Damaris could interrupt him, with quick, sweet defiance:

"But there is no cost!"

And, to drive home the sincerity of her disclaimer, and further reassure

him, she took his hand again and held it for an instant close against her

bosom, tears and laughter together present in her eyes.

"Ah! you beautiful dear, you beautiful dear," Faircloth cried, brokenly,

as in pain, somewhat indeed beside himself. "Before God, I come near

blessing that blatant young fool and pharisee of a parson since he has

brought me to this."

Then he put her a little way from him, penetrated by fear lest the white

love which--in all honour and reverence--he was bound to hold her in,

should flush ever so faintly, red.

"For, after all, it is up to me," he said, more to himself than to her,

"to make very sure there isn't, and never--by God's mercy--shall be,

any cost."

And with that--for the avoidance of the congregation, now streaming

rather tumultuously out of church--they went on across the village green,

hissed at by slow waddling, hard-eyed, most conceited geese, to the lane

which leads down to the causeway and warren skirting the river-bank.

CHAPTER IV

WHEREIN MISS FELICIA VERITY CONCLUSIVELY SHOWS WHAT SPIRIT SHE IS OF

Her attraction consisted in her transparency, in the eager simplicity

with which she cast her home-made nets and set her innocuous springes.

To-day Miss Felicia was out to wing the Angel of Peace, and crowd that

celestial messenger into the arms of Damaris and Theresa Bilson

collectively and severally. Such was the major interest of the hour. But,

for Miss Felicia the oncoming of middle-age by no means condemned the

lesser pleasures of life to nullity. Hence the minor interest of the hour

centred in debate as to whether or not the thermometer justified her

wearing a coat of dark blue silk and cloth, heavily trimmed with ruchings

and passementerie, reaching to her feet. A somewhat sumptuous garment

this, given her by Sir Charles and Damaris last winter in Madrid. She

fancied herself in it greatly, both for the sake of the dear donors, and

because the cut of it was clever, disguising the over-narrowness of her

maypole-like figure and giving her a becoming breadth and fulness.

She decided in favour of the coveted splendour; and at about a

quarter-past twelve strolled along the carriage-drive on her way to the

goose green and the village street. There, or thereabouts, unless her

plot lamentably miscarried, she expected to meet her niece and that

niece's ex-governess-companion, herded in amicable converse by the

pinioned Angel of Peace. Her devious and discursive mind fluttered to and

fro, meanwhile, over a number of but loosely connected subjects.

Of precisely what, upon a certain memorable occasion, had taken place

between her brother, Sir Charles, and poor Theresa--causing the latter

to send up urgent signals of distress to which she, Miss Felicia,

instantly responded--she still was ignorant. Theresa had, she feared,

been just a wee bit flighty, leaving Damaris unattended while herself

mildly gadding. But such dereliction of duty was insufficient to account

for the arbitrary fashion in which she had been sent about her business,

literally--the word wasn't pretty--chucked out! Miss Felicia always

suspected there must be _something_, she would say _worse_--it sounded

harsh--but something _more_ than merely that. Her interpretations of

peculiar conduct were liable to run in terms of the heart. Had Theresa,

poor thing, by chance formed a hopeless attachment?--Hopeless, of course,

almost ludicrously so; yet what more natural, more comprehensible,

Charles being who and what he was? Not that he would, in the faintest

degree, lend himself to such misplaced affection. Of that he was

incapable. The bare idea was grotesque. He, of course, was guiltless.

But, assuming there _was_ a feeling on Theresa's side, wasn't she equally

guiltless? She could not help being fascinated.--Thus Miss Felicia was

bound to acquit both. Alike they left the court without a stain on their

respective characters.

Not for worlds would she ever dream of worrying Charles by attempting to

reintroduce poor Theresa to his notice. But with Damaris it was

different. The idea that any persons of her acquaintance were at sixes

and sevens, on bad terms, when, with a little good will on their part

and tactful effort upon hers, they might be on pleasant ones was to her

actively afflicting. To drop an old friend, or even one not

conspicuously friendly if bound to you by associations and habit,

appeared to her an offence against corporate humanity, an actual however

fractional lowering of the temperature of universal charity. The loss to

one was a loss to all--in some sort. Therefore did she run to adjust, to

smooth, to palliate.

Charles was away--it so neatly happened--and Theresa Bilson here, not, it

must be owned, altogether without Miss Felicia's connivance. If darling

Damaris still was possessed of a hatchet she must clearly be given, this

opportunity to bury it. To have that weapon safe underground would be,

from every point of view, so very much nicer.

At this point in her meditations beneath the trees bordering the carriage

drive, their bare tops swaying in the breeze and bright sunshine, Miss

Felicia fell to contrasting the present exhilarating morning with that

dismally rainy one, just over three years ago, when--regardless of her

sister, Mrs. Cowden's remonstrances--she had come here from Paulton Lacy

in response to Theresa's signals of distress. Just at the elbow of the

drive, so she remembered, she had met a quite astonishingly good-looking

young man, brown-gold bearded, his sou'wester and oilskins shining with

wet. She vaguely recalled some talk about him with her brother, Sir

Charles, afterwards during luncheon.--What was it?--Oh! yes, of course,

it was he who had rescued Damaris when she was lost out on the Bar, and

brought her home down the tide-river by boat. She had often wanted to

know more about him, for he struck her at the time as quite out of the

common, quite remarkably attractive. But on the only occasion since when

she had mentioned the subject, Damaris drew in her horns and became

curiously uncommunicative. It was all connected, of course, with the dear

girl's illness and the disagreeable episode of Theresa's dismissal.--How

all the more satisfactory, then, that the Theresa business, in any case,

was at this very hour in process of being set right! Miss Felicia had

advised Theresa how to act--to speak to Damaris quite naturally and

affectionately, taking her good-will for granted. Damaris would be

charming to her, she felt convinced.

Felicia Verity held the fronts of her long blue coat together, since the

wind sported with them rather roughly, and went forward with her quick,

wavering gait.

It was a pity Damaris did not marry she sometimes felt. Of course,

Charles would miss her quite terribly. Their love for one another was so

delightful, so really unique. On his account she was glad.--And yet--with

a sigh, while the colour in her thin cheeks heightened a little--lacking

marriage a woman's life is rather incomplete. Not that she herself had

reason for complaint, with all the affection showered upon her! The last

two years, in particular, had been abundantly blessed thanks to Charles

and Damaris. She admired them, dear people, with all her warm heart and

felt very grateful to them.

Here it should be registered, in passing, that the resilience of Felicia

Verity's inherent good-breeding saved her gratitude from any charge of

grovelling, as it saved her many enthusiasms from any charge of

sloppiness. Both, if exaggerated, still stood squarely, even gallantly

upon their feet.

Her mind switched back to the ever fertile question of the married and

the single state. She often wondered why Charles never espoused a second

wife. He would have liked a son surely? But then, were it possible to

find a fault in him, it would be that of a little coldness, a little

loftiness in his attitude towards women. He was too far above them in

intellect and experience, she supposed, and through all the remarkable

military commands he had held, administrative posts he had occupied,

quite to come down to their level. In some ways Damaris was very like

him--clever, lofty too at moments. Possibly this accounted for her

apparent indifference to affairs of the heart and to lovers. Anyhow, she

had ample time before her still in relation to all that.

Miss Felicia passed into the road. About fifty yards distant she saw the

servants--Mary, Mrs. Cooper and Patch--standing close together in a

quaint, solemn, little bunch. The two small Patches circled round the

said bunch, patiently expectant, not being admitted evidently to whatever

deliberations their elders and betters had in hand.

Felicia Verity's relations with the servants were invariably excellent.

Yet, finding them in mufti, outside the boundaries of her brother's

demesne thus, she was conscious of a certain modesty, hesitating alike to

intrude upon their confabulations and to pass onward without a trifle

amiable of talk. She advanced, smiling, nodded to the two women, then--

"A delicious day, isn't it, Patch?" she said, adding, for lack of a more

pertinent remark--"What kind of sermon did the new curate, Mr. Sawyer,

give you?--A good one, I hope?"

A pause followed this guileless question, during which Mary looked on the

ground, Mrs. Cooper murmured: "Oh! dear, oh, dear!" under her breath, and

Patch swallowed visibly before finding voice to reply:

"One, I regret to say, ma'am, he never ought to have preached."

"Poor young man!" she laughed it off. "You're a terribly severe critic,

I'm afraid, Patch. Probably he was nervous."

"And reason enough. You might think Satan himself stood at his elbow, the

wicked things he said."

This statement, coming from the mild and cow-like Mrs. Cooper, caused

Felicia Verity the liveliest surprise. She glanced enquiringly from one

to the other of the little group, reading constraint and hardly repressed

excitement in the countenance of each. Their aspect and behaviour struck

her, in fact, as singular to the point of alarm.

"Mary," she asked, a trifle breathlessly, "has anything happened? Where

is Miss Damaris?"

"Hadn't she got back to The Hard, ma'am, before you came out?"

"No--why should she? You and the other servants always reach home first."

"Miss Damaris went out before the rest," Mrs. Cooper broke forth in

dolorous widowed accents. "And no wonder, pore dear young lady, was it,

Mr. Patch? My heart bled for her, ma'am, that it did."

Miss Felicia, gentle and eager, so pathetically resembling yet not

resembling her famous brother, grew autocratic, stern as him

almost, for once.

"And you allowed Miss Damaris to leave church alone--she felt unwell,

I suppose--none of you accompanied her? I don't understand it at

all," she said.

"Young Captain Faircloth went out with Miss Damaris. She wished it,

ma'am," Mary declared, heated and resentful at the unmerited rebuke. "She

as good as called to him to come and take her out of church. It wasn't

for us to interfere, so we held back."

"Captain Faircloth? But this becomes more and more extraordinary! Who is

Captain Faircloth?"

"Ah! there you touch it, you must excuse my saying, ma'am." Mrs.

Cooper gasped.

But at this juncture, Patch, rising to the height of masculine

responsibility, flung himself gallantly--and how unwillingly--into the

breach. He was wounded in his respect and respectability alike, wounded

for the honour of the family whom he had so long and faithfully served.

He was fairly cut to the quick--while these three females merely darkened

judgment by talking all at cross purposes and all at once. Never had the

solid, honest coachman found himself in a tighter or, for that matter, in

anything like so tight a place. But, looking in the direction of the

village, black of clothing, heavy of walk and figure, he espied, as he

trusted, approaching help.

"If you please, ma'am," he said, touching his black bowler as he

spoke, "I see Canon Horniblow coming along the road. I think it would

be more suitable for him to give you an account of what has passed.

He'll know how to put it with--with the least unpleasantness to all

parties. It isn't our place--Mrs. Cooper's, Mary's, or mine--if you'll

pardon my making so free with my opinion, to mention any more of

what's took place."

Felicia Verity, now thoroughly frightened, darted forward. The fronts of

her blue coat again flew apart, and that rich garment stood out in a

prodigious frill around and behind her from the waist, as she leaned on

the wind, almost running in her agitation and haste.

"My dear Canon," she cried, "I am in such anxiety. I learn something has

happened to my niece, who I had come to meet. Our good servants are so

distractingly mysterious. They refer me to you. Pray relieve my

uncertainty and suspense."

But, even while she spoke, Miss Felicia's anxiety deepened, for the

kindly, easy-going clergyman appeared to suffer, like the servants, from

some uncommon shock. His large fleshy nose and somewhat pendulous

cheeks were a mottled, purplish red. Anger and deprecation struggled in

his glance.

"I was on my way to The Hard," he began, "to express my regrets--offer my

apologies would hardly be too strong a phrase--to your niece, Miss

Verity, and to yourself. For I felt compelled, without any delay, to

dissociate myself from the intemperate procedure of my colleague--of my

curate. He has used, or rather misused, his official position, has

grievously misused the privileges of the pulpit--the pulpit of our parish

church--to attack the reputation of private individuals and resuscitate

long-buried scandals."

The speaker was, unquestionably, greatly distressed. Miss Felicia,

though more than ever bewildered, felt for him warmly. It pained her

excessively to observe how his large hands clasped and unclasped, how

his loose lips worked.

"Let me assure you," he went on, "though I trust that is superfluous--"

"I am certain it is, dear Dr. Horniblow," she feelingly declared.

"Thanks," he replied. "You are most kind, most indulgent to me, Miss

Verity.--Superfluous, I would say, to assure you that my colleague

adopted this deplorable course without my knowledge or sanction. He

sprang it on me like a bomb-shell. As a Christian my conscience, as a

gentleman my sense of fair play, condemns his action."

"Yes--yes--I sympathize.--I am convinced you are incapable of any

indiscretion, any unkindness, in the pulpit or out of it. But why, my

dear Canon, apologize to us? How can this unfortunate sermon affect me or

my niece? How can the scandal you hint at in any respect concern us?"

"Because," he began, that mottling of purple increasingly deforming his

amiable face.--And there words failed him, incontinently he stuck. He

detested strong language, but--heavens and earth--how could he put it to

her, as she gazed at him with startled, candid eyes, innocent of guile as

those of a babe? Only too certainly no word had reached her of the

truth. The good man groaned in spirit for, like Patch, he found himself

in a place of quite unexampled tightness, and with no hope of shunting

the immense discomfort of it on to alien shoulders such as had been

granted the happier Patch.

"Because," he began again, only to suffer renewed agony of wordlessness.

In desperation he shifted his ground.

"You have heard, perhaps, that your niece, Miss Damaris, left the church

before the conclusion of the sermon? I do not blame her"--

He waved a fatherly hand. Miss Verity acquiesced.

"Or rather was led out by--by Captain Faircloth--a young officer in the

mercantile marine, whose abilities and successful advance in his

profession this village has every reason to respect."

He broke off.

"Let us walk on towards The Hard. Pray let us walk on.--Has no rumour

ever reached you, Miss Verity, regarding this young man?"

The wildest ideas flitted through Miss Felicia's brain.

--The figure in shiny oilskins--yet preposterous, surely?--After all, an

affair of the heart--misplaced affection--Damaris?--Did this account for

the apparent indifference?

--How intensely interesting; yet how unwise.--How--but she must keep her

own counsel. The wind, now at her back, glued the blue coat

inconveniently against and even between her legs, unceremoniously

whisking her forward.

"Rumours--oh, none," she protested.

"None?" he echoed despairingly. "Pray let us walk on."

A foolish urgency on his part this, she felt, since she was already

almost on the run.

"None that, by birth, Captain Faircloth is somewhat nearly related to

your family--to your--your brother, Sir Charles, in fact?"

There, the incubus was off his straining chest at last! He felt easier,

capable of manipulating the situation to some extent, smoothing down its

rather terrible ascerbities.

"Such connections do," he hastened to add, "as we must regretfully

admit, exist even in the highest, the most exalted circles.

Irregularities of youth, doubtlessly deeply repented of. I repeat sins

of youth, at which only the sinless--and they, alas! to the shame of my

sex are lamentably few--can be qualified to cast a stone.--You, you

follow me?"

"You mean me to understand"--

"Yes, yes--exactly so--to understand that this young man is

reputed to be"--

"Thank you, my dear Canon--thank you," Felicia Verity here interposed

quickly, yet with much simple dignity, for on a sudden she became

singularly unflurried and composed.

"I do, I believe, follow you," she continued.--"You have discharged your

difficult mission with a delicacy and consideration for which I am

grateful; but I am unequal to discussing the subject in further detail

just now.--To me, you know, my brother is above criticism. Whatever

incidents may--may belong to former years, I accept without cavil or

question, in silence--dear Dr. Horniblow--in silence. His wishes upon

this matter--should he care to confide them to me--and those of my

niece, will dictate my conduct to--towards my nephew, Captain

Faircloth.--Believe me, in all sincerity, I thank you. I am very much

indebted to you for the information you have communicated to me. It

simplifies my position. And now," she gave him her hand, "will you pardon

my asking you to leave me?"

Walking slowly--for he felt played out, pretty thoroughly done for, as he

put it, and beat--back to the vicarage and his belated Sunday dinner:--

"And of such are the Kingdom of Heaven," James Horniblow said to

himself--perhaps truly.

He also said other things, distinctly other things, in which occurred the

name of Reginald Sawyer whose days as curate of Deadham were numbered. If

he did not resign voluntarily, well then, pressure must, very certainly,

be employed to make him resign.

Meanwhile that blue-coated, virginal member of the Kingdom of Heaven

sped homeward at the top of her speed. She was conscious of immense

upheaval. Never had she felt so alive, so on the spot. The portals of

highest drama swung wide before her. She hastened to enter and pour forth

the abounding treasures of her sympathy at the feet of the actors in this

most marvellous piece. That her own part in it must be insignificant,

probably not even a speaking one, troubled her not the least. She was out

for them, not for herself. It was, also, characteristic of Miss Felicia

that she felt in nowise shocked. Not the ethical, still less the social

aspects of the drama affected her, but only its human ones. These dear

people had suffered, and she hadn't known it. They suffered still. She

enclosed them in arms of compassion.--If to the pure all things are pure,

Felicia Verity's purity at this juncture radiantly stood the test. And

that, not through puritanical shutting of the eyes or juggling with fact.

As she declared to Canon Horniblow, she accepted the incident without

question or cavil--for her brother. For herself, any possibility of

stepping off the narrow path of virtue, and exploring the alluring,

fragrant thickets disposed to left of it and to right, had never, ever so

distantly, occurred to her.

She arrived at The Hard with a bright colour and beating heart. Crossed

the hall and waited at the drawing-room door. A man's voice was audible

within, low-toned and grave, but very pleasant. It reminded her curiously

of Charles--Charles long ago on leave from India, lightening the heavy

conventionalities of Canton Magna with his brilliant, enigmatic, and--to

her--all too fugitive presence. Harriet had never really appreciated

Charles--though she was dazzled by his fame at intervals--didn't really

appreciate him to this day. Well, the loss was hers and the gain

indubitably Felicia's, since the elder sister's obtuseness had left the

younger sister a free field.--At thought of which Felicia softly laughed.

Again she listened to the man's voice--her brother Charles's delightful

young voice. It brought back the glamour of her girlhood, of other

voices which had mingled with his, of dances, picnics, cricket matches,

days with the hounds. She felt strangely moved, transported; also

strangely shy--so that she debated retirement. Did not, of course,

retire, but went into the drawing-room with a gentle rush, a dart

between the stumpy pillars.

"I hoped that I should find you both," she said. "Yes," to Damaris'

solemn and enquiring eyes--"I happened to meet our good, kind Canon and

have a little conversation with him. I hope"--to Faircloth--"you and I

may come to know one another better, know one another as friends. You are

not going?--No, indeed, you must stay to luncheon. It would grieve

me--and I think would grieve my brother Charles also, if you refused to

break bread in this house."

CHAPTER V

DEALING WITH EMBLEMS, OMENS AND DEMONSTRATIONS

Deadham resembled most country parishes in this, that, while revelling in

internal dissensions, when attacked from without its inhabitants promptly

scrapped every vendetta and, for the time being, stood back to back

against the world.

As one consequence of such parochial solidarity, the village gentry set

in a steady stream towards The Hard on the Monday afternoon following

the historic Sunday already chronicled. Commander and Mrs. Battye

called. Captain and Mrs. Taylor called, bringing with them their

daughter Louisa, a tight-lipped, well instructed High School mistress,

of whom her parents stood--one couldn't but notice it--most wholesomely

in awe. As is the youthful cuckoo in the nest of the hedge sparrow, so

was Louisa Taylor to the authors of her being.--Mrs. Horniblow called

also, flanked by her two girls, May and Doris--plain, thick-set,

energetic, well-meaning young persons, whom their shrewd mother loved,

sheltered, rallied, and cherished, while perfectly aware of their

limitations as to beauty and to brains. Immediately behind her slipped

in Mrs. Cripps. The doctor abstained, conscious of having put a match to

the fuse which had exploded yesterday's astounding homiletic torpedo.

The whole affair irritated him to the point of detestable ill-temper.

Still, if only to throw dust in the public eye, the house of Cripps must

be represented. He therefore deputed the job--like so many another

ungrateful one--to his forlorn-looking and red-eyed spouse. This vote of

confidence, if somewhat crudely proposed and seconded, was still so

evidently sincere and kindly meant that Damaris and Miss Felicia felt

constrained to accept it in good part.

Conversation ran upon the weather, the crops, the migratory wild fowl

now peopling the Haven, the Royal Family--invariably a favourite topic

this, in genteel circles furthest removed from the throne--in anecdotes

of servants and of pets interspersed with protests against the rise in

butcher Cleave's prices, the dullness of the newspapers and the

surprising scarcity of eggs.--Ran on any and every subject, in short,

save that of sermons preached by curates enamoured of the Decalogue.

Alone--saving and excepting Dr. Cripps--did the Miss Minetts fail to put

in an appearance. This of necessity, since had not they, figuratively

speaking, warmed the viper in their bosoms, cradled the assassin upon

their hearth? They were further handicapped, in respect of any

demonstration, by the fact of Theresa Bilson's presence in their midst.

Owing to the general combustion, Miss Felicia and the Peace Angel's joint

mission had gone by the wall. Theresa was still an exile from The Hard,

and doomed to remain so as the event proved. With that remarkable

power--not uncommon in her sex--of transmuting fact, granted the healing

hand of time, from defeat to personal advantage, she had converted her

repulse by Sir Charles Verity into a legend of quite flattering quality.

She had left The Hard because--But--

"She must not be asked to give chapter and verse. The position had been

_extremely_ delicate. Even now she could barely speak of it--she had gone

through too much. To be more explicit"--she bridled--"would trench upon

the immodest, almost. But just _this_ she _could_ say--she withdrew from

The Hard three years ago, because she saw withdrawal would be best for

_others_. Their peace of mind had been her object."

The above guarded confidences the Miss Minetts, hanging upon her lips,

received with devout admiration and fully believed. And, the best of it

was, Theresa had come by now, thanks to frequent rehearsal, fully to

believe this version herself. At the present juncture it had its

convenience, since she could declare her allegiance to her former

employer unimpaired. Thereby was she at liberty to join in the local

condemnation of Reginald Sawyer and his sermon. She did so with an

assumption of elegant, if slightly hysterical, omniscience. This was not

without its practical side. She regretted her inability to meet him at

meals. In consequence the Miss Minetts proposed he should be served in

his own sitting-room, until such time as it suited him to find another

place of residence than the Grey House. For their allegiance went on all

fours with Theresa's. It was also unimpaired. Propriety had been outraged

on every hand; matters, heretofore deemed unmentionable, rushed into the

forefront of knowledge and conversation; yet never had they actually

enjoyed themselves so greatly. The sense of being a storm

centre--inasmuch as they harboured the viper assassin--produced in

them an unexampled militancy. Latent sex-antagonism revealed itself.

The man, by common consent was down; and, being down, the Miss Minetts

jumped on him, pounded him, if terms so vulgar are permissible in

respect for ladies so refined. For every sin of omission, committed

against their womanhood by the members of his sex, they made him

scapegoat--unconsciously it is true, but effectively none the less. From

being his slaves they became his tormentors. Never was young fellow more

taken aback. Such revulsions of human feeling are instructive--deplorable

or diverting according as you view it.

Meanwhile that portion of the local gentry aforesaid, whom awkward

personal predicament--as in the case of Dr. Cripps and the Miss

Minetts--did not preclude from visiting The Hard, having called early on

Monday afternoon also left early, being anxious to prove their civility

of purest water, untainted by self-seeking, by ulterior greed of tea and

cakes. It followed that Damaris found herself relieved of their somewhat

embarrassed, though kindly and well-intentioned, presence before sunset.

And of this she was glad, since the afternoon had been fruitful of

interests far more intimate and vital in character.

While Captain and Mrs. Taylor, with their highly superior offspring

Louisa, still held the floor, Damaris received a telegram from her

father announcing a change of plans involving his immediate return.

"Send to meet the seven-thirty at Marychurch," so the pink paper

instructed her. "Carteret comes with me. When we arrive will explain."

On reception of the above, her first thought was of the letter forwarded

yesterday from the India Office, bearing the signature of the Secretary

of State. And close on the heels of that thought, looking over its

shoulder, indeed, in the effort--which she resisted--to claim priority,

was the thought of the dear man with the blue eyes about to be a guest,

once again, under this roof. This gave her a little thrill, a little

gasp, wrapping her away to the borders of sad inattention to Louisa

Taylor's somewhat academic discourse.--The girl's English was altogether

too grammatical for entire good-breeding. In that how very far away from

Carteret's!--Damaris tried to range herself with present company. But the

man with the blue eyes indubitably held the centre of the stage. She wore

the pearls to-day he gave her at St. Augustin. In what spirit did he

come?--She hoped in the earlier one, that of the time when she so

completely trusted him. For his counsel, dared she claim it in that

earlier spirit, would be of inestimable value just now. She so badly

needed someone in authority to advise with as to the events of yesterday,

both in their malign and their beneficent aspects. Aunt Felicia had risen

to the height of her capacity--dear thing, had been exquisite; but she

would obey orders rather than issue them. Her office was not to lead, but

rather to be led. And that the events of yesterday opened a new phase of

her own and Faircloth's relation to one another appeared beyond dispute.

Where exactly did the curve of duty towards her father touch that

relation, run parallel with or intersect it? She felt perplexed.

After tea, Miss Felicia having vanished on some affair of her

own--Damaris asked no question, but supposed it not unconnected with the

now, since Sir Charles was about to return, permanently exiled

Theresa--our maiden went upstairs, in the tender evening light, on

domestic cares intent. She wished to assure herself that the chintz

bedroom, opening off the main landing and overlooking the lawn and front

garden, had been duly made ready for Colonel Carteret. She took a

somewhat wistful pleasure in silently ministering to his possible small

needs in the matter of sufficient wealth of towels, candles and soap. She

lengthened out the process. Lingered, rearranged the ornaments upon the

mantelpiece, the bunch of sweet-leafed geranium--as yet unshrivelled by

frost--and belated roses, placed in a vase upon the toilet-table.

In so doing she caught sight of her reflection in the mirror, and paused,

studying it. Her looks were not at their best. She was wan.--That might,

in part, be owing to the waning light. Around her eyes were dark circles,

making them appear unnaturally large and solemn. So yesterday's emotions

had left their mark! The nervous strain had been considerable and she

showed it. One cannot drink the cup of shame, however undeserved, with

physical any more than with mental impunity. She still felt a little

shattered, but hoped neither her father nor Carteret would remark her

plight. If the whole affair of yesterday could, in its objectionable

aspects, be kept from Sir Charles's knowledge she would be infinitely

glad. And why shouldn't it be? Without permission, Aunt Felicia certainly

would not tell. Neither would the servants. The parish had given

testimony, this afternoon, both of its good faith and its discretion.

So much for the objectionable side of the matter. But there was another

side, far from objectionable, beautiful in sentiment and in promise. And,

still viewing her reflection in the glass, she saw her eyes lose their

solemnity, lighten with a smile her lips repeated. This was where

Carteret's advice would be of so great value. How much ought she to tell

her father of all that?

For, from amidst the shame, the anger, the strain and effort, Faircloth

showed, to her thinking, triumphant, satisfying alike to her affection

and her taste. In no respect would she have asked him other than he was.

She moved across to the window, and sat down there, looking out over the

garden and battery, with its little cannons, to the Bar, and sea beyond

which melted into the dim primrose and silver of the horizon. Such colour

as existed was soft, soothing, the colour of a world of dreams, of

subdued and voiceless fancies. It was harmonious, restful as an

accompaniment to vision.--Damaris let it lap against her consciousness,

encircling, supporting this, as water laps, also encircling and

supporting--while caressing, mysteriously whispering against a boat's

side--a boat lying at its moorings, swinging gently upon an even

keel.--And her vision was of Faircloth, exclusively of him, just now.

For he had stayed to luncheon yesterday. A meal, to him in a sense

sacred, as being the first eaten by him in his father's house. So

graciously invited, how, indeed, could he do otherwise than stay? And,

the initial strangeness, the inherent wonder of that sacred character

wearing off, he found voice and talked not without eloquence. Talked of

his proper element, the sea, gaining ease and self-possession from the

magnitude and manifold enchantments of his theme.

To him, as to all true-born sailor-men--so Damaris divined--the world is

made of water, with but accident of land. Impeding, inconvenient accident

at that, too often blocking the passage across or through, and

constraining you to steer a foolishly, really quite inordinately

divergent course. Under this obstructive head the two Americas offend

direfully, sprawling their united strength wellnigh from pole to pole.

The piercing of their central isthmus promised some mitigation of this

impertinence of emergent matter; though whether in his, the speaker's

lifetime, remained--so he took it--open to doubt. The "roaring forties,"

and grim blizzard-ridden Fuegian Straits would long continue, as he

feared, to bar the way to the Pacific. Not that his personal fancy

favoured West so much as East. Not into the sunset but into the sunrising

did he love to sail some goodly black-hulled ship.--And as he talked,

more especially at his mention of this eastward voyaging, those manifold

enchantments of his calling stirred Damaris' imagination, making her

eyes bright as the fabled eyes of danger, and fathomless as well.

But the best came later. For, Mary having served coffee, Miss Felicia,

making an excuse of letters to be written, with pretty tact left them to

themselves. And Faircloth, returning after closing the door behind her

fluttering, gently eager figure, paused behind Damaris' chair.--Jacobean,

cane-panelled, with high-carved back and arms to it. Thomas Clarkson

Verity had unquestionably a nice taste in furniture.--The young

sea-captain rested his right hand on the dark terminal scroll-work, and

bending down, laid his left hand upon Damaris' hand, covering it as it

lay on the white damask table-cloth.

"Have I done what I should, and left undone what I shouldn't do, my dear

and lovely sister?" he asked her, half-laughing and half-abashed. "It's a

tricky business being here, you know--to put it no higher than that. And

it might, with truth, be put far higher. I get so horribly fearful of

letting you down in any way--however trivial--before other people. I

balance on a knife-edge all the while."

"Have no silly fears of that sort," Damaris said quickly, a trifle

distressed.

For it plucked at her sisterly pride in him that he should, even by

implication, debase himself, noting inequality of station between himself

and her. She held the worldly aspects of the matter in contempt. They

angered her, so that she impulsively banished reserve. Leaning forward,

she bent her head, putting her lips to the image of the flying

sea-bird--which so intrigued her loving curiosity--and those three

letters tattooed in blue and crimson upon the back of his hand.

"There--there"--she murmured, as soothing a child--"does this

convince you?"

But here broke off, her heart contracting with a spasm of wondering

tenderness. For under that pressure of her lips she felt his flesh quiver

and start. She looked up at the handsome bearded face, so close above

her, in swift enquiry, the potion--as once before--troubling her that, in

touching this quaint stigmata, she inflicted bodily suffering. And, as

on that earlier occasion, asked the question:

"Ah! but have I hurt you?"

Faircloth shook his head, smiling. Words failed him just then and he went

pale beneath the overlay of clear brown sunburn.

"Then tell me what this stands for?" she said, being herself strangely

moved, and desirous to lower the temperature of her own emotion--possibly

of his as well. "Tell me what it means."

"Just a boy's fear and a boy's superstition--a bit morbid, both of them,

perhaps--that is as I see things now. For I hold one should leave one's

body as it pleased the Almighty to make it, unblemished by semi-savage

decorations which won't wash off."

Faircloth moved away, drew his chair up nearer the head of the table,

the corner between them, so that his hand could if desire prompted again

find hers.

"By the way, I'm so glad you don't wear ear-rings, Damaris," he said.

"They belong to the semi-savage order of decoration. I hate them. You

never will wear them? Promise me that."

And she had promised, somewhat diverted by his tone of authority and of

insistence.

"But about this?" she asked him, indicating the blue and crimson symbol.

"As I say, fruit of fear and superstition--a pretty pair in which to put

one's faith! All the same, they went far to save my life, I fancy--for

which I thank them mightily being here, with you, to-day."

And he told her--softening the uglier details, as unfit for a

gently-nurtured woman's hearing--a brutal story of the sea. Of a sailing

ship becalmed in tropic waters, waiting, through long blistering days and

breathless sweltering nights, for the breeze which wouldn't come--a

floating hell, between glaring skies and glaring ocean--and of bullyings,

indignities and torments devised by a brain diseased by drink.

"But was there no one to interfere, no one to protect you?" Damaris

cried, aghast.

"A man's master in his own ship," Faircloth answered. "And short of

mutiny there's no redress. Neither officers nor men had a stomach for

mutiny. They were a poor, cowed lot. Till this drunken madness came on

him he had been easy going enough. They supposed, when it passed, he'd

be so again. And then as he reserved his special attentions for me,

they were willing to grin and bear it--or rather let me bear it, just

stupidly letting things go. It was my first long voyage. I'd been lucky

in my skippers so far, and was a bit soft still. A bit conceited, I

don't doubt, as well. He swore he'd break my spirit--for my own good,

of course--and he came near succeeding.--But Damaris, Damaris, dear,

don't take it to heart so. What does it matter? It did me no lasting

harm, and was all over and done with--would have been forgotten too,

but for the rather silly sign of it--years and years ago. Let us talk

no more about it."

"Oh, no!--go on--please, go on," she brokenly prayed him.

So he told her, further, how at Singapore, the outward voyage at last

ended, he was tempted to desert; or, better still, put an end, once and

for all, to the whole black business of living. And how, meditating on

the methods of such drastic deliverance--sitting in the palm-shaded

verandah of a fly-blown little eating-house, kept by a monkey-faced,

squint-eyed Japanese--he happened to pick up a Calcutta newspaper. He

read its columns mechanically, without interest or understanding, his

mind still working on methods of death, when a name leapt at him weighted

with personal meaning.

"It hit me," Faircloth said, "full between the eyes, knocking the

cry-baby stuff out of me, and knocking stuff of very different order in.

For I wanted something stronger than mother-love--precious though that

is--to brace me up and put some spunk into me just then.--Sir Charles was

campaigning in Afghanistan, and this Calcutta paper sang his praises to a

rousing tune. Lamented the loss of him to the Indian Government, and the

lack of appreciation and support of him at home which induced him to take

foreign service. Can't you imagine how all this about a great soldier,

whose blood after all ran in my veins, pulled me clean up out of the

slime, where suicide tempted the soft side of me, into another world?--A

sane world, in which a man can make good, if only he's pluck to hold

on.--Yes, he saved me; or at all events roused the spirit in me which

makes for salvation, and which that drunken brute had almost killed. But,

because I was only a boy as yet, with a boy's queer instincts and

extravagancies, I made the monkey-faced, Japanese eating-house

keeper--who added artistic tattooing to other and less reputable ways of

piling up a fortune--fix the sea-bird, for faith in my profession--and

those three initials of my own name and a name not altogether my own,

right here.--Fix them for remembrance and for a warning of which I could

never get free. Always I should be forced to see it. And others must see

it too. Through it my identity--short of mutilation--was indestructibly

established. From that identity, henceforward, there wasn't any possible

running away."

Faircloth had ended on a note of exultation, calmly sounded yet profound.

And upon that final note Damaris dwelt now, sitting on the chintz-covered

window-seat of the room which Carteret would to-night inhabit. She went

through the cruel story again, while the transparent twilight drew its

elfin veil over all things, outdoor and in.

The crescent moon, a slender, upright wisp of a thing, climbed the

southern sky. And Damaris' soul was strangely satisfied, for the story,

if cruel, was one of restitution and the healing of a wrong. To her

father--his father--the boy had turned in that bad hour, which very

perfectly made for peace between them. The curve of her duty to the one,

as she now apprehended, in nowise cut across or deflected the curve of

her duty towards the other. The two were the same, were one. And this,

somehow, some day, when time and sentiment offered opportunity for such

disclosure, she must let her father know. She must repeat to him the

story of the eating-house and its monkey-faced proprietor--of

questionable reputation--away in tropic Singapore. It could hardly fail

to appeal to him if rightly told. About the events and vulgar publicity

of yesterday nothing need be said. About this, within careful limits,

much; and that, with, as she believed, happiest result. She had succeeded

in bringing father and son together in the first instance. Now, with this

pathetic story as lever, might she not hope to bring them into closer,

more permanent union? Why should not Faircloth, in future, come and go,

if not as an acknowledged son, yet as acknowledged and welcome friend, of

the house? A consummation this, to her, delightful and reasonable as

just. For had not the young man passed muster, and that triumphantly--she

again told herself--in small things as well as great, in things of social

usage and habit, those "little foxes" which, as between class and class,

do so deplorably and disastrously "spoil the grapes?"

Therefore she began to invent ingenious speeches to Carteret and to her

father. Hatch ingenious schemes and pretty plots--in the style of dear

Aunt Felicia almost!--Was that lady's peace-making passion infectious, by

chance? And supposing it were, hadn't it very charming and praiseworthy

turns to it--witness Felicia's rather noble gathering in and acceptance

of Faircloth yesterday.

Arriving at which engaging conclusion, Damaris felt minded to commune for

a space with the restful loveliness of the twilight, before going

downstairs again and seeking more definite employment of books or

needlework. She raised the window-sash and, kneeling on the

chintz-covered cushioned window-seat, leaned out.

The gardeners to-day had rooted up the geraniums and dug over the empty

flower beds, just below, preparatory to planting them with bulbs for

spring blossoming. The keen, pungent scent of the newly-turned earth

hung in the humid air, as, mingling with it--a less agreeable

incense--did the reek of the mud-flats. On the right the twin ilex trees

formed a mass of soft imponderable gloom. Above and behind them the sky

was like smoked crystal. The lawn lay open and vacant. Upon it nothing

hopped or crept. The garden birds had eaten their suppers long since,

and sought snug bosky perching places for the night. Even the unsleeping

sea was silent, the tide low and waveless, no more than a languid ripple

far out upon the shelving sands. All dwelt in calm, in a brooding

tranquillity which might be felt.

Damaris listened to the silence, until her ears began to suspect its

sincerity. Sounds were there in plenty, she believed, were her hearing

sharp enough to detect them. They naughtily played hide-and-seek with

her, striking a chord too deep or too thinly acute for human sense.

Sights were there too, had her eyes but a cat's or an owl's keener

faculty of seeing. Behind the tranquillity she apprehended movement and

action employing a medium, obeying impulses, to us unknown. Restfulness

fled away, but, in place of it, interest grew. If she concentrated her

attention and listened more carefully, she should hear; looked more

steadily, she should see.

Just because she was tired, a little shattered still and spent, did this

predominance of outward nature draw her, imposing itself. It beckoned

her; and, through passing deficiency of will, she followed its beckoning,

making no serious effort to resist. With the consequence she presently

did hear sounds, but sounds surely real and recognizable enough.

Coming from the shore eastwards, below the sea-wall along the river

frontage, ponies walked, or rather floundered, fetlock deep in blown

sand--a whole drove of them to judge by the confused and muffled

trampling of their many hoofs. The drop from the top of the sea-wall to

the beach was too great, and the space between the foot of the wall and

the river-bank and breakwater too confined, for her to see the animals,

even had not oncoming darkness rendered all objects increasingly

ill-defined.

But the confused trampling instead of keeping along the foreshore, as in

all reason it should, now came up and over the sea-wall, on to the

battery, into the garden, heading towards the house, Damaris strained her

eyes through the tranquil obscurity, seeking visible cause of this

advancing commotion, but without effect. Yet all the while, as her

hearing clearly testified, the unseen ponies hustled one another,

plunging, shying away from the swish and crack of a long-thonged whip.

One stumbled and rolled over in the sand.--For although the mob was

half-way up the lawn by now, the shuffling, sliding sand stayed always

with them.--After a nasty struggle it got on to its feet, tottering

forward under savage blows, dead lame. Another, a laggard, fell into its

tracks, and lay there foundered, rattling in the throat.

By this time the foremost of the drove came abreast the house front,

where Sir Charles Verity's three ground-floor rooms, with the corridor

behind them, ranged out from the main building. The many-paned

semicircular windows of these rooms dimly glistened, below their

fan-shaped, slated roofs. The crowding scurry of scared, over-driven

animals was so indisputable that Damaris expected a universal smashing of

glass. But the sound of many hoofs, still muted by sliding sand, passed

straight on into and through the house as though no obstacle intervened

barring progress.

The many-paned windows remained intact, undemolished, dimly glistening

beneath their slated roofs. The garden stretched vacant, as before, right

away to the battery, in the elusive twilight, a sky of smoked

crystal--through which stars began to show faintly, points of cold

blurred light--above the gloom of the ilex trees to the west, and in the

south, above the indistinguishable sea, the slender moon hanging upright,

silver and sickle-shaped.

Thus far Damaris' entire consciousness had resided in and been limited to

her auditory sense; concentration being too absorbed and intense to allow

room for reasoning, still less for scepticism or even astonishment. She

had watched with her ears--as the blind watch--desperate to interpret,

instant by instant, inch by inch, this reconstructed tragedy of long-dead

man and long-dead beast. There had been no thinking round the central

interest, no attempted reading of its bearing upon normal events. Mind

and imagination were fascinated by it to the exclusion of all else. It

acted as an extravagant dream acts, abrogating all known laws of cause

and effect, giving logic and science the lie, negativing probability,

making the untrue true, the impossible convincingly manifest.

Not, indeed, until she beheld Mary Fisher, deep-bosomed and comely, in

black gown, white apron and cap, moving within those rooms

downstairs--still echoing, as they surely must, to that tumultuous and

rather ghastly equine transit--did the extraordinary character of the

occurrence flash into fullness of relief.

Mary, meanwhile, set down her flat candlestick upon the big writing-table

in Sir Charles's study, lighted lamps and drew blinds and curtains. Went

into the bedroom next door and dressing-room beyond, methodically

performing the evening ritual of "shutting up." Her shadow marched with

her, as though mockingly assisting in her operations, now crouching, now

leaping ahead, blotting a ceiling, extending itself upon a wall space.

Other shadows, thrown by the furniture, came forth and leapt also,

pranced, skipping back into hiding as the candle-light shifted and

passed. But save this indirect admission of the immaterial and grotesque,

everything showed reassuringly ordinary, the woman herself unconcerned,

ignorant of disturbance.

Damaris rose from her kneeling posture upon the window-seat and,

standing, lowered the sash. Once was enough. It was no longer incumbent

upon her to listen or to look. If these ghostly phenomena were repeated

they could convey nothing more to her, nothing fresh. They had delivered

their message--one addressed wholly and solely to herself, so she judged,

since Mary had so conspicuously no suspicion of it.

Our maiden's lips were dry. Her heart beat in her ears. Yet she was in no

degree unnerved. Seldom indeed had she been more mistress of her powers,

self-realized and vigilant. Nor did she feel tired any more, infirm of

will and spent. Rather was she consciously resolute to encounter and

withstand events--of what order she did not know as yet but events of

moment and far-reaching result, already on the road, journeying toward

her hotfoot. They were designed to test and try her. Would do their

utmost to overwhelm, to submerge her, were she weak. But she didn't

intend them to submerge her. She bade weakness quit, all her young

courage rising in arms.

The marvellous things she just now heard, so nearly saw--for it had come

very near to seeing, hadn't?--were _avant couriers_ of these same

journeying events, their appointed prelude. She could explain neither how

nor why--but, very certainly, somehow. Nor could she explain the

relation--if any--coupling together the said marvels heard and the

events. Nevertheless, she knew the former rode ahead, whether in

malignity or mercy, to forewarn her. This place, The Hard, in virtue of

its numerous vicissitudes of office and of ownership, of the memories and

traditions which it harboured, both sinister, amiable, erudite,

passionate, was singularly sentient, replete with influences. In times of

strain and stress the normal wears thin, and such lurking influences are

released. They break bounds, shouting--to such as have the psychic

genius--convincing testimony of their existence.

All this Damaris perceived, standing in the middle of the room while the

silver crescent moon looked in at her. The stillness once again was

absolute. The dusk, save where the windows made pale squares upon the

carpet, thick. The four-post bed, gay enough by day with hangings and

valences patterned in roses on a yellow ground, looked cavernous.

Carteret would lie under its black canopy to-night if--

"If all goes well."

Damaris said the words aloud, her thought becoming personal and

articulate.

Once before she had heard the smugglers' ponies, waiting in this same

room. Waiting at the open window to catch the first rumble of the wheels

of a returning carriage. Her poor dear Nannie, Sarah Watson, was

returning home after a summer holiday spent with her own people in the

north. And Damaris, younger then by nearly five years, had listened

impatiently, ready to skirmish down into the front hall--directly the

carriage turned the elbow of the drive--and enclose her faithful nurse

and foster-mother in arms of child-like love. But destiny ruled otherwise.

In vain she waited. Sarah Watson returned no more, death having elected

to take her rather horribly to himself some hours previously amid the

flaming wreckage of a derailed express.

What did this second hearing presage? A like vain waiting and disclosure

of death-dealing accident? Notwithstanding her attitude of high

resolution, the question challenged Damaris in sardonic fashion from

beneath the black canopy of the great bed. Her hand went up to the string

of pearls which, on a sudden, grew heavy about her throat.

"But not--not--pray God, the dear man with the blue eyes," she cried.

She was glad to be alone, in the encompassing semi-dark, for a warm wave

of emotion swept over her, an ardour hardly of the spiritual sort. Had

she deceived herself? Was she, in truth, desirous Carteret should

approach her solely according to that earlier manner, in which she so

simply trusted him? Did she hail his coming as that of a wise counsellor

merely--or--

But here Mary--still pursuing the time-honoured ritual of shutting

up--entered candle in hand, the landing showing brightly lit behind her.

"Dear heart alive!" she exclaimed, "whoever's that? You, Miss Damaris?

Alone here in the dark. You did make me jump. But there," she added,

repentant of her unceremonious exclamation, "I don't know what possesses

us all to-night. The least thing seems to make you jump. Mrs. Cooper's

all of a twitter, and Laura--silly girl--is almost as bad. I suppose it's

the weather being so quiet after yesterday's gale. For my own part I

always do like a wind about. It seems company, particularly these long

evenings if you're called on to go round the house by yourself."

All of which amounted to an admission, as Damaris was not slow to detect.

She was still under the empire of emotion. The abrupt intrusion affected

her. She, too, needed to carry off the situation.

"Poor Mary," she said, "you have been frightened--by what? Did you hear

anything you could not account for when you were down in the library

just now?"

The answer came after a pause, as though the speaker were suspicious,

slightly unwilling to commit herself.

"No, Miss Damaris, not in Sir Charles's rooms or in the west wing either.

Whatever unaccountable noises there ever is belong to this old part of

the house."

She set her candlestick on the dressing-table, and went to each window in

turn, drawing blinds down and curtains across. So doing she continued to

talk, moving to and fro meanwhile with a firm, light tread.

"Not that I pay much attention to such things myself. I don't hold it's

right. It's my opinion there's no sort of nonsense you can't drive

yourself into believing once you let ideas get a root in you. I've seen

too much of Mrs. Cooper giving away like that. The two winters you and

Sir Charles was abroad I'd a proper upset with her--though we are good

friends--more than once. After sundown she was enough to terrify you out

of your life--wouldn't go here and wouldn't go there for fear of she

didn't know what. Tempting Providence, I call it, and spoke to her quite

sharp. If ever I wanted to go over to spend an hour or two with father

and mother in Marychurch, I was bound to ask Mrs. Patch and the children

to come in and keep her company. There's no sense in putting yourself

into such a state. It makes you a trouble to yourself and everybody else.

And in the end, a thousand to one if anything comes of all the turmoil

and fuss--Mrs. Cooper, to be only fair to her, when she's in a reasonable

humour, allows as much."

Mary stepped across to the bed and doubled back the quilt, preparatory to

turning down the fine linen sheet. She felt she had extracted herself

from a somewhat invidious position with flying colours; and, in the

process, had administered timely advice. For it wasn't suitable Miss

Damaris should be moping alone upstairs at odd times like this. It all

came of yesterday's upset.--Her righteous anger blazed against the

clerical culprit. In that connection there was other matter of which she

craved to deliver herself--refreshing items of local gossip, sweet as

honey to the mouth did she but dare retail them. She balanced the

question this way and that. Would satisfaction outweigh offence, or

offence satisfaction, on the part of Miss Damaris? You could not be sure

how she'd take things--quite. And yet she ought to know, for the affair

certainly placed Captain Faircloth in a pleasant light. Only one who was

every inch a gentleman would behave so handsomely as he had.

She stretched across the bed to smooth the slightly wrinkled surface of

the sheet. This gymnastic feat necessitated the averting of her face and

turning of her back.

"There's a fine tale going round of how the Island lads--wild young

fellows ready for any pranks--served Mr. Sawyer, the curate," she began.

"They say William Jennifer put them up to it, having a grudge against him

for trying to get his youngest boy taken up for stealing apples last

week. They planned to give him a ducking in the pool just above the

ferry, where the water's so deep under the bank. And if Captain Faircloth

hadn't happened to come along, for certain they'd have made Mr. Sawyer

swim for it. Mr. Patch hears they handled him ever so rough, tore his

coat, and were on the very tick of pitching him in. But Captain Faircloth

would not suffer it. He took a very high line with them, it is said. And

not content with getting Mr. Sawyer away, walked with him as far as the

Grey House to protect him from any further interference."

She gave the pillows sundry judicious strokings and pats.

"I hope Mr. Sawyer's properly thankful, for it isn't many that would have

shown him so much leniency as that."

She would have enjoyed labouring the point. But comment appeared to her,

under the circumstances, to trench on impertinence. Facts spoke for

themselves. She restrained herself, fetched her candlestick from the

dressing-table, and stood by the open door, thereby enjoining her young

lady's exit.

Thus far Damaris maintained silence, but in passing out on to the

landing, she said--"Thank you. I am glad to know what has happened."

Encouraged by which acknowledgment, the excellent woman ventured

further advice.

"And now, miss, you must please just lie down on the schoolroom sofa and

get a little sleep before the gentlemen and Mr. Hordle arrive back. There

is a good two hours to wait yet, and I'll call you in plenty of time for

you to dress. You don't look altogether yourself, miss. Too much talking

with all that host of callers. You are properly fagged out. I'll get Mrs.

Cooper to beat up an egg for you in a tumbler of hot milk, with a

tablespoonful of sherry and just a pinch of sugar in it. That will get

your circulation right."

CHAPTER VI

SHOWING HOW SIR CHARLES VERITY WAS JUSTIFIED OF HIS LABOURS

Which homely programme being duly executed, worked restorative wonders.

Matter, in the sublimated form of egg-flip, acted upon mind beneficially

through the functions of a healthy, if weary, young body. Our maiden

slept, to dream not of ghostly ponies or other uncomfortably discarnate

creatures; but of Darcy Faircloth in his pretty piece of Quixotism,

rescuing a minister of the Church of England "as by law established" from

heretical baptismal rites of total immersion. The picture had a rough

side to it, and also a merry one; but, beyond these, generous dealing

wholly delightful to her feeling. She awoke soothed and restored, ready

to confront the oncoming of events--whatever their character--in a spirit

of high confidence as well as of resolution.

With the purpose of advertising this brave humour she dressed herself in

her best. I do not deny a love of fine clothes in Damaris. Yet in her own

home, and for delectation of the men belonging to her, a woman is surely

free to deck herself as handsomely as her purse allows. "Beauty

unadorned" ceased to be practicable, in self-respecting circles, with the

expulsion of our first parents from the paradisaic state; while beauty

merely dowdy, is a pouring of contempt on one of God's best gifts to the

human race. Therefore I find no fault with Damaris, upon this rather

fateful evening, in that she clothed herself in a maize-coloured silk

gown flowered in faint amber and faint pink. Cut in the piece from

shoulder to hem, according to a then prevailing fashion, it moulded

bosom, waist and haunches, spreading away into a demi-train behind. The

high Medici collar of old lace, at the back of the square décolletage,

conferred dignity; the hanging lace of the elbow sleeves a lightness. Her

hair, in two wide plaits, bound her head smoothly, save where soft

disobedient little curls, refusing restriction, shaded her forehead and

the nape of her neck.

After a few seconds of silent debate she clasped Carteret's pearls about

her throat again; and so fared away, a creature of radiant aspect, amid

sombre setting of low ceilings and dark carpeted floors, to await the

advent of the travellers.

These arrived some little while before their time, so that the girl, in

her gleaming dress, had gone but half-way down the staircase when they

came side by side into the hall.--Two very proper gentlemen, the moist

freshness of the night attending them, a certain nobility in their

bearing which moved her to enthusiasm, momentarily even bringing a mist

before her eyes. For they were safe and well both of them, so she

joyously registered, serene of countenance, moreover, as bearers of glad

tidings are. Whatever the ghostly ponies foretold could be no evil

shadowing them--for which she gave God thanks.

Meanwhile, there without, the light of the carriage lamps pierced the

enclosing gloom, played on the silver plating of harness, on the shining

coats of the horses, whose nostrils sent out jets of pale steam. Played

over the faces of the servants, too, Mary and Laura just within the open

door, Hordle and Conyers outside loading down the baggage from the back

of the mail-phaeton, and on Patch, exalted high above them on the

driving-seat.

As Damaris paused, irradiated by the joy of welcome and of forebodings

falsified, upon the lowest step of the staircase, Sir Charles turned

aside and tenderly kissed her.

"My darling," he said.

And Carteret, following him an instant later, took her by both hands and,

from arm's length, surveyed her in smiling admiration he made no effort

to repress.

"Dear witch, this is unexpected good fortune. I had little thought of

seeing you so soon--resplendent being that you are, veritably clothed

with sunshine."

"And with your pearls," she gaily said.

"Ah! my poor pearls," he took her up lightly. "I am pleased they still

find favour in your sight. But aren't you curious to learn what has made

us desert our partridge shooting at an hour's notice, granting the pretty

little beggars unlooked-for length of life?"

His blue eyes laughed into hers. There was a delightful atmosphere about

him. Something had happened to him surely--for wasn't he, after all, a

young man even yet?

"Yes--what--what has brought you, Colonel Sahib?" Damaris laughed back at

him, bubbling over with happy excitement.

"Miracles," he answered. "A purblind Government at last admits the error

of its ways and proposes to make reparation for its neglect of a notable

public-servant."

"You?" she cried.

Carteret shook his head, still surveying her but with a soberer glance.

"No--no--not me. In any case there isn't any indebtedness to

acknowledge--no arrears to pay off. I have my deserts.--To a man

immensely my superior. Look nearer home, dear witch."

He made a gesture in the direction of his host.

"My Commissioner Sahib?"

"Yes--your Commissioner Sahib, who comes post haste to request your dear

little permission, before accepting this tardy recognition of his

services to the British Empire."

"Ah! but that's too much!" the girl said softly, glancing from one to the

other, enchanted and abashed by the greatness of their loyalty to and

prominent thought of her.

"Has this made him happy?" she asked Carteret, under her breath. "He

looks so, I think. How good that this has come in time--that it hasn't

come too late."

For, in the midst of her joyful excitement, a shadow crossed Damaris'

mind oddly obscuring the light. She suffered a perception things might so

easily have turned out otherwise; a suspicion that, had the reparation of

which Carteret spoke been delayed, even by a little, its beloved

recipient would no longer have found use for or profit in it. Damaris

fought the black thought, as ungrateful and faithless. To fear disaster

is too often to invite it.

Just at this juncture Miss Felicia made hurried and gently eager

irruption into the hall; and with that irruption the tone of prevailing

sentiment declined upon the somewhat trivial, even though warmly

affectionate. For she fluttered round Sir Charles, as Mary Fisher helped

divest him of his overcoat, in sympathetic overflowings of the simplest

sort.--"She had been reading and failed to hear the carriage, hence her

tardy appearance. Let him come into the drawing-room at once, out of

these draughts. There was a delightful wood fire and he must be chilled.

The drive down the valley was always so cold at night--particularly where

the road runs through the marsh lands by Lampit."

In her zeal of welcome Miss Verity was voluble to the point of

inconsequence, not to say incoherence. Questions poured from her. She

appeared agitated, quaintly self-conscious, so at least it occurred to

Damaris. Finally she addressed Carteret.

"And you too must be frozen," she declared. "How long it is since we met!

I have always been so unlucky in just missing you here! Really I believe

I have only seen you once since you and Charles stayed with us at Canton

Magna.--You were both on leave from India. I dare not think how many

years ago that is--before this child"--her candid eyes appealingly sought

those of Damaris--"before this child existed. And you are so wonderfully

unaltered."

Colour dyed her thin face and rather scraggy neck. Only the young should

blush. After forty such involuntary exhibitions of emotion are

unattractive, questionably even pathetic.

"Really time has stood still with you--it seems to me, Colonel Carteret."

"Time has done better than stand still," Damaris broke in, with a rather

surprising imperiousness. "It has beautifully run backwards--lately."

And our maiden, in her whispering gleaming dress, swept down from the

step, swept past the sadly taken aback Miss Felicia, and joined her

father. She put her hand within his arm.

"Come and warm yourself--come, dearest," she said, gently drawing him

onward into the long room, where from above the range of dark

bookshelves, goggle-eyed, pearl-grey Chinese goblins and monsters, and

oblique-eyed Chinese philosophers and saints looked mysteriously down

through the warm mellow light.

Damaris was conscious of a singular inward turmoil. For Miss Felicia's

speeches found small favour in her ears. She resented this open claiming

of Carteret as a member of the elder generation. Still more resented her

own relegation to the nullity of the prenatal state. Reminiscences, in

which she had neither lot nor part, left her cold. Or, to be accurate,

bred in her an intemperate heat, putting a match to jealousies which,

till this instant, she had no knowledge of. Touched by that match they

flared to the confusion of charity and reverence. Hence, impulsively,

unscrupulously, yet with ingenious unkindness, she struck--her tongue a

sword--to the wounding of poor Miss Felicia. And she felt no necessity

for apology. She liked to be unkind. She liked to strike. Aunt Felicia

should not have been so self-assertive, so tactless. She had brought

chastisement upon herself. It wasn't like her to behave thus. Her

enthusiasms abounded; but she possessed a delicate appreciation of

relative positions. She never poached. This came perilously near

poaching.--And everything had danced to so inspiring a tune, the movement

of it so delicious! Now the evening was spoilt. The first fine alacrity

of it could not be recaptured--which was all Aunt Felicia's fault.--No,

for her unkindness Damaris felt no regret.

It may be remarked that our angry maiden's mind dwelt rather upon the

snub she had inflicted on Miss Verity, than upon the extensive compliment

she had paid, and the challenge she had delivered, to Carteret. Hearing

her flattering declaration, his mind not unnaturally dwelt more upon the

latter. It took him like a blow, so that from bending courteously over

the elder lady's hand, he straightened himself with a jerk. His eyes

followed the imperious, sun-clad young figure, questioning and keenly

alert. To-day he had liberally enjoyed the pleasures of friendship, for

Charles Verity had been largely and generously elate. But Damaris'

outburst switched feeling and sentiment onto other lines. They became

personal. Were her words thrown off in mere lightness of heart, or had

she spoken deliberately, with intention? It were wiser, perhaps, not to

ask. He steadied his attention on to Miss Felicia once more, but not

without effort.

"You always said kind and charming things, I remember," so he told her.

"You are good enough to say them still."

Damaris stood by her father, upon the tiger skin before the hearth.

"Tell me, dearest?" she prayed him.

Charles Verity put his hand under her chin, turned up her face and looked

searchingly at her. Her beauty to-night was conspicuous and of noble

quality. It satisfied his pride. Public life invited him, offering him

place and power. Ranklings of disappointment, of detraction and slight,

were extinguished. His soul was delivered from the haunting vexations of

them. He was in the saddle again, and this radiant woman-child, whom he

so profoundly loved, should ride forth with him for all the world to

see--if she pleased. That she would please he had no doubt. Pomp and

circumstance would suit her well. She was, moreover, no slight or frothy

piece of femininity; but could be trusted, amid the glamour of new and

brilliant conditions, to use her judgment and to keep her head.

Increasingly he respected her character as well as her intelligence. He

found in her unswerving sense of right and wrong, sense of honour

likewise. Impetuous she might be, swift to feel and to revolt; but of

tender conscience and, on occasion, royally compassionate. Now he could

give her fuller opportunity. Could place her in circumstances admittedly

enviable and prominent. From a comparative back-water, she should gain

the full stream--and that stream, in a sense, at the flood.

Rarely, if ever, had Charles Verity experienced purer pleasure, touched a

finer level of purpose and of hope than to-day, when thinking of and now

when looking upon Damaris. He thankfully appraised her worth, and in

spirit bowed before it, not doatingly or weakly but with reasoned

conviction. Weighed in the balances she would not be found wanting, such

was his firm belief. For himself he accepted this recall to active

participation in affairs, active service to the State, with a lofty

content. But that his daughter, in the flower of her young womanhood,

would profit by this larger and more distinguished way of life, gave the

said recall its deeper values and its zest.

Still he put her off awhile as to the exact announcement, smiling upon

her in fond, yet stately approval.

"Let the telling keep until after dinner, my dear," he bade her. "Pacify

the cravings of the natural man for food and drink. The day has been

fertile in demands--strenuous indeed to the point of fatigue. So let us

comfort ourselves inwardly and materially before we affront weighty

decisions."

He kissed her cheek.

"By the way, though, does it ever occur to you to think of the Bhutpur

Sultan-i-bagh and wish to go East again?"

And Damaris, with still uplifted chin, surveyed him gravely and with a

certain wistfulness, Miss Felicia's attempted poaching forgotten and an

impression of Faircloth vividly overtaking her. For they were so

intimately, disturbingly alike, the father and the son, in voice as well

as in build and feature.

"Go East?" she said, Faircloth's declared preference for sailing into the

sunrise present to her. "Why, I go East in my dreams nearly every night.

I love it--love it more rather than less as I grow older. Of course I

wish to go--some day. But that's by the way, Commissioner Sahib. All that

I really want, now, at once, is to go wherever you go, stay wherever you

stay. You won't ask me to agree to any plan which parts us, will

you?--which takes you away from me?"

"Ruth to a strange Naomi, my dear," he answered. "But so be it. I desire

nothing better than to have you always with me.--But I will not keep you

on tenter-hooks as to your and my projected destination. Let them bring

in dinner in half an hour. Carteret and I shall be ready. Meanwhile, read

this--agreeing to relegate discussion of it to a less hungry season."

And taking the letter she had forwarded to him yesterday, bearing the

imprint of the Indian Office, from the breast pocket of his shooting

coat, he put it into her hand.

The appointment--namely, that of Lieutenant-Governor of an Indian

presidency famous in modern history, a cradle of great reputations and

great men, of English names to conjure with while our Eastern Empire

endures--was offered, in terms complimentary above those common to

official communications. Sir Charles Verity's expert knowledge, not only

of the said mighty province but of the turbulent kingdom lying beyond its

frontiers, marked him as peculiarly fitted for the post. A campaign

against that same turbulent kingdom had but recently been brought to a

victorious conclusion. His influence, it was felt, might be of supreme

value at this juncture in the maintenance of good relations, and

consolidation of permanent peace.

Damaris' heart glowed within her as she read the courteous praiseful

sentences. Even more than through the well-merited success of his book,

did her father thus obtain and come into the fullness of his own at last.

Her imagination glowed, too, calling up pictures of the half-remembered,

half-fabulous oriental scene. The romance of English rule in India, the

romance of India itself, its variety, its complexity, the multitude of

its gods, the multitude of its peoples, hung before her as a mirage,

prodigal in marvels, reaching back and linking up through the centuries

with the hidden wisdom, the hidden terror of the Ancient of Days.

To this land of alien faiths and secular wonders, she found herself

summoned, not as casual sightseer or tourist, but as among the handful of

elect persons who count in its social, political and administrative life.

In virtue of her father's position, her own would be both conspicuous and

assured. An intoxicating prospect this for a girl of one-and-twenty!

Intoxicating, yet, as she envisaged it, disquieting likewise. She

balanced on the thought of all it demanded as well as all it offered, of

all it required from her--dazed by the largeness of the purview, volition

in suspense.

Carteret was the first to reappear, habited in the prescribed black and

white of evening male attire. In the last six months he had, perhaps, put

on flesh; but this without detriment to the admirable proportions of his

figure. It retained its effect of perfect response to the will within,

and all its natural grace. His fair hair and moustache were still almost

untouched with grey. His physical attraction, in short, remained

unimpaired. And of this Damaris was actually, if unconsciously, sensible

as he closed the door and, passing between the stumpy pillars, walked up

the long narrow room and stood, his hands behind him, his back to the

pleasantly hissing and crackling fire of driftwood.

"Alone, dear witch?" he said, and, seeing the open letter in her

hand--"Well, what do you make of this proposition?" And yet again, as she

raised serious pondering eyes--"You find it an extensive order?"

"I find it magnificent for him--beautifully as it should be, adequate

and right."

"And for yourself?" Carteret asked, aware of a carefulness in her

language and intrigued by it.

"Magnificent for me, too--though it takes away my breath."

"You must learn to breathe deeper, that's all," he returned, gently

teasing her.

"And who is to teach me to breathe deeper, dear Colonel Sahib," she

quickly, and rather embarrassingly, asked. "Not my father. He'll have

innumerable big things to do and to do them without waste of energy he

must be saved at every point. He must not fritter away strength in

coaching me in my odds and ends of duties, still less in covering up my

silly mistakes."

"Oh! you exaggerate difficulties," he said, looking not at her but at the

fierce yellow and black striped tiger skin at his feet.--Bless the lovely

child, what was she driving at?

Carteret started for Deadham under the impression he had himself

thoroughly in hand, and that all danger of certain inconvenient emotions

was passed. He had lived them down, cast them out. For over two years now

he had given himself to the superintendence of his estate, to county

business, to the regulation of his sister's--happily more

prosperous--affairs, to the shepherding of his two elder nephews in their

respective professions and securing the two younger ones royally good

times during their holidays at home. Throughout the hunting season,

moreover, he rode to hounds on an average of three days a week. Such

healthy sport helps notably to deliver a man from vain desires, by

sending his body cleanly weary to bed and to sleep o' nights.

By such varied activities had Carteret systematically essayed to rid

himself of his somewhat exquisite distemper, and, when coming to Deadham,

honestly believed himself immune, sane and safe. He was proportionately

disturbed by finding the cure of this autumn love-madness less complete

than, fool-like, he had supposed. For it showed disquieting signs of

resurrection even when Damaris, arrayed in the sheen of silken sunlight,

greeted him at the staircase foot, and an alarming disposition finally to

fling away head-cloth and winding-sheet when she petulantly broke in upon

Miss Verity's faded memories of Canton Magna with the flattering

assertion that time had run backward with him of late.

Now alone with her, confident, moreover, of her maidenly doubts

and pretty self-distrust, he felt at a decided disadvantage. The

detached, affectionately friendly, the avuncular--not to say

grandfatherly--attitude escaped him. He could not play that part.

"Oh! you exaggerate difficulties," he therefore told her, with a

singular absence of his habitual mansuetude, his tone trenching on

impatience. "Instinct and common sense will teach you-mother-wit, too-of

which, you may take it from me, you have enough and to spare.-Let alone

that there will be a host of people emulous of guiding your steps aright,

if your steps should stand in need of guidance which I venture to doubt.

Don't underrate your own cleverness." Hearing him, sensible of his

apparent impatience and misconceiving the cause of it, Damaris' temper

stirred. She felt vexed. She also felt injured.

"What has happened to you, Colonel Sahib?" she asked him squarely. "I

see nothing foolish in what I have said. You wouldn't have me so

conceited that I rushed into this immense business without a qualm,

without any thought whether I can carry it out creditably--with credit

to him, I mean?"

Thus astonishingly attacked, Carteret hedged.

"Miss Verity, of course, will be"--he began.

Damaris cut him short.

"Aunt Felicia is an angel, a darling," she declared, "but--but"--

And there stopped, pricked by a guilty conscience. For to expose Miss

Felicia's inadequacies and enlarge on her ineligibility for the position

of feminine Chief of the Staff, struck her as unworthy, a meanness to

which, under existing circumstances, she could not condescend to stoop.

Carteret looked up, to be entranced not only by the fair spectacle of

her youth but by her delicious little air of shame and self-reproach.

Evidently she had caught herself out in some small naughtiness--was both

penitent and defiant, at once admitting her fault and pleading for

indulgence. He suspected some thought at the back of her mind which he

could neither exactly seize nor place. She baffled him with her changes

of mood and of direction--coming close and then slipping from under his

hand. This humour was surely new in her. She would not leave him alone,

would not let him rest. Had she developed, since last he had converse

with her, into a practised coquette?

"Look here, dear witch," he said, making a return upon himself, and

manfully withstanding the sweet provocation of her near neighbourhood.

"We seem to be queerly at cross purposes. I can't pretend to follow the

turnings and doublings of your ingenious mind. I gather there is

something you want of me. To be plain, then, what is it?"

"That--that you shouldn't desert me--desert us--in this crisis. You have

never deserted me before--never since I can first remember."

"I desert you--good Lord!" Carteret exclaimed, his hands dropping at his

sides with an odd sort of helplessness.

"Ah! that's asking too much, I suppose," she said. "I'm selfish even to

think of it. Yet how can I do otherwise? Don't you understand how all

difficulties would vanish, and how beautifully simple and easy everything

would be if you coached me--if you, dear Colonel Sahib, went with us?"

The man with the blue eyes looked down at the tiger skin again, his

countenance strained and blanched.

More than ever did he find her humour baffling. Not once nor twice had

he, putting force upon himself, resisted the temptation to woo

her--witness his retirement from St. Augustin and his determined

abstinence from intercourse with her since. But now, so it might

veritably appear, the positions were reversed and she wooed him. Though

whether pushed to that length merely by wayward fancy, by some

transient skittish influence or frolic in the blood, or by realized

design he had no means of judging.--Well, he had bidden her be plain,

and she, in some sort at least, obeyed him. It behooved him, therefore,

to be plain in return, in as far as a straightforward reading of her

meaning would carry.

"So you think all would be simple and easy were I to go with you and your

father?" he said, both speech and manner tempered to gentleness. "I am

glad to have you think so--should be still more glad could I share your

belief. But I know better, dearest witch--know that you are mistaken.

This is no case of desertion--put that out of your precious mind once

and for all--but of discretion. My being in attendance, far from

simplifying, would embroil and distort your position. An elderly

gentleman perpetually trotting"--

"Don't," Damaris cried, holding up both hands in hot repudiation. "Don't

say that. There's distortion if you like! It's ugly--I won't have it, for

it is not true."

In the obvious sincerity of which denunciation Carteret found balm; yet

adhered to his purpose.

"But it is true, alas; and I therefore repeat it both for your admonition

and my own. For an elderly gentleman trotting at a young girl's heels is

a most unedifying spectacle--giving occasion, and reasonably, to the

enemy to blaspheme--bad for her in numberless ways; and, if he's any

remnant of self-respect left in him, is anything better than a fatuous

dotard, damnably bad for him as well. Do you understand?"

Damaris presented a mutinous countenance. She would have had much ado to

explain her own motives during this ten minutes' conference. If her

mental--or were they not rather mainly emotional?--turnings and doublings

proved baffling to her companion, they proved baffling to herself in an

almost greater degree. Things in general seemed to have gone into the

melting-pot. So many events had taken place, so many more been

preshadowed, so many strains of feeling excited! And these were

confusingly unrelated, or appeared to be so as yet. Amongst the confusion

of them she found no sure foothold, still less any highway along which to

travel in confidence and security. Her thought ran wild. Her intentions

ran with it, changing their colour chameleon-like from minute to minute.

Now she was tempted to make an equivocal rejoinder.

"To understand," she said, "is not always, Colonel Sahib, necessarily

to agree."

"I am satisfied with understanding and don't press for agreement," he

answered, and on an easier note--"since to me it is glaringly evident

you should take this fine flight unhandicapped. My duty is to stand

aside and leave you absolutely free--not because I enjoy standing aside,

but"--he would allow sentiment such meagre indulgence--"just exactly

because I do not."

Here for the second time, at the crucial moment, Felicia Verity made

irruption upon the scene. But though her entrance was hurried, it

differed fundamentally from that earlier one; so that both the man and

the girl, standing in the proximity of their intimate colloquy before the

fire, were sensible of and arrested by it. She was self-forgetful,

self-possessed, the exalted touch of a pure devotion upon her.

"I have been with my brother Charles," she began, addressing them both.

"I happened to see Hordle coming from the library--and I put off dinner.

I thought, darling"--this to Damaris, with a becoming hint of

deference--"I might do so. I gathered that Charles--that your

father--wished it. He has not been feeling well."

And as Damaris anxiously exclaimed--

"Yes"--Miss Felicia went on--"not at all well. Hordle told me. That was

why I went to the library. He hoped, if he waited and rested for a little

while, the uncomfortable sensations might subside and it would be

needless to mention them. He did not want any fuss made. We gave him

restoratives, and he recovered from the faintness. But he won't be equal,

he admits, to coming in to dinner. Colonel Carteret must be hungry--your

father begs us to wait no longer, I assured him we would not. Hordle is

with him. He should not be alone, I think, while any pain continues."

"Pain--pain?" Damaris cried, her imagination rather horribly caught by

the word. "But is he hurt, has he had some accident?"

While Carteret asked tersely: "Pain--and where?"

"Here," Felicia answered, laying her hand upon her left side over the

heart. She looked earnestly at Carteret as she spoke, conveying to him an

alarm she sought to spare Damaris.

"He tries to make little of it, and assures me it was only the heat of

the house which caused him discomfort after the cold air out of doors.

It may be only that, but I think we ought to make sure."

Again, and with that same becoming hint of deference, she turned to

her niece.

"So I sent orders that Patch should drive at once to Stourmouth and fetch

Dr. McCabe. I did not stop to consult you because it seemed best he

should take out the horses before they were washed down and stabled."

"Yes--but I can go to him?" Damaris asked.

"Darling--of course. But I would try to follow his lead, if I were

you--treat it all lightly, since he so wishes. Your father knows best in

most things--and may know best in this. Please God it is so."

Left alone with Carteret.

"I am anxious--most cruelly anxious about my brother," she said.

While Damaris, sweeping across the hall and down the corridor in her

sunshine silken dress, repeated:

"The ponies--the smugglers' ponies," a sob in her throat.

CHAPTER VII

TELLING HOW CHARLES VERITY LOOKED ON THE MOTHER OF HIS SON

"Which is equivalent to saying, 'Hear the conclusion of the whole

matter,' isn't it, McCabe?"

Dr. McCabe's square, hairy-backed hands fumbled with the stethoscope as

he pushed it into his breast pocket, and, in replying, his advertised

cheerfulness rang somewhat false.

"Not so fast, Sir Charles--in the good Lord's name, not so fast. While

there's life there's hope, it's me settled opinion. I'm never for signing

a patient's death-warrant before the blessed soul of him's entirely

parted company with its mortal tenement of clay. The normal human being

takes a mighty lot of killing in my experience, where the will to live is

still intact. Let alone that you can never be quite upsides with Nature.

Ah! she's an astonishing box of tricks to draw on where final

dissolution's concerned. She glories to turn round on your pathological

and biological high science; and, while you're measuring a man for his

coffin, to help him give death the slip."

Charles Verity slightly shifted his position--and that with singular

carefulness--against the pillows in the deep red-covered chair. His

hands, inert and bluish about the finger-tips, lay along the padded arms

of it. The jacket of his grey-and-white striped flannel sleeping-suit was

unfastened at the throat, showing the irregular lift and fall of his

chest with each laboured breath. His features were accentuated, his face

drawn and of a surprising pallor.

The chair, in which he sat, had been brought forward into the wide arc of

the great window forming the front of the room. Two bays of this stood

open down to the ground. Looking out, beyond the rich brown of the

newly-turned earth in the flower-beds, the lawn stretched away--a dim

greyish green, under the long shadows cast by the hollies masking the

wall on the left, and glittering, powdered by myriads of scintillating

dewdrops, where the early sunshine slanted down on it from between their

stiff pinnacles and sharply serrated crests.

In the shrubberies robins sang, shrilly sweet. A murmur of waves,

breaking at the back of the Bar, hung in the chill, moist, windless air.

Presently a handbarrow rumbled and creaked, as West--the head gardener,

last surviving relic of Thomas Clarkson Verity's reign--wheeled it from

beneath the ilex trees towards the battery, leaving dark smudgy tracks

upon the spangled turf.

Arrived at his objective, the old gardener, with most admired

deliberation, loaded down long-handled birch-broom, rake and hoe; and

applied himself to mysterious peckings and sweeping of the gravel around

the wooden carriages of the little cannon and black pyramid of

ball.--Man, tools, and barrow were outlined against the pensive

brightness of autumn sea and autumn sky, which last, to southward, still

carried remembrance of sunrise in a broad band of faint yellowish pink,

fading upward into misty azure and barred with horizontal pencillings of

tarnished silver cloud.

Thus far Charles Verity had watched the progress of the bowed,

slow-moving figure musingly. But now, as the iron of the hoe clinked

against the gravel flints, he came back, so to say, to himself and back

to the supreme question at issue. He looked up, his eyes and the

soundless ironic laughter resident in them, meeting McCabe's twinkling,

cunning yet faithful and merry little eyes, with a flash.

"The work of the world is not arrested," he said. "See, that

octogenarian, old West. He wheeled ill-oiled, squeaking barrows and

hacked at the garden paths when I was a Harchester boy. He wheels the one

and hacks at the other even yet--a fact nicely lowering to one's private

egotism, when you come to consider it. Why, then, my good friend,

perjure yourself or strive to mince matters? The work of the world will

be done whether I'm here to direct the doing of it or not.--Granted I am

tough and in personal knowledge of ill-health a neophyte. My luck

throughout has been almost uncanny. Neither in soldiering nor in sport,

from man or from beast, have I ever suffered so much as a scratch. I have

borne a charmed life--established a record for invulnerability, which

served me well in the East where the gods still walk in the semblance of

man and miracle is still persistently prevalent. Accident has passed me

by--save for being laid up once, nearly thirty years ago, with a broken

ankle in the house of some friends at Poonah."

He ceased speaking, checking, as it seemed, disposition to further

disclosure; while the soundless laughter in his eyes found answering

expression upon his lips, curving them, to a somewhat bitter smile

beneath the flowing moustache.

"In to-day's enforced idleness how persistently cancelled episodes and

emotions rap, ghostly, on the door demanding and gaining entrance!" he

presently said. "Must we take it, Doctor, that oblivion is a fiction,

merciful forgetfulness an illusion; and that every action, every

desire--whether fulfilled or not--is printed indelibly upon one's memory,

merely waiting the hour of weakness and physical defeat to show up?"

"The Lord only knows!" McCabe threw off, a little hopelessly. This was

the first utterance approaching complaint; and he deplored it for his

patient's sake. He didn't like that word defeat.

Then, to his hearer's relief with a softened accent, Charles Verity took

up his former theme.