She shrugged her shoulders and looked away, so that he should not see

the quivering of her mouth. "It's made everything impossible. I admire

him more than ever. I admire him for having told the truth and for

having climbed so far up by his gallantry. But---- I'm no fool, Tabs. I

know that I couldn't marry him without bringing ridicule upon all of us.

Noble notions about human equality don't work in practice. He's what he

is--fine of his kind. He's finer than you or I, Tabs, only he's not our

sort. He couldn't ever become our sort. If I were as big as he is, I

might not mind. But I'm little and mean; I care so much for caste. And

yet, in spite of that, I want to marry him. I oughtn't to tell you, of

all people. But I can't tell him and I can't tell any one--any one but

you, Tabs. I want him so much that I'm ashamed sometimes. I wouldn't

have my people know it, so you must stick by me. Do at least as much for

me as you promised to do for Maisie--stay with me till I can forget

him." And then she added ruefully, "It isn't much fun for you after all

you'd expected."

He couldn't afford to let her become emotional. Riders and smart

equipages were passing. Several times already they had been recognized.

The introduction of Maisie's name supplied him with a loophole. "Mrs.

Lockwood rather adds to our complication. If I'm not engaged to you and

I see something of her, your father will never understand. If I were

your father, I wouldn't. To be perfectly frank, he thinks already that

I'm lenient to Maisie only because she's good-looking----"

Terry didn't permit him to get further. "Daddy's probably right. Be

honest, Tabs. Would you have stood up for her, if you'd found her fat

and forty? Of course you wouldn't. Maisie's a dear, but she's dangerous.

She can't help being dangerous; it's half her attraction. By the way,

we've been walking entirely in the wrong direction."

They had come out by Hyde Park Corner. "How do you make that out?" he

asked. "I thought we would lunch at the Ritz."

She began to apologize. "Before I met you this morning, I'd arranged for

us to lunch with her--I mean with Maisie. You don't mind, do you? I was

speaking with her over the phone and she said we must come because she

didn't feel safe."

"She said that to you, too! She said the same thing to me. But you and

I, do we want her?"

Terry nodded, making her eyes wide. "We'll all make each other more

safe. That's what friends are for. I told her we'd be at her house by

one."

"If you told her that----" He was trying to discover whether he was

relieved or disappointed. With an eagerness which it was hard to account

for, he was wondering whether Lady Dawn would be there. He pulled out

his watch. "Twelve-forty-five. We can just do it in a taxi. If you told

her that, we'd better stick to your plans."

He hailed a driver who was passing and helped her into the cab.

II

As he and Terry chugged their way to Mulberry Tree Court he eyed her,

sitting beside him. Would he ever get her? If he did, would she prove to

be one of his really big things? All men must have thought that their

wives would be the really big things in their lives before they married

them. How many of them thought that six months after they were married?

There was Adair, for instance. But his wife was going to be the big

thing--on that he was determined.

And yet, it wasn't very big of Terry to be using him as a stalking-horse

for her love for Braithwaite; he felt morally certain that that was what

she was doing. She hadn't acknowledged to having seen him, but Tabs felt

instinctively that she had seen him. He also felt that within the next

twenty-four hours she would be seeing him again. It was impossible for

him to accuse her of clandestine meetings of which he had no proof; at

the same time he was distressed by the restraint that was put upon

himself. As things were, anything might happen. When it did happen, it

would happen suddenly and he would be in a measure to blame.

And here again, in this luncheon with Maisie, he was being made a party

to her policy of secrecy. There could be no doubt that Sir Tobias was in

ignorance of her continual correspondence with Maisie.

He looked at her. How near she seemed to him and yet in reality what

miles away! He could listen to her voice. He could touch her. But he

could not foresee a single one of her future actions. She was remote and

strange and dear. She had offered to become engaged to him, but she was

no part of him. She filled him with discomfort and unrest. For the first

time he dared to frame his charge against her. It was in almost the same

words as the charge which she herself had brought against Braithwaite.

He could love her so that it seemed that if he did not win her, he would

never be able to love any other woman; but he could not trust her. He

began to question whether she had ever been the woman he had tried to

think her. Perhaps she was only a dummy and his imagination had clothed

her with affection. He had attributed to her adorable qualities----

When all was said, how little he really knew about her! His need of her

fought with his sense of discretion. It was not dignified that a man of

his position and years should allow himself to become a shuttlecock in

the hands of her capricious inexperience. Would he ever be able to

bridge that gulf of years! Lady Beddow's unhappy criticism haunted him.

"He lacks ardor." Perhaps she was right; experience should marry

experience and inexperience inexperience.

As they sped down the Brompton Road, they passed the end of Honeymoon

Square. In the enclosed garden among spring flowers children were still

playing. Scattered here and there, under the thin shade of blossoming

trees, he caught glimpses of white prams with their attendant nurses.

The little houses--his own among them--stood all a-row, shoulder to

shoulder, looking intensely smiling and habitable. His imagination

reconjured all the midnights they had witnessed--the home-comings under

cover of darkness, the secret endearments of lovers, the muffled

laughter. Then he remembered his own dream, which he had planned to

share with her. It was intolerable that it should escape conversion into

reality.

It seemed little short of marvelous that she should still sit beside

him. She should have vanished with the Square. Had he given her a name,

he would have called her his lady in heliotrope, for she was dressed in

a heliotrope gown, trimmed round the hem and throat with gray opossum

and topped with a little close-fitting turban of color and fur to match.

She looked so dainty and subtly haughty, so austere in her virginal

beauty, that it seemed to him he must have wronged her with his silent

conjectures.

"You're more than ordinarily pretty to-day," he said.

"Am I? What you mean, I suppose, is that you like my gown. It's a new

one. I'm wearing it for the first time, especially for you."

She turned her laughing face towards him, violet eyes, flushed cheeks,

golden hair, white teeth--everything aflash with instant gratitude. The

discovery of how easily he could command her happiness touched him.

"Can I make you as merry as all that just by telling you you're

beautiful?"

She compressed her lips and nodded. "It's not being told. That doesn't

matter. It's being told by you."

He felt for the moment that he had recovered her--that he had bridged

the gulf of the years that divided. Before anything further could be

said, they were halting in Mulberry Tree Court.

III

On entering the house with the marigold-tinted curtains he had glanced

round casually for any signs of Lady Dawn. After Porter had shown him

into the drawing-room Terry had left him to go in search of Maisie. He

walked over to the tall French-windows and found himself once more

gazing out on the garden-rockery with its oval lake, its silent fountain

and its toy-boat that never sailed anywhere. He made an effort to

continue gazing out, for his impulse was to turn and look at the

portrait over the fireplace. He tantalized himself by trying to ignore

it. But it was strange the fascination that it held for him. He had the

feeling that behind his back the face had changed from the profile

position in which it had been painted, so that the steady stone-gray

eyes were challenging his attention. At last he resisted no longer;

walking over to the fireplace, he stood gazing up at it.

For a moment he tried to pretend to himself that his interest was purely

an art-interest. It was Sargent's brush-work that he was admiring. Then

he smiled, as much to the portrait as to himself. "Princess Czarina

Bolsheviki," he murmured, "were you really looking at me when my back

was turned? Did you flash your eyes away directly I obeyed your desire?

It's the trick of every woman; but you're not like every woman, Princess

Czarina Bolsheviki."

It seemed to him almost as though the woman on the canvas was about to

relax her pose and quiver into life. The longer he looked, the less

aloof she became and the more her serenity trembled. He felt that he

knew so much about her--so very much more than he had ever been told.

There were experiences of pride and terror which were common to them

both--the pride and terror of appalling heart-hunger. He knew for

certain, as though those painted lips had confessed it, that he was the

one man in the world who had the power to make her cry. And yet he

dissociated in his mind the woman of the portrait from the woman who had

slipped past him out of the night with the taunting, sideways smile of

feminine triumph. The living woman could wound and disappoint; the

woman of the portrait was his friend entirely.

He was startled out of the mood into which he had fallen by the sound of

footsteps crossing the hall. He was not going to be discovered in that

position by Maisie for a second time. He had barely recovered his place

by the French window, when she and Terry entered laughing. It would have

been easy to have mistaken them for sisters, with their golden heads and

clear complexions. Directly he caught sight of them he guessed by the

mischief in their eyes that their laughter had been at his expense. It

was Terry who spoke. "Oh, Tabs, how could you? It was like a little

frightened boy."

He glanced from one to the other of them for further enlightenment. "Do

what? If you'll let me know, I'll tell you."

"Run away, like you did last night," Maisie explained. "I've just been

describing it to Terry. There was I sitting on the couch when Di

entered. The first thing she asked me was, 'Who's your new butler?' I

wouldn't tell her. 'He'll be here in a minute,' I said; 'I'll introduce

him to you.' We waited for about a minute and, when you didn't come, I

went out into the hall. 'He's gone, Madam,' Porter told me in her most

Mayfair manner. 'Gone!' I exclaimed. 'He can't have gone without saying

good-by.' But I was afraid you had, so I went on to the steps and called

after you. I don't know whether you heard me. When I came back into the

drawing-room, Di was smiling. 'I've read about lordly butlers,' she

said, 'but it's the first time I ever met one.' So there you are! You

can imagine what a trouble I had to clear myself. I only downed her

suspicions when I assured her that you were on the point of becoming

engaged to Terry."

Instantly Terry's eyes sought his; the laughter died out of them. He

shared her annoyance that Lady Dawn should have received this piece of

information--Lady Dawn of all persons. He wasn't engaged to Terry. He

was a long way from being engaged to her--perhaps further at this moment

than since his return.

The silence that followed made Maisie aware that she had been guilty of

a mistake. He suspected that she had intended to be guilty of it from

the start. Nevertheless, she played the part of innocence, making her

cornflower eyes eloquent with apology. "Oh, I'm afraid I've put my foot

in it. But you are almost engaged, aren't you?"

Tabs laughed good-humoredly. "It's all right, Mrs. Lockwood. You didn't

mean to, but you've paid me back in more than my own coin."

Porter relieved the tension at that moment by announcing that lunch was

served.

When they had taken their seats in the front-room, overlooking the

make-believe village-green, Terry surprised them by saying carelessly,

"Oh, Maisie, you remember General Braithwaite whom we nursed in our

hospital?"

Maisie looked up sharply, trying to warn her that Porter was still

present. "Of course I remember him," she said. "Since then we've both

met him a hundred times. I think Lord Taborley would like some bread,

Porter."

But Terry wasn't to be deterred. She seemed to be taking a perverse

delight in introducing the one subject on which it would have been most

fitting for her to have remained silent. "Since Tabs came back we've

found out all about the General. You'll never guess who he really is or

was. It's difficult to say whether he is or was, now that he's

demobilized."

Tabs recognized the blaze of recklessness in her eyes, like the glare of

lighted windows after nightfall from which the curtains have been

suddenly thrown back. He had seen that look in her eyes at the hunt

when, in disobedience to shouted warnings, she had looked back across

her shoulder challengingly before taking an audacious jump. There was in

her expression the fear of the thing she was about to do and the panic

of determination to get it done. He attempted to turn her aside from the

danger by slipping in quietly, "I don't think I'd discuss the General at

this moment."

"At this moment!" she flashed back with a scared smile. The sound of her

own voice seemed to clap spurs to her excitement. "Why not at this

moment, dear Tabs? Everything comes out sooner or later. If there's

going to be any spreading of gossip, one takes the sting out of it by

being the first to spread it. Besides, you oughtn't to mind. You ought

to feel most frightfully bucked."

"Nevertheless, I don't think I'd say it."

Then he held his breath for, paying no heed to him, she had turned to

Maisie. "You mustn't laugh, but it's too good to keep to oneself.

Before he was a General, what do you think he did for a living? He used

to clean Lord Taborley's boots. You don't believe it, but it's a fact.

Daddy's terribly grim with me over it. Of course it was _infra dig_ to

go footing all over town with your best friend's valet. But how was I to

know that he'd been that? Daddy says I ought to have sensed it, if I'd

had any sort of a social instinct. But here's the funniest thing of all,

the way we made the discovery. I'd invited him to dine at our house on

the very night that Tabs was Daddy's guest. I'll never forget your

faces, Tabs, when Daddy introduced the two of you." She commenced to

pantomime the scene with forced gayety; then she pretended to become

aware for the first time that they weren't joining in her laughter.

"What's wrong? You look as solemn as a funeral. Don't you find it

amusing?"

Porter was leaving the room. Maisie waited till the door had closed.

Then, "You didn't intend it to be amusing. Why on earth did you say all

this before her?"

Under the rebuke Terry's face flushed defiance. She was near to tears,

but she contrived to go on smiling. "When I want all the world to know

anything that's private, I mention it before servants. It always works."

"But----" Maisie was at a loss to find a motive for such indiscretion.

She glanced helplessly at Tabs. "But," she objected, "surely you don't

want all the world to know about this, Terry? You and the General have

been such good pals, and---- I have to say it, even though Lord

Taborley is present: there were a great number of your friends who were

rather afraid----"

"Then they won't have to be afraid any longer," Terry cut in with icy

sweetness. "When it's reported to the General that I've told this story,

he won't have to be rather afraid either. It'll set all his doubts at

rest."

Tabs had sat puzzled and horrified while she had been talking.

Everything that he could remember about her was gentle; it wasn't like

her to be cruel. Now at last he realized that it was for his sake that

she was being cruel--far more cruel to herself than to any one else. She

had so little faith in her strength to break with Braithwaite that she

was building up a protective wall of contempt by the spread of this

damaging story. If Braithwaite heard it, she might well hope to rouse

his hatred and save herself further effort.

From across the table her eyes sought his in appeal; his answered hers

with intuitive comprehension. But his mind was stunned with apprehension

at the discovery that her passion for this man meant so much that his

hate would be a lighter burden than his love.

Maisie turned to Tabs with veiled disdain. "I suppose it was you who

told her this, Lord Taborley?"

He paid her scant attention and continued looking at Terry. "On the

contrary." He spoke with unruffled urbanity. "It was General

Braithwaite--Steely Jack as he was nicknamed in the Army. He never lost

an inch of trench, so they say. Like your own first husband, Mrs.

Lockwood, he's most to be feared when every one else would have given up

hoping. Like myself, though he doesn't know it, he's a round-the-corner

person. Curious, Terry, that you should have attracted two

round-the-corner admirers! It makes one almost believe that you're a

round-the-corner person yourself."

He had said it without consciousness of magnanimity. There was nothing

magnanimous about stating the truth according to his code of honor. He

was seeing the bleak look that would come into Braithwaite's face should

he hear of this happening. He was wondering whether Braithwaite

possessed the insight into feminine strategy not to take offense, but to

interpret it as surrender.

Terry was speaking again. "My dear Maisie, if ever you get to know Lord

Taborley, you'll learn to have a better opinion of him. He plays with

all his cards on the table. I think most men play like that. It's we

women who cheat and carry spare aces and revoke when the game's going

against us." Then came her amazing burst of frankness, "Like you did

when, to suit your own purpose, you pretended that we were on the point

of becoming engaged. Like I did when I told that story just now about

Steely Jack. And again like you've done all along in your dealings with

Adair. Why, even now, when you're ready to give him up, you can't play

the cards that are on the table; you have to try to borrow Lord Taborley

from me. Don't get angry. I'm not accusing you especially. We women are

all the same; there's not one of us who can stick to the rules of the

game." Her glance shifted to Tabs. "You used to think that I was the

exception. You see, I'm not. The wonder is that men can even pretend to

respect us."

Long after she had finished and the conversation had taken a new turn,

she went on gazing at him, raising and lowering her eyes as she ate her

lunch, begging him to understand.

"You're wrong, Terry." In her capacity as hostess, Maisie was making an

attempt to get away from personalities. She was too convicted by what

had been said to consider it wise to defend herself. "You're wrong. Men

don't want to respect us. They love us for having faults that they

wouldn't tolerate in themselves. They encourage us to cultivate them. It

flatters their integrity to discover our dishonesties. They like to

believe that we're cowards. They don't expect us to tell the truth. They

almost resent our having a sense of honor. The woman who cheats at every

turn and then cries in their arms when she's found out, is the kind of

woman who always has a man to take care of her. Look at my sister, Lady

Dawn. She's never been known to cry. She's missed everything in life

through being almost repellently honorable."

In the discussion that followed Tabs took no part, though he was often

appealed to for an opinion. As he listened to their modulated flow of

voices, their refined and gentle intonations, their evasive, slyly

uttered words, he began to have an understanding of what was taking

place. It was something primitive--the oldest of all battles. Neither

of them wanted him, but each was prompted to covet the pretense of his

possession. Their hunting instincts were aroused. He had taken on a

sudden value in their eyes because each had discovered that the other

was in pursuit of him.

His thoughts went back to Lady Dawn--to her pale aloofness. She wasn't

like this--she was different from all other women. It was ridiculous

that he should be so sure that she was different when his only proof was

a portrait, quite certainly idealized. He began to argue with himself

again as to whether he ought to seek her out and endanger her serenity

by telling her about Lord Dawn. It would be useless to confide such

intentions to Maisie. He would obtain no help from her. She could

conceive of no sympathy between a man and woman into which sex did not

enter. The thought of sex in connection with Lady Dawn seemed an

impertinence.

The discussion went on. Luncheon was at an end. Coffee had been served.

Cigarettes were being lighted. Again and again he was referred to. Did

he think this and didn't he agree to that? Wasn't this true of the way

in which men regarded women? Their differences of opinion seemed so

trivial. Their views so immature and amateurish. He watched them with

curious, brooding attention. They were so nobly tender in their outward

forms. He appreciated the grace of their gestures, the fine-boned

smallness of their bodies, the delicacy of their molding, the tendril

thinness of their fingers, the sagacity of their tiny aristocratic

heads, the seduction of their soft red mouths, the poetry of the fringe

of golden lashes in which the pathos of their eyes hung enmeshed--their

intrusive, penetrating frailty, which supplicated, denounced and

astounded. They were so weak and yet so strong. A man could crush them

with one arm. But they could slay a man's soul with their sweetness.

They were equipped in every detail by their pale perfection to quicken

and to disappoint. To disappoint! That was what they had been trying to

persuade him for the past half-hour--that they were Nature's traps,

cunningly contrived and baited. _The Philistines be upon thee, Samson!_

Their self-traductions were undermining his faith in all sacredness.

In the silence of his brain he fought--fought against disillusion,

claiming exemption for at least one woman from these sweeping

denunciations--the woman in the portrait.

A man had been passing and repassing the windows, cut into triangles by

the looped back, marigold-tinted curtains. At first he had mistaken him

for a different man each time he had passed. Then the lazy certainty had

grown up within him that it was always the same man. A man who wanted

something--wanted something that was in that house. It wasn't possible

to make out his features. He wore a morning-coat and was top-hatted. The

swing of his carriage was indefinitely familiar.

And now he had vanished--lost courage, lost patience, given up his

quest, perhaps. Through the triangular gaps in the panes the

village-green showed untraversed, sunlit, tranquil, garnished.

Without knocking Porter entered, looking worried.

Maisie broke off from her conversation long enough to say, "A little

later, Porter. We're not finished."

She was resuming, when Porter again interrupted. "It isn't that, Madam.

It isn't----"

"Then what is it?"

With an elaborate air of caution Porter closed the door and set her back

against it. "I've told him that it's no good. That you won't see him,

Madam."

"Of course not. That's quite right." Maisie bestowed her approval with

rapid tolerance. "I can't see any one at present." Then, as an

after-thought, "By the way, who is it?"

It was then that Porter let fall her bomb. "It's no good my telling him.

He won't go away." Her firmness crumbled. She bleated in a dramatic

surrender to distress. The three who heard her caught the commotion of

her alarm and waited breathless. Her explanation came at last. "It's Mr.

Easterday." The moment she had said it, she turned and fled.

The door had scarcely closed, when Maisie rose from her chair and stood

swaying. She sank back, closing her eyes and pressing her hands against

her breast. The mask of placidity had been wrenched from her face,

leaving it blanched with the conflict between yearning, temptation and

loneliness.

"Adair!" she moaned. "My God, I daren't trust myself!"

Unclosing her eyes, she gazed burningly at Tabs.

"I was honest in what I promised. I do want to live as though Reggie

weren't dead. How did you put it? As though he were round the corner. As

though he were truly coming back."

In the silence that followed she stifled a sob, realizing that it wasn't

Tabs who was the obstacle. Turning hysterically to Terry, she laid hold

of both her hands. "I can't do it--_can't, can't_ by myself. I can only

do it if you'll tell Lord Taborley to help me."

IV

At a nod from Terry he left the table. In the hall he found an odd sight

waiting for him. He had to look twice to make certain that this was the

Adair Easterday whom he had known, and not a strayed and beflustered

wedding-guest.

The man before him was worried to distraction. He had the unhappy,

panic-stricken eyes of an over-driven bullock that scents the

slaughterhouse. And yet his dress was immaculate; he was tailored and

laundered as though for an occasion of joy. Everything that he wore was

discreetly festive, from the lavender gloves and shiny topper to the

striped trousers and canvas spats. One would have said that he was a

caricature of George Grossmith on his way to a garden-party.

But he was hot--terribly hot; far more hot than he had any excuse for

being in brisk spring weather. There were beads of perspiration on his

forehead; his face was congested with excitement. To lend the touch of

humor, which always lurks behind other people's tragedies, he held his

top-hat by the brim in his right hand, as though he were taking a

collection, while from his left, like a feather-duster, trailed an

enormous bunch of roses. He was a short man in the late thirties,

red-headed and inclined to be podgy. He was not built to express poetic

passions--how many of us are, if it comes to that?--or to sustain their

onslaught with dignity. Emotion seemed to have bloated him with unshed

tears. There was nothing noble in his distress--only a farcical

appearance of wretchedness.

As Tabs crossed the hall to the front-door, just inside of which Adair

was standing, he felt an undeserved compassion for him--the kind of

compassion one feels for a clumsy dog, which is always getting under

people's feet. At the same time he couldn't help marveling that there

should be two women at the same time in the world who were willing to

compete for such a man's affections.

"I happened to be lunching here," Tabs commenced conventionally. But he

altered his tactics promptly. In the presence of his friend's

self-advertised misery nothing but the briefest truth seemed adequate.

"Old man, it's no good. She won't see you. She doesn't want you."

Forgetting his sense of justice, he placed his hand affectionately on

Adair's shoulder.

Adair stared in a full-blown way and nodded. "She never did want me."

He passed no comment on this unforeseen meeting in the little house with

the marigold-tinted curtains. He manifested no resentment against this

familiar angel who had been deputed to bar the gates of Eden to his

approaches. He was incapable of surprise. He was obsessed by the

solitary idea of his own forlornness. "I knew it. She never did want

me." And then, in a rush of self-pity, "No one ever wanted me."

"Except Phyllis," Tabs suggested.

Adair appeared not to have heard. He stood like a living statue, his

top-hat extended, his bunch of roses dangling--the picture of idiotic

futility. Genuine emotion, however mean its origin, always has its grand

moments. Tabs forgot the silly beginnings of this upset and the endless

troubles it had caused. All he saw was a typical ragamuffin of humanity

in the grip of the policeman, Nemesis. Adair had been caught trying to

do what thousands of other ragamuffins achieved daily with success. He

had been arrested red-handed in the act of stealing forbidden happiness.

It was his first offense. He was inexpert and had bungled. He had

bungled because, while assuming the role of roguery, he had remained at

heart an honest man. Now that he was caught, he took the exposure of his

dishonesty too seriously.

Tabs had almost forgotten that he had been the last to speak, when Adair

repeated his exact words, "Except Phyllis!" And then, "Poor kid! She,

too, is unhappy."

Through the marshy obscurities of his humiliation his conscience was

building a path. With his two hands he crushed his topper back onto his

head. The act had the vehemence of decision. In the doing of it he

dropped the roses to the floor. There they lay forgotten--so forgotten

that he placed his foot on them without noticing.

"Home! Best be going home," he muttered.

Without further explanation, he drew back the latch and let himself out

into the sunlit Court. Delaying long enough to pick up his hat and cane,

Tabs followed.

Adair gave no sign of recognition as he caught up with him. Failing to

hail a taxi, they boarded a bus. Tabs paid the fares. Adair sat like

Napoleon after Waterloo, taking no notice of anything. It was the

intensity of his thoughts that kept him silent--not moroseness.

They had reached Clapham Common and had come to his garden-gate, before

he acknowledged Tabs' presence.

"I was a fool. I deserved it," he said sadly. "It's ended in exactly the

way that any sane man would have expected."

Kicking the gate open, he passed up the path. From the Common Tabs

watched him, till he was safely within the house and the door had shut.

As he turned away, he scarcely knew whether to laugh or feel vexed. The

misfortunes of others can always be traced to folly; it is only our own

misfortunes that are never deserved and never anything less than august.

If Adair's love-affair had appeared ridiculous in his eyes, probably his

own would afford materials for jest to some one else.

He couldn't forget the top-hat and the trampled roses. The

ineffectualness of all passion loomed large. It might have its value as

an educative process, but what a waste of energy! For the moment he drew

no distinction between Adair's guilty hankering after something which

was forbidden and his own honorable love for Terry. The end of all

passion was futility.

Then he laughed, for in imagination he saw the world as a crestfallen

caricature of George Grossmith, top-hatted and bespatted, wending its

unfestive way through the centuries to an eternal garden-party, from

which Adam and his lineage were forever debarred.

V

His exit from Mulberry Tree Court had been so hurried that he had had no

time to make arrangements with Terry.

He had no sooner knocked than the door was opened by Maisie. He was

slightly embarrassed at being brought face to face with her thus

suddenly after the last scene that they had shared. He entered in a

tentative manner, only just crossing the threshold, as though he had not

much time to spare.

"I called in," he apologized, "because I thought you'd like to know what

happened--and to fetch Terry."

"Of course." She spoke with a cheerfulness that astonished him. "I was

expecting you." With that she led the way across the hall to the

drawing-room.

Carrying his hat, he followed. He clung to his hat purposely; it would

serve as a reminder that he had not come to stay long. She was on the

point of seating herself, when she spotted it. "Oh, how rude of me!" In

the twinkling of an eye she had deprived him of it and vanished.

"Captured once more!" he thought.

During the few seconds that she was gone, he looked about him.

Everything was as it had been yesterday. A companionable fire glowed in

the grate. On a table beside the couch tea was spread. Even as

yesterday, the nearest chair to the couch was at least six feet away,

making it necessary for any one who did not wish to appear boorish to

share the couch with her. There was something else that he had noticed

on entering: while he had been away she had made a complete change of

toilet. She was now dressed in a filmy gown of emerald green, with

shoes, stockings and buckles to match. It was a gown so _chic_ that, had

he been a woman, he would have guessed at once that it was the latest

from Paquin's. Inasmuch as he was a man, his sole comment was, "Plucky

little thorough-bred! You don't catch her owning that she's down." The

emerald shade brought out all the values of her coloring, the faint rose

of her complexion, the daffodil gold of her flaxen hair. He had expected

to be bored by a Magdalene repentant; instead he had found himself

confronted by a challenging young Diana. His admiration went out to her

for her courage.

Having come back and resettled herself on the couch, she smiled up at

him through flickering lashes. "A nice frock, don't you think? Nothing

like a new frock after a knock-out for restoring your self-respect."

"It's a charming frock. Where's Terry?"

She clasped her small hands about her knees, leaning her head far back

so that her eyes glinted up at his languidly. Perhaps it was necessary

to do that in order to see him properly. He was still standing. And yet

her attitude served another purpose; it called attention to the firm

young lines of her bust and throat, and to the voluptuous curve of her

lips, parted in patient expectancy.

"Terry!" Her voice sounded drowsy. "I forgot. I ought to have given you

her message. She couldn't stop. She had another engagement."

"An engagement!" He was dumbfounded. "That's strange! She never said

anything---- Are you sure she didn't invent it?"

"Certain." Maisie sat up fully awake now. "Quite positive. But she had

made up her mind not to keep it till, through no fault of yours, you

gave her the chance. You don't want to believe that; it sounds as though

she had cheated. You don't know much about women, Lord Taborley. You

don't know because you refuse to learn. You're determined, in the face

of every proof to the contrary, to live and die in the faith that we're

angels." She shook her finger at him. He was amused to discover that he

was being scolded. "Angels! We're far from it. We're very much like you

men, with this difference, that we're cowards. What you need--this may

sound entirely wrong--is a good sensible woman to take you in hand, and

give you a run for your money, and teach you your own value. Why, with

your position and charm----"

"You must excuse my interrupting. Of course it all depends on what you

mean by a run for my money. But are there many good and sensible women

who are game for an adventure of that sort?"

"Heaps of them," she assured him, imitating his mock seriousness. "The

more outwardly good and sensible, the more inwardly they're willing."

"Humph!" He pretended to be pondering this gem of information. And then,

"But you have to own, Mrs. Lockwood, that Terry's not----"

She blocked his protest with a gay little laugh. "I make no exceptions.

Terry's exactly like the rest of us--younger and more innocent looking,

no doubt, but just as imperfect. As regards this engagement of hers, she

breathed no word of it until you had gone. Then she began to flirt with

the idea that she might be able to keep it. At last she couldn't resist

the temptation any longer. Out she came with it, that she must be going.

I'd lay a wager I could name the person with whom----"

"You'd lose your wager."

"I think not." She met the threatened tempest in his eyes with calmness.

"Would you give a name to this person?"

"Where's the good?" She shrugged her dainty shoulders. "We both know it?

Steely Jack. Isn't that what you call him?"

Instantly she leant forward. Her whole instinct was to touch him. She

hadn't intended to hurt him like that. He looked so defiant, and gaunt

and deserted--such a huge, scarred boy of a man. He reminded her of one

of those early war-posters, in which a solitary figure was depicted,

knee-deep in barbed wire, head bandaged, hurling the last of his bombs.

"Please don't be angry," she pleaded. "I was clumsy; but I was trying to

help. When you helped me yesterday, you too were clumsy. You can't put

on a new frock, worse luck, the way I've done, to restore your

self-respect. But I do wish you'd buy a new something--a new race-horse

or a new car--I don't care what as long as it would make you swank. A

little swanking would do you all the good in the world; it would keep

Terry from knowing how much you care. Terry's not half good enough for

you; one day you'll acknowledge it. Still, if you really do think you

want her, you can bring her to heel any moment by putting on an

indifferent air. Look how jealously she flared up at me at lunch. It

makes a woman furious to see her rejections picked up as treasures by

another woman. The only reason why Terry brought you here to-day was to

see for herself just how deep an impression we'd made on each other."

At last she mustered the courage to touch him. Reaching out, she took

his hand and drew him to her. He stood against her knees, looking down.

Her voice was tender. "Some one had to say these things to you, just as

you had to say things to me that weren't altogether pleasant. So why

shouldn't I to you? After all, we're both in the same box, and the box

is labeled NOT WANTED. It pains me to see a man like you, wasting

himself on a girl who hasn't the sense to appreciate what he's

offering." She raised her eyes to his with a slow smile. "Don't mistake

me, Lord Taborley, I'm not trying to secure what you're offering for

myself."

He began to see the drift of her argument. Before he could formulate it,

she herself had put it into words. "Can't we do a little missionary

work, you and I, by appreciating each other just a little?"

Flinging prejudices to the winds, he took a place beside her on the

couch. Why shouldn't he? Why should he go on conserving himself so

scrupulously for a girl who didn't value his loyalty?

"I should consider it a privilege to be appreciated by you," he said

gravely. "But let's start properly. How about dinner at the Berkeley?

After that, if you felt like it, we could do a theatre. Would that suit

you?"

* * * * *

It was close on midnight when they returned to Mulberry Tree Court. Not

until he was handing her out of the taxi and Porter was standing framed

in the open doorway, did he remember that he'd imparted none of his

important news concerning Adair.

"About Adair----" he commenced. "Or shall I put him off till to-morrow?"

"Till forever." As her feet touched the pavement, she swung around on

him with laughter. They had been very happy in the last six hours. She

pressed close against him. He caught the sparkle of her eyes as he

stooped above her and the faint, sweet fragrance of her hair. She rested

an ungloved hand on his arm. It looked dim like a large white moth that

had settled there.

"I have few principles to guide me," she whispered, "but the few that I

have I observe. I never dig up my dead and I never botanize on the

graves of the past. Good-night. Merry dreams to you, Lord Taborley."

With the suddenness of a phantom she went from him. There were a brief

few seconds while he heard the ripple of her laughter and the rustling

of her dress. Then the door closed. Save for the lamps of the waiting

taxi night was again eventless and dark.

VI

That evening was the first of many such adventures. His tall limping

figure became a familiar sight in Mulberry Tree Court.

Very early in their friendship he took her advice and delighted her by

purchasing a smart two-seater runabout which he drove himself. Sometimes

it was at her door shortly after breakfast to transport her to where

saddle-horses were waiting in the Park. Sometimes it would turn up about

lunch-time and stand impatiently chugging while she changed into sport's

clothes, after which it would dash away with her, humming contentedly,

into the depths of the country. It was the magic-carpet which obeyed all

her desires. After war-days, with their petrol shortages and restricted

travel, it seemed more than ordinarily magic. It made emphatic as

nothing else could have done, the freedom and serenity which peace had

restored. The very fleetness of its obedience prompted her to urge Tabs

to take her farther and ever farther afield. There were evenings when

they dined within sight of the sea beneath the red roofs of Rye and

started back for London across the Sussex downs, driving straight into

the eye of the sunset. There were afternoons when they drifted over the

Chiltern hills to where the spires and domes of Oxford rise, placid as

masts of a sunken ship in an encroaching sea of greenness.

But it was most frequently nearing midnight when the quiet of the

secluded Court was wakened by the merry buzzing of the engine. At first

it would come from far away, drowsily like the song of a belated bee.

Then it would gather in volume and grow more lively, till it panted

round the little village-green and quavered into silence in front of

Maisie's door. Porter, with the gold light of the hall behind her, would

always be there on the threshold to receive her mistress. It was

difficult to guess what Porter thought. There were impromptu jaunts to

theaters and dances. Porter had seen many gay beginnings and tearful

endings. Her face was immobile and respectful at whatever hour he

called.

It was a curious friendship that had developed between them--a

friendship which lived from hand to mouth, which had the appearance of

being more than a friendship, in which nothing was premeditated. Nothing

could be premeditated so far as he was concerned. Terry had first call

on all his leisure--not that she availed herself of it very often;

nevertheless, he held himself in readiness to break every engagement

for her. Maisie was his consolation prize when Terry had failed. Maisie

was not deceived as to the spare-man place that she held in his

affections. She was painfully aware that at any moment their friendship

might end as abruptly as it had started. On either side it was based on

a common need for kindness, a common tenderness and a common desire for

protection from loneliness. In a sense they were each a substitute for

something postponed and more satisfying. While he was making up to her

for the loss of Adair, she was trying to save him from the rashness of

committing himself too fatally to Terry. They were altruists, actuated

by self-interested motives.

And yet it was a friendship not untinged by enmity. His enmity was

awakened when she became too possessive in the demands which she made

and especially when she let fall criticisms, however mild, concerning

Terry. These occurrences set him thinking of the other casuals who had

ventured on her doorstep, not meaning to stay, and had ended by hanging

up their hats in her hall. Her enmity was roused by the courteous

circumspection of his behavior. He never admitted her to the privacy of

his inmost thoughts. He could be gay and gallant and bountifully

generous, but he never permitted her to peep beneath the surface. He

addressed her invariably as Mrs. Lockwood. The use of her surname held

her at arm's length. She longed most frightfully to hear him call her by

the name that was less safe. She denied to herself that she wanted him

to make love to her; at the same time she was disappointed at the

persistency with which he held her off. She liked to believe that, if he

had made love to her, she would have rebuffed him. She rehearsed many

times the indignant words with which she would have set him in his

place; she would have reminded him that it was for Reggie Pollock she

was waiting--as though he were not dead, but only round the corner. To

her chagrin Tabs never gave her the least incentive to employ them.

He saw her never more and frequently less than once a day. There was a

week at a stretch when he saw nothing of her. She bridged these tedious

intervals of expecting by the length of her telephone conversations.

Whenever he stayed away for long, she tortured herself with suspicions

that his courtship of Terry had begun to prosper. If he returned

debonair and smiling, she felt confirmed in these suspicions. He was

most dear to her when he returned in an under-mood of distress. She knew

then that she was necessary; to be necessary was the passion of her

heart. Then she would become gay and tender and mothering--an altogether

sweeter, gentler and more self-effacing Maisie.

Whither were they drifting--toward marriage or only toward infatuation?

If you had asked Tabs, he would have replied promptly, "Toward neither."

He had promised to tide her over the dull spots. She had advised him to

take a course of education in his own value in order that he might

increase his worth to Terry. She had told him that he ought to let some

good sensible woman take him in hand and give him a run for his money.

They had accepted each other at their word--that was all.

At the same time he knew that that was not all. He knew that if there

was one thing more irritating to her than being addressed as Mrs.

Lockwood, it was his way of treating her as if she were good and

sensible. Most women would feel affronted at hearing themselves spoken

of as anything other than sensible and good. Good and sensible women are

the pillars of society, but they are not usually regarded as attractive

companions for joyous excursions in two-seater runabouts.

Neither of them was entirely insensitive to the conjectures that their

sudden intimacy had given rise to in the minds of onlookers. They were

both too well-known and were seen together in too many different places

to avoid the breath of gossip--even of scandal. Men were scarce after

the wholesale butchery of the war, especially bachelors of Lord

Taborley's class. Had he only had the conceit to know it, he had

returned to London a strong favorite for the season's matrimonial

sweepstakes. More than one anxious mother of unappropriated daughters

had set him down for preference on her list of eligibles. When

invitations poured in on him and were politely regretted, there was

consternation and puzzlement. The puzzlement vanished when the

explanation was whispered across a hundred dinner-tables, "Haven't you

heard? It's Maisie Lockwood."

Then would follow details of how they had been seen at sundry theaters,

at half-a-dozen fashionable hotels and riding together in the Park.

"She mounted on one of Lord Taborley's horses of course."

"It's quite a case," people said. "If he doesn't mean matrimony, it

would be decent to exercise more discretion. There used to be some talk

of Terry Beddow; that's completely ended. Queer the women men fall for,

even the quietest of them! No one's sane any longer. Had three husbands

already, hasn't she? Quite a crowd! One would scarcely have supposed

that an exclusive chap like Taborley would have joined in the queue to

make a fourth. And he could have had almost any girl for the asking.

There's never any telling."

Veiled references began to appear in the society columns; but not so

veiled that they could not be recognized. "A romance is developing

between a noble lord, who served in the ranks during the war, and a

vivacious beauty, three times widowed, well-known in fashionable

circles, etc." One paper published a photograph of them riding side by

side. After that sceptics who had not seen for themselves, were

persuaded.

It was a mad world--a world in which it was not safe to be censorious.

The lid was off the conventions. Every one was shouting for

happiness--happiness at all costs. When they could not get it for the

asking, they were taking it without thought of law or penalties. There

were few who could afford to sit in judgment and many who preferred to

laugh. The day of authority was over. Traditions were no longer

respected. While the war was on, men and women had been drilled into

dumb acquiescence; now that the drilling was abolished, they had become

a mob, avid, leaderless and uproarious.

Tabs came to realize that he was not alone in his lost sense of

direction. The right to live had been restored, but neither individuals

nor nations were sure what they wanted to do with it. After having been

as one in their sacrificial certainty, they had arrived at a cross-roads

where there was no policeman to take charge. They had broken up into

little groups, gathered about their own vociferous stump-orators. The

result was babel. Of orators there were a plenty. They abused one

another across the Irish Sea. They tried to shout one another down

across the Atlantic Ocean. But the hammer-head men of righteousness were

gone. After the apocalyptic splendor of mailed knights of Christ

charging stern-faced down to Armageddon, the results of victory had been

consigned to the weakling care of a race of talkers.

And yet there was music and laughter. Spring rushed on. Feet that had

marched, now moved in the rhythm of the dance. Theaters were crowded.

Jazz-bands clashed. There were endless processions. Youth beckoned.

Chestnut bloom grew white and fell in flurries. Women were no less

beautiful. The sun shone thunderously.

If Tabs were foolish, which he did not concede, all the world was his

companion in foolishness. Blindly and gropingly he was still going in

search of his kingdom. He ignored the gossip which his championship of

Maisie had called forth. He despised it. It made him the more

compassionate toward her--the more determined to help her to weather

the storm. Well-meaning friends undertook to warn him. "She's most

beautiful and charming. And she's Lady Dawn's sister, of course.

But----Well, to put it frankly, a woman who's been married three times

might just as well never have been married at all. Looks as though she'd

only squandered her money in rising to the nicety of a marriage-license.

I hope you don't mean to marry her, old chap, because she's not your

sort."

When Tabs went to the trouble of assuring these well-wishers that he did

not intend to marry her and that she was his sort, they slipped their

tongues into their cheeks and opened their eyes wide, "Oh, so that's the

way of it!"

Maisie reported to him similar experiences. "So you see how I'm

regarded, as though I were no better than I should be. And I'm young and

I've done nothing wrong. If it wasn't for your friendship, I should be

tempted----"

"But you have my friendship!" he assured her.

He tried to rise superior to this petty talk of scandal-mongers, but it

was not always possible when he remembered Terry.

VII

He met Terry as often as he could contrive, but he no longer forced

himself upon her. He could effect nothing so long as her infatuation for

Braithwaite lasted.

Now that Sir Tobias had lost faith in him as a lover, his opportunities

for meeting her became more rare. When Sir Tobias lost faith in any one,

he made no attempt to disguise it. In the case of Tabs, he let him know

it with a fine air of magnanimity, as though he were doing him a

kindness. His frankness took the form of communicating some new

disparaging criticism, astutely attributed to Lady Beddow, every time he

was paid a visit.

Having separated Tabs from Terry by carrying him off to his library on

one pretext or another, he would carefully close the door and commence,

"You men who've seen service are all unbalanced; it would be unfair to

hold any of you responsible. You're no exception, my dear fellow, though

you probably don't notice it in yourself. As Lady Beddow was saying to

me this morning, 'Poor Lord Taborley, he has a rambling mind. Most

likely it's a species of shell-shock. There's a queer look comes into

his eyes. It's not always there. It's a look as if he were haunted. You

ought to speak to him, Tobias--you're his oldest friend--and advise him

to see a specialist. It's lucky we found his weakness out before things

between him and Terry went too far.'"

Or he would say, "Lady Beddow and I were talking about you, my dear

fellow. You know she's very fond of you. She loved your mother before

you. 'The little big lady from America,' she used to call her. She's

naturally very much upset at the way in which you're getting yourself

talked about. Unfortunately she holds me partly responsible for having

induced you to visit this Maisie woman. 'You ought to have known him

better,' she says. 'There's an immoral streak in him--an inherited

taint, which I, for one, always suspected.' She was wondering whether

you have any knowledge of there having been insanity in your family."

After having invented such discomforting surmises and given his wife the

credit for them, the old gentleman would blink his crafty eyes and rest

his hand affectionately on Tabs' arm. At the end of each visit he was

pressed to call again; but when he called, it was to find himself

shepherded into the library, safely out of reach of Terry, in order that

he might hear his conduct discussed afresh, either directly or by

insinuation.

He was unable to defend himself without betraying Terry. She maintained

her silence with regard to Braithwaite, refusing to take her parents

into her confidence. They naturally attributed the hanging fire of the

engagement to Tabs, supposing that on the eve of his proposal he had

been ensnared in the net of Maisie. In their eyes he cut a shabby

figure.

Behind his back Terry came to his defense. She would hear and believe no

wrong of him. This only proved to her parents that her heart still

followed him. They thought her very brave and became more gloomy in

their accusations. Matters took a serious turn: her health began to

fail. When the doctor was summoned, he ascribed the cause to secret

worrying and prescribed a complete change. Tabs received no word of this

happening, for Terry had become increasingly shy, so that she created

the appearance of avoiding him. She quite definitely avoided Maisie.

There came a day in early June when he went to call on her and was

informed by the velvet-plush James that Miss Terry was out of London on

a visit of undetermined length. When he asked for her address, James

shook his head mournfully. She had been ill and was to be spared all

disturbing communications. His orders were that her address was to be

given to nobody.

"But that order doesn't apply to me," Tabs urged.

James became more profoundly agitated. He averted his eyes, while he

fiddled with the last button of his plump waistcoat. "I regret to say,

to your Lordship most especially."

"Humph!" Tabs stroked his chin. "Is Sir Tobias at home?"

"Your Lordship would gain nothing by seeing Sir Tobias."

"You might mention to him that I called." With that he descended the

steps and climbed into his runabout.

"Turned away!" he thought. "Turned away from Terry's house!" Then his

mind went back to two months ago--the hopes he'd had, his meeting with

her at the station, his asking her father for her hand in marriage. It

was like the old front-line trench, when reenforcements had failed to

come up: there was nothing for it but to dig one's self in and stick it

out.

He had been shown the door with as little ceremony as an intruding

peddler.

VIII

From Terry's house he went to Mulberry Tree Court, but the route that he

chose was not direct. He drove all over the West End first, through

Oxford Street, Bond Street, Piccadilly; then back by way of Regent

Street, swinging to the left through Conduit Street, till he again

struck Bond Street. He doubled and redoubled on his tracks, moving among

crowds, feeling that he must hear the noise of crowds, yet seeing little

of the sights on which his eyes rested. It had been like this with him

before, after being in too close contact with calamity. It had been like

this in war-days, when he had returned on brief leaves out of monstrous

offensives to the appalling quiet of a normal world. He hadn't dared to

be alone. He had felt that his sanity depended on his rubbing shoulders

with people. He had been like a child in an empty house, leaning out of

a window to catch the stir of life along the pavements.

The gayety of the London season was at its height. Khaki was growing

rare. Signs of war had almost completely vanished. No one wanted to talk

about it. No one wanted to read about it. Shops had redecorated their

windows with the necessities and luxuries of civilian requirements.

There was a wave of spendthrift extravagance abroad. Every one in the

streets had the look of being out for a good time. The threat of

torturing to-morrows no longer made life haggard. If there was one

lesson that the past five years had taught it was that each new day was

a gift from the gods, to be enjoyed separately and drained of every

available drop of pleasure. The restraints of duty were indefinitely

postponed. Men and women sauntered in pairs, aimlessly and joyously.

Work was the bondage furthest from their thoughts. They seemed aware of

no one but themselves in their ecstasy at being reunited. Racing had

been restarted; up and down the gutters newsboys ran shouting the

winners. London was a Tommy on leave, insubordinately, humorously,

contagiously happy.

As he drove, Tabs argued out his problem. From house-top to house-top

the June sky sagged like an azure canopy. Across pavements the afternoon

sunshine lay in bars of gold. Flower-sellers stood at intervals along

the curb, scenting the air with their country nosegays. A lazy breeze

ruffled drooping flags which had been hung out for the latest festival.

Everywhere there were girls in their blowy summer dresses--girls of all

kinds and sorts. Single girls, married girls, girls who worked for their

livings, girls whose business it was to be beautiful, girls who were

merely drudges. There were both pathos and urgency in the sight of them.

It was not good that they should live alone. They had wasted their youth

too long. The great necessity for that waste was ended. Not one of them

was a patch on Maisie.

If he did not desire Maisie, why did he miss her? Was it that he would

not allow himself to desire her? Why did he encourage his passion for

Terry--Terry who in her mild and gentle way had become almost insolently

unappreciative? Wouldn't he be wiser to content himself with the woman

who was within reach rather than----?

He frowned as the truth dawned on him. For the first time he had

acknowledged it. He did love Maisie. Not as he loved Terry, of course;

but in a more human way, to the extent of needing her companionship. He

had made a discovery that amazed himself--a discovery that thousands of

men had made before him: that it was possible for him to love two women

at the same tune, utterly differently and yet with entire sincerity. He

felt as lowered in his self-esteem as if he had committed bigamy. He was

dumbfounded at this new twist that his emotions had developed. Without

consulting him, they had played a trick on him which forever

disqualified him for the larger role of constant lover. He felt himself

pushed down to almost the level of a philanderer--a philanderer not much

more august than Adair. The suspicion crossed his mind that, if he could

believe himself in love with two women, he couldn't be very mightily in

love with either.

But he was impatient of delays--worn out with procrastinations. The

magnificent chances of the present were slipping past him. One day he

would be old. "_Now, now, now_, is the appointed time," throbbed his

engine. Out of the sheer disorganization of his thoughts a desperate

scheme took shape. Why should he not go to Maisie and say, "We're

neither of us first in each other's affections. It's a rough-and-tumble

world! Why be thin-skinned about it? We may become first later. Let's

stop dreaming of kingdoms round the corner and make the best of such

kingdoms as are ours to-day."

The idea took hold of him with force. It fascinated him. He turned his

car about. In passing through Mayfair he made a detour to glance at

Taborley House. The American Hospital had vacated it. It looked ruined

and forlorn. He tried to picture it as it might appear if Maisie were

its mistress.

Twenty minutes later he drew up before the retiring little villa with

its marigold-tinted curtains. He had by no manner of means decided on

his course of action. He could not have told you what he was going to

say to Maisie. In this as in so many other ways, he believed himself

abnormal. No one had ever told him that ninety-nine out of a hundred

married men, if they spoke the truth, would have to confess that they

had been unaware thirty seconds before they proposed that they were

going to do so; and that the most incredible happening in their lives

had been when, thirty seconds later, they had discovered that not only

had they proposed, but that they had been riotously accepted.

CHAPTER THE SEVENTH

SOME PEOPLE FIND THEIR KINGDOMS

I

He was in the act of shutting off his engine when he heard himself

accosted. "I beg your pardon, but are you, Mr. Gervis?"

It was a pleasant voice--a man's. Keeping his eyes on what he was doing,

Tabs answered in the negative. Then he recalled that Gervis had been the

name of Maisie's second husband. "If it's the Gervis who used to live

here," he indicated the house with a jerk of his head, "I'm afraid you

won't find him. He's been dead these three years--killed at the Front."

A quiet chuckle greeted this piece of information, followed by a hearty,

"Thank the Lord."

Tabs had finished what he was doing. As he stepped out of the car, he

threw a contemptuous glance at the man who could be so callous. He was a

slightly built, fresh-complexioned young fellow of middle height, with

amiable gray eyes and a fair, closely-trimmed mustache. He belonged to

the demobilized subaltern type and had the weary, drawn expression of

over-strained nerves that so many young faces had at that time. He was

dressed in a smartly fitting suit of striped navy-blue flannel and

carried himself with the plucky alertness of a highly bred fox-terrier.

He had a clean and gallant bearing which it was difficult to reconcile

with the ungenerosity of his last remark. In a neat, unforceful way he

would have been handsome, had it not been for a badly healed scar which

ran straight across his forehead, only just escaping his eyes.

Before Tabs could say anything, he was apologizing. "That sounded

rotten. I'm sorry. But you see, I didn't know the chap. It's his wife

that I'm trying to find. She was married to a man named Pollock when I

knew her. I was rather a pal of Pollock's, belonged to the same squadron

and was shot down at the same time. I've been a prisoner in Germany.

Just got back, in fact. As you'll understand, I'm rather out of touch. I

thought you'd be able to tell me whether she still lived here."

It was very damping to his ardor at this particular moment to have

Maisie's matrimonial past raked up. Within the next half hour he would

very possibly be asking her to be his wife. He wasn't sure that he was

going to; but meeting this friend of her first husband on her doorstep

didn't help him to make up his mind. He was no longer unsympathetic to

the young fellow, but he was quite determined that he must be sent about

his business.

"As a matter of fact," he said, "the lady you're in search of does live

here. But she's not Mrs. Gervis any longer. She's married again. She's

Mrs. Lockwood now."

A glint of enmity came into the stranger's eyes. "Then you're Mr.

Lockwood, perhaps?"

Tabs answered him with a note of irritation. "I'm not Mr. Lockwood.

She's a widow. Lockwood also was killed. But I really don't see why you

should stop me on the pavement to ask so many questions. You can find

out everything by ringing the bell."

"That's right." The young fellow stroked his mustache. "But I didn't

want to do that until I had made certain. Surely you can see how

embarrassing---- And now this third chap's gone West, you say. Poor

little Maisie, she hasn't had much luck."

It was difficult to be brusque with a man of his own class, especially

with a man so genuinely likeable. But he had to get rid of him. After

having nerved himself up to the point of being at least prepared to

propose to Maisie, he couldn't contemplate an evening of sharing her

with a stranger and listening to the merits of her first husband.

"So you're an old friend! Well, I'm afraid she won't be free this

evening. I have an appointment with her. But, if you like, I'll mention

that I met you and I'll let her know that you'll call--when shall we

say--to-morrow? Perhaps you'd care to give me your name----"

The young man smiled good-naturedly. "I couldn't think of troubling you

to that extent."

"In that case, I'll have to ask you to excuse me. All kinds of luck to

you on your return. It must be rather jolly not to be a prisoner. Good

evening."

Tabs crossed the pavement and rang the bell. In order that he might

afford no opportunity for further conversation, he stood with his face

towards the door while he waited for it to be opened. He was very

conscious that the stranger had not departed, but was hovering

immediately in rear of him.

It was Porter who answered his summons. "I'm sorry, your Lordship, Mrs.

Lockwood is out---- No, she didn't leave any word. She's bound to be

back shortly---- Why, certainly, if your Lordship has the time."

While she was closing the front door, he walked across the hall and let

himself into the drawing-room. He went directly over to the empty

fireplace and gazed up at Lady Dawn's portrait. It always seemed to

challenge him--seemed to be trying to say something to him. It was

almost as though it were his conscience hanging there on the wall. He

had an idea that it reproached him for his silence with regard to Lord

Dawn. He felt that, were he to do what his instinctive sense of justice

had first urged--go to Lady Dawn and tell her that her husband had cared

for her--the painted face would be no longer turned away and the

stone-gray eyes no longer averted.

He was haunted by the obsession that he would never have any luck till

he had vindicated the dead man's memory.

It was Maisie who had prevented him up to now--Maisie with her laughter,

her breezy arguments, her short views of life, her contempt for

sentiment, her sledge-hammer motto, with which she shattered the past,

"I never dig up my dead." She had made him hesitant about reopening the

subject. Her sister was the most beautiful woman in England. A man never

knows to what boundaries a woman's jealousy spreads. He feared lest, if

he persisted, she might impute to him less lofty motives than the desire

to play fair by a comrade-in-arms who had gone West.

Something stirred behind him. He swung about and found himself staring

into the face of the stranger who had accosted him on the pavement.

"Sargent painted it ten years ago," the stranger said. "She's not as

young as that now."

"How did you get in?" Tabs demanded.

The stranger laughed boyishly. "Not too loud or you'll give the show

away. I followed you. The maid raised no objection. She thought we were

together--which was exactly what I intended."

"But what do you want? What right have you here?"

"Want! I know what I want. As to my right, that's problematic."

He turned his back on Tabs and commenced to move about the room, picking

things up and examining them with a purposeful curiosity. He showed no

fear, yet in all his movements there was a calculated stealth. Tabs

watched him in amazement, wondering what he ought to do. If it came to

grappling with him, unless he carried fire-arms, there was little doubt

as to who would get the better of the contest. The man might be a

lunatic, a blackmailer, a burglar; by his odd mode of entry, he had laid

himself open to every suspicion. But he looked perfectly normal; and if

he had been a burglar, he surely would have selected an opportunity when

no other man was present. It was an awkward situation, this being shut

up alone in a husbandless woman's house with an unknown intruder. It

seemed to be an occasion for tact rather than the possible fuss of

police interference.

At this moment the stranger made a discovery.

He had been examining the five silver photograph-frames, each in turn,

with close attention. With his back towards Tabs he remarked, "It looks

as though she hadn't forgotten him. Five reminders of his homely mug and

not a solitary one of the also-rans! Numbers Two and Three couldn't have

made such a deep impression." He caught his breath in a nervous shudder.

"It's queer. Everything's queer when one's just come back. One's so

changed that he could court his own wife without being recognized. You,

too, were out there I should judge by the way you limp. I wonder whether

you've got over the queerness yet. I haven't had time----"

From in front of the empty fireplace, Tabs interrupted him. "Look here,

my dear chap, I don't want to be rude and this isn't my house; but

what's your game?"

The stranger turned and smiled. His frank gray eyes were amused and

friendly. "Upon my word, I haven't any game. I'm like yourself--just

paying a visit."

Tabs shook his head and gazed at him fixedly. "It won't do; you know

that. You're a gentleman. Gentlemen don't get into unprotected women's

houses by your kind of methods."

"They don't. That's a fact." He laughed carelessly. "I suppose this is

what comes of having been a prisoner in Germany. One prefers to be

underhand."

"Don't you think it's time you stopped fooling?" Tabs spoke in a

conversational tone without temper. "There's Mrs. Lockwood to be

considered; she may be here at any moment. It's no good coming this

returned prisoner trick; all the prisoners in Germany were returned

shortly after the Armistice. Eight months have elapsed."

"All right. Have it your own way."

The stranger ceased to wander and sat himself down at Maisie's end of

the couch. Pulling out his cigarette-case, he offered it to Tabs. "Have

a gasper?---- You don't need to refuse because of Maisie. If she's the

Maisie she used to be, she won't object.---- Well, if you won't, I

will."

Tabs noticed that his hand trembled in holding the match. The man was a

bundle of nerves; he was only maintaining this display of coolness with

an effort. Whatever the purpose of his bold intrusion, it was not

social, as he had pretended.

"I don't like any man to think me a liar." The man spoke slowly between

puffs at his cigarette. "You think it's all bunkum that I'm fresh out of

Germany, but it isn't. Do you see that?" He ran his finger across the

gash in his forehead. "That and the ill-treatment I received in the

prison-camps made me go wuzzy. The only fact about myself that I could

remember in all those years was Maisie. So it's natural that I should

come to see her first. I wasn't sure of my own identity until a month

ago. I suppose I was released at the Armistice, but for seven out of the

past eight months I must have wandered in rags over Central Europe.

However, all's well that ends well, and here I am."

"But you knew that she'd remarried," Tabs objected suspiciously; "you

asked me if I were Gervis."

"A friend of Pollock's told me that," he explained. "Gervis was

excusable. But this Lockwood fellow's the third. It's a bit thick! She

certainly has been going it." He looked up suddenly. "I've been doing

all the talking. What about yourself?"

Tabs crossed the room and opened one of the long French windows which

led out into the rockery. The golden afternoon had faded into early

evening and a refreshing coolness was in the air. When he came back, he

seated himself at the other end of the couch. "Just to show that there's

no ill-feeling, I'll accept one of your gaspers, if you'll allow

me.----There's nothing for me to explain. My name is Lord Taborley and

I'm a friend of Mrs. Lockwood. There's nothing else."

The stranger leaned forward. His humor left him, revealing his premature

haggardness. He laid a hand on Tabs' arm and asked a question. "You're

fond of her?"

Tabs eyed him in silence, trying to divine what was intended. "At any

rate, you are," he said kindly; "I see it now."

"Not fond of her, I'm in love with her." The man's face softened as he

made the confession. "I was in love with her when she was still the wife

of Pollock. I've been through deep waters. I've had to wait for her like

Jacob did for Rachel. I've lost most things--my memory, my health, my

very likeness! but never for five minutes have I lost my love for her.

She was the only star in my darkness----" The words fell from him with

somber sincerity. "I don't know whether you understand----"

But Tabs' thoughts had turned inwards. He was living again the

englamored poignancy of the years when Terry had been for him precisely

that--the only star in his darkness. The intensity of the vision was

like a cry of warning rousing his sleeping idealism from its lethargy.

His present errand became a treachery to be swept aside by his refound

strength. He recognized the intruder with new eyes, not as an enemy, but

as a comrade--a comrade marooned on the selfsame island of loneliness

and bound to him by the common experience of a kindred adversity. He was

like Crusoe discovering the footprint. Here, quite close to him, was a

fellow waif who had drunk deep of his own bitter sense of desertion.

With a thrill of sympathy, his heart turned to him.

"The only star in the darkness!" He repeated the stranger's words. "For

most of us there's been one woman who was all of that. If she fails

us----" He stifled his pessimism. "When stars fail, one waits for the

morning."

"So you, too, had your woman!"

The stranger smiled and relaxed against the cushions. "Foolish of me!

You can't blame me. Twice I've believed that I'd lost her. First there

was Gervis and then this Lockwood. Poor devils, I cry quits on them. But

when I found you so at home here, you can guess what I dreaded. And yet

you'll never guess why I followed you into this house." He lit a

cigarette and crossed his legs. "I didn't want you to escape me till I'd

asked a question---- Has it ever entered your head that Pollock might

not be dead?"

Tabs started. Then he sat very still. It was the commonplace tone in

which the question had been asked that froze his blood. It was as though

this man had said, "I can bring him back." For a moment he knew genuine

fear--the non-physical fear which the impalpable can awake in the

bravest mind. Through the open window the companionable mutter of London

entered. The normality of everything on which his eyes rested did its

best to reassure him--the mellow evening sunlight in the friendly room,

the flowers in the rockery, the toy-boat on the pond. "I never dig up my

dead." He remembered Maisie's motto. But what if the dead----

He pulled himself together. Pollock not dead! An absurd suggestion!

Maisie had changed her name twice since then--a sufficient proof! The

poor fellow was demented. Everything that he had done bore the hall-mark

of insanity. He had owned that he had been deranged to within a month

ago. Everything that he had said might be quite true. He probably had

been the dead man's friend and in love with Maisie at the time of her

first marriage. The misfortunes that had befallen him had exaggerated

his love into mania--a mania which the news of Gervis and then of

Lockwood had rendered active. He felt an immense compassion for the man.

There, save for the grace of God, sat himself. But what was to be done?

Already Maisie was overdue. Not a second could be wasted. He must humor

him and get him out of the house, if a scene was to be prevented.

And all the time the stranger had been watching him--following his

thoughts, no doubt. He spoke again. "Don't you agree with me? It would

be damned awkward if Pollock came back."

Tabs forced a smile. "I'm not so sure that I do. She never loved any one

but her first husband. She's told me so. The other two---- I don't

believe she herself knows how they happened. They were soldiers. They

weren't long for this world. She didn't want to do them out of

anything." He glanced at his watch. "By Jove, and I've not dined yet!

I'm afraid I must be off. How about you? I'd be awfully glad if you'd

take dinner with me."

The man jumped to his feet, so that Tabs rose with him. But once they

were on their feet an amused expression of cunning came into his eyes.

It told Tabs plainly that he had seen through the strategy. He shook his

head. "Very good of you. But I'm waiting for Maisie." He held out his

hand. It was evident that he was determined to take Tabs at his word.

"We'll meet again, perhaps. What you've just said piques my curiosity.

Before you go, there's one more question. In your opinion what would

Maisie's attitude be if Pollock did come back?"

Tabs was instantly aware that he had made a false move. His bluff had

been called. He'd made it impossible for himself to prolong his call; at

the same time he didn't dare to leave this man behind in the house. It

wasn't Maisie that he was thinking of now--he could warn her as she

entered the Court--it was Porter. A madman was capable of anything; and

yet, confound the chap's deceptiveness, he didn't look mad. There was

only one chance of delaying his departure: at all costs he must involve

him in an argument.

"If Pollock came back! Curious that you should suggest that! I've sat in

this room and discussed the possibility with Mrs. Lockwood by the hour.

For the past two months--that's as long as I've known her--I've been

helping her to live as though he might come back."

The man's coolness instantly vanished. His excitement grew well-nigh

beyond control. "You're not going. Sit down. You've got to explain." He

rapped out his sentences in short, quick jerks. His voice had become

harsh and imperative. "You can't have any idea what this means to me.

It's ridiculous. Why should you, a living man, help her, when she's so

beautiful, to save herself for a dead man? She didn't save herself in

the case of Gervis and Lockwood."

With a sigh of relief Tabs reseated himself. The man sank down beside

him, crowding against him on the couch. His anxiety was sharp-pointed

as a dagger. "Quick," he urged.

"I don't know that I can be quick." Tabs spoke leisurely. He paused,

trying to think what he should say next. "Here it is in a nutshell. Mrs.

Lockwood, as we both know, is a more than ordinarily charming woman.

She's the kind who, without being able to prevent herself, draws men.

There are women like that. Her three marriages, all taking place so

close together gave her a reputation---- You're a man of the world;

you'll understand that I'm not trying to say anything derogatory. But

three matrimonial adventures in such rapid succession gave her a

reputation for lightness. She was young and pretty. She longed to live

life. You can't blame her. For a woman life isn't a very full affair

without a man. And yet there aren't many men who would be willing to

choose a wife with three previous husbands to her credit. It would seem

too much like a week-end experiment, without the option of parting when

the week was ended. So here was the injustice of her social situation;

without having committed a solitary indiscretion, she was damaged

goods--debarred from matrimony, yet coveted by men. Do you realize the

temptation----"

The man half rose in his irritation. "You're not answering my question."

The violence in his tone was unmistakeable. "What I've got to find out

is, what put you up to persuading her to live as though Pollock were not

dead?"

"I was coming to that." Tabs spoke reassuringly. "Beneath all her gayety

I found, when I began to know her, that she was desperate--desperate to

live in the sunshine and mortally afraid of shadows. At the least hint

of shadows she grew reckless. She believed that her happiness was in the

past. So I taught her to play a game--a game that has often saved me

from despair. It was just this--to act as though all the goodness one

has known still lies ahead; in her case this meant living as though the

man whom she had loved were not dead, but waiting for her round some

future corner. So that was why---- But I think I've answered your

question."

Tabs rose from the couch and limped over to the empty fireplace. He

stood there beneath the portrait of Lady Dawn, supporting himself with

one arm against the mantel. The room was beginning to fill with dusk.

Beyond the threshold of the open window, the rockery-garden was still

vaguely golden. The little pond was a silver mirror.

Perhaps two minutes had elapsed. Uncertainly the stranger struggled to

his feet. He moved towards the door, halted and came slowly back. He

looked very spent, and slim, and wasted in the gathering shadows. As

Tabs gazed down at him, he noticed that his face was prodigiously

solemn.

"I don't mind now." He swallowed like a small boy getting rid of his

emotion. "I don't mind Gervis or Lockwood any longer; it's as though

they'd never happened. And I don't feel hard to her, the way I might

have. I'm glad you told her about things being round the corner. Because

I'm Pollock. I have come back."

Tabs stared at him. He was deeply moved. To humor him in his delusion

seemed the height of callousness. Yet what else was possible under the

circumstances?

"Of course you're Pollock," he assured him gently. "One wouldn't

recognize you from your portraits, but I ought to have guessed."

The man caught the deception in his tone. He lifted up his puzzled gray

eyes. "You don't---- No, I see you don't. You don't believe me. Yet I am

Pollock."

"My dear chap," Tabs said it coaxingly, "I don't see why you should

think I doubt you. I'm quite certain you're Pollock--Reggie Pollock, the

first of all the aces: the man who brought down the Zeppelin over

Brussels. You see I know all about you. Your picture was in the papers.

I've told you that you were expected. So why----"

The front door was heard to open and close. There was the sound of

Maisie's voice. They stood rigidly listening in the semi-darkness.

Neither of them spoke or stirred. As she entered, a shaft of light from

the hall preceded her. Quietly Tabs placed himself between her and the

stranger. The stranger made no motion to thwart him; he stood like one

turned to stone. Just across the threshold she halted, leaning forward

slightly and peering through the shadows.

"Why, Tabs," she laughed, "how romantic of you to sit waiting for me in

the twilight!"

Tabs came forward as though he were about to push her back. "I'm not

alone, Mrs. Lockwood----"

"I know. Porter told me. But why are you standing in my way?" She

laughed again. A shiver of fear cut short her laughter. "What's the

matter? I don't see your friend. Why don't you introduce----"

"He's not my friend. He says he's yours."

"Then all the more reason---- Why are you acting strangely? No, please

let me into my own room, Tabs."

He had put out his arm to prevent her. Without warning the stranger

advanced into the shaft of light. She saw him and fell back screaming,

covering her eyes. With a vehemence that was unexpected, he pushed Tabs

aside and clasped her to him. "Maisie darling, don't be afraid. I'm

real. I know everything. And I don't mind----"

At sound of his voice, she uncovered her eyes. His face was close to

hers. The fixed look of terror left her.

Putting out her hands timidly, she ran her fingers along the scar in his

forehead. "They've hurt you. Poor you! My Reggie! Oh, my lover, they've

hurt you!"

She buried her head against his shoulder and fell to weeping

passionately.

II

Neither of them had seen him go. He had tiptoed past them like a ghost

and out into the summer night. The sky was luminous with the dust of

stars. A sleepy wind was blowing.

He jumped into his car and sped away, making such haste that one might

have thought he was pursued. He wheeled to the left in the direction

that led to the Surrey hills. It was the direction he had taken with

Terry on that March morning when she had met him at the station. He was

making a discovery: that there is no tragedy more difficult to

contemplate with charity than the sight of other people's happiness.

Their follies we can tolerate and view even with compassion; but their

joys are unendurable. Joy separates men with impassable barriers. It

transfigures beggars into Lazaruses lying at rest in Abraham's bosom. We

view them from afar off and their contentment increases the burning of

our torment. No man has yet discovered how to share his joy. Only a god

could say, "My joy I give unto you."

They had not seen him go. That was the neglect that rankled. Even though

they had seen him, they would not have cared; they would have done

nothing to delay him. They were past all caring. Like tired ships,

having weathered many storms, they had furled their sails in the harbor

of desire. He had slipped by them like a demon vessel, all canvas

spread, out-going on his endless voyage.

From the door, before he left, he had looked back. The room was a-silver

with twilight. The garden beyond was still vaguely golden. The pond

glimmered darkly like a magic mirror. The murmur of London wove patterns

on the silence. From the hall across the silver of the dusk, an

intrusive shaft of light pointed like a finger at those two entranced,

who had refound the peace that time had scattered.

Even though Pollock had not returned, he himself could never have

married her. There are violations of the austerity of the soul which the

urgings of the flesh cannot accomplish. In the vivid flash of reality

that had visited him he knew that now. He was angry--bitterly angry. But

his anger was not for her; it was for himself. He could be so

audaciously prophetic in the affairs of others. He could advise them and

well-nigh compel them to conserve themselves for kingdoms of whose

coming there was neither the slightest hope nor warning. His penetrating

optimism could foresee the daringly incredible, so that it almost seemed

in the case of Maisie that his optimism had created out of the

incredible a fact. He could work these miracles of restraint for others;

himself he could not restrain. His road ran straight as destiny, yet any

lazy kingdom of mildness in a woman's eyes was capable of luring him

aside. In his abasement he lost all faith in his self-knowledge. Hadn't

he always been the victim of an imagination which had tricked mere

liking into a resemblance to passion? He strutted, gestured, despaired

till he almost persuaded himself that he was the part he was acting. But

had he the faintest conception of what real love meant? Hadn't he always

acted a part? Yes, even in the case of Terry!

His saner judgment intervened. He hadn't always been like that. Where

had the point of departure started? He traced back the weakness till he

came to the moment when he had permitted his sense of justice to be

over-ruled by a woman. It had started with Maisie, when he had allowed

her to persuade him to hide the truth from Lady Dawn.

He jammed on the brakes, bringing the car to a sudden halt. To go and

tell her must be the first step in his redemption. Till that was done

the curse of the dead man would follow him. It seemed to him now, as he

looked back, that through all the spring and summer the shadow of Lord

Dawn had crept behind him. He would go at once. He would go that night.

He knew where he could find her. He would set out like a pilgrim of long

ago through the moon-drenched, hay-scented sweetness of the country.

His vision turned outwards. He realized for the first time where he had

halted. He was within sight of Richmond Park, outside _The Star and

Garter Hotel_, the old haunt of merry-makers, which had now become a

permanent hospital for the mutilated. There were lights to mark the

windows of men who suffered. As he watched, some leaped up; others were

snapped out. He could hear in memory the starchy rustling of nurses and

the creaking of springs as the patients turned. There were men in there

without arms and legs and faces; he had shared their danger and he had

been spared. Surely the God who had covered him with His mantle, had had

some plan--some design of goodness for him!

Far below in a curving streak of blessedness the Thames ran silvered by

the moonlight. He could see the clumped shadows of woods and the flicker

of ripples striking fire against the banks. More distantly London

glowed--a golden flower cupped in the hollowed hand of night. Holding

his breath he listened to the loudness of the quiet. Subtle ecstasies

drifted to him, fluttering like moths against the windows of his

mind--"lilies like thoughts, roses like words, in the sweet brain of

June." _There was a design._ Maisie had found her kingdom. Was it too

much to expect that round some future turning God had another kingdom

waiting?

III

He drove back to London by the directest route. He would have to get

supper before he made a start. By the time he had done that, packed his

bag, and refilled his tank it would be close on midnight. Dawn Castle

lay somewhere down in Gloucestershire. He knew the road as far as

Oxford; after that his ideas were vague.

He was a little daunted by the thought of Lady Dawn. Everything that he

had heard about her, including his first meeting with her, had served to

daunt him. He pictured her as a woman with a conscience clear-cut as a

cameo--a woman, infallible and unsubdued, impatient of foolishness and

gentle in her spirit with the cold tranquillity of a landscape under

ice. How would she receive him, coming out of nowhere, unheralded and

unexplained? And how could he explain the urgency that had compelled him

to come to her? It was a delicate task that he had set himself, this

seeking out a woman with whom he was unacquainted, that he might tell

her that her husband had not hated her when he died. What concern was it

of his, she might well ask. If she chose to be hostile, there were no

arguments by which he could defend his interference. His sole

justification was his deep-rooted conviction that he was doing right.

She never cried. How often Maisie had insisted on her sister's

abstinence from tears, as though it was something monstrous that summed

up all her character! He would have felt far more comfortable in

visiting her if he had been assured that she sometimes cried.

As he turned into Brompton Square, he thought he caught the door of his

house in the act of closing. He might have been mistaken. It was dark

under the shadow of the trees. Quite possibly it had been the door of a

neighbor's house. Nevertheless, he hugged the curb as he drove so that

he might scan the face of any one on the pavement. Forty yards from his

doorstep, at a point where things were darkest, a man passed him. He was

a tall man and walked with the erectness of one who had been a soldier.

The way in which he carried himself and strode was extraordinarily

reminiscent. Tabs slowed down and looked back; the man moved straight

ahead, without hesitancy or sign of recognition. It couldn't be

Braithwaite; Ann's vicinity was the least likely place in which to find

him.

As Tabs let himself into his house, he found Ann in the hall. "Was there

some one here to see me?" he asked.

"There's been no one to see your Lordship," Ann replied respectfully.

He scarcely knew what prompted him to say it. Perhaps it was the

healthy neatness of her appearance--the extreme orderliness of her

quiet. "Ann, you're the sanest creature I meet anywhere. You've the

pluck of one in a million."

She turned to him a face that was flushing and eyes that were unusually

bright. "It's good of your Lordship. Your Lordship is always kind."

"No, Ann, only human. I know what you've been through and I'm glad

you're getting over it---- I have to be away to-night. I shall need some

supper. While you're preparing it, I'll pack."

On the way upstairs he telephoned the garage to send for his car and to

return it within the hour. Then he climbed the last flight to his

bedroom.

While he packed, he kept pausing and knitting his brows. A ridiculous

conviction was forming in his mind. "It couldn't have been," he assured

himself. Yet the more he recalled the man on the pavement the more

certain he was that he had been Steely Jack. But what motive could

Braithwaite have had for calling and why should Ann try to hide the fact

that he had called? He had lost trace of him utterly since that day when

he had handed him Terry's ultimatum at the Savoy. Since then Terry and

he had had many meetings, he did not doubt. Braithwaite's influence

clung to her like her shadow. But if he was so in love with Terry, the

more reason why he should steer clear of Ann. To have called at Brompton

Square would have been asking for a cloudburst. It couldn't have been

Braithwaite. And yet----

And then there was Ann. Since that day when the General's portrait had

appeared in the papers, she had given up watching for letters marked,

"On His Majesty's Service." She had made no further enquiries as to how

his Lordship's friend at the War Office was progressing. Her silence

told its story; she had learned the truth. In what spirit she had

accepted the truth Tabs had no means of guessing. Lady Hamilton, the

little maid-of-all-work, had been the beloved of Nelson. Ann was not

without her precedent. But the maid-of-all-work had become Lady Hamilton

before the Admiral had set eyes on her. Steely Jack was a General, while

Ann was still a servant. Her claims would not meet with much applause if

they were brought before a jury.

To all appearance she had resigned herself to the inevitable. Tabs was

frankly surprised at her magnanimity and fortitude. About her fortitude

there could be no question, but concerning her magnanimity he was not a

little skeptical. More than once he had caught her singing as she went

about her work. She didn't get all the words correctly; she sang them

with improvisions, filling in the gaps where her memory failed.

Throughout the war the song had been sung to men on leave at the

Alhambra by the heroine who acted the revengeful part of _Tootsie_:

"Some day I'll make you love me.

Some day you'll call me 'Dear'.

You'll feel so lonely

And want me only;

I'm sure you'll want me near.

I know you can't forget me,

Though, dear, for years you'll try.

I'll make you miss me

And want to kiss me,

Bye and bye."

She was a mystery. If she were playing a game, it was a game the

intentions of which he could not fathom. The man whom he had passed on

the pavement could not have been Braithwaite. Common-sense insisted on

that.

IV

While he was at supper she gave him no chance to question her. "I'm

motoring down to Dawn Castle," he told her. "I've left the address on my

desk. Don't forward any letters till you hear from me. I don't suppose

that I shall be there for more than a day. To tell the truth," he

glanced up smiling at her seriousness, "I haven't been invited."

Ann refused to be lured off her perch of reticence. She set before him

the dish she was carrying. "I'm sure wherever your Lordship goes there's

a welcome."

He felt that he was being reproved. He had been conscious of her silent

criticism from the moment he had announced that he would be away for the

night. He respected Ann and was anxious for her good opinion. She was by

long odds the most honorable woman of his acquaintance and the best,

because she was the kindest. He had had the feeling throughout the past

two months that there was very little that had happened inside his brain

that had escaped her. She had disapproved of Maisie. She had shown no

enthusiasm for Terry. She had been aware of his dangers when he himself

was disguising them with excuses. All this he knew though no word had

been exchanged. She had observed in all her dealings with him the

decorum to be expected from a high-class servant. And yet she was his

trusted friend, whose virtues compelled his admiration and whose loyalty

commanded his affection. She thought ahead for him and smoothed his

path. Her sense of responsibility was as tender as a sister's. Her

humility lent it a touch of pathos. He looked up to her as men

instinctively look up to good women in whatever grade of society they

find them. The silent knowledge which each had of the other formed a

bond of sympathy, the more delicate because it was unuttered.

He said, "Long ago--it must have been before the war--I gave you tickets

to see Peter Pan."

"It wasn't to me your Lordship gave them. It was to Braithwaite."

"Was it?" He held her eyes, striving to peer behind their curtained

windows. It was the first time that that name had been mentioned between

them in casual conversation. "You're right. It comes back to me now. It

was the Christmas of 1913 that he took you. Do you remember the fairy

who was dying? There was only one way of keeping her alive. Peter Pan

had to make the children in the audience promise that they believed in

fairies. When they did that, she got well. That's why I'm going to Dawn

Castle to-night."

Ann ceased abruptly from what she was doing and stared at her master in

concern. He laughed mischievously. "Wrong again, Ann; I've not taken

leave of my senses. Two hours ago I made the same mistake. There was a

man who asked me whether I believed that Mrs. Lockwood's first husband,

who was killed at the Front, would return. While I was wondering how

long it would be before he'd grow violent, he proved to me that he was

her first husband. So I'm believing in fairies."

A secret happiness lit up her face. "Deep down beneath our doubts, most

of us believe in fairies, I think, your Lordship." With a shy smile she

left him.

The purring of an engine warned him that the car had returned and was

waiting. He could hear Ann in the hall, handing out his bags. He had

finished his supper; he might as well be off. As he drove out of the

Square, he looked back; she was standing on the steps, gazing after him.

He had the restless certainty, now that it was too late, that she had

had a secret which, at the last moment, she would have given the world

to have shared with him.

V

Of that night journey in after years he remembered only the deep peace

and the ecstasy. He was doing something at last that was right; though

why it was right, he would have found it hard to explain. He encountered

none of the difficulties he had anticipated in picking up his direction.

He flew unswervingly to the mark like a bullet traveling a predestined

path. The first sixty miles were familiar; Maisie had covered them with

him on many occasions. By every law of emotion each landmark should have

stirred some poignant memory, some fresh wistfulness of regret. The fact

was that he hardly gave her a thought. When he did, it was only to wish

her luck and to congratulate himself on his escape.

Having passed through Oxford lying blanched in moonlight, he climbed out

of the Thames valley, striking through uplands across the wold to

Burford. From then on all memories were left behind; he had become an

explorer in an unknown country.

Everything was sleeping. How trustfully it slept! Trees were hooded like

extinguished candles. Flowers throughout the fields clasped their faces

in their hands. Birds, like fluffy balls, drowsed on branches. Stars

alone were wakeful. They stooped to watch him with intent, companionable

glances. Now and then he had to halt to flash his torch on a sign-post

or to consult his map. For the most part he took chances and guessed.

Night engulfed him, rushed past him, broke over him. He was like a ship

thrusting forward into a trackless ocean.

The paleness of dawn was in the sky as he neared Gloucester. When he

entered, its roofs and towers were precipices of gold and fire,

straining up to the New Jerusalem which floated in the clouds. The

streets of the ancient city had a mystic look, white and hushed and

tenantless. But already the cheeky sparrows were about,

scandal-mongering beneath the eaves with an unholy disregard for the awe

by which they were surrounded.

He left Gloucester in a southwesterly direction. In fields the hay was

lying cut. A largesse of dew had been scattered through the hedgerows

like loot from the treasure-chests of emperors. Larks were battling up,

striving to sing against the very bars of heaven. Every fragrance and

sound was a messenger, guaranteeing happiness.

Round a bend in the road he came across a cluster of thatched cottages,

their white walls gleaming incandescent in the morning sunshine. Beyond

them lay a parkland, from the edge of which rose a wooded knoll, crowned

by a moated castle. The next mile-stone warned him that it was the

village of Dawn he was approaching.

VI

All day he had waited--a lazy summer day, drowsy with the hum of bees

and heavy with the perfume of cottage flowers. On entering the village

he had put up at _The Dawn Arms_, an old-fashioned hunting hostel which

owed its prosperity to the fame of the Dawn foxhounds. Having bathed and

breakfasted, he had started off to leave his card on Lady Dawn. Arriving

at the Castle, he had been informed that her Ladyship had left early

that morning and was not expected back till early evening. He had filled

in the morning by sleeping and the afternoon by joining a band of

sight-seeing trippers who had driven over from Gloucester in

gayly-painted chars-a-bancs.

With a spice of amusement, he had paid his shilling for admission at the

wooden booth outside the Castle gate and had found himself herded with a

crowd of affectionately inclined young women and young men who perspired

freely--the latter for the sake of greater comfort had removed their

coats and knotted handkerchiefs about their throats. In good time a

decrepit ex-butler had appeared to act as guide and had led the

excursionists over the Norman part of the ruins. He had shown them the

dungeons, the room in which a prince had been murdered and the havoc

wrought upon the walls by Cromwellian cannon. The ever recurring theme

of his trembling narrative was the prowess and the splendor of the

Dawns. He was like a weak-voiced cricket chirping in the sunshine. His

stories of bygone lords, who had died in rebellions and crusades, were

too ancient to grip the imagination. At first his veneration for the

race which he served inspired an outward show of respect on the part of

his hearers. But soon, in straggling twos and threes, they lagged behind

to explore and pluck wall-flowers from the crannies. Girls, feeling the

pressure of lovers' arms about their waists, giggled shrilly. They

wandered off to shady nooks in the grass-grown ramparts where woolly

sheep looked up somnolently to watch them.

To the few who remained the old man mumbled on. It was the nobility of

the late Lord Dawn that he was now recounting--the daring horseman he

had been, the deviltry of him, the lust of life he had had, the

greatness of his possessions and how he had foregone all this beauty to

be hammered into the defilement of the trenches like a rat, cornered in

a sewer.

"Visitors are not allowed in the part of the Castle that is inhabited.

But, since her Ladyship's away----"

Unlocking a door, he led them through a tunnel to a grilled gate,

through the bars of which they saw the Castle's terraced rose-gardens,

falling away steeply in a cascade of petals to a water-lilied,

green-scummed moat which encircled the stronghold like a necklace of

jade. Beside the water's edge a fair-haired boy in a white sailor suit

was deeply absorbed in sailing a boat.

"His little Lordship," the old man whispered.

"But I didn't know---- How old?" Tabs questioned.

"Eight years, sir, come December."

Long after he had returned to the inn, the picture of the little boy

remained with him. This discovery that Lord Dawn had left a son made him

the more certain of the justice of his errand.

The azure and emerald of late afternoon drifted into the ensanguined

gold of sunset. The long-tarrying twilight had already settled when a

messenger arrived, bearing a note. It was from her Ladyship, regretting

her absence and saying that she would be happy to receive a visit from

Lord Taborley that evening or at any time that was convenient.

VII

He set out at once. Heretofore, with the exception of Terry, women had

meant little to him. But he was curious to meet this woman--curious and

eager in a strangely boyish fashion. Every one who had mentioned her had

spoken of her with a certain hint of fear, not untinged with adoration.

He hadn't been aware how anxious he had been to meet her until her note

had summoned him. He wondered whether she had any of the endearing

humanity of her sister. He wondered whether what Pollock had said was

true, that she looked much older than her portrait. He didn't want her

to look older----

He came to the bridge across the moat and the gateway which bore the

grooves in which the old portcullis used to slide. He passed through the

gateway, under the tower, into the graveled courtyard of the Castle. On

three sides the courtyard was loop-holed and sullen, but on the fourth

modern windows and a brass-knobbed door had been let into the solid

masonry. Above the door, shining down on the whitened steps, a lamp

burnt in a wrought-iron socket. Several of the windows were also

lighted.

His knock was answered by a gray-haired man, with the gravity of

deportment which is peculiar to lawyers, undertakers and footmen. While

the man went to inform his mistress, Tabs was left to note how the hall

was hung with hunting trophies. Then he heard himself being requested to

follow.

Having climbed a winding stair, he was shown into a room in the turret,

one side of which was filled by a tall leaded window gazing westward.

The landscape which it framed, hung against the darkness like a painted

canvas--a far-reaching expanse of tree-dotted pasture, vague with

islands of mist and rimmed by the last faint sparks of the sunset. The

ceiling was heavily beamed, the furniture Jacobean, the walls paneled

and hung with many generations of family portraits. In a wide hearth a

fire of coals and logs was burning. In the room's center stood a carved

table on which was set a massive silver lamp, casting a solitary

illumination.

"Lord Taborley, my Lady."

As his name was announced, he heard the rustle of her dress, and

discovered that she had been seated in a low chair by the window. She

rose with a slow grace. There was something indefinably tragic and

foreordained about her every movement. Maisie's name for her flashed

into his mind, "The Princess Czarina Bolsheviki." It suited her exactly.

In those surroundings she might have posed as Mary Queen of Scots in

prison--a queen without a kingdom whose pride was unbroken. In the

dimness his first impression was of her queenly gentleness.

"I can guess why you've come."