CHAPTER 1

THE BEATING HEART

The Beating Heart

BY

VICTORIA CROSS

_Author of “Anna Lombard,” “Five Nights,” “Life’s Shopwindow,”

“Over Life’s Edge,” etc._

NEW YORK

BRENTANO’S

PUBLISHERS

COPYRIGHT, 1924, BY

VIVIEN CORY GRIFFIN

All rights reserved

_Printed in the United States of America_

CONTENTS

PAGE

1. The Kiss in the Wilderness 1

2. Colour 49

3. A Novel Elopement 62

4. The Jewel Casket 100

5. The Vengeance of Pasht 116

6. Village Passion 128

7. Supping with the Devil 151

_The Heart can beat with_

LOVE

DESIRE

PITY

SYMPATHY

FEAR

JEALOUSY

INDIGNATION

THE KISS IN THE WILDERNESS

BY

VICTORIA CROSS

They were coming up in a closed carriage from Jerico, a jolly, merry,

roystering crowd. Melisande whose real name was Eliza, late of the

Gaiety theatre, now married to a millionaire, Lord and Lady Hillingford

on their honeymoon, an old bachelor Major keen on reckless adventure,

and Miss Smith.

To pass the time they were singing comic songs with resounding chorus,

which floated out of the open windows and echoed strangely from the

stony hills of the wide stretching barren wilderness that lies between

Jerico and Jerusalem.

It was a brilliant night with a huge silver moon at the full hanging in

the sky above sending its floods of light down upon the lonely waste,

in which there was no tree nor flower nor bird: yet something moved at

intervals, a curious low four-footed shape with sloping spine and coat

so cunningly contrived in spots and lines of brown and white that it

matched exactly the patchy, stony hills and clefts and crannies amongst

the rocks through which the creatures flitted with their elusive

movements.

The exhilarated crowd within the carriage took no notice except one,

Miss Smith who was always an exception to whatever the rest might do or

be.

The supper at the Jerico Inn before their start had been good with

copious libations of the rich Greek wine and now Melisande’s golden

head was leaning on Hillingford’s shoulder while she shrilled out the

chorus from her coral mouth and the millionaire’s arm was round Lady

Hillingford’s neck and the Greek wine no doubt was to blame if she was

too confused to notice it wasn’t her husband’s arm. The old Major was

frankly overcome and curled up in a quiescent ball in his corner of

the great roomy old carriage, only Miss Smith sat quiet and sedate in

her grey travelling dress watching the shapes flitting among the rocks

in the moonlight. They were hyaenas Miss Smith knew what they were.

She was not intoxicated, she was not sleepy. She was not singing comic

songs. She sat up straight, alert and watchful.

Her companions did not heed her. They generally left her alone

recognizing that while with them she was not of them. At the same time

they did not object to her. No one ever objected to Miss Smith. They

teased her goodnaturedly because she never drank, smoked, flirted nor

swore as they did and used to read and study dingy brown books in

the queer languages of the country and she as goodnaturedly smiled

and continued to pursue her own quiet way. Among other women she was

generally passed over and ignored and considered unattractive because

she was generally termed “good” and in these days to be a good woman,

is not attractive. A beautiful woman, a fast woman, a fascinating

woman, a wicked woman, any adjective almost, sounds interesting but

good no. So once having dubbed her good everyone let her alone and she

was allowed to wear her crown of Virtue unchallenged and undisturbed.

In person she was rather tall and slender and affected quiet

well-fitting tailor made clothes. Her hair was of a warm brown shade

and very thick but so quietly done, pressed close to her small head

that no one looked twice at it while the frizzed out golden curls,

now getting thin from over much dying that flared in a halo round

Melisande’s head drew every eye. Miss Smith’s skin was cool and pale,

her eye grave and grey a different thing altogether from the sunny

saucy laughing blue beloved by man. Yet the eye had beauty in its

calm repose like a clear deep pool in a shady wood. She was 36 though

she looked only about 26 and her present and future had been kindly

settled for her as old maid by her friends. When she had first joined

the touring party, both the married men had attempted to flirt with

her after the way of married men but Miss Smith did not care for

flirtations with married men and did not want the attentions of the old

bachelor Major Mitchell who gallantly offered them. What she did want

was locked up in her own soul.

She had been proposed to at 16 and had accepted. He was a young man

her father’s secretary. The engagement had pursued a tranquil and as

Miss Smith privately thought a disappointing course until one evening

when as he was leaving her after much long and as she thought boring

conversation, she ventured to whisper softly as he took her hand in

farewell “Kiss me.”

Instantly she was enfolded in his arms and a kiss pressed upon her

lips, not an irreverent one but one full of force and electric fire

and pressed down so hard that her lips were painfully crushed upon her

teeth, under it. When he let her go suddenly she was absolutely white

dazed and breathless and involuntarily sank down on the chair nearest

her.

The young man’s face was white too as they stared for a moment at each

other in silence. Not a word was spoken. He retreated silently, swiftly

to the door and vanished through it. She sat still where she was

until the beating of her heart grew calmer and allowed her to get up.

Then as the sense of physical shock passed she smiled. That had been

delightful! That was Life! That was Love! That moment compensated her

for the preceding boring weeks of her engagement. In that moment she

had had her first insight into that stupendous joy that we share with

the animals and primitive man alike. Perverted, degraded, chained and

beaten down out of sight, as the sexual instinct is by civilization,

there are still moments like these of innocent youthful joy in which we

see the face of Nature for an instant and realise her tremendous power.

Little Christine Smith went to bed that night profoundly happy.

Engagements were not stupid after all. Life was not all dullness.

Poets and novelists were right. There was something in existence which

was marvelous and golden and glowing and it was love. She adored her

fiance now. Had he not in that electric wonderful kiss shown her the

majestic Force that he represented? It was overaweing, inspiring. All

night she dreamt innocently happily of the kiss that had lifted her to

heaven. In the morning there was a letter from him.

Trembling and flushing she had carried it to her room to read alone.

His prayer no doubt to her to hasten their marriage so that there might

be more and more and more of those heavenly moments. But the letter

was not that. _It was an apology._ A craving of pardon for that

kiss. A promise that if forgiven he would never, never ever again.

Christine could not understand. Grown cold and white she read that

astounding letter over and over again and the more she read it the less

she understood it. What did he mean? What was wrong? Why was the kiss

wrong? It was not, her common sense told her that. It had been just

the revelation of his love for her in all its splendid strength and

ardour and she loved him for it, and now here was this stupid letter in

which he painted himself as a sort of criminal. She was dumbfounded.

But one thing was clear. He evidently thought the kiss was very wicked

and if she did not agree then he would think her very wicked also.

Christine sat very still and cold thinking, the gay mirage that Nature

had flung all about her dissipated and gone. Her primitive instincts

urged her to go to him and tell him he was mistaken. The kiss was

Right and he must take her in his arms and kiss her again and again in

exactly the same way give her again that wonderful glimpse of a golden

and rose-coloured world of ecstasy. But civilised 16 is rather shy.

Christine shrank from facing that cold condemnation that was in the

letter, turned upon herself. It seemed so impossible to explain, to

find the words to fit all those myriad feelings leaping within herself.

She was afraid he would not understand.

At last after hours of thought she folded the letter and put it away.

He had said he would come that evening to hear her say she forgave him.

She decided she must say nothing but extend to him her pardon as he

desired.

For months the engagement went on. Christine secretly hoped that once

again his feelings might betray him and that glorious moment come again

but it never did.

The engagement was finally broken off and not by him. Christine told

him gently that she feared they hardly understood each other well

enough for marriage.

The young man mournfully and humbly accepted her decree. To this day he

believes that it was that fatal moment (to her so ecstatic) that was

his undoing.

There had been several engagements since then on the same dull formal

lines and terminated in the same way by her. They had not contained

any whirling moments such as the one she had experienced and for the

return of which she waited confidently as an astronomer for the return

of a comet. This time when it came....

Meanwhile she was not unhappy. She was strong and fleet of foot and

clear of eye. She had perfect health in a splendid well knit frame and

life was sweet and all the days of this tour through Palestine had been

very bright and fair.

She had enjoyed especially this just finished visit to Jerico, going

down from Jerusalem in the early summer when the heat was so deadly

that not a soul except their own reckless party would venture down

there.

The Hotel keeper at Jerusalem had begged them not to go! The season

for it was over the heat far too great but they had laughed at him.

They had been so cooked they declared a temperature of 110° could not

frighten them and the idea of going down down to the scorching plain

of Jerico, to the borders of the Dead Sea beneath which lay the sinful

Cities of the Plain had a delightful fascination in it.

The road the landlord urged was extremely dangerous. It lay through

the wilderness and at this time the Bedouin Arabs were travelling up

and down. Caravans and long lines of them fully armed might be met at

any point. If go they must an escort of two armed soldiers would be

provided for them by the Government. What would be the good of two

soldiers against a band of robbers? Hillingford had asked and the

landlord had explained “If you have Turkish soldiers with you, no

matter how few, it shows you are under the protection of the Sultan of

Turkey the head of their religion the Sheik-Islam: they will not lift a

hand against their own chief. No one will touch you.”

The party consented to take the escort but at the last moment it

did not arrive and they would not wait. Finally to the sound of

lamentations from their host, they drove away, in the capacious vehicle

with a good pair of horses and a single unarmed man as driver. They

went by night to avoid the blinding heat of the sun and here they were

returning by night by moonlight and the moonlight that falls on the

plain of Jerico and on the stony wilderness around it is as hot as

English sunlight. The party were well pleased with their visit they had

enjoyed it especially Miss Smith. She had liked the journey down down

into the simmering bowl of heat, at the bottom of which lay the rich

verdant tree filled plain of Jerico and the sparkling blue Salt Lake

called the Dead Sea.

The Jerico Inn kept by a Greek where they stayed was a low white

building of immensely thick walls and almost hidden from view under

the shade of a gigantic fig tree whose wide spreading massive thick

leaved boughs filled the court yard with deep delicious shadow green

and cool. Here, on their arrival after midnight they had sat and supped

at a table neatly spread with bread and cheese and fruit and great jars

of honey and the rich heady wines of Greece and while the others had

rioted and jested and laughed and kissed Miss Smith had sat gazing up

through the fig leaves to where between them here and there a great

planet burned fiercely in the sky uneclipsed even by the silver light

of the moon. She was enjoying it all in her deep calm soul. The next

morning the rioters slept late in the cool stone chambers of the inn,

but she was up while the larks were singing overhead and the whole

fair plain of Jerico was smiling in fresh dew and early light. Alone

and unafraid and unmolested she found her way down to the edge of the

sparkling sea, undressed and bathed in its wonderful blue and limpid

waters that would not let her sing and clung round her snowy throat and

limbs like the heaviest thickest oil.

Miss Smith thought of all these things now in pleasant retrospect as

the carriage lumbered along slowly up the stony road between the hills.

Suddenly a sharp sound the crack of a rifle came stinging through the

silence, followed by a terrible thud in front of the carriage. Their

driver, doubled up in a sort of ball, fell from his seat and then

rolled heavily to the ground, the reins still in his hands. The horses

plunged and shied a little as his body fell close by their heels, but

they were too hot and weary in that long upward climb to run away.

They were startled frightened, something had happened but fatigue was

greater than any other feeling. They stopped dead still with heaving

sweating sides.

The instant the carriage stopped, the occupants who had by now sung

themselves into a state of lethargy, woke up with a shock and the men

began to get out. Miss Smith had descended on her side and was first at

the side of the fallen driver.

Miss Smith knew all about first aid and she saw here there was no aid

to be given. The man was dead. The old Major came to her side. He also

knew death when he saw it. “God bless me!” he ejaculated. “This is

dreadful, poor fellow! Poor fellow! What’s it all mean, eh?”

Miss Smith did not answer, she was looking through the silver space to

a long broken line of rocks some 200 yards away. From these, men were

running up to them. In a few moments it seemed the carriage in which

the two women still sat, huddled together, was surrounded by a circle

of Bedouin Arabs. Each one carried a rifle in one hand and a short

knife was thrust into the broad sash folded many times round their

waist.

Thought is very quick and Miss Smith had time to think even in that

alarming moment how handsome and picturesque a crowd they were. Their

dark faces were finely carved and featured with brilliant flashing

eyes and teeth. On their heads they wore what looked like two enormous

rolls of coloured cord, deep red and blue, forming a sort of turban and

falling in a twist on their shoulders at the back. A vest of coloured

silk and purple Zouave jacket, wide sash and cartridge belt, and loose

crimson trousers to somewhat below the knee made up a costume worn with

extraordinary grace on beautiful and stately figures of about average

height. These men were not specially tall but extremely lithe and well

proportioned. They closed round the little English group as leopards

encircle antelope. Two of them between them carried the soft limp body

of a shot hyaena. They laid it down by the body of the driver. Miss

Smith stooped for a moment and stroked softly the exquisite white fur

on its chest. Then she straightened herself and looked round on the

circle of eager dark faces and asked them in Arabic what they wanted.

And then the whole English party realised that they were helpless and

useless in this emergency except for this slim quiet serene person,

whom they had laughed at and ignored. She was now the mistress of the

situation. Their lives and safety lay in her hands. They could only

stand by gaping helplessly while she, thanks to her dingy brown books,

parleyed with their enemies.

It looked as if they were in an appalling mess and they depended on her

now to get them out of it. The women in the carriage put scared white

faces out of the window.

“What do they say, the scoundrels?” queried the Major after Christine

in her musical voice had exchanged some sentences with the leader. To

Major Mitchell the best man living, if he had a dark skin, was always a

scoundrel.

“He says they had no intention of killing our driver,” she replied,

“but a shot ricochetted from a rock that was aimed at a hyaena.”

“Oh come that’s good!” said Hillingford, “well then can they help us to

get on anywhere?”

“You must remember that is what they _say_,” she returned calmly

and then she resumed conversing with the Arab leader, while the women

in the carriage shivered in the heat and the English men cursed

themselves inwardly for having come without the Government guard. The

millionaire stole close to Christine’s side. “Offer them anything,

_anything_, a thousand, ten thousand, if we get safely back to

Jerusalem,” he whispered shakily. Christine turned her clear eyes upon

him. “I do not think _money_ is what they want,” she replied

regarding him steadily. What she thought they did want she did not say.

John Briggs, millionaire, stepped back, white under his Eastern

sunburn. His money had smoothed out most ruts in his life. Was it going

to fail him now? He glanced at the other two men and it was three very

pinched looking faces that stared at each other in the moonlight,

while the long glistening barrels of the rifles held by the Arabs

sides, almost touched them as the circle drew nearer and the dark

eager countenances with their glittering eyes and teeth came thrusting

themselves close up to their shoulders.

“Ugly business Jack,” muttered Hillingford.

“Scoundrels,” repeated the Major whose vocabulary was limited,

clenching his fists.

“This is just what the landlord said. Fools we were not to take his

advice,” said Briggs savagely.

Then they were silent. Christine had finished a long talk with the

leading Arab and had now turned to them.

“They say they don’t want money nor anything we have with us. That they

are not robbers and that the shooting of our driver was an accident. As

they have killed him however, they can do nothing without their Sheik’s

orders. He is called Sheik Lasrali and he has a tent pitched some

distance from here in the wilderness and we must all go there with them

and hear his orders.”

“What cheek! The scoundrels,” burst out the Major. Christine’s even

brows contracted a little.

“Do be careful Major and control yourself,” she said, “We are in a bad

enough position as it is, don’t make it worse.”

“How are we to get to this Lasrali?” asked Hillingford.

“We must walk,” returned Christine and he thought how well she showed

up, standing there in the moonlight, wholly undismayed, quite calm

and mistress of herself and talking easily and clearly that difficult

gutteral tongue which he had given up studying in despair.

“We have no driver,” she went on, “and if we had the carriage couldn’t

go over that rough ground. It would be overturned directly. We have

got to go back some distance in that direction.” She pointed far back

across the stony waste towards the plain of Jerico whence they had come

and the travellers groaned involuntarily. To go back! Further away

from the city with its law and order and protection, further into this

savage desolation where the moonlight showed nothing but rocks and

stones where even the rough rocky grass struggled in vain for existence

and here and there bleached bones showed whitely on the ground.

“There is no help for it” she said merely and turned to the carriage.

The women in it were sitting white faced and silent but like English

women faced with grave emergency their courage rose to meet it. There

was no complaint, no shrinking back. They opened the door of the

carriage and stepped down on to the stony ground without a word.

The vehicle was packed in all its corners with small handbags and

cases, extra cloaks and wraps and sunshades. The Arabs peered in

curiously jabbering amongst themselves. There was a hasty consultation

between the travellers as to whether they could carry anything with

them. The Gaiety girl, Melisande, prayed for her handbag. It had all

her make up in it. Lady Hillingford could not bear parting from her

small flat case. Hillingford hastily opened his bag and extracted his

favorite razor. Miss Smith went to hers and pulled out her Arabic

dictionary.

“Don’t take much,” she advised. “It’s so hot and we have a long way to

walk. The Arabs are going to leave a guard and the carriage and all

its contents will be perfectly safe. I have told them we must take the

horses out and take them with us. The Sheik will have water and food

and rest when we get there.”

While the women fussed over their luggage, anxious as human beings

always are about trifles even with the great issues of life and death

hanging over them, and the Arabs sat down a little way off watching

them with an amused smile curling their dark lips and their rifles held

across their knees, the three men and Christine stood for a moment

together at the horses’ heads.

“I wonder whether we’re wise,” Hillingford asked, “in giving in like

this? Suppose we said we would not go?”

“The alternative is for us all to sit here under a guard while two

of the Arabs go off with a message to the Sheik and ask for orders.”

Christine answered, she had evidently discussed this with the chief

already, “but you see he might be ages coming back. Perhaps he wouldn’t

come till the morning and we’d get awfully tired waiting here and the

horses would get no water. Then he says the Sheik would be sure to send

for us, so we’d have to go in the end.”

“Why should he send for us, damn him?” This from the Major.

“The leader says he would not mind the men going on but he would be

sure to want to see the three ladies!”

“Scoundrel!” shouted the Major.

“I think we had better go and make no trouble about it,” said

Christine, “we may be able to reason things out with Lasrali.”

The men nodded. There seemed no way out. An Arab came up and took out

the two horses, weary and dejected with the long toil. Christine patted

their necks and the Arab led them off the roadway. Next came another

Arab strung about with various small articles belonging to the English

that he had been deputed to carry by the leader. Hillingford and his

wife followed, then Briggs and Melisande, then the Major and Christine

and this small column of English was flanked on each side by a guard of

six Arabs.

Christine turned and glanced back as they were starting. Two motionless

Arabs sat on the box seat of the carriage, their rifles on their knees.

Side by side on the ground lay the dead driver and the dead hyaena

mingling their blood in a small dark pool on the road.

Out into the wilderness. Away from even the road, that wild desolate

and inhospitable as it is, has at least, each end in civilization.

But in the wilderness itself that stretches between the proud city of

Jerusalem and the fair plain of Jerico there one can see the face of

Loneliness itself and feel Starvation and Death lurking among those

never ending ridges of whitish rock rising from the arid, waterless

plain. The African desert with its soft films of sand, its glorious

mirage seems homelike by contrast with it. The American desert with

unbroken miles of sagebrush and its alkali pools seems inviting ground

in comparison. In the wilderness there is nothing but solitude and

stone and hyaenas grown fat on the corpses of wayfarers.

Doggedly and in silence the little party went on. The two wives in

their thin high heeled shoes and silk stockings suffered most. The

men and Christine walked easily on flat heels over the loose stones

and uneven surface. But no one of them made any sound of discontent.

Melisande and Eva Hillingford stumbled along awkwardly and painfully

but bravely and the curls on their forehead and the silk blouses on

their chests were soaked through with sweat in the hot still air.

Apprehension as to their possible fate had got its teeth well into them

now. Leaving the road, their only friend and guide, had brought them

to a sense of their utter helplessness. Even if left now unmolested,

they could not find their way back to it, they could only wander about

amongst these everlasting gleaming rocks, each one exactly like another

till they died.

After a little while physical fatigue and pain shut out much reflection

on other things. They were intolerably thirsty and their limbs ached

from that curious rough walking similar to going up hill on an English

beach. The Arabs were not inconsiderate and did not even hurry them.

Only once when the Major lagged behind one of the guard pressing on

their heels poked the nuzzle of a rifle against his shoulder blades.

After that, rather than have it happen again, he stepped out more

briskly.

The first light of the dawn showed faintly in the East, when the Arab

leader pointed out to the white weary crowd toiling on some large dark

objects not very far away.

“Lasrali’s tents,” he said.

It seemed as they came nearer quite a large encampment altogether a

great number of tents pitched near to a ridge of rock which slightly

overhanging made a sort of rough shed. Against this were grouped

various animals, camels, horses, donkeys and goats, some lying down

others standing round a heap of fodder put down for them. Christine

went forward and spoke earnestly with the Arab leading the horses:

making him promise to allow them to lie down and to give them plenty

of food and water as they could take it. He laughed showing all his

glittering teeth in the bright moonlight.

“Lasrali would be very angry with me if I did not look after them. He

loves horses.” What a relief those words carried to her mind. A man who

loved horses could not be wholly bad. She fell back and told the good

news to the others. They were just on the outside of the encampment

now. Most of its occupants had retired apparently, but a long line of

cooking fires burnt redly still upon the ground. The chief man who

had so far all along spoken with Christine, gave his charges over to

the guard and disappeared into the largest of the tents to know his

master’s wishes. It was only a few minutes before he returned and

ushered them all in, holding back the tent flaps for them and then

bringing up the rear himself.

It was a large and roomy tent well carpeted and with masses of silken

cushions lying about. Also there were little tables at which if sitting

on a cushion on the floor, one could comfortably write and read.

Lasrali himself was seated in one of those capacious black wood chairs

inlaid with mother of pearl, so familiar in Damascus. Wearing a snow

white burnous, edged with gold embroidery and a gold band encircling

the hood of it, just above his black brows he presented a kingly

and dignified appearance. His face was handsome in the typical Arab

way. Olive skinned and oval with refined aristocratic features and

large dark eyes. In age he appeared about 38. In one rather white and

slender hand he held a long stemmed pipe which he appeared to have been

peacefully smoking when disturbed.

As soon as the worn weary captives were ushered in, he rose from his

seat, bowed slightly and then immediately resumed it, ordering one of

his Arabs to bring forward cushions for his visitors. When these were

brought the three women sank down gratefully upon them, the men taking

their stand behind them until Lasrali waved them with a more decided

gesture to be seated also. Then he called up the leader to stand beside

him, and set himself to listen attentively to the man’s story, pulling

occasionally at his pipe and asking now and then a quiet question.

The Arab leader went on with his interminable relation for endless time

as it seemed to the wearied English. With the exception of Miss Smith,

they could none of them understand a word and they were so dazed and

sleepy with heat and fatigue that the conversation came to their ears

only in an unmeaning blur. Christine was tired too, but her head was

clear and she sat bright eyed and upright on her cushion listening

intently to every word that was uttered. Much of the conversation’s

meaning she missed of course. It is impossible for a stranger however

well he knows a language to catch all that passes between two others,

not addressing him but talking rapidly to each other, but the drift of

it she gathered very well. At one time when the leader said something

as to money she took her courage in both hands and ventured to

re-inforce his statement.

“There is a gentleman here,” she said, indicating Briggs, “who will pay

anything you like to ask in money for our release.”

Lasrali regarded her in silence but did not reply and the leader turned

on her saying:

“My master is very rich man, he does not seek money. He might be

pleased however to take a white wife.”

“The dream of my life has been to win a white woman who is also a

lady,” supplemented Lasrali in a very low tone, “no sum of money can

weigh against such a dream.”

Christine did not translate any of these sentences into English. They

sank into her heart and set it beating. In defiance of something within

her that seemed holding her back, she seized hold of the old phrases

and stated them as one who speaks from a sense of duty.

“The English are a mighty people. We are few but if any of us are

injured, a great army will come to avenge us.”

She thought she saw the faint flicker of a smile pass over Lasrali’s

face that he was too courteous to wholly indulge in. The leader was not

so ceremonious however. He laughed openly.

“Your country used to be great and protect its subjects. It is too

lazy to do that now. Besides my master cannot be found in his native

mountains and the captive men would be killed and scattered to the

winds of heaven long before help came and the captive women would be--”

The expression made the blood fly flaming all over Christine’s face and

Lasrali sharply reprimanded the Arab leader.

“Do not talk to the lady at all,” he said with anger. “Confine your

conversation to me,” and he motioned him to come closer to his chair.

After a long discussion between them Lasrali at last waved him to one

side and addressing Christine direct asked her and the other two ladies

to get up and approach him. This they did, Christine springing up at

once and the other two wearily dragging themselves to their feet.

Then they stood in a line before him and the Arab regarded them all

with grave attentive eyes. Dusty and tired, with rumpled hair and

damp faces, in their rather bright coloured clothes, hatless and with

arms and necks bare in the intense heat, neither Lady Hillingford who

was 25 and pale and dark, nor Melisande who had no age and was of the

flamboyant type, looked their best and being conscious of this did not

improve matters by their expressions. Melisande trying to get up her

footlight smile and Lady Hillingford frankly weary and disdainful.

It was on Christine that the Arab’s quiet gaze rested longest. Trim,

elegant, apparently untired, her clear pale skin rendered still paler

by the heat, her large eyes burning with keen interest and power, her

lips, glowing red, her thick hair unruffled in its soft close waves

about her head, she certainly presented the most pleasing aspect of the

three. Her gaze was fixed unwaveringly upon the handsome face turned to

her. She looked exactly what she felt, intensely interested. After a

lengthened survey which was in no way rude nor impudent, only evidently

extremely critical and observant of the minutest details, he turned to

his attendant and told him to conduct all the English to a private tent

and look after them except the lady who spoke Arabic and she should

follow them directly. Christine looked at her companions with her

cheerful smile and translated this adding, “Go ahead and leave me. I’ll

come as soon as I can.”

They did not like seeming to desert her, but she had become so much

their leader and director in the last few hours and she seemed so

perfectly unafraid of the whole situation that they solemnly filed out

after the Arab in silence.

The tent was now empty except for the handsome seated form and herself

standing before him, a slender, graceful English figure in her simple

grey clothes. The light from the great swinging center lamp fell on her

thick brown hair and showed a soft wavering colour in her cheeks as she

gazed steadily at her captor. She felt no fear as she heard the others

withdraw. She did not know what was going to happen to her, no word in

the long conversation had indicated what her fate might be and she knew

herself absolutely defenceless but her whole mind had been seized as it

were by a great expectancy and there was no room for any other feeling.

Physically she was in those moments intensely alive: every sense seemed

at its highest power. Her eyes took in every detail of the face and

form opposite her, her ears were conscious of the faintest rustle and

click of the curtain behind her as they fell to shutting her in, her

nostrils quivered to the strange scent of tobacco and camel, coffee and

wood fire, in the tent. Her whole being seemed rising on tip-toe to go

forward to something she did not know. Lasrali rose from his seat and

approached her. She did not retreat. Then in a single sweep of his arm

he had drawn her close up to his breast, he bent his head and pressed

his lips down hard on hers.

Then suddenly she knew that here now, whirling down upon her through

the space of twenty years, was again the wonderful moment she had

known at 16 and never refound. It was here now. It was hers again.

Her head was pressed back on his arm. She could not move. Again the

pain on her mouth. Again the realization of being in the presence of a

tremendous Force and that not a destructive but an august beneficent

force, the constructive force of Life itself. Again that glimpse before

her eyes of something wonderful, something majestic and utterly beyond

the petty details of everyday existence. For the moment she seemed

united to something vast, eternal, primaeval, as indeed she was, to

the Impulse of Life itself that causes the whole universe to roll on

through its countless aeons. Her eyes gazed up to the dark beauty of

those above her but she did not see them with their lids half closed

over them and the straight black brows contracted into one line almost

as with severe physical pain above them. She saw before her mental

vision the magnificence of triumphal Life sweeping up towards her to

engulf her in its stupendous onrush.

It was only for an instant: She was released suddenly and staggered

slightly, clutching at the central tent pole for support and white and

trembling just as she had been on that other evening long ago. But her

eyes were shining still with the joy of the vision and she smiled at

Lasrali now gravely regarding her. He took her arm and led her up to

his own vacant chair into which he gently pressed her. Then bending

over her he began to speak slowly and distinctly so that she caught

every word.

“Listen. I want you. For the others I do not care. As you know I am

an Arab and not like the English supposed to have only one wife. I

can have a number but as it happens I have none now. If you will stay

and be my wife, I will let all your companions go. I will give them a

driver and a guard and they will go safely on their way to Jerusalem.

Nothing of theirs will be taken and I will send two of my Arabs to

explain the shooting.”

He stopped, waiting for her reply and Christine in the crisis of her

fate seemed suddenly struck dumb. The immensity of her feelings, the

intense desire to express all that was surging up in her soul seemed

to paralyse her utterance as a volume of water gets choked by its own

pressure in the narrow neck of a vessel from which it is struggling to

escape. She, the glib interpreter for others, she, the student who had

read Arab poetry by the hour was now tongue tied and silent, unable

to utter one little word of love or encouragement to the man bending

over her. She thought the beauty of his face so perfect, its expression

now so infinitely soft and tender, that she longed to throw her arms

about his neck and tell him that she loved him and would those words

have been any less true, any more exaggerated an expression than when

an English society girl says, “I love you,” to a man she is going to

marry, after a three weeks’ engagement?

Rather, the truth of it was so intense in Christine’s case and the

realisation of it so overawing that her lips were locked and her limbs

seemed inert. She struggled as we struggle in dreams to speak but not

a single world would come to her aid. She could only look and look back

to the eyes above her. Her dilated, appealing gaze might have been one

of helpless, fascinated terror and her heart thumping so violently in

her bosom blanched her face and lips.

A shade of disappointment came over Lasrali’s countenance.

“You will stay to save your friends?” he repeated and Christine managed

to force her trembling lips to a weak, yes.

“Aiwa.”

Lasrali gave a deep sigh as of relief and straightened himself. His

face relapsed into its habitual gravity as he said:

“I see you are very frightened but there is no need. In my tent you

will not be hurt or grieved. You will be safe, protected, I believe

happy. I shall try with all my force to make you so. You are very tired

now, go and rest; eat and sleep. Peace be with you.”

Again Christine tried to respond but the whole view of this love and

life so suddenly forced upon her seemed too great for her to assimilate

and to find quickly the suitable words a vehicle for her thoughts. And

the moment for her to speak and accept seemed maliciously to have gone

before she could grasp it.

If it was impossible for her to speak while he bent over her, his face

suffused with tenderness, it seemed still more hopeless to do so now

when he had drawn a little away and his usual calm and dignity had

enfolded him.

She hesitated clasping her hands, not as he fancied in supplication

to him, but to those unseen powers that were holding her, preventing

her disclosing her feeling towards him. Her mind was staggered and as

we fail when suddenly we come into view of a colossal mountain or a

huge giant tree, to summon words in which to describe our admiration,

because words seem so inadequate, so did Christine fail now.

Lasrali did not touch her again but with a grave gesture, waved her to

the door of the tent, the curtains of which he himself held back that

she might pass through.

With a look of intense gratitude, admiration and love, which he

translated as one of final appeal, she passed out and he was left alone.

* * * * *

When Christine entered the other tent, the rest of the party were

seated in the centre, round a piece of carpet on which stood a coffee

pot of steaming coffee, a jug of goat’s milk, white bread as good as in

the Jerico hotel and a pile of dates.

They raised jaded looking enquiring faces to her as she joined the

circle and sat down.

“It’s all right. You are quite safe. Give me some coffee and I’ll tell

you.”

“Hurrah!” exclaimed Briggs. “Well you are splendid. What does he say?”

“He says, first we must all sleep here and rest until it’s cool

to-morrow afternoon. He will then send you all with a good driver and

an armed escort up to Jerusalem and an Arab who will explain all about

the shooting and see that the proper people are sent after our driver’s

body, which will be guarded till they come.” She paused and drank up

her coffee. A relieved sigh rose from the others, from all except the

Major who would not look relieved. He glared fiercely into his coffee

cup in silence.

“How wonderful!” said Lady Hillingford.

“Good fellow,” from her husband.

“Thank God,” said the millionaire.

“Well, he’s a darling,” declared Melisande.

Then Christine quietly threw her bombshell.

“Yes, only he says one of the women must stay.”

“Scoundrel,” shouted the Major, banging his cup down on the carpet.

“Ah, I _thought_ so,” murmured Lady Hillingford turning very white.

The two husbands looked at each other across the coffee without a word.

“Which one does he want?” asked Melisande drawing out her little mirror

from the bag on her lap and puffing out her golden locks at the side of

her head with her jewelled fingers.

“Me,” replied Christine.

“_You?_” exclaimed both ladies at once with an emphasis which was

not at all complimentary.

“Yes: seems strange, doesn’t it?” returned Christine tranquilly,

sinking her white even teeth into her dates with keen satisfaction.

She was evidently going to enjoy her supper to the full.

All eyes turned on her. Her companions stared at her in those moments

as if they had never seen her before. And indeed it was a new Christine

from the one they had been travelling with. The primaeval woman was

rising in her in all her strength and glory and arming her with new and

wonderful weapons. In her skin which had a curious transparency was

kindled a lovely rose flush, her eyes were no longer still dark pools

but rather wells of moving fire, her lips were redder than Melisande’s

painted ones. As she sat her slender body rose full of proud grace from

her cushion seat.

There was a long pause, full of tension. Somehow the ladies looked

displeased and the men not less concerned than before. Melisande was

the first to break the silence.

“What did you say?” she asked abruptly as Christine continued to eat

calmly and cheerfully.

“Said I’d stay.”

“Said you would stay?” gasped the men together.

“Yes, of course. I wasn’t going to get you all shot and Eva and Sandy

kept as prisoners as well as myself. I didn’t see the use.”

“Oh, but look here, we can’t stand this,” broke out Hillingford. “Do

you think we could go back and save ourselves at your expense like

that?”

“Well, what would you propose?” asked Christine pouring more milk into

her coffee.

“Er--well, I--er--don’t know--I should think they’d never dare

to--to--” he stopped.

“I don’t know either but they might dare a good lot. I heard a great

many cheering references to ‘Dead men tell no tales,’ while the

leader was talking to him. He seemed to think it was a splendid plan

for you three men to be shot and then for Lasrali to disappear into

the wilderness with us three women after duly rewarding his faithful

followers with our horses, carriage, bags, and jewelry and burying the

driver under a rock. It sounded a most engaging programme and I was

afraid each minute Lasrali would accept it. But he wouldn’t.”

“Did you offer him all he liked to ask if he would let us _all_

go?” asked Briggs.

“I did and he said it had been the dream of his life to--to marry a

white woman and a lady and he would not give it up for any amount of

money.”

“Scoundrel,” exclaimed the Major.

“Did you say that although we seemed a small party we had all the power

of England and the law behind us and he would certainly suffer very

much if he injured us?”

“I did: and he said England wasn’t much good now and didn’t protect her

people worth a cent. Besides which nobody could possibly get at him in

the wilderness until--until, well, until he’d realised his dream.”

“Devil! Devil!” shouted the Major who had at last got on to another

word.

The others all sat pale and silent. The tremendous end of their

journey to the Dead Sea taken so thoughtlessly and gaily was coming

close up to them now and appalled them.

It was Hillingford who spoke first.

“I don’t know what you others think about it but personally I feel I’d

rather stay here and be shot than save myself at a woman’s expense.

Damn it, I say, we _can’t_ go back and leave you here.”

“Our wives, Hillingford, our wives, we’ve got to think of them,”

murmured Briggs. He doubtless did think of his wife, but also somewhere

at the back of his mind he had the feeling that Eternal Justice would

be better satisfied by Miss Smith becoming an Arab’s bride than by John

Briggs with all his millions being murdered in the wilderness.

“If I know Eva,” Hillingford returned hotly, “she’d die here with me

rather than sneak out of a thing like this.”

Lady Hillingford looked back at her husband. Her face was dead white

but she knew what she had to do and say and played up to her caste.

“Certainly, Will, I’ll stay. I have no doubt you can finish me with a

rock or a knife.”

Christine looked over to him with a smile in her now lovely eyes. Then

having finished an excellent meal, she sat back on her cushion and

wiped her pink tipped fingers on her little handkerchief. Then she

stretched out a small hand to Hillingford.

“It’s most awfully good of you Lord Hillingford and I do appreciate

it. But I should simply hate for all our lives to be wasted. I should

want to do the same and stay and save you, in any case but as it is

you needn’t worry at all. You can all go off with clear consciences. We

came out for adventures and this is the biggest we’ve had. It’s mine

principally and I’m going to take it. I think Lasrali hasn’t been half

bad in spite of what the Major says. He has very self sacrificingly

picked out the plainest and least attractive woman simply because she’s

free and the others have husbands. I like him and I’m going to stay and

marry him.”

This was another bombshell amongst them that left them gasping. Only

Melisande did not seem surprised. She watched Christine with a little

malicious smile.

“Good heavens!” was all Hillingford seemed able to answer and the

distress on his face hardly lightened. Briggs was candidly and openly

pleased. It had been an awful moment for him when he really thought

Death was coming for him through his stockade of money-bags.

“Very plucky, I call it,” he said, “daring little devil, isn’t she

Sandy?”

“Oh, very,” returned Melisande getting out her cigarette case and

lighting up.

Suddenly the Major banged both clenched fists down on the carpet square

making the coffee cups dance and jingle.

“You an English woman going to marry that devil and _like it_.

Faugh!”

In his indignation he tried to struggle to his feet but being short and

fat and seated on a cushion he found this very difficult and nearly

rolled over into the coffee cups. Christine sprang to her feet and

offered him her hand.

“I think we’re all dead tired,” she said, “let’s go to bed and talk in

the morning.”

The rest of the circle broke up. They were tired beyond all words and

got up and approached thankfully the great square at the back of the

tent where rugs were unrolled and a quantity of cushions laid out.

They ranged themselves in the following order. Lady Hillingford, then

her husband, then the millionaire, then his wife, then next her in the

outside Miss Smith. The Major would have none of them. He stalked up to

the capacious bed and took his cushion and small rug.

“I despise you,” he said in a fierce undertone to Miss Smith as he

grabbed his pillow.

“Sorry,” replied Christine and threw herself full length beside

Melisande. She longed for rest and a cessation of talk and discussion,

to lie still in the darkness and listen to the Voice of Nature in her

ear and feel the kiss of Life burning on her lips.

They drew the great rug which they shared in common over them, for with

the dawn a little chill was coming into the air.

“Put out the light as you pass, Major,” called Briggs, and the Major

did so throwing his rug and cushion down as far from the others as he

could get. No one spoke any more and sleep came down heavily like a

great cloud upon them and enfolded them. Except (as usual) Christine.

Stretched out still and looking into the soft darkness, she lay and

thought.

Here after all these years, winging its way to her across the gulf

of time and space had come again the joy she had known when on the

threshold of life.

She had come into the barren desert which gives nothing neither shade

nor rest nor water nor food, and it had given her this.

How strangely things happened; she had joined this touring party,

hoping for fun and adventure, all the amusing little adventures of

travel and suddenly she had stumbled into the biggest adventure that

could happen to her that would change her whole life.

She was, what so very few of us are, free from the necessity of

consideration for others. She was without relations, home or family

ties. Without any dear ones to regret or that would regret her. In the

twenty years that had intervened between that first engagement and the

present time, one by one every one that belonged to her or who loved

her had been taken from her. She had felt the extreme loneliness of

this grow upon her and had wildly resented it at times, but here now

she saw that it was enviable. Without remorse or regret, she was free

to accept this great experience, now she had come face to face with it.

She had nothing to hold her nor restrain her from going forward to it.

There was nothing in the life behind her to hold out a single detaining

hand. She had not even a pet nor a house that needed attention and

arrangement.

She was one of those single women with a sufficient income to dress

well and live in the best hotels who spent her time studying, motoring,

dancing, amusing herself in all legitimate, civilized ways, travelling

widely and looking, always looking for something. With some of them if

they are plain and stupid it is love they are looking for, sometimes

only a kiss. Christine had never had to seek for love and kisses

she could have had by dozens. It was because she was looking for a

particular kind of love, a special sort of kiss, that the search had

been long. She did not seek brutality nor cruelty, those are totally

different from though often confused with force, intensity. The real

true strength of Love that is striving to create Life in a beloved

object that is what she had been seeking and had now found and she

could not see that she had to make any particular sacrifice for it. She

admired the grave dignity and beauty of the man himself and she had

felt that strange sharp call of his individuality to hers, which is

after all the basis of all love between the sexes whether civilized or

uncivilized. The one quality which to her was one absolute essential

in any man she was to love, tenderness and kindness to animals seemed

assured by what his servant had said. Had she really known anything

more of her father’s secretary, than she knew now of Lasrali? She could

have married him for the sake of that golden moment in his arms and she

was now going to marry Lasrali for exactly the same reason. In her eyes

it was quite as good a reason as marrying to obtain a house in town, a

settled income or a title. She saw very clearly that Nature, cruel as

she is in the deaths, disease, pain and all the woes she sends upon us

and the animals has yet in her hands for all created things this one

supreme joy and consolation for all the suffering of life, the joy of

simple, natural unrestrained love. No animals fail to realise this and

few men and women in a natural state, but in a civilized state there

are hundreds of thousands who live, marry, suffer and die without one

glimpse of this Eternal Truth.

So far Christine had steadily avoided marrying anyone, between whom

and herself there did not seem to be that strange wild magnetism, that

irresistible call and challenge to the senses, getting out of her

numerous engagements as best she could and submitting to being angrily

and furiously called a jilt, which she knew was not true. She was

simply one looking for gold and consistently refusing the dross that

was pressed upon her in its place.

Lasrali did not sleep that night. All through the remaining hours he

sat wide eyed in his chair, sometimes drawing at his pipe but more

often idle staring down at the carpet that kept the stony dust of the

wilderness from his fine narrow high arched feet. A very hardy struggle

was going on within him and he was fighting bravely against the

greatest power in the Universe, outside that still greater power that

has been given to the soul of man.

Several times his wearied attendant outside raised the tent flap a tiny

bit and looked in only to see his master still sitting there as a

statue, lost in thought.

It is absurd to limit the good and bad impulses in man by any creed,

caste, or colour. The human soul has no such limits. Nobleness,

generosity, self-sacrifice, dwell indiscriminately in black, yellow,

red, and white races alike. Evil, also is scattered impartially

through the whole of humanity as witness the loathsome cruelties and

barbarities committed by men of our own time and race under the name

of Scientific Research which surpass in horror anything done by savage

tribes.

At last when the morning was fairly on its way, he summoned his Arab.

“Are the English still sleeping?”

“Yes, they all sleep very soundly: a good time to kill the men now if

you wish.”

Lasrali lifted his hand in protest, his brows contracting.

“Listen. When the English wake, take them water for washing and all

they need. Then a good meal. While they eat, come and rouse me if I

should be sleeping. When they finish their meal, bring them here to me.”

The Arab bowed and went away muttering. Lasrali, exhausted, passed

through the curtains to his inner tent to sleep.

Although Christine had slept less than the others she was the first to

awake, when the light was sinking in the tent and the flush of sunset

was stealing over the wilderness, softening all its grim, glaring

whiteness. She looked round with a feeling of surprise that the day had

vanished, they had slept it away. It seemed strange to be waking to

the rose of sunset instead of the rose of dawn as she was accustomed

to do. She lifted herself from the rugs and looked at the sleepers

beside her. Hillingford was the only one whose eyes were open and as he

met her glance he smiled and as if by common consent they both rose,

very quietly so as not to disturb the others and went out of the tent

together, passing by the Major still soundly asleep by the door.

The encampment outside was an animated scene, cooking fires were

sparkling everywhere and Arabs coming and going between them preparing

the evening meal. The line of camels and other animals were feeding

leisurely under their rock shelter, all the tent doors were open except

the great double one, really two tents, joined together, one behind the

other, which belonged to Lasrali. Of these the door flaps were closed

and fastened and two Arabs sat on the ground before them.

Christine looked out on it all curiously and smelt the scent of the

wood fires rising in the hot still air with a curious leaping of the

heart. Why is it that the scent of the camp fire affects all or nearly

all mankind with a strange feeling like nostalgia? Is it because on its

fragrance our senses are borne back to primaeval times when our first

camp fires smoked in the untamed forest?

She glanced across to Lasrali’s tent and the sight of its closed door

struck her with a sense of loneliness. Her life henceforth would lean

upon him. This scene that she looked upon would be its outside shell

but there was nothing in it that she cared about except himself.

She turned to Hillingford who stood beside her. The Arabs about them

glanced at them sideways, but the Mahomedan from his earliest years

is taught not to stare and the long dark eyes were drooped again

immediately over boiling kettle, or rice bowl as if they had seen

nothing unusual.

“There are just one or two things I should like you to do for me,” she

said gently, “if you will.”

“Of course, I will, anything,” he returned gazing at her in the

soft rose light that fell all about them from the tinted sky. How

wonderfully well she was looking he thought with no toilet made nor

adjuncts of any kind. He did not realise how the great force of

expectant life was awakened and moving within her, painting her cheeks

and lips, kindling and softening her eyes.

“You know I have no near relations,” she went on, “so there’s no

one to see or to tell about me, but I should like the money I have

to be safeguarded. Will you be my trustee and look after it for me?

And re-invest the income, so that in the future, if there should be

any--any, well if it’s wanted it will be there. In my bag when you go

back to the carriage you will find a small packet of all my papers,

bank book, check book, etc. Will you take possession of it. That will

give you all the details. And send me back by one of the Arabs my

little case of clothes. I shall want that here.”

“I’ll do anything and everything,” he returned, “but you must authorize

me about the money here,” and he drew out his pocket book and gave it

to her. “Write down there that you wished me to act for you. Here’s

a pen.” He gave her his own stylographic and she looked at it for a

moment in silence.

“Isn’t this all funny? Doing this civilized sort of business out here

in this wilderness. What an end we have had to our tour!”

“Yes, it’s awful,” groaned Hillingford, “I shall never forgive myself

or feel the same again.” Christine had seated herself on a great stone

and was writing rapidly in the pocket book all that she thought was

necessary. When it was done, she handed up the book and pen to him.

“Will that do?”

Hillingford read it through.

“That’s all right,” he said and shut the book and replaced it. “But we

shall send after you and rescue you as soon as we get back.”

Christine still seated put her hand round her knees and stared over the

small space that intervened to the closed tent door of Lasrali.

“Do you remember your Roman History?” she said slowly after a minute.

“You remember how the Romans carried off the Sabine women and how

after a time the Sabine husbands and fathers came after them to rescue

them and the Sabine women came out and said they were happy with their

Roman husbands and didn’t want to be rescued? It was too late. Well

it’s the same now. I am sure it will be too late. Besides this I am a

sort of hostage. If you come after me to rescue me I believe you won’t

find me because Lasrali will go far, far away in the mountains and

hide.”

“But surely he could be found. We could get an army to scour the

place,” remonstrated Hillingford in hot desperation.

Christine shook her head.

“It might be possible to find and punish him but what about me? I

should think I should be killed when the news first came to him he was

being followed and don’t you see he has us all in his power _now_?

If he lets you go, you are on parole, as it were. You can’t pursue him

afterwards,” Hillingford groaned, then he burst out, “He’s no right to

keep you.”

“No, but I am staying of my own free will. Don’t attempt to rescue

me. You will only make fearful trouble if you do and it seems to be

dishonourable when he has had you in his power and let you go. Be quite

happy about me, really. I have had so many years of ordinary civilized

life I am quite prepared to accept this adventure as a change and make

the best of it.”

Hillingford was silent, staring down at the ground.

“Do you despise me, too, like the Major?” she asked with a little laugh.

“Good heavens, no, I think you are a heroine. Of course, I know

whatever you may say, you are only doing it for us!”

Christine’s brows contracted.

Again this wall of hopeless misunderstanding. She could not clear it

away. She could not explain to him for he would never understand. They

spoke the same language, they were of the same country, class and

creed, yet she felt further from him, in a way, than she did from the

stranger who was their host.

Hillingford who was girt about with conventions and civilization got on

very well with the half of Christine that was conventional, civilized

woman, the other half the simple, natural primitive woman he would not

have been able to understand at all.

Christine did not attempt further explanation all she said was:

“Well, remember the Sabine women and don’t rescue me. I don’t want it.

I think it would be dishonourable and extremely dangerous. When I want

civilization again I’ll find a way of getting back to it. Now, promise.

Then I shall feel safer and happier,” and very reluctantly Hillingford

promised.

The rosy glow was fading, stars sparkled in it here and there. In the

East a great pale moon came up reminding them of the approaching hour

of departure.

In silence they walked back to the tent. The door was open and an Arab

was lighting the central lamp, while two others were spreading out a

meal on the carpet. The women were arranging their hair before scraps

of looking-glass and the men sat moody and silent watching the Arabs at

work.

It was a short and quiet meal, less lively than their supper last night.

There seemed nothing more to be said. No one seemed to have any ideas,

or to wish to speak. A sullen sort of apathy had settled on them all

as if they were a flock of overdriven sheep. Christine alone looked

radiant and clear-eyed and sat looking through the door of the tent

towards that other one of which she could just see the closed flaps. At

last she saw movement about it. Arabs went in carrying coffee and Arabs

came out and at last one crossed the space to their tent and entered.

“The horses are refreshed and ready. All is now prepared for your

departure and our Master would be pleased if you will come to his tent.”

Not knowing yet whether they were all going to be executed at the last

moment or not the English all rose and followed the Arab out of their

tent across the now moonlit space to the other one and were ushered

gravely in.

Lasrali was standing to receive them. The audience was to be short so

no cushions were prepared nor offered, of which the Major was very

glad. They filed in. Christine as the interpreter and the only one

who could understand was pushed a little forward and stood in front

of the rest. Her eyes alight, her cheeks and lips glowing, her form

full of elastic strength, she looked as she felt in the first flush of

womanhood. Her face was smiling as she looked up at him and Lasrali

looked down at her as a man dying of thirst looks at a crystal spring.

Then he began to speak very clearly and restrainedly.

“I am an Arab and a host is a host, and guests are guests. I tell you

now you are all free. Last night I made conditions I should not have

done. They do not exist this evening. With my escort you will all

proceed to Jerusalem and may peace be with you.”

He stopped and Christine, paling a little, repeated it in English.

Then Lasrali approached her a step nearer and added: “Sacred is the law

of hospitality. I infringed it last night. I touched this lady. To her

I apologise.”

Utter silence. Christine stood as if actually turned to ice or stone.

Her color fled. She gazed up at Lasrali as if he were demented. Her

companions to whom the words conveyed nothing grew cold with fear. What

now? What in heaven’s name had he said? Was all that first palaver some

ghastly joke? Had he now suggested they should be eaten alive or what?

They gazed at Christine, longing for her to speak and fully prepared

for the worst. Her face was a study of astonishment, agony and despair.

The Major couldn’t stand it. He went up behind her and shook her arm.

“What’s he said now? The scoundrel!”

Lasrali bent towards her with grave kindness.

“Perhaps you do not understand. You are free. Go with your friends. I

regret that your beauty last night overcame me.”

Christine still stood white and silent and trembling. Was it possible?

Here again the very idea, the actual words that had ruined her

happiness at 16! Here in this man of different race and caste and

blood, country and creed, the same misunderstanding. Were men all

alike? Was it only Woman who saw clearly back to the primaeval fount of

things and recognized in passion the joyous force of life?

“Christine!” it was Lady Hollingford’s voice sharp and thin. She was

delicate and nervous and she felt she could bear the strain no longer.

“Do tell us what he says, whatever it is!”

In a flash Christine saw how this little accident of knowing the

language put them all in her power. Her friends, their safety, Lasrali,

his reputation, were all her toys.

For the moment the temptation came to her to mistranslate his words.

Just to say he dismissed them as had been arranged and was keeping her.

The primaeval woman fighting for her ends prompted this. That would

satisfy all these civilized fools and they would go and leave her in

peace with the heroine’s halo round her head. It would be so difficult

otherwise perhaps to stay.

But the impulse was pushed aside instantly by her feelings of truth and

honour and responsibility to those who trusted her. Also she would not

rob Lasrali of the credit for his fine feelings and his self-sacrifice.

Stammering and hesitating because of the amazement gripping her, she

gave out his words in English exactly as he had spoken them and the

relief of the others was mixed with surprise.

“Well, that’s all right! What’s the matter with you?” asked Lady

Hillingford, but Melisande only laughed.

“Please leave me now I desire rest,” Lasrali said.

“Do thank him for us and tell him how grateful we are,” Hillingford

said and Christine mechanically turned his words into Arabic. Slipping,

slipping from her she saw the golden moment, never to be captured

again. The English are not a graceful people. They tried to bow and

salute Lasrali who stood there reposeful and dignified but they were

not very good at it and in a sort of huddled bunch they got through the

tent curtains. The Major marched out with flat defiance.

“Showed the white feather after all, didn’t dare to touch us, thought

so, damned scoundrel!” was his farewell remark.

Christine was the last to leave. The others had preceded her and the

curtains had fallen to behind them. Her hand was on the dangling

fringes. She looked back. The tent was empty. At the other side of it

were the curtains dividing off Lasrali’s sleeping tent. Through them he

had disappeared. Should she? Dare she? Race after that fleeting, golden

moment which was now eluding her for the second time? Behind her lay

all those years of an existence she knew so well. Almost every form

of civilised amusement that a modern age provides had been hers. And

love in all its delicate restrained civilised ways had been offered her

again and again but there had seemed something tame and flat about it

all. Before her stood Life in another dress or rather in an unashamed

barbaric nakedness which had some strength and glory about it. Above

all it was something new. She seemed in those seconds to visualise it

as a dancing, laughing figure, taunting her, daring her to come after

it. And she would dare. Beyond the further curtains was burning a great

electric force that was calling to every nerve and pulse and fibre of

her frame pulling her irresistibly to itself.

The curtains dropped from her nerveless fingers. Swift, silent as a

shadow, she passed across the space and drew back the curtains that

had closed behind Lasrali. A dim light burned in the tent. Beyond she

saw his unrolled bed. He himself was standing still gazing at the

ground. He turned and saw her as she entered, not weak nor white nor

trembling nor hesitant now, but alive, determined, triumphant, glowing,

expanding, the future mother of a bold and hardy race. Eyes shining,

she advanced towards him with outstretched hands.

“Lasrali! don’t send me away! I want to stay here with you!”

A flash came over his face as of some great enlightenment. He put both

his hands on her shoulders and gazed keenly into her eyes but hers did

not waver. They glowed and glowed carrying their message straight to

his.

“Is it true?” he asked.

“Yes, I swear it by the Koran.”

Over his face so superbly gifted by Nature, swept that wonderful, all

enveloping softness and sweetness that filled her with ecstasy.

“Then the dream of my life is realised.”

“And mine,” said Christine.

COLOUR

_Circumstances sometimes make us virtuous against our will._

George Morris was pottering about at the back of the dusty, dingy

little picture shop, while the dealer had gone to fetch the picture

backing George had come in for, when he noticed set away on a shelf a

little sketch and paused before it fascinated. It was a most attractive

little thing, all red: everything in it was a delightful warm, rich,

glowing crimson. The background was red--the interior of a room full

of firelight. A bed hung with red curtains occupied the centre with an

undraped woman’s figure of the loveliest lines, getting into it: one

ivory knee pressed the side of the bed: her fair hair, glinting with

red in the firelight, fell over her shoulders and her rounded arm,

uplifted to draw aside the curtain. Underneath the picture was written

the one word, “RUBY.”

George Morris, city man, living in the suburbs with Mrs. Morris in the

dull, solid round of English existence, felt his heart leap up suddenly

in response to the call of the picture. Under a plain, prosaic exterior

this man had a deep natural love for romance, a thirst for adventure,

a longing for the “wine, woman and song” that seemed never to form

a part of his humdrum life. He thought of Mrs. Morris and her dull,

plain face and the ginger-brown gown she seemed to live in. Why did she

always wear brown, he wondered? Why not red, for instance? He thought

of their bedroom at Meadow View, Mervyn Road: its linoleum floor, its

iron bedstead, its white walls, its narrow grate filled with tissue

paper and never guilty of a fire. In fact, it was always so cold that

Maria Morris wore very thick nightgowns and woolly jackets to keep

warm, and the electric light was so expensive now that she would hardly

allow it to be used upstairs, and always said they could just as well

undress in the dark.

George sighed. Why was Maria like that and his bedroom like that? Why

should he not have a rich, warm, red room like this ... and ... and...?

“There you are, sir: the best three-ply there is for picture backing.”

George turned round with a start. He had quite forgotten his errand.

The dealer was peering at him through his spectacles, the thin wood in

his hand.

“Er--ah!--thank you very much,” he stammered. “Er--this picture

here--what price is it?” He indicated the little red sketch.

“Oh, that’s not for sale,” replied the man. “It’s just a bit an artist

brought in to show me. He’s painting quite a big picture. It’s for the

Salon, I believe.”

“Oh,” murmured George, “not for the Academy?” He felt disappointed he

couldn’t buy the sketch, and if the picture was going to Paris he would

never see it again.

The dealer shook his head doubtfully. “No. I think not. Colour’s a bit

too warm for England, I should say.”

The door bell sprang at the moment, and the dealer looked round a pile

of frames into the front shop.

“Why, here is Mr. Brookes himself!” he exclaimed. And George saw a tall

slight young man with the artist’s slouch-hat and a flowing tie come

in and nod to the shopman. “There’s a gentleman here admiring your

picture,” the latter said, and George approached him eagerly.

“I do indeed,” he said. “It’s a wonderful picture. I’m sorry I won’t

ever see the big one.”

The artist flushed with pleasure. “You can come and see it now, if you

like,” he said in a pleased tone. “My shanty’s only a stone’s throw

from here; two tubes of purple madder, please, Smith, and chalk them

up, will you? I haven’t a cent on me.”

George’s heart beat. A visit to a real studio with an artist to see

this glorious red picture! He accepted at once. What a comfort that

Maria had always been out to tea lately and there was no need for him

to hurry back.

When the artist had got his paints and George had paid for his

purchase, they left the shop together and walked to the studio.

It was in a side street, and you went down a long slope from the

pavement to a wooden door which the artist opened with his latchkey,

and George walked through a small passage into a great, untidy,

comfortable room that, with its hint of gaiety and dissolute romance,

delighted him. There were deep chairs everywhere, a huge dais in one

corner all draped in gorgeous red, a stove in the centre glowing hot,

a deep cushioned semi-circular lounge half round it. One corner of the

room was walled off with voluminous blue curtains to form the artist’s

bedroom. The whole end of the room farthest from this was window,

but it only looked into a quiet green garden with high walls round

affording complete seclusion. There was a delightful litter of pictures

all about, a mass of flowers by the sunny window, an aviary of singing

birds, soft Turkey rugs on the floor, and the perfume of scented

cigarettes in the air. George liked it. He liked it much better than

the stiff drawing room with the starched white curtains and high hard

chairs of Meadow View.

The artist drew forward two big chairs and then, going to the dais

pulled on a cord. The curtains flew apart and there was the picture!

Then he threw himself into one of the chairs while George took the

other, and the two men gazed at the canvas in silence.

“Wonderful woman she is,” remarked the artist after a minute between

the puffs of his cigarette. “Bit of a mystery. Calls herself Mrs.

Brown, but don’t believe that’s her real name. Can’t make out what

she’s doing it for: whether it’s the money or for the fun of it; little

of both, perhaps. She’s not a regular model evidently, but she’s one of

the best I ever had. Good figure, isn’t it?”

“Oh, perfect, perfect!” replied George rapturously. He couldn’t take

his eyes off the picture. He sat before it spellbound, clasping his

British umbrella in both hands as it stood between his British knees

gazing at the vivid, barbaric riot of beautiful colour and suggestion

that appealed so to his romantic un-British heart. “What’s her face

like?”

“Oh, nothing very much. Not a bad little face when she smiles and gets

some colour; but you see I didn’t want the face for that picture.”

“No, quite so, quite so,” assented George.

“Larky woman, I should think,” went on the artist. “Married to a sort

of dull brute of a husband--doesn’t care about her; leaves her alone

all day.”

“Pig!” grunted George indignantly. “Can you imagine a man having a

woman like that and neglecting her?”

The artist laughed.

“Well, marriage is a killing atmosphere. I don’t know what she may be

at home, she’s amusing enough when she comes in here.”

“What do you know about her? Where did you meet her?”

“The funny part is I don’t know anything. She just walked in here one

afternoon: said she was bored to death and had no romance or fun

in her life, and no money of her own to spend. Said she’d sit as a

model if I’d have her. I wasn’t much struck at first: she was rather

badly dressed, you know; but we talked a little bit and I got rather

interested. I’d had the idea for this picture for a long time, I hadn’t

a model, and she was cheap and very willing to learn and be civil,

which all of them are not, and so there it was. She’s been coming to me

for quite a time now, and it’s good, the picture, isn’t it? I’m hoping

it’ll make a big hit.”

George nodded. He was grasping his umbrella feverishly, his hands

rolling and unrolling the silk flaps nervously. He would do it, he

would. He’d have this one bit of romance in his life to cherish and

look back upon.

He turned to the insouciant artist who, with his head tilted back and

the cigarette in his teeth and his leg hanging over one arm of the

chair, was contemplating his work with satisfaction through half-closed

eyes.

“I think I heard you say in that shop you were a little pressed for

ready money,” he said in his rather stiff way.

The artist laughed. “Dead broke, my dear sir, that’s what I am! Why?

Are you thinking of making me an offer for the picture?”

George leant nearer him.

“The picture’s good,” he said hoarsely, for his throat felt dry, “but

it’s the woman I want. Do you want to make twenty pounds? Well, here’s

your chance. Get her for me. Get her here. Lend me the studio for a

few hours. Fix up those red curtains, have it just like the picture,

red lights, red fire, red roses, red everything. Get her posing just

like that, mind, just like that; then you clear out and leave us alone.”

The artist was sitting bolt upright now staring at Mr. George Morris as

if he could not believe his eyes or his ears, as indeed he could not.

Was this really the very respectable old party he had met in the shop?

His eyes were glowing, his face flushed. He looked almost young and

handsome. What an astounding proposition from such an orthodox-looking

old Briton! Still, twenty pounds....

“But I don’t suppose for one minute she’d consent,” he said after an

astonished pause of reflection.

George made an angry movement of impatience.

“Unless you muddle things,” he said, “she won’t know anything about it.

You won’t ask her anything.”

“But I don’t see....” began the other.

“Look here. You get the lady to come to an ordinary sitting; just as

usual. You fix up everything, just as it is there, as you always do, I

suppose. I’m waiting behind those curtains there. Then you get her to

pose just like that: you step back to get something, brush or what-not.

You slip behind the curtains and then clear out of the studio and I am

left in your place. What’s to prevent you doing that?”

“Nothing. Only it seems rather a bad trick for me to play her and she

may disappoint you, she may....”

“Never mind,” returned George calmly now. “If I muddle my own affairs

when you leave us that’s my business; nothing to do with you. You get

your twenty all the same.”

“When?” asked the artist dubiously.

“When I look through those curtains,” returned George intimating the

artist’s walled-off bedroom behind them, “and see this picture in life.

When you pass me to go out I’ll slip the notes into your hand.”

Mr. James Brookes looked down on the floor in silent thought. He didn’t

like the idea at all. Still, he was very hard up and perhaps his model

would not mind. She seemed very good natured. He could pass it off as a

practical joke.

“I don’t half like it,” he said after a minute. “Still, I’ll do it.”

“When?”

“Day after to-morrow she’s coming--four to six. You’d better be here by

three-thirty, so there’s no chance of her seeing you come in.”

George got up with a strange fire of joy in his heart. Here was

romance, intrigue, adventure, coming into his life at last!

He cast his eyes round the studio with its inviting air of ease, its

bright colours, its luxury, which seemed to belie, or was it the cause

of its owner’s poverty?

“I envy you your life,” he said, buttoning up his coat and gazing at

the innumerable portraits of brunettes and blondes on the studio walls.

“There must be so much beauty, poetry, colour in it, novelty, change.”

And he sighed, thinking of his eighteen years at Meadow View with Maria.

“Oh, I don’t know,” returned the artist. “One gets sick of it, you

know; so many women and all jealous and squabbling with one another.

One longs sometimes for a home and a little peace and quietness.”

“What a pity we can’t change places,” mused George as he walked home

thinking over the artist’s words. Then he fell to wondering what the

model’s face would be like. “A nice little face when she smiles and

gets some colour,” the artist had said, and it rather took his fancy.

Ruby! It was a sweet name! And she, like himself, was sighing for

romance in her life, was evidently just as lonely and unappreciated as

he was. By the time he got back to Mervyn Road, his face had assumed

its usual chastened expression.

Maria seemed rather more dull and sour than usual.

“Why didn’t you come back to tea?” she enquired.

George flushed.

“You have been out so often to tea lately,” he said.

“Well, I wasn’t to-day,” she snapped. “You might let me know when

you’re not coming home till dinner.”

“I’ll be at the office late, I know, the day after to-morrow,” replied

George, trying to speak naturally, but getting redder and redder.

“All right,” returned Maria, “I’m glad to know it. I’ll go and have tea

with Aunt Emma.”

“Do, my dear, and I’ll get back in time for dinner.”

“I should hope so,” rejoined Maria.

George was amiability itself that evening. The glow of the picture had

got into his heart and warmed it, and that night he could not sleep for

thinking of it. What might not this adventure lead up to? He had heard

of men who had cosy little flats, the existence of which was unknown

to their lawful wives. He had always thought this very wrong, but now

he began to feel sympathy with those men. Perhaps, like himself they

had dull, unsympathetic wives; perhaps they, too, were yearning after

colour in their lives. A little flat and all furnished in red, which

could be kept very warm so that its occupant could wear those nice

pink and blue things he saw in the windows of the Burlington Arcade,

and dispense with woolly jackets. Silk stockings, too! He had often

thought it would be nice to have someone to take those neat boxes of

silk stockings home to that he saw on the counter of men’s shops when

he went to buy his ties. He had never thought of Maria. Silk stockings

didn’t go with Meadow View--they went with little flats. Of course, it

might be rather expensive, but then, why should he not spend something

on his own amusements? He was very liberal with Maria. She was always

buying new hats. Now last year, she had had--how many? There was

the hat with the green feathers, and--er--er the hat with the green

feathers, and--and--the hat with the green feathers. Well, there, he

couldn’t think of any other hat, so he supposed she had had only one

last year, and finally, trying to find another hat for Maria, he fell

asleep.

* * * * *

The great day came and with a beating heart, Mr. George Morris left

his office early and hurried to the studio, arriving there some

minutes before the appointed time. The artist let him in himself, and

George thought the studio looked more attractive than ever. The sun

was streaming through the lowered red blinds, the stove was burning

brightly, there were flowers on the many little tables and a heavy

fragrance from burning pastilles in the air. He was quite sorry to have

to go into the dark recesses of the bedroom in the corner, but his host

insisted on it and gave him a chair well back against the wall away

from the curtain. He gave him a paper, but as it was too dark to read

there with any comfort and he was strictly enjoined not to make the

faintest noise, so that he could not turn its pages, it was obvious the

paper was not much use to him. And how could anyone read in that state

of high-strung expectation in which Mr. George Morris now found himself?

After sitting there alone in the obscurity for what seemed an

interminable time, he heard a ring at the main door and the artist

going out to answer it. They seemed to linger a long time at the door

and he thought he heard some ripples of laughter that set all his

pulses beating. Then he heard the studio door open and evidently two

persons entering. But he was disappointed that he could not hear their

conversation, hardly their voices through the muffling folds of the

heavy curtains. He was afraid to leave his seat and approach nearer

the curtains for fear lest some noise of his movement might betray

him. The model’s ears might be sharper than his own. There was quite a

long pause of silence, and he wondered what they were doing. Perhaps

the model was undressing. Then he heard the moving of furniture and

supposed the scene was being arranged. The heavy bed with its elaborate

red drapery that figured in the picture had to be pushed to its right

position on the dais. He sat impatiently on his chair, the notes all

ready in his hand to be given to the artist in that blissful moment

when he should pass by him on his way out, leaving him alone with the

adorable model.

At last his host’s light step approached the other side of the

curtains, a hand was laid on them, and he heard his voice say: “I’ll

just fetch that tube,” and then the curtains were pulled apart.

Morris sprang to his feet and stood spellbound. There was the lovely

picture in the life, the warm interior, the gorgeous bed, the crimson

lights and in the centre, the feminine figure of lovely whiteness with

the flowing hair in the pose of just getting into bed.

The artist passed swiftly by him, pulled the notes out of George’s

nerveless hand as he stood there staring, then passed on noiselessly

to the door which he closed behind him with the faintest click.

Faint though it was, it came to George’s ears and roused him. He was

alone--the room, the scene, the model was his! With outstretched arm he

rushed forward to clasp this beauty, this dream, this delight to him.

He reached the dais. His arms were almost round her lovely shoulders

when the model turned.

A shriek rang through the studio: “_George!_”

“_Maria!_”

A NOVEL ELOPEMENT

The train puffed its way along its line through one of the prettiest

parts of Kent and carried among its many passengers a bridal couple

that had that morning been married and were now _en route_ for

their honeymoon.

Three weeks ago they had never seen each other, these two, who now

at the respective ages of eighteen and twenty-five, had taken their

solemn oath to remain together till Death. They had met at a dance. He

had been in the mood to marry somebody; she was already rather tired

of refusing offers and accepted his for a change. Their engagement

had been a joyous whirl, and both were very happy now and were quite

convinced that their choice was excellent. Eva thought Eric was so

clever and had such a wonderful mind and character because he always

agreed with her in conversation. Eric was so occupied with gazing into

her blue eyes when he answered her searching questions, that he had

not the remotest idea what it was he agreed to. If she said she loved

dogs he said he thought there was nothing so jolly and faithful; if

she said women should have votes, he said it would be a shame if they

hadn’t. If she said she adored music, he said his happiest hours were

passed listening to her playing; if she said vivisection was a blot on

our civilization, he said it was a beastly, unnatural practice and

ought to be stopped. If she said the traffic in old horses should be

abolished he told her his idea had always been to found a home where

old horses could end their days in peace. Once, when he trod on the

tail of her mother’s cat, he had seemed, to her surprise, a little

callous about it. She had reproached him. The cat had been picked up

immediately by him, fondled on his knee and given a saucer of milk by

way of consolation.

Eva simply glowed with joy and love after such conversations and

incidents, and when her mother pointed out that she knew very little of

the man and that the engagement was very short, she answered:

“It doesn’t matter, we are so alike and take the same view of

everything. We are sure to be happy.”

She honestly thought she saw him in his words. All she saw was what

he let her see--the reflection of her own warm-hearted, clear-headed

self. She had really thought out the subjects on which she formed her

well-founded opinions. When she offered these to him, as he never

thought out anything and had no opinions, he accepted hers just as

lightly and easily as he would have accepted the contrary ones, if

offered!

It is always very difficult for the deep, strong nature of a woman

to realise the facile worthlessness of a man’s. She was happy as she

sat in the corner of the carriage, her hand tucked into his. She was

sure--or _nearly_ sure--that she had found a good, great man.

He was quite sure he had found a girl with a pretty face and nice

figure--these were clear to the eye, no bother of thinking them out--so

both young people were blissfully content and satisfied.

Suddenly the easy motion of the train stopped. A jar and a jerk, then

it drew up motionless where the line ran through a pretty wood. Eric

sprang up and put his head out of the window. It was autumn, the

evening chill, and dusk. He could not see ahead--only that they were

not stopping at any station. Presently the guard came along by the side

of the train:

“There’s an obstruction on the line, sir, on ahead! Part of a tunnel

fallen in. It will take some clearing away, too. We can’t get on

to-night.”

Most of the other passengers were looking out and listening to his

discouraging accents. Their eyes wandered over the wood in which the

train was pulled up. It stood golden in autumn leaf, silent and chill.

It seemed unresponsive, and to offer no solution of their difficulties.

Then plans began to be made and eagerly discussed. Some of the

passengers were in favor of returning to the last station and stopping

there the night, being somewhat reluctantly assured by the guard they

could “get on in the morning.”

Eric withdrew his head and sat down by Eva.

“What would you like to do, darling?”

Eva was gazing into the mystery of the shadowy wood.

“Could we camp there?” she said. “Under that golden canopy, it’s very

lovely!”

Eric’s face lengthened.

“Hardly, dear, I think. It’s so damp and----”

“There is a lovely full moon rising behind the trees,” she answered.

Eric was silent. The wood did not appeal to him, nor the rising moon.

Neither did the “Bull and Cow” which was the station inn and the only

one they had seen from the last station as they passed.

In the pause that ensued the guard entered the carriage and approached

the young couple confidentially.

“We’ve decided to make a run back, sir, from here; but if I may make

a suggestion, there’s a nice farmhouse not a stone’s throw from here

where you’d be most comfortable. I know the party as keeps it would put

you up for the night and give you a good supper.”

Eva looked up brightly.

“A farmhouse? Is it a pretty one?”

“Well, I couldn’t say as it’s so very pretty,” returned the guard

doubtfully, “but there’s good ale to be had and fowls and pork and nice

rooms, too, what they let in the summer.”

Eric became decisive.

“I think, darling, that’s really the best we can do, and if it’s quite

near we can get our light luggage carried over.”

A man was found by the guard. They gathered their wraps and light cases

together. In a few moments they were standing on the damp soil by the

side of the train, listening to the directions he was giving for the

route.

It did not sound so very near:

“You keeps away from the wood and you goes up the hill to the top and

then down on the other side till you comes to the bridge, and don’t

cross the bridge, but keep along by the stream till you get to a stile,

and you cross the stile and go through two fields and then there’s a

bit of a wood and you go through the wood and then you comes out on a

bit of a slope and the farm’s just facing you.”

“But that’s a long way,” expostulated Eric. Eva was surprised at his

cross tone. She had never heard it before.

“It will be a lovely walk on this moonlight night,” she volunteered.

“It’s not more’n fifteen minutes or ’arf-an-hour’s walk,” said the

guard in an aggrieved tone, “and you can’t miss it, and the ale’s good.”

Eric tipped him. The man shouldered the cases and they started. They

followed their instructions to keep away from the wood and took a

little narrow path that wound up to the top of the hill. The moon was

just peeping over its brow and made long shadows fall from the trees

that stood here and there. The air was damp and cool and full of the

scent of late roses and wet leaves.

To the girl it was all pure enjoyment, only clouded a little by the

fact that Eric seemed so put out. They walked side by side in silence.

The man trudged along behind them, silent also. Up and up till the

ridge was reached, then down and down on the other side. Eva walked

with springing steps admiring the calm beauty of it all, drawing

pleasure from each little detail of star in the sky or gleam of

moonlight on the brook. She hazarded a few enthusiastic remarks, but

Eric did not seem to hear them, and there was silence until the second

field beyond the stile was reached. Then through the quiet air came

suddenly to them a strange sound--a low, hollow sound of misery. Eva

stopped:

“What is that sound, Eric?”

“Dog barking, I should think,” he answered shortly.

“I never heard a dog bark like that before; it has an awful,

extraordinary sound.”

“Yes, because the beast has barked himself hoarse, I should think,

that’s all.”

Eva stood listening.

“Yes, I suppose it is hoarse as you say, but what a terrible sound.”

It was a terrible lamenting cry of a soul in misery that came to them

wailing over the wood and the stream.

“Please come along,” Eric said as she stood there with dilating eyes.

“We don’t want to spend the night here.”

Eva walked on. The sound of the barking, if barking it could be called,

becoming clearer and nearer as they advanced. They were in the wood

now, and the moonlight falling through the trees made beautiful

patterns and traceries on the moss-grown path, but Eva now had no eyes

for it. She was listening to that long-drawn wail of pain that came

fitfully through the silver air.

“But aren’t you sorry for it?” she asked.

“I don’t know. It’s barked itself into that condition, I expect. I

suppose it’s one of the farm dogs. I hope the brute won’t go on like

that all night.”

Eva was silent. It was not quite what she expected Eric to say, but she

made no comment.

They were through the wood, on the slope, and there was the farmhouse

at last facing them on the slope opposite.

It looked comfortable enough and cheery; well-built and solid with a

warm blaze of light in its lower windows. A large farmyard was close

at its side; an orchard on the other side. From behind the house the

hollow, melancholy barking continued, belying the aspect of peace and

rest.

At the door of the farmhouse they received a warm welcome. It was

thrown open by the stout, good-tempered looking woman herself, while

her husband and son, burly figures in their rough farm clothes, lounged

up to the threshold, hands in pockets, to stare at the strangers.

Behind them at the end of the passage or hall a door stood open to

warmth and lights and a table laid for supper.

Farmer Bates and his wife let rooms in the summer, so they knew

the ways of the rich and those who were not farmers. There was no

difficulty. They could have a nice room, they could have hot water,

they could have baths and they could have early tea in the morning;

they could have roast chicken and soup and apple tart for supper.

Eric cheered up and Eva saw the expression she was familiar with come

back to his face. The “engagement expression” as she now christened

it in her mind. It was the only one she had seen for those three

weeks--the only one she knew--but she saw now his face had others.

She was asked to go in and sit by the fire, and did so while the

farmer’s young, handsome son took the place opposite. Eric was

arranging terms with the woman and seeing their luggage carried

upstairs.

The young farmer started a conversation as he was accustomed to do

with the summer visitors. Eva was preoccupied; she wanted to ask about

the dog, but she hesitated as to how best to approach the subject, and

before she had decided, the others came back into the room.

The supper was quite a merry meal for all except herself. It was all

quiet outside now, but in spite of the talk going on round her, her

ears were only listening for that call from without. Eric grew quite

jovial; he approved the farmer’s ale and drank heartily. The farming

family were pleased at their guests’ appreciation, and the prospect of

the good pay coming in. Bridegrooms were always generous. Suddenly,

across the laughter and the talk, it came again; that awful wail of

hopeless misery. The hosts did not appear to hear it, but Eva’s face

blanched, and a look of annoyance flashed across Eric’s handsome

countenance.

Eva turned to the young man next her:

“Why has that dog got such a peculiar bark?” she asked.

“Because he’s going mad, I think,” he answered. “We’re going to shoot

him in the morning.”

The young farmer was quite surprised by the look of distress that come

to the girl’s face.

“Oh, but why?” she exclaimed. “I think from his bark he wants water.

Let me take him some.”

The man laughed:

“You take him water? Why you couldn’t get near him. He’s so savage he’d

eat you alive.”

“What has made him so savage?”

“Well, we’ve kept him on the chain for seven years, and it’s sent him

crazy, I think,” he answered indifferently. “We haven’t been able to

get near him for years; we just throw him his food and push the water

to him with a pole.”

“Do you mean you’ve kept him chained up and never let him free once,

never given him any exercise for seven years?”

“Oh, he gets exercise enough dancing about at the end of that chain and

howling. We let him howl in the winter for we don’t notice him, and

it’s too much trouble to go out and bash him, but in the summer when

the visitors are here we thrash him when he barks, for they don’t like

it, and if it annoys you I’ll soon settle him now.”

And before she realised what he was going to do, he rose from his

place, strode up to where some huge horsewhips were ranged against the

wall, and then with one in his hand, went to the door. The burly farmer

turned in his chair.

“That’s right, Steve, you go and give him a good hiding. Teach him to

behave when we have ladies here.”

The son would have gone out, but Eva had sprung up and she put herself

between him and the door.

“Pray don’t,” she said. “It does distress me to hear him, but I

wouldn’t have him beaten for anything.”

The young farmer looked down into her blanched face and dilated eyes.

Their beauty conquered him.

“As you like,” he said rather sullenly, and hung the whip up again on

the wall.

The farmer himself laughed.

“Now then, missis,” he called banteringly. “You’ve no call to

interfere. If he wants to beat our dog, why shouldn’t we?”

“Don’t be foolish, Eva. Come and sit down,” Eric said. His tone was

full of annoyance.

She came back to the table and sat down facing the farmer. She was

white and trembling.

“It’s not your dog,” she said steadily.

The farmer’s red face turned purple.

“Not our dog, eh! Not our dog! And ’oos dog is it, then, I should like

to know?”

“It’s God’s dog,” the girl replied unflinchingly.

She had a beautiful voice, very soft and sweet in tone, but full of

power. It vibrated through the room now, charged with the intensity of

her feelings and held her listeners:

“All animals are His. He created them. They are not ours. They are only

lent to us in trust, and it is _my_ business to interfere, as it

is everybody’s business to interfere when they are ill-treated and

mis-used.”

No one spoke for a moment. The farmer sat back, open-mouthed.

“’Pon my word,” he stuttered after a minute. “’Pon my word,” and could

get no further.

They all turned instinctively to Eric to see what view he would take,

and Eva, too, looked at him appealingly. Surely he would take her side

against the others!

“Eric?” she said questioningly. He coloured hotly. He was annoyed at

her making a scene like this about nothing.

“Don’t be stupid, Eva,” he said shortly. “Go on with your supper. Of

course Bates has a right to do as he thinks best. Personally, I think

it would be a good thing if he did give the brute a thrashing and

stopped his howling.”

“Eric!” she exclaimed again, but this time her tone was one of sheer

amazement and bewilderment, and sitting in her place she stared across

at him as if he were some new strange monster suddenly presented to her

eyes. And indeed, this was the fact. She saw, for the first time, the

real Eric. This was not the man she had married this morning, surely?

This was not the man whose eyes had been wont to fill with sympathetic

tears whenever she had wept. A feeling of extreme loneliness came over

her. He was one in spirit with these coarse-faced, brutal farmers, who

had tortured their four-footed servant for seven years and thrashed him

when he had cried to them for help.

She was alone amongst them all.

She had no husband. That man opposite her, who had just let fall those

words, was not the one she had loved and adored and married. By his

speech he seemed to have let loose an icy river which was flowing now

wide and deep as the Polar sea between them.

“Don’t sit staring at me,” Eric said impatiently. “Go on with your

supper, for Heaven’s sake.”

Eva’s lips set. She pushed her plate from her and rose.

“Thank you, I have finished,” she merely said, but there was such a

cutting disdain in her voice, such a thin, frosty edge to her tone,

that it seemed to those at the table a shower of ice had fallen

suddenly upon them. She stood for a moment looking down on the circle,

at the flushed, bloated faces, at the burly lounging forms of these

men who could sit there stuffing themselves to their protruding eyes;

well-warmed, well-fed, well-clothed, and knowing that their faithful

friend and devoted defender was stretched on the cold stones a few feet

away, dying in the agonies of thirst and despair.

She turned and left the room before anyone moved or spoke, and went

upstairs to the bedroom.

She opened the door. A fire had been lighted in the grate, and its

cheerful red light was playing all over the room. The blinds were

pulled down, and thick red curtains drawn across the windows. On the

neat dressing-table stood a vase full of dried lavender. The bed in the

corner with snowy sheets and counterpane invited to repose. Another

little bed, draped in pink dimity, stood near the window.

It was a room in which any weary traveller would have liked to rest.

Eva noticed nothing. She shut the door behind her, then walked over to

the window, pulled aside the curtains and let the spring blind fly up

with a snap. Then she looked out, and there was the dog! Facing her

across a large stone paved yard, fully illuminated by the brilliant

moonlight so that she could see every detail. At the extreme end of

his chain, his long-nailed paws on the stone flags, the wild-eyed,

dishevelled looking creature stood, gazing towards the house where his

tormentors lived. The girl’s quick eyes took in his gaunt and bony

frame, the rough hair that stood upright down his spine, the open jaw

with white foam hanging from it, the neck from which all the hair was

gone, rubbed away in his ceaseless efforts to free himself from his

chain. Near him were a few bones and untouched scraps. Just out of his

reach, however he might strain, was an overturned earthenware saucer.

It looked dry, as if it had not contained water for many days.

So little like a dog the creature looked, she could not determine to

what breed it belonged, but it seemed to have been something between

a mastiff and a wolfhound. Now it was just a huge, wasted wreck,

glaring-eyed, demented, that man had made.

And she looked out at it and pitied it and loved it with that boundless

love and sympathy for all suffering things, that is the best part of

the female nature.

So he had stood in that stone-paved yard, week in week out for seven

years--day after day, night after night, of burning sun and intolerable

heat, or icy cold and cutting winds. No shelter, not even a kennel, not

even a trace of straw. All round him was a ring of shining white on the

grey flags which his scratching feet had made in his hopeless efforts

to be free; and the physical sufferings were the least of what he had

borne. The worst had been the awful monotony of those long, dreary

days without hope, without aim or occupation: that emptiness and that

sameness that preys on an animal’s brain just as much as on a man’s.

Chained up in his youthful days, with all the wild longings for the

twenty-mile run, the smell of the wildwoods, the finding of mates,

fermenting in his blood, with his great canine heart full of that

wonderful enthusiastic worship of man that Nature has planted there,

longing for love and companionship, for the touch of a kind hand on

his head, he had watched the homestead with wistful, hungering eyes.

And because, when people approached him, he had tugged so frantically

at his chain and pawed the air to show his joy and longing to follow

them, he had been thought savage, and when he had cried out in his

loneliness, he had been beaten into quietude; but his agony and his

sorrow, and his wonder at it all was so great that even those cruel

thrashings had not silenced him.

And now, after seven years of this, he was to be shot to-morrow! The

girl, looking out at him, understood all he had gone through, and

a fierce resentment against his tormentors rose and swelled within

her like a great wave. Somehow, she would save him, she determined,

and give him a little happiness before he died; give him that love

and sympathy his heart had been craving for all those years. She had

forgotten herself, forgotten it was her wedding evening--a time so

passionately anticipated during her engagement. As for Eric, he seemed

to have disappeared from her. Somewhere between the Church and the

farmhouse the Eric she loved had vanished. How could she reach that

poor, condemned prisoner? If she went down now to the farmhouse door

she would be heard unfastening it, even if she could move those solid

bars. If she were seen in the yard she would certainly be followed and

prevented from getting near the dog. No one else could be persuaded to

release him. Everyone was afraid of those gleaming teeth and blood-shot

eyes. She would only probably succeed in getting him shot that night

instead of to-morrow. And how would they shoot him? Not with one

merciful bullet sent direct to the brain; but probably aiming from a

distance, they might shoot and wound him a dozen times and then perhaps

leave him dying and not dead.

They would certainly kill him in the same clumsy, misunderstanding way

they had treated him while alive. Merely to release him in his present

condition, wild-looking and supposed to be mad, would be no kindness.

If he dashed away he would soon be followed, perhaps stoned by the

screaming rabble of the village. No, she must not only release him, she

must take him away and with her. He was her dog now. No one wanted him.

He was going to be shot. Well, she would not have that. She would take

him. Then suddenly she remembered Eric. He would certainly object! and

she was married. She had to consult him.

She turned from the window in a sudden panic--she was a prisoner, too.

And her gaoler was of the stamp of the men downstairs. How awful this

was! She had never meant to marry such a man. Had he shown himself

before the ceremony as he had at the supper here, she would never have

married him. Her hands turned cold, and her knees shook. She sank down

in a chair by the fire. She had never realized the prison side of

marriage.

Union with the twin soul she had thought she had found in Eric had not

suggested it. But now she saw how the case was. Had she been travelling

alone she could have gone to the farmer and paid him his own price for

the dog and taken him away with her, openly. It would have been quite

simple. But now she knew instinctively Eric would not let her do this

and as he was against her as well as all those downstairs, the dog

would probably be shot before her eyes and she would be powerless to

prevent it because she had given up her single freedom of action, given

up the right over her own conduct. And to that man! It was horrible.

Her nails sank into her clenched hands. In that moment she longed to

be free of that room, free of her marriage as the dog outside longed

to be free of his chain. The sex passion is infinitely curious in its

nature. Though in some ways so strong, so resistless, yet in others it

is so frail a plant that the lightest wind may sweep it away. Eva had

given to Eric not only love and admiration, but also the natural joyous

passion of awakened girlhood. Now all these were equally dead. She sat

there, numb and cold with only one desire--to save the dog and escape.

As she sat trying to think out some plan of action, the door opened

and Eric came in. The supper had done him good; his bad temper was

forgotten. He came in smiling, and she saw again the old Eric with the

“engagement expression.” Suddenly it occurred to her she could win her

way by blandishment however her feelings might have changed. For the

dog’s sake she must dissemble and act.

She went up to him with arms outstretched.

“Oh, Eric darling, I am so glad you have come. Do do me a favor, and

I’ll simply adore you. Do let us buy that poor dog and take him away

with us and make up to him for all he has suffered.”

The smile died away from the man’s face. He unclasped her arms from his

neck.

“But, my dear child, he’s mad. You can’t take a mad dog about with you.

His own people are afraid to go near him.”

“I should think they would be after the way they have treated him,” she

answered with burning indignation. “But _I’m_ not afraid of him.

He is not mad. He is only crazy with loneliness and thirst. Let me go

down and release him, and I’ll be responsible for him.”

Eric stared at her in amazement and with a growing anger fed by

jealousy and wounded vanity.

A man’s nerves and state of general self-control are not at their best

on such an occasion as this, and in his unbalanced condition it seemed

intolerable to him that his bride should not be wholly occupied with

himself but should be worrying over a miserable brute of a dog. It did

not occur to him that she was only now displaying those qualities that

had so much attracted him from the first--that soft, warm heart, that

all-embracing love and sympathy that coupled with her physical beauty

had made him decide to marry her out of all the women he might have

chosen. It did not occur to him either what a priceless possession

of adoring love he might have gained for all the rest of his life by

yielding to her then and conquering himself; nor how, for ever he would

kill his own future by opposition. He was simply intensely angry,

jealous and annoyed and blinded by hurt vanity and selfish passion.

“It’s our _duty_ to do something,” she urged. “Come and look at

him,” and she drew him, reluctant, to the window.

The dog stood in the same position at the end of the hateful chain! his

eyes glaring, his mouth open, his body shivering. The man and woman

looked out at him together. The woman’s eyes saw a fellow creature’s

suffering soul, the man saw--a mad dog.

“It’s really nothing whatever to do with us,” he expostulated, “it’s

not our business. The people who own him must know how to manage him.

Why do you bother yourself about it!”

Eva turned and gazed at him with sheer surprise.

“But Eric, we couldn’t possibly enjoy ourselves and sleep comfortably

up here knowing he is there in such misery!”

“Of course, we could, if you were not so silly about it,” he answered.

Eva was silent. Power to reply seemed taken away from her in face of

this colossal adamantine hardness. She began to realise that this man

she had married was not at all the exceptional individual she had

imagined, but just the ordinary usual human being, not actively cruel,

but absolutely indifferent and callous, not caring about anything

except the satisfaction of his senses and the comfort of his own body.

“Well, if you could, I couldn’t,” she said after a moment. “Let me go

down and unchain him and tell the people I’ll buy him. If you don’t

want him with us, I’ll send him to my sister to keep for me.”

“To attempt to unchain a dog in that condition is going to your death,”

he said shortly, keeping control over himself as well as he could.

“I am sure it’s not so, but even if it were and I feel it’s my duty,

I ought to do it. Why, Eric, how many times in the War did you not go

forward to almost certain death just because it was your duty?”

Eric coloured furiously.

“That may be, but I’m not going to risk my life now to free a mad dog.”

“I’m not asking you to. I want to free him.”

“And my answer is, you shan’t do anything so damnably foolish.” Swept

by a sudden whirl of anger that was utterly beyond him to control, he

strode across the room, locked the door, tore out the key and flung it

with all his force through the window. It fell tinkling on the stone

flags of the yard.

“Now that ends all this damned nonsense,” he said violently, and drew

her roughly away from the window which he closed, and pulled the

curtain across.

The girl stood as if turned into stone. As the key fell, a cry escaped

her. A cry so bitter with hate and loathing that he might well have

shuddered if he had noted it. But he did not. He did not realise it was

the death-cry of the last shred of love or feeling of allegiance to

him that was left in her heart.

The explosion of rage had helped Eric to become normal again. Having

now secured, as he supposed, beyond all possibility of doubt, his own

way, he became calmer. The brain-storm passed. He came up to where she

stood, mute and motionless by the hearth.

“Darling,” he said, attempting to draw her into his arms, “don’t be

stupid and spoil all our pleasure. Have you forgotten how we looked

forward to being like this alone together?”

She wrenched herself away from him, and there was such a fury of

resentment in her eyes that even he fell back from her with a confused

sense of having made some fatal error. Women were intended by Nature to

rule the world, not men, and that is why any attempt to coerce a woman

by man generally fails.

“Don’t touch me,” she said in a voice low and sharp with the intensity

of her anger. “You shall never touch me again.”

“You seem to forget you’re my wife,” he said hotly.

“If I am fifty thousand times your wife I will never give myself to

you. You can kill me first.”

Eric stepped back and regarded her with dismay. He was face to face now

with a force which he could only dimly comprehend. But as the storm

had passed from his brain, it had left his intellect fairly clear, and

he began to see things were getting serious. Somehow he was making a

mess of it. Mechanically he turned away, fumbling in his pocket for his

cigarette case. He drew out a cigarette, lighted it and began to smoke.

What would be best to do, he wondered. Perhaps, if he said nothing

she would calm down again. He rather wished he had not been so hasty.

He wished he had put the key in his pocket instead of throwing it out

of the window. There was no getting out of the room now for either of

them. He regretted he had not been wiser and temporised more.

Presently he threw himself into a chair, and watched her furtively. Her

eyes were turned away towards the fire. She stood like a thing turned

into stone.

“What are we going to do, then?” he said, half banteringly, when the

silence became unbearable. “Sit up all night?”

“As you please,” the girl replied, without turning her head. He

wondered what she was thinking about, and debated feverishly with

himself what he should do or say. He would have been astonished if he

could have known her thoughts. He had not the faintest conception of

the character and the will he was dealing with.

The girl stood there,--Herself, sunk utterly in her thought. How to

gain her end and carry out the dog’s deliverance was the only thing

that occupied her. Eric’s last words had suddenly flashed a light into

her brain. For a moment, when the key had whizzed by her and clinked

on the stones without, hope had died in her. It seemed so impossible

then to ever reach the poor chained one down there in time, but now his

words, “sit up all night” showed her suddenly the contrary proposition.

If Eric were once asleep and she, alone awake in the room, she could

effect her escape from it by the window. Her heart gave a suffocating

leap upward as the whole plan unrolled itself like a map before her

mental vision. Light and agile as a cat, it would be possible for

her to swing herself down by knotted sheets to the yard, loose the

prisoner, and with him run through the moon-lighted country, back to

that station down the line their train had passed, and catch the first

one back to London. It was all most dangerous and difficult, most open

to failure, still it was a _possible_ plan--if Eric were asleep.

And with an infinite sense of horror and loathing, she realised the

best and perhaps the only way to ensure his sleep was to reverse all

she had said, to humiliate herself, to act a part, to give herself to

him--and let him sleep. She saw his plan now was to sit up and smoke

waiting and hoping she would change her mind. Time was passing, and

each silver minute of the night brought the prisoner outside nearer to

his doom.

She suddenly bent her head down on the mantelpiece. Nothing she would

hate so much now as the caress of this man in whose caresses she had

once so rejoiced! These moments she had so looked forward to, how

horrible, how terrible they were now! His embrace! Surely with that

fury of resentment in her heart, she would suffocate in it! But the

dog had to be saved, and to accomplish that she would go through any

suffering, any degradation. She drew herself together with a supreme

effort of will, and turned to the man in the chair.

“Eric, I am so sorry I spoke as I did. Let’s never mind about anything.

Let’s forget it. Kiss me.”

He had sprung to his feet at her first word. She was beside him now,

looking up at him with her glorious eyes full of light and her face

glowing with smiles, though her heart was shuddering within her.

“Darling, my own, I am so sorry too,” Eric was covering her upturned

face with kisses. “My dearest, my very own.”

Outside, the dog stood cold and stiff in the damp night air, aching

with thirst, his poor, half-crazy eyes turned up to the moonlit sky

from which no mercy came. The hours crept by, till the clock in the

village struck three. For seven years he had listened to those strokes

that marked the passing hours, hours that never brought him nearer to

liberty, to the free use of his cramped limbs, to any of the natural

joys for which he had been created. He sank wearily down on his

haunches. He could no longer cry out; his voice seemed broken in his

throat, his tongue was swollen and black. He kept his head turned to

the window where he had seen the two figures stand looking at him. Some

faint, dull hope had stirred in him that they might be thinking of

him, that they might be coming to him to alleviate his misery and his

torment of thirst. But no, the window had been shut and had gone dark.

Inside the room the strokes of the clock vibrated through the

stillness, and Eva, lying open-eyed and filled with desperate

impatience, slid noiselessly out of bed, and with soundless movements

and feverish haste began to dress. Eric was asleep. Never in all her

life had she prayed for anything so fervently as she did now that he

might remain so. With infinite caution she crept about the room, making

her toilet to the minutest detail. Within her all her personal self

felt humiliated, outraged, seething with fury, but she would not think

of herself, only of the work ahead to be done.

Hurry generally means noise. Therefore, filled with burning impatience

as she was, she had to move slowly, regulating each movement and each

tip-toe step. Once Eric moved and sighed, and she started in terror

and stood motionless, but he did not awake, and with a thumping heart

and trembling fingers she went on with her preparations. When she was

fully dressed to her hat, and with her gloves and purse stowed away in

her bodice, together with Eric’s clasp-knife that he had left lying on

the table, she approached the unoccupied bed standing in the corner

by the window, and inch by inch drew the sheets from it. These alone

would have been too short a length for her purpose even when knotted

together at their extreme ends, but she took the counterpane as well,

and all three end to end she judged would let her nearly to the ground.

At their country place at home her father had shown her how to escape

in case of fire, and she knew now exactly what to do. She knotted

the corner of the sheet tightly round the little wooden post of the

bed, and then there was the barrier of the window to be surmounted.

She did not dare to draw back the curtains for fear of the rattle of

their rings, but she lifted them slowly and silently to one side and

then with both hands and infinite care, guided the spring blind up and

looked out. Her heart gave a leap of boundless sympathy as she saw the

great dog sitting at the end of his tightly-drawn chain, still gazing

towards the window--his only hope--as he had been hours ago.

No Juliet felt more eager to join her Romeo than this girl did now

to get to the suffering animal and soothe its pain. And of such

natures is the Kingdom of Heaven. Such people are those who make this

earth a little less like hell. Blind and curtain out of the way, it

still remained to open the window without noise. Very, very softly

with indrawn breath and shaking heart, she raised it half way, just

enough to let her through. Then she paid out her long rope of knotted

bedclothes, and looking out, she saw it reached to within about eight

feet of the yard. Then, as often before in the fire drill, she crept

on to the window sill, twisted her feet well round the dangling cloths

and gripped them hard in her little hands. Then down, down she swung

her light weight and dropped at length noiselessly to the ground. The

captive in the yard rose to his feet and lowered his head, staring at

her fixedly, but he gave no sound. Some instinct seemed to tell him

that all this strange proceeding had something to do with him.

The girl, once out of the room and away from the sleeping man she had

sworn to love and honour and cleave to till death, felt such a rush of

joyous elation that it seemed to give her wings. Quite half her work

was successfully accomplished. She ran swift and silent as a shadow

across the yard.

As he realised she was actually coming to him, the enormous dog tore at

his chain, and as he could not advance he reared himself on his hind

legs, his front pawing at the air, his eyes almost out of his head,

his foaming jaws wide open. It was a fearsome sight, but the girl went

on unflinchingly, straight up to the desperate animal. Tall as she was

the dog stood as high as herself, and as she reached him his great

bony, shaggy paws descended heavily on her shoulders, and she put both

her arms out under them and clasped him to her warm, loving breast.

And the animal enveloped in that marvelous electricity that flowed out

from her, soothed and calmed instantly by that contact with true loving

humanity which he had longed for all through his dreary life stood

perfectly still, all his raging pulses calmed, all his tormenting pains

dying away.

“Darling, be good now while I release you,” she said in his ear, and

gently let him slide to his four feet. Then she knelt down beside him

and put her hands to his collar.

The dog understood perfectly she had come to release him. At last, at

last he would be free, and he stood patient and still as a statue,

only his whole frame quivered and thrilled with joy. He felt her

little fingers trying desperately to undo the hateful collar. Eva’s

heart beat almost to choke her. Suppose, suppose she failed to get it

undone. Seven years had solidified the leather almost into iron; the

brass point that pierced the leather was embedded in and had become one

almost with it.

Both were welded together under a thick coat of verdigris. Every nail

on her fingers was broken before she gave up the hopeless task of

unstrapping it. Then, keeping one hand on the dog’s head, she felt in

her bosom for the knife.

Because she understood him so perfectly, and that his loneliness and

forsaken neglect had been the chief sorrow of his life, she knew

just how to manage him. When she failed to undo the collar, he felt

his heart die within him and had she moved away from him, his poor

desperate brain would have given way. But she kept quite close to

him and that told him that all hope was not lost, and nerved him to

patience. The collar was loose for the hair had been rubbed and the

neck wasted away which had filled it, and there was room for the

knife-blade to pass under the leather.

“Hold still, now, don’t move,” she whispered in tense tones, and then

sawed with all her strength, outwards on the collar.

It seemed incredibly hard, but the knife was sharp and leather must in

the end yield to steel.

After minutes that seemed hours she cut it through, and with one great

bound the dog leapt away from chain and collar. Free! Free in the

moonlit night! Eva rose to her feet, and he came back to her, lowering

his great body down to the earth on his fore-paws, and then springing

to his full height to put them on her breast to show his rapture.

Elated, joyous, but still in terror of being overtaken, Eva threw one

rapid glance over the silent house and up to the window where her long

white rope hung gleaming in the moonlight.

Then “Come,” she said to the dog, and close, side by side, they raced

out of the yard by the door just behind where he had been chained. A

door that was never fastened for he had guarded it so faithfully and

securely. Out of the yard and through the wasty farmyard adjoining,

then over the low wall surrounding it, and they were out on the slope,

tearing away like mad things to the shelter of the wood.

Here they continued to run, down the narrow, mossy path that Eric

and she had come by, filled with such different feelings the evening

before. Silent now, with all their strength given to speed, but with

perfect union of intention, they steadied down to an even trot, the dog

modifying his pace to the human being’s. He knew that she had saved

him, freed him, and he was now her faithful slave for life. No evil,

no danger should come near her. No enemy could lay a finger on her as

long as an atom of strength remained in him to defend her. He was hers

and she was his till death.

At last they reached the spot where the train had pulled up the

previous evening, and Eva, still hounded by the fear of pursuit, after

a few minutes’ rest, ran on steadily, taking a little path that passed

beneath evergreens near the railway.

The station down the line was thirteen miles distant, yet such is the

force of joy and the power of will and determination that the girl felt

hardly fatigued when she saw the red and green lights ahead of her; and

she walked into the booking office with a light and springing step as

the yawning clerk opened it.

The next train to London, the first in the day to carry the mails, left

in fifteen minutes. She took her ticket and a dog ticket, and went out

on to the platform and sat down. She felt such happiness, such joy

in her success, her accomplished plan, that nothing in her life had

equalled it, and all sense of pain and tiredness were entirely drowned

in it.

The dog was more distressed than she. He fell heavily at her feet

as she sat down. He was footsore, his limbs ached and he was oh, so

thirsty, but he minded nothing. He was content.

Eva had been afraid to wait to give him water, but she bent over him

now, looking anxiously at his swollen, hanging tongue. He did not ask

for anything, only looked up at her with great eyes from which the

wildness was already dying away; for had he not felt a soft hand on

his head and heard a kind voice in his ear?

She rose to seek water for him, and, stiff and sore though he was, he

dragged himself to his feet to follow her. He could not bear her to

move away from him.

There was a little tap of water standing out from the wall further down

the platform, and stooping down, she turned it on and made a little

bowl of her two small, pink-palmed hands for him to drink from. At

first he seemed hardly able to swallow, nor get the water over his

swollen tongue, but she waited patiently, and at last he drank easily

and freely as long as she thought good for him. Then they walked

back to the seat and she sat down and took his head on her knees and

smoothed back the harsh, rough hair and looked deep into his eyes, and

they talked together, as lovers do, in looks and silence.

At last the train arrived, and the guard of it came along, swinging

his lantern. He stopped when he caught sight of her daintily-dressed

figure, and the huge, rough wolfhound at her side. She turned to him,

her hand on the carriage door.

“Can I take him in the carriage with me?” she asked.

The guard flashed his light over them.

“Yes, that’ll be all right. The train’s almost empty,” he replied,

eyeing the dog. He was not at all anxious to have the grim-looking

beast shut up with him in his van.

“Not many people travels at this time of night,” he added

inquisitively, looking in at her after she was seated and the dog had

dropped onto the floor of the carriage.

Eva made no response, and he turned away mumbling in a dissatisfied

tone: “Runaways and eloping couples, thieves and such--them’s wot

travels at night.”

Two or three minutes more of this anguished suspense and then the train

started, gathered speed and they were away--safe. She leant over the

dog with a joyous laugh. Oh, the relief of that moving train! Not Eric

nor Bates, nor all the farm hands could overtake them now.

“He talked of eloping couples; that’s just what we are, aren’t we,

darling?” And the dog beat his great, waving brush of a tail on the

carriage floor for answer. She sat back in a corner, for the first time

realising that she was very tired, but the joy at her heart glowed more

fiercely every moment as the train rushed on its non-stop run to town.

She had done it all; she had succeeded so admirably. She had saved the

dog. She did not believe they could be separated now. If Bates sued

her for stealing his dog she was ready to pay his full value which the

farmer would probably prefer; and Eric? What would he do or say or

think when he woke and found himself alone in the room where he had

locked himself? Would he climb down the sheets as she had done? She

wondered and laughed. But whatever he did he should never approach her

again.

Arrived in town she went straight to her sister, a girl of twenty,

widowed in the War, who had always strenuously disapproved of Eric.

Brushing past the astonished footman in the hall, she ran upstairs and

found the beautiful Linda still in bed. She sat up in astonishment as

Eva and the great hound burst into the room.

“Linda, I’ve eloped!”

“Well, you _are_ modern! You were only married yesterday!”

“I know,” Eva answered, sitting down in a deep armchair, “but I found I

hadn’t married the man I meant to after all, but somebody else that I

didn’t like at all.”

“We most of us do that,” returned Linda, swinging two ivory feet out of

bed and eyeing the dog:

“What a beautiful dog. What’s he doing here?”

Few would have applied that adjective to the great creature stretched

before her. But Linda saw through the devastation man had made to the

original beauty given by Nature.

“He is the cause of everything. I eloped with _him_.”

“What do you mean? Tell me everything, now, from the beginning,” and

Linda wrapped herself in a rose-hued gown and settled herself to

listen. The dog stretched himself out on his side between them and

fell asleep, worn out, not so much by the physical exertions as the

conflicting emotions of the night.

Eva told all; shortly, incisively. Only once did she give rein to her

feelings--when she had to tell how she had bought Eric’s passivity and

sleep--she sprang up with her hands clenched into knots.

“If I have a child by him, I’ll kill it before it breathes!” she

exclaimed. “What is the good of multiplying callous brutes like that?”

Linda listened attentively to the end. Then she rose and rang the bell.

“You poor thing, you must be quite worn out. What you want is breakfast

first and then sleep.”

“But did I do rightly? Do tell me what you think, Lin.”

“Of course I think so, and I think you have made a good exchange. A dog

will never disappoint you--never go back on you--never be unkind to

you, never be unfaithful to you and a man will--always.”

Eva sighed, leaning back and closing her eyes.

“It’s so good to be back with you, Lin.”

The maid brought in hot coffee, and a huge breakfast tray of delicious

edibles, and the girls laughed and talked as they ate, and the dog who

had had bones flung to him on the flags, had a pile of delicate curly

slices of bacon on a hand-painted porcelain dish. After breakfast Linda

insisted on Eva going to bed, and there in that soundless room the girl

and dog slept away the morning hours.

In the afternoon Eric came, and Eva went down to see him in the library.

“What does all this mean?” he asked as she closed the door and stood

facing him.

“I am not coming back to you. Linda has asked me to stay with her, and

I have accepted.”

“But you married me!”

“No, that’s where you make the mistake. I married a dream man, a man

of my own imagination, a man who was decent and kind and humane, quite

different from you altogether.”

Eric flushed a dull, angry red.

“You consummated the marriage with _me_ anyhow; you won’t deny

that, I suppose?” he said.

A look of intense repulsion came over her face.

“For the dog’s sake, I gave myself to you, though I _loathed_

you,” she answered in a low tone, full of repressed vehemence.

“For the dog’s sake,” repeated Eric, growing more and more bewildered

and less and less able to solve the problem that woman always presents

to man. “How? I don’t understand.”

“You had determined to sit up all night and prevent me going to him; if

I had had any chloroform or any drug to put you to sleep I would have

given it to you. I had nothing but myself so I gave you that.”

She was standing close to him and looking straight into his eyes. The

gaze was relentless and bright as the blade of a sword.

“But your kisses--your wonderful passion--your insistence--” he

stammered.

“It was all for his sake. I tell you, I hated and loathed you.”

“It was damned good acting then.”

“It could hardly exceed yours during our engagement,” she flashed back.

“Acting, no, it was prostitution,” he said with a sudden storm of

anger, “if what you say now is true.”

“Perhaps; you may call it what you please. I would do anything in the

world to save a helpless and suffering animal and be proud of it,” she

answered.

Eric turned away and took a few paces up the long room. She angered

him. In a way he longed to strike her for what she said to him, but

the memory of last night clung to him and held him. It had been so

wonderful, so perfect, her love, real or assumed; she looked now so

bright, so true, so undaunted, he longed for her, coveted her more than

ever he had done in the past. He could not imagine how they had drifted

into this mess. He had tried hard to please her during their engagement

and had succeeded. He had won her. How had he lost her so soon? He did

not know what to say, nor how to act. And all about this stupid dog; he

would kill the beast if he could get hold of it.

“What can we do now?” he said, at last in a tone of bewildered

perplexity.

“We must get a divorce. I believe it can be managed somehow. Your wife

has eloped, deserted you, refuses to come back, go to a lawyer and see

what he can do for you. If those charges are not enough, I have done

more for I married a good man, and my wedding night was passed with

somebody else, another totally different man. If a lawyer can’t twist

that into cause for divorce, he can’t be much of a lawyer. I don’t

want to spoil your whole life, so I give you leave to say anything you

like about me.”

And before he had realised it, she had opened the door and had gone,

and though he stormed and swore and summoned the servants and Linda

came down to him, nothing would induce Eva to see him again.

She vanished from him and all he could do was to follow her advice and

seek consolation of his lawyers.

About a year later, had anyone passed through the scarlet land of

poppies at Cromer, he would have seen two girls sitting among them,

looking out to the hazy sea, and a great wolfhound lying between

them. He has been christened Joy, and his sparkling eye and glossy

coat, his rounded form and waving brush of a tail all speak to the

appropriateness of his name.

He and Eva are inseparable and he understands her looks, her tones, her

words. He understands _her_ far better than Eric ever had, and at

any moment he would lay down his life joyfully for her sake.

“I see that Eric has married again, Eva,” Linda said presently. “So now

you are really and truly free. Do you think you will ever marry again,

yourself?”

“Not while Joy lives,” Eva answered, her little hand resting on his

neck and buried in its thick, glossy black hair. “I would never give

him a rival. The next man might want to chain him up in the yard! Then

we’d have to run away again, wouldn’t we, Joy?”

And the great dog leapt to his feet and gave a deep, musical bark in

answer, bounding backwards and forwards and leaping up to them as the

two girls rose and wended their way slowly through the poppies, emblems

of peace and forgetfulness, home.

THE JEWEL CASKET

The wind howled miserably round the great London station and pierced

the thin, worn clothing of Jim Thorn and Bill Smith as they loitered,

hands in pockets, near the mouth of one of the draughty passages.

It was a bitter January evening and neither inside them nor outside

them had the men anything to keep them warm.

“It ain’t no sort of use, Bill,” remarked Jim, drearily, after a long

silence during which both men had been gazing across the wide space

filled with moving figures to where the refreshment buffet threw out

its warm and cheery glow speaking of the tempting delights within.

“We shan’t get a job here to-night. There’s too many reg’lar porters

about.” He was a thin, spare man, with a long white face in which shone

two grey eyes of a kindly expression. Once a good gardener, ill-health

and ill-luck had brought him to evil days.

“Go on with yer! Who came here after a job?” snarled the other,

in every way a contrast to his companion: thick-set and heavy,

bull-necked, long-lipped and cruel-eyed. “It’s pinching we’re after and

I’ll get something to-night or I’m not Bill Smith.” Lie finished his

sentence with an oath. The other made no reply, only sank into a still

more slouching position against the wall. The crowd of passengers

before them had swelled. There were many coming out from the ticket

office following well-filled trucks of luggage. It was not long now

to the departure of a favorite express into Kent. Jim Thorn’s gaze

drifted about the throng until it lighted on a girl’s figure, one of a

newly-arrived party, and there it remained. His eyes followed her about

with interest, not because he thought she had anything to “pinch,” but

because, in his own instinctive, uneducated way, he loved all pretty

things. She was a very pretty young lady in her plain dark clothes and

her heavy furs, with a slim tall figure and golden curly hair peeping

out from underneath her small black velvet hat. Jim looked at her with

pleasure. He quite forgot about the hot coffee he had been dreaming of

in watching her dainty movements.

It did not occur to him to envy her furs or her warm clothing, nor

to be wrathful with her that she had them, and he had not. His mind

was not of the Socialist order. He no more expected her to give him

her cloak than he expected himself to give his coat to one who had

only waistcoat and trousers. Her cloak was hers and his coat was his,

and could he have explained his mental attitude in words, he would

have told you that he was jolly glad that the same law and order that

enabled the lady to keep her cloak, also gave him the right to keep his

coat and not have it torn off his back by one poorer than he. Although

the companion of a thief, he was by nature a respecter of property.

Suddenly he felt a great grab on his arm, and Bill bent his large red

face close to him.

“Look there!” he whispered excitedly. “The very thing I was looking

for. See that party?”

Jim, following with his gaze Bill’s outstretched finger, saw to his

dismay that it indicated the very young girl he had been so admiring.

“See that little case she has?” pursued his companion in his thick,

beery accents. “Mark my words, that a jool case!” His mouth was close

to Jim’s ear now. “P’raps dimonds, maybe pearls.” He let fly these

imposing words like darts into Jim’s ear.

Jim straightened up and strained his eyes to see what the girl was

carrying. It certainly did look most inviting. A little square, rather

deep case of some dark wood, clamped carefully on all sides with metal,

and with a handle on the top through which the dainty hand of its owner

was passed. It looked as if pearls or diamonds might be lying on cotton

wool inside, and yet the sentimental Jim felt he did not want that

young lady robbed.

“It’s a bit small,” he ventured lamely, in a discouraging tone.

The burly one gave a contemptuous grunt. “Much good _you’d_ be at

the game without me,” he answered. “Haven’t you never heard wot’s good

comes in small parcels? Don’t you know that small and valuable, easy to

sell and light to carry should be the pinchers’ motto? I’m onto that

there jool casket, if I dies for it.”

“But you don’t know what’s in it,” argued Jim. “Maybe it’s just a

purse with not much in, an’ a ticket, an’ a hanky.”

The other sniffed scornfully, his gaze glued on the girl’s hand as he

answered:

“You just watch, as I do, an’ don’t talk so much. I’ve watched and

watched that girl till I knows wot’s in that casket as well as I knows

wot’s in my pocket. ’Ow do I know? Well, because she’s that careful

of it. She looks down at that little box every half-minute and just

now, when she set it down for a second and the porter comes by, up she

snatches it again and holds it to her, and w’en just now someone wanted

to take it off her while she fastened her jacket, she shakes her head

and clings on all the time.”

“It’ll take some doing to get it,” replied Jim, with intensifying gloom.

“I can manage it,” returned Bill, swelling out his chest. “You’ll see.

I’ll always take trouble for jools, and jools they is. Girls don’t go

on like that about anything else.”

“P’raps it’s her young man’s picture,” suggested the sentimental Jim in

a last hope of changing his companion’s intention, though the little

square box with its clamp did not suggest a portrait-case.

The light from where the men stood was not very good and the dark case

sank indistinguishably into the shadow of the girl’s dress. Bill could

not see to his satisfaction what shape and look it really had but the

girl’s intense solicitude for it carried complete conviction to his

mind which was unable to imagine anything being of value except what

could be turned into cash.

The conversation came to an end as the crowd of passengers moved toward

the barrier. It was time for action and the two thieves mingled with

the stream of hurrying humanity and pressed closely up behind the party

to which the girl with the jewel-case belonged. She was certainly very

careful of it. She held it tightly and firmly to her so that it could

not be caught or brushed out of her grasp by any jostling or hustling

movement and she constantly glanced down on it as if to assure herself

of its safety. The train had not come up and the throng swayed back

again, Bill and Jim moving naturally with it, but always quite close

to the girl. They were, though thinly and poorly dressed, not ragged,

or in their aspect in any way likely to attract attention. Bill,

especially, had adapted for the occasion quite a traveling appearance

and had a light overcoat on one arm. True it was only a bit of an

overcoat, but when skilfully draped on the arm, looked quite well and

might have its uses. Their quarry now approached the book-stall to the

delight of Bill, but though the girl stopped to look with interest at

the books and papers and even purchased one of the latter, she never

once set down the little box. The train was now due and the passengers

thickly bunched near the barrier to the platform. Once through the

barrier the girl would be, as Jim put it to himself, “safe,” for he

really did not want to see that box filched from her slender hand, and

as Bill put it to himself, “lorst.” He felt desperate and was just

inwardly cursing his luck when luck itself favoured him. The girl was

standing chatting to the older persons of her group, presumably her

parents, when a young man, leading a fat terrier, hurriedly joined the

throng round the gates. Bill’s eye fell on the dog, and he instantly

moved to the side of the girl farthest from the young man. With a

movement of his hand he attracted the dog’s attention, and next moment

the chain was wound round the girl’s ankles. The dog-owner pulled at

the chain, but to free herself she had to take it from his hand, and to

do so, for one moment, she set the box down beside her. In the second,

while she stooped over the dog, Bill’s great hand dropped on the

box. It was lifted and under his hanging coat, and he and Jim sifted

themselves out of the press of passengers now swaying to the gates

which had just been opened. Calmly, quietly, with blank faces, Jim and

Bill crossed the station to the exit, hearing in their rear a sort of

confused clamour which told them the owner of the box had discovered

her loss.

No one stopped them, no one looked at them. They slipped through the

wind-swept passage, and in a few seconds were out in the street; still

without apparent haste, but at a good pace, they turned down a side

alley and made a short cut for “home.” As they turned down one silent,

dark street, Bill, swelling with satisfaction, opened out on his

companion.

“Now you see wot it is. But for me you’d never have got this necklace,

or tiary, whichever it is, an’ we might have stayed grubbin’ at ’ome

all winter. Now we’ll have a trip abroad for it won’t do to try and

sell ’em here. It ain’t safe for pearls and dimonds.”

“We don’t know yet that they is pearls and dimonds,” objected Jim.

“There you go. You haven’t the brain to imagine anything,” returned

Bill loftily. “And what do you think a young lady would be

carrying--herself--personally, mind, when she had a strappin’ maid

walking behind her with a dressing-case a yard square. Maybe you’d have

gone for that dressing-case,” he added, with a crushing sneer. “That’s

the ordinary brain all over. Sees what’s just ahead an’ no more; goes

for the gilt-topped bottles and lets the tiarys go. Now p’raps when

we’ve sold the jools and are getting a fling on the Continnong you’ll

be grateful you’ve got such a partner and you won’t be so narsty about

it.”

It was a bitter night; sleeting now and with scurries of icy wind and

snow. In the sky a moon was struggling up amongst thick black clouds,

the streets and alleys through which they passed were slippery, wet

and dark. Arrived at a dingy building with a gaping open doorway, they

groped their way up an unlighted stone staircase and reached their

“pitch” at the top in safety. Bill marched in first with the air of a

conqueror, and Jim followed, bolting the door after him. There was a

little light from the remains of a smouldering fire in the grate.

Jim stirred it into a blaze and fed it with some split-up egg-boxes,

and Bill turned on the gas and lighted it.

“That’s my job,” he said, setting down the little dark case on the

table, “and a neat bit of work I calls it, and that dawg helped

wonderful.”

Jim regarded it mournfully. Odd though it may seem this strange waif of

humanity was not thinking of the rich contents; he was wondering what

the poor young lady was feeling at having lost it.

The light revealed a curious den in which these two lived. A folding

bed of ancient date with one side sagging to the floor, in the corner.

A capacious cupboard in the wall through the half-open door of which

strange and various articles were protruding, a table in the centre

with scattered tin cups and plates and battered tin teapot on it and on

the window ledge a cracked flower-pot with a primrose-root growing in

it--Jim’s.

“Now, then,” said Bill, “let’s have a look.” He took up the box and

turned it round. “Why, blimey, it hasn’t a lock,” he exclaimed, rather

blankly. “That don’t look like jools--only a bit of a catch like this,

and two ’oles each side. Wot the ’Ell’s that for?”

With fingers beginning to tremble, he forced up the brass catch and

then tore open the lid, and then both men who had been bending forward

over their treasure, collapsed suddenly speechless, on the two chairs,

and sat opposite to each other staring across the table, for there

within the box was no necklace of rare pearls reposing on velvet

cushions, but a neat little nest of hay, from the centre of which

looked out with enquiring eyes--two white mice!

Very dainty silk-like coats of the purest white on which the gas-light

gleamed, tiny pink paws of the palest shell-like pink, little white

ears delicate as a butterfly’s wing and large eyes like glowing rubies.

Gentle and not dreaming that anyone could hurt them, they looked up at

the staring faces of the men over them, unafraid, and began polishing

their noses with their tiny paws.

Bill recovered from the shock first. With a foul oath, he sprang to his

feet and made a grab at the box, but Jim was too quick for him. With

one of his agile movements that made him such an invaluable thief, he

snatched away the box before Bill’s heavy hand reached it, snapped down

its lid and held it firmly in both hands against his chest.

“Wot yer goin’ to do with it?” he asked.

For a full ten seconds, Bill swore all the best oaths he knew.

“Do with it?” he roared at the finish. “Throw it on the fire and see

those vermin burn alive--you just give it me!”

Jim turned pale and clutched the box tighter.

“Now, Bill, you’d never do such a thing,” he urged anxiously. “They’s

done you no harm and it’s crool to burn them; no good’d come of it,

besides the lidy was fond of ’em, you saw that yourself, and maybe

there’ll be a reward. Here’s a name and address on the box.”

This was sound sense, but Bill was blind and deaf with fury. No oaths

nor mere words could suffice to vent his rage. Some horrible violence

and cruelty alone could do that. He made a lunge across the rickety

table, but Jim avoided him and backed against the wall. He was pale,

but his eyes shone with an indomitable light. A frail, small man with a

poor physique and little health or strength but there was a spirit in

him that had often stood up to and conquered the big bully before. He

saw now this might be a fight to the death, but he just felt he didn’t

care. He would be crushed to a pulp first before Bill got hold of the

box and burned those two little innocent things inside. His blood was

up and on its tide had risen that wonderful determination that can make

one weak man equal to ten strong ones. Bill was round the table in an

instant and let fly at him a blow from his ponderous fist which he

meant to stretch him senseless, but Jim dodged and it only caught the

corner of his eye and his lean arm seemed locked like steel across the

box on his chest and Bill wrenched at it in vain.

Does some great current of electricity come into being with that mental

fixity of purpose and lend a determined combatant a strength altogether

beyond his own?

It seemed so to Jim. He seemed full of some living force as he dodged

round the table and chairs and over the bed and Bill came floundering

after him, cursing and sending his blows wide of the mark. At last Jim

found himself close to the door and with a monkey’s quickness shot back

the bolt and fell through the opening door. Bill grabbed him by the

neck, but Jim wriggled so furiously that both men fell in a heap on the

top stair and then rolled to the bottom. As they bumped onto the last

step, Bill’s hands sank from the other’s neck and while Jim scrambled

to his feet he lay inert and crumpled on the lowest stair.

Jim, breathless, his thin clothing torn and one eye closed, but still

gripping the box to his body, ran out into the street and to the

nearest lamp-post. There under the wavering light he read the address

on the casket-lid:

MISS TORRINGTON

Hailstone Hall

Sevenoaks, Kent.

All the time Bill had been chasing him round the attic a resolution had

been forming in his mind. If he escaped with his life he would take the

box and its little inmates back to the young “lidy.”

For years past in his low degraded existence this man’s soul had

vaguely yearned after goodness, as a plant in a dark cellar strains

with its colourless leaves towards its native light, but there was

little opportunity in his life overshadowed by Bill for anything but

crime. He hated Bill but he couldn’t get away from him. He had not

the strength of mind to say good-bye to the daring pal who kept the

attic supplied with bread and beer and knew exactly how to utilise in

his petty thievings the sharp agility of Jim. But now to-night was

the end of it all. Bill was down and out and the way lay clear to a

good action, and standing there in the biting cold with his bleeding

eye and bruised body, he thrilled through and through with joy. He had

done something already. He had foiled his companion’s brutal intention,

he had saved the animals, and now if he could restore the “lidy’s”

property to her safe and sound he felt he would be content no matter

what happened to himself. Possibly the thought of a reward struggled

for life at the back of his mind, but it was not the prompting motive,

and there was a risk of being turned over to the law and to prison on

returning the property, which far out-balanced the possible reward. To

have kept on the right side of his partner and destroyed the stolen

goods, as a business proposition, was far better, but the thought of

the lady’s pleasure and the joy of the little creatures that had looked

out so confidingly at him, attracted him just as the primrose blossoms

pleased his eyes when they bloomed in the Spring on his window ledge.

Sevenoaks! Not so far away--a matter of twenty-four mile. He had

tramped it before in the hop-picking season; he could tramp it again.

It was a freezing night, but the moon was getting up, and if he had

luck he would be there in the morning. He raised the lid of the casket

and looked in to see if his treasures were still safe. Yes, there they

lay close side by side, like tiny snowballs tucked down in the hay

which had protected them through all the scuffling with Bill and the

roll down the stairs.

Jim carefully snapped to the lid and put the box under his arm for

shelter against the searching wind. Then aching and shaky in body but

dauntless in mind he set out for his tramp to Sevenoaks. When the city

and its pitiless streets were left behind him and he had once reached

the open country road he felt happier. Here there were no police to

pass with a quaking heart as they sternly eyed his blood-stained face

and torn coat. He stepped out more strongly as the night wind of the

countryside blew in his face. It was cold but not so damp and cruel

as London’s breath. He looked over the hedge-tops across the wide

meadows with the shadowy form of sleeping cattle; he looked at the

trees arching over him and the tracery of their shadows on his path,

at the sky with the moon riding high in it through bands of scurrying

clouds, and he felt he loved it all. Wonderful indeed, as the Latin

poet sang, is the joy of the mind conscious of its own right doing, and

wonderful also is the dominion of man’s mind over his body. Jim, the

poor, penniless tramp, hungry and empty and aching, footsore, weary

and cold, marched on full of the greatest joy of his life because his

mind told him he was doing right. Many doubts and fears beset him and

much anxious questioning as to his reception and his fate but nothing

could quell that springing sense of joy in his heart as mile after mile

fell behind him. When the first red light of morning lit up the sky, it

shewed a forlorn and limping figure with a drawn and haggard face, but

with a proud, glad light in its one uninjured eye.

The great gates of Hailstone Hall looked imposing enough, shut tight in

frosty splendour of twisted ironwork, but they were not locked and Jim

pushed them open with an unfaltering hand. The drive winding between

the velvet green of tall evergreen trees and with gleaming bands of

sparkling frost on each side, lay before him silent and solitary save

for the birds hopping across it, and Jim walked straight up the middle

of it and found himself with a beating heart on the steps before the

big front door. No slinking round by the back door for him with that

proud consciousness of right in his breast. He wanted no delays and

parleys with impeding and inquisitive servants. He felt weak and his

strength failing; with the last bit of it he wanted to put the box

himself straight into the lady’s hand, and then what became of him did

not seem to matter at all.

The door opened in response to his modest ring and a young footman

looked out at him with blank astonishment.

“Please can I see Miss Torrington,” said Jim. “I’ve something for her

which she wants very particular.”

He had thought this sentence out with care, and it certainly showed

ingenuity in its suggestion of the lady’s desire to see him.

The door was not slammed in his face as he feared it might be. The

young footman held it, still staring at him in silence. As he said

afterwards in the servants’ hall, “I was that surprised at his cheek

coming to the front door in his condition I couldn’t say nothing.”

At that moment the butler chanced to cross the hall and seeing the open

door and the intruder on the steps, approached. A tall, portly man the

butler, who would have made about four of Jim. As he came up the frail

one clutched still harder the box against his bony ribs. “Good Lord, if

she should drop upon me, I’m done,” was the thought that dashed through

his brain. Nothing of the kind happened, however.

“My good man,” said the butler benevolently, “what is it you want?”

Jim repeated his fine phrase, but stammering a little as his weakness

gained on him.

“Very good,” replied the butler blandly, “Give me what you have and I

will give it to Miss Torrington.”

Jim’s heart thumped, and the hall seemed moving round him, but he stuck

to his purpose.

“Twenty-four miles,” he stammered with blue lips. “Give it ’er myself.”

The butler looked him over. He was a man of some brains, or perhaps

he would not have been butler to Miss Torrington on a comfortable

salary. He met the clear determined gaze of Jim’s one unclosed eye and

read perhaps something in it that made him sign to Jim to enter and

the footman to close the door. Then he said: “If you wait here I will

enquire if Miss Torrington wishes to see you.”

Jim stood still as a post just inside the door and erect, though

everything was getting uncertain round him, and the footman lounged

watching him.

Though a thief by profession and accustomed to be so styled and

considered, a feeling of amusement stirred in Jim that the man should

mount guard over him here.

“As if I’d steal a thing off ’er,” passed through him, and somehow this

new feeling of pride and self-respect he had been indulging in was so

delightful he thought he would never steal another thing as long as he

lived.

Jim did not know how long he waited, but it seemed a world of time,

and then a swift, light step came down the stairs and the young

lady herself came across the hall towards him. There she was, slim,

dark-clothed form and golden hair and slender hand.

“Oh, you’ve found my box!” she exclaimed in a sweet, soft voice. “Oh,

good man! Are they alive and all right?”

Jim stood speechless; the last of his powers seemed deserting him. His

voice died in his throat. With both trembling hands he pushed out the

precious casket into her eager grasp.

Then all went dark and he fell in a crumpled heap on the whiteness of

the marble flooring.

* * * * *

Bill is now in quod doing seven years for a burglary with violence,

but Jim is third gardener at Hailstone Hall, has a sunny room all to

himself, and a whole row of primroses on his window sill.

THE VENGEANCE OF PASHT

In the torrid heat of the Egyptian afternoon the desert lay

outstretched, a silent, shimmering golden sea. Little wavelets of sand

rose from its surface at intervals, curled over and blew away as the

scorching desert wind passed by. Otherwise nothing moved nor stirred

till the form of a camel outlined itself against the blue sky, walking

easily and swiftly and bearing on its back the slight white clothed

figure of a girl. She was young and extremely fair, the mass of curls

pressed up against the shady hat-brim was gold as the sunshine, the

eyes were bright sparkling blue like the sky above, the skin all

softness and bloom. She was humming to herself as she rode--she felt so

happy, so delightfully alone and free. She had slipped away from the

noisy clamoring crowd of tourists with whom she travelled on her little

Cook’s ticket which had cost her £25 and brought her to this ancient

land of old and sacred gods.

She had escaped from the hateful attentions of one of the men of the

party and now with a map and a guide book she had started out on the

great adventure of finding for herself the obscure and lonely little

temple of the Goddess Pasht.

From her childhood she had studied Egyptian history and she knew all

about the great Goddess; divine protector of all the feline tribe. Her

father had been an Egyptologist of some note and books and pictures of

Egypt had been her playthings from her earliest years but what were

books and pictures to the delights of being here at last and seeing for

herself the rich and glorious temples that have been the wonders of the

world for centuries?

She rode on leisurely, accommodating her supple body to the long

swinging stride of the camel and the sun slanted slowly to the Western

sky behind her. She was thinking how delightful life would be if there

were more of this loneliness in it; that horde of chattering companions

she was with usually day and night, how she hated it and that one man

who pursued her so relentlessly. That wretched man, how she hated him.

He was positively spoiling the whole of her tour. Wherever she went

she always found that he was there. She never seemed able to escape

him. If their little boat had to cross the Nile to reach Thebes, he

always managed to secure the seat next to hers. If the party were

making an excursion on donkeys, he always rode his up beside hers and

once, through pushing up close beside her on a steep bank, he had

forced her donkey so near the edge that it had almost rolled over

it. It had been so from the very first, this constant pursuit of her

and she could honestly feel she had given him no encouragement. His

personal appearance on the first day she saw him among the crowd of

jolly-faced tourists had repelled her. The long lanky dark hair which

was always falling over his pallid forehead, the sinister dark eyes,

the peculiarly evil mouth and above all the large lean sinewy hands had

filled her with a sense of horror and repulsion.

Even before she had heard what he was, a medical student, and been

shocked by his callous conversation, his horrid talk of his cruel

experiments on cats. Cats! animals that she particularly loved for

their soft, sinuous movements, their beautiful eyes and their deep

silent affections.

She shuddered as she thought of him and glanced involuntarily behind

her. But here out in the desert there seemed no menace. Only limpid

golden light on golden sand met her eye, infinite silence and peace was

all around.

She consulted the map; she should be nearing her destination now and

after a few more minutes she descried ahead of her the rising mound of

sand that marked the site of the half buried temple of Pasht. Rather

plain in its architecture and not imposing in size, it is often passed

over by the tourist and the sight-seer as unworthy of particular

notice, and the long camel ride one has to take to find. But now with

its smooth straight walls glowing gold in the magic lights and its dark

portal suggesting mysteries within, its lonely situation out here away

from any other tomb or temple away from every sign of life, half buried

beneath the drifting tide of sand it seemed to the girl most appealing,

far more interesting visited thus in its grandeur of desolation than

the larger ones she had seen thronged with loquacious dragomen and

gaping visitors.

She pulled up the camel and looked around. Everywhere about her amber

glory of soundless space.

“Khush” she said gently to the camel and the great docile beast went

down on his knees and let her dismount.

She had to descend three steps and then through the great granite

doorway she entered the temple.

There were three small horizontal windows, rectangular slits, at the

top of the walls near the stone roof on which the sand had piled and

the whole of the interior was full of a soft grey light. In the very

centre of the small square chamber was the great statue of the Goddess

about three times the girl’s own size. A seated majestic figure in grey

stone, the body that of a woman, bare breasted and with hands resting

on its knees, the head and face that of an enormous cat with calm fixed

eyes looking out towards the desert beyond the open door. So had it sat

gazing in unmoved calm while the centuries rolled by and generations of

men turned into dust which the desert wind swept by the temple door.

Pasht sat there silent and alone in her neglected temple. Her

worshippers had passed away, the flowers and lights and wreaths of

former days were hers no more, the girls who had danced in her honour

and flung chains of roses round her feet, where were they now with

their dusky slender limbs and dark laughing eyes? Perished and gone but

she in her carven stone sat there still, serene and secure.

The girl on first entering could see nothing but after a few minutes

when her eyes, accustomed to the soft gloom, took indistinctly the huge

form of the great woman-cat towering over her, a sense of awe enfolded

her and she dropped into a sitting position near its feet, and gazed up

reverently into the curious feline countenance, carved so long ago by

some skilled and loving hand.

“Goddess, I love you,” she said in a whispering tone after a minute’s

silent musing, “just as much as any of your old, old long ago

worshippers did, and I love all cats all your incarnations. They are

the dearest darlings in the world and so misunderstood. Just because

they have not the exuberant spirits of the dog, man thinks they

can’t feel. But deep down in their dark reserved passionate natures,

they feel intensely and they love. Oh, how they can love when one

understands them! I am glad they were held sacred and worshipped in

Egypt! Perhaps I was one of your temple girls, Goddess, in those old,

far off times!”

She sat still on the sand, her hands loosely clasped round her knees.

She felt so happy to have discovered the temple--and the statue that

her father had told her of and all by herself, and happy to be able to

sit still and think for which there was generally so little time in

this tour with the band of people always being hurried along from one

place to another.

This was an interval of calm and rest and she was thoroughly enjoying

it. She felt no fear, no sense of loneliness, under the kind grave

eyes of the stone deity. She felt protected and with some august

companion.

Suddenly in the soft and profound stillness a sound struck upon her

and thinking the camel had become restless, she rose and turned to the

door. Then drew back with a half uttered exclamation and stood close

against the colossal knees of the goddess with horror stamped on her

face. In the doorway stood the slim erect figure of a young man in a

light grey suit. Not apparently a very horrifying sight but a chill

hatred ran all along the girl’s veins as she looked at him and her hand

grew cold as the stone on which it rested.

He advanced smiling. “This is a treat darling to find you here all

alone,” he said gaily coming up to her. “What’s this old thing here?

Why I do believe its a beastly cat,” and he stared up impudently into

the stately countenance above them.

“Oh, hush! please, it’s a statue of the Goddess Pasht.”

The young man looked back at her laughing, “Pasht, well who’s she and

why’s she got a cat’s head?”

“She was the patron Goddess of cats,” said the girl.

“Oh, was she? Well, she won’t like me then, I’ve cut up lots of her

protégés, starved them and drowned them and doubled them up with

tetanus.”

“Please don’t tell me about it. I don’t want to hear.” The girl’s lips

were white; all her happy smiles and colour had fled.

“Oh they were only ordinary wretched little street cats anyway,”

rejoined the man lightly.

“How did you come here?” asked the girl. Her eyes were fixed on the

stone face above them. Was it only her fancy, or that the light was

failing? It seemed to her the countenance had darkened as if with wrath

and the calm gaze grown fierce and grim.

“On a camel; same as you did. Oh, you didn’t think I was going over to

Thebes did you with the rest of the flock, if you weren’t there? Not

much. I just waited about in the Hotel and after you’d gone I found

out from the porter whom you’d hired the camel from, then I went to

_him_ and found out where you had headed for. Then I followed you

but I had to be precious careful you didn’t turn round and see me. One

can see for such miles in the desert.”

“Why did you come?” the girl’s voice was strained and low. Oh, how she

hated this man who had made her life a burden ever since the beginning

of the tour.

The man laughed.

“What a question! As if you don’t know, you little humbug! Why to make

love to you of course, not to see this old Smash Pash or whatever you

said her name was.”

“Well you know I don’t want to listen to you and its getting late now.

Let us ride back.” She was still standing by the knees of the statue.

He was between her and the door, she could not move towards it without

approaching him.

She glanced round; the greyness of the temple was of a darker tint;

outside the glowing patch of light showed the approach of sunset.

“Not at all. I have no intention of going back yet. You may as well sit

down and be sensible. I’ve come out to ask you again will you marry me?”

“No, I have told you before I will not.”

“Why?”

“Because I don’t love you. I could never love anybody who cut up

animals alive.”

“We don’t call it that now, you are so old fashioned, we call it

Scientific Research.”

“It’s the same thing whatever you call it.”

“Lots of women admire it.”

“Well marry one of them.”

“I don’t want to, I want to marry you.”

“You can never do that.”

“We shall see. To-morrow morning you will be begging and praying me to

marry you.”

The girl went deadly cold all over and the sweat broke out on her

forehead. He had come a little nearer. Through the dark she could see

the evil face, the horribly eager expression.

“What do you mean?” she stammered, her throat was dry, her limbs

trembled. Horror and hatred and a nameless fear possessed her. The

temple seemed growing smaller, its walls contracting, pushing him upon

her.

“I should think you’d know. We’re going to make a night of it here and

if you’re alive in the morning--well, we’ll see what you say then.”

There was a great dead silence. Now that she realized the extremity of

her danger her courage seemed to rise to meet it. She thought rapidly:

Was there any escape, any help anywhere? Was anyone likely to come to

her rescue? Would she be missed, followed?

“You arranged it all very well,” the man’s voice went on in mocking

tones as if in answer to her thoughts. “You told no one where you were

going. Only the camel man has the least idea where you are and I’ve

tipped him well. He won’t tell anyone _in time_.”

He was very near her now and suddenly he threw both arms round her

and drawing her up to him kissed her violently on the mouth. At the

touch of his lips a perfect fury of revolt rose in her and she struck

out wildly at him with her clenched fists. With the strength that the

madness of anger gives she wrenched herself loose from him and fled

behind the statue so that the colossal form of the image was between

her and her tormentor. There she paused trembling and gasping.

The man was now by the knees of the statue. She saw his dark face and

the black brows contracted into a straight savage line as the light

from one of the slit-like windows above fell on it. He followed her

but terror lent wings to her feet and she fled away before he could

reach her circling round the image. He followed and dodged and circled

also but she was too quick and fleet in her movements for him to

circumvent. So for a few moments they played in a deadly game round

the age old Deity. But the girl felt her strength failing. The poisons

of hatred and anger, terror and loathing were pouring into her blood,

enervating her, taking away her powers. Her eyes were darkening, her

limbs giving way.

In another moment she must faint and fall.

They were on opposite sides now. Across the lap of the Goddess she

saw the crimson face, the bulging blood-shot eyes of the human beast

waiting to spring on her. The temple was going dark, all was whirling

before her.

“Save me, Pasht!”

And as her agonized scream rang through the temple, she pressed her

slender white hands against the arms of the statue.

Was it the pressure of those soft fingers disturbing the balance

already shaken by the shifting of the sand floor through a thousand

years? Or was the stone heart of the Goddess turned to flesh and blood

as man’s heart is so often turned to stone? Who shall say?

Before the murderous beast could move back from where he stood beside

her lap the huge idol reeled and fell over on its side with a sullen

thud bearing him to the ground beneath its six tons of solid granite.

The temple shook to its foundation and the whole air was filled with

a fog of blood and sand. One piercing shriek of agony rang through

it. Then there was silence except for the sound of the blood thrown

on the walls trickling down them to the ground. The concussion of the

air in that small space had thrown the already half fainting girl back

against the wall. For a moment she could see nothing, the stinging

sand filling and closing her eyes. Then as the particles settled down

once more to their age old repose her terrified gaze took in the form

of the huge image at her feet, the scarlet wall opposite her, the

semi-obliterated mass of small human form and clothes. The man’s face

was crushed deeply into the sand under the colossal shoulder of the

Goddess but something still moved, chaining her fascinated gaze--two

large sinewy hands scrabbled still convulsively pulling at the sand.

Then after a few more minutes these also grew motionless. Breathless,

terrified, half suffocated and dazed the girl still clung to the wall

hardly realising yet what had happened and if she herself were still

living and uninjured. Then as the sand settled and the air grew clear,

calmness returned to her and she knew she was safe and free.

With gentle steps she approached the huge fallen form, avoiding the

horrid blue hands that looked still able to grip and grasp and holding

her skirts away from all the contamination oozing from under the stone

and looked down into the face of the statue. The light from the doorway

slanted on to it and seemed to soften it all into smiles and the desert

wind springing up passed through the temple and out at the top slits by

the roof with a loud purring sound. The girl stooped and pressed her

warm red lips on the ancient stone brow in a kiss of gratitude, then

passed out into the sunset and mounting her camel and followed by the

other, rode away over the golden sand and night settled slowly on the

desert in a violet dusk enclosing the ancient temple where the Goddess

Pasht lay purring on her prey. Her starry eyed children were avenged.

VILLAGE PASSION

The shapely mass of her body was outlined dark against the rosy gold of

the evening sky, as she sat on the top of the red brick orchard wall,

looking up and down the country road on which it bordered.

She was named Apricot Marten and the Christian name given her by a

fanciful mother could not have been more suitably bestowed. She was

just like a golden glowing apricot in its very best condition when

it hangs basking in the summer sun. She had a soft, clear skin with

a warm flush in the velvet cheek, great lustrous laughing eyes of a

warm golden brown, and a wealth of bright waving hair in which the

sunrays seemed to have got permanently entangled. Her mouth was bright

crimson and turned up at its smiling corners, and her body was supple

and gracious in its full rounded contours. Altogether she was an

enchanting piece of girlhood just merging into womanhood, and many were

the sleepless nights passed by the young men of Fullingham village in

thinking about her.

She was not entirely free from the reputation of a flirt, but deep in

her heart her choice was made, and from it she never swerved however

mischievously she might behave.

It was John Macpherson the Highlander, the lithe, agile, black-haired,

hasty-tempered Scot who worked on the farm which adjoined her father’s

cottage and orchard. But she gave this away to no one, and many thought

she had her eye on Tony Morrison, whose father owned the little

village shop and general store, and, in absence of all competition,

did a good business. Tony served in the store, and while rather short

and insignificant in physique, made up for this by the extreme care

he bestowed upon his dress and personal appearance. He wore neat and

becoming grey suits and townish-looking hats, and always produced a

pleasing impression of great cleanliness and smartness. Tony’s heart

had been given long ago to Bessie Smith in the next village, a little

quiet mouse of a girl with violet eyes. Apricot was much too flamboyant

a personage to please his quiet taste, but this secret devotion he also

imparted to no one, and as Apricot was considered the belle of his

village, it flattered his masculine vanity to be supposed one of her

accepted admirers. By a quiet and modest smile he generally managed

to encourage the rumours about himself and Apricot while ostensibly

denying them. All of which made the heart of John Macpherson flare up

with consuming anger against him.

Thus stood matters in Fullingham village on that lovely summer evening

when Apricot sat humming to herself on the top of the orchard wall.

The scene was truly idyllic in its beauty. Fullingham is one of the

prettiest villages in the quietest and most remote part of Devonshire,

and this evening the glory of pink light in the sky was so great it

turned even the white road a rosy colour, and all the hedges were full

of wild roses and the still warm air heavy with balmy scents.

Apricot thought it beautiful, and looked with longing eyes up and down

the road. She felt she wanted to kiss somebody, to throw her arms

round somebody’s neck, and who so delightful for this as the handsome

Highlander, if he would only come! They had an appointment at this

place and hour. She was there, but where was he? There was no one to

be seen in the road except a small shock-haired boy gnawing an apple.

Then, swinging lightly along, came a figure down the road.

Apricot put her hand to shade her eyes to see, but it was not John. She

thought at first it was Tony, that slight, neat form in grey with the

smart hat; but no, it was not he. It was a stranger.

Up went Apricot’s hand to her hair to smoothe back a tress. What would

he think of her? She wondered. Would he look up as he passed?

The stranger did more than that. When he came up to the orchard he

stopped and looked up.

“What are you doing up there?” he asked. His voice was gentle and

courteous, and the face he turned up towards her very pleasant to look

at.

Apricot did not resent his addressing her.

“What’s that to you?” she called back saucily, showing her small white

teeth in a gay smile; and pulling a great red rose that grew on the

wall close to her hand, she threw it down full in his face.

The stranger caught the rose and kissed it, and then stuck it in his

coat.

“Come down and have a little walk with me. You look lonely up there.”

“Not so lonely as you look in the road, young man.”

“Oh, I’m lonely enough! That’s why I want your company.”

“Will you catch me?” she said laughing and leaning over.

“Certainly I will,” he answered, holding out his arms. “Come along.”

She swung her shapely legs and neat feet over the side of the wall

next him, and then let herself slip down it. He caught her fine,

well-developed figure in his arms, and holding her up tight and close

gave her a kiss on her bright red lips.

She slapped his face, but quite gently, and struggled away from him,

shaking her blue cotton gown straight that had been rather rumpled by

her descend.

“Now we’ll go for a walk,” said the stranger. “Which way?”

“Oh, we’ll go towards Hawley village. That’s very pretty,” she

answered. “And if you want the train you can get it there. You’re a

town gentleman, aren’t you?” she added shyly.

Fullingham village is off the railway line and it was not an uncommon

thing for strangers to pass through the village from Riverside where

there was a station to Hawley on the other side where they could

again take the train, having walked through six miles of the prettiest

Devonshire scenery.

“Oh, that’ll do very well. I didn’t know you had a train so near. Yes,

I’m finishing my holiday and going back to town to-night.”

They were walking slowly up the road now in the gorgeous sunset light.

A moon large and pale as a thin white paper disc rose in the East

before them.

Apricot had her own ideas in view in going in the Hawley direction and

shipping the stranger off her hands there. She was thoroughly enjoying

the new sensation of walking and talking with a London gentleman, but

she was not _quite_ sure how John Macpherson would view her little

promenade, and she was not _too_ anxious to be met or seen by him.

It was quite true he had not kept their tryst, and in her own mind that

quite excused her for going off with someone else. But then, he and she

did not always agree about these things, and altogether it was best to

take the handsome stranger out of her own village and over to Hawley in

which direction the Fullingham rustics did not often walk.

Laughing and jesting and walking quite near together the two young

figures passed up the sunlit road. Some little way ahead of them there

was a fork, one road winding up an incline and passing through a larch

plantation on the hill before it dipped down to Hawley station, the

other a far prettier road following the valley and passing through a

lovely wood as it worked round to Riverside.

Apricot and the stranger walked along with springing steps, taking the

Hawley road. It was surely an evening to feel, if ever, the madness

of Summer in one’s veins. He thought he had never seen such a lovely

country girl and she, without swerving in the least from her allegiance

to the fiery Macpherson, thought it was the greatest fun in the world

to be admired by a town gentleman, a real London man, with London

clothes and all.

“There’ll be none of this when I’m married to John,” she was reflecting

inwardly. “Best have what fun I can now.”

Heated a little by their walk up hill in the warm Devonshire air, they

entered the feathery larch plantation with a feeling of relief. It was

full of light, shade and music; thrushes and blackbirds, robins and

chaffinches not yet exhausted by their nesting cares were trilling on

every side of them.

“Let’s sit down here,” he suggested as they came to a mossy bank where

a tiny brooklet tinkled by, and Apricot, flushed and lovely, sat

down willingly and let the stranger’s arm come round her waist. Her

conscience told her it was not quite right, but oh! that wood with its

rosy mystery of softened summer light and the wandering perfumes of

roses and hot resin and the magic of the birds’ voices, all talking of

love, what girl would not be swayed by it and made a little giddy by

the sweet intoxication of it all?

Meantime, Macpherson had gone down to the store, his work being over

at the farm for that day, to buy himself a new tie wherewith to charm

Apricot at the trysting. He was much put out to find there only one

tie and that green, a colour he thought didn’t suit him. Everyone knows

the kind of village shop it was where everything is sold, but things

are so seldom what one wants. Gloves are there, but only size ten.

Boots are there, but only size four. Pencils are sold out, but you can

have a slate pencil. Bootlaces have not come in, but you can have a

ball of string. Macpherson bought his tie, and as the gawky girl who

assisted Morrison, was wrapping it up in a bit of paper too small for

it, he asked:

“Where’s Tony?”

“Gorn sweethearting, I ’spects,” answered the girl with a grin,

“leastways, he went out all dressed up in his new soot and hat.”

Macpherson grunted, paid and left, went home, donned the tie, and then,

a little late, flustered and rather put out, hurried to the appointed

orchard wall. There was no Apricot--no one to be seen at all up or

down the wide country road except a small boy devouring the core of an

apple. Macpherson waited with glowering eyes. It was all very well for

him to be a bit late. He had a man’s work to do, but girls should be

punctual.

Several minutes went by, each an hour to the waiting man. Then he

strode across to the boy on the other side.

“You seen Miss Apricot about here?” he asked.

The boy looked up stolidly. “I seed her a while ago.”

“Where?”

“On yon wall,” answered the boy, nodding in that direction.

“Well, where did she go?”

“Nowhere, till a gent comed along; then there wur a lot of huggin’ and

kissin’ an’ she went off with he.”

Macpherson’s face was a study as he listened to this astounding

statement. He stood rooted to the spot, and from his six feet glowered

down on the malicious little imp in the road as if he could kill

him. The boy knew perfectly well that Macpherson was “sweet” on Miss

Apricot, and he thoroughly enjoyed imparting this information. He would

have been afraid to make up such a story, but since he had witnessed it

all and it was perfectly true and this great giant had asked him, he

was going to have the fun of telling him, on the same principle that he

egged on Farmer Smith’s dog to fight another dog and shook the bag when

he was carrying ferrets to make them attack each other.

He was a little alarmed when Macpherson’s great paw came down heavily

on his shoulder.

“You little rat! What sort of a man was it? Tell me that!”

“I dunno,” said the boy sullenly, trying to shake himself free, “a kind

of a smart chap in a grey soot and hat.”

“A grey suit and hat!” The light blazed in Macpherson’s dark eyes. He

shook the boy by the shoulder.

“Was it Tony Morrison at the store?”

“I dunno,” wailed the boy frightened now by the awful look of rage in

the man’s face and only anxious to get away. “I never go to the store,

muvver always goes.”

Another frightful shake that made his teeth rattle.

“Was it?”

“I dunno. I never saw ’is face, only ’is back as he was a-kissin’ of

her. It mout be the store man, or it moutn’t.”

“Little devil!” growled Macpherson, and with a final shake sent the boy

down on his hands and knees in the dust. Then he strode off up the road

at a tremendous pace, his blood on fire, his mind entirely made up.

It was Tony, of course. He knew that absolutely. He was convinced of

it. The grey suit and hat, the smart appearance--who else in Fullingham

had that? It was Tony’s own particular property and asset. Besides,

had he not just heard at the store that Tony was gone sweethearting?

Of course it was all quite clear. Huggin’ and kissin’ his Apricot!

The thought of her darling velvet cheek that he himself so reverently

touched, her lovely smiling scarlet mouth, came to him and seemed to

add boiling oil to the raging flame within him. He would do for him!

He would kill him! He would break his back! The cur! The reptile! Who

all along had been carrying on with his girl and who was so smug and

so satisfied--always at the store so neat and clean, and always so

civil-spoken and so quiet!

He had always rather liked Tony. There had been a great friendship

between the men only lately a little spoiled by the slumbering

suspicion in John’s mind that Tony might be “after his girl,” but Tony

had always been good to him personally and he always spoke of Apricot

to John as Miss Marten, which came back bitterly to John now. “I’ll

‘Miss Marten’ him when I catch him,” he said between his teeth.

A hideous thing is jealousy, blinding its victim, deafening him alike

to the voice of conscience and the voice of reason hounding him on to

the scaffold and the grave.

John Macpherson, good man, great soul, walked up the road that evening

with red murder in his heart. When he came to the cross-roads he

stopped and hesitated. Which way had they gone?

He decided they must have taken the road to Riverside. It lay before

him so attractively beautiful all bathed in golden sheen; the road to

Hawley was up hill and in shadow.

Before one reaches Riverside comes the wood, and as the road passes

into it there is a low stile. On this stile with his back to the road

and all unconscious of the desperate figure of vengeance striding

along it, sat a figure in grey. It was Tony, blissfully happy; full of

light-hearted innocent enjoyment swinging his legs to the tune he was

whistling. He was looking back to Riverside and was counting the kisses

shy little Bessie had given him that day, and thinking how sweet she

had looked when she promised to marry him. Now he was on his way home

to Fullingham and just pausing to rest on the stile and enjoy the sweet

calm and peace of this perfect evening which suited so well his happy

mood.

Suddenly as John came along the road he caught sight of the grey back

rising above the stile and every drop of blood in John’s body turned

to raging flame. His ears caught the gay whistle. Apricot was nowhere

to be seen, but that was natural. She would be slinking home through

the woods by way of Riverside and back to her father’s cottage, where

she would turn up with the innocent look of the cat who has stolen the

cream. Well, nothing could be better. Apricot out of the way he could

deal all the more swiftly and better with his rival.

Like a bull at a fence he rushed at the stile, and Tony was knocked off

and down on the ground, pinned under John’s hands at his throat before

he knew who had approached.

“You weasel! You little devil! I’ll kill you!” John stormed, and

lifting the prostrate man by the neck dashed him down again with all

his force. There was a wide stone flag just under the stile to help

matters in the muddy wintertime, and on this flag Tony’s head came down

with a good bang.

“What’s up?” he gasped, as well as he could with John’s suffocating

grip on his neck. “What’s this for, Mac?”

“Huggin’ and kissin’!” ground out John between his teeth. “I’ll teach

you to come after my girl!”

“I haven’t! I haven’t!” cried Tony. “Let up, Mac, let up! You’re mad.”

“If I’m mad you’re dead. I’m going to kill you, you little beast!”

Bang! “Where were you this afternoon?” Bang! “Answer me that.” Bang!

Tony’s lips were going white. His thoughts were scattered by the blows

on his head. He managed to gasp out: “Riverside! I’ve been to Bessie--I

haven’t seen your girl.”

“You’re a good liar,” scoffed John. “You were seen huggin’ my girl and

I’ll see you never do again. Now go on with more of your lies.” Bang!

Bang!

But Tony’s lying or speaking at all had come to an end. His face went

grey; his jaw dropped; his body fell limp in the fierce hands which

held him.

John let him slide down and struggled to his feet. Instantly his rage

fell from him. He was face to face with the awful fact--he had killed a

man.

Sane now, calm, his anger utterly spent and gone from him, John stood

panting there, looking about him. He was quite alone in the golden

evening; everything was exquisitely calm about him, a thrush near by

was pouring out his song, and the figure, a few moments before sitting

whistling on the stile, was now lying limp and motionless at his feet.

Those few moments of blind, dark rage had turned one man into a corpse,

the other into a murderer.

Murder! It was hanging for that.

A wild longing to undo what he had done possessed him. He went down on

his knees.

“Tony!” he called. “What’s the matter with you? Tony, wake up!” But

the man lay still and grey before him. He undid his coat and felt his

heart; there was no movement.

He passed his trembling arm under his head and raised him and put his

own face down close to see if any breath touched his cheek; but there

was none. Limp, nerveless, the body lay across the flagstone, seeming

to ask him, “What will you do with me now?” And John, wrapped in that

awful horror, that awful responsibility of his deed, rose from his

knees and stood shuddering by the stile.

Then terror came and seized him. He must conceal his act. He must hide

the body. It must never be known he had murdered Tony. He might never

be discovered. If Tony’s body were found later, in the wood, what would

tie this deed to him, Macpherson? Tony might have been murdered by a

tramp in the wood.

Shivering as if with mortal cold, John stooped over the body and

dragged it by the shoulders out of the path, and into the little wood.

Parting the flowering bushes by the side of the track, he pushed into

the thick undergrowth and there left the motionless form under some

wild azaleas.

Then with, the cold, clammy fingers of his crime clinging to him,

unnerved and shaken, with his heart in a black terror, he crept out, a

criminal, from the shade of the trees and took the sunfilled road again.

He looked all round the stile, but there was no trace of the crime

committed there. He brushed the white dust of the path from his own

clothes. Then he stood and listened.

Not a sound to mar the lovely serenity of the golden air. Even the

thrush had finished his beautiful song and all was silence.

* * * * *

John Macpherson, the same in outward appearance, but within a

miserable, broken and craven man, entered the village pot-house as the

sunset faded and the moon grew brighter, and called for a glass of beer.

When he got it he took it to one of the side benches, where he sat down

away from the rest of the company and swallowed it in silence.

What an awful sense of guilt clung round him; but the man deserved it,

he kept telling himself. Why did he come sneaking round after another

man’s girl? If it ever came out that he had killed him, everyone would

allow that he had been sorely tried. As he sat there, black and moody,

with eyes fixed on the sawdust-covered floor, scraps of conversation

floated over to him from the bar where the men had gathered. He heard

nothing at first; then a sentence pierced his preoccupied brain.

“Smart young fellow, wasn’t he? Did you see him, Bill?”

And then Bill’s answer struck dully on his ears:

“I just seed him go by. I was at the window there, an’ I looks up.

‘Why, there’s Tony, ses I’ bein’ as ’ow he was all togged up in grey.

And I calls out, ‘Tony!’ ’cos I wanted them bootlaces he promised me.

And the feller turns round and I couldn’t help larfin’, for it wasn’t

Tony at all, but this other chap.”

There was a general laugh at Bill’s expense.

“I could have told you Tony was off for the day. I met him going to

Riverside just after dinner-time.”

“An’ what was this young feller doin’ down here, this London chap, I

mean?” came another question.

“Oh, just walking through Fullingham, as they do, you know, to see the

country. He went up by Marten’s orchard last thing I see of him, going

to Hawley, for sure.”

The talk drifted on then; but John Macpherson, seated near the open

door whence the delicious balmy air, heavy with the scent of new-mown

hay, came in and mixed with the beer and baccy of the bar, grew cold

with horror as he sat and heard. An icy conviction gripped him to his

inner being strangling him.

_He had killed the wrong man!_

He knew it. He felt sure of it. Tony’s gasping words came back to him

backed up now so unexpectedly by this man at the bar. Tony had been

to Riverside, he had “gorn sweethearting” but to his own legitimate

property, his own girl. It was the other man in grey who--oh, the

horror of it! He’d go mad if he sat there another minute. He got

onto his feet and was just about to cross the threshold when another

phrase from the little knot of men arrested him. They had got onto a

prize-fight now. They were discussing it, as one of the men had seen

it in a neighboring town.

“And there he lay, and nothin’ they could do seemed to bring him round.

I thought he was dead, sure. Then another bloke comes along, and

whether he tips brandy down ’is throat or what he does, I don’t know;

but up springs my fine fellow as gay as you please, and they sets to

again.”

A sudden ray of hope seemed to split the darkness in John’s mind.

Suppose--suppose Tony was not quite dead? Oh! the wonderful joy of the

thought. Suppose, like that other man, he could come round! Oh, if such

a thing might happen now and let him out of this cold cell of terror

he seemed shut up in, he swore within himself he would never lift hand

against man, woman or child again!

He had his whiskey-flask in his pocket. Full of a new determination he

turned and walked to the bar.

“Six-penn’orth?” asked the barman, as John handed him the flask.

“Fill it right up, man,” said John briefly. And when this was done and

paid for, he turned and went out without a word.

The barman shook his head. “Macpherson looks bad to-night,” he remarked.

“Bin drinkin’ perhaps; or p’raps that girl’s leading him a dog’s life.

She’s a termagant.”

Outside John sped up the road, new hope, dim, faint uncertain, but

still hope glimmering in his heart. The full moon was up in a rich

purple sky, and the night was soft and full of beauty. But John could

see nothing. He felt the hangman’s cord about his neck, and for the

wrong man--the wrong man!

All seemed quite still, calm as he had left it when he reached the

wood. The silvery light filtered gently through the leaves and fell on

his little path, showing him the way.

He stepped aside to the clump of azaleas and pushed them back. There

lay the still body, just as he had left it. It had not stirred.

With a thumping heart and a prayer on his lips John knelt beside it,

and raising the head pushed the neck of the open flask between the

pallid lips.

There was no movement, but some seemed to go down the throat, but he

could not be sure. Then he got desperate, and getting his handkerchief

just soaked it in the spirit and rubbed it violently all over the man’s

face and eyes.

“Tony man, wake up, I say!” he muttered, scrubbing his forehead with

the fiery spirit.

At last, oh, God! that was a sigh! He was breathing!

John’s hand trembled so that he nearly spilt the rest of the flask.

Tony opened his eyes.

“Why, what’s this?” he uttered faintly. “Where am I?”

“Here, drink some more,” said John feverishly, tipping the flask up and

sending a fresh stream down Tony’s throat.

He never touched spirits and it burnt him like fire.

He sat up, John supporting him, and looked round. “Is that you, Mac?”

he said. “Oh, I remember. You nearly bashed me to death under the

stile. What’s it all about, Mac?” His voice was rather weakly; his eyes

wandered over John’s anxious face and then up to the tracery of boughs

over them.

“It was all a mistake, Tony, and I am more sorry than I can say. But

you’re not hurt much, are you?”

Tony was sitting up now. His face looked very white. His hat, carefully

picked up by Macpherson and put beside him under the azaleas, was there

still. His forehead looked damp, and the whiskey-soaked locks of hair

hung loose over it. He leaned his cheek on his hand as he answered:

“I’ll have you up before the beak for this,” he said calmly. Tony was

mostly calm.

“You won’t?” exclaimed John anxiously.

“It’s six months’ hard for ’sault and battery, and it’s two years quod

for manslaughter,” remarked Tony.

John felt a cold sweat break out on him.

“But I’ve said it was a mistake,” he urged. “I thought it was you--”

Then he began to stammer. After all, Apricot was his girl and he was

not going to give her away.

“Well, why didn’t you find out before you came and knocked me about?”

asked Tony in an aggrieved voice. “Spoiled my hat, too.” And he took it

out from the azaleas and smoothed its battered brim in his hands.

“Look here, Tony,” said John desperately, “you must overlook this. Not

a word must come out. Say how I can make up to you and I’ll do it.”

“There’s that fifty pounds you’ve saved up,” remarked Tony mildly,

still stroking his hat.

John fell back flabbergasted. Fifty pounds! The savings of his whole

life! The sacred sum put by so that when it grew to a hundred he could

set up house with Apricot!

“What do you mean?” he asked with trembling lips.

“It won’t be nice doin’ hard for six months; and it’s two years if they

bring it in manslaughter.”

“But I didn’t kill you, man! They can’t call it that!”

“You meant to, though; and you nearly did me in. Oh, my head! it do

feel bad!” And Tony leant against a bush beside him and closed his eyes.

John seized his flask and made him take another gulp.

“You better take me home,” he said weakly. “I’d like to die in the old

house.”

John was desperate.

“Look here, Tony, if you don’t die and don’t say a word you shall have

the fifty, I promise you.”

Tony straightened himself a little.

“I’ll do my best, Mac,” he said feebly. “How soon can I have the money?

Soon as I’ve got it I’ll say I had a fit; then if I dies you’re safe,

anyway; and I’ll leave Bessie the fifty.”

“You’re a cool one,” growled out John. “Fifty pounds is a lot of money,

Tony.”

“Well, don’t pay it, don’t pay it, Mac. Maybe you’ll find it all right

in quod. Two years ain’t long, you know.”

Cold shivers went down John’s spine. Prison for one of the Highland

Macphersons! And Apricot alone and unprotected for two years! She’d

never wait for him; nor would old Marten ever let him have his daughter

then. He knew Tony had some knowledge of the law. His grandfather had

been a solicitor in a small way, and on this account many were the

knotty points referred to Tony by the villagers. But he hated like

anything to lose his cherished fifty, and made another effort.

“Look here,” he said, “I don’t see what’s to prevent my denying the

whole thing. It’s your word against mine.”

Tony shook his head solemnly. “I’d have the truth on my side, and the

truth’s a fierce thing to be up against.”

John considered. He felt that Tony was right. He could never stand up

and call God to witness that he had not laid a finger on Tony. He felt

he’d be struck dead or blind if he did.

“An’ a man’s dying oath is always took in evidence,” added Tony in a

mournful tone.

“How can it be a dyin’ oath if you don’t die?”

“If I _think_ it’s my dyin’ oath it’s the same thing.”

“’Spose it all comes out, anyway?”

“Can’t,” said Tony, sitting up and speaking with more vigour. “I’f I

gets your fifty I’m mum unless I feels like dyin’. If it’s that way,

I’ll say I have had a fit; and if I say it’s a fit, a fit it is.”

John gave in. “All right,” he said with a long sigh. “I’ll get you the

money to-night. Now let’s get back.”

He assisted Tony to his feet and put his battered hat on his head.

“Oh, it do ache!” groaned Tony.

“That’s all the whiskey you’ve drunk,” returned John unsympathetically.

“Maybe it is, and maybe it’s the bashing it’s had,” returned Tony. And

after that, in silence, the two men emerged from the wood onto the

moonlit road.

John walked along in black gloom, pondering alternately on his lost

fifty and on Apricot.

He wondered if she had walked as far as Hawley with the stranger; if

she had got back home by now; if there was the smallest chance of his

seeing her to-night. He thirsted for the touch of her red lips to

console him for all he had suffered in emotion that day.

Oddly enough he did not feel angry with her. It is a curious point of

ethics with the lower classes that what is done with a gentleman does

not count. There is not considered to be anything serious about it;

it’s only “a bit of a lark”; and while the thought of Tony supplanting

him had filled him with red fury against him, he had nothing at all

against the gentleman from town who had stolen a kiss from his girl in

passing through the village. In fact, far away in the recesses of his

heart there burnt a spark of pride that Apricot’s beauty could not be

resisted by anyone.

The two men reached the village with hardly a word exchanged, Tony

occasionally stopping to lean on his companion’s arm.

John left him at the store and went dolefully enough to fetch the price

of his folly. He brought over the small tin box in which he had saved

it and added to it through so many years, and put it into the other’s

hands in the back bedroom behind the shop. He could not bear to see it

counted out by the smiling Tony, but with a hoarse mutter of: “It’s all

there. Mind you keep your word, durn you!” he hurried away.

The night was exquisitely lovely, full of sweet scents, and all the

whispers of Summer in the air. He walked past Marten’s orchard and

looked longingly up to the wall where the trees hung their branches

heavy with fruit over the top.

But there was no one to be seen, and finally he walked away

disconsolately back to the farm.

All the next day he longed to see Apricot; but it was not till the

evening when all the village was dipped in soft violet shadows that he

at last met her, just as she was coming out of the store. She looked so

lovely his heart rose in a great bound, and he threw his arm around her

and pressed his lips into the side of her creamy neck.

“What you been to the store for?” he asked jealously.

“Only for a bit of ribbon; but I stopped to talk to Tony. Oh, John!

Think! He’s going to marry Bessie Smith in a month, and he’s got fifty

pounds to start housekeeping! Some folks do save wonderful, don’t they?”

“Yes, and some has things given ’em,” said John savagely. “But we’ll

be getting married, too. What would you say if I put the banns up

to-morrow?”

Apricot lifted two soft arms and put them about his neck. They were

sheltered by an old oak that grew near the store, and there was no one

to see. Her upturned face and glowing eyes looked very fair and sweet

in the dusk.

She loved her John and meant to marry him, and no one else in this

world, but walks and talks like yesterday’s with the stranger were very

great fun and she was afraid they might be few and far when she was

Mrs. Macpherson. Her scarlet mouth closed on John’s as she murmured

back:

“I think I’d say, John dear, don’t be so hasty!”

SUPPING WITH THE DEVIL

CHAPTER 1

“Here, Jenkins, take this animal!” And the body of the dog from which

one foreleg had been cut away was thrown into the arms of the new

laboratory attendant.

The dog was screaming wildly and some of its blood splashed upon

Jenkin’s white smock frock and some into his no less white face. The

great scientist Sir Charles Smith-Brown Bart. Dsc. F.R.C.S. etc., etc.,

was at work in his laboratory and his new attendant was assisting him.

It was Sunday morning and the Great Man was rather afraid he might be

made late for church by the bungling slowness of his subordinate.

“Throw him into the trough, man, don’t stand there staring and clamp

down his paws so that he can’t move, the three he’s got left anyway,”

he added with a little chuckle. Sir Charles was always cheerful and

pleasant at his work. Jenkins turned, lowered the dog into the trough

on his back and taking each leg fastened it into the iron clamp

provided on each side. The dog was screaming in agony and Jenkins’

fingers trembled as he did the clamps and turned his head away that

he might not see the beseeching terror in the animal’s eyes. It did

not seem right somehow. He had fed the little spaniel last night and

thought what a jolly little beast it was, frisking round him, and

caressing him with its soft nose and tongue. This Sunday morning’s work

did not seem right to him, but then he was a new hand, only having been

engaged last night and having had his duties described to him as “the

care of animals.”

“Now then have you got him fixed?” asked the great man, coming up

behind him, with a keen looking knife in his hand. With this he pointed

to the dog’s head.

“Bind his jaws and clamp the head, that’s right. Now my friend--” the

great man leant over the trough in which the dog lay rigid, helpless,

extended on its back, its legs clamped to the sides of the trough, wide

apart. Jenkins turned away and stared stolidly at the piece of bright

blue sky that appeared above the frosted panes of the lower part of the

window.

The dog unable to scream with its bound jaws could still moan and a

groaning moan of direct agony came to Jenkins’ ears as the great man

bent over the trough.

When he looked round he saw there was a great gash all down the chest

and stomach, laying bare the inside, and in the open cavity the

scientist was fumbling with both hands.

“There now that’ll do for the present,” he said cheerily as he withdrew

them, covered with blood, and wiped them briskly on a towel, “I shall

have to be off to church now or I shall be late.”

“And what about the dog, Sir?”

“Oh, I’ll leave him like that. I always do. Let ’em cool off a bit you

know,” again the pleasant laugh. “Then I’ll have at him again after

lunch.”

He was taking off his white smock in which he worked and revealed

himself well dressed underneath. He walked to the wash handstand with

its fine brass taps and washed his hands carefully. Then he went into

the hall outside where his frock-coat and tall hat were hanging.

Jenkins followed him eyeing him uneasily.

“Of course, Sir,” he began rather hesitatingly, “I’m new to this kind

of work and p’raps I don’t understand it, but isn’t it a bit cruel?”

The great man had slipped on his fine well made coat over his large

comfortable self and was just settling above his eyebrows his very

polished new silk hat. He looked back pleasantly at the nervous,

puckered face of his subordinate.

“My dear Jenkins you decidedly are new to it, very: but I trust you

will improve in time.” He took off his pince-nez and held them lightly

in one hand, as he was wont to do when addressing a class. “But I

don’t like these signs of squeamishness. Now I’ll just ask you a few

questions. You don’t know anything about Scientific Research do you?”

“No, Sir,” returned Jenkins humbly.

“Well, then,” pursued his employer genially, “you must remember

Scientific Research is a very noble work and that’s what I am doing

here, a very noble work,” he repeated, “read the daily papers, they are

always saying so.” Here he waved his pince-nez airily and smiled.

Jenkins was not an adept at analysing sarcasm but as he looked at the

smiling doctor and heard his pleasant tones, he had a vague idea that

the big man was “making game of him.”

“Then another thing is its all for the benefit of humanity. Now

remember that, Jenkins, because it’s a useful phrase, the benefit of

humanity. I am working for the benefit of humanity. You must get that

well in your head. All you saw this morning, all you will see here

while you are with me is all for the benefit of humanity, see?”

Jenkins feeling himself confused and baffled by the smiling eyes and

suave tones, tried to keep hold of his point.

“Still it is cruel, isn’t it, Sir?” he mumbled.

“Cruel?” repeated the Doctor with a shade of impatience. “Certainly

_not_. Supposing it were cruel what an uproar there would be!

You know what a lot of churches there are, all full of God-fearing

clergymen, good holy men. Would they allow it if it were cruel? Of

course not. They would denounce it in their sermons but they never say

a word against it. They uphold it. To-day for instance all the London

churches are full of these good men talking themselves hoarse, telling

us all what we must not do, but you won’t find one saying we must not

pursue our researches.”

“P’raps they don’t know what you are a doin’ of,” blurted out Jenkins

and then paused alarmed at what his employer would think of his

boldness, but Sir Charles only laughed gently.

“Oh, yes, they do,” he said. “We tell them often enough in our books

and our medical papers. But they see the aim, my dear Jenkins, unlike

you I am afraid. They see how noble, how important our work is. They

see how important, how immensely valuable, how necessary it is, in

fact, to humanity, to know that monkeys can have measles!” he broke off

laughing and Jenkins felt again the big man was making fun of him. Sir

Charles did not seem to mind now being late for church. He was amused

at the poor simple ignorant fellow before him and he liked the feeling

that he could confuse him with his big words and twist him round his

finger.

Jenkins stood blinking for a moment in silence. The little spaniel’s

agonised moaning came from the room behind him and filled his ears

making a curious undertone to the light banter of the man before

him. Sir Charles was a great believer in propaganda and never let go

an opportunity of sowing the good seed. He was a little afraid that

sooner or later an infuriated populace might turn against him and his

colleagues and put a stop to those practices for which now they so

meekly and conveniently paid: so seeing Jenkins still appeared somewhat

obdurate he continued more seriously.

“Just think a minute. There’s the whole country! England! You love

England, don’t you, Jenkins? Fought for it, eh?”

“Yes, Sir, I do,” replied Jenkins fervently. His whole face lighted up.

“Well, now England’s in the forefront of all humanitarian projects.

Won’t have bull fights, stopped cock fights, sends men to prison for

throwing a cat out of a window, would _England_ allow this work of

ours to go on, if it were cruel? No she would stop it. Would she tax

her people to give us little gifts of 500,000 pounds for Research if it

were cruel? Certainly not. Are you a taxpayer, Jenkins?”

“I must be, Sir. We’re all taxed.”

“Just so. Then here in the laboratory you’ll have the satisfaction

of seeing how your money is spent for you. Money, Jenkins, it takes

money, the noble work. Sixty thousand animals more or less go through

the laboratories every year in England. Expensive ones too, some of

them: it takes money, _your_ money, see?” Here the doctor gave his

victim a playful little dig in the side. “Now I really must run off.

Don’t you bother your head about these things. Just remember what I say

that England’s a splendidly humane country and couldn’t allow anything

brutal to be done and don’t forget too how awfully important it is to

know that monkeys have measles!”

Before his confused listener could make any remark the doctor had

walked down the passage, passed through the door and banged it behind

him.

Sir Charles walked down the road and across the straggling bit of

waste ground that surrounded his laboratory, with a pleased expression

on his face. One of his favorite experiments was to batter a dog to

death slowly with repeated blows, making notes during the operation,

of the time necessary to produce insensibility and the further time to

produce actual extinction. It was always an interesting experiment to

his highly scientific mind and he felt in some degree as if he had been

practicing in the same way on Jenkins’ mind. He thought with a smile it

would not take long in his laboratory to batter to death all Jenkins’

funny little ideas about cruelty.

Jenkins, left standing in the hall, remained there as if transfixed.

He felt as if the whole thing must be some horrible nightmare and that

he would wake up in a minute in his country cottage with the sound of

clucking hens outside, instead of that awful moaning from the room

behind him.

What sort of hell was this that he had dropped into?

You see Jenkins lacked a scientific education which enables a man

to see that black is really white and so on. Jenkins was only just

an average ordinary man so he must be excused if Sir Charles’ most

beautifully kept and perfectly appointed laboratory with all the latest

scientific appliances for giving monkeys measles and kindred noble

work, appeared to him a hell.

How had he got into it?

Seeing by chance that scrap of paper and the advertisement that a man

was wanted to take charge of animals, he had applied for the place,

because he was fond of animals, and got it.

He had arrived last night and been shown his quarters. He had also

been shown a room with four healthy happy dogs in it in kennels round

the walls. He had been told to feed them and keep them clean which work

he had joyfully accepted. The dogs had jumped round him in delight

recognizing a friend and he had spent most of his evening with them,

cleaning out the kennels which seemed to be old ones that had been

used for many occupants before these four had been put into them. His

work done he had passed through a passage with closed doors on all

sides of him and up the long flight of stairs at the end of it, to his

own two rooms, on an upper floor. These seemed cosy enough and he had

slept well. In the early morning he had been roused by the unearthly

screaming of a dog and fearing some accident had happened to one of his

charges, he bolted down to the room where he had left them overnight.

Finding only three scared looking animals there, he had followed the

terrible scream down the passage, opened the door that faced him

and come straight in on the scene of one of the doctor’s scientific

operations. Jenkins being unscientific failed to see any trace of

beauty and nobleness in the work before him. He only saw a perspiring

man in a blood stained smock holding a dog who was shrieking like a

human person in the extreme of pain and terror. He understood nothing,

he vaguely thought there must be some accident and his help was needed.

He rushed forward. “Oh, Sir--”

The scientist looked up. His face was working, his eye glaring.

“Damn you, you fool, what do you come here for when I’m at work? Get

out. Get out!” he repeated as Jenkins did not stir. “And never come

here unless I ring for you.”

Jenkins turned on shaking legs and got out of the room somehow,

shutting the door tightly behind him. Then he walked down the passage

to the room where the live dogs were, entered and shut that door too

and stood with his back against it facing his charges. Yesterday they

had jumped up to him. Now they stood still, looking at him askance.

Their ears pricked listening to those frightful screams. Then he went

into the middle of the room and sat down on a wooden chair and buried

his face in his hands with a groan. He couldn’t yet make much head or

tail of it all but one thing was certain. The man in the other room was

cutting up a dog alive. A dog who had been well and happy last night.

It had been taken from among these out of this room and by inference

these others were awaiting the same fate. And they knew it: he

stretched out his hands to them and after a time they came up to him;

not as last night capering and joyous, but cowering and whimpering,

sidling up to him pleading for a protection they felt by instinct he

could not give. He had put his arms round them and so they sat grouped

together the man and the terrified dogs listening to those horrible

cries. He did not know how long he sat there but after a time a church

bell clanged out a few harsh strokes and after that the doctor’s bell

had sounded summoning him to his duties. Now the great man had departed

and he was left in the hallway to think over his first lesson in

applied Science.

Jenkins was not an educated man, but he had a good clear mind capable

of adjusting itself to new situations. He was, besides, what we all

understand by a good man. He had those simple sincere rules of conduct

that make the useful citizen. He had his own very definite ideas of

right and wrong and lived up to them. He thought it was right to pay

your way, to help your neighbour whenever possible, to work hard and

mind your own business. He thought it wrong to lie, steal or murder, to

cheat or injure another in any way, or to abuse the helpless and the

weak. That was his simple code and it had served him very well the 38

years of his hard-working life. He saw now chance had flung him into a

place where what seemed to him scandalous infamies were carried on and

his first impulse was to flee from it, as one would from any plague

spot: make a clean bolt of it and forget that such a place existed. But

he checked the impulse as cowardly. No, here he was suddenly up against

something he did not in the least understand. It was his duty to try

to master it and see what it all meant. He perceived very clearly that

however gross the evil existing here it was one legally protected and

upheld. He remembered he had once called in a policeman to stop a man

beating a dog: nothing of that sort would avail here, that was evident.

The doctor was quite confident and easy in his mind apparently and

while the exterior of the place looked squalid and desolate situated in

its ragged waste land, the interior was fitted up with every comfort

and even luxury. Electric lights and lamps and telephones were in

every room he had seen. Beyond the outlying position, there seemed no

special secrecy or concealment about the place: No: somehow or other,

he could not think how, but _somehow_ this man was _allowed_

to do what he was doing. Allowed as he had said, by the country, by the

laws, by the church, by his fellows, to do these atrocities. His blood

boiled within him. Again came the temptation to bolt but the thought

of the animals held him. His fighting spirit was up but he could do

nothing until he knew more about what sort of a hell he was in. He

must explore. He walked down the softly carpeted hallway away from the

door, towards the staircase end and opening the first door he came to

at the side entered the apartment. It was long and narrow. No carpet

here: on the floor only bare tessellated black and white tiles. There

were windows high up in the walls: below these ranged against each

side of the room were iron cages. The light fell coldly from above and

there was a faint foul odour in the air that belied the appearance of

aggressive brightness and cleanliness of the whole place. There was a

row of iron cages on each side all down the long room and from these

rose a continuous low moaning sound which seemed to chill his blood. He

looked at the cages: each one was occupied by a mutilated or diseased

animal: most of them turning, swaying and moaning in direst agony in

their cramped quarters: others crouching motionless with staring eyes,

frozen images of despair. Jenkins turned to the first cage on his

right. It contained a retriever blinded in both eyes from the sockets

of which oozed blood and matter. He was sitting on his haunches on the

bare iron floor of his cage in which he could just turn round, that was

all: the bars at the top almost touched his head.

Jenkins stopped and spoke gently to him. The dog raised his ears a

little at the unaccustomed sound and threw up his great gentle glossy

head with the most piteous long drawn howl that Jenkins had ever heard.

Its accent of unutterable woe was such that no human voice could

achieve. It said as plainly as words, “Oh, let me out of my prison

house, let me die and escape.”

Jenkins eyes filled. He spoke again and put his hand through the bars

and stroked the dog’s shoulder and the sightless face turned towards

his hand and the dog’s hot nose pushed into it with another long drawn

pleading howl.

Jenkin’s looked at the little white enamelled tablet beneath the cage

and read:

“March 1st--Eyes removed.” The date was a fortnight back! With a

sickening feeling half benumbing him, Jenkins passed to the next cage.

Here was a ghastly creature that once had been a dog, staring with

glaring eyes through the bars. It took no notice. It’s agony appeared

to be so appalling that it was mute and rigid with it.

Jenkins stooped and read:

“Tumour (artificial) on brain. Experiment commenced February 15.” The

next cage held a small spaniel puppy with a hugely bloated body that

was twisting and writhing in every conceivable position. It’s tongue

was hanging out, foam was pouring from its mouth, its eyes bulging from

its head, it gave short scream of agony at intervals and threw itself

against the bars of its cage.

Jenkins felt it was not mad. Out of the large protruding brown eyes

looked not insanity: only terror and wonder at its own awful suffering.

Jenkins read on the cage:

“Virus introduced into stomach.” There was no date.

In the next cage the occupant lay at the point of death. It was a small

dog: the floor of its cage was one pool of blood. Where one of its ears

should have been gaped a huge hole from which blood was still running.

Its head had been apparently bandaged. Its paws evidently tied together

but in its madness of pain it had torn away its bonds. Now it lay still

on its side. Its mouth open gasping, its eyes staring, too weak to move

or cry. _Dying at last._

Jenkins read:

“Ear removed. New ear grafted. February 1st.”

A month and a half it had been there!

Jenkins crept on down the middle path between the row: feeling weak

and cold as he went. Each cage seemed to him more horrible than the

last. Of some the contents are indescribable. Beneath some ran the

legend--“Starving Experiments.” And in these the dogs lay rough-haired,

motionless, their bones almost through their skin, their eyes glazed

and the dates ranged from January.

After the dog cages came cats, cats and kittens in all stages of

mutilation with their small red tongues showing in their gasping mouths

that let out faint little cries for mercy. After these, monkeys and

here underneath Jenkins read:

Measles induced at various early dates.

He paused here looking at the suffering creatures, shivering and

crouching on the bare zinc floors of their cells and his face grew

strangely dark as he recalled the scientist’s smiling words: “It’s so

beneficial to humanity to know that monkeys can have measles!”

His feet crept on again. He felt he could hardly move them but he

determined to see it all. Other monkeys had suffered such frightful

injuries he could hardly recognize what they were. Their wizened

anguished little faces were pressed against the bars. They clung there

whining and chattering. Some without eyes, some without ears, some

with huge lumps in their throats that they continually pulled at with

trembling paws. Then the cages ended. He had come to the end of the row

and he saw in front of him a round zinc cylinder-shaped receptacle,

just like in appearance the ash barrels seen in back yards. He

noticed, however, this had perforated holes in the lid. He lifted this

off and down at the bottom of the barrel lay a collie dog.

He called to it and it lifted its head apathetically and gazed up with

dull eyes. It was very, very emaciated: just its coat seemed covering

its skeleton. Jenkins put down both his arms into the barrel and very

gently lifted the dog out bodily and set it on the ground. It lay just

where he set it, crumpled up. Then he raised it and spoke to it. The

dog apparently tried to respond and moved but as it got on its feet it

turned and turned and turned in an endless awful circle. It could not

do otherwise. Its head bent down at a queer angle, its legs quivering,

its tail and ears hanging, its eyes lifeless, its bones sticking in

places through its rough hair, it turned and turned on the same small

spot of ground till it sank exhausted.

Jenkins read:

“Portion of brain removed. Interesting circular movement induced.” And

the date was _two years before the present time_.

Jenkins straightened himself, the distorted creature crouching, silent

at his feet.

“And this is _England_!” he said half aloud.

Impossible to cure, to help, to alleviate any of this suffering.

Impossible to bestow the last boon of death on these sad helpless

beings. For if he freed any of these, new ones would be put in their

place.

With his heart heaving, and beating in a tumult of fury, he bent and

very tenderly lifted the skeleton collie in his arms, held it for a

moment against him and spoke to it gently. Then lowered it back into

its awful prison house and replaced the lid.

Then shivering as if with mortal cold he dragged himself on a few paces

to the end of the room where there was a small gas fire burning and an

arm chair drawn up by it. He sank into this and put his hands to the

fire. This was the doctor’s end of the apartment. A screen shut it off

from the long line of cages. A square of warm carpet covered the bare

tiles on the floor. A small table with some paper and-note books and

a shaded lamp stood in front of the fire. Jenkins sat in the doctor’s

chair listening to the moaning of unspeakable pain that filled all the

air, low and desolate and hopeless, and shuddered.

When the feeling of physical illness had worn off a little, he rose to

his feet and retraced his steps down the long avenue of cages. He could

not bear to look at them again but kept his gaze resolutely in front of

him. He knew he could do nothing to help the hapless tortured inmates.

His duties were to clean out the cages and to feed and water and wait

upon the healthy animals. He was not allowed to interfere with the

animals under experiment. If he overstepped his limit by the very least

he saw he would be thrown out at once and he was bent upon staying. He

felt quite clearly he was face to face with some momentous evil that

was vast and far-reaching and of which he could not read the meaning.

He could not grapple with it for he did not fully yet understand

what it was but he would be patient, he would be calm, he would be

self-controlled, he would watch and study and wait and then perhaps he

could do something. But infinite caution would be necessary: no rash

step, no giving way to raging impulses of anger and indignation would

serve him here nor help those tortured prisoners. “Who sups with the

devil must have a long spoon” and he felt he was now the guest of the

devil, indeed.

He got out of the apartment at last and closed the door after him. He

went down the hallway and listened at the small laboratory door behind

which he knew the dog was lying clamped in the trough. The moaning had

ceased. There was no sound now. Jenkins crept on up the stairs to his

own top floor rooms. Before commencing the flight he first noticed

another door on his left which he had not opened. He read on it in

passing on a small plate, Lethal Chamber. He dragged himself up the

stairs and finally reached his own little rooms at the top: with which

he had been so pleased the night before. Only the night before and it

seemed he had lived through an age of misery since then. He entered his

own little sitting room, bolted the door after him and then sat down at

the table, his head in his hands, a broken man. His beliefs, faiths,

ideals, were all shattered and fell from him leaving him naked and

alone.

This was England; These things were done in England, allowed, approved

of, and he had loved England, believed in it, fought for it. Did he

love it now? No. Would he fight for it and offer his life again for

it? No. He had believed in God. He had loved him. Not all the war and

the suffering and the horror of it had shaken his belief in Him. Did

he believe in Him now? Love Him? No. There could be no loving, good,

all-powerful being who could look down on that laboratory and that man

who worked there and not shrivel them both to nothing. A God there

might be, but if these things pleased Him then He must be evil. If they

did not please Him He must be as powerless as Jenkins himself to stop

them.

Perhaps it was that. Perhaps there was a spirit of good but perhaps it

could not work alone, perhaps it needed human co-operation. This was

a new thought to Jenkins and it give a little light to the broken and

dejected man.