Book III

JANE

chapter 1

Jane Harding had a flat at the top of a block of mansions overlooking

the river in Chelsea.

Here, on the evening following the party, came Sebastian Levinne.

"I've fixed it up, Jane," he said. "Radmaager is coming here to see you

sometime to-morrow. He prefers to do that, it seems."

"'Come, tell me how you live, he cried,'" quoted Jane. "Well, I'm

living very nicely and respectably, entirely alone! Do you want

something to eat, Sebastian?"

"If there is anything?"

"There are scrambled eggs and mushrooms, anchovy toast and black coffee

if you'll sit here peaceably while I get them."

She put the cigarette box and the matches beside him and left the room.

In a quarter of an hour the meal was ready.

"I like coming to see you, Jane," said Sebastian. "You never treat me

as a bloated young Jew to whom only the flesh pots of the Savoy would

make appeal."

Jane smiled without speaking.

Presently she said: "I like your girl, Sebastian."

"Joe?"

"Yes, Joe."

Sebastian said gruffly: "What--what do you really think of her?"

Again Jane paused before answering.

"So young," she said at last. "So terribly young."

Sebastian chuckled.

"She'd be very angry if she heard you."

"Probably." After a minute she said: "You care for her very much, don't

you, Sebastian?"

"Yes. It's odd, isn't it, Jane, how little all the things you've got

matter? I've got practically all the things I want, except Joe, and Joe

is all that matters. I can see what a fool I am, but it doesn't make

a bit of difference! What's the difference between Joe and a hundred

other girls? Very little. And yet she's the only thing in the world

that matters to me just now."

"Partly because you can't get her."

"Perhaps. But I don't think that's so entirely."

"Neither do I."

"What do you think of Vernon?" asked Sebastian after a pause.

Jane changed her position, shading her face from the fire.

"He's interesting," she said slowly, "partly, I think, because he is so

completely unambitious."

"Unambitious, do you think?"

"Yes. He wants things made easy."

"If so, he'll never do anything in music. You want driving power for

that."

"Yes, you want driving power. But music will be the power that drives

_him_!"

Sebastian looked up, his face alight and appreciative.

"Do you know, Jane," he said, "I believe you're right!"

She smiled but made no answer.

"I wish I knew what to make of the girl he's engaged to," said

Sebastian.

"What is she like?"

"Pretty. Some people might call it lovely--but I'd call it pretty. She

does the things that other people do, and does them very sweetly. She's

not a cat. I'm afraid--yes, I am afraid now that she definitely cares

for Vernon."

"You needn't be afraid. Your pet genius won't be turned aside or held

down. That doesn't happen. I'm more than ever sure, every day I live,

that that doesn't happen."

"Nothing would turn _you_ aside, Jane, but then you have got

driving power."

"And yet, do you know, Sebastian, I believe I should be more easily

'turned aside,' as you call it, than your Vernon? I know what I want

and go for it--he doesn't know what he wants, or rather doesn't want

it, but _it_ goes for _him_.... And that _It_, whatever

It is, _will_ be served--no matter at what cost."

"Cost to whom?"

"Ah! I wonder...."

Sebastian rose.

"I must go. Thanks for feeding me, Jane."

"Thank you for what you've done for me with Radmaager. You're a very

good friend, Sebastian. And I don't think success will ever spoil you."

"Oh! success...." He held out his hand.

She laid both hands on his shoulders and kissed him.

"My dear, I hope you will get your Joe. But if not I am quite sure you

will get everything else!"

_2_

Herr Radmaager did not come to see Jane Harding for nearly a fortnight.

He arrived without warning of any kind at half-past ten in the morning.

He stumped into the flat without a word of apology and looked around

the walls of the sitting room.

"It is you who have furnished and papered this? Yes?"

"Yes."

"You live here alone?"

"Yes."

"But you have not always lived alone?"

"No."

Radmaager said unexpectedly: "That is good." Then he said commandingly:

"Come here."

He took her by both arms, and drew her toward the window. There he

looked her over from head to foot. He pinched the flesh of her arm

between finger and thumb, opened her mouth and looked down her throat,

and finally put a large hand on each side of her waist.

"Breathe in--good! Now out--sharply."

He took a tape measure out of his pocket, made her repeat the two

movements, passing the tape measure round her each time. Finally

he pocketed it and put it away. Neither he nor Jane seemed to see

anything curious in the proceedings.

"It is well," said Radmaager. "Your chest is excellent, your throat

is strong. You are intelligent--since you have not interrupted me. I

can find many singers with a better voice than yours--your voice is

very true, very beautiful, but it is not clear, a silver thread. If

you force it, it will go--and where will you be then, I ask you? The

music you sing now is absurd--if you were not pig-headed as the devil

you would not sing those rôles. Yet I respect you because you are an

artist."

He paused, then went on:

"Now listen to me. My music is beautiful and it will not hurt your

voice. When Ibsen created Solveig he created the most wonderful woman

character that has ever been created. My opera will stand and fall

by its Solveig--and it is not sufficient to have a singer. There are

Cavarossi, Mary Montner, Jeanne Dorta--all hope to sing Solveig. But I

will not have it. What are they? Unintelligent animals with marvelous

vocal chords. For my Solveig I must have a perfect instrument, an

instrument with intelligence. You are a young singer--as yet unknown.

You shall sing at Covent Garden next year in my _Peer Gynt_ if you

satisfy me. Now listen...."

He sat down at Jane's piano and began to play--queer rhythmic

monotonous notes.

"It is the snow, you comprehend--the Northern snow. That is what your

voice must be like--the snow. It is white like damask--and the pattern

runs through it. But the pattern is in the music, not in your voice."

He went on playing. Endless monotony, endless repetition, and yet

suddenly the something that was woven through it caught your ear--what

he had called the pattern.

He stopped.

"Well?"

"It will be very difficult to sing."

"Quite right. But you have an excellent ear. You wish to sing

Solveig--yes?"

"Naturally. It's the chance of a lifetime. If I can satisfy you."

"I think you can." He got up again, laid his hands on her shoulders.

"How old are you?"

"Thirty-three."

"And you have been very unhappy--that is so?"

"Yes."

"How many men have you lived with?"

"One."

"And he was not a good man?"

Jane answered evenly: "He was a very bad one."

"I see. Yes, it is that which is written in your face. Now listen to

me. All that you have suffered, all that you have enjoyed, you will

put it into my music--not with abandon, not with unrestraint, but

with controlled and disciplined force. You have intelligence and you

have courage. Without courage nothing can ever be accomplished. Those

without courage turn their backs on life. You will never turn your back

on life. Whatever comes you will stand there facing it with your chin

up and your eyes very steady.... But I hope, my child, that you will

not be too much hurt."

He turned away.

"I will send on the score," he said over his shoulder. "And you will

study it."

He stumped out of the room and the flat door banged.

Jane sat down by the table. She stared at the wall in front of her with

unseeing eyes. Her chance had come.

She murmured very softly to herself: "I'm afraid."

_3_

For a whole week Vernon debated the question of whether he should

or should not take Jane at her word. He could get up to town at the

week-end--but then perhaps Jane would be away. He felt miserably

self-conscious and shy. Perhaps by now she had forgotten that she had

asked him.

He let the week-end go by. He felt that certainly by now she would have

forgotten him. Then he got a letter from Joe in which she mentioned

having seen Jane twice. That decided Vernon. At six o'clock on the

following Saturday he rang the bell of Jane's flat.

Jane herself opened it. Her eyes opened a little wider when she saw

who it was. Otherwise she displayed no surprise.

"Come in," she said. "I'm finishing my practising. But you won't mind."

He followed her into a long room whose windows overlooked the river.

It was very empty. A grand piano, a divan, a couple of chairs and

walls that were papered with a wild riot of bluebells and daffodils.

One wall alone was papered in sober dark green and on it hung a single

picture--a queer study of bare tree trunks. Something about it reminded

Vernon of his early adventures in the Forest.

On the music stool was the little man like a white worm.

Jane pushed a cigarette box toward Vernon, said in her brutal

commanding voice, "Now, Mr. Hill," and began to walk up and down the

room.

Mr. Hill flung himself upon the piano. His hands twinkled up and down

it with marvellous speed and dexterity. Jane sang. Most of the time

_sotto voce_, almost under her breath. Occasionally she would take

a phrase full pitch. Once or twice she stopped with an exclamation of

what sounded like furious impatience, and Mr. Hill was made to repeat

from several bars back.

She broke off quite suddenly by clapping her hands. She crossed to the

fireplace, pushed the bell, and turning her head addressed Mr. Hill for

the first time as a human being.

"You'll stay and have some tea, won't you, Mr. Hill?"

Mr. Hill was afraid he couldn't. He twisted his body apologetically

several times and sidled out of the room. A maid brought in black

coffee and hot buttered toast, which appeared to be Jane's conception

of afternoon tea.

"What was that you were singing?"

"Electra--Richard Strauss."

"Oh! I liked it. It was like dogs fighting."

"Strauss would be flattered. All the same, I know what you mean. It is

combative."

She pushed the toast toward him and added: "Your cousin's been here

twice."

"I know. She wrote and told me."

He felt tongue-tied and uncomfortable. He had wanted so much to come,

and now that he was here he didn't know what to say. Something about

Jane made him uncomfortable. He blurted out at last:

"Tell me truthfully--would you advise me to chuck work altogether and

stick to music?"

"How can I possibly tell? I don't know what you want to do."

"You spoke like that the other night. As though everyone can do just

what they like."

"So they can. Not always, of course--but very nearly always. If you

want to murder someone, there is really nothing to stop you. But you

will be hanged afterwards--naturally."

"I don't want to murder anyone."

"No, you want your fairy story to end happily. Uncle dies and

leaves you all his money. You marry your lady love and live at

Abbots--whatever it's called--happily ever afterward."

Vernon said angrily: "I wish you wouldn't laugh at me."

Jane was silent a minute, then she said in a different voice: "I wasn't

laughing at you. I was doing something I'd no business to do--trying to

interfere."

"What do you mean, trying to interfere?"

"Trying to make you face reality, and forgetting that you

are--what--about eight years younger than I am?--and that your time for

that hasn't yet come."

He thought suddenly: "I could say anything to her--anything at all. She

wouldn't always answer the way I wanted her to, though."

Aloud he said: "Please go on. I'm afraid it's very egotistical, my

talking about myself like this, but I'm so worried and unhappy. I want

to know what you meant when you said the other evening that of the four

things I wanted, I could get any one of them but not all together."

Jane considered a minute.

"What did I mean exactly? Why, just this. To get what you want, you

must usually pay a price or take a risk--sometimes both. For instance,

I love music--a certain kind of music. My voice is suitable for a

totally different kind of music. It's an unusually good concert

voice--not an operatic one, except for very light opera. But I've sung

in Wagner, in Strauss--in all the things I like. I haven't exactly

paid a price--but I take an enormous risk. My voice may give out any

minute. I know that. I've looked the fact in the face and I've decided

that the game is worth the candle.

"Now, in your case, you mentioned four things. For the first, I suppose

that if you remain in your uncle's business for a sufficient number

of years you will grow rich without any further trouble. That's not

very interesting. Secondly, you want to live at Abbots Puissants. You

could do that to-morrow if you married a girl with money. Then the girl

you're fond of, the girl you want to marry----"

"Can I get her to-morrow?" asked Vernon. He spoke with a kind of angry

irony.

"I should say so--quite easily."

"How?"

"By selling Abbots Puissants. It is yours to sell, isn't it?"

"Yes, but I couldn't do that. I couldn't--I couldn't...." Jane leaned

back in her chair and smiled.

"You prefer to go on believing that life is a fairy story?"

"There must be some other way."

"Yes, of course there is another. Probably the simplest. There's

nothing to stop you both going out to the nearest Registry Office.

You've both got the use of your limbs."

"You don't understand. There are hundreds of difficulties in the way.

I couldn't ask Nell to face a life of poverty. She doesn't want to be

poor."

"Perhaps she can't."

"What do you mean by 'can't'?"

"Just that. Can't. Some people can't be poor, you know."

Vernon got up, walked twice up and down the room. Then he came back,

dropped on the hearth rug beside Jane's chair, and looked up at her.

"What about the fourth thing? Music? Do you think I could ever do that?"

"That I can't say. Wanting mayn't be any use there. But if it does

happen, I expect it will swallow up all the rest. They'll all

go--Abbots Puissants, money, the girl. My dear, I don't feel life's

going to be easy for you. Ugh! A goose is walking over my grave. Now

tell me something about this opera Sebastian Levinne says you are

writing."

When he had finished telling her, it was nine o'clock. They both

exclaimed and went out to a little restaurant together. As he said

good-bye afterward his first diffidence returned.

"I think you are one of the--the nicest people I ever met. You will

let me come again and talk, won't you? If I haven't bored you too

frightfully."

"Any time you like. Good-night."

_4_

Myra wrote to Joe:

Dearest Josephine:

I am so worried about Vernon and this woman he is always going up

to town to see--some opera singer or other. Years older than he is.

It's so dreadful the way women like that get hold of boys. I am

terribly worried and don't know what to do about it. I have spoken

to your Uncle Sydney, but he was not very helpful about it and just

said that boys will be boys. But I don't want _my_ boy to be

like that. I was wondering, dear Joe, if it would be any good my

seeing this woman and begging her to leave my boy alone. Even a

_bad_ woman would listen to a mother, I think. Vernon is too

young to have his life ruined. I really don't know what to do. I

seem to have no influence over Vernon nowadays.

With much love,

Your affectionate

Aunt Myra.

Joe showed this letter to Sebastian.

"I suppose she means Jane," said Sebastian. "I'd rather like to see an

interview between them. Frankly, I think Jane would be amused."

"It's too silly," said Joe hotly. "I wish to goodness Vernon

_would_ fall in love with Jane. It would be a hundred times better

for him than being in love with that silly stick of a Nell."

"You don't like Nell, do you, Joe?"

"You don't like her either."

"Oh! yes, I do, in a way. She doesn't interest me very much, but I can

quite see the attraction. In her own way, she's quite lovely."

"Yes, in a chocolate-box way."

"She doesn't attract me, because to my mind there's nothing there to

attract as yet. The real Nell hasn't happened. Perhaps she never will.

I suppose to some people that is very attractive because it opens out

all sorts of possibilities."

"Well, I think Jane is worth ten of Nell! The sooner Vernon gets over

his silly calf love for Nell and falls in love with Jane instead, the

better it will be."

Sebastian lit a cigarette and said slowly: "I'm not sure that I agree

with you."

"Why?"

"Well, it's not very easy to explain. But, you see, Jane is a real

person--very much so. To be in love with Jane might be a whole-time

job. We're agreed, aren't we, that Vernon is very possibly a genius?

Well, I don't think a genius wants to be married to a real person.

He wants to be married to someone rather negligible--someone whose

personality won't interfere. Now it may sound cynical, but that's

what will probably happen if Vernon marries Nell. At the moment she

represents--I don't quite know what to call it--what's that line?

'The apple tree, the singing and the gold....' Something like that.

Once he's married to her, that will go. She'll just be a nice pretty

sweet-tempered girl whom, naturally, he loves very much. But she won't

_interfere_. She'll never get between him and his work--she hasn't

got sufficient personality. Now Jane might. She wouldn't mean to, but

she might. It isn't Jane's beauty that attracts you--it's herself. She

might be absolutely fatal to Vernon."

"Well," said Joe, "I don't agree with you. I think Nell's a silly

little ass and I should hate to see Vernon married to her. I hope it

will all come to nothing."

"Which is much the likeliest thing to happen," said Sebastian.

chapter 2

Nell was back in London. Vernon came up to see her the day after her

return. She noticed the change in him at once. He looked haggard,

excited. He said abruptly:

"Nell, I'm going to chuck Birmingham."

"_What?_"

"Listen while I tell you...."

He talked eagerly, excitedly. His music--he'd got to give himself up to

it. He told her of the opera.

"Listen, Nell. This is you--in your tower--with your golden hair

hanging down and shining--shining in the sun."

He went to the piano, began to play, explaining as he did so.

"Violins--you see--and this is all for harps ... and these are the

round jewels...."

He played what seemed to Nell to be a series of rather ugly discords.

She privately thought it all hideous. Perhaps it would sound

differently played by an orchestra.

But she loved him--and because she loved him, everything he did must be

right. She smiled and said:

"It's lovely, Vernon."

"Do you really like it, Nell? Oh! sweetheart--you are so wonderful. You

always understand. You're so sweet about everything."

He came across to her, knelt down and buried his face on her lap.

"I love you so ... I love you so."

She stroked his dark head.

"Tell me the story of it."

"Shall I? Well, you see, there's a princess in a tower with golden

hair, and kings and knights come from all over the world to try and get

her to marry them. But she's too haughty to look at any of them--the

real good old fairy-story touch. And at last one comes--a kind of

gypsy fellow--very ragged, with a little green hat on his head and a

kind of pipe he plays on. And he sings and says that he has the biggest

kingdom of anyone because his kingdom is the whole world--and that

there are no jewels like his jewels, which are dewdrops. And they say

he's mad and throw him out. But that night when the princess is lying

in bed she hears him playing his song in the castle garden and she

listens.

"Then there's an old Jew pedlar man in the town and he offers the

fellow gold and riches with which to win the princess, but the gypsy

laughs and says, What could he give in exchange? And the old man says

his green hat and the pipe he plays on, but the gypsy says he will

never part with those.

"He plays in the palace garden every night. There's an old bard in the

palace and he tells a tale of how a hundred years ago a prince of the

royal house was bewitched by a gypsy maid and wandered forth and was

never seen again. And the princess listens to it, and at last one night

she gets up and comes to the window. And the gypsy tells her to leave

all her robes and jewels behind and to come out in a simple white gown.

But she thinks in her heart that it's as well to be on the safe side,

so she puts a pearl in the hem of her skirt, and she comes out, and

they go off in the moonlight while he sings. But the pearl in her dress

weighs her down and she can't keep up. And he goes on, not realizing

that she's left behind....

"I've told this very badly, like a story, but that's the end of the

first act--his going off in the moonlight and her left behind weeping.

There are three scenes. The castle hall, the market place, and the

palace garden outside her window."

"Won't that be very expensive--in the way of scenery, I mean?"

suggested Nell.

"I don't know--I hadn't thought--oh! it can be managed, I expect."

Vernon was irritated by these prosaic details.

"Now the second act is near the market place. There is a girl there

mending dolls--with black hair hanging down round her face. The gypsy

comes along, and asks her what she's doing, and she says she's mending

the children's toys--she's got the most wonderful needle and thread in

the world. He tells her all about the princess and how he's lost her

again, and he says he's going to the old Jew pedlar to sell his hat and

his pipe, and she warns him not to--but he says he must.

"I wish I could tell things better. I'm just giving you the story

now--not the way I've divided it up, because I'm not exactly sure

myself yet about that. I've got the music--that's the great thing:

the heavy empty palace music--and the noisy clattering market-place

music--and the princess--like that line of poetry, 'a singing stream

in a silent vale,' and the doll mender all trees and dark woods like

the Forest used to sound at Abbots Puissants; you know, enchanted and

mysterious and a little frightening ... I think you'll have to have

some instruments specially tuned for it.... Well, I won't go into that,

it wouldn't interest you--it's too technical.

"Where was I? Oh! yes, he turns up at the palace--as a great king this

time--all clanking swords and horse trappings and blazing jewels,

and the princess is overjoyed and they're going to be married and

everything's all right. But he begins to get pale and weary, worse

every day, and when anyone asks him what is the matter, he says,

'Nothing.'"

"Like you when you were a little boy at Abbots Puissants," said Nell

smiling.

"Did I say that? I don't remember. Well, then the night before the

wedding he can't bear it any more, and he steals away from the palace

and down to the market and wakes up the old Jew and says he must

have back his hat and his pipe. He'll give back everything he got in

exchange. The old Jew laughs, and throws down the hat, torn across, and

the pipe, broken, at the prince's feet.

"He's broken-hearted--the bottom knocked out of the world--and he

wanders away with them in his hand, till he comes to where the doll

mender is sitting with her feet tucked up under her, and he tells her

what has happened and she tells him to lie down and sleep. And when he

wakes in the morning there are his green hat and his pipe, mended so

beautifully that no one could tell they had been mended.

"And then he laughs for joy, and she goes to a cupboard and pulls out a

similar little green hat and a pipe, and they go out together through

the forest, and just as the sun rises on the edge of the forest, he

looks at her and remembers. He says, 'Why, a hundred years ago I left

my palace and my throne for love of you.' And she says, 'Yes. But

because you were afraid you hid a piece of gold in the lining of your

doublet, and the gleam of it enchanted your eyes and we lost each

other. But now the whole world is ours and we will wander through it

together for ever and ever.'"

Vernon stopped. He turned an enthusiastic face upon Nell. "It ought to

be lovely, the end ... so lovely. If I can get into the music what I

see and hear: the two of them in their little green hats ... playing

their pipes ... and the forest and the sun rising...."

His face grew dreamy and ecstatic. He seemed to have forgotten Nell.

Nell herself felt indescribable sensations sweep over her. She was

afraid of this queer rapt Vernon. He had talked of music before to her,

but never with this strange exalted passion. She knew that Sebastian

Levinne thought Vernon might do wonderful things someday, but she

remembered lives she had read of musical geniuses, and suddenly she

wished with all her heart that Vernon might not have this marvellous

gift. She wanted him as he had been heretofore, her eager boyish lover,

the two of them wrapped in their common dream.

The wives of musicians were always unhappy: she had read that

somewhere. She didn't want Vernon to be a great musician. She wanted

him to make some money quickly and live with her at Abbots Puissants.

She wanted a sweet sane normal everyday life. Love--and Vernon.

This thing--this kind of possession--was _dangerous_. She was sure

it was dangerous.

But she couldn't damp Vernon's ardour. She loved him far too much

for that. She said, trying to make her voice sound sympathetic and

interested:

"What an unusual fairy story! Do you mean to say you've remembered it

from ever since you were a child?"

"More or less. I thought of it again that morning on the river at

Cambridge--just before I saw you standing under that tree. Darling, you

were so lovely--so lovely.... You always will be lovely, won't you? I

couldn't bear it if you weren't. What idiotic things I am saying! And

then, after that night at Ranelagh, that wonderful night when I told

you that I loved you, all the music came pouring into my mind. Only

I couldn't remember the story clearly--only really the bit about the

tower.

"But I've had marvellous luck. I've met a girl who is actually the

niece of the hospital nurse who told me the story. And she remembered

it perfectly and helped me to get it quite clearly again. Isn't it

extraordinary the way things happen?"

"Who is she, this woman?"

"She's really rather a wonderful person, I think. Awfully nice and

frightfully clever. She's a singer--Jane Harding. She sings Electra and

Brunhild and Isolde with the new English Opera Company, and she may

sing at Covent Garden next year. I met her at a party of Sebastian's. I

want you to meet her. I'm sure you'd like her awfully."

"How old is she? Young?"

"Youngish--about thirty, I should think. She has an awfully queer

effect on one. In a way you almost dislike her, and yet she makes you

feel you can do things. She's been very good to me."

"I dare say."

Why did she say that? Why should she feel an unreasoning prejudice

against this woman--this Jane Harding?

Vernon was staring at her with rather a puzzled expression.

"What's the matter, darling? You said that so queerly."

"I don't know." She tried to laugh. "A goose walking over my grave,

perhaps."

"Funny," said Vernon frowning. "Somebody else said that just lately."

"Lots of people say it," said Nell laughing. She paused and then said:

"I'd--I'd like to meet this friend of yours very much, Vernon."

"I know. I want her to meet you. I've talked a lot about you to her."

"I wish you wouldn't. Talk about me, I mean. After all, we promised

Mother no one should know."

"Nobody outside--but Sebastian knows and Joe."

"That's different. You've known them all your life."

"Yes, of course. I'm sorry. I didn't think. I didn't say we were

engaged, or tell your name or anything. You're not cross, are you, Nell

darling?"

"Of course not."

Even in her own ears her voice sounded hard. Why was life so horribly

difficult? She was afraid of this music. Already it had made Vernon

chuck up a good job. _Was_ it the music? Or was it Jane Harding?

She thought to herself desperately: "I wish I'd never met Vernon. I

wish I'd never loved him. I wish--oh! I wish I didn't love so much. I'm

afraid. I'm afraid...."

_2_

It was over! the plunge was taken! There was unpleasantness, of course.

Uncle Sydney was furious; not, Vernon was forced to confess, without

reason. There were scenes with his mother--tears--recriminations. A

dozen times he was on the point of giving way, and yet, somehow or

other, he didn't.

He had a curious sense of desolation all the time. He was alone in this

thing. Nell, because she loved him, agreed to all he said, but he was

uncomfortably conscious that his decision had grieved and disturbed

her, and might even shake her faith in the future. Sebastian thought

the move premature. For the time being, he would have advised making

the best of two worlds. Not that he said so. Sebastian never gave

advice to anybody. Even the staunch Joe was doubtful. She realized that

for Vernon to sever his connection with the Bents was serious, and she

had not the real faith in Vernon's musical future which would have made

her heartily applaud the step.

So far in his life, Vernon had never had the courage to set himself

definitely in opposition to everybody. When it was all over, and he

was settled in the very cheap rooms which were all he could afford in

London, he felt as one might who had overcome invincible odds. Then,

and not till then, he went to see Jane Harding.

He had held boyish imaginary conversations with her in his mind.

"I have done what you told me."

"Splendid! I knew you had the courage really."

He was modest, she applauded. He was sustained and uplifted by her

praise.

The reality, as always, fell out quite differently. His intercourse

with Jane always did. He was always holding imaginary conversations

with Jane in his mind, and the reality was always totally different.

In this case, when he announced, with due modesty, what he had done,

she seemed to take it as a matter of course, with nothing particularly

heroic about it. She said:

"Well, you must have wanted to do it or you wouldn't have done it."

He felt baffled, almost angry. A curious sense of constraint always

came over him in Jane's presence. He could never be wholly natural with

her. He had so much he wanted to say--but he found it difficult to say.

He was tongue-tied--embarrassed. And then suddenly, for no reason,

it seemed, the cloud would lift and he would be talking happily and

easily, saying the things that came into his head.

He thought: "Why am I so embarrassed with her? _She's_ natural

enough."

It worried him. From the first moment he had met her, he had felt

disturbed--afraid. He resented the effect she had on him and yet he was

unwilling to admit how strong that effect was.

An attempt to bring about a friendship between her and Nell failed.

Vernon could feel that behind the outward cordiality that politeness

dictates there was very little real feeling.

When he asked Nell what she thought of Jane, she answered: "I like her

very much. I think she's most interesting."

He was more awkward approaching Jane, but she helped him.

"You want to know what I think of your Nell? She is lovely--and very

sweet."

He said: "And you really think you'll be friends?"

"No, of course not. Why should we?"

"Well, but----"

He stammered, taken aback.

"Friendship is not a kind of equilateral triangle. If A likes B and

loves C, then C and B _et cetera, et cetera_.... We've nothing in

common, your Nell and I. She, too, expects life to be a fairy story,

and is just beginning to be afraid, poor child, that it mayn't be,

after all. She's a Sleeping Beauty waking in the forest. Love, to her,

is something very wonderful and very beautiful."

"Isn't it that to you?"

He had to ask. He wanted to know so badly. So often, so often, he'd

wondered about Boris Androv, about those five years.

She looked at him with a face from which all expression had died out.

"Some day--I'll tell you."

He wanted to say, "Tell me now," but he didn't. He said instead:

"Tell me, Jane, what is life to you?"

She paused a minute and then said: "A difficult, dangerous, but

endlessly interesting adventure."

_3_

At last he was able to work. He began to appreciate to the full the

joys of freedom. There was nothing to fray his nerves, nothing to

dissipate his energy. It could flow, all in one steady stream, into

his work. There were few distractions. At the moment, he had only just

enough money to keep body and soul together. Abbots Puissants was still

unlet....

The autumn passed and most of the winter. He saw Nell once or twice a

week, stolen unsatisfactory meetings. They were both conscious of the

loss of the first fine rapture. She questioned him closely about the

progress of the opera. How was it going? When did he expect it would be

finished? What chances were there of its being produced?

Vernon was vague as to all these practical aspects. He was concerned at

the moment only with the creative side. The opera was getting itself

born slowly, with innumerable pangs and difficulties, with a hundred

setbacks owing to Vernon's own lack of experience and technique. His

conversation was mostly of instrumental difficulties or possibilities.

He went out with odd musicians who played in orchestras. Nell went to

many concerts and was fond of music but it is doubtful if she could

have told an oboe from a clarionet. She'd always imagined a horn and a

French horn to be much the same thing. The technical knowledge needed

in score writing appalled her, and Vernon's indifference to how and

when the opera would be produced made her uneasy.

He hardly realized himself how much his uncertain answers depressed and

alienated Nell. He was startled one day when she said to him--indeed,

not so much said as wailed:

"Oh! Vernon, don't try me too hard. It's so difficult--so difficult. I

must have some hope. You don't understand."

He looked at her astonished.

"But Nell, it's all right _really_. It's only a question of being

patient."

"I know, Vernon. I shouldn't have said that, but you see----"

She paused.

"It makes it so much more difficult for me, darling," said Vernon, "if

I feel that you're unhappy."

"Oh! I'm not--I won't be."

But underneath, choked down, that old feeling of resentment lifted its

head again. Vernon didn't understand or care how difficult things were

for her. He never had the faintest conception of her difficulties.

He would, perhaps, have called them silly, or trivial. They were, in

one sense, but in another they weren't--since the sum total of them

went to make up her life. Vernon didn't see or realize that she was

fighting a battle--fighting it all the time. She could never relax. If

he could only realize that, give her a word of cheer, show her that he

understood the difficult position in which she was placed. But he never

would see.

A devastating sense of loneliness swept over Nell. Men were like

that--they never understood or cared. Love--that seemed to solve

everything. But really it didn't solve anything at all. She almost

hated Vernon. Selfishly absorbed in his work, disliking her to be

unhappy because it upset _him_....

She thought: "Any _woman_ would understand."

And, moved by some obscure impulse, she went of her own accord to see

Jane Harding.

Jane was in, and if she was surprised to see Nell, she did not show it.

They talked for some time of desultory things. Yet Nell had a feeling

that Jane was waiting and watching, biding her time.

Why had she come? She didn't know. She feared and distrusted

Jane--perhaps that was why! Jane was her enemy. Yes, but she had a fear

that her enemy had a wisdom denied to her. Jane (she put it to herself)

was clever. She was, very possibly, bad--yes, she was sure Jane was

bad--but somehow or other one might learn from her.

She began rather blunderingly. Did Jane think that Vernon's music was

likely to be successful--that is to say, successful _soon_? She

tried in vain to keep a quaver out of her voice.

She felt Jane's cool green eyes upon her.

"Things getting difficult?"

"Yes, you see----"

It tumbled out, a great deal of it: the shifts, the difficulties,

the unspoken force of her mother's silent pressure, a dimly veiled

reference to Someone, name not given, Someone who understood and was

kind and was rich.

How easy to say these things to a woman--even a woman like Jane, who

couldn't know anything about them. Women understood--they didn't pooh

pooh trifles and make everything out to be unimportant.

When she had finished, Jane said: "It's a little hard on you. When you

first met Vernon you had no idea of this music business."

"I didn't think it would be like this," said Nell bitterly.

"Well, it's no good going back to what you didn't think, is it?"

"I suppose not." Nell felt vaguely annoyed at Jane's tone. "Oh!" she

broke out. "You feel, of course, that everything ought to give way to

his music--that he's a genius--that I ought to be glad to make any

sacrifice."

"No, I don't," said Jane, "I don't think any of those things. I don't

know what good geniuses are, or works of art either. Some people are

born with a feeling that they matter more than anything else, and some

people aren't. It's impossible to say who's right. The best thing for

you would be to persuade Vernon to give up music, sell Abbots Puissants

and settle down with you on the proceeds. But I do know this, that

you haven't an earthly chance of getting him to give up music. These

things, genius, art, whatever you like to call them, are much stronger

than you are. You might just as well be King Canute on the seashore.

You can't turn back Vernon from music."

"What can I do?" said Nell hopelessly.

"Well, you can either marry this other man you were talking of and be

reasonably happy, or you can marry Vernon and be actively unhappy with

periods of bliss."

Nell looked at her.

"What would you do?" she whispered.

"Oh! I should marry Vernon and be unhappy, but then some of us like

taking our pleasures sadly."

Nell got up. She stood in the doorway looking back at Jane who had not

moved. She was lying back against the wall, smoking a cigarette, her

eyes half closed. She looked a little like a cat, or a Chinese idol. A

sudden wave of fury came over Nell.

"I hate you," she cried. "You're taking Vernon away from me.

Yes--_you_. You're bad--evil. I know it, I can feel it. You're a

bad woman."

"You're jealous," said Jane quietly.

"You admit then, there's something to be jealous of? Not that Vernon

loves you. He doesn't. He never would. It's you who want to get hold of

him."

There was silence--a pulsating silence. Then, without moving, Jane

laughed. Nell hurried out of the flat, hardly knowing what she was

doing.

_4_

Sebastian came very often to see Jane. He usually came after dinner,

ringing up first to find out if she would be at home. They both found a

curious pleasure in each other's company. To Sebastian Jane recounted

her struggles with the rôle of Solveig, the difficulties of the music,

the difficulty of pleasing Radmaager, the still greater difficulty of

pleasing herself. To Jane Sebastian imparted his ambitions, his present

plans, his future vague ideals.

One evening, after they had both been silent after a long spell of

talking, he said:

"I can talk to you better than anyone I know, Jane. I don't quite know

why, either."

"Well, in a way, we're both the same kind of person, aren't we?"

"Are we?"

"I think so. Not superficially, perhaps, but fundamentally. We both

like truth. I think, as far as one can say that of oneself, we both see

things as they are."

"And you think most people don't?"

"Of course they don't. Nell Vereker, for instance. She sees things as

they've been shown her, as she hopes they are."

"A slave of convention, you mean?"

"Yes, but it works both ways. Joe, for instance, prides herself on

being unconventional, but that makes just as much for narrowness and

prejudice."

"Yes, if you're 'agin' everything irrespective of what it is. Joe is

like that. She _must_ be a rebel. She never really examines a

thing on its merits. And that's what damns me so hopelessly in her

eyes. I'm successful, and she admires failures. I'm rich, so she'd

gain instead of lose if she married me. And being a Jew doesn't count

against you much nowadays."

"It's even fashionable," said Jane laughing.

"And yet, do you know, Jane, I always have a queer feeling that Joe

really likes me."

"Perhaps she does. She's the wrong age for you, Sebastian. That Swede

at your party said something wonderfully true--about separation in

time being worse than separation in space. If you're the wrong age for

a person, nothing keeps you apart so hopelessly. You may be made for

one another, but be born at the wrong time for each other. Does that

sound nonsense? I believe when she's about thirty-five, Joe could love

you--the real essential you--madly. It'll take a woman to love you,

Sebastian, not a girl."

Sebastian was looking into the fire. It was a cold February day, and

there were logs piled up on the coals. Jane hated gas fires.

"Have you ever wondered, Jane, why we don't fall in love with each

other, you and I? Platonic friendship doesn't usually work. And

you're very attractive. There's a lot of the siren about you--quite

unconscious, but it's there."

"Perhaps we should under normal conditions."

"Aren't we under normal conditions? Oh! wait a minute--I know what you

mean. You mean, the line's already engaged."

"Yes. If you didn't love Joe----"

"And if you----"

He stopped.

"Well?" said Jane. "You knew, didn't you?"

"Yes, I suppose so. You don't mind talking about it?"

"Not in the least. If a thing's there, what does it matter if you talk

of it or not?"

"Are you one of the people, Jane, who believe that if you want a thing

enough you can make it happen?"

Jane considered.

"No--I don't think I am. So many things happen to you naturally that

it keeps you busy without--well, looking for things as well. When a

thing's offered you, you've got to choose whether you'll accept it or

refuse it. That's destiny. And when you've made your choice you must

abide by it without looking back."

"That's the spirit of Greek tragedy. You've got Electra into your

bones, Jane." He picked up a book from the table. "_Peer Gynt?_

You're steeping yourself in Solveig, I see."

"Yes. It's more her opera than Peer's. You know, Sebastian, Solveig

is a wonderfully fascinating character--so impassive, so calm, and

yet so utterly certain that her love for Peer is the only thing in

heaven or earth. She knows that he wants and needs her though he never

tells her so, she is abandoned and deserted by him, and manages to

turn that desertion into a crowning proof of his love. By the way,

that Whitsuntide music of Radmaager's is perfectly glorious. You know:

'Blessed is he who has made my life blessed!' To show that the love of

a man can turn into a kind of impassioned nun is difficult but rather

wonderful."

"Is Radmaager pleased with you?"

"Sometimes he is. Yesterday, on the other hand, he consigned my soul to

hell and shook me till my teeth rattled. He was perfectly right, too. I

sang it all wrong--like a melodramatic stage-struck girl. It's got to

be sheer force of will--restraint. Solveig must be so soft and gentle

but really so terribly strong. It's like Radmaager said the first day.

Snow--smooth snow--with a wonderful clear design running through it."

She went on to talk of Vernon's work.

"It's almost finished, you know. I want him to show it to Radmaager."

"Will he?"

"I think so. Have you seen it?"

"Parts of it only."

"What do you think of it?"

"I'll hear what you think of it first, Jane. Your judgment's as good as

mine any day where music is concerned."

"It's crude. There's too much in it--too much good stuff. He hasn't

learned how to handle his material, but the material is there--masses

and masses of it. Do you agree?"

Sebastian nodded.

"Absolutely. I'm more sure than ever that Vernon is going to--well,

revolutionize things. But there's a nasty time coming. He'll have to

face the fact that what he's written isn't, when all's said and done, a

commercial proposition."

"You mean, it couldn't be produced?"

"That's what I mean."

"_You_ could produce it."

"You mean, out of friendship?"

"That's what I meant."

Sebastian got up and began to pace up and down.

"To my way of thinking, that's unethical," he said at last.

"And also you don't like losing money."

"Quite true."

"But you could afford to lose a certain amount without--well, noticing

it?"

"I always notice losing money. It affects--well, my pride."

Jane nodded.

"I understand that. But I don't think, Sebastian, that you need lose

money."

"My dear Jane----"

"Don't argue with me till you know what I'm arguing about. You're going

to produce a certain amount of what the world calls 'highbrow' stuff

at the little Holborn theatre, aren't you? Well, this summer--say

the beginning of July--produce _The Princess in the Tower_

for--say--two weeks. Don't produce it from the point of view of an

opera (don't tell Vernon this, by the way--but there, you wouldn't.

You're not an idiot) but from the point of view of a musical

spectacular play. Unusual scenery and weird lighting effects--you're

keen on lighting, I know. The Russian ballet--that's what you've got

to aim at; that's the--the _tone_ of it. Have good singers, but

attractive ones to look at as well. And now, putting modesty in the

background, I'll tell you this. I'll make a success of it for you."

"You--as the princess?"

"No, my dear child, as the doll mender. It's a weird character--a

character that will attract and arrest. The music of the doll mender

is the best thing Vernon has done. Sebastian, you've always said I

could act. They're going to let me sing at Covent Garden this season

because I can act. I shall make a hit. I know I can act--and acting

counts for a lot in opera. I can--I can _sway_ people. I can make

them _feel_. Vernon's opera will need licking into shape from the

dramatic point of view. Leave that to me. From the musical side, you

and Radmaager may be able to make suggestions--if he'll take them.

Musicians are the devil to deal with, as we all know. The thing can be

done, Sebastian."

She leaned forward, her face vivid and impressive. Sebastian's face

grew more impassive, as it always did when he was thinking hard. He

looked appraisingly at Jane, weighing her, not from the personal

standpoint, but from the impersonal. He believed in Jane, in her

dynamic force, inner magnetism, in her wonderful power of communicating

emotion over the footlights.

"I'll think it over," he said quietly. "There's something in what you

say."

Jane laughed suddenly,

"And you'll be able to get me very cheap, Sebastian," she said.

"I shall expect to," said Sebastian gravely. "My Jewish instincts must

be appeased somehow. You're putting this thing over on me, Jane--don't

imagine that I don't know it!"

chapter 3

At last "The Princess in the Tower" was finished. Vernon suffered from

a tremendous wave of reaction. The whole thing was rotten--hopeless.

Best to chuck it into the fire.

Nell's sweetness and encouragement were like manna to him at this time.

She had that wonderful instinct for always saying the words he longed

to hear. But for her, as he constantly told her, he would have given

way to despair long ago.

He had seen less of Jane during the winter. She had been on tour

with the English Opera Company part of the time. When she sang in

_Electra_ in Birmingham, he went down for it. He was tremendously

impressed--loved both the music and Jane's impersonation of Electra.

That ruthless will, that determined: "Say naught but dance on!" She

gave the impression of being more spirit than flesh. He was conscious

that her voice was really too weak for the part, but somehow it didn't

seem to matter. She _was_ Electra--that fanatical fiery spirit of

relentless doom.

He stayed a few days with his mother--days which he found trying and

difficult. He went to see his Uncle Sydney and was received coldly.

Enid was engaged to be married to a solicitor, and Uncle Sydney was not

too pleased about it.

Nell and her mother were away for Easter. On their return Vernon rang

up and said he must see her immediately. He arrived with a white face

and burning eyes.

"Nell, do you know what I've heard? Everyone has been saying that you

are going to marry George Chetwynd. _George Chetwynd!_"

"Who said so?"

"Lots of people. They say you go round with him everywhere."

Nell looked frightened and unhappy.

"I wish you wouldn't believe things. And Vernon, don't look so--so

accusing. It's perfectly true that he has asked me to marry him--twice,

as a matter of fact."

"That old man?"

"Oh! Vernon, don't be ridiculous. He's only about forty-one or -two."

"Nearly double your age. Why, I thought he wanted to marry your mother,

perhaps."

Nell laughed in spite of herself.

"Oh! dear, I wish he would. Mother's really awfully handsome still."

"That's what I thought that night at Ranelagh. I never guessed--I never

dreamed--that it was _you_! Or hadn't it begun then?"

"Oh! yes, it had begun--as you call it. That was why Mother was so

angry that night--at my going off alone with you."

"And I never guessed! Nell, you might have told me!"

"Told you what? There wasn't anything to tell--then!"

"No, I suppose not. I'm being an idiot. But I do know he's awfully

rich. I get frightened sometimes. Oh! darling Nell, it was beastly of

me to doubt you--even for a minute. As though you'd ever care how rich

anyone was."

Nell said irritably: "Rich, rich, rich! You harp on that. He's awfully

kind and awfully nice, too."

"Oh, I dare say."

"He is, Vernon. Really he is."

"It's nice of you to stick up for him, darling, but he must be an

insensitive sort of brute to hang round after you've refused him twice."

Nell did not answer. She looked at him in a way he did not

understand--something piteous and appealing and yet defiant in that

strange limpid gaze. It was as though she looked at him from a world so

far removed from his that they might be on different spheres.

He said: "I feel ashamed of myself, Nell. But you're so lovely,

everyone must want you."

She broke down suddenly--began to cry. He was startled. She cried on,

sobbed on his shoulder.

"I don't know what to do--I don't know what to do. I'm so unhappy. If I

could only talk to you."

"But you can talk to me, darling. I'm here listening."

"No, no, no ... I can never talk to you. You don't understand. It's all

no use."

She cried on. He kissed her, soothed her, poured out all his love....

When he had gone her mother came into the room, an open letter in her

hand.

She did not appear to notice Nell's tear-stained face.

"George Chetwynd sails for America on the thirtieth of May," she

remarked as she went across to her desk.

"I don't care when he sails," said Nell rebelliously.

Mrs. Vereker did not answer.

That night Nell knelt longer than usual by her narrow white bed.

"Oh! God, please let me marry Vernon, I want to so much. I do love him

so. Please let things come right and let us be married. Make something

happen.... Please God...."

_2_

At the end of April Abbots Puissants was let. Vernon came to Nell in

some excitement.

"Nell, will you marry me now? We could just manage. It's a bad let--an

awfully bad one--but I simply had to take it. You see, there's been the

mortgage interest to pay and all the expenses of the upkeep while it's

been unlet. I've had to borrow for all that and now of course it's got

to be paid back. We'll be pretty short for a year or two, but then it

won't be so bad...."

He talked on, explaining the financial details.

"I've been into it all, Nell. I have really. Sensibly, I mean. We could

afford a tiny flat and one maid and have a little left over to play

with. Oh! Nell, you wouldn't mind being poor with me, would you? You

said once I didn't know what it was to be poor, but you can't say that

now. I've lived on frightfully little since I came to London, and I

haven't minded a bit."

No, Nell knew he hadn't. The fact was in some way a vague reproach to

her. And yet, though she couldn't quite express it to herself, she felt

that the two cases were not on a par. It made much more difference to

women. To be gay and pretty and admired and have a good time--none of

those things affected men. They hadn't that everlasting problem of

clothes--nobody minded if they were shabby.

But how explain these things to Vernon? One couldn't. He wasn't like

George Chetwynd. George understood things like that.

"Nell."

She sat there, irresolute, his arm round her. She had got to decide.

Visions floated before her eyes. Amelie ... the hot little house, the

wailing children ... George Chetwynd and his car ... a stuffy little

flat, a dirty incompetent maid ... dances ... clothes ... the money

they owed dressmakers ... the rent of the London house--unpaid ...

herself at Ascot, smiling, chattering in a lovely model gown ... then,

with a sudden revulsion, she was back at Ranelagh on the bridge over

the water with Vernon....

In almost the same voice as she had used that evening she said: "I

don't know. Oh! Vernon, I don't know."

"Oh! Nell darling, do ... do!"

She disengaged herself from him, got up.

"Please, Vernon--I must think ... yes, think. I--I can't when I'm with

you."

She wrote to him later that night:

Dearest Vernon:

Let us wait a little longer--say six months. I don't feel I want

to be married now. Besides, something might have happened about

your opera then. You think I'm afraid of being poor, but it's not

quite that. I've seen people--people who loved each other--and they

didn't any more because of all the bothers and worries. I feel that

if we wait and are patient everything will come right. Oh! Vernon,

I know it will--and then everything will be so lovely. If only we

wait and have patience....

Vernon was angry when he got this letter. He did not show the letter to

Jane, but he broke out into sufficiently unguarded speech to let her

see how the land lay. She said at once in her disconcerting fashion:

"You do think you're sufficient prize for any girl, don't you, Vernon?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, do you think it will be awfully jolly for a girl who has danced

and been to parties and had lots of fun and people admiring her to be

stuck down in a poky hole with no more fun?"

"We'd have each other."

"You can't make love to her for twenty-four hours on end. While you're

working, what is she to do?"

"Don't you think a woman can be poor and happy?"

"Certainly, given the necessary qualifications."

"Which are--what? Love and trust?"

"No, you idiotic child. A sense of humour, a tough hide, and the

valuable quality of being sufficient unto oneself. You will insist on

love in a cottage being a sentimental problem dependent on the amount

of love concerned. It's far more a problem of mental outlook. You'd be

all right stuck down anywhere--Buckingham Palace or the Sahara--because

you've got your mental preoccupation--music. But Nell's dependent on

extraneous circumstances. Marrying you will cut her off from all her

friends."

"Why should it?"

"Because it's the hardest thing in the world for people with different

incomes to continue friends. They're not all doing the same thing

naturally."

"You always put me in the wrong," said Vernon savagely. "Or at any rate

you try to."

"Well, it annoys me to see you put yourself on a pedestal and stand

admiring yourself for nothing at all," said Jane calmly. "You expect

Nell to sacrifice her friends and life to you, but you wouldn't make

your sacrifice for her."

"What sacrifice? I'd do anything."

"Except sell Abbots Puissants!"

"You don't understand."

Jane looked at him gently.

"Perhaps I do. Oh! yes, my dear, I do very well. But don't be noble.

It always annoys me to see people being noble! Let's talk about _The

Princess in the Tower_. I want you to show it to Radmaager."

"Oh! it's so rotten. I couldn't. You know, I didn't realize myself,

Jane, how rotten it was until I had finished it."

"No," said Jane. "Nobody ever does. Fortunately--or nothing ever would

be finished. Show it to Radmaager. What he says will be interesting, at

all events."

Vernon yielded rather grudgingly.

"He'll think it such awful cheek."

"No, he won't. He's a very high opinion of what Sebastian says, and

Sebastian has always believed in you. Radmaager says that, for so young

a man, Sebastian's judgment is amazing."

"Good old Sebastian! He's wonderful," said Vernon warmly. "Nearly

everything he's done has been a success. Shekels are rolling in. God!

how I envy him sometimes."

"You needn't. He's not such a very happy person, really."

"You mean Joe? Oh, that will all come right."

"I wonder. Vernon, do you see much of Joe?"

"A fair amount. Not as much as I used to. I can't stand that queer

artistic set she's drifted into--their hair's all wrong and they look

unwashed and they talk what seems to me the most arrant drivel.

They're not a bit like your crowd--the people who really do things."

"We're what Sebastian would call the successful commercial

propositions. All the same, I'm worried about Joe. I'm afraid she's

going to do something foolish."

"That bounder La Marre, you mean?"

"Yes, I mean that bounder La Marre. He's clever with women, you know,

Vernon. Some men are."

"You think she'd go off with him or something? Of course Joe is a

damned fool in some ways." He looked curiously at Jane. "But I should

have thought you----"

He stopped, suddenly crimson. Jane looked very faintly amused.

"You really needn't be embarrassed by my morals."

"I wasn't. I mean--I've always wondered--oh! I've wondered such an

awful lot...."

His voice died away. There was silence. Jane sat very upright. She did

not look at Vernon. She looked straight ahead of her. Presently, in a

quiet even voice, she began to speak. She spoke quite unemotionally and

evenly, as though recounting something that had happened to someone

else. It was a cold concise recital of horror, and to Vernon the most

dreadful thing about it was her own detached calm. She spoke as a

scientist might speak, impersonally.

He buried his face in his hands.

Jane brought her recital to an end. Her quiet voice ceased.

Vernon said in a low shuddering voice: "And you lived through

_that_? I--I didn't know that such things were."

Jane said calmly: "He was a Russian and a degenerate. It's hard for an

Anglo Saxon to understand that peculiar refined lust of cruelty. You

understand brutality. You don't understand anything else."

Vernon said, feeling childish and awkward as he put the question:

"You--you loved him very much?"

She shook her head slowly, began to speak and then stopped.

"Why dissect the past?" she said after a minute or two. "He did some

fine work. There's a thing of his in the South Kensington. It's

macabre, but it's good."

Then she began once more to talk of _The Princess in the Tower_.

Vernon went to the South Kensington two days later. He found the

solitary representation of Boris Androv's work easily enough. A drowned

woman--the face was horrible, puffed, bloated, decomposed, but the body

was beautiful ... a lovely body. Vernon knew instinctively that it was

Jane's body.

He stood looking down on the bronze nude figure, with arms spread wide

and long lank hair reaching out mournfully.

Such a beautiful body ... Jane's body. Androv had modelled that nude

body from her.

For the first time for years a queer remembrance of the Beast came over

him. He felt afraid.

He turned quickly away from the beautiful bronze figure and left the

building hurriedly, almost running.

_3_

It was the first night of Radmaager's new opera, _Peer Gynt_.

Vernon was going to it and had been asked by Radmaager to attend a

supper party afterward. He was dining with Nell at her mother's house.

She was not coming to the opera.

Much to Nell's surprise, Vernon did not turn up to dinner. They waited

some time, and then began without him. He arrived just as dessert was

being put on the table.

"I'm most awfully sorry, Mrs. Vereker. I can't tell you how sorry I am.

Something very--very unexpected occurred. I'll tell you later."

His face was so white and he was so obviously upset that Mrs. Vereker

forgot her annoyance. She was always a tactful woman of the world and

she treated the present situation with her usual discretion.

"Well," she said, rising, "now you are here, Vernon, you can talk to

Nell. If you're going to the opera you won't have much time."

She left the room. Nell looked inquiringly at Vernon. He answered her

look.

"Joe's gone off with La Marre."

"Oh, Vernon, she hasn't!"

"She has."

"Do you mean that she has eloped? That she's married him? That they've

run away to get married?"

Vernon said grimly: "He can't marry her. He's got a wife already."

"Oh, Vernon, how awful! How could she?"

"Joe was always wrong-headed. She'll regret this--I know she will. I

don't believe she really cares for him."

"What about Sebastian? Won't he feel this terribly?"

"Yes, poor devil. I've been with him now. He's absolutely broken up

over it. I'd no idea how much he cared for Joe."

"I know he did."

"You see, there were the three of us--always. Joe and I and Sebastian.

We belonged together."

A faint pang of jealousy shot through Nell. Vernon repeated:

"The three of us. It's----Oh! I don't know. I feel as though I'd been

to blame in some way. I've let myself get out of touch with Joe. Dear

old Joe, she was so staunch always--better than any sister could be. It

hurts me to think of the things she used to say when she was a kid--how

she'd never have anything to do with men. And now she's come a mucker

like this."

Nell said in a shocked voice: "A married man. That's what makes it so

awful. Had he any children?"

"How should I know anything about his beastly children?"

"Vernon--don't be so cross."

"Sorry, Nell. I'm upset, that's all."

"How could she do such a thing?" said Nell. She had always rather

resented Joe's unspoken contempt of which she had been subconsciously

aware. She would not have been human had she not felt a faint sense of

superiority. "To run away with anyone married! It's dreadful!"

"Well, she had courage, anyway," said Vernon.

He felt a sudden passionate desire to defend Joe--Joe who belonged to

Abbots Puissants and the old days.

"Courage?" said Nell.

"Yes, courage!" said Vernon, "At any rate she wasn't prudent. She

didn't count the cost. She's chucked away everything in the world for

love. That's more than some people will do."

"Vernon!"

She got up, breathing hard.

"Well, it's true." All his smouldering resentment came bursting out.

"You won't even face a little discomfort for me, Nell. You're always

saying 'Wait' and 'Let's be careful.' You aren't capable of chucking

everything to the winds for love of anyone."

"Oh! Vernon, how cruel you are ... how cruel!"

He saw the tears come into her eyes and was immediately all compunction.

"Oh! Nell, I didn't mean it--I didn't mean it, sweetheart."

His arms went round her, held her to him. Her sobs lessened. He glanced

at his watch.

"Damn! I must go. Good-night, Nell darling. You do love me, don't you?"

"Yes, of course--of course I do."

He kissed her once more, hurried off. She sat down again by the

disordered dinner table. Sat there, lost in thought....

_4_

He got to Covent Garden late. _Peer Gynt_ had begun. The scene was

Ingrid's wedding, and Vernon arrived just at the moment of the first

brief meeting of Peer and Solveig. He wondered if Jane were nervous.

She managed to look marvellously young with her fair plaits and her

innocent calm bearing. She looked nineteen. The act ended with the

carrying off of Ingrid by Peer.

Vernon found himself interested less in the music than in Jane.

To-night was Jane's ordeal. She had to make good or go under. Vernon

knew how anxious she was, above everything else to justify Radmaager's

trust in her.

Presently he knew that all was well. Jane was the perfect Solveig. Her

voice, clear and true--the crystal thread, as Radmaager had called

it--sang unfalteringly and her acting was wonderful. The calm steadfast

personality of Solveig dominated the opera.

Vernon found himself for the first time interested in the story of

the weak storm-torn Peer, the coward who ran from reality at every

opportunity. The music of Peer's conflict with the great Boyg stirred

him, reminding him of his childish terror of the Beast. It was the

same formless bogy fear of childhood. Unseen, Solveig's clear voice

delivered him from it. The scene in the forest where Solveig comes to

Peer was infinitely beautiful, ending with Peer bidding Solveig remain

while he went out to take up his burden. Her reply: "If it is so heavy

it is best two should share it." And then Peer's departure, his final

evasion: "Bring sorrow on her? No. Go roundabout, Peer, go roundabout."

The Whitsuntide music was the most beautiful, but in atmosphere very

Radmaagian, Vernon thought. It led up to and prepared for the effect

of the final scene: the weary Peer asleep with his head on Solveig's

lap, and Solveig, her hair silvered, a Madonna blue cloak round her in

the middle of the stage, her head silhouetted against the rising sun,

singing valiantly against the buttons' moulder.

It was a wonderful duet--Chavaranov, the famous Russian bass, his voice

deepening and deepening, and Jane, with her silver thread singing

steadily upward and ever upward, higher and higher, till the last note

was left to her--high and incredibly pure.... And the sun rose....

Vernon, feeling boyishly important, went behind afterward. The

opera had been a terrific success. The applause had been long and

enthusiastic. He found Radmaager holding Jane by the hand and kissing

her with artistic fervour and thoroughness.

"You are an angel--you are magnificent--yes, magnificent! You are an

artist. Ah!" he burst into a torrent of words in his native language,

then reverted to English. "I will reward you--yes, little one, I will

reward you. I know very well how to do it. I will persuade the long

Sebastian. Together we will--"

"Hush," said Jane.

Vernon came forward awkwardly, said shyly: "It was splendid!"

He squeezed Jane's hand, and she gave him a brief affectionate smile.

"Where's Sebastian? Wasn't he here just now?"

Sebastian was no longer to be seen. Vernon volunteered to go in search

of him and bring him along to supper. He said vaguely that he thought

he knew where he was. Jane knew nothing of the news about Joe and he

didn't see how he could tell her at the moment.

He got a taxi and drove to Sebastian's house but did not find him.

Vernon wondered if perhaps Sebastian might be at his own rooms where he

had left him earlier in the evening. He drove there straight away.

He was feeling suddenly elated and triumphant. Even Joe did not seem

to matter for the moment. He felt suddenly convinced that his own work

was good--or rather that it would be some day. And somehow or other he

also felt that things were coming right with Nell. She had clung to him

differently to-night--more closely--more as though she could not bear

to let him go.... Yes, he was sure of it. Everything was coming right.

He ran up the stairs to his room. It was in darkness. Sebastian was not

here then. He switched on the light, looked round. A note lay on the

table, sent by hand. He picked it up. It was addressed to him in Nell's

handwriting. He tore it open....

He stood there a long time. Then, carefully and methodically, he drew

up a chair to the table, setting it very exactly straight, as though

that were important, and sat down holding the note in his hand. He read

it again for the tenth or eleventh time:

Dearest Vernon--forgive me--please forgive me. I am going to marry

George Chetwynd. I don't love him as I love you but I shall be safe

with him. Again--do forgive me--please.

Your always loving Nell.

He said aloud: "_Safe with him._ What does she mean by that? She'd

have been safe with me. _Safe with him?_ That hurts...."

He sat there. Minutes passed.... Hours passed.... He sat there,

motionless, almost unable to think.... Once the thought rose dully in

his brain: "Was this how Sebastian felt? I didn't understand...."

When he heard a rustle in the doorway he didn't look up. His first

sight of Jane was when she came round the table, dropped on her knees

beside him.

"Vernon, my dear, what is it? I knew there was something when you

didn't come to the supper. I came to see."

Dully, mechanically, he held out the note to her. She took it and read

it. She laid it down again on the table.

He said in a dull bewildered voice: "She needn't have said that about

not being safe with me. She would have been safe with me."

"Oh! Vernon--my dear...."

Her arms went round him. He clutched at her suddenly--a frightened

clutch such as a child might give at its mother. A sob burst from his

throat. He laid his face down on the gleaming white skin of her neck.

"Oh! Jane ... Jane...."

She held him closer. She stroked his hair. He murmured:

"Stay with me. Stay with me. Don't leave me."

She answered: "I won't leave you. It's all right."

Her voice was tender--motherly. Something broke in him like the

breaking of a dam. Ideas swirled and rushed through his head. His

father kissing Winnie at Abbots Puissants ... the statue in the South

Kensington ... Jane's body ... her beautiful body.

He said hoarsely: "Stay with me."

Her arms round him, her lips on his forehead, she murmured back: "I'll

stay with you, dear."

Like a mother to a child.

He wrenched himself suddenly free.

"Not like that. Not like that. Like this."

His lips fastened on hers--fiercely, hungrily--his hand clutched at the

roundness of her breast. He'd always wanted her--always. He knew it

now. It was her body he wanted, that beautiful gracious body that Boris

Androv had known so well.

He said again: "Stay with me."

There was a long pause--it seemed to him as though minutes, hours,

years passed before she answered.

She said: "_I'll stay...._"

chapter 4

On a day in July Sebastian Levinne walked along the Embankment in the

direction of Jane's flat. It was a day more suggestive of early spring

than of summer. A cold wind blew the dust in his face and made him

blink.

There was a change visible in Sebastian. He had grown perceptibly

older. There was very little of the boy about him now--there never had

been much. He had always had that curious maturity of outlook which is

the Semitic inheritance. As he walked along now, frowning to himself

and pondering, he would easily have been taken for a man over thirty.

Jane herself opened the door of the flat to him. She spoke in a low

unusually husky voice.

"Vernon's out. He couldn't wait for you. You said three, you know, and

it's past four now."

"I was kept. Just as well, perhaps. I'm never quite sure of the best

way of dealing with Vernon's nerves."

"Don't tell me any fresh crises have arisen? I couldn't bear it."

"Oh! you'll get used to them. I've had to. What's the matter with your

voice, Jane?"

"A cold. A throat, rather. It's all right. I'm nursing it."

"My God! and _The Princess in the Tower_ to-morrow night. Suppose

you can't sing?"

"Oh! I shall sing. Don't be afraid. Only don't mind my whispering. I

want to save it every bit I can."

"Of course. You've seen someone, I suppose?"

"My usual man in Harley Street."

"What did he say?"

"The usual things."

"He didn't forbid you to sing to-morrow?"

"Oh! no."

"You're an awfully good liar, aren't you, Jane?"

"I thought it would save trouble. But I might have known it would be no

good with you. I'll be honest. He warned me that I'd been persistently

overstraining my voice for years. He said it was madness to sing

to-morrow night. But I don't care."

"My dear Jane, I'm not going to risk your losing your voice."

"Mind your own business, Sebastian. My voice is my affair. I don't

interfere in your concerns, don't interfere in mine."

Sebastian grinned.

"The tiger cat at home," he remarked. "But you mustn't, Jane, all the

same. Does Vernon know?"

"Of course not. What do you think? And you're not to tell him,

Sebastian."

"I don't interfere really," said Sebastian. "I never have. But Jane

dear, it will be ten thousand pities. The opera's not worth it. And

Vernon's not worth it either. Be angry with me if you like for saying

so."

"Why should I be angry with you? It's the truth and I know it. All the

same, I'm going through with it. Call me any kind of a conceited egoist

you like, but _The Princess in the Tower_ won't be a success

without me. I've been a success as Isolde and a furore as Solveig. It's

my moment. And it's going to be Vernon's moment too. I can at least do

that for him."

He heard the undercurrent of feeling, the unconscious betrayal of

that "at least," but not by a muscle of his face did he show that he

had realized its significance. He only said again very gently: "He's

not worth it, Jane. Paddle your own canoe. It's the only way. You've

arrived. Vernon hasn't and may never."

"I know. I know. No one's what you call 'worth it'--except perhaps one

person."

"Who?"

"_You_, Sebastian. _You're_ worth it--and yet it's not for

you I'm doing it!"

Sebastian was surprised and touched. A sudden mist came over his eyes.

He stretched out his hand and took Jane's. They sat for a minute or two

in silence.

"That was nice of you, Jane," he said at last.

"Well, it's true. You're worth a dozen of Vernon. You've got brains,

initiative, strength of character...."

Her husky voice died away. After another minute or two he said very

gently:

"How are things? Much as usual?"

"Yes, I think so. You know Mrs. Deyre came to see me?"

"No, I didn't. What did she want?"

"She came to beg me to give up her boy. Pointed out how I was ruining

his life. Only a really bad woman would do what I was doing. And so on.

You can guess the kind of thing."

"And what did you say to her?" asked Sebastian curiously.

Jane shrugged her shoulders.

"What could I say? That to Vernon one harlot was as good as another?"

"Oh! my dear," said Sebastian gently. "Is it as bad as that?"

Jane got up, lighted a cigarette, and walked restlessly about the room.

Sebastian noticed how haggard her face had become.

"Is he--more or less all right?" he ventured.

"He drinks too much," said Jane curtly.

"Can't you prevent it?"

"No, I can't."

"It's queer. I should have thought you would always have great

influence over Vernon."

"Well, I haven't. Not now." She was silent for a moment and then said:

"Nell's being married in the autumn, isn't she?"

"Yes. Do you think things will be--better then?"

"I haven't the least idea."

"I wish to God he'd pull up," said Sebastian. "If you can't keep him

straight, Jane, nobody can. Of course, it's in the blood."

She came and sat down again.

"Tell me--tell me everything you know. About his people--his father,

his mother."

Sebastian gave a succinct account of the Deyres. Jane listened.

"His mother you've seen," he concluded. "Queer, isn't it, that Vernon

doesn't seem to have inherited one single thing from her? He's a Deyre

through and through. They are all artistic, musical, weak-willed,

self-indulgent, and attractive to women. Heredity's an odd thing."

"I don't quite agree with you," said Jane. "Vernon's not like his

mother, but he _has_ inherited something from her."

"What?"

"Vitality. She's an extraordinarily fine animal--have you ever thought

of her that way? Well, Vernon's inherited some of that. Without it he'd

never have been a composer. If he were a Deyre pure and simple he'd

only have _dallied_ with music. It's the Bent force that gives him

the power to create. You say his grandfather built up their business

single-handed. Well, there's the same thing in Vernon."

"I wonder if you're right."

"I'm sure I am."

Sebastian considered silently for some minutes.

"Is it only drink?" he said at last. "Or is it--well, I mean, are

there--other people?"

"Oh! there are others."

"And you don't mind?"

"Mind? Mind? Of course I mind. What do you think I'm made of,

Sebastian? I'm nearly killed with minding.... But what can I do? Make

scenes? Rant and rave and drive Vernon away from me altogether?"

Her beautiful husky voice rose from its whisper. Sebastian made a quick

gesture and she stopped.

"You're right. I must be careful."

"I can't understand it," grumbled Sebastian. "Even his music doesn't

seem to mean anything to Vernon now. He's taken every suggestion from

Radmaager and been like a lamb. It's unnatural!"

"We must wait. It will come back. It's reaction--reaction and Nell

together. I can't help feeling that if _The Princess in the Tower_

is a success, Vernon will pull himself together. He must feel a certain

pride--a sense of achievement."

"I hope so," said Sebastian heavily. "But I'm a bit worried about the

future."

"In what way? What are you afraid of?"

"War."

Jane looked at him in astonishment. She could hardly believe her ears.

She thought she must have mistaken the word.

"_War?_"

"Yes. The outcome of this Sarajevo business."

It still seemed to Jane a little absurd and ridiculous.

"War with whom?"

"Germany--principally."

"Oh! surely, Sebastian. Such a--a--far-away thing."

"What does the pretext matter?" said Sebastian impatiently. "It's the

way money has been going. Money talks. I handle money--our relations in

Russia handle money. We know. From the way money has been behaving for

some time we can guess what is in the wind. War's coming, Jane."

Jane looked at him and changed her mind. Sebastian was in earnest, and

Sebastian usually knew what he was talking about. If he said war was

coming, then, fantastic as it seemed, war would come.

Sebastian sat still, lost in thought. Money, investments, various

loans, financial responsibilities he had undertaken, the future of his

theatres, the policy to be adopted by the weekly paper he owned. Then,

of course, there would be fighting. He was the son of a naturalized

Englishman. He didn't wish in the least to go and fight, but he

supposed it would be necessary. Everyone below a certain age would do

so as a matter of course. It was not the danger that worried him, it

was the annoyance of leaving his pet schemes to be looked after by

someone else. "They'll make a mess of it, sure to," thought Sebastian

bitterly. He put the war down as being a long job--two years, perhaps

more. In the end, he shouldn't wonder if America was dragged into it.

The government would issue loans--war loans would be a good

investment. No highbrow stuff for the theatres. Soldiers on leave

would want light comedy--pretty girls--legs--dancing. He thought

it all out carefully. It was a good thing to get a chance to think

uninterruptedly. Being with Jane was like being alone. She always knew

when you didn't want to be spoken to.

He looked across at her. She, too, was thinking. He wondered what she

was thinking about--you never quite knew with Jane. She and Vernon were

alike there--didn't tell their thoughts. She was probably thinking

about Vernon. If Vernon should go to the war and be killed! But

no--that mustn't be. Sebastian's artistic soul rebelled. Vernon mustn't

be killed.

_2_

The production of _The Princess in the Tower_ has been forgotten

by now. It came at an unfortunate time, since war broke out only about

three weeks later.

At the time it was what is called "well received." Certain critics

waxed a little sarcastic over this "new school of young musicians" who

thought they could revolutionize all existing ideas. Others praised it

with sincerity as a work of great promise, though immature. But one and

all spoke enthusiastically of the perfect beauty and artistry of the

whole performance. Everyone "went to Holborn, such miles out of the

way, dear, but really worth it," to see the attractive fantastic drama,

and "that wonderful new singer, Jane Harding. Her _face_, dear, is

simply wonderful--quite mediæval. It wouldn't be the same without her!"

It was a triumph for Jane, though a triumph that was short-lived. On

the fifth day she was forced to retire from the cast.

Sebastian was summoned by telephone at an hour when Vernon would not be

there. Jane met him with such a radiant smile that he thought at first

that his fears were not going to be realized.

"It's no good, Sebastian. Mary Lloyd must go on with it. She's not too

bad, considering. As a matter of fact, she's got a better voice than I

have and she's quite nice-looking."

"H'm, I was afraid Hershall would say that. I'd like to see him

myself."

"Yes, he wants to see you. Not that there's anything to be done, I'm

afraid."

"What do you mean? Nothing to be done?"

"It's gone, my child. Gone for good. Hershall's too honest to hold out

any real hope. He says of course you never can be absolutely sure. It

might come back with rest, _et cetera, et cetera_. He said it very

well, and then I looked at him and laughed--and then he had to look

shamefaced and own up. He was relieved, I think, at the way I took it."

"But Jane, darling Jane...."

"Oh! don't mind so much, Sebastian. Please don't. It's so much easier

if you don't. It's been a gamble, you know, all along--my voice was

never really strong enough. I gambled with it. So far I won--now, I've

lost. Well, there it is! One must be a good gambler and not let the

hands twitch. Isn't that what they say at Monte Carlo?"

"Does Vernon know?"

"Yes. He's most awfully upset. He loved my voice. He's really quite

broken-hearted about it."

"But he doesn't know that----"

"That if I had waited two days, and not sung on the opening night of

his opera, it would have been all right? No, he doesn't know that. And

if you are loyal to me, Sebastian, he never will."

"I shan't make promises. I think he ought to know."

"No, because really it's unwarrantable what I've done! I've laid him

under an obligation to me without his knowledge. That's a thing one

shouldn't do. It isn't fair. If I had gone to Vernon and told him what

Hershall said, do you suppose he would ever have consented to let me

sing? He'd have prevented me by main force. It would be the meanest and

cruellest thing in the world to go to Vernon now and say: 'See what I

have done for you!' Snivelling and asking for sympathy and gratitude

ladled out in a soup plate."

Sebastian was silent.

"Come now, my dear, agree."

"Yes," said Sebastian at last. "You're right. What you did was

unethical. You did it without Vernon's knowledge, and it's got to be

kept from him now. But oh! Jane darling, why did you? Is Vernon's music

worth it?"

"It will be--some day."

"Is that why you did it?"

Jane shook her head.

"I thought not."

There was a pause, Sebastian said: "What will you do now, Jane?"

"Possibly teach. Possibly go on the stage. I don't know. If the worst

comes to the worst, I can always cook."

They both laughed, but Jane was very near tears.

She looked across the table at Sebastian and then suddenly rose and

came and knelt down beside him. She laid her head down on his shoulder

and he put his arm round her.

"Oh! Sebastian ... Sebastian ..."

"Poor old Jane!"

"I pretend I don't mind--but I do ... I do. I loved singing. I loved

it, loved it, loved it.... That lovely Whitsuntide music of Solveig. I

shall never sing it again."

"I know. Why were you such a fool, Jane?"

"I don't know. Sheer idiocy."

"If you had the choice again----"

"I'd do the same thing again."

A silence. Then Jane lifted her head and said:

"Do you remember saying, Sebastian, that I had great 'driving power'?

That nothing would turn me aside? And I said that I might be more

easily turned aside than you thought. That between Vernon and me, I

should go to the wall."

Sebastian said: "Things are queer."

Jane slipped down on the floor beside him, her hand still in his.

"You can be clever," said Sebastian, breaking the silence. "You can

have the brains to foresee things, and the wits to plan things, and the

force to succeed, but with all the cleverness in the world you can't

avoid suffering some way or another. That's what's so odd. I know I've

got brains, I know I'll get to the top of anything I undertake. I'm not

like Vernon. Vernon will either be a heaven-sent genius, or else he'll

be an idle dissipated young man. He's got a gift if he's got anything,

I've got ability. And yet with all the ability in the world, I can't

prevent myself getting hurt."

"No one can."

"One might, perhaps, if one gave up one's whole life to it. If you

pursued safety and nothing but safety. You'd get your wings singed,

perhaps, but that would be all. You'd build a nice smooth wall and hide

yourself inside it."

"You're thinking of somebody in particular? Who?"

"Just a fancy. The future Mrs. George Chetwynd, if you want to be

exact."

"Nell? Do you think Nell has the strength of character to shut herself

out from life?"

"Oh! Nell has got an enormous power of developing protective colouring.

Some species have." He paused, then went on: "Jane, have you ever heard

from--Joe?"

"Yes, my dear, twice."

"What did she say?"

"Very little. Just what fun everything was, and how she was enjoying

herself, and how splendid one felt when one had had the courage to defy

convention." She paused and then added: "She's not happy, Sebastian."

"You think not?"

"I'm sure of it."

There was a long silence. Two unhappy faces looked into the empty

fireplace. Outside taxis hooted as they sped rapidly down the

Embankment. Life went on....

_3_

It was the ninth of August. Nell Vereker turned out of Paddington

Station and walked slowly down toward the park. Four-wheelers passed

her with old ladies in them laden with many hams. Staring placards were

flaunted at every street corner. In every shop was a queue of people

anxious to buy commodities.

Nell had said to herself many times: "We're at war--actually at war,"

and had not been able to believe it. To-day, for the first time, it

seemed to come home to her. A train journey where the ticket office

refused to change a five-pound note had proved the turning point.

Ridiculous, but there it was.

A taxi passed and Nell hailed it. She got in, giving the address of

Jane's flat in Chelsea. She glanced at her watch. It was just half-past

ten. No fear that Jane would be out so early.

Nell went up in the lift and stood outside the door, having rung the

bell. Her heart was beating nervously. In another minute the door would

open. Her small face grew white and strained. Ah! now the door was

opening. She and Jane were face to face.

She thought Jane started a little--that was all.

"Oh!" she said. "It's you."

"Yes," said Nell. "May I come in, please?"

It seemed to her that Jane hesitated a minute before drawing back to

let her enter. She retreated into the hall, shut a door at the far

end, and then drew open the sitting-room door for Nell to pass in. She

followed her, closing the door behind her.

"Well?"

"Jane, I've come to ask you if you know where Vernon is."

"Vernon?"

"Yes. I went to his rooms--yesterday. He's left. The woman there didn't

know where he'd gone. She said his letters were forwarded to you. I

went home and wrote to you asking for his address. Then I was afraid

you wouldn't tell me, wouldn't even answer, perhaps, and I thought I'd

come instead."

"I see."

The tone was noncommittal, unhelpful. Nell hurried on.

"I was sure you'd know where he was. You do, don't you?"

"Yes, I know."

A slow answer, unnecessarily slow, Nell thought. Either Jane knew or

she didn't.

Again a pause. Then Jane said: "Why do you want to see Vernon, Nell?"

Nell raised a white face.

"Because I've been such a beast--such a beast! I see it now--now

that this awful war has come. I was such a miserable coward. I hate

myself--simply hate myself. Just because George was kind and good

and--yes, rich! Oh, Jane, how you must despise me! I know you do.

You're quite right to despise me. Somehow this war has made everything

clear--don't you find that?"

"Not particularly. There have been wars before and there will be wars

again. They don't really alter anything underneath, you know."

Nell was not paying attention.

"It's wicked to do anything except marry the man you love. I do love

Vernon. I always knew I loved him, but I just hadn't the courage....

Oh! Jane, do you think it's too late? Perhaps it is. Perhaps he won't

want me now. But I _must_ see him. Even if he doesn't want me. I

must tell him."

She stood there looking piteously up at Jane. Would Jane help her? If

not, she must try Sebastian--but she was afraid of Sebastian. He might

refuse flatly to do anything.

"I could get hold of him for you," said Jane slowly, after a minute or

two.

"Oh! thank you, Jane. And Jane--tell me--the war?"

"He's applied to join up, if that's what you mean."

"Yes. Oh! it's dreadful--if he should be killed. But it can't last

long. It'll be over by Christmas--everybody says so."

"Sebastian says it will last two years."

"Oh! but Sebastian can't know. He's not really English. He's Russian."

Jane shook her head. Then she said: "I'll go and--" she

paused--"telephone. Wait here."

She went out, closing the door behind her. She went to the end of the

passage and into the bedroom. Vernon raised a dark rumpled head from

the pillow.

"Get up," said Jane curtly. "Wash yourself and shave yourself and try

and make yourself reasonably decent. Nell's here and wants to see you."

"Nell! But----"

"She thinks I'm telephoning to you. When you're ready, you can go

outside the front door and ring the bell--and may God have mercy on

both our souls."

"But Jane. Nell ... what does she want?"

"If you want to marry her, Vernon, now is your chance."

"But I'll have to tell her----"

"What? That you've been leading a 'gay life,' that you've been 'wild'?

All the usual euphemisms! That's all she'll expect--and she'll be

grateful to you for laying as little stress on that as possible.

But tell her about you and me and you bring it from the general to

the particular--and take the child through hell. Muzzle that noble

conscience of yours and think of her."

Vernon rose slowly from the bed.

"I don't understand you, Jane."

"No, probably you never will."

He said: "Has Nell thrown over George Chetwynd?"

"I haven't asked for details. I'm going back to her now. Hurry up."

She left the room. Vernon thought: "I've never understood Jane. I

never shall. She's so damned disconcerting. Well, I suppose I've been

a sort of passing amusement to her. No, that's ungrateful. She's been

damned decent to me. Nobody could have been more decent than Jane has

been. But I couldn't make Nell understand that. She'd think Jane was

dreadful...."

As he shaved and washed rapidly he said to himself: "All the same, it's

out of the question. Nell and I could never come together again. Oh! I

don't suppose there's any question of that. She's probably only come

to ask me to forgive her, to make her feel comfortable in case I get

killed in this bloody war. The sort of thing a girl would do. Anyway, I

don't believe I care any more."

Another voice, deep down, said ironically: "Oh! no, not at all. Then

why is your heart beating and your hand shaking? You bloody ass, of

course you care!"

He was ready. He went outside--rang the bell. A mean

subterfuge--unworthy--he felt ashamed. Jane opened the door. She said,

rather like a parlour maid, "In here," and waved him toward the sitting

room. He went in, closing the door behind him.

Nell had risen at his entrance. She stood with her hands clasped in

front of her.

Her voice came faint and weak, like a guilty child.

"Oh! Vernon...."

Time swept backward. He was in the boat at Cambridge ... on the bridge

at Ranelagh. He forgot Jane, he forgot everything. He and Nell were the

only people in the world.

"Nell!"

They were clinging together, breathless as though they had been

running. Words tumbled from Nell's lips.

"Vernon--if you want--I do love you--Oh! I do.... I'll marry

you any time--at once--to-day. I don't mind about being poor or

_anything_!"

He lifted her off her feet, kissed her eyes, her hair, her lips.

"Darling--oh! darling. Don't let's waste a minute--not a minute. I

don't know how you get married. I've never thought about it. But let's

go out and see. We'll go to the Archbishop of Canterbury--isn't that

what you do? and get a special licence. How the devil _do_ you get

married?"

"We might ask a clergyman?"

"Or there's a Registry Office. That's the thing."

"I don't think I want to be married at a Registry Office. I'd feel

rather like a cook or a house parlourmaid being engaged."

"I don't think it's that kind, darling. But if you'd rather be married

in a church, let's be married in a church. There are thousands of

churches in London, all with nothing to do. I'm sure one of them will

love to marry us."

They went out together, laughing happily. Vernon had forgotten

everything--remorse, conscience, Jane....

At half-past two that afternoon Vernon Deyre and Eleanor Vereker were

married in the church of St. Ethelred's, Chelsea.