I must be present at the post

mortem to-morrow," he said to himself as a new idea struck him. "There

should be much to be learnt from an examination of the Peripheral

Nerves. And the brain too--there will be interesting indications in the

cerebellum, and the association fibres." . . .

The carriage swung again into the familiar parts of town. As he looked

out of the windows at the lights and movement, Morton Sims forgot the

purely scientific side of thought. The kindly human side of him

reasserted itself.

How infinitely sad it was! How deep the underlying horror of this

sordid life-tragedy at the close of which he had been assisting!

Who should say, who could define, the true responsibility of the man

they were killing up there on the North London Hill?

Predisposition to Alcohol, Reversion, Heredity!--was not the drunken

old solicitor, long since dust, the true murderer of the

gentle-mannered girl in Hackney?

_Lothian_, the father of Gilbert Lothian the poet! the poet who

certainly knew nothing of what was being done to the young man in the

prison, who had probably never heard of his existence even.

The "Fiend Alcohol" at work once more, planting ghastly growths behind

the scutcheons of every family!

A cunning murderer with a poisoned mind and body on one side, the

brilliant young poet in the sunlight of success and high approbation

upon the other!

Mystery of mysteries that God should allow so foul a thing to dominate

and tangle the fair threads and delicate tissues of life!

"Well, that's that!" said the doctor, in a phrase he was fond of using

when he dosed an episode in his mind. "I'll make my notes on Hancock's

case and forget it until I find it necessary to use them in my work.

And I'll lock up the poems Moultrie has sent me and I won't look at the

book again for a month. Then I shall be able to read the verses for

themselves and without any arrière-penseé.

"But, I wonder . . . ?"

The brougham stopped at the doctor's house in Russell Square.

* * * * *

BOOK ONE

LOTHIAN IN LONDON

"Myself, arch traitor to myself,

My hollowest friend, my deadliest foe,

My clog whatever road I go."

THE DRUNKARD

CHAPTER I

UNDER THE WAGGON-ROOF. A DINNER IN BRYANSTONE SQUARE

"Le véritable Amphitryon est l'Amphitryon où l'on dine."

--_Molière._

It was a warm night in July when Mr. Amberley, the publisher,

entertained a few friends at dinner to meet Gilbert Lothian, the poet.

Although the evening was extremely sultry and the houses of the West

End were radiating the heat which they had stored up from the sun-rays

during the day, Mr. Amberley's dining room was deliciously cool.

The house was one of those roomy old-fashioned places still to be found

unspoiled in Bryanstone Square, and the dining room, especially, was

notable. It was on the first floor, over-looking the square, a long and

lofty room with a magnificent waggon-roof which was the envy of every

one who saw it, and gave the place extraordinary distinction.

The walls were panelled with oak, which had been stained a curious

green, that was not olive nor ash-green but partook of both--the

veritable colour, indeed, of the grey-green olive trees that one sees

on some terrace of the Italian Alps at dawn.

The pictures were very few, considering the size of the room, and they

were all quite modern--"In the movement"--as shrewd Mr. Amberley was

himself.

A portrait of Mrs. Amberley by William Nicholson, which was quite

famous in its way, displayed all the severe pregnancy and almost solemn

reserve of this painter. There was a pastel of Prydes' which

showed--rather suggested--a squalid room in which a gentleman of 1800,

with a flavour of Robert Macaire about him, stood in the full rays of

the wine and honey-coloured light of an afternoon sun.

Upon yet another panel was a painting upon silk by Charles Conder,

inspired of course, by Watteau, informed by that sad and haunting

catching after a fairyland never quite reached, which is the

distinctive note of Conder's style, and which might well have served

for an illustration to a grotesque fantasy of Heine.

Mrs. Amberley loved this painting. She had a Pater-like faculty of

reading into--or from--a picture, something which the artist never

thought about at all, and she used to call this little masterpiece "An

Ode of Horace in Patch, Powder and Peruque!" She adored these perfectly

painted little snuff-box deities who wandered through shadowy mists of

amethyst and rouge-de-fer in a fantastic wood.

It is extremely interesting to discover, know of, or to sit at ease in

a room which, in its way, is historic, and this is what the Amberleys'

guests always felt, and were meant to feel.

In its present form, and with its actual decorations, this celebrated

room only dated from some fifteen years back. The Waggon-roof alone

remained unaltered from its earlier periods.

The Publishing house of Ince and Amberley had been a bulwark of the

Victorian era, and not without some growing celebrity in the earlier

Georgian Period.

Lord Byron had spoken well of the young firm once, Rogers was believed

to have advanced them money, and when that eminent Cornish pugilist

"The Lamorna Cove" wrote his reminiscences they were published by Ince

and Amberley, while old Lord Alvanley himself contributed a preface.

From small beginnings came great things. The firm grew and acquired a

status, and about this time, or possibly a little later, the

dining-room at Bryanstone Square had come into being.

Its walls were not panelled then in delicate green. They were covered

with rich plum-coloured paper festooned by roses of high-gilt. In the

pictures, with their heavy frames of gold, the dogs and stags of

Landseer were let loose, or the sly sleek gipsies of Mr. Frith told

rustic fortunes beneath the spreading chestnut trees.

But Browning had dined there--in the later times--an inextinguishable

fire just covered with a sprinkling of grey ash. With solemn ritual,

Charles Dickens had brewed milk punch in an old bowl of Lowestoft

china, still preserved in the drawing-room. The young Robert Cecil, in

his early _Saturday Review_ days, had cracked his walnuts and sipped

his "pint of port" with little thought of the high destiny to which he

should come, and Alfred Tennyson, then Bohemian and unknown, had been

allowed to vent that grim philosophy which is the reaction of all

imaginative and sensitive natures against the seeming impossibility of

success and being understood.

The traditions of Ince and Amberley--its dignified and quiet home was

in Hanover Square--had always been preserved.

Its policy, at the same time, had continually altered with the passage

of years and the change of the public taste. Yet, so carefully, and

indeed so genuinely, had this been accomplished that none of the

historic prestige of the business had been lost. It still stood as a

bulwark of the old dignified age. A young modern author, whatever his

new celebrity, felt that to be published by Ince and Amberley

hall-marked him as it were.

Younger firms, greedy of his momentary notoriety, might offer him

better terms--and generally did--but Ince and Amberley conferred the

Accolade!

He was admitted to the Dining Room.

John Amberley (the Inces had long since disappeared), at fifty was a

great publisher, and a charming man of the world. He was one of the

personalities of London, carrying out what heredity and natural

aptitude had fitted him to do, and was this evening entertaining some

literary personages of the day in the famous Dining Room.

The Waggon-roof, which had looked down upon just such gatherings as

these for generations, would, if it could have spoken, have discovered

no very essential difference between this dinner party and others in

the past. True, the walls were differently coloured and pictures which

appealed to a different set of artistic conventions were hanging upon

them.

The people who were accustomed to meet round the table in 19-- were not

dressed as other gatherings had been. There was no huge silver epergne

in the centre of that table now. Nor did the Amberley at one end of it

display his mastery of ritual carving.

But the talk was the same. Words only were different. The guests'

vocabularies were wider and less restrained. It was the music of piano

and the pizzicato plucking of strings--there was no pompous organ note,

no ore rotundo any more. They all talked of what they had done, were

doing, and hoped to do. There was a hurry of the mind, inherent in

people of their craft and like a man running, in all of them. The eyes

of some of them burned like restless ghosts as they tried to explain

themselves, display their own genius, become prophets and acquire

honour in the heart of their own country.

Yes! it had always been so!

The brightest and most lucent brains had flashed into winged words and

illuminated that long handsome room.

And ever, at the head of the long table, there had been a bland,

listening Amberley, catching, tasting and sifting the idea, analysing

the constituents of the flash, balancing the brilliant theory against

the momentary public taste. A kind, uncreative, managing Amberley! A

fair and honest enough Amberley in the main. Serene, enthroned and

necessary.

The publisher was a large man, broad in the shoulder and slightly

corpulent. There was something Georgian about him--he cultivated it

rather, and was delighted when pleated shirts became again fashionable

for evening wear. He had a veritable face of the Regency, more

especially in profile, sensual, fine, a thought gluttonous and markedly

intelligent.

His voice was authoritative but bland, and frequently capable of a

sympathetic interest which was almost musical. His love of letters was

deep and genuine, his taste catholic and excellent, while many an

author found real inspiration and intense pleasure in his personal

praise.

This was the cultured and human side of him, and he had another--the

shrewd business man of Hanover Square.

He was not, to use the slang of the literary agent, a "knifer." He paid

die market price without being generous and he was perfectly honest in

all his dealings.

But his business in life was to sell books, and he permitted himself no

experiments in failure. A writer--whether he produced good work or

popular trash--must generally have his definite market and his more or

less assured position, before Ince and Amberley would take him up.

It was distinctly something for a member of the upper rank and files to

say in the course of conversation, "Ince and Amberley are doing my new

book, you know."

To-night Amberley, as he sat at the head of his table towards the close

of dinner, was in high good humour, and very pleasant with himself and

his guests.

The ladies had not yet gone away, coffee was being served at the table,

and almost every one was smoking a cigarette. The party was quite a

small one. There were only five guests, who, with Mr. and Mrs. Amberley

and their only daughter Muriel, made up eight people in all. There was

nothing ceremonious about it, and, though three of the guests were well

known in the literary world, none of these were great, while the

remaining couple were merely promising beginners.

There was, therefore, considerable animation and gaiety round this

hospitable table, with its squat candlesticks, of dark-green Serpentine

and silver, the topaz-coloured shades, its gleaming surface of dark

mahogany (Mrs. Amberley had eagerly adopted the new habit of having no

white table-cloth), its really interesting old silver, and the square

mats of pure white Egyptian linen in front of each person.

In age, with the exception of Mr. Amberley and his wife, every one was

young, while both host and hostess showed in perfection that modern

grace of perfect correspondence with environment which seems to have

quite banished the evidences of time's progress among the folk of

to-day who know every one, appreciate everything and are extremely

well-to-do.

On Amberley's right hand sat Mrs. Herbert Toftrees, while her husband

was at the other end of the table at the right hand of his

hostess--Gilbert Lothian, the guest of the evening, being on Mrs.

Amberley's left.

Mr. and Mrs. Toftrees were novelists whose combined names were

household words all over England. Their books were signed by both of

them--"Enid and Herbert Toftrees" and they were quite at the head of

their own peculiar line of business. They knew exactly what they were

doing--"selling bacon" they called it to their intimate friends--and

were two of the most successful trades-people in London. Unlike other

eminent purveyors of literary trash they were far too clever not to

know that neither of them had a trace of the real fire, and if their

constant and cynical disclaimer of any real talent sometimes seemed to

betray a hidden sore, it was at least admirably truthful.

They were shallow, clever, amusing people whom it was always pleasant

to meet. They entertained a good deal and the majority of their guests

were literary men and women of talent who fluttered like moths round

the candle of their success. The talented writers who ate their dinners

found a bitter joy in cursing a public taste which provided the

Toftrees with several thousands a year, but they returned again and

again, in the effort to find out how it was done.

They also had visions of just such another delightful house in

Lancaster Gate, an automobile identical in its horse-power and

appointments, and were certain that if they could only learn the recipe

and trick, wrest the magic formula from these wizards of the

typewriter, all these things might be theirs also!

The Herbert Toftrees themselves always appeared--in the frankest and

kindest way--to be in thorough sympathy with such aspirations. Their

candour was almost effusive. "Any one can do what we do" was their

attitude. Herbert Toftrees himself, a young man with a rather

carefully-cultivated, elderly manner, was particularly impressive. He

had a deep voice and slow enunciation, which, when he was upon his own

hearthrug almost convinced himself.

"There is absolutely no reason," he would say, in tones which carried

absolute conviction to his hearer at the moment, "why you shouldn't be

making fifteen hundred a year in six months."

But that was as far as it went. That was the voice of the genial host

dispensing wines, entrées and advice, easy upon his own hearth, the

centre of the one picture where he was certain of supremacy.

But let eager and hungry genius call next day for definite particulars,

instructions as to the preparations of a "popular" plot, hints as to

the shop-girl's taste in heroines,--with hopes of introductory letters

to the great firms who buy serials--and the greyest of grey dawns

succeeded the rosy-coloured night.

It was all vague and cloudy now. General principles were alone

vouchsafed--indeed who shall blame the tradesman for an adroit refusal

to give away the secrets of the shop?

Genius retired--it happened over and over again--cursing successful

mediocrity for its evasive cleverness, and with a deep hidden shame

that it should have stooped so low, and so ineffectually! . . . "That's

very true. What Toftrees says is absolutely true," Mr. Amberley said

genially, turning to young Dickson Ingworth, who was sitting by his

daughter Muriel.

He nodded to the eager youth with a little private encouragement and

hint of understanding which was very flattering. It was as who should

say, "Here you are at my house. For the first time you have been

admitted to the Dining Room. I have taken you up, I am going to publish

a book of yours and see what you are made of. Gather honey while you

may, young Dickson Ingworth!"

Ingworth blushed slightly as the great man's encouraging admonitions

fell upon him. He was not down from Oxford more than a year. He had

written very little, Gilbert Lothian was backing him and introducing

him to literary circles in town, he was abnormally conscious of his own

good fortune, all nervous anxiety to be adequate--all ears.

"Yes, sir," he said, with the pleasant boyish deference of an

undergraduate to the Provost of his college--it sat gracefully upon his

youth and was gracefully said.

Then he looked reverentially at Toftrees and waited to hear more.

Herbert Toftrees' face was large and clean shaven. His sleek hair was

smoothly brushed over a somewhat protruding forehead. There was the

coarse determined vigour about his brow that the bull-dog jaw is

supposed to indicate in another type of face, and the eyes below were

grey and steadfast. Toftrees stared at people with tremendous gravity.

Only those who realised the shrewd emptiness behind them were able to

discern what some one had once called their flickering "R.S.V.P.

expression"--that latent hope that his vis-à-vis might not be finding

him out after all!

"I mean it," Toftrees said in his resonant, and yet quiet voice. "There

really is no reason, Mr. Ingworth, why you should not be making an

income of at least eight or nine hundred a year in twelve months'

time."

"Herbert has helped such a lot of boys," said Mrs. Toftrees,

confidentially, to her host, although there was a slight weariness in

her voice, the suggestion of a set phrase. "But who is Mr. Dickson

Ingworth? What has he done?--he is quite good-looking, don't you

think?"

"Oh, a boy, a mere boy!" the big red-faced publisher purred in an

undertone. "Lothian brought him to me first in Hanover Square. In fact,

Lothian asked if he might bring him here to-night. We are doing a

little book of his--the first novel he will have had published."

Mrs. Toftrees pricked up her ears, so to say. She was really the

business head of the Toftrees combination. Her husband did the

ornamental part and provided the red-hot plots, but it was she who had

invented and carried out the "note," and it was she who supervised the

contracts. As Mr. Amberley was well aware, what this keen, pretty and

well-dressed little woman didn't know about publishing was worth

nothing whatever.

"Oh, really," she said, in genuine surprise. "Rather unusual for you,

isn't it? Is the boy a genius then?"

Amberley shook his head. He hated everything the worthy Toftrees

wrote--he had never been able to read more than ten lines of any of the

half-dozen books he had published for them. But the Hanover Square side

of him had a vast respect for the large sums the couple charmed from

the pockets of the public no less than the handsome percentage they put

into his own. And a confidential word on business matters with a pretty

and pleasant little woman was not without allurement even under the

Waggon-roof itself.

"Not at all. Not at all," he murmured into a pretty ear. "We are not

paying the lad any advance upon royalties!" He laughed a well-fed

laugh. "Ince and Amberley's list," he continued, "is accepted for

itself!"

Mrs. Toftrees smiled back at him. "_Of course_," she murmured. "But I

wasn't thinking of the financial side of it. Why? . . . why are you

departing from your usual traditions and throwing the shadow of your

cloak over this fortunate boy?--if I may ask, of course!"

"Well," Amberley answered, and her keen ear detected--or thought that

she detected--a slight reluctance in his voice. . . . "Well, Lothian

brought him to me, you know."

Mrs. Toftrees' face changed and Amberley saw it.

She was looking down the table to where Lothian was sitting. Her face

was a little flushed, and the expression upon it--though not allowed to

be explicit--was by no means agreeable. "Lothian's work is very

wonderful," she said--and there was a question in her voice "--you

think so, Mr. Amberley?"

Bryanstone Square, the Dining Room, asserted itself. Truth to tell,

Amberley felt a little uncomfortable and displeased with himself. The

fun of the dinner table--the cigarette moment--had rather escaped him.

He had got young people round him to-night. He wanted them to be jolly.

He had meant to be a good host, to forget his dignities, to unbend and

be jolly with them--this fiction-mongering woman was becoming annoying.

"I certainly do, Mrs. Toftrees," he replied, with dignity, and a

distinct tone of reproof in his voice.

Mrs. Toftrees, the cool tradeswoman, gave the great man a soothing

smile of complete understanding and agreement.

Mr. Amberley turned to a girl upon his left who had been taken in by

Dickson Ingworth and who had been carrying on a laughing conversation

with him during dinner.

She was a pretty girl, a friend of his daughter Muriel. He liked pretty

girls, and he smiled half paternally, half gallantly at her.

"Won't you have another cigarette, Miss Wallace?" he said, pushing a

silver box towards her. "They are supposed to be rather wonderful. My

cousin Eustace Amberley is in the Egyptian Army and an aide-de-camp to

the Khedive. The Khedive receives the officers every month and every

one takes away a box of five hundred when they leave the palace--His

Highness' own peculiar brand. These are some of them, which Eustace

sent me."

"May I?" she answered, a rounded, white arm stretched out to the box.

"They certainly are wonderful. I have to be content with Virginian at

home. I buy fifty at a time, and a tin costs one and threepence."

She lit it delicately from the little methyl lamp he passed her, and

the big man's kind eyes rested on her with appreciation.

She was, he thought, very like a Madonna of Donatello, which he had

seen and liked in Florence. The abundant hair was a dark nut-brown,

almost chocolate in certain lights. The eyes were brown also, the

complexion the true Italian morbidezza, pale, but not pallid, like a

furled magnolia bud. And the girl's mouth was charming--"delicious" was

the word in the mind of this connoisseur. It was as clear-cut as that

of a girl's face in a Grecian frieze of honey-coloured travertine,

there was a serene sweetness about it. But when she smiled the whole

face was changed. The young brown eyes lit up and visited others with

their own, as a bee visits flowers. The smile was radiant and had a

conscious provocation in it. The paleness of the cheeks showed such

tints of pearl and rose that they seemed carved from the under surface

of a sea-shell.

And, as Amberley looked, wishing that he had talked more to her during

dinner, startled suddenly to discover such loveliness, he saw her lips

suddenly glow out into colour in an extraordinary way. It wasn't

scarlet--unpainted lips are never really that--but of the veiled

blood-colour that is warm and throbs with life; a colour that hardly

any of the names we give to pigment can properly describe or fix.

What did he know about her? he asked himself as she was lighting her

second cigarette. Hardly anything! She was a girl friend of his

daughter's--they had been to the same school together at Bath--an

orphan he thought, without any people. She earned her own

living--assistant Librarian, he remembered, at old Podley's library.

Yes, Podley the millionaire nonconformist who was always endowing and

inventing fads! And Muriel had told him that she wrote a little, short

stories in some of the women's papers. . . .

"At any rate," he said, while these thoughts were flashing through his

mind "you smoke as if you liked it! All the girls smoke now, Muriel is

inveterate, but I often have a suspicion that many of them do it

because it's the fashion."

Rita Wallace gave a wise little shake of her head.

"Oh, no," she answered. "Men know so little about girls! You think

we're so different from you in lots of things, but we aren't really.

Muriel and I always used to smoke at school--it doesn't matter about

telling now, does it?"

Mr. Amberley made a mock expression of horror.

"Good heavens!" he said, "what appalling revelations for a father to

endure! I wish I had had an inkling of it at the time!"

"You couldn't have, Mr. Amberley," she answered, and her smile was more

provocative than ever, and delightfully naughty. "We used to do it in

the bathroom. The hot vapour from the bath took all the smell of

tobacco away. I discovered that!"

"Tell me some more, my dear. What other iniquities did you all

perpetrate--and I thought Muriel such a pattern girl."

"Oh, we did lots of things, Mr. Amberley, but it wouldn't be fair to

give them away. We were little devils, nearly all of us!"

She gave him a little Parisian salute from the ends of her eyelids,

instinct with a kind of impish innocence, the sort of thing that has an

irresistible appeal to a middle-aged man of the world.

"Muriel!" Mr. Amberley said to his daughter, "Miss Wallace has been

telling me dreadful things about your schooldays. I am grieved and

pained!"

Muriel Amberley was a slim girl with dark smouldering eyes and a faint

enigmatic smile. Her voice was very clear and fresh and there was a

vibrant note in it like the clash of silver bells. She had been talking

to Mrs. Toftrees, but she looked up as her father spoke.

"Don't be a wretch, Cupid!" she said, to Rita Wallace over the table.

"Cupid? Why Cupid?" Herbert Toftrees asked, in his deep voice.

"Oh, it's a name we gave her at school," Muriel answered, looking at

her friend, and both girls began to laugh.

Mr. Amberley re-engaged the girl in talk.

"You have done some literary work, have you not?" he asked kindly, and

in a lower voice.

Again her face changed. Its first virginal demureness, the sudden

flashing splendour of her smile, had gone alike. It became eager and

wistful too.

"You can't call it _that_, Mr. Amberley," she replied in a voice

pitched to his own key. "I've written a few stories which have been

published and I've had three articles in the Saturday edition of the

_Westminster_--that's nearly everything. But I can't say how I love it

all! It is delightful to have my work among books--at the Podley

Library you know. I learned typewriting and shorthand and was afraid

that I should have to go into a city office--and then this turned up."

She hesitated for a moment, and then stopped shyly. He could see that

the girl was afraid of boring him. A moment before, she had been

perfectly collected and aware--a girl in his own rank of life

responsive to his chaff. Now she realised that she was speaking of

things very near and dear to her--and speaking of them to a high-priest

of those Mysteries she loved--one holding keys to unlock all doors.

He took her in a moment, understood the change of mood and expression,

and it was subtle flattery. Like all intelligent and successful men,

recognition was not the least of his rewards. That this engaging child,

even, knew him for what he was gave him an added interest in her. All

Muriel's girl friends adored him. He was the nicest and most generous

of unofficial Papas!--but this was different.

"Don't say that, my dear. Never depreciate yourself or belittle what

you have done. I suppose you are about Muriel's age, twenty-one or

two--yes?--then let me tell you that you have done excellently well."

"That is kind of you."

"No, it is sincere. No man knows how hard--or how easy--it is to

succeed by writing to-day."

She understood him in a moment. "Only the other day, Mr. Amberley," she

said, "I read Stevenson's 'Letter to a young gentleman who proposes to

embrace the career of Art.' And if I _could_ write feeble things to

tickle feeble minds I wouldn't even try. It seems so, so low!"

Quite unconsciously her eye had fallen upon Mrs. Toftrees opposite, who

was again chattering away to Muriel Amberley.

He saw it, but gave no sign that he had done so.

"Keep such an ideal, my dear. Whether you do small or great things, it

will bring you peace of mind and dignity of conscience. But don't

despise or condemn merely popular writers. In the Kingdom of Art there

are many mansions you know."

The girl made a slight movement of the head. He saw that she was

touched and grateful at his interest in her small affairs, but that she

wanted to dismiss them from his mind no less than from her own.

"But I _am_ mad, crazy," she said, "about _other_ peoples' work, the

big peoples' work, the work one simply can't help reverencing!"

She had turned from him again and was looking down the table to where

Gilbert Lothian was sitting.

"Yes," he answered, following the direction of her glance, "you are

quite right _there_!"

She flushed with enthusiasm. "I did so want to see him," she said.

"I've hardly ever met any literary people at all before, certainly

never any one who mattered. Muriel told me that Mr. Lothian was coming;

she loves his poems as much as I do. And when she wrote and asked me I

was terribly excited. It's so good of you to have me, Mr. Amberley."

Her voice was touching in its gratitude, and he was touched at this

damsel, so pretty, courageous and forlorn.

"I hope, my dear," he said, "that you will give us all the pleasure of

seeing you here very often."

At that moment Mrs. Amberley looked up and her fine, shrewd eyes swept

round the table. She was a handsome, hook-nosed dame, with a lavish

coronet of grey hair, stately and kindly in expression, obviously

capable of many tolerances, but with moments when "ne louche pas à La

Reine" could be very plainly written on her face.

As she gathered up the three women and rose, Mr. Amberley knew in a

moment that all was not quite well. No one else could have even guessed

at it, but he knew. The years that had dealt so prosperously with him;

Fate which had linked arms and was ever debonnair, had greatly blessed

him in this also. He worshipped this stately madam, as she him, and

always watched her face as some poor fisherman strives to read the

Western sky.

The door of the Dining Room was towards Mrs. Amberley's end of the

table, and, as the ladies rose and moved towards it, Gilbert Lothian

had gone to it and held it open.

His table-napkin was in his right hand, his left was on the handle of

the door, and as the women swept out, he bowed.

Herbert Toftrees thought that there was something rather theatrical, a

little over-emphasised, in the bow--as he regarded the poet, whom he

had met for the first time that night, from beneath watchful eye-lids.

And _did_ one bow? Wasn't it rather like a scene upon the stage?

Toftrees, a quite well-bred man, was a little puzzled by Gilbert

Lothian. Then he concluded--and his whole thoughts upon the matter

passed idly through his mind within the duration of a single

second--that the poet was an intimate friend of the house.

Lothian was closing the door, and Toftrees was sinking back into his

chair, when the latter happened to glance at his host.

Amberley, still standing, was _watching_ Lothian--there was no other

word which would correctly describe the big man's attitude--and

Toftrees felt strangely uneasy. Something seemed tapping nervously at

the door of his mind. He heard the furtive knocking, half realised the

name of the thought that timidly essayed an entrance, and then

resolutely crushed it.

Such a thing was quite impossible, of course.

The four men sat down, more closely grouped together than before.

The coffee, which had been served by a footman, before the ladies had

disappeared, was a pretence in cups no bigger than plovers' eggs.

Amberley liked the modern affectation of his women guests remaining at

the table and sharing the joys of the after-dinner-hour. But now, the

butler entered with larger cups and a tray of liqueurs, while the host

himself poured out a glass of port and handed the old-fashioned cradle

in which the bottle lay to young Dickson Ingworth on his right.

That curly-headed youth, who was a Pembroke man and knew the ritual of

the Johnsonian Common Room at Oxford, gravely filled his own glass and

pushed the bottle to Herbert Toftrees, who was in the vacated seat of

his hostess, and pouring a little Perrier water into a tumbler.

The butler lifted the wicker-work cradle with care, passed behind

Toftrees, and set it before Gilbert Lothian.

Lothian looked at it for a moment and then made a decisive movement of

his head.

"Thank you, no," he said, after a second's consideration, and in a

voice that was slightly high-pitched but instinct with personality--it

could never have been mistaken for any one else's voice, for

instance--"I think I will have a whiskey and soda."

Toftrees, at the end of the table, within two feet of Lothian, gave a

mental start. The popular novelist was rather confused.

A year ago no one had heard of Gilbert Lothian--that was not a name

that counted in any way. He had been a sort of semi-obscure journalist

who signed what he wrote in such papers as would print him. There were

a couple of novels to his name which had obtained a sort of cult among

minor people, and, certainly, some really eminent weeklies had

published very occasional but signed reviews.

As far as Herbert Toftrees could remember--and his jealous memory was

good--Lothian had always been rather small beer until a year or so

back.

And then "Surgit Amari"--the first book of poems had been published.

In a single month Lothian had become famous.

For the ringing splendour of his words echoed in every heart. In this

book, and in a subsequent volume, he had touched the very springs of

tears. Not with sentiment--with the very highest and most electric

literary art--he had tried and succeeded in irradiating the happenings

of domestic life in the light that streamed from the Cross.

". . . Thank you, no. I think I will have a whiskey and soda."

CHAPTER II

GRAVELY UNFORTUNATE OCCURRENCE IN MRS. AMBERLEY'S DRAWING ROOM

"[Greek: Misô mnêmona sumpotên], Procille."

--_Martial._

--"One should not always take after-dinner amenities au pied de la

lettre."

--_Free Translation._

Toftrees, at the head of the table, shifted his chair a little so that

he was almost facing Gilbert Lothian.

Lothian's arresting voice was quite clear as he spoke to the butler.

"That's not the voice of a man who's done himself too well," the

novelist thought. But he was puzzled, nevertheless. People like Lothian

behaved pretty much as they liked, of course. Convention didn't

restrain them. But the sudden request was odd.

And there was that flourishing bow as the women left the room, and

certainly Amberley had seemed to look rather strangely at his guest.

Toftrees disposed himself to watch events. He had wanted to meet the

poet for some time. There was a certain reason. No one knew much about

him in London. He lived in the country and was not seen in the usual

places despite his celebrity. There had been a good deal of surmise

about this new star.

Lothian was like the photographs which had appeared of him in the

newspapers, but with a great deal more "personality" than these were

able to suggest. Certainly no one looked less like a poet, though this

did not surprise the popular novelist, in an age when literary men

looked exactly like every one else. But there was not the slightest

trace of idealism, of the "thoughts high and hard" that were ever the

clear watchwords of his song. "A man who wears a mask," thought Herbert

Toftrees with interest and a certain half-conscious fellow-feeling.

The poet was of medium height and about thirty-five years of age. He

was fat, with a broad-shouldered corpulence which would have been far

less noticeable in a man who was a few inches taller. The clean-shaven

face was fattish also, but there was, nevertheless, a curious

suggestion of contour about it. It should have been a pure oval, and in

certain lights it almost seemed that, while the fatness appeared to

dissolve and fall away from it. It was a contour veiled by something

that was, but ought not to have been, there.

The eyes were grey and capable of infinite expression--a fact which

always became apparent to any one who had been half an hour in his

company. But this feature also was enigmatic. For the most part the

eyes seemed to be working at half-power, not quite doing or being what

one would have expected of them.

The upper lip was short, and the mouth by far the most real and

significant part of the face. It was small, but not too small, clearly

and delicately cut though without a trace of effeminacy. In its

mobility, its sensitive life, its approach to beauty, it said

everything in the face. Thick-growing hair of dark brown was allowed to

come rather low over a high and finely modelled brow, hair

which--despite a natural luxuriance--was cut close to the sides and

back of the head.

Such was Toftrees' view of Gilbert Lothian, and it both had insight and

was fair. No one can be a Toftrees and the literary idol of thousands

and thousands of people without being infinitely the intellectual

superior of those people. The novelist had a fine brain and if he could

have put a tenth of his observation and knowledge upon paper, he might

have been an artistic as well as a commercial success.

But he was hopelessly inarticulate, and æsthetic achievement was denied

him. There was considerable consolation in the large income which

provided so many pleasures and comforts, but it was bitter to

know--when he met any one like Lothian--that if he could appreciate

Lothian thoroughly he could never emulate him. And it was still more

bitter to be aware that men like Lothian often regarded his own work as

a mischief and dishonour.

Toftrees, therefore, watched the man at his side with a kind of

critical envy, mingled with a perfectly sincere admiration at the

bottom of it all.

He very soon became certain that something was wrong.

His first half-thought was a certainty now. Something that some one had

said to him a week ago at a Savage Club dinner--one of those

irresponsible but dangerous and damaging remarks which begin, "D'you

know, I'm told that so and so--" flashed through his mind.

"Are you in town for long, Mr. Lothian?" he asked. "You don't come to

town often, do you?"

"No, I don't," Lothian answered. "I hate London. A damnable place I

always think."

The other, so thorough a Londoner, always getting so much--in every

way--out of his life in London, looked at the speaker curiously, not

quite knowing how to take him.

Lothian seemed to see it. He had made the remark with emphasis, with a

superior note in his voice, but he corrected himself quickly.

It was almost as though Toftrees' glance had made him uneasy. His face

became rather ingratiating, and there was a propitiatory note in his

voice when he spoke again. He drew his chair a little nearer to the

other's.

"I knew too much of London when I was a young man," he went on with an

unnecessarily confidential and intimate manner. "When I came down from

Oxford first, I was caught up into the 'new' movement. It all seemed

very wonderful to me then. It did to all of us. We divorced art from

morals, we lived extraordinary lives, we sipped honey from every

flower. Most of the men of that period are dead. One or two are insane,

others have gone quite under and are living dreadful larva-like lives

in obscene hells of the body and soul, of which you can have no

conception. But, thank God, I got out of it in time--just in time! If

it hadn't been for my dear wife . . ."

He paused. The sensitive lips smiled, with an almost painful

tenderness, a quivering, momentary effect which seemed grotesquely out

of place in a face which had become flushed and suddenly seemed much

fatter.

There was a horrible insincerity about that self-conscious smile--the

more horrible because, at the moment, Toftrees saw that Lothian

believed absolutely in his own emotion, was pleased with himself

sub-consciously, too, and was perfectly certain that he was making a

fine impression--pulling aside the curtain that hung before a beautiful

and holy place!

The smile lingered for a moment. The light in the curious eyes seemed

turned inward complacently surveying a sanctuary.

Then there was an abrupt change of manner.

Lothian laughed. There was a snap in his laughter, which, Toftrees was

sure, was meant to convey the shutting down of a lid.

"I like you," Lothian was trying to say to him--the acquaintance of ten

minutes!--"I can open my heart to you. You've had a peep at the Poet's

Holy of Holies. But we're men of the world--you and I!--enough of this.

We're in society. We're dining at the Amberleys'. Our confidences are

over!"

"So you see," the _actual_ voice said, "I don't like London. It's no

place for a gentleman!"

Lothian's laugh as he said this was quite vague and silly. His hand

strayed out towards the decanter of whiskey. His face was half anxious,

half pleased, wholly pitiable and weak. His laugh ended in a sort of

bleat, which he realised in a moment and coughed to obscure.

There was a splash and gurgle as he pressed the trigger of the syphon.

Intense disgust and contempt succeeded Toftrees' first amazement. So

this, after all the fuss, was Gilbert Lothian!

The man had talked like a provincial yokel, and then fawned upon him

with his sickly, uninvited confidences.

He was drunk. There was no doubt about that.

He must have come there drunk, or nearly so. The last half hour had

depressed the balance, brought out what was hidden, revealed the

fellow's state.

"If it hadn't been for my dear wife!"--the tout! How utterly disgusting

it was!

Toftrees had never been drunk in his life except at a bump-supper at

B.N.C.--his college--nearly fifteen years ago.--The shocking form of

coming to the Amberleys' like this!--He was horribly upset and a little

frightened, too. He remembered where he was--such a thing was an

incredible profanation _here_!

. . . He heard a quiet vibrant voice speaking.

He looked up. Gilbert Lothian was leaning back in his chair, holding a

newly-lighted cigarette in a steady hand. His face was absolutely

composed. There was not the slightest hint that it had been bloated and

unsteady the minute before. Intellect and strength--STRENGTH! that was

the incredible thing--lay calmly over it. The skin, surely it _had_

been oddly blotched? was of an even, healthy-seeming tint.

A conversation between the Poet and his host had obviously been in

progress for several minutes. Toftrees realised that he had been lost

in his own thoughts for some time--if indeed this scene was real at all

and he himself were sober!

". . . I don't think," Lothian was saying with precision, and a certain

high air which sat well upon him--"I don't think that you quite see it

in all its bearings. There must be a rough and ready standard for

ordinary work-a-day life--that I grant. But when you penetrate to the

springs of action----"

"When you do that," Amberley interrupted, "naturally, rough and ready

standards fall to pieces. Still we have to live by them. Few of us are

competent to manipulate the more delicate machinery! But your

conclusion is--?"

"--That hypocrisy is the most misunderstood and distorted word in our

mother tongue. The man whom fools call hypocrite may yet be entirely

sincere. Lofty assertions, the proclamation of high ideals and noble

thoughts may at the same time be allied with startling moral failure!"

Amberley shook his head.

"It's specious," he replied, "and it's doubtless highly comforting for

the startling moral failure. But I find a difficulty in adjusting my

obstinate mind to the point of view."

"It _is_ difficult," Lothian said, "but that's because so few people

are psychologists, and so few people--the Priests often seem to me less

than any one--understand the meaning of Christianity. But because David

was a murderer and an adulterer will you tell me that the psalms are

insincere? Surely, if all that is good in a man or woman is to be

invalidated by the presence of contradictory evil, then Beelzebub must

sit enthroned and be potent over the affairs of men!"

Mr. Amberley rose from his chair. His face had quite lost its watchful

expression. It was genial and pleased as before.

"King David has a great deal to answer for," he said. "I don't know

what the unorthodox and the 'live-your-own-life' school would do

without him. But let us go into the drawing room."

With his rich, hearty laugh echoing under the Waggon roof, the big man

thrust his arm through Lothian's.

"There are two girls dying to talk to the poet!" he said. "That I

happen to know! My daughter Muriel reads your books in bed, I believe!

and her friend Miss Wallace was saying all sorts of nice things about

you at dinner. Come along, come along, my dear boy."

The two men left the dining room, and their voices could be heard in

the hall beyond.

Toftrees lingered behind for a moment with young Dickson Ingworth.

The boy's face was flushed. His eyes sparkled with excitement and the

three glasses of champagne he had drunk at dinner were having their

influence with him.

He was quite young, ingenuous, and filled with conceit at being where

he was--dining with the Amberleys, brought there under the ægis of

Gilbert Lothian, chatting confidentially to the great Herbert Toftrees

himself!

His immature heart was bursting with pride, Pol Roger, and

satisfaction. He hadn't the least idea of what he was saying--that he

was saying something frightfully dangerous and treacherous at least.

"I say, Mr. Toftrees, isn't Gilbert splendid? I could listen to him all

night. He talks like that to me sometimes, when he's in the mood. It's

like Walter Pater and Dr. Johnson rolled into one. And then he sort of

punctuates it with something dry and brown and freakish--like Heine in

the 'Florentine Nights'!"

With all his eagerness to hear more--the quiet malice in him welling

up to understand and pin down this Gilbert Lothian--Toftrees was

forced to pause for a moment. He knew that he could never have expressed

himself as this enthusiastic and excited boy was able to do. Ingworth

was a pupil then! Lothian could inspire, and was already founding a

school . . .

"You know Mr. Lothian very well, I suppose?"

"Oh, yes. I go and stay with Gilbert in the country a lot. I'm nearly

always there! I am like a brother to him--he was an only child, you

know. But isn't he wonderful?"

"Marvellous!" Toftrees chuckled as he said the word. He couldn't help

it.

Misunderstood as his chuckle was, it did the trick and brought

confidence in full flood from the careless and excited boy.

"Yes, and I know him so well! Hardly any one knows him so well as I do.

Every one in town is crying out to find out all about him, and I'm

really the only one who knows . . ."

He looked towards the door. Thoughts of the two pretty girls beyond

flushed the wayward, wine-heated mind.

"I'm going to have a liqueur brandy," Toftrees said hastily--he had

taken nothing the whole evening--"won't you, too?"

"Now you'd never think," Ingworth said, sipping from his tiny glass,

"that at seven o'clock this evening Prince and I--Prince is the valet

at Gilbert's club--could hardly wake him up and get him to dress?"

"No!"

"It's a fact though, Mr. Toftrees. We had the devil of a time. He'd

been out all day--it was bovril with lots of salt in it that put him

right. As a matter of fact--of course, this is quite between you and

me--I was in a bit of a funk that it was coming over him again at

dinner. Stale drunk. You know! I saw he was paying a lot of compliments

to Mrs. Amberley. At first she didn't seem to understand, and then she

didn't quite seem to like it. But I was glad when I heard him ask the

man for a whiskey and soda just now. I know his programme so well. I

was sure that it would pull him together all right--or at least that

number two would. I suppose you saw he was rather off when the ladies

had gone and you were talking to him?"

"Well, I wasn't sure of course."

"I was, I know him so well. Gilbert's father was my father's

solicitor--one of the old three bottle men. But when Gilbert collared

number two just now I realised that it would be quite all right. You

heard him with Mr. Amberley just now? Splendid!"

"Yes. And now suppose we go and see how he's getting on in the drawing

room," said Herbert Toftrees with a curious note in his voice.

The boy mistook it for anxiety. "Oh, he'll be as right as rain, you'll

find. It comes off and on in waves, you know," he said.

Toftrees looked at the youth with frank wonder. He spoke in the way of

use and wont, as if he were saying nothing extraordinary--merely

stating a fact.

The novelist was really shocked. Personally, he was the most temperate

of men. He was _homme du monde_, of course. He touched upon life at

other points than the decorous and above-board. He had known men,

friends of his own, go down, down, down, through drink. But here, with

these people, it was not the same. In Bohemia, in raffish literary

clubs and the reprobate purlieus of Fleet Street, one expected this

sort of thing and accepted it as part of the _milieu_.

Under the Waggon roof, at Amberley's house, where there were charming

women, it was shocking; it was an outrage! And the frankness of this

well-dressed and well-spoken youth was disgusting in its very

simplicity and non-moral attitude. Toftrees had gathered something of

the young man's past during dinner. Was this, then, what one learnt at

Eton? The novelist was himself the son of a clergyman, a man of some

family but bitter poor. He had been educated at a country grammar

school. His wife was the youngest daughter of a Gloucestershire

baronet, impoverished also.

Neither of them had enjoyed all that should have been theirs by virtue

of their birth, and the fact had left a blank, a slight residuum of

bitterness and envy which success and wealth could never quite smooth

away.

"Well, it doesn't seem to trouble you much," he said.

Ingworth laughed. He was unconscious of his great indiscretion, frothy

and young, entirely unaware that he was giving his friend and patron

into possibly hostile hands and providing an opportunity for a

dissection of which half London might hear.

"Gilbert's quite different from any one else," he said lightly. "He is

a genius. Keats taking pepper before claret, don't you know! One must

not measure him by ordinary standards."

"I suppose not," Toftrees answered drily, reflecting that among the

disciples of a great man it was generally the Judas who wrote the

biography--"Let's go to the drawing room."

As they went out, the mind of the novelist was working with excitement

and heat. He himself was conscious of it and was surprised. His was an

intellect rather like dry ice. Very little perturbed it as a rule, yet

to-night he was stirred.

Wonder was predominant.

Physically, to begin with, it was extraordinary that more drink should

sober a man who a moment before had been making exaggerated and

half-maudlin confidences to a stranger--in common with most decent

living people, Toftrees knew nothing of the pathology of poisoned men.

And, then, that sobriety had been so profound! Clearly reasoned

thought, an arresting but perfectly sane point of view, had been

enunciated with lucidity and force of phrase.

Disgust, the keener since it was more than tinged by envy, mingled with

the wonder.

So the high harmonies of "Surgit Amari" came out of the bottle after

all! Toftrees himself had been deeply moved by the poems, and yet, he

now imagined, the author was probably drunk when he wrote them! If only

the world knew!--it _ought_ to know. Blackguards who, for some reason

or other, had been given angel voices should be put in the pillory for

every one to see. Hypocrite! . . .

Ingworth opened the door of the drawing room very quietly. Music had

begun, and as he and Toftrees entered, Muriel Amberley was already half

way through one of the preludes of Chopin.

Mrs. Amberley and Mrs. Toftrees were sitting close together and

carrying on a vigorous, whispered conversation, despite the music. Mr.

Amberley was by himself in a big arm-chair near the piano, and Lothian

sat upon a settee of blue linen with Rita Wallace.

As he sank into a chair Toftrees glanced at Lothian.

The poet's face was unpleasant. When he had been talking to Amberley it

had lighted up and had more than a hint of fineness. Now it was heavy

again, veiled and coarsened. Lothian's head was nodding in time to the

music. One well-shaped but rather red hand moved restlessly upon his

knee. The man was struggling--Toftrees was certain of it--to appear as

if the music was giving him intense pleasure. He was thinking about

himself and how he looked to the other people in the room.

Drip, drip, drip!--it was the sad, graceful prelude in which the fall

of rain is supposed to be suggested, the hot steady rain of the

Mediterranean which had fallen at Majorca ever so many years ago and

was falling now in sound, though he that caught its beauty was long

since dust. Drip, drip!--and then the soft repetition which announced

that the delicate and lovely vision had reached its close, that the

august grey harmonies were over.

For a moment, there was silence in the drawing room.

Muriel's white fingers rested on the keys of the piano, the candles

threw their light upwards upon the enigmatic maiden face. Her father

sighed quietly--happily also as he looked at her--and the low buzz of

Mrs. Amberley's and Mrs. Toftrees' talk became much more distinct.

Suddenly Gilbert Lothian jumped up from the settee. He hurried to the

piano, his face flushed, his eyes liquid and bright.

It was consciously and theatrically done, an exaggeration of his bow in

the dining room--not the right thing in the very least!

"Oh, thank you! _Thank you!_" he said in a high, fervent voice. "How

wonderful that is! And you played it as Crouchmann plays it--the _only_

interpretation! I know him quite well. We had supper together the other

night after his concert, and he told me--no, that won't interest you.

I'll tell you another time, remind me! Now, _do_ play something else!"

He fumbled with the music upon the piano with tremulous and unsteady

hands.

"Ah! here we are!" he cried, and there was an insistent note of

familiarity in his voice. "The book of Valses! You know the twelfth of

course? Tempo giusto! It goes like this . . ."

He began to hum, quite musically, and to wave his hands.

Muriel Amberley glanced quickly at her father and there was distress in

her eyes.

Amberley was standing by the piano in a moment. He seemed very much

master of himself, serene and dominant, by the side of Gilbert Lothian.

His face was coldly civil and there was disgust in his eyes.

"I don't think my daughter will play any more, Mr. Lothian," he said.

An ugly look flashed out upon the poet's face, suspicion and

realisation showed there for a second and passed.

He became nervous, embarrassed, almost pitiably apologetic. The

savoir-faire which would have helped some men to take the rebuke

entirely deserted him. There was something assiduous, almost vulgar, a

frightened acceptance of the lash indeed, which immensely accentuated

the sudden _défaillance_ and break-down.

In the big drawing room no one spoke at all.

Then there was a sudden movement and stir. Gilbert Lothian was saying

good-night.

He had remembered that he really had some work to do before going to

bed, some letters to write, as a matter of fact. He was shaking hands

with every one.

"I do hope that I shall have the pleasure of hearing you play some more

Chopin before long, Miss Amberley! Thank you so much Mrs. Amberley--I'm

going to write a poem about your beautiful Dining Room. I suppose we

shall meet at the Authors' Club dinner on Saturday, Mr. Toftrees?--so

interested to have met you at last."

. . . The people in the drawing room heard him chattering vivaciously

to Mr. Amberley, who had accompanied his departing guest into the hall.

No one said a single word. They heard the front door close, and the

steps of the master of the house as he returned to them. They were all

waiting.

When Amberley came in he made a courtly attempt at ignoring what had

just occurred. The calm surface of the evening had been rudely

disturbed--yes! For once even an Amberley party had gone wrong--there

was to be no fun from this meeting of young folk to-night.

But it was Mrs. Amberley who spoke. She really could not help it. Mrs.

Toftrees had been telling her of various rumours concerning Gilbert

Lothian some time before the episode at the piano, and with all her

tolerance Mrs. Amberley was thoroughly angry.

That such a thing should have happened in her house, before Muriel and

her girl friend--oh! it was unthinkable!

"So Mr. Gilbert Lothian has gone," she said with considerable emphasis.

"Yes, dear," Mr. Amberley answered as he sat down again, willing enough

that nothing more should be said.

But it was not to be so.

"We can never have him here again," said the angry lady.

Amberley shook his head. "Very unfortunate, extremely unfortunate," he

murmured.

"I cannot understand it. Such a thing has never happened here before.

Now I understand why Mr. Lothian hides himself in the country and never

goes about. _Il y avait raison!_"

"I don't say that genius is any _excuse_ for this sort of thing,"

Amberley replied uneasily, "and Lothian has genius--but one must take

more than one thing into consideration . . ."

He paused, not quite knowing how to continue the sentence, and

genuinely sorry and upset. His glance fell upon Herbert Toftrees, and

he had a sort of feeling that the novelist might help him out.

"Don't you think so, Toftrees?" he asked.

The novelist surveyed the room with his steady grey eyes, marshalling

his hearers as it were.

"But let us put his talent aside," he said. "Think of him as an

ordinary person in our own rank of life--Mrs. Amberley's guest.

Certainly he could not have taken anything here to have made him in the

strange state he is in. Surely he must have known that he was not fit

to come to a decent house."

"I shall give his poems away," Muriel Amberley said with a little

shudder. "I can never read them again. And I did love them so! I wish

you hadn't asked Mr. Lothian to come here, Father."

"There is one consolation," said Mrs. Toftrees in a hard voice; "the

man must be realising what he has done. He was not too far gone for

that!"

A new voice broke into the talk. It came from young Dickson Ingworth

who had slid into the seat by Rita Wallace when Lothian went to the

piano.

He blushed and stammered as he spoke, but there was a fine loyalty in

his voice.

"It seems rather dreadful, Mrs. Amberley," he said, quite thinking that

he was committing literary suicide as he did so. "It is dreadful of

course. But Gilbert _is_ such a fine chap when he's--when he's, all

right! You can't think! And then, 'Surgit Amari'! Don't let's forget he

wrote 'The Loom'--'Delicate Threads! O fairest in life's tissue,'" he

quoted from the celebrated verse.

Then Rita Wallace spoke. "He is great," she said. "He is manifesting

himself in his own way. That is all. To me, at any rate, the meeting

with Mr. Lothian has been wonderful."

Mrs. Toftrees stared with undisguised dislike of such assertions on the

part of a young girl.

But Mrs. Amberley, always kind and generous-hearted, had been pleased

and touched by Dickson Ingworth's defence of his friend and master. She

quite realised what the lad stood to lose by doing it, and what courage

on his part it showed. And when Rita Wallace chimed in, Mrs. Amberley

dismissed the whole occurrence from her mind as she beamed benevolently

at the two young people on the sofa.

"Let's forget all about it," she said. "Mrs. Toftrees, help me to make

my husband sing. He can only sing one song but he sings it

excellently--'In cellar cool'--just the thing for a hot night. Joseph!

do as I tell you!"

The little group of people rearranged themselves, as Muriel sat down at

the piano to accompany her father.

"Le metier de poëte laisse a désirer," Toftrees murmured to his wife

with a sneer which almost disguised the atrocious accent of his French.

CHAPTER III

SHAME IN "THE ROARING GALLANT TOWN"

--"Is it for this I have given away

Mine ancient wisdom and austere control?"

"'Très volontiers' repartit le démon. 'Vous aimez

les tableaux changeants; je veux vous contenter.'"

--_Le Sage._

When the door of the house had closed after him, and with Mr.

Amberley's courteous but grave good-night ringing in his ears, Gilbert

Lothian walked briskly away across the Square.

It was very hot. The July sun, that tempest of fire which had passed

over the town during the day, had sucked up all the sweetness from the

air and it was sickly, like air under a blanket which has been breathed

many times. As it often is in July, London had been delightfully fresh

at dawn, when the country waggons were bringing the sweet-peas and the

roses to market, and although his mind had not been fresh as the sun

rose over St. James' where he was staying, Lothian had enjoyed the

early morning from the window of his bedroom. It had been clear and

scentless, like a field with the dew upon it, in the country from which

he had come five days ago.

Now his mind was like a field in the full sun of noon, parched and full

of hot odours.

He was perfectly aware that he had made a _faux pas_. How far it went,

whether he was not exaggerating it, he did not know. The semi-intoxicated

person--more especially when speech and gait are more or less normal,

as in his case--is quite incapable of gauging the impression he makes

on others. In lax and tolerant circles where no outward indication is

given him of his state, he goes on his way pleased and confident that

he has made an excellent impression, sure that no one has found him

out.

But his cunning and self-congratulation quite desert him when he is

openly snubbed or reproved. "Was I very far gone?" he afterwards asks

some confidential friend who may have been present at his discomfiture.

And whatever form the answer may take, the drunkard is abnormally

interested in all the details of the event. Born of the toxic

influences in his blood, there is a gaunt and greedy vanity which

insists upon the whole scene being re-enacted and commented upon.

Lothian had no one to tell him how far he had gone, precisely what

impression he had made upon his hosts and their guests. He felt with a

sense of injury that Dickson Ingworth ought to have come away with him.

The young man owed so much to him in the literary life! It was a

treachery not to have come away with him.

As he got into a cab and told the man to drive him as far as Piccadilly

Circus, he was still pursuing this train of thought. He had taken

Ingworth to the Amberleys', and now the cub was sitting in the drawing

room there, with those charming girls! quite happy and at ease. He,

Gilbert Lothian himself! was out of it all, shut out from that gracious

house and those cultured people whom he had been so glad to meet.

. . . Again he heard the soft closing of the big front door behind him,

and his skin grew hot at the thought. The remembrance of Amberley's

quiet courtesy, but entire change of manner in the hall, was horrible.

He felt as if he had been whipped. The dread of a slight, the fear of a

quarrel, which is a marked symptom of the alcoholic--is indeed his

torment and curse through life--was heavy upon Lothian now.

The sense of impotence was sickening. What a weak fool he had been to

break down and fly like that. To run away! What faltering and trembling

incapacity for self-assertion he had shown. He had felt uneasy with the

very servant who gave him his opera hat!

And what had he done after all? Very little, surely.

That prelude of Chopin always appealed to him strongly. He had written

about it; Crouchmann had played it privately for him and pointed out

new beauties. Certainly he had only met Miss Amberley for the first

time that night and he may have been a little over-excited and

effusive. His thoughts--a poet's thoughts after all--had come too

quickly for ordered expression. He was too Celtic in manner, too

artistic for these staid cold folk.

He tried to depreciate the Amberleys in his thoughts. Amberley was only

a glorified trades-man after all! Lothian tried to call up within him

that bitter joy which comes from despising that which we really respect

or desire. "Yes! damn the fellow! He _lived_ on poets and men of

letters--privileged people, the salt of the earth, the real forces of

life!"

And yet he ought to have stayed on and corrected his mistake. He had

made himself ridiculous in front of four women--he didn't care about

the men so much--and that was horribly galling.

As the cab swung down Regent Street, Lothian was sure that if his

nerves had not weakened for a moment he would never have given himself

away. It was, he felt, very unfortunate. He knew, as he could not help

knowing, that not only had he a mind and power of a rare, high quality,

but that he possessed great personal charm. What he did not realise was

how utterly all these things fled from him when he was not quite sober.

Certainly at this moment he was unable to comprehend it in the

slightest. Realisation would come later, at the inevitable punishment

hour.

He over-paid his cabman absurdly. The man's quick and eager deference

pleased him. He was incapable of any sense of proportion, and he felt

somehow or other reinstated in his own opinion by this trivial and

bought servility.

He looked at his watch. It was not very much after ten, and he became

conscious of how ridiculously early he had fled from the Amberleys'.

But as he stood on the pavement--in the very centre of the pleasure-web

of London with its roar and glare--he pushed such thoughts resolutely

from him and turned into a luxurious "lounge," celebrated among fast

youths and pleasure-seekers, known by an affectionate nick-name at the

Universities, in every regimental mess or naval ward-room in Great

Britain.

As he went down a carpeted passage he saw himself in the long mirror

that lined it. He looked quite himself, well-dressed, prosperous, his

face under full control and just like any other smart man about town.

At this hour, there were not many people in the place. It would become

crowded and noisy later on.

The white and green tiles of the walls gleamed softly in the shaded

lights, electric fans and a huge block of ice upon a pedestal kept the

air cool. There were palms which refreshed the eye and upon the

porphyry counter at which he was served there was a mass of mauve

hydrangea in a copper bowl.

He drank a whiskey and soda very quickly--that was to remove the marked

physical exhaustion which had begun to creep over him--ordered another

and lit a cigarette.

His nerves responded with magical quickness to the spirit. All day long

he had been feeding them with the accustomed poison. The strain of the

last half hour had used up more vitality than he had been aware.

For the second time that night--a night so infinitely more eventful

than he knew--he became master of himself, calm, happy, even, in the

sense of power returned, and complete correspondence with his

environment.

The barmaid who served him was--like most of these Slaves of the Still

in this part of London--an extremely handsome girl. Her face was

painted--all these girls paint their faces--but it was done merely to

conceal the pallor and ravages wrought upon it by a hard and feverish

life. Lothian felt an immense pity for her, symbolic as she was of all

the others, and the few remarks he made were uttered with an

instinctive deference and courtesy.

He had been married seven years before this time, and had at once

retired into the country with his wife where, by slow degrees, he had

felt his way to the work which had at last made him celebrated. But in

the past he had known the under side of London well and had chosen it

deliberately as his _milieu_.

It had in no way been forced upon him. Struggling journalist and author

as he was, good houses had been open to him, for he was a member of a

well-known family and had made many friends at Oxford.

But the other life was so much easier! If its pleasures were coarse,

they were hot and strong! For years, as many a poet has done before

him, he lived a bad life, tolerant of vice in himself and others, kind,

generous often, but tossed and worn by his passions--rivetting the

chains link by link upon his soul--until he had met and married Mary.

And no one knew better than he the horrors of life behind the counters

of a bar.

He turned away, as two fresh-faced lads came noisily up to the counter,

turned away with a sigh of pity. He was quite unconscious--though he

would have been interested at the psychological fact--that the girl had

wondered at his manner and thought him affected and dull.

She would much rather have been complimented and chaffed. She

understood that. Life is full of anodynes. Mercifully enough the rank

and file of the oppressed are not too frequently conscious of their

miseries. There is a half-truth in the philosophy of Dr. Pangloss, and

if fettered limbs go lame, the chains are not always clanking.

The poor barmaid went to bed that night in an excellent humour, for the

two lads Lothian had seen brought her some pairs of gloves. And if she

had known of Lothian's pity she would have resented it bitterly.

"Like the fellow's cheek," she would have said.

Lothian, as he believed, had absolutely recovered his own normal

personality. He admitted now, as he left the "lounge," that he had not

been his true self at the Amberleys'.

"At this moment, as I stand here," he said to himself, "'I am the

Captain of my Soul,'" not in the least understanding that when he spoke

of his own "soul" he meant nothing more than his five senses.

The man thought he was normal. He was not. On the morrow, when

partially recovering from the excesses of to-day, there was a

possibility that he might become normal--for a brief period, and until

he began to drink again.

For him to become really himself, perfectly clean from the stigmata of

the inebriate mind, would have taken him at least six months of total

abstinence from alcohol.

Lothian's health, though impaired, had by no means broken down.

A strong constitution, immense vitality, had preserved it, up to this

point. At this period, though a poisoned man, an alcoholised body,

there were frequent times of absolute normality--when he was, for

certain definite spaces of time by the clock, exactly as he would have

been had he never become a slave to alcohol at all.

As he stood upon the pavement of Piccadilly Circus, he felt and

believed that such a time had come now.

He was mistaken. All that was happening was that there was a temporary

lull in the ebb and flow of alcohol in his veins. The brain cells were

charged up to a certain point with poison. At this point they gave a

false impression of security.

It must be remembered, and it cannot be too strongly insisted on, that

the mental processes of the inebriate are _definite_, and are _induced_.

The ordinary person says of an inebriate simply that "he is a drunkard"

or "he drinks." Whether he or she says it with sympathetic sorrow, or

abhorrence, the bald statement rarely leads to any further train of

thought.

It is very difficult for the ordinary person to realise that the

mental processes are _sui generis_ a Kingdom--though with a debased

coinage--which requires considerable experience before it can always

be recognised from the ring of true metal.

Alcoholism so changes the mental life of any one that it results in

an ego which has _special_ external and internal characteristics.

And so, in order to appreciate fully this history of Gilbert

Lothian--to note the difference between the man as he was known and as

he really was--it must always be kept in mind under what influence he

moves through life, and that his steps have strayed into a dreadful

kingdom unknown and unrealised by happier men.

He had passed out of one great Palace of Drink.

Had he been as he supposed himself to be, he would have sought rest at

once. He would have hurried joyously from temptation in this freedom

from his chains.

Instead of that, the question he asked himself was, "What shall I do

now?"

The glutton crams himself at certain stated periods. But when repletion

comes he stops eating. The habit is rhythmic and periodically certain.

But the Drunkard--his far more sorrowful and lamentable brother--has

not even this half-saving grace. In common with the inordinate

smoker--whose harm is physical and not mental--the inebriate drinks as

long as he is able to, until he is incapacitated. "Where shall I go

now?"

If God does indeed give human souls to His good angels, as gardens to

weed and tend, that thought must have brought tears of pity to the eyes

of the august beings who were battling for Gilbert Lothian.

Their hour was not yet.

They were to see the temple of the Paraclete fall into greater ruin and

disaster than ever before. The splendid spires and pinnacles, the whole

serene beauty of soul and body which had made this Temple a high

landmark when God first built it, were crumbling to decay.

Deep down among the strong foundations the enemy was at work. The

spire--the "Central-one"--which sprang up towards Heaven was deeply

undermined. Still--save to the eyes of experts--its glory rose

unimpaired. But it was but a lovely shell with no longer any grip upon

its base of weakened Will. And the bells in the wind-swept height of

the Tower no longer rang truly. On red dawns or on pearl-grey evenings

the message they sent over the country-side was beginning to be false.

There was no peace when they tolled the Angelus.

In oriel or great rose-window the colour of the painted glass was

growing dim. The clear colour was fading, though here and there it was

shot with baleful fire which the Artist had never painted there,--like

the blood-shot eyes of the man who drinks.

A miasmic mist had crept into the noble spaces of the aisles. The vast

supporting pillars grew insubstantial and seemed to tremble as the

vapour eddied round them. A black veil was quickly falling before the

Figure above the Altar, and the seven dim lamps of the Sanctuary burned

with green and flickering light.

The bells of a Great Mind's Message, which had been cast with so much

silver in them, rang an increasing dissonance. The trumpets of the

organ echoed with a harsh note in the far clerestory; the flutes were

false, the _dolce_ stop no longer sweet. The great pipes of the pedal

organ muttered and stammered in their massive voices, as if dark

advisers whispered in the ear of the musician who controlled them.

Lothian had passed from one great Palace of Drink. "Where shall I go?"

he asked himself again, and immediately his eye fell upon another, the

brilliant illumination upon the façade of a well-known "Theatre of

Varieties."

His hot eye-balls drank in the flaring signs, and telegraphed both an

impulse and a memory to his brain.

"Yes!" he said. "I will revisit the 'Kingdom.' There is still two

thirds of an hour before the performance will be over. How well I used

to know it! What a nightly haunt it used to be. Surely, even now, there

will be some people I know there? . . . I'll go in and see!"

As Lothian turned in at the principal doors of the most celebrated

Music Hall in the world, his pulses began to quicken.

--The huge foyer, the purple carpets, with their wreaths of laurel in a

purple which was darker yet, the gleaming marble stairway, with its

wide and noble sweep, how familiar all this dignified splendour was, he

thought as he entered the second Palace of Drink which flung wide its

doors to him this night.

A palace of drink and lust, vast and beautiful! for those who brought

poisoned blood and vicious desires within its portals! Here, banished

from the pagan groves and the sunlit temples of their ancient

glory--banished also from the German pine-woods where Heine saw them in

pallid life under the full moon--Venus, Bacchus and Silenus held their

unholy court.

For all the world--save only for a few wise men to whom they were but

symbols--Venus and Bacchus were deities once.

When the Acropolis cut into the blue sky of Hellas with its white

splendour these were the chiefest to whom men prayed, and they ruled

the lives of all.

And, day by day, new temples rise in their honour. Once they were

worshipped with blythe body and blinded soul. Now the tired body and

the besotted brain alone pay them reverence. But great are their

temples still.

Such were the thoughts of Lothian--Lothian the Christian poet--and he

was pleased that they should come to him.

It showed how detached he was, what real command he had of himself. In

the old wild days, before his marriage and celebrity, he had come to

this place, and other places like it, to seize greedily upon pleasure,

as a monkey seizes upon a nut. He came to survey it all now, to revisit

the feverish theatre of his young follies with a bland Olympian

attitude.

The poison was flattering him now, placing him upon a swaying pedestal

for a moment. He was sucking in the best honey that worthless withering

flowers could exude, and it was hot and sweet upon his tongue.

--Were any of the old set there after all? He hoped so. Not conscious

of himself as a rule, without a trace of "side" and detesting

ostentation or any display of his fame, he wanted to show off now. He

wanted to console himself for his rebuff at the house in Bryanstone

Square. Vulgar and envious adulation, interested praise from those who

were still in the pit of obscurity from which his finer brain had

helped him to escape, would be perfectly adequate to-night.

After the episode at the Amberleys', coarse flattery heaped on with a

spade would be as ice in the desert.

And he found what he desired.

He passed slowly through the promenade, towards the door which led to

the stalls, and the great lounge where, if anywhere, he would find

people who knew him and whom he knew.

In a slowly-moving tide, like a weed-clogged wave, the women of the

town ebbed and flowed from horn to horn of the moon-shaped crescent

where they walk. Against the background of sea-purple and white, their

dresses and the nodding plumes in their great hats moved languorously.

Sickly perfumes, as from the fan of an odalisque, swept over them.

Many beautiful painted masks floated through the scented aisle of the

theatre, as they had floated up and down the bronze corridors of the

Temple of Diana at Ephesus in the far off days of St. Paul. A mourning

thrill shivered up from the violins of the orchestra below; the 'cellos

made their plaint, the cymbals rattled, the kettledrums spoke with deep

vibrating voices.

. . . So had the sistra clanked and droned in the old temple of bronze

and silver before the altars of Artemis,--the old music, the eternal

faces, ever the same!

A chill came to Lothian as he passed among these "estranged sad

spectres of the night." He thought suddenly of his pure and gracious

wife, alone in their little house in the country, he thought of the

Canaanitish harlot whose soul was the first that Christ redeemed. For a

moment or two his mind was like a darkened room in which a magic

lantern is being operated and fantastic, unexpected pictures flit

across the screen. And then he was in the big lounge.

Yes, some of them were there!--a little older, perhaps, to his now much

more critical eye, somewhat more bloated and coarsened, but the same

still.

"Good heavens!" said a huge man with a blood red face, startling in its

menace, like a bully looking into an empty room, "Why, here's old

Lothian! Where in the world have _you_ sprung from, my dear boy?"

Lothian's face lit up with pleasure and recognition. The big evil-faced

man was Paradil, the painter of pastels, a wayward drunken creature who

never had money in his pocket, but that he gave it away to every one.

He was a man spoken of as a genius by those who knew. His rare pictures

fetched large prices, but he hardly ever worked. He was soaked,

dissolved and pickled in brandy.

A little elderly man like a diseased doll, came up and began to

twitter. He was the husband of a famous dancer who performed at the

theatre, a wit in his way, an adroit manager of his wife's affairs with

other men, a man with a mind as hollow and bitter as a dried lemon.

He was a well-known figure in upper Bohemia. His name was constantly

mentioned in the newspapers as an entrepreneur of all sorts of things,

a popular, evil little man.

"Ah, Lothian," he said, as one or two other people came up and some one

gave a copious order for drinks, "still alternating between the prayer

book and the decanter? I must congratulate you on 'Surgit Amari.' I

read it, and it made me green with envy to think how many thousand

copies you had sold of it."

"You've kept the colour, Edgar," he said, looking into the little

creature's face, but the words stabbed through him, nevertheless. How

true they were--superficially--how they expressed--and must

express--the view of his old disreputable companions. They envied him

his cunning--as they thought it--they would have given their ears to

have possessed the same power of profitable hypocrisy--as they thought

it. Meanwhile they spoke virtuously to each other about him. "Gilbert

Lothian the author of 'Surgit Amari'!--it would make a cat laugh!"

One can't throw off one's past like a dirty shirt--Gilbert began to

wish he had not come here.

"I ought never to be seen in these places," he thought, forgetting that

it was only the sting of the little man's malice that provoked the

truth.

But Paradil, kindly Paradil with the bully's face and a heart bursting

with dropsical good nature, speedily intervened.

Other men joined the circle; "rounds of drinks" were paid for by each

person according to the ritual of such an occasion as this.

In half an hour, when the theatre began to empty, Lothian was really,

definitely drunk.

Hot circles expanded and contracted within his head. His face became

pale and very grave in expression, as he walked out into Leicester

Square upon Paradil's supporting arm. There was a portentous dignity in

his voice as he gave the address of his club to the cabman. As he shook

hands with Paradil out of the window, tears came into his eyes, as he

thought of the other's drunken, wasted life. "If I can only help you in

any way, old chap--" he tried to say, and then sank back in oblivion

upon the cushions.

He was quite unconscious of anything during the short drive to St.

James's Street, and when the experienced cabman pulled down the flag of

the taximeter and opened the door, he sat there like a log.

The X Club was not fashionable, but it was reputable and of old

establishment. It was fairly easy to get into--for the people whom the

election committee wanted there--exceedingly difficult for the wrong

set of people. Very many country gentlemen--county people, but of

moderate means--belonged to it; the Major-General and the Admiral were

not infrequent visitors; several Judges were on the members' list and

looked in now and again.

As far as the Arts went, they were but poorly represented. There was no

sparkle, no night-life about the place. The painters, actors and

writers preferred a club that began to brighten up about eleven o'clock

at night--just when the X became dreary. Not more than a dozen suppers

were served at the staid building in St. James' on any night of the

week.

Nevertheless, it was not an "old fogies'" club. There was a younger

leaven working there. A good many younger men who also belonged to much

more lively establishments found refreshment, quiet, and just the

proper kind of atmosphere at the X.

For young men of good families who were starting life in London, there

was a certain sense of being at home there. The building had, in the

past, been the house of a celebrated duke and something of comely and

decent order clung to every room now. And, more than anything, the

servants suggested a country or London house of name.

Mullion, the grey-haired head-porter who sat in his glass box in the

hall was a kind and assiduous friend to every one. He was reported to

be worth ten thousand pounds and his manners were perfection. He was

one of the most celebrated servants in London. His deference was never

tinged by servility. His interest in your affairs and wants was

delicately intimate and quite genuine. Great people had tried to lure

this good and shrewd person from the X Club, but without success. For

seventeen years he had sat there in the hall, and, if fate was kind, he

meant to sit there for seventeen years more.

All the servants of the X were like that. The youngest waiter in the

smoking-rooms, library or dining room wore the face of a considerate

friend, and Prince, the head bed-room valet was beloved by every one.

Members of other clubs talked about him and Mullion, the head-porter,

with sighs of regret.

When Gilbert Lothian's taxi-cab stopped at the doors of the X Club, he

was expected. Dickson Ingworth, who was a member also, had been there

for a few moments, expectant of his friend.

Old Mullion had gone for the night, and an under-porter sat in the

quiet hall, but Prince, the valet, stood talking to Ingworth at the

bottom of the stair-case.

"It will be perfectly all right," said Prince. "I haven't done for Mr.

Lothian for all these years without understanding his ways. Drunk or

sober, sir, Mr. Gilbert is always a gentleman. He's the most pleasant

country member in the club, sir! I understand his habits thoroughly,

and he would bear me out in that at any time. I'm sure of that! His

bowl of soup is being kept hot in the kitchens now. The small flask of

cognac and the bottle of Worcester sauce are waiting on his dressing

table. And there's a half bottle of champagne, which he takes to put

him right when I call him in the morning, already on the ice!"

"I know he appreciates it, Prince. He can't say enough about how you

look after him when he's in London."

"I thoroughly believe it, sir," said the valet, "but it gives me great

pleasure to hear it from you, who are such a friend of Mr. Gilbert's. I

may say, sir--if I may tell you without offence--that I'm not really on

duty to-night. But when I see how Mr. Gilbert was when he was dressing

for dinner, I made up my mind to stay. James begged me to go, but I

would not. James is a good lad, but he's no memory for detail. He'd

have forgot the bi-carbonate of soda for Mr. Gilbert's heart-burn, or

something like that--I think that's him, sir!"

Ingworth and the valet hurried over the hall as the inner doors swung

open and Lothian entered. His shirt-front was crumpled. His face was

white and set, his eyes fixed and sombre.

It was as though the master of the house had returned, when the poet

entered. The under-porter hurried out of his box, Prince had the coat

and opera hat whisked away in a moment. In a moment more, like some

trick of the theatre and surrounded by satellites, Lothian was mounting

the stairs towards his bedroom.

They put him in an arm-chair--these eager servitors! The electric

lights in the comfortable bed-room were all switched on. The servant

who loved him, not for his generosity, but for himself, vied with the

young gentleman who loved him for somewhat different reasons.

Both of them had been dominated by this personality for so long, that

there was no sorrow nor pity in their minds. The faithful man of the

people who had served gentlemen so long that any other life would have

been impossible to him, the boy of position, united in their efforts of

resuscitation.

The Master's mind must be called back! The Master's body must be

succoured and provided for.

The two were there to do it, and it seemed quite an ordinary and

natural thing.

"You take off his boots, Prince, and I'll manage his collar."

"Yes, sir."

"Managed it?"

"A little difficulty with the left boot, sir. The instep is a trifle

swelled."

"Good heavens! I do hope he's not going to have another attack of

gout!"

"I hope not, sir. But you can't ever tell. It comes very sudden. Like a

thief in the night, as you may say."

"There! I've broken the stud, but that doesn't matter. His neck's

free."

"And his boots are off. There's some one knocking. It's his soup. Would

you mind putting his bed-room slippers on, sir? I don't like the cold

for his feet."

Prince hurried to the door, whispered a word or two to whoever stood

outside, and returned with a tray.

"Another few minutes," said Prince, as he poured the brandy and

measured the Worcester sauce into the silver-plated tureen; "another

few minutes and he'll be beautiful! Mr. Gilbert responds to anything

wonderful quick. I've had him worse than this at half past twelve, and

at quarter to one he's been talking like an archdeacon. You persuade

him, sir."

"Here's your soup, Gilbert!"

"_It's all nothing, there's nobody, all nothing--dark--_," the voice

was clogged and drowsy--if a blanket could speak, the voice might have

been so.

The boy looked hopelessly at the valet.

Prince, an alert little man with a yellow vivacious countenance and

heavy, black eye-brows, smiled superior. "When Mr. Gilbert really have

copped the brewer--excuse the expression, sir--he generally says a few

words without much meaning. Leave him to me if you please."

He wheeled a little table up to the arm-chair, and caught hold of

Lothian's shoulder, shaking him.

"What? What? My soup?"

"Yessir, your soup."

The man's recuperative power was marvellous. His eyes were bleared, his

face white, the wavy hair fell in disorder over his forehead. But he

was awake and conscious.

"Thank you, Prince," he said, in his clear and sweet voice, "just what

I wanted. Hullo, Dicker! You here?--I'll just have my soup. . . ."

He grasped the large ladle-spoon with curious eagerness. It was as

though he found salvation in the hot liquid--pungent as it was with

cognac and burning spices.

He lapped it eagerly, coughing now and again, "gluck-gluck" and then a

groan of satisfaction.

The other two watched him with quiet eagerness. There was nothing

horrible to them in this. Neither the valet nor the boy understood that

they were "lacqueys in the house of shame." As they saw their muddy

magic beginning to succeed, satisfaction swelled within them.

Gilbert Lothian's mind was coming back. They were blind to the hideous

necessity of their summons, untouched by disgust at the physical

processes involved.

"Will you require me any more, sir?"

"No, thank you, Prince."

"Very good, sir. I have made the morning arrangements."

"Good-night, Prince."

The bedroom door closed.

Lothian heaved himself out of his chair. He seemed fifteen years older.

His head was sunk forward upon his shoulders, his stomach seemed to

protrude, his face was pale, blotchy, debauched, and appeared to be

much larger than it ordinarily did.

With a slow movement, as if every joint in his body creaked and gave

him pain, he began to pace slowly up and down the room. Dickson

Ingworth sat on the bed and watched him.

Yet as the man moved slowly up and down the room, collecting the

threads of his poisoned consciousness, slowly recapturing his mind,

there was something big about him.

Each heavy, semi-drunken movement had force and personality. The

lowering, considering face spelt power, even now.

He stopped in front of the bed.

"Well, Dicker?" he said--and suddenly his whole face was transformed.

Ten years fell away. The smile was sweet and simple, there was a

freakish humour in the eyes,--"Well, Dicker?"

The boy gave a great gasp of pleasure and relief. The "gude-man" had

come home, the powerful mind-machine had started once more, the house

was itself again!

"How are you, Gilbert?"

"Very tired. Horrible indigestion and heartburn, legs like lumps of

brass and a nasty feeling as if an imprisoned black-bird were

fluttering at the base of my spine! But quite sober, Dicker, now!"

"Nor were you ever anything else, in Bryanstone Square," the young man

said hotly. "It _was_ such a mistake for you to go away, Gilbert. So

unnecessary!"

"I had my reasons. Was there much comment? Now tell me honestly, was it

very noticeable?--what did they say?"

"No one said anything at all," Ingworth answered, lying bravely. "The

evening didn't last long after you went. Every one left together--I say

you ought to have seen the Toftrees' motor!--and I drove Miss Wallace

home, and then came on here."

"A beautiful girl," Lothian said sleepily. "I only talked to her for a

minute or two and she seemed clever and sympathetic. Certainly she is

lovely."

Ingworth rose from the bed. He pointed to the table in the centre of

the room. "Well, I'm off, old chap," he said. "As far as Miss Wallace

goes, she's absolutely gone on you! She was quoting your verses all the

way in the cab. She lives in a tiny flat with another girl, and I had

to wait outside while she did up that parcel there! It's 'Surgit

Amari,' she wants you to sign it for her, and there's a note as well, I

believe. Good-night."

"Good-night, Dicker. I can't talk now. I'm beautifully drunk

to-night . . . Look me up in the morning. Then we'll talk."

The door had hardly closed upon the departing youth, when Lothian sank

into a heap upon his chair. His body felt like a quivering jelly, a

leaden depression, as if Hell itself weighed him down.

Mechanically, and with cold, trembling hands, he opened the brown paper

parcel. His book, in its cover of sage-green and gold, fell out upon

the table. He began to read the note--the hand-writing was firm, clear

and full of youth--so he thought. The heading of the note paper was

embossed--

"The Podley Pure Literature Institute.

_Dear Mr. Lothian_:

I am so proud and happy to have met you to-night. I am so sorry

that I had not the chance of telling you what your poems have been

to me--though of course you must always be hearing that sort of

thing. So I will say nothing more, but ask you, only, to put your

name in my copy of "Surgit Amari" and thus make it more

precious--if that is possible--than before.

Mr. Ingworth has kindly promised to give you this note and the

book.

Yours sincerely,

RITA WALLACE."

The letter dropped unheeded upon the carpet. Thick tears began to roll

down Lothian's swollen face.

"Mary! Mary!" he said aloud, "I want you, I want you!" . . .

"Darling! there is no one else in the world but you."

He was calling for his wife, always so good and kind to him, his dear

and loving wife. At the end of his long foul day, lived without a

thought of her, he was calling for her help and comfort like a sick

child.

Poisoned, abject, he whined for her in the empty room.

--She was sleeping now, in the quiet house by the sea. The horn of a

motor-car tooted in St. James' Street below--She was sleeping now in

her quiet chamber. Tired lids covered the frank, blue eyes, the thick

masses of yellow hair were straying over the linen pillow. She was

dreaming of him as the night wind moaned about the house.

He threw himself upon his knees by the bedside, in dreadful drunken

surrender and appeal.

--"Father help me! Jesus help me!--forgive me!"--he dare not invoke the

Holy Ghost. He shrank from that. The Father had made everything and had

made him. He was a beneficent, all-pervading Force--He would

understand. The Lord Jesus was a familiar Figure. He was human; Man as

well as God. One could visualise Him. He had cared for harlots and

drunkards! . . .

Far down in his sub-conscious brain Lothian was aware of what he was

doing. He was whining not to be hurt. His prayers were no more than

superstitious garrulity and fear. Something--a small despairing part of

himself, had climbed upon the roof of the dishonoured Temple and was

stretching trembling hands out into the overwhelming darkness of the

Night.

"Father, help me! Help me _now_. Let me go to bed without phantoms and

torturing ghosts round me! Do not look into the Temple to-night. I will

cleanse it to-morrow. I swear it! Father! Help me!"

He began to gabble the Lord's Prayer--that would adjust things in a

sort of way--wouldn't it? There was a promise--yes--one said it, and it

charmed away disaster.

Half-way through the prayer he stopped. The words would not come to

him. He had forgotten.

But that no longer distressed him. The black curtain of stupor was

descending once more.

"'Thy will be done'--what _did_ come after? Well! never mind!" God

was good. He'd understand. After all, intention was everything!

He scrambled into bed and instantly fell asleep, while the lovely face

of Rita Wallace was the first thing that swam into his disordered

brain.

In a remote village of Norfolk, not a quarter of a mile from Gilbert

Lothian's own house, a keen-faced man with a pointed beard, a slim,

alert figure like an osier wand and steely brown eyes was reading a

thin green-covered book of poems.

Now and then he made a pencil note in the margin. His face was alive

with interest, almost with excitement. It was as though he were tracing

something, hunting for some secret hidden in the pages.

More than once he gave a subdued exclamation of excitement.

"It's there!" he said at last to himself. "Yes, it is there! I'm sure

of it, quite apart from what I've heard in the village since I came."

He rose, put the book carefully away in a drawer, locked it, blew out

the lamp and went to bed.

Three hundred miles away in Cornwall, a crippled spinster was lying on

her bed of pain in a cottage by the sea.

The windows of her room were open and the moon-rays touched a white

Crucifix upon the wall to glory.

The Atlantic groundswell upon the distant beaches made a sound as of

fairy drums.

The light of a shaded candle fell upon the white coverlet of her bed,

and upon a book bound in sage-green and gold which lay there.

The woman's face shone. She had just read for the fifth time, the poem

in "Surgit Amari" which closes the first book.

The lovely lines had fused with the holy rapture of the night, and her

patient soul was caught up into commune with Jesus.

"Soon! Oh, soon! Dear Lord," she gasped, "I shall be with Thee for

ever. If it seemeth good to Thee, let me be taken up on some such

tranquil night as this. And I thank Thee, Dear Saviour, that Thou hast

poured Thy Grace into the soul of Gilbert Lothian, the Poet. Through

the white soul of this poet, which Thou hast chosen to be a conduit of

comfort to me, my night pain has gone. I am drawn nearer to Thee, Jesus

who hast died for me!

"Lord, bless the poet. Pour down Thy Grace upon him. Guard him, shield

him and his for ever more. And, Sweet Lord, if it be Thy will, let me

meet him in Heaven and tell him of this night--this fair night of

summer when I lay dying and happy and thinking kindly and with

gratitude of him.

"Jesus!"

CHAPTER IV

LOTHIAN GOES TO THE LIBRARY OF PURE LITERATURE

"I only knew one poet in my life:

And this, or something like it, was his way."

--_Browning._

The Podley Library in West Kensington was a fad of its creator. Mr.

John Podley was a millionaire, or nearly so, and the head of a great

pin-making firm. He was a public man of name and often preached or

lectured at the species of semi-religious conversations known as

"Pleasant Sunday Afternoons."

Sunday afternoon in England--though Mr. Podley called it "The

Sabbath"--represented the pin-maker's mental attitude with some

fidelity. All avenues to pleasure of any kind were barred, though

possibly amusement is the better word. A heavy meal clogged the

intellect, an imperfectly-understood piece of Jewish religious politics

was made into an idol, erected and bowed down to.

Mr. Podley had always lived with the fear of God, and the love of money

constantly before his eyes. "Sabbath observance" and total abstinence

were his watchwords, and he also took a great interest in "Literature"

and had pronounced views upon the subject. These views, like everything

else about him, were confined and narrow, but were the sincere

convictions of an ignorant, pompous and highly successful man.

He had, accordingly, established the Podley Free Library in Kensington

in order to enunciate and carry out his ideas in a practical way. What

he considered--and not without some truth--the immoral tendency of

modern writers, was to be sternly prohibited in his model house of

books.

Nothing should repose upon those shelves which might bring a blush to

the cheeks of the youngest girl or unsettle the minds of any one at

all. "Very unsettling" was a great phrase of this good, wealthy and

stupid old man. He really was good, vulgar and limited as were all his

tastes, and he had founded the Library to the glory of God.

He found it impossible--when he became confronted by the task--to

choose the books himself, as he had hoped to do.

He had sat down one day in his elegant private sanctum at Tulse Hill

with sheets of foolscap before him, to make a first list. The

"Pilgrim's Progress" was written down immediately in his flowing

clerkly hand. Then came the novels of Mrs. Henry Wood. "Get all of this

line" was the pencilled note in the margin. Memories of his youth

reasserted themselves, so "Jessica's First Prayer," "Ministering

Children" and "A Peep Behind the Scenes" were quickly added, and then

there had been a pause.

"Milton, Shakespeare and the Bible?" said Mrs. Podley, when consulted.

"They're pure enough, I'm sure!" and the pin-maker who had never been

to a theatre, nor read a line of the great poets, wrote them down at

once. As for the Bible, it was God's word, and so "would never bring a

blush" etc. It was Mr. Podley's favourite reading--the Old Testament

more than the New--and if any one had scoffed at the idea that the

Almighty had written it Himself, in English and with a pen, Podley

would have thought him infidel.

The millionaire was quite out of date. The modern expansions of thought

among the Non-conformists puzzled him when he was (rarely) brought into

any contact with them. His grim, uncultured beliefs were such as exist

only in the remote granite meeting houses of the Cornish moors to-day.

"I see that Bunyan wrote another book, the 'Holy War,'" said Mr. Podley

to his wife. "I never heard of it and I'm a bit doubtful. I don't like

the name, shall I enter it up or not?"

The good lady shook her head. "Not knowing, can't say," she remarked.

"But if it is the same man who wrote 'Pilgrim's Progress' then it's

sure to be pure."

"It's the 'Holy' that puzzles me," he answered, "that's a papist

word--'Holy Church' 'Holy Mary' and that."

"Then I should leave it out. But I tell you what, my dear, choosing

these books'll take up a lot of your valuable time, especially if each

one's got to be chose separate. You might have to read a lot of them

yourself, there's no knowing! And why should you?"

"Why, indeed?" said Mr. Podley. "But I don't see how----"

"Well, I do then, John. It's as simple as A. B. C. You want to

establish a library in which there shan't be any wicked books."

"That is so?"

"Yes, my dear. Pure, absolutely pure!"

"Well, then, have them bought for you by an expert--like you do the

metal for the pins. You don't buy metal yourself any more. You pay high

wages to your buyers to do it. Treat the books the same!"

"There's a good deal in that, dear. But I want to take a _personal_

interest in the thing."

"Now don't you worry, John. 'Tis right that we should all be

conscientious in what we do, but them as has risen to the head of great

businesses haven't any further call to trouble about minor details.

I've heard you say it many a time. And so with this library. You're

putting down the money for it. You've bought the land and the building

is being erected. You've got to pay, and if that isn't taking a

personal interest then I'm sure I don't know what is!"

"You advise me?--"

"To go to the best book shop in London--there's that place opposite the

Royal Academy that is the King's booksellers. See one of the partners.

Explain that you want the library furnished with pure books, state the

number you want, and get an estimate of the cost. It's their business

to know what books are pure and what aren't--and, besides, at a shop

like that, they wouldn't sell any wicked books. It would be beneath

them."

Podley had taken his wife's advice. He had "placed an order" for an

initial ten thousand pure volumes with the firm in question, and the

thing was done.

The shop in Piccadilly was a very famous shop indeed. It had all the

_cachet_ of a library of distinction. Its director was a man of

letters and an anthologist of repute. The men who actually sold the

books were gentlemen of knowledge and taste, invaluable to many

celebrated authors, mines of information, and all of them trained

bibliophiles.

"Now look here, Lewis," the director said, to one of his assistants, an

Oxford man who translated Flaubert and wrote introductions to English

editions of Gautier in his spare time, "you've got to fill a library

with books."

Mr. Lewis smiled. "Funny thing they should come to us," he said; "I

should have thought they would have bought them by the yard, in the

Strand. What is it, American millionaire? question of bindings and

wall-space?"

"No, not quite," said the director. "It's Mr. Podley, the pin

millionaire and philanthropist. He's founding a public library of 'pure

literature' in Kensington. The only books he has ever read, apparently,

are the books of the Old Testament. He was with me for an hour this

morning. Take a week and make a list. He wants ten thousand volumes for

a start."

The eyes of Mr. Lewis gleamed. "Certainly!" he said. "It will be quite

delightful. It seems almost too good to be true. But will the list be

scrutinised before the books are actually bought? Won't this Podley man

take another opinion?"

The director shook his head. "He doesn't know any one who could give

him one," he answered. "It would only mean engaging another expert, and

he's quite satisfied with our credentials. 'Pure books'! Good Lord! I

wonder what he thinks he means. I should like to get inside that man's

head and poke about for an hour. It would be interesting."

Mr. Lewis provided for the Kensington Institute exactly the library he

would have acquired for himself, if he could have afforded it. The

result, for all real lovers of books, would have been delightful if any

of them had known of it But the name frightened them away, and they

never went there. Members of the general public were also deterred by

the name of the Institute--though for quite different reasons--and folk

of Mr. Podley's own mental attitude were too illiterate (like him), to

want books--"pure" or otherwise--at all.

Podley, again after consultation with his wife, appointed a clerk from

the Birmingham pin works as chief librarian. "It won't matter," that

shrewd woman had pointed out, "if he knows anything about literature or

not! His duties will be to supervise the lending of the books, and a

soft job he'll have too!"

A Mr. Hands had been elected, a limpet-like adherent to Podley's

particular shibboleth, and a person as anæmic in mind and body as could

have been met with in a month of search.

An old naval pensioner and his wife were appointed care-takers, and a

lady-typist and sub-librarian was advertised for, at thirty-five

shillings a week.

Rita Wallace had obtained the post.

Hardly any one ever came to the library. In the surge and swell of

London life it became as remote as an island in the Hebrides. Podley

had endowed it--it was the public excuse for the knighthood he

purchased in a year from the Liberal Party--and there it was!

Rita Wallace had early taken entire charge and command of her nominal

superior--the whiskered and despondent Mr. Hands. The girl frightened

and dazzled him. As he might have done at the foot of Etna or

Stromboli, he admired, kept at a distance, and accepted the fact that

she was there.

The girl was absolute mistress of the solitary building full of

beautiful books. Sometimes Hands, whose wife was dying of cancer, and

who had no stated times of attendance, stayed away for several days.

Snell and his wife--the care-takers--adored her, and she lunched every

day with them in the basement.

Mrs. Snell often spoke to her husband about "Miss Rita." "If that there

Hands could be got rid of," she would say, "then it would be ever so

much better. Poor silly thing that he is, with his face like the

underside of a Dover sole! And two hundred a year for doing nothing

more than what Miss Rita tells him! He calls her 'Miss'--as I'm sure he

should, her being a Commander's daughter and him just a dirty

Birmingham clerk! Miss Rita ought to have his two hundred a year, and

him her thirty-five shillings a week. Thirty-five shillings! what is it

for an officer's daughter, that was born at Malta too! I'd like to give

that old Podley a piece of my mind, I would!"

"In the first place he never comes here. In the second place he's not a

gentleman himself, so that don't mean nothing to him," Snell would say

on such occasion of talk.

He had been at the Bombardment of Alexandria and could not quite

forget it. . . . "Now if it was Lord Charles what had started

this--'--Magneta--' library, then _'e_ could 'a' been spoke

to--Podley!"

It was four o'clock on the afternoon of the day after the Amberleys'

dinner-party. Hands was away, staying beside his sick wife, and Rita

Wallace proposed to close the library.

She had just got rid of the curate from a neighbouring church, who had

discovered the deserted place--and her. Snubbed with skill the boy had

departed, and as no one else would come--or if they did what would it

matter?--Rita was about to press the button of the electric bell upon

her table and summon Snell.

The afternoon sunlight poured in upon the books from the window in the

dome.

The place was cool and absolutely silent, save for the note a straying

drone-bee made as his diapason swept this way and that.

Even here, as the sunlight fell upon the dusty gold and crimson of the

books, summer was calling. The bee came close to Rita and settled for a

moment upon the sulphur-coloured rose that stood in a specimen-glass

upon her writing-table.

He was a big fellow, and like an Alderman in a robe of black fur,

bearing a gold chain.

"Oh, you darling!" Rita said, thinking of summer and the outside world.

She would go to Kensington Palace Gardens where there were trees, green

grass and flowers. "Oh, you darling! You're a little jewel with a

voice, a bit of the real country! I believe you've actually been

droning over the hop-fields of Kent!"

She looked up suddenly, her eyes startled, the perfect mouth parted in

vexation. Some one was coming, she might be kept any length of

time--for the rare visitors to the Podley Library were generally bores.

. . . That silly curate might have returned!

The outer swing doors thudded in the hall, there was the click of a

latch as the inner door was pushed open and Gilbert Lothian entered.

The girl recognised him at once, as he made his way under the dome

towards her, and her eyes grew wide with wonder. Lothian was wearing a

suit of grey flannel, his hair as he took off his straw hat was a

little tumbled, his face fresh and clear.

"How do you do," he said, with the half-shy deference that came into

his voice when he spoke to women. "It was such a lovely afternoon that

I thought I might venture to bring back your copy of 'Surgit Amari'

myself."

Rita Wallace flashed her quick, humorous smile at him--the connection

between the weather and his wish was not too obvious. But her smile had

pleasure of another kind in it also--he had wanted to see her again.

Lothian laughed boyishly. "I wanted to see you again," he said, in the

very words of her thought.

The girl was flattered and delighted. There was not the slightest hint

of self-consciousness in her manner, and the flush that came into her

cheeks was one of pure friendliness.

"It is very kind of you to take so much trouble," she said in a voice

as sweet as singing. "I was so disappointed when you had to go away so

early from the Amberleys' last night."

She did not say the conventional thing about how much his poems had

meant to her. Girls that he met--and they were not many--nearly always

did, and he always disliked it. Such things meant nothing when they

came as part of ordinary greetings. They jarred upon the poet's

sensitive taste and he was pleased and interested to find that this

girl said nothing of the sort.

"Well, here's the book," he said, putting it down upon Rita's table.

"And I've written in it as you asked. Do you collect autographs then?"

She shook her head. "Oh, dear me no," she answered. "I think it's silly

to collect anything that isn't beautiful. But, in a book one values,

and with which one has been happy, the author's autograph seems to add

to the book's personality. But I hate crazes. There are lots of girls

that wait outside stage doors to make popular actors write in their

books. Did you know that, Mr. Lothian?"

"No, I didn't! Little donkeys! Hard lines on the actors. Even I get a

few albums now and then, and it's a fearful nuisance. I put off writing

in them and they lie about my study until they get quite a battered and

dissipated look."

"And then?"

"Oh, I write in them. It would be impolite not to, you know. I have an

invaluable formula. I write, 'Dear Madam, I am very sorry to say that I

cannot accede to your kind request for an autograph. The practice is

one with which I am not in sympathy. Yours very truly, Gilbert

Lothian!'"

"That's splendid, Mr. Lothian, better than sending a telegram, as some

one did the other day to an importunate girl. They were talking about

it last night at the Amberleys' after you left. I suppose that's really

what gave me courage to send 'Surgit Amari' by Mr. Dickson Ingworth.

Mr. and Mrs. Toftrees said that they always write passages from their

novels when they are asked."

"Perhaps that's a good plan," Lothian answered, listening to the "viols

in her voice" and not much interested in the minor advertising arts of

the Toftrees. What rare maiden was this with whom he was chatting? What

had made him come to see her after all?--a mere whim doubtless--but was

he not about to reap a very delightful harvest?

For he was conscious of immense pleasure as he stood there talking to

her, and there was excitement mingled with the pleasure. It was as

though he was advancing upon a landscape, and at every step something

fresh and interesting came into view.

"I _did_ so dislike Mr. Toftrees and his wife," Rita said with a

mischievous little gleam in her eyes.

"Did you?" he asked in surprise. "They seemed very pleasant people I

thought."

"I expect that was because you thought nothing whatever about them, Mr.

Lothian," she replied.

He realised the absolute truth of the remark in a flash. The novelists

had in no way interested him. He had not thought about these people at

all--this maiden was a psychologist then! There was something subtly

flattering in what she had said. His point of view had interested the

girl, she had discovered it, small and unimportant though it was.

"But why did you dislike poor Mr. Toftrees?" he said, with an eminently

friendly smile--already an unconscious note of intimacy had been

sounded, he was interested to hear why she disliked the man, not the

woman.

"He is pompous and insincere," she replied. "He tries to draw attention

to his great success, or rather his notoriety, by pretending to despise

it. Surely, it would be far more manly to accept the fact frankly, and

not to hint that he could be a great artist if he could bring himself

to do without a lot of money!"

Lothian wondered what had provoked this little outburst. It was

quiveringly sincere, that he saw. His eyes questioned hers.

"It's such dreadful appalling treacle they write! I saw a little

flapper in the Tube two days ago, with the Toftrees' latest

book--'Milly Mine.' Her expression was ecstatic!"

"For my part I think that's something to have done, do you know, to

have taken that flapper out of the daily tube of her life into Romance.

Heaven with electric lights and plush fittings is better than none at

all. I couldn't grudge the flapper her ecstasy, nor Mr. Toftrees his

big cheques. I should very much like to see the people in Tubes reading

my books--it would be good for them--and to pouch enormous cheques

myself--would be good for me! But there must be Toftrees sort of

persons now that every one knows how to read!"

"Well, I'll let his work alone," she answered, "but I certainly do

dislike him. He was trying to run your work down last night--though we

wouldn't let him."

So the secret was out now! Lothian smiled and the quick, enthusiastic

girl understood. A little ripple of laughter came from her.

"Yes, that's it," she cried. "He did all he could."

"Did he? Confound him! I wonder why?"

Lothian asked the question with entire simplicity. Subtle-minded and

complex as he was, he was incapable of mean thoughts and muddy envy

when he was not under the influence of drink.

Poisoned, alas, he was entirely different. All the evil in him rose to

the surface. As yet it by no means obscured or overpowered the good,

but it became manifest and active.

In the case of this fine intellect and splendid artist, no less than in

the worker in the slum or the labourer in the field, drink seemed an

actual key to unlock the dark and secret doors of wickedness which are

in every heart. Some coiled and sleeping serpent within him, no less

than in them, raised its head into baleful life and sudden enmity of

good.

A few nights ago, half intoxicated in a club--intoxicated in mind that

is, for he was holding forth with a caustic bitterness and sharp

brilliancy that had drawn a crowd around him--he had abused the work of

Herbert Toftrees and his wife with contemptuous and venomous words.

He was quite unconscious that he had ever done so. He knew nothing

about the couple and had never read a line of their works. The subject

had just cropped up somehow, like a bird from a stubble, and he had let

fly. It was pure coincidence that he had met the novelists at the

Amberleys' and Lothian had entirely forgotten that he had ever

mentioned their work at the club.

But the husband and wife had heard of it the next day, as people

concerned always do hear these things, and neither of them were likely

to forget that their books had been called "as flat as champagne in

decanters," their heroines "stuffy" and that compared to even "--" and

"--" they had been stigmatised as being as pawn-brokers are to bankers.

Lothian had made two bitter enemies and he had not the slightest

suspicion of it.

"I wonder why?" he said again. "I don't know the man. I've never done

him any harm that I know of. But of course he has a right to his own

opinions, and no doubt he really thinks----"

"He knows nothing whatever about it," Rita answered. "If a man like

that reads poetry at all he has to do it in a prose translation! But I

can tell you why--Addison puts it far better than I can. I found the

passage the other day. I'll show you."

She was all innocent eagerness and fire, astonishingly sweet and

enthusiastic as she hurried to a bookshelf and came back with a volume.

Following her slim finger, he read:--

"There are many passions and tempers of mankind, which naturally

dispose us to depress and vilify the merit of one rising in the

esteem of mankind.

All those who made their entrance into the world with the same

advantages, and were once looked on as his equals, are apt to think

the fame of his merits a reflection on their own deserts. Those,

who were once his equals, envy and defame him, because they now see

him their superior; and those who were once his superiors, because

they look upon him as their equal."

The girl was gazing at him in breathless attention, wondering whether

she had done the right thing, hoping, indeed, that Lothian would be

pleased.

He was both pleased and touched by this lovely eager little champion,

so unexpectedly raised up to defend him.

"Thank you very much," he said. "How kind of you! My bruised vanity is

now at rest. I am healed of my grievous wound! But this seems quite a

good library. Are you here all alone, does nobody ever come here? I

always heard that the Podley Library was where the bad books went when

they died. Tell me all about it."

His hand had mechanically slipped into his waistcoat and half withdrawn

his cigarette case. He could never be long without smoking and he

wanted a cigarette now more than ever. During a whole hour he had not

had a drink. A slight suspicion of headache floated at the back of his

head, he was conscious of something heavy at his right side.

"Do smoke," she said. "No one minds--there never is any one to mind,

and I smoke here myself. Mr. Hands, the head librarian, didn't like it

at first but he does what I tell him now. I'm the assistant librarian."

She announced her status with genuine pride and pleasure, being

obviously certain that she occupied a far from unimportant position in

public affairs.

Lothian was touched at her simplicity. What a child she was really,

with all her cleverness and quickness.

He smoked and made her smoke also--"Delicious!" she exclaimed with

pretty greediness. "How perfectly sweet to be a man and able to afford

Ben Ezra's Number 5."

"How perfectly sweet!"--it was a favourite expression of Rita's. He

soon got to know it very well.

He soon got to know all about the library and about her also, as she

showed him round.

She was twenty-one, only twenty-one. Her father, a captain in the Navy,

had left her just sufficient money for her education, which had been at

a first-class school. Then she had had to be dependent entirely upon

her own exertions. She seemed to have no relations and not many friends

of importance, and she lived in a tiny three-roomed flat with another

girl who was a typist in the city.

She chattered away to him just as if he were a girl friend as they

moved among the books, and it was nearly an hour before they left the

Library together.

"And now what are you going to do?"

"I must go home, Mr. Lothian," she said with a little sigh. "It has

been so kind of you to come and see me. I was going to sit in

Kensington Palace Gardens for a little while, but I think I shall go

back to the flat now. How hot it is! Oh, for the sea, now, just think

of it!"

There was a flat sound in her voice. It lost its animation and timbre.

He knew she was sorry to say good-bye to him, rather forlorn now that

the stimulus and excitement of their talk was over.

She was lonely, of course. Her pleasures could be but few and far

between, and at twenty-one, when the currents of the blood run fast and

free, even books cannot provide everything. Thirty-five shillings a

week! He had been poor himself in his early journalistic days. It was

harder for a girl. He thought of her sitting in Kensington Gardens--the

pathetic and solitary pleasure the child had mapped out for herself! He

could see the little three-roomed flat in imagination, with its girlish

decorations and lack of any real comfort, and some appalling meal

presently to be eaten, bread and jam, a lettuce!

The idea came into his mind in a flash, but he hesitated before

speaking. Wouldn't she be angry if he asked her? He'd only met her

twice, she was a lady. Then he decided to risk it.

"I wonder," he said slowly.

"What are you wondering, Mr. Lothian?"

--"If you realise how easy it is to be by the sea. I know it's cheek to

ask you--or at least I suppose it is, but let's go!"

"How do you mean, Mr. Lothian?"

"Let's motor down to Brighton now, at once. Let's dine at the

Metropole, and go and sit on the pier afterwards, and then rush home

under the stars whenever we feel inclined. Will you!"

"How splendid!" she cried, "now! at once? get out of everything?"

"Yes, now. I am to be the fairy godmother. You have only to say the

magic word, and I will wave my wand. The blue heat mists of evening

will be over the ripe Sussex cornfields, and we shall see the poppies

drinking in the blood of the sinking sun with their burnt red mouths.

And then, when we have dined, the moon will wash the sea with silver,

the stars will come out like golden rain and the Queen Moon will be

upon her throne! We shall see the long, lit front of Brighton like a

horned crescent of topaz against the black velvet of the downs. And

while we watch it under the moon, the breeze shall bring us faint

echoes of the fairy flutes from Prospero's enchanted Island--'But doth

suffer a sea-change into something rich and strange--' And then the sea

will take up the burthen 'Ding-dong, ding-dong bell.' Now say the magic

word!"

"There is magic in the Magician's voice already, and I needs must

answer. Yes! and oh, yes, YES a thousand times!"

"The commandments of convention mean nothing to you?"

"They are the Upper Ten Commandments, not mine."

"Then I will go and command my dragon. I know where you live. Be ready

in an hour!"

"How perfectly, _perfectly_ sweet! And may we, oh, may we have a

lobster mayonnaise for dinner?"

CHAPTER V

"FOR THE FIRST TIME, HE WAS GOING TO HAVE A GIRL FRIEND"

"Across the hills, and far away

Beyond their utmost purple rim,

And deep into the dying day

The happy princess followed him."

--_Tennyson._

Lothian went back to his club in a taxi-cab, telling the man to drive

at top speed. On the way he ordered a motor-car to go to Brighton and

to call for him within twenty minutes.

He was in a state of great exhilaration. He had not had such an

adventure as this for years--if ever before. A girl so lovely, so

clever, so young--and particularly of his own social rank--he had never

met, save for a short space of time and under the usual social

conditions which forbade any real intimacy.

Even in the days before his marriage, flirtations, or indeed any

companionship, with girls who were not of his class had not attracted

him. He had never, unlike other men no less brilliant and gifted than

himself, much cared for even the innocent side of Bohemian camaraderie

with girls.

And to have a girl friend--and such a girl as Rita Wallace--was a

delightful prospect. He saw himself responding to all sorts of simple

feminine confidences, exploring reverently the unknown country of the

Maiden mind, helping, protecting; unfolding new beauties for the young

girl's delight. Yes! he would have a girl friend!

The thing should be ideal, pure and without a thought of harm. She

understood him, she trusted herself to him at once and she should be

repaid richly from the stores of his mind. None knew better than he

what jewels he had to give to one who could recognise jewels when she

saw them.

He changed his hat for a cap and had a coat brought down from his

bedroom. Should he write a note to Mary at home? He had not sent her

more than two telegrams of the "All going splendidly, too busy to

write," kind, during the five days he had been in London. He decided

that he would write a long letter to-morrow morning. Not to-night.

To-night was to be one of pure, fresh pleasure. Every prospect pleased.

Nothing whatever would jar. He was not in the mood to write home

now--to compose details of his time in Town, to edit and alter the true

record for the inspection of loving eyes.

"My darling!" he said to himself as he drank the second whiskey and

soda which had been brought to him since he had come in, but there was

an uncomfortable feeling in the back of his mind that the words did not

ring true.

More than ever exhilarated, as excited as a boy, he jumped into the

motor-car when it arrived, and glided swiftly westwards, congratulating

himself a dozen times on the idle impulse which had sent him to

Kensington. He began to wonder how it had come.

The impulse to bring the book himself had been with him all day. It had

taken him till lunch time at least to put himself in any way right--to

_appear_ right even. With a sick and bitter mind he had gone through

the complex physical ritual necessary after the night before--the

champagne at eight, the Turkish bath, the hair-dresser's in Regent

Street where fast men slunk with hot and shaking hands to have the

marks of their vices ironed out of their faces with vibrating hammers

worked by electricity.

All through the morning, the bitter, naked, grinning truth about

himself had been horribly present--no new visitor, but the same leering

ghost he knew so well.

Escape was impossible until the bestial sequence of his morning cure

had run its course. Coming down the bedroom stairs into the club there

was the disgusting and anxious consciousness that his movements were

automatic and jerky, the real fear of meeting any one--the longing to

bolt upstairs again and hide. Then a tremendous effort of will had

forced him to go on. Facial control was--as ever--the most difficult

thing. When he passed the waiters in the smoking room he must screw his

face into the appearance of absorbed thought, freeze the twitching

mouth and the flickering eyes into immobility. He had hummed a little

tune as he had sat down at a table and ordered a brandy and soda,

starting as if from a reverie when it was brought him, and making a

remark about the weather in a voice of effusive geniality which

embarrassed the well-trained servant.

By lunch time the convulsive glances in the mirror, the nervous

straying of the hand to the hair, the see-saw of the voice had all

gone. Black depression, fear, self-pity, had vanished. The events of

the night before became like a landscape seen through the wrong end of

a telescope, far away, and as if they concerned some one quite other

than himself.

He had not exactly forgotten the shame of his behaviour at the

Amberleys' house. But, as he always did after events of this sort, and

they were becoming far more general than he realised, he had pushed the

thought away in some attic of the brain and closed the door. He would

have these memories out some day--soon. It would not be pleasant, but

it must of course be done. Then he would put everything right with

himself, destroy all these corpses, and emerge into the free sunlight

for ever more.

But not to-day. He must put himself _quite_ right to-day. When he _was_

right then he wouldn't have another drink all day. Yes! then by

to-morrow, after a quiet, pensive night, he would throw off all his

habits as if he were throwing an old pair of gloves over a wall. He

knew well what he could do! He knew himself better than any one else

knew him.

But not to-day. "Inshallah Bukra!"--"Please God, to-morrow!"

It had all seemed perfectly natural, though it happened over and over

again, and to-morrow never came.

He did not know that this was but one more definite symptom of his

poisoned state, as definite as the shaking hand, the maudlin midnight

invocations of God, the frequent physical nausea of the morning, even.

And if the man is to be understood and his history to become real in

all its phases, then these things must be set down truly and without a

veil.

It was a joy to watch her pleasure as they swung out of London in the

twenty-horse power Ford he had hired.

She did not say much but leant back on the luxurious cushions by his

side. There was a dream of happiness upon her face, and Lothian also

felt that he was living in a dream, that it was all part of the painted

scenes of sleep.

The early evening was still and quiet. The Western sky, a faint

copper-green with friths and locks of purple, was as yet unfired. In

the long lights the landscape still retained its colour unaltered by

the dying splendours of sunset. The engines of the car were running

sweetly in a monotonous and drowsy hum, the driver sat motionless in

front as they droned through the quiet villages and up and down the

long white ribands of the road. It was an hour of unutterable content.

Once they stopped in a village and drew up before the inn. It was a

lovely place. A bell was tolling for evensong in the grey church and

they saw the vicar pass under the lych-gate with slow footsteps. One of

the long, painted windows was caught by the sun and gleamed like a red

diamond. The road fell to a pond where green water-flags were growing

and waxen-white water-lilies floated. Beyond it was a willow wood.

The driver sat on a bench before the inn and drank his beer, but

Gilbert and Rita passed through it into a garden that there was. The

flowers were just beginning to cense the still air and the faint sound

of a water-wheel down the river came to them--_tic, tac, lorelei!_

She would have milk, "Milk that one cannot get in London," and even he

asked for no poison in this tranquil garden.

Clematis hung the gables like tapestry of Tyrian purple. There were

beds of red crocketed hollyhock and a hedge of honeysuckle with a

hundred yellow trumpet mouths. At their feet were the flowers of

belamour.

"Men have died, trying to find this place which we have found," he

said.

A red-admiral floated by upon its fans of vermilion and black as

Gilbert quoted, and a faint echo from the water-mill answered him.

_Tic--tac--lorelei!_

"Magician! half an hour ago we were in London!"

"You are happy?"

"I can't find anything to say--yet. It is perfect."

She leant back with a deep sigh and closed her eyes, and he was well

content to say nothing, for in all the garden she seemed to him the

most perfect thing, rosa-amorosa, the queen of all the roses!

It was as a flower he looked at her, no more. It was all a dream, of

course. It had come in dream-fashion, it would go in the fashion of a

dream. At that moment she was not a warm human girl with a lovely face.

She was not the clever, lonely, subtle-simple maiden in the house of

books. She was a flower he had met.

His mind began to weave words, the shuttle to glide in the loom of the

poet, but words came to him that were not his own.

"Come hither, Child! and rest;

This is the end of day,

Behold the weary West!

"Now are the flowers confest

Of slumber; sleep as they!

Come hither, Child! and rest."

And then he sighed, for he thought of the other poet who had written

those lines and of what had brought him to his dreadful death.

Why did thoughts like these come into the flower garden?

How true--even here--were the words he had put upon the title-page of

the book which had made him famous--

"_Say, brother, have you not full oft Found, even as the Roman did,

That in Life's most delicious cup Surgit Amari Aliquid!_"

The girl heard him sigh and turned quickly. She saw that her friend's

face was overcast.

It was so much to her, this moment, she was so happy since she had

stepped from the hot streets of the city into fairyland with the

Magician, that there must be no single shadow.

"Come!" she said gaily, "this is perfect but there are other perfect

things waiting. Wave your wand again, Prospero, and change the magic

scene."

Lothian jumped up from his seat.

"Yes! on into the sunset. You are right. We must go before we are

satisfied. That's the whole art of living--Miranda!"

Her eyes twinkled with mischief.

"How old you have grown all of a sudden," she said, but as they passed

through the inn once more he thought with wonder that if six years were

added to his age he might have been her father in very fact. Many a man

of forty-one or two had girls as old as she.

He sent her to the motor, on pretence of stopping to pay for the milk,

but in the little bar-parlour he hurriedly ordered whiskey--"a large

one, yes, only half the soda."

The landlord poured it out with great speed, understanding immediately.

He must have been used to this furtive taking in of the fuel, here was

another accustomed acolyte of alcohol.

"Next stop Brighton, sir," he said with a genial wink.

Lothian's melancholy passed away like a stone falling through water as

the car started once more. He said something wildly foolish and

discovered, with a throb of amazement and recognition, that she could

play! He had never met a girl before who could play, as he liked to

play.

There was a strain of impish, freakish humour in Lothian which few

people understood, which few _sensible_ people ever can understand. It

is hardly to be defined, it seems incredibly childish and mad to the

majority of folk, but it sweetens life to those who have it. And such

people are very rare, so that when one meets another there is a

surprised and delighted welcome, a freemason's greeting, a shout of joy

in Laughter Land!

"Good heavens!" he said, "and you can play then!"

There was no need to mention the name of the game--it has none

indeed--but Rita understood. Her sweet face wrinkled into impish

mischief and she nodded.

"Didn't you know?"

"How could I possibly?"

"No, you couldn't of course, but I never thought it of _you_."

"Nor I of you," he answered. "I'll test you. 'The cow is in the

garden.'"

"'The cat is in the lake,'" she answered instantly.

"'The pig is in the hammock?'"

"'What difference _does_ it make?'" she shouted triumphantly.

For the rest of the drive to Brighton their laughter never stopped.

Nothing draws a man and a woman together as laughter does--when it is

intimate to themselves, a mutual language not to be understood of

others. They became extraordinary friends, as if they had known each

other from childhood, and the sunset fires in all their glory passed

unheeded.

Although he could hear nothing of what they said, there was a

sympathetic grin upon the chauffeur's face at the ringing mirth behind

him.

"It's your turn to suppose now, Mr. Lothian."

"Well--wait a minute--oh, let's suppose that Mr. Podley once wrote a

moral poem--you to play!"

Rita thought for a minute or two, her lips rippling with merriment, her

young eyes shining.

A little chuckle escaped her, her shoulders began to shake and then she

shrieked with joy.

"I've got it, splendid! Listen! It's to inculcate kindness to animals.

"I am only a whelk, Sir,

Though if you but knew,

Although I'm a whelk, Sir,

The Lord made me too!"

"Magnificent!--your turn."

"Well, what will the title of the Toftrees' next novel be?"

"'Cats' meat!'--I say, do you know that I have invented the one _quite_

perfect opening for a short story. You'll realise when you hear it that

it stands alone. It's perfect, like Giotto's Campanile or 'The Hound of

Heaven.'"

"Tell me quickly!"

"Mr. Florimond awoke from a deep sleep. There was nobody there but the

Dog Trust."

"You are wonderful. I see it, of course. It's style itself! And how

would you end the story? Have you studied the end yet?"

"Yes. I worked at it all the time I was in Italy last year. You shall

hear that too. Mr. Florimond sank into a deep sleep. There was nobody

there but the Dog Trust."

. . . He told her of his younger days in London when he shared a flat

with a brother journalist named Passhe.

"We lived the most delightful freakish lives you can imagine," he said.

"When we came into breakfast from our respective bedrooms we had a

ritual which never varied. We neither looked at each other nor spoke,

but sat down opposite at the table. We each had our newspaper put in

our place by the man who looked after us. We opened the papers and

pretended to read for a moment. Then Basil looked over the top of his

at me, very gravely. 'We live in stirring times, Mr. Lothian!' he would

say, and I used to answer, 'Indeed, Mr. Passhe, we do!' Then we became

as usual."

"How perfectly sweet! I must do that with Ethel--that's the girl I live

with, you know--only we don't have the papers. It runs up so!" she

concluded, with a wise little air that sent a momentary throb of pain

through a man who had never understood (even in his poorest days) what

money meant; and probably never would understand.

Poor, dear little girl! Why couldn't he give her--

"We're here, Mr. Lothian! Look at the lights! Brighton at last!"

Rita had been whisked away by a chambermaid and he was waiting for her

in the great hall of the Metropole. He had washed, reserved a table,

and swallowed a gin and bitters. He felt rather tired physically, and a

little depressed also. His limbs had suddenly felt cramped as he left

the motor car, the wild exhilaration of their fun had made him tired

and nervous now. His bad state of health asserted itself unpleasantly,

his forehead was clammy and the palms of his hands wet.

No champagne for him! Rita should have champagne if she liked, but

whiskey, whiskey! that was the only thing. "I can soon pull myself

together," he thought. "She won't know. I'll tell the fellow to bring

it in a decanter."

Presently she came to him among the people who moved or sat about under

the lights of the big, luxurious vestibule. She was a little shy and

nervous, slightly flushed and anxious, for she had never been in such a

splendid public place before.

He gathered that from her whispered remarks, as with a curious and

pleasant air of proprietorship he took her to the dining rooms.

There was a bunch of amber-coloured roses upon her plate as she sat

down at their table, which he had sent there a few minutes before. She

pressed them to her face with a shy look of pleasure as he conferred

with the head waiter, who himself came hurrying up to them.

Lothian was not known at the hotel, but it was always the same wherever

he went. His wife often chaffed him about it. She said that he had a

"tipping face." Whether that was so or not, the result was the same, he

received immediate and marked attention. Rita noticed it with pride.

He had been, from the first moment he entered the Library in his simple

flannel suit, just a charming and deferential companion. There had been

no preliminaries. The thing had just happened, that was all. In all her

life she had never met any one so delightful, and in her excitement and

pleasure she had quite forgotten that he was Gilbert Lothian.

But it came back to her very vividly now.

How calmly he ordered the dinner and conferred with the wine-man, who

had a great silver chain hanging on his shirt front! What an accustomed

man-of-the-world air there was about him, how they all ran to serve

him. She blushed mentally as she thought of her simple confidences and

girlish chatter--and yet he hadn't seemed to mind.

She looked round her. "It is difficult to realise," she said, as much

to herself as to her host, "that there are people who dine in places

like this every day."

Lothian looked round him. "Yes," he said a trifle bitterly, as his eye

fell upon a party of Jews who had motored down from London,--"people

who rule over three-quarters of the world--and an entire eclipse of the

intellect! You can see it here, unimportant as it is, compared to the

great places in London and Paris--'the feasting and the folly and the

fun, the lying and the lusting and the drink'!"

Rita looked at him wonderingly, following the direction of his eyes.

"Those people seem happy," she said, not understanding his sudden mood,

"they are all laughing and they all seem amused."

"Yes, but people don't always laugh because they are amused.

Slow-witted, obese brained people--like those Israelites there--laugh

very often on the chance that there is something funny which eludes

them. They don't want to betray themselves. When I see people like that

I feel as if my mind ought to be sprinkled with some disinfecting

fluid."

As a matter of fact, the party at the other table with their handsome

Oriental faces and alert, vivacious manner did not seem in the least

slow-witted, nor were they. One of them was a peer and great newspaper

proprietor, another a musician of world celebrity. Lothian's cynicism

jarred on the pleasure of the moment. For the first time the girl did

not feel quite _en rapport_, and was a little uneasy. He struck too

harsh a note.

But at that moment waiters bustled up with soup, champagne in an ice

pail, and a decanter of some bright amber liquid for Lothian. He poured

and drank quickly, with an involuntary sigh of satisfaction.

"How I wanted that!" he said with a frank smile. "I was talking

nonsense, Miranda, but I was tired. And I'm afraid that when I get

tired I'm cross. I've been working very hard lately and am a little run

down," he added, anxious that she should not think that their talk had

tired him, and feeling the necessity of some explanation.

It satisfied her immediately. His change of voice and face reassured

her, the little shadow passed.

"Oh, I _am_ enjoying myself!" she said with a sigh of pleasure, "but

what's this? How strange! The soup is _cold_!"

"Yes, didn't you know? It's iced consommé, awfully good in hot

weather."

She shook her head. "No, I didn't," she said. "I've never been anywhere

or seen anything, you know. When Ethel and I feel frightfully rich, we

have dinner at Lyons, but I've never been to a swagger restaurant

before."

"And you like it?"

"It's heavenly! How good this soup is. But what a waste it seems to put

all that ice round the champagne. Ice is so dreadfully expensive. You

get hardly any for fourpence at our fishmongers."

But it was the mayonnaise with its elaborate decoration that intrigued

her most.

Words failed at the luscious sight and it was a sheer joy to watch her.

"Oh, what a pig I am!" she said, after her second helping, with her

flashing, radiant smile, "but it was too perfectly sweet for anything."

The champagne and excitement had tinted her cheeks exquisitely, it was

as though a few drops of red wine had been poured into a glass of clear

crystal water. With little appetite himself, Lothian watched her eat

with intense pleasure in her youth and health. His depression had gone,

he seemed to draw vitality from her, to be informed with something of

her own pulsing youth. He became quite at his best, and how good that

was, not very many people knew.

It was his hour, his moment, every sense was flattered and satisfied.

He was dining with the prettiest girl in the room, people turned to

look at her. She hung on his words and was instantly appreciative. A

full flask of poison was by his side, he could help himself without let

or hindrance. Her innocence of what he was doing--of what it was

necessary for him to do to remain at concert-pitch--was supreme. No one

else knew or would have cared twopence if they did.

He was witty, in a high courtly way. The hour of freakish fun was over,

and his shrewd insight into life, his poetic and illuminating method of

statement, the grace and kindliness of it all held the girl spellbound.

And well it might. His nerves, cleared and tempered, telegraphed each

message to his brilliant, lambent brain with absolute precision.

There was an entire co-ordination of all the reflexes.

And Rita knew well that she was hearing what many people would have

given much to hear, knew that Lothian was exerting himself to a

manifestation of the highest power of his brain--for her.

For her! It was an incredible triumph, wonderfully sweet. The dominant

sex-instinct awoke. Unconsciously she was now responding to him as

woman to man. Her eyes, her lips showed it, everything was quite

different from what it had been before.

In all that happened afterwards, neither of them ever forgot that

night. For the girl it was Illumination.

. . . She had mentioned a writer of beautiful prose whom she had

recently discovered in the library and who had come as a revelation to

her.

"Nothing else I have ever read produces the same impression," she said.

"There are very few writers in prose that can."

"It is magic."

"But to be understood. You see, some of his chapters--the passages on

Leonardo da Vinci for instance, are intended to be musical compositions

as it were, in which words have to take the place and perform the

functions of notes. It has been pointed out that they are impassioned,

not so much in the sense of expressing any very definite sentiment, but

because, from the combination and structure of the sentences, they

harmonise with certain phases of emotion."

She understood. The whole mechanism and intention of the writer were

revealed to her in those lucent words.

And then a statement of his philosophy.

"In telling me of your reading just now, you spoke of that progress of

the soul that each new horizon in literature seems to stimulate and

ensure for you. And you quoted some hackneyed and beautiful lines of

Longfellow. Cling always to that idea of progress, but remember that we

don't really rise to higher things upon the stepping stones of our dead

selves so much as on the stepping stones of our dead opinions. That is

Progress. _Progress means the capability of seeing new forms of

beauty._"

"But there are places where one wants to linger."

"I know, but it's dangerous. You were splendidly right when you bade me

move from that garden just now. The road was waiting. It is so with

states of the soul. The limpet is the lowest of organisms. Movement is

everything. One life may seem to be like sunlight moving over sombre

ground and another like the shadow of a cloud traversing a sunlit

space. But both have meaning and value. Never strike an average and

imagine you have found content. The average life is nothing but a

pudding in a fog!"

Lothian had been talking very earnestly, his eyes full of light, fixed

on her eyes. And now, in a moment, he saw what had been there for many

minutes, he saw what he had roused.

He was startled.

During this delightful evening that side of their intercourse had not

been very present in his mind. She was a delightful flower, a flower

with a mind. It is summed up very simply. _He had never once wanted

to touch her._

His face changed and grew troubled. A new presence was there, a problem

rose where there had been none before. The realisation of her physical

loveliness and desirability came to him in a flood of new sensation.

The strong male impulse was alive and burning for the first time that

night.

A waiter had brought a silver dish of big peaches, and as she ate the

fruit there was that in her eyes which he recognised, though he knew

her mind was unconscious of it.

In the sudden stir and tumult of his thoughts, one became dominant.

It was an evil thought, perhaps the most subtle and the most evil that

can come to a man. The pride of intellect in its most gross and

devilish manifestation awoke.

He was not a vain man. He did not usually think much about his personal

appearance and charm. But he knew how changed in outward aspect he was

becoming. His glass told him that every morning at shaving time. His

vice was marking him. He was not what he was, not what he should and

might be, in a physical regard. And girls, he knew, were generally

attracted by physical good-looks in a man. Young Dickson Ingworth, for

instance, seemed able to pick and choose. Lothian had often laughed at

the boyish and conceited narratives of his prowess. And now, to the

older man came the realisation that his age, his growing corpulence,

need mean nothing at all--if he willed it so. A girl like this, a pearl

among maidens, could be dominated by his intellect. He knew that he was

not mistaken. Over a fool, however lovely and attractive by reason of

her sex, he would have no power. But here . . .

An allurement more dazzling than he had thought life held was suddenly

shown him.

There was an honest horror, a shudder and recoil of all the good in him

from this monstrous revelation, so sudden, so unexpected.

He shuddered and then found an instant compromise.

It could not concern _himself_, it never should. But it might be

regarded--just for a few brief moments!--from a detached point of view,

as if it had to do with some one else, some creation of a fiction or a

poem.

And even that was unutterably sweet.

It should be so, only for this night. There would be no harm done. And

it was for the sake of his Art, the psychological experience to be

gathered. . . .

There is no time in thought. The second hand of his watch had hardly

moved when he leant towards her a little and spoke.

"Cupid!" he said. "I think I know why they used to call you Cupid at

your school!"

Just as she had been a dear, clever and deferential school-girl in the

Library, a girl-poet in the garden, a freakish companion-wit after

that, so now she became a woman.

He had fallen. She knew and tasted consciousness of power.

Another side of the girl's complex personality appeared. She led him on

and tried to draw back. She became provocative at moments when he did

not respond at once. She flirted with a finished art.

As he lit a cigarette for her, she tested the "power of the hour" to

its limit, showing without possibility of mistake how aware she was.

"What would Mrs. Lothian think of your bringing me here to dinner?" she

said very suddenly.

For a moment he did not know what to answer, the attack was so direct,

the little feline thrust revealing so surely where he stood.

"She would be delighted that I was having such a jolly evening," he

answered, but neither his smile nor his voice was quite true.

She smiled at him in girlish mockery, rejoicing!

"You little devil!" he thought with an embarrassed mental grin. "How

dare you." She should pay for that.

"Would you mind if my wife did care," he asked, looking her straight in

the eyes.

"I ought to, but--I shouldn't!" she answered recklessly, and all his

blood became fired.

Yet at that, he leant back in his chair and laughed a frank laugh of

amusement. The tension was over, the dangerous moment passed, and soon

afterwards they wandered out into the night, to go upon the pier "just

for half an hour" before starting for London.

And neither of them saw that upon one of the lounges in the great hall,

sipping coffee and talking to the newspaper-peer Herbert Toftrees was

sitting.

He saw them at once and started, while an ugly look came into his eyes.

"Look," he said. "There's Gilbert Lothian, the Christian Poet!"

"So that's the man!" said Lord Morston, "deuced pretty wife he's got.

And very fine work he does too, by the way."

"Oh, that's not his wife," Toftrees answered with contempt. "I know who

that is quite well. Lothian keeps his wife somewhere down in the

country and no one ever sees her." And he proceeded to pour the history

of the Amberleys' dinner-party into a quietly amused and cynical ear.

The swift rush back to London under the stars was quiet and dreamy.

Repose fell over Gilbert and Rita as they sat side by side, repose

"from the cool cisterns of the midnight air."

They felt much drawn to each other. Laughter and all feverish thoughts

were swept away by the breezes of their passage through the night. They

were old friends now! An affection had sprung up between them which was

to be a real and enduring thing. They were to be dear friends always,

and that would be "perfectly sweet."

Rita had been so lonely. She had wanted a friend so.

He was going home on the morrow. He had been too long away.

But he would be up in town again quite soon, and meanwhile they would

correspond.

"Dear little Rita," he said, as he held her hand outside the door of

the block of flats in Kensington. "Dear child, I'm so glad."

It was a clear night and the clocks were striking twelve.

"And I'm glad, too," she answered,--"Gilbert!"

He was soon at his club, had paid the chauffeur and dismissed him.

There was no one he wanted to talk to in either of the smoking rooms,

and so, after a final peg he went upstairs to bed. He was quite

peaceful and calm in mind, very placidly happy and pleased.

To-morrow he would go home to Mary.

He said his prayers, begging God to make this strange and sweet

friendship that had come into his life of value to him and to his

little friend, might it always be fine and pure!

So he got into bed and a pleasant drowsiness stole over him; he had a

sense of great virtue and peace. All was well with his soul.

"Dear little Rita," were the words he murmured as he fell asleep and

lay tranquil in yet another phase of his poisoned life.

No dreams disturbed his sleep. No premonition came to tell him whither

he had set his steps or whither they would lead him.

A mile or two away there was a nameless grave of shame, within a

citadel where "pale Anguish keeps the gate and the Warder is Despair."

But no spectre rose from that grave to warn him.

END OF THE FIRST BOOK

BOOK TWO

LOTHIAN IN NORFOLK

"Not with fine gold for a payment,

But with coin of sighs,

But with rending of raiment

And with weeping of eyes,

But with shame of stricken faces

And with strewing of dust,

For the sin of stately places

And lordship of lust."

CHAPTER I

VIGNETTE OF EARLY MORNING. "GILBERT IS COMING HOME!"

"Elle se repand dans ma vie

Comme un air imprégné de sel,

Et dans mon âme inassouvie

Verse le goût de l'éternel."

--_Baudelaire._

The white magic of morning was at work over the village of Mortland

Royal. From a distant steading came the thin brazen cry of a cock, thin

as a bugle, and round the Lothians' sleeping house the bubble of

bird-song began.

In the orchard before the house, which ran down to the trout stream,

Trust, the brown spaniel dog, came out of a barrel in his little fenced

enclosure, sniffed the morning air, yawned, and went back again into

his barrel. White mist was rising from the water-meadows, billowed into

delicate eddies and spirals by the first breeze of day, and already

touched by the rosy fingers of dawn.

In the wood beyond the meadows an old cock-pheasant made a sound like

high hysteric laughter.

The house, with its gravel-sweep giving directly on to the unfenced

orchard, was long and low. The stones were mellowed by time, and

orange, olive, and ash-coloured lichens clung to them. The roof was of

tiles, warm red and green with age, the windows mullioned, the

chimney-stack, which cut deep into the roof, high and with the grace of

Tudor times.

The place was called the "Old House" in the village and was a veritable

sixteenth century cottage, rather spoilt by repairs and minor

extensions, but still, in the silent summer morning, with something of

the grace and fragrance of an Elizabethan song. It was quite small,

really, a large cottage and nothing more, but it had a personality of

its own and it was always very tranquil.

On such a summer dawn as this with the rabbits frisking in the

pearl-hung grass, on autumn days of brown and purple, or keen spring

mornings when the wind fifed a tune among the bare branches of the

apple-trees; on dead winter days when sea-birds from the marshes

flitted against the grey sky like sudden drifts of snow, a deep peace

ever brooded over the house.

The air began to grow fresher and the mists to disperse as the breeze

came over the great marshes a mile beyond the village. Out on the

mud-flats with their sullen tidal creeks the sun was rising like a red

Host from the far sea which tolled like a Mass bell. The curlews with

their melancholy voices were beginning to fly inland from the marshes,

high up in the still sky. The plovers were calling, the red-shanks

piping in the marrum grass, and a sedge of herons shouted their hoarse

"frank, frank" as they clanged away over the saltings.

Only the birds were awake in this remote Norfolk village, the cows in

the meadows had but just turned in their sleep, and not even the bees

were yet a-wing. Peace, profound and brooding, lay over the Poet's

house.

Dawn blossomed into perfect morning, all gold and blue. It began, early

as it was, to grow hot. Trust came out of his barrel and began to pad

round his little yard with bright brown eyes.

There was a sound of some one stirring in the silent house, and

presently the back door, in the recess near the entrance gates, was

flung wide open and a housemaid with untidy hair and eyes still heavy

with sleep, stood yawning upon the step. There was a rattle of cinders

and the cracking of sticks as the fire was lit in the kitchen beyond.

Trust, in the orchard, heard the sound. He could smell the wood-smoke

from the chimney. Presently one of the Great Ones, the Beloved Ones,

would let him out for a scamper in the dew. Then there would be

biscuits for the dog Trust.

And now brisk footsteps were heard upon the road outside the entrance

gates. In a moment more these were pushed open with a rattle, and

Tumpany swung in humming a little tune.

Tumpany was a shortish thick-set man of fifty, with a red clean-shaven

face. He walked with his body bent forward, his arms hanging at his

sides, and always seemed about to break into a short run. It was five

years since he had retired even from the coast-guard, but Royal Navy

was written large all over him, and would be until he tossed off his

last pint of beer and sailed away to Fidler's Green--"Nine miles to

windward of Hell," as he loved to explain to the housemaid and the

cook.

Tumpany's wife kept a small shop in the village, and he himself did the

boots and knives, cleaned Gilbert's guns and went wild-fowling with him

in the winter, was the more immediate Providence of the Dog Trust, and

generally a most important and trusted person in the little household

of the Poet.

There was an almost exaggerated briskness in Tumpany's walk and manner

as he turned into the kitchen. Blanche, the housemaid, was now "doing"

the dining-room, in the interior of the house, but Phoebe, the cook--a

stalwart lass of three and twenty--had just got the fire to her liking

and was giving a finishing touch of polish to the range.

"Morning, my girl!" said Tumpany in a bluff, cheery voice.

Phoebe did not answer, but went on polishing the handle of the oven

door.

He repeated the salutation, a shade less confidently.

The girl gave a final leisurely twist of the leather, surveyed her work

critically for a moment, and then rose to her feet.

"There are them knives," she said shortly, pointing to a basket upon

the table, "and the boots is in the back kitchen."

"You needn't be so short with a man, Phoebe."

"You needn't have been so beastly drunk last night. Then them knives

wouldn't want doing this morning. If it hadn't been for me the dog

wouldn't have had no food. If the mistress knew she would have given

you what for, as I expect your missis have already if the truth were

known."

"Damn the mistress!" said Tumpany. He adored Mary Lothian, as Phoebe

very well knew, but his head burned and he was in the uncertain temper

of the "morning after." The need of self-assertion was paramount.

"Now, no beastly language in my kitchen," said the girl. "You go and do

your damning--and them knives--in the outhouse. I wonder you've the

face to come here at all, Master being away too. Get out, do!"

With a very red and sulky face, Tumpany gathered up the knives and

shambled away to his own particular sanctum.

The ex-sailor was confused in his mind. There was a buzzing in his head

like that of bees in a hive. He had a faint recollection of being

turned out of the Mortland Arms just before ten o'clock the night

before. His muddy memories showed him the stern judicial face of the

rather grim old lady who kept the Inn. He seemed to feel her firm hands

upon his shoulders yet.

But had he come back to the Old House? He was burning to ask the cook.

One thing was satisfactory. His mistress had not seen him or else

Phoebe's threat would have meant nothing. Yet what had happened in his

own house? He had woke up in the little parlour behind the shop. Some

one had covered him with an overcoat. He had not dared to go upstairs

to his wife. He hoped--here he began to rub a knife up and down the

board with great vigour--he did hope that he hadn't set about her.

There was a sick fear in the man's heart as he polished his knives.

In many ways a better fellow never breathed. He was extremely popular

in the village, Gilbert Lothian swore by him, Mary Lothian liked him

very well. He was a person of some consequence in the village community

where labourers worked early and late for a wage of thirteen shillings

a week. His pension was a good one, the little shop kept by his wife

was not unprosperous, Lothian was generous. He only got drunk now and

then--generally at the time when he drew his pension--but when he did

his wife suffered. He would strike her, not knowing what he did. The

dreadful marks would be on her face in the morning and he would suffer

an agony of dull and inarticulate remorse.

So, even in the pretty cottage of this prosperous and popular man--so

envied by his poorer neighbours--_surgit amari aliquid_!

. . . If only things had been all right last night!

Tumpany put down his knife with a bang. He slipped from his little

outhouse, and slunk across the orchard. Then he opened the iron gate of

the dog's kennel.

The dog Trust exploded over Tumpany like a shell of brown fur. He leapt

at him in an ecstasy of love and greeting and then, unable to express

his feelings in any other way, rolled over on his back with his long

pink tongue hanging out, and his eyes blinking in the sun.

"Goodorg," said Tumpany, a little comforted, and then both he and Trust

slunk back to the outhouse. There was a sympathetic furtiveness in the

animal also. It was as though the Dog Trust quite understood.

Tumpany resumed his work. Two rabbits which he had shot the day before

were hanging from the roof, and Trust looked up at them with eager

eyes. A rabbit represented the unattainable to Trust. He was a

hard-working and highly-trained sporting dog, a wild-fowling dog

especially, and he was never allowed to retrieve a rabbit for fear of

spoiling the tenderness of his mouth. When one of the delicious little

creatures bolted under his very nose, he must take no notice of it at

all. Trust held the (wholly erroneous) belief that if only he had the

chance he could run down a rabbit in the open field. He did not realise

that a dog who will swim over a creek with a snipe or tiny ring-plover

in his mouth and drop it without a bone being broken must never touch

fur. His own greatness forbade these baser joys, but like the Prince in

the story who wanted to make mud pies with the beggar children, he was

unconscious of his position, and for him too--on this sweet

morning--surgit amari aliquid.

But life has many compensations. The open door of the brick shed was

darkened suddenly. Phoebe, who in reality had a deep admiration for Mr.

Tumpany, had relented, and in her hand was a mug of beer.

"There!" she said with a grin, "and take care it don't hiss as it goes

down. Pipes red hot I expect! Lord what fools men are!"

Tumpany said nothing, but the deep "gluck gluck" of satisfaction as he

drank was far more eloquent than words.

Phoebe watched him with a pitying and almost maternal wonder in her

simple mind.

"A good thing you've come early, and Mistress ain't up yet," she said.

"I went into the cellar as quiet as a cat, and I held a dish-cloth over

the spigot when I knocked it in again so as to deaden the sound. You

can hear the knock all over the house else!"

"Thank ye, Phoebe, my dear. That there beer's in lovely condition; and

I don't mind saying I wanted it bad."

"Well, take care, as you don't want it another day so early. I see your

wife last night!"

She paused, maliciously enjoying the anxiety which immediately clouded

the man's round, red face.

"It's all right," she said at length. "She was out when you come home

from the public, and she found you snoring in the parlour. There was no

words passed. I must get to work."

She hurried back to her kitchen. Tumpany began to whistle.

The growing warmth of the morning had melted the congealed blood which

hung from the noses of the rabbits. One or two drops fell upon the

flags of the floor and the Dog Trust licked them up with immense

relish.

Thus day began for the humbler members of the Poet's household.

At a few minutes before eight o'clock, the mistress of the house came

down stairs, crossed the hall and went into the dining room.

Mary Lothian was a woman of thirty-eight. She was tall, of good figure,

and carried herself well. She was erect, without producing any

impression of stiffness. She walked firmly, but with grace.

Her abundant hair was pale gold in colour and worn in a simple Greek

knot. The nose, slightly aquiline, was in exact proportion to the face.

This was of an oval contour, though not markedly so, and was just a

little thin. The eyes under finely drawn brows, were a clear and

steadfast blue.

In almost every face the mouth is the most expressive feature. If the

eyes are the windows of the soul, the mouth is its revelation. It is

the true indication of what is within. The history of a man or woman's

life lies there. For those who can read, its subtle changing curves at

some time or another, betray all secrets of evil or of good. It is the

first feature that sensual vices coarsen or self-control refines. The

sin of pride moulds it into shapes that cannot be hidden. Envy, hatred

and malice must needs write their superscription there, and the blood

stirs about our hearts when we read of an angelic smile.

The Greeks knew this, and when their actors trod the marble stage of

Dionysius at Athens, or the theatre of Olympian Zeus by the hill

Kronian, their faces were masked. The lips of Hecuba were always frozen

into horror. The mouths of the heralds of the Lysistrata were set in

one curve of comedy throughout the play. Voices of gladness or sorrow

came from lips of wax or clay, which never changed as the living lips

beneath them needs must do. A certain sharpness and reality, as of life

suddenly arrested at one moment of passion, was aimed at. Men's real

mouths were too mobile and might betray things alien to the words they

chanted.

The mouth of Mary Lothian was beautiful. It was rather large,

well-shaped without possessing any purely æsthetic appeal, and only a

very great painter could have realised it upon canvas. In a photograph

it was nothing, unless a pure accident of the camera had once in a way

caught its expression. The mouth of this woman was absolutely frank and

kind. Its womanly dignity was overlaid with serene tenderness, a firm

sweetness which never left it. In repose or in laughter--it was a mouth

that could really laugh--this kindness and simplicity was always there.

Always it seemed to say "here is a good woman and one without guile."

The whole face was capable without being clever. No freakish wit lurked

in the calm, open eyes, there was nothing of the fantastic, little of

the original in the quiet comely face. All kind and simple people loved

Mary Lothian and her--

"Sweet lips, whereon perpetually did reign

The Summer calm of golden charity."

Men with feverish minds and hectic natures could see but little in

her--a quiet woman moving about a tranquil house. There was nothing

showy in her grave distinction. She never thought about attracting

people, only of being kind to them. Not as a companion for their

lighter hours nor as a sharer in their merriment, did people come to

her. It was when trouble of mind, body or estate assailed them that

they came and found a "most silver flow of subtle-paced counsel in

distress."

Since the passing of Victoria and the high-noon of her reign, the

purely English ideal of womanhood has disappeared curiously from

contemporary art and has not the firm hold upon the general mind that

it had thirty years ago.

The heroines of poems and fictions are complex people to-day,

world-weary, tempestuous and without peace of heart or mind. The two

great voices of the immediate past have lost much of their meaning for

modern ears.

"So just

A type of womankind, that God sees fit to trust

Her with the holy task of giving life in turn."

--Not many pens nor brushes are busy with such ladies now.

"Crown'd Isabel, thro' all her placid life,

The queen of marriage, a most perfect wife."

--Who sings such Isabels to-day? It is Calypso of the magic island of

whom the modern world loves to hear, and few poets sing Penelope

faithful by the hearth any more.

But when deep peace broods over a dwelling, it is from the Mary

Lothians of England that it comes.

Mary was very simply dressed, but there was an indescribable air of

distinction about her. The skirt of white piqué hung perfectly, the

cream-coloured blouse with drawn-thread work at the neck and wrists was

fresh and dainty. On her head was a panama hat with a scarf of mauve

silk tied loosely round it and hanging down her back in two long ends.

In one hand she held a silver-headed walking cane, in the other a small

prayer-book, for she was going to matins before breakfast.

She spoke a word to the cook and went out of the back door, calling a

good-morning to Tumpany as she passed his shed, and then went through

the entrance-gate into the village street.

By this hour the labourers were all at work in the fields and

farmyards--the hay harvest was over and the corn cutting about to

begin--but the cottage doors were open and the children were gathering

in little groups, ready to proceed to school.

There was a fresh smell of wood-smoke in the air and the gardens of the

cottages were brilliant with flowers.

Mary Lothian, however, was thinking very little about the village--to

which she was Lady Bountiful. She hardly noticed the sweet day

springing over the country side.

She was thinking of Gilbert.

He had been away for a week now and she had heard no news of him except

for a couple of brief telegrams.

For several days before he went to London, she had seen the signs of

restlessness and ennui approaching. She knew them well. He had been

irritable and moody by fits and starts. After lunch he had slept away

the afternoons, and at dinner he had been feverishly gay. Once or twice

he had driven into Wordingham--the local town--during the afternoon,

and had returned late at night, very angry on one of these occasions to

find her sitting up for him.

"I wish to goodness you would go to bed, Mary," he had said with a

sullen look in his eyes. "I do hate being fussed over as if I were a

child. I hate my comings and goings spied upon in this ridiculous way.

I must have freedom! Kindly try and remember that you have married a

poet--an artist!--and not some beef-brained ordinary fool!"

The servants had gone to bed, but she had lit candles in old silver

holders, and spread a dainty supper for him in case he should be

hungry, taking especial care over the egg sandwiches and the salad

which he said she made so perfectly.

She had gone to bed without a word, for she knew well what made him

speak to her like that. She lay awake listening, her room was over the

dining room, and heard the clink of a glass and the gurgle of a syphon.

He was having more drink then. When he came upstairs he went into the

dressing room where he sometimes slept, and before long she heard him

breathing heavily in sleep. He always came to her room when he was

himself.

Then she had gone downstairs noiselessly to find her little supper

untouched, a smear of cigarette ash upon the tablecloth, and that he

had forgotten to extinguish the candles.

There came a day when he was especially kind and sweet. His recent

irritation and restlessness seemed to have quite gone. He smoked pipes

instead of cigarettes, always a good sign in him, and in the afternoon

they had gone for a long tramp together over the marshes. She was very

happy. For the last year, particularly since his name had become

well-known and he was seriously counted among the celebrities of the

hour, he had not cared to be with her so much as in the past. He only

wanted to be with her when he was depressed and despondent about the

future. Then he came for comfort and clung to her like a boy with his

mother. "It's for the sake of my Art," he would say often enough,

though she never reproached him with neglect. "I _must_ be a great

deal alone now. Things come to me when I am alone. I love being with

you, sweetheart, but we must both make a sacrifice for my work. It

means the future. It means everything for both of us!"

He used not to be like this, she sometimes reflected. In the earlier

days, when he was actually doing the work which had brought him fame,

he had never wanted to be away from her. He used to read her

everything, ask her opinion about all his work. Life had been more

simple. She had known every detail of his. He had not drunk much in

those days. In those days there had been no question of that at all.

After the success it was different.

She had gone to his study in the morning, after nights when he had been

working late, and had been struck with fear when she had looked at the

tantalus. But, then, he had been spruce and cheerful at breakfast and

had made a hearty meal. Her remonstrances had been easily swept away.

He had laughed.

"Darling, don't be an old goose! You don't understand a bit. What?--Oh,

yes, I suppose I did have rather a lot of whiskey last night. But I did

splendid work. And it is only once in a way. I'm as fit this morning as

I ever was in my life. But I'm working double tides now. You know what

an immense strain it is. Just let me consolidate my reputation, become

absolutely secure, and--well, then you'll see!"

But for months now things had not improved, and on this particular day,

a week ago now, the sudden change in Gilbert, when the placidity of the

old time seemed to have returned, was like cool water to a wound.

They had been such friends again! In the evening they had got out all

her music and while he played, she had sung the dear old songs of their

courtship and early married life. They had the "Keys Of Heaven," "The

Rain Is on the River," "My Dear Soul" and the "Be My Dear and Dearest!"

of Cotsford Dick.

On the next morning the post had brought letters calling Gilbert to

London. He had to arrange with Messrs. Ince and Amberley about his new

book. Mr. Amberley had asked him to dine--"You don't perhaps quite

understand, dear, but when Amberley asks one, one _must_ go"--there

were other important things to see after.

Gilbert had not asked her to come with him. She would have liked to

have gone to London very much. It was a long time since she had been to

a theatre, ages since she had heard a good concert. And shopping too!

It seemed such a good opportunity, while the sales were on.

She had hinted as much, but he had shaken his head with decision: "No,

dear, not now. I am going strictly on business. I couldn't give you the

time I should want to, and I should hate that. It wouldn't be fair to

you. We'll go up in the Autumn, just you and I together and have a

really good time. That will be far jollier. For heaven's sake, don't

let's try to mix up business with pleasure. It's fatal to both."

Had he known that he was to be called to London? Had he arranged it

beforehand, itching to be free of her gentle yoke, her wise,

restraining hand? Was that the reason that he had been so affectionate

the day before he went away? His conscience was uneasy perhaps . . . ?

And why had he not written--was there a sordid, horrible reason for his

silence; when was he coming back . . . ?

These were the sad, disturbing thoughts stirring in Mary's mind as the

near tolling of the bell smote upon her ears and she entered the

Churchyard.

The church at Mortland Royal was large and noble. It would have held

the total population of the village three times over. Relic of Tudor

times when Norfolk was the rich and prosperous centre of the wool

industry of England, it was only one of the many pious monuments of a

vanished past which still keep watch and ward over the remote,

forgotten villages of the North East Coast.

Stately still the fane, in its noble masses, its fairness, majesty and

strength, the slender intricacy and rich meshes of its tracery in which

no single cusp or finial is in vain, no stroke of the chisel useless.

Stately the grey towers also, foursquare for centuries to the winds of

the Wash. Dust the man who made it, but uncrumbled stone the body of

his dream. He had thought in light and shadow. He had seen these

immemorial stones when the sun of July mornings was hot upon them, or

the early dusks of December left them to the dark. Out of the spaces of

light and darkness in the vision of his mind this strong tower had been

built.

Inviolate, it was standing now.

But as Mary passed through the great porch with its worn and weathered

saints into the Church itself, the breath of the morning was damp and

there was a chill within.

The gallant chirrup of the swallows flying round the tower, sank to a

faint "cheep, cheep," the voice of the tolling bell became muffled and

funereal, and mildew lay upon the air. "Non sum qualis eram," the lorn

interior seemed to echo to her steps, "bonae sub regno Ecclesiæ."

There was a little American organ in the Chancel. No more would the

rich plainsong of Gregory echo under these ancient roofs like a flowing

tide in some cavern of the sea.

The stone Altar was covered with a decaying web of crimson upon which

was embroidered a symbol of sickly, faded yellow. Perhaps never again

would a Priest raise the Monstrance there, while the ceremonial

candle-flames were pallid in the morning light and hushed voices hymned

the Lamb of God.

These, all these, were in the olden time and long ago.

But the Presence of God, the Peace of God, were in the Church still,

soul-saving, and as real as when the gracious ceremonies of the past

symbolised them for those who were there to worship.

Mr. Medley, the old Priest who was curate to a Rector who was generally

away, walked in from the vestry with the patient footsteps of age and

began the office.

. . . _Almighty and most merciful Father; we have erred and strayed

from thy ways like lost sheep._

The old and worthy man with his tremulous voice, the sweet matron with

her grave beauty just matured to that St. Martin's Summer of Youth

which is the youth of perfect wifehood, said the sacred words together.

His cultured and appealing voice, her warm contralto echoed under the

high roof in ebb and flow and antiphon of sound.

It was the twenty-sixth day of the month. . . .

"Trouble and heaviness have laid hold upon me:

Yet is my delight in thy commandments."

"The righteousness of thy testimonies is everlasting: O

grant me understanding and I shall live."

The morning was lighter than ever when Mary came out of Church, and its

smile was reflected on her face.

In the village street an old labourer leading a team of horses, touched

his cap and grinned a welcome while his wistful eyes plainly said, "God

bless you, Ma'am," as Mary went by.

A merry "ting-tang clank" came from the blacksmith's shop, ringing out

brightly in the bright air, and as she drew near the gate of the Old

House, whom should she see but the postman!

"No. There ain't no letter for you," said the Postman--a sly old

crab-apple of a man who always knew far too much--"but what should you

say," he dangled it before her as a sweetmeat before a child, "what

should you say if as how I had a telegram for 'ee?"

--"That you were talking nonsense, William. There can't be a telegram.

It's far too early!"

"Well, then, there _is_!" said William triumphantly, "'anded in at

the St. James' Street office, London, at eight-two! Either Mr.

Lothian's up early or he ain't been to bed. It come over the telephone

from Wordingham while I was a sorting the letters. Mrs. Casley took'n

down. So there! Mr. Lothian's a coming home by the nine-ten to-night."

Mary tore open the orange envelope:--

"_Arrive nine-ten to-night all my love Gilbert_"

was what she read.

Then, with quick footsteps, she hurried through the gates. Her eyes

sparkled, her lips had grown red, and as she smiled her beautiful,

white teeth flashed in the sunlight.

She looked like a girl.

Tumpany was propped against the lintel of the back door. Phoebe was

talking to him, the Dog Trust basked at his feet, and he had a short

briar pipe in his mouth.

"Master is coming home this evening, Tumpany!" Mary said.

Tumpany snatched the pipe from his mouth and stood to attention. The

cook vanished into the kitchen.

"Can I see you then, Mum?" Tumpany asked, anxiously.

"After breakfast. I've not had breakfast yet. Then we'll go into

everything."

She vanished.

"Them peas," said Tumpany to himself, "he'll want to know about them

peas--Goodorg!"--accompanied by Trust, Tumpany disappeared in the

direction of the kitchen garden.

But Mary sat long over breakfast that morning. The sunlight painted

oblongs of gold upon the jade-green carpet. A bee visited the copper

bowl of honeysuckle upon the sideboard, a wasp became hopelessly

captured by the marmalade, and from the bedrooms the voice of Blanche,

the housemaid, floated down--tunefully convinced that every nice girl

loves a sailor.

And of all these homely sounds Mary Lothian's ear had little heed.

Sound, light, colour, the scent of the flowers in the garden--a thing

almost musical in itself--were as nothing.

One happy fact had closed each avenue of sense. Gilbert was coming

home!

Gilbert was coming home!

CHAPTER II

AN EXHIBITION OF DOCTOR MORTON SIMS AND MR. MEDLEY, WITH AN ACCOUNT OF

HOW LOTHIAN RETURNED TO MORTLAND ROYAL

"Seest thou a man diligent in his business: He shall stand before

Kings. He shall not stand before mean men."

--_The Bible._

About eleven-thirty in the morning, Mr. Medley, the curate, came out of

the rectory where he lived, and went into the village.

Mortland Royal was a rich living, worth, with the great and lesser

tythe, some eight or nine hundred a year. The rector, the Hon. Leonard

O'Donnell, was the son of an Irish peer who owned considerable property

in Norfolk and in whose gift the living was. Mr. O'Donnell was a man of

many activities, a bachelor, much in request in London, and very little

inclined to waste his energies in a small country village. He was a

courtly, polished little man who found his true _milieu_ among people

of his own class, and neither understood, nor particularly cared to

understand, a peasant community.

His work, as he said, lay elsewhere, and he did a great deal of good in

his own way with considerable satisfaction to himself.

Possessed of some private means, Mortland Royal supplemented his income

and provided him with a convenient _pied à terre_ where he could

retire in odd moments to a fashionable county in which a number of

great people came to shoot in the season. The rectory itself was a

large old-fashioned house with some pretensions to be called a country

mansion, and for convenience sake, Mr. Medley was housed there, and

became de facto, if not de jure, the rector of the village. Mr.

O'Donnell gave his colleague two hundred a year, house room, and an

absolutely free hand. The two men liked one another, if they had not

much in common, and the arrangement was mutually convenient.

Medley was a pious priest of the old-fashioned type. His flock claimed

all the interest of his life. He had certain fixed and comely habits

belonging to his type and generation. He read his Horace still and took

a glass of port at dinner. Something of a scholar, he occasionally

reviewed some new edition of a Latin classic for the _Spectator_,

though he was without literary ambitions. He had a little money of his

own, and three times a year he dined at the high table in Merton

College Hall, where every one was very pleased to see him.

A vanishing type to-day, but admirably suited to his environment. The

right man in the right place.

The real rector was regarded with awe and some pride in the village.

His name was often in the newspapers. He was an eloquent speaker upon

Temperance questions at important congresses. He went to garden parties

at Windsor and theatricals at Sandringham. When he was in residence and

preached in his own church, it was fuller than at other times. He was a

draw. His distinguished face and high, well-bred voice were a pleasant

variation of monotony. And the theology which had made him so welcome

in Mayfair was not without a pleasing titillation for even the rustic

mind. Mr. O'Donnel was convinced, and preached melodiously, the theory

that the Divine Mercy extends to all human beings. He asserted that, in

the event, all people would enter Paradise--unless, indeed, there was

no Paradise, which in his heart of hearts he thought exceedingly

likely.

But he did good work in the world, though probably less than he

imagined. It was as an advocate of Temperance that Leonard O'Donnell

was particularly known, and it was as that he was welcomed by Society.

He was a sort of spiritual Karlsbad and was nicknamed the Dean of

Vichy.

The fact was one that had a direct bearing on Gilbert Lothian's life.

The Rector of Mortland Royal was a "managing" man. His forte was to be

a sort of earthly Providence to all sorts of people within his sphere,

and his motive was one of genuine good nature and a wish to help. As a

woman he would have been an inveterate matchmaker.

Did old Marchioness, who liked to keep an eye upon her household

affairs, bewail the quality of London milk--then she must have it from

Mr. Samuel, the tenant of the Glebe Farm at Mortland Royal!

Did a brother clergyman ask to be recommended a school for his son, the

Rector knew the very place and was quite prepared to take the boy down

himself and commend him specially to the Headmaster. With equal

eagerness, Mr. O'Donnell would urge a confessor or a pill, and the odd

thing about it was, that he was nearly always right, and all sorts of

people made use of the restless, kindly little man.

One day, Dr. Morton Sims, the bacteriologist and famous expert upon

Inebriety, had walked from a meeting of the Royal Commissioners upon

Alcoholism to the Junior Carlton with Mr. O'Donnell.

Both were members and they had dined there together.

"I am run down," said Morton Sims, during the meal. "I have been too

much in London lately. I've got a lot of important research work to do.

I'm going to take a house in the country for a few months, only I don't

know where."

The mind of the man occupied with big things was impatient of detail;

the mind of the man occupied with small ones responded instantly.

"I know of the very place, Sims. In my own village. How fortunate! The

'Haven.' Old Admiral Custance used to have it, but he's dead recently.

There are six months of the lease still to run. Mrs. Custance has gone

to live at Lugano. She wants to let the place furnished until the lease

is up."

"It sounds as if it might do."

"But, my dear fellow, it's the very place you want! Exactly the thing!

I can manage it for you in no time. Pashwhip and Moger--the house

agents in our nearest town--have the letting. Do let me be of use!"

"It's very kind of you, O'Donnell."

"Delighted. It will be so jolly to have you in the village. I'm not

there as much as I could wish, of course. My other work keeps me so

much in London. But Medley, my colleague, is an excellent fellow. He'll

look after you in every way."

"Who lives round about?"

"Well, as far as Society is concerned, we are a little distance from

anywhere. Lord Fakenham's is the nearest house----"

"Not in that way, O'Donnell. I mean interesting people. Lord Fakenham

is a bore--a twelve-bore one might say. I hate the big shooting houses

in East England."

The Rector was rather at a loss. "Well," he said, reluctantly, "I don't

know about what you'd probably call _interesting_ people. Sir Ambrose

McKee, the big Scotch distiller--Ambrosia whiskey, you know--has the

shooting and comes down to the Manor House in September. Oh, and

Gilbert Lothian, the poet, has a cottage in the place. I've met him

twice, but I can't say that I know much about him. Medley swears by his

wife, though. She does everything in the village I'm told. She was a

Fielding, the younger branch."

The doctor's face became strangely interested. It was alert and

watchful in a moment.

"Gilbert Lothian! He lives there does he! Now you tempt me. I've heard

a good deal about Gilbert Lothian."

The Rector was genuinely surprised. "Well, most people have," he

answered. "But I should hardly have thought that a modern poet was much

in your line."

Morton Sims smiled, rather oddly. "Perhaps not," he said, "but I'm

interested all the same. I have my own reasons. Put me into

communication with the house agents, will you, O'Donnell?"

The affair had been quickly arranged. The house proved satisfactory,

and Dr. Morton Sims had taken it.

On the morning when Mary Lothian had heard from Gilbert that he was

returning that evening, Mr. Medley, reminded of his duty by a postcard

from the Rector at Cowes, set out to pay a call and offer his services

to the distinguished newcomer.

The "Haven" was a pleasant gabled house standing in grounds of about

three acres, not far from the Church and Rectory. The late Admiral

Custance had kept it in beautiful order. The green, pneumatic lawns

suggested those of a college quadrangle, the privet hedges were clipped

with care, the whole place was taut and trim.

Mr. Medley found Dr. Morton Sims smoking a morning pipe in the library,

dressed in a suit of grey flannel and with a holiday air about him.

The two men liked each other at once. There was no doubt about that in

the minds of either of them.

There was a certain dryness and mellow humour in Mr. Medley--a ripe

flavour about him, as of an old English fruit crushed upon the palate.

"Here is a rare bird," the doctor thought.

And Morton Sims interested the clerygman no less. The doctor's great

achievements and the fact that he was a definite feature in English

life were quite familiar. When, on fugitive occasions any one of this

sort strayed into the placid domains of his interest Medley was capable

of welcoming him with eagerness. He did so now, and warmed himself in

the steady glow from the celebrated man with whom he was sitting.

That they were both Oxford men, more or less of the same period, was an

additional link between them.

. . . "Two or three times a year I go up," Medley said, "and dine in

Hall at Merton. I'm a little out of it, of course. The old, remembered

faces become fewer and fewer each year. But there are friends left

still, and though I can't quite get at their point of view, the younger

fellows are very kind to me. Directly I turn into Oriel Street; I

breathe the old atmosphere, and I confess that my heart beats a little

quicker, as Merton tower comes into view."

"I know," the doctor said. "I was at Balliol you know--a little

different, even in our day. But when I go up I'm always dreadfully

busy, at the Museum or in the Medical School. It's the younger folk,

the scientific dons and undergraduates who are reading science that I

have to do with. I have not much time for the sentiments and caresses

of the past. Life is so short and I have so much yet that I hope to do

in it, that I simply refuse my mind the pleasures of retrospection.

You'll call me a Philistine, but when I go to lecture at Cambridge--as

I sometimes do--it stimulates me far more than Oxford."

"Detestable place!" said Mr. Medley, with a smile. "A nephew of mine is

a tutor there, Peterhouse. He has quite a name in his way, they tell

me. He writes little leprous books in which he conducts the Christian

Faith to the frontier of modern thought with a consolatory cheque for

its professional services in the past. And, besides, the river at

Cambridge is a ditch."

The doctor's eyes leapt up at this.

"Yes, isn't it marvellous that they can row as they do!" he said with

the eagerness of a boy.

"You rowed then?"

"Oh, yes. I was in the crew of--74--our year it was."

"Really! really!--I had no idea, Dr. Morton Sims! I was in the Trials

of--71, when Merton was head of the river, but we were the losing boat

and I never got into the Eight. How different it all was then!"

Both men were silent for a minute. The priest's words had struck an

unaccustomed chord of memory in the doctor's mind.

"Those times will never come again," Morton Sims said, and puffed

rather more quickly than usual at his pipe. He had spoken truly enough

when he had said that he had not time in his strenuous life for

memories of his youth, that he shut his eyes to the immemorial appeal

of Oxford when he went there. But he responded now, instinctively, for

there is a Freemasonry, greater than all the ritual of King Solomon,

among those who have rowed upon the Isis, in the happy, thrice-happy

days of Youth!

To weary clergymen absorbed in the _va_ and _vient_ of sordid parishes,

to grave Justices upon the Bench, the strenuous cynics of the Bar,

plodding masters of schools, the suave solicitor, the banker, the

painter, or the poet, these vivid memories of the Loving Mother, must

always come now and again in life.

The Bells of Youth ring once more. The faint echo of the shouts from

river or from playing field, make themselves heard with ghostly voices.

In the Chapels of Wayneflete, or of Laud, some soprano choir is singing

yet. In the tower of the Cardinal, Big Tom tolls out of the past,

bidding the College porters close their doors.

White and fretted spires shoot upwards into skies that will never be so

blue again. Again the snap-dragon blooms over the grey walls of

Trinity, the crimson creeper stains the porch of Cranmer, and Autumn

leaves of bronze, purple and yellow carpet all the Magdalen Walks.

These things can never be quite forgotten by those who have loved them

and been of them.

The duration of a reverie is purely accidental. There is no time in

thought. The pictures of a lifetime may glow in the brain, while a

second passes by the clock, a single episode may inform the

retrospection of an hour.

These two grey-headed men, upon this delightful summer morning, were

not long lost in thought.

"And now," said the clergyman, "have you seen anything of the village

yet?"

"Not yet. For the three days that I have been here I have been

arranging my books and instruments, and turning that big room over the

barn into a laboratory."

"Oh, yes. Where the Admiral used to keep his Trafalgar models. An

excellent room! Now what do you say, Dr. Morton Sims, to a little

progress through the village with me? I'm quite certain that every one

is agog to see you, and to sum you up. Natural village curiosity! You

might as well make your appearance under my wing."

"Teucro auspice, auspice Teucro?"

"Precisely," said Medley, with a smile of pleasure at the quotation

from his beloved poet, and the two men left the house together in high

glee, laughing like boys.

They visited the Church, in which Morton Sims took a polite interest,

and then the clergyman took his guest over the Rectory.

It was a fine house, standing in the midst of fair lawns upon which

great beech trees grew here and there, giving the extensive grounds

something of the aspect of a park. The rooms were large and lofty, with

fine ceilings of the Adams' school, florid braveries of stucco that

were quite at home in a house like this. There were portraits

everywhere, chiefly members of the O'Donnell family, and the faces in

their fresh Irish comeliness were gay and ingenuous, as of privileged

young people who could never grow old.

"Really, this is a delightful house," the Doctor said as he stood in

the library. "I wonder O'Donnell doesn't spend more time in Mortland

Royal. Few parsons are housed like this."

"It's not his _metier_, Doctor. He hasn't the faculty of really

understanding peasants, and I think he is quite right in what he is

doing. And, of course, from a selfish point of view, I am glad. I have

refused two college livings to stay on here. In all probability I shall

stay here till I die. O'Donnell does a great work for Temperance all

over England--though doubtless you know more about that than I do."

"Er, yes," Morton Sims replied, though without any marked enthusiasm.

"O'Donnell is very eloquent, and no doubt does good. My dear old

friend, Bishop Moultrie, in Norfolk here is most enthusiastic about his

work. I like O'Donnell, he's sincere. But I belong to the scientific

party, and while I welcome anything that really tends to stem

inebriety, I believe that O'Donnell and Moultrie and all of them are on

the wrong tack entirely."

"I know very little about the modern temperance movement in any

direction," said Mr. Medley with a certain dryness. "Blue Ribbons and

Bands of Hope are all very well, I suppose, but there is such a

tendency nowadays among Non-conformists and the extreme evangelical

party to exalt abstinence from alcohol into the one thing necessary to

salvation, that I keep out of it all as much as I can. I like my glass

of port, and I don't mean to give it up!"

Morton Sims laughed. "It doesn't do you the least good really," he

said, laughing. "I could prove to you in five minutes, and with entire

certainty, that your single glass of port is bad, even for you! But I

quite agree with your attitude towards all the religious emotionalism

that is worked up. The drunkard who turns to religion simply manifests

the class of ideas, which is one of the features of the epileptic

temperament. It is a confession of ineptitude, and a recourse to a

means of salvation from a condition which is too hard for him to bear.

That is to say, Fear is at the bottom of his new convictions!"

Certainly Medley was not particularly sympathetic to the modern

Temperance movement among religious people. Perhaps Mr. O'Donnell's

somewhat vociferous enthusiasm had something to do with it. But on the

other hand, he was very far from accepting such a cold scientific

doctrine as this. He knew that the Holy Spirit does not always work

through fear. But like the wise and quiet-minded man that he was, he

forbore argument and listened with intellectual pleasure to the views

of his new friend.

"I know," he said, with a courtly hint of deference in his voice, that

became him very well, "of your position in the ranks of those who are

fighting Intemperance. But, and you must pardon the ignorance of a

country priest who is quite out of all 'movements,' I don't know

anything of your standpoint. What is your remedy, Dr. Morton Sims?"

The great man smiled inwardly.

It did really seem extraordinary to him that a cultured professional

man of this day should actually know nothing of his hopes, aims and

propaganda. And then, ever on the watch for traces of egoism and

vain-glory in himself, he accepted the fact with humility.

Who was he, who was any one in life, to imagine that his views were

known to all the world?

"Well," he said, "what we believe is just this: It is quite impossible

to abolish or to prohibit alcohol. It is necessary in a thousand

industries. Prohibition is futile. It has been tried, and has failed,

in the United States. While alcohol exists, the man predisposed to

abuse it will get it. You, as a clergyman, know as well as I do, as a

doctor, that it is impossible to make people moral by Act of

Parliament."

This was entirely in accordance with Medley's own view. "Of course," he

said, "the only thing that can make people moral is an act of God,

cooperating with an act of their own."

"Possibly. I am not concerned to affirm or deny the power of an Act of

the Supreme Being. Nor am I able to say anything about its operation.

Science tells me nothing upon this point. About the act of the

individual I have a good deal to say."

--"I am most interested" . . .

"Well then, what we want to do is to root out drunkenness by

eliminating inebriates from society by a process of Artificial

Selection. It is within the power of science to evolve a sober race. We

must forbid inebriates to have children and make it penal for them to

do so."

Medley started. "Forbid them to marry?" he asked.

"It would be futile. Drunkenness often develops after marriage. There

is only one way--by preventing Drunkards from reproducing their

like--by forbidding the procreation of children by them. If drunkards

were taken before magistrates sitting in secret session, and, on

conviction, were warned that the procreation of children would subject

them to this or that penalty, then the birthrate of drunkards would

certainly fall immensely."

"But innumerable drunkards would inevitably escape the meshes of the

law."

"Yes. But that is an argument against all laws. And this law would be

more perfect in its operation than any other, for if the drunken father

evaded it in one generation, the drunken son would be taken in the

next."

The Priest said nothing for a moment. The latent distrust and dislike

of science which is an inherent part of the life and training of so

many Priests, was blazing up in him with a fury of antagonism. What

impious interference with the laws of God was this? It seemed a

profanation, horrible!

Like all good Christians of his temper of mind, he was quite unable to

realise that God might be choosing to work in this way, and by the

human hands of men. He had not the slightest conception of the great

truth that every new discovery of Science and each fresh extension of

its operations is not in the least antagonistic to Christianity when

surveyed by the clear, unbiassed mind.

Mr. Medley was a dog-lover. He was a member of the Kennel-Club, and

sent dogs to shows. He knew that, in order to breed a long-tailed

variety of dogs, it would be ridiculous to preserve carefully all the

short-tailed individuals and pull vigorously at their tails. He

exercised the privilege of Artificial Selection carefully enough in his

own kennels, but the mere proposal that such a thing should be done in

the case of human beings seemed impious to him.

Dr. Morton Sims was also incapable of realising that his scheme for the

betterment of the race was perfectly in accordance with the Christian

Philosophy.

But Morton Sims was not a professing Christian and was not concerned

with the Christian aspect. Mr. Medley was, and although one of his

favourite hymns began, "God Moves in a Mysterious Way," he was really

chilled to the bone for a minute at the words of the Scientist. He

remained silent for a moment or so.

"But that seems to me quite horrible," he said, at length. "It is

opposed to the best instincts of human nature--as horrible as

Malthusianism, as horrible and as impracticable."

His expression as he looked at his guest was wistful. "I don't want to

be discourteous," it seemed to say, "but this is really my thought."

"Perhaps," the other answered with a half-sigh. He was well used to

encounter just such a voice, just such a shocked countenance as that

of his host--"But by '_best instincts_' people often mean strong

prejudices. Our scheme is undoubtedly Malthusian. I am no believer in

Malthusianism as a check to what is called 'over-population.' That

_does_ seem to me immoral. Nature requires no help in that regard. But

Inebriety is an evil the extent of which no one but an expert can

possibly measure. _The ordinary man simply doesn't know!_ But supposing

I admit what you say. Let us agree that my scheme is horrible, that in

a sense it is immoral--or a-moral--that it is possibly impracticable.

"The alternative is more horrible and more immoral still. There is

absolutely no choice between Temperance Reform, by the abolition of

drink, and Temperance Reform by the abolition of the drunkard. An ill

thing is not rendered worse by being bravely confronted. An unavoidable

evil is not made more evil by being turned to good account. It rests

with us to extract what good we can from the evil. Horrible? Immoral?

Perhaps; but we are confronted by two horrors and two immoralities, and

we are compelled to make a choice. Which is best; to live safe because

strong, or to tremble behind fortifications; to be temperate by Nature

or sober by Law?"

. . . They stood in the quiet sunlit library, with its placid books and

pictures irradiated by the light of approaching noon.

The slim, bearded man in his grey suit, faced the dry, elderly

clergyman. His voice rang with challenge, his whole personality was

redolent of ardour, conviction, an aroma of the War he spent his life

in waging far away from this quiet room of books.

For years, this had been Medley's home. Each night, with his Horace and

his pipe, he spent the happy, sober hours between dinner and bedtime

here. His sermons were written on the old oak table. Over the high

carved marble of the mantel the engraving of Our Lord knocking at the

weed-grown door of a human heart, had looked down upon all his

familiar, quiet evenings. In summer the long windows were open and the

moonlight washed the lawns with silver, and the shadows of the trees

seemed like pieces of black velvet nailed to the grass.

In winter the piled logs glowed upon the hearth and the bitter winds

from the Marshes, sang like a flight of arrows round the house.

What was this that had come into the library, what new disturbing,

insistent element? The Rector brought no such atmosphere into the house

when he arrived. He would sip his coffee and smoke his pipe and linger

for a gracious moment with the Singer of Mantua, or dispute about the

true birthplace of him who sent Odysseus sailing over wine-coloured and

enchanted seas.

An insistent voice seemed to be calling to the clergyman--"Awake from

your slumber--your long slumber! Hear the words of Truth!"

He said nothing. His whole face showed reluctance, bewilderment,

misease.

The far keener intelligence of the other noted it at once. The mind of

the Medico-Psychologist appreciated the episode at its exact value. He

had troubled a still pool, and to no good purpose. Words of his--even

if they carried an uneasy conviction--would never rouse this man to

action. Let it be so! Why waste time? The clergyman was a delightful

survival, a "rare Bird" still!

"Well, that is my theory, at any rate, since you asked for it," Morton

Sims said, the urgency and excitement quite gone from his voice. "And

now, some more of the village, please!"

Mr. Medley smiled cheerfully. He became suddenly conscious of the light

and comfortable morning again. He felt his feet upon the carpet, he was

in a place that he knew.

"We'll go through the wicket-gate in the south wall," he said, with

alacrity. "It's our nearest way, and there is a good view of the Manor

House to be got from there. It's a fine old place, empty for most of

the year, but always full for the shooting. Sir Ambrose McKee has it."

"The whiskey man?"

"Yes. The great distiller," Medley answered nervously--most anxious to

sheer off from any further controversial subjects.

They went out into the village.

The old red-brick manor house was surveyed from a distance, and Morton

Sims remarked absently upon its picturesqueness. His mind was occupied

with other and far alien thoughts.

Then they went down the white dusty road--the bordering hedges were all

pilm-powdered for there had been no rain for many days--to the centre

of the village.

Four roads met there, East, South, West and North, and it was known to

the village as "The Cross." On one side of the little central green was

the Post office and general shop. On the other was the Mortland Royal

Arms, and on the South, to the right of the old stone bridge, which ran

over the narrow river, were the roof and chimneys of Gilbert Lothian's

house nestling among the trees and with a vista of the orchard which

stretched down to the stream.

"That's a nice little place," the doctor said. "Whose is that?"

"It's the house of our village celebrity," Mr. Medley replied--with a

rather hostile crackle in his voice, or at least the other thought so.

"Our local celebrity," Medley continued, "Mr. Gilbert Lothian, the

poet."

Neither the face nor the voice of the doctor changed at all. But his

mind came to attention. This was a moment he had been waiting for.

"Oh, I know," he said, with an assumed indifference which he was well

aware would have its effect of provocation upon the simple mind of the

Priest. "The name is quite familiar to me. Bishop Moultrie sent me a

book of Lothian's poems last winter. And now that I come to think of

it, O'Donnell told me that Mr. Lothian lived here. What sort of a man

is he?"

Medley hesitated. "Well," he said at length, "the truth is that I don't

like him much personally, and I don't understand him in any way. I

speak with prejudice I'm afraid, and I do not wish that any words of

mine should make you share it."

"Oh, we all have our likes and dislikes. Every one has his private Dr.

Fell and it can't be helped. But tell me about Lothian. I will remember

your very honest warning! Don't you like his work?"

"I confess I see very little in it, Doctor. But then, my taste is

old-fashioned and not in accord with modern literary movements. My

'Christian Year' supplies all the religious verse I need."

"Keble wrote some fine verse," said the doctor tentatively.

"Exactly. Sound prosody and restrained style! There is fervour and

feeling in Lothian's work. It is impossible to deny it. But it's too

passionate and feverish. There is a savage, almost despairing,

clutching at spiritual emotion which strikes me as thoroughly

unhealthy. The Love of Jesus, the mysterious operations of the Holy

Ghost--these seem to me no proper vehicles for words which are tortured

into a wild and sensuous music. As I read the poems of Gilbert Lothian

I am reminded of the wicked and yet beautiful verses of Swinburne, and

of others who have turned their lyre to the praise of lust. The

sentiment is different, but the method is the same. And I confess that

it revolts me to see the verbal tricks and polished brilliance of

modern Pagan writers adapted to a fugitive and delirious ecstasy of

Christian Faith."

Morton Sims understood thoroughly. This was the obstinate and

prejudiced voice of an older literary generation, suddenly become

vindictively vocal.

"I know all that you mean," he said. "I don't agree with you in the

least, but I appreciate your point of view. But let me keep myself out

of the discussion for a moment. I am not what you would probably be

prepared to call a professing Christian. But how about Moultrie? He

sent me Lothian's poems first of all. I remember the actual evening

last winter when they arrived. A contemporaneous circumstance has

etched it into my memory with certainty. Moultrie is a deeply convinced

Christian. He is a man of the widest culture also. Yet he savours his

palate with every _nuance_, every elusive and delicate melody that

the genius of Lothian gives us. How about Moultrie's attitude?--it is a

very general one."

Mr. Medley laughed, half with apology, half with the grim humour which

was personal to him.

"I quite admit all you say," he replied, "but, as I told you, I belong

to another generation and I don't in the least mean to change or listen

to the voice of the charmer! I am a prejudiced old fogey, in short! I

am still so antiquated and foolish as to have a temperamental dislike

for a French-man, for instance. I like a picture to tell a story, and I

flatly refused to get into Moultrie's abominable automobile when he

brought it to the Rectory the other day!"

Morton Sims was not in the least deceived by this half real, half

mocking apologia. It was not merely a question of style that had roused

this heat in the dry elderly man when he spoke of the things which he

so greatly disliked in the poet's work. There was something behind

this, and the doctor meant to find out what it was. He was in Mortland

Royal, in the first instance, in order to follow up the problem of

Gilbert Lothian. His choice of a country residence had been determined

by the Poet's locality. Every instinct of the scientist and hunter was

awake in him. He had dreadful reasons, reasons which he could never

quite think of without a mental shudder, for finding out everything

about the unknown and elusive genius who had given "Surgit Amari," to

the world.

He looked his companion full in the face, and spoke in a compelling,

searching voice that the other had not heard before.

"What's the real antagonism, Mr. Medley?" he said.

Then the clergyman spoke out.

"You press me," he said, "very well, I will tell you. I don't believe

Lothian is a good man. It is a stern and terrible thing to say,--God

grant I am mistaken!--but he appears to me to write of supreme things

with insincerity. Not vulgarly, you'll understand. Not with his tongue

in his cheek, but without the conviction that imposes conduct, and

perhaps even with his heart in his mouth!"

"Conduct?"

". . . I fear I am saying too much."

"Hardly to me! Then Mr. Lothian--?"

"He drinks," the Priest said bluntly, "you're sure to hear of it in

some indirect way since you are going to stay in the village for six

months. But that's the truth of it!"

The face of Dr. Morton Sims suddenly became quite pale. His brown eyes

glittered as if with an almost uncontrollable excitement.

"Ah!" he exclaimed, and there was something so curious in his voice

that the clergyman was alarmed at what he had said. He knew, and could

know, nothing of what was passing in the other's mind. A scrupulously

fair and honest man within his lights, he feared that he had made too

harsh a statement--particularly to a man who thought that even an

after-dinner glass of port was an error in hygiene!

"I don't mean to say that he gets drunk," Medley continued hastily,

"but he really does excite himself and whip himself up to work by means

of spirits."

The clergyman hesitated. The doctor spurred him on.

"Most interesting to the scientific man--please go on."

"Well, I don't know that there is much to say--I do hope I am not doing

the man an injustice, because I am getting on for twice his age and

envy the modern brilliance of his brain! But about a fortnight ago I

went to see Crutwell--a poor fellow who is dying of phthisis--and found

Lothian there. He was holding Crutwell's hand and talking to him about

Paradise in a monotonous musical voice. He had been drinking. I saw it

at once. His eyes were quite wild."

"But the patient was made happier?"

"Yes. He was. Happier, I freely confess it, than my long ministrations

have ever been able to make him. But that is certainly not the point.

It is very distressing to a parish Priest to meet with these things in

his visitations. Do you know," here Mr. Medley gave a rueful chuckle,

"I followed this alcoholic missioner the other day into the house of an

old bed-ridden woman whom he helps to support. Lothian is extremely

generous by the way. He would literally take off his coat and give it

away--which really means, of course, that he has no conception of what

money means.

"At any rate, I went into old Sarah's cottage about half an hour after

Lothian had been there. The old lady in question lived a jolly, wicked

life until senile paralysis intervened. She is now quite a connoisseur

in religion. I found her, on the occasion of which I speak, lying back

upon her pillows with a perfectly rapturous expression on her wicked

and wrinkled old face. 'Oh, Mr. Lothian's been, sir!' she said, 'Oh,

'twas beautiful! He gave me five shillings and then he knelt down and

prayed. I never heard such praying--meaning no disrespect, sir, of

course. But it was beautiful. The tears were rolling down Mr. Lothian's

cheeks!' 'Mr. Lothian is very kind,' I said. 'He's wonnerful,' she

replied, 'for he was really as drunk as a Lord the whole time, though

he didn't see as I saw it. Fancy praying so beautiful and him like

that. What a brain!'"

Morton Sims burst out laughing, he could not help it. "All the same,"

he said at length, "it's certainly rather scandalous."

Medley made a hurried deprecating movement of his hands. "No, no!" he

said, "don't think that. I am over-emphasising things. Those two

instances are quite isolated. In a general way Lothian is just like any

one else. To speak quite frankly, Doctor, I'm not a safe guide when

Gilbert Lothian is discussed."

"Yes?"

"For this reason. I admire and reverence Mrs. Lothian as I have never

reverenced any other woman. Now and then I have met saint-like people,

and the more saint-like they were--I hope I am not cynical--the less of

comely humanity they seemed to have. Only once have I met a saint

quietly walking this world with sane and happy footsteps. And that is

Mary Lothian."

There was a catch and tremble in the voice of the elderly clergyman.

Morton Sims, who had liked him from the first, now felt more drawn to

him than at any other time during their morning talk and walk.

"Now you see why I am a little bitter about Gilbert Lothian! I don't

think that he is worthy of such a perfect wife as he has got! I'll take

you to tea with her this afternoon and you will see!"

"I should like to meet her very much. Lothian is not here then?"

"He has been away for a week or so, but he is returning to-night. Our

old postman, who knows everything, told me so at least."

The two men continued their walk through the village until lunch time,

when they separated.

At three o'clock a maid brought a note from the Rectory to the "Haven."

In the letter Medley said that he had been summoned to Wordingham by

telegram and could not take the doctor to call on Mrs. Lothian.

The doctor spent the afternoon reading in the garden. He took tea among

the flowers there, and after dinner, as it was extremely hot, he once

more sought his deck chair under the mulberry tree in front of the

house. Not a breath of air stirred. Now and then a cockchafer boomed

through the heavy dark, and at his feet some glowworms had lit their

elfin lamps.

There was thunder in the air too, it was murmuring ten miles away over

the Wash, and now and again the sky above the marshes was lit with

flickering green and violet fires.

A definite depression settled down upon the doctor's spirits and

something seemed to be like a load upon lungs and brain.

He always kept himself physically fit. In London, during his busy life,

walking, which was the exercise he loved best, was not possible. So he

fenced, and swam a good deal at the Bath Club, of which he was a

member.

For three days now, he had taken no exercise whatever. He had been

arranging his new household.

"Liver!" he thought to himself. "That is why I am melancholy and

depressed to-night. And then the storm that is hanging about has its

effect too. But hardly any one realises that the liver is the seat of

the emotions! It should be said--more truly--that such a one died of a

broken liver, not a broken heart!" . . .

He sighed. His imaginings did not amuse him to-night. His vitality was

lowered. That sick ennui which lies behind the thunder was upon him. As

the storm grew nearer through the vast spaces of the night, so his

psychic organism responded to its approach. Some uneasy imp had got

into the barracks of his brain and was beating furiously upon the

cerebral drum.

The vast and level landscape, the wide night, were alike to be

dramatised by the storm.

And so, also, in the sphere of his thought, upon that secret stage

where, after all, everything really happens, there was drama and

disturbance. The level-minded scientist in Dr. Morton Sims drooped its

head and bowed to the imperious onslaught. The man of letters in him

awoke. Strange and fantastic influences were abroad this night and

would have their way even with this cool sane person.

He knew what was happening to him as the night grew hotter, the

lightning more frequent. He, the Ego of him, was slipping away from the

material plane and entering that psychic country which he knew of and

dreaded for its strange allurements.

Imaginative by nature and temperament, with a something of the artist

in him, it was his habit to starve and repress that side of him as much

as he was able.

He knew the unfathomable gulf that separated the psychical from the

physiological. It was in the sphere of physiology that his work lay,

here he was great, there must be no divided allegiance.

There was a menacing stammer of thunder. A certain line of verse came

into his mind, a line of Lothian's.

"_Oh dreadful trumpets sounding,

Pealing and resounding,

From the hid battlements of eternity!_"

"I will take a ten mile walk to-morrow," he said to himself, and

resolutely wrenched his thoughts towards material things. There was, he

remembered with a slight shudder, that appalling passage in a recent

letter from Mrs. Daly--

. . . "Six weeks ago a tippler was put into an alms-house in this

State. Within a few days he had devised various expedients to

procure rum, but had failed. At length he hit on one that was

successful. He went into the wood yard of the establishment, placed

one hand upon the block, and with an axe in the other struck it off

at a single blow. With the stump raised and streaming he ran into

the house and cried, 'Get some rum. Get some rum. My hand is off.'

In the confusion and bustle of the occasion a bowl of rum was

brought, into which he plunged the bleeding member of his body,

then raising the bowl to his mouth, drank freely and exultantly

exclaimed, 'Now I am satisfied!'"

Horrible! Why was it possible that men might poison themselves so?

Would all the efforts of himself and his friends ever make such

monstrous happenings cease? Oh, that it might be so!

They were breaking up stubborn land. The churches were against them,

but the Home Secretary of the day was their friend--in the future the

disease might be eradicated from society.

Oh, that it might be so! for the good of the human race!

How absolutely horrible it was that transparent, coloured liquids in

bottles of glass--liquids that could be bought everywhere for a few

pence--should have the devilish power to transform men, not to beasts,

but to monsters.

The man of whom Mrs. Daly had written--hideously alcoholised and

insane! Hancock, the Hackney murderer, poisoned, insane!

The doctor had been present at the post-mortem, after the execution. It

had all been so pitiably clear to the trained eye! The liver, the

heart, told him their tale very plainly. Any General Practitioner would

have known. Ordinary cirrhosis, the scar tissue perfectly plain; the

lime-salts deposited in the wasting muscles of the heart. But Morton

Sims had found far more than this in that poisoned shell which had

held, also, a poisoned soul. He had marked the little swellings upon

the long nerve processes that run from the normal cell of the healthy

brain. Something that looked like a little string of beads under the

microscope had told him all he wanted to know.

And that little string of beads, the lesions which interfered with the

proper passage of nerve impulses, the scraps of tissue which the

section-cutter had thinned and given to the lens, had meant torture and

death to a good woman.

How dreadfully women suffered! Their husbands and lovers and brothers

became brutes to them. The women who were merely struck or beaten now

and then were fortunate. The women whose lives were made one long

ingenious torture were legion.

Dr. Morton Sims was a bachelor. He was more. He was a man with a virgin

mind. Devoted always to the line of work he had undertaken he had

allowed nothing else to disturb his life. For him passion was explained

by pathological and physiological occurrences. That is to say, passion

in others. For himself, he had allowed nothing that was sensual to

interfere with his progress, or to influence the wise order of his

days.

Therefore, he reverenced women.

Hidden in his mind was that latent adoration that the Catholic feels

about the Real Presence upon an altar.

A good Knight of Science, he was as pure and pellucid in thought upon

these matters as any Knight who bore the descending Dove upon his

shield and flung into the _mêlée_ calling upon the name of the

Paraclete.

In his own fashion, and with his own vision of what it was, Morton

Sims, also, was one of those seeking the Holy Grail.

He adored his sister, a sweet woman made for love and motherhood but

who had chosen the virgin life of renunciation that she might help the

world.

Women! Yes, it was women who suffered. There were tears in his mind as

he thought of Women. Before a good woman he always wished to kneel.

How heavy the night was!

He identified it with the sorrowful weight and pressure of the Fiend

Alcohol upon the world. And there was a woman, here near him, a woman

with a sweet and fragrant nature--so the old clergyman had said.

On her, too, the weight must be lying. For Mary Lothian there must be

horror in the days. . . .

"One thing I _will_ do," he said to the dark--and that he spoke aloud

was sufficient indication of his state of mind--"I'll get hold of

Gilbert Lothian while I am here. I'll save him at any rate, if I can.

And it is quite obvious that he cannot be too far gone for salvation.

I'll save him from an end no less frightful than that of his brother of

whom he has probably never heard. The good woman he seems to have

married shall be happy! The man's fine brain shan't be lost. This shall

be my special experiment while I am down here. Coincidence, no less

than good-will, makes that duty perfectly plain for me."

As he stood there, glad to have found some definite material thing with

which to occupy his mind, a housemaid came through the French windows

of the library. She hurried towards him, ghost-like in her white cap

and apron.

"Are you there, sir?" she said, peering this way and that in the thick

dark.

"Yes, here I am, Condon, what is it?"

"Please, sir, there's been an accident. A gentleman has been thrown out

of a dog-cart. It's a Mr. Lothian. His man's here, and the gentleman's

wife has heard you're in the village and there's no other doctor nearer

than Wordingham."

"I'll come at once," Morton Sims said.

He hurried through the quiet library with its green-shaded reading lamp

and went into the hall.

Tumpany was standing there, his cap held before him in two hands,

naval-fashion. His round red face was streaming with perspiration, his

eyes were frightened and he exhaled a strong smell of beer.

His hand went up mechanically and his left foot scraped upon the

oilcloth of the hall as Morton Sims entered.

"Beg your pardon, sir," Tumpany began at once, "but I'm Mr. Gilbert

Lothian's man. Master have had an accident. I was driving him home from

the station when the horse stumbled just outside the village. Master

was pitched out on his head. My mistress would be very grateful if you

could come at once."

"Certainly, I will," Sims answered, looking at the man with a keen,

experienced eye which made him shift uneasily upon his feet. "Wait here

for a moment."

He hurried back into the library and put lint, cotton-wool and a pair

of blunt-nosed scissors into a hand-bag. Then, calling for a candle and

lighting it, he went out into the stable yard and up to the room above

the big barn, emerging in a minute or two with a bottle of antiseptic

lotion.

These were all the preparations he could make until he knew more. The

thing might be serious or it might be little or nothing. Fortunately

Lothian's house was not five minutes' walk from the "Haven." If

instruments were required he could fetch them in a very short time.

As he left the house with Tumpany, he noticed that the man lurched upon

the step. Quite obviously he was half intoxicated.

With a cunning born of long experience of inebriate men, the doctor

affected a complete unconsciousness of what he had discovered. If he

put the man upon his guard he would get nothing out of him, that was

quite certain.

"He's made a direct statement so far," the doctor thought. "He's only

on the border-land of intoxication. For as long as he thinks I have

noticed nothing he will be coherent. Directly he realises that I have

spotted his state he'll become confused and ashamed and he won't be

able to tell me anything."

"This is very unfortunate," he said in a smooth and confidential voice.

"I do hope it is nothing very serious. Of course I know your master

very well by name."

"Yessir," Tumpany answered thickly, but with a perceptible note of

pleasure in his voice. "Yessir, I should say Master is one of the best

shots in Norfolk. You'd have heard of him, of course."

"But how did it happen?"

"This 'ere accident, sir?" said Tumpany rather vaguely, his mind

obviously running upon his master's achievements among the wild geese

of the marshes.

"Yes, the accident," the doctor answered in his smooth, kindly

voice--though it would have given him great relief to have boxed the

ears of his beery guide.

"I was driving master home, sir. It's not our trap. We don't keep one.

We hires in the village, but the man as the trap belongs to couldn't

go. So I drove, sir."

Movement had stirred up the fumes of alcohol in this barrel! Oh, the

interminable repetitions, the horrid incapacity for getting to the

point of men who were drunk! Lives of the utmost value had been lost by

fools like this--great events in the history of the world had turned

upon an extra pot of beer! But patience, patience!

"Yes, you drove, and the horse stumbled. Did the horse come right

down?"

"I'm not much of a whip, sir, as you may say, though I know about

ordinary driving. They say that a sailor-man is no good with a horse.

But that isn't true."

Yet despite the irritation of his mind, the necessity for absolute

self-control, the expert found time to make a note of this further

instance of the intolerable egotism that alcohol induces in its slaves.

"But I expect you drove very well, indeed! Then the horse did _not_

come right down!"

Just at the right moment, carefully calculated to have its effect, the

doctor's voice became sharper and had a ring of command in it.

There was an instant response.

"No, sir. The cob only stumbled. But master was sitting loose like. He

fell out like a log, sir. He made a noise like a piece of luggage

falling."

"Oh! Did he fall on his head?"

"Yessir. But he had a stiff felt hat on. I got help and as we carried

him into the house he was bleeding awful."

"Curious that he should fall like that. Was he, well, was he quite

himself should you think?"

It was a bow drawn at a venture, and it provoked a reply that instantly

told Morton Sims what he wanted to know.

"Oh, yessir! By all means, sir! Most cert'nly! Master was as sober as a

judge, sir!"

"Of _course_," Sims replied in a surprised tone of voice. "I thought

that he might have been tired by the journey from London."

. . . So it was true then! Lothian was drunk. The thing was obvious.

But this was a good and loyal fellow, not to give his master away.

Morton Sims liked that. He made a note that poor beery Tumpany should

have half a sovereign on the morrow, when he was sober. Then the two

men turned in through the gates of the Old House.

The front door was wide open to the night. The light which flowed out

from the tall lamp upon an oak table in the hall cut into the black

velvet of the drive with a sharply defined wedge of orange-yellow.

There was something ominous in this wide-set door of a frightened

house.

The doctor walked straight into the hall, a small old-fashioned place

panelled in white.

To the right another door stood open. In the doorway stood a

maid-servant with a frightened face. Beyond her, through the archway of

the door, showed the section of a singularly beautiful room.

The maid started. "Oh, you've come, sir!" she said--"in here please,

sir."

The doctor followed the girl into the lit room.

This is what he saw:--

A room with the walls covered with canvas of a delicate oat-meal colour

up to the height of seven feet. Above this a moulded beading of wood

which had been painted vermilion--the veritable post-box red. Above

this again a frieze of pure white paper. At set intervals upon the

canvas were brilliant colour-prints in thin gold frames. The room was

lit with many candles in tall holders of silver.

At one side of it was a table spread for supper, gleaming with delicate

napery and cut glass, peaches in a bowl of red earthenware,

ruby-coloured wine in a jug of German glass with a lid of pewter shaped

like a snake's head.

At the other side of the room was a huge Chesterfield couch,

upholstered in broad stripes of black and olive linen.

The still figure of a man in a tweed suit lay upon the couch. There was

blood upon his face and clotted rust-like stains upon his loosened

collar. A washing-bowl of stained water stood upon the green carpet.

Upon a chair, by the head of the couch a tall woman with shining yellow

hair was sitting. She wore a low-cut evening dress of black, pearls

were about the white column of her throat, a dragon fly of emeralds set

in aluminium sparkled in her hair, and upon her wrists were heavy

Moorish bracelets of oxydised silver studded with the bird's egg blue

of the turquoise stone.

For an instant, not of the time but of thought, the doctor was

startled.

Then, as the stately and beautiful woman rose to meet him, he

understood.

She had decked herself, adorned her fair body with all the braveries

she had so that she might be lovely and acceptable to her husband's

eyes as he came home to her. Came home to her . . . like this!

Morton Sims had shaken the slim hand, murmured some words of

condolence, and hastened to the motionless figure upon the couch.

His deft fingers were feeling, pressing, touching with a wonderful

instinct, the skull beneath the tumbled masses of blood-clotted hair.

Nothing there, scalp wounds merely. Arms, legs--yes, these were

uninjured too. The collar-bone was intact under the flesh that

cushioned it. The skin of the left wrist was lacerated and

bruised--Lothian, of course, had been sitting on the left side of the

driver when he fell like a log from the gig--but the bones of the hand

and arm were normal. There was not a single symptom of brain

concussion. The deep gurgling breathing, the alarming snore-like sound

that came from between the curiously pure and clear-cut lips, meant one

thing only.

Morton Sims stood up.

Mary Lothian was waiting. There was an agony of expectation in her

eyes.

"Not the least reason to be alarmed," said the doctor. "Some nasty cuts

in the scalp, that is all."

She gave a deep sigh, a momentary shudder, and then her face became

calm.

"It is so kind of you to come, Doctor," she said.--"Then that deep

spasmodic breathing--he has not really hurt his head?"

"Not in the least as far as I can say, and I am fairly certain. We must

get him up to bed. Then I can cut away the hair and bandage the wounds.

I must take his temperature also. It's possible--just possible that the

shock may have unpleasant results, though I really don't think it will.

I will give him some bromide though, as soon as he wakes up."

"Ah!" she said. That was all, but it meant everything.

He knew that to this woman, at least, plain-speaking was best.

"Yes," he continued, "I am sorry to say that he is under the influence

of alcohol. He has obviously been drinking heavily of late. I am a

specialist in such matters and I can hardly be mistaken. There is just

a possibility that this may bring on delirium tremens--only a

possibility. He has never suffered from that?"

"Oh, never. Thank God never!" A sob came into her voice. Her face

glowed with the love and tenderness within, the blue eyes seemed set in

a soul rather than in a face, so beautiful had they become. "He's so

good," she said with a wistful smile. "You can't think what a sweet boy

he is when he doesn't drink any horrible things."

"Madam, I have read his poems. I know what an intellect and force lies

drugged upon that sofa there. But we will soon have the flame burning

clearly once more. It has been the work of my life to study these

cases."

"Yes, I know, Doctor. I have heard so much of your work."

"Believe then that I am going to save this foolish young man, to give

him back to you and to the world. A free man once more!"

"Free!" she whispered. "Oh, free from his vice!"

"_Vice_, Madam! I thought that all intelligent people understood by

this time. For the last ten years I and my colleagues have been trying

to make them understand! It is not a _vice_ from which your husband

suffers. It is a _disease_!"

He saw that she was pleased that he had spoken to her thus--though he

was in some doubt if she appreciated what he had actually said.

But already the shuttle of an incipient friendship was beginning to

dart between them.

Two high clear souls had met and recognised each other.

"Well, suppose we get him to bed, Doctor," she said. "We can carry him

up between us. There are two maids, and Tumpany is quite sober enough

to help."

"Quite!" the doctor answered. "I rather like that man upon a first

meeting."

Mary laughed--a low contralto laugh. "She has a sense of humour too!"

the doctor thought.

"Yes," she said, "Tumpany is a good fellow at heart. And, like most

people who drink, when he is himself he is a quite delightful person."

She went out into the hall, tall and beautiful, the jewels in her hair

and on her hands sparkling in the candlelight.

Morton Sims took one of the candles from the table and went up to the

couch.

A shadow flickered over the face of the man who was lying there.

It was but momentary, but in that instant the watcher became cold. The

silver of the candle-stick stung the palm of a hand which was suddenly

wet.

This tranquil, lovely room with its soft yellow light, dissolved and

shifted like a scene in a dream. . . .

. . . It was a raw winter's morning. The walls were the whitewashed

walls of a prison mortuary. There was a smell of chloride of

lime. . . .

And lying upon a long zinc slab, with little grooves and depressions

running down to the eye-hole of a drain, was a still figure whose

face was a ghastly caricature of this face, hideously, revoltingly

alike . . .

Mary Lothian, Tumpany, and two maid-servants came into the room, and

with some difficulty the poet was carried upstairs.

He was hardly laid upon his bed when the rain came, falling in great

sheets with a loud noise, cooling and purging the hot air.

CHAPTER III

PSYCHOLOGY OF THE INEBRIATE, AND THE LETTER OF JEWELLED WORDS

"Verbosa ac grandis epistola venit a Capreis."

--_Juvenal._

It was three days after the accident.

Gilbert lay in bed. His head was crossed with bandages, his wrist was

wrapped with lint and a wet compress was upon the ankle of his strained

left foot.

The windows of his bedroom were wide to the sun and air of the morning.

There were two pleasant droning sounds. A bee was flying round the

room, and down below in the garden Tumpany was mowing the strip of lawn

before the house. Gilbert was very tranquil. He was wrapped round with

a delicious peace of mind and body. He seemed to be floating in some

warm ether of peace.

There was a table by the side of his bed. In a slender vase upon it was

a single marguerite daisy with its full green stem, its rays of

white--Chinese white in a box of colours--round the central gold. Close

to his hand, upon the white turned down sheet was a copy of "John

Inglesant." It was a book he loved and could always return to, and he

had had his copy bound in most sumptuous purple.

Mary came into the bedroom.

She was carrying a little tray upon which there was a jug of milk and a

bottle of soda water. There was a serene happiness upon her face. She

had him now--the man she loved! He was hers, her own without

possibility of interference. She was his Providence, he depended

utterly upon her.

There are not many women like this in life, but there are some. Perhaps

they were more frequent in the days of the past. Women who have no

single thought of Self: women whose thoughts are always prayers: women

in whose veins love takes the place of blood, whose hearts are cisterns

of sweet charity, whose touch means healing, whose voices are like

harps that sound forgiveness and devotion alone.

She put the tray upon the bedside table and sat down upon the bed,

taking his unwounded hand in hers, stroking it with the soft cushions

of her fingers, holding up its well-shaped plumpness as if it were a

toy.

"There is something so comic about your hands, darling!" she said. "They

are so nice and fat and jolly. They make me want to laugh!"

To Gilbert his wife's happy voice seemed but part of the dream-like

peace which lay upon him. He was drowsy with incense. How fresh and

fragrant she was! he thought idly. He pulled her down to him and kissed

her and the gilded threads of her hair brushed his forehead. Her lips

were cool as violets with the dew upon their petals. She belonged to

him. She was part of the pleasant furniture of the room, the hour!

"How are you feeling, darling? You're looking so much better!"

"My head hurts a little, but not much. But my nerves are ever so much

better. Look how steady my hand is." He held it out with childish

pride.

"And you'll see, Molly dear, that when I'm shaved, my complexion will

be quite nice again! It's a horrid nuisance not to be able to shave. Do

I look very bad?"

"No, you wicked image! You're a vain little wretch, Gillie, really!"

"I'm quite sure that I'm not. But, Molly, it's so nice to be feeling

better. Master of one's self. Not frightened about things."

"Of course it is, you old stupid! If you were always good how much

happier you'd be! Take my advice. Do what I tell you, and everything

will come right. You've got a great big brain, but you're a silly boy,

too! Think how much more placid you are now. Never take any more

spirits again!"

"No, I won't, darling. I promise you I won't."

"That's right, dear. And this nice new doctor will help you. You like

him, don't you?"

"Molly! What a dear simple fool you are! _Like_ him? You don't in

the least realise who he is. It's Morton Sims, Morton Sims himself!

He's a fearfully important person. Twice, they say, he's refused to

take a baronetcy. He's come down here to do research work. It's an

enormous condescension on his part to come and plaster up my head. It's

really rather like Lord Rosebery coming to shave one! And he'll send in

a bill for about fifty pounds!"

"He won't, Gillie dear. I'm sure. But if he does, what's the use of

worrying? I'll pay it out of my own money, and I've got nearly as much

as you--nasty miser!"

They laughed together at this. Mary had three or four hundreds a year

of her own, Gilbert a little more, independently of what he earned by

writing. Mary was mean with her money. That is to say, she saved it up

to give to poorer people and debated with herself about a new frock

like a chancellor of the Exchequer about the advisability of a fresh

tax. And Lothian didn't care and never thought about money. He had no

real sense of personal property. He liked spending money. He was

extravagant for other people. If he bought a rare book, a special

Japanese colour-print, any desirable thing--he generally gave it away

to some one at once. He really liked people with whom he came into

contact to have delightful things quite as much as he liked to have

them himself.

Nor was this an outcome of the poisoned state of his body, his brain,

and--more terrible than all!--of his mind. It was genuine human

kindness, an eager longing that others should enjoy things that he

himself enjoyed so poignantly.

But what he gave must be the things that _he_ liked, though to all

_necessity_ he was liberal. A sick poor person without proper

nourishment, a child without a toy, some wretched tramp without tobacco

for his pipe--to him these were all tragedies, equal in their appeal to

his charity. And this was because of his trained power of psychology,

his profound insight into the minds of others, though even that was

marred by a Rousseau-like belief that every one was good and decent at

heart! Still, the need of the dying village consumptive for milk and

calf's-foot jelly, was no more vivid in his mind than the need of the

tramp for a smoke. As far as he was able, it was his Duty, his happy

duty, to satisfy the wants of both.

Mary was different.

The consumptive, yes! Stout flannel shirts for old shepherds who must

tend the birth of lambs on bitter Spring midnights. Food for the tramp,

too--no dusty wayfarer should go unsatisfied from the Lothians' house!

But not the subsequent shilling for beer and shag and the humble luxury

of the Inn kitchen that Gilbert would have bestowed.

Such was her wise penuriousness in its calm economy of the angels!

Yet, her husband had his economy also. Odd as it was, it was part of

his temperament. If he had bought a rare and perfect object of art, and

then met some one who he saw longed for it, but couldn't afford to have

it in the ordinary way, he took a real delight in giving it. But it

would have been easier for him to lop off a hand than to present one of

the Toftrees' novels to any one who was thirsting for something to

read. He would have thought it immoral to do so.

He had a great row with his wife when she presented a gaudy pair of

pink-gilt vases to an ex-housemaid who was about to be married.

"But dear, she's _delighted_," Mary had said.

"You've committed a crime! It's disgraceful. Oblige me by never doing

anything of the sort again. Why didn't you give her a ham?"

"Molly, may I have a cigarette?"

"Hadn't you better have a pipe? The doctor said that you smoked far too

many cigarettes and that they were bad for you."

For three days Lothian had had nothing to drink but a glass of Burgundy

at lunch and dinner. Lying in bed, perfectly tranquil, calling upon no

physical resources, the sense of nerve-rest within him was grateful and

profound.

But the inebriate lives almost entirely upon momentary sensation. The

slightest recrudescence of health makes him forget the horrors of the

past.

In the false calm of his quiet room, his tended state, the love and

care surrounding him, Gilbert had already come to imagine that he was

what he hoped to be in his saner moments. He had, at the moment, not

the least desire for a drink. In three days he was already complacent

and felt himself strong!

Yet his nerves were still unstable and every impulse was on a hair

trigger, so to speak.

The fact became evident at once.

He knew well enough that when he began to smoke pipes the most pressing

desire of the other narcotic, alcohol, became numbed. Cigarettes

stimulated that desire, or at least accompanied it. He could not live

happily without cigarettes.

He knew that Mary knew this also--experience of him had given her the

sad knowledge--and he was quite certain that Dr. Morton Sims must know

too.

The extraordinary transitions of the drunkard from one mental state to

another are more symptomatic than any other thing about him. Gilbert's

face altered and became sullen. A sharp and acid note tuned his voice.

"I see," he said, "you've been talking me over with Morton Sims. Thank

you so _very_ much!"

He began to brag about himself, a thing he would have been horrified to

do to any one but Mary. Even with her it was a weak weapon, and

sometimes in his hands a mean and cruel one too.

". . . You were kind enough to marry me, but you don't in the least

seem to understand whom you have married! Is my art nothing to you? Do

you realise who I am at all--in any way? Of course you don't! You're

too big a fool to do so. But other women know! At any rate, I beg you

will not talk over your husband with stray medical men who come along.

You might spare me that at least. I should have thought you would have

had more sense of personal dignity than that!"

She winced at the cruelty of his words, at the wounding bitterness

which he knew so well how to throw into his voice. But she showed no

sign of it. He was a poisoned man, and she knew it. Morton Sims had

made it plainer than ever to her at their talks downstairs during the

last three days. It wasn't Gillie who said these hard things, it was

the Fiend Alcohol that lurked within him and who should be driven out.

. . .

It wasn't her Gilbert, really!

In her mind she said one word. "Jesus!" It was a prayer, hope, comfort

and control. The response was instant.

That secret help had been discovered long since by her. Of her own

searching it had come, and then, one day she had picked up one of her

husband's favourite books and had read of this very habit she had

acquired.

"Inglesant found that repeating the name of Jesus simply in the

lonely nights kept his brain quiet when it was on the point of

distraction, being of the same mind as Sir Charles Lucas when 'Many

times calling upon the sacred name of Jesus,' he was shot dead at

Colchester."

The spiritual telegraphy that goes on between Earth and Heaven, from

God to His Saints is by no means understood by the World.

"You old duffer," Mary said. "Really, you are a perfect blighter--as

you so often call me! Haven't you just been boasting about feeling so

much better? And, fat wretch! am I not doing everything possible for

you. _Of course_ I've talked you over with the doctor. We're going

to make you right! We're going to make you slim and beautiful once

more. My dear thing! it's all arranged and settled. Don't bubble like a

frog! Don't look at your poor Missis as if she were a nasty smell! It's

no use, Gillie dear, we've got you now!"

No momentary ill-humour could stand against this. He was, after all,

quite dependent upon the lady with the golden hair who was sitting upon

his bed.

And it was with no more Oriental complacence, but with a very

humble-minded reverence, that the poet drew his wife to him and kissed

her once more.

". . . But I may have a cigarette, Molly?"

"Of course you may, if you want one. It was only a general sort of

remark that the doctor made. A few cigarettes can't harm any one. Don't

I have two every day myself--since you got me into the habit? But

you've been smoking fifty a day, for _weeks_ before you went to town."

"Oh, Molly! What utter rot! I _never_ have!"

"But you _have_, Gilbert. You smoke the Virginian ones in the tins

of fifty. You always have lots of tins, but you never think how they

come into the house. I order them from the grocer in Wordingham.

They're put down in the monthly book--so you see I _know_!"

"Fifty a day! Of course, it's appalling."

"Well, you're going to be a good boy now, a perfect angel. Here you

are, here are three cigarettes for you. And you're going to have a

sweet-bread for lunch and I'm going to cook it for you myself!"

"Dear old dear!"

"Yes, I am. And Tumpany wants to see you. Will you see him? Dr. Morton

Sims won't be here for another half hour."

"Yes, I'll have Tumpany up. Best chap I know, Tumpany is. But why's the

doctor coming? My head's healed up all right now."

There was a whimsical note in his voice as he asked the question.

"You know, darling! He wants to have a long talk with you."

"Apropos of the reformation stakes I suppose."

"To give you back your wonderful brain in peace, darling!" she

answered, bending down, catching him to her breast in her sweet arms.

". . . Gillie! Gillie! I love you so!"

"And now suppose you send up Tumpany, dear."

"Yes, at once."

She went away, smiling and kissing her hand, hoping with an intensity

of hope which burned within her like a flame, that when the doctor came

and talked to Gilbert as had been arranged, the past might be wiped out

and a new life begun in this quiet village of East England.

In a minute there was a knock at the bedroom door.

"Come in," Gilbert called out.

Tumpany entered.

Upon the red face of that worthy person there was a grin of sheer

delight as he made his bow and scrape.

Then he held up his right arm. He was grasping a leash of mallard, and

the metallic blue-green and white upon the wings of the ducks shone in

the sun.

Gilbert leapt in his bed, and then put his hand to his bandaged head

with a half groan.--"Good God!" he cried, "how the deuce did you get

those?"

"First of August, sir. Wildfowling begins!"

"Heavens! so it is. I ought to have been out! I never thought about the

date. Damn you for pitching me out of the dog-cart, William!"

"Yessir! You've told me so before," Tumpany answered, his face

reflecting the smile upon his master's.

"What are they, flappers?"

"No, sir, mature birds. I was out on the marshes before daylight. The

birds were coming off the meils--and North Creake flat. First day since

February, sir! You know what I was feeling like!"

"Don't I, oh, don't I, by Jove! Now tell me. What were you using?"

"Well, sir, I thought I would fire at nothing but duck on the first

day. Just to christen the day, sir. So I used five and a half and

smokeless diamond. Your cartridges."

"What gun?"

"Well, I used my old pigeon gun, sir. It's full choke, both barrels and

on the meils it's always a case of long shots."

"Why didn't you have one of my guns? The long-chambered twelve, or the

big Greener ten-bore--they're there in the cupboard in the gun room,

you've got the key! Did a whole sord of mallard come over, or were

those three stragglers?"

"A sord, sir. The two drakes were right and left shots and this duck

came down too. As I said to the mistress just now, 'last year,' I said,

'Mr. Gilbert and I were out for two mornings after the first of August

and we never brought back nothing but a brace of curlew--and now here's

a leash of duck, M'm.'"

"If you'd had a bigger gun, and a sord came over, you'd have got a bag,

William! Why the devil didn't you take the ten-bore?"

"Well, sir, I won't say as I didn't go and have a look at 'im in the

gun room--knowing how they're flighting just now and that a big gun

would be useful. But with you lying in bed I couldn't do it. So I went

out and shot just for the honour of the house, as it were."

"Well, I shall be up in a day or two, William, and I'll see if I can't

wipe your eye!"

"I hope you will, sir, I'm sure. There's quite a lot of mallard about,

early as it is."

"I'll get among them soon, Tumpany!"

"Yessir--the Mistress I think, sir, and the doctor."

Tumpany's ears were keen, like those of most wildfowlers,--he heard

voices coming along the passage towards the bedroom.

The door opened and Morton Sims came in with Mary.

He shook hands with Gilbert, admired Tumpany's leash of duck, and then,

left alone with the poet, sat down upon the bed.

The two men regarded each other with interest. They were both

"personalities" and both of them made their mark in their several ways.

"Good heavens!" the doctor was thinking. "What a brilliant brain's

hidden behind those lint bandages! This is the man who can make the

throat swell with sorrow and the heart leap high with hope! With all my

learning and success, I can only bring comfort to people's bowels or

cure insomnia. This fellow here can heal souls--like a priest! Even for

me--now and then--he has unlocked the gates of fairyland."

"Good Lord!" Gilbert said to himself. "What wouldn't I give to be a

fellow like this fellow. He is great. He can put a drug into one's body

and one's soul awakes! He's got a magic wand. He waves it, and sanity

returns. He pours out of a bottle and blind eyes once more see God,

dull ears hear music! I go and get drunk at Amberleys' house and cringe

before a Toftrees, Mon Dieu! This man can never go away from a house

without leaving a sense of loss behind him."

--"Well, how are you, Mr. Lothian?"

"Much better, thanks, Doctor. I'm feeling quite fit, in fact."

"Yes, but you're not, you know. I made a complete examination of you

yesterday, you remember, and now I've tabulated the results."

"Tell me then."

"If you weren't who you are, I wouldn't tell you at all, being who you

are, I will."

Lothian nodded. "Fire away!" he said with his sweet smile, his great

charm of manner--all the greater for the enforced abstinence of the

last three days--"I shan't funk anything you tell me."

"Very well, then. Your liver is beginning--only beginning--to be

enlarged. You've got a more or less permanent catarrh of the stomach,

and a permanent catarrh of the throat and nasal passages from membranes

inflamed by alcohol and constant cigarette smoking. And there is a hint

of coming heart trouble, too."

Lothian laughed, frankly enough. "I know all that," he said. "Really,

Doctor, there's nothing very dreadful in that. I'm as strong as a

horse, really!"

"Yes, you are, in one way. Your constitution is a fine one. I was

talking to your man-servant yesterday and I know what you are able to

go through when you are shooting in the winter. I would not venture

upon such risks myself even."

"Then everything is for the best, in the best of all possible worlds?"

Gilbert answered lightly, feeling sure that the other would take him.

"Unfortunately, in your case, it's _not_," Morton Sims replied. "You

seem to forget two things about 'Candide'--that Dr. Pangloss was a

failure and a fool, and that one must cultivate one's garden! Voltaire

was a wise man!"

Gilbert dropped his jesting note.

"You've something to say to me," he answered, "probably a good deal

more. Say it. Say anything you like, and be quite certain that I shan't

be offended."

"I will. It's this, Mr. Lothian. Your stomach will go on digesting and

your heart performing its functions long after your brain has gone."

Then there was silence in the sunlit bedroom.

"You think that?" Lothian said at length, in a quiet voice.

"I know it. You are on the verge of terrible nervous and mental

collapse. I'm going to be brutal, but I'm going to speak the truth.

Three months more of drinking as you have been of late and, for all

effective purposes you go out!"

Gilbert's face flushed purple with rage.

"How dare you say such a thing to me, sir?" he cried. "How dare you

tell me, tell _me_, that I have been drinking heavily. You are

certainly wise to say it when there is no witness here!"

Morton Sims smiled sadly. He was quite unmoved by Lothian's rage. It

left him cool. But when he spoke, there was a hypnotic ring in his

voice which caught at the weak and tremulous will of the man upon the

bed and held it down.

"Now really, Mr. Lothian!" he said, "what on earth is the use of

talking like that to me? It means nothing. It does not express your

real thought. Can you suppose that your condition is not an open book

to _me_? You know that you wouldn't speak as you're doing if your

nerves weren't in a terrible state. You have one of the finest minds in

England; don't bring it to irremediable ruin for want of a helping

hand."

Lothian lay back on his pillow breathing quickly. He felt that his

hands were trembling and he pushed them under the clothes. His legs

were twitching and a spasm of cramp-pain shot into the calf of one of

them.

"Look here, Doctor," he said after a moment, "I spoke like a fool,

which I'm not. I have been rather overdoing it lately. My work has been

worrying me and I've been trying to whip myself up with alcohol."

Morton Sims nodded. "Well, we'll soon put you right," he said.

Mary Lothian had told him the true history of the case. For three

years, at least, her husband had been drinking steadily, silent,

persistent, lonely drinking. For a long time, a period of months to her

own fear and horror-quickened knowledge, Lothian had been taking a

quantity of spirits which she estimated at two-thirds of a bottle a

day. Without enlightening her, and adding what an inebriate of this

type could easily procure in addition, the doctor put the true quantity

at about a bottle and a half--say for the last two months certainly.

He knew also, that whatever else Lothian might do, either now or when

he became more confidential, he would lie about the _quantity_ of

spirits he was in the habit of consuming. Inebriates always do.

"Of course," he said, talking in a quiet man-of-the-world voice, "_I_

know what a strain such work as yours must be, and there is certainly

temptation to stimulate flagging energies with some drug. Hundreds of

men do it, doctors too!--literary men, actors, legal men!"

He noted immediately the slight indication of relief in the patient,

who thought he had successfully deceived him, and he saw also that sad

and doubting anxiety in the eyes, which says so poignantly, "what must

I do to be saved?"

Could he save this man?

Everything was against it, his history, his temperament, the length to

which he had already gone. The whole stern and horrible statistics of

experience were dead against it.

But he could, and would, try. There was a chance.

A great doctor must think more rapidly than a general upon the field of

battle; as quickly indeed as one who faces a deadly antagonist with the

naked foil. There was one way in which to treat this man. He must tell

him more about the psychology--and even if necessary the pathology--of

his own case than he could tell any ordinary patient.

"I'll tell you something," he said, "and I expect your personal

experience will back me up. You've no 'craving' for alcohol I expect?

On the sensual side there's no sense of indulging in a pleasurable

self-gratification?"

Lothian's face lighted up with interest and surprise. "Not a _bit_," he

said excitedly, "that's exactly where people make a mistake! I don't

mind telling you that when I've taken more than I ought, people, my

wife and so on, have remonstrated with me. But none of them ever seem

to understand. They talk about a 'craving' and so on. Religious people,

even the cleverest, don't seem to understand. I've heard Bishop

Moultrie preach a temperance sermon and talk about the 'vice' of

indulgence, the hideous 'craving' and all that. But it never seemed to

explain anything to me, nor did it to all the men who drink too much, I

ever met."

"There _is_ no craving," the Doctor answered quietly--"in the sense

these people use the word. And there is no vice. It is a disease. They

mean well, they even effect some cures, but they are misinformed."

"Well, it's very hard to answer them at any rate. One somehow knows

within oneself that they're all wrong, but one can't explain."

"I can explain to you--I couldn't explain to, well to your man Tumpany

for instance, _he_ couldn't understand."

"Tumpany only drinks beer," Lothian answered in a tone of voice that a

traveller in Thibet would use in speaking of some one who had ventured

no further from home than Boulogne.

It was another indication, an unconscious betrayal. His defences were

fast breaking down.

Morton Sims felt the keen, almost æsthetic pleasure the artist knows

when he is doing good work. Already this mind was responsive to the

skilled touch and the expected, melancholy music sounding from that

injured instrument.

"He seems a very good sort, that fellow of yours," the doctor continued

indifferently, and then, with a more eager and confidential manner,

"But let me explain where the ordinary temperance people are wrong.

First, tell me, haven't you at times quarrelled with friends, because

you've become suspicious of them, and have imagined some treacherous

and concealed motive in the background?"

"I don't know that I've quarrelled much."

"Well, perhaps not. But you've felt suspicious of people a good deal.

You've wondered whether people were thinking about you. In all sorts of

little ways you've had these thoughts constantly. Perhaps if a

correspondent who generally signs himself 'yours sincerely' has

inadvertently signed 'yours truly' you have worried a good deal and

invented all sorts of reasons. If some person of position you know

drives past you, and his look or wave of the hand does not appear to be

as cordial as usual, don't you invent all kinds of distressing reasons

to account for what you imagine?"

Lothian nodded.

His face was flushed again, his eyes--rather yellow and bloodshot

still--were markedly startled, a little apprehensive.

"If this man knew so much, a wizard who saw into the secret places of

the mind, what more might he not know?"

But it was impossible for him to realise the vast knowledge and supreme

skill of the pleasant man with the cultured voice who sat on the side

of the bed.

The fear was perfectly plain to Morton Sims.

"May I have a cigarette?" he said, taking his case from his pocket.

Lothian became more at ease at once.

"Well,"--puff-puff--"these little suspicions are characteristic of the

disease. The man who is suffering from it says that these feelings of

resistance cannot arise in himself. Therefore, they must be caused by

somebody. Who more likely then than by those who are in social contact

with him?"

"I see that and it's very true. Perhaps truer than you can know!"

Lothian said with a rather bitter smile. "But how does all this explain

what we were talking about at first. The 'Craving' and all that?"

"I am coming to it now. I had to make the other postulate first. In

this way. We have seen in this suspicion--one of many instances--that

an entirely fictitious world is created in the mind of a man by

alcohol. It is one in which he _must_ live. It is peopled with

unrealities and phantasies. As he goes on drinking, this world becomes

more and more complex. Then, when a man becomes in a state which we

call 'chronic alcoholism' a new Ego, a new self is created. _This new

personality fails to recognise that it was ever anything else_--mark

this well--_and proceeds to harmonise everything with the new state_.

And now, as the new consciousness, the new Ego, is the compelling mind

of the moment, the Inebriate is terrified at any weakening in it. _The

preservation of this new Ego seems to be his only guard against the_

imagined _pitfalls and treacheries_. Therefore he does all in his power

to strengthen his defences. He continues alcohol, because it is to him

the only possible agent by which he can _keep grasp of his identity_.

For him it is no poison, no excess. It sustains his very being. His

_stomach_ doesn't crave for it, as the ignorant will tell you. It has

no _sensual_ appeal. Lots of inebriates hate the taste of alcohol. In

advanced stages it is quite a matter of indifference to a man what form

of alcohol he drinks. If he can't get whiskey, he will drink methylated

spirit. He takes the drug simply because of the necessity for the

maintenance of a condition the falsity of which he is unable to

appreciate."

Lothian lay thinking.

The lucid statement was perfectly clear to him and absorbingly

interesting in its psychology. He was a profound psychologist himself,

though he did not apply his theories personally, a spectator of others,

turning away from the contemplation of himself during the past years in

secret terror of what he might find there.

How new this was, yet how true. It shed a flood of light upon so much

that he had failed to understand!

"Thank you," he said simply. "I feel certain that what you say is

true."

Morton Sims nodded with pleasure. "Perhaps nothing is quite true," he

said, "but I think we are getting as near truth in these matters as we

can. What we have to do, is to let the whole of the public know too.

When once it is thoroughly understood what Inebriety is, then the

remedy will be applied, the only remedy."

"And that is?"

"I'll tell you our theories at my next visit. You must be quiet now."

"But there are a dozen questions I want to ask you--and my own case?"

"I am sending you some medicine, and we will talk more next time. And,

if you like, I will send you a paper upon the Psychology of the

Alcoholic, which I read the other day before the Society for the Study

of Alcoholism. It may interest you. But don't necessarily take it all

for gospel! I'm only feeling my way."

"I'll compare it with such experiences as I have had--though of course

I'm not what you'd call an _inebriate_." There was a lurking

undercurrent of suspicion creeping into his voice once more.

"Of course not! Did I ever say so, Mr. Lothian! But what you propose

will be of real value to me, if I may have your conclusions."

Lothian was flattered. He would show this great scientist how entirely

capable he could be of understanding and appreciating his researches.

He would collaborate with him. It would be new and exhilarating!

"I'll make notes," he replied, "and please use them as you will!"

The doctor rose. "Thanks," he answered. "It will be a help. But what we

really require is an alcoholic De Quincey to detail in his graphic

manner the memories of his past experiences--a man who has the power

and the courage to lay open the cravings and the writhings of his

former slavery, and to compare them with his emancipated self."

Lothian started. When the kindly, keen-faced man had gone, he lay long

in thought.

In the afternoon Mary came to him. "Do you mind if I leave you for an

hour or two, dear?" she asked. "I have some things to get and I thought

I would drive into Wordingham."

"Of course not, I shall be quite all right."

"Well, be sure and ring for anything you want."

"Very well. I shall probably sleep. By the way, I thought of asking

Dickson Ingworth down for a few days. There are some duck about, you

know, and he can bring his gun."

"Do, darling, if you would like him."

"Very well, then. I wonder if you'd write a note for me, explaining

that I'm in bed, but shall be up to-morrow. Supposing you ask him to

come in a couple of days."

"Yes, I will," she replied, kissing him with her almost maternal,

protective air, "and I'll post it in Wordingham."

When she had left the room he began to smoke slowly.

He felt a certain irritation at all this love and regard, a discontent.

Mary was always the same. With his knowledge of her, he could predict

with absolute accuracy what she would do in almost every given moment.

She would do the right thing, the kind and wise thing, but the certain,

the predicted thing. She lived from a great depth of being and peace

personified was hers, the peace of God indeed!--but--

"She has no changes, no surprises," he thought, "all even surface, even

depth."

He admired all her care and watchfulness of him with deep æsthetic

pleasure. It was beautiful and he loved beauty. But now and then, it

bored him as applied to himself. After six months of the unchanging

gold and blue of Italy and Greece, he remembered how he had longed for

a grey, weeping sky, with ashen cirrus clouds, heaped tumuli of

smoke-grey and cold pearl. And sometimes after a lifeless, rotting

autumn and an iron-winter, how every fibre cried out for the sun and

the South!

He remembered that a man of letters, who had got into dreadful trouble

and had served a period of imprisonment, had remarked to him that the

food of penal servitude was plentiful and good, but that it was its

dreadful monotony that made it a contributory torture.

And who could live for ever upon honey-comb? Not he at any rate.

Mary was "always her sweet self"--just like a phrase in a girl's novel.

There were men who liked that, and preferred it, of course. Even when

she was angry with him, he knew exactly how the quarrel would go--a

tune he had heard many times before. The passion of their early love

had faded; as it must always do. She was beautiful and desirable still,

but too calm, too peaceful, sometimes!

This was one of those times. One must be trained to appreciate Heaven

properly, Paradise must be experienced first--otherwise, would not

almost every one want a little holiday sometimes? He thought of a

meeting of really good people, men and women--one stumbled in upon such

a thing now and then. How appallingly dull they generally were! Did

they never crave for madder music and stronger wine?

. . . He could not read. Restless and rebellious thoughts occupied

his mind.

The Fiend Alcohol was at work once more, though Lothian had no

suspicion of it. The new and evil Ego, created by alcohol, which the

doctor had told him of, was awake within him, asserting itself,

stirring uneasily, finding its identity diminishing, its vitality

lowered and thus clamant for its rights.

And if this, in all its horror, is not true demoniacal possession, what

else is? What more does the precise scientific language of those who

study the psychology of the inebriate mean than "He was possessed of a

Devil"?

The fiend, the new Ego, went on with its work as the poet lay there and

the long lights of the summer afternoon filled the room with gold-dust.

The house was absolutely still. Mary had given orders that there was to

be no noise at all, "in order that the Master might sleep, if he

could."

It was a summer's afternoon, the scent of some flowers below in the

garden came up to Gilbert with a curious familiarity. What _was_

the scent? What memory, which would not come, was it trying to evoke?

A motor-car droned through the village beyond the grounds.

Memory leaped up in a moment.

Of course! The ride to Brighton, the happy afternoon with Rita Wallace.

That was it! He had thought of her a good deal on the journey down from

London--until he had sat in the dining car with those shooting men from

Thetford and had had too many whiskeys and sodas. During the last three

days in bed, she had not "occurred" to him vividly. Yet all the time

there had been something at the back of his mind of which he had been

conscious, but was unable to explain to himself. The nasty knock on his

head, when he had taken a toss from the dogcart, was the reason, no

doubt.

Yet, there had been a distinct sense of hidden thought-treasure,

something to draw upon as it were. And now he knew! and abandoned

himself to the luxury of the discovery.

He must write to her, of course. He had promised to do so at once.

Already she would be wondering. He would write her a wonderful letter.

Such a letter as few men could write, and certainly such as she had

never received. He would put all he knew into it. His sweet girl-friend

should marvel at the jewelled words.

The idea excited him. His pulses began to beat quicker, his eyes grew

brighter. But he would not do it now. Night was the time for such a

present as he would make for her, when all the house was sleeping and

Mary was in her own room. Then, in the night-silence, his brain should

be awake, weaving a coloured tapestry of prose with words for threads,

this new, delicious impulse of friendship the shuttle to carry them.

Like some coarser epicure, arranging and gloating over the details of a

feast to come, he made his plans.

He pressed the electric button at the side of the bed and Blanche, the

housemaid, answered the summons.

"Where is Tumpany, Blanche?" he asked.

"In the garden, sir."

"Well, tell him to come up, please. I want to speak to him."

In a minute or two heavy steps resounded down the corridor, accompanied

by a curious scuffling noise. There was a knock, the door opened, a

yelp of joy, and the Dog Trust had leapt upon the bed and was rolling

over and over upon the counterpane, licking his master's hands, making

loving dashes for his face, his faithful little heart bursting with

emotions he was quite unable to express.

"Thought you'd like to see him, sir," said Tumpany. "He know'd you'd

come back right enough, and he's been terrible restless."

Lothian captured the dog at last, and held him pressed to his side.

"I am very glad to see the old chap again. Look here, William, just you

go quietly over to the Mortland Arms, don't look as if you were going

on any special errand,--but you know--and get a bottle of whiskey. Draw

the cork and put it back in the bottle so that I can take it out with

my fingers when I want to. Then bring it quietly up here."

"Yessir," said Tumpany. "That'll be all right, sir," and departed with

a somewhat ludicrous air of secrecy and importance that tickled his

master's sense of humour and made him smile.

It was by no means the first time that Tumpany had carried out these

little confidential missions.

In ten minutes the man was back again, with the bottle.

"Shall I leave the dog, sir?"

"Yes, you may as well. He's quite happy."

Tumpany went away.

Gilbert rose from bed, the bottle in his hand, and looked round for a

hiding-place. The wardrobe! That would do. He put it in one of the big

inside pockets of a shooting-coat which was hanging there and carefully

closed the door.

As he did so, he caught sight of his face in the panel-mirror. It was

sly and unpleasant. Something horrible seemed to be peeping out.

He shook his head and a slight blush came to his cheeks.

The eyes under the bandaged brow, the smirk upon the clear-cut

mouth. . . . "Beastly!" he said aloud, as if speaking of some one

else--as indeed he really was, had he but realised it.

Now he would sleep, to be fresh for the night. Bromide--always a good

friend, though not so certain in its action as in the past--Ammonium

Bromide should paralyse his racing brain to sleep.

He dissolved five tablets in a little water and drank the mixture.

When Mary came noiselessly into the room, three hours later, he was

sleeping calmly. One arm was round the Dog Trust, who was sleeping too.

Her husband looked strangely youthful and innocent. A faint smile hung

about his lips and her whole heart went out to him as he slept.

* * * * *

It was after midnight.

Deep peace brooded over the poet's household. Only he was awake. The

dog slumbered in his kennel, the servants in their rooms, the Sweet

Chatelaine of the Old House lay in tranquil sleep in her own chamber.

. . . On a small oak table by Gilbert's bedside, three tall candles

were burning in holders of silver. Upon it also was an open bottle of

whiskey, the carafe of water from the washstand and a bedroom tumbler.

The door was locked.

Gilbert was sitting up in bed. Upon his raised knees a pad of white

paper was resting. In his hand was a stylographic pen of red vulcanite,

and a third of the page was covered with small delicate writing.

His face was flushed but quite motionless. His whole body in its white

pyjama suit was perfectly still. The only movement was that of the hand

travelling over the page, the only sound that of the dull grinding of

the stylus, as it went this way and that.

There was something sinister about this automaton in the bed with its

moving hand. And in our day there is always something a little

fantastic and unreal about candlelight. . . .

How absolutely still the night was! Not a breath of air stirred.

The movements, the stir and tumult of the mind of the person so rigid

in the bed were not heard.

_What_ was it, _who_ was it, that was writing in the bed?

Who can say?

Was it Gilbert Lothian, the young and kindly-natured man who reverenced

all things that were pure, beautiful and of good report?

Or was it that dreadful other self, the Being created out of poison,

that was laying sure and stealthy fingers upon the Soul, that "glorious

Devil large of heart and brain"?

Who can tell?

The subtle knowledge of the great doctor could not have said, the holy

love of the young matron could not have divined.

These things are hidden yet, and still will be.

The hump of the bed-clothes sank. The pad fell flat. The figure

stretched out towards the table, there was the stealthy trickle of

liquid, the gurgle of a body, drinking.

Then the bed-clothes rose once more, the pad went to its place, the

figure stiffened; and the red pen moved obedient to that which

controlled it, setting down the jewelled words upon the page.

--The first of the long series of letters that the Girl of the Library

was destined to receive! Not the most beautiful perhaps, not the most

wonderful. Passion was not born yet, and if love was, there was no

concrete word of it here. No one but Gilbert Lothian ever knew what was

born on that fated midnight, when he wrote this first subtle letter,

deadly for this girl to receive, perhaps, from such a man, at such a

time in her life.

A love letter without a word of love.

These are passages from the letter:--

. . . "So, Rita, I am going to write a great poem for you. Will you

take it from your friend? I think you will, for it will be made for

you in the first place and wrought with all my skill.

"I am going to call it 'A Lady in a Library.' No one will know the

innermost inwardness of it but just you and me. Will not that be

delightful, Rita mia amica? When you answer this letter, say that

it will be delightful, please!

"'A Lady in a Library!' Are not the words wonderful--say it quietly

to yourself--'A Lady in a Library!'"

This was the poem which appeared two months afterwards in the _English

Review_ and definitely established Gilbert Lothian's claim to stand in

the very forefront of the poets of his decade. It is certain to live

long. More than one critic of the highest standing has printed his

belief that it will be immortal, and many lovers of the poet's work

think so too.

. . . "The Lady and the Poet meet in a Library upon a golden

afternoon. She is the very Spirit and Genius of the place. She has

drawn beauty from many brave books. They have told her their

secrets as she moves among them, and lavished all their store upon

her. Some of the beauty which they hold has passed into her face,

and the rosy tints of youth become more glorious.

"Oh, they have been very generous!

"The thin volume of Keats gave her eyes their colour, but an old

and sober-backed edition of Coleridge opened its dun boards and

robbed the magic stanzas of 'Kubla Khan' to give them their mystery

and wonder.

"Milton bestowed the music of her voice, but it came from the

second volume in which Comus lies hid. Her smile was half Herrick

and half Heine, and her hair was spun in a 'Wood near Athens' by

the fairies--Tom III, _Opera Glmi Shakespeare, Editio e Libris

Podley!_--upon a night in Midsummer."

"Random thoughts, Cupid! random thoughts! They come to me like

moths through the still night, and I put them down for you. A

grey-fawn _Papillon de nuit_ is fluttering round my candles now and

sometimes he falls flapping and whirring on my paper like a tiny

clock-work toy. But I will not kill him. I am happy in writing

to my friend, distilling my friendship for you in the lonely

laboratory of self, so he shall go unharmed. His ancestors may have

feasted upon royal tapestries and laid their eggs in the purple

robes of kings!

"What are the moths like in Kensington this night, Cupid?--But of

course you are asleep now. I make a picture for myself of you

sleeping.

"The whole village is asleep now, save only me, and I am trying to

reconstruct our afternoon and evening together, five days ago or

was it six? It is more than ever possible to do that at midnight

and alone, though every detail is etched upon my memory and I am

only adding colour.

"How happy we were! It is so strange to me to think how instantly

we became friends--as we are agreed we are always to be, you and I.

And think of all we still have to find out about each other! There

are golden days coming in our friendship, all sorts of revelations

and surprises. There are so many enchanted places in the Kingdom of

Thought to which I have the key, so many doors I shall open for

you.

"Ours shall be a perfect friendship--of your bounty I crave again

what you have already given!--and I will build it up as an

artificer in rare woods or stained marbles, a carver of

moon-stones, a builder of temples in honey-coloured Travertine,

makes beautiful states in which the soul can dwell, out of

beautiful perishable things.

"How often do two people meet as you and I have met? Most rarely.

Men and women fall in love, sometimes too early, sometimes too

late. There is a brief summer, and then a long winter of calm grey

days which numb the soul into acquiescence, or stab the dull

tranquillity with the lightnings of tragedy and woe.

"We have the better part! We are to be friends, Rita, you and

I--that is the rivulet of repeated melody which runs through my

first letter to you. Some sad dawn will rise for me, when you tell

of something nearer and more poignant than anything I can offer

you. It will be a dawn in which, for you the trumpets, the sackbuts

and the psalteries of Heaven will sound. And your friend will bless

you; and retire to the back of the scene with a most graceful bow!

"In the last act of the play, when all the players appear as Nymphs

and Graces, and Seasons, your friend will be found wearing the rich

yet sober liveries of Autumn, saluting Spring and her Partner with

a courtly song, and a dance which expresses his sentiments

according to the best choreographic traditions.

"But, as he retires among the last red leaves of the year, and

walks jauntily down the forest rides as the setting sun shows the

trees already bare, he will know one thing, even if Spring does not

know it then--when she turns to her Partner.

"He will know that in her future life, his voice, his face, can

never be quite forgotten. Sometimes, at the feast, 'surgit amari

aliquid' that he is not present there with the wistful glance, the

hands that were ever reverent, the old familiar keys!

"For a brief instant of recollection, he will have for you

'_L'effet d'un clair-de-lune par une nuit d'été'_. And you will say

to yourself, '_Ami du temps passés, vos paroles me reviennent comme

un écho lointain, comme le son d'un cloche apporté par le vent; et

il me semble que vous êtes là quand je lis des passages d'amour

dans vos livres_'."

A click of glass against glass, the low sound of drinking, a black

shadow parodied and repeated upon the ceiling in the candle-glow.

The letter is nearly finished now--the bottle is nearly empty.

"'Tiens!' I hear you say--by the way, Rita, where did you learn to

speak such perfect French? They tell me in Paris and, Mon Dieu! in

Tours even! that I speak well. Mais, toi! . . .

"Well 'How stupid!' I hear you say. 'Why does Gilbert strike this

note of the 'cello and the big sobbing flutes at the very beginning

of things?'

"Why, indeed? I hardly know myself. But it is very late now. The

curtains of the dark are already shaken by the birth-pangs of the

morning. Soon the jocund noises of dawn will begin.

"Let it be so for you and me. There are long and happy days coming

in our friendship. The end is not yet! Soon, quite soon, I will

return to London with a pocket-full of plans for pleasure, and the

magician's wand polished like the poker in the best parlour of an

evangelical household, and charged with the most superior magic!

"Meanwhile I shall write you my thoughts as you must send me yours.

"I kiss your hand,

"GILBERT LOTHIAN."

The figure rose from the bed, gathering the papers together, putting

them into a drawer of the dressing-table.

It staggered a little.

"I'm drunk," came in a tired voice, from lips that were parched and

dry.

With trembling hands the empty bottle was hidden, the glass washed out

and replaced, the door noiselessly unlocked.

Then Lothian lurched to the open window.

It was as he had said, dawn was at hand. But a thick grey mist hid

everything. Phantoms seemed to sway in it, speaking to each other with

tiny doll-like squeaks.

There were no jocund noises as he crept back into bed and fell into a

stupor, snoring loudly.

No jocund noises of Dawn.

CHAPTER IV

DICKSON INGWORTH UNDER THE MICROSCOPE

"On n'est jamais trahi que par ses siens."

--_Proverb of Provence._

Lothian and Dickson Ingworth were driving into Wordingham.

It was just after lunch and there was a pleasant cold-snap in the air,

a hint of Autumn which would soon be here.

The younger man was driving, sending the cob along at a good pace,

quite obviously a skilful and accustomed whip.

His host sat by his side and looked up at him with some curiosity, a

curiosity which had been growing upon him during the last few days.

Ingworth was certainly good-looking, in a boyish, rather rakish

fashion. There were no indications of dissipation in his face. He was

not a dissipated youth. But there was, nevertheless, in the cast of the

features, something that suggested rather more than staidness. The hair

was dark red and very crisp and curly, the mouth was well-shaped and

rather thick in the lips. Upon it, more often than not, was the hint of

a smile at some inward thought, "rather like some youthful apprentice

pirate, not adventured far upon the high seas yet, but with sufficient

experience to lick the chops of memory now and then" . . . thus

Gilbert's half amused, half wondering thought.

And the eyes?--yes, there was something a little queer about the eyes.

They were dark, not very steady in expression, and the whites--by Jove!

that was it--had a curious opalescence at times. Could it possibly be

that his friend had a touch of the tar-brush somewhere? It was faint,

elusive, born more of a chance thought than of reality perhaps, and yet

as the dog-cart bowled along the straight white road Gilbert wondered

more and more.

He had known the lad, who was some two and twenty years of age, for

twelve months or more. Where had he met him?--Oh, yes, at an exhibition

of caricatures in the Carfax Gallery. Cromartie had introduced them.

Ingworth had made friends at once. In a graceful impulsive way he had

taken Lothian into a corner, and, blushing a good deal, had told him

how much he had wanted to know him. He had just come down from Oxford;

he told the poet how eagerly he was being read by the younger men

there.

That was how it had begun.

Friendship was an immediate result. Lothian, quite impervious to

flattery and spurning coteries and the "tea-shops," had found this

young man's devotion a pleasant thing. He was a gentleman and he didn't

bore Gilbert by literary talk. He was, in short, like an extremely

intelligent fag to a boy in the sixth form of a public school. He spoke

the same language of Oxford and school that Gilbert did--the bond

between them was just that, and the elder and well-known man had done

all he could for his protégé.

From Gilbert's point of view, the friendship had occurred by chance, it

had presented no jarring elements, and he had drifted into it with

good-natured acquiescence.

It was a fortnight after Mary had sent the invitation to Ingworth, who

could not come at the moment, being kept in London by "important work."

He had now arrived, and this was the eighth day of his visit.

"I can't understand Tumpany letting this beast down," Ingworth said.

"He's as sure footed as possible. Was Tumpany fluffed?"

"I suppose he was, a little."

"Then why didn't you drive, Gilbert?"

"I? Oh, well, I did myself rather well in the train coming down, and so

I thought I'd leave it to William!"

Gilbert smiled as he said this, his absolutely frank and charming

smile--it would have disarmed a coroner!

Ingworth smiled also, but here was something self-conscious and

deprecating. He was apologising for his friend's rueful but open

statement of fact. The big man had said, in effect, "I was drunk," the

small man tried to excuse the plain statement with quite unnecessary

sycophancy.

"But you couldn't have been very bad?"

"Oh, no, I wasn't, Dicker. But I was half asleep as we got into the

village, and as you see this cart is rather high and with a low

splashboard. My feet weren't braced against the foot-bar and I simply

shot out!"

Ingworth looked quickly at Lothian, and chuckled. Then he clicked his

tongue and the trap rolled on silently.

Lothian sat quietly in his place, smoking his cigar. He was conscious

of a subtle change in this lad since he had come down. It interested

him. He began to analyse as Ingworth drove onwards, quite oblivious of

the keen, far-seeing brain beside him.

--That last little laugh of Ingworth's. There was a new note in it, a

note that had sounded several times during the last few days. It almost

seemed informed with a slight hint of patronage, and also of

reservation. It wasn't the admiring response of the past. The young man

had been absolutely loyal in the past, though no great strain had been

put upon his friendship. It was not difficult to be friends with a

benefactor--while the benefactions last. Certainly on one occasion--at

the Amberleys' dinner-party--he had behaved with marked loyalty.

Gilbert had heard all about it from Rita Wallace. But that, after all,

was an isolated instance. Lothian decided to test it. . . .

"Of course I wasn't tight," he said suddenly and with some sharpness.

"My dear old chap," the lad replied hastily--too hastily--"don't I

know?"

It wasn't sincere! How badly he did it! Lothian watched him out of the

corner of his eye. There was certainly _something_. Dickson was

changed.

Then the big mind brushed these thoughts away impatiently. It had

enough to brood over! This small creature which was just now intruding

in the great and gathering sweep of his daily thoughts might well be

dissected some other time.

Lothian's head sank forward upon his chest. His eyes lost light and

speculation, the mouth set firm. Instinctively he crossed his arms upon

his breast, and the clean-shaved face with the growing heaviness of

contour mingled with its youth, made an almost Napoleonic profile

against the bright grey arc of sky over the marshes.

Ingworth saw it and wondered. "One can see he's a big man," he thought

with a slight feeling of discomfort. "I wonder if Toftrees is right and

his reputation is going down and people are beginning to find out about

him?"

He surveyed the circumstances of the last fortnight--two very important

weeks for him.

Until his arrival in Norfolk about a week ago he had not seen Lothian

since the night of the party at the Amberleys', the poet having left

town immediately afterwards. But he had met, and seen a good deal of

Herbert Toftrees and his wife.

These worthy people liked an audience. Their somewhat dubious solar

system was incomplete without a whole series of lesser lights. The

rewards of their industry and popularity were worth little unless they

were constantly able to display them.

Knowing their own disabilities, however, quite aware that they were in

literature by false pretences so to speak, they preferred to be

reigning luminaries in a minor constellation rather than become part of

the star dust in the Milky Way. Courtier stars must be recruited,

little eager parasitic stars who should twinkle pleasantly at their

hospitable board.

Dickson Ingworth, much to his own surprise and delight, had been swept

in. He thought himself in great good luck, and perhaps indeed he was.

Nephew of a retired civilian from the Malay Archipelago, he had been

sent to Eton and Oxford by this gentleman, who had purchased a small

estate in Wiltshire and settled down as a minor country squire. The lad

was destined to succeed to this moderate establishment, but, at the

University, he had fallen into one of those small and silly "literary"

sets, which are the despair of tutors and simply serve as an excuse for

general slackness. The boy had announced his intention of embracing a

literary career when he had managed to scrape through his pass schools.

He had a hundred a year of his own--always spent before he received

it--and the Wiltshire squire, quite confident in the ultimate result,

had cut off his allowance. "Try it," he had said. "No one will be more

pleased than I if you make it a success. You won't, though! When you're

tired, come back here and take up your place. It will be waiting for

you. But meanwhile, my dear boy, not a penny do you get from me!"

So Dickson Ingworth had "embraced a literary career." The caresses had

not as yet been returned with any ardour. Conceit and a desire to taste

"ginger in the mouth while it was hot" had sent him to London. He had

hardly ever read a notable book. He had not the slightest glimmerings

of what literature meant. But he got a few short stories accepted now

and then, did some odd journalism, and lived on his hundred a year, a

fair amount of credit, and such friends as he was able to make.

In his heart of hearts the boy knew himself for what he was. But his

good looks, his youth--most valuable asset of all!--and the fact that

he would some day have some sort of settled position, enabled him to

rub along pretty well for the time.

Without much real harm in him--he was too lacking in temperament to be

really wicked--he was as cunning as an ape and justified his good

opinions of his cleverness by the fact that his laborious little tricks

constantly succeeded. He was always achieving infinitesimal successes.

He had marked out Gilbert Lothian, for instance, and had succeeded in

making a friend of him easily enough.

Lothian rarely thought ill of any one and any one could take him in. To

do Ingworth justice he liked Lothian very much, and really admired him.

He did not understand him in the least. His poems were rather worse

Greek to him than the Euripidean choruses he had learnt by heart at

school. At the same time it was a great thing to be Fidus Achates to

the poet of the moment, and it was extremely convenient--also--to have

a delightful country house to retire to when one was hard up, and a

patron who not only introduced one to editors, but would lend five

pounds as a matter of course.

Perhaps there was really some Eastern taint in the young fellow's

blood. At any rate he was sly by nature, had a good deal of undeveloped

capability for treachery latent within him, and, encouraged by success,

was becoming a marked parasite.

Lazy by nature, he soon discovered how easy it was--to take one

example--to look up the magazines of three years back, steal a

situation or a plot, adapt it to the day, and sell it for a guinea or

two. His small literary career had hitherto been just that. If he had

been put upon the rack he could not have confessed to an original

thought. And it was the same in many other aspects of his life. He made

himself useful. He was always sympathetic and charming to some wife in

Bohemia who bewailed the inconstancy of her husband, and earned the

title of a "nice, good-hearted boy." On the next evening he would

gladly sup with the husband and the chorus girl who was the cause of

the trouble, and flatter them both.

Master Dickson Ingworth, it will be seen, was by no means a person of

fine nature. He was simply very young, without any sort of ideals save

the gratification of the moment, and would, no doubt, become a decent

member of society in time.

In a lower rank of life, and without the comfortable inheritance which

awaited him, he would probably have become a sneak-thief or a

blackmailer in a small way.

In the event, he was destined to live a happy and fairly popular life

in the Wiltshire Grange, and to die a much better man than he was at

two and twenty. He was not to repent of, but to forget, all the

calculated meannesses of his youth, and at fifty he would have shown

any one to the door with horror who suggested a single one of the

tricks that he had himself been guilty of in his youth.

And, parasite always, he is displayed here because of the part he is

destined to take in the drama of Gilbert Lothian's life.

"I've been seeing a good deal of Toftrees lately, Gilbert," Ingworth

said with a side glance.

Lothian looked up from his reverie.

"What? Oh, yes!--the Toftrees. Nice chap, Toftrees, I thought, when I

met him the other night. Awfully clever, don't you think, to get hold

of such an enormous public? Mind you, Dicker, I wouldn't give one of

his books to any one if I could help it. But that's because I want

every one to care for real literature. That's my own personal

standpoint. Apart from that, I do think that Mr. and Mrs. Toftrees

deserve all they get in the way of money and popularity and so on.

There must be such people under the modern conditions, and apart from

their work they both seem most interesting."

This took the wind from the young man's sails. He was sensitive enough

to perceive--though not to appreciate--the largeness of such an

attitude as this. He felt baffled and rather small.

Then, something that had been instilled into him by his new and

influential friends not only provided an antidote to his momentary

discomfiture but became personal to himself.

A sense of envy, almost of hate, towards this man who had been so

consistently kind to him, bloomed like some poisonous and swift-growing

fungus in his unstable mind.

"I say," he said maliciously, though there was fear in his voice, too,

"Herbert Toftrees has got his knife into you, Gilbert."

Lothian looked at the young man in surprise. "Got his _knife into me_?"

he said, genuinely perplexed.

"Well, yes. He's going about town saying all sorts of unpleasant things

about you."

Lothian laughed. "Yes!" he said, "I remember! Miss Wallace told me so

not long ago. How intensely amusing!"

Ingworth hated him at the moment. There was a disgusting sense of

impotence and smallness, in that he could not sting Lothian.

"Toftrees is a very influential man in London," he said sententiously.

At that moment all the humour in Lothian awoke.

He leant back and laughed aloud.

"Oh, Dicker!" he said, "what a babe you are!"

Ingworth grew red. He was furious, but dared say nothing more. He felt

as if he had been trying to bore a tunnel through the Alps with a

boiled carrot and had wasted a franc in paying some one to hold his

shadow while he made the attempt!

Lothian's laughter was perfectly genuine. He cared absolutely nothing

what Toftrees said or thought about him. But he did care about the

young man at his side.

. . . The other Self, the new Ego, suddenly became awake and dominant.

Suspicion reared its head.

For days and days now he had drunk hardly anything. The anti-alcoholic

medicines that Morton Sims had administered were gradually

strengthening the enfeebled will and bringing back the real tenant of

his soul. But now . . .

Here was one whom he had thought his friend. It was not so then! An

enemy sat by his side?--he would soon discover.

And then, with a skill which made the lad a plaything in his hands,

with a cunning a hundred times deeper than Ingworth's immature

shiftiness, Lothian began his work.

But it was not the real Lothian. It was the adroit devil waked to life

that set itself to the task as the dog-cart rattled into the little

country town and drew up before the George Hotel in the Market Square.

"Thanks awfully, old chap," Lothian said cheerfully as they turned

under the archway into the stable yard. "You're a topping whip, you

know, Dicker. I can't drive a bit myself. But I like to see you."

For a moment Ingworth forgot his rancour at the praise. Unconscious of

the dominant personality and the mental grin behind the words, he

swallowed the compliment as a trout gulps a fly.

They descended from the trap and the stable-men began to unharness the

cob. Lothian thrust his arm through the other's. "Come along, Jehu!" he

said. "I want a drink badly, and I'm sure you do, after the drive. I

don't care what you say, that cob is _not_ so easy to handle." . . .

His voice was lost in the long passage that led from the stable yard to

the "saloon-lounge."

CHAPTER V

A QUARREL IN THE "MOST SELECT LOUNGE IN THE COUNTY"

"I strike quickly, being moved. . . . A dog of the house of

Montague moves me."

--_Romeo and Juliet._

The George Hotel in Wordingham was a most important place in the life

and economy of the little Norfolk town.

The town drank there.

In the handsome billiard room, any evening after dinner, one might find

the solicitor, the lieutenant of the Coast-guards, in command of the

district, a squire or two, Mr. Pashwhip and Mr. Moger the estate agents

and auctioneers, Mr. Reeves the maltster and local J.P.--town, not

county--and in fact all the local notabilities up to a certain point,

including Mr. Helzephron, the landlord and Worshipful Master of the

Wordingham Lodge of Freemasons for that year.

The Doctor, the Bank Manager and, naturally, the Rector, were the only

people of consequence who did not "use the house" and make it their

club. They were definitely upon the plane of gentlefolk and could not

well do so. Accordingly they formed a little bridge playing coterie of

their own, occasionally assisted by the Lieutenant, who preferred the

Hotel, but made fugitive excursions into the somewhat politer society

which was his _milieu_ by birth.

Who does not know them, these comfortable, respectable hotels in the

High Streets or Market Places of small country towns? Yet who has

pointed the discovering finger at them or drawn attention to the smug

and _convenable_ curses that they are?

"There was a flaunting gin palace at the corner of the street,"--that

is the sort of phrase you may read in half a hundred books. The holes

and dens where working people get drunk, and issuing therefrom make

night hideous at closing time, stink in the nostrils of every one. They

form the texts and illustrations of many earnest lectures, much fervent

sermonizing. But nothing is said of the suave and well-conducted

establishments where the prosperous inebriates of stagnant county towns

meet to take their poison. When the doors of the George closed in

Wordingham and its little coterie of patrons issued forth, gravely,

pompously, a little unsteadily perhaps, to seek their homes, the Police

Inspector touched his cap--"The gentlemen from the George, going home!"

But the wives knew all about such places as the George.

It is upon the women that the burden falls, gentle or simple, nearly

always the women.

Mrs. Gaunt, the naval officer's wife, knew very well why her husband

had never got his ship, and why he "went into the Coast-guard." She was

accustomed to hear unsteady steps upon the gravel sweep a little after

eleven, to see the flushed face of the man she loved, to know that he

had spent the evening tippling with his social inferiors, to lie sad

and uncomplaining by his side while his snores filled the air and the

bedroom was pervaded by the odour of spirits--an Admiral's daughter

she, gently nurtured, gently born, well accustomed to these sordid

horrors by now.

Mrs. Reeves, the Maltster's wife, was soured in temper and angular of

face. She had been a pretty and trusting girl not so long ago as years

measure. She "gave as good as she got," and the servants of the big

bourgeois house with its rankly splendid furniture only turned in their

sleep when, towards midnight and once or twice a month, loud

recriminations reached them from the downstairs rooms.

The solicitor, a big genial brute with a sense of humour, only

frightened to tears the elderly maiden sister who kept his house. He

was never unkind, never used bad language, and was merely noisy, but at

eight o'clock on the mornings following an audit dinner, a "Lodge

Night," or the evening of Petty Sessions, a little shrivelled,

trembling spinster would creep out of the house before breakfast and

kneel in piteous supplication at the Altar rails for the big, blond and

jovial brother who was "dissolving his soul" in wine--the

well-remembered phrase from the poem of Longfellow which she had

learned at school was always with her and gave a bitter urgency to her

prayers.

All the company who met almost nightly at the George were prosperous,

well-to-do citizens. The government of the little town was in their

hands. They administered the laws for drunkards, fined them or sent

them to prison at Norwich. Their prosperity did not suffer. Custom

flowed to Mr. Pashwhip and Mr. Moger, who were always ready to take or

stand a drink. The malt of Mr. Reeves was bought by the great breweries

of England and deteriorated nothing in quality, while more money than

the pompous and heavy man could spend rolled into his coffers. The

solicitor did his routine conveyancing and so on well enough.

No one did anything out of the ordinary. There were no scandals,

"alarums and excursions." It was all decent and ordered.

The doctor could have given some astonishing evidence before a Medical

Commission. But he was a wise and quiet general practitioner who did

his work, held his tongue and sent his three boys to Cambridge.

The Rector might have had an illuminating word to say. He was a good

but timid man, and saw how impossible it was to make any movement. They

were all his own church-wardens, sidesmen, supporters! How could he

throw the sleepy, stagnant, comfortable town into a turmoil and

disorder in which souls might be definitely lost for ever?

He could only pray earnestly as he said the Mass each morning during

the seasons of the year.

It is so all over England. Deny it who may.

In Whitechapel the Fiend Alcohol is a dishevelled fury shrieking

obscenities. In the saloons and theatres of the West End he is a suave

Mephistopheles in evening dress. In Wordingham and the other provincial

towns and cities of England, he appears as a plump and prosperous

person in broadcloth, the little difficulty about his feet being got

over by well-made country shoes, and with a hat pressed down over ears

that may be a trifle pointed or may not.

But the mothers, the wives, the sisters recognise him anywhere.

The number of martyrs is uncounted. Their names are unknown, their

hidden miseries unsung.

Who hears the sobs or sees the tears shed by the secret army of Slaves

to the Slaves of Alcohol?

It is they who must drink the cup to the last dregs of horror and of

shame. The unbearable weight is upon them, that is to say, upon

tenderness and beauty, on feebleness and Love. Women endure the blows,

or cruel words more agonising. They are the meek victims of the Fiend's

malice when he enters into those they love. It is womanhood that lies

helpless upon the rack for ruthless hands to torture.

Cujus animam geminentem!

--She whose soul groaning, condoling and grieving the sword pierced

through!

Saviours sometimes, sufferers always.

* * * * *

Into the "lounge" of the George Hotel came Gilbert Lothian and Dickson

Ingworth.

They were well-dressed men of the upper classes. Their clothes

proclaimed them--for there will be (unwritten) sumptuary laws for many

years in England yet. Their voices and intonation stamped them as

members of the upper classes. A railway porter, a duke, or the

Wordingham solicitor would alike have placed them with absolute

certainty.

They were laughing and talking together with bright, animated faces,

and in this masked life that we all lead to-day no single person could

have guessed at the forces and tragedies at work beneath.

They sat down in a long room with a good carpet upon the floor, dull

green walls hung with elaborate pictures advertising whiskeys, in gold

frames, and comfortable leather chairs grouped in threes round tables

with tops of hammered copper.

Mr. Helzephron did everything in a most up-to-date fashion--as he could

well afford. "The most select lounge in the county" was a minor heading

upon the hotel note-paper.

At one end of the room was a semicircular counter, upon which were

innumerable regiments of tumblers and wine-glasses and three or four

huge crystal vessels of spirits, tulip-shaped, with gilded inscriptions

and shining plated taps.

Behind the counter was Miss Molly Palmer, the barmaid of the hotel,

and, behind her, the alcove was lined with mirrors and glass shelves on

which were rows of liqueur flasks, bottles of brandy and dummy boxes of

chocolates tied up with scarlet ribands.

"Now tell me, Dicker," Lothian said, lighting a cigarette, "how do you

mean about Toftrees?"

The glamour of the past was on the unstable youth now, the same

influence which had made him--at some possible risk to himself--defend

Lothian so warmly in the drawing room at Bryanstone Square.

The splendour of Toftrees was far away, dim in Lancaster Gate.

"Oh, he's jealous of you because you really can write, Gilbert! That

must be it. But he really has got his knife into you!"

Internally, Lothian winced. "Oh, but I assure you he has not," was all

that he said.

Ingworth finished his whiskey and soda. "Well, you know what I mean,

old chap," he replied. "He's going about saying that you aren't

sincere, that you're really fluffed when you write your poems, don't

you know. The other night, at a supper at the Savoy, where I was, he

said you were making a trade of Christianity, that you didn't really

believe in what you wrote, and couldn't possibly."

Lothian laughed. "Have another whiskey," he said. "And what did you

say, Dicker?"

There was a sneer in Lothian's voice which the other was quite quick to

hear and to resent. On that occasion he had not defended his friend, as

it happened.

"Oh, I said you meant well," Ingworth answered with quick impertinence,

and then, afraid of what he had done hurriedly drained the second glass

which the barmaid had just brought him.

"Well, I do, really," Lothian replied, so calmly that the younger man

was deceived, and once more angry that his shaft had glanced upon what

seemed to be impenetrable armour.

Yet, below the unruffled surface, the poet's mind was sick with

loathing and disgust. He was not angry with Ingworth, against Toftrees

he felt no rancour. He was sick, deadly sick with himself, inasmuch as

he had descended so low as to be touched by such paws as these.

"I'll get through his damned high-and-mighty attitude yet," Ingworth

thought to himself.

"I say," he remarked, "did you enjoy your trip to Brighton with Rita

Wallace? Toftrees saw you there, you know. He was dining at the

Metropole the same night."

He had pierced--right through--though he did not know it.

"Rather dangerous, wasn't it?" he continued. "Suppose your wife got to

know, Gilbert?"

Something, those letters, near his heart, began to throb like a pulse

in Lothian's pocket. One of the letters had arrived that very morning.

"Look here, Ingworth," he said, and his face became menacing, "you

rather forget yourself, I think, in speaking to me in this way. You're

a good sort of boy--at least I've thought so--and I've taken you up

rather. But I don't allow impudence from people like you. Remember!"

The ice-cold voice frightened the other, but he had to the full that

ape-like semi-courage which gibbers on till the last moment of a

greater animal's patience.

The whiskey had affected him also. His brain was becoming heated.

"Well, I don't know about impudence," he answered pertly and with a red

face. "Anyhow, Rita dined with _me_ last week!"

He brought it out with a little note of triumph.

Lothian nodded.

"Yes, and you took her to that disgusting little café Maréchale in

Soho. You ought not to take a lady to such a place as that. You've been

long enough in London to know. Don't be such a babe. If you ever get a

nice girl to go out with you again try and think things out a little

more."

Tears of mortified vanity were in the young man's eyes.

"She's been writing to you!" he said with a catch in his voice, and

suddenly his whole face seemed to change and dissolve into something

else.

Did the lips really grow thicker? Did the angry blood which suffused

the cheeks give them a dusky tinge which was not of Europe? Would the

tongue loll out soon?

"I _beg_ your pardon?" Lothian said coolly.

"Yes, she has!" the young fellow hissed. "You're trying on a game with

the girl. She's a lady, and a good girl, and you're a married man.

She's been telling you about me, though I've a right to meet her and

you've not!--Look here, if she realised and knew what I know, and

Toftrees and Mr. Amberley know, what every one in London knows, by

Jove, she'd never speak to you again!"

Gilbert lifted his glass and sipped slowly. His face was composed. It

bore the Napoleonic mask it had worn during the last part of their

drive to the town.

Suddenly Gilbert rose up in his chair.

"You dirty little hanger-on," he said in a low voice, "how dare you

mention any woman's name in this way!"

Without heat, without anger, but merely as a necessary measure of

precaution or punishment, he smashed his left fist into Ingworth's jaw

and laid him flat upon the carpet.

The girl behind the bar, who knew who Gilbert Lothian was very well,

had been watching what was going on with experienced eyes.

She had seen, or known with the quick intuition of her training, that a

row was imminent between the famous Mr. Lothian--whose occasional

presences in the "lounge" were thought to confer a certain lustre upon

that too hospitable rendezvous--and the excited young man with the dark

red and strangely curly hair.

Molly Palmer had pressed the button of her private bell, which called

Mr. Helzephron himself from his account books in the office.

Mr. Helzephron was a slim, bearded man, black of hair and saffron of

visage. He was from Cornwall, in the beginning, and combined the

inherent melancholy and pessimism of the Celt with the Celt's shrewd

business instincts when he transplants himself.

He entered at that moment and caught hold of the wretched Ingworth just

as the young man had risen, saw red, and was about to leap over the

table at Lothian, whom, in all probability he would very soon have

demolished.

Helzephron's arms and hands were like vices of steel. His voice droned

like a wasp in a jam jar.

"Now, then," he said, "what's all this? What's all this, sir? I can't

have this sort of thing going on. Has this gentleman been insulting

you, Mr. Lothian?"

Ingworth was powerless in the Cornishman's grip. For a moment he would

have given anything in the world to leap at the throat of the man at

the other side of the table, who was still calmly smoking in his chair.

But quick prudence asserted itself. Lothian was known here, a

celebrity. He was a celebrity anywhere, a public brawl with him would

be dreadfully scandalous and distressing, while in the end it would

assuredly not be the poet who would suffer most.

And Ingworth was a coward; not a physical coward, for he would have

stood up to any one with nothing but glee in his heart, but a moral

one. Lothian, he knew, wouldn't have minded the scandal a bit, here or

anywhere else. But to Ingworth, cooled instantly by the lean grip of

the landlord, the prospect was horrible.

And to be held by another man below one in social rank, landlord of an

inn, policeman, or what not, while it rouses the blood of some men to

frenzy, in others brings back an instant sanity.

Ingworth remained perfectly still.

For a second or two Lothian watched him with a calm, almost judicial

air. Then he flushed suddenly, with a generous shame at the position.

"It's all right, Helzephron," he said. "It's a mistake, a damned silly

mistake. As a matter of fact I lost my temper. Please let Mr. Ingworth

go."

Mr. Helzephron possessed those baser sides of tact which pass for

sincerity with many people.

"Very sorry, I'm sure," he droned, and stood waiting with melancholy

interest to see what would happen next.

"I'm very sorry, Dicker," Lothian said impulsively; "you rather riled

me, you know. But I behaved badly. It won't do either of us any good to

have a rough and tumble here, but of course" . . . he looked

significantly at the door.

Ingworth took him, and admired him for his simplicity. The old public

school feeling was uppermost now. He knew that Gilbert knew he was no

coward. He knew also that he could have knocked the other into a cocked

hat in about three minutes.

"I was abominably rude, Gilbert," he said frankly. "Don't let's talk

rot. I'm sorry."

"It's good of you to take it in that way, Dicker. I'm awfully sorry,

too."

Mr. Helzephron interposed. "All's well that ends well," he remarked

sententiously. "That's the best of gentlemen, they do settle these

matters as gentlemen should. Now if you'll come with me, sir, I'll take

you to the lavatory and you can sponge that blood off your face. You're

not marked, really."

With a grin and a wink to Lothian, both of which were returned,

Ingworth marched away in the wake of the landlord.

The air was cleared.

Gilbert was deeply sorry for what he had done. He had quite forgotten

the provocation that he had received. "Good old sportsman, Dicker!" he

thought; "he's a fine chap. I was a bounder to hit him. It would have

served me jolly well right if he'd given me a hiding."

And the younger man, as he went to remove the stain of combat, had

kindly and generous thoughts of his distinguished friend.

But, _che sara sara_, these kindly thoughts were but to bloom for

an hour and fade. Neither knew that one of them was so soon to be

brought to the yawning gates of Hell itself, and, at the very last

moment, the unconscious action of the other was to snatch him from

them.

Already the threads were being woven in those webs of Time, whereof God

alone knows the pattern and directs the loom. Neither of them knew.

The barmaid, a tall, fresh-faced young girl, came down the room and

took the empty glasses from the table.

"I say, Mr. Lothian," she remarked, "it's no business of mine, and no

offence meant, but you didn't ought to have hit him."

"I know," Gilbert answered, "but why do you say so?"

"He's got such nice curly hair!" she replied with a provocative look

from her bright eyes, and whisked away to the shelter of her counter.

Lothian sighed. During the years he had lived in Norfolk he had seen

many fresh-faced girls come and go. Only a few days before, he had read

a statement made by Mrs. Bramwell Booth of the Salvation Army that the

number of immoral women in the West End of London who have been

barmaids is one quarter of the whole. . . .

At that moment, this Miss Molly Palmer was the _belle des coulisses_ of

Wordingham. The local bloods quarrelled about her, the elder men gave

her gloves on the sly, her pert repartees kept the lounge in a roar

from ten to eleven.

Once, with a sneer and as one man of the world to another, Helzephron

had shown Lothian a trade paper in which these girls are advertised

for--

"Barmaid wanted, must be attractive."

"Young lady wanted for select wine-room in the West End, gentlemen

only, must be well educated and of good appearance, age not over

twenty-five."

"Required at once, attractive young lady as barmaid--young.

Photograph."

. . . A great depression fell upon the poet. Everywhere he turned just

now ennui and darkness seemed to confront him. His youth was going. His

fame brought no pleasure nor contentment. The easy financial

circumstances of his life seemed to roll over him like a weed-clogged

wave. His wife's love and care--was not that losing its savour also?

The delightful labour of writing, the breathless and strenuous

clutching at the waiting harps of poetry, was not he fainting and

failing in this high effort, too?

His life was a grey, numbed thing. He was reminded of it whichever way

he turned.

There was a time when the Holy Mysteries brought him a joy which was

priceless and unutterable.

Yes! when he knelt at the Mass with Mary by his side, he had felt the

breath of Paradise upon his brow. Emptied of all earthly things his

soul had entered into the mystical Communion of Saints.

To husband and wife, in humble supplication side by side, the still

small voice had spoken. The rushing wind of the Holy Ghost had risen

around them and the Passion of Jesus been more near.

And now?--the man rose from his chair with a laugh so sad and hollow, a

face so contorted with pain, that it startled the silly girl behind the

bar.

She made a rapid calculation. "He was sober when 'e come," she thought

in the vernacular, "and 'e can stand a lot, can Mr. Lothian. It's

nothing. Them poets!"

"Something amusing you?" she said with her best smile.

Lothian nodded. "Oh, just my thoughts," he replied. "Give me another

whiskey and soda--a fat one, yes, a little more, yes, that'll do."

For a moment, a moment of hesitation, he held it out at arm's length.

The sunlight of the afternoon blazed into the glass and turned the

liquid to molten gold.

The light came from a window in the roof, just over the bar itself. The

remainder of the room was in quiet shadow.

He looked down into the room and shuddered. It was typical of his life

now.

He looked up at the half open window from which the glory came.

"Oh, that I had the wings of a dove!" he said, with a sad smile.

Molly Palmer watched him. "Juggins!" she thought, "them poets!"

But Lothian's words seemed to call for some rejoinder and the girl was

at a loss.

"Wish you meant it!" she said at length, wondering if that would meet

the occasion--as it often met others.

Lothian laughed, and drank down the whiskey.

The light from above faded almost instantly--perhaps a cloud was

passing over the sun.

But, _au contraire_, the shadow of the room beyond had invitation

now. It no longer seemed sombre.

He went into the shadows and sat down in the same chair where he had

been before.

He smiled as he lit another cigarette. How strange moods were! how

powerful for a moment, but how quickly over! The letters in his breast

pocket seemed to glow out with material warmth, a warmth that went

straight to his heart through the cloth and linen of his clothing. The

new Ego was fed. Rita!

Yes! at least life had given him this and was it not the treasure of

treasures? There was nothing coarse nor earthly in this at least!

The music of the Venusberg throbbed in all his pulses, calling, calling

from the hollow hill. He did not realise from where it came--this magic

music--and that there is more than one angelic choir.

Rita and Gilbert. Gilbert and Rita!

The words and music of one song!

So we observe that now the masked musicians in the unseen orchestra are

in their places.

Any little trouble with the Management is over. Opposition players have

sorrowfully departed. The Audience has willed it so, and the band only

awaits its leader.

Monsieur L'Ame du Vin, that celebrated conductor, has just slid into

his seat. He smirks at his players, gives an intelligent glance at the

first violin, and taps upon the desk.

Three beats of the baton, a raised left hand, and once more the oft

repeated overture to the Dance of Death commences, with the Fiend

Alcohol beating time.

Ingworth came back soon. There was a slight bruise upon his upper lip,

but that was all.

The two men--it was to be the last time in lives which had so strangely

crossed--were friends in a sense that they had never been before. Both

of them looked back upon that afternoon during the immediate days to

come with regret and sorrow. Each remembered it differently, according

to the depth of individual temperament. But it was remembered, as an

hour when strife and turmoil had ceased; when, trembling on the brink

of unforeseen events to come, there was pause and friendship, when the

good in both of them rose to the surface for a little space and was

observed of both.

"Now, Dicker, you just watch. They'll all be here soon for their

afternoon drink--the local bloods, I mean. It's their substitute for

afternoon tea, don't you know. They sit here talking about nothing to

friends who have devoted their lives to the subject. Watch it for your

work. You'll learn a lot. That must have been the way in which Flaubert

got his stuff for 'Madame Bovary.'"

Something of the artist's fire animated the lad. He was no artist. He

hadn't read "Madame Bovary," and it wouldn't have interested him if he

had. But the plan appealed to him. It fitted in with his method of

life. It was getting something for nothing. Yet he realised, to give

him his due, a little more than this. He was sitting at the feet of his

Master.

But as it happened, on that afternoon the local bloods were otherwise

employed, for at any rate they made no appearance.

Lothian felt at ease. He had one or two more pegs. He had been so

comparatively abstemious since his accident and under the regime of Dr.

Morton Sims, that what he took now had only a tranquillising and

pleasantly narcotic influence.

The nervous irritation of an hour before which had made him strike his

friend, the depression and hollow misery which succeeded it, the few

minutes of lyrical exaltation as he thought of Rita Wallace, all these

were merged in a sense of _bien être_ and drowsiness.

He enjoyed an unaccustomed and languid repletion in his mind, as if it

had been overfed and wanted to lie down for a time.

Mr. Helzephron sat down at their table after a time and prosed away in

his monotonous voice. He was a man of some education, had read, and was

a Dickens lover. He did not often have the opportunity of conversation

with any one like Lothian and he made the most of it. Like many common

men who are anxious to ingratiate themselves with their superiors, he

thought that the surest way to do so was to abuse his neighbours, thus,

as he imagined, proclaiming himself above them and flattering his

hearer. Lothian always said of the landlord of the George that he was

worth his weight in gall, and for a time he was amused.

At five o'clock the two visitors had some tea and toast and at the half

hour both were ready to go.

"I'll run round to the post office," Ingworth said, "and see if there

are any late letters."

"Very well," Gilbert answered, "and I'll have the horse put in."

The afternoon post for Mortland Royal left the town at three, and

letters which came in by the five o'clock mail were not delivered at

the village until the next morning unless--as now--they were specially

called for.

Ingworth ran off.

"Well, Mr. Lothian," said the landlord. "I don't often have the

pleasure of a talk with you. Just one more with me before you go?"

They were standing together at the bar counter when a page boy entered

the lounge and went up to his master. "Please, sir," he said, "the new

young lady's come."

"Oh, very well," Helzephron answered. "I'll be out in a minute. Where

is she?"

"In the hall, sir. And shall Boots go down for her trunk?"

"Yes; tell him to go to the station at once with the hand-cart. A new

barmaid," he said, turning to Gilbert, "for the four ale bar, a woman

of about thirty, not much class, you understand, wouldn't do for the

lounge, but will keep the working men in order. It's astonishing how

glad they are to get a job when they're about thirty! They're no draw

then, and they know it. The worst of it is that these older women

generally help themselves from the till or the bottle! I've had fifty

applications for this job."

He led the way out into the hall of the hotel, followed by Lothian, who

was on his way to the stable yard.

A woman was sitting upon a plush-covered bench by the wall. She was a

dark gipsy looking creature, coarsely handsome and of an opulent

figure. She stood up as Helzephron came out into the hall, and there

seemed to be a suggestion of great boldness and flaunting assertion

about her, oddly restrained and overlaid by a timidity quite at

variance with her appearance.

The landlord was in front, and for a moment Lothian was concealed.

Then, as he was about to wish Helzephron good afternoon and turned for

the purpose, he came into view of the new barmaid.

She saw him full face and an instant and horrible change came over her

own. It faded to dead paper-white. The dark eyes became fixed like

lenses. The jaw dropped like the jaw of a ventriloquist's puppet, a

strangled gurgle came from the open mouth and then a hoarse scream of

terror. The woman's arms jerked up in the air as if they had been

pulled by strings, and her hands in shabby black gloves curved into

claws and were rigid. Then she spun round, caught her boot in the leg

of the chair and fell in a swoon upon the floor.

The landlord swore in his surprise and alarm.

Then, keen as a knife, he whipped round and looked at Lothian.

Lothian's face expressed nothing but the most unbounded astonishment.

Help was summoned and the woman was carried into the landlord's private

office, where restoratives were applied.

In three or four minutes she opened her eyes and moaned. Lothian,

Helzephron and a chambermaid who was attending on her, were the only

other people in the office.

"There, there," said the landlord irritably, when he saw that

consciousness was returning. "What in heaven's name did you go off like

that for? You don't belong to do that sort of thing often I hope. If so

I may as well tell you at once that you'll be no good here."

"I'm very sorry, sir," said the poor creature, trembling and obviously

struggling with rising hysteria. "It took me sudden. I'm very strong,

really, sir. It shan't happen again."

"I hope not," Helzephron answered in a rather more kindly tone. "Elsie,

go into the lounge and ask Miss Palmer for a little brandy and

water--but what took you like this?"

The woman hesitated. Her glance fell upon Lothian who was standing

there, a pitying and perplexed spectator of this strange scene. She

could not repress a shudder as she saw him, though both men noticed

that the staring horror was going from her eyes and that her face was

relieved.

"I'm very sorry," she said again, "but the sight of that gentleman

coming upon me sudden and unexpected was the cause of it."

"This gentleman!" Helzephron replied. "This is Mr. Gilbert Lothian, a

famous gentleman and one of our country gentleman in Norfolk. What can

you have to do with him?"

"Oh, nothing sir, nothing. But there's a very strong resemblance in

this gentleman to some one"--she hesitated and shuddered--"to some one

I once knew. I thought it was him come back at first. I see now that

there's lots of difference. I've had an unhappy life, sir."

She began to sob quietly.

"Now, drink this," said the landlord, handing her the brandy which the

chambermaid had just brought. "Stop crying and Elsie will take you up

to your room. Your references are all right and I don't want to know

nothing of your history. Do your duty by me like a good girl and you'll

find me a good master. Your past's nothing to me."

Lothian and the landlord went out into the stable yard where the

rainbow-throated pigeons were murmuring on the tiled roofs, and the

ostler--like Mousqueton--was spitting meditatively. They discussed this

strange occurrence.

"I never saw a woman so frightened!" said Mr. Helzephron. "You might

have been old Bogy himself, Mr. Lothian. I didn't know what to think

for a moment! I hope she doesn't drink."

"Well, I suppose we've all got a double somewhere or other," Lothian

answered. "I suppose she saw some likeness in me to some one who has

ill used her, poor thing."

"Oh, yes, sir," Helzephron replied. "That's it--she said as much. Half

the plays and novels turn on such likenesses. I used to be a great

play-goer when I was in London and I've seen all the best actresses.

But I'm damned if I ever see such downright horror as there was in that

girl's face. He must have been a bad un whoever he was. Real natural

tragedy in that face--William, put in Mr. Lothian's horse."

He said good-bye and re-entered the hotel.

Lothian remained in the centre of the yard. He lit a cigarette and

watched the horse being harnessed. His face was clouded with thought.

It was very strange! How frightful the poor woman had looked. It was a

nightmare face, a face of Gustave Doré from the Inferno engravings!

He never saw the woman again, as it happened, and never knew who she

was. If he had read of the Hackney murder in the papers of the year

before he had given it no attention. He knew nothing of the coarse

siren for whose sake the poisoned man of Hackney had killed the wife

who loved him, and who, under an assumed name, was living out her

obscure and haunted life in menial toil.

Dr. Morton Sims might have thrown some light upon the incident at the

George perhaps. But then Dr. Morton Sims never heard of it and it soon

passed from the poet's mind.

No doubt the Fiend Alcohol who provided the incidental music at the

head of his orchestra was smiling.

For the Overture to the Dance of Death is curiously coloured music and

there are red threads of melody interwoven with the sable chords.

CHAPTER VI

AN OMNES EXEUNT FROM MORTLAND ROYAL

"Wenn Menschen auseinandergehn

So sagen sie--auf Wiedersehn!

Ja Wiederseh'n."

--_Goethe._

Dickson Ingworth returned from the post office with several letters.

He handed three of them to Lothian. One was a business letter from the

firm of Ince and Amberley, the other an invitation to a literary dinner

at the Trocadero, the third, with foreign stamp and postmark, was for

Mary Lothian.

As they drove out of the town, Ingworth was in high spirits. His eyes

sparkled, he seemed excited.

"Good news by this post, Dicker?" Gilbert asked.

Ingworth had been waiting for the question. He tried to keep the

tremulous pleasure out of his voice as he answered.

"Well, rather. I've just heard from Herbert Toftrees. When I saw him

last, just before I came down here, he hinted that he might be able to

influence things for me in a certain quarter." . . .

He paused.

Gilbert saw how it was. The lad was bursting with news but wanted to

appear calm, wanted to be coaxed. Well, Gilbert owed him that!

"Really! Has something come off, Dicker, then? Do tell me, I should be

so glad."

"Yes, Gilbert. It's the damnedst lucky thing! Toftrees is a topping

chap. The other day he hinted at something he might be able to do for

me in his deep-voiced, mysterious way. I didn't pay much attention

because they say he's rather like that, and one mustn't put too much

trust in it. But, by Jove! it's come off. The editor of the

_Wire_--Ommany you know--wants somebody to go to Italy with the

delegation of English Public School Masters, as special correspondent

for a month. They've offered it to me. It's a big step, Gilbert, for

me! They will pay awfully well for the job and it means that I shall

get in permanently with the _Wire_."

"I'm awfully glad, Dicker. Splendid for you! But what is it exactly?"

"The new movement in Italy, anti-Papal and National. It's the schools,

you know. The King and the Mayor of Rome are frightfully keen that all

the better class schools, like our public schools, you know--shall be

taken out of the hands of the Jesuits and the seminary priests. Games

and a healthy sort of school life are to be organised for the boys.

They're going to try and introduce our system if they can. A Harrow

tutor, a Winchester man, undermasters from Haileybury, Repton and

Denstone are going out to organise things."

"And you're going with them to tell England all about it! I

congratulate you, Dicker. It's a big chance. You can make some fine

articles out of it, if you take care. It should introduce your name."

"Thanks awfully, I hope so. It's because I got my running blue I

expect. But it's jolly decent of the old Toffer all the same."

"Oh, it is. When do you go?"

"At once. They start in four days. I shall have to go up to town by the

first train to-morrow."

"I'm sorry, but of course, if you must" . . .

"Oh, I must," Ingworth said importantly. "I have to see Ommany

to-morrow night."

Unconsciously, as he urged the cob onwards, his head sank forward a

little, and he imitated the grave pre-occupation of Lothian upon the

drive out.

Mary Lothian was sitting in a deck chair in front of the house when the

two men came through the gate. A little table stood by the side of her

chair, and on it was a basket of the thin silk socks her husband wore.

She was darning one of the expensive gossamer things with a tiny needle

and almost invisible thread.

Mary looked up quickly as the two men came up to her. There was a swift

interrogation in her eyes, instantly suppressed but piteous in its

significance.

But now, she smiled.

Gilbert was all right! She knew it at once. He had come back from

Wordingham quite sober, and in her tender anxious heart she blessed God

and Dr. Morton Sims.

She was told of Dickson's opportunity. Gilbert was as anxious to tell,

and as excited as his friend. "Oh, I _am_ so glad, Dicker!" she said

over and over again. "My dear boy, I _am_ so glad! Now you've got your

chance at last. Your real chance. Never come down here again if you

don't make the most of it!"

Ingworth sat down upon the lawn at her feet. Dusk was at hand. The sun

was sinking to rest and the flowers of the garden were almost shouting

with perfume.

Rooks winged homeward through the fading light, and the Dog Trust

gambolled in the middle-distance of the lawn as the cock-chafers went

booming by.

. . . "Think I shall be able to do it, Mrs. Gilbert?"

"Of course you will, Dicker! Put your very heart into it, won't you!

It's your chance at last, isn't it?"

Ingworth jumped to his feet. "I shall do it," he said gravely, as who

should say that the destinies of kingdoms depended upon his endeavours.

"And now I must go in and write some letters. I shall have to be off

quite early to-morrow, Mrs. Gilbert."

"I'll arrange all that. Go in and do your letters. We're not going to

dine till eight to-night."

Ingworth crossed the lawn and went into the house.

Gilbert drew his chair up to his wife.

She held out her hand. He took it, raised it to his lips and kissed it.

He was at home.

"I'm glad, dear," Mary said, "that Dicker has got something definite to

do. It will steady him. If he is successful it will give him a new

sense of responsibility. I wouldn't say anything to you, Gillie, but I

have not liked him so much this time as I used to."

"Why?"

"He doesn't seem to have been treating you quite in the way he used to.

He's been talking a good deal to me of some people who seem to have

taken him up in London. And I can't help knowing that you've done

everything for him in the past. Really, Gillie, I have had to snub him

quite severely, for me, once or twice."

"Yes."

"_Yes._ He assumed a confidential, semi-superior sort of air and

manner. In a clumsy, boyish sort of way he's tried to suggest that I'm

not happy with you."

Lothian laughed bitterly. "I know," he said, "so many people are like

that. Ingworth has good streaks like all of us. But speaking generally

he's unstable. I've found it out lately, too. Never mind. He's off

to-morrow. Oh, by the way, here's a letter for you, dear, I forgot."

Mary took the letter and rose from her chair. Arm in arm they entered

the house together and went upstairs to dress for dinner.

Gilbert had had his bath, had changed, and was tying his tie in front

of the dressing table mirror, when the door of his room opened and Mary

hurried in.

Her hair was coiled in its masses of pale gold, and a star of emeralds

which he had given her was fixed in it. She wore a long dressing robe

of green silk fringed with dull red arabesques--he had bought it for

her in Tunis.

A rope of camels' hair gathered it in round her slender waist and the

lovely column of her neck, the superb white arms were bare.

"What is it, dear?" he said, for his wife's fair face was troubled.

"Oh, darling," she answered, with a sob in her voice, "I've had bad

news from Nice."

"About Dorothy?"

"Yes, Miss Dalton, the lady nurse who is with her has written. It's all

been no use, Gillie, no use at all! She's dying, dear. The doctor from

Cannes who has been attending her has said so. And Sir William Larus

who is at Mentone was called in too. They give her three weeks or a

month. They've cabled to India but it's a forlorn hope. Harold won't be

able to get to her in time--though there's just a chance."

She sank down upon the bed and covered her face with her hands.

She was speaking of her sister, Lady Davidson, who was stricken with

consumption. Sir Harold Davidson was a major in the Indian Army, a

baronet without much money, and a keen soldier. Mary's sister had

developed the disease in England, where she had been ordered from Simla

by the doctors there. She was supposed to be "run down" and no more

then. Phthisis had been diagnosed in London--incipient only--and she

had been sent to the Riviera at once. The reports from Nice had become

much worse during the last few weeks, and now--this letter.

Gilbert went to his wife and sat down beside her upon the bed, drawing

her to him. He was fond of Dorothy Davidson and also of her husband,

but he knew that Mary adored her sister.

"Darling," he said, "don't give way. It may not be so bad after all.

And so much depends upon the patient in all illnesses--doesn't it?

Morton Sims was telling us so the other night, you remember? Dolly is

an awfully sporting sort of girl. She won't give in."

Mary leant her head upon his shoulder. The strong arms that held her

brought consolation. The lips of the husband and wife met.

"It's dear of you to say so," Mary said at length, "but I know, dear.

The doctor and the nurse have been quite explicit. Dorothy is dying,

Gillie, I can't let her die alone, can I?"

"No, dear, of course not," he replied rather vaguely, not quite

understanding what she meant for a moment.

"She must have some one of her own people with her. Harold will most

likely not arrive in time. I must go--mustn't I?"

Then Gilbert realised.

His swift imagination pictured a lonely hotel death-bed among the palms

and mimosa of the Côte d'Azur, a pretty and charming girl fading away

from the blue white and gold with no loving hands to tend her, and only

the paid services of strangers to speed or assuage the young soul's

passage from sunshine and laughter to the unknown.

"You must go to her at once, sweetheart," he said gravely.

"Oh, I _must_! You don't mind my leaving you?"

"How can you ask it? But I will come with you. We will both go. You

will want a man."

Mary hesitated for a second, and then she shook her head.

"I shall manage quite well by myself," she said. "It will be better so.

I'm quite used to travelling alone as you know. And the journey to Nice

is nothing. I shall be in one carriage all the way from Calais. You

could come out after, if necessary."

"I would come gladly, dear."

"I know, Gillie, and it's sweet of you. But you couldn't be of use and

it would be miserable for you. It is better that I should be alone with

Dolly. I can always wire if I want you."

"As you think best, dear. Then I will stay quietly down here."

"Yes, do. You have that poem to work on, 'A Lady in a Library.' It is a

beautiful fancy and will make you greater than ever! It's quite the

best thing you've done so far. And then there's the shooting."

"Oh, I shall do very well, Molly. Don't bother about me, dear."

She held him closer. Her cool white arms were around his neck.

"But I always do bother about you, husband," she whispered, "because I

love you better than anything else in the world. It is sweet of you to

let me go like this. And I feel so much happier about you now, since

the doctor has come to the village."

He winced with pain and shame at her loving words. A pang went right

through him.

It passed as swiftly as it had come. Sweet and loving women too often

provide men with excuses for their own ill conduct. Lothian knew

that--under the special circumstances of which his wife knew

nothing--it was his duty to go with Mary. But he didn't want to go. He

would have hated going.

Already a wide vista was opening before him--a freedom, an absolute

freedom! Wild music! The Wine of Life! Now, if ever, Fate, Destiny,

call it what he would, was preparing the choicest banquet.

He had met Rita. Rita was waiting, he could be with Rita!

And yet, so subtle and tortuous is the play of egoism upon conscience,

he felt pleased with himself for his ready concurrence in his wife's

plans. He assumed the rôle she gave him with avidity, and when he

answered her she thought him the best and noblest of men.

"It will be dreadful without you, darling, but you are quite right to

go. Send for me if you want me. I'll catch the next boat. But I have my

work to do, and I can see a good deal of Morton Sims"--he knew well,

and felt with shame, the cunning of this last statement--"and if I'm

dull I can always run up to town for a day or two and stay at the

club."

"Of course you can, dear. You won't feel so lonely then. Now about

details. I must pack to-night."

"Yes, dear, and then you can go off with Dicker in the morning, and

catch the night boat. If you like, that is."

"Well, I shouldn't gain anything by that, dear. I should only have to

wait about in Calais until one o'clock the next day when the train de

luxe starts. But I should like to go first thing to-morrow. I couldn't

wait about here the whole day. Dicker will be company of sorts. I shall

get to town about two, and go to the Charing Cross Hotel. Then I shall

do some shopping, go to bed early, and catch the boat train from the

station in the morning. I would rather do it like that."

Both of them were experienced travellers and knew the continental

routes well. It was arranged so.

Mary did not come down to dinner. A tray was sent up to her room.

Lothian dined alone with Ingworth. The voices of the two men were

hushed to a lower tone in deference to the grief of the lady above. But

there was a subdued undercurrent of high spirits nevertheless. Ingworth

was wildly excited by the prospect before him; Gilbert fell into his

mood with no trouble at all.

He also had his own thoughts, his own private thoughts.

--"I say, Dicker, let's have some champagne, shall we?--just to wish

your mission success."

"Yes, do let's. I'm just in the mood for buzz-water to-night."

The housemaid went to the cellar and fetched the wine.

"Here's to you, Dicker! May you become a G. W. Stevens or a Julian

Ralph!"

"Thanks, old chap. I'll do my best, now that my chance has come. I say

I am awfully sorry about Lady Davidson. It's such rough luck on Mrs.

Gilbert. You'll be rather at a loose end without your wife, won't

you?--or will you write?"

He tossed off his second glass of Pol Roger.

"Oh, I shall be quite happy," Lothian answered, and as he said it a

quiet smile came placidly upon his lips. It glowed out from within, as

from some comfortable inward knowledge.

Ingworth saw it, and his mind, quickened by wine and excitement, found

the truth unerringly.

Anger and envy flushed the young man's veins. He hated his host once

more.

"So that is his game, damned hypocrite!" Ingworth thought. "I shall be

away, his wife will be out of the way and he will make the running with

Rita Wallace just as he likes."

He looked at Lothian, and then had a mental vision of himself.

"He's fat and bloated," he thought. "Surely a young and lovely girl

like Rita _can't_ care for him?"

But even as he endeavoured to comfort his greedy conceit by these

imaginings, he felt the shadow of the big mind falling upon them. He

knew, as he had known so often of late, the power of that which was

cased in its envelope of flesh, and which could not be denied.

Perhaps there is no hate so bitter, no fear so impotent and

distressing, as that which is experienced by the surface for the depth.

It is the fury of the brilliant scabbard against the sword within,

decoration versus that which cleaves.

Ingworth wished that he were not going away--leaving the field

clear. . . .

"Have a cigar, Dicker. No?--well, here's the very best of luck."

"Thanks, the same to you!"

END OF BOOK TWO

BOOK THREE

FRUIT OF THE DEAD SEA

"Let thy fountain be blessed: and rejoice with the wife of thy

youth."

"Let her be as the loving hind and pleasant roe: let her breasts

satisfy thee at all times: and be thou ravished always with her

love."

"And why wilt thou, my son, be ravished with a strange woman, and

embrace the bosom of a stranger?"

"_His own iniquities shall take the wicked himself, and he shall

be holden with the cords of his sins._"

CHAPTER I

THE GIRLS IN THE FOURTH STORY FLAT

"We were two daughters of one race;

She was the fairest in the face;"

--_Tennyson._

In the sitting room of a small forty-five pound flat, upon the fourth

floor of a tall red-brick building in West Kensington known as Queens

Mansions, Ethel Harrison, the girl who lived with Rita Wallace, sat

sewing by the window.

It was seven o'clock in the evening and though dusk was at hand there

was still enough light to sew by. The flat, moreover, was on the west

side of the building and caught the last rays of the sun as he sank to

rest behind the quivering vapours of London.

Last week in August as it was, the heat which hung over the metropolis

for so long was in no way abated. All the oxygen was gone from the air,

and for those who must stay in London--the workers, who could only read

in the papers of translucent sunlit seas in Cornwall where one bathed

from the beaches all day long; of bright northern moors where dew fell

upon the heather at dawn--life was become stifling and hard.

In the window hung a bird-cage and the canary within it--the pet of

these two lonely maidens--drooped upon its perch. It was known as "The

Lulu Bird" and was a recurring incident in their lives.

Ethel was six and twenty, short, undistinguished of feature and with

sandy hair. She was the daughter of a very poor clergyman in

Lancashire, and she was the principal typist in the busy office of a

firm of solicitors in the city. She had ever so many certificates for

shorthand, was a quick and accurate machine-writer, understood the

routine of an office in all its details, and was invaluable to her

employers. They boasted of her, indeed, trusted her in every way,

worked her from nine to six on normal days, to any hours of the night

at times of pressure, and paid her the highest salary in the market.

That is to say, that this girl was at the very top of her profession

and received two pounds ten shillings a week. Dozens of girls envied

her, she was more highly paid than most of the men clerks in the city.

She knew herself to be a very fortunate girl. She gave high technical

ability, a good intelligence, unceasing, unwearying and most loyal

service for fifty shillings a week.

Each year she had a holiday of fourteen days, when she clubbed with

some other girls and they all went to some farmhouse in the country, or

even for a cheap excursion abroad, with everything calculated to the

last shilling. This girl did all this, dressed like a lady, had a

little home of her own with Rita, preserved her dignity and

independence, and sent many a small postal order to help the poor

curate's wife, her mother, with the hungry brood of younger ones. Mr.

and Mrs. Harrison in Lancashire spoke of their eldest daughter with

pride. She had "her flat in town." She was "doing extraordinarily

well"; "Sister Ethel" was a fairy godmother to her little brothers and

sisters.

She was a good girl, good and happy. The graces were denied her; she

had made all sweet virtues her own. No man wooed her, no man looked

twice at her. She had no religious ecstasies, and--instead of a theatre

where one had to pay--asked no thrills from sensuous ceremonial. She

simply went to the nearest church and said her prayers.

It is the shame of most of us that when we meet such women as these, we

pass them by with a kindly laugh or a patronising word. Men and women

of the world prefer more decorative folk. They like to watch holiness

in a picturesque setting, Elizabeth of Hungary washing the beggar's

feet upon the palace steps. . . .

A little worker-bee saint, making a milk pudding for a sick washerwoman

on a gas-stove in a flat--that comes rather too close home, does it

not?

The light was really fading now, and Ethel put down her sewing, rose

from her basket-work chair, and lit the gas.

It was an incandescent burner, hanging from the centre of the ceiling,

and the girls' living room was revealed.

It was a very simple, comely, makeshift little home.

On one side of the fireplace--now filled with a brown and gasping

harts-tongue fern in an earthen pot--was Ethel's bookshelf.

Up-to-date she had a hundred and thirty-two books, of the "Everyman"

and "World's Classics" series. She generally managed a book and a half

each fortnight, and her horizon was bounded by the two-hundredth

volume. Dickens she had very much neglected of late, the new Ruskin had

kept the set at "David Copperfield" for weeks, but she was getting on

steadily with her Thackeries.

Rita had no books. She was free of that Kingdom at the Podley

Institute, but the little black piano was hers. The great luxury of the

Chesterfield was a joint extravagance. Both ends would let down to make

a couch when necessary, and though it had cost the girls three pounds

ten, it "made all the difference to the room."

All the photographs upon the mantel-shelf were Ethel's. There was her

father in his cassock--staring straight out of the frame like a good

and patient mule. . . . Her sisters and brothers also, of all ages and

sizes, and all clothed with an odd suggestion of masquerading, of

attempting the right thing. Not but what they were all perfect to poor

Ethel, whose life was far too busy and limited to understand the

tragedy of clothes.

Rita's photographs were on the piano.

There were several of her school-friends--lucky Rita had been to a

smart school!--and the enigmatic face of Muriel Amberley with its

youthful Mona Lisa smile looked out from an oval frame of red leather

stamped with an occasional fleur-de-lys in gold.

There was a portrait of Mr. Podley, cut from the _Graphic_ and framed

cheaply, and there were two new photographs.

One of them was that of a curly-headed, good-looking young man with

rather thick lips and a painful consciousness that he was being

photographed investing the whole picture with suspense.

Ethel had heard Rita refer to the original of this portrait once or

twice as "Dicker" or "Curly."

But, then, there was another photograph. A large one this time, done in

cloudy browns, nearly a foot square and with the name of a very famous

artist of the camera stamped into the card.

This was a new arrival, also, of the past few weeks, and it was held in

a massive frame of thick plain silver.

The frame, with the portrait in it, had arrived at the flat some

fortnight ago in an elaborate wooden box.

Ethel had recognised the portrait at once. It was of Mr. Gilbert

Lothian, the great poet. Rita had met him at a dinner-party, and, if

she didn't exaggerate, the great man had almost shown a disposition to

be friendly. It was nice of him to send Rita his photograph, but the

frame was rather too much. All that massive silver!--"it must have cost

thirty shillings at least," she had thought in her innocence.

When the gas was turned up, for some reason or other her eye had fallen

at once upon the photograph upon the top of the piano.

She had read some of Lothian's poems, but she had found nothing

whatever in them that had pleased her. Even when her father had written

to her and recommended them for her to read the poems meant less than

nothing, and the face--no! she didn't like the face. "I hardly think

that it's quite a _good_ face," she said to herself, not recognising

that--the question of morality quite apart--her hostility rose from the

fact that it was a face utterly outside her limited experience, a face

that was eloquent of a life, of things, of thoughts that she could

never even begin to understand.

In the middle of the room the small round table was spread with a fair

white cloth and set for a meal. There was a green bowl of bananas, a

loaf of brown bread, some sardines in a glass dish. But a place was

laid for one person only.

Rita was in their mutual bedroom dressing. Rita was going to dine out.

The two girls had lived together for a year now. At the beginning of

their association one thing had been agreed between them. Their outside

lives were to be lived independently of their home life. No confidences

were to be expected or demanded as a matter of course. If confidences

were made they were to be free and spontaneous, at the wish or whim of

each.

The contract had been loyally observed. Ethel never had any secrets.

Rita had had several during the year of their association, but they had

proved only minor little secrets after all. Sooner or later she had

told them, and they had been food for virginal laughter for them both.

But now, during the last few weeks?--Ethel's glance flitted uneasily

from the big photograph upon the piano to a little round table of

bamboo work in one corner of the sitting room.

Upon this table lay a huge bunch of dark red roses. The stalks were

fitted into a holder of finely-woven white grass--as delicate in

texture as a panama hat--and the bouquet was tied with graceful bows

and streamers of purple satin--broad, expensive ribbon.

A boy messenger, most unusual visitor, had brought them an hour ago.

"For Miss Rita Wallace."

The quiet mind, the crystal soul of this girl, dimly discerned

something alien and disturbing.

The door of the sitting-room opened and Rita came in.

She was radiant. Her one evening dress was not an expensive affair, a

simple, girl's frock of olive-green _crêpe de chene_ in the Empire

fashion, but the girl and her clothes were one.

The high "waist," coming just under the curve of the breast, was edged

with an embroidery of dull silver thread, and the gleam of this upon

its olive setting threw up the fair column of the throat the rounded

arms, the whiteness of the girlish bosom, with a most striking and

arresting lustre.

Round her neck the girl wore a riband of dark green velvet, and as a

pendant from it hung a little star of amethysts and olivines set in a

filigree of platinum, no rare nor costly jewel, but a beautiful one.

She was pulling her long white gloves up to the elbow as she entered

the room.

Ethel loved Rita dearly. Rita was her romance, the art and colour of

her life. She was always saying or doing astonishing things, she was

always beautiful. To-night, though the frock was an old friend, the

pendant quite familiar, Ethel thought that she had never seen her

friend so lovely. The nut-brown hair was shining, the young, brown eyes

lit up with excitement and joy, the tints of rose and pearl upon Rita's

cheeks came and went as her heart beat.

"A Duke might be glad to marry her," the plain girl thought without a

throb of envy.

She was perfectly right. If Rita had been in society or on the stage

she probably would have married a peer--not a Duke though, that was

Ethel's inexperience. There are so few dukes that they have not the

same liberty of action as other noblemen. The Beauty Market is badly

organised--curious fact in an age when to purvey cats' meat is a

specialised industry. But the fact remains. The prettiest girls in

England don't have their pictures in the papers and advertise no

dentrifice or musical comedy on the one hand, nor St. Peter and St.

George, their fashionable West End temples, on the other. Buyers of

Beauty have but a limited choice, and on the whole it is a salutary

thing, though doubtless hard upon loveliness that perforce throws

itself away upon men without rank or fortune for want of proper

opportunity!

"How do I look, Wog dear?" Rita asked.

"Splendid, darling," Ethel answered eagerly--a pretty junior typist in

Ethel's office, who had been snubbed, had once sent her homely senior a

golliwog doll, and since then the good-humoured Ethel was "Wog" to her

friends.

"I'm so glad. I want to look my best to-night."

"Well, then, you do," Ethel replied, and with an heroic effort forbore

further questioning.

She always kept loyally to the compact of silence and non-interference

with what went on outside the flat.

Rita chuckled and darted one of her naughty, provocative glances.

"Wog! You're dying to know where I'm going!"

Some girls would have affected indifference immediately. Not so the

simple Wog.

"Of course I am, Cupid," she said.

"I'm going to dine with Gilbert."

"Gilbert?"

"Gilbert Lothian I mean, of course. We are absolute friends, Wog

dear--he and I. I haven't told you before, but I will now. You remember

that night I was home so late, nearly a month ago? Yes?--well I had

been motoring to Brighton with Gilbert. I met him for the first time at

the Amberleys'--but that you know. Since then we have become

friends--such a strange and wonderful friendship it is, Ethel! It's

made things so different for me."

"But how friends? Have you seen him often, then? But you can't have?"

Rita shook her head, impatiently for a moment, and then she smiled

gently. How could poor old Wog know or understand!

"No!" she cried, with a little tap of her shoe upon the carpet. "But

there are such things as letters aren't there?"

"Has he been writing to you, then?"

"Writing! I have had four of the most beautiful letters that a poet

ever wrote. It took him days to write each one. He chose every word,

over and over again. Every sentence is music, every word a note in a

chord!"

Ethel went up to her friend and kissed her. "Dear old Cupid," she said,

"I'm so glad, so very glad. I don't understand his poems myself, but

Father simply loves them. I am sure you will be very happy. Only I do

hope he is a good man--really worthy of my dear! And so"--she

continued, with a struggle to get down to commonplace brightness of

manner--"And so he's coming for you to-night! Now I know why you look

so beautiful and are so happy."

Two tears gathered in the kind green eyes, tears of joy at her dear

girl's happiness, but with a tincture of sadness too. With a somewhat

unaccustomed flash of imagination, she looked into the future and saw

herself lonely in the flat, or with another girl who could never be to

her what Rita was.

She looked up at Rita again, trying to smile through her tears.

What she saw astounded her.

Rita's face was flushed. A knot of wrinkles had sprung between her

eyebrows. Her mouth was mutinous, her brown eyes lit with an angry and

puzzled light.

"I don't understand you, Ethel," she said in a voice which was so cold

and unusual that the other girl was dumb.--"What on earth do you mean?"

"Mean, dear," Ethel faltered. "I don't quite understand. I thought you

meant--I thought . . ."

"What did you think?"

"I thought you meant that you were engaged to him, Cupid darling!"

"Engaged!--_Why Gilbert is married._"

Ethel glanced quickly at the flowers, at the photograph upon the piano.

Things seemed going round and round her--the heat, that was it--"But

the letters!" she managed to say at length, "and, and--oh, Cupid, what

_are_ you doing? He can't be a good man. I'm certain of it, dear! I'm

older than you are. I know more about things. You don't realise,--but

how should you poor darling! He can't be a good man! Rita, _does his

wife know_?"

The girl frowned impatiently. "How limited and narrow you are, Ethel,"

she said. "Have you such low ideals that you think friendship between a

man and a woman impossible? Are you entirely fettered by convention and

silly old puritanical nonsense? Wouldn't you be glad and proud to have

a man with a wonderful mind for your friend--a man who is all chivalry

and kindness, who pours out the treasures of his intellect for one?"

Ethel did not answer. She did not, in truth, know what to say. There

_was_ no reason she could adduce why Rita should not have a man friend.

She knew that many singular and fine natures despised conventionality

or ordinary rules and seemed to have the right to do so. And

then--_honi soit_! Yet, inarticulate as she was, she felt by some

instinct that there was something wrong. Mr. Gilbert Lothian was

married. That meant everything. A married man, and a poet too! oughtn't

to have any secret and very intimate friendships with beautiful, wilful

and unprotected girls.

. . . "You have nothing to say! Of course! There _is_ nothing that

any wide-minded person could say. Ethel, you're a dear old stupe!"--she

crossed the room and kissed her friend.

And Ethel was so glad to hear the customary affection return to Rita's

voice, the soft lips upon her cheek set her gentle and loving heart in

so warm a glow, that her fears and objections dissolved and she said no

more.

The electric bell at the front door whirred.

Rita tore herself from Ethel's embrace. There was a mirror over the

mantel-shelf. She gazed into it for a few seconds and then hurried away

into the little hall.

There was the click of the latch as it was drawn back, a moment of

silence, and then Ethel heard a voice with a peculiar vibration and

timbre--an altogether unforgettable voice--say two words.

"At last!"

Then there was a murmur of conversation, the words of which she could

not catch, interrupted once by Rita's happy laughter.

Finally she heard Rita hurry into the bedroom, no doubt for her cloak,

and return with an excited word. Then the door closed and there was an

instant of footsteps upon the stone stairs outside.

Ethel was left alone.

She went to her bookshelf--she did not seem to want to think just

now--and after a moment's hesitation took down "Sesame and Lilies."

Then she sat at the table with a sigh and looked without much interest

at the bananas, the sardines and the brown bread.

Ethel was left alone.