DESPAIR'S LAST JOURNEY

By David Christie Murray

1901

INTRODUCTION--HOW AND WHERE THE STORY OF DESPAIR'S LAST JOURNEY WAS TOLD

I

A solitary passenger alighted from the train, and many people lookedcuriously after him. The mulatto porter handed to the platform awell-battered portmanteau, which was plastered thickly over withluggage-labels and the advertising tickets of hotels in every quarter ofthe globe. A great canvas bag followed, ornamented in like fashion. Thenfrom the baggage-van an invisible person tumbled, a canvas bale. The coffee-coloured mulatto held out a grayish-white palm for thequarter-dollar the passenger was ready to drop into it, and steppedback to the platform of the car. The engine bell tolled slowly, as if itsounded a knell, and the train wound away. The curve of the line carriedit out of sight in less than a minute, but in the clear mountain air thequickened ringing of the bell, the pant of the engine, and the roll ofthe wheels were audible for a long time. Then the engine, with a finalwail of good-bye, plunged into the tunnel of a distant snow-shed, andthe whole region seemed as quiet as a grave. 

The little weatherboard railside station was void of life, and therewas not a soul in sight. The passenger had given up the ticket for hissleeping-berth an hour before, and had announced his intention to stopover at this lonely place. An altercation with the conductor as to thepossibility of releasing the canvas bale from the baggage-van before itarrived at its expressed destination at Vancouver had reached the earsof other travellers who were on duty in the observation car, painfullyconscious of the scenery and the obligations it imposed. To experiencesome ecstasy, more or less, was imperative, and it was weary work formost of them. They stuck to it manfully and woman-fully, with abysmalfurtive yawns; but the skirmish between the conductor and theirfellow-passenger came as a sort of godsend, and when the transfer ofa dollar bill, incredibly dirty and greasy and tattered, had broughtwarfare to a close, they still had the voluntary exile to stare at. Hewas a welcome change from scenery, and they stared hard. 

He was a city man to look at, and had the garb of cities--tall silk hat, well worn, but well brushed; frock-coat in similar condition; dark-graytrousers, a little trodden at the heels; patent-leather boots; highcollar; silken scarf. Everything he wore was slightly shabby, except hislinen; but a millionaire who was disposed to be careless about his dressmight have gone so attired. People had a habit of looking twice at thispassenger, for he bore an air of being somebody; but the universal starewhich fastened on him as the train steamed away was the result of hisintent to deliver himself (at evident caprice) at a place so lonely, andso curiously out of accord with his own aspect. What was a clean-shavenman of cities, with silk hat, and frock-coat, and patent leathers, doingat Beaver Tail, in the heart of the Rocky Mountains? Why had he suddenlydecided to stay there, of all places in the world? And why had he madeup his mind without having so much as seen the place? These questionskept the occupants of the observation car in better talk than scenerylong after the lonely passenger had landed, and long after the last wailof the engine had sounded in his ears. 

If he had come here in search of landscape splendours, he might havehad his fill at once. The railside shanty stood at a height of some fourthousand feet above sea-level, but the mountains heaved vast shouldersand white heads about him. 

Below, in the tremendous gorge, a torrent ran recklessly, tearing at itsrocky confines with raging hands, and crying out in many voices like amultitude bent on some deed of vengeance--hurrying, delaying, turningon itself, maddening itself. Its bellowing seemed a part of universalsilence. Silence brooded here, alone, with those wild voices for anemphasis. 

Right and left the gorge swept out into dreadful magnificences of heightand depth, and glow and shadow. Cliffs of black basalt, scarred andriven by the accidents of thousands of years, frowned like eyeless giantfaces. One height, with a supernal leap, had risen from the highest, and stood poised a mile aloft, as if it were a feat to stand so fora second, with a craggy head cut out of the sheet of blue. Mountaintorrents, too far away to bring the merest murmur to the ear, spun andplaited their quivering ropes of silver wire. The shadows in the cleftsof near hills were like purple wine in a glass. Above and beyond theywere bloomed like an ungathered plum. The giant firs looked like orderlypin-rows of decreasing size for half a mile along the climbing heights. Before they reached the snow-line they seemed as smooth as the smallestmoss that grows. 

The passenger regarded none of these things, but stared thoughtfullyat the platform at his feet. He drew a cigarette from amongst a loosehandful in a waistcoat pocket, struck a lucifer match upon his thigh, and smoked absently for a minute or so. Then he took the portmanteauin one hand and the brown bag in the other, and, leaving the railwayplatform, crossed the single line, and made a plunging, carelessscramble through a narrow belt of undergrowth. In a minute or less hecame upon a moss-grown way cut through the wood along the side of themountain--the old Cariboo Track men used before the days of the railway. Weighted as he was, he found it warm work here, shut in from the coolbreezes of the mountains and yet exposed to the rays of the mid-day sun. He wrestled along, however, for some quarter of a mile, and, reachinga small wooden bridge which crossed a runnel of clear water, set hisburden down and looked about him, mopping his brow with a handkerchief. 

'This will do, I fancy, ' he said aloud, and then began to undress. 

He stripped to socks, drawers, and vest before opening the brown bag, from which he took an old black felt hat, a shirt of gray patternlessflannel, coat and trousers of gray tweed, a belt of leather, and apair of mountain boots. Having attired himself in these things, he litanother cigarette, and smoked broodingly until it was finished. Then hewalked back to the railside shanty, found the canvas bale, and slowlyand with great exertion lugged it down the slope and along the trail. Hepanted and perspired at this task; for though he was sturdily set, andlarge of limb and stature, he was obviously unused to that kind of work, and by the time it was over he was fain to throw himself upon themoss and rest for a full half-hour. Being rested, he rolled over, and, stretching out a hand towards the discarded frock-coat, drew from itsinner pocket a ball of Canadian and American notes, crushed and tangledtogether like papers of no value. He smoothed them out, flattening themupon his knee one by one, and, having counted them over, rolled them uptidily, and thrust them to the bottom of the brown bag. Next, he beganto untie the cords which fastened the canvas bale, muttering 'Damn thething!' at intervals, as the knots refused to yield to his unskilfulhandling. Finally, when the work was two-thirds done, he made searchfor a pen-knife, and, having found it, severed the remaining knots, andthrew the cords away into the runnel. 

'That's emblematic, ' he said. 'Anything's emblematic if you're on thelook-out for emblems. '

The canvas bale, being unrolled, displayed a bundle of gray blankets;a tent-pole, jointed like a fishing-rod, and in three pieces; an axe; aleather gun-case; a small gridiron; a small frying-pan; a tin quart pot, close-packed with loose cartridges; and a pair of folding trestles anda folding board for the construction of a little table. The canvas inwhich all these things had been packed afforded material for a tent, and the Solitary, with a seeming custom and alertness which no manwould have argued from his aspect of an hour ago, began to set up hisabiding-place in the narrow natural clearing he had chosen. 

In a while everything was tidy and ship-shape, and when he had made afire, and had constructed a tripod of branches from which to hang thequart pot, newly filled with water from the sparkling runnel near athand, the lonely man sat down and smoked again, letting his eyes rovehere and there, and seeming to scan the scene before him with a dreamyinterest. The pot boiled over, and the hissing of the wet embers awokehim from his contemplations. The brown portmanteau, being opened, provedto be filled with packets of provisions of various kinds. He made tea, broke into a tin of sardines and a packet of hard biscuits, and then satmunching and sipping, with his feet stretched wide apart, and his backagainst a tree--a picture of unthinking idleness. 

A rustle near at hand awoke attention, and he rolled his head lazilyon one shoulder. The rustle drew nearer yet, and round the bend of thetrail came a man in moleskin trousers, a gray shirt, and a shapelessfelt hat, which seemed to have no colour but those lent to it by yearsof sun and rain. 

'Hillo, mate!' said the new man. 

'Hillo!' said the camper-out. 

'Come here by the last train, I suppose?'

'By the last train. '

'Got a mate with you?'

'No. '

The new-comer stared, and said 'Hm!' doubtfully. He looked from theother man's pale, clean-shaven face to his white hands. 

'New to this kind of game, ain't you? he asked, at length. 

'For a year or two, ' the other answered. 

'I spotted the trail you made from the platform, ' said the new-comer. 'Iseen something had been dragged away. I was bound to follow. ' There wasa part apology in his tone, as if he knew himself unwelcome. 'You mighthave been Indians, ' he added, 'or any kind of riff-raff. '

'Quite so, ' said the man of the camp. 'Not many of 'em hereabouts, Isuppose?'

'One or two in a year, perhaps. And harmless, what there is of 'em; butas thievish as a set of jackdaws. '

'You in charge of the station?' asked the man of the camp, lookingcomposedly down the canon and sipping at his tea. 

'Yes, I'm in charge. '

'Alone?'

'Alone? Yes. '

'Fond of being alone?'

'Yes. '

'So am I. '

'All right. ' The man in the moleskin trousers and the shapeless hatlaughed, lounged indeterminately for a minute, rolled his quid in hischeek, spat, wiped his bearded mouth with the back of a sunburnt hand, and laughed again. 'There's room enough for both of us. Good-night, mate. '

'Good-night'

The keeper of the station strolled away with a backward glance, and theman of the camp sipped his tea and stared straight before him. The soundof the retreating footsteps had died away, when the Solitary raised apowerful voice and cried, 'Hillo!'

'Hillo!' came the answer, so muffled by the trees that it sounded as iffrom a considerable distance. The two men walked towards each other andmet face to face. They had exchanged a greeting of good-night together, but the sun had some two hours to travel before it set upon the plains. Here it was out of sight already behind a monstrous hill, and althoughthe dome of the sky was one translucent quiet splendour, dusk lay in theshadow of the mountain and the nearer shadows of the sombre pines. 

'I want to ask you, ' said the camper-out, 'if you're a teetotaler?'

'No, ' said the station-keeper, 'not in particular. '

'Any whisky about here just now?'

'A gallon, ' said the station-keeper; 'new in yesterday. Like a tot?'

'No. '

The word was snapped out savagely, and the station-keeper said 'Oh!'like an astonished echo. 

'It's not at all unlikely that I may ask you for some, ' the camper-outwent on. 

'You're sweetly welcome, ' said the other; but he was waved down by animpatient gesture. 

'It's not at all unlikely that I may come and beg for it. You're not togive me any. You understand?' The station-keeper stared in the dusk, butmade no answer or sign of answer. 'It's not at all unlikely that I maycome and try to persuade you that this was a joke, and that I didn'tmean it. I may offer you ten dollars for a drink--twenty, thirty, ahundred. I'm not to have it. And if you allow yourself to be persuadedto give me so much as one teaspoonful, no matter when or why, I'll shootyou next day, so sure as I am a living sinner. '

'Oh, you will, will you?

'I will, by God!'

'That's all right, ' said the station-keeper. 'You're a very prettyneighbour, you are, _by_ George!'

'I am, ' the other man assented--'a very pretty neighbour. '

They parted there without another word. The man of the camp went back tohis fire, and the man of the station to his shanty. Away below the campthe caņon was dense with shade, but far off up the valley one rod ofblinding sunlight struck the most distant peak, and made its snowsdazzle on the eye. The snow-peak shone for half an hour, and thenby imperceptible changes mellowed to a clear pale gold. Then by finegradations it grew to a pale rose, a deep rose, a cold gray, a solemnpurple. By this time the sky beyond the peak was a fiery glory. Thisfaded in turn, first in a gush of liquid amber, then in soft green, thenin blue, then violet. A lone star scintillated over the for crest, wentout, relit itself, went out again, twinkled for a time, and at lastshone steadfast with a diamond lustre. 

As the darkness gathered, the fire, which fora while gleamed morebrightly, sank to a dull red, fading and brightening at the falling andrising of the wind, but growing with every minute less responsive tothat soft influence. 

The stars twinkled over the sky in myriads. The man of the camp threwaway the stump of his last cigarette, entered his tent, pulled off hisboots, rolled himself in a blanket, and lay down, facing the distantpeak and the one shining speck of a world above it. 

'You have made a hideous muddle of things. ' he said at last--'a hideousmuddle. Nothing to fear, for everything has happened. Nothing to hopefor, for nothing can happen any more. Fortune wasted, friends wasted, genius wasted, heart wasted, life wasted. Ah, well! I ought to sleepto-night; I'm tired. '

The torrent roared in the heart of the primeval silence. The peak andthe star swam apart from each other in the solemn spaces of the sky. Under the tent, which showed ghostly in the starlight, the man laysilent for hours, but when next he spoke his voice was choked withtears. 

'Not that, ' he said--'not that! I can endure the rest, but norepentance. To repent would drive me mad. '

II

Twice a day the mountains echoed to the clangour of the passing expresstrain, and at intervals less settled and orderly to the slower rumble ofluggage-trucks, laden or empty. The iron artery stretched from coastto coast, and here and there touched and fed a ganglion. To one livingalone in those mountain fastnesses the roar and shriek and roll broughtinsistent memories of the world. No inmate of the oubliette could havebeen more lonely, and yet life was accessible, and even near. 

A month went by. The solitary man of the camp fished and shot, ate, drank, wandered, slept, and saw no face and heard no voice. He had runout of supplies, and having pencilled a note to that effect, had slippedit, with a five-dollar bill, under the door of the railside shanty. Hiswants had been supplied--they extended to tea and biscuit only--and hehad taken care to be out of the way. Sometimes he heard a distant shot, and knew that the man of the shanty was afoot in search of game. Withina very little distance of the railway track sport could be had inplenty. 

Loneliness was broken at last. The rustle of boughs and the sound ofsteps and voices reached the Solitary's ears one day as he sat at hisfavourite outlook staring down the gorge. At the first note of one ofthe voices he started and changed colour. Nobody would have taken himfor a man of cities now, with his beard of a month's growth, and histanned hands and face. The open-air colour was the stronger for beingnew. With continued exposure it would fade from a red tan to a yellow. Deep as it was now, it paled at the first-heard sound of the approachingvoice. The man threw a soul of anger and hatred into his ears andlistened. 

'About a month?' the voice said 'Yes. I heard of his leaving Winnipeg onthe twentieth. I went on to Vancouver and found he wasn't there. Then Igot news of a fellow stopping off here, and, of course, it couldn'tbe anybody else. He's my brother-in-law, and I've got a letter for himwhich I'm pledged to put into his hands. '

'Indeed, sir!'

The answering voice was the voice of the man of the shanty. It soundedvery rough and uncultured after the dandified drawl it followed, but itsounded manlier for the contrast, too. 

'He's a queer fellow, ' said the first speaker; 'but this is the queeresttrick I've known him play. Tell me, is he--is he drinking at all?'

'No, ' the other answered. 'He's not drinking. The first day he was herehe promised to put a load of shot into me if ever I gave him liquor. '

'Did he really? That's Paul all over. Oh, this the tent? Nobody here, apparently. Well, I must wait. I have a book with me, and I must spendfour-and-twenty hours here in any case. Good-afternoon. Thank you. '

The listener was within twenty yards, but invisible beyond the crowdedundergrowth. The new arrival was perfectly attired, and handsome, ina supercilious, brainless way. He wore a Norfolk Jacket andknickerbockers, and his tanned boots were polished till they shone likeglass. For a while he poked about the tent and its neighbourhood, and, having satisfied his curiosity, drew out a cigar-case from one pocket, asilver matchbox from another, and a paper-clad novel from a third. Thenhe disposed himself so as to command a view of the landscape, and beganto smoke and read. 

He had occupied himself in this way for perhaps half an hour, when asudden voice hailed him, and startled him so that he dropped his book. 

'Hillo, you there! Come here!'

'Oh, 'he said, 'is that you, Paul, old fellow? Where are you?'

'Here, ' said the voice ungraciously. 

The latest arrival made his way in the direction indicated, but thoughthe voice had sounded not more than a score of yards away, he had tocall out twice or thrice, and wait for an answer. The brush was denseand tangled, and he could have lost himself for a lifetime in it. 

'Oh, there you are, Paul! Upon my word, I shouldn't have known you. '

'I heard you say you had a letter for me. I'd a good deal rather nothave seen you, but since you are here you may as well discharge yourcommission, and when you've done that you can go. '

'I've got a letter for you, Paul. It's from poor dear Madge, and I'mbound to say that I think she's beastly ill-used, and very unfortunate. '

'Doubly unfortunate, ' said the camper-out--'unfortunate in a brute of ahusband and a cad of a brother. Give me the letter. '

'Here it is, Paul. You may think what you like about me, of course, butI have travelled something like seven or eight thousand miles to findyou. '

'On Madge's money?' asked the other, balancing the letter in a carelessgrip between thumb and finger. 'Nobody asks you to stop to hear yourselfdescribed. You were a cad from your cradle; you were a liar as soon asyou could learn to lisp, and a sponge from the happy hour when you foundthe first fool to lend you half a crown. You needn't wait, George, butso long as you are here I will do my best to tell you what you are. Youare a fruitful theme, and I could be fluent for a week or two. Going?Well, luck go with you, of the sort you merit. I'd call you a cur, butthere isn't a cur in all the world who wouldn't walk himself blindand lame to bite me in revenge for the insult I put upon him. Go--youinfinitesimal! you epitome of unpitiable little shames!'

The bearer of the letter, who had travelled so far for so curious awelcome, had found a beaten trail which led him back to the woodlandroad. He had gone a score of yards by this time; but the voice pursuedhim--level, heavy, sonorous, driven by full lungs. 

'Put your fingers in your ears, George, or I shall find a word to scorchyou. You are the poorest thing in Nature's bag of samples. A well-bredwoodlouse wouldn't employ you for a scavenger. If you shrank to yoursoul's dimensions you might wander lost for a century on the point ofa cambric needle. You are the last rarefied essence of thecontemptible--the final word of the genius of the mean. '

This was not shouted, but was sent out in a steady trumpet-notethat swelled fuller and fuller, like the voice of a great speaker inharanguing a clamorous audience, rising steadily, as if measured justto dominate clamour, and no more. In the pauses of his speech thecamper-out had heard the noise of running feet. The sound seemed stillfaintly audible, though perhaps only fancy caught it. He sent out oneclarion cry of 'Good-bye, George!' and surrendered himself to a fit ofuncontrolled laughter. This coming to an end of sudden gravity, he tookup the letter, which had fallen on the moss between his outstretchedlegs, and looked at the superscription. 

'Madge!' he said. 'Poor little Madge!'

He put the envelope to his bristly lips and kissed it. Then he broke theseal and began to read:

'My own darling Husband, 'You _must_ have the enclosed, and George has promised not to rest untilhe finds you and lays it in your hands. The last lines your father everwrote in this world----'

'What?' he said aloud. 'What?

'The last lines your father ever wrote in this world arrived onSaturday, the twentieth, and news of his death reached me by wire onMonday, the twenty-second. '

'That's a big enough dose for one day, ' he said. 'I can't standany more. ' He thrust the letter into his breast-pocket. 'Anotherimpossibility. No prodigal's return to end _that_ story. Veal was nevera favourite meat of mine. Lord! I could laugh to see what a mess I havemade of things. I could cry if anybody else had made it, and had meantas well, and hoped as blindly. 

'Monday, the twenty-second. That was the day I came here. Strange itis--strange! I'd have sworn he was alive that night--that first night inthe tent here. I seemed to feel him near me. We had that knack--the oldgovernor and I--poor old chap! He could jog my mental elbow when I wasa thousand miles away from him, and I could make him talk of me at anytime. 

'Ghosts? No. Death is death, and there's an end of it. Ah!' He stoodsuddenly arrested. 'Six hours' difference between here and England. Thatexplains it. His last wish was towards me. He loved nobody as he lovedme, I think. Well, I shall vex him no more. His tribulation is over. 

'Why cant a wrong-doer have a hell of his own, and be saved fromsingeing innocent people? The smoke of my torment ascendeth, and evenGeorge goes coughing at the smell of brimstone. George would be muchmore comfortable if I had been virtuous--Madge would have more to lendhim. 

'Now, if I had a bottle of whisky here, I'd put an end to this for anhour or two. But I haven't, and I must do something. I must drug thisdown. Bodily labour. ' He laid his open palm on the knotted rind of thebig tree against which he had leaned his back whilst he read the firstphrases of the letter. 'You'll do as well as anything. It took many ascore of years to bring you here, but now you must come down. You'llsleep in the gorge before I have done with you, old piny monster, threehundred feet below your roots. '

He walked to the tent, and returning jacketless, axe in hand, fell uponthe tree with a measured frenzy. The sun was still high, and before hehad been at work ten minutes the sweat poured from his brow like rain. He paused to breathe, and to survey the gash he had made in the sideof the tree. Compared with the girth of the forest giant, it looked themerest trifle, but he nodded gaspingly. 

'You'll sleep in the gorge before I have done with you, you old goliathof your tribe. I shall have you down. '

He laboured with dogged fury. His hands blistered at the unaccustomedtask. The helve of the axe was stained with blood, and clung to hisgrasp as if his palms were glued. His blows grew altogether ineffectualThe axe fell sideways often, and at such times the blow jarred him tothe spine. 'You will come down, ' he said, 'if I die for it' He went backto the tent, and casting himself on the turf before it, laved his handsin the ice-cold mountain-stream. In half an hour he returned to histask, and worked at it until he could no longer lift a hand. Even then, as he walked brokenly away, he turned with an angry murmur:

'I'll have you down!'

He built his fire, and brewed and sipped his tea and munched his rationsin great weariness that night, and it was earlier than usual when herolled himself in his blanket and lay down. But though he ached withfatigue from neck to heel, there was no sleep for him. He seemed to hangsuspended over a great lake of slumber, and to hold, in spite of his ownwill, to a bar which magnetized his burning palms. He had but to releasethe bar to fall deep into oblivion, but his grasp was fixed, and hehad no power to loose it. So, after many hours of tumbling this way andthat, he arose, and fed his fire with dry chips until it flamed; andthen, in alternate gushes of light and darkness, he read his father'sletter. 

'Hendricks has just left me, and I succeeded in getting from him at thelast a plain statement of his opinion. I may last a month longer, buthe thinks it unlikely. I may go in a week. A chill, or a shock, or anylittle trifle may precipitate the change, and make an end at any moment. I can write for a few minutes at a time, and I am trying for Paul's saketo say one or two things which will make my future task more likely ofsuccess. . . . 

'I was fifty when my father died. I had been bred in the strictestCalvinistic school; but my heart had revolted against the creed, andfrom the time when I was five-and-twenty my mind had rejected it withequal decision and disdain. I looked for no other faith or form offaith. At the centre of the negation in which I lived there was this onethought: There may, for anything I can tell, be a great First Cause. Icannot know. I can neither affirm nor deny, for the whole question isbeyond my understanding. But this at least seems clear: If there be aGod at all, He is far away. He is great beyond our dreaming--distantbeyond our dreaming. If there be a scheme in the universe, there is atleast no care for the atoms which compose it. God sits far withdrawn, beyond our prayers, beyond our tears and fears. This fretful insectof an hour, who cannot even measure the terms he uses, speaks ofthe Eternal, the Immutable, and strives by his prayers to change Itspurposes. I am writing now by lamplight, and the agonies of the singedmoths whose little bodies encrust my lamp-glass do not move me from mypurpose. I realize their anguish at this moment with a deep pity, butI do not stay to save them. My heavier purpose will not wait for them. Thus I dreamed it was, likening smallest things to the greatest, withGod. 

'At my father's death a change began to work in my opinions. I hadconvinced myself that this life was all that man enjoyed or suffered, but I began to be conscious that I was under tutelage. I began--at firstfaintly and with much doubting--to think that my father's spirit and myown were in communion. I knew that he had loved me fondly, and to me hehad always seemed a pattern of what is admirable in man. Now he seemedgreater, wiser, milder. I grew to believe that he had survived thegrave, and that he had found permission to be my guide and guardian. Thecreed which slowly grew up in my mind and heart, and is now fixed there, was simply this: that as a great Emperor rules his many provinces, Godrules the universe, employing many officers--intelligences of loftiestestate, then intelligences less lofty; less lofty still beneath these, and at the last the humbler servants, who are still as gods to us, butwithin our reach, and His messengers and agents. Then God seemed nolonger utterly remote and impossible to belief, and I believed. Andwhether this be true or false, I know one thing: this faith has made mea better man than I should have been without it My beloved father, wiseand kind, has seemed to lead me by the hand. I have not dared in theknowledge of his sleepless love to do many things to which I have beentempted. I have learned from him to know--if I know anything--thatlife from its lowest form is a striving upward through uncounted andinnumerable grades, and that in each grade something is learned thatfits us for the next, or something lost which has to be won back againafter a great purgation of pain and repentance. 

'It is three days since I began to write, and I am so weak that I canbarely hold the pen. Send this to Paul. He has gone far wrong. He willcome back again to the right. I have asked that I may guide him, and myprayer has been granted. From the hour at which I quit this flesh untilhe joins me my work is appointed me, and I shall not leave him. Goodbye, dear child. Be at peace, for all will yet be well. 

'When Paul sees these last words of mine, he will know that I am withhim. '

The letter ended there, and the reader's dazzled eyes looked into thedarkness. One flickering flame hovered above the embers of the fire andseemed to leave them and return, to die and break to life again. At lastit fluttered upward and was gone. 

The runnel, like the greater stream below, had many voices. It chatteredlight-hearted trifles, lamented child-like griefs, and sobbed itself tosleep over and over and over. In the black caņon the river bellowed itsrage and triumph and despair. The shadows of the night were deep, andsilence brooded within them, and the ears thrilled and tingled to themonitions of its voiceless sea. 

'Father!' he whispered. 

The night gave no response, but the answer sounded in the lonely man'sheart:

'I am here. '

III

In the broad daylight it was not easy to believe that the experience ofthe night-time was more than an excitement of the nerves. The tide ofhabitual conviction set strongly against a superstitious fancy. None theless the Solitary spent many hours in tender and remorseful musings overthe lost father, and all day long he wondered at the voice which hadseemed to answer him. 

'It would be well for me, perhaps, ' he said, when he had spenttwo-thirds of the day under the spell of these clear recollections--'itwould be well for me, perhaps, if I could think it true. '

An inward voice said, as if with deliberate emphasis, 'It is true. '

The words did not seem to be his own, and the thought was not hisown, and he was startled, almost wildly. But he had been much given tointrospection. He was accustomed to the study of his own mind's working, and the inward voice impressed him less than if he had been a man ofsimpler intellect. The intelligence of man plays many curious tricksupon itself, and he was ready with explanations. He pored upon these, turned them over, criticised them, sat secure in them. 

The inward voice said 'Paul, ' and nothing more. No call had sounded onthe waking ear, and yet an echo seemed to live in the air, as if a realvoice had spoken. His heart thrilled and his breast ached with a greatlonging. He subdued himself, sitting with bowed head and closed eyes, his chin sunk upon his folded hands. There was a bitter pain in histhroat. 

'No, ' he said half aloud, as if he had need to form his thoughts inwords; 'it is all at an end, dear old dad It was well for you that youdied with that good hope in your mind It shed a ray of peace on yourheart in the last dark hour. It would be well for me if I could thinkthat you were here. . I could stand the pain of it I could bear, I think, to turn my whole life's stream back upon itself if that would bring youpeace. I could bear to repent if my repentance could avail But you aregone into the great dark. You will be sad no more and glad no more. Ibroke your heart, and you tried to patch it with that futile hope. Andyou were not the man to ask me to be a coward, and a liar to my ownsoul. I will keep what little rag of manliness I have. '

The inward voice seemed to say 'Wait. '

'It would be easy to go mad, ' he said, rising wearily. '"They rest fromtheir labours, and their works do follow them. "'

He had wandered a mile or two from his tent, along the track, and nowturned his footsteps home again. The afternoon light was mellowing. Agreat range of hills, with a line of cloud shining across the breast ofit like a baldric of silver, lifted parcel-coloured masses of white andviolet into a rolling billowy glory of cloud which half obscured andhalf relieved them. The sky above was of an infinite purity. He stoodand looked, until his heart yearned. 

The yearning spoke itself in words which had been familiar sincechildhood:

'"Oh that I had wings like a dove, for then would I fly away and be atrest!"'

'Old earth, ' he said, 'why is it? You seem to long for me. You seem tostretch out hands to me, as if you would say, "Sleep here!" We belongto one another, I suppose. This flesh and bone, this breathing, thinkingapparatus, grew out of the slime of you, old world, and will go back toyour dust and flourish in grass and flower, and float in cloud and fallin rain. You have hidden in your green breast all the millions who havegone before me. Fecund mother! kind grave! And you, too, for all sogreen and kisty as you look, you are dying. Your life is longer thanmine, but you are no Immortal. Your hills roll down to your valleys. Every stream that tumbles from their heights wears away a little. Thelight snow and lighter air are heavy on those heights of steel, and willmake them into dust at last. Your inward fires will cool, and the airthat clothes you like a delicate robe will shrink and vanish, and leaveyou naked to the sun. I shall come to your bosom and be quiet, and youwill find the bourne of death likewise, and we shall swing togetherround and round And the fires of the sun will cool, and you will gospinning in blackness, and split in silent explosions of cold in theblind dark. Dying heart, beating strong in full manhood! dying earth, smiling and yearning there with pity and rest in your bosom! we are butcreatures of a day--my day the briefer. And that would matter little ifI had been worthy of my day. But I have played the fool with life, andhave earned my own contempt and creep into my hiding-place with shame. '

He strolled back to the tent, and whether he would have it or no, andwhether he would believe it or no, the inward voice spoke now and then. Twice in the wide daylight he stood still, and his hair crisped and hisblood tingled. The voice was there, and yet he could not guess what ithad to say to him. It was as though it spoke in a language to which hehad no key. 

As he sat musing his eye fell upon the axe, and he started up and seizedit as if suddenly reminded of some forgotten urgent duty. He fellto work at the big tree again, and laboured doggedly till nightfall. Inexperienced as he was, he brought observation and intelligence to thetask, and knew already the kind of stroke which told most with the leastexpenditure of effort. When he could see no longer, he leaned gasping onthe axe, and gave a grim nod of the head. 'I shall have you down. '

He was at it again next morning light and early. He toiled all day. The great pine leaned somewhat over the cliff, and though the angle wasslight, it told as the gash deepened, and when the sun dipped over thetop of the western mountain the huge doomed thing gave its first groanand hung a little towards its grave. At this sign the tired worker fellto with a freshened vigour. He was still striking when the royal headbowed, and then swept downward with a rush. He sprang to one side justin time to avoid the backward kick and the enormous flying splinters. Ten feet from its base and a hundred from its lowest branch the trunkcaught the edge of the rock. The leverage and the weight of the fallsnapped the two or three square feet of stanch fibre the axe had spared. That last strong anchorage broke, and the tree flashed into the rapids. The churning, shooting waters made a plaything of it. 

The next day he fell into deep ennui, and to beguile himself he rummagedout of the canvas bag an old note-book and a pencil, and began a clumsyand uninstructed effort to sketch the scene before him. The effortproving quite abortive, he began to scrawl beneath it, 'Paul Armstrong. ''Yours very truly, Paul Armstrong. ' 'Disrespectfully yours, PaulArmstrong. ' 'Sacred to the memory of Paul Armstrong, who died of boredomin the Rocky Mountains. ' 'Paul Armstrong: the Autobiography of an Ass. '

He was in the very act of throwing the book away from him when he feltsuddenly arrested. Why not 'Paul Armstrong: an Autobiography? It wouldfill the time. But the idea was no sooner formed than it began to pain. What sort of a record would it have to be if it were honest? What aconfession of folly, of failure!

But as he sat his thoughts shaped themselves--

Thus. 

THE STORY OF PAUL ARMSTRONG'S LIFE AND OF DESPAIR'S LAST JOURNEY

CHAPTER I

The first hint of memory showed a hearth, a fire, and a woman sittingin a chair with an outstretched finger. An invisible hand bunched hispetticoats behind, and at his feet was a rug made of looped fragmentsof cloth of various colours. He lurched across the rug and caught thefinger with a sense of adventure and triumph. Somebody clapped hands andlaughed. Memory gave no more. 

Then there was a long, narrow, brick-paved yard, a kind of oblong well, with one of the narrower sides broken down. The bricks of the pavementwere of many colours--browns, purples, reds. They were full of breakagesand hollows, and in rainy weather small pools gathered in the pettyvalleys. The loftiest boundary wall had once been whitewashed, but wasnow streaked green and yellow with old rains. A pump with a worn troughof stone stood half-way up the yard, and near it was a boy--a verylittle boy, in petticoats, and a yellow straw hat with ribbons. Thefrock he wore was of some tartan pattern, with red and green in it Hehad white thread socks, and shoes with straps across the instep. Thestraps were fastened with round glass buttons, and the child, with hisfeet planted close together, was looking down at the buttons with aflush of pride. He was conscious of being prettily attired, and this washis first remembered touch of personal vanity. 

He was walking and crying in an old-fashioned village street, cryingbecause his fat small thighs were chafing one another. It was Sunday, or a holiday, for his father was in a tall silk hat and black broadclothand high collar, and a satin stock which fastened with a shiny bucklehigh up in the neck behind. His father stooped and lifted him, andcarried him all the way to an old house with three front-doors, andporches over the doors, and a cage with two doves in it hanging on thelichened wall. There was a hedged garden opposite the house, with fourpoplars in the hedgerow. Their tops went right into the blue. Inside theold house was an old gentleman who was called Uncle. Round the room hesat in were hung a number of fiddles in green-baize bags. How he hadlearned what the bags held the child could not tell, but he knew. The old gentleman took him on his knee, and allowed him to touch hiswhiskers, which were crisp and soft, and snipped pieces of white paperinto the shapes of trees and animals and houses, with a little pair ofscissors. He had blue veins on the back of his white hands, and littlecords the like of which were not on the child's, as examination proved. This was his first memory of any house which was not home. 

There he first saw a piano. It was open, and he beat the keys, soundingnow one note at a time and now two or three together. This was afascinating exercise, but he was bidden to desist from it, and was givena picture-book to look at It was full of wiry-looking steel plates ofmen in cauldrons, and on crucifixes, and on racks, and bound to stakesin fires. He remembered it as Foxe's 'Book of Martyrs, ' but by a laterknowledge. 

There was a well in a yard, with a rope and a windlass, and an oldwooden bucket all over trailing green mosses. Off the yard there was ablacksmith's shop, with a disused anvil and disused tools in it, and acold hearth covered with scattered slack and iron filings. A dog, whosechain allowed him to come within a yard of the door of this workshop, woke up at the clank of the tools and barked. The child cried until hismother came and took him away with some show of angry impatience, notwith his father's gentleness. He knew her for his mother, of course, butthis was his first remembrance of her. 

It was baking-day, and so it could not have been a Sunday. In a big'jowl' of earthenware--that was the local word for it--a batch of doughwas set before a fire to rise. It had a clean cloth spread over it, andthe dough had been slashed across and across with a knife. Somebody saidthe sign of the cross was made to keep the devil out of the bread. Therewas a vague wonder at that, but it soon died. A portion of the doughwas used to make what were called 'rough-and-ready cakes. ' Dripping wasrolled into the dough, and it was sprinkled with sugar and currants. Then it was pulled into all manner of rough shapes, so as to bake withcrisp edges, and was put on a greased dripping-pan into an oven. Thecakes were served hot with new milk, and made a regal feast. 

It grew dark, which for summer-time was a new experience. The child, tired, but wakeful, stood at the door in fear of the dog. Suddenly heroused the household with screams of joy. 

'Mother! mother! Look what I've found!'

There was a rush and a swirl of petticoats. The infant had seen thestars for the first time, and had some trouble in explaining the natureof his find. When it was known that he had discovered the solar systemand its neighbouring fragment of the universe, there was a laugh, and hewas left alone, humiliated. 

'I have made many equally valuable and original discoveries since then, 'said Paul Armstrong, and so went on staring down the canon, seeingnothing of what lay before him, but beholding his child-self so clearlythat he seemed to be living over again the life of forty years ago. 

The child was shy, dreamy, sensitive, inventive, and a liar. He andhis brother Dick were together walking in the shabby High Street, andtalking about cricket. 

'I'll bet you haven't seen what I've seen, ' said Paul. He was sevenyears old by now, breeched in corduroys, which had had time to growrusty. The middle-aged man, sitting at his tent-door, smelt the odour ofthe new cords, and heard their disgusting whistle as he moved hislimbs in them for the first time. Only the poorest boys went clothed incorduroy, and Paul and brother Dick were bitterly lowered in their ownesteem when they were forced by motherly economy into that badge ofsocial servitude. 'I'll bet you haven't seen what I've seen. '

'What have you seen? asked Dick. 

He was rather a fatuous boy, with round, innocent eyes, easily openingat tales of marvel, and a temptation to a liar. 

'Why, when I was in Scotland three years ago with father, ' Paul began, 'I saw the Highlanders play cricket. ' He had never in his life been amile away from his native parish, and Dick knew that as well as he did, but it made no difference. 'They wore kilts, and father wore a kilt, andhad a feather in his bonnet, and top-boots like Robin Hood, all looseabout the tops, and a bow and arrow. And he smoked a cigar, and gave mea whole lot of vesuvians to strike by myself behind a tent. You couldsmell vesuvians and cigars and sunshiny trod-on grass everywhere. '

'Tell us about the Highlanders, ' said Dick. 

'They was all ten foot high, ' said Paul. 'They wouldn't have 'em in theeleven without they was ten foot high. '

Dick said that stood to reason. 

'And they played in their kilts, and they didn't wear pads, and theyhad their bats all made of iron, and the ball was iron, too. It was acannon-ball, and they fired it out of a cannon, and the wickets was amile and a half apart--no, a mile and a quarter--and one man hit theball, and the other men shouted, "Run it out!" and he ran sixty-fourruns. Then he dropped down stone-dead, and Mr. Murchison read thefuneral service. '

Then the talk drifted. Next Sunday the Rev. Roderic Murchison, M. A. , read out from the pulpit a text which gave over all liars to fire andbrimstone. Paul went quaking all day. Dick and he slept together in agaunt attic chamber. Mary, their sister, twenty years Paul's elder, sawthem to bed, put them through a rough form of prayer, and took away thecandle. Dick, with nothing on his conscience, went to sleep. Paul layand sweated, dreading fire, and wondering with open-eyed horror, 'Whybrimstone?' and imagining extraordinary terrors from its addition. At last conscience would have no Nay, and brimful of fear andcontrition--for the one was as real as the other--he woke up Dick inthe black hollow of the night This was hard work, but he was bent onself-purgation, and would not confess until Dick was really wide awake. 

'Dick!' he said, gripping his brother in the dark and straining him inhis childish arms. 'Dick! Oh, Dick, I've been a liar, and I daresn'tgo to sleep. Do you remember what I said about the Highlanders lastThursday?'

'Blow the Highlanders!' said Dick. 'What did ye wake _me_ up for?'

'It wasn't true, Dick, ' the penitent whimpered. 'I never saw aHighlander, and father didn't take me to Scotland with him. It was allmade up. '

'I know that, ' said Dick. 'You _are_ a fool to wake a chap up in thedark to tell him that. '

That was the child's first remembered penitence and confession. Theman remembered how he had sobbed himself to sleep. Why had he lied, and_was_ a portion his in the lake of fire and brimstone, and what wasthe good of being repentant and confessing, and being called a fool forone's pains?

When the childish Paul came out of the kitchen-door into thatthree-sided well of a brick-paved yard, and walked towards theprinting-office at the far end of the narrow strip of garden, the firstdoor beyond the pump-trough led him to a flight of stairs. The flight ofstairs, dirty and littered, mounted to a lumber-room, where there weregreat piles of waste-paper, refuse from the shop and office. There weremany torn and battered old books here, and most of them were deservingof the neglect into which they had fallen. The father had bought oldbooks literally by the cart-load at auction, and had weeded from themasses of rubbish such things as promised to be saleable. The restwere Paul's prey, and there were scraps of romance here and there, andfugitive leaves of Hone's 'Everyday Book, ' and the _Penny Magazine_, with dingy woodcuts. One inestimable bundle of leaves unbound held thegreater part of 'Peregrine Pickle, ' the whole of 'Robinson Crusoe, ' andpart of 'The Devil on Two Sticks. ' Brother Bob, dead and gone these manyyears, had once kept pigeons in that lumber-room, and had driven a holein the wall, so that the birds might have free going out and in. Thiswas one of the family remembrances. Before there had been so many mouthsto fill and so many small figures to be clothed, there had been roomin the Armstrong household for some things which were not whollyutilitarian. This keeping of pigeons was, as it were, a link with agolden past, a bright thread in the tapestry of the bygone, which hungon the eye of imagination in contrast with the sordid present, where fewof the threads were bright except to the inexhaustible fancy of a child, who can see brightness almost anywhere. 

The lumber-room had many memories for the dreamer in the tent-door. Hewas often banished there for punishment, and he sometimes confessed tofaults which were not his, if they were not of too dark a dye, in thehope of being sent thither. There he would grub amongst the mouldyrefuse of the place, and would find treatises of forgotten divines onDaniel and the end of the world, and translations of Ovid on the Artof Love sadly mutilated by rats, and nautical almanacs of a long bygonedate, and much other doubtful treasure. 

The mother came into the brick-paved yard and shrilled 'Paul! Paul layquiet. The voice called up and down, and was lost in the recesses ofthe heaped timber in the yard which lay beside the ill-kempt strip ofgarden. The hedge which had once divided the neighbouring domains wasbroken down in many places, and Paul and his brother played often on thetimber-stacks, and in the aromatic groves of sawn planks which inclinedtowards each other in row on row, making an odorous cloistered shade, excellent for enacted memories of Chingachgook and Uncas and thePathfinder. There was a sawpit in the yard, a favourite hiding-place forthe boys, and the turpentiny scent of fresh sawdust had always been athing to conjure with in the Solitary's memory. The smell of printer'sink which hung about the dowdy, untidy, bankrupt printing-office hada hint of it. Years afterwards and years ago in the studio of thePresident of the Belgian Academy, when Paul was famous and on easy termswith famous people, a servant uncorked a tin of turpentine to clean hismaster's palette, and the sawpit yawned again, and every broken brick inthe floor of the old office showed so clear that he could have drawnthe finest crevice. The odour was in his nostrils now as he sat at thetent-door, and he did not dream that it sweated from the sun-smittenpines. It was all memory to his fancy, and the voice went shrilling'Paul!' among the timber-stacks, and was lost in the cavernous shed atthe far-end of the yard. Then everything went quiet for an hour, andPaul made acquaintance with the poverty-stricken artist who could nottake his mistress to the ball because she had no stockings fit to goin, and who hit on the expedient of painting stockings on her legs. Howsimply and innocently comic the episode was to the child's mind, to besure! and how harmless were the naughtiest adventures exposed under thelifted roofs when the lame devil waved his crutch from the top of thesteeple!

But in the full tide of this retired joy Paul hears a step at the bottomof the lumber-room stairs, and knows it for his mother's. She is cominghere, and there is no hiding-place for anything bigger than a rat. Themotherly temper is sharp, and the motherly hand is heavy. He has beencalled and has not answered--a crime deserving punishment, and sure toearn it. The step grows nearer and trouble more assured. Suddenly a rayof hope darts through him, and he feigns sleep. His heart labours, but he keeps his breath regular by a great effort. Mother gazes for aminute, and goes away on tiptoe. There is quiet for five minutes, andPaul is back in fairyland. But mother is here again on tiptoe, and thevoice of doom sounds on his ear. 

'I thought you was foxing, you little beast!'

Then Paul takes his thrashing as well as he can, aiming to receive mostof it on his elbows, and is in bitter disgrace for days and days. Thephenomenally guilty and degraded young ruffian who _acted_ a lie!---afar viler thing, it would seem, than to speak one!

This is the worst of the household, to the Solitary's mind, that allcombine in prolonged reprobation for any crime of his. He has no memoryfor Dick's offences or Jack's or David's; but Dick and Jack and Davidare unforgetting, and the girls sniff unutterable holiness and contempt. He knows he is a liar, and he knows that liars have their portion inthat awful lake, but he is high-spirited and fanciful, and he forgets, sealing his doom weekly at the least, and making it more sure. Thisreputation of liar began when Wombwell's Menagerie of Wild Beasts firstvisited the parish, and the neighbourhood of lions and tigers so flushedhis imagination that he saw them everywhere. He came home one day witha story of a tiger running away with the shop-shutters of a neighbouringgrocer on his back. He was chastised for this gratuitous unwarrantableyarn, and stuck to it Perhaps he had dreamed it and believed it true, but on that point memory was silent. Anyway it was fixed and decidedthat he was a liar, and 'A liar we can ne'er believe, though heshould speak the thing that's true. ' So nobody believed Paul under anyconditions, not even when truth was crystalline. 

He was a little older, a very little older, and he lay in bed onemoonlight night in summer. He had been to chapel that Sunday evening, and the Rev. Roderic Murchison had preached a sermon from the text, 'Todepart and to be with Christ, which is far better. ' Paul's small soulwas filled to the brim with a sort of yearning peace. The moon yearnedat him through the uncurtained window of the bare attic chamber, and helonged back to it. Oh how sweet, how sweet to pass to peace for ever, tolie asleep for ever, with the grass and the daisies for a counterpane, and yet to be somewhere and wideawake and happy! 'Suffer little childrento come unto Me, and forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom ofheaven. ' Paul was of the kingdom for a time, but he had the blunderingill-luck to mention it. He put his arms round Dick, who lay awake there, and he cried and said good-bye, and told Dick that he was going to dieand be an angel. And in his heart he forgave Dick--nebulously but withsincerity--not particularizing things, but offering plenary grace forall offences. And Dick took fright and ran with bare legs projectingfrom his scanty nightshirt, and blubbered that Paul was dying--that hesaid so, that he was sure of it. And Paul, listening at the top of thestairs, heard the news given and forgave everybody, and went back to bedagain and was filled with inexpressible joy of assured longing. Thegood mother came upstairs carrying Dick, who had been solaced withunaccustomed supper of bread and treacle--he was sticky and crumby withit hours afterwards when Paul still lay crying--and she gave Paul such ahiding for his heartless wickedness as he had never had in all hisdays till then. It was not the pain of the flogging, though he had beenchastened with a liberal hand, that kept him in tears throughout thatwretched night. It was the bitter sense of injustice, for Paul hadimputed his dream to himself for holiness, and had believed so truly andhad meant so well. 

And the matter did not end there Paul had slept on his trouble and hadforgotten it, as children can. He was stripped to the waist, and wastaking his morning wash at the sink in the back-kitchen when his fathercame, carrying in his left hand an instrument called the 'tawse, ' abroad flat leathern strap, cut into strips at one end. The strips hadbeen hardened in the fire, and the 'tawse 'was a holy horror to theboys, who saw it often and were threatened with it sometimes, but whohad felt it never. Armstrong the father came in pale and gray, his handsquivering, and he gave Paul a little sermon. The ineradicable Ayrshireaccent shook out in his voice more strongly than common, for he was anidle dreamer, and a man who hated to see pain, and to whom it was anagony to inflict it. 

'This will hurt me far more than it will hurt you, my lad, saidArmstrong senior; and Paul, by a swift, sidelong movement of the mind, decided that he had been born a liar because his father was one beforehim. 

Then the father expanded upon the enormity of his wickedness, and toldhim how he had shamefully trifled with the thought of death, which wasthe most serious of all things, and how in his vanity he had tried toalarm his brother, and how this evil lying spirit must be beaten out ofhim. Paul was silent, for how could he explain? And the kindly father, who had had to work himself up to this cold-blooded severity, went halfhysterical when he had once begun, and overdid the thing. Paul'sflesh ached and stung and quivered on his bones for days. A fortnightafterwards, when he went to bathe, having forgotten his flogging, hisstripes were seen, and a schoolmate christened him Tiger on account ofthem. To that day there were people who knew him as Tiger Armstrong, though they had forgotten the reason of the nickname. 

This was one of the inconveniences of having a reputation. There weremore such doleful comedies in the lonely man's mind as he looked downthe gorge. 

The scenes came back as if they were enacted before him. The oldeight-day dock ticked in its recess; the fire rustled and dropped acinder; the cat purred on the hearth; Paul sat reading, absorbed, andyet in memory he knew of the cat and the dock and the fire, and even ofa humming fly somewhere, and a gleam of sunshine on the weather-stainedwhitewash of the wall outside. 

In came Mrs. Armstrong, with the little household servant at her heels, and laid something on the ledge of the old clock face. She was anuncommonly tall woman, and had a knack of putting things on high out ofother people's reach. 

'That's for the potatoes, ' she said; 'run and get 'em as soon as everyou've peeled the turnips. '

'Yes, ma'am, ' said the girl; and they both went out together. 

Two or three minutes later Paul went out. His father sat behind thecounter of the shop, and Paul was afraid that if he went that way hewould be seized upon and compelled to take his place. So he ran up thegarden, climbed a wall or two, and dropped into Badger's field. He hadnot gone twenty yards when he found a halfpenny lying on the grass. Helaid hands on it, and made for the confectioner's, where he expendedit on a sickly sweet called 'paper-suck'--a treacly, sticky abominationwith a spiral of old newspaper twined about it Brother Dick appearedby chance, and shared the treat. Paul at this time had taken to makingverses on his own account, incited by a great deal of miscellaneousreading. This was an exercise which demanded quiet and retirement, andhe got away into the fields, and, lying face downwards on the grass, gave himself over hand and foot to fancy. It was quite late in theafternoon when appetite brought him to himself. He had forgotten hisdinner, but relying on his ability to filch something, he walked homewith a light heart He marched innocently through the open door of theshop. 

'Paul!' His father stopped him, his spectacles tipped up into his whitehair, and his gray eyes half hidden under eyebrows like a shaggyScotch deer-hound's. The portrait of Sir Walter's 'Maida' had a strongsuggestion of the Scottish face, wistful, affectionate, and full ofsimple sagacity. Just now the gray eyes looked doom. Paul knew he haddone something awful, and felt guilty, though he knew nothing as yetof the charge against him. 'What ha' ye dune wi' the threepenny-bit yestole this morning?'

'What threepenny-bit?' said Paul. 'I haven't seen no threepenny-bit, father. '

The verse he hammered out in his lonely moments was grammatical, becausehis exemplars would have it so; but to have been grammatical in commonspeech would have seemed like a pedantry. 

'The threepenny-bit your mother put on the clock-ledge, ye pelferin'vag'bond!' said his father sternly. 

'I never seen it, ' Paul declared. 

'There, there!' said Armstrong; 'it comes natural to lie, and I'll nottempt ye. Not another word. Ye'll go to your chamber, and ye'll stopthere till ye're in the mind to confess. There's the fruits ofyour crime marked on your lips this minute, and Dick saw ye at thesweet-stuff shop. Away with ye, before I lay hands on ye!'

Paul's hob-nailed boots went lingeringly up the uncarpeted stairs tothe attic room, and there he spent the long, long afternoon. There wasnothing to do, nothing to think about, nothing to read. He stared at thetinman's shop opposite, and at the cheesemonger's fat widow, and at thewindow of the Berlin wool shop next door to the cheesemonger's, andwhen a customer went in he speculated idly on his purchase. He was veryhungry and lonely and dull, and the three other attic rooms which wereopen to him were as uninteresting as his own. Evening came on, and heseemed to be forgotten. He took off his boots, and crept to the lowerflight of stairs and listened. Everything was going on just as it wouldhave done if he had not been alone and miserable and martyred Well, hecould starve and die and go to heaven, and then perhaps they would allbe sorry, and discover some little good in him. Evening deepened intonight, and still he sat there. A little insect behind the wall-paperagainst which he leaned his disconsolate head ticked and ticked like awatch. Paul had heard of the death-watch, and this, of course, wasit, and its token was, of course, of his own untimely end. He weptluxuriously. 

By-and-by he got up, and crept on tiptoe past the door of the bestbedroom, which stood a little open, and invited him inwards by themysterious gleam on the ceiling and the thrilling shadows of the greatfour-poster with its dusky hangings--a family heirloom, hint of far-offfamily prosperity, big enough for a hearse and quite as gloomy to lookat. A heavy, solid mahogany chest of drawers stood near the window, andPaul, aided by the gaslights glistening amongst the polished tinwarein the shop opposite, went through every drawer. His hands lighted onsomething done up in tissue-paper--an oblong parcel. He investigatedit, and it turned out to be a big sponge loaf. He had seen one like itbefore, and guessed that it came as a gift from the old-maid cousinsat the farm. He pinched off a bit from one of the bottom corners, andnibbled it He had not known till then how hungry he was, and the cakewas more than delicious. He pinched off more, and was frightened tofind how much he had taken. Detection was sure, and who but he couldbe suspected? Nothing could save him now, and though he had never heardeither proverb, he acted on both--'In for a penny, in for a pound, ' and'As well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb. ' A voice and a footstep belowstartled him, and he fled guiltily. Now he was a thief, and then he wasa beleaguered citizen, forced to make excursions by night, and liveat risk of life on the provisions of the foe. He lay on the bed, andwatched the lights on the ceiling until the cheesemonger's shop and thetinman's were closed; then he went to sleep, and in a while Dick cameand awoke him. 

'You'll get nothing to eat till you confess, ' said Dick, 'and thenyou'll get a licking. '

'Then I shall die, ' said Paul. 'I shan't confess what I never done. '

He undressed and got into bed, and was more of a Christian martyr thanhe had ever been before. He slept fairly well, all things considered;but when in the morning his father's deep, asthmatic cough sounded onthe stairs, he felt as if his heart had slipped through his spine andhad dropped upon the floor. He sat up in bed as his father entered theroom. 

'Well, sir, are ye in any mind to tell the truth yet?'

'I didn't take it, father; I never seen it' 'Vary good; yell just staythere. '

Dick, with his hair staring from his head in all directions, pulledon his boots and trousers, and, gathering his other belongings in botharms, went off to make his toilet in the back-kitchen. The heavy daybegan for Paul, and when he had dressed he prowled disconsolately abouthis prison limits. In the ceiling of one of the back rooms there wasa trap-door, and he began to wonder if he could open it There was acrippled three-legged table in the next apartment, and two old chairs, the rush bottoms of which had given way. He lugged these beneath thetrap and mounted. He had two or three tumbles, and anything but a cator a boy would have broken its neck several times over; but at last hesucceeded in forcing the trap, and scrambled up. The joists of the roofand the rough inside of the slates were all he saw at first; but in awhile he discerned a solid-looking shadow in the near distance, and madetowards it. It proved to be a small table, and on it, covered thick withdust, were a broken jug, a broken cup, and a broken table-knife. Whatbrought these things in so curious a place Paul never knew; but therethey were, and the spot in an instant was a robber's cave, and fullof the most palpitating and delicious fears. He seized the brokentable-knife as a weapon, and dashed back towards the trap-door. Hismovement towards the table must have taken him over some protectedplace--some region where a wall or beam made the lath-and-plasterflooring sound beneath his feet. But in his backward dash he missedthis. The thin and fragile stuff gave way beneath him, and he camethrough with a tearing crash, and fell on the floor of the room beneathwith a shock which snapped his teeth together and left him dizzy andhalf stunned. There was a big rent in the ceiling, and the floor wascovered for a square yard or two with hairy plaster and fragments ofwood. 

Paul thought at first that he was broken all over, but, coming to gatherhimself together, found himself whole. He transferred the crippledtable and the chairs to their original places, and stowed away theknife between the cords and the mattress of his bed. Then he listeneddreadfully to discover if the noise of his fall had awakened anyanswering commotion below stairs. Growing easy on this point, he beganto be aware that he was hungry again, and bethought him of the remnantof the sponge loaf. Nothing much worse than had already happenedcould befall him, and after brief temptation he kicked off his unlacedhobnails and stole downstairs. With some such vague idea of disguisingcrime as a thievish monkey might have had, he packed up a pair ofneatly folded towels in the paper which had once held the loaf, and soretreated to his prison. All day long the familiar noises of thehouse, exaggerated into importance by his own loneliness, went on. Feettravelled here and there, voices called, the tingling shop-bell rang. The little servant came to make the bed, and treated him with thedisdain which befitted a convicted criminal. In a while she went away, and left him lonelier than before. Even disdain had something of humancompanionship in it. 

And now, hunger's pangs having been fairly well appeased by the remnantof the sponge loaf, Paul had time to surrender himself to the thoughtof impending starvation. He convinced himself that a boy could die ofstarvation in two days. Morrow at noontide would see him stark and cold. He grew newly holy at this reflection, and forgave everybody afresh withflattering tears. It became a sort of essential that he should leave amemorial on the wall of the cell in which he was about to perish, andso he got out the broken knife from under the mattress, and carved a bigcross in the papered plaster of the wall. It was less artistic in itsoutline than he could have hoped; but its symbolism, at least, wasclear, and he wept and exulted as he worked at it. 

The heavy day went by and the heavy night, and he began to be reallyhollow, and to believe with less than his original sense of comfortthat his end was near. With the morning came his father with yesterday'squestion. Paul broke into wild tears and protests. He wasn't, wasn't, wasn't guilty. 

'Vary good. Yell just stay there. '

Dick, touched by the agony of despair with which Paul threw himself uponthe bed, advised surrender. 

'What's a lickin'?' said Dick. 'Have it over. '

'Oh, Dick, ' cried Paul, clipping at the air between them, 'plead forme!'

'Not me, ' said Dick, who was less literary than Paul, and misunderstoodthe unfamiliar word--'bleed for yourself. '

And again the heavy day went on, and Paul wept and wept alone. But ithappened that this was scouring day; and a sort of wooden fender whichfenced in the foot of the eight-day clock being moved, the missing bitof silver was found behind it, and the martyr was released. There wereno apologies; but Paul was told to clean himself, and was whispered byDick that there was a tea-party that afternoon, and that he was to beallowed to be present at it. 

Then fell misery. He knew why the sponge loaf had been saved, and thougheverybody was kind now, and seemed to feel in an unspeaking way that hehad been ill-used, he foresaw the near future and trembled. 

He had been made to black his Sunday boots, he had been washed with suchdesperate earnestness that his face and neck tingled, and he diffusedan atmosphere of yellow soap as he walked. He was in his best clothes, which fitted him as a sausage is fitted by its skin; he was guillotinedin a white collar with a serrated inside edge, and guilt filled everycrevice of his soul. 

'Fanny Ann, ' said Mrs. Armstrong, putting the last finishing touches tothe tea-table, 'fetch the sponge loaf. '

A rollicking shout of laughter rose from the tent door, and went rollingdown the gorge, and the dream was over for the time. 

CHAPTER II

It was mid-July, and even at an altitude of four thousand feet the suncould scorch at noonday. The lonely man sat at his outlook, gazing downthe valley. There was a faint haze abroad, a thickening of the air soapparently slight, and in itself so imperceptible, that he would nothave noticed it but for the fact that it blotted out many familiardistant peaks, and narrowed his horizon to some four or five miles. Hewaited for the sun to pierce this impalpable fog, but waited in vain. The sun itself was red and angry in colour, and shrunk to half itscommon size. Even at noontide the eye could look on it for a second ortwo without being unbearably dazzled. 

The shade in which he sat moved slowly eastward, and had almost desertedhim, when his hand felt a sudden fierce pang of pain as if an insect hadstung him. He moved hastily and examined the mark of what he took fora sting. It was round, small, and red, as if the end of a hotknitting-needle had been pressed upon the skin. Whilst he sat suckingat the place to draw the pain away, and looking round in search of theinsect foe, the same quick burning pang struck him on the cheek. Hemoved hastily again, and stared and listened keenly. There was not abuzz of wings anywhere near at hand, and not an insect in sight. But ashe looked and harkened he was enlightened. A great tear of resinous gumhad caught and hardened in a fork of the branches, and the sun's raysfalling on and through this were concentrated as if by a burning-glass. The fiery point had stung him. 

He broke away the cause of mischief, and then looked about him witha new understanding. The forest fires had begun, and it was the smokewhich so closed in the view. He could detect now a faintly aromaticsmell of burning, and wondered that he had not noticed it before. 

There was not a breath of air stirring, and not a hint of flame in allthe haze which on every side blotted out the far-off hills, and changedto a dull tint of smoke those which still loomed upon him. At night themoon hung in the starless sky like a globe of blood, and day by day thedimness of the air increased. The cloud took no form of cloud, and nota sound came through it except for the voice of the water, and theoccasional roll and clangour of the trains. The distances in view grewbriefer and more brief, and within a week of the date of his discoverythe nearest peaks were obliterated, and the air had grown pungent withits charge of invisible burned atoms. 

He sat in the midst of this narrowed and darkened world, this world ofsilence and solitude, as he sat in the middle of his own despairs. Hislife had fallen away to this--an aching heart in a world where no mancame. Had it not been for pride, he could have wept for pity of himself. Had it not been for a sense of rebellion against fate and the world, he could have died of his own disdain. He had played the fool, but theworld had taken an unjust advantage of his folly. He loathed himself andit. 

Thus trebly banished--from friends, from the world, from Nature--hedreamed his dreams. The past came back again. 

Paul was keeping shop. The door, rarely passed by the foot of acustomer, stood open to invite the world at large. Armstrong came inwith his spectacles resting on his shaggy brows. Paul, who had beenwool-gathering, went back to nominative, dative, and ablative. He hatedthe Eton Latin grammar as he had not learned to hate anything else inlife. 

'Any custom?' asked the father. 

'Nobody, ' said Paul. 

'Paul, lad, ' said Armstrong, after a lengthy pause. He cleared histhroat, and laid a hand on the boy's shoulder. 'Yell reach your twalthbirthday next week. It's time ye were doing something in the warld. 'He pulled down his glasses and looked at the lad gravely. 'I've tauldMester Reddy ye'll not be going back to school after the holidays. There's over-many mouths to keep, and over-many backs to clothe, lad. Ye'll have to buckle to, like the rest of us. '

'Yes, father, ' said Paul. The prospect looked welcome, as almost anychange does to a boy. 

'What would ye like to be?' his father asked

'I dunno, ' said Paul, rubbing his nose hard with the back of onefreckled hand. 

'Well, I'll thenk it over. Ye can get away to your plays now, but theserious purpose o' life's beginnin' for ye. '

Paul needed no further leave. He snatched his cap and was away up theHigh Street before anybody could find time to tell him that his neckwas unwashed, his boots unblacked or unlaced, or his collar disarranged. These reminders were an unfailing grievance to him when they came, andthey seemed to hail upon him all day long. With the thought that he wasentering the world and beginning his career in earnest, he thrust hishands into his corduroy pockets, swaggering in his walk, and so absorbedthat he forgot to touch the street lamp-posts for two or three hundredyards. He stood overcome by this discovery, retraced his steps almost tothe shop-door, in spite of his fear of being recalled, and then racedon his original way, laying a hand on each lamp-post as he passed itIn this fashion he arrived at the gate of an unpretentious little housewhich had many reasons for looking glorious and palatial in his eyes. For one thing, it was a private house. No business of any sort was donethere, and its inhabitants lived on their own money. Then it stood backfrom the road, behind iron railings, and had a gravel pathway leadingto the front door, and a little bit of orderly garden with one droopinglaburnum in it, which in its season hung clear gold blossoms over theroadway. There was a small coach-house beside the main building. It heldno vehicle of any sort, but it was a coach-house all the same. Insidethe house everything was neat and clean, and to Paul's mind luxurious. There were carpets in all the living-rooms and bedrooms. There was apiano, there were marble mantelpieces with gold-framed mirrors overthem, one to each front-room, and the chambers which held thesesplendours were familiarly used, and not merely kept for show. Paul hadthe run of this house, for the orphan children of his mother's secondcousin lived there, and the relationship was recognised. 

He rang the bell, and a fresh-coloured, prettyish girl in a smart capcame to the door. 

'Oh, ' she said, 'it's you, is it! Come to see the young ladies, areyou?' Paul nodded with his hands in his pockets. 

'You're in pretty fettle!' said the girl. 'Look at your boots! Look atyour hair! Look at the smut on your nose!'

Paul looked at his boots, tried to look at his hair, squinted downwardsin search of the smut, and said: 'Bother!'

'All right, ' the girl responded. 'You'll find 'em in the garden. They'llbe rare and proud to see you. '

Paul, somewhat shamefaced, took the familiar way into the garden, andstood rooted. A small striped tent of pink and white had been set up onthe unshaven grass-plot, and five or six girls, all in white dresses, were seated near it round a tea-table. One, who had black hair and darkeyes, wore a crimson sash, and the rest had blue sashes with prodigiousbows. Paul knew them all with one exception, but after the first glancehe had eyes for the exception only. She was a lackadaisical young personof eighteen, with pale sandy ringlets and a cold-boiled-veal complexion;but he thought her a creature of another sphere, and his heart shiveredwith a strange, delicious sense of worship. He stood and stared, and hisinward thoughts were poorly translated by his aspect, as happens withmost people How long the dream held him he did not know, but the Visionturned, and he met the young person's eye. 

'Who is that dirty boy? asked the Vision. 'I suppose he wants to speakto you, Zillah. '

Zillah, who was the elder of the two orphan girls, turned, and blushedtill she looked the colour of her sash. But she rose from her seat andcame to Paul and whispered to him:

'You mustn't come here to-day, Paul We've got company. And goodnessgracious, child, how untidy you are to be sure!'

Then shame fell like an avalanche, and Paul went altogether dizzy andsilly under the shock of it How he got home he never knew, but anhour later he was in the back-kitchen, standing on a mat in hisstocking-feet, with his shirt-sleeves turned up to his elbows, and waspolishing his boots until the leather grew hot beneath the brush. Hewashed himself in a frenzy of remorse and resolve, and scoured his handswith yellow soap, silver sand, and a stubbly scrubbing-brush until theytingled. Then he fell upon the family stock of hair-oil, which was keptin a medicine-bottle in the kitchen cupboard, and, except on Sundays, was held sacred to the girls. Then he put on a clean collar (which wasa daring and outrageous defiance of authority, which allowed but two aweek), and prepared to face consequences. The family brush and combwere kept in a small bag which hung on a nail beside the scratched anddefaced old family looking-glass, and Paul was artistically at work uponhis hair when his mother entered the kitchen. The excellent woman satdown to laugh, and Armstrong came in with his customary vague air ofpatient thinking. 

'William, ' said Mrs. Armstrong, 'look at our Paul. Niver tell me thehage of merricles is past Why, I believe he's fell in love!'

It was the perpetual astonishment of Paul's life that his motheralways knew and understood the things he would not have her know andunderstand. Even now, at his tent-door, seeing all these dead hours soclearly that he forgot his present existence altogether, he thought ofher half-malicious, wholly-humorous intuition with wonder. Why had shenever understood the things he would have given so much to have herunderstand?

Armstrong smiled with a melancholy, tired sweetness. 

'Larn to be tidy, lad, ' he said. 'I like a self-respecting fellow thathonours his own person. '

'M'm, ' said Mrs. Armstrong. 'You've got a five days' beard on, William. '

He looked at her, stroking his own bristly chin. 

'Ay, ' he said. 'This'll be Thursday. Paul, just be getting me my razorand the brush and soap-box, there's a good lad. '

Paul obeyed, and then betook himself to the timber-grove, where he satrapt into meditations on the Vision. He had read whatever came withinhis reach, good, bad, or indifferent, and his conscious thoughts werealways a patchwork of phrases. When he was put to mind the shop he readthe penny weeklies. He was fresh from one of the works of J. F. Smith, the un-remembered prose laureate of the _London Journal_, who would havebeen reckoned a giant of invention if he had lived in these days, and asentence from his latest chapter got into Paul's head and went roundand round: 'There lay the fair, gifted, almost idolized girl. ' In Mr. Smith's moving page the fair, gifted, almost idolized girl was dying, and Paul did not as yet know enough of the story-teller's craft of thatday to be sure that she would recover in the next chapter. She mixedherself with the lady of the sandy ringlets who had described him as adirty boy, and the pathos of the situation lent an added anguish to histhoughts. How beautiful was the lady of the ringlets, how ethereal inaspect, how far removed, how worshipful, how adorable! How refined washer voice, how elegant her accent! She had spoken of him as a b'y, butthat was a local fashion, and Paul knew no better. She was far and faraway--a being of the skies, at once an aristocrat and an angel. He beganto make verses about her, of course--ghastly, fustian stuff, at therecollection of which the Solitary shuddered, and then laughed. But fromthat day forward Paul had spasmodic rages of personal cleanliness andadornment. 

There was a jar of goose-oil always kept on the top of the baking-ovenin the back-kitchen, and, learning that goose-oil was an unfailingspecific for the growth of whiskers and moustache, he began to rub hislip and cheeks with this unguent Many a time when he was left alone helit a candle, and getting his face between it and the mirror, tried totrace on the outline a fringe of hair. He found an occasional momentarysatisfaction in burned cork, but the joy was futile, and impermanent. 

He met the Vision in the street one day when he was carrying a parcel, and the shame of his menial employment, and the sense of the coarsenessof his clothes made him long for the earth to open. The fact that theyoung person did not know him, or look at him, or think about him, madeno difference. The young head was filled with absurd dreams. Sometimeshe was a prince in disguise. He was being bred up to know nothing of hisprincedom, so that he might be splendidly and properly astonished whenthe revelation came. At other times he recognised his lowly origin, andwent away into the boy's Somewhere--a noble country full of beneficentchances--and came back great and glorious, in gloves and patent-leatherboots, and a hat and moustache, and conquered the Vision and marriedher. At other times he died, with his great heart unspoken, and wasburied in the parish churchyard. 

But whilst he was full of all manner of ambitions and yearnings, anddreams which nobody else in the wide world dreamed about, a familyconclave was held to decide what Paul should be. One Simmons, a dapper, perky draper in the High Street, wanted a shop-boy, and Mrs. Armstrongwas for asking the place for Paul There was not a grain of ambition inthe household, and the melancholy fact was that there was no money tobind Paul apprentice anywhere. But Paul would have none of the draper. He was cuffed in corners by the maternal hand, but he held his own. He would run away, he declared, he would drown himself, he would doanything rather than submit to that. So finally he was turned into theramshackle old printing-office, where all his elder brothers had beenbefore him, and learned to sort pie, and to roll at press, and tosweep the floors, and to blow old dusty type-cases clean. He worea brown-paper apron tied about his waist with string, and lived soobscured in printer's ink, for which he seemed to have a naturalaffinity, that he hardly looked like a white boy at all. 

He was still a liar, but he told his lies on paper now, and hid them. Hetold them in prose and verse--prose which was measled with 'Oh's, ' and'Alas's, ' and full of great windblown phrases of bombast, like inflatedbladders, each with one little parched pea of meaning to rattle insideit The verse was mainly such as might have been written by a moderatelyilliterate absurd old man who had found life a vanity, and had deservedhis discovery. 

There was one idle and worthless journeyman in the ramshackle office, and one only. He kept the place like a pigsty, and the floor waslittered with boards on which unlocked formes of type fell about intoconfusion. Paul could pick his way through these blindfold, and many andmany a night in the dark he raged out his verses, marching to and frowith the four big dim windows staring dully at him, wall-eyed withcountless paper patches, seen as darker blots on the darkness. 

One night he was there in hiding. He had played truant fromSunday-school and chapel, and had been all day in the fields, hungry, but happy beyond all dreaming. And, oh! the Sundays! the dreary, bestialdays, with Sunday-school at half-past nine and chapel at eleven, andSunday-school at half-past two and chapel at half-past six and familyprayers at nine, and bed at half-past nine, and books forbidden, andspeech a crime, and whistling a felony. Paul had broken loose, and knewnot what to look for, and cared little for the hour. For his head wasfull of verses, and his heart was full of the summer day, and forthe first time in his life he had gone to Nature, and forgotten histhrice-thirty-times copied emotions, and had dared to speak in his ownvoice. The lines he had made that day were unutterably sacred and sweetto him. The dreaming Solitary, staring down the gorge, heard theboy's awestruck whisper, and, forgetting all the rest of the verses, remembered this one only:

 'Why, all is happy! Not a worm that crawls, Or grasshopper that chirps about the grass, Or beetle basking on the sunny walls, Or mail-clad fly that skims the face of glass The river wears in summer;--not a bird That sings the tranquil glory of the fields, Or single sight is seen or sound is heard, But some new pleasure to my full soul yields!'

Paul, standing there in the darkness, whispered this many times as ifstruck with awe by it, and indeed the boy wondered, and thought it aninspiration. 

'That is poetry, ' said Paul 'I am a poet--a poet--a poet!'

He fell on his knees, with his face on his hands in the open quoindrawer, feeling as if he had uttered a blasphemy. How long he was therehe never knew, but he was disturbed by the grating of a door below, andhis father's voice called up the stairs:

'Paul! Where are ye?'

'Here, father, ' Paul answered

A sob met his voice half-way, and Armstrong came stumbling up thestairs. 

'What's the matter, lad?' he asked, in a tone between concern andimpatience. 

'Nothing, ' said Paul. 

'Why is't ye're here alaun?' his father demanded 'And whaur have ye beenthe livelong day? And what are ye cryin' for?

'Nothing, ' said Paul again. 

'Ye're not such a fule, ' said Armstrong, 'as to be cryin' an' hidin' fornaething, an' I'm not such a fule as to believe it. '

He paused, but Paul made no reply. The old man struck a lucifer matchand lit the gas. The boy stood blinking in the light, his face stainedwith tears, his eyelids red and a little swollen. To the father's eye helooked sullen and defiant Of course he was neither, but he was entirelyhopeless of being understood, and therefore helpless to explain. 

'Noo, Paul, ' said Armstrong, with a severity which he felt to bejustified, 'I'm goin' to the bottom o' this business. Ye've absentedyourself the haul day from the House o' God. Ye've not been seen sincemorning's light, and it's nigh-hand on midnight Whaur _have_ ye been?Answer me that at once, sir. '

'In the Hoarstone Fields, ' said Paul. 

'And wha's been with ye, helping ye to desecrate God's day?'

'Nobody, father. I've been by myself all the while. '

'And what's been your work, my lad?' There was silence, and the silencebegan to have a threat in it 'I'm goin' to the bottom o' this affeer, Paul, ' said the father. He meant that honestly, but he was not takingthe right way. 'I'm not to be put off by ony lies or inventions. Ye'vebeen alaun in the Hoarstone Fields all day? What took ye there? And hoohave ye passed the time? I'll know!' he added, after another long pause. 

Perhaps there was nobody in the world who stood less chance of knowing, but how should Armstrong have guessed that? He was a just man, and askind-hearted a father as might have been found within a hundred miles. If he could have known the truth, he would not only have been disarmed, but proud and glad. But Paul at this time had a holy terror of him. Itgrew to a close and reverent affection later on, and there was such aconfidence between this pair as is not often found. But now? Paul wouldhave suffered anything rather than tell the truth. It was not that hewould not. He could not His tongue was fettered. 

'Noo, Paul, ' said Armstrong. 'Let's have a luik at this. Ye're notsupposin' in your inmost mind that I'm in the least small degree likelyto believe the yarn ye've tauld me. Ye've been in the lonely fields allday, doing naething and speaking to naebody. And for that ye've stayedaway from your meals, an' noo ye're in hiding like a creminal? It hasn'tan air o' pro-babeelity, Paul; it has _no_ air o' pro-babeelity. You seethat?

Paul saw it--quite as clearly as his father. But how was it to beexplained? Could Paul say, 'My good sir, I am a boy of genius. I havebeen filled with the Divine afflatus, and have been driven into solitudeby my own thoughts. I have been so held by dreams of beauty that I haveforgotten everything'? Could Paul offer that intolerable cheeky boast?And yet to offer to explain was to do that, and nothing less than that. 

'Vary well, ' said Armstrong. 'Ye'll go to your bed, and I'd advise yeto thenk the matter over. I'll gev ye till morning. But I'll have thetruth, or I'll know the reason why. '

The gas went out under Armstrong's thumb and finger on the tap, and inthe sudden darkness the gray, patient, reproachful face still burned inthe boy's eyes. 

'Father!' said Paul, and stretching out both hands, he caught hold ofhim by the sleeve. 

'Well!' answered Armstrong sternly. 

He thought it his duty to be stern, but the tone killed the risingimpulse of courage in Paul's heart He could have stammered a hint of thetruth then, and the darkness would have been friendly to him. A caress, a hand on head or shoulder, would have done the business, but caresseswere not in fashion in the Armstrong household. There was anothersilence, and Armstrong said:

'I gev ye till morning, and then Paul, my lad, ye'll have yourself tothank for what may happen. I'll be at the bottom o' this matter, or I'llknow the reason why. I'm no friend to the rod, but I'll not stand byopen-eyed an' see you walkin' straight to the deevil without an effortto turn ye. An' I'll have naething less than a full confession. Ye mayluik for a flogging if I don't get it, and a daily flogging till I do. For, my lad, if I flay your back, and break my heart to do it, I'll winat the truth. '

They went down the long dark garden together, and at the kitchen-doorArmstrong paused. 

'It's a sore thing, ' he said, 'for a man to have to misuse his ain fleshan' blood. But ye're not of an age to understand that. Remember, Paul, this is not my seeking; but I'll have the truth by foul means or fair. And it's just you to choose. '

Paul entered the kitchen, and his mother was for instant justice, as shesaw it, but Armstrong intervened. 

'This matter is in my hands, ' he said. 

He was a very quiet and yielding man in many things, but when he choseto speak in that way he made his word law. 

Then came the lonely night. The wretched poet, a weedy lad who hadovergrown his strength, lay in bed and cried in anguish. He topped hisfather by a head already, though he was but three months beyond hisfifteenth birthday, and if he had chosen to fight he might perhaps haveheld his own. But a thought so impious never entered his mind. He washelpless, and he lay blubbering, undignified, with a breaking heart. Hedid not think much or often of the coming pain, but he brooded on theindignity and injustice until he writhed with yelps of wrath and hatredand agony of heart, and awoke Dick, who wanted to know what was thematter, and was roughly sympathetic for a time, until, finding he couldmake out nothing, he turned and went to sleep again. 

There were black looks in the morning everywhere, for Paul was knownto be in deep disgrace again. He swallowed a cup of the thin, washycoffee--its flavour of chicory and coarse brown sugar was nauseous onthe palate of the man at the tent door--and then his father, pale ashimself, rose amidst the affrighted boys and girls, and motioned himsilently to the sitting-room. This was a sort of family vault, with itsscanty furniture in grave-clothes, and a smell of damp disuse about italways, even in summer-time. 

'Are ye ready with the truth?' asked Armstrong. Paul looked at him likea dumb thing in a trap, but said never a word. 'Very well, ' The grayman's hands shook and his voice, and his face was of the colour of graypaper. 'Go to the back-kitchen and strip. '

Paul, dry-eyed, gloomy, and desperate, walked before, and his fatherfollowed. The girls clung to each other. There had been no such scene asthis in the house for years. The tawse had hung idle even for Paul formany and many a day. Armstrong took the instrument of justice from itshook, and laid it on the table He took off his coat, and rolled up hisleft shirt-sleeve. He was left-handed. The arm he bared was corded andpuny. It shook as if he had the palsy. His wife had a sudden pity forhim, and ran at him with a gush of tears. 

'William, ' she said, 'don't break your heart for the young vil'in; heisn't worth it Oh, God! I wish he was no child o' mine. '

She dropped into a chair and cried. Armstrong passed out of the kitchen. The girls listened, and Dick, chalky white, with his mouth open, as Paulhad seen him on his way through. They heard the swish, swish, swish ofthe tawse, and not another sound but hard breathing for a full minute;then Paul began to groan, and then to shriek. 

'Now, ' panted Armstrong, 'shall I have the truth?'

There was no answer, and he fell to again; but Paul turned and caughthis arm, and after an ineffectual struggle, the old man dropped thetawse and walked into the kitchen. Paul dressed and sat on the table, quivering all over. He sat there for hours, and nobody approached himuntil at last the servant, with frightened eyes, came to make ready fordinner; then he got up and went to his old refuge in the lumber-room. One of his sisters brought him food after the family dinner-hour, but herefused it passionately. 

'Oh, Paul, ' she said, clinging to him till he shook her from hiswrithing shoulders, 'why don't you confess?'

'Confess what? snarled Paul. 'Confess I was born into a family of foolsand nincompoops? That's all I've got to confess. '

He was left to himself all day, and at night he went un-chidden to thelarder, and helped himself to bread and cheese. He took a jug to thepump, and coming back, ate his meal, standing amongst his people like anoutlaw. 

'Well, Paul, ' said his father, 'are ye in the mind to make a cleanbreast of it?'

'No, ' said Paul, 'I'm not. '

The defiance fell like a thunderbolt, and eyes changed with eyes allround the room in horror and amazement. 

'We'll see in the morning, ' Armstrong said. 

'All right, ' answered Paul; and so finished his meal, and took his capfrom its hook behind the door. 

'Where are you going?' cried his mother. 

'That's my business, ' said Paul, breaking into sudden passionatedefiance. 'What am _I_ flogged like a dog for? _You_ don't know. Thereisn't one of you, from father down to George, who knows what I've beendoing. I can't remember an hour's fair play from the day that I wasborn. Look here, father: you may take another turn at me to-morrow andnext day, you can come on every morning till I'm as old as you are, butyou'll never get a word out of me. I've done no harm, and anybody withan ounce of justice in him would prove something before he served hisown flesh and blood as you've served me. '

He was in a rage of tears again, and every word he spoke was tuned tothe vulgar accent of his childhood. 'Father' was 'feyther' and 'born'was 'boorn. ' He did not speak like a poet, or look like one to whosefull soul all things yielded pleasure. These thoughts hit Paul, and helaughed loud and bitterly, and went his way into the street. 

The upshot of it was that Paul was flogged no more. Armstrong sickenedof the enterprise, and gave it up. 

The lonely man was thinking of it all, seeing it all. Suddenly a voiceseemed to speak to him, and the impression was so astonishingly vividthat before he knew he had answered it aloud. He started awake at thesound of his own voice, and his skin crisped from head to heel. 

'There's no rancour, Paul, lad?' the voice had said, or seemed to say. 

'Rancour?' he had answered, with a queer tender laugh. 'You dear olddad!'

For the first time the sense of an actual visitation rested with him, and continued real. He felt, he knew, or seemed to know, that hisfather's soul was near. 

CHAPTER III

Paul was standing in a room in the old house in Church Vale, the room inwhich the fiddles hung around the wall in their bags of green baize. Asound of laughter drew him to the kitchen, and he had to make his waythrough a darkened narrow passage, with the up-and-down steps of whichhe was not familiar. At the turn of the passage he came upon a picture. 

To the man at the tent door it was as clear as if the bodily eye yetrested upon it. 

The kitchen floor was of cherry-red square bricks; the door was open tothe June sunlight, framing its scrap of landscape, with the windlass ofthe well and the bucket overgrown with mosses and brimming with watercrystal clear, and there were flowering plants in the window, withleaves and blossoms all translucent against the outer dazzle. Thewhole family was gathered there: Uncle Dan, with his six feet of yeomanmanhood, bald and rufous-gray; Aunt Deborah, with her child's figure andthe kind old face framed in the ringlets of her younger days; the girlsand the boys, a houseful of them, ranging in years from six-and-twentyto four or five, and every face was puckered with laughter, and everyhand and voice applauded. In their midst was a stranger to Paul, agirl of eighteen, who marched up and down the room with a half-floweredfoxglove in her hand. She carried it like a sabre at the slope, and herstep was a burlesque of the cavalry stride. She issued military ordersto an imaginary contingent of troops, and her contralto voice rang likea bell. Her upper lip was corked in two dainty black lines of moustache, and on her tumbled and untidy curls she had perched a shallow chipstrawberry-pottle, which sat like a forage-cap. 

'Carry--so! she sang out; and at that instant, discerning a stranger, she turned, with bent shoulders and a swift rustle of skirts, andskimmed into the back garden. 

'Oh, you silly!' cried one of the girls; 'it's only Paul. '

She came back, and as she passed the old moss-grown bucket she bent toit and scooped up a palmiul of water, and washed away the moustache ofburnt cork; then, with a coquettish lingering in her walk, she came in, patting her lips with her apron, her roguish head still decorated withthe strawberry-pottle. Her eyes sparkled with an innocent baby devilry, but the rest of her face was as demure as a Quakeress's bonnet Her hairwas of an extraordinary fineness and plenty, and as wayward as it wasfine, so that with the shadow of the doorway round her, and the brightsunlight in every thread of it, it burned like a halo. 

'Paul?' she said, pausing in front of him, and looking from a levelright into his eyes, whilst her rosy little hands smoothed her apron. 'Is Paul a cousin, too?'

'Of course he is, ' said the girl who had called her back; 'he's ourfirst cousin, Paul is. '

'Is he, ' she asked, with demure face and dancing eye--' is he--in akissing relationship?'

'Try him, my wench, ' said Paul's uncle. 

She bunched her red lips for a kiss, like a child, and advanced herhead. Paul's face was like a peony for colour, but he pouted his lipsalso, and bent to meet hers. When they had almost met, she drew herhead back with a demure shake and a look of doubt The kitchen rangwith laughter at Paul's hangdog discomfiture. The innocent, wicked, tantalizing eye mocked him, and he was awhirl with shame; but he foundin the midst of it a desperate courage, and, throwing one arm around herneck, he kissed her full on the lips with a loud rustic smack. 

'Well, ' she said, with a face of horrified rebuke, all but the eyes, which fairly danced with mirth and mischief, 'if that's Castle Barfieldmanners, I'd better go home again. '

'Quite right, Paul, ' said Paul's uncle. 'Stand none o' their nonsense, lad. '

'Oh, but, uncle, ' said she, 'you _would_ think him milder to look athim--now, wouldn't ee?'

Paul knew the speech of the local gentry, he knew his father's Ayrshireaccent, and his own yokel drawl; but this new cousin spoke an Englishaltogether strange to his ears, and it sounded fairylike. He stared infoolish worship. 

'You'd better know who you be, ' said Paul's uncle, 'and shake hands. This is your grand-uncle's grand-niece, Paul. May Gold her name is. May, my darlin', this is Paul Armstrong. '

She held out her hand, and Paul took it shyly in his own. He had veryrarely touched a hand which was not roughened more or less by labour. The warm, soft pressure tightened on his own hard palm for an instantonly, but he tingled from head to foot as if he had touched somethingelectric. 

'Oh!'-she said, 'this is Uncle Armstrong's little boy? She was by twoyears his senior, and for a girl she was tall; but he was more than on alevel with her so far as mere height went, and the phrase cut him at theheart. She took the strawberry-pottle from her head with both hands, asif it had been a crown, and laid it on the kitchen dresser. 'I've heardmy father talk of his father five hundred times. My father thinks noend of Uncle Armstrong. He says that for a man of learning he never metanybody one half so sensible. '

Paul fell head over heels in love with the pretty cousin fromDevonshire. That is to say, he fell in love with his own dreams abouther, and they were sweet enough for any lad to fall in love with. Shesang and she played, she brimmed over with accomplishment, which wasall rustic enough, no doubt, but angel-fine to Paul, and exotic, andnot like anything within his knowledge. She played and she sang thatafternoon, and never again had Paul's ears drunk in such tones ofheaven. 

He went home in an ecstasy of delight and anguish. How beautiful shewas! what a grace enveloped her! Her very name was a ravishment--a nameof spring and flowers and pure bright skies. May! He dared to whisperit, and he tingled from head to heel. His heart fondled it: May! May!May! and, with inexpressible vague, sweet longing, May! once more. Thenher hair! then her voice! then the rosy softness of her hand! then, withhideous revulsion, from her perfections to himself! The gulf of shame!His boots were an epic of despair, his necktie was a tragedy. Then backto her with all the graces of the heavens upon her! Then back to himselfagain, and the deep damnation of the button which was missing from hiswaistcoat Paul was a poet, and should have had a soul above buttons; butbefore the phantom of that missing button his soul grovelled, until itsprang up once more to hover round her foot, her hand, her eyes, hervoice, her name of May! May! May! and, with shudders of frostiestself-reproach and richest pleasure, round the memory of that kiss!

In a week or two Paul had grown devoutly religious, and had no idea ofthe real why. The Church Vale cousins were ardent churchgoers, for thegirls were at the time of life for ardour, and both the Vicar and hisCurate were unmarried. Paul, whose proper place of Sabbath boredom wasEbenezer, was welcome as a proselyte, and had a seat in the familypew, and the rapture of walking homeward sometimes by the side of thefeminine magnet. 

So the dweller at the tent door sees himself at church, a pious varierfrom chapel. The July sunbeams are falling through stained glass; theroof-beams of the nondescript old building are half visible in shadow. The windows are open, and a warm, spiced wind flutters through inpleasantly successful disputation with odours of dry-rot and chillyearth and stone. The sheep are bleating amongst the mounded graves, andthe curate is bleating at the lectern. A yearning peace is in Paul'sheart, and the pretty distant cousin is near at hand, with a smell ofdry lavender in her dress. The first twining of feeling and belief ishere, the earliest of many of those juggleries of Nature which make afool of reason. Oh, sweet hour! oh, happy world! oh, holy place, whereshe is! Oh, harmless, innocent calf-love! A jolly old throstle issinging away in the elm which overhangs the parson's gate. There is adisembodied skylark voice somewhere high up in the mare's-tail cloudswhich veil the earth from too much heat and brightness; and the youngheart is unhardened and unspotted from the world. 

And oh! oho! the elysium of the summer mornings, when Dick and Paul, and the cousins, male and female, rose at four and strayed with theirDevonian angel through lanes and fields as far as Beacon Hargate, gathering wild flowers and calling at the farm for milk. There areno more such flowers, there is no more such air, no more such merrysunshine; there is no such nectar any more as foamed in the shiningpail. 

On the way from Church Vale to Beacon Hargate there is a brook, whichnow runs ink and smells of evil, and in those days flowed so clear thatyou could count the parcel-coloured pebbles at the bottom, through waterwhich was sometimes pellucid as diamond, and sometimes of a cairngormcolour. The arched pathway over it, with its weather-stained, square-cuttimber guards at either side, was called June Bridge, and above andbelow the bridge, in curved hollows of the banks where the bed of thebrook was earthy, water-lilies floated, sliding with the stream, andtugging back on their oozy anchorage. Paul found his goddess leaning onthis bridge, watching the lilies, and began to hum whilst he was yet outof hearing, 'May, on June bridge, in July weather, ' and to make a song in his head. 

'Can ee swim, Paul?' asked his goddess. 

'Oh yes, ' said Paul, 'I can swim right enough. Want them lilies?' Shenodded, smiling. 'I'll get 'em for you. '

He climbed the bridge, and dropped into the meadow. 

'I'll wait for ee, ' said May, and sauntered on out of sight. 

Paul stripped and dived, came up with a shake of the head, and swamdown-stream. He reached the water-lilies in a dozen strokes, laid a handon the stalk of one in passing, and tugged at it. The stem proved to betougher than he had guessed, and he dropped his feet to find bottom. Hewas out of his depth, but he set both hands low and twisted at the stem. This took him under water, but he came up smiling triumph, threw hisprize into the meadow, and paddled round the group on an outlook for thefinest blooms. One in the very middle of the floating bed was fresh andflawless, and he swam for it. A number of cold weedy things were roundhis legs at once, and before he knew it he was thickly meshed. The slimytouch sent an unpleasant thrill through him, but he had no sense of fearas yet He wrenched off the bloom he had aimed for, and again he wentunder water. Then he found he could not rise, and a sudden spasm ofterror shook him. He struggled madly, and the pulses in his head beatlike bells. Just when the case seemed desperate, and he felt as if hemust take breath or die, something gave way. He surged upward, and gotone great gulp of air. His senses came back to him, and the terror diedaway. He threw himself upon his back and paddled, and, keeping his faceabove water thus, he tried artrully and slowly to extricate his legsfrom the net which held them. A minute went by, and he was bound as fastas ever. Instinct told him that another struggle meant ruin, and yetinstinct bade him struggle. He set his teeth and paddled softly. Howlong could he last like this? he asked himself; and at that instant heseemed to find an answer. The attitude in which he floated was becomingrapidly more and more upright. There was a sinking weight upon his feet. 

At this he shrieked for help, but he paddled softly and without hurryall the same. He listened as well as he could for the beating in hisears. The fields seemed deserted, but he called again. He closed hiseyes and listened, paddling softly, with set teeth. He was nearlyupright in the water now, and the weight still dragged But there wasyet an inch or two to spare, and he was resolved to make the most of hischances. He called for help again, and a voice answered him petulantlyfrom the bank. 

'You silly toad!' said the pretty cousin. 'What do you want to frightenme like that for?' 'I'm drowndin'!' Paul answered. 

'Not you!' said the pretty cousin. She made a movement of disdain, andturned away; but Paul yelled at her with a fear so vivid that she turnedagain with a white face, and fell upon her knees. 'Oh, Paul, ' she cried, 'are ee really drownin'?'

'Yes, I am, ' said Paul doggedly. 'These blasted weeds is pullin' medown. Be quick! Tie that there lace thing to your parasawl, and shy itto me. Look slippy, or it'll be all up with me. Hold your end tight. Now, shy! Pull now! Gently--gently. '

He reached the bank, and gripped it with both hands. There was no needto say that he had had a fright. His wide eyes and the colour of hisface said that. 

'Can ee get out now?' she asked. 

'No, ' said Paul; 'I'm anchored. '

'I'll pull ee out, ' said she, rising to her feet; and Paul thrust onehand towards her. She took him by the wrist, stuck both heels in thecrisp turf, and pulled. Paul set an elbow on the brink, and strainedupwards with all his might Something sucked out of the stream-bed, andthe waters went muddy. 'You're coming!' cried May, and gave a haul whichwas meant to be victorious; but Paul still hung like a log. 

'There's about a ton of it, ' said Paul. 'It's tied like ropes. '

'Gimme t'other hand, ' returned young Devon. 'I'll pull ee out if I diesfor't. '

Paul surrendered the other hand, and she pulled. There was anothersuck at the bottom of the stream, and Paul came up by a foot. She wentbackwards for a new vantage-ground, and pulled again, and Paul came tobank, clothed from the waist downward in water-lily leaf and weed, andlay face downwards helpless on the turf at her feet. 

'Now, ' she said tartly, 'you're not goin' to faint, I hope!' Paul saidnothing. 'Like a girl, ' she added, with disdain. 

'Not me, ' answered Paul, with his nose in the turf. 'What have I got tofeint for?'

He asked the question with feeble scorn, and fainted. 

May Gold stooped to a basket which lay near her, and, taking from it apair of garden scissors, knelt beside Paul, and began to snip his bonds. He woke to find her thus engaged, and a virginal sweet sense of shamefilled him. Her fingers touched his skin at times, and he tingled with asoft fire. 

'Nobody'd think it from they grimy paws, ' said May Gold to herself; 'buthe've got a skin as fair as a maid's. '

Paul heard the words, and shuddered exquisitely as she laid her softwarm hand on his shoulder, leaning over him, and slicing away at thewithes in a business-like fashion. 

'I'll finish that, ' he said tremulously. 

'La, ' she cried, 'the child's awake all the time! There's the scissors;I'll go and wait in the lane. '

Paul lay still for a moment listening to the rustle of her dress; andwhen it had gone out of hearing he rolled over, and with a shaking handbegan to free himself of the remnant of his bonds. He had not, so far, had time to think of the imminent peril from which he had escaped. Hehad been near death. Death! What a grip at the heartstrings! He hadhad his second of terror in the fact, but the fact was nothing like thelooking back on it There was no urgent fear now to compel him to therestraint of cowardice, and at this instant he was coward from scalp tosole--from heart to skin coward. The peril escaped was a thousand timesmore horrible than the peril endured, and he quailed now that the dangerwas over. 

All his thoughts and half his feelings had hurried for weeks pasttowards prayer. In his extremity he had not prayed or thought ofpraying. A cool, self-centred, self-preserving something in his mind hadtaught him to command all his own forces for one purpose. Would he havebeen damned if he had lost the power to pray before that cunning mentorof the flesh deserted him?

He dressed lingeringly and feebly, and when he had done so he went backto the tangle of water-weeds he had left on the river-bank. There werea dozen of the lovely waxlike blooms amongst them, uninjured. He snippedthem away with the scissors, and, climbing the stile with heavy feet, surrendered them to May. 

'Oh, ' she said shrilly, 'take 'em away! I couldn't bear to look at 'em!'

'Take 'em, ' said Paul. 'They jolly nigh cost me my life. '

Before he answered (or before she caught the meaning of his answer) shehad flung them into the roadway; but at the instant when she understoodhim she made a dart at them, gathered them all together in her hands, and sped to the brookside. There she lay at length upon the turf, andwashed the blooms in the flowing water. Then she gathered long toughgrasses, and looped them together until she had made a cord, with whichshe bound the waxen posy. Paul followed and sat near, languidly proppedon one hand to watch her. 

'Paul Armstrong, ' said May, and he knew at once by this manner ofaddress that she was going to be severe with him, 'I'd no idea you wasso wicked. '

'Oh, ' Paul answered defensively, 'I ain't wicked--not over and above. '

'You're a very wicked boy indeed, ' she said. 'You was in danger of yourlife--there's no mistake about that, though at first I didn't believeyou. '

'There's nothing wicked in that, ' said Paul

'Ah 1' she cried, her little white teeth gripping one end of the grassycord whilst she wound the other about the stems of the water-lilies, 'I can see you know what I mean. Using bad language in the very face ofdeath and danger! I wonder you wasn't drowned for a judgment. '

'Oh, come, ' Paul answered. 'I didn't use bad language. '

'Oh, yes, you did, though, ' she retorted. 'And I'm not going to befriends with a boy as talks like that. '

'Not friends!' said Paul. 'Why, May?' He spoke in an accent ofincredulous reproach. 

'No, ' she said. 'I'm properly shocked, I tell ee. I'm never going to befriends again. '

'If I thought that was goin' to be true, ' said Paul, 'do you know whatI'd do?'

'No, I don't, ' she answered, 'and I don't want to. '

'I'd hull myself into that brook this minute and never come out again. '

'You'd do what? she asked. 

To 'hull' is to hurl in the dialect Paul spoke in youth. The word wasstrange to her. 

'I'd throw myself into that brook this minute, and never come outagain. '

'Oh, you wicked boy!' she cried, but her eyes sparkled with triumph. Shequenched the sparkle. 'It _is_ true; and after that piece of wickedness, it's truer than ever. '

Paul rose to his feet; his face was white, and his eyes stared as theyhad done when she had just rescued him. 

'Good-bye, May, ' he said. 

'Good-bye, ' she answered coolly. 

'You're never goin' to be friends any more, May?'

'No, ' she said, but rose to her feet with a shriek, for Paul had takentwo swift paces, and had plunged back into the brook, clothes and all. 'Paul!' she shrilled after him. 'Paul! Don't ee drown. Don't ee now. Don't, don't, don't, don't, don't ee!'

Paul stood shoulder-deep in the stream, and she besought him from thebank with clasped hands and frightened eyes. 

'Goin' to be friends, ' said Paul grimly. 

'Yes, yes, yes!' she cried. 'Come out, do, there's a dear!'

Paul reached the bank in a stroke, and climbed back into the meadow. The instant he gained his feet she rushed at him and boxed his earsfuriously. Paul laughed with pleasure. He had had his head punched byevery fighting peer within a mile of home, and the soft little handsfell like a sort of fairy snowflakes. 

'Oh, you wicked, wicked, wicked boy!' she raged, stamping her foot athim. 'You can go in again as soon as ee want to. _I_ won't be so fullishas to call ee out. '

'D'ye mean it?' asked Paul, suddenly grim again. 

'No, ' she said, fawning on him with her hands, but doing it at adistance for fear of his wet clothes. 'But, Paul, child, you'll catchyour death. Run home. '

'I'm not a child, ' said Paul. 'I'm within two years as old as you are, May. I say, May------'

'Oh, do run home!' she coaxed him. 'Do ee, now, Paul, for my sake. '

'I'm off, ' said Paul. 'Ask me anything like that, and I'll walk intofire _or_ water. '

'Why, Paul, ' said the little Vanity, turning her face down, and lookingup at him past her beautiful lashes and arched brows, 'whatever makesyou talk like that?'

'Because it's the simple truth, ' said Paul 'You try me, May. '

'But why is it the simple truth?' she asked. 

'Because----' said Paul fiercely, and then stopped dead. 

'Oh, that's no answer, ' she said, with a little sway of her hips. Shekept her eye upon him, but turned her head slightly aside. She mighthave practised glance and posture all her life and made them no moretelling. But Paul's teeth were beginning to chatter, and she wasalarmed. 'Don't stop to tell me now, ' she said, and seeing that he wasabout to protest, she added swiftly: 'Come and tell me to-night, Paul, won't ee, now? And run home now, Paul, do, there's a dear. Run, and thenyou won't catch cold--to please me, Paul. '

So Paul ran, and ran himself into a glow, and felt as if the fire ofcomfort in his heart would have warmed the Polar regions. Until time andexperience taught him better, he always wanted a big word for even theleast of themes. 

'Man, ' said old Armstrong once (but that was years later), 'ye'd borrowthe lungs of Gargantua to sing the epic of a house-fly. '

'Yes, dad, ' said Paul; 'that's a capital imitation of my style, ' andthey both chuckled affectionately. 

But now his mind was a mere firework of interjections--squibs, bombs, and rockets of 'Oh!' and 'Ah!' and 'Now!' and 'She'll listen! and'She'll despise me!' He was within a month of sixteen, and he was inreceipt of sixpence a week as pocket-money, but the second fact was tobe no more durable than the first. He could neither stay at sixteen norat the sixpence. Time would take care of the one event, and Paul of theother. An immediate marriage, perhaps even an early marriage, was out ofquestion. It might be necessary to wait for years. There was a fortuneto be made, of course, and though it might come by some rare chanceto-morrow, it might, on the other hand, take time. 

'We've got to be practical, ' said Paul. 

Whether Paul were a greater ass than most imaginative boys of his yearsmay be a question, but he was as serious about this matter as if he hadbeen eight-and-twenty, and when he reached home he had been rejected andhad died of it, and accepted and married many times over. He got intohis working clothes after a thorough rub down, and, except for a touchof languor, was none the worse for his morning's adventure. Armstrongwas out on business for the day, and in the drowsy afternoon Paul laidan old press blanket on the office floor, took a ream of printing-paperfor a pillow, and slept like a top. This made an end of languor, andwhen the hour of freedom struck, he ran down the weedy garden and racedupstairs to his attic-chamber, and there attired himself in his best. These were days when the cheapest of cheap dandies wore paper cuffsand collars, then newly discovered, and Paul made himself trim in thisinexpensive fashion. He had spent half an hour at his ablutions beforeleaving the office, and walked towards his rendezvous all neat andshining. 

May met him at the door with a finger on her lips and a pretty air ofmystery. 

'I've had to fib about ee. Uncle Dan saw you run past all wet thismorning, and he asked. I had to tell him something. I said you fell intrying to reach them watter-lilies. I didn't want your own uncle to knowyour wickedness. '

There was not time for more, for Uncle Dan himself appeared at thismoment. 

'None the worse for your duckin', eh, Paul?'

'Not a bit. '

'We're goin' to have a bit of music, lad. Come in and sit down, ifyou've a mind to it. '

Paul half welcomed and half resented the putting off of the decisivemoment He was in a dreadful nervous flutter, his hopes alternatelyflying like a flag in a high wind, and drooping in a sick abandonment ofeverything. And May was more ravishing than ever. She had stuck thestem of a rose in one little ear like a pen, and the full flower itselfnestled drooping at her cheek. There was never anything in the worldmore demure than her face and her manner, but the frolic eye betrayedher mood now and then, and Paul was half beside himself at every furtivesmile she shot at him. A local tenor, the pride of the church choir, wasthere, and May and he sang duets together, amongst them 'Come where mylove lies dreaming. ' Paul's heart obeyed the call with a virgin coyness, and his thoughts stole into some dim-seen shadowed sanctuary, some placeof silence where the feet fell soft, and a pale curtain gleamed, andwhere behind the curtain lay something so sacred that he dared not drawthe veil, even in fancy. 'Her beauty beaming, ' sang the local tenor. 'Her beauty beaming, ' May's voice carolled. Heaven, how it beamed! Theboy's emotion choked him. If shame had not lent him self-control, hewould have broken into tears before them all. 

The musical hour wore away, and the local tenor had a supper engagement, and must go. May slid from the room, and soon after her voice was heardcalling 'Paul. '

Paul answered. 

'Come here a minute, ' she said. 'I want to speak to ee. '

Paul stumbled out, blind and stupid. She was standing at the open doorwith some gauzy white stuff loosely folded over her hair and drawn overher bosom. The July moon was at the full, and low in the heavens. 

'Look at that, ' she said, and Paul looked. 

The four poplars clove the intense dark blue, but not so loftily asin his first remembrance of them. The street was quiet Not a sounddisturbed the humming spicy silence of the summer night Paul turned fromthat sweet intoxication to her face. She smiled at him, and his heartseemed to swoon. He did not know till later, but she suffered from somevery slight tenderness of the eyes which made them shrink from too muchlight, and he had never seen her in her full beauty until this moment, when they seemed so large and deep that he could scarcely bear to lookat them. She had a hat in her hand, and she held it out to him, stillsmiling, but so dreamily, so unlike herself, that he could but look andtremble and wonder. He took the hat mechanically, and saw that it washis own. He thought himself dismissed, and his heart changed from a softethereal fire to cold lead. 

'Auntie!' she called--'Aunt Deb 'Me and Paul's goin' to take a bit of awalk. I've got to give him a lecture. '

Some affectionate assenting answer came, and May floated into themoonlight, across the street, and into a shady alley which lay betweentwo high-hedged gardens; then into moonlight again, across another road, through a clinking turnstile, and into a broad field, where Paul hadplayed many a game of cricket before and after working hours. Fromhere the open country gleamed, mystic and strange; every hill and dalefamiliar, and all unlike themselves, as a friend's ghost might be unlikethe living friend. 

Her first words jarred his dream to pieces. 

'You're a funny boy, Paul. After all that fullishness of yours thismorning I met your brother Dick. He gave me something. I've got it herethis minute. I want to know if it belongs to you--really. Dick says it'sall your very own, but I don't more'n half believe him. I say you musthave copied it out of some book. Now, di'n't ee?'

'I don't know, ' said Paul huskily. 'What is it?'

'It's a piece of poetry, ' she said. 'Can you make poetry?'

'I try sometimes, ' said Paul. 

It cost an effort to answer. He wanted her to know, and he shrank fromher knowing. 

'Did you make this?'

'What?'

'I'll tell it. '

She spoke the lines prettily, and put away her rustic accent, all butthe music:

 '"Down in the West dwells my lady Clare: Blow, O balmy wind, from the West! Bathe me in odours of her hair, Bring me her thoughts ere she fell to rest!

 '"Beam, O moon, through her casement bars; Bathe in thy glory her glorious hair: Keep guard over her, sentinel stars; Watch her and keep her, all things fair!"'

'You didn't make that up out of your own head, did ee, Paul?

'Yes, ' said Paul. 

Here was his divinity reciting the lines with which she herself hadinspired him. 

'Now, couldn't ee make a piece of poetry about me?' she asked. 

Paul's heart gave one great thump at his breast and stopped. 

'That was about you, ' he said. 

'Why, you silly boy, ' she said, 'you've got the name wrong. But oh, Paul, ain't ee beginning very young? Askin' for maids' thoughts aforethey go to sleep! Mine, too! You'll be a regular gallows young reprobateafore you're much older. That I'm sure of. '

There was a trembling wish deep down in his heart that she had leftthis unsaid, but how could he be so disloyal as to let it float to thesurface? He drowned it deep, but it was there. She had misunderstood. She read him coarsely, not as the May of his dreams had read him. 

'Now, you write something about me, will ee, Paul?--something in myown name. Will ee?' Paul made no answer for the moment, for the requestfairly carried him off his balance. 'Will ee, now?' she asked, bringingher face in front of his. 

'Yes, yes, yes, ' he half sighed, half panted. 

'Here's a stile, ' she said, springing forward with a happy gurgle of alaugh. The laugh to Paul's ear was as musical as the sad chuckle ofthe nightingale, and as far from sorrow as its one rival is from mirth. There was _camaraderie_ in it, sympathy, a touch even of somethingconfidential. 'Now, well sit down here together, and you shall make itup. '

She perched on the stile as light as a perching bird, and drew her lithefigure on one side to make room for Paul. The stile was narrow, andthere was barely room for two. Paul hesitated shyly, but she patted theseat in a pretty assumption of impatience, and he obeyed. 

'Paul, ' she said, sliding an arm behind him, and taking hold of theside-post. 'What was it ee wanted to tell this morning?'

'This morning?' said Paul stupidly. It is one thing to resolve to becourageous in battle. It may be another thing when the fight begins. 

'Now, I'm sure you haven't forgot already, ' she said. 'Here! You catchhold of the post on my side. Then we shall be comfortable. ' She swayedforward to make easier for him the movement she advised, and her wholefigure from ankle to shoulder touched him lightly. He obeyed, and sheswung back again, nestling into the curve of his arm. 'That's nice, isn't it? Now, what was ee going to tell?' Paul had not a word to sayfor himself. If he had ever had the audacity to picture anything in hisown mind like this present truth, he would have thought it certain tobe deliriously happy; but as a matter of fact he was miserable, and felthimself at the clumsiest disadvantage. 'You said, ' she murmured, halfreproachfully, you'd go through fire _or_ water for me, Paul. '

'So I would, ' said Paul. 

'Why? she asked, nestling a little nearer. 'Why, Paul?'

'I would, ' said he, rather sulkily than otherwise. 

'Why?' She swayed forward again, and looked into his face. Her breathfanned his cheek. Her eyes were wide open and looked into his almostmournfully. 'Why?' Her glance hypnotized him. 'Why?'

'I love you, ' he said, in a whisper. 

'Do ee? she cooed. 'Oh, you silly Paul! What for?'

'I don't know, ' he said. 'There never was anybody as lovely as you are. '

The words seemed to slide from him, apart from his will. 

'Oh, you silly Paul Am I lovely?'

'Lovely? sighed Paul, and tangled his eyes in hers more and more. 

'You'll make up that piece of poetry about me, won't ee, Paul?'

'Yes. '

The word was just audible, a breath, no more. 

'You dear!' she said; and, leaning nearer and yet nearer to him, shelaid her lips on his. They rested there for one thrilling instant, andthen she drew back an inch or two only. 'Make it up about that, ' shesaid, looking point blank into his eyes. Paul drooped his head and thelips met again, and fastened. A delicate fire burned him, and he curledhis arm about her waist, and drew her to him. She yielded for oneinstant, and then slipped away with a panting laugh. 'Oh, Paul?' shesaid; 'you really are too dreadful for anything! Fancy! A mere childlike you. I should like to know what Mr. Filmer'd say if ever he knewI'd let ee do that. '

By one of those curious intuitions to which the mind is open at timesof profound excitement, Paul knew what her answer would be, but heasked the question. At first his voice made no sound; but he cleared histhroat and spoke dryly, and in a tone of commonplace:

'Who is Mr. Filmer?'

'Mr. Filmer's the gentleman I'm going to be married to, ' said May. 'He's a very jealous temper, and I shouldn't like him to know I'd beenflirting, even with a child like you. '

It was all over. 

CHAPTER IV

Paul survived. He left the church, and returned with a doubtfulallegiance to Ebenezer. He joined the singing-class there, for his voicehad suddenly grown harsh and deep, and he conceived himself to be abasso. The parish swarmed with vocal celebrities, and he would be one ofthem. He made his first visit to the class, and got there early. 

Came in two young ladies in hoops, with pork-pie hats and hair done upin bags of chenille. The like figures may be seen in the drawings ofJohn Leech, _circa_ 1860. Each young lady had a curved nose. One nosecurved inward at the bridge, and the other outward at the bridge, and ifthe curves had been set together they would have fitted with precision. Came in a lean lady with a purse mouth, rather open--looking like anempty voluntary-bag. Came in a stout lady, like a full voluntary-bag, the mouth close shut with a clasp. Came in a gentleman with shiningrabbit teeth, smiling as if for a wager. Came in a gentleman with a deepbass voice consciously indicated in the carriage of his head--the voicegarrotting him, as it were, rather high up in the collar. Came in agentleman with heavy movable eyebrows, which looked too big for thelimited playground a very small forehead afforded. Came in a smallapoplectic man, bald and clean-shaven, and red and angry in the face, like an ill-conditioned baby. Came in ladies and gentlemen who smirkedand slid; ladies and gentlemen who loitered, and were sheepish when byhazard they caught an eye; ladies and gentlemen crammed to suffocationwith a sense of their own importance; ladies and gentlemen miserablyoverwhelmed with a sense of the importance of other people. 

Paul knew every one of them, and had known them from childhood; andsomehow they were all transformed from commonplace, and dignified intoa comedy which was at once sympathetic and exquisitely droll. Hisnarrow world had widened; his neighbours had sprung alive. His heart wastickled with a genial laughter, and his mirth tasted sweet to him, likea mellow apple. He could have hugged the crowd for sheer delight. 

The conductor of the singing-class weeded Paul out at the close of thefirst glee, and brought his musical ambitions to an end. 

'Theer are at least twelve notes in an ordinary singin' voice, ' said theconductor, 'and theer ought to be eight half-tones scattered in among'em, somewheer. You've got two notes at present, and one's a squeakand t'other's a grumble. I think you might find a more advantageousempl'yment for your time elsewheer. '

Paul submitted to this verdict with high good-humour. He retired to thefar end of the schoolroom, and sat out 'the practice' with a growingsense of pleasure. He exulted in the possession of a new sense whichmade all these people lovable. 

'Now I've found this out, ' said Paul to himself, 'I shall never belonely any more. There'll always be summat to think about--summat with arelish in it. '

He must needs, of course, try to get the relish on paper, and he wrote agreat deal of boyish stuff in flagrant imitation of Dickens, and hidit, jackdaw-like, in such places as he could find. In the slattern oldoffice where Paul was learning more or less to be a workman at his tradethere was no such thing as a ceiling. Frayed mortar, with matted scrapsof cow-hair in it, used to fall frequently into the type-caseswhenever a high wind shook the crazy slates, and, to obviate this, somecontriving person had nailed a number of sheets of brown paper to therafters. Paul's hiding-place for his literary work was above thesesheets of paper, and one day when old Armstrong stood by his side, atintack gave way beneath the superincumbent weight, and the whole bundleof scraps in verse and prose fell at the author's feet Armstrong stoopedfor it, and Paul went red and white, and his legs shook beneath him. There was an upturned box by the side of the cracked and blistered oldstove which warmed the room in winter, and Armstrong went to it and satdown to untie his bundle. The author had never had any confidences withanybody, and his father was one of the last people in the world to whomhe would have dared to make appeal for advice or help. In his agitationhe went on pecking at the case of type before him, and setting thestamps on end at random, inside out and upside down, and in anyprogression chance might order. The old man coughed, and Paul droppedhis composing-stick into the space-box with a clatter, and spilt itscontents there. Armstrong slipped the string which bound the roll ofpapers, and began to glance over his discovery. Paul felt as if theramshackle building had been out at sea. 

'M'm, ' said Armstrong, with the merest dry tick of a tone which seemedto express inquiry and surprise. Paul started as if an arrow had gonethrough him, and dropped his composing-stick a second time. 'Ye're veryclumsy, there, my lad, ' said the old man. 'What's happening?'

Paul made no answer, and the father went back to his papers. 

'"Bilsby, "' the old man hummed, half aloud, '"Bilsby is fat--fat withthe comfortable fatness which has grown about him in the course offive-and-forty years of perfect self-approval. Bilsby is not great, or good, or magnanimous, or wise, or wealthy, or of long descent, orhandsome, or admired; but he is happy. He gets up with Bilsby in themorning, has breakfast, dinner, tea and supper with him, and goes to bedwith him at night. If Bilsby had a choice--and Bilsby hasn't--he wouldmake no change. He has himself to feed on--an immortal feast He sits atthat eternal board, before that unfailing dish, which grows the morehe ruminates upon it. Fat of the fat, sweet of the sweet is Bilsby toBilsby's palate. What will become of Bilsby when he dies? There can beno heaven for Bilsby, for he would have to hymn another glory there;There can be no fate of pain, for even if the Devil take him, there willstill be Bilsby, and that fact alone would keep him happy. "

'What's all this rampant wickedness, y' irreverent dog?' askedArmstrong. 'This is your writing, isn't it?'

'Yes, sir, ' said Paul, feeling his throat harsh and constricted like aquill. 

Armstrong said no more, but rolling up the bundle and sliding theknotted string once more about it, put it in his pocket and walkeddownstairs. Paul hardly dared to meet him at the mid-day dinner, but heput the best face he could upon the matter--a very pale and disturbedface it was--and presented himself at table. Nothing was said. The grayman sat with his book propped up against the bread-basket, as usual, and ate without knowing what passed his lips. The meal over, he took hisarm-chair by the kitchen fire, and lit his pipe, and read with the catperched on his shoulder. Mrs. Armstrong went to mind the shop, the restof the family dispersed to their various avocations, and Paul sat still, listening to the ticking of the clock, and awaiting the stroke of twoto take him back to work. He felt as if it would be cowardice to goearlier, but he was unhappy, and would willingly have been elsewhere. 

Suddenly Armstrong reached out his hand towards the table and set downhis book. Then from the coat-pocket where Paul had plainly seen itbulging he drew the roll of manuscript. 

'Paul, ' said the old man, 'I've been readin' this farrago, and the lessthat's said about it the better. I obsairve that the main part of it'sdevoted to the exaggerated satire of your neighbours. That's a spiritI'm sorry to notice in ye, and I regret to see that ye're alreadylooking sulky at rebuke. The vairse, ' pursued Armstrong, 'is mainlysickly, whining, puling stuff, as far away from Nature and experience asit's easily possible to be. Now, I invite ye. Listen to this. '

He began to read with a fine disdain:

 '"Come not when I am dead To drop thy foolish tears upon my grave. "'

Paul averted his head, and set one hand before his face. Months ago, when May Gold's perfidy was a new thing, and the whole world wasdarkened, he had copied these lines from the Poet Laureate with tears, and they had seemed to him a perfect expression of himself. The old manground out the lines with increasing scorn, and Paul began to grin, andthen to shake with suppressed laughter. Armstrong went on to the endunyieldingly. 

'I'm not denying, ' he said, a moment later, 'that I've found here andthere a salt sprinkle o' common-sense. But _that_, my lad, ' banginga hand on the manuscript page before him, 'is simply unadulteratedrubbish. It's the silliest thing in the haul collection. '

Paul's reverence for his father's judgment in such matters was atradition and a religion. 'Old Armstrong' was the parish pride asscholar and critic. The Rev. Roderic Murchison, who was a Master of Artsof Aberdeen, sat at the gray little man's feet like a pupil. Armstronghad none of the minister's Greek and Latin, but he was his master inEnglish letters. In spite of this awful prescription of authority Paulspirted laughter. 

'It's Tennyson!' he spluttered. 'It's the Poet Laureate!'

'Then, ' said Armstrong, 'the Poet Laureate's a drivelling idiot, likehis predecessor. '

'What?' Paul asked, underneath his breath. He had never listened to suchblasphemy. 

'In my day, ' said Armstrong, 'a poet laid a table for men to eat anddrink at. We'd Sir Walter's beef and bannocks, and puir young Byron'sAthol brose. Wha calls this mingling o' skim milk an' treacle the wineo' the soul a poet ought to pour?

'Scott and Byron!' cried Paul, amazed out of all reverence. 'Why, there's more poetry in Tennyson's little finger than in both theirbodies. '

'Hoots, man! hauld your silly tongue, ' cried his father. 

'Have you read "In Memoriam"?' cried Paul. 

'No, ' returned Armstrong curtly, 'I have not. '

'Then, ' Paul stormed, 'what's your opinion good for?'

The old man's eyes flashed, and he made a motion as if to rise. Hecontrolled himself, however, and reached out a hand to the hob for theclay he had relinquished a minute or two before. 

'The question's fair, ' he said; 'the question's fair--pairfectly fair, Paul. I misliked the manner of it, but the question's fair. '

'I beg your pardon, sir, ' said Paul. 

He could have knelt to him. 

'They'll be having Tennyson at the Institute Library?' the old manasked. 'I'll walk over for him. '

'I beg your pardon, sir, ' said Paul, 'but Tennyson----'

'Ay, ay!' said Armstrong, 'age fossilizes. It's like enough the man hasa word to say. I'll look at him. '

He took his rusty old silk hat from its hook beside the eight-day clock, and went out quietly. 

For the first minute in his life Paul truly loved him. 

'It would ha'served me right, ' he mourned, 'if he'd ha' knocked me down. It's a lot better as it is, though; but it's hard to bear. '

That afternoon, and for many a morning and afternoon for months, oldArmstrong shuffled swiftly along the weedy garden, and took his seat onthe upturned box beside the stove, and there studied his Tennyson andsmoked his pipe. These were halcyon days for Paul, for the old man wasnot long obdurate, and began to halve the delight of his own reading. 

'Ay, ay!' he said, by way of making his first admission, '"in MyFather's house are many mansions. " This chap has the key to theorgan-loft' Then, a little later: 'It's clean thinking, and a bonnymusic' Later still, with a long, slow sigh on the word: 'Eh!' and then, unconsciously: 'Deep waters, lad, deep waters. '

He read slowly, for the dialect was new, and he was bent on masteringit. His occasional difficulties seemed strange to the boy, but then, Paul had been suckled at this fountain, and could make no allowances forthe prepossessions of age, and the distaste of an old palate for a newflavour. An occasional question startled him, the answer was so obviousand simple. 

 '"Or where the kneeling hamlet drains The chalice of the grapes of God, "'

Armstrong read out 'D'ye find the meaning of that, Paul, lad, ' he asked. 

'Village church, ' said Paul 'Holy Communion. '

'To be sure, ' said the old man, 'to be sure. It's tight packed, but it'ssimple as A B C. '

There were questions Paul could not answer, and he and the old manpuzzled them out together. They drew closer and closer. The boy daredto reveal his mind, and the father began to respect his opinion. Bythe time the warm weather was round again they were fast friends. Theytramped up and down the path of the neglected garden arm-in-arm, andtalked of literature and politics and the world at large. Paul haddreams, and sometimes he gave his father a glimpse of them. Armstrongpreached humility. 

'L'arn, my lad, ' he would say, almost sternly, 'l'arn before ye try toteach. '

Paul had turned public instructor already, but that was his secret Therewas a sort of treason in it, for Armstrong's rival, a young and pushingtradesman, had started a weekly paper, and Paul was an anonymouscontributor to its pages. This journal was called the _BarfieldAdvertiser, and Quarry-moor, Church Vale, and Heydon Hay Gazette_; butit was satirically known in the Armstrong household as the _Crusher_, and its leading articles (which were certainly rather turgid andpompous) were food for weekly mirth. But one day this was changed. 

'Why, William, ' cried Mrs. Armstrong, 'this fellow's turned quitesensible. You might ha' wrote this yourself. It's simply nayther morenor less than you was sayin' last Wednesday at this very table. '

Paul's coffee went the wrong way, and his cough caused a momentarydiversion. But when Dick had vigorously thumped him on the back, and hehad resumed his seat at table, Armstrong read the article aloud. 

'Ay, ay!' he said at the close, 'it's certainly my own opinion, and varycleanly put. '

Paul's coffee went the wrong way again, and again Dick thumped himon the back. When the paper had gone the round of the household theanonymous writer stole it, and carried it, neatly folded beneath hiswaistcoat, to the office. He knew it by heart already, but he read itinsatiably over and over again. He was in print, and to be in print forthe first time is to experience as fine a delirium as is to be found inlove or liquor. The typed column ravished his senses, and the editorial'we' looked imperial. He was 'we' in spite of shirt-sleeves andink-smeared apron of herden. In those days the _Times_ could uproot aMinistry, but its editor in his proudest hour would have been a dwarf ifhe had measured himself by Paul's self-appreciation. Sweet are the usesof a boy's vanity, sweeter than honey and the honeycomb. 

The dreamer in his mountain eyrie felt his heart warm with a sort offatherly pity over these bumpkin raptures. The lad blows a bubble offoolery, and it glitters and floats and bursts, and who is the worsefor it? The man carves folly in brass, and breaks his head on his ownmonument; or forges it in steel, and stabs his own heart with it. Thevanities of youth are yeast in wholesome ale. The follies of later lifeare mildew in the cask. The lad who never tasted Paul's intoxication maymake a worthy citizen, but he will never set the Thames afire. 

Paul went on writing, and thundered from the editorial pulpit weekly. Hegave the _Crusher_ a policy. Castle Barfield was to be a borough at thenext redistribution of seats. Its watchwords were 'Peace, Retrenchment, and Reform. ' It was to uphold the traditions of Manchester in a curiousblend with the philosophy, or the want of it, of Thomas Carlyle. Itassailed the Vicar of All Saints' for the introduction of a surplicedchoir, and it showed a bared arm and a clenched fist to Popery. 

The Jovian wielder of the _Crusher's_ lightnings got used to beingdiscussed at the Saturday morning table, and encountered praise andblame there with an equal countenance. In his own unplummeted depths hewas Scott before the discovery of the authorship of the Waverley series;he was Junius; he was S. G. O. And not a soul ever guessed at the truth, for just as Paul had resolved to reveal his identity and claim his famethe _Crusher_ died. 

Then for a long time he was voiceless, and, having no paper balloonto float him, he went about in his own thoughts, quite like a commonperson. A year later, routing out the whole series of printed articlesfrom one of his jackdaw hiding-places, he was inspired by an intensedisdain, and burned them in the office stove. 

All the time the world he lived in was the world he took least heedof. Until Ralston crossed him--Ralston, his man of men, and king, anddeity--the only real creature was the gray old man who had begottenhim. Father and son had grown to a curious sympathy, in which age neverdomineered because of age, or youth presumed because of youth. Armstrongthe elder was a poet, though he had never printed a line; and he andPaul brought their verses to each other. They used to print at times theproductions of the local bard, and their first bond of genial and equallaughter (which is one of the best bonds in life) came of their jointreading of one of his effusions. Paul had given it the dignity of type. Armstrong was his own proof-reader, and Paul read the MS. Aloud, whilsthis father, with balanced pen, ticked off the lines. They were headed'Lines on a Walk I once took in the Country, ' and they opened thus:

'It was upon a day in May When through the field I took my way, It wasdelightful for to see The sheep and lambs--they did agree. 

'And as I went forth on that day I met a stile within my way, That stilewhich did give rest to me Again I may not no more see. 

'As on my way I then did trod, The lark did roar his song to God. '

There they laughed, with tears, for this was not a jest of anybody'spurposed making, but a pinch from Nature's pepper-castor, and it tickledthe lungs to madness. 

'Paul, lad, ' said Armstrong, coming to a sudden serious end oflaughter, and wiping his eyes, 'it's not an ungentle heart that finds itdelightful to see the fleecy, silly people o' the fields in harmony. Andthe reflection on the stile's a fine bit o' pathetics. "I've been happythere, " says the poor ignorance; "and I may never see it more. " It'sthe etairnal hauntin' thoct o' man in all ages. "We've no abiding cityhere. " "The grass withereth, the flower fadeth. " "Never, never more, "says poor Poe's raven. Listen, m'n! Ye'll hear Shakespeare's immortalthunder. The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces dissolve with thegreat globe itself and all that it inherits. It's all there, Paul. It'sin the hiccoughing throat of him. Puir felly! Well just put him intodecent English, and see that naebody else shall laugh at him. '

So they trimmed the local bard, and made him sober, and even mildlysweet; and when, with their joint amendments, they sent the poem home, the bard refused to be edited, declined the parcel, and took his tradeelsewhere. 

But the tinkering of the poor verses brought Paul and his father finallytogether, and from that hour onward they were friends. 

CHAPTER V

And now the mind of the Exile turned to the episode of NorahMacMulty--grotesque, pitiable, laughable. 

Paul had pssed his seventeenth birthday, and reckoned himself a man. He was in love again, but tentatively. He had read 'Don Juan, ' and hadlearned a thing or two. He conceived that he had rubbed off the firstsoft bloom of youth, and the idea, natural to his time of life, that hewas aged and experienced had taken full hold of him. 

He was not wholly certain that he adored the pretty girl at thebonnet-shop. He had never spoken to her, for one thing, and had onlyseen her from a distance, but she did well enough to moon about, andmade an excellent peg to hang verses on. 

He had been away on a lovely summer evening's ramble into the quiet ofthe country. He had been verse-making or verse-polishing, and was in ahigh state of mental exaltation when he reached the darkened main streetof the town about ten o'clock. He turned the corner, and walked straightinto the arms of a woman, who hugged him with a drunken ardour. Herbreath was fiery with gin, and the coarsely-sweet scent of it filled himwith an impulse of loathing. 

'Let go, ' said Paul

'Deed I'll not let go, ' the woman answered, in a drunken voice. 'Ye'rejust sent here be Providence to see a poor lonely little craychurehome. '

'Let go, ' said Paul again; but she clung and laughed, and, in a suddenspasm of downright horror, he put out more strength than he guessed, and wrenched himself free. The woman tottered backwards, swayed for aninstant, and then fell. The back of her head came into sharp contactwith the corner of the wall. She lay quite still, and Paul grewfrightened. 'Here, ' he said, 'take my hand. Let me help you up. ' He hadnot expected her to answer, but her continued silence seemed dreadful. He kneeled to look closely into her face. She was quite young--not morethan two or three and twenty at the outside--and she had a quantity oflight auburn hair, which, though untidy, had a soft beauty of its own. Her eyes were closed, and her face was white. 'Now, don't lie therepretending to be killed, ' said Paul, in an unsteady voice. She made nomovement, and he rose and looked about him in dismay. 

There was not a creature in the street, and the public lamps were neverlighted in the summer-time. A long way off the windows of a gin-shopcast a light upon the road, and nearer, on the opposite side, a redlamp burned. With a lingering glance of fear and pity at the recumbentfigure, Paul sped towards the red lamp as fast as he could lift a leg. In his agitation he gave such a tug at the bell that it clanged like afire-alarm. The doctor's assistant, a dashing young gentleman whom Paulknew from afar, and who was remarkable to him chiefly for an expensivetaste in clothing, came briskly to the door. 

'There's a woman at the corner, ' said Paul, 'badly hurt; I thought itbest to let you know. '

The assistant snatched a hat from the hall table, and came out at once. 

'Where is she?'

Paul pointed, and they ran together. The assistant had the quicker turnof speed, and reached the corner first. He was kneeling beside the womanwhen Paul reached him. 

'Got a handkerchief?' he asked

Paul lugged half a square yard of turkey-red cotton from his pocket. 'That's the ticket, ' said the assistant. He folded the handkerchief. . 'Now, hold her head up whilst I get this under it. '

Paul obeyed again, but the hair was all in a warm wet mesh of blood. 

'What are you shaking at?' the assistant asked him. 'You're a prettypoor plucked un, ' he added, as he tied the bandage tight across thewoman's forehead. 

'I'm not used to it, ' said Paul, choking with nausea and pity. 

'That's pretty evident, ' returned the other. 'Now, get her shawl roundher head whilst I hold her up. That'll do. We must get her down to thesurgery. Take her by her shoulders; there. Get your arms well under her. Heave ho! Wait a minute till I settle her dress and get a good hold ofher knees. Upsy daisy; march!'

They went staggeringly, not because of the weight, but by reason of thegiddiness which assailed Paul. He thought it had suddenly grown foggy, for there was a mist between him and all the dimly visible objects ofthe night There were coloured sparks in the mist by-and-by, and whenonce they had got their burden through the open hall and had laid iton a plain straight couch in the surgery, Paul was glad to sit downuninvited. 

'Take a sniff at that, ' said the assistant, pressing an un-stopperedbottle into his hand. 

Paul obeyed him. The pungent ammonia brought the tears to his eyes andtook his breath away, but it dispersed the fog and stilled the wheelwhich had been whirling in his head The assistant had taken off hiscoat and rolled up his shirtsleeves, and was going about his task withprofessional dexterity and coolness. 

'How did this happen?' he asked. 

He was Paul's senior by three years at most, but he had as magisterialand assured a manner as if he had been fifty. 

Paul told the story just as it happened. 

'Well, ' said the assistant, 'this is a pretty grave old case, and so Itell you. You may find yourself in trouble over this. '

'Find myself in trouble?' said Paul. 'Me?'

'Yes, ' said the assistant; 'you. '

'You've got better work in hand than talkin' rubbish, ' Paul retorted;'stick to it. '

'Ah, ' said the budding surgeon, 'well wait till the woman's conscious, if ever she is, and see what sort of a tale she has to tell. '

'It's the simple truf he's tould ye, ' said the patient, in a feeblevoice. 'What do ye be tryin' to frighten him for?'

'Oh, you're coming round, are you? asked the assistant; 'didn't expectit. That's a pretty nasty crack you've got. '

'Twill take more than that to kill Norah MacMulty, ' said the youngwoman, struggling into a sitting posture, and beginning mechanically toarrange her disordered dress. 'The MacMultys is a fine fightin' famly, and it runs in the blood to take a cracked skull quite kindly. I'll betakin' a glass at the Grapes, and then I'll be goin' home, but not tillI've thanked ye kindly. Has anybody seen me bonnut?'

'I shan't allow you to go to the Grapes to-night, my good woman, ' saidthe assistant. 'Where do you live?'

She named her address, a wretched little row of tenement houses some tenscore yards away. 

'What's your trade?'

'Me trade, is it?' she answered, with a feeble, good-humoured laugh. 'Tis not much of a trade, anyhow; I'm a street-walker. '

She made the statement wholly commonplace in tone, and gave it with aslittle reluctance or embarrassment as if she had laid claim to the mostrespectable calling in the world. 

The assistant stared and laughed, but she caught Paul's look of amazedhorror. 

'Well, ' she said, 'why wouldn't I be? I'll go to hell for it, av coorse, for that's God's will on all of us. Tis hard lines, too, for 'tis noneso fine a life when ye've tried ut. Thank ye kindly, both of yez. I'dpay ye for ut, but ye'd not be takin' a poor girl's last shillin', Iknow, from the good-tempered purty face of ye. '

'You're sweetly welcome, ' said the assistant, busily washing his handsat the sink, and looking sideways at her. 'You're a queer fish, anyway. '

''Tis a queer fish I am, ' she answered, 'an' by-an'-by they'll havethe cookin' of me. Fried soul, ' she said, with a faint laugh. 'Begobs!that's funny; I never thought o'that before. Fried soul!'

'How old are you?' the assistant asked. 

'Faith, ' she said, 'I'm just past two-an'-twinty. 'Tis an agein' life, an' I look more; but 'tis God's truf I'm tellin' ye. '

'Very likely, ' said the assistant, towelling his hands. 

'I'll go now, ' said Norah MacMulty. 'I'm a trifle unsteady with theshakin', but the drink's out of me, worse luck! and I'll be able towalk. '

'No calling at the Grapes, mind you, ' said the assistant 'You'd betterlook in at the infirmary about eleven o'clock to-morrow. '

'I'll do that, ' she answered. 'Will ye be lendin' me your shoulder asfar as the dure, young man? I'll be better in a minute. '

Paul did as she requested, but he crawled with repulsion beneath herhand. The touch inspired him with loathing. He had lived a shelteredlife, and had never seen an open abandonment to shame. He wondered whyGod allowed the degraded thing to live, and his heart ached with pityat the same time. He led her to the door, and then across the road. Theassistant sent a curt 'Good-night' after him. He answered it, and thedoor dosed. 

'Can you walk alone now?' he asked. 

'I'll try, ' she said, and made a staggering attempt at it. 

Paul caught her, or she would have fallen. 

'Take my arm, ' he said to her, hardening his heart with an effort. 

He blessed the darkness and the quiet of the street, but before they hadgone a score of yards a door opened in a house he knew, and Armstrongcame out of it. 

In ninety-nine cases out of a hundred the old man would have gone bydreaming, but he was alert enough at odd moments, and this chanced to beone of them. He saw Paul arm-in-arm with a bandaged drunken woman, andas he recognised his son the pair reeled together. 

'Paul!' he cried. 'Good God!'

'I'm glad it's you, father, ' said Paul. 'This poor creature fell at thecorner yonder and cut her head terribly. I fetched young Marley to herfrom Dr. Hervey's, and he has seen to her. She wants to get home. '

'I'll take the other side, ' said Armstrong, and the three lurched slowlyalong in the dimness. 

'Ye're good people, ' Norah MacMulty said when they had brought her toher door. 

A slattern woman answered Armstrong's knock, heard the news with nodiscernible emotion, and helped the arrival in as if she had been asack of coals. Armstrong and Paul went home with few words. 'Don't bestartled when you see me, ' Paul said at the door. 'I helped to carry herto the doctor's, and she bled horribly. '

It was not meant for an exaggeration, but he was unused to such scenes, and the woman's language more than anything else had helped to scare himfrom his self-possession. The hour was late already, reckoning by hiscustom. He washed, and went upstairs, but not to bed. He threw thewindow open and let in the soft, heavy night-air. Strange thoughts madea jumble in his mind. From his attic he could see, over the roofs of thehouses opposite, the outlines of the Quarrymore Hills, clearly definedin the light of the rising moon. Half way between him and them the airwas dimly red with the glow of the unseen furnaces in the valley. Heheard the loud roar of the invisible fires, and now and then the clankof iron. His thoughts were not on these things, but he was vaguelyconscious of them. 

He had taken his earliest look at the real tragedy of life. The peril ofthe woman's soul was the first thing to emerge clearly from the chaos ofhis thoughts. Her flippant, reckless acceptance of the certainty ofher own damnation horrified him. Out of the streets, out of the bestialdegradation of that life of shame and drink, into sheer hell? No chance?No hope? Surely Christ had died! But only for those who owned Him, and called upon Him! No, no, and a thousand times no! It was not to bebelieved, not to be borne. It was hateful, horrible, monstrous. The poordegraded thing had punishment enough already. She was in hell already. 

The bruised reed, the smoking flax! He fell upon his knees, and his soulseemed to melt in a flood of anguished pity. He wept passionately, withan incoherent clamour in his heart of 'God--God--God!'

The storm wore itself out, but he knelt there long, with his hands onthe window-sill, and his face buried in them. He had been too agitatedto find words, and now he was too tired and empty even to wish for them. His eyes were dry, and his lips were harsh and salt with his tears. 

He looked up, and the whole night had changed. The moon rode high, and was nearly at the full. The skies were spangled with thousands onthousands of glittering stars. He thrust out his head and looked upwardinto the vast blue of the night Out from the stainless sky fell onewarm, heavy drop full on his upturned forehead. To his worn thoughts itwas like an angel's tear. He nestled beside the open window, and gazedfrom star to star, seeming idly to trace an intricate winding road ofblue amongst them. Peace came back to him, an empty peace, no more thana mental languor. He slept at last, and awoke stiff and chill to findthe light of morning creeping along a clouded east. 

All that day one purpose was present to his mind. When the day's workwas over and he was free, he dressed and walked into the street Heroamed up and down it from end to end, and several times he divergedfrom it to pace the road in which Norah MacMulty lived, and to lingerabout the house into which he had helped her. He had something to say toNorah MacMulty, but he caught no sight of her. He went home, and to bed. Next evening he paced the streets again. There was still no sign of her, but he encountered the assistant, who nodded to him in passing. Paulstopped him. 

'I beg your pardon, ' he said. 'Is there any news of that poor woman?'

'Yes, ' said the assistant. 'She's in for a touch of erysipelas. Theykept her at the Infirmary to-day. If they'd left her at large she'd havekilled herself. '

'How?' said Paul. 

'Drink, ' returned the assistant, and went his own way. 

So Paul ceased his wanderings for a while, and a fortnight had passedbefore he saw the woman again. 

It was a Sunday afternoon, and he was off for his customary lonelyramble. Armstrong always went upstairs for a nap after Sunday's dinner, and Paul was left without companionship. 

The woman was a mile away from her home, and was sitting on the lowersteps of a stile by the side of the highway. She was tidily attired, andsober. Her recent illness had left a pensive look upon her face. 

'You're better?' said Paul, stopping in front of her. 

She looked up in some surprise. 

'Oh, ' she answered. ''Tis you? I'm better, thank ye kindly. There's notmany cares to ask. '

'Do you remember, ' Paul demanded, with a face whiter than her own, 'whatyou said at the doctor's the night you were hurt?'

'No, ' she replied. 'What was it?'

'The doctor asked you what your trade was, ' said Paul. 

'Yes, ' she said; 'I mind it now. '

'Did you mean it?' Paul asked. 

'Ye're a trifle over-young to turn parson, ' she responded. 'Go yourways, child, and don't be bothering. '

'Don't ask me to go yet, ' said Paul 'I've something I want to say toyou. ' His voice stuck in his throat, and she turned her glance towardshim in a new surprise. 'You said, ' he went on with difficulty, 'that youwere sure to go to hell. '

'I'm that, ' she answered dryly, drawing her shawl about her shoulders. 

'Well, ' said Paul, 'you shan't. I'm not going to let you. ' She laughedoddly with a mere ejaculation, and stared along the road. 'Do you everthink what hell is like?' he asked. 

'Would I drink if I didn't?' she answered without looking at him. 

'You can't put it away by drinking. '

'I know that, ' she answered, with a sudden sullen fierceness. Then, 'Yemean well, I dare say, but ye're wastin' time. Go your ways. '

'It's no use asking, ' said Paul; 'I can't do it. ' She looked up at himagain, and he hurried on, with a dry husk in his throat: 'I can't restfor thinking of it I can't eat I can't sleep. I can't think of anythingelse. '

A slight spasm contorted her lips for a mere instant, but she lookeddown the road again, and answered drearily:

'That's a pity. '

There was a tone of tired scorn in her words, but this, as it were, wasonly on the surface. There was something else below, and the sense of iturged him on. 

'You have a good face, ' he said. 'You were not meant----'

He checked himself. 

'Me poor boy, ' she answered, with another motion to arrange her shawl, 'ye can't tell me anything I don't know. '

'I can tell you something you've forgotten, ' said Paul. 'I don't carewhat you've done; you're God's child, and while there's life there'shope. '

'Ye're not a man yet, ' said Norah MacMulty; 'but if ever ye mean to beone, hould your tongue an' go. '

'I don't mind hurting you if I can do you any good by it. ' 'Ye can do meno good, nor yourself neither. Here's people coming along the road, andit's ten to one they'll know ye. Ye've no right to be seen talkin' tothe likes of me at your age. '

'I don't care for the people, ' he answered. 'I don't care for anythingbut what I've got to say. '

'Well, ' she said, 'if you don't care, I'm sure I don't. 'Tis no odds tome what anybody thinks. '

The people who approached were strangers, two men and two women of theworking class. They passed the pair without notice, talking of their ownaffairs. 

'I'm only two days from the hospital, ' said the girl when they were outof hearing, 'and me legs gives way underneath me. If 'twas not for that, I'd not stay here. Go now; I'm tired of ye. '

'Look here, ' said Paul, with the dry husk in his throat again, 'youdon't like your life. '

'Faith, then, ' she answered, 'I do not. '

'Then why not leave it?'

'Ye're talking like a child. How the divvle _can_ I leave it?'

'Leave it with me, ' said Paul. 

That was what he had meant to say from the first, and now that he hadspoken his word his difficulties seemed to fall away. 

'I can't earn full wages yet, but I can get two-thirds anywhere. I canmake eighteen shillings a week, and I can live on half of it. You canhave the other half, and there will be no need, then---- You will findsomething to do in time--sewing, or ironing, or something--and then itwill be easier for us both. '

'Ye're mad!' said Norah MacMulty. 

'No, ' said Paul, 'I'm not mad. I'm going to save your soul, Norah. '

She looked at him fixedly. 

'Ye mean it?' she asked. 

'I mean it, ' he answered. 'I mean it in God's hearing. '

'Well, ' she said, 'I'm mightily obliged to ye. '

'You're coming, Norah?'

'What's your name?'

'Armstrong--Paul Armstrong. '

'I'll remember that, ' she said. 'Good-bye to ye, Paul Armstrong. '

'No, ' said Paul, 'you will come to me. I shall go to look for workto-morrow, and as soon as I have found it I shall send for you, and youwill come. '

'D'ye want me to live with ye?' she asked. 

'No, ' he answered with a strong shudder. She saw that clearly, and hercolour changed. The swift distortion showed itself about her lips again. It passed away in an instant, but it left the mouth trembling. 'I wantyou to be away somewhere where nobody can say a word against you. I wantto see you and talk to you sometimes, and know that you are going onprosperously. '

'I'm mightily obliged to ye, ' she said again. 'Ye're a good little fool, but a fool you are. '

'I am not a fool for this, Norah. Nobody is a fool who tries to do God'swork. '

'Anybody's a fool that tries to do God's work that way, ' she answered. 

'You say you are going to hell, Norah. '

'And so I am, but not for ruinin' a child that's got hysterics. I canface the divvle without havin' that on my conscience. And I'll tell yesomethin' that'll maybe turn out useful when ye grow older. Ye thinkbecause I folly a callin' that no decent woman can think of and becauseye know that I drink, that I've no pride of me own. Ye're mistaken, PaulArmstrong. If ye were ten years older, and I me own woman, I'd set thesein your face. D'ye mind me now?' She shook her hands before her foran instant, and withdrew them under her shawl again. 'Ye mean well, Ithink, but ye're just in-sultin' past bearin', an' so you are! Would Ilive on the 'arnin's of a child? Oh, Mary, Mary, Mother o' God!' 'sheburst out, 'look down an' see how I'm trodden in the mud. Go away, goaway; go away, I tell ye! I know what I am. Right well I know what I am. But d'ye think I'm that?

Black misery on your---- No. Ill not curse ye, for I believe ye meantwell. But if ye're not gone, I've a scissors here, an' I'll do meself amischief. '

The outburst overwhelmed him. The man of the world who could have stoodunmoved against it would have needs been brave and cool. The torrent ofher passion swept him like a straw. 

'I beg your pardon, ' he stammered; 'I beg your pardon with all my heartand soul. '

'Go!' she said. 

He obeyed her, and the episode of Norah MacMulty came to a close. 

'Paul, ' said the Solitary, waking for a moment from the dream in whichthese old things acted themselves again before him, 'you were always afool, but the folly of that time was better than to-day's. '

CHAPTER VI

Ralston was on the scene--Ralston in ripe middle age, massive and shortof stature, with a square head and a billowy, sable-silvered head ofhair; full lips, richly shadowed by his beard; an eye which twinkledlike some bland star of humour at one minute and pierced like a gimletat the next; a manner suavely dogged, jovially wilful, calmly hectoring, winning as the wiles of a child; a voice of husky sweetness, like afog-bound clarion at times; a learning which, if it embraced nothingwholly, had squeezed some spot of vital juice out of well-nigheverything; wise, loquacious, masterful, _bon-vivant_; the most perfecttalker of his day in England; half parson and half journalist; loyal tothe bone; courageous to the bone; not an originating man, but original;a receiver, and, through his own personality, a transmitter of greatthoughts to the masses; a fighting theologian; a fighting politician; ahowling scoff to orthodoxy; a flying flag and peal of trumpet and tuckof drum to freedom everywhere. This was Ralston. 

What should bring Paul from the inky apron, and the dusty type-cases, and the battered old founts of metal, and the worm-eaten old founts ofwood, and the slattern bankrupt office into the society of such a man asthis?

The Exile dreamed his dream, and a year was gone in a breath. 

The Armstrong household was asleep. It was one o'clock--noon of theslumberous hours. Paul slipped downstairs in his stocking-feet, strucka match, lit the kitchen gas, and drew on his boots. Then back came thecreaking bolts of the door which led to the garden. Out went the gas, and Paul, matchbox in hand, sped stealthily to the office, the summerdews falling and the weeds smelling sweet. The battered padlock on thestaple of the door had been a pure pretence for years past. It lockedand opened as well without the aid of a key as with it Paul lifted theouter edge of the door in both hands and swung it back cautiously, toavoid the shriek it gave when merely thrust open, and then lifted itto its former place. He mounted the stairs--there was not a nail in hisboots which did not know each shred of fraying timber in them--thriddedan unerring way through the outspread lumber on the floor to the standat which he commonly worked, set the gas-bracket blazing there, andbegan to stack type as if for dear life, but without a copy. The clockat Trinity struck the hours half a mile away. The clock at Christ'sfollowed a second or two later, nearer and clearer. Then a mile off, soft and mellow, but unheard unless the ear waited for them, the bellsof the Old Church chimed. Three o'clock was sounding, and the summerdark was at its deepest, when Paul secured a first proof of the work onwhich he had been engaged, and hid away the forme in a hollow beneaththe stairs. 

In this wise he stole two hours from sleep nightly for a month; and atthe end of that time, lo! a printed poem, molten and cast, and re-moltenand re-cast, chiselled and fined and polished, and all in Paul'sbrain-factory, without a guiding touch of pen or pencil--the work of ayear. 

The night after the completion of this task Ralston lectured for theYoung Men's Christian Institute, and Paul was there. He was there rightearly, and secured a seat in the front row. The theme was 'In Memoriam. 'Ralston talked and Paul listened. In five minutes Ralston was talking toPaul. Even now, in this strange review of the things that had helped ordaunted him in all his days, the self-exiled Solitary, perched alone inhis eyrie in the Rocky Mountains, encompassed by amorphous smoke-cloud, whilst the unseen river gnashed on its rocky teeth and howled--even nowhe felt the controlling magic of the voice and manner, even now he feltthe triumph which sprang from the knowledge that this man chose him fromthe throng, played on him with splendid improvisations, made him thereceptive and distributive instrument for his thoughts. 

'I know, ' said the living Paul Armstrong, looking back on the deadaspiring creature he had been. 'Not a self-accusing thought! Pureworship in the eyes. And the visage! not this battered mask, but theface of eighteen! Not an ounce of alcohol ever fired his blood from hiscradle till now. A meagre table all his life through--enough and barelyenough. Clean hands and a pure heart, and burning ardour in the eyes. _I_ could talk to a lad like that. Eh, me!'

The lecture was over; the audience had drained away; the great man andthe Secretary were closeted for a minute; there was a chinking sound ofgold. Ralston came out with a cheery 'Good-night, ' and Paul was waitingat the head of the stairs. 

'Mr. Ralston, ' said Paul. 

'Oho!' said Ralston in his sounding bass, hoarse like the deeper notesof a reed. 'My audience!'

'Will you read this, sir?'

Paul offered a paper-roll. The orator made a sideway skip out of therange of the tube, as if it had held an explosive. Paul's face fellwoefully, and the great man laughed and clapped him on the shoulder. 

'Walk to the station, ' he said, and rolled downstairs, Paul after him, and in seventh heaven. 'What have you there?' asked Ralston, as theyreached the street. 'Prose? verse? print? manuscript?--what?'

'It's in type, ' said Paul. 'It is a poem, sir. '

'What will you bet on that?' asked Ralston. 

'I'll take odds, sir, ' said Paul 'It's never even betting. '

'Ha!' The orator turned and stopped and looked at him. 'You are in mydebt, young gentleman. '

'For years past, sir. '

'What? Eh?'

'For years past. '

'I never saw your face before to-night'

'No, sir. I walk in on Sunday nights to hear you, but I go to the backof the gallery. '

'You tramp twelve miles of a Sunday night to hear me?'

'Yes, sir. '

'Summer-time, eh?'

'Any weather. '

'Present the deadly tube. I'll stand the charge. ' He thrust Paul's poeminto the pocket of a loose alpaca overcoat 'I was saying that you werein my debt. You made me talk ten minutes longer than I ought to havedone, and I've lost my train. There's not another for forty minutes. Come and march the platform. '

'Thank you, sir. '

'What's your name?'

'Paul Armstrong, sir. '

'Armstrong? Armstrong? Father's house here in the High Street? Printerand stationer? Ah! Old Bill Armstrong. Ayrshire Scotch. Anti-Corn Law. Villiers' Committee. I know him. How do you get on together--eh?'

'My father, sir? He's the dearest friend I have in the world. '

'That's as it should be. Tell me about yourself. What are you?'

'I work in the office. '

'Compositor?'

'Compositor and pressman. '

'Many a nugget has come out of that pocket What do you read? Tennyson, Iknow. Whom else?'

'Anything I can get, Mr. Ralston. 9

'Tell me. You're eighteen at a guess. Tell me last year's love and thisyear's love, and I'll prophesy. '

'It was Hazlitt at the beginning of last year, sir. Then it was Hunt, and Lamb. Now it's Thackeray. '

'Keats anywhere?'

'Oh! Keats?9 The tone was enough. 

'Favourite bit of Keats now?'

'Oh, sir, you can't have favourite bits of Keats. '

'Come! _The_ darling. '

'"St Agnes, "' said Paul; 'Chapman's Homer, "The Nightingale, ""Hyperion. "'

'Oh! One love at a time. '

'I can't, sir. '

'Wordsworth?'

'That's easier, Mr. Ralston. "The Intimations. "' 'Byron?'

'Oh! "The Don"--miles and miles, sir. ' 'Where's Shakespeare--eh?'

'In the bosom of God Almighty. '

So cheerily the talk had gone, so rapidly, he had no taint of shynessleft. Here was the man of his worship since he had first dared to playthe pious truant from chapel, the one man of the whole world he esteemedthe greatest and the wisest. They had talked for three minutes and hewas at home with his deity, and yet had lost no tremor of the adoringthrill. 

'Good!' said Ralston. 'Dickens?' Paul's answer was nothing more thanan inarticulate gurgle of pleasure, neither a laugh nor an exclamation. 'Carlyle?' Paul was silent, and Ralston asked in a doubtful voice: 'Notread Carlyle?'

'I'd go, ' said Paul in a half whisper, 'from here to Chelsea on my handsand knees to see him. '

'The best of magnets won't draw lead, ' said Ralston, and at the timePaul was puzzled by the phrase, but he blushed with pleasure when herecalled it later on. 'And Browning?'

'Ugh!' said Paul. 

'Ah, well, that's natural. But, mind you, Mr. Armstrong, in a year ortwo you'll feel humiliated to think of your present position. '

They talked, marching up and down the platform, until the train came. 

'You have been very kind, sir, ' said Paul when at last the dreaded bellrang and the distant engine screamed. 

'Have I?' asked Ralston. 'Remember it as a debt you'll owe to someaspiring youngster thirty years hence. '

The train came up before anything further was said. They shook hands andparted. 

Then for days and weeks Paul waited for a letter, waylaying the postmanevery morning at the door. The letter came at last, brief and to thepoint:

'Have read your poem. A bright promise--not yet an achievement. Commandof language more evident than individual thought. Be more yourself, butgo on in hope. Let nothing discourage. Remember that personal characterreveals itself in art Lofty conduct breeds the lofty ideal. '

The last phrase hit Paul hard. He was in search of the lofty ideal, andif lofty conduct would bring it, he meant to have it. 

He was strolling on the next Saturday afternoon, with Ralston's letterin his pocket Saturday was a half-holiday, and he was free to do withit what he pleased. His feet took him by an unfrequented way, and inthe course of an hour's devious ramble he found himself on the canalspoil-bank. The cutting was perhaps a hundred feet deep, and theartificial mounds were old enough to be covered by turf and gorse. Theybore here and there a tree, and in any hollow of the hills, where thechimneys and furnace-fires were hidden, it needed no special gift ofthe imagination to make a rolling prairie of the scene, or at least agrouse-peopled moor. 

Paul sat down in such a hollow and read Ralston's letter for thethousandth time, and resolved anew on lofty conduct Suddenly he wasaware of an approaching noise of voices, and in a little while a rabbleof some twenty men and youths came charging down the slope to where helounged in communion with his own fancies. The small crowd was noisy andexcited, and Paul noticed some pallid, staring faces as it hurried by. The whole contingent, wrangling and cursing unintelligibly, came to asudden halt in the bend of the hollow. Here a man in corduroys and arabbit-skin waistcoat called in a stentorian voice for order, and thebabel gradually died down. 

'These are the draws, ' said the man in the rabbit-skin waistcoat, wavinga dirty scrap of paper in a dirtier hand--'these are the draws for thefirst encounter. '

He began to read a list of names. The first was answered in a tone ofbullying jocundity. The second and the third name each elicited a growlAt the call of the fourth name there was no response. 

'Blades!' called the man in the rabbit-skin waistcoat--'Ikey Blades ofQuanymoor!'

Everybody turned to stare at Paul. 

'That's him, ' said one. 'Course it is, ' said another. 

'Bin yo Ikey Blades from Quarrymoor?' asked the man with the list. 

'No, ' said Paul

The man cursed, devoting himself and Paul to unnameable penalties. He wound up by asking Paul what he was doing. He wrapped this simpleinquiry in a robe of blasphemies. 'Nothing particular, ' Paulanswered. 'What's the matter?' 'Tak' it easy with him, ' said a burly, hoarse-voiced man. 'Beest thee i' the Major's pay?' 'Major?' asked Paul. 'What Major?' 'Why--Major Fellowes!'

'No, ' said Paul, laughing. 'I've got no more to do with the police thanthee hast. What is it, lads? A bit of a match, eh? Goo along. Need'stha' no fear o' me. '

He had been fighting his way out of the local dialect for half a dozenyears, but it was expedient not to forget it here. 

'I dunno about that, ' said the man with the waistcoat. 'Who bist?'

'Armstrong's my naäm, ' said Paul. 'I've lived i' the Barfield Road allmy life. '

'Can ye put 'em up?' was the next query. 'Why, yes, ' said Paul. 'I canput 'em up if I see rayson for it. '

'All right We'll tak' yo on in place of Ikey Blades. This is the fustchap yo'n ha' to tackle. Billy Tunks he is--comes from Virgin's End. '

Billy Tunks (or Tonks, more probably) carried one of the pale andstaring faces Paul had already noticed. He and Paul surveyed each other. 

The man in the rabbit-skin waistcoat, having arranged preliminaries, explained to Paul. This was 'a little bit of a friendly turn-up withthe weepons of Natur', ' intended to settle the disputed qualities ofthe youth of eight local parishes. Paul's presence, it appeared, wasentirely providential, for, with the exception of the seven candidateshere in search of glory, there was nobody present who had not at onetime or another 'fowt' for money. 

'I suppose, ' said Paul's informant, 'you've never fowt for money?'

'No, ' Paul answered, 'I've never fowt for money. Mek yourself easy onthat score. '

'Oh, ' said the other, 'I wasn't castin' no suspicion. But it's just aquiet bit o' fun like for them as ain't been blooded in a reg'lar way. It's a bit o' fun for the young uns. Billy an' yov comes second. '

'All right, ' said Paul. 

He thought of Ralston's letter, and laughed. Lofty conduct breeds thelofty ideal. What would Ralston say to this, he wondered? Not that thething had a touch of barbarism to his mind. It was rough, of course, but it was inspiring, and he was used to it. He had seen a great dealof this peculiar sport, and had a warm liking for it. Being in it wasbetter than looking on, but even looking on was pleasant. 

'Now, lads, ' said the master of the ceremonies, 'get to your corners. An', gentlemen-sports all, no shoutin'. '

The business of the afternoon began in earnest A brace of lads stood up, stripped to the waist They shook hands, and set to work. The men weremere clowns, but the exhibition was anything but clownish. In that partof the world, at least, the traditions of the game were kept alive, and there was plenty of sound scientific fighting to be seen. Paulknew enough to recognise it when he saw it, and he had not watchedtwo minutes before he knew that in this instance he was hopelesslyoutclassed. 

'I'm in for a hiding, ' he said to himself. 'A chap in search of thelofty ideal will have to make up his mind to a pretty good hiding, too. If you're eating for honour, you mustn't leave anything on thetrencher. ' He watched the fight keenly, but he watched it with aheart that danced unevenly. 'Yes, ' he thought; 'I shall have to take abellyful. '

The combat was brief and decisive. 

'Sivin an' a quarter minutes of a round, ' said the master of theceremonies; 'an' a pretty bit o' fightin. ' Theed'st best get ready, 'turning to Paul. 'The little un's pumped. He'll ask for a secondhelpin', but that'll finish him. '

The prophecy was realized, and Paul found himself in a brief space oftime standing hand in hand with Master Tonks, and looking him squarelyin the eye. The fist Paul held in his own was like a mason's mallet, butits owner was of a clumsy and shambling build. Paul silently breathedthe one word 'tactics, ' and he and his opponent fell back from eachother. He thought Master Tonk's attitude curiously awkward, but he hadno guess as to what lay behind it. He sparred for an opening. It lookedall opening, and he wondered, and half dropped his hands. 

'Goo in!' said somebody, in a jeering voice. 'Goo in, one or t'other onye!'

Paul went in, and Master Tonks went down. He was picked up, and knockeddown again. 

'Why, what is it, ' asked Paul. 'You've got no guard, lad. '

'I told thee how it ud be, ' said one of the onlookers, addressing MasterTonks, as he sat upon the turf nursing his nose in the hollow of hisarm. 'Ye see, lads, ' he continued, 'it's like this: This is Turn Tunks, this is--Billy's brother. They'm my nevews, the pair on 'em. Billy'slaid up with a broken leg, and Turn's come here to show for him for thehonour o' the family. I thought he knowed a bit about it, or I wouldn'tha' suffered him to come. '

So this part of the contest ended in fiasco, but the next combat and thenext were spirited and skilful The four victors in the first bout drewstraws for the second. The winner of the first fight fell to Paul'sshare. 

'Lofty conduct!' said Paul to himself, with a little rueful grin. 'I'min for it, and I must make the best of it. '

He made the best of it for one fast five minutes, and all on a suddenhe found himself looking at the sky, his opponent and the little crowdclean vanished. He was dreamy and quiet, and had no opinions aboutanything, and no interest in anything. Somebody picked him up and sethim on somebody else's knee, where he was sponged and fanned. There wasa faint suggestion in his mind to the effect that somebody, somewhere, had a shocking headache. Then he knew that one or two men were roughlyhelping him to dress. He himself mechanically aided this work, andby-and-by found himself watching a new encounter, aware by this timethat the headache was his own. He handled nose, and upper-lip, and eyedelicately, and came to the conclusion that he presented a picture tothe gaze of man. Then, gradually pulling himself together, he watchedthe business of the day with tranquil interest. 

Four had had it out with four, and then two with two; and now thesurvivors of the match were engaged for the final prize of honour. Eachman had fought twice already, and they were both too tired to do muchexecution upon each other; but at last Paul's late antagonist won, andthe simple game was over. The man in the rabbit-skin waistcoat thankedPaul for having preserved the symmetry of the day. 

'Eight's a shapely little handful, ' this authority said. 'It's the pickof the basket for a number, eight is. Sixteen's on-widdy, and it knocksa hole in a long summer's day. Four's a flash in the pan; but eight's apretty little number. ' He added genially: 'We'm all very much obliged toyou, young man. '

'Oh, ' said Paul, 'I like to be neighbourly. '

The muscles of his face were stiffening, and his inclination to laughcost him a twinge. 

The man in the rabbit-skin waistcoat said his sentiment did him credit, and shook hands with him on the strength of it. The crowd went away asit had come, and left him where it found him. He was not going to walkhome in broad daylight with such a visage as he carried. He paced aboutthe trampled hollow to keep his blood in circulation, and in a littlewhile the friendly darkness began to gather. Then he set out for homeat leisure, choosing unlighted ways; and after a circuitous journey, climbed a gate and a garden wall or two, and landed at the office. Therehe made his toilet with the aid of a piece of yellow soap, a bucket ofwater, and a jack-towel, and then walked down the darkened garden tothe house. He paced the paved yard on tiptoe, and peeping through thekitchen-window, saw his father seated alone at the fireside Armstronglooked up with his customary mild, abstracted gaze. 

'Why, Paul, lad!' he cried. 'Who's handled ye like that?'

'There's no harm done, sir, ' said Paul 'I've been putting a precept ofMr. Ralston's into effect in a way he never dreamt of. '

'Ye've been fighting, ' said his father, with a voice of reproof. 'Unlessye've a vera guid reason for it, that's a blackgyard way of settlingdifferences. '

'I'm like Othello, sir, ' Paul answered: "Nought I did in hate, but allin honour. " I had no difference with the gentleman who did this for me. We met and parted on the most excellent terms. '

But even when Paul had told his story, Armstrong was un-appeased, anddeclined to see any form of humour in it. 

'It's just a wanton defacing of the Divine image, ' he said, 'and areturn upon the original beast. '

Paul was constrained to let the incident rest there, but he comfortedhimself by fighting the battle over again in fancy. In this wise he beatthe champion of the afternoon hands down, and came off without a scar. 

CHAPTER VII

Armstrong and Paul were keeping house alone, and were playing chesstogether. The big eight-day clock ticked, the cat purred noisily onArmstrong's shoulder, the clear burning fire made slight crisp soundsin the grate, and now and then slack fell from the bars. The two sat insilence, poring over the board. Paul made a move. 

'That's vile play, ' said Armstrong. 'Mate in four. '

'Go on, sir, ' Paul answered. 

'Chick, ' said Armstrong. 

'But you lose your castle. '

'Do I so? But I get a pawn for it, and chick again. '

'Yes, ' said Paul, 'I see. ' He turned down his king and sat absent-eyed. 

'Ye're falling off, Paul, ' said Armstrong, 'or else your mind's not onthe game. '

'To tell you the truth, sir, ' Paul returned, sitting up with a suddensprightliness, 'my mind's not on the game. '

'Where is it, lad?'

'Well, sir, it's in London. ' 'London?'

'London, sir. I can't stop here all my days. I want to see the world. '

Armstrong rose to light his pipe at the gas. He dropped into his seatslowly, took the cat from his shoulder, and set it on his knees. Thepurr rose louder as he stroked lingeringly. 

'Ay!' he said after a long pause; 'ay, ay!'

'I was afraid you wouldn't like it, sir, ' said Paul 'I'm not mislikingit, lad, ' his father answered. 'I'm not misliking it What's yourproposition, Paul?'

'I don't know, sir. I've formed no plans. I don't know how to go aboutthings. I'm stifling here. '

'It's natural, ' said Armstrong; 'I've stifled here for twenty years, lad. But then, ' he added, with his own dry, wistful twinkle of afleeting smile, 'I was born to stifle. What'll you do in the world, Paul, when ye get into it, if ye're out of it here?'

'I don't know, sir. I shall try to do something. '

'Ay!' said Armstrong again; 'ay, ay!'

His gray-blue eyes dreamed behind his grizzled brows, and Paul satwatching him. There was a touching something in the gray, bowed figureand the gray patience of his face. Paul seemed to see him alone, thusdreaming. 

'I won't go, dad, unless you like. '

'It's best, Paul; it's best. '

A knock sounded at the front-door, and Paul walked down the long narrowpassage which lay alongside the sitting-room and the shop, and admittedthe major part of the household. They had been to a tea-meeting andconcert at Ebenezer, and they all trooped chattering into the bigkitchen, bringing a smell of frost and night air in their raiment. 

'Mary, ' said Armstrong, at the first gap of silence, 'Paul is going toLondon. '

Paul's heart swelled at this unlooked-for acceptance of his plans, butthe household stood in wonder. 

'What's Paul got to go to London for?' asked Mrs. Armstrong. 

'We've talked it over within the last few minutes, ' returned Armstrong. 'The lad's coming to discretion. He wants to see the world. I'll findsomething for him to do there. '

'William, ' said his wife, 'you're mad. '

Armstrong lit his pipe and said nothing, but the wife uplifted her voiceand spoke. 

'Yes, ' she said, 'you've got your proper look on, as if you were half amillion miles away, and me a insect, crawling about somewhere in anotherplanet and not worthy of a thought I know your ways--I've got a right toknow 'em after nine-and-thirty 'ears o' married life, I reckon. You'vespoke your word, and you'll sooner die than go back on it. Another man'ud give some sort of a why an' a wherefore. But you! You're Sir Horacle, you are. You've opened your lips, and other folks' talk is just no morethan so many dogs a-chelpin'! What's our Paul want to go to Londonfor? Answer me that, if you please, William Armstrong. If it was in me, William, to be a downright vulgar woman, I'd take the poker to you. '

Armstrong looked up with his swift, dry twinkle, and she laughed. She tried to make the laugh sound angry, but the effort was useless. Armstrong twinkled again, and she burst into a peal. 

'Children, ' she said, wiping her eyes with the fringe of her shawl, 'remember what I tell you. That's the best man in the world, but I hopeto gracious goodness as none of you will ever grow up like him. He'senough to break the patience of a saint. If Job'd ha' lived with him, he'd ha' broke his head with one of his potsherds. '

Then the household laughed at large, for of late years this was thefashion--this, or something very like it--in which all combativedisputes had ended. It had not always been so. In the earlier years, which Paul could well remember, before the gray little man had achievedhis triumph of speechless mastery, there had been scenes which borderedon the terrible. 

'And now, ' said Mrs. Armstrong, 'what's our Paul to go to London for?'

'He'll finish learning his business there, ' said Armstrong. 'In two orthree years' time he ought to be able to come back and take charge ofthe place. There's the nucleus of a good trade here, if it had energyand knowledge brought to bear on it. '

There was an end of spoken opposition, and the fact that Paul was goingto London was accepted. A month went by, and all arrangements were made. The Rev. Roderic Murchison had left Barfield, and had accepted a callfrom some congregation in the outskirts of the great city. He held asalaried post as well as Metropolitan secretary to his sect, and hadbecome a person of importance. He was in association with a firm ofprinters who worked mainly for the big Nonconformist bodies, and anodour of sanctity was supposed, by the Armstrong household at least, to rest upon the labours upon which Paul was about to enter in theiroffice. Paul had examples of the office craftsmanship set before him. Technically they were excellent, but their literary form was not of thehighest order. He learned that a hundred and odd workmen were engaged, and he pictured them as a set of square-toes whose talk would be guardedand pious and narrow, for in his innocence he imagined the men whotranslated good books into type were necessarily good, and the men whotranslated into type the goody-goody were of that spiritual complexion. 

Paul and his father travelled up to London together on a Thursday. They found lodgings in Charterhouse Square at the house of a sprightlyblack-eyed lady, whose husband, long deceased, had been a Nonconformistminister. She was very smiling and gracious, and Paul thought her acharming woman, but he got out of her good books very early, and neverknew how for years after. 

'Oh yes, Mr. Armstrong, ' she said at the Sunday dinner, 'anybody wouldknow you were from the country. '

'How?' Paul asked. 

'By your hair, ' said the lady. 

'Oh, well, ' said Paul, 'I must get it cut London fashion. '

Mrs. Bryne bit her lips and flashed a look at him. The boarderstittered, but Paul sat unconscious. He knew that ignorant peoplemisplaced their aspirates at times, but Mrs. Bryne was a lady, and woresilk dresses on week-days. 

But he had sown a seed of misliking, and it had opportunity to ripen. Armstrong the elder, with that wholesale want of worldly wisdom whichdistinguished him, had arranged that Paul should have a room in Mrs. Bryne's house, with breakfast and supper on week-days and whole boardon Sundays, on terms which fitted accurately with his earnings. He gavePaul a pound for pocket-money, and went away without a thought as towhat the lad was to do for his daily dinner. This admirable businessarrangement bore fruit, of course. 

At eight o'clock on a February morning Paul presented himself at theoffice. The day was foggy and bitter. The street-lamps were alight, andall the shops yet open were dull yellow with gas-lamps in the fog. Hehad to ask his way several times, and only one passenger in four orfive took any notice of him, but he reached his destination as someneighbouring church clock boomed the hour out of the nowhere of theupper air. He announced himself by name to a man in a glass-case at thehead of the stairs. The man gave him a surly side-way nod, and Paul, notunderstanding, waited for something more. 

'Upstairs, ye fool!' said the man. 

'It's a cold mornin', ' said Paul. That nose o' yours looks a bitpinched with it. I've half a mind to warm it for you. '

'Well, ' said the surly man, 'how often do you want to be spoken to?'

'Once is enough, ' said Paul. 'Come outside and I'll gi' thee a lesson inmanners. '

The surly man declined this invitation, and slid down the glass in frontof him. Paul mounted wrathfully. He was more grieved at himself thanat the other fellow, because he had made up his mind to be civil toeverybody, and above all things to put away the Barfield accent, whichhe could do quite easily when he thought about it. 

In the great room he entered there were rows on rows of compositors'frames, all dimly illuminated by a single gas-jet, and the air was thickwith fog. One prematurely sharp-looking small boy was performing a sortof rhythmic dance with a shrill whistle for accompaniment. He had a bigcan of water, which he swung like a censer as he danced. The can had asmall hole pierced in the bottom, and the boy was laying the dust Whenthe can had yielded its last drop he took up a big broom and swept theplace rapidly, keeping up his shrill whistle meanwhile. 

'Isn't it time somebody was here?' Paul asked at length. 

'Manday's a saint's day, ' said the boy. 'You a-comin' to work 'ere?' heasked. Paul nodded. 'You'll know better next taime. Why, even the "O. "doesn't come before naine on a Manday. '

That was the fashionable Cockney dialect of the time. It is dead, as arethe many fashions of Cockney speech which have followed it until now, and as the present accent will be in a year or two. It tickled Paul'sear, and to get more of it he beguiled the boy to talk. 

'Who's the "O. "?' he asked

'"O. "?' said the boy sharply. 'Overseer. '

'Why are they late on Monday?'

'I suppose, ' said the boy, 'they stop too late at church on Sanday. Theyare a pretty old ikey lot as works 'ere, and so I tell you. '

Paul began to revise his opinion as to the probable character of hisassociates. But perhaps the boy was purposely misleading him. He thoughtit worth while to wait and see. 

'What's your name?' he asked, by way of keeping the conversation going. 

'Tom Ketling, ' said the boy, 'but they calls me "Tat" for short, becauseI used to hang about outside Tattersall's and run errands. I pickedup most of my education there. There ain't many of 'em as can teach meanything. ' He broke off short in his confidences at the sound of a heavyshuffling footstep on the stairs. 'Oh, my!' he cried, 'this is a marble, and no error! How are you, Forty?'

'You here?' said the man thus hailed. 'Why, how you _are_ reforming!'His voice had a deep chuckling husk in it, as if he had just finished anexhausting laugh, and his lungs still panted. His face and figure werevague in the fog and dimness of the place, but as he rolled and chucklednearer Paul stared at him, not without reason. He was respectablyattired at the first glance in a heavy overcoat of milled cloth, withfacings of some sort of cheap imitation fur, and a silk-hat which, though creased in many places, was flatteringly oiled, and shone with alustre to which its age bequeathed no right. He had a high collar whichrose to the cheek-bone, and was severely starched, though yellow andserrated at the edges. His face was a flame of high colour, and his nosewas a burlesque on the nose of Bardolph. It was not merely huge; it wasportentous. It was of the size and shape of a well-grown winter pear, and it wagged as he walked, touching now one bloated cheek and now theother. It was garnished with many dark bosses, as if it were ornamentedby round nails of a purple tone, and when once the owner had carriedit fairly under the gas-jet it seemed as if it were the nose whichshed such light as there was to struggle with the fog. 'You see it, 'he cried, with the same short-winded chuckle. 'Everybody sees itBr-r-r-r-r-r-r!' He shook his head rapidly from side to side, and theamazing nose tapped either cheek in turn with an actual audible soundlike the faintest clapping of hands. Apart from this deformity and thesanguine colour of his face he was a jolly-looking fellow, and his browneyes twinkled as if they had been transparent, with a flickering lightbehind them. 'I got that, ' he said, rubbing die nose with the palmof one hand, 'from my highly respectable grandfather. He was a greatlandowner, so I'm told, down Guildford way, and drank more port andbrandy-punch than any man in England. This'--he fondled the noseagain--'this skipped a generation. My highly respectable father'sproboscis was pure Greek--Greek so pure, sir, that the late Presidentof the Royal Academy has been known to follow him about London in ahansom-cab from dawn to dewy eve in the hope of catching its outline. Br-r-r-r-r-r-r!' He wagged the monstrous feature again. He stopped shortwith a ludicrous solemnity. 'Your highly respectable name is Armstrong?'he said with a voice and attitude of courtesy. 'I judged so. You are aturnover apprentice from the establishment of your highly respectablefather in the country? Exactly. My highly respectable name is Warr, sir. I am sometimes known as Forty in recognition of a little feat of mine, in respect of which "let other lips, " et cetera. I suppose that I havenever told you----' He was in an attitude of extremest confidence, buthe changed it with a flourish, 'I was told, sir, to be here to meetyou. It is mine to initiate you into the highly respectable mysteries. Isuppose I never told you '--the air of confidence was back again--'thatI am the owner of an heirloom?'

'I don't remember that you ever did, ' Paul answered. 

'An heirloom, ' the man with the nose exclaimed, 'an heirloom which--inshort, a highly respectable heirloom--a work of art. This is varnishingday. Would you like to see the work of art varnished? Then come withme. ' He laid aside the burlesque air, and said seriously: 'There will benothing done here for an hour. '

Paul followed him down the stairs and into the street, where the fogseemed thicker than before. 

'Is it often like this in the City?' he asked. 

'No, ' said his companion; 'I regret to say it isn't We get very littleopen weather in the City at this time of year. As a rule, in Februaryyou find the City clouded. '

'This is quite clouded enough for my taste, ' said Paul, coughing andweeping. 

'My dear sir, ' said Mr. Warr, 'this is merely Italian! Ah! I forgot Youare fresh from the country. You think this foggy! Well, perhaps it isnot quite so bright as we get it some days. But a real fog in London isa very different thing from this. In 'the great fog of January, '68, it happened very fortunately for me that the partner of myhighly-respectable joys and sorrows had asked me to purchase a meat-axe. I hewed my way home by its aid, sir. When I reached London Bridge I wasso fatigued that I was compelled to sit down, and to beguile the time Icut a portion of the fog in strips, and modelled the strips into avery handsome set of hat-pegs. They would have made a highly superiorsouvenir of an interesting occasion, but they were, unfortunately, stolen. By the way, if you happen to have sixpence about you I needn'task for credit for the varnish. I hate debt as I hate the devil. Thankyou, sir. This way. ' He rolled into a gin-shop, and called for 'aquartern and two outs, ' tendering Paul's coin in payment. 

Paul declined any share in the liquor. He was watchful, and as full ofinterest as a child. The battered pewter counter, with little pools ofdirty liquid in its hollows; the green-painted, flat-bellied barrelswith bands of faded gilding; the moist and filthy sawdust on the floor, with last week's odours in it and a mere sprinkling of clean sawduston top, offering its hint of the timber-stacks in the yard next doorto home; the winking gas with the fog-halo round it; the shirt-sleevedbarman; the female habitual drunkard here for a dram thus early, andholding her glass in both shaking palms as if she warmed her hands atit; the ceiling, cobwebbed and clouded with gas-smoke; the gaping door, like a dead jaw that would have dropped but for the straps that heldit--all these things beat themselves in on his intelligence as if theywould make an eternal pressure there. It was as if the place had a moralphysiognomy of its own, and as if through countless details he absorbedan instinct as to its daily life. 

'I suppose, ' said Paul, 'you varnish that work of art pretty often?'

'As often as I can, ' Mr. Warr responded. 'But the varnish is costly, my credit is nowhere worth a tinker's damn, and I live in a chronicimpecuniosity. '

He varnished the work of art with a genuine relish, and, the processbeing over, he and Paul returned to the office, where signs of life werebeginning to show themselves. The flare of some thirty or forty lightedgas-brackets made an inroad on the fog, and knots of men were laughingand talking. It very soon became clear to Paul's intelligence that thedaily work and conversation of his new companions were not in any markeddegree ruled or moulded by the influence of that religious literaturewith which they helped to furnish the world. They were neither betternor worse than the average British workman; but they certainly curseda good deal, and a stiffish breeze of indecency blew through all theirspeech. 

In ten minutes every man was at his case, and silence reigned. Theoverseer--a dyspeptic, long-haired man, who looked like a dejectedtragedian--interviewed the new-comer, supplied him with a certain amountof 'copy, ' and left him to his devices. Mr. Warr worked by his side. That gentleman without the silk-hat came out bald, and without thefur-trimmed overcoat came out shabby, in a very threadbare old blackrock. He wore a portentous pair of cuffs to match the antiquatedcollar, and these being slipped off and the coat-sleeves turned upfor convenience in working, Paul wondered if any shirt or otherunder-garment kept them company. Any doubt he may have had on that pointwas dissipated early in the day, for Mr. Warr chancing to stoop withhis head towards Paul, gave the young man a clear view of his bareback, between which and the world at large there was nothing but thethreadbare coat. 

About half-past twelve o'clock the small boy whom Paul had encounteredon his arrival began to move about from man to man with a strip ofpaper. Each man looked at the paper and spoke a single word. Then theboy invariably pronounced a word which sounded like 'vedge, ' and theman either shook his head or nodded. Paul wondered what this mightmean, until his turn came, when he found a choice of viands written in ascrawling hand upon the scrap of paper:

'Boiled beef and carrots. 

'Boiled pork and pease-pudding. '

'It's sixpence-halfpenny if you have it here, sixpence if you go out forit. '

Paul made his choice, and the boy said 'Vedge?' in an accent of inquiry. 

'What's "vedge"?'

The boy looked up in a momentary wonder, and then grinned knowingly, andshook his head. 

'What do you mean by "vedge"?'

'Ah!' said the boy, 'you don't get over me. '

'I'm not trying to get over you. I want to know what you mean. '

'Oh yes, ' said the boy; 'of course you do! They don't eat greens andtaters where you come from! Oh dear no; not at all!'

'That's it, is it? Then, I take vedge. '

'If s an extra penny, mind you. You pays on Saturday. '

The boy turned to Mr. Warr, who made his choice also. 

A little later a voice said 'Halt!' and there was a clatter ofcomposing-sticks laid smartly down on the cases. Almost at the sameinstant the small boy came in with a pyramid of plates with flat tincovers. 'Beef and vedge, ' shrilled the boy, and, setting down hisburden, charged out again, returning instantly with another cry of'Beef, no vedge. ' He was out and in again with a cry of 'Pork andvedge, ' and out and in again with a cry of 'Pork, no vedge. ' Then ashock-headed youth appeared with a basket foil of tin measures and abig can of black beer. He was met with an instant storm of chaff, andallusions of a Rabelaisian sort were made to one Mary for whom he wouldseem to have had a kindness. He departing, the men set themselves to theserious business of dinner, and, the meal being over, they gathered intogroups, and smoked and talked, whilst the small boy cleared away. 

An aproned man in a very old skull cap of black silk, and a shabbyfrock-coat like Mr. Warr's, approached Paul and announced himself as'the Father of the Chapel. ' He welcomed the young man with a curiousformal courtesy, and aired scraps of Latin with which Paul was familiarfrom many years of study of the specimen-books of the type-founders, who used to exhibit the most exquisite specimens of the printers' art inquotations from Cicero. Mr. Warr borrowed sixpence on the plea of suddenand severe internal pains, and went out to varnish the work of art. Hereturned with a moist eye, and in the course of the afternoon twice orthrice dipped his bulbous nose into the letter 'e' box, and snored for aminute at a time among the types. 

Day followed day, and one day was like another. Saturday came, and Paulreceived his wages. He paid his first weekly bill at his boarding-houseby aid of the remnant of the sovereign left for pocket-money. Next weeksaw him in debt. The third week saw him dinnerless. He knew the mistakehis father had made, but it did not occur to him to take any activesteps to remedy it Any lad of his years with a farthing's-worth ofbusiness faculty would have written home to explain his case, and wouldhave gone into cheaper lodgings. Paul chose to do nothing, but to wanderhungrily and vacantly through the city in the dinner-hour. He foundno more varnish for the work of art, and his working comrade was lessamiable than he had been. The week's end found him a little furtherin debt, in spite of abstention. His landlady, who thought he had beenimpertinent in that unconscious matter of the aspirate, was not disposedto be friendly. 

'I can tell by your looks, ' she said, 'that you have been dissipating, and I know that you are wasting your money. I shall write and tell yourfather so. '

'Very well, ' said Paul. 

He was voracious at the supper-table, and that made the landlady nokinder to him. He ate like a wolf at every meal on Sunday, and hisfellow-boarders chaffed him; but the lady of the house looked as if shewould fain have poisoned him. 

She asked Paul into her private sitting-room after supper, and heaccepted her invitation. 

'I shall expect a satisfactory settlement at the end of this week, Mr. Armstrong, ' she said icily. 'Unless I get it from you I shall write toyour home for it, and in any case I shall be obliged if you will leave. '

'Very well, ' said Paul. 

He thought all this rather unprosperous for a beginning of a free life, but he cared astonishingly little. If he had looked at the prospect, hemight have begun to think it in a small way very serious. Recallingthe time as he sat in his mountain eyrie, he found in it the firstindication of his own irresponsibility, a knack of blinding himself toconsequences. 

Monday came, and he dined. It did not seem worth while to deny himselfany further. Tuesday came, and in the middle of the morning's work aman rapped on his case with a composing-stick, and said aloud, 'I calla Chapel. ' Mr. Warr turned on Paul, and told him he must go outside andwait until such time as the meeting thus summoned was over. He and threeapprentices clustered on the landing. The doors were closed, and theywaited for half an hour. 

At the end of that time they were re-admitted, and Paul was solemnlyescorted to the old man with the skull-cap. 

'I have a question to ask you, Mr. Armstrong, ' the old gentleman began. 'Were you properly indentured to this business. '

'No, ' said Paul. 'I picked up what I know about it in my father'soffice. '

'You were never bound apprentice?'

'No. '

'Thank you, Mr. Armstrong, that will do. '

Paul went back to his case, and fell to work there, not caring tospeculate much as to what had happened. The Father of the Chapel, accompanied by two or three of his companions, left the composing-room, were absent for some twenty minutes, and then filed solemnly back again. Shortly afterwards a clerk came in, with a pen behind his ear. He stoodby Paul's side, and pronounced his name in a tone of question. 

'Here, ' said Paul, looking round at him. 

'Just give your hands a bit of a rinse, ' said the clerk, 'and put onyour things and come down into the manager's office, will you?'

Paul nodded, and went off to the sink and the jack-towel, wondering alittle. When in due time he presented himself before the manager he wasat once enlightened. 

'That is your week's money, Armstrong, and your services will not berequired here further. '

'Why not?' Paul asked. 

'No fault of yours, ' the manager answered; 'but we find that you havenot been regularly apprenticed to the trade. This is a Union house, andwe are under Union rules. ' Paul took up the half-sovereign and the smallmound of silver the manager pushed towards him, and dropped it intohis pocket coin by coin. 'I don't know your circumstances, ' the managercontinued, 'but if you're in want of work, I can put you in the way ofit at once. There's a non-Union house close by, where I happen to knowthey're short of hands. I have written the address in case you care totry there. You needn't make it known to any of our men that I sent youthere. Good-morning. '

'I'm not going home, ' said Paul to himself, as he walked into the street'I'm not going home, whatever happens. '

He consulted the address he held in his hand, and walked towards it. His dinnerless wanderings of last week had taught him something of theintricacies of the City, if not much, and he chanced to know his way. The place he sought was high up at the top of a ramshackle old house ina narrow court, and a score of dispirited-looking men and youths wereat work there. A tired dyspeptic, with a dusty patch of hair and rabbitteeth, approached him when he entered. 

'Yes, ' he said, when Paul had explained his business; 'you can start inat once, and if you're any good you're safe for a month or two. I hopeyou're a steady worker, ' he went on despondingly, as if he were quitehopeless. 'They're not a dependable lot here--not a dependable lot atall. '

Paul took his place amongst the depressed little crowd at two o'clockthat afternoon, and worked away among them until two o'clock on thefollowing Saturday. A little before that hour it became evident thatsomething was wrong. An excited little man ran into the dingy room, andbegan a whispered conversation with the tired dyspeptic. 

'But, my God!' said the latter, in a tearful voice; 'I _must_ have itI've got my men to pay. '

At this everybody pricked an ear. 

'It's all right, old man, ' said the other. 'Here's the cheque, and it'sas good as the Bank of England. But I've only just this minute got it. It's after one o'clock, and it's Saturday, and the Bank's closed. Whatam I to do?

'I don't care what you do. Get somebody to cash it for you, I suppose. I've got to have the money. Here's all the bills made out, and in tenminutes the men'll be waiting. '

'Well, ' said the man, I'll try. It ain't my fault, Johnny. '

He ran out as excitedly as he had entered, and the men stopped work bycommon consent, and struggled into their coats. 

'It's bad enough, ' said one of them, 'to work for two-thirds money evenwhen you get it. '

Nobody else said anything. The dyspeptic foreman drew a case out ofa rack near the wall, and sat down upon it. The rest hung aboutdispiritedly, and waited for what might transpire. 

Two or three gathered round the imposing-surface. 

'Have a jeff?' said one. 

'If you like, ' said another. 

'Come along, ' said a third, turning up the sleeves of his coat

Paul drew near, moved by curiosity. 

One of the men picked up three em quadrats from a case near at hand. An em quadrat is an elongated cube of type-metal, on which three ofthe elongated surfaces are plain, whilst the fourth bears grooved markswhich indicate the fount of type to which it belongs. The cubes wereused as dice. The men started with a halfpenny pool, and the firstthrower cast three plain surfaces. He paid in three-halfpence. Thesecond man threw with equal effect, and put in three-pence. The thirdman threw three nicked surfaces, and took the pool. 

Two or three more of the men who were waiting for the messenger's returnrose and drew near. Then others came, and, at last, all but Paul wereplaying. The rules were simple enough: Any man who turned up threeblanks paid the whole of the pool. One nicked surface took a third, twonicked surfaces two-thirds, three nicked surfaces the whole. Somebodycleared the whole, and the game started afresh. Paul threw down ahalfpenny and joined in. As last comer he was last to play. Thefirst throw cleared the pool. It was renewed, and the next throw tookfourpence. Twopence remained. Three blanks doubled it--fourpence. Three blanks doubled it again--eightpence. Again three blanks doubledit--sixteenpence. A throw of one by common consent took sixpence. Threeblanks made the shilling two. Three more blanks made two shillings four. Three more made it eight, and three more sixteen. Faces began to paleand hands to tremble. A single took six shillings after a good deal ofwrangling, and ten shillings were left Paul threw for the ten shillingsand swept the pool In all his life he had never known such a sensation, though the money as yet was mainly of paper slips. 

The cashier had negotiated his cheque somehow and somewhere, and wasbusy with the money. The men received their meagre wages, debts werepaid, and the game went on. The stakes never again rose so high as atthe first round in which Paul found himself engaged, but he still wonheavily in proportion to the game, and continued to win until the end. He was then the only winner, and one of the losers asked him to pay fordrinks. Paul, with a certain feeling of splendour and magnanimity, threwdown half a sovereign. 

'Take it out of that, ' he said. 

One of the despoiled poor devils clutched it, and they all went offtogether, leaving Paul to struggle into his overcoat and follow, if hepleased. 

'You made a pretty good thing out of that, 'said the pockmarked cashier, swinging the key with which he waited to lock the door. 

'I'll see, ' Paul answered. 

He emptied his pockets on the imposing-surface, and counted the pile. Hehad some fifty shillings over and above the week's wages. 

'You've been up their shirts to the tune of about six bob a man, ' saidthe cashier. 'They'll be sorry before the week's out. '

The winner was not affected by any consideration of that sort. Hepouched the money, and took his way with a farewell nod. He had tasteda novel excitement, and the thrill was still in his blood He walkedrapidly through the winter air towards his lodgings, dressed there inhis best, and sallied out again, making straight for the Cock tavern. What suggested the idea to him he never knew, but he meant to take apint of port with Will Waterproof at that famous hostel, which thenstood on its own classic ground. The old Cock was not a palatial house, but it was splendid to the raw country lad, and he was half afraid toenter. He strode in looking as mannish and as townlike as he could, andseated himself in one of the boxes alone. A waiter approached him, arotund man, in gouty-looking slippers, with a napkin across his arm. Was this, he wondered, the steward of the can, 'a shade more plump thancommon '?

'Give me a chop, ' said Paul, 'and a pint of port'

'Chop, sir, ' said the waiter; 'yes, sir. And a pint of----'

'Port, ' said Paul, and, being ignorant of the ways of such places, pulled out a handful of silver and asked 'How much?'

'Bring the bill in due course, sir, ' said the water gravely, and movingaway, called the order for the chop up the chimney, as it seemed to thevisitor, and then rolled off stealthily in the gouty slippers in searchof the port. He brought it in a small decanter, which he polishedassiduously as he walked along. Paul thought it looked very little fora pint, but made no comment. The waiter poured out a glass and retired. The experimenter had tasted elderberry once, but he knew no more ofwine. The draught had relish fiery new, and it seemed to warm himeverywhere at once. His mind grew exquisitely bright, and his thoughtswere astonishingly vivid. He began to improvise verses, and they camewith an ease which was quite startling. They seemed to unroll themselvesbefore him, to reveal themselves line by line as if they had been inexistence long ago, and some spell had suddenly made them visible to hisintelligence. It was a moment of singular triumph, and it lasted untilthe grave waiter laid his chop before him. He ate keenly, and finishedhis pint of port A sort of beatific indolence was upon him, and he hadno wish to move, but he thought the waiter looked at him, and he wasuncertain as to whether he had a right to stay. He summoned the man andpaid him, and gave him sixpence for himself. Then he walked into thestreet, but the exercise was not like walking. His step was quite firmand steady, but his whole frame felt light, as if he could have spurnedthe pavement with a foot, and have leaped the roadway at an easy bound. He thought of young Hotspur, and 'methinks it were an easy leap to pluckbright honour from the pale-faced moon. ' He walked erect with his chinin the air, and regarded the men and women who passed him with a strangesense of being able to understand them all. There seemed to be a storyin every face, and he felt vaguely and yet positively that he could readit if he chose. He found himself for the first time in Oxford Streetwithout knowing either by what route he had reached it or what was thename of the thoroughfare. The crowds, the lights, the movement and thedin of traffic were in themselves an intoxication. It gave him a senseof strength to be alone among them. Then all his thoughts trembled intoa sudden swimming laxity, and his mood changed to one of deep sadness. He set himself to analyse an inward dumb reproach which filled him--toask a reason for it--to trace it to some source. It seemed to formitself definitely on a sudden, and his winnings began to gall himbitterly. He had never gambled before, and now he felt the passion ofgreed into which he had been betrayed disgusting. He was ashamed ofhaving played at all, and still more ashamed of the callousness oftriumph in which he had walked away with his gains. He had pitied hisassociates. He had seen the misery of their estate quite clearly. Andyet he had stooped to profit by their folly, and slattern wives anddirty little neglected children would be cold and hungry because ofhim before a week was over. He would return the money on Monday, everypenny. He might have to pinch himself for a week or two, but he would doit. 

His mood sank lower and lower, and self-reproach grew at once moreinsistent and more urgent He felt homesick, and the populous street waslike a desert. All the people who had seemed so warmly near to him werealoof and cold. He would have welcomed any companionship. The ebbingforces of the wine left him comfortless. 

In his complete ignorance and inexperience he supposed the pint of portto have had no effect on him. This up-and-down play of the emotionswas not what he had read of as the result of wine on an unaccustomeddrinker. His step was steady, his eye was clear, there was no confusionin his thoughts. It would be a perfectly safe thing to have anotherglass of wine and then go home. If he had been asked why he wished formore, he could not have given a reason. It was enough for the momentthat he desired it. 

He found himself outside a flaring house, with the words 'Wine Shades'in a blaze of wind-fluttered gas above the door, and painted placardsin the window: 'Wines from the Wood. Fine old Sherry, 10d. , 8d. , and 6d. Per dock glass. ' He had never tasted sherry. Sherry surely was thedrink of many heroes. Shakespeare and Jonson drank it at the Mermaid. He entered the place, called for his wine--'Your best, ' he said, as hethrew his shilling on the counter--and sat down on a high stool to drinkit. Before his glass was empty he had flashed back into high spiritsagain. He resumed his walk in a new exultation, and this time he knewenough to attribute it to the wine. What a superb boon it conferred uponthe mind! How easy it seemed to soar out of sadness and loneliness intothese exalted regions of friendship with all created things. He walkedthrough the winter night with no knowledge of the route he took and withno care. He could ask his way home at any time. 

He came to the Metropolitan Music Hall in the Edgware Road, and sufferedhimself to be borne in by the crowd at the doors. The place and itslike were strange to him. The performance seemed wholly contemptibleand absurd. Men and women screamed with laughter and roared applause atjests which were either inane or hateful. A noisy man in a long-waistedovercoat, whose skirts swept the stage, a blonde wig, flying yellowwhiskers, and a white hat at a raking angle, sang an idiotic song withpatter interspersed between the verses. He described a visit receivedfrom Lord Off-his-Chump, Lady Off-her-Chump, and all the honourableMisses Off-their-Chumps. The witticisms convulsed Paul's neighbours andleft him saturnine. He conceived a loathing and despite for the creatureon the stage which he had never felt before for any living thing. Thepopular laughter and applause fed his personal hatred and disdain. Hemade an involuntary sound of contempt as the 'lion comique' went off. 

'Ah!' said a voice beside him. 'You don't like that?' Paul turned andlooked at the man who had accosted him. He was evidently a foreigner, and his complexion was so jaundiced that he was the colour of a guinea. What should have been the whites of his eyes were of a deep yellow. His nose had a hook, high up, right between the eyes, and his loftyforehead, narrowing to a peak, was ridged like a ploughed field. Hishair and beard and moustache were all crisp and curling, and theirblackness was faintly streaked with gray. 

'You don't like that?' said the stranger again. 'No, ' said Paul. Idon't. '

'The cruel thing about it, ' said the stranger, 'is that other peopledo. '

'Yes, ' said Paul; 'that is the cruel thing about it. '

He had the suspicion of strangers which is natural to most rustic folkin London, and his manner was purposely dry. 

'It strikes me, ' said the yellow man, 'that you and I are about the onlysensible people here. Come and have a drink. '

'Thank you, 'Paul returned, 'I don't drink with strangers. '

'Oh, well, ' said the other, 'that's a wise thing, too. Have a cigar?'

'I don't smoke, thank you. '

'And that again is a very sensible thing, ' said the stranger, laughing. 'I am a slave to tobacco. Smoking has ceased to be a pleasure since itbecame a necessity. '

The man's speech had a faintly foreign sound, but his English wasfaultless. The very slight peculiarity which marked it was rather alevel flatness in the tone than an accent It suggested a time when ithad cost him an effort to speak the language, though the time had longpassed away. The good-nature with which he accepted Paul's rebuff lulledthe youngster's suspicions, and lulled it the more completely that theman turned away with a smiling nod and made no further attempt to enterinto conversation. 

The lion comique was followed by a juggler, who appeared in the guiseof a hotel waiter, and laid a table as if for breakfast. The tablearranged, he began to perform the most extraordinary tricks withthe things he had placed upon it Eggs, egg-cups, teapot, cream-jug, sugar-basin, breakfast bacon, loaf, bread-trencher, table-napkins, plates, knives, forks, and spoons spouted in a fountain from his hands. They seemed to be thrown into the air at random, and the man dartedhither and thither about the stage to catch them. Then he was back atthe table again amidst a storm of crockeryware, cutlery, and provisions, and each article as it descended was caught with an astonishingdexterity and set in its proper place with a swift exactness whichlooked like magic. The artist had a perfect aplomb, and he put offthe catching of each article till the last fraction of the inevitablesecond, so that he seemed secure in perfect triumph and yet on the edgeof instant failure. The house howled with excited laughter and applause, and Paul roared as loud as any. He was as sober as a judge so far asbalance of body and clearness of speech and thought were concerned, butthe wine was in his blood. He stamped, clapped hands, and shouted untilthe performer left the stage, and had twice returned and bowed He feltthat the applause would not cease until he ceased to lead it. 

'That's better, eh?' said the man at Paul's side when the tumult wasover. 

'Yes, by Jingo!' said Paul 'It _was_ better. Look here, I'm afraid I wasrather rude to you a little while ago. Come and have a drink with me. '

'With all the pleasure in life, ' the stranger answered. 

They rose and pushed their way to the bar together. The stranger wouldlike a brandy-and-soda. Paul would take a brandy-and-soda. They talked, and Paul thought his chance-found companion a remarkably agreeablefellow. He seemed to have been everywhere. He spoke familiarly of manyEuropean countries and of the United States. But somehow he faded awayin a sort of mist, and Paul's last remembrance of him was that he waslaughingly pulling at his arm and advising him to go home. He seemed tobe blotted out suddenly in that very act. 

The Exile flashed back from his memories to himself, and awoke with afaint, gasping cry, for his mind had led him to the hour of the lostinnocence. There are thousands on thousands of men who have lived purerlives than he who would yet deride the shaft which struck him, and laughto think of its poignant power to wound. For the pure soul in the frailbody, for the high hope and the will of burned cord, for the passionwhich hurries the senses and has no power to blind the conscience, thereis a lasting purgatory open. How many a time since that hour of loss hehad groaned in the silence of the night to think of it, and had takenhis pillow in his teeth! To live the purer for the shame which bit sodeep and keen? Ah, no; to overlay it with new shames, to groan over innew vigils. 

Easy for the callous good, who know neither sin nor virtue in extremes, who live somewhere about the level of a passable rectitude, and neithersink nor soar far from it--easy for them to dismiss this bitter truthfor a mere sentimentalism; but there _is_ a virginity of the soul whichevil custom cannot deflower. Woe to him who knows it, the chaste in wishand the unchaste in act, the rogue who values honour, the poltroon whowould fain be brave! Ah, the goat-hoofed Satyr dancing there, drunk andleering, goatish in odour, unwashed and foul! Is it I? Is it I? And theanguished angel who weeps to look upon him. Is it I? Woe, woe is me, forI am each and both of these!

Oh, goat-hoofed devil in man, and buffeted aspirant soul! Oh, divineGod-man, who art myself, and whom I with my own hands do hourly crucify, whom I do scourge and crown with thorns and spit upon!

Shall a man think thus but once only--shall he feed this burning ironin his breast but one sole time, and then go gaily afield in searchof fresh agonies? Even so, and not once again only, but his lifetimethrough. This is why it is written that though you bray a fool in amortar among bruised wheat with a pestle, yet will not his folly departfrom him. 

Bowed earthward, with garments that stink of rain-soaked dye dryingin the sunshine, with swollen features and boots that suck at theflagstones, bristled and bloated and bleared, I go by you. Had I nevera concupiscence for honour? Is there no Christ-half that walks within metowards the place of rottenness and dead men's bones?

Back to the vision again, not merely remembering, but living it all. 

Sick nausea, rising faintly yet heavily on the senses, swimming upward, as it were, along with a half-drowned rebeginning of life and thecognizance of things; deep loathing, and eyes like new-cast musket-ballsfor heat and weight; a frowsy air; a mouth like burned leather linedwith vile odours. Forget it all in a mere instinct of distaste. Sinkdown with the sick wave. Swim down the sick wave in floating circles. Sway here and swing there at the bottom of the whirlpool, and up againtowards the light which heaves slowly on the eye as it used to do atthe upward turn after a dive, when the sunlight shone through the yellowwater of the lock. Then on a sudden--daylight; and then, like a burstingshell on the brain, the truth. 

No use for the incredulous oath that the truth is false. 

'My God! it isn't--it can't be!'

It can be--and it is. It _has_ been, and no mere episode of an eternitywill wipe it out or can undo it There is the dirty blind torn away fromone corner of the roller; there is the peeling paper on the wall, andthe wall leprous where the paper has fallen away from it. Here, underhis cheek, is the yellow malodorous pillow. 

The sick brain cannot think; the foul mouth seems to taste of his ownsoiled soul. 

And the woman, when he turns his leaden head, lying there, flushed--agirl of the bestial-handsome sort, with a smear of wet black hair on herbrow, and a sensuous mouth, spurting breath like the lips of a swimmerhalf under water. 

Out of this--anywhere. Feverish haste in dressing. Robbed, too--penniless. 

What does that matter?

It matters greatly, it would seem, for here is a hulking, pock-markedvillain demanding money, and a shrieking, night-gowned virago haulingthe fugitive back up the stairs with obscenities which match the placeand himself and her. 

Then a flash in the heart, as if Hell's flame of shame and Heaven'slightning of righteous wrath lit it together. The pock-marked rascal islying quiet on the ruddled bricks at the foot of the stairs. The woman'sVoice curses until the corner is turned. A door slams. He is hatless andunwashed and dishevelled, standing in the Blackfriars Road. 

Never to be forgotten the taste of the morning river air; never to beforgotten the grain of the stone on which his elbows leaned, or thetawny coil of the waters below him; never to be forgotten the purpledome and dark cross of Paul's, with its edge of gold on one side and therosy east away and away beyond it. 

His thoughts were the gasps of a devil's agony. He felt in gushes, likethe welling of heart's blood. His soul clamoured 'Beast, beast, beast!'at him; 'how dare you foul my dwelling-place!'

A warm trickle on his left hand, which had some dim associations ofphysical pain, bade him look at it; there was a yellow splinter of toothsticking there. He warmed to think he had struck home, and then chilledas he asked: 'Wasn't the poor devil at his proper trade?' He pulled outthe jagged splinter, and bound the wound with his handkerchief. 

To be twenty hours younger! To be only ten hours younger!

Ting, ting, clang, clang 'Ting, ting, dang, clang! Ting, ting, clang, clang! Ting, ting, clang, clang! The bells of the clock-tower atWestminster. He made a fool's rhyme to them:

'Down--In--my--home--'neath---the--clear--sky--No--thing--they--know--and--naught--care--I. '

The big bell said 'Doom 'eight times. 

'Doom' the big bell seemed to say a ninth time, sweet and far. TheDreamer started, awoke, and knew his surroundings again. The ninth soundwas the deep call of an engine whistle, rolled on river and rock andforest, and mellowed on many miles of smoky air. He sat with his chin onhis hands, his heart yet tingling. 

'Was that how it happened, Paul?

In his soul the question sounded, not in his ear. He answered the voicewith a sighing 'Yes, ' and then looked up and wondered. 

'Dad, ' he said aloud, 'am I making confession? Do you follow thesememories? Have I only to glass things in my mind for you to see them?'

He waited in a sudden awe. He would make no answer of his own; he wouldlend the aid of no obscure mechanism of the brain to any tricking ofhimself. No answer came, and he sat disheartened, staring at the onevisible hill which peered like a shadow from the other shadows in themidst of which he dwelt. 

A minute later he was ten years forward. He was seated in thesmoking-room of the Victoria Hotel at Euston, and he and Ralston werealone. Ralston was talking. 

'The soul, ' he said, 'makes experiments. It writes its notes on thebody, and, having learned its own lesson, it throws the paper away. Welose to learn value. We shall know better next time. We have to sampleour cargo, and we waste most of it, but we shall be refound for the nextvoayge. Bless God for an open-air penitence, but let us have no foul airof the cloister to turn repentance sour. So big a thing as the soul canafford to forgive so small a thing as the body. '

'After divorce, perhaps, ' said Paul; and fell to his dream again. 

CHAPTER VIII

The damp, river-scented earth slipped under his feet. The blare of asteam clarion, and the bang of a steam-driven drum, sounded, and thenaphtha lamps of the merry-go-round and the circus gleamed throughthe fog. The infernal noise jigged on his brain-pan as if every flyingcrotchet and quaver stamped like the hoof of a little devil in thesurface of his brain. The smell of the lamps was in his nostrils, andwith it odours of tar and stables and orange-peel. 

Six-and-thirty hours had gone by since he had turned his back onBlackfriars Bridge. It was more than fifty hours since he had tastedfood, and he had spent two days and a night in the open in fog andrain. He had been hungry, but the pangs of hunger had passed, and he wasconscious of little but a cold nausea. He drew towards the light and themusic mechanically. In front of him, illuminated by flaring lamps (whichsparkled, he thought, as an apple of Sodom might have done when newlycut), was a placard fixed in an iron frame, with clamps which piercedthe turf. 'One night only in Reading, ' said the placard. Until then hehad not known his whereabouts. 

There was no more custom for the merry-go-round, and its noisy organceased to play. He could hear the band within the circus now, the dullthud of hoofs on sawdusted earth, and the crack of a whip. A mirthlessvoice, with an intention of mirth in it, said, 'Look out! Catch her!She'll tumble!' A laugh spouted up from the spectators within, and washalf smothered by the canvas of the show. Not far from him was a slitin the canvas wall, with a pale yellow spirit of light in it. A man cameinto the gleam. 

'Now, where, ' the man asked, in a voice of anger, 'is that boy?

The voice of some invisible person responded in an alternation between ahoarse bass and a shrill falsetto:

'Perchance he wanders with the paling moon, where Delos' tower awaitsthe lagging dawn, which fronts not yet her summit, or perchance----'

'Oh, go to 'ell!' said the voice that had first spoken. 'Where _is_ thatboy?'

'You might, ' began the invisible person, in a cracked soprano, andconcluded in a tone three octaves lower, 'have let me finish. '

'Let you finish!' said the other. 'Would you finish? _Can_ you finish?He stood comically silhouetted--a balloon propped by two monstroussausages and topped by a football. 'Billy, ' he said, in a grave voice, after a minute's pause, 'where is that boy? Miriam can't do three turns. If Pauer isn't here in five minutes, the fat's in the fire. '

'Well, ' said the falsetto voice, 'why don't you'--the hoarse bassocarried on the phrase--'send somebody else?'

'Who am I to send? asked the man in view. 'I'd give five bob, ' he added, 'to get him here. '

'Tell me where he is, ' said Paul, 'and I'll get him for half the money, if I have to carry him. '

The man to whom he spoke turned round and stared at him. 

'Who are you?' he asked. 

'A hungry vagabond, ' said Paul, 'willing to earn a meal. '

'Do you know the town?'

'No; I'm a stranger. '

'That, ' said the fat man, pointing, 'leads to the gate. Turn to theright, run three hundred yards, and there's a pub on the left. You can'tmistake it. Tell Herr Pauer he's waited for. Sixpence if you're smart. '

'Shilling!' said Paul, half on the run already. The fat man hung fire. 'Shilling!' said Paul again. 

'Shilling if he's here in ten minutes, ' said the other. 

Paul ran. The fatigue which had weighed upon his limbs seemed gone. Oncefree of the clogging and slippery mire which had been wrought out of thewet turf by many travelling feet, he raced along the firm high-road athis best speed. He made a leap into the entrance-hall of the house whichhad been indicated to him, and narrowly escaped collision with a man whowas moving smartly towards the street. 

'Hillo!' said the man, slipping nimbly on one side, and staring at himas he suddenly arrested himself. 

'Hillo!' said Paul. He was face to face with the jaundiced man ofSaturday. 'Are you Herr Pauer?

He was guided to the question by the man's attire. He was in some sortof circus uniform, and in act to button a huge shaggy overcoat above it. 

'That's my name, ' said the other. 'What brings you here?'

'You're wanted at the circus, ' Paul answered, flushing and turning paleagain. 

'All right, ' said Herr Pauer, 'I'm going there. But what is up with you, my young friend?'

'Nothing much, ' Paul answered. 

'No?' said Herr Pauer, buttoning himself from throat to toes, andlooking at him with a glittering eye. 'I should have thought quitedifferently. Come along with me. '

Paul hung back, but he remembered the earned shilling. There was asmell of cooking in the house, and he was suddenly ravenous at themere thought of food. The two turned into the road together, and walkedsmartly side by side. They reached the circus, and Herr Pauer motionedto Paul to enter. 

'Come in, ' he said, seeing that the youngster lingered. 

Paul obeyed again, and was ushered into a small turfy space boxed inwith canvas. A few loose boards were laid upon the ground by way offlooring. There was a table at one side, on which lay a small circularshaving mirror, a comb, a stick of cosmetic, and two open pots ofporcelain, the larger one containing chalk, and the smaller half-filledwith rouge. 

'Three minutes, ' said the fat man, thrusting his head round the canvaspartition; 'and short at that. '

'All right, ' returned Herr Pauer. 

He unbuttoned the overcoat, and let it slip to the ground, drew offa huge pair of rubber boots, and stood revealed in buckled pumps andstockings, silk breeches, a white waistcoat with gilt buttons, and acut-away coat of light-blue cloth slashed with gold braid. He dipped hisfingers in the powdered chalk, and rubbed his face, looking hard at Paulmeanwhile, and growing ghastlier every second as the white obscuredthe yellow of his face. He stooped to the fallen overcoat, took an oldhare's-foot from one of his pockets, and, dipping it in the rouge-pot, took the shaving-glass in hand, and, with many facial contortions, pursued his toilet, looking from his own reflection to Paul's face andback again with swift alternation. He pinched a bit of the cosmeticbetween thumb and finger, and dressed his eyelashes with it. Then hecarefully drew an arched eyebrow, and paused to look at Paul again. The single brow gave him a comically elfin look, and Paul grinned; HerrPauer drew another eyebrow, touched up his moustache, obliterated thegray upon his temples, and combed and twisted moustache and hair to hisown satisfaction. Then he sat down on the table, and looked once moreat his companion. Paul looked back at him, but felt his very eyeballsredden. The band beyond the screen played louder and louder. Then therecame a great roar of applause, and Herr Pauer, keeping an eye on Paultill the last instant, walked away. 

The fat man entered a minute later. 

'The governor says you are to go inside, ' he said, 'and wait till histurn's over. Here's your bob, anyhow. A bargain's a bargain, ain't it?'

Paul accepted the proffered shilling, and slipped it into his pocket. Then he accompanied his guide, who pushed him through a labyrinth ofprops and stays, above which were ranged benches for the accommodationof the audience. They reached a spot from which they could see thewhole space of the ring through a break between the benches. The fat manstruck Paul as having somehow the look of keeping him in custody. ButHerr Pauer appeared in the circle, and he forgot to think about thatfancy. He wondered what his curiously-encountered chance-acquaintancewas going to do. He had not long to wait, for two men in livery came onwith a table, arranged in all respects as the conjurer's table had beenarranged in the music-hall on Saturday night, and Herr Pauer proceededto play precisely the tricks the conjurer had played. He was just asadroit and swift and' agile as the original, and the audience stampedand laughed and shouted. 

'Ah, ' the fat man breathed in Paul's ear, 'the governor hasn't been awaya month for nothing. '

Paul turned, but his custodian seemed unconscious of him. Theperformance reached an end amidst a hurricane of applause, and HerrPauer came back several times to bow his acknowledgments. The fat manseemed to wake, and, with a hand on Paul's shoulder, pushed him backamongst the props and stays until they reached the canvas room again. Somebody had placed a ragged cane-seated chair near the table, and HerrPauer, who was already waiting, motioned his visitor into it. He seatedhimself on the table, with one trim leg swinging to and fro, and lit acigar. 

'Now, ' he said, rolling a cloud of smoke from his lips, 'what have yourun away from?'

'I haven't run away from anything, ' said Paul. 

'Ah, well! we shall see about that. When I saw you on Saturday nightyou were flush of money. Now--so my man tells me--you call yourselfa starving vagabond, and you run errands for a shilling. You are wetthrough, and you are mud all over. You have no hat, my young friend. Youmay just as well make a clean breast of it. '

'I've nothing to make a clean breast of, ' Paul answered sullenly. 

'Oh yes, you have, ' said Herr Pauer. 'You were very tipsy on Saturdaynight. Were you ever tipsy before?'

'No, 'said Paul. 

'You had money, ' said Herr Pauer. 'Was it your own?'

'Yes. '

The answer was defiant and angry. 

'To do as you liked with? Didn't you owe any of it?

'I owed something. '

'Got tipsy. Got cleared out. Hadn't the pluck to go home. That about thesize of it?'

'Yes, ' said Paul, 'that's about the size of it. '

'No hat, ' Herr Pauer went on comfortably. 'Out all night. Sundaymorning. Empty pockets. Religious landlady. '

'How do you know?' Paul asked. 

'You told me about the landlady. The rest is easy enough. What are yougoing to do?'

'I don't know. I haven't thought about it. '

'You are a shiftless young devil, I must say. Doesn't it occur to you tothink you _are_ a shiftless young devil--eh?'

'I think it does, ' said Paul with extreme inward bitterness, 'now thatyou come to mention it. '

'Come now, ' said Herr Pauer, shifting his seat on the table and turningto face the lad, 'you shall not take that tone. I tell you you shall nottake it, because it is a wrong and dangerous tone. You have done thingsthat you are ashamed of. You shall have the goodness to be ashamed ofthem like a man, and not like a fool. Now, what are you going to do?'

'I can earn a living, ' Paul answered. 'I've got a trade between myfingers. '

'What is it?'

'I'm a compositor. I can do a man's work, if I can only earn two-thirdsof a man's wages. '

'That is all very well. But it's not quite what I mean. You have ahome?'

Paul laid his face in his hands and groaned. He was so ashamed at thisthat he had no courage to undo his own act. He sat with his face stillhidden. 

'You will go straight home to-morrow, ' said Herr Pauer, rising from thetable. The culprit shook his head. 'Tomorrow, ' Herr Pauer reiterated. The culprit shook his head again. 'They will kill the fatted calf, ' saidHerr Pauer. 

'Oh, no, they won't, ' said Paul

His father might be moved to do it, but not the rest. Oh, no, not therest. And on the whole he would rather not have the fatted calf. Hewould prefer any desolation to forgiveness. Forgiveness must be precededby knowledge, and the thought of that was unendurable. 

'Do you reckon, ' asked Herr Pauer, 'that you are ever going to see yourfolks again?'

Paul said nothing, and the circus proprietor moved back to his seaton the table. The circus band played close by, and at times the peoplecheered But in the little canvas box of a room there was silence for along while Before it was broken the fat man came with a message. 

'Poor Gill's no use to-night, governor; his ankle's worse than ever. '

'All right, ' said Herr Pauer. 'I'll take an extra turn. Tell me when I'mwanted. '

'Saltanelli's off in a minute'

'I'll follow. '

The fat man withdrew, and Herr Pauer, having carefully balanced thestump of his cigar on the edge of the table, went after him. Paul waitedfor half a minute, and then stole out The fat man faced him. 

'Where are you going to?'

'What business is that of yours?' Paul asked

'Governor's orders was you was to stop till he came back again. '

'Suppose I refuse to stop?'

'You can make a row if you like, ' the fat man said wheezingly; 'but thegovernor's orders is the governor's orders. The governor says, "Keepthat young chap till I come back again. " There's plenty here to do it. '

'Very well, ' said Paul, noticing half-a-dozen loungers in the canvaspassage. 

He went back and took his former place The savage appetite he had felthalf an hour earlier had gone, and the empty nausea was back again. Hehad not heart enough left to care for anything. When the owner of thetent returned he brought a black bottle in his hand, and one of theliveried men came in behind him with a jug and glasses. 

'I take one between turns, ' said Herr Pauer--'never more One is apick-me-up. Anything more than one is wrong. ' He poured a stiff doseof rum into either glass, and looking towards Paul, water-jug in hand, said, 'Say when. '

'None for me, ' Paul answered. 'I never touched the cursed stuff tillSaturday. I'll never touch it again. '

'Nonsense!' his companion answered, filling up the glass and pushing ittowards him. 'Your teeth are chattering. Do you think because you havebeen a fool in one way that you have a right to be a fool in another?'

Paul sipped and shuddered, but in a second or two--no more--a faintsense of returning warmth stole through him. He sipped again, and thefaint glow grew stronger. He took a pull which half emptied the tumbler, and the spirit made him cough and brought the tears to his eyes; but hefelt his numbed limbs again. Pauer had relit the stump of his cigar andtaken his old place on the table. 

'It's not any part of my usual life-business, 'he said, 'to do what I amdoing now, but I like odd things, and it is an odd thing that I shouldmeet you here. Besides that, I have been a fool in my time, and afellow-feeling makes us kind. I shall put you up to-night, becauseyou're a decent young chap, and a greenhorn. You shall have your clothesdried and brushed, and you shall be made decent to look at; and youshall get a hat, and in the morning you shall go home. '

'You're very kind, ' said Paul, 'but I'm not going to take your help onfalse pretences. I shan't go home. '

'I will chance that, ' said Herr Pauer. 'Finish your drink and put thatcoat on. You're shivering again. '

Paul obeyed sleepily. Herr Pauer drew a penknife from his pocket andimpaled the last inch of his cigar with it. He sat puffing there, andsat looking at his guest, or prisoner, and Paul looked at him drowsilyin turn until Herr Pauer's head seemed to swell and fill the canvasbox. The noise of the band came in gushes, as if his ears were now underwater and now clear of it The head went on swelling, and the sound ofthe music grew fainter. He was deliciously warm, and he had a feeling ofbeing lifted and gently balanced to and fro as if he were in a hammock. After this he forgot everything until he felt Pauer's hand on hisshoulder, and started broad awake, with a clear sense that the spacesclose at hand which had been so crammed with life a little while agowere all dark and deserted. 

'Time to go, ' said Pauer. 'No, never mind the coat. '

Paul was struggling out of it. 'I have another. ' He held his arms abroadto show that he was already provided, and the lad rose to his feet 'Takethis, ' said Pauer, fixing a rough unlined cap upon his head with bothhands. 'It will look less odd, and it's better than nothing. ' Heturned out the lamp to its last spark, and then with a puff of breathextinguished it altogether. 'Tu m'attends, George?' he called tosomebody outside. 

'Che d'addends, ' said a voice at a little distance; and Paul, guided byPauer's hand upon his arm, groped his way towards it. 

In the pale light outside the tent, the fog having cleared away, and athin strip of moon hanging over the river, Paul dimly discerned a stout, broad-shouldered man of brief stature, who was half buried in a big furovercoat An eyeglass shone faintly beneath the brim of his silk hatThe three made their way across the slippery field, and on to the firmhigh-road. They reached the inn to which Paul had run as a messenger alittle while ago, and Pauer led the way to an upstair room where supperwas laid, and a bright fire was blazing on the hearth. The guest neededno second invitation to be seated, but he made a poor meal, in spiteof the best intentions. His companions disregarded him for a time, andspoke in a language he did not understand. He tried to disconnect andisolate their words, but they all seemed to run together. He fanciedthat Pauer talked in one tongue and his friend in another, but he knewlater that this was a mere question of accent. When Paul was growingsleepy again the man with the eyeglass spoke in English. 

'Ask him, then. '

'My friend here, ' said Pauer, 'Mr. George Darco, wants a smart, handyyoungster. If you can give us a satisfactory account of how you cameinto your present condition, he will find you employment. '

Paul looked from one to the other, and both men regarded him seriously. He blushed furiously, and his eyes fell. 

'I suppose, ' said Pauer, 'that you don't remember much of what you saidto me on Saturday night?

'I don't know, ' Paul answered. 

'Do you remember that I told you I was going with my show to CastleBarfield?

'No, ' said Paul. 

'Do you remember writing your father's address in my pocket-book, andtelling me that he would do my printing for nothing if I told him I wasa friend of yours?'

'No, ' said Paul again. 'I didn't know I was so bad as that. '

'Do you remember a long screed you gave me about manly purity?'

'No, ' said Paul once more. His voice would barely obey him. 

'You went off in tow with that young woman. Do you remember that?'

'I know I did. I don't remember it. '

'She cleared you out, I suppose?' 'Yes. '

'And you were ashamed to go home? You hadn't money to pay your landlady?

'It wasn't that. '

'What was it, then?

'For God's sake don't ask me! I can't bear to think of it. 

And then it all came out in an incoherent burst, through savagely chokedtears. He had lost his honour. He was lowered in his own eyes. He wouldnever be able to respect himself again. The two men stared at all this, wondering what lay behind it, until on a sudden the enigma becameclear to both of them. The man with the eyeglass laughed like a horse, whinnying and neighing in mirth unrestrainable. Paul blundered blindlyat the door, but Pauer stepped nimbly and set his back against it. 

'You young idiot!' he said in a friendly voice, which had a littlequiver in it which was not inspired by merriment. 

Mr. George Darco continued to laugh until he rolled from his chair tothe floor. He rose gasping and weeping. 

'Oh, ' he said, 'vos there efer any think so vunny? Oh, somepoty holt me. I shall tie of it. '

He recovered slowly, and seeing how deeply his laughter wounded theobject of it, he tried to look solemn, but broke out again. Pauer spokesharply to him in the foreign tongue he had used before, and he subduedhimself. 

'Go back to your chair and sit down, ' said Pauer, laying a hand onPaul's shoulder. 'Don't make mountains out of molehills. '

The lad allowed himself to be pushed into a seat

'It's all very well for you, you glass-eyed old reprobate, ' said Pauer, speaking in English. 'I can understand the boy if you can't. '

'You!' gasped Darco, with a new spurt of laughter. 'You!'

'Yes, ' said Pauer, 'I. ' His tone was angry, and his friend, after ahumorous glance at him, poured out a glass of beer and drank it, butsaid no more. 'Stay there till I come back, said Pauer a minute or solater. 'I'll be back in a jiffy. '

Darco made a renewed onslaught on the cold boiled beef, as if hehad been famishing. Paul sat still and stared at the fire. He was acompendium of shames, and whether he were more ashamed of his crime orhis confession he could not tell. Pauer came back, accompanied by a manwho looked like a hostler. The man carried a lighted candle and chewedthoughtfully at a straw. 

'You'd better go to bed now, ' said Pauer. 'This man will show you theway. When you're undressed, give him your clothes, and he'll have themdried and brushed for you by morning. '

Paul obeyed, and when he had handed over his clothes to the hostler'scare he went to bed, and listened for awhile to the murmuring voices ofPauer and Darco, who were now immediately beneath him. His last resolvebefore he went to sleep was that in the morning he would go into thetown and try to find work at his own trade; but he had begun to learnthat he was born to drift, and he drifted. His clothes were brought tohim clean and dry, and he turned the false cuffs and the collar he wore, so that he made himself in his own way sufficiently presentable, andjust as he had finished dressing Pauer came into his room. There was aplentiful breakfast downstairs, and it was of a better quality than theaspect of the house might have seemed to warrant Paul did fall justiceto it, and when the cloth was cleared Darco laid writing materials onthe table. He said that his sight was failing, and that he had beenadvised to rest his eyes as much as possible. He would be obliged ifPaul would write a letter for him from dictation. He dictated a lengthybusiness letter setting forth the terms on which he was willing toaccept the management of a theatrical provincial tour, and when it wasfinished he asked Pauer to read it. 

'That's all right, ' said Pauer. 'Good legible fist. Well spelled. Punctuation and capitals all right. '

'Ferry well, ' said Darco. 'If the younk man wants a chop, I can give himone. Dwenty shillings a veek, and meals at the mittle of the tay. '

'What is the work?' Paul asked. 

'To be my brivate zecretary, ' said Darco, 'and to dravel with me throughthe gountry. '

'When am I to begin?'

'Now, ' said Darco. 

Paul sat down at the table, and his new employer dictated a great numberof letters to him, all offering engagements to ladies and gentlemen, atsalaries ranging from one pound to four pounds ten. 

'What's all that for, George?' asked Pauer, who was sitting idly smokingby the fire. 

'That is for Golding, ' Darco announced. 'Younk Evans takes themanagement, but I haf the gontrol. '

'Getting your hands pretty full, ain't you, George?'

'Ah!' said Darco. 'Vait till I get my London theatre. I should haf beenin London lonk ako if it had not been for Barton. He gild the boots thatlace the golden legs. '

'What did he do?' asked Pauer. 

'Gild the boots that lace the golden legs. '

'Killed the goose that lays the golden eggs, do you mean?'

'Man alife!' ejaculated Darco. 'I zaid zo. '

'You said distinctly, ' said Pauer, '"gild the boots that lace the goldenlegs. "'

'Ferry well, ' said Darco. 'I zay zo. Vot _are_ you talking apout?'

Pauer looked at his watch. 

'I must settle up and march, George, ' he said 'If you carry thatbusiness through, let me know. I'm willing to join. '

He followed his circus, which, as Paul gathered, had made a start atfive o'clock that morning, and Darco and his new secretary took trainfor London. The two had a second-class carriage to themselves. 

'You haf lodgings somevares--eh? Darco asked. 

'In Charterhouse Square, 'Paul answered. 

'That is too far away, ' said his employer. 'I lif at Hamp-stead. Youmust get lotchings glose by me. You haf got no money?'

'No money, ' said Paul. 

'That is a vife-bound node, ' said Darco. 'Co to your lotchings and bayyour pill. I shall stop it out of your zalery. Then you will gome to meat this attress. ' He gave minute directions about omnibuses green andred and yellow, and all these Paul stored away in his memory as well ashe could. 'Now, berhabs, ' said his employer, 'you think I am a vool togif you a vife-bound node. But if you are not honest I shall be rit ofyou jeaply, and I shall know at vonce. '

Paul fired a little at this. 

'If you don't think I am to be trusted you had better not employ me. '

'That is all right, ' said Darco. 'I am Cheorge Dargo. I do things my ownvay. Look here. Are you vond of imidading beobles?'

'No, ' said Paul; 'not that I know of. '

'Don't pegin on me, ' said Darco. 'There is everypody thinks he ganimidade me. All the beobles in all my gombanies dry it on. But bevoreyou can imidade a man he must haf zome beguliaridies. Now, I hafen't gotany beguliaridies, and zo it's no good drying to imidade me. '

They parted at the London terminus. Paul made his way to CharterhouseSquare, where he was received with marked disfavour. He paid his bill, packed his trunk--a small affair which he could shoulder easily--and setput for Darco's house. It was a little house, but it stood by itselfin a very trim garden, and it was furnished in a style which made Paulgasp. He had been very poorly bred, and he had never had access to sucha place in all his life before. The bevelled Venetian mirrors intheir gilded frames, the rose-coloured blinds, the rich brocades andglittering gilding of the chairs, the Chinese dragons in porcelain, thevery tongs and poker and fire-shovel of cut brass, astonished him. Hethought that his employer must be a Croesus. This faith was confirmedwhen he was called into the library, where there was a wealth of books, nobly bound. 

'That gollection, ' said Darco, 'gost me two thousand bounds. I am stilladding to it. Here is an original Bigvig, the Bigvig of Jarles Tickens, with all the green covers bound with it up. Here is "Ton Quigsotte, "the first etition in Sbanish. Here is the "Dreacle Piple, " berfect, fromtidel page to the last line of Revelations. Here is efery blay-pillthat has ever been issued at Her Majesty's Theatre from the time it vasopened until now. ' He patted and fondled his treasure with a smilingpride and affection. 'They are not to be touched, ' he said, 'on anybretext. Nopoty stobs in my house a minute who touches my books. I amCheorge Dargo, ant ven I zay a thing I mean it' He pointed to a door. 'Through that, ' he said, 'is a lafadory. You can vash your hands andgome and haf lunge. '

Paul obeyed, and at the luncheon-table was introduced to Mrs. Darco, alean brunette, who by way of establishing her own dignity was sulkilydisdainful of the newcomer. He was glad to escape into the library, where Darco set him to work on more correspondence--an endless whirl ofit, diversified with family skirmishes. 

'Now, who the tevil has been mettling again with my babers? I haf dolteferybody I will not haf my babers mettled. ' Then a dash to the door, and an inquiry trumpeted up the stairway. 'Who the tevil has beenmettling with my babers?'

Then a shrill inquiry from above. 

'What's the matter, George?'

'Nothings. I know where I but it now. I will not haf my babers mettled. '

Then more dictation, the dictator waddling fiercely across the room andback again for ten minutes or so. Then a rush to the door, and a newcall upstairs. 

'Who the tevil---- Oh, it's all right I remember where

I put it. '

Then more dictation, and a third rush. 

'Who the tevil----'

Then a hurricane of whirling skirts upon the stairs, and on a suddenMrs. Darco, kneeling on the floor, wrestling both hands above her head, and shrieking. Mr. Darco darted and shook her as if she had been adoormat. 

'Get ub! No volly--no volly!'

Mrs. Darco got up and walked soberly upstairs. 

'It is klopulus hysteriga, ' said Mr. Darco, with a startling calm. 'Andthat is the only way to dreat it But I will not haf my babers mettled. '

Then more dictation, until Paul's mind was crossed by a suddenrecollection. 

'I beg your pardon, sir, ' he said, diving his hand into his pocket. 'Iforgot to give you the change out of that five-pound note. '

'Keep it, ' said Darco. 'You will haf to look resbegdable if you stayhere. You will haf to puy things. '

'I don't like to take it, sir, until I have earned it. '

'Now, ' said Darco, 'who do you subbose you are? If you want to stobhere, you will do as you are dold to do. I am Cheorge Dargo. I do notsbeak to beobles dwice. '

'Oh, very well, sir, ' said Paul, and went on writing from dictation. 

'Now, 'said Darco, 'you haf got all the attresses at the foot of theledders. Attress an envelope for each ledder, and leave them all obenfor my signature. I am going to zleep for half an hour. '

He plunged into an armchair, closed his eyes, and in a minute he wassnoring regularly and deeply. Paul performed his task, and sat idle fora time. At the end of the stipulated half-hour Darco ceased to snore, opened his eyes, yawned and stretched as if he longed to fall in pieces, and instantly fell to work again. He made Paul read aloud the wholeafternoon's correspondence, signed each sheet in a hand of clerk-likeprecision, but with a great deal more than clerk-like character in it, saw all the letters and envelopes stamped, rang the bell, and sent hiscorrespondence to the post. 

'Ant now, ' he said, 'I haf got to pekin my day's work. ' Paul stared alittle, but made no answer. 'You had petter gome with me, ' said Darco. 'It will help you to learn your business. '

Paul assisted his employer into the big fur coat, assumed his own andthe shabby cap Pauer had given him, and went out at Darco's heels. Aclosed brougham waited in the street. They entered and were driven away. 

It was nearing six o'clock by this time, and as they were drivendownhill they came into a stratum of cold yellow fog, through which thegas-lamps stared with a bleared and drunken look. The vehicle rumbledalong for some three-quarters of an hour, and pulled up in a shabbyside-way strewn with cabbage-leaves and all manner of decaying vegetableoffal Darco rolled out of the brougham, and plunged with a waddlingswiftness into a narrow, ill-lit passage which smelt of escaping gas. Paul followed, and in half a minute found himself for the first timewithin the walls of a theatre and on the stage. The darkened auditoriumloomed beyond the solitary T-bracket like a great sepulchre. A hundredpeople, more or less, were gathered on the stage. 

'Act dwo!' roared Darco at the moment of his entrance. 'Glear for Actdwo. ' People began to dribble into the outlying darkness. 'Do you hear?'he stormed, clapping his hands together. 'Glear for Act dwo. Look here, ladies and chentlemen, I am Cheorge Dargo. I do not zay to anypotytwice. '

From the moment when he gripped the idea that this was a rehearsalthe place was a fairyland to Paul. Darco stormed round, correctingeverybody, acted for everybody, and a little man, who was barricadedbehind an enormous moustache, and seemed to be second in command, echoedthe chief's commands plaintively:

'Oh I say, now, why don't you? You got that cross marked down lastnight. '

'You're Binda, are you?' said Darco, addressing one pale and tremblingyoung woman who had just tried an entrance. 'Veil, now, look here. Idon't sbeak to beobles twice. Binda is a light, high-sbirited kirl Sheis all light and laughder and nonsense. See? She gums hob, skib, andchump. Like this. '

He waddled furiously to the wing and made the entrance. He wasludicrous, he was grotesque, but somehow he conveyed the idea he desiredto convey. The girl tried again, but failed to satisfy him. 

'Vere do you garry your prains?' he asked. 'In your boods?'

The girl began to whimper, and the lieutenant took Darco by the sleeve. 

'Don't worry her to-night, governor, ' he said. 'She's a good littlesort, and her mother's dying. '

'Vy the tevil didn't you zay zo? demanded the manager. 'How am I toknow? Gif her a zovereign, ' he whispered, 'and ask her if she vantsanything--bort-wine or chellies. _You_ know. ' Then he turned, roaring:'Vere is Miss Lawrence's understudy? Zing, if you please, Miss Clewes. I never sbeak to beobles twice. You may go home, Miss Lawrence. DellVillips if you want anything, ant I'll zee to it. Vy the tevil don'tbeobles zay when there are things the madder at home? Now, Miss Clewes. '

The lieutenant was back at Paul's elbow a minute later. 

'The governor's a hot un, ' he said--'he's a fair hot un when he's atwork. But for a heart--well, I'm damned if gold's in it with him!'

CHAPTER IX

In a month's time from this Paul's soul sat chuckling all day long. Helived with the quaintest set he had ever conceived, and there was nopage of 'Nickleby' which was fuller of comedy than a day of his ownlife. He met Crummies, and actually heard him wonder how those thingsgot into the papers. He met the Infant Phenomenon. With his own handshe had helped to adjust the immortal real pump and tubs. He was still inthe days when there was a farce in an evening's performance to play thepeople in, and a solid five-act melodrama for the public's solid fare, and a farce to play the people out. 

Darco travelled with his own company, majestically Astrachan-furredand splendid, but rarely clean-shaven. Nine days in ten an aggressivestubble on cheek and chin seemed to sprout from an inward sense of hisown glorious import. 

'I am Cheorge Dargo, ' he said unfailingly to every provincialstage-manager he met 'I nefer sbeaks to beobles twice. '

His brutalities of demeanour earned for him the noisy hatred of scoresof people. His hidden benefactions bought for him the silent blessingsof some suffering unit in every town. He bullied by instinct in public. He blessed the suffering by instinct in private. He was cursed byninety-nine in the hundred, and the odd man adored him. Paul's heartfastened to the uncouth man, and he did him burningly eager service. 

Paul was in clover, and had sense enough to know it. 

'I regognise the zymptoms, ' said Darco, when they had been on tour aweek. 'I am not going to haf my insbirations in the tay-dime any longer. All my crate iteas will gome to me now for some dime in the night. Youhaf got to be near me, young Armstrong. You must sday vith me in thezame lotchings. '

This meant that Darco paid his whole expenses, and that his salary cameto him each week intact. He began to save money and to develop at thesame time an inexpensive dandyism. He took to brown velveteen and topatent leather boots. He bought a secondhand watch at a pawnbroker's, but disdained a chain. His father had inspired him with a horror ofjewellery; for once, when he had spent the savings of a month upon acheap scarf-pin, the elder Armstrong had wrathfully asked him what hemeant by sticking that brass-headed nail in his chest, and had thrownthe gewgaw into the fire. But the watch for the first week or two was atoken of established manhood, and it was consulted a full hundred timesa day, and was corrected by every public clock he passed. 

His occupation was no sinecure, for Darco was running half-a-dozencompanies, and kept up a fire of correspondence with each. He had dramason the anvil, too, and dictated by the hour every day. Often he wokePaul in the dead of night, and routed him out of bed, and gave him notesof some prodigious idea which had just occurred to him. 

Darco had an unfailing formula with his landladies: 'Prek-fasd forthree, lunge for three, tinner for three; petrooms and zidding-room fortwo, ' He worked for three and ate for two. 

'I am in many respegs, ' he told Paul, 'a most remarkaple man. I am aboet, and a creat boet; but I haf no lankwage. My Vrench is Cherman, andmy Cherman is Vrench, ant my Enklish is Alsatian. My normal demperadureis fever heat. I am a toctor; I am a zoldier. I haf peen a creat agdorin garagder bards--Alsatian garagder bards--in Vrance and in Chermany. I can write a blay, ant I can stage id, ant I can baint the scenery forid. I am Cheorge Dargo, ant vere I haf not been it is nod vorth vile toco; and vot I do not know apout a theatre it is not vorth vile to learn. Sdob vith me, and I will deach you your business. '

The company played a week within five miles of Castle Barfield, andPaul snatched an hour for home. There the brown velveteen and the patentleathers and the watch made a great impression, and the eight sovereignsPaul was able to jingle in his pockets and display to wondering eyes. 

'There's danger in the life, lad, ' said Armstrong wistfully. 'I knowit, for I saw a heap of it in my youth. Keep a clean heart, Paul. Highthinking goes with chaste and sober living. There's nothing blurs faithlike our own misdeeds. '

Paul was thankful for the dusk which hid his flaming cheeks at thismoment. His mother had taken away the candle, and the old man had chosenthe instant's solitude for this one serious word. 

'I'm not denying, ' said Armstrong, 'that it is a good worldly positionfor a lad of your years, but what's it going to lead to, Paul, lad?What's the direction, I'm asking?

'I'm going to be a dramatist, ' said Paul. 

'A play-actor!' cried the mother, who was back again. 

'A play-writer, ' Paul corrected. 'I've got the best tutor in the world. '

'Do you mean to tell me, ' his mother asked, 'that you think o' makingthat a trade for a lifetime?'

'Why not? asked Pau. 

'Why not, indeed!' she cried, with an angry click of herknitting-needle. 'Writing a parcel o' rubbidge for fools to speak, andother fools to laugh at. '

'It was Shakespeare's trade, Mary, ' said Armstrong. 

'It's a pretty far cry from our Paul to Shakespeare, I reckon, ' said themother with sudden dryness. 

'I suppose it is, ' said Paul, laughing; 'but there are degrees in everycalling. Wait a bit I don't mean that you shall be ashamed of me. '

Paul had been away from home for half a year, and absence had alteredmany things. The High Street of the town had grown mean and sordid tothe eye. Shops which had once been palatial had lost all the glamourwhich childhood had given them and custom had preserved. The dusty, untidy shop at home had shrunk to less than half its originaldimensions. Armstrong seemed changed more than anything or anybodyelse. He looked suddenly small and old and gray. He was not much overfive-and-sixty, but he had always seemed old to Paul, even from theearliest recollections of infancy. But his age had been the age ofdignity and authority, and now it was age without disguise, white-hairedand withered, and bowed in uncomplaining patience. 

But Paul felt that there was no such change anywhere as in himself. Acertain complacency had stolen across the horror which had shaken himat the first contemplation of his own fall. He had made a step towardsmanhood; he heard the talk of men--not the best, not the wisest, yetneither the worst nor the most stupid--and he knew now how lightly theyvalued that which he had once esteemed priceless. He had written in hisnote-book:

'To forgive is godlike. Be as God unto thyself. '

He had made a step towards manhood. He had thought it a hideous, irremediable plunge to ruin, and yet somehow he seemed to stand thehigher for it. The episode was to be hateful for ever in memory. Butit was to cloud life no longer--only to stand as a sign of warning, a danger-signal. Surely the net is spread in vain in the sight of anybird. The burned child dreads the fire. He did not as yet reckon thatman is a moral Salamander, and accommodates himself to all temperaturesof heat and asceticism. How should a raw lad of less than nineteen thinkin such a fashion? But he knew what he had not known; he had passedthrough the fire, and the smell of burning had left his raiment. 

The Midland mother gave him a cold cheek to kiss when he went away, butthe Scottish father embraced him with a trembling arm. 

'Ye'll be remembering Sir Walter's last words to Lockhart, ' he said. 'Bea good man, my dear. '

Paul pressed his smooth cheek against the soft white whiskers of hisfather's face, and held his right hand hard. There was a lump in histhroat, and his good-bye had a husk in it. He went back to the societyof men who had never thought manly chastity a virtue or the unchastityof men a crime. He went back armed in steel, and the armour lasted afull fortnight in its perfection. Then here and there a rivet came out, and by-and-by the whole suit fell to pieces. 

'Id is gurious, ' said Darco, 'that all the vunniest sdories in the vorltshould be vhat they gall imbrober. Look at Arisdophanes; look at Jaucer;look at the "Gontes Troladigues"; look at the "Tegameron. "'

'Look at Pickwick, ' said Paul. 

'Vell!' cried Darco, 'look at Bigvig. Bigvig woult haf peen a creat tealvunnier if Tickens had lived at the dime of Zmollet. '

'I don't mind drinking out of a jug, ' said Paul, 'but I like a cleanjug. I've read Aristophanes--in translation. It's like drinking wine outof a gold cup that has been washed in a sewer. '

'Who says that?' asked Darco. 

'I do, ' said Paul. 

'It is a ferry coot ebicram, ' said Darco. 'I vill rememper id. But, mindt you, to be squeamish is not to be glean-minded. 

If a sdory is vunny, I laugh. Vy not? If a man tells me a sdory that isonly dirdy, I co someveres else. I am a goot man. For dwendy-three hoursand fifty-eight minutes in a tay I am as bure-minded as a child; then, in the ott dwo minutes somepoty tells me a dirdy sdory. I laugh, and Igo avay, and I think of my blays and my boedry and my pusiness. It iswater on a duck's pack. '

'Dirty water, ' said Paul. 

'There is enough glean water in the tay's rainfall to wash it off, 'Darco answered. 'Did you efer read "The Orichinal"?

'No, ' said Paul. 

'The man who wrote it vos so healthy that he nefer hat need to washhimself. His skin was too bure to hold dirt. '

'Filthy beggar!' said Paul. 

'I make it a baraple, ' Darco declared. 'Id is true of the immordal soul. I am as bure-minded as a child, and I haf heardt den thousand fillainoussdories. Vot does it madder?'

The rivets of Paul's armour rotted, as the rivets of most men's armourrot, and he grew to tolerate what had been abominable. And that is theway of life, which is a series of declensions from high ideals, and ismeant to be so because things must be lost before their worth can beknown. The society in which he lived and moved was as rich as any in theworld in the kind of narrative he had discussed with Darco. Little bylittle he got to take Darco's view. It is the view of ninety percent, of men of the world. A naturally pure mind never learns to lovenastiness, but it learns to tolerate it, for the sake of the wit whichsometimes lives with it. 

Darco was a man whom nobody ever saw for an instant under the influenceof liquor, but then it was impossible to make him drunk. It seemed toPaul as if it were just as unlikely for him to become intoxicated bydrinking as for a decanter to grow tipsy by having liquor pouredinto it. If he ate--as he did--twice as much as the average keen-setsportsman, he drank as much as the average hopeless drunkard, and no mancould have guessed from his speech, or acts, or aspect that he was nota total abstainer. Paul, too, began to discover that he had a cast-ironpot of a head, and took an infantile pride in the fact; but this kind ofvanity was not often indulged in, and he had no physical predispositionto it. 

Darco made money by the handful, and spent it with a lavish ostentation. Paul continued his habit of riding about in cabs and dining in hotels. It was a bad commercial training, but he was not at the time of life tothink of that. The days and nights were full. There were both labourand enjoyment in them. Every week showed him a new town or city: classicEdinburgh, dirty Glasgow--cleaner nowadays--roaring Liverpool, rainyManchester, smoke-clouded Birmingham and Sheffield, granite-builtAberdeen, jolly Dublin, with an unaccustomed twang in the whisky, afterthe Scottish progress; Belfast, Cork, Waterford. Everywhere characterstudies in shoals; dialect studies every day and all day long. Paulcould train his tongue, before the twelve months' tour was over, to thespeech of Exeter, or Norwich, or Brighton, or Newcastle, or Berwick, or Aberdeen, or Cork, or the black North. He set himself to the taskconscientiously, and with a rich enjoyment. What a Gargantuan table wasthe world!

How lovable, laughable, hateful were the men who sat at it! What a feastof feeling was spread daily!

The tour came near to its end, and Darco was arranging a new seriesfor half a dozen companies, so that work grew furious. A man mighthave commanded an army or ruled a great department of State withless expenditure of energy. There was no advertising or consulting ofagencies, but everything was done by personal letter. There were reamsand reams of letters; there were scores and scores of contractswith managers, and actors, and actresses, and upholsterers, andscene-painters, and printers, and bill-posters, and Darco one organizedmass of effort at the centre of all the business hurly-burly, doingthree men's work, and tearing into fibre the nerves of all men who camenear him. He could be princely with it all in his own way. 

'You haf learned your pusiness, young Armstrong, ' he said to Paul whenthe rush was over. 'I gan deach anypoty his pusiness if he is not avool. I am Cheorge Dargo. You haf done your work gabidally, and you arevorth fife dimes vot I am baying you. But I alvays like the shady siteof a pargain, and I shall only gif you four dimes. '

So at four times the original sum Paul's salary was fixed, and he beganto feel himself a man of consequence. 

'I am Mr. Darco's private secretary, ' he was told to say to people withwhom he was empowered to deal. 'I am entirely in Mr. Darco's confidence, and you may deal with me exactly as if Mr. Darco were here. '

At the beginning of the second year the great provincial cities hadbegun to take advantage of the Public Libraries Act, and here was a newjoy for Paul. The Free Library was the first place he asked for in anybig town, and at every spare hour he stuck his nose into a book, andkept it there until duty called him away again. Something in 'Gil Bias'about poverty in observation struck his fancy, and he cast about inhis own mind asking where he could observe, not knowing yet that he wasobserving all things. He hit upon the landlady. A man who has fifty-twolandladies in a year has surely a fertile field. He sorted andclassified in the light of experience: the honeyed, the acidulated, andbibulous-godly (mostly Scottish), the bibulous-ungodly (mostly English), the slut with a clean outside to things, the painstaking sloven, thepeculative (here one majestic sample), the reduced in circumstances, the confidential, the reserved, the frisky, the motherly, thestep-motherly--a most excellent assembly for mirth and pity. 

Mrs. Brace came back again. How many years was it since the memory ofMrs. Brace had touched the Exile's mind?

Darco did, in the main, his own marketing. He had sent home sausages forbreakfast, seven in number. Six came to table. 

'Vere is my other zausage, ' cries Darco. 'There vere zeven. Now thereare six. Vere is my other zausage?'

'Really you know, sir, ' says Mrs. Brace. 'Sausages do shrink so in thecooking. '

Paul was under the table with a helpless yelp of pleasure, and Darcostormed like a beaten gong. 

Come back again, in the brown sultry air, and the solitude, over thatbridge of years departed, Mrs. Fuller. It was Mrs. Fuller's plan toconvey a portion of the guests' clean linen from the chest of drawersinto the hall, and to lay it on the table there pinned up in a neatnewspaper parcel, and to say, 'If you please, gentlemen, the restof your linning have come home, and, if you please, it's two andelevenpence halfpenny. ' Oh, the days--the days when a jest like thiscould shake the ribs with mirth!

And Mistress MacAlister, painfully intoxicated at the dinner hour of 2p. M. , and the uncooked leg of young pork in the larder. 

'D'ye thenk ah'm goin' to cuik till ye on the Sabba' Day? Ye'll nobe findin' th' irreligious sort o' betches that'll do that for ye inDundee, ah'm thenkin'. '

And the little soft-spoken lady from New Orleans, whose husband had beena General--in Del Oro--and an old friend of Darco's in his campaigningdays. And the execution in the house. And Darco signing a cheque fortwice the amount claimed, and blubbering like a great fat baby, andswearing to burn the cheque if she thanked him by another word. OldDarco, the nerve-tearer, the inordinate pyramid of vanity, the tender, the generous, the loyal. Sweetest fruit in sourest rind! Sleep on, old Darco. God makes none gentler in heart, though He makes many morebeloved. 

And how men do, on all hands, unconsciously lay themselves out todelight the budding genial satirist! Here is Darco, wealthy andprosperous as he has never been before, launching out fearlessly, andbearing with him _the_ splendour of the stage--the great MontgomeryBassett. Darco, in consultation with the glorious creature, the questionbeing in which of his unrivalled and majestic assumptions he shall firstappear:

'It doesn't matter, dear boy, ' says Mr. Montgomery Bassett, in thatnoble voice, a voice rich as the king of all the wines of Burgundy--'itdoesn't matter the toss up of a blind beggar's farthing. The peopledon't come to see the play, my boy; they come to see me. They'd come tosee me if I played in Punch and Judy. '

And the late leading man, now dethroned, and put to second business:

'Bassett! Montgomery Bassett! I could act his head off, dear boy. Heis the rottenest stick that ever stalked upon a stage. He can't get infront of that infernal Roman nose, sir. "Now, " says Bassett, "I'm goingto be pathetic;" and the Roman nose says, "I'll see you damned first. ""And now, " says Bassett, "we'll have a bit of comedy. " "Oh no, youwon't, " says the nose. You might as well try to act behind a barn-dooras to act behind that nose. Just fill me out a little tot of Scotch, darling laddie. I want to lose the taste of Bassett. '

And the leading lady and the _ingénue_ who hung together like twincherries on one stalk, bathed in soft dews of tenderness, until Bassettpraised the one and not the other, and the leading lady calledthe ingénue 'Chit' and the ingénue retorted 'Wrinkles!' And thereconciliation at the champagne supper which Darco gave when Bassettwent away, when the tears they shed must have tasted of the wine. 

Oh, the days--the days, long years before he set out on his Journey ofDespair, when mirth had no malice, and tears were tributaries to pity!

'I have vound oudt, ' said Darco, one day, 'that our paggage man isa pantit He is ropping eferypoty, and I have kiven him a fortnight'svages, and the bag to carry. That is my liddle chockular vay to say hehas got the zack. I haf dele-graphed for a new man, and he will comefrom Lonton by the seven-thirty train. His name is Warr, and you willknow him by his nose, which is pigger than your fist, and as hot to lookat as the powels of the Phalarian Pull. It ought to be an acony to garryit, but he laughs pehint it in the distance. But I nodice it alwayszeems to make his eyes vater. '

Paul went to meet this phenomenon, and from the train Mr. Warr of theNonconformist printing-office stepped out, carrying the work of artbefore him like an oriflamme. 

'Mr. Warr, I believe?' said Paul. 

'The same, sir, ' said Mr. Warr, with a spinal inclination. 

Paul's face was framed in a virginal fringe of brown beard, and he wasdressed by a London theatrical tailor. Mr. Wan-had no memory of him. 

'I am Mr. Darco's private secretary, ' said Paul. 'That is the address ofyour lodgings, and when you have taken your traps there Mr. Darco willmeet you at the theatre. '

'I am at your disposal, sir, ' said Mr. Warr. 

He gathered up two newspaper parcels, each of which leaked raggedhosiery and soiled linen at either end, and pottered along the platformat Paul's side, subservient and timid. Paul spurted laughter andaffected a cough to hide it. 

'Here is the refreshment-room, Mr. Warr, ' he said. 'May I ask if youcare at this moment to administer a coating of varnish to the work ofart?'

'Have I had the pleasure to encounter you before, sir?' asked Mr. Warr, peering at him sideways across that astonishing nose, with a brown eyebright with moisture. It was like an old cat looking out from the sideof a fireplace. 

'Come in and see, ' said Paul. 

Mr. Warr went in, and being offered a choice in varnishes, selected coldgin. 

'My highly superior respects, sir. You either know me, or my fame hasreached you. ' He smiled a propitiatory smile. 'I do not recall you, sir. '

'I have varnished the work of art before to-day, ' said Paul. 'Do youremember Bucklersbury?'

'I should do so, ' Mr. Warr returned. 'I drudged there for eight longyears, and had it not been for Mr. Darco's kindly memories of an oldassociate, I might have drudged there still. But two and fifty shillingsper week, sir, with freedom and travel thrown in, are highly superior tothirty-six, with slavery superadded. But I do not recall your face andfigure, sir. '

'My name is Armstrong, ' said Paul. 'I worked beside you for a week ortwo. '

'The friend of my youth, ' said Mr. Warr. 'Permit me to shake hands. Relyupon me, Mr. Armstrong, not to be presumptuous. Rely upon me, sir. Ishall respect bygones. Mr. Darco will tell you who I was and what I waswhen he first knew me. I was first low com. , sir, at the Vic, upon mysoul and honour, Mr. Armstrong. But the work of art, sir, so grewand prospered that at last the very gallery guyed me. I went for thevarnish, Mr. Armstrong, in sheer despair. As God is my highly superiorjudge, sir, I never drank until I had a drunkard's nose. Then I madea jest of a deformity, and the joke carried me too far. This infernalfeature is an unnatural legacy. It is from my maternal grandfather, whoonce owned the town of Guildford. I have heard my mother say that hiscellars covered a quarter of an acre, and held nothing but portand brandy--packed, sir, seven feet deep. To-morrow, in Mr. Darco'spresence, I sign the pledge till the end of the tour, as per our highlysuperior arrangement. I do not know, sir, whether behind that aspect ofprosperity there lurks the probability of another fourpennyworth. '

'You mustn't get tipsy to meet Mr. Darco, ' said Paul. 

'There is no fear of that, sir, ' Mr. Warr answered. 'That, ' pointing tothe empty glass, 'is my first to-day, and I as thirsty as I am hungry. '

'Eat, man, eat, ' said Paul. 

'May I, sir?' asked Mr. Warr. 

'Your fill, ' said Paul. 

There were hard-boiled eggs and cold sausages on the marble-toppedcounter, and Mr. Warr fell to work among them, and mumbled gratitudewith his mouth full. When he had half cleared the counter, Paul paid forthe depredations, and Mr. Warr, who knew the town of old, picked up hisleaking parcels and made off for the address given him. 

'Veil, ' said Darco when Paul got back to him, 'you haf seen him? Had heany package and luckage?' Paul described Mr. Warr's kit. 'You must puyfor him a jeap, useful bordmandeau, and jarge id to me. I shall sdop itout of his wages, ' which of course he never did. 

Mr. Warr presented himself at Darco's lodging next morning wrapped ina perfume of gin and cloves. He laid upon the table a wordy document infoolscap with a receipt stamp in one corner, and read it aloud in hisown breathless chuckle. It set forth that whereas he, the undersignedWilliam Treherne Macfarvel Warr, of the one part, late of, et cetera, had entered into an engagement with George Darco, Esq. , et cetera, etcetera, of the other part, to such and such an effect of polysyllabicrigmarole, he, the aforesaid and undersigned, did seriously and trulycovenant with the aforesaid George Darco, Esq. , of et cetera, etcetera, all over again, not to drink or imbibe or partake of any form ofalcoholic liquor, whether distilled or fermented, until such time as theagreement or engagement between the aforesaid and undersigned on the onepart, and the aforesaid George Darco, Esq. , of the other part, shouldend, cease, and determine. He signed this document with a greatsprawling flourish, and Darco and Paul having appended their names toit also, Mr. Warr wrote the date of the transaction across the receiptstamp, and handed the paper to his employer with a solemn bow. 

'You haf peen zaying goot-bye to the dear greature, ' said Darco; 'I cansee that. '

'In the words of Othello, sir, ' said Mr. Warr: '"I kissed her ere Ikilled her. "' He smiled self-consciously, but instantly grew graveagain. 'You know me, Mr. Darco. You have my highly superior word. Inever go back on it, sir. '

Mr. Warr kept his word, but he grew insufferably self-righteous, andpreached total abstinence to everybody, from Darco to the call-boy. Heatoned for this unconsciously by the longing calculations he made. 

'I have consulted the almanac, ' he confided to Paul; 'it is two hundredand seventy-one days to my next drink. '

After this he offered a figure almost daily: 'Two seventy. A dryjourney, Mr. Armstrong. ''Two fifty, sir, two fifty. The longest lanemust turn, sir. ' Then, after a long spell of yearning: 'Only two hundrednow, sir. I should like to obliterate two hundred. But a Warr's word issacred. '

'Now, ' said Paul one day, 'why don't you take advantage of this soberspell to cure yourself of the craving, in place of looking forward tothe next outburst and counting the days between? Why don't you make upyour mind to have done with it altogether?

'Sir, ' said Mr. Warr with intense solemnity, 'if I thought I had tastedmy last liquor, I'd cut my throat. '

'If ever I find myself disposed to feel like that, ' Paul answered, 'Iwill cut my own. '

'Oh dear no, you won't, sir, ' said Mr. Warr. 'If ever you go that way atall, you'll slide into it. You will always believe that you could dropit at any moment until you find you can't. Then you'll be reconciled, like the rest of us. '

Paul had little fear. His temptation, he told himself, did not lie inthat direction. 

CHAPTER X

Darco's work fell into routine for a time. The wheels of all hisaffairs went so smoothly that he and his assistant found many easybreathing-spaces. But Paul was of a mind just now to scorn delight andlive laborious days. He confined himself for many hours of each day tohis bedroom, and on the weekly railway journey with his chief he satfor the most part in a brown study, And made frequent entries in a bignote-book. 

'Vat are you doing?' Darco asked one day. 

Paul blushed, and answered that he would rather wait a day or two beforespeaking. 

'I shall ask your opinion in a week at the outside, ' he added. 

Darco went to sleep, a thing he seemed able to do whenever the fancytook him, and Paul made notes furiously all through the rest of thejourney. His ideas affected him curiously, for at times his eyes wouldfill and he would blow his nose, and at other times he would chucklerichly to himself. He had got what he conceived to be a dramatic notionby the tip of the tail, and he was engaged in the manufacture ofhis first drama. In due time the result of his labours in his mostclerk-like hand was passed over a breakfast-table to Darco, who winced, and looked like a shying horse at it. 

'Vot is id?' he asked. 

'It is a play, ' said Paul, blushing and stammering. 'I want to have yourjudgment on it. '

'Dake it away!' cried Darco; 'dake it away. I am wriding blays myselluf, ant I will nod look at other beoble's. No. Dake it away!'

Paul stared at him in confusion. 

'I do not vant to look at anypoty's blays, ' said Darco. 'I haf gotalreaty all the tramatic iteas there ever haf been in the vorldt--allthere efer will be. I do not vant notions that are olter than the hillsbrought to me, and then for beobles to say I haf zeen their piecesand gopied from them. I do not vant to gopy from anypoty. I am CheorgeDargo. '

'I'll bet, ' said Paul rashly, 'that you haven't met this idea yet. '

'My tear poy, ' Darco answered, 'if you haf cot a new way of bantling anold itea you are ferry lucky. But there are no new iteas, and you maytake my vort for it. If anypoty asks who told you that, say it wasCheorge Dargo. '

'Let me read it to you, ' Paul urged. 'It's hardly likely that ayoungster like myself is going to have the cheek to charge _you_ withhaving stolen your ideas--now, is it?' Darco smoothed a little. 'Youcould tell me if there's anything in it, or if I'm wasting time. '

'Go on, ' said Darco, suddenly rising from the table and hurling himselfinto an arm-chair, so that the floor shuddered, and the windows of theroom danced in their panes. 

Paul sipped his tea, opened his manuscript and began to read. He read onuntil a loud snore reached his ears, and then looked up discouraged. 

'Vot's the madder?' Darco asked. 'Go on; I am listening. '

Paul went on and Darco snored continuously, but whenever the readerlooked up at him, he was wide awake and attentive. The landlady came into clear the table and Darco drove her from the room as if she hadcome to steal her own properties. Then he flung himself anew into hisarm-chair and snored until the reading came to a close. It had lastedtwo hours and a half, and Paul at times had been affected by his ownhumour and pathos. He waited with his eyes on the word 'Curtain 'at thebottom of the final page. 

'You think that is a blay?' said Darco. 'Vell, it is nod a blay. It is achelly. '

'I don't quite think I know what you mean, ' Paul answered, horriblycrestfallen. 

'I say vot I mean, ' Darco responded. 'It is a chelly. It is a very gootchelly--in' places. You might like it if you took it in a sboon out ofa storypook, or a folume of boedry; but a blay is a very differentgreation. '

Then he fell to a mortally technical criticism of Paul's work--apractical stage-manager's criticism--and enlightened his hearer's mindon many things. He said, 'I am Cheorge Dargo, ant now you know, ' alittle oftener than was necessary, but he laid bare all the weaknessesof plot and execution--all the improbabilities which Paul supposedhimself cunningly to have effaced or bidden, and he showed him howfatally he had disguised his budding scoundrel in a robe of goodnessthroughout the whole of the first act. 

'But it's life!' cried Paul. 'That's what happens in life. You meet aman who seems made of honesty; you trust him, and he picks your pocket. '

'Aha!' said Darco; 'but there is always somepoty who knows the druthapout him, ant efery memper of your autience must represend thatsomepoty. Now, I'll dell you. I vill make a sgeleton for you. We willpild your chelly into a gomedy, ant we will preathe into id the preathof life, and it shall valk apout. '

'You'll--you'll work with me?' Paul cried. 'Hurrah!'

Darco rang a peal at the bell, and the landlady, probably thinking thehouse on fire, scurried madly to answer the call. 

'Half-bast elefen o'glock, ' growled Darco accusingly, 'ant look at thepreakfast-dable. '

'But you told me, sir----' began the gasping woman. 

'Now don't sdant jattering there, ' said Darco, 'I am koing to be busy. Glear avay!'

'I came to clear away at nine, sir. '

'Glear avay now, ' said Darco; 'don't vaste my dime. '

'I'm sure I don't want to waste your time, Mr. Darco, ' said thelandlady, 'but you've given me such a turn, sir, I don't know where Iam. '

Darco shook the room again by a new plunge into the armchair, and thetrembling landlady cleared away. 

'Now, dake nodes!' he roared, as she left the room. 

'I shall be very glad to take notice, sir, ' said the landlady. 

'Nodes!' shouted Darco. 'Nodes. I am not dalking to you. I am dalking tomy brivade zegredary. '

Paul seized a pencil, set a pile of paper before him on the table, andwaited. Darco began to prowl about the room, setting chairs in placewith great precision, arranging ornaments on the chimney-shelf, andsettling pictures on the wall with methodical exactness, mutteringmeanwhile, 'Nodes. Dake nodes. I am dalking to my brivade zegredary. Nodes. Dake nodes. ' Paul was familiar with his ways, and waitedseriously. 

'But this down, ' said Darco, pacing and turning suddenly. 'No. Don't butthat down. I don't vant that' He roamed off again, murmuring: 'No. Don'tbut it down. I don't vant it. I don't vant it. Nodes. Dake nodes. ' Thenwith sudden loudness and decision: 'But this down. '

He began to talk. Paul tried to follow him on paper, but the task washopeless. Darco talked with a choking incoherence and at a dreadfulpace. It was as if a big-bellied bottle were turned upside down, andas if the bottle were sentient and strove to empty the whole of itscontents at once through a narrow neck. At last a meaning began todeclare itself--the merest intelligible germ of a meaning--but it grewand grew until Paul clapped his hands with a cry of triumph at it. 

'That is what was wanted. '

'That is a bart of vat is vanted, ' said Darco. 'Haf you cot it town?'Before Paul could answer he was off again in a new tangle, and fightingand tearing his way through it as madly as before. 'Now I am dired, ' hesaid. 'I shall haf some lunge, and co to sleep. '

He caught at the bell-pull in passing, gave it a tug, and waddled off tohis bedroom. The landlady came in with the tray and began to arrange thetable. 

'I don't know what you gentlemen have been doing sir, ' she said to Paul, 'but I'm sure I was afraid there was going to be murder in the house. I never heard anybody go on so in my life. I don't know how any younggentleman puts up with it. '

'There is very little danger, I assure you, ' said Paul. 'Mr. Darco and Ihave been talking business. '

'Well, ' returned the landlady, 'I suppose you know how to manage him. But I wouldn't be his keeper not for love _or_ money. '

'I am Mr. Darco's private secretary, ma'am, ' Paul answered gravely. 

'All I can say is, ' said the landlady, sighing, 'I'm glad it'sSaturday. '

It happened that the company took a late train that night for a distanttown, and Darco paid his bill before leaving for the theatre. He toldthe landlady that he had been extremely comfortable, and that he shouldhave great pleasure in recommending her to his friends. When he hadgone, the landlady told Paul that she was glad the gendeman had his lucyintervals. 

But the comedy having been once rebegun on Darco's lines, was written toan accompaniment of fears and tremblings. It terrified the servants andthe women-folk at large of every house the collaborateurs lodged in. Slaveys, with clasped hands and faces pale beneath smudges of blacklead, shook in the hall or on the stairs and landing whilst Darco roared, andPaul at the end of a day's work used sometimes to feel as if he had beenbadly beaten about the head. None the less, the work was finished, andput into rehearsal. 

'Ve vill dry it on the tog, ' said Darco, and Paul, who never dared toquestion him as to his meaning, went puzzled for a while. 

But Darco rarely said a thing once without repeating it many times, andat length Paul understood that the play was to be played 'on the dog, 'which is theatrical English for the production of a new piece at anobscure house in the country. It was tried, but the dog never took to itwith any great kindness. Darco swore it was the first comedy which hadbeen produced since the days of Sheridan. He put it into the repertoire, and played it once a week, and whenever it was played it brought aguinea to Paul's pocket. It is not every first effort in any work of artwhich does as much as this, however, and Paul had the good sense to seethat he was fortunate, and looked hopefully to the future. He creptinto the gallery when the piece was played in any town, and watched hisneighbours, and listened to their comments on the action and to theirtalk between the acts. This taught him a great deal, for he saw howlittle the popular instinct varies in matters of emotion, and theverdict to which he listened was everywhere substantially the same. 

There came an especially memorable afternoon when Mr. Warr in afour-wheeled fly drove to Darco's lodgings, and announced the suddensickness of the juvenile lead. Darco pounced on Paul as the sick man'ssuccessor. 

'My dear sir, ' said Paul, 'I never spoke a word in public in my life. Ican't do it. '

'That's all right, my poy, ' said Darco. 'You've got to do it. '

There was no arguing the matter. 

Mr. Warr was despatched in the fly to gather the members of the company. Darco thrust into Paul's hands the part he had to study, and went offtranquilly to his own room to sleep. Paul slaved for an hour, and seemedto have mastered nothing. Darco, having timed himself to sleep for onehour precisely, awoke to the minute, and bundled off his victim to thetheatre. There such members of the company as Mr. Warr had succeededin finding were already collected, and the scenes in which Paul wasconcerned were run through again and again until he began to have someidea of what was expected of him, and even some distant knowledge ofthe words. But the whole thing was like a nightmare, and whenever thethought of the coming night crossed his mind, it afflicted him with ahalf paralysis. Darco worried him incessantly, bubbling with unhelpfulenthusiasm, roaring at him, pushing and hauling him hither and thither, so that at last he resigned himself to a stupor of despair. The leadinglady intervened, and she and Darco talked together for a minute. 

'Tam it!' he shouted. 'Do you think I want anypoty to deach me? I amCheorge Dargo. I know my drade!'

But the leading lady stuck to him, and at last he went away. 

'Now, my dear, ' said Miss Belmont to Paul. 'I'll shepherd you. You'remostly with me, and so long as we're together you're safe. Darco's adarling when you know him, but he's enough to break a beginner's heart. Now, dears '--she appealed here to her whole public--'put your heartsinto it, and help the young gentleman through. '

The rehearsal went on again, and the nightmare feeling wore away alittle. 

'You've got to give me a little bit of a chance here, ' said MissBelmont, with her pretty little gloved hand on Paul's shoulder. 'Yousee, it's your forgiveness melts me, and if you forgive me like chuckinga pennyworth of coppers at a beggar, I shan't be melted. Now, then:"Georgy"--say it like that, just a bit throaty and quivery--"I loved youso that I'd have laid down my life for you!" Try it like that. That'sbetter. Now, give me your eyes, large and mournful, for just five ticks. Now turn, three steps up stage, hand to forehead. That's it, but notquite so woodeny. Turn. Eyes again. "Georgy!" Now one step down, bothhands out Pause. That's it "You have broken a truer heart than you willeasily find again. But I will say no more. Good-bye, Georgy. And for thesake of those old dreams which were once so sweet, and now are flown forever, God bless you 'Oh, God bless you and forgive you!" No. Try and getit just a little bit more. Poor dear Bannister always cried when he cameto that. I've seen the tears run down his face many a time. Just go backto "Georgy, I loved you sa" Yes, yes, yes, that's it; that's capital. Now, that lets me in. "Oh, Richard! Richard! Is it possible that youforgive me?" That's your cue for the chair, face in both hands. Now mylong speech: "Richard, " and so on, and so on. "Good-bye, then, dearest, truest, tenderest. " Just a little shake of the shoulders here and there, as if you were sobbing to yourself, don't you see? "Good-bye, good-bye. "No, don't get up yet. Count six very slowly after "Good-bye" the secondtime. Now rise, turn, arms out "Georgy! Can't you see?" Then down Irush, and--curtain. Now, just once more from "Georgy, I loved you so. "'

The company clapped hands. Berry, the first comedian, poked Earlsford, the leading man, in the waistcoat. 

'_You'll_ have to look to your laurels in a year or two. '

'Now, ' said Miss Belmont, 'you can't expect to shine tonight. Thatwouldn't be reasonable, would it? But if you won't prevent the rest fromshining you'll have done your duty nobly. Never you mind Darco: I'llkeep him out of the house to-night. I'm the only woman in the professionwho has the length of his foot I'd rather say the breadth of his heart, for that's where I always get at him. There'll be an explanation and anapology. You'd better read your part. The house won't mind it. Then putall you know into that last scene. Chuck the book a minute before thereal business comes on, as if you'd made up your mind to go for thegloves. That'll fetch 'em. Well go over that bit again and again tillyou've got it They'll be just jumping with pleasure in front if yousurprise 'em with a good touch at the finish, and they'll go awaythinking how splendidly you'd have done it if you'd had half a chance. It's the trot up the avenue, don't you see?

Mr. Warr, who at a gesture had followed Darco from the theatre, appearedwith a basket in his hand, and was followed by a man who bore a largerbasket on his shoulder. 

'The governor sends his highly superior compliments, ladies andgentlemen, ' said Mr. Warr, 'and his polite request that you will beso very kind as to forget the dinner-hour. Sandwiches, ladies andgentlemen. Ham, beef, tongue, pâté de foie gras, potted shrimps, and cetera. Juice of the grape. ' He pointed to the basket, which hisattendant had already laid upon the stage. 'Fizzy, Pommery-Gréno, andno less, upon my sacred word of honour!' He groped in his pockets. 'Champagne-opener, to be carefully returned to bearer. Ah, sir, ' headded feelingly to Paul, 'when I forswore the varnish, I little thoughtit would rise to this quality. And, ladies and gentlemen, ' he continuedaloud, 'I was to request that you would unite in lending your highlysuperior aid to the neophyte. '

'Our compliments to the governor, ' said the leading comedian, who hadseized the nippers and was already hard at work. 'We bestow on himunanimously the order of the golden brick. '

Darco's health was toasted, and the company went to rehearsal again, each with a champagne-glass in one hand and a sandwich in the other, and worked banqueting. Paul drank a glass of wine, and the coming nightlooked less terrible. 

'We've two hours clear, 'said Miss Belmont 'Now see if we don't makesomething of you in that time. '

Paul began to take up his cue with spirit, as often as not without thebook, and to take his proper places without prompting. They worked theirway on again to the final scene. 

'Now, don't be afraid to let go, ' said Miss Belmont 'Let us have it asif the house was full. '

So Paul threw down his part as arranged, for by this time he knew thewords of this one scene, and what with the wine and the growing sense offreedom, he did pretty well, and when he sat in the arm-chair with hisface in his hands Miss Belmont no longer gabbled her lines, but spokethem with all the feeling and fervour of which she was mistress. Andwhen she came to her 'Good-bye, good-bye, ' Paul, who at all times waseasily emotional, was crying softly. He rose with outspread arms and thetears on his face and his voice broke. The leading lady rushed at himand clipped him round the neck, and Paul clipped the leading lady in aperfectly innocent enthusiasm and strained her to his breast. 

'You--little--devil!' she whispered, as she drew away from him andstabbed him with one wicked flash of her blue eyes. 'I'll forgive youthis time, ' she added half a minute later; 'but it isn't professional. '

'Time for one more run through, ladies and gentlemen, ' said thestage-manager, and once more the task began. 

Miss Belmont's eyes plagued Paul most of the time, now with a lookof serious affront, now with a sort of mocking challenge. Now, he wasinclined to try that grip again to see how she would take it, and themocking eyes invited him. Then he dared not so much as think of it, forthe eyes looked severe offence at him. When the time came he was like awooden doll handling a wooden doll. 

'Pooh!' said Miss Belmont, pettishly drawing back from him. 'That won'tdo. Try again. '

They harked back to the beginning of the scene. The others had stolenaway to their various dressing-rooms. Only the stage-manager was left, and he was engaged in talking with the leader of the orchestra, who hadjust come in with a fiddle-case beneath his arm peeping out from hisshabby paletot The farewell speech came, and it was only breathed. Shehad always dearly, dearly loved him. She had lost him by her pride, hercoquetry--her silly, silly, heartless coquetry. Her fingers touched himon the cheek soft as a snowflake, and lingered there whilst the cooingvoice went on. Then came the 'Good-bye' again and the answering call. She paused and looked, and darted to him, and they clung together, sheleaning back her head and tangling his eyes in hers. 

'You hold me like that, ' she breathed, 'until the curtain falls, '

She released herself gradually from his embrace, and drew away. Paul'spulses beat to a strange tune, and he was afraid to look at her. 

'Ah!' she said, in a voice so commonplace that he jumped to hearit, 'the kind creatures have left us half a bottle. One glass, Mr. Armstrong, will do you good. You dress with Berry; hell help you withyour make-up. Don't be nervous. You've got the book to prop you tillthe very end, and there you'll be as right as rain. Here's luck to yourfirst appearance. '

Paul took the glass she held out to him, but his hand trembled so thathe spilled one half its contents on the stage. 

'How clumsy!' purred the leading lady. 'Here, take a full glass; there'smore in the bottle. There; chink glasses. Luck for to-night. '

He drank mechanically, and the stinging wine threw him into a fit ofcoughing. Miss Belmont patted him laughingly on the back, and ran awayto her own room. Paul took his part from the stage, and tumbled up aspiral iron staircase to the loft in which the leading comedian dressed. 

'You'd better wear Bannister's togs, if they'll fit you, ' said thecomedian; 'if not, you'll want a dress-suit for the second act. '

The clothes fitted excellently, and Berry saw to the neophyte's make-up, painting and powdering him dexterously, and dressing the virginal beardand moustache with a dark cosmetic. 

'You're funking it, ' the comedian said cheerfully. 'That's all right, my boy; there never was a man worth his salt who didn't. Give me a newpart, and I'm as nervous as a cat. But you're in luck in a way, forwe've all been together so long in this that we could play it in oursleep. There isn't one of us that doesn't know the thing inside-out andupside-down and backwards. '

Paul crept down the spiral staircase, part in hand, and listened whilstthe local manager, who rather prided himself on his ability asan orator, deplored the serious and sudden indisposition of thatestablished favourite, Mr. Bannister, and announced that Mr. Armstronghad 'gallantly stepped into the breach, ' and would essay the part, literally at a moment's notice. Paul would most certainly haveungallantly bolted out of the breach had that been possible; but thepeople cheered the local manager cordially, and he, stepping back intothe gloom of the stage, found Paul shivering there, and tried to heartenhim. 

The night went by in a sort of fog, but Paul read his lines somehow, andmade his crosses at the right places; and actors are eager to answer toany little courtesy from a manager, and Darco's half-dozen of champagnewas richly paid for by the _élan_ with which everybody played. As tothe neophyte, they fed and nursed him, and were in at the close of everyspeech of his with a spring and a rattle which made the audience halfforget the artificiality of the scenes he clouded. Mr. Berry took asmuch whisky-and-water as was good for him, and perhaps a little more, and Paul in his nervous anxiety lent a helpful hand towards the emptyingof the bottle. There was no buzz in the cast-iron head and no cloud inthe eyes, but he was strung to a strange tension, and he was lookingforward to that last act and the embrace which crowned it. 

'I shan't take the book for this last scene, ' he whispered to theprompter; 'but watch me, will you?'

The prompter nodded, and Paul passed on to the spot from which he wasto make his entrance. There was Miss Belmont waiting also. She was inevening dress, with shining white arms and shoulders. 

'Fit?' she asked laconically, buttoning a glove. 

'Middling, ' said Paul hoarsely. 

She slid away from him through the painted doorway, and he heard hervoice on the stage. There was a pause, and someone near him whispered:

'Mr. Armstrong, go on; they're waiting. '

He obeyed. The practised woman, cool as a cucumber, gave him his cue asecond time, and continued to make the pause look rational He plungedinto the scene, awkward and constrained, but resolute, and in somedegree master of himself. It was his stage business to be awkward andconstrained, but he fared not over well, for on the stage it is easyto go too close to nature. But at the very last he lost his nervoustremors, and in the one scene in which he had been coached so often heacquitted himself with credit. 

'Can't you see?' he asked in the final line of his piece, and theleading lady was in his arms again. 

'I can see, ' she whispered. 'Kiss me, you silly boy!'

And Paul bent his lips to hers, and kissed her in a way which lookedtheatrically emotional to the house. The roller came down with a thud. 

'Stay as you are, ' she said; 'there is a call. '

The curtain rose again and fell again, and Paul held the leading lady inhis arms. The embrace lasted little more than a minute, but it left Paulfrantically in love--after a fashion. 

This was bad in many ways, for the woman was eight years his senior anda most heartless coquette, and Paul's infatuation kept him from his ownthoughts, which were just beginning to be of value to him. 

The Dreamer in the mountains grieved wistfully as the old times enactedthemselves before him. 'Love, ' says blackguard Iago, 'is a lust ofthe blood and a permission of the will. ' Well, one-and-twenty made hisdreams even out of such poor material. The westward train boomed past, invisible from first to last in the smoke-cloud. 

CHAPTER XI

Miss Belmont, nine-and-twenty, fresh and fair, ignorant-clever (afterthe known feminine fashion), _rusée_ to the finger-tips, with a dragonreputation for virtue and a resolute will to keep it, was dangerous tothe peace of mind of masculine twenty-one. She made Paul her bondslave. She intoxicated him with a touch, and sobered him with a face of suddenmarble. She played the matron and the sister with him, and drove him madbetween whiles. 

Here is one scene out of hundreds, all acted to the Solitary's mind asif the past were back again. 

Summer was dying. The woods were yet lusty but growing sombre. Levelbeams of parting sunlight flashing through the trees like white-hotwire. A Sunday picnic for the company, magnificently provided by Darco, had brought Paul and Miss Belmont together. The lady had led the wayinto this solitude with so much tact and skill that Paul took pridein his own generalship. They sat on a rustic bench together, andimmediately before them was an opening in the trees. At a very littledistance the ground fell suddenly away, and in the valley wound ashining river with fold on fold of wooded lands beyond. 

Paul was quivering to be nearer to her, but he had no courage to move. He looked at her, and her eyes seemed to be dreaming on the distanthills. He stole a timid hand towards her very slowly. She turned towardshim with a soft smile, took the hand in her own, and held it, nestlingher shoulders into the rustic woodwork and sending her dreamy gaze backto the hills again. Once or twice, as if unconsciously, she lifted thehand slightly and laid it down again caressingly. 

Paul looked at her adoringly. It was like being in heaven, with a touchof vertigo. 

'Claudia, ' said Paul, in a whisper. 

'Yes, ' she answered. 'Don't speak louder than that. It suits the placeto whisper. What are you thinking about?'

'You, ' said Paul 'I think of nothing else. '

'You silly boy, ' said Miss Belmont. 'Why should you think about me?'

'I can't help it I wake up to think of you. I think of you all day. I goto sleep thinking of you. I dream about you in the night-time. '

'Oh, you silly Paul!' Her lips smiled, but her eyes dreamed unchanginglyon the landscape. 'Why do you think of me?'

'Because I love you, ' said Paul. 

The hand which held his own seemed to encourage him to draw nearer, andyet the sign, if there were any sign at all, was so faint that he wasafraid to obey it She turned her head slowly to look at him. Her roundsoft chin stirred the lace at her shoulder and was half hidden by it, and she sat placidly dreaming at his ardent eyes just as she had dreamedat the hills. 

'I think you do, ' she said sweetly; 'but that is all nonsense. You areonly a boy, and I am a middle-aged woman. '

'Middle-aged!' said Paul, with a fiery two-syllabled laugh of scorn atthe idea. 

'A woman is middle-aged at five-and-twenty. Didn't you know that, Paul?She took his hand within her own, and played with it 'What a beautifulhand!' she said. 'But you don't take care of it. You treat itcarelessly. Now, I spend half an hour on my hands every day. Let me showyou the difference, ' and she began to draw off her glove. 

'Let me, ' said Paul, and she surrendered the hand and he peeled theglove from it delicately, and held the white wonder in his own palm. Hestooped and kissed it in an idiot rapture. 'How happy you make me!' hesaid, looking up with tears in his eyes. 'How I love you!'

She stroked his cheek and his hair with the soft ungloved hand, smilingsoftly at him. He prisoned the hand again, and kissed it again. 

'You are a silly boy, ' she said; 'a dear, nice, affectionate, sillyboy!' She released her hand and caressed his cheek again. 'If you wereolder than you are I shouldn't allow you to take these liberties, youknow. ' Then she bent forward sideways a little, and allowed her hand tostray beyond his shoulder. 'What makes you fancy that you love an oldwoman like me, Paul?

'It's no fancy, ' he said; 'it's life or death with me, Claudia. '

'Poor boy, ' said Miss Belmont caressingly, and so moved nearer to himand drew his head to her shoulder. 'Am I kind to you, Paul?'

'You are an angel, ' said Paul

'Isn't it rather cruel to be kind to you, Paul?'

He buried his hot face in the soft drapery of her shoulder, and gave amurmured 'No; oh, no!'

'You think you love me, but it's only a boy's fancy, Paul It will passaway. I suppose it's happy whilst it lasts, when I am kind to you. Butit can't last long. I shall be sorry to part, for I like you very much. '

'We mustn't part, ' said Paul huskily. 'Claudia, if you left me I shouldbreak my heart. '

'No, no, ' she answered, drawing him a little nearer. 'Hearts are not soeasily broken. '

'Easily!' he said. 'Do you think it's easy, Claudia, to live as I do?I'm in heaven now, and I'd give my life to be with you for an hourlike this. But when I'm away from you, when I see you in that beastBannister's arms, and remember the only time I ever kissed you--oh, whywere you so kind then, and why are you so cold and cruel now?'

'Cold? Cruel?' She stroked his flushed cheek with her soft fingers. 'Ilet you kiss me because I thought what a dear, nice handsome boy youwere; but I should never have done it if I had thought that you would beso silly after it. If you were not so very silly I should like to kissyou, because it's a woman's way to kiss the people that she's reallyfond of. But you _are_ so foolish, Paul dear, that I dare not. '

'I won't be foolish, ' said Paul, lifting his head, and looking at her. 

'Well, ' she said, 'will you give me your word of honour to stay here forfive minutes after I am gone if I give you just one kiss, and not tobeg me for another, and not to try to get into the same carriage with megoing home?'

'Don't ask me that, ' he besought her. 

'Ah, Paul, ' she said tenderly, 'don't you think for a moment that I ama woman, and that this foolish world would talk about me, even with you, if I gave it only the shadow of a chance? Come; I must go now. Promise. '

'The kiss, ' said Paul. 

'The promise, ' said Miss Belmont. 

'Yes, I promise. If you asked me to leap over the rocks in front of usI'd do it. '

'Give me your hands, then. You won't try to keep me?'

'No, no, no. '

She kissed him warmly and lingeringly on the lips, and darted suddenlyaway. Paul rose to his feet and held out his arms towards her. 

'Your promise, ' she said. 'Your word of honour as a gentleman. ' Hedropped his hands. 'You shall be paid for that, ' she whispered, with aface glowing like his own, and she returned to him and kissed him oncemore, holding his hands in hers. Then she left him swiftly and ran downthe pathway, turning at the bend to waft a last kiss to him, and so wasgone. 

Paul mooned about in a miserable, aching ecstasy for a quarter ofan hour or so, and then, finding by his watch that the supper-hourappointed by Darco was near at hand, he sauntered to the hotel. MissBelmont was there before him, radiant and serene, and looking asunkissable as Diana. Paul would have approached her, but a mere motionof her fine eyebrows warned him off. He ate little, but he drank a gooddeal of wine, and was gay and moody by turns as he was driven home. Andfar into the night in his own room he walked up and down and made versesand raved them in whispers to himself, because Darco slept in the nextapartment, and was not at all the man to be wisely awakened by the voiceof Love's young dream. He drew his curtains apart and opened his windowon the scented night, and took the moon and stars into his confidence, and the kisses bit softly down into his heart like fire. 

Other scenes there were in which the cunning damsel betrayed Paul intothe belief that he was an ennobling and lofty influence in her life. Shewas rigid in her choice of topics for conversation, but she ornamentedher speech now and then with an almost masculine embroidery, and onceshe caught Paul looking at her with a shocked and wounded air. 

'I caught your look, ' she said, as soon as she could speak to him alone. 'I know what it meant, and, oh! you made me hate myself. There isn'tany real harm in it--I mean, it isn't wicked--but it isn't refined orwomanly, and I'll 'never do it again--never, never, never, for my dearlittle Paul's sake. And Paul shall have a kiss for teaching Claudia alesson. Naughty Claudia!'

And again one day at rehearsal Miss Belmont ordered a brandy-and-soda, and Paul's face clouded; and Claudia was penitent, and Paul got morekisses for helping naughty Claudia to forget these man-like habits. 

The boy's infatuation chimed in with a growing liking for the stage, andhe volunteered to work there with so much ardour that Darco was newlypleased with him, and gave him ample opportunity. So he saw more andmore of Claudia, and made some progress in his new craft, and thefoolish game of love went on, until it brought about a crisis. 

It was three o'clock on Friday afternoon, and Paul was at the theatre, seated in the manager's room, counting and putting into envelopes theweekly salaries of the company. He had just consigned the two crispestand cleanest of his small stock of five-pound notes and the brightesthalf-sovereign to an envelope bearing the name of Miss Claudia Belmont, when the lady herself tapped at the door and entered. 

'I wanted to see you alone, Paul dear, ' she said, 'and so I came overearly. I have a piece of news for you. It is very sad news for me, but Iam afraid you will not think it so. '

'If it grieves you it grieves me, ' said Paul; 'you can't have a troublethat I don't share. '

'I am going away, ' she said, walking to the window and looking out on ashabby back-yard which was full of rotting scenery and old stage-lumberof all sorts. 

'Going away?' Paul repeated. 

He was dazed and numbed, as if he had received a blow. 

'Yes, ' said Claudia. 'Mr. Darco and I have never hit it off very welltogether, and now I am going. I have a very good offer for London, and Ileave at the end of next week. '

'But I can put things right with Mr. Darco, ' said Paul; 'I know I can. '

'No, ' she said, with a seeming gentle sadness; 'it's quite impossible. My position here has grown intolerable, and, besides that, everything isarranged; I have signed for London this afternoon. '

Paul said nothing for the time, for the intelligence crushed him. 

'I was afraid that you would be hurt, ' she added, after a pause. 'I amglad to see that you can take it more easily than I can. '

'Claudia!' said Paul miserably, and sat staring before him with a whiteface. 

'I did almost hope, ' she said, 'that you would have cared a little. '

'Can't you see?' he answered--' oh, can't you see?'

'I don't want play-acting, Paul, ' said Claudia, searching for herhandkerchief, 'After all we have been to each other I expected a littlegenuine feeling. '

'Claudia, ' he burst out, 'you mustn't go; you mustn't leave me. I shouldbreak my heart without you. '

'I must go, Paul, ' said Claudia. 

'Then I will go, ' cried Paul; 'I can't part from you. '

'How can you go, silly boy?' she answered, suffering him to take herhand in his and place his arm about her waist; 'you have nothing to doin London; you know nobody there. You have excellent prospects here withDarco. '

'Where you go I go, ' said the young idiot stanchly. 'I could not liveapart from you. You're the world to me, Claudia. '

He meant it, every word, and in his contradictory heat and flurry anddespair he felt as if there were no words at his call which were strongenough to express him. 

'Oh, ' said Claudia, 'it would be sweet to think you cared so much if Icould only believe you. '

'Believe me? cried Paul. 'Oh, Claudia!'

And then he choked, and could say no more. 

But Claudia, whose self-possession was less disturbed than his, heard afootstep on the staircase, and whispered an eager warning to him justin time. He shot back into his seat, and feigned to be busy with hisaccounts and his orderly little pile of money. Miss Belmont stoopedat the table, and when Mr. Berry entered he found her initialling thepay-sheet. She looked up with a sweet smile, nodded a greeting to him, inspected the contents of the envelope, transferred them to her purse, and moved to the door; then she turned. 

'Oh, Mr. Armstrong, would you mind taking the trouble to run down tomy lodgings when you have got through with this? I have something veryparticular to ask you, if you don't mind. You know where I'm staying?Thank you _so_ much. Good-afternoon. '

She was gone, and everything was gone. Paul made a mechanical effort toget through his business. 

'I say, young Armstrong, ' cried Mr. Berry, 'you're woolgathering; you'vegiven me an extra fiver, or has old Darco found out what I'm worth atlast?'

'My mistake, ' said Paul; 'I don't know what I'm doing. I've got abeastly headache; I can't think or see. '

'Hair of the dog?' suggested Mr. Berry. 'Hi! Chips, old sonnie'--he wasbawling down the staircase--' catch 'Oh, butter-fingers! There it is, just behind you. Half-a-crown. Just nip across, will you? Two Scotchesand a split. Take a pull at your own tap while you're there, and lookslippy. Armstrong, dear boy, you're looking very chalky. Don't overdoit, dear boy, whatever you do. In my youth I never did apply hot andrebellious liquors to the blood. I take to 'em very kindly now, but Inever began till thirty. A man's a seasoned cask at thirty. '

Paul let him talk, and was glad enough not to be further noticed. He satwith his head in his hands and stared at the table, and tried torealize what life would be without Claudia. It looked wholly vacant andintolerable. 

'Here you are, ' said Mr. Berry, releasing the soda-water with a pop, andfoaming the contents of the bottle into the glasses. 

Paul groaned and drank, and by-and-by felt a little better. He would seeClaudia, would decide on some scheme of action, however desperate, whichwould prevent him from wholly losing sight of her. He would releasehimself from his engagement with Darco. That made him feel like a hound, for who had been so good to him as Darco? Who had taken him out ofhunger and trouble but Darco? He recalled himself characterless, despairing; he contrasted his old lot with the present. The change wasall of Darco's working, and he had grown to love the man, and the manon his side had given proofs enough of liking. It looked like a blackingratitude to leave him. It was what it looked like--neither more norless. But, then, Claudia, Claudia, Claudia! How could he live withoutClaudia?

He looked at things all round. He had a fixed position, which was soexcellent that he could not hope to mend it for years to come if he leftit now. He had a true friend whose friendship he might lose if he lefthim now. He had perhaps an open avenue to fame, and it would close ifhe retired from it, and might never open any more. All these things hecounted clearly, and reckoned the world well lost for Claudia. 

The afternoon work was over, the pay-sheet initialled from top tobottom, the accounts made up and balanced, and the change and paperslocked up in Darco's cash-box. He was free to go to Claudia. 

A fly carried him in ten minutes to her door, and she herself admittedhim. 

'Come in, Paul, ' she said 'I have been thinking, and I want to speakto you very, very seriously. ' She led him into her sitting-room. 'Miss Pounceby is out for the day, so that we shall have time to talktogether. ' Miss Pounceby was the _ingénue_, and she and Claudia livedtogether. 'Sit down, dear, and let me see if I can't bring you toreason. '

'You can't persuade me to lose you, Claudia, ' said Paul gloomily. 'Itisn't to be done; it isn't to be thought about. '

'Silly boy!' said Claudia, seating herself beside him, and taking hishand in both of hers, 'you know I love you like a sister. '

'I don't want a sister's love, ' said Paul. 'I want you to marry me. '

'Why, Paul, ' she answered, 'the world would laugh at me. You are onlyjust one-and-twenty; I am four years older. That is ages, you know, andit is ages on the wrong side. '

'Why should we care about the world?' Paul asked. 'What has the world todo with us so long as we can be happy?'

'But I don't love you in that way, Paul, ' said Claudia. She leanedforward and sideways, and looked gravely in his eyes. 'I love you verymuch, dear Paul--very, very much indeed--and I shall be grieved to loseyou. '

'I shan't lose you, ' said Paul. 'I have made my mind up. '

'You dear boy!' she said, and kissed him; but when he would haveembraced her she drew back with a warning forefinger upraised. 'You mustnot presume upon my kindness, Paul; but I know that I can trust you. I should not have asked you to meet me here if I had not been sure ofthat. '

'Claudia, ' cried Paul, rising and pacing about the room, 'have somepity. I am not a child; I am a man. I can't bear this. You must beeverything or you must be nothing. '

'Nothing, Paul?' said Claudia, with grave, accusing eyes and woundedface and voice. 'Nothing?'

It was exquisite practice, and she was a hundred times a better actressoff the boards than on. Paul could appreciate her art at its full valuein later years, but just now he found earnestness enough for two, andwould have broken his heart outright if he had known how she was playingwith him. 

'Nothing or all, ' he said. 'You treat me like a child, Claudia, but I ama man, if I _am_ only a little over one-and-twenty. I have a man's heartand a man's blood in my veins. No. Don't come near me yet; I want to bemy own master. '

'Oh, Paul, dear!' said Claudia; 'you mustn't talk so I never thoughtyou felt so deeply. How could I? Must it all be over, Paul? Are theyall gone, dear--all the happy, peaceful, tranquil hours? Can't I give mylittle brother Paul a simple kiss without making such a tempest?'

'I have had no peaceful, tranquil hours, ' cried Paul. 'Oh, Claudia!Claudia!'

'Kiss and be friends, Paul, ' said Claudia, and Paul was lured back tohis absurd paradise, and fed on kisses and caresses which were sometimessuffered to reach the edge of ardour, and then skilfully chilled. 

If feminine nine-and-twenty thinks it worth while to befool masculineone-and-twenty, and knows her business as well as Claudia knew it, thetask is fairly easy. Claudia would not hear of Paul throwing away hisprospects for so mad a purpose as to follow her to London. She coveredher pretty ears with her ringed fingers when he talked of it, andpositively refused to listen. But he must be rewarded for his devotion, too, and Claudia wished with all her heart that she could love Paul ashe loved her. But it would be wicked to marry without a proper feelingfor a husband, and Paul was her brother, her dear, dear younger brother, and to talk of marriage at their ages was such a folly. Wouldn't Paulalways be her brother? And she laid her soft warm cheek against hisand kissed his hand. What more could he ask for, silly boy? Wasn't thathappiness enough for him if he really loved her? If he would be good, and promise never, never, never to be foolish again, and frightenClaudia with his anger--why _should_ he want to frighten his poorClaudia?--they might always love each other, and be, oh, so happy!

The programme thus presented was actually admitted at last to bereasonable--for the time being--and Paul was sent away with thetenderest farewells and a profound belief--for the time being--thatClaudia was an angel. 

'Whatever you do, dear, ' she had said at parting, with her sisterly armsabout his neck, 'you must not dream of following me to London. I couldnot bear to think that you had imperilled your prospects for my sake. '

'I care for nothing in the world but you, ' said Paul. 

He played honest coin against counters. 

'It is sweet to hear you say so, ' said the sisterly Claudia, and she wasso touched by his devotion that she allowed him to kiss her almost aswildly as he wished to do. 

An hour or two later Paul was in Darco's presence. He had a hang-doglook and felt ashamed, but he was resolute. 

'I beg your pardon, sir, 'he said, 'but it has become absolutelynecessary that I should go to London. '

'Oh!' said Darco, 'is there anythings the madder? Ven do you want to coand for how lonk?'

'I must go at the end of next week, ' Paul answered, not daring to lookat him, 'and I must go for good. '

'I am baying you goot vages, ' said Darco. 'You vill not get as gootvages. Vot is the madder?'

'It is no question of wages, sir, ' returned Paul 'I had not thought oflooking for another situation even, though I shall have to do so, ofcourse. But it is absolutely essential that I should be in London. Ihope you won't think that I am acting ungratefully. I feel as if Iwere, but it will be easy for you to fill my place, and I shall alwaysremember how kind and generous you have been to me. '

'Now, loog you here, ' said Darco; 'there is somethings the madder. I cansee it in your vace. You dell me vod it is, and I will but it straightfor you. I can see that somethings is the madder. I am not a fool. I amCheorge Dargo. Now dell me. '

'I can't explain, ' said Paul. 'I can only tell you that I have to go toLondon. I must go. '

'You vait there a liddle bid, ' returned Darco. 'I am going to think. 'He rolled away, and Paul hoped he might think to little purpose, but inhalf an hour he was back again. His eyes snapped, but he was as cold asan iceberg. 'Ven do you vant to co?' he asked abruptly. 

'As soon as you can spare me, ' Paul answered. 

'I can sbare you now, ' said Darco. 'You are a pick-headed younk itiot, ant you can co at once. There is your zalary for next week. Goot-efeningto you. '

He went out, banging the door behind him, and Paul was left alonefeeling strangely mean and foolish. It seemed that Darco had come to anexplanation of his movement, and Paul did not care to think that he hadfound the real reason for it The real reason was a sacred thing whilstit was hidden away in his own breast; but, held out to the inspectionof others, it had a gawky, unfledged sort of look. It lost dignity. Thedove that cooed in his bosom was a live bird; but once under Darco'seyes, and it was a moulted rag--a thing dead and despicable. 

He had to face Darco again, and he had little taste for the meeting. 

'I haf found oudt vat you are coing to London for, ' said Darco. 'Youare a tarn fool. I haf never seen such a tarn fool in all my tays antyears--nefer: nefer since I gave up peing a tarn fool myself. You canvork; you haf got prains; you haf cot a gareer in front of you; you areone-ant-dwenty. My Cott! you are one-and-dwenty; ant you haf prains, antintustry, ant jances, and you juck them all into the gudder for liddleJarlie Prown. '

'Who is Jarlie Prown?' asked Paul. 

'Jarlie Prown is Glautia Pelmond, ' said Darco. 'She has kebt herinitials. C stands for Glautia, just as veil as it stands for Jarlie;and P stands both for Prown and Pelmond. She has ruint as many men asshe has does and vingers. It is no pusiness of mine. Co your vays, yousilly itiot 'Id is your dime of life to be an itiot, and it is my dimeof life to laugh at you. '

'I have never heard a man breathe a word till now against Miss Belmont'svirtue, 'cried Paul. 

'Firtue?' cried Darco, with a snorting laugh; 'what is firtue? Let medell you this: Your Miss Glautia Pelmond is a volubtuous ice-woman; antthat is the most tangerous of all the taughters of the horse-leedge. Antzo, my younk donkey, goot-night ant goot-bye. I am Cheorge Dargo, ant Inefer forgive an incratitude. '

This contemptuous parting wounded Paul to the quick, and the strangestatements about Claudia maddened him. In one respect, at least, Darco, in his treatment of women, was chivalry incarnate; he would speak noscandal--no, nor listen to it. Paul tossed and tumbled throughout thenight--a prey to shame and passion and cold doubt. Darco, who had sowell deserved his gratitude, had accused him of the contrary--the onevice of all others which had seemed most repugnant to his nature. Darcowas right, and Paul was bitten by shame. Then his mind flew to Claudia, and he thought how tender she had been that afternoon, how confiding, how warm, yet how delicately reticent in conduct Then he flamed and heldhis arms out in the darkness, and swore to be constant to that lovelycreature, that maddening, dazzling, priceless idol, for ever. Then, likea stinging douche to a man in ardent heat of blood, came Darco's saying. Darco was a true man, and to think of him as a scandalmonger was merefolly. He had quarrelled with Claudia, to be sure, and there was aloophole out of which a hopeful doubt might pass. And yet to think sowas an insult, for Darco was the last man in the world to take a revengeso base. But Darco honestly and mistakenly disliked her. That wasanother matter. He was a headstrong man, impetuous, prone to leapto conclusions--a very walking heap of favourable and unfavourableprejudice. Thus, neither Claudia nor Darco was dethroned. Theheadlong, stammering, vivid man had made a mistake--the fat, unwieldy, diamond-hearted creature, all crusted with slag and scoria. Paul couldhave cried to know that Darco dreamed him ungrateful. 

'Who knows him as I do?' he thought. 'People laugh at his boasting, andrun away from his blundering thunder; but the man has the heart of anangel. '

He thought of all those underground benefactions in which he himself hadacted as almoner--the bank-notes to poverty, the Sandeman's port and theevaporated turtle-soup to sickness. And the pity of it that such a manshould so misjudge his Claudia! 'Voluptuous ice-woman. ' He could fathomthe meaning of the phrase, but the wave it would fain have spouted overhis Claudia left her angel raiment dry. Neither one nor the other of thefar-parted spumings of the wave touched her. Was that ice when her lipswere so tenderly laid on his, and their hearts beat close together? Wasthat voluptuous when she held him to a brother's part, and soothed hispassions into slumber with quiet talk of sweet and sober things? And yetin Darco's face, to one who knew him as well as Paul did, there hadbeen a mournful look when he had spoken of the most dangerous of all thedaughters of the horse-leech. Out with the thought--out with it 'trampleit down! Poor, dear old Darco had been abused. Claudia was spotless asthe snow, soft as the dawn, sweet, sweet and sweeter than the honeyor the honeycomb. Thus round the clock of the dark hours ran Paul'sthoughts, with never a definite hour to strike. 

He packed his portmanteaux before leaving his room next morning, andeven in that simple act he found reproaches. He was carrying away fromDarco's service a far different kit to that he had brought into it. Thethree or four coarse homemade shirts, and the rough and scanty supply ofunderclothing, were exchanged for linen and silks and woollen stuffsof the finest. There were trees for his boots; there was a dandydressing-case; there were many things of the mere existence and use ofwhich he had not known two years ago. They were all mementoes of Darco'sgenerosity. Surely no man had ever found so open-handed an employer. But, for all these reflections, Paul could not surrender Claudia. 

He heard the clatter of the breakfast apparatus, and smelt the odours ofcoffee and the savoury meats the soul of which Darco loved; but he darednot face the man to whom he felt he had behaved so badly. 

'Are you gomink in to pregfast?' Darco trumpeted. 

Paul entered and took his seat, and swallowed a cup of coffee; but hehad no heart to eat. 

Darco took his prodigious breakfast in cold gloom, and Paul was as sureof his bitter resentment as of his own useless regret for having woundedhim. It was a trying hour for both of them. 

'I am going out now, ' said Darco, 'ant you will pe gone before I am packagain. Shake hants. ' You are going to be very zorry before I see youagain. '

Paul took the proffered hand, and was nine-tenths inclined to beghimself back again into Darco's friendship; but he could not bringhimself to speak, and in a second or two Darco was in the street, andthe opportunity had gone. But Paul had his marching-orders, at least, and, calling a fly, he saw his luggage set upon it, drove to therailway-station, deposited all his belongings in the cloak-room, andthen started to give Claudia his news. Claudia sent out word that hemight call again in an hour, and, glancing disconsolately at the windowof her sitting-room as he walked away, he saw Miss Pounceby gigglingbehind the curtains with her head in a bush of curlpapers. He paced thestreets until the hour had gone by, and then returned. 

'What brings you here so early?' Claudia asked. 

She looked ravishingly fresh and pretty to Paul's fancy. 

'I told Darco, 'Paul answered, 'that I was going to London, and that Iwanted to leave at the end of next week. He was hurt and angry, and hesaid that, if I had made up my mind about it, I had better go at once. '

'You have behaved very foolishly, Paul, ' said Claudia--' very foolishlyindeed. '

'I did it for your sake, Claudia. '

'For my sake?' said Claudia, raising her eyebrows. 'Why, my dear child, how am I supposed to profit by it?' The question took his breath away. 'I certainly never asked you, or advised you to do anything so verysilly. You have very likely ruined your whole career. At least, you havethrown away such a position as you won't see again for years to come. How many people do you think there are in the world who will give youthe salary Darco gave you, or treat you as he treated you? Oh, youneedn't look at me in that way, Paul, as if I were responsible. It isnone of my doing, and I wash my hands of it. '

'But, Claudia, ' cried Paul, 'I told you what I was going to do. '

'You certainly told me some nonsense of the kind, ' she answered, 'andI remember the very words I used. I told you that you must not dreamof following me to London. I said--I remember my very wordsdistinctly--that I could not bear to think of your imperilling yourprospects. '

'Claudia, ' said Paul, 'I thought you would be glad. '

'Why should I be glad to see you making a fool of yourself?' Claudiaasked disdainfully. 'I thought you had more sense. '

'I shall find work in London, ' Paul said rather helplessly. 'I havesaved more than fifty pounds. '

Possibly the sisterly lady had thought Paul very much poorer than hewas, and had been in fear that he might in some way become a burdento her. The fancy did not touch Paul at the time, but he rememberedafterwards how swiftly the acerbity of her manner faded. 

'Well, ' she answered, 'you are sillier than I thought you were; but it'sof no use crying over spilt milk. You must make the best of things. '

'I shan't care for anything, ' said Paul, rallying a little, 'so long asI'm not parted from you, Claudia. '

'That's all very well, Paul dear, ' returned Claudia, 'but this is apractical world, and the people who live in it have got to be practicaltoo. ' She pinched his cheek as she said this, and laughed at him inquite the old delicious way. 'What makes you so absurdly romantic, Paul?'

'I don't know, ' said Paul, 'that I'm more romantic than other people. I'm not the only man who ever fell in love, and I'm sure nobody ever hada better excuse than I have. '

'Upon my word!' cried the lady, 'you have a very nice way of sayingthings. Do you know, Paul, if you go on like this, you'll begin to bedangerous--in a year or two. '

'I don't belong to the dangerous classes, ' Paul answered. 'I'm muchlikelier to suffer myself than to make you suffer. '

'Oh, I'm not talking about me, ' said Claudia. 'I'm thinking of the otherladies. '

'There are no other ladies, ' Paul declared. 'There never will be anyother ladies. There is only one lady in the whole world for me. '

'Now, seriously, Paul, how long do you think this ridiculous infatuationfor me is going to last?'

'For ever!' cried Paul boldly. 'For ever and ever. And it isnt aninfatuation, Claudia. It's a perfectly reasonable thing to fall in lovewith you. Why, you can't walk down the street without half a dozen mendoing it I know how they turn round to look at you. '

'Oh, you outrageous little flatterer! Wherever did you learn to tellsuch fascinating fibs?'

'They're not fibs, Claudia. You know it as well as I do And I'll tellyou something. You ask me why I love you. I'm a judge of character. '

'Oh, you dreadful boy! You're not going to judge my character, I hope!'

'I did that long ago, ' said Paul, 'and that is why I fell in love withyou. No, ' he broke off, blushing and stammering, 'that is not why I fellin love; but that is why I never wanted to climb out again. '

'Well, ' said Claudia gaily, 'if you didn't fall in love with mycharacter, I'm sure I don't know what else there is. '

'You, ' said Paul rapturously. 'Your beauty, Claudia. Don't you ever lookin the glass?'

'How do you think I am to do my hair?' she asked, laughing. 'Butseriously, now, Paul, you don't think I'm a beauty? You never told methat before. '

'Claudia, ' he said, reproaching her, 'I've told you a thousand times. '

'Oh yes, ' said Claudia, 'in fun. But now, without nonsense--really? Am Ipretty?'

'No; you're not pretty, Claudia. Pretty's commonplace. You are lovely. Ithink you are the most beautiful woman in the world. '

'You darling boy! There's a kiss for that. No, no, no, Paul. Only a verylittle one. But I'm not so silly as to believe you, Paul. '

'Claudia, ' said Paul--they had reached by this time to the brotherly andsisterly attitude, and sat on the couch together, with the sisterly armround Paul's neck--' I was bitterly sorry to leave old Darco, and to lethim think that I was ungrateful. I know how much he has done for me. '

'I am sure I am not sorry to leave Darco, ' she said. 'Grumpy, frumpy, stumpy, dumpy old German! I hate him!'

'Don't say that, ' said Paul. 'There's as kind a heart under old Darco'swaistcoat as you'll find in the whole wide world. '

'Never mind Darco, Paul dear. He's not a favourite theme of mine. '

'I wish you hadn't had to leave him, all the same, because then Ishouldn't have had to leave him. Where shall you live in London, Claudia?'

'I'm going to stay with a Mrs. Walpole, a widow lady, a friend of minewho takes in a few boarders. '

'Might I stay there, too?

'You? Oh, you improper boy! Of course not. '

'Don't say that, Claudia. I've given up everything only to be near you. That's all I ask for, Claudia. It's all I want in the world. '

'My dear Paul, ' said Claudia, 'you must not dream of such a thing. Itwould be most unwise. Why, good gracious, child, you'd compromise meevery hour!'

'Indeed, indeed I wouldn't, ' Paul declared. 'I would rather die than doit Oh, Claudia! you don't know how I love you. You don't know what itwill be to me to be with you. You can't guess how miserably unhappy Ishall be if I am away from you. '

'Very well, Paul, ' said Claudia rather frigidly; 'but you must not blameme if you lose my friendship by presuming on it. I have no fear of beingable to take care of my own reputation, and I want you to understandthat I will do it. And now you may kiss me, and then we will talkbusiness. ' Paul availed himself of the permission with alacrity untilClaudia slid gently away. 'That is enough, and more than enough. I won'thave you making any more declamatory love-scenes, you dreadful boy! No, not another. No; not the least little one in the world. You will keepto that side of the table and I shall sit on this. Now, reach me mywriting-desk. I am going to give you a letter of introduction to Walton, my new manager. I shall tell him how clever you are, and that you areambitious and want to get to London. You'll get nothing like such asalary as Darco gave you--not more than half at the outside. You'll livein a poky little garret at the top of a smoky London house, and you'llpay thirty shillings a week for board and lodging, and the rest will goin washing and 'bus fares. You're making a very bad exchange, I can tellyou, even if Walton will have anything to say to you. ' 'I don't care ifI'm to be near you, Claudia. '

'But you're not going to enjoy the liberties I allow you here. You mustunderstand that, Paul. '

'I shall see you, ' said Paul 'I shall be near you. '

'Very well. Now, I'll write the letter. And when it is written youwill take the very first train to town and give it into Walton's handsto-night. '

'But I am going on with you to Cardiff, ' Paul cried. 

'Indeed, ' said Claudia, 'you will do nothing of the kind. I am not soabsurd as to allow it I am not going to be compromised in that way inmy last week with the company. ' Paul stared at her with a face sodisconsolate that she laughed; but she put on a tender seriousnessa moment later. 'Do you call that love, Paul? Ah, no! Few men--veryfew--ever so much as learn the meaning of the word. It is pureselfishness. You don't think of poor Claudia. You would let herreputation be torn to rags and tatters, but what would that amount to ifonly you could gratify your own wishes?'

'I'll go, Claudia, ' cried Paul. 'I'll go to London. Great Heaven 'what aselfish, unreasonable beast I am 'Forgive me, Claudia. I did not think. '

'Now you are my own dear Paul again. But you mustn't expect me to find_all_ the wisdom. '

She wrote her letter, and Paul watched the white hand skimming overthe paper. When it was written she read it out to him. It was reallyan excellent letter of introduction, business-like and cordial. Paulreceived it with devout thanksgiving. Then Claudia gave him the addressof the boarding-house to which she herself was bound, and looked up histrain in the time-table. 

'You must start in half an hour, ' she said. 'Oh, Paul dear! Paul! Iwonder if, in spite of all your protestations, you are so sorry to partas I am. '

'Claudia!' said Paul, and ran to the open arms. 

He was abjectly in love and abjectly submissive, and Claudia had neverbeen so kind. But when at last she told him 'You must go, ' he strainedher in his arms so wildly that he fairly frightened her. Then, terrifiedin his own turn, he released her, and covered her hand with tears andkisses of contrition. 

'Go, ' she said pantingly--'go, at once!'

He looked with remorse at her pale face and questioning eyes, andlurched towards the table on which he had laid his hat. 

'Paul, ' said Claudia, 'it would have been better for you if you hadnever met me. '

'No, 'he answered, looking back at her. 'I shall never think that, whatever happens. '

'You will think it often, ' she said. 'But go now, dear, for pity'ssake. '

He went out into the street with his wet face, and for a minute or moredid not know why people stared at him. Then he came to his senses alittle, and found himself walking away from the station instead oftowards it He retraced his steps, caught his train, and travelled up toLondon, his pulses beating 'Claudia' all the way. 

CHAPTER XII

Claudia's introduction served so well that Paul was allowed to show whathe was made of in rehearsal at the Mirror Theatre, with a prospectivesalary of fifty shillings a week. He had been a personage of late, andDarco had delegated to him a good deal of his own authority. He was nota personage any longer, and he was not altogether happy in his fall fromdignity. But Claudia was coming. He and Claudia would be in the samehouse together, and playing at the same theatre. He would see her atbreakfast, at luncheon, at dinner; he would escort her from the theatreand home again. That would be happiness enough to atone for anything. 

This prophecy was not quite realized. Claudia chose to breakfast in herown room, and she was a woman of many friends, and lunched out and dinedout so often that Paul hardly saw anything of her. The Sundays wouldhave been Elysian days, but ladies and gentlemen of fashionable aspectdrove to the house in handsome equipages, and spirited Miss Belmont awayto revels at Richmond and elsewhere in which Paul had no part. He movedsadly about the house, in the streets, with no heart for study, or forthe writing of the new comedy on which his mind had been set so warmlyonly a few weeks before. His old companions were travelling about thecountry, meeting old friends and making new ones, and he wished himselfback amongst them many a time. He could have written to Claudia, andhave looked forward to the time when he could have met her again onequal terms. They were not equals any longer. Miss Belmont was starredin big type, and was leading lady, at a biggish salary; for her firstreal chance had come to her, and she had charmed the town. Paul was awalking gentleman with a part of fifty lines, and not a solitary criticnamed his name. 

Sometimes, but very rarely, Claudia shone upon him. On fine evenings, and on those sparse occasions when she and Paul dined at the same table, she would walk to the theatre and accept his escort Then, for a briefhalf-hour, life was worth the living again. But there was one nightlyhour of torment. His work was over early, for he had nothing to do afterthe opening of the third act of the piece then playing. He would dressand wait in his room, and wonder whether that idiot, that dolt and foolincomparable, Captain the Honourable John MacMadden, was waiting at thestage-door. Captain MacMadden belonged to the Household Brigade, andwas a bachelor of five-and-thirty. He parted his hair in the middle, andwore a moustache and weeping whiskers of the jettiest, shiny black. Hesmiled constantly, to show a set of dazzling white teeth. In his ownmind Paul loaded this exquisite with savage satire. He was a tailor'sdummy carrying about a barber's dummy, and the barber's dummy wasfinished with a dentist's advertisement He carried a very thinumbrella--the mere ghost of an umbrella--he was gloved and booted withthe fineness of a lady, and he was always delicately perfumed. He wasreported to be wealthy, abominably wealthy, and three nights a week ormore he would present himself at the theatre, and take Miss Belmont outto supper. But so discreet was that lady, and so careful of her goodreport, that Captain MacMadden never came without a guardian dragon inthe person of another young lady of the theatres, who was accompanied bya gentleman who was in all points tailored and barbered and gloved andbooted like Captain MacMadden himself. 

Paul would wonder if the splendid warrior were below until he couldendure himself no longer. Then he would descend and hang about thestage-door, to find his enemy or not to find him, as the case might be, but in either event to eat his heart in jealousy and impatience. Whenhe found him he burned to insult him by asking him what tailor headvertised, or by addressing him as the Housemaid's Terror or theNursegirl's Blight. He ground tegmenta of 'Maud' between his teeth ashe looked at him. 'His essences turn the live air sick, ' and 'that oiledand curled Assyrian bull, smelling of musk and of insolence. ' And ithappened one night that Captain MacMadden, arriving late, and in amighty hurry and flutter lest he should have missed the lady, tappedPaul upon the shoulder, and said:

'My boy, can you tell me if Miss Belmont has left the theatre?'

Paul, who was at that instant bending all the force of his mind uponCaptain MacMadden, and punching his head in visioned combat, turnedon him with a passionate 'Damn your impertinence, sir!' which set thestartled gentleman agape with wonder. At this instant Claudia pushedthrough the swinging door which led from the stage to the corridor, andshe ran in between the belligerent Paul and the object of his rage. 

'What is this?' she asked. 

'This gentleman, ' said Paul, 'is sadly in want of a lesson ingood-breeding. I shall be happy to offer him one. '

'Upon my word, ' returned Captain MacMadden mildly, 'you're devilishpeppery. Hadn't the slightest intention to affront anybody, upon myword. Nothing further from thoughts. Can't say moah. '

'Mr. Armstrong, ' said Claudia, 'I have never seen you display thisill-bred brutality before. I had not expected you to show it in mypresence to my friend. '

Paul felt for the instant that he had been brutal and ill-bred. Claudiajudged him so, and whatever Claudia said must needs be just But when shehad swept by him to the waiting brougham and the fashionable escort hadfollowed her, he stood in a choking rage, and felt like Cain. A thickdrizzle was falling, and he swung out into the night, glad of the wetcoolness in his flaming face, and the wet wind that fanned him. Thestreets were heavily mired and the drizzle grew to a fast downpour. He turned up his coat-collar and ploughed along, growing more and moreresolutely angry, and more and more resolved to fight his case out withClaudia. The house in which they lived was dark when he reached it, except for a single gas-jet in the hall at which guests bound bedwardlit their candles. He walked into the dining-room and sat down to wait, with nothing but the winking jet on the wall and his own thoughts forcompany. The fire in the grate had died, and its cooling ashes madea crisp, faint noise from time to time. The clock on the mantelpieceticked irritatingly, and sounded the quarters at intervals which seemedcuriously irregular. At times one quarter seemed to follow close onanother's heels, and the next seemed to lag for hours. Paul was soakedto the skin, and had violent fits of shivering, but he would not leavehis post lest he should miss Claudia. 

Cabs rolled by, and every one brought Claudia to his fancy, but scoresof them passed without pause. One o'clock sounded and no Claudia. Twoo'clock, and no Claudia. Then the rumble of a lonely hansom, a slipperystoppage of a horse's feet, and Claudia's voice crying, 'Two doorshigher up. ' Then a renewed motion, a pause, the scrape of a latchkey atthe lock, and Paul was on his feet, candlestick in hand. 

'Mayn't I come in?' asked the hateful voice of Captain MacMadden. 'On'ya moment, upon my word. '

'Certainly not, ' Claudia answered curtly. 'Good-night. '

'You'll think of what I asked you?'

'Indeed, ' said Claudia, in a voice of scorn, 'I will do nothing of thekind. I have never been so insulted in my life, and I shall be obligedif you will put an end to your attentions. '

The heart of the involuntary listener glowed within him, but CaptainMacMadden's drawl broke in and chilled him horribly. 

'Well, look here, Claudia, damn it all! Will you marry me? I'll go thatfar, if nothing else will do for you. I will, upon my word. '

'You may ask me that question in a week's time, ' said Claudia. 'Atpresent I have no more to say to you than just "Good-night. "'

The door closed and there was a silence. Claudia laughed quietlyto herself, and rustled towards the gas-jet. Paul stepped out andintercepted her, the unlit candle in his hand, his hair disordered, andhis face stained with the dye the rain had soaked from his hat Histeeth were chattering noisily and rapidly, and he and Claudia faced eachother. Paul lit his candle mechanically, and set it on the hall table, below the jet, which blinked with a faint intermittent hum. 

'Are you spying upon me, Mr. Armstrong? asked Claudia, with a touch ofthe manner of the stage. 

'Not I, ' Paul answered bluntly; 'I waited up to speak to you. Are yougoing to marry that grinning nincompoop?'

'You presume, ' said Claudia, with yet more of the manner of the stage. 'You presume abominably. Allow me to pass, sir. '

'The man has offered you a life of shame, ' said Paul. 'You mean tolisten to him after that? She looked at him scornfully and defiantly. 'Well, ' he said, shivering strangely from head to foot, 'you're not thewoman I took you for. It's good-bye to Claudia. '

He stood aside for her to pass. She lit her candle and swept by him. Heheard her door close, and the key turn in the lock. He stood shudderingin the hall, the chance-held candle dropping grease upon the oil-cloth. He gave one big dry sob and mounted to his garret-room. There was nosleep for him, and he did not undress. The candle burned down in itssocket, the light flared up and died, and the nauseous stink of wick andtallow filled the room. His mind was strangely vacant, but even in thedarkness and the silence he found a thousand things in which to take aleaden interest: as the swaying of the window-curtains where a slightdraught caught them; the faintly-seen progress of the rain-drops downthe window-pane; the wet glints of light where the street gas-lamp dimlyirradiated the windows and the houses on the opposite side of the way;a ticking insect in the wall-paper; sounds of night traffic in the greatthoroughfare a quarter of a mile off; the squashing tramp of a policemanon his rounds; the moaning voices of wind and rain; the very beating ofhis own pulses in his head; the very stupor of his own intelligence. 

It was still raining when the dismal dawn crept up, and he was chilledto the marrow. He rose stupidly from the chair in which he had passedthe night, and began to change his dress, stiffly and with difficulty. During the greater part of the night he had been sitting in a droopingposture, and he found without trouble or interest that he could notchange it. There was an aching weight upon his loins, but he had nointerest in that either. He sat in his room all day. The chambermaidcame to the door and tapped, and receiving no answer, entered. Shestared to see him sitting at the window and the bed undisturbed, but shewent away again. Somehow the day crawled on, and as the darkness fell hecrept downstairs, and crawled, an aching stoop, to the theatre. Hewas an hour before the time, but by hazard he met the manager at thestage-door. 

'Why, great God, Armstrong! what's the matter?'

'I got wet last night, ' Paul answered, in a voice which startled him andpained his throat. 

He had not spoken a word since he had said good-bye to Claudia. 

'You've no right to be out like this, ' said the manager brusquely; 'it'ssuicide. You're no good here, you know, ' he added, in a kinder voice. 'Here, you, Collins; call a cab, and help Mr. Armstrong into it. '

'Can you do without me?' Paul asked, in that strange voice. 

'Do without you? Yes. I've a man at hand that will swallow your linesand biz in half an hour. Get a fire in your bedroom; have a good stiffglass of rum as hot as you can drink it. Get somebody to make youcayenne pills--cayenne-pepper and bread-crumbs. Take three or four, andhave 'em hot. Why, man alive, you've got an ague!'

The cab was brought, and Paul was helped into it and driven home. Hecould not lift his hand above his head to pay the fare, and the cabmandescended grumblingly to take it; but seeing how his fare's feet fumbledat the steps, got down a second time to help him to the door. Paulwalked into the dining-room, hat in hand, and bent The boarders were atdessert, and Claudia for once was with them. 

'No beggars allowed in this bar, ' said one of the professional boardersjocularly, thinking the entrance a bit of playful masquerade. 

'I'm not very well, 'said Paul, with a frog-like roop. 'I've been down tothe theatre, and Walton has sent me home again. I'm afraid I can't quitemanage to get upstairs. '

He did not look at Claudia, but he was conscious of her gaze, and heknew somehow that there was fright in her eyes. 

Two of the boarders engineered him to his room, and one undressedhim whilst the other ran for rum and cayenne-pepper. They were alltheatrical folk in the house, and kindly in case of trouble, as theirtribe is always. Paul was put to bed, and had extra blankets heapedupon him, and a fire was lit in the grate. He was dosed with hotrum-and-water and the cayenne pills, and was then left, first to growmaudlin, and next to fall into a sleep which was full of monstrousdreams. At one time he lay in a great cleft between two hills, andstones rolled down upon him, causing him dull pain; then the stonesformed themselves into a fence--a kind of rough arch on which otherstones battered without ceasing till he was walled in thickly. Atanother time he had to climb up an endless hill, with hot chains abouthis loins and knees. 

Somebody came into his room with a candle, and the light awoke him. Itwas one of his fellow-boarders back from the theatre, with news that itwas nearly midnight. He forced more hot rum on the patient, and sat withhim until he was sound asleep. The liquor did its work, and he sleptwithout dreams until daylight. He strove to rise and dress, but the taskwas beyond him, and there was nothing left but to lie and stare at theceiling, and to say to himself over and over again, without a touch ofinterest or feeling: 'It's good-bye to Claudia. ' The landlady came tosee him, and found him burning and shivering, and complaining of thebitter cold. She went away, and came back again with a doctor, who toldhim cheerfully that he was in for rheumatic fever, big or little, assure as a gun. 

'But he's young, ma'am, ' said the doctor--'he's young, and we shall pullhim through. '

'Can he be moved?' asked the landlady. 

'Moved? No, possibly not for weeks. '

'Have you any money, Mr. Armstrong?' said the landlady, 'or shall Iwrite to your friends?'

'There's fifty-one pounds in my dressing-bag, ' croaked Paul. 'Whenyou've buried me and paid your bill, send the balance to my father. '

'Buried you?' said the doctor. 'You don't suppose you're going to pegout, do you?'

'I hope so, ' said Paul. 

'Oh, ' said the doctor, casting a shrewd, good-humoured eye at him, 'you feel like that, do you? But you've got me to reckon with, and theBritish Pharmacopoeia. When did you eat last?

'Day before yesterday. '

'All right, young man; I'll fettle you, and if you think you're going toslip your cable, you're mightily in error. '

'Well, ' said Paul, 'it doesn't matter to me one way or the other. '

The time went on, and a day later he was light-headed, and babbled, ashe learned afterwards, of Claudia. Sometimes he upbraided her savagely, and sometimes he made tragic love to her. He had intervals of completesanity, in which the thought of her was like an inward fire; then he hada five weeks' spell of madness, and awoke from it free from pain, but amere crate of bones which felt heavier than lead. He remembered some ofhis own delusions clearly, but lost count of whole weeks of time, andhad yet to learn how long he had lain there. When he awoke he knew thatsomebody was in the room, and made an effort to turn his head. Thatfailed, but the somebody heard the faint rustle he made, and the firstface his eyes looked at was the face of Darco. 

'Ah!' said Darco, 'you haf got your prains pack again. You know me, eh?'

Paul tried to nod, but succeeded only in closing his eyes in sign ofassent. 

'I am a bid of a dogtor, ' said Darco; 'led me veel your bulse. Goot--goot, ant your demberadure is normal. It is now begome yourbusiness to ead and trink. ' He waddled across the room, and came backwith a tin of jelly and a spoon, and fed the invalid 'That is enough, 'he said, after the fifth spoonful. 'Liddle and often; that is the cameto blay. '

Paul was too weak to wonder at anything, or he would have wondered atDarco's presence; but Nature was too wise to let him waste his forces onany such unprofitable exercise as thinking, and sent him to sleep again. When he awoke he was ravenously hungry, and in a day or two he began toabuse the nurse who tended him for stinting his victuals. But the nursewas a good-humoured old campaigner. 

'Why, bless your heart, Mr. Armstrong, ' she said, when in an intervalof contrition Paul apologised, 'it do me good to hear you swear thathearty! Most gentlemen does it when they're picking up a bit. '

There was in his mind barely a thought of Claudia; the one fever seemedto have burned the other out of him. 

'The heart, ' said the doctor--'the heart's the thing we're always afraidof in rheumatic fever, and the heart's as sound as a nut. '

Paul stretched feebly, and thought he had his jest wholly to himself;but the doctor undeceived him. 

'It wasn't always so, my young friend. '

Paul blushed like fire. 

'Have I been babbling? he asked guiltily. 

'A bit, ' said the doctor; 'enough to justify those gloomy hopes ofyours. '

Paul hung his head in a transient shame, and murmured that he was sorry. 

'Pooh, pooh!' cried the doctor; 'you're all right now. You can bear tohear a little bit of news about the lady?'

'Yes, ' said Paul, 'anything. '

'She's married, ' said the doctor--'married to the Honourable CaptainMacMadden, and has left the stage. '

'Did she ever come to see me?' Paul asked. 

'No, ' said the doctor. 

The passion of the youth went to join the calf-love of the boy, and theman accomplished looked on them both with a half-humorous wonder. He waslearning his world, he thought. It would not be easy to fool him in thatway again. 

He sat propped up with pillows in an arm-chair now, and could hold abook; but the lubricant at his joints had all been licked up by thefever, and it was slow to come back again, so that he had hideoustwinges when he moved. He had plenty of society now that he was fit forit, for the fellow-boarders were idle during the day, and spared time tosit and talk with him. 

'You recognised old Darco when you saw him, didn't you?' one of themasked. 

'Oh yes, ' said Paul, 'I knew him. What brought him here? I behaved verybadly toold Darco. '

'Well, to tell you the truth, ' said the other, 'he said so. "Ant I neferforgive an incradidude, " says he, and proved it by paying the doctor'sbill. '

Every man in the profession had a more or less plausible imitation ofold Darco's 'leedle beguliaridies. ' He was as well known as the Strand, and loved and hated as few men are. 

'I treated Darco very badly, ' said Paul. 'I can't rest under that sortof obligation to him. How much did he pay?'

'You'd better ask the doctor. '

Paul asked the doctor next time he saw him, but elicited nothing. 

'But I can't allow it, ' Paul cried; 'I can't endure it I behavedabominably to Darco; I behaved like a beast and a fool. I'd take hisscorn and hatred if he thought I was worth either; but I can't accepthis benefits after the way in which I served him. I left the kindestfriend I ever had, the man who took me out of the gutter--and that'sGod's truth, doctor; and I left him to follow that----'

He ground his teeth hard on the word he was fain to use. 

'Steady!' said the doctor--' steady!'

'That Ignis Fatuus, ' groaned Paul. 'Is that mild enough for you?'

The doctor knew everything. There was no further shame in making a cleanbreast of it. 

'It's better than what you were going to say, ' the doctor answered, 'whatever it was. I hate vulgarity as the devil hates virtue. It's apretty sex; I know something about it You seem to have lighted upon apretty sample. '

Just at this instant there came a tap at the door, and the voice of themaid was heard saying, 'This is the room, sir. ' The door opened, and inwalked Armstrong the elder. 

'Dad!' cried Paul

His father held his hand and looked at him. 

'I've been sore troubled by your silence, lad, 'he said. 'I've had hardwork to find ye. Ye might have written. '

'I was coming to see you, ' said Paul, 'so soon as I could travel. Whenwill that be, doctor?'

'In a fortnight's time, perhaps, ' the doctor answered--'not muchearlier. '

The doctor went his way, and the father and son were together. 

'You're out of Darco's service, I understand?' said Armstrong. 'He wrotekindly about ye, but he said you'd parted. Why did you leave him, Paul?'

Paul was penitent and feeble of body, and his father was his dearest. Bit by bit he told his story, or as much of it as he could be told. 

'Man, ' said Armstrong, 'ye're beginning airly. '

CHAPTER XIII

The Dreamer dreamed, and the dream showed the old ramshackle, bankruptprinting-office at Castle Barfield again. Paul was back there. The thinghad happened with a strange in-evitableness. He had gone home and hadsuffered a relapse, and had again recovered, and all his savingswere expended. There had come a rush of work with which the solitaryjourneyman and his boy could not cope. Paul had gone to theirassistance, and, the unusual flow of work continuing, he had stayedthere. He made many applications by letter for other employment, andanswered many advertisements, but nothing happened to deliver him. Hisheart galled him daily, for he had seen something of the world, and hadtasted a first-night triumph as part-author of a play, and had mixed onequal terms with people who were very far away from his present sphere. The county election, which had brought the increase of business, wasover and done with. Paul succeeded the journeyman, who went his way andfound employment elsewhere. 

In the dim local yokel mind Paul was a failure, and he knew it. He hadgone away, and his brothers and sisters had magnified his successes, and he was back again, a refugee, as it were, from a world which he hadapparently misused. He was taciturn and gloomy, and, to the fancy ofthose who held themselves his equals and superiors, was disposed to givehimself airs. Two years with Darco had made him something of an epicure. He had grown to hate soiled hands and coarse clothes, and the trivialtalk of people who only lived for trifles. He suffered doubly, therefore, as one who had failed, and as one who took the airs whichbelong only to success. Life was not happy for a while. 

The 'stand-by' of Armstrong's poor business was the printing of acertain coarse label from stereotype plates, and, when there was nothingelse to be done, this would be taken in hand for unbroken days together. It was an operation as purely mechanical as any in the world, and thethoughts of the worker had time and chance to roam anywhere. Paul madehundreds of verses. The clean sheet set home to the pins, frisket andtympan down, the turn of the drum-handle, the pull of the bar, thebackward turn of the drum, frisket and tympan up, and the printed sheetlaid on the ordered pile-day in, day out, ten hours a day, the samethings done and done again. Hands growing into horn; muscles swellinglike a blacksmith's. A healthy life enough, with a rough, plain diet, and yet a purgatory in its way, with prospect and horizon bound. 

In a year or more they widened, for Paul had set up for himselfsomething of a study in the old lumber-room, where on a brokentable, with an upturned box for a chair, and a candle stuck in agingerbeer-bottle, he wrote down the verses he had hammered out duringthe day, and he began stealthily to send these here and there tomagazine editors, who sometimes sent them back and sometimes printedthem, but never seemed to dream of payment, until at last one offeredhim two guineas for a long Christmas story in rhyme, and he began tosee a hope of escape from the treadmill round. He set to work on ablank-verse play, and spent the greater part of a year on it, and wasprepared to find himself enthroned with Shakespeare. He put his dramainto type, a page at a time, pulling but a single impression of eachpage, and distributing the type jealously before he went to bed, andjealously hiding his pages. And when it was all complete, and his browswere familiar with the touch of laurel, he sent the great work to aLondon manager, and never heard word of it afterwards, good, bad, orindifferent He waited for months in sick hope and sick despair, and thenwrote asking for a judgment. He waited more months, and no answer came. He wrote for the return of his work, humbly, then impatiently, andfinally with wrathful insult No answer ever came. The muse seemedas vile a jade as Claudia. But he had his tattered and stained oldmanuscript, interlined and entangled so that no creature but, himselfcould read it, and he put it all in type once more, and sent his printedcopy to an eminent firm of publishers, who, after considering the matterfor six months, offered to take the risk of publication for a hundredpounds, on which he burned his manuscript in the cracked office stove, and left the printed copy of it in the publishers' hands to do as theypleased with it. 

He turned to prose and wrote short stories, and sent them broadcast Theycame back, and he sent them out again. He made a list of magazines and alist of the stories, and each one went the rounds. One stuck and broughtproof-sheets, and in due time a ten-pound note. He poured in all therest on the one discerning editor, who had already refused one half ofthem. In a month the man of discernment offered ten shillings per pagefor the lot. Paul accepted, and in another month was back in London, resolute to try a new backfall with the world. 

He found lodgings far away in the northern district, apprised the onediscerning editor of his whereabouts, and sat down to wait and work forglory. And, oh! how kind again on a sudden seemed the Fates who for fouryears had been so harsh with him. Scarce had he been settled a week whenthere came a letter addressed to Paul Armstrong, Esq. , care of Messrs. Blank and Blank, reporting that the editor of a certain magazine hadread with much pleasure a tale from Mr. Armstrong's pen, and would behappy to receive from him one of the same length. Paul danced and sang, and then plunged into labour, wrote his story, received his proof-sheetand his cheque, and with the letter a request that he would submitanything he might have in the way of a three-volume story. He wasassured that it would receive instant attention. 

'I'm five-and-twenty, ' said Paul, 'and the world is at my feet'

But books are not to be written in a day, though they may becommissioned in an instant, and the financial stock was small, seeinghow big an enterprise was to be started on it, and somehow the storywould not form. What ghostly wrestling of the spirit with vague shadowswhich would take no shape! what sleepless tossings there were!--whatfruitless rambles in the darkened streets! what hurried walks toHampstead Heath! and what slow prowlings there amongst the gone! And, then, how the Concept came suddenly from nowhere, without a warning, without an effort, and stood up serene and strong, and bursting throughand through with passion as if it had been alive and fully grown foryears. Then to pen and ink and paper, not yet a weariness to soul andflesh! as they were to be in after days, the virgin page an invitation, the ink-pot a magic fountain, the very feel of the pen between thumb andfinger a pleasure. There was no thought in those fresh days of stintinglabour or of making rules for it--so many hours for work and so manyhours for recreation, and such and such hours for meals. The book--thebook was everything. He went to sleep with his people. He awoke to them. He lived all day with them. He found them more real than the living. Life was one vivid rage of emotion, of laughter, and of tears. Hisown pathetics and his own humours were the sweetest things he had everknown, and he cried at the one and laughed at the other more than themost sentimental of readers ever laughed and cried over any book thatwas ever written. And it was at this time that he wrote certain versesin which he set forth his beliefs in art. The lonely man in his eyrie inthe Rockies, reviewing the bygone time, murmured what he could recall ofthese:

 '"A land of fire and a land of frost Build!" said the Lord of the Soul; "And lay me an ocean from coast to coast, And let it be awful with many a ghost Of galleons laden with gold, and lost In the smothering surge's roll. 

 '"And make me a myriad rounded stars To spangle my firmament, Sweet like Hesper, glad with the balm Of a ceaseless, passionless, changeless calm And hot like Sirius, and red like Mars With a god-like discontent. 

 '"And frame in the land of fire, " he said, "Frame me a soul like thine: Swift as the snail's soft horn to feel, Yet hard and keen as the tempered steel, And be there a fire in heart and head Demoniac and divine. "'

The rest of the words had no duelling in his memory, though he was surethey had been made and written; but they were meant to say that alllabour conceived and executed in a land of fire should be remodelledin the land of frost at the risk of being cast away in its passage fromone to the other. This in plain English meant the union of hot zeal andcold diligence, which is a worthy recipe for any worker in any craft Itserved Paul's turn for six prodigious weeks, from the rising of thesun until long after the going down of the same. The book was done in aquarter of the time he had apportioned to it. For six weeks the forcesof every waking minute had strained fiercely forward to one purpose, andat seven o'clock on an autumn Friday he wrote the words 'The End, 'and, looking up, saw the sunlight in dazzling strips between the greenpainted laths of the blind, and found that his lamp was pale. He drewup the blind and opened the window, and the sweet air bathed his head. There was a deep sadness in his heart, and when he arose and by chancesaw his face in the glass it was the face of a ghost If the halest ofyoung men will live in alternations of frost and fire for six weeks onend, he must expect to pay for it. 

Paul paid dearly in lassitude, and broken sleep, and loss of appetite, and afterwards in six weeks of idle waiting in poverty, for there wasno work or power of thought left in him for the time. He pawned thedressing-case old Darco had given him and the dress-suit which he hadnot worn for four years, and he had his meals, such as they were, at acabman's restaurant, and his last penny went, and tobacco famine set in;and his landlord, who was a maudlin man with a cultured turn for drink, would come in at night to his sitting-room and cry, and say that thewater-rates were going to cut the supply; and the butcher had said, 'Nomore credit after Saturday. '

And whilst he was thus agreeably engaged on one occasion a knock came tothe door, and a slattern slavey came in with a plate in her hand, and onthe plate a wet and flabby oblong something crusted with dirt and slime. 

'I can't quite make it out, sir, 'said the slavey, 'but I think as thisis a letter, and it hasn't been opened, sir, and I fancy it's addressedto you. '

And within the slimy envelope was a soaked letter, in which the ink hadso run as to leave it scarcely legible, and being diligently pored upon, the letter was found to indicate that the recipient of the story hadread it with great charm and interest, and was willing to purchase theserial rights of the same for the sum of Ģ250, Ģ150 on the author'ssignature to terms, and Ģ100 on the day of the publication of the firstnumber. 

'It's 'ard for a poor working man to be kep' out of his money like this, sir, ' the landlord moaned. 

'Damn you!' said Paul. 'Listen to this. ' He read the letter, and with astart reverted to the date: 'September 27th, and this is October 27th!I haven't tasted food these three days, or had a pinch of tobacco, andthis has been waiting for me--this--this--for a whole month! Explain, you execrable! or, as sure as the brother of the sun reigns overthe Heavenly Empire, I will brain you with the poker. Shell out, youvillain!--shell out, to your last halfpenny! 'Ard for a poor working manto be kep' out of his money, is it? Somebody in this infernal house haskept me waiting and half starving for a month, whilst I have two hundredand fifty pounds to my credit. What are you worth, you hoary inebriate?Speak, or die!'

'Seven and eight, ' said the landlord, 'and a bogus thrip-penny. '

'Give me five shillings!' cried Paul, snatching up the poker, and thelandlord pottered out the money. 

Away tore Paul to the house round the corner. There were sausages therefrizzling in a metal-pan with a little row of blue gas-jets below it. There was brandy there; there was beer. There was tobacco of a sort, and there was an admirable whisky, not the diluted vitriol common to theoutlying London house before the passing of the Adulteration Act, buthonest whisky, mellow and old. 

Paul, full of meat, and singing to himself behind his pipe, walkedhomeward with a flask of that good liquor in his pocket, and therebehind was the landlord clinging to the railings at the bottom of thearea-steps and maundering to a policeman. 

'Five shillings--'storted by threats. Tha's the man, ' said the landlord. 

'Come in, officer, and have a drink, ' said Paul, and the officer, afteran upward and downward look along the street, marched into the house. Paul gave him a drink instantly, and whilst the landlord hiccuped''Started by threats 'he explained the situation. 'Of course, I made himshell out, ' said Paul. 'Wouldn't you?

'Well, I'm a guardian of the peace, myself, sir, ' said the officer; 'butit wouldn't ha' been more than five bob and costs if you'd ha' dressedhim down. Speaking as a man of uniform, as I may say, I should ha'thought that cheap at the money. '

''Storted by threats, ' said the landlord. 

'Take another, ' cried Paul, 'and go to bed. You'll be paid in themorning, and you can stick up "To Let" as soon as you like. I'm off tothe Continent. '

There was still a cab fare in Paul's pocket when he awoke and dressed inthe morning, and he booked away to the publisher's office and receivedhis cheque. Then away to the bank, and away from the bank withfifteen ten-pound notes of the Bank of England. Then a breakfast ata restaurant, and a pint of champagne to drink his own health in--thefirst wine tasted for nearly five years. Next to 'my uncle's' to redeemthe dressing-bag and the dress-suit, and next home to stagger thelandlord with that pile of wealth. Then to pack, singing; to drive backto town; to lunch late after the purchase of a suit of reach-me-downs, new hat, boots, gloves, and paletot; and last, away to the Continentaltrain for a first look at Paris. And all the while it was richly comicto himself to feel how he exulted, and to say within doors demurelyto the shopman, to the waiter, the ticket clerk, the porter: 'I am anauthor, sir, an accepted author, with the first fruits of my first bookin my pocket I am on the way to Paris and distinction. ' The four yearsof lost prospect and horizon looked nothing, less than nothing. But theChannel waters were rough, and he was chilled by the solemn gentlemenwho sat battened down with basins in their laps, turning green andyellow in the sickly light; and the railway journey beyond was cold anduncomfortable, and Paris in the gray fog of a late October morningwas less gay than he had expected. What little he knew of the languageseemed to be recognised by the natives of the land, but what they had tosay to him was as rapid as the clatter of a running boy's hoop-stick ona row of railings, and as intelligible. An English-speaking tout seizedhim, and he was grateful to be decoyed into a dirty hotel on the otherside of the river, where people understood him more or less when heasked a question. Here he entered himself in the guest-book, and underthe head of 'Profession 'wrote the world 'Literature 'with great pride. He ate his cutlets and chipped potatoes at breakfast with an unwontedrelish, in spite of a revolting table-cloth, encrusted with mustardand spilt sauces, and blue with wine-stains, over which salt had beenspilled to restore the whiteness of the fabric in case it should everhave the good chance to be washed. The yard of bread was a novelty. Thedistempered houses opposite--pink and green and blue--were novelties. The jalousied windows gave the street a delicious foreign look. Thelittle cavalry officer who came clanking in with his baggy trousersand his spurs and dangling sword, almost as long as its wearer, was adelight. Paul went to the window to look at the middle-aged _bonne_ whowent by in her Alsatian cap and flying coloured ribbons. 

At five-and-twenty a night of wearisome and broken sleep makes smalldifference to the spirits, and when he had washed as well as he couldby the aid of a cream-jug full of water and a saucer, and a towelhandkerchief, and without the aid of soap, he dressed, and salliedout with the intent to lose himself in Paris. There is nothing soexhilarating as the first sight of a foreign city, and Paul wandered onand on, past the Palace of Justice and over the bridge, and, turning tothe left, made along the Rue de Rivoli, passed the far-stretching faįadeof the Louvre, and so went on till he reached the Place de la Concorde. There, staring into the basin of one of the fountains, as if he had beenwaiting for Paul to come to him, was Darco, fur-coated and silk-hattedas of yore, and looking neither older nor younger by a day than whenthey had parted. 

'Darco!' said Paul, with his heart in his mouth. 'How glad I am! Youdear old Darco!'

Darco stared a moment, for the young man's beard and moustache werefully grown, and they disguised him. 

'Oh!' he said at last. 'Id is Armstronk. How do you do?' He held outhis hand somewhat laxly, but Paul took it in both his and wrung itfervently. 

'I can't tell you how glad I am to see you. I can't tell you howbitterly sorry I've been for the brutal way in which I paid you forall your kindness. Try and forgive me, old chap. Do now. It wasn'tingratitude, Darco, though it looked like it It was a boy's infatuationfor a woman. '

'I dold you, ' said Darco--' I rememper as if it was yesterday. I said:"You are a tarn fool, and you will be zorry. "'

'I _have_ been sorry this five years or nearly, ' said Paul, stillclinging to his hand. 'Make it up, old chap, and come and have lunchsomewhere. '

'Zo pe id, ' said Darco, stolid as an ox. 'Do you vant a virst-glassrestaurant, or a second-glass, or vat?'

'The best in Paris!' cried Paul gaily, though he had to blow his noseand to cry 'Hem!' to clear his throat, the sight, of old Darco touchedhis heart so. 

'Gome along, then, ' said Darco, and rolled off sturdily like a barrel onbarrels in the direction of the Boulevards. 'Rue Gasdilione, ' he said, playing guide as he walked along. 'Blace Fendôme. Golumn Fendôme. Rue dela Baix. You haf not been in Baris until now?

'I got here this morning, ' Paul answered. 

'I am here four tays, ' said Darco. 'I shall be here four tays longer. Iam puying a gomedy, ant a blay in five agds. '

'Buying?' said Paul 'I thought the one recognised custom was to steal'

'That's a vool's game, ' Darco declared. 'If you sdeal, and if what yousdeal is worth sdealing, anypoty can sdeal from you. If you burchase it, it is yours, and nopoty can take it away. Honesty is the best policy. And, pesides that, I am Cheorge Dargo. I know my way apout. '

Paul could have hugged him for sheer joy at hearing the familiar bragagain: 'I am Cheorge Dargo. ' The old countersign was like music. 

'Where are we going?' asked Paul. 

'Ve are koink, ' said Darco, 'to the Hareng d'Or, where they haf a drychampagne, and where they can give you such a preakfast as you cannotget in the world. Ant I shall have a Cloria with a zeventy-year-oldGogniag in it. Ant the Blat de chour is a Navarin de mouton. I saw thatas I passed the house two hours aco. I shall haf two boitions, mindyou. '

'Twenty!' cried Paul. 

'No, ' said Darco. 'I could not ead twenty. '

They reached the restaurant, one of those jolly little houses whichare all down now--short as is the time since that in which theyflourished--where the host knew almost all his guests, and luxury wenthand in hand with a sort of camaraderie which cannot breathe in our newpalaces. The chef was a treasure, but as yet no American millionairesstrove to coax him across the Atlantic. There were no better wines inthe world, there was no better coffee, and, by way of a wonder, therewere no better cigars. Darco shook hands with the host, and broke outat him in a brash of Alsatian French, which to Paul's ears was like arolling of drums. He caught his own name in the torrent of noise, anddistinguished the words 'un homme lidéraire, cheune, gomme fous foyez, mais déjā pien tisdangué. ' The host bowed, and Paul bowed, and blusheda little, and Darco ordered a déjeûner at the host's discretion, stipulating only for his own double portion of the Navarin de mouton. Sothere came oysters, with a cobwebbed bottle of old hock in a cradle, andan unknown delicate fish with burnt butter, and then the Navarin withchampagne in an ice-pail, and fruit, and delicate foreign cheeses, andcoffee which is a dream to the man whose unjaded palate first tries itin perfection. The seventy-years-old cognac was there also, and Paul'shead was humming ever so little before the feast was over. 

'And the dopacco?' said Darco lazily--' eh?'

'The true believer smokes it in Paradise, ' said Paul; and Darcotranslated the saying to the host, who bowed and smiled. 

'How did you know that I was _un homme littéraire?_' asked Paul, stumbling at the unaccustomed words. 

'I haf seen your name to half a tozen short stories, ' said Darco. 'It was no mere gomparison of names to me. I know your sdyle. It haschanged. It has changed for the petter, but I know id. You gannotdeceive me apout a sdyle. I am Cheorge Dargo. I know my way anywhere. 'They smoked and sipped their coffee in a splendid contentment 'Vatprings you to Baris?' Darco asked lazily. 

'I sold a book yesterday, ' said Paul--'my first I had worked hard; Ithought I deserved a little holiday--I have got to learn my world. And Iwas beastly hungry the day before yesterday. '

'I have been there, ' returned Darco. 'There was an English Duke--he isdead now--I did a liddle service in Puda Besth. He vanted to bay me. I said "I am Cheorge Dargo. I do not take money excebt in the way ofbusiness. " Ven I was ruint in the United States I game back to England, and I hat not one benny. I galled on the Duke. He was at bregfasd. Hegot ub, ant he took me py the shoulders begause he was glad to see me, and he said, "My tear Dargo, you are wet"; and I said: "You would be wetif you had slept in the rain in St Chames's Bank. "'

'You've had hard times, old Darco?'

'I have had a million dollars. I haf had nothings. Once I sdole a loaf. I gave the paker ten dollars the week after and dold him vat I haddone. ' He puffed idly and sipped his Gloria. 'I am Cheorge Dargo, ' hemurmured nosily. 'There is nothings I haf not been. There is nothings Ihave not seen. 

There is nothings worth doing that I have not done. ' He smoked andsipped again. 'But I haf not got a liderary sdyle. You haf a liderarysdyle. Come again with me to write blays. We will both great fortunesmake. '

'Shake hands on that, ' said Paul vehemently; and Darco shook hands withphlegm. 

'It is a pargain, ' he said. 'See me in five hours' time--Hotel Meurice, Rue de Rivoli I will write it for you. And now I must go apout my work. I am encaged in ten minutes. '

Paul paid the bill, slipped Darco's address into his waistcoat pocket, shook hands with him at the door, and walked away, unconscious, to hislife's undoing. 

CHAPTER XIV

The voice of the river spoke from the great gorge in accents ofexultation and despair, and the voice was a part of the primevalsilence, as it had been from the moment when the Solitary had firstlistened to it. The impalpable, formless brown fog was about him Itsacrid scent of burning was in his nostrils. And, all the same, he was inParis, in the Rue de Quenailles, where he had lived so long, and wherehe had begun the real troubles of his lifetime. 

He saw and heard as if he had been there. The street was lined on eitherside with picturesque houses of an ancient date, the fronts of whichwere parcel-coloured, blue, pink, buff, white, green, all worn into avaried grayish harmony by years of exposure to the weather. The cobbledroadway was drenched in sunlight, and the green jalousies on the sunnyside of the street had their own effect on the physiognomy of thethoroughfare. 

Paul made his way towards his hotel, foreboding nothing, but fullof youth and high spirits, and somewhat unfairly inspired by wine, considering the hour of the day. He was aware of this, and his onedesire was to reach his own cool and shadowed chamber, and there sleephimself back into a sober possession of his faculties. Had any personsuggested to him that he was tipsy, he would have had a right to repelthe accusation with scorn. He walked without hesitation or uncertainty;he saw quite clearly and thought quite clearly. He had taken a glassmore champagne than was entirely good for him, and that was all. Had thething happened after dinner, he would simply have put on the brake forthe rest of the evening, and would have carried his load with ease. Asit was, nothing but a nap was needed to bring him back to a comfortableafternoon sensation. He told himself this as he strolled homeward, tasting his cigar in an occasional whiff, but using it mainly as a sortof fairy baton with which to beat time to the spirit ditties of no tunewhich filled his harmless mind. 

On the side of the street on which he walked he saw the figure of agirl, but he took no especial notice of her until he was almost in theact of passing. Then he noticed that she was tall and lithe, and thatshe had fine brown eyes and hair. There was nothing in the slightestdegree compulsive or imperative about her. She was just a girl, andthere was an end of it He might have passed her a thousand times withouta second thought, or without a thought at all, but that unhappy extraglass of wine was in his blood, and he must needs accost her--more, perhaps, to show off his French than for any other reason. His attitudetowards women had hitherto been chivalrous and shy, and he was awareof the overcoming of a difficulty which had frequently given himsome concern when he flourished off his hat and asked, with a smilinginsolence:

'Why are you wandering here, I pray?'

The girl looked at him innocently enough, with a gaze quite free fromanger, coquetry, or embarrassment. It might have been a common thing inher experience to be thus accosted by a stranger. 

'I am waiting for my sister, 'she responded simply. 

Did she suppose she would have to wait long? asked Paul. The girl didnot know. Would she wait under shelter from the sun? She shrugged hershoulders, and inclined her head on one shoulder with lifted eyebrows. 

'Come along, ' said the vacuous idiot 'Let us have a glass of winetogether. '

The girl smiled sedately, and they went off together. 

The extraordinary part of this business was not that a young man who hadlunched a little too freely should make a fool of himself, but thatthe girl was a good girl, of average breeding, and, as Paul lived toconvince himself, in spite of all the unhappiness she brought him, hadnever entered upon anything remotely resembling such an adventure as thepresent in all her life. But the readiness of her acquiescence misledhim, and in the little hard-trodden wjne-garden in which they sippeda sugary champagne together, in a trellised alcove like a relic of oldVauxhall, he grew amorous, and told her that her eyes were like beryls, and that their whites were like porcelain. The lonely man in the brownsmoke-fog, with the roar of the river in his ears, as unregarded as theroar of traffic in a city, recalled it all, and laughed as he threw hishands abroad, and fell into a frowning thoughtfulness as he allowed themto drop laxly between his knees. The girl had eyes, to be sure--twoof them--and they were brown, with a touch of beryl in the brown, and, conceivably, they had a soul behind them, of one sort or another, butshe had as much personality as a jelly-fish. She was neither pleased noraffronted by the vacuous ass's compliments, and when he praised her hairand her complexion, she accepted it as placidly as if she had been awaxen lady in a barber's window. 

It may have been that this very aloofness of stupidity appealed to himas a thing to conquer, but, anyway, he got an arm about her waist, and went on praising her with ridiculous emphasis. She allowed him tosqueeze, and she allowed him to praise, and when he pressed her glassupon her she sipped at it with reasonable relish and set it down again. When they had been sitting in the arbour for a quarter of an hour orso she became loquacious. She said it was a fine day, but that she hadfeared in the morning that it would rain. It was a much finer daythan the Thursday of last week had been, for then it had rained in theafternoon, and since she had been beguiled from home by the treacherouspretence of the day without an umbrella she had had a feather spoiled--afeather 'que m'a coûté cinq francs, m'sieu!' Paul answered that she wasa little angel, and she told him a parcel of nothings which under fairand reasonable conditions would have bored his head off. But it isa notable thing that when a youth is beginning to learn a foreignlanguage--and Paul was only now entering upon a colloquial familiaritywith French--he has so much satisfaction in understanding what is saidto him that a very stupid conversation can interest him. It is not whatis said which pleases, but the fact that he can follow it, and this, with a man who is not easily susceptible of boredom, will last him wellinto the knowledge of a novel tongue. He gathered from the confidencesexchanged that the young lady lived at home with papa and mamma and hersister; that papa was engaged in a big drapery establishment, and camehome late at night; that mamma was a suburban modiste, and was also awayfrom home all day; that her sister and herself did some kind of fancywork at home--his French was not complete enough to enable him tounderstand accurately what it was--and that she always made holiday on aThursday afternoon. 

Now, Paul had never played the conquering dog until now. He had so farbeen the victim of the sex, and in his own small way had suffered scornand beguilement enough. What with the luncheon and the sticky champagne, he began to feel mighty and vainglorious, and he took the airs whichhe supposed to be appropriate to the situation. He praised the lady, therefore, with a humorous appreciation of the manner in which sheaccepted flatteries which were passed, so to say, upon a shovel, andhe tasted with a gratified palate his own fine flavour as a man of theworld. 

That was the silly beginning of it, and the lonely man, recalling it allas if he had been back in the midst of it again, asked himself with thattired scorn of his own career and nature which had become a part of him, if any creature with as much brain as earwax had ever before been soeasily beckoned to the devil. 

'Millions, I suppose, ' he said half aloud, in answer to his own mentalquery--'millions. '

And so went on with his dream. 

Of the variety of fools there is literally no end, but for the king offool who is predestined to come a cropper in the field of life, andto spill other people in his own downfall, there is no rival for theQuixote. The man who is over-anxious to pay in the market of moralsis the man who goes bankrupt You may be a good deal of a scoundrel andretain your own esteem and that of the world, but you must not palterwith your own offences. The world resents a half-virtue, and theworld is right It is the half-virtue which breeds hypocrisy andself-deception, and these are the most despicable of human vices. Courage is at the root of manhood, and even the courage which daresto do wrong and have done with it is better than the cowardice whichpatches vice with virtue until it can no longer discern the colour ofeither. 

Here, for instance, began a liaison of the vulgarest and simplest kind, for which a man of any wisdom would have repented in due course whilsthe would have compounded with it, and would have parted from it, and, whilst counting it amongst the sins and follies of his youth, would haveleft it behind him. 

Paul and the girl parted innocently that night, but made an appointmentto meet again on the morrow. He had no stomach for the encounter, buthe would not break his word, and so, for the sake of a punctilio, hewrecked himself. He and Annette went to the Mabille together, and in hischaracter of man of the world he made love to her with as fine a relishas if he had sat down to bread-and-water after dinner; then, in ordernot to be quite a blackguard, he met her again, and, to save himselffrom his own conscience, again, and at last the compound of vanity, weakness, and virtue landed him with her in London, where they set uphousekeeping together. 

For a time this was great, with its twang of Rue Monsieur le Prince andMurger and the old Bohemia, and Paul was convinced that he had done anoble thing in not deserting the little woman. In a flaccid sort of away she seemed to love him, and in that respect, since his own mind wasby no means urgent, he was satisfied. He was faithful to the tie, andflaunted his own magnanimity. 

But his true mistress was his work, and this he loved with an increasingardour. How devotedly he laboured he never knew until long afterwards, when what had once been a passion of delight and a necessity of naturedegenerated into a stale drudgery practised for the sake of mere money. But, oh! the sweetness of brain-toil whilst the heart was fresh andwhilst it still seemed worth while to preach some kind of gospel tomankind! To pace the streets and read the faces of people as theywent by, to weave a thousand stories in a day around the destinies ofstrangers, to sit far into the night fed with rich and glowing fancies, to express them with conscious power, to work with living vigour for thelove of work alone!

These were rich days, and if the domestic intercourse werepoverty-stricken there was the bachelor intercourse at the clubs to makeup for it, and even amongst his married friends Annette was an ignorablequantity unless he took to waving her like a flag of virtue. 

There was Fortescue, a man of medium fame, but of real genius, whosedelightful home was always open to him. Mrs. Fortescue probably knew allabout Paul's eccentric menage, but she had been an opera-singer in herday, had known a good many open secrets of the kind, and was a woman ofthe world. It was not her business to pry into that kind of secret, andshe liked the young fellow for many reasons. Considering what a foolhe was, he had grown to an astonishing charm of manner. The lonely mansmoking his idle pipe at his tent door in the caņon looked back at himacross such a distance of time and fate that his inspection of the youthwas almost impersonal. The lad passed for a piece of naïve nature, and not altogether unjustly. He was eager and ardent, and absurdlytender-hearted. He loved all his friends, and he had a crowd of them. 'Because, ' as Balzac says, 'he had known a time when a sou'sworth offried potatoes would have been a luxury, ' he threw about his money witha lordly liberality. A simple ballad, if sung with any approach to art, would bring tears into his eyes. He had all the virtues which came easyto him, and, leaving Annette out of question for the moment, he waswithout vices. He had rubbed against the world long enough to havegrown polished. Nobody questioned his origin or upbringing. His talk wasbrilliant, if it bore no searching analysis, and he had his circle oflisteners wherever he went. He was a born raconteur, and had provedhimself in that particular, and his increasing acquaintance withthe stage and the professors of its trifling art helped him in thisdirection. 

Fortescue's house was his one haunt apart from the clubs, the onecivilized and civilizing home he knew with intimacy, and one night thereover a cigarette and a whisky-and-soda he turned his jejune philosophyof life upon his host. 

'I confess, ' he said, 'that I have no great opinion of the marriagetie. Let there be a loyal association between man and woman, let eachrecognise the responsibilities which belong to it, and where's the fearof any priestly ban or the need of any priestly blessing?'

'My dear Armstrong, ' said Fortescue, who was very much his senior, anda man of a rather starched propriety by nature, 'I would beg you, if youpermit me, to avoid that theme. The marriage tie to me means a full halfof the whole sanctity of life. To my mind, the man who derides it is, sofar as his derision carries him, an ass. '

'Oh, ' cried Paul, laughing, 'I like a straight hitter. '

Fortescue shifted the theme with some adroitness, but the talk grewstiff and formal. The younger man felt the disapproval of the elder, andwas ill at ease under it. He rather shied at the house from thattime forward, and, since an awkwardness of that kind grows easily andrapidly, his visits dwindled into rarity, until they ceased by automaticprocess. 

It was years before he found a home again. 

'Along with many noble and admirable qualities the English people haveone defect, which is recognised in the satires of every neighbouringnation, but is never acknowledged by themselves. ' Thus Paul Armstrongat his tent door, with the voice of the torrent to emphasize the wastesilence of his dwelling-place, and the fog to clear his mental vision byshutting out from his perception all extraneous things; not thinking inthese words, or thinking in words at all, but dunking thus: 'Proprietyis a British legend and a British lie. '

He was back in the old chambers, which were in one of the smaller Innsof Court, and was looking at the stale mirth and madness of the bygonedays. Eight out of ten of the men he remembered had settled down, andtwo of the ten, to make an average, had gone to the devil The twowere mainly of the better sort--fellows who stuck to an absurdresponsibility, and let it ruin them. The eight were the good citizenswho had had the wit to cut responsibility adrift. That was life as heknew it, as the boys of his day who studied divinity or medicine, or whoread for the Bar, or who worked in painting or at journalism or letters, all knew it. Clerics, lawyers, painters, authors, men on 'Change, allmarried and settled and respected, admirable citizens by the dozen andthe score, and where are Lorna, and Clara, and Kate, and Caroline, andFanny? Heaven knows--possibly. The knack of prosperity, surely, is tobury your indiscretions. 

Oh, bitter, bitter, bitter to have loaded life with such a burden, notto have had the courage of a hundred others, and to have left the poorresponsibility to sink or swim, to have compounded between vice orvirtue instead of making a clean bargain with one or the other likethe rest of the world, to have permitted a foolish pity to look likea resolute manhood to his eyes, to have throttled his own soul for ascruple!

He stages his own soul, and this is what he sees and hears and knows. 

Annette is ailing, is seriously ill indeed, and he has taken her intothe country. He has rented a cottage, in the front of which there isa great level common reaching for a mile or two on either side, andcovered with golden gorse. In front of the cottage and across the commonis a coppice, all browns and purples and yellows and siennas, and beyondthat, as seen from the upper windows of the cottage, the land fades intomisty autumnal blues, to join a whitened horizon which seems to shunthe meeting, until for very weariness it can postpone it no longer--abell-tent of sky, as it were, with a lifted edge, and beyond the skirtsof the nearer sky another. Annette is lying in bed, and Paul is lookingout of the window; he will see the landscape in that way always. He hasknown it under broad summer sunshine, in springtide freshness, underwinter snow, obscured in sheeting rain, in moonlight, starlight, dawn, sunset; but whenever his thoughts go backwards to the place he islooking out of the window on that particular aspect of the scene, andAnnette is behind him, propped in her bed with pillows. 

'Paul!' He turns. 

'Come to me a moment. Sit down beside me. Take my hand'

He lays down the empty pipe he has been twirling in his fingers, andobeys her. 

'Paul!'

'Yes, dear. '

'I cannot talk much, ' she says, in her pretty foreign accent

It has been the one ambition of her mind during these three or fouryears to speak English like an Englishwoman, and she has very nearlysucceeded, only there is still a rhythm left which is charming to hear. 

'I shall not be with you long. '

'What?'says Paul. 'Nonsense, sweetheart! that's a mere sick fancy. Chaseit away. '

'It is no fancy, ' says Annette--'no fancy at all. I heard the doctor thismorning. They did not think I could hear, and he was talking with thehousekeeper. He said he feared the worst. You know what that means, Paul. '

What should he say? A man of ardent blood and active brain does notlive with a jelly-fish for sole home society for a year or two withouta certain weariness, yet his manhood scorned him for it, and evenif passion had never been alive at all there was tenderness and thecamaraderie which comes of close association. He kissed her, and he liedin kissing her, but it was not a wicked or an evil lie. 

'My dear, ' he said, 'this is all fancy. You will be well and strongagain in a month or two. I have talked to the doctor, and I can assureyou he has no sort of fear about you. Look here, now. Darco is comingdown to-morrow, and we shall revise our play. Within a week it shall befinished, and then we will have you packed carefully in cotton-wool andwill carry you back to Paris. Or if you think it will be too cold inParis we will take train to Nice, and pass the winter there. '

'No, ' she said, 'I shall spend my winter here, and it will be my last. 'Her eyebrows had a pathetic lift, and her gaze was on the sky, beyondthe curtains and the window-panes. 'Paul! Paul dear! Do one thing forme. ' She turned her frightened appealing brown eyes upon him, and stoleher hand softly and timidly into his. 

'Yes, dear, ' he answered. 'Anything that is in my power--anything. '

She had never seemed so human. 

'I shall not live to plague you, ' said Annette. 'You are strong andbrave and clever, and you have ambitions, you big boy, and I have been aweight about your neck. '

'No, no, no!' he cried. 

'Oh yes, ' she answered mournfully. 'I know it I have seen it all along. But all that will soon be over. Only there is one thing, Paul. '

She stretched out her arms to him, and he bent his head so that shemight embrace him. He had always fought in his own heart for the fictionthat he loved her, and sometimes he had won in that difficult conflict;now he was sure of it, and he put his arms about her. Was he to lose herjust as she revealed herself in this sweet way?

'Paul, ' she asked him, 'are you sorry that I am going? Shall yougrieve--a little?'

'You mustn't talk so, dear, ' said Paul; 'you break my heart. '

He spoke with a genuine vehemence. He was astonished at the strength ofhis own feeling. 

'Then, ' she said, 'do this one little thing for me. Whisper. Let mewhisper. Can you hear me like that?

'Yes, sweetheart, yes. What is it?'

'Make me an honest woman before I die, ' said Annette, in a voice thatbarely reached him. 'I was brought up to be a good girl, and I havesuffered--oh Paul, dear, I have suffered! Promise me. '

Here were depths he had not looked for or suspected, and he thoughtwithin himself how blind he had been; how much he had misread her;how like a doll he had treated her. His whole heart smote him withself-scorn, with pity, with remorse. 

'You are not dying, dear Annette, ' he said; 'you will live, and we shalllove each other a thousand times better than we have ever done before, because this fear of yours has broken the ice between us. '

'No, Paul, ' she answered. Her arms fell languidly on the counterpane. 'Ishall not live, but promise me that. Let me die happy. Tu sais, chéri, que ma mčre est morte. Je voudrais encontrer ma mčre au ciel, commefille honnęte, ne c'est pas? Ah! pour l'amour de Dieu, Paul!'

'My darling, ' he answered, 'I'll do it! I'll do anything. But don't talknonsense about dying. We shall have many a happy year together yet. '

It was his facile, ardent way to think of himself as brokenhearted ifhe lost her, and he had never seen her in such a mood as this before, or anything approaching to it It was no pretence for the moment that heloved her. He felt for the first time that their two hearts were near. And though he had been loyal to her, and through times good, bad andindifferent had brought her of his best, and had done what he could in acool, husbandly sort of way to make her happy, he knew his moral debtto her, and was sore about it, and had been sore about it often. It hadnever been in his mind for an instant to evade his burden, even whenhe had felt the weight of it most heavily, and he was willing and eveneager to offer this small and laggard reparation. 

'We have lived here much more than the statutory time, ' he said. 'I willgo and see the district registrar at once, and we will be married at theearliest possible minute. That will only be a legal union, dear, but ifyou care for anything further we can be married in a church when you getstrong enough. '

'Thank you, Paul, ' she answered. 'You _are_ good to me. '

'Poor, sweet little woman!' he answered, for now he was touched deeplyby his own remorse. 'There, you are happy now?

'So happy, Paul! So happy!'

He kissed her and left her there, and loading up his pipe, set out at abrisk pace across the common in the direction of the little townshipin which the registrar was to be found. Half an hour's walk brought himthere, and the functionary was at home. Paul explained his errand andits urgency. A special fee obviated publicity, and he paid it. Moneysmoothes all kinds of roads, and in arrangements for marriage it willalmost abolish time. 

Arrangements concluded, the coming bridegroom hastened home, his heartwarm with resolve and tender with a new-born affection. It was curious, he thought, that he should so have misunderstood a woman with whom hehad been so long in the closest intercourse. That placid, yielding wayof hers, that habit of mind which he had regarded in his mannishfashion as being altogether gelatinous and invertebrate--how ill he hadconstrued it all. What a depth of feeling lay concealed beneath it! 'Jevoudrais encontrer ma mčre au ciel, comme fille honnęte. ' Ah! the poorcreature, who had yielded too easily to his embraces and his flatteries, whom he had led astray with professions of love and admiration whichhad never been real--what amends were too large to repay her? And thepromised amend seemed little enough, for he had not contemplated lifeaway from Annette. His association with her had isolated him in acertain degree, but if good women were out of his life, and he missedthem sometimes rather sadly, good fellows were plentiful, married andsingle, and the length of time for which his liaison had lasted had lentit a kind of respectability. Possibly, after all, even if Annettehad not been about to release him, marriage would have been the bestsolution of a difficulty. He wondered now why he had never thought of itearlier. Simply because a trustful girl in her innocence and ignorancehad permitted herself to repose her whole future on one who might haveplayed the scoundrel with her, he had been content to forget his duty. Well, he would atone. 

The ceremony, when it came, was of the simplest, and had a bald andbusiness air about it which was discomfiting to a man who felt that hewas giving rein to a noble sentiment The registrar, as he pocketed hisfee, and shook hands in congratulation, assured him it was efficacious. It took place, of course, in Annette's bedroom, but it was done with somuch delicacy that not even the landlady suspected it. The registrar andhis assistant passed to her mind as medical men called to the bedside ofthe patient. 

Paul sat for half an hour after they had gone with Annette's handin his, and then, seeing that she had fallen asleep, softly withdrewhimself. He strolled to the common, and there, wading through gorse, hefound the doctor who had attended her from the time of their arrival. 

'Well, Mr. Armstrong, ' said the medico cheerfully, 'how's the patient?'

'Better, I think, ' said Paul. 'But, doctor, tell me--what made you takeso gloomy a view a week ago? Don't you think she'll mend?'

'Mend, my dear sir? said the doctor. 'Of course she'll mend. You'll haveher on her feet again in a week or two. She's never been in danger for amoment. '

'But didn't you say a week ago----'

'That she _was_ in danger?'

'Yes. That she was in danger. '

'I give you my word, Mr. Armstrong, that the idea never crossed my mind. I've never had a touch of anxiety from the first. I'd like you to giveme a game at chess to-night, if you're not otherwise engaged. I'm justgoing across to have a look at Mrs. Armstrong now. But it's a merematter of form, I assure you. Good morning. '

'Why didn't I ask that question earlier?' said Paul to himself. But hescarcely knew as yet in what direction his thoughts were pointing. 

CHAPTER XV

Paul Armstrong--the real Paul Armstrong who dreamed these dreams ofmemory--sat day by day in his mountain solitude surrounded by thesmoke-fog which obliterated all but the nearer objects from his view. Hecould faintly distinguish the bluff on the other side of the caņon. Itwas like a pale, flat, and barely perceptible stain on grayish-brownpaper. The mountains were all abolished, but their ghostly voices lived. Here and there the slumbering heat upon their flanks would provoke asnow-slide, and the long-drawn roar and rumble of it would go rollingand echoing apparently in a dozen regions all at once, so that it wouldbe impossible to tell from what direction the original sound proceeded. Two voices of the solitude were ceaseless--the reverberating roar of theriver and the chatter of the mountain brook which ran to meet it; butin ears long accustomed to them they seemed to weave a silence of theirown. Twice a day, at least, his sole reminders of the living, pulsingouter world went by. Sometimes as the panting train rushed east or west, its reminder of the world from which he had parted brought a bitter pangwith it. 

He found but little occupation for his hands, and, apart from hismemories, little for his mind. He read and reread his father's dyingwords until he knew them by rote, and could read them with shut eyes ashe lay in his blanket in the wakeful hours of night. He would not admitto himself that he had a real belief in their message, and yet it wasalways with him in a fainter or a stronger fashion, and it made a partof life. 

It was not merely that he had little to do and little to think aboutapart from his memories, that he dwelt so constantly upon them. Hethought often that there was something within himself which led himgently yet inexorably to these contemplations, and it happened more thanonce that while he was in the very act of thinking thus his dream cameupon him as if a spell had been cast upon his mind Forgotten emotionslived again; facial expressions of people he had known; tones ofvoices not remarkable, and not much remarked, came back. It was likea curiously vivid dream; but it had all happened, and he was living itover again. 

Bring what intellectual denial he would to the problem his father'sletter had set before his mind, his nerves at least accepted it, andhe had a settled consciousness that he was not alone. He fought againstthis as a mere superstitious folly. He was often angry with himself forever stooping to discuss it in his own mind. He had long ago resolvedthat the man dies as the beast dies, and that there is no more a bourneof new life for the one than for the other. And now all manner of doubtsbegan to pester him. No more for the one than for the other? Why not forall? Why not one unending cycle of experience? Why not the passing ofone growing intelligence through every form of life? The Eastern sagesdreamed so. 

He would sit there at his tent door buried deep in his thoughts, andoften, without his being able to trace the faintest sign of any actionin his own mental mechanism, his father's voice would wake him with aninterjection of, 'Exactly!' or 'That's the point, Paul!' There was nosound, and yet the voice was there, and the old familiar Ayrshire accentseemed to mark it as strongly as it had done in his father's lifetime. It was all very well to deride it as a mere delusion; it was easy toput it on one side for a moment and to stand over it in an intelligentsuperiority, tracking it to its sources in some obscure action of nerveand brain. But howsoever often he might eject belief from his mind, itcame back with a clinging, gentle insistence which would not be denied;and little by little, though sorely against his will, he began to have asence of it. A verse of 'In Memoriam 'was often in his mind:

 'How pure in heart, and sound in head, With what divine affections bold, Should be the man whose heart would hold An hour's communion with the dead. '

He began at last to think that his own unfitness for such a communionhelped him to his disbelief in its possibility, and from that hour thefeeling of his father's nearness weighed more and more upon him. 

Sitting at his tent door hour on hour, feeling himself, with the passageof each day, more completely isolated from the world, he seemed forcedto a clear appreciation of the inner truth of his own retrospect; and, so far as any exercise of will was concerned, he found it a record offolly and weakness. There had been hours of high good fortune there, butthey had been barely of his seeking, and of his own actual making not atall. Folly and weakness had stung him many and many a time, but it wasnot until he had reached the last recorded effort of memory that theyhad laid a weight upon his shoulders. Now he knew that he had tied amillstone about his neck; that he had permanently denied to himself allthe sweet and vivifying influences of the higher social life. Sometimesdetached from him, as though it watched from outside and waited forfurther confessions from his memory, and sometimes seeming an intimatepart of him, as if it were a constituent of that desolate ache whichfilled and possessed his soul, there was always there the image of thegray old father, wistful, sagacious, patient--no ghost, but veritablya haunting thought, and at last, in spite of all contention, as real tohim as his own hands. Yet when he went back to his dreams his obsessionvanished, and it was only in the pauses of his vision that it returned. 

Here were the dreams again. 

He had come to understand quite clearly that a trick had been playedupon him, but he was not constantly unhappy in its contemplation, oraltogether resentful at it Annette improved in health with a startlingrapidity, and he had the doctor's assurance on that head. 

'Mrs. Armstrong is as sound as a roach, sir, and will probably outliveeither of us. '

'That is well, ' said Paul, and he set himself to bear the burden he hadgathered. 

At this time he found the greatest happiness in work, and alike withDarco, and for his own hand, he laboured unceasingly. Money camefast--more money than he had ever hoped for. Fame came also, in afashion, and many genial societies were open to him. But Annette was nota person to be defrauded of anything she conceived to be a right, andhe soon found upon how slight a thread domestic content might hang. Invitations to Mr. Paul Armstrong were plentiful, but of Mrs. PaulArmstrong his world had no knowledge outside the jolly bachelorcontingent which overflowed house and table upon Sundays. When thesesingle invitations came Annette invariably retired to her bedroom, and, having locked herself in there, refused to hold any sort of intercoursewith Paul. 

'My dear, ' he would say to soothe her, 'I am not going without you; butI can't force people to invite you, and we must just make the best ofthings. '

So he grew to be something of a hermit; and all on a sudden he resolvedto cut himself adrift from England, and to live abroad. Before hiswanderings were over, he was destined to know Europe pretty thoroughly;but at this time his knowledge of it was limited to Paris, and here andthere a bit of Northern France. He would break new ground. Antwerp woulddo as well as any other city for a starting-place, and within a day ortwo of the hour at which the fancy first occurred to him he was ready tostart He crossed by the _Baron Osy_, took rooms in a hotel on the GroenPlate, and lived and worked there for a month or two under the droppingmusic of the cathedral chimes. The outfit of a man of letters is thesimplest in the world. With a ream of writing-paper, a pint of ink, andsixpennyworth of pens, he is professionally provisioned for half ayear. Paul had no need to be in personal touch either with publisher orstage-manager, and he knew his absence from England to be unmarked andunregretted. Annette and he seemed to get on well enough together. Therewas no real communion between them. Paul was all on fire about his work, and she had no more comprehension of his thoughts than a canary-birdwould have had. But it was not possible for a man of his temperament tolive constantly under the same roof, and to sit daily at the sametable with anybody, male or female, without developing some kind ofcamaraderie. Mrs. Armstrong seemed to like the life fairly well, and tofind a pleasure in the fleeting society of the birds of passage whowent and came. She had dresses to her heart's content, and in her prettygelid way enjoyed a good deal of popularity; but by-and-by, as summeragain drew near, she wearied of her surroundings, and incited Paul tomove. The work on which he had been engaged was finished and disposedof; there were a good many loose hundreds at the bank, and more werecoming. He was ready for a holiday, and for Annette's sake was willingto persuade himself that he was in need of one. So in May weather theyset off to make a round of the old Flemish country--Ghent, and Bruges, and Aix, and Mechlin. Thence they slid on to Namur, working slowlytowards Switzerland in Paul's fancy, but stopping by mere hazard atJanenne, and being by a very simple accident enticed some four or fivemiles from the main line of their route to Montcourtois. They had beendrawn aside in the first place to visit the famous grottoes of Janenne, and the jolly old _doyen_ of Montcourtois was their fellow-passenger inthe brake which conveyed them to the station. The old priest was a manof learning, and in his day he had travelled, and had known the world. Paul and he fell into animated converse, and struck up an immediateliking for each other. It turned out, curiously enough, that, though theold gentleman had lived for twenty years within half a dozen miles ofthe wonderful grottoes, he had never been prompted to visit them untilnow. He was on the way to wipe out his reproach, and by the timethe sight-seeing was over Paul found himself so fascinated by hissimplicity, his bonhomie, and the charming, varied stream of his talk, that he must needs invite the old gentleman to dinner at the Hotel ofthe Three Friends, where preparations for his own reception for thenight had been made. The old priest accepted the invitation at once, andearly evening found them the only occupants of a great salon in whicha hundred people might have dined with case. A brass lamp, suspended bychains from the ceiling, illumined their corner of the' centre table, and at the far end of the room a big stove bloomed red-hot all roundlike a magnified cherry. These preparations were scarcely needed, forthe air was balmy, the windows were open, and the sky was yet full ofthe evening light of early summer. The voice of a stream not far awayran on with a ceaseless, light-hearted babble, and through the openwindows the one street of the village was visible until it swerved awayto the left There are a thousand villages like Montcour-tois; but it wasthe first of its genus Paul had known, and he found a quiet charm in itThe Hotel of the Three Friends stood in the Place Publique, dominatedby a brand-new town-hall; but all the rest of the place was quaint andold-fashioned. All the houses were distempered in various colours, andall their architects had worked after the decrees of the destinies, sothat the street-line itself was full of gable-ends, and the edificesfaced in as many directions as was possible. A sturdy, thick-set villagegirl, neat as a new pin, with cheeks hard and red, and shining likehard red apples, brought in the soup--a _soupe ā la bonne femme_, and admirable of its kind--brought in a dish of fresh-caught troutexcellently fried; followed this with veal cutlets; with a tart, and alocal cheese which, though it had no fame beyond its own borders, was asurprise for an epicure. With the fish came a dusty, cobwebbed bottlein a cradle, and at the sight of it the _doyen_ lifted his eyebrows, and faintly smacked his lips. Paul, in ordering dinner, had asked thesquare-built Flemish waitress:

'You have Burgundy?

'But yes, sir, ' the girl had answered, 'and of the best. '

'Bring me a bottle of your best, ' Paul had said, and had thought no moreof the matter. 

But when the venerable cleric so twinkled at the sight of the dustyflagon in the threadbare bid wicker cradle, he was tempted to ask ifthey had anything very special before them. 

'My dear sir, ' returned the _doyen_, 'it is a wine for an Emperor, andif I may be permitted to tell you so, its appearance is attributable tomy presence here. '

It was a noble vintage, and the _doyen_ grew eloquent over it. 

'It is here in the Ardennes, ' he said, 'that you find the best Burgundyof the world. We have no vineyards of our own, though, if tradition canbe trusted, they grew a good grape here hundreds of years ago; but wehave cellarage, and here beneath our feet is a vault cut out of theliving rock, the temperature of which does not vary one degree Reaumuron the hottest day in summer and the coldest night in winter. That isthe right harbour for such a craft as this to sail into. ' He touchedthe bottle affectionately with the tips of his beautifully-trimmed whitefingers. 'You must not take me for a wine-bibber, ' he said smilingly, 'but all gifts of God are good, and this is the best that Heaven affordsin this direction. '

Paul rang the bell no great time later, and called for a second bottle. The _doyen_ protested, but with a discernible faintheartedness. Hetalked of vintages as the twilight fell and the lamp beamed morebrightly on the snowy napery. Well, he had travelled, he had seenthe world, he had been young. Of all wines in the world for himJohannesberg. One bottle, one truly imperial bottle, he remembered. 

'It was a physician of Paris, the most eminent, who travelled for hispleasure, and whose acquaintance I made in Rome. It is very long ago. The Holy Father was suffering agonies, and he endured them like a hero. But everybody feared that he was dying, and our Roman doctors couldmake nothing of the case at all. It occurred to somebody to speak to HisHoliness of the doctor Gaston. The physicians in attendance were gladto invite him, and by a very simple and almost painless operation heremoved the seat of trouble, and in a week His Holiness was himselfagain. His Holiness was full of gratitude, and would gladly have paidany fee the doctor had chosen to name. But he would have no fee at all. He was not a good son of the Church, but he was an excellent Christianall the same, and it was his pride to have restored so valuable alife. Gaston told me the whole story. "My child, " said the Pope, "somesouvenir of your own skill and kindness you shall accept from me; Iinsist upon it. " Then the good doctor hardened his heart, and he said:"I am for these many years a collector of wines, and I have in Paris mylittle cellar, which is without its rival for its size. But there isone treasure which I cannot buy, nor beg, nor steal. It is the ImperialJohannes-berg. It goes alone to the crowned heads of Europe and to yourHoliness. Rothschild cannot buy it with his millions. If I may beg but abottle----" And His Holiness laughed, and "My good son, " he said, "youshall have a dozen. " And Papa was better than his word, for he sentthirteen. Gaston, ' continued the ancient priest, laying a hand on thelistener's sleeve, 'had six friends in Rome, of whom I was one. Heresolved that the thirteenth bottle should be expended, and that hewould store the rest We assembled--ah! my son, we assembled. There werelittle glasses of fair water handed round and cubes of bread like dice, and we sipped and nibbled, that our palates might be clean. Then thebottle was brought in with the tray of glasses, the right Rhinewine-glasses of pale green, with the vine-leaves and grape-bunchesabout the stem. And the bottle was opened, and---- You know your Scott?Do you remember how the bottle of claret "parfumčd ze apartment"? Oh, itwas so when that cork was drawn! Odours of flowers and old memories! Itwas nectar when we came to taste it It was of the kingliest, the mostimperial. '

Paul filled the priest's glass again and replenished his own, but theold man rose laughingly from the table. 

'I am something of a poet, ' he said, 'in my imaginations, but I do notcarry my fancies into practice. No more wine to-night. '

Paul pressed him, but the old gentleman was firm. He yielded to thetemptation of coffee and a cigar, and the two went on talking of triflesfor half an hour. Annette had long since risen from the table, and hadstrolled to the far end of the room beyond the glowing stove. She hadthrown open a French window there, and had stood for some time lookingout upon the night when she called for Paul. 

'Come here; I want to speak to you. '

Paul excused himself, and obeyed the summons. Beyond the French windowlay a little alcove, about which a barren but full-leaved vine wastrailed. The sky was still filled with a diffuse light, and the Maymoon, pale as yet, was rising like a silver canoe above the edge of ahill a mile away. 

'Paul, ' said Annette, 'I want to stay here. There's a sort of peaceabout the place, and I should like to be here for a little while. '

'Well, dear, ' he answered, 'there are worse places in the world. '

'No, ' she whispered, drawing him down to her; 'I want to tell yousomething. ' With her arm about his neck, she breathed into his ear:'There are only two of us, Paul; you must look out for a third. '

He turned her face to his, and he saw that her eyes were moist and thather face was pale. The momentous thing had been prettily said, as ifonly a touch of fun and a touch of commonplace could make the sacrednessof it bearable to either. In that second he forgot everything. Indifference melted, vanished, and he took her in his arms with afeeling he had never known before. How long they stood there he couldnot have told, but the voice of the priest awoke him from his thoughts. 

'I am afraid, Monsieur Armstrong, ' said the _doyen_, 'that I delay mydeparture too long. '

'Go to bed, darlipg, ' Paul whispered. 'Good-night. I'll make yourexcuses. You mustn't show up before strangers with a face like that. '

He pressed his lips to hers, took both hands ardently in his own for asecond, and walked hastily back into the _salle ā manger_. The _doyen_stood with his beaver on the table before him, and his white handssmoothing the folds of his soutane. 

'I beg your pardon, ' cried Paul, 'but my wife called me away. She issuffering from some slight indisposition, and we have made up our mindsto rest here for a little while. '

'Indisposition!' cried the priest; 'I am sorry to hear that. But in onerespect you are fortunate. Here in this _infecte_ little village--youwould barely believe it, but 'tis true--we have the king of all Europeandoctors. Shall I bring him to you?'

'Are you indeed so fortunate? Paul asked laughingly. 'Bring him by allmeans. '

'There is nothing pressing about the case? the _doyen_ asked. 

'Nothing pressing, ' Paul responded. 

'The morrow will do, then?'

'The morrow will do admirably. '

The old priest withdrew with a cordial hand-shake, and Paul lit a cigarand sat down to look at the newly-revealed position of affairs. Thealliance between Annette and himself had been of the most trivial sort, and he had condemned himself for it a thousand times. But now a newfeeling took possession of him, and she had grown suddenly sacred in hiseyes. The burden which had sometimes galled him had grown welcome in asingle instant. 

The doctor came next day, a rotund man of benevolent aspect, withlittle smiling slits of eyes slightly turned up at the outer end, like aChinaman's. He was familiarly known in the village as Le Chinois. But itdid not take Paul long to learn that, in spite of the nickname, he wasidolized by every inhabitant of the district for miles round. He was aman of private income, and all his professional earnings were spent uponhis poor. In a fortnight Paul and he were thick as thieves. Le Chinoishad travelled extensively, and appeared to be on terms of intimacy withthe literature of every European people. He had not the faintest idea ofthe pronunciation of the English language, but he wrote it currently andwith some approach to elegance, and his knowledge of English letters putPaul to shame. With all his learning and his philosophic agnosticism, hewas as simple-hearted as a child. Annette took the greatest fancy to himand welcomed his visits, and played round him with a sprightliness herhusband had never before observed in her. 'She is changing, ' he thought, 'and changing for the better. ' The new conditions seemed as if theybrought new life and developed a novel character. But he noticed thather outbursts of gaiety were followed invariably by deep depression. Shewould sit in the garden in the dusk of the early summer evenings alone, and if her solitude were intruded upon would wave him away without aword. It irritated her at such times even to be looked at, and Paul, deeply anxious for the time being to fall in with her every whim, wouldbetake himself to the little café opposite, and chat there with thesimple village folk. Sometimes M. Le Prince, a scion of one of thenoblest houses of Europe, who lived in retirement on an income of somethree hundred sterling per annum, would drop in and sip his littleglass of orgeat, and chatter with the peasants about crops and weather. Sometimes the doctor would spend a spare half-hour there in the evening, and sometimes the venerable _doyen_ himself, though he never actuallyentered the house except upon a pastoral visit, would take a seatoutside and drink his after-dinner coffee amongst the members of hisflock. 

Always after these quiet dissipations when Paul went home he foundAnnette asleep, and in a very little while each day became like another, and a routine was established. Annette was invariably a little fatiguedin the morning, but brightened as the day went on. She was vivacious inthe afternoon; by dinner-time she was in feverish high spirits. Afterdinner she became depressed and moody. Paul, observing these symptomswith tender interest, attributed them all to her condition, and assumedthat they were natural. 

But one evening in mid-June an incident happened which for a time gavehim genuine concern. Since he had resolved to settle in the villagefor some time, he had rented a small office in the hotel, which he hadtransformed into a study, and there he spent most of his waking time atwork. On this particular day he had gone to his den immediately afterluncheon, and had grown so absorbed in his labours that the dinner-bellhad sounded unheard. He was aroused from his work by the apple-cheekedmaid, and was told that dinner was already served. He dashed upstairstwo steps at a time, laved his hands and face, and descended to thedining-room. Annette was not there. He inquired for her, and learnedthat she had gone out an hour or two before and had not yet returned. This caused him no anxiety, for she had made some acquaintances in theplace, and had one or two houses at which she was accustomed to visitBut when the meal was over and there was still no sign of her, he beganto be vaguely inquiet, and, taking up his hat, he walked out into thetranquil brightness of the summer evening, and called from house tohouse to ask after her. But Madame Bulot had not seen her, nor hadMadame Gerard, nor had the doctor, nor had little Mademoiselle Coquelin, the dressmaker. Madame Armstrong had been observed on the road which ledto the Bois de Falaise some four hours ago, and that was the latest newsof her. The vague inquiet began to deepen into serious misgiving. Paulwalked rapidly to the Terre de Falaise, scoured the broad carriage-drivewhich had been cut through the wood, beat up one or two favourite littlehaunts of Annette's, and found no trace of her. He returned to thehotel, only to learn that she had not been seen. A terror of a thousandimagined accidents took hold of him, and he flew to the gendarmerie withintent to organize a search. But while he was discussing ways and meanswith the Juge d'Instruction, who had been hastily sent for from nextdoor, a stable-keeper from the hotel ran up to inform him that Madamehad been found, that she had been evidently dreadfully frightened, andwas in hysterics. When he reached the hotel, breathless, he found agroup of startled people in the corridor, and from the bedroom he couldhear Annette's voice shrieking that they were dancing in the wood, and that their bones were white. He pushed eagerly through the knot oflisteners, and made his way into the bedroom. The doctor was there, andwarned him away at once. 

'You can do no good here, ' he said; 'you will only distress yourself. '

'There is no danger?' he asked, panting after his homeward run. 

'There is not the slightest atom of danger, ' said the doctor. 

CHAPTER XVI

Here, in the wakeful night, high up in the monstrous hills, with thiseverlasting torrent raging in his ears, and the camp-fire out of doorsthere flaring, flickering, glowing, dying down--here in the fog of theforest fires and the solitude of the mountains, it is so easy to seethings as they truly were. A shrug, a smile, a word, a silence, the liftof an eyebrow--things which had no apparent meaning a dozen years ago, which were either unnoticed or forgotten in an instant--are alivewith monitions now. Not to have seen! Not to have guessed 'It looksincredible. A mule might have begun to read the riddle. 

Paul read nothing. 

And now, looking back from this smoky eyrie through all the interveningyears, it seems as if the tragedy of a life might have been averted, asif a little weight, a little prescience, a little care, might have madethe sum of life work out to a far other total. 

There has been no star visible in the heavens, nor any glimpse of amoon for four nights. The sun is the dimmest red ball in the daytime, a danger-signal lantern, seen through dirty glass. There is a yeast atwork in the Solitary's mind It is as if the material universe beingcut away from him--save just this solid remnant of it in which helounges--there were space found for something not belonging to it todraw near him. 

Over and over again the lonely man had read his father's last letter, and now in the hot, oppressive midnight it repeated itself in his mind:

'At my father's death a change began to work in my opinions. I hadconvinced myself that this life was all that man enjoyed or suffered, but I began to be conscious that I was under tutelage. I began--at firstfaintly and with much doubting--to think that my father's spirit and myown were in communion. I knew that he had loved me fondly, and to me hehad always seemed a pattern of what is admirable in man. Now he seemedgreater, wiser, milder. I grew to believe that he had survived thegrave, and that he had found permission to be my guide and guardian. Thecreed which slowly grew up in my mind and heart, and is now fixed there, was simply this: that as a great Emperor rules his many provinces, Godrules the universe, employing many officers--intelligences of loftiestestate, then intelligences less lofty; less lofty still beneath these, and at the last the humbler servants, who are still as gods to us, butwithin our reach, and His messengers and agents. Then God seemed nolonger utterly remote and impossible to belief, and I believed. Andwhether this be true or false, I know one thing: this faith has made mea better man than I should have been without it. My beloved father, wiseand kind, has seemed to lead me by the hand. I have not dared in theknowledge of his sleepless love to do many things to which I have beentempted. I have learned from him to know--if I know anything--thatlife from its lowest form is a striving upward through uncounted andinnumerable grades, and that in each grade something is learned thatfits us for the next, or something lost which has to be won back againafter a great purgation of pain and repentance. 

'It is three days since I began to write, and I am so weak that I canbarely hold the pen. Send this to Paul He has gone far wrong. He willcome back again to the right. I have asked that I may guide him, and myprayer has been granted. From the hour at which I quit this fleshuntil he joins me my work is appointed me, and I shall not leave him. Good-bye, dear child Be at peace, for all will yet be well. 

'When Paul sees these last words of mine, he will know that I am withhim. '

Thus, word for word, he went over it all again, for the hundredth timeor more, and on a sudden his soul seemed to flow from him in a greatlonging. He rose unconsciously, and stepped beyond the doorway of histent, and stretched his arms wide to the night. 

'Be with me! oh! be with me, and let me know and feel that you are here. 'If it be madness to believe so, I will not care!'

But that thought froze him. What right had he to welcome madness? Ofwhat avail was it to crown a wasted life with such a folly?

'You believed it, dear old dad?' he said. 'But how shall I? Can I dodgemyself? Can I slink by a side-road out of sight of my own intelligence?'

He stood long with dejected head and drooping hands, and then gropinghis way back to his couch, lay down again. 

And his dreams came back to him. 

He was suddenly afire over a new idea for a comedy, and from the risingof the sun to the going down of the same he slaved at it and exultedin it day by day. He made long tramps into the country and lost himselfcontinuously. Pretty generally he awoke from his fancies to find himselfravenously hungry, and without so much as a hint of an orient in hismind. But almost any village or hamlet was good for bread, of a sort, and for trustworthy eggs and new milk; and his necessities brought himinto contact with the Walloon language, in which--or something very likeit--Froissart wrote his chronicles. He picked up nuggets in the wayof character--clean gold--and whether he were wandering with his ownthoughts or struggling through the medium of this new tongue towardsa knowledge of rustic Belgian life, or pruning and digging about hisimaginations in his workshop, he was happy as a man need be. 

Annette and he saw less and less of each other, but that was acircumstance to which he resigned himself with ease. They had taken tworooms at the corner of their corridor to begin with, a large room and asmaller one, and there was no need to move from their original quarters. The smaller chamber was used as a dressing-room. Paul's circular tubwas there, and the trunks with which the pair travelled, and coats anddresses were hung about the walls. But it was Annette's whim one day inPaul's absence to have a bed set up in this second apartment, and thatsame night, rising late from work, he found himself locked from hiswife's room. He had not been consulted as to this arrangement, and itstruck a little cold upon him, but thinking that he would talk it overin the morning, he betook himself to sleep. Next day Annette complainedof headache, and the pallor of her face and the heaviness of her eyeswere a sufficing certificate to suffering. 

'I was very, very ill last night, ' she said pleadingly, 'and I wanted tobe alone. Oh! I can't tell you how much I wanted to be alone. '

Paul took her hand in his, and smoothed it between his own. The skin washarsh and dry, and the little hand felt almost like a hot coal. 

'My dear, ' he said anxiously, 'you are quite in a high fever. I shallrun away for Laurent instantly. '

'Why will you pester me?' she asked, with a weary little spurt oftemper. 'I have no more need for a doctor than you have. I understand myown condition perfectly, and I want to go to sleep. '

'But, my dear, ' said Paul, 'these symptoms seem to be increasing, andyou really ought to have advice. Laurent is an able man; you can trusthim, I am sure. '

'Oh! she cried, 'your voice rasps me in the very middle of my brain. 'Goaway and let me sleep, for pity's sake. '

'Let me make you a cup of tea, ' he said, subduing his voice to awhisper. 'I have a whole packet of that lovely stuff I bought before weleft London. '

'Pray go, ' she answered him. 

There was nothing for it but to obey, and he went from the room a littledisconsolate. 

'This, ' he said to himself as he walked down to the _salle ā manger_' iswhat the poor things have to go through. Love and marriage are notall beer and skittles for either party, but they are pitiable forthe woman. ' Even now there was no deep attachment in his mind towardsAnnette, and he blamed himself for his want of feeling. 'I owe hereverything, ' he thought--'everything that I can bring her. I suppose sheloved me when she came to me. God knows!'

He was sorry for her, but he upbraided himself for the thought that hewould have been just as sorry for any other woman who suffered in thesame way, if only her trouble were brought near enough for him to beaware of it. He had bound himself down to a life without love, but therewas an exquisite disloyalty in the mere admission of that thought. 

He was too disturbed to care for breakfast, and after drinking a cup ofcoffee he lit his pipe and strolled in search of the doctor. The goodold Chinois was munching his pistolet, and sipping at a great bowl ofhot milk just tinctured with coffee, and his man was already at thedoor with the queer old buggy and the queer old horse familiar to thecountry-side over a circuit of half a dozen leagues from its centre. 

'I have come, ' said Paul, 'to talk to you about Mrs. Armstrong. I don'tlike the look of things at all. '

'Ha!' said Laurent 'Tell me, what do you observe?'

'I notice, ' Paul answered, 'a dreadful variableness of mood, a feverishexaltation, followed by a serious depression, an increasing desire tobe alone, a sort of nervous resentment of any inquiry as to her stateof health. That, I think, is about all. I dare say that everything I mayhave noticed may be attributable to her present condition, and that inmy inexperience of such things I may be unduly nervous; but I wish you'dmake an opportunity of seeing her casually in the course of the day. ForHeaven's sake, doctor, ' he added with a laugh, 'don't let her guess thatI sent you. The one thing she most resents is having the mere suggestionoffered that she should see a doctor. '

Laurent rubbed his close-cropped silver head with one hand, and with theother wrung a few drops of liquid from his huge moustache, looking upat Paul meanwhile with a crafty benevolence in his eye, like asupernaturally wise old parrot. 

'Ah yes!' he hummed in a deep nasal tone, which Paul knew well alreadyas being characteristic of him when he had to reason out a problem as hetalked. 'Monsieur Armstrong, the man who has half-confidences with hisphysician is in serious error. '

'I don't understand, ' said Paul. 

'You know of nothing, ' said Laurent, 'which would help to explain thesesymptoms apart from the fact that madame believes herself to be about tobecome a mother?'

'Nothing else, ' Paul answered in some astonishment, 'Unless----'

Laurent, holding up his bowl in both hands, echoed:

'Sinon?----'

'Well, ' said Paul, 'I'm afraid that I may have been a little neglectfullately. I have a piece of work in hand which occupies me a great deal. Imay, perhaps, be too absorbed in it. '

'That, of course, is perhaps possible, ' said Laurent 'I will contriveto see her in the course of the day, and you may trust an old doctor's_savoir faire_. She shall not guess that you sent me. '

Immediately upon this the doctor's servant rapped at the door to saythat all was ready, and Paul took his leave. He went immediately to hisstudy, and there the embers of last night's fire, being fanned everso little, began to glow again, and he became absorbed in his work, insomuch that when the bell rang for déjeûner at noon he was amazed tonotice how quickly time had flown. When he got to table Annette was inher place, still looking a trifle pale and heavy-eyed, but evidentlymuch relieved since he had last seen her. 

'I want you to do me a little favour, Paul, ' she said

'Yes, ' he answered gaily. 

'I want what you call--what is your word for it? Oh yes, I know--I wantwhat you call a pick-me-up. Will you share a pint of wine with me? Iwant a glass--just one glass of champagne. I quite long for it. '

'Why, yes, ' said Paul, 'that is a simple matter enough, ' and he gave theorder for the wine. 

Annette drank the greater part of it, and began to glow and sparkle. The colour came back to her cheeks and the light to her eyes. She wasunusually bright and animated, and chattered all manner of good-humourednonsense with the juge de paix and the garde-champętre. 

'That is your medicine, my dear, ' said Paul, in a half-whisper, tappingthe bottle with a finger-nail. 'I shall prescribe it for you daily. '

She made a little face at him and laughed. 'I don't like the stuff, 'she said, 'very often, but I longed for it this morning; and, oh! I ambetter for it. '

They were as much at home in the Hotel of the Three Friends by thistime as if they had lived there all their lives. There was no strangerpresent at the meal, and it was not at all a surprising thing whenAnnette floated away to the piano at the further end of the room andbegan to tinkle at the keys there. She was by no means an accomplishedmusician, but she played a few little airs with a sort of spontaneityand grace, and she had a sweet, thin, bird-like voice, a clear andliquid note, which was perhaps her greatest charm. She searched amongthe music upon the top of the piano, flicking the untidy scatteredleaves until she found a song she knew. 

'Music, messieurs, ' she said, 'is an aid to digestion; I will make asandwich of sentiment for you--cheese on the one side, dessert on theother, and love in the middle. '

The garde and the juge and the local huissier and the bachelor chemistall beat the hafts of their knives on the table in applause, and shesang, with a vivacity and archness Paul had never before observed inher, a snatch of cheap Belgian sentimentalism:

 'Toux les deux, la main dans la main, Nous poursuivions notre chemin, Sous la céleste voûte; Les doux échos mystérieux Répéter nos baisers joyeux Tout le long--tout le long de la route. '

And whilst she was warbling the door of the salle opened and in walkedLaurent. 

'Pardon, madame, ' he cried; 'do not permit me to interrupt you. '

But Annette had already risen from the piano, and had closed the lid ofthe instrument. 

'My sister has gone to Janenne, ' he explained, 'and I am leftbreakfastless. You hungry rascals have not eaten everything, I hope?'

The Flemish maid would lay an instant cover for Monsieur Laurent, androom was made for him at the table with something like enthusiasm. Hebegan to talk vivaciously scraps of local news gathered on his morningrounds among his patients, and from time to time he turned to Paul toexplain some rustic allusion or phrase. He made himself charming, andsince he did not explain that he had purposely dismissed his sister forthe day in order to find an excuse for his visit to the hotel, Annettehad no present suspicion of him. They had a little playful badinagetogether, and Laurent, turning mock-sentimental, lamented his celibacyso quaintly that she broke into peals of silvery laughter over him. Paulwas pleased with her, and half inclined to be proud of her for the firsttime in his life, though he had a nervous fear lest her gaiety shouldtopple over like an unskilled artist on the slack wire. 

By-and-by Laurent set about his meal in a business-like fashion, andPaul strolled quietly from the room. The others, juge and garde andhuissier and chemist, chief of gendarmerie, and all the rest ofthe regular frequenters of the table, were called away by their ownavocations. Paul, sitting with his study-door ajar, looking as ifprepared to be absorbed in labour at any moment, watched them as theywent out by ones and twos, and knew that at last Laurent and Annettewere together. The heat of summer noon was in the air. The _place_ wasempty, and there was everywhere a humming silence through which his eardiscerned now and then the deeper hum of Laurent's voice. Not a wordwas audible, or would have been even had Paul cared to play theeavesdropper, but one might have thought that the doctor was preaching asermon. 

'He's a wise old man, is Laurent, ' said Paul to himself, 'and, for abachelor, he seems to have an uncommon good knowledge of women. Thatcomes out of a doctor's practice, I dare say. '

The heat of the day, the single glass of wine he had taken, and thehearty meal he had eaten after his morning fast, all combined to makehim drowsy, and he had fallen into a half-slumber in which he saw hazilythe creatures of his fancy moving behind the footlights, when the doorof the dining-room opened, and he heard Laurent's words of farewell:

'Croyez moi, Madame Armstrong, c'est une affaire assez grave. Maiscourage, courage! Et--bon jour--et bonne espérance. '

Then the door closed, and the doctor's sturdy feet in their thick-soledboots went echoing along the parquet, clattered for a moment on thepavement outside, and were lost to hearing. 

Paul woke with a numbness at the heart. The affair was serious; butcourage, and good hope! That sounded grave. He rose from his chair, thepipe between his lips still sending up a spiral of blue smoke. He wasasking himself whether he should go in to the next apartment eitherto comfort or to question, when the door of the _salle ā manger_ againopened, and Annette stole into his room. She pushed the door wide andstood framed for an instant against the shadow of the corridor. She wasdressed in some filmy white stuff, with a great blue bow at the throatand a bow of scarlet in her hair. She had an odd taste in contrasts, but the Parisian touch was always evident in what she wore, and ifher scheme of personal adornment were sometimes quaint, it was alwaysartistic. Paul noticed then, and remembered always, a strange pathos inher look. She seemed for the moment curiously childlike. Her face hadonce more lost its colour, and her eyes, which were thick with tears, were like those of a child grown frightened in loneliness, and searchingdoubtfully and almost in terror for the homeward way. 

She put out her hands towards him with a gesture of appeal. It seemed asif she asked his pardon, though why that should be he could not guess, and as he made a hasty movement towards her she entered the roomsuddenly, and thrust the door vehemently behind her so that the corridorrang with the echo of the sound. 

'Paul, ' she said, 'Paul!' and sinking on her knees before him, she threwher arms round him and began to cry bitterly. 

He tried to raise her, but her arms clung tightly, and he could donothing but stand there awkwardly and smooth her hair with foolish, half-articulate expressions of sympathy. She cried as if broken-heartedfor a time, and when at last his caressing fingers raised her facetowards his own, her chin and throat were wet with tears, and her eyeswere still brimming. He coaxed her with much difficulty to an arm-chair, and when he had seated her there he knelt beside her with an arm abouther waist. 

'What is it, little woman?' he asked. 'Dear little woman, what is it?'

He had striven in vain with his disengaged hand to draw away theinterlaced fingers she had knitted across her eyes, but at this appealshe cast her arms abroad and looked at him with a swift intentnessthrough her tears. 

'You mean it?' she asked with an eager fierceness in her eyes and voice. 

'Mean it?' he answered. 'What, the dear little woman? Of course I meanit. '

'Paul, ' she said, 'if you will only love me, if you will only strivewith me, I will love and worship you all my days. '

'What can I do?' he asked. 'Tell me, and I will do it'

'Oh!' she cried, beating the air with her hands, 'these moods, thesefollies! they are my own fault I am dividing myself from you. I ambreaking my own heart; I am miserable for no reason. Help me, Paul, helpme! Be at least my friend!'

He was not a man to whom such an appeal could be made in vain, and hisheart acquitted him of any falsehood when he assured her that he lovedher, and would yield her any earthly service in his power. 

'But, sweetheart, ' he said, 'tell me how I am to help you. Don't thinkthat there is any reproach in what I say, but often when I wish to benear you you banish me, and I have to go, because all my thought is notto harass you. I heard what Laurent said just now----'

Her face hardened into an expression of inquiry. Her black brows shotdown level, over her brown eyes, and the eyes gloomed at him with athreat in them. 

'You heard?' she said. 

'Yes, ' he responded caressingly, 'I heard his parting words, "l'affaireest assez grave--mais courage, et bonne espérance. "'

'Is that all you heard?' she demanded, bending the level challenge ofher brows still lower, and snaking away her form from his embrace as ifshe feared it. 

'I heard no more, ' said Paul. 

'Ah, well!' she answered in a sudden lassitude. She fell back into thearm-chair with closed eyes, and suffered her hands to fall laxly oneither side of her knees. 'You will find me a changed girl, Paul. I amgoing to have done with my moods, and I am going to follow--I am goingto follow--what is it I am going to follow? M. Laurent knows. Oh yes, itis the goddess of hygiene! I am to bathe, and I am to drive, and I amto walk, and I am to be equably cheerful, and I am to give up my blackcoffee and my strong tea and my eau des Carmes, and I am never to drinkwine until dinner-time, and then only two glasses--two little glasses ofclaret or burgundy--and then I am to be quite an angel of good temper, and everybody is to adore me. That is the verdict of M. Laurent. Do youthink, Paul, I shall be charming when I have done all these things?'

'You would be charming, little sweetheart, ' said Paul, 'whether youdid them or no. It is not a question of charm, but of health, dear, and Laurent is a very sage old gentleman indeed, and you may follow hiscounsel with perfect certainty. I can't help owning, ' he went on, 'thatI've been a little nervous lately about the fluctuation of your spirits, and I'm glad he happened to drop in and have a talk with you. '

She flashed from languor into a mood of vivid irony. Her lips curled, her eyes opened wide with a dancing beryl-coloured flame behind them, and her eyebrows arched in a sublime disdain. 

'You didn't send him?' she asked

'I?' said Paul, with a guilty stammer--' I--send him?'

'Now, before you lie, ' said Annette, with a tragic gesture of the hand, 'hear me. The window of our dressing-room happens--just happens, byGod's providence to confute a fool--to command a view of Dr. Laurent'sdoor. I saw you go in; I could even hear you knock. Do you think you candeceive me? Pah!'

She rose, evaded his arm, swept from the room in a kind of torrentialrage, banged the door behind her, and was gone. 

He was so amazed at it all--the swift interchange of penitenceto self-abasement, languor, challenge, suspicion, wrath, andaccusation--that he stood dumfounded, not knowing what to think. Heheard the flying feet and swirling skirts as Annette raced upstairs. Inthe drowsy stillness of the afternoon he heard the door of her bedroomclose with a decisive click, and then the sharp shooting of the bolt andthe shrieking of the key as it turned in its unaccustomed wards. Stillstanding there in wonderment, he listened to her footsteps overheadas she dashed through the dressing-room, and an instant later came theslamming and the locking of a second door. 

He sat down, reached mechanically for his pipe, beat out the ashes fromit on the level tiles of the hearth, and mechanically filled and lit it. He searched his mind for a clue to the whole extraordinary businessof the last half-hour, and could find but one: the anxieties of comingmaternity, and possibly the change of frame which women suffer at suchtimes, had unhinged Annette, and had disturbed her mind and nerves fromtheir ordinary balance. He longed for an interview with Laurent, but hedared not seek it. He would have sent a messenger to him, but he alsomight be watched by those keen and too observant eyes. 

As he sat and thought things over he gradually gathered courage, and atlength he began to discern a touch of comedy in that which had so muchdisturbed him. It was a very tender and touching comedy, but it wascomedy all the same--a bird-soul of light and laughter hovering overa lake of tears. The _dear_ little woman! He had thought herunimpressionable, even a little stupid, and he saw now how much he hadwronged her. She was full of emotions he had never suspected, and couldnot even now analyze. Her very waywardness, the strange caprices offeeling which had so astonished him as they chased each other, began tolook charming in the new light his thoughts cast upon them. 

'Thus it is, ' said Paul to himself, 'we come into the world casting ourshadows before us, and making laughter and trouble of all sorts for ourmakers before we are born. '

It was obviously the mother's lot to suffer much. It was obviouslythe man's business to be very patient, very tender. He began to thinkhimself exceeding good and wise. He was learning to appreciate anew feature in human nature, something which had its element ofunpleasantness if not rightly seen and understood, but, being so seenand understood, a very beautiful and tender thing indeed. There was asacred shyness in his thoughts, but overriding this a triumphant tenderunderstanding of the humours of the situation which tickled him mostdelicately. It would be easy to be patient now that he understood sowell, and he resolved upon patience comfortably. 

He sat so absorbed in his own fancies and feelings that he was unawareof the rumble of a carriage and the 'clicking of horses' hoofs over thecobbles of the _place_, but he knew of these things a moment later whenthe broad-beamed Evariste rapped at his study-door, and announced twogentlemen to see him. Straight upon her heels came Darco in a silk hatof splendid lustre, and a nobly frogged overcoat with costly astrachanat cuffs and collar, as though, instead of being the sweltering dayit was, it had been mid-winter. Behind him came Pauer, in tweeds and awhite waistcoat, his face gold colour with his ancient jaundice, andhis eyes a pale saffron. They were both in the best of good humours, andDarco stood on tiptoe to take Paul by the shoulders. 

'Ve have done id!' he cried in a voice of triumph. 'Ve have done id thistime, ant no mistake!'

'What have you done?' asked Paul. 

'Vot have we done, Pauer--eh? Vot haf we done?' cried Darco. 'Tell himand have done with it, ' said Pauer. 

'Ve have bought the Goncreve, ' said Darco, with a glowing air oftriumph. 

'Bought the what?' asked Paul. 

'The Congreve Theatre, ' Pauer explained. 

'Ah!'said Paul. 

'That is vot I am zayink, ' cried Darco. 'Ve haf bought the Goncreve. Itis in the handts of the decorators now. Ve shall oben in the first weekof Sebtemper, ant ve are coing for the gloves. Ve are coing to oben witha gomedy. Do you hear? A gomedy. Ant you ant I are coing to write thatgomedy. Do you understandt?' He slipped out of his overcoat, and threwit into the arm-chair in the corner. Then he banged the lustrous hatupon the table, and snatching up a pen, thrust it into Paul's hand. 'Veare coing to wride that gomedy, ant ve are coing to begin at vonce--eh?'

'Why, certainly, ' said Paul. 'Have you got an idea to work on?'

'My poy, ' said Darco, 'I am primming with iteas. I am itching all oferwith iteas, as if I were living in a bag of vleas. I am Cheorge Dargo. Ven you find Cheorge Dargo without iteas you may co to the nearestghemist ant ask for poison. Take your ben ant sit down, ant I will showyou if I haf iteas or no. '

CHAPTER XVII

The work thus abruptly begun lasted for weeks, and Darco's enthusiasmdrove Paul before it as if it had been a hurricane. Pauer lounged fora day or two, and then betook his golden visage and saffron eyes toLondon, leaving the pair to their labours. Paul and Darco worked on anaverage twelve hours a day, and it happened occasionally that a group ofterrified _commis voyageurs_ would assemble in the passage outside thestudy anticipating murder, whilst Darco, in Alsatian English, declaimedthe passion of his heroine. There were deep wells of laughter here andthere in the course of that dramatic pilgrimage. 

'Now, vat I want, ' said Darco, 'is just this: It is Binda's endrance. She is a leedle vat you would call distraught, not mat, but ankrished. She is very pretty, she is very bale. She stands at the door, and Raouldoes not see her. She is there for vive zeconds to a tick, not more, notless--vive zeconds; write it down. Enter Binda, pause, unobserved, vivezeconds. Have you got it down? She is priddy, she is bale, a leedletouch of colour under the eyes; she is tressed in vite, some filmy kindof stuff, with a plue bow at the throat and a bit of scarlet ribbon, orred flower, or zomethings, in her hair. And zo she stands at the doorand she looks at Raoul, and he toes not know she is there, ant vor justthose vive zeconds there is no music, not a note, and then---- Lookhere, I am Cheorge Dargo; I can write a blay, and stage a blay, andbaint the zeenery for a blay, and I can gompose the music for a blay, and I can berform on every damned inztrument in the orghestra. And thisis vod Binda does: Bale and bretty, do you zee? at the door for vivezilent zeconds, and then with all her zoul one great appeal, she crossesto Raoul at his desk petween zecond and third O. P. , ant she coes likethis. '

The fat, brief-statured man waddled in his enthusiasm from Binda'simaginary entering-place towards Paul with an allure of comedy-pathosso piercing in its effect that the amanuensis cast both hands in the airwith a shriek of helpless mirth, and, losing his balance, wallowed onthe floor amidst untidy heaps of books, newspapers, and manuscript. 

'Vod is the madder?' Darco cried, rushing towards Paul, and leaning overhim with instant solicitude. 

Darco's collaborateur was smitten with a sudden shame and repentance. 

'A kind of spasm, ' he said breathlessly--'a pain just here. '

Darco helped him to his feet. 

'You are too emotional, tear poy, 'he said; 'you are too easily vorkedupon. I will rink the pell for a prandy-ant-zoda, ant you shall lie townvor a leettle while. '

It was the thick-set Evariste who brought the syphon bottle and thesmall carafe of brandy and the tumblers, and it was she who caughtPaul on her broad Flemish bosom when the drink, which he had acceptedsoberly, went the wrong way, and with a wild snort into his tumbler hefell backwards. 

'Le bauvre cheune homme ā dombé zupidement malade. '

The poor young man was horribly afraid at first of having irredeemablyhurt Darco's feelings, but that excellent enthusiast had not even thebeginning of an idea that it was possible for anyone to laugh at himunless he chose of purpose aforethought to be laughable. Thus theepisode passed lightly enough, but Paul was continually in danger of areversion to it whenever the distraught heroine appeared upon the scene. 

He saw but little of Annette during the weeks of labour to which Darco'snew enterprise enforced him. She slept alone, and was rarely accessiblebefore the mid-day breakfast or later than the dinner-hour. Laurentvisited her almost daily, and she seemed to submit to his attentionswith a better grace than she had shown at first; but she was stillsubject to those rapid and violent alternations of mood which hadalready perplexed and alarmed her husband. She had apparently conceivedan aversion to being seen abroad, and it was with the greatestdifficulty that she could be persuaded to take an occasional carriagedrive. 

'I shall venture to advise you, ' said Laurent to Paul 'You tell me thatyour work is almost finished, and that in a day or two you are settingout for London. '

'Yes, ' said Paul. 

'You will do well to take Mrs. Armstrong with you, ' Laurent said. 'Sheis in need of change and distraction. This quiet, dead-alive existenceis not good for her. You must insist upon her shaking herself free ofthe habits of seclusion into which she is falling. I should urge youvery strongly to find some good creature of her own sex who would bea companion to her. She is living too much alone; she has too fewinterests. '

'Well, of course, ' Paul answered, 'that is very largely my fault; butthe press of work is over now, and I shall be able to give more time andcare to her. '

'You will find it advisable, ' said Laurent, with a certain meaning inhis face and voice which Paul at the moment could not fathom. 

Something occurred to put an end to their conversation, and it was notresumed before Paul's departure with Darco for London. When it came tothe point Annette flatly refused to go to England. She averred thatshe was not strong enough to travel, that she was altogether better andhappier where she was than she hoped to be elsewhere. 

'You will be back in a month's time, ' she urged. 'You will be busy allthe while you are away. The theatre will claim you day and night, andI should be moping in some great hotel without a soul to speak to. I amquite at home amongst the people here, and they are used to me and to myways. '

Paul urged Laurent's suggestion upon her, and she received it with anunexpected anger. 

'What? A companion? And may I ask you why?'

'For no other earthly reason than that you should have a friend athand--somebody who might on occasion be useful to you. '

'Oh no, ' said Annette, tossing her head, and then looking askance athim, with half-veiled eyes: 'you would like to have me watched and spiedupon, and to have a report of my conduct sent to you, as if I were aprisoner or a maniac. '

'My dear child, ' said Paul, in sheer amazement, 'what extraordinarydream is this? What has put so strange a fancy in your mind?'

'Tell me, ' cried Annette, suddenly whirling round upon him, 'what is ityou suspect? What intrigue? What plot? What secret?'

'Come, come, ' he said, 'there is no plot--no secret But you know thatyou are not quite yourself of late, and it is not right or kind to leaveyou here in your present delicate health without some responsible personto look after you. '

'Has M. Laurent been poisoning your mind against me?' she demanded, witha curious slowness. She advanced a foot as she spoke, and moved forwardtowards him with a something between fear and anger in her eyes. 

'My dear child, ' he answered, 'what strange illusions are you nursing?Intrigues and plots, and watching and reports! Don't believe in any suchnonsense, I implore you. '

'What has Laurent been telling you about me? I insist--I _will_ know. '

'Laurent has been telling me that he thinks you are likely to find achange beneficial, and that you ought not to be left here alone. '

'Why not?' she asked, with a flash of rage. 'Why am I incapable oftaking care of myself?'

'You are not strong or well, ' said Paul. 'You are not quite mistress ofyour own emotions. '

'Ah!' she cried, 'now we are to have the accusation. I am going mad! Isthat it? You would like to get rid of me on that ground? Do I understandat last?'

Paul would have been blind if he had failed to see that beneath the airof scorn she strove to wear there was some real terror in her mind, andhe did his best to soothe it. 

'All these things are the merest fancies, ' he began. 

'Oh yes, ' she broke in. 'Delusions! That is step number one. We sufferfrom delusions. '

'If you believe in anything of the sort that you suggest, you aremistaken. If you wish to be happy, you must banish all that nonsensefrom your mind. It _is_ pure nonsense, dearest. Why should Laurent tryto poison my mind? He likes you very well. He takes a warm interestin you, to the best of my belief. But you are really very fanciful andstrange to-day, and you have been giving yourself up far too much tosolitude for two months past. It is your duty to yourself and me toaccept Laurent's advice. You must not be left here alone. You may chooseyour own companion. She shall be entirely at your orders. You shallengage her yourself; you shall pay her salary; she shall be at your owncontrol. '

'I know, ' she answered, tapping her foot upon the floor. 'I know. Thetruth is, you never really cared for me, and now you have grown tired. You want to be rid of me. '

'Now, that, ' said Paul, 'is not only nonsense, it is very wickednonsense, and I will not permit it The whole matter lies with yourself. If you continue to nurse those wrong and foolish thoughts, you will makeit necessary for me to insist upon your obedience. If you will behavelike a sensible creature, I may feel justified in yielding to yourwish, and leaving you behind. But if I have any more of these absurdsuspicions I shall not venture to leave you here. '

He spoke with a purposed sternness, but with something of a heartache, too. There was no escape in his own mind from the belief that the wholechange which had of late revealed itself in Annette was due to thefact of approaching maternity, and he had a man's natural pity for hersufferings. He bore her fancies with patience, but he thought it bestfor her that he should feign some anger at them. 

The plan seemed to act for the time being at least, for after a moment'sincertitude, in which she seemed to battle with herself, she turned herhumid brown eyes upon him, and said softly:

'I am very foolishly suspicious sometimes, Paul. I know--oh, I know thatI am not the girl I used to be. Bear with me, dear. I shall be differentby-and-by. '

'I am sure of that, ' he answered, and she approaching him with anappealing languor in her eyes, and in the carriage of her whole figure, he took her into his arms, and for a minute or two she cried quietlyupon his shoulder. He patted and caressed her, and she looked up with aquivering face. 

'I will never think or say those things again. I know how wrong theyare, but, Paul, they come into my mind, and I cannot resist themsometimes. But I will--I will in future. You shall never hear them anymore. But I want you to believe me, dearest, in just this one littlething. It will be the best and kindest thing that you can do for meto leave me here alone whilst you are away in London. I am not withoutfriends here, when I can find the courage and the strength to see them. M. Laurent will look after me. You will write to me every day, won'tyou? I shall not be lonely. But the idea of having a stranger about me, fussing and inquiring, is horrible. I can't bear it. '

'Very well, dear, 'said Paul, greatly relieved at the turn things hadtaken, 'you shall have your way. But you must remember, dear '--he spokeas soothingly as he could--' it is my duty to see that you are cared forproperly, and I must not leave you to yourself unless I am quiteassured beforehand that you are certain to be bright and brave when I amgone. 'He placed his hand beneath her chin, and coaxed her eyes to meethis own. 'You won't nourish these distressing fancies any more, willyou?'

'No, ' she answered, clinging to him; 'they are all gone. They are alldone with. You will be kind and good to me, Paul--I know you will. Itisn't a very great favour for a grown-up woman to ask to be allowed totake care of herself, is it, Paul, darling?'

'That must depend, ' he answered gaily, 'whether the grown-up woman iswell enough and strong enough for the task. '

'Ah, well, ' said Annette with an equal brightness, 'you shall see. '

There were still two days' work to be done at the comedy, and Darco wasresolute not to leave for London until all was finished. The first twoacts were already in rehearsal at the Congreve, and Pauer, who was oneof those old stagers of the profession who know their business upsidedown and inside out, was in superintendence until Darco should arrive tomould the whole production to his own exigent fancy. 

The change in Annette was remarkable. She had evidently made up her mindfor a struggle with herself, and she kept her inequalities of mood inastonishing control, all things considered. She became interested in thework in hand, and took some trifle of needlework to the study for thefinal reading of the piece between Darco and her husband Paul, withthe manuscript before him, acted the whole comedy as brilliantly asan arm-chair rendering could go, and Darco with notebook and pencillistened in keenly attentive silence, note-taking here and there. 

'Id is a gread vork, ' he announced solemnly when it was all over. 'Id ispeautifully written, and that is your affair, younk Armstronk. But thegoncebtion is clorious, ant that is my affair. Vot? Not? I am CheorgeDargo, and I know my trade. '

They were both up at four o'clock next morning to catch the mail toCalais, and Paul was able to leave Annette without severe misgiving. Laurent had promised to look after her, and the improvement in her ownhopes appeared so manifest that he felt safe about her, except for thoseslight inevitable uneasinesses which occur at such a time. But hewas only to be away for a month at the outside, and he had Laurent'sassurance that he might make his mind easy. Annette herself rose to seePaul away, in spite of his remonstrances. She nestled by him whilst hestood to drink his coffee in the gray dawn of the morning, in the great, empty, echoing _salle ā manger_, with Darco rolling about the houselike an exaggerated football impelled by unseen influences, and roaringtempestuous orders like a ship's captain in a squall. 

Never in his life had Paul felt so wholly tender as he did then towardsAnnette. He had begun to read so many new meanings into her of late. Sheseemed no longer the molluscous little creature he had once thought her, but a woman, capable of much suffering, of some determination, of realaffection. He was leaving her at the very time at which she most neededhis guardianship and care, and at the hour, too, when she seemed firstreally to confide in him and cling to him. His eyes were moist when heheld her in a last embrace, and ran into the street in answer to Darco'sfinal call. His collaborateur was already seated in the voiture, glossysilk hat, astrachan cuffs and collar, gold-rimmed eyeglass, and all The_cocker's_ whip cracked stormily, and the fat Flemish horse started offat a pace of four miles an hour. 

'Mark my vorts, ' said Darco, as they rolled along the country roadtowards the station at which they were to intercept the northwardtravelling Malle des Indes, 'you are dravelling to vame ant vorchune. '

'Well, 'said Paul, 'that's pleasant to know, isn't it, old Darco?'

'It is very bleasant, ' returned Darco. 'You ant I are an iteal gouple. We fit each other like the two halves of a pear. I am a boet. Do youhear me, younk Armstronk? I am a boet I am a berson of imachination. I can invent. I can gontrive. There is nopoty in the vorlt who cangonstruct a blot like me. But I gannot egspress myself. Now, you ganegspress me; that is your desdiny. You will egspress Cheorge Dargo. Youwill descend to future aitches as the dranslader of Cheorge Dargo. '

'It is a happy lot, old chap, ' said Paul, 'and I am so proud of it thatI am going to sleep. '

'Lacy tewle!' said Darco, 'give me the script. I haf been thinking ofsomethings. '

How Darco worked, stormed, domineered in the ensuing month, nobodyoutside the limits of the Congreve knew. He appalled the timid andmaddened the courageous. He was up all night for half a week together, seeming to live with a teaspoon in one hand and a tin of some nutritivemeat essence in the other, and always administering doses to himself asif he were a patient in danger of imminent exhaustion. 

Mr. Warr was here, under solemn articles not once to varnish the work ofart until the run of the piece was over. 

'A dreadful circumstance, truly, Mr. Armstrong, ' he complained. 'I amdeprived of the consolation of one device which has hitherto upheld meat such times of trial. The piece might run, sir, for a year; it mighteven run for two. There is no looking forward to a definite date ofrelief, sir. It is like being imprisoned at Her Majesty's pleasure. Apainful prospect, Mr. Armstrong---a period of unassuaged incertitude, sir. ' Daroo burst down upon him like a stormy wind. 

'Don't stand jattering there. Co ant do somethings. '

'I have nothing at this moment which calls for my attention, I do assureyou, Mr. Darco. '

'Then find somethings. There is always blenty for efery-boty to do abouta theadre. '

Mr. Warr drifted before the storm, and found a harbour in thepainting-room, whence he was blasted five minutes later half shipwreckedand wholly demoralized. But Darco was a general who could spare hisforces, and three days before the play was announced for production headdressed his army:

'Laties and chentlemen, I nefer pelieve in worrying peoples. You haf alldone noply. Tomorrow there will be no call. Next day at eleven sharp, eferything as at the broduction. Then it will debend upon yourselveswhether you are galled upon to rehearse again or no. '

With this all engaged dispersed well pleased, and Darco announced hisintention of dining and going to bed. He ordered dinner for two, and atehis double portion through seven courses, after which he went tranquillyhome to his hotel and slept the clock round. 

The rehearsal next day was so completely satisfactory that he wascontent to leave it on its merits, and on the following evening thefirst production of the new management at the Congreve went with a roarof triumph. There was no mistaking the verdict of the house, and thePress was as emphatic as the first night's audience. 

'Vod did I dell you?' Darco asked. 'Vame and vorchune are at your veed. It vos a luggy day for us to meet. Vot? Not? I am Cheorge Darga!'

Paul was tired, excited, and elated all at once. He had promised tostart for Belgium so soon as the verdict of the public was made clear, but he could afford to snatch the journey down to Castle Barfield, andto get a glimpse of the old father. He slept on the journey, and tookthe last five miles by cab. Armstrong was in his accustomed placeamongst the dusty and neglected stock when Paul broke in upon him, somewhat grayer than ever, a little more bent, perhaps, but with justthe old look of wise patience in his face, the shaggy eyebrows fringingjust the old quiet twinkle in his eyes. He declined to express the leastatom of surprise. 

'It's you, Paul, is it?' he asked tranquilly, rising to shake hands. 'You've had a grand success, I'm learning. I read the notice in the_Times_. '

'The play's all right, ' said Paul. 'And how's all here?'

'Oh, ' said his father, 'we have our dwallin' in the middle parts offortune. We're neither uplifted nor cast down. Come in, lad. Well all beglad to see ye. '

The old place was exactly as it always had been in his memory, andyet it was all shrunken and narrowed, and had grown meaner and morepoverty-stricken than it had used to seem. 

He settled down in his old place by the fireside, lit his pipe, listenedto the local annals, and prepared to be questioned with respect to hisown prospects and affairs. 

'You'll be growing pretty well to do, Paul?' said Armstrong. 

'Well, yes, ' said Paul, feeling at a pocket-book which lay at the rightside of his tweed coat. 'I'm getting pretty well-to-do. '

'Yell be getting married one of these fine days?' his father asked, twinkling dryly at him. 

'Well, the fact is, sir, ' Paul answered in some embarrassment, 'I ammarried. '

'Holy Paul!' said Armstrong, and dropped his pipe upon the patchworkrug. Paul stooped for it to cover his own confusion. 

'Yes, ' he said hurriedly, 'I am married. And I felt such a beast for nothaving written to tell you all about it that I made up my mind to bemy own messenger. The truth is it was all rather hurried, andunexpected--in a way. There had been an attachment for some time, butthere was no immediate thought of marriage, and Annette--that is mywife's name--Annette fell ill, and was not expected to recover, and itwas really, to both our minds, a sort of death-bed ceremony, and now sheis quite recovered. '

There was such a sense of awkwardness upon him that he boggled thesimple story altogether. There was no amazement in his mind at all whenhis father spoke next. He could have foretold his words. 

'Man, 'said Armstrong, 'had ye led the gyirl astray?'

He had never meant to lie about the matter, but at this point-blankthrust he lied. 

'My dear old dad!' he said, 'what _are_ you thinking of?'

'I beg your pardon, Paul, ' said Armstrong--'I beg your pardon. '

They seemed at once to have a gulf between them, though the simple, honest elder, who had probably never lied in the whole course of hislife, did not perceive it. Before Paul it gaped unbridgable. 

'She's a dear, good little creature, ' Paul boggled along, with adisastrous facility of words which had no guidance. 'She's French bydescent, but she speaks very good English--very fair English. I taughther. I'll bring her down to see you. We're living in Belgium at present, at a little place called Montcourtois, a charming little place. Shelikes the quiet of it, and it's very favourable for work. If one livesin town there are so many calls upon one's time. You can't get reallysettled down to the development of an idea, you know. '

'Ay, ' said Armstrong, 'I can imagine that. But, Paul, lad, I could havewished ye'd written. '

'Don't make it harder than it is, sir, ' Paul appealed. 'I ought to havewritten. I'm very sorry that I didn't, and I've come down purposely toexplain it all. '

'Well, ' said his father, 'better late than never. What kind is she like, lad?'

'Well, ' said Paul, 'you can't expect a man to describe the girl he's inlove with so as to satisfy anybody else She's slight and not very tall;she has brown hair and brown eyes; she has a very pretty voice, and verydainty ways. '

'Ay, ay, lad!' said Armstrong; 'but her soul--her intelligence?'

'She's bright and clever, ' Paul cried, rather protestingly. 'She takes akeen interest in my work. We're dearly attached to each other, and I amlooking forward to a happy life. '

'What like are her people?' Armstrong asked. 

'Well, I don't know a great deal about her people. She's an orphan. Shehas an elder sister, and an aunt and an uncle or two. '

'She'll be a Catholic, will she?'

'No, ' said Paul; 'her family is Huguenot. I think I should rather haveshrunk from marrying a Catholic. There's a sort of prejudice of which itisn't easy to free the mind. '

He was sinking clean out of sight of his own esteem; but it was his solebusiness for the time being to save his father as far as possible, andhe had grown reckless of himself. 

'She shall come to see you, ' he went on, 'and you wont be able to helpmaking friends with her. I've to be back in Montcourtois to-morrownight, or she'll be worrying her life out. That means I must catch theone o'clock express for town, and that, again, means that I've only fourhours to spend at home this time. '

'Ye'll have a glass of whisky, Paul?'

'I will, sir, ' Paul answered, 'with all the pleasure in life. '

So Armstrong went to the cupboard and brought out a bottle and the sugarbasin, and set the kettle on the fire, and then sat down and loaded uphis pipe in silence. 

'There's much I'd like to say, Paul, ' he began at length. 

There was nothing in the act which could have moved a stranger toanything but a smile at the oddity of it, but it touched Paul almost totears when the gray old man lugged out of his coat-tail pocket a wholenewspaper, and having pinched from it a most economical fragment, singedhis fingers at the bars in the act of lighting it. He had laughed atthat little quaintness a hundred times as a lad, and it was somehow thefirst thing that had come home to him as a real reminder to be in wantof reformation. '

They grew more at ease. Armstrong took up the subject he had broken afew minutes earlier. 

'I don't guess, ' he said, 'whether you're believe these thoughts foryourself, but there's a gap between you and me, Paul. Ye've had gravetroubles. 

'I have, sir, ' said Paul. 

'I've known it, ' said his father. 'I've thoughts in my mind when ye'reaway: "Paul's blythe, " or I thenk of ye, lad; I sit here in the auldarm-chair and think of ye, and eh, man, I'm just as certain of myselfas if I were aware of every fact in your existence. Promise me this. I'mwearing we meet this last time for ever, and I want ye to keep the auldfeelings from time to time. Write a little more regularly, about ye. Take me into confidence when ye're gone. 

Paul promised, and all the estrangement seemed to melt away. This was tobe their last meeting, both or them guessed it, and when at last itgrew to the time Paul must go, the father went down the long hall thefront-door. Paul fumbled for the pocket-book in the darkness of thepassage found a piece of paper, and kissed the old man at parting hethrust this into his hand. 

Arrived at the station nearest to Montcourtois; then the voiture fromthe hotel with the grinning Victor on the box, and Laurent waiting. 

'No bad news' asked Paul. 

'Things are not quite what they might be or what they should be, 'Laurent answered. 'But get in, and we will talk as we drive. Do youremember, ' he asked, whilst Victor filled the night with the noise of afusillade of whip-crackings--'do you remember that I told, you some timeago that a man should have no secrets from his physician?

'Yes, ' said Paul. 'Well?'

'Have you had any secrets from me in respect to Madame Armstrong?'

'No; nothing that I can think of. I don't quite see what you are drivingat. '

'Do you remember, ' Laurent asked, 'the evening on which you firstcalled me to attend her--the night on which she cried out that they weredancing in the wood, and that their bones were white? Do you remember?'

'Good God!' cried Paul; 'do I remember?'

'Did you ever diagnose that case? the doctor asked. 

'No. Do you mean to say that her mind is affected, that----

'You never guessed?' asked Laurent, leaning across to him and graspinghim by the arm--'you never guessed? Upon your life and honour?'

'Guessed? Guessed what?'

'Now, ' said Laurent, 'I am going to hurt you, and I cannot help it. I amsorry, but it must be. '

'Speak out, man!' gasped Paul--'speak out!'

'That, ' said Laurent, 'was delirium tremens. '

They had three miles to travel, and not another word was spoken on theroad; but as they passed the doctor's house a voice called out to him, and the driver pulled up. 

'Stay with me a moment, Mr. Armstrong, ' said Laurent 'I will but givethis man an ordonnance for the pharmacien, and I will be with you. Drivehome, Victor!'

The carriage rattled off; the doctor, the messenger, and Paul stood atthe kerb for a minute or so. The carriage rumbled into the distance; awindow was heard to open and to dose. Laurent took Paul's arm, and theywalked together without a word until they came in front of the windowof the room which Paul had used as a study. The blind was up, a lamp waslit, and the whole room was visible from the roadway. 

'Mon Dieu!' said Laurent in a whisper. 

Annette was there in her nightdress, looking from side to side likea hunted creature. A decanter stood upon the table. She approached itcrouching, seized it with one hand, took a tumbler in the other, andthree times poured and three times drank as if the draught were water;then she glided away and closed the door behind her. 

CHAPTER XVIII

For any and every episode of his life save this, Paul, when he chose tothink about it, could make a fairly expressive picture in his mind, andcould bring back something of the emotion of the time. Here he couldremember only that Laurent clutched him by the arm, and that he turnedon Laurent with something of the vague appeal for aid which might beimagined in the mind of a frightened child. He saw that a thousand signswhich he should have recognised had escaped him, and in the flush ofreal apprehension which followed this thought he seemed to himself tohave been almost wilfully blind to the truth. There were so many thingswhich might have guided him, and he had taken warning by none of them. 

'I beg your pardon, old chap, ' he said to Laurent, speakingunconsciously in English, 'but I'm a little bit upset. You would notmind lending me your arm inside?'

'Assuredly not, ' cried Laurent, still supporting him; and the two menentered the hotel together. 

The Solitary still remembered how his clumsy footsteps seemed to fumbleat the stone stairs, and the very pressure of Laurent's arm upon hisown shoulder was still a living sensation with him; yet for the actualmoment thought and sensation alike seemed to have been abolished. Laurent, when the study had once been reached, helped Paul into a chair, and stood over him with a look of friendly solicitude. 

'A little stimulant, I think, ' he said at last, in a tone ofcommonplace, and set a hand on the decanter which Annette had sorecently laid down. 

'Not that, Laurent!' cried Paul, with a gesture the other was swift tointerpret. 

The doctor left the room with a meaningless, friendly tap on Paul'sshoulder, and came back a few instants later with a bottle of brandy. 

'I insist, ' he said commandingly, in answer to Paul's rejecting wave ofthe hand. 

When Laurent insisted there were few people who said him nay, and Paultook the potion which was poured out for him. 

He could remember it all, from this point onward, as if he had been amere disinterested spectator of the scene. He could see his own figurestraightening itself mechanically in the chair in which it sat. He couldsee himself mechanically throwing one leg over another, and assuming anattitude of indifference and ease. He could see himself distinctly inthe act of knocking out the ashes of his pipe upon the grate; in therefilling and lighting of it; in the numberless little gestures whichseemed to indicate an entire possession of himself And all the whilesomething was booming in his mind as if the word 'lost 'were only halfarticulated there--a scarcely uttered word that carried doom with it. 

'I do not know, ' said Laurent, speaking, for a man of his experienceand authority, rather brokenly--'I do not know whether it was my duty tohave spoken earlier. I have not known you very long; but we have learnedto like each other, and I would have done you the service to tell youwhat I knew a month or two ago if I could have found the courage. But Iwill ask you to believe that I was much perplexed, and that I could notresolve in my own mind whether or not you knew already. It would haveseemed a cruel thing to intrude upon such a secret. '

'Yes, ' said Paul, breaking silence for the first time since he hadentered the house, 'I understand that' He pulled gravely at his pipe, and sipped again at the glass Laurent had poured out for him. 'What'sgoing to be done?' he asked; and then, with a sudden petulance, 'Whathave I got to do?'

'In a patient so young, ' said Laurent, 'unless there is some hereditarytaint to combat, there should be no impossibility in establishing acure. What of Madame Armstrong's heredity?' What did Paul know of MadameArmstrong's heredity? Save for a casual glimpse of her sister, who hadseemed to him as commonplace as candle-light, he had no knowledge of anyperson of her name or family. He sat silent, not knowing how to expresshis ignorance without compromising Annette and himself. But Laurentpressed him. 

'Do you know of anything, ' he asked, 'which should make the task of curedifficult?'And, being thus pressed, there seemed nothing for it but forPaul to say that he knew nothing. 'Then, ' said Laurent, 'we must notdespair. I have already spoken to your wife, and have pointed out toher the very serious nature of her danger, and she has promised meamendment. With what result, ' he added, throwing his arms abroad, 'yousee. '

'You think it a serious danger? Paul asked him. 

'My God!' ejaculated Laurent--'serious! But an instant, my dearArmstrong. We are not thinking of a male inebriate; we are thinking of awoman--a question so different that there is barely any comparison to bemade. '

'Is that so? said Paul, in a voice of little interest, though he feltfor the moment as if his heart were breaking. 

'That is so, ' returned Laurent, with emphasis; 'and I can assure youthat, if you desire to effect a cure here, you must betake yourself--andbetake yourself at once--to heroic measures. Your wife must be placed, without delay, in competent hands, and no restraint must be placed uponthose who undertake to treat her. '

'Very well, ' said Paul dully, 'I understand all that We'll have anothertalk in the morning, if you don't mind. '

Laurent forbore to speak further just then, but he kept Paul in silentcompany for an hour, and was more useful in that way than he could havebeen if he had poured out the gathered knowledge of an encyclopaediaupon him. He gave that dumb sense of sympathy which, in hours of deepdistress, is so very much more potent than the spoken word. Paul at lastrose and shook him by the hand. 

'Good-night, ' he said, 'and thank you. '

Laurent accepted his dismissal, returned the grip, took up his hatand moved away. It would appear that he had not gone far, for when aninstant later Paul poured out a second or third glass of cognac forhimself, there came a tap upon the study window, and Laurent's face wasvisible there dose to one of the lower panes. Paul threw the window openand looked out at him. 

'You have something to say?' he asked. 

'Yes, ' said Laurent, with a grave and tender face, 'I have this onething to say: Do not follow that sorrowful example. '

'Oh, ' said Paul, 'have no fear there; my temptation does not lie in thatdirection. '

'My dear young friend, ' said Laurent, 'no man until he is tempted knowsin what direction his temptation lies. '

They shook hands again through the open window and then parteddefinitely for the night. 

Paul sat long in the silence, not thinking of anything in particular orconscious of any particular emotion. The café on the opposite side ofthe _place_ had long since closed. When Laurent's footsteps had fadedout of hearing there was no sound abroad for which it was not necessaryto listen, except when a distant dog barked now and then, or the slowrumble of a far-off train came once into hearing and disappeared in thevalley with which the railway clove the low hills beyond Janenne. Thedark air of night flowed in through the open window, cool and sweet, bringing with it the familiar odours of the pine plantations in whichthe countryside abounded. Paul smoked pipe after pipe, and he knew verywell that if anybody had been there to look at him, he would have seemedunmoved, and yet he seemed to himself more than once to be playing themountebank with his own trouble, as when, for instance, the lines cameinto his mind:

 'Break, thou deep vase of chilling tears, That grief has shaken into frost'

But all the while there was a slow anguish rising within him or aroundhim. It seemed to reach his breast quite suddenly and almost to stopthe beating of his heart. Then it ebbed away again, and he found himselfcrooning unemotionally, 'For years--a measureless ill--for ever, forever!' The pain came back, and once more ebbed away. What was it? heasked in the self-torturing way which besets the analyst of his ownnature. Self-pity, he answered. Self-pity, pure and simple. He, PaulArmstrong, furnished with heart and brains and social powers, withfortune at hand, and fame to be had for the beckoning, had slid intothis sickening quagmire thus early in his life's pilgrimage, and hadcome to an arrest there. 

Then, out of this profound despondency he arose to a sudden resolution. This was not a matter to be despaired of. It was a thing to fightagainst, an ill not to be endured, but to be cured. Laurent would help, but the main share of the conflict must fall upon himself. Almost forthe first time in his life he was conscious of a clear and definite callto manhood. He was entered for a real strife with Fate--a fight to afinish. Well, he would not shrink from it He set himself to askwhat weapons he could use. Patience, tact, determination, sleeplessvigilance--they all seemed as if they were to be had for the asking. Heresolved upon them all, and so, having closed the window and put out thelamp, he walked heavily up to bed. 

Annette's doors were locked, both that which gave upon the corridor andthat which communicated with his own little room. He could but rememberhow often they had been closed before, and what varying reasons he hadbeen forced to seek and find for her isolation of herself. That riddlewas read now. There would be a stormy scene in the morning when he cameto tell Annette that he had solved it, and thinking of how he shouldface it, and of what means were the likeliest to lead to ultimatevictory, he lost something of the sickness of his pain. He undressed andlay down in the dark, but there was no sleep for him until long afterthe window-blind had grown amber-tinted with the gleam of the level sunupon it. 

When he awoke his watch told him that it was near ten o'clock. He rangfor his bath, dressed, breakfasted, met the people of the house, andanswered their friendly inquiries as to his journey all pretty much asif nothing had occurred to change the whole horizon of his life. He madeno inquiries as to Annette, and no news came to him with regard to her. 

It was near noonday when Laurent came into his study, very grave andgray, and looking as if he, too, had had a night of severe trouble. Paul read the sympathy in his face, and rose to meet him. The two shookhands, and from that moment there was a real friendship between them. 'You have seen her? Laurent asked. 

'Not yet, ' said Paul

'You have thought over what I was compelled to tell you--what you saw?'

'Yes; I have thought it all over. 

'And your conclusions?'

'To ask the aid of your experience, and to abide by your advice. '

'Thank you, ' said Laurent gravely. 'I, too, have been thinking, andperhaps, in my judgment, it may be better that I should first see heralone. In my capacity of physician I can speak impersonally. '

'I am in your hands, ' Paul answered, 'and I shall accede to whatever youthink is best. '

'Well, ' returned Laurent, with a gray smile, 'I do not commonly advocateeavesdropping, but I think perhaps it may be as well for you to hear ourtalk together. It will guide you as to what you may say or do hereafter. I will send up my name now, and when I am admitted you may follow toyour own small room. Is that espionage? I do not very greatly caremyself, for I shall warn her from the first that I shall faithfullyreport every spoken word so far as I can remember it. '

'I will come, ' said Paul. 'I have the right And the more I know thebetter I can use it. '

Laurent twirled the milled button of the call-bell which stood upon thedesk. 

'My respects to Madame Armstrong, ' he said, when the landlady'smiddle-aged daughter came in and smoothed her apron as a sign of respectto Monsieur le Médecin. 'I am a few moments late, but I am here to keepmy appointment. '

Out went Mademoiselle Adčle, and her slippered footsteps faded up thestaircase. There was a sound of knocking, a conversation inaudible tothe two who strained their ears to listen, and then mademoiselle wasback again. 

Madame was _malade--bien malade_--would beg Monsieur le Médecin toexcuse her. 

'Then I will try, ' said Laurent 'I have your authority?'

'Absolutely, ' said Paul, and the doctor went creaking up the stairs inhis heavy, country-made boots. 

Paul sat alone again and listened with his heart in his ears. 

A series of raps sounded upon the door above, at first quiet andpersuasive, and then increasing in intensity. There came a faint soundof protesting inquiry, and in answer:

'Dr. Laurent, s'il vous plait, madame. '

There was another protest, and Laurent spoke again:

'But I am here by appointment, madame, and I cannot afford to waste mytime. '

And just here a curious and rather embarrassing thing happened, for thedoctor, laying a nervous hand upon the door, found it suddenly opened tohim with no symptom of resistance. 

'A thousand pardons!' he exclaimed. 'Pray tell me when you are ready. '

Annette was at the door like a wild cat, but the square-built toe ofLaurent's foot was between it and the jamb. Paul raced up the stairsin his stocking-feet, his boots in his hand. This was not a time fordelicacies of sentiment He wished to save Annette. He wished even moreto save himself from the misery of a lifelong degradation. He dartedinto his own room whilst Laurent was still standing like a statue at thedoor of the adjoining chamber, but reached it barely in time, for on asudden the door of Annette's apartment was thrown open, and a voice ofimperious sarcasm demanded to know to what Madame Armstrong was indebtedfor this unexpected honour. 

'It will be well, ' said Laurent in his professional tone, 'for MadameArmstrong to return to bed. '

He turned the key in the door, and at this Annette sent out shriek onshriek, until the whole corridor seemed to shrill with the outcry. 

'Madame, ' said Laurent in his deep nasal voice, when the clamour dieddown for a moment, 'your husband is in the house. He is within hearing. I have his entire authority to speak to you, and I am intent to use it Iam here to tell you that you have abused his absence and his confidence, and that on his arrival at Janenne last night I told him the result ofmy observations during the last four or five weeks. '

Paul, boots in hand, sat on the edge of his own bed, and heard a kind ofgasping noise. Then for a moment there was silence until Laurent spokeagain. 

'If you will permit, madame, ' he said, 'this interview may go smoothly. If you choose to be angry, that is your affair. I am authorized by yourhusband, as your physician, to speak plain truths to you. You need nottrouble to deny me, but I see you have already been drinking. '

'How dare you!' she flashed out, and Paul heard the stamp of her littlenaked foot upon the fox-skin rug which lay beside their bed. 

'Madame, ' said Laurent, 'there is no question of daring or not daring. Ihave told your husband everything, and he is sitting in the next room atthis moment, and hears every word we speak. '

'Paul!' she cried, 'Paul is here? Why hasn't he been to see me? Why hashe no word for me?'

'Madame, ' said Laurent sternly, 'I bid you cease these theatricalpretences. Your unhappy husband saw you last night when you three timesseized the decanter which had been left for him. '

She gasped: 'You liar!'

'That is all very well, madame, ' responded Laurent, 'but my eyes aremine, and I have known the truth for months past. Why do you venture ona hope so vain? Now, I will tell you plainly, Madame Armstrong, youare going on the way to hell. You are to be stopped, and you shall bestopped. Pray make no mistake as to the authority that is to be exerted. It shall be exerted as mildly as you permit. It shall be exerted asinexorably as the necessities of the case demand I have told you alreadymany times into what a pitfall you were descending, but until last nightI never dared to warn your husband. He knows the truth now, knowsit all, and he leaves you in my hands. You have not heeded advice orbeseeching, and--I say it, believe me, with deep reluctance--we mustdraw a cordon about you, and protect you from yourself. Pray understand, madame, it is a protective cordon only, and your own action may relax itat any time; but your actions will be watched, as it is my duty to tellyou, to the extremest scruple. '

'What do you mean to do? Paul heard her ask in a husky, panting voice, which made him figure in his own mind a hunted creature almost run toground. 

'Nothing more, ' Laurent replied, 'nothing more, madame, believeme--nothing more than is dictated by the necessities of the case. Youhave an ordonnance dating from Paris. 

I have instructed the pharmacien that he is no longer to respect it. '

Annette whined at this like a child robbed of a toy. 

'I have forbidden him this morning, ' Laurent pursued, 'to supply you, without my special direction, with any drug whatever, and I have givenhim particular orders about the eau'des Carmes. I am now about to tellthe hotel people that you are under my care and treatment, and that youwill be allowed only a measured quantity of wine per diem. '

'You mean to expose me to them?' Annette asked

'I do not propose to expose madame to anybody, ' Laurent responded, 'butif madame chooses to expose herself----'

The listener could imagine the shrug of the broad shoulders and theoutward cast of the persuasive hands. 

'Voyons, madame, ' pursued the doctor, 'we wish nothing but your good, but that we are determined to accomplish. I have nothing to add to whatI have said already, and perhaps it is time that you should see yourhusband. '

Paul hastily thrust his feet into his slippers, and awaited the openingof the door. 

'He is there, ' said Laurent; 'he has probably listened to every word wehave spoken. '

Paul sat trembling on the bed-edge. The imminent interview disturbed himstrangely, and set all manner of conflicting tides flowing in heart andbrain. He was part coward and part hero; ready to face everything andto run away from everything. His pity for Annette was pity, and no more;his sympathy for Paul Armstrong amounted to a passion. He strove tobring himself to what he conceived to be a more fitting mood, but whilsthe struggled with himself the inner door of the room in which he satwas suddenly torn open, and Annette stood before him. He could not havebelieved, without that actual visual revelation, that such a wreckcould have been achieved in so small a space of time. Whatever ofspirituality, whatever of youthful foolish _espičglerie_ the face hadheld, had vanished. The visage was like a mask--and a mask of death. There was a splash of purplish crimson beneath either eyelid, but forthe rest the face was of the yellow of a week-old bone; the eyelidswere puffy, and the lips were lax. The whole face quivered like a shakenjelly as she looked at him. 

'Paul, ' she said--' Paul, Paul!'

And with that she cast herself upon his breast in a very storm of tears. 

For a moment he stood helpless and confused, and then a sudden flux ofpity came upon him, and he held her steadily and firmly in answer to thehysteric grip with which her arms encircled him, now tightening and nowrelaxing. She fawned upon him piteously from the very beginning of thisembrace, and at the last she fell, both knees thudding upon the carpet, and abased her head between his ankles, crying bitterly the while. Andat this whatever manhood was within the man fled for the time being, andhe, kneeling to raise her from her self-abasement, also lifted up hisvoice and wept bitterly. 

Before things had quite reached this melancholy pass Laurent had stolenfrom the room, and had closed both doors behind him, so that husband andwife were alone. 

'Dearest, ' said Paul, 'what can I do to help you?'

The word was not wholly sincere, but it held more than the average ounceof sincerity to the ton which keeps human speech a possibility. At leasthis desire was to help her, if it were only a way of helping himself. But the whole thing was so miserable that to analyze emotions at sucha moment was surely to mount the very Appenines of folly. Annette criedand cried, with her yet young and supple figure clinging to him, and, inspite of the debauched, melancholy face, what could he do but stroke herhair and kiss her cheek, and promise kindness and encouragement? Mostof the time he was inwardly murmuring, 'Poor devil!' and was assuringhimself that he had taken up a most hopeless handful; but the wholewretched tangle of feeling was too intricate to be unravelled by somuch as a straight inch. What could he do? He asked the questiondespairingly; he asked it in genuine pity of Annette; he asked it in ayet more genuine pity of himself. The man who deals professionally withthe emotions of other people cannot preserve the simplicity of his own;it would be out of nature to believe it. 

There was a reconciliation of a sort, but it could hardly be very realat first, and to give it any aspect of permanence time was necessary. 

Laurent and Paul concocted a plan of campaign. It was essential inthe doctor's opinion to avoid as far as possible all open evidenceof watchfulness, and yet to know very accurately what was being done. Innumerable attempts were made to break the cordon of guardianshipwhich was drawn around Annette. She feigned, of course, as people inher position always feign, to acquiesce entirely in the means which wereadopted to guard her from herself, but there were eternal skirmishesbetween the outlying posts of the two armies which came in a very shorttime to be established. In that newfound prosperity of his Paul hadgrown absolutely careless about money, and he had not the faintest ideaas to the extent of his wife's supplies. That she had enough, forthe time being, to corrupt quite a small regiment was speedily mademanifest, and a silent contest, in which the victor acknowledged victoryno more than the vanquished admitted defeat, set in. How wide theramifications of this strange war might be Paul could not guess, but onoccasion some circumstance would reveal that they had reached unexpecteddistances. It was a perfectly understood thing in the hotel itself thatno supplies of wine or of more potent liquor were to be supplied atMadame Armstrong's order. The village pharmacien sold nothing to herwithout Laurent's consent, but there were ways and means of one sort oranother by which she contrived to procure her poison, and at such timesthe old signs were always perceptible: the passion for solitude, the tricksy, changing spirit which varied from extravagant mirthto unreasonable anger. Laurent watched the contest with a sleeplessloyalty, and Annette, finding herself foiled by him a thousand timesoftener than by the less vigilant Paul, grew to hate him. But in spiteof all the unfortunate creature could do to accelerate her own ruin, she grew slowly back to health, and to something more than her originalpersonal attractiveness. For a kind of experience was marked upon her, and the indefinable yet universally recognised expression which betokensthis was present in her looks. When watchfulness prevailed over thestrange craft which was brought into conflict with it, Annette knew howto be charming, even to the man who suffered so much at her hands; butwhen the contrabandists succeeded in running in their supplies therewere hours of horror--scenes in which rage and accusation were succeededby storms of tears and tempestuous self-reproach. On one such occasionPaul sat in his study, for the moment oblivious of the world. Hisdissipation and his best relief from the cares which beset him waslabour, and he laboured hard. It was his fashion at this time to standat his desk--a rude thing built for him by the village carpenter--and inthe pauses which came in between his actual spells of writing, to strideabout his limited territory, enacting the scenes he was striving toportray, and shaping his sentences in such an impassioned undertone asan actor will employ in the study of a part. He was at the limit ofhis walk from the window, thus engaged, when the door was violently andwithout warning broken open in such fashion that its edge struck him onthe face. Here was Annette, blazing with some newly-discovered injury, and Paul at once recognised the ancient and too-well-rememberedsymptoms. The contrabandists had got through again, and this time witha vengeance. When he could gather his scattered wits--the blow in itselfhad been a shrewd thing--he found that he was being stormily assailed inrespect of an amour with the cook of the Hotel of the Three Friends, ahighly respectable person of fifty summers and a waist of sixty inchesin circumference. He closed the door, and, mopping his injured nose, invited Annette to a seat. 

'Talk lower, dear, ' he asked her. 'It shall be perfectly understoodbetween us that I deserve all your reproaches, but don't give the poor, dear old cook away, or, if you must assail her, speak in English. '

'That is your ring, ' said Annette. She drew her wedding-ring from herfinger and cast it to the floor. 'I have done with you for ever; you area traitor and a villain. '

Paul stooped for the ring as it rolled to his feet, and bestowed it inhis pocket. 

'You and Laurent, ' cried Annette, 'have conspired to kill me. Oh, I knowyou both! but if there is justice in earth or heaven, I will have it Donot think because I am a woman and alone that I can find no protector. Iam not so helpless as you fancy. '

'I am very busy, dear, ' Paul answered in a cold desperation, 'and wemight discuss these important questions at another moment. '

'Oh, ' cried Annette, 'anything to avoid the truth!'

'Yes, ' said Paul, with the first flush of anger he had permittedhimself, 'anything to avoid the truth--anything, or almost anything; butif you stay here one other moment I will avoid the truth no longer. '

He cast the door wide open, and Annette with an amazing submissivenesspassed through it. 

It was long past mid-autumn by this time, and was indeed fast drawingon towards winter, so that in the little study a fire was lit in theearlier hours of the day to air the room. It had been lighted thatmorning, and the first true nip of winter was in the air. Paul sat alonewith his head between his hands until a violent shiver aroused him fromhis thoughts. The air was growing dark as well as chilly; a pale yellowlight gleamed already from the windows of the Café de la Régence acrossthe _place_, and the outlook was as chilly as the air, as comfortless asthe thoughts which filled his mind. 

'Hands up, ' said Paul to himself; 'hands up and sink down into the wastewaters, and have done with it. '

Of what act of desperation he would have been guilty in this mood hecould never have told, but at this instant the door was opened verysoftly, and Annette was back again. She had been somewhat dishevelledat her last appearance, and carelessly attired. She had now, to allseeming, called in the aid of the solitary coiffeur of the village, andher pretty brown locks were done up in lustrous coils. She was attiredin a charming little dressing-gown of pale-blue, with lace at the wristsand throat, and her complexion had been somewhat rudely brightened by atouch of red upon the cheeks. She closed the door softly behind her, andadvanced with pleading hands. 

'Paul dear, ' she said, 'I do not know if ever you can forgive me, but Ithink you would, perhaps, if you knew the real truth about me. Oh, Paul, Paul, Paul, I am afraid--I am afraid that I am going mad! I have noself-control. I say cruel and wicked things without believing them, andI cannot help it There is a devil in my soul who tempts me. What is apoor little girl like me to do against the devil? Won't you help me, Paul dear? Give me back my ring; I never meant to throw it away. Thereis nothing I value so much in the world. Give it back to me, Paul. There; put it on my finger. God bless you for ever, you dearest, dearest, kindest, patient dear! And now, Paul, take me in your arms asyou used to do. Kiss me, and tell me that you love me. I'm only a littlecreature, Paul, when everything's said and done; I'm five feet three, English measure, and how can _I_ be expected to fight a devil! Kiss me, kiss me again, Paul. '

She thrust him back with rage, tore the ring once more from her finger, and cast it again upon the floor. Then, with an air of comedy disdain, 'It is really too cheap a thing to fool a fool like you. ' And so, with ashrill peal of stagey laughter, she curtseyed low to him and glided fromthe room. 

He stood with clenched hands for a single instant, and--how he neverknew--came to a sudden calm. He took up his hat from the desk on whichhe had thrown it on entering the room, and sauntered out to the frontof the hotel in a complete vacancy of thought and emotion; and as helounged there, thinking of nothing and caring for nothing, there waswoven into the woof of life the next thread of his destiny, for whoshould drive up to the main door of the Three Friends, with her maid andher luggage, and all the airs and impertinences of a person of fashion, but La Femme Incomprise. 

CHAPTER XIX

And who should be La Femme Incomprise but Madame la Baronne de Wyeth, a lady more or less known to fame in two continents, but whom theunwitting Paul had not yet so much as heard of in the whole courseof his life. He was conscious in the chill and gloom of the Novemberevening of a lively and slender figure, which danced as if upon springsfor a mere instant as it alighted from the carriage, of an accompanyingrich rustle of silk, the exhalation of a fine perfume, the glance ofa dark eye towards him as he raised his hat and stood aside from thedoorway, and then the first encounter was over and was dismissed frommind. 

There was no Annette at dinner, but he had not expected her, and wasglad to know that she was in hiding. But when, after an hour or two'saimless ramble under the shadow of the Terre de Falaise, he returnedto the hotel and entered the _salle ā manger_, he found there a certainunwonted sense of warmth and brightness. Not only was the stoveblooming cherry-red at the far end of the apartment, but the little-usedfireplace was aglow with blazing pine-logs, and two extra lamps wereset upon the table. He noted these things with that particularity a manspends upon detail at those times of subdued and profound emotion whenhe seems incapable of noting anything, and took his seat carelesslyat the table in his accustomed place. The juge, and the garde, and thebachelor chemist, and the chief of the gendarmerie, and all the restof the customary convives, dribbled in one by one, and exchanged thecustomary salutations. Time was when they had been immensely interestingas types of mankind more or less rural or townish, but to-night he wasweary of them, and would very willingly have been alone. The half-seenvision of two hours ago had passed completely from his mind, and thebroad-beamed, apple-cheeked Evariste had already served the soup whenMadame la Baronne de Wyeth rustled into the room with an aspect socommanding and stately that all the Belgian gentlemen rose to their feetand bowed as she took her seat at table. Paul rose and bowed with therest, and the lady, with an easy and graceful inclination from leftto right, offered to him a kind of specialized salute as she sat downimmediately opposite to him. She was full between the glow of the twoextra lamps, and at a first glance, by dint of bright eyes, sparklingteeth, a high complexion, and a Parisian half-toilet, she looked as ifshe might have been a beauty. She was barely that, as a second glancediscovered, but she had an undoubted charm of grace and manner, andPaul, whose native origin and customs of life had led him far from thescene of fine ladyhood, was greatly impressed by her. So were the restof the diners for that matter, and the customary rough banter of thetable was hushed in the presence of this new arrival. The men conversedin whispers when they spoke at all, and in the intervals between thecourses they crumbled their bread upon the tablecloth in a manifestembarrassment. Not a word was exchanged between Paul and his vis-ā-visuntil, towards the close of the meal, the lady's attendant brought toher a small tray of silver with a fine little flacon of transparentVenetian ware, and a liqueur-glass upon it She had drunk nothing butwater throughout the repast, but she now poured out a spoonful of someamber-coloured and highly aromatic liqueur, and, leaning slightly acrossthe table, said, with a marked American-English accent:

'May I trouble you for a single small lump of sugar, Mr. Armstrong?'

She held out the liqueur-glass towards him, and Paul, in answer to animperious little nod of the head, which seemed to indicate that he wasobeying orders correctly, dropped a square nodule of sugar into it, andlooked up with a questioning aspect. 

'My name appears to be known to you, madam?' he said. 

'My dear sir, 'she purred back again in what he learned to recogniselater on as the true Bostonian tone, 'your name is known toeverybody--or, at least, to everyone who is worth knowing. Haven't weall been going wild in London and New York about your last comedy, andisn't your portrait in the photographers' windows everywhere?'

Paul was young, and therefore, if not vain, at least accessible to theassaults of vanity, and he blushed to the ears with pleasure. He hadnot noticed until the moment when the lady set her thickly-jewelled handupon it that a little silver bell was placed at her side. She touchedit, and her maid entered, and at a murmured aside retired, returning ina moment with a filigree card-case. 

'That is my name, ' said the lady; 'you may not have heard it before. '

There was so complete a certainty of recognition in her voice and mannerthat Paul, though a very poor courtier indeed, bowed as he read thecard, and murmured that everybody knew the name of Madame la Baronne deWyeth. 

This, as it turned out, was destined to embarrass him a little; butMadame was graciously communicative, and he was not long in learningthat she was the authoress of a volume of poems which bore the title 'LeCour Soupir. ' She would be proud and delighted, she told him, to havehis judgment alike on the original work and its rendition in French, which was also the labour of her own hands. 

'You see, Mr. Armstrong, ' she said, 'I was born in Paris, though ofAmerican parentage, and I have lived there nearly all my life, so that Iam really and truly quite bilingual. French and English are exactly oneand the same to me, so far as facility of expression goes; and I did notcare to entrust the expression of my most intimate and sacred thoughtsinto a stranger's hands. To appeal to the readers of French and Englishis to appeal to the whole world of intellect. Perhaps that is not a verymodest desire; but it is mine, Mr. Armstrong, as I think it must bethat of all those who are conscious of great thoughts. By the way, ' sheasked, with a comprehensive glance around the table, 'do any of thesegentlemen speak English?'

'Not a word, ' Paul answered. 

'If you are quite sure of that, Mr. Armstrong, ' said the lady, 'we canpursue our talk in peace; but there is nothing so disconcerting as todread an eavesdropper when one is exchanging confidences. '

Paul had not, so far, begun to exchange confidences, and he ratherwondered in his own bourgeois mind if this fascinating lady wereoffering him a challenge to a flirtation. It might very well haveappeared, so thought the Exile who recalled these things with so clearan after-light upon them, that the lady had that object, and no other;but for the moment there was a natural embarrassment in thinking so. 

'You have written verse, Mr. Armstrong?' asked the Baroness. 

'Reams, ' Paul answered, with a laugh, though he was not entirely at hisease. 

'Oh, ' said the lady, 'you must show me some of it; you must show it tome all. I am sure, from your prose, that you have the true singinggift; and when one can both think and sing, one is a poet, you know, Mr. Armstrong. '

'I have nothing to show, ' Paul answered; 'I have burnt all my poor stufflong and long ago. '

'And you write no longer?' she asked--'you write verse no more? Oh, butthat is wicked--it is criminal to have the gift and not to use it'But then, of course, one knows how much depends upon congeniality ofsurrounding and society. There have been times when I have thought thatmy own poor little pipe was silenced for ever. It is so easy to loseheart; it is sometimes so very difficult to retain one's courage andanimation. Do the gentlemen remain here, by-the-by, to smoke, Mr. Armstrong?'

There was a something odd in the way in which she used his name--asomething not at all easy to be defined--and it influenced Paulstrangely every time she spoke it. It was not altogether unlike acaress, if one could associate an idea of that sort with the manner andmeaning of a great lady with whom one had not exchanged a word untilwithin the last half-hour. Paul knew not what to make of the grand dame;but she fluttered and flattered him prodigiously, and in his excitementthe troubles which had seemed so chokingly bitter so brief a time agowere all for the moment forgotten. 

'They sit about the table for an hour or two after dinner, ' Paulresponded, in answer to her last question. 

'I notice, ' said the lady, 'that there is a fire in the salon next door. If you are not too wedded to your tobacco, I shall be grateful for yoursociety. '

'Oh, madam!' cried Paul, 'I am honoured beyond measure. '

And so, when the Baroness had sipped her small liqueur and rose, witha queenly little inclination to the company, Paul rose also, and havingopened the door for her, followed her lead into the next apartment, aspacious room, very dimly lighted, and as bare as if it had been madeready for a ball. Here the Baroness established her seat upon a settee, and Paul was encouraged to bring a chair into her neighbourhood, andwas there held in discourse. And though he might in the review of laterexperiences have arrived at the conclusion that Madame la Baronne wasa somewhat heartless and not particularly brainy little fribble, he wasnever able to forget or deny a certain charm of manner which he hadnot elsewhere encountered, and which had in it a seductive warmth andgentleness. Before he fairly knew it, he was talking with something ofthe ease and intimacy of an old friend. He had been so sore-heartedof late and so removed from all feminine companionship, that thisunexpected, unlooked-for intercourse with a woman of culture and of suchundoubted airs of refinement soothed like a poultice. It was water tothe thirsty, bread to the hungry heart; it was fire and shelter tothe houseless wanderer. Madame drew him into little confidences, allsufficiently simple, harmless, and discreet They related mainly to hismethods of work, to his acquaintance with brother men of letters, toincidents of youthful life, to the early hopes and failures of hiscareer. 

'How profoundly interesting!' Madame purred from time to time. 'Oh, you men of the people, Mr. Armstrong, you men of the people, how you dosurpass and captivate us all when you just happen to have brains!'

The 'man of the people 'was certainly making no concealment of hisorigin, as he certainly never made any parade of it; but he did notquite like this, and perhaps his face revealed as much, for the Baronesshastened with great agility to quit the theme. She began to offer toPaul some little insight into her own history. It would be a prudery, she said, to pretend to be sensitive about it any longer--the wholeworld knew the sordid and melancholy truth; and this sounded likea prelude to a much fuller explanation than she was for the momentdisposed to make, and it helped Paul to understand the hints in whichshe chose to set forward the fact that she was a person of a lonelyheart, that her husband pursued his affairs in Wall Street and elsewherewithout her greatly concerning herself as to what those affairs mightbe, and apparently leaving her much to her own devices. He learned tothink afterwards that these confidences, coming upon so very brief anacquaintance, were barely indicative of that exquisite delicacy of soulfor which the lady gave herself credit, but it did not occur to himto think so for one moment at the time. The two extra lamps upon thedinner-table had probably been placed there at her own request, butit was beyond dispute that she showed to far greater advantage in thesubdued light in which she now sat Time had had no great opportunity ofravishing her good looks as yet, but a certain boldness and bluntness offeature which denied her complete right to beauty was lost here, and hercomplexion was subdued, so that to the eye of her companion she lookedbewitching, and everybody knows how far easier it is to condone a breachof taste in a beautiful woman than in a plain one. But now as the talkwent on and grew momentarily more intimate, Paul was made to see that hewas in the presence of a suffering heart, that he was speaking with onewho had never been able to come into contact with another soul. 'We liveapart from each other, all of us, Mr. Armstrong, ' she said. 'It is onlythe artist, only the thinker and dreamer, who cares to grieve over itall; but there is something appalling in the thought that no one soulreally touches another. You shake your head, ' she said. 'Forgive me, butyou are young, and you are not yet disillusionized. '

'I have a right to be in some things, ' Paul said to himself; but he madeno verbal answer. 

'No, ' she went on in a tone of tender regret in the pretty purringAmerican voice, which of itself was like the touch of a soft hand. 'Weare born to isolation. As one grows older----'

Paul laughed at that outright It was his first laugh for quite a lengthyspace of time, and he enjoyed it. 

'Oh, ' said the lady, taking the implied compliment quite seriously, 'Iam not a centenarian, but I am two-and-thirty, Mr. Armstrong, and in thecourse of two-and-thirty years one may do a very considerable amount ofliving. I say it advisedly, as one grows older the recognition of thatisolation of which I have spoken grows more and more complete. It beatsone down into despair at times; but then one is here for other thingsthan despair: one is here for duty; one is here to suffer, and to gatherstrength by suffering; that is the whole secret of our destiny. It issimple enough, and yet how long it takes to learn the lesson truly!'

Beyond this no great progress was made on that first evening, but itappeared that the lady had come to stay for at least a little time. It is probable that she had not often found so very responsive aninstrument to play upon, for Paul Armstrong's one lifelong weakness wasthat any woman of average intelligence, who chose to take the trouble, could sound him through every note of his gamut, and the Baroness deWyeth seemed to find a lively satisfaction in the exercise of her ownpower in that direction. 

There was no further sign of Annette that evening, and it was not untilthe Baroness had retired that Paul began again seriously to rememberher. It would at any moment, since his discovery of the lure by whichshe had beguiled him into marriage, have seemed a mere ridiculousprudery of conscience to hide from himself that he had thrown the betterpart of his life away; but he had meant to do his duty as it seemed tolie plain and straight before him, and he meant it still, increasinglydifficult as it appeared. But all the talk of the lonely soul, of theeternal isolation of the spirit, in which man was doomed to live, allthe tinsel sentimentalisms of which the talk of the bilingual poetesshad mainly consisted, afforded perhaps as poor a pabulum as he couldanywhere have found. There was he, with that sore-stricken heart of his, so sore-stricken, indeed, that it was well-nigh numbed, and here for thefirst time in his life he had met a woman of more than common surfacebreeding, of high family--for the Baroness de Wyeth was guilty of nomere vulgar brag in claiming so much for herself--of more than ordinaryattractiveness in person, and of far more than common faculty in thedirection of a dangerous, sympathetic semi-humbug. Was it any wonder if, when he lay down that night, he contrasted the hours of the eveningwith those of the afternoon, or if he recalled the fact that at thevery turning of the road which had led him to fortune and to fame he hadthrown away all that could make them really worth the having?

Annette was sleeping off the fumes of brandy and the insane hysteriawhich went along with them. The dainty lady from whom he had justparted was going to her repose with her own beautiful, sad thoughts ina refinement of surrounding which he could only fancy. His thoughtsfollowed her to her chamber until it seemed to him that he was in somesort guilty of a profanation, and with that touch of self-chiding theborn sex-worshipper must needs flash into a mood of adoration. A morethoroughpaced small coquette than La Femme Incomprise never breathed, yet she must needs be a holy angel for the time being to Paul Armstrong, because she had fine eyes and teeth, and could talk with some eloquenceabout heart-sorrows she had never known. And he, he who lay there withhis career like a stream which is poisoned at its source, might, had heguided his own destinies with anything but the judgment of a fool, havefound himself just such a companion as he had but now parted from, and have known in her a life-long comrade, an undying solace andinspiration. Oh, fool! and fool! and fool! through all the wretched, lonely hours of night--fool! and fool! and again fool unutterable!

Annette, on the morrow, was repentant and pitiable. The contrabandistsupplies had been of a very limited nature, and now they were over shesuffered a more than common misery of reaction from excess. For a whileshe was sullen, and sulked in her own chamber; but when her headache hadworn itself out, she began to creep listlessly about the hotel Paul andthe Baroness had spent a second evening _tęte-ā-tęte_ and Paul's firstjudgment of the sympathetic nature of her character had been admirablyconfirmed. 

Husband and wife had had but one interview with each other since thelatest outbreak, and this had not tended to improve their relations orto sweeten the temper of either one or die other. Paul had not mentionedthe existence of his wife to the Baroness until he had learned of thelady's intention to make a stay of some length in Montcourtois. Thenhe had said to himself dismally: She will think I have hidden somethingfrom her unless I mention Annette; and he had named her in a mereinstinct of self-protection. 

'My wife, ' he had said simply, 'would be very happy and honoured to meetyou, but she is confined to her room by a slight indisposition which Ihope will pass away in a little time. '

'I shall hope, then, to make her acquaintance to-morrow, ' said theBaroness, and thereupon they got back to transcendentalisms and soulsolitude, and made up their minds how sweet a thing it would be ifonly it were possible for any one human creature to know and thoroughlyunderstand another. With this unfailing battle-horse ready to pranceinto the arena under the Baroness's poetic spur, they were never indanger of being gravelled for lack of matter, but found each other'ssociety mutually and beautifully stimulative to the heart and mind. After Paul's short and unhappy interview with Annette, the Baronessrequested the pleasure of his society upon a drive she proposed totake. He acceding with great willingness, they rolled away together, andMadame confided to Paul the purpose of her visit to these solitudes at aso inclement season of the year. It was her intent to study the ancientWalloon tongue upon its own ground, and to put her studies to someliterary effect by an elaborate comparison of the language spoken bythe peasantry of the present day with that of the earliest of the French_jongleurs_ and chroniclers. 

'So you see, Mr. Armstrong, ' she said sweetly, 'that if you are resolvedupon keeping your artistic quiet here throughout the greater part of thewinter, you and I will have some opportunity of becoming known to eachother. '

Paul did not dare to say how warm a welcome he accorded to thissuggestion, but it was dangerously sweet to him, and he hadself-understanding enough to recognise that fact. But he was in no moodto struggle against whatever Fate might bring. He was not coxcomb enoughto conceive himself likely to be dangerous to a witty and experiencedwoman of the world, and as to what might happen to himself he did notcare. He was desolate enough to be desperate, and if in two short dayshe had learned to believe that the final loss of the new interest he hadfound would be among the gravest of troubles, he had learned also asa part of that lesson that the society would be strangely sweet to himwhilst it lasted. On Paul's side there was no thought of a flirtation, and on the side of the Baroness there was not much thought of anythingelse, so that they got on most famously together, for it is alwaysricher sport in a case of this kind to have one of the parties concernedin earnest Paul took all the soulful shop, on the strength of which thelady had patrolled Europe and the United States on a sort of sentimentaljourney, to be as serious as the Evangels, and the discussion of it madethe drive an undiluted pleasure to him. 

But when the carriage returned to the hotel and passed Paul's study ata walking pace, he caught sight of Annette at the window, and her faceseemed to him to offer some promise of a scene. She certainly bent alook of surprised anger upon her husband and the strange, richly-dressedlady with whom he was seated, but he waved his hand to her as he went byand made up a mind to trust to the chapter of chances. As it turned out, Annette was not inclined to be disagreeable, and hearing of the lady'srank, and being casually informed that she was the wife of the greatAmerican-Belgian millionaire, she became resolved to be gracious, andmade a careful toilet in preparation for dinner. She and the Baronessmet at table, and Annette did not shine by contrast with the newcomer. The poor thing probably knew it, and when Paul and Madame talkedtogether of books she had never seen or heard of, and of people whosenames were strange to her, she could scarcely have been altogetherhappy. Her husband led her into the conversation now and then, but therewas nothing for it but for her to dwindle out again, and when the mealwas over she made a real or pretended excuse of headache to retire. Paul was disposed to be grateful to her for what he felt to be a genuineforbearance, and he would have given some sign to this effect hadAnnette afforded him an opportunity. But she kept herself sedulouslyapart from him, and it was only at the table that they met at all. Things pursued this course until the approach of Christmas, and then anincident happened which brought about, or at least very much helped tobring about, disaster. 

When two people of opposite sexes are constantly in each other's societyand their main topic of conversation--however hashed, ragouted, rissoledand spiced--is the loneliness of the Ego, certain little familiaritiesare likely to ensue which, though they may be of the most platonicorder in the world, are not likely to be made a subject of outspokenconfidence between a husband and a wife, or a married lady and herhusband. Thus, when Madame la Baronne and Paul were quite alone it was'Gertrude' on the one side, and it was 'Paul' upon the other, and thelady, being the elder, and a little more the elder than she caredto say, would occasionally venture upon 'Paul dear, ' with an air somatronly that the most censorious of observers could have found nocavil with the manner of it. It came about in due time, let Laurent'swatch-dogs do what they would, that the contrabandists once moresucceeded in running their cargo into the Hotel of the Three Friends. Itwas a very small one, but it was large enough to serve its turn. 

Annette had not appeared all day, and Paul's summons at her chamber-doorhad elicited no response. He and the Baroness had dined together and hadtalked in the way now grown customary to them, being neither more norless affectionate towards each other than common, and they were nowtogether in the public salon, and, as fate would have it, they werealone. The Baroness dropped something with a metallic sound upon thefloor, and uttered a little cry of dismay. 

'Oh, my bracelet!' she exclaimed; 'my favourite, my precious bracelet!It is broken, and I would not have had anything happen to it for theworld!'

Paul ran to lift it from the floor, and assured himself by examinationthat it was not broken. The hasp by which it was fastened had come open, whether as the result of accident or design may not be known. Ladieshave ways of saving a platonic converse from mere dulness, and thismay have been one of them, or may not. But Paul, having shown todemonstration that the ornament was undamaged, the Baroness held out avery prettily-rounded, plump, white arm, and Paul, trembling a little atthe slight contact the task involved, proceeded rather clumsily to fixthe bracelet in its place. He looked up, and the lady's eyes were fixedupon his face with an expression of grave and serene tenderness. His owneyes were humid, and he looked back at her as an earth-bound soul mightlook towards paradise. And on a sudden, before a sound of warning hadbeen heard by either of them, their two hands were struck violentlyapart, and Annette stood between them, her eyes flaming with rageand the spirit of temporary insanity last imported by the domesticsmugglers. 

CHAPTER XX

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'No man knows the sex. Women are like Tennyson's description of thelaw--a wilderness of single instances; but except for those surprisingexamples which are detected for us only by the talisman of a great love, there is a family likeness amongst them. The woman is the tougher-fibredcreature, and there is excellent good reason why she should be so. Shesuffers as no man ever suffers, and she could not bear her pangs--shewould go mad under them--if she were half as sensitive to suffering asthe less-tried male; and on the moral side the lady is a pachyderm andthe average workman an un-shelled polype in comparison. I invoke, ' hecried, striding the little grassy platform on which his feet had worn apathway between his tent-door and the chattering runnel--'I invoke theunnumbered squads and battalions and armies of shame which are known, and always have been known, to every town and city which has ever daredto call itself civilized since history began. From Lais in her jewelledlitter to Cora in her English landau in the Bois, and on to theshabbiest small slut who flaunts her raddle and her broken feather inthe slums of London, the same story is told and the same moral preached. Where is an equal army of men to be found to invite the contumely oftheir own sex? A woman's virtue is her continence, and a man's virtuesare truthfulness and courage. There is an unspeakably great army ofthe one sex which makes a show and a lure of its penal uniform. Find meanywhere a band of men who flaunt themselves in an equal denial of thevirtues proper to man, who parade themselves as cowards and liars, andstrive to make a living by the parade of their own desertion from themanly principle. The tender sensibility of the generic woman is a fraud, and I should know that better than most men, because I so long believedin it and had so many rude awakenings from faith. But, oh I now andagain--happy the man who learns it early!--there is a woman to be foundso strong and delicate, so tender yet courageous, so much beyond thebest that men ever find in men, that there is nothing for us but toabase our souls in gratitude and worship and wonder. We--we have geniusof a hundred sorts, and still genius is rare; we invent, we construct, we drag new sciences, patient fact by fact, from the regions ofdarkness; we think great thoughts and speak great words--there is nolimit set to the passion of our intellectual greed, no limit to theconquering march of eternal achievement; and when all is said and donethere never lived a woman who had true genius for anything but love andgoodness. There in that glorious small specialized field they shine, andthey shine the brighter and more splendid because of their contrastwith a sordid, heartless, stupid, and greedy sex. And there, ' he said, kneeling to stir the slumbering embers of his camp-fire--'there, shiningin that little shining field, are you, Madge, brightest amongst thebrightest and saddest among the saddest, and here am I who wrecked yourlife for you with such admirable good intent'

The rage flamed out. He took his seat upon his camp-stool, and shreddedtobacco for his pipe, staring with vacant eyes into the smoke-fog whicheverywhere imprisoned his gaze, and in a minute he was back at hisdreams again, and the past once more unrolled itself before him. 

He was back in Montcourtois, marching the cobbled pavement of the_place_ in front of the Hotel of the Three Friends, hatless and justhalf conscious of the touch of the wintry air on his cheek. The Baronesswas newly rankling under an insult now so many years of age; andAnnette, clearly visible at moments between the slits of the Venetianblinds, was still pacing the lamplit salon. The whole thing happened inhis mind again precisely as it had happened in fact so very long ago. 

A sudden remembrance and a sudden impulse moved him almost in the sameinstant. When the bracelet had fallen from her arm, the Baroness hadcried out to the effect that it was her most valued treasure, and Paulsuddenly called to mind the fact that it still lay on the floor of thesalon. Annette might observe it at any moment, and might choose to wreakher supposed offence upon it; and, thinking thus, he hastened backto the apartment, prepared for any storm that might assail him. ButAnnette, who, in the inexplicable changes of mood which affected herat such times as these, was marching gaily up and down the room singing'Tout le long de la route 'to a swinging rhythm, chose to disregardhim. He saw the precious ornament lying where it had fallen, possessedhimself of it, and passed out at the further door. For any sign shegave Annette may not have seen him, and Paul had time, as he crossed thecorridor to his study, to remark upon a form of alcoholism which allowedits victim unembarrassed speech in combination with a steady gait and anentire irresponsibility of thought. The manifestation was comparativelynew to him, and he had spent some thought upon it It was so foreignto the popular idea of drunkenness that it accounted to him for hislong-continued blindness to the truth. 

He was tarred with the literary brush, which is to say that he waseternally bent upon the examination of all human symptoms, whetherthey displayed themselves in himself or in another. He had made it thebusiness of his life to analyze those symptoms, though he was but asyet a chemist's apprentice, wandering and wondering through the vastlaboratory of the world. Yet, apprentice as he was, he had learnedenough of the secret of his own craft to know that the professionalanalyst of emotion quickens perception at the expense of sensation. Theman who is always pulling emotion to pieces as a part of the day's workgrows to a philosophic indifference about it, as a vivisector becomesdead to a sense of pain. Yet neither the anatomist of the livingsoul nor the anatomist of the living body becomes insensible in anyappreciable degree to the exigence of his own pains, and the memories ofa thousand triumphant operations will not hinder the start and outcry ofthe greatest of surgeons if you stick an unexpected pin into any part ofhis anatomy. 

Paul had laid his hand upon the handle of the door of the study, andwith his disengaged hand was fumbling in his pocket for a match, when heheard a tripping footstep on the stairs behind him, and he was hailed bythe Baroness's Parisian maid. Madame la Baronne, so the maid explained, had let fall a valuable ornament in the salon; had Mr. Armstrong seenit, and, if not, would he give orders that it should be sought for andreturned? Paul felt the precious object in his pocket. 

'I do not know Madame's arrangements, ' he said, 'but I have thebracelet, and, if it were possible for her to receive me, I should liketo hand it to her personally. '

'Oh, but yes, ' said the maid. Madame la Baronne had her little suiteof rooms, and was quite in position to receive. M. Armstrong's desireshould be named to her, and the maid would bring an answer. 

She fluttered upstairs with swashing petticoats and a flutter ofribbons, and Paul waited in the corridor below. On the waxed floor ofthe salon Annette's feet still moved to a rhythmic, half-dancing walk, and her bird-like voice soared to--

 'Tons les deux, la main dans la main, Nous poursuivions notre chemin, Sous la celeste voûte. '

'Under the celestial vault, ' said Paul; 'and bent on the discovery ofwhat infernal regions?'

The maid came back, pruning herself with coquettish graces, to answerthat Madame la Baronne would have pleasure in receiving M. Armstrongin five minutes, and, having delivered her message, rustled rapidlyupstairs again. She paused at the turning of the stair, and leaned overto say:

'Numéro quinze, the fifth door to the right of monsieur. '

'Thank you, ' Paul answered, and, turning into the darkened study, strucka light and consulted his watch. It was ten minutes past nine, and hesat still to await the quarter hour. There was a clattering of pots andpans in the distant kitchen, and Annette was still singing and walkingin the near apartment An occasional murmur of voices, a click ofbilliard-balls, and even the faint noise made by the shuffle of a set ofdominoes in the café over the road reached his ears, but save for theseslight signs of life the world seemed asleep. Annette suddenly ceasedto sing in the middle of a bar. He heard her open the door of the salon. She passed the little corridor in silence, and ascended the stair. Heheard the key turn, first in the lock of one door and then in that ofanother. He consulted his watch once more by the flickering light ofa lucifer match. He was within a minute of the appointed time, and hebegan to ask himself with a fluttering heart what he was to say, and howhe was to bear himself in the coming interview. Upstairs outraged purityand dignity were waiting for him, and he himself, innocent as he hadmeant to be, was yet in a sense the author of the outrage. The minutecrawled. It ticked its final second out at last, and he arose holdingthe bracelet in his hand. He mounted the stair, knocked at the door themaid had indicated to him, and was bidden to enter. The Baroness wasseated in a sea-green dressing-gown ornamented by many pretty devices inlace of priceless fabric, which had taken a coffee tint by reason ofits age. A book was lying on her knees, and she was toying with an ivorypaper-knife which had its haft in a silver embossed rhinoceros tooth. She nodded Paul to a chair which had evidently been placed for him. 

'I see, ' she said, 'that you have found my bracelet'

He handed it to her without a word. She purred a 'Thank you, ' and testedits clasp about her arm. 

'Sit down, Mr. Armstrong, ' she said. 

Paul was still voiceless, but he echoed the coldly courteous Mr. Armstrong 'in his mind with some dismay. 

'I do not see, ' said the Baroness de Wyeth, 'how it is possible topass over the incident of to-night in silence. Perhaps we may speak oneexplanatory word about it and let it go. What have you to tell me, Mr. Armstrong?'

'Well----'

Paul balanced appealing hands in front of him, waved them, suffered themto fall at his sides, and said no more. 

'You must be conscious, ' said the Baroness, tapping the book whichlay before her with her paper-knife, 'that it was by accident that theincident which is only known to ourselves did not happen in public. In ameasure I have compromised myself, and, if you will permit me to sayso, I am not a woman who is accustomed to be compromised. Your wifeobjects--a little unconventionally perhaps--to our association. I ama woman of the world, and I know very well what construction might beplaced on such an episode. We can both see clearly that such a thingmight happen again at any instant under circumstances less favourableto my reputation, and I cannot afford to risk the renewing of it Iam seriously afraid that I shall have in future to deny myself theprivileges of a very pleasant friendship. '

'Your will shall be my law, ' said Paul 'I have no excuse to urge, andhave certainly no complaint to make of your decision. I shall go at yourcommand, Gertrude----'

She waved the paper-knife against him with a gesture which seemed toprotest against that one dear familiarity. 

'I beg your pardon, ' he cried; 'the name escaped me. I shall not havethe chance to use it often after this, and you may let it pass. I amgoing, but I must tell you this: I have not been very fortunate in mychoice of friends amongst women, or in the choice which has been thrustupon me, and so long as I live I shall remember----' He paused, andwaited for a while until he regained the mastery of himself. Then hewent on steadily, with a level voice almost as if he were a schoolboyreading from a lesson-book: 'I shall remember as long as I live thebeautiful thoughts with which you have inspired me, your kindness, yourfriendship--and, and----'

He never knew how it happened--men of his temperament never do know--buthe was on his knees before her, and the words burst from him with a sob. 

'And--you!'

She smiled upon him from the maternal height of the coquette who is ayear or two older than the man she coquets with. 

The tears were in his eyes and on his cheeks, and glistened in thevirgin beard. She stooped forward and laid a hand upon his head. 

'Do you care so much to leave me, Paul?' she asked. 

A man of the world would have known the studied quaver in the voice--thethroaty, stagey sweetness of it. What was to be expected of a yokel ofgenius who had been rushed through a hundred towns or so in everlastingassociation with De Vavasours and Montmorencys--rushed through Londonand through Paris under much the same inauspicious petticoat influences, and had hardly ever met a real live lady in his life on terms ofintimacy until now? And Madame la Baronne de Wyčth had told him enoughand had shown him enough in the way of correspondence with distinguishedpeople of both hemispheres to let him know that she could play thepart of _grand dame_ at discretion anywhere. That was possibly thepreponderant influence in his mind. Had he himself been a gentlemanby extraction, had he been able to meet this exquisite and delicatecreature of old dreams and modern conditions on any terms of equality, he would not have abased himself in spirit as he did. The woman wasregnant The woman is always regnant, whether she be queen or dairymaid, but the barrier between himself and her was built of the old hurdlesof low birth and iron fortune. Here anyway in his heart rang the knell'Good-bye, ' the farewell, farewell, farewell which every poet worth hissalt has heard not once but many times, and, in the middle of the dirgethe bell rang so remorselessly, came the exquisite chrysm of a fondlinghand upon his head. 

It dwelt there scarcely for a moment, and if every nerve had not beenvibrant with feeling, the touch was so light that it might almost havepassed unnoticed. As things happened it was like a torch touchinga torch as yet unlighted, and the young man flamed. He caught thecaressing hand as it left his hair, and kissed it. 

Ah! the weeping tears and the melancholy Touchstone humour that smiledwryly to see them, each as big as a pea. 

The Baroness surrendered her hand, and Paul kissed it with that passionwhich inspires a pilgrim at the shrine, and the odd something superaddedwhich has made fools of men since Eve plucked her first girdle offig-leaves. He wept above the hand, and he fondled the hand, and hekissed it with protesting murmurs of undying affection and esteem, andwhilst this storm was in danger of playing itself out, and the unsuingsuitor was likely to make an end of the business and go, the disengagedhand of the Baroness stole out and took him maternally by the chin, under the rain-soaked beard. 

'Paul dear, ' said the Baroness, 'I did not think that you would havefelt our parting like this. We can't help it, we literary people--wemust quote, we must express the profoundest feelings of our souls inthe words of other people. What's the Shakespearian line? "I hold itgood that we shake hands and part", Good-bye, Paul. '

He was on his feet again, and they were hand in hand. Her left hand wason his right shoulder. Their eyes met and lingered on each other. 

'We're saying good-bye, Paul, ' purred the Baroness in a voice oftenderest cadence. 'You see the need for it, don't you, you dear boy?Perhaps we may see each other later on, but it _is_ good-bye now, forthe time being. It must be so. You see that, don't you, Paul dear?

'Oh yes, ' he said, 'I see it. Who could fail to see it? You shall havemy thanks when I can offer them for having asked no explanation, noapology. '

'Paul, ' said the Baroness, and the left hand on his right shoulder drewhim a little nearer to her. Once, a year or two before, he had been upin the Yorkshire dales, and had strolled along by the side of the Wharfeon a day when the river ran beryl-brown or sapphire clear as it glancedover pebbly shallow or rocky depth. There was the beryl glint in hereye--the darling brown with the liquid light playing upon it. He lookednow. The woodlands were about him; the river murmured near. The damnableartistic gift which made use of all accomplished experience helped himto obey the impulse of the slow, persuasive hand. The beryl light in theeyes invited him, and the faint droop of languishing eyelid did the rest'Paul dear, ' she whispered, 'it is good-bye. You may kiss me just thisonce and go. Kiss me, Paul dear, as you would kiss your mother's ghost, and go. '

He stooped and kissed her, reverently and lingeringly, upon theforehead. 

'Good-bye, ' he said--'good-bye. '

Then, with an electric amazement, her lips were on his for a singleinstant, and she strained him near to her. 

'Now, go, ' she said, withdrawing herself before he had found time toanswer her embrace. 'Go, and farewell!'

He was in the upper corridor almost before he knew it, in the confusionof his nerves. The key snapped quickly in the lock, and he was alone. Hegroped his way along the darkened passage until he reached the headof the stairs, and there he recovered some consciousness of fact. Hedrooped slowly down into his study, and sat there in the dark and coldfor hours, swearing fealty to contradictory deities of passion and offriendship. 

CHAPTER XXI

That year winter had advanced with a delaying foot thus far across theBelgian Ardennes, but this was the hour chosen by the icy king for thebeginning of his real siege of that region. Whilst Paul sat in his studyin the dark, the cold gathered about him tenser and more tense until hewas fain to seek the warmer shelter of his own room. There across thegleaming darkness of the window-panes he could discern great broadsnowflakes loitering down one after the other as if intent on nobusiness in the world, and yet in spite of their seeming want of purposethey had covered the earth six inches deep before daybreak. 

He awoke in the morning to look out upon a world of virginwhite:--street, and roofs, and far-spread trees and fields all dazzlingin their winter cloak beneath a sky of cloudless blue, white towards thehorizon where it could catch the lustre of the up-beating brightnessof the snow. In the dark cold mornings of the year the hotel peoplehad fallen into a habit of bringing up his coffee and pistolet to hisbedroom. He had been willing enough to acquiesce in the custom; butas he sat sipping and munching in dressing-gown and slippers, with atravelling-rug about his knees, and revolving the events of last nightin his mind, he heard a noise in the stables, and, thrusting thewindow open, looked out into the cold, still, clear air. Victor, theshock-headed driver, was leading out a pair of flea-bitten grays alreadyaccoutred for a journey, part of their harness dragging through the asyet untrodden snow. 

'Holla!' he called--'Victor!' The man looked up, knuckling at hisforehead. 'Are they shooting to-day?' Paul asked. 'It ought to be a goodday for the trackers. '

'No, monsieur, ' Victor answered; 'it is Madame la Baronne who departs. She takes the express to Verviers at half-past nine. Monsieur willexcuse; I am afraid of being late already. '

From the moment at which he had heard the horses moving down below, he had anticipated this without wholly knowing to what he had lookedforward. He thrust aside with his foot the ice-cold tub in which itwas his custom to rejoice--as befitted an Englishman of his years--and, hastily sponging his face and hands, made a hurried toilet, listeningmeanwhile for any sound which might bring definite tidings to his mind. When he descended the carriage was still at the main entrance to thehotel, and Victor was pulling on to his chapped hands a huge pair ofsheepskin gloves, the wool worn inside. 

'We have but thirty-five minutes, ' the driver grumbled, 'and two milesto go, and all uphill. '

'Is that a very awful task?' Paul asked, for the mere sake of sayingsomething. 

He was intent on retaining his name, and on saying farewell in such afashion that his manner should cast no reflection on the dear departingdivinity. Mademoiselle Adčle was already at the door, wiping her handsupon her apron. Madame Alexis, the cook, was ranged up alongside, and beyond her was the apple-cheeked Flamande maid One of the malehangers-on of the establishment came stumbling down the staircase witha great travelling-trunk upon his shoulders, and arranged his burdenalongside the driver's seat. Then down tripped the Baroness's maid, carrying a dressing-bag in one hand and a despatch-box in the other. Then followed a nondescript female who charred about the house and didscullery-work, and sometimes, in a borrowed dress, served at table. Shecame enveloped in rugs and furs, and at every note of preparation fordeparture Paul's heart beat faster. At last he could bear to look forthe last figure in the procession no longer, for he was bent on anaspect of entire nonchalance, and the desolation of an actual farewellstruck more and more on his spirit as he waited. 

At last the expected frou-frou, and the soft footfall of thebeautifully-shod feet, warned him of the Baroness's coming. 

She paused in the hall to say a gracious word here and there, and topress something of evidently unexpected value into the hands of theattendant trio, for they all curtseyed low, and said, as if awestricken, 'Réellement, Madame la Baronne est trop bonne, ' as if their strings hadbeen mechanically pulled, and they had been trained to speak the wordsin unison. 

Paul dared not turn his head, but the gracious little figure paused inpassing him. Madame la Baronne was richly befurred and so thickly veiledthat he could discern nothing, or little, apart from the sparklingbrightness of her eyes. She sprinkled her adieux around her in Frenchto an accompaniment of thanks and curtsies, but she spoke to Paul inEnglish. 

'I am going to Venders, ' she said, 'and I am afraid my studies will bea little broken. In the meantime I will write to you and give you anaddress, and I shall be glad if you will answer me. '

She held out her hand, and Paul held it for a mere instant, nolonger--he was careful of that--than the occasion would have demandedhad but the merest friendly acquaintance existed between them. He darednot trust himself to speak, but he raised his hat and pressed the hand, and the pressure was returned. Then the Baroness entered the carriage, Victor cracked his whip impatiently, and the slow Flemish horses bowledaway, their hoof-beats silenced by the snow. They had reached thecorner, and in another instant would have been out of sight, when Paulgave an artificial start, as if he had suddenly called to mind somethingof importance, and dashed after the retreating carriage. He overtook iteasily enough, and, laying a hand upon it, ran alongside. 

'This is not good-bye?'he said. 'Tell me that this is not good-bye. '

'I hope it is not good-bye, ' she answered. 'But go now, dear heart, Ibeg you; you know why I am going. '

The 'dear heart' thrilled him through and through. 

'You will write?' he asked. 

'I will write to-night, ' she said, 'but you must leave me now. '

He fell from the carriage side, and the vehicle went on its leisurelycourse, leaving him standing in the snow and staring after it; butrecollecting himself in a moment, he turned and plodded slowly back tothe hotel, with as unconcerned and commonplace a look as he could summonat short notice. 

Annette had one of her old spells of secrecy, and was hidden allday long. He was glad to miss her and to be left alone with his ownthoughts. He could not realize himself and he could not realize theBaroness; her promised letter would, however, tell him something. Itmight enable him at once to find his orient. 

He passed through a strange day--a day of resentment and of tenderness, a day of despair and of hope. He could not work or plan, and reading wasimpossible, and to-morrow morning looked absurdly distant Yet it came atlast, after an almost sleepless night, in the course of which he heardAnnette moving and the occasional clink of glass. He could see a lightgleaming underneath her door half a dozen times, and these remindersof her came to him always with a dull ache of wretchedness, yet he fellasleep at last and overslept himself, so that he escaped the final hoursof waiting. The promised letter was to hand, and he tore its envelopeopen with trembling fingers, not knowing what to expect within. 

'My very dear Friend' (it began), 'All day I have thought of you; I do not know what feeling has beenstrongest in my mind. I make no secret of the esteem I have for you, or of the sorrow I have felt at being forced to end the pleasantestfriendship I have ever known. I should not say to end it, for such acompanionship of spirit as we have experienced can never be ended, butwe must close the first chapter of the book, and the rest will not makesuch happy reading. I have felt my heart ache more than once in thecontemplation of your unhappiness, for though you have never spoken ofit, I knew without the episode of last night--I have known almost fromthe first--how profoundly you have suffered and will continue to suffer. Ah, my dear friend, it is only those who have suffered in that way whocan truly sympathize with you. To have found a completer isolation inthe search for companionship--that is the tragedy of many souls. It isyours, and I know it and feel it, because it is mine also. 

'I am weary with my journey, and I am so sad and lonely that I havescarce the heart to write; but promise me just this one thing: Give mehalf an hour of your thoughts each day, and let me know what part ofthe day you choose, so that I may think of you at the same time. Doyou believe that any actual communion of the mind is possible in suchconditions? I should like to believe it. How pure, how spiritual, howexquisite a friendship might exist if it were only so!'

Exactly. And what a quagmire a properly experienced lady may lead aman into if she so wills! This particular experiment suggested by theBaroness is singularly successful in the enslaving of the eager, and ithas the great merit of permitting the willing horse to do all the work. The lover can moon and rhapsodise at a safe distance, and it makes nota pennyworth of difference to him whether the mistress moons andrhapsodises also, or whether she is engaged in a flirtation throughanother telepathic line, or whether she has a score of different linesconverging upon her all at once. 

Paul, of course, most willingly accorded the lady the daily half-hourdemanded. He became persuaded in a very little while that the soul ofGertrude met his midway, and when she sent him a description of herlittle boudoir, so that he might the better realize her in her ownsurroundings, he used to float away to Verviers in vision, and sit byGertrude in fancy, and hold Gertrude's hand, and express to Gertrudeall his ardours of friendship and esteem--for, of course, it never gotbeyond that, or was ever to be permitted to get beyond it--and Gertrudeused to give him vow for vow, all in the range of the highest moralfeeling. It is possible that there are people who might imbibe thissort of mental liquor and come to no damage by it, but Paul found itremarkably heady. At first he thought the draught stimulative, but ina while he began to know that it was enervating. He began to rebel athimself. 

'I am throwing away my manhood for a dream, ' he said. 

For Gertrude, whose letters were fairly frequent and most sisterlytender, would hear nothing of Paul's petition that he might be allowedto visit her--would not even listen to any suggestion that they mightever meet again in any approach to the happy seclusion and privacy ofthe first sweet days. 

But Paul Armstrong was feeble in rebellion against himself, and he washere caught firmly in the toils of the first passion of his manhood. TheMay Gold episode and the Claudie Belmont episode had long been things tolaugh at. Marriage had turned out an unredeemed tragedy, which had neverhad even the poor excuse of a passing infatuation behind it He had neverloved Annette, and she was fast growing into a terror and an aversion. And now all this tomfoolery of telepathic communion, this wilfulbrooding over an absent woman, this summoning of her features to mind, this recalling of her tones, this yearning in which his own soul seemedto beat its mortal bars in the strife to draw her spirit near, madea clean end of the platonic theory so far as he was concerned. TheBaroness, at her end of the spirit-wire, appears to have been lesspotently disturbed. Perhaps she took less pains to disturb herself;possibly she took none whatever. 

It came at last on Paul's side to amount to something very like apossession. Night and day his thoughts hovered about her. He would notadmit to his mind one dishonouring thought of her. 

 'Charlotte was a married woman, and a moral man was Werther, And for all the wealth of Indies would do nothing for to hurt her. '

And Gertrude was a married woman also, and Paul--who had not too rigidlyobeyed the precepts of morality in his day--was bent on honour inthis instance. He wrote reams of letters, all of which might have beenprinted without harm to anybody; but by-and-by his passion began tocarry him off his feet, as passion has carried stronger men than he, andthe fever of his pulses got into his ink, and he began to make love, butwith a dreadful guardedness and a deadly fear lest he should offendthe susceptibilities of this creature of the skies. She rebuked himby implication and in a parable. She had had a mournful letter from afriend in Boston, an old and valued correspondent, a lady whose domesticrelations were of the saddest sort, who had long believed herself tohave established a pure and tender friendship with a person of theopposite sex, and who had now been shocked and horrified beyond measureby a proposal of elopement How rare a genuine friendship between men andwomen seemed to be! How happy was she in the security she enjoyed inthe solidity of his character, in that delicacy of mind and heart whichpermitted the most delightful intimacies of thought without danger. Hewrote back fiercely that he was unworthy of the confidence she reposedin him, that he loved her passionately, adoringly, and without any dreamof hope. 

'I will not soil my worship of you by even asking for your forgiveness, 'so he wrote. 'I have told you what I had to tell. There is no longer anypower in me to hide it And now I know that it is good-bye indeed. In thesorrow and the loneliness which are rightly mine--since I earned themwith much foolish painstaking--I shall never cease to love you, but Ishall not presume to write to you again. '

'My poor Paul, 'she wrote back to him, 'what madness!

And how great a cruelty to snatch from me the solace of your friendship'Forget the madness, dearest friend. Undo the cruelty. Let us bury thememory of this outburst, let us go back to the past. Alas! did ever manor woman return to the past? But we must not part in this way. You mustwrite to me at times. You must let me know of your artistic hopes. Youmust give me news of your career. '

He was amazed to find that he was answered at all, and even in hismisery he joyed to find himself reprieved from the sentence his ownconscience had passed upon him. He was still free to write, and he wrotealmost every day, though he sent off his budget only once a week. He didnot make love in the sense of seeking to persuade his goddess to descendto him, but he made no further disguise of himself, and he was not againreproved. 

This all led to a long space of infertility, and it was stretched stillfurther by the departure of the Baroness to Paris. There, she wrotePaul, she would be much in society, and if he should find himself inthe gay city at any time during her stay, she could introduce him tocharming and useful people. But she was very round in her warnings tohim. 

'You must not come, 'she told him, 'unless you are absolutely sure thatthere is no danger of making me absurd in the eyes of my friends. Dearlyas I esteem you, I should never forgive you that. You have been sovery outspoken of late, and I have permitted you to write your heart sofreely, that I should be guilty of the foolishest affectation if I weresilent on this one matter. We cannot control our affections. It is notgiven to us to love and dislike at discretion, but we can control ourlanguage and our conduct, and I must exact your promise ere you meet me. And I will tell you this once, and I will never breathe it any more: Hadwe met under happier conditions, had we both been free to choose, I knowthat I could have loved you. I am thus candid with you because I wishyou to know how entirely I rely upon your discretion and respect. Wemay have happiness denied us, and to choose it now would be to suffermiserably, but we have each a personal esteem to guard. Ah, Paul! bekind to me. Do not make it hard to see you again. '

If all this were written, as Paul came most devoutly to believe in laterdays, with the single-minded desire to enslave him yet more completely, it was truly heartless, but that was certainly the end it gained. Itseemed to him the most pathetic and womanly of effusions, for what womanwould write that she could have loved a man in happier conditions unlessshe did truly love him? She suffered as he suffered. Without her warrantit would have been coxcombical to believe it But the belief made heraltogether sacred in his eyes, and he vowed a thousand times thatno word or tone of his should ever offend that angel delicacy andtenderness. A curious part of this maniac experience was his estimate ofhimself as it proceeded. He was in a mood entirely heroical. The Baronde Wyeth, who was making money to supply the most whimsical needs of theabsent Gertrude, never entered into his head. It did not offer itself onany single occasion to his intelligence to think that there was anythingto be reprehended in this sterile dalliance. 

As for Annette, she had grown to be impossible. She resented theguardianship exercised over her with an increasing fierceness. Whenshe could smuggle her contraband through the enemy's lines, she lockedherself in her room, and remained there until the supply was exhaustedShe would emerge blotched, pale, and haggard, and companionship betweenherself and her husband was out of question. 

At the time at which the letter just cited reached Paul Annette'scunning had been unequal to the war for at least a fortnight, and herconstitution was still youthful and strong enough to enable herto return to something of her earlier aspect after a few days ofabstinence. 

'I have business which will take me to Paris in a little while, ' herhusband told her. 

'Very well, ' she said indifferently. 

'Do you prefer to come with me, or to stay here?' he asked. 

'To go with you?'she demanded. 'Under what conditions?'

'Under the conditions I have always offered, ' he returned: 'that you areaccompanied by a female companion of my choice. '

'I shall stay here, ' Annette said curtly. 

'As you will. '

He was relieved by her decision, not merely because the last thread ofcomradeship between them was broken, but because he dreaded the exposureof the cupboard skeleton, which was always putting out a ghastly head athim. In a great city like Paris there might arise an occasion of escapefrom control at any moment, and Heaven alone knew what _esclandre_ mightensue upon a single escapade. 

He made his preparations for departure. Laurent promised his mostcareful supervision of affairs, and Paul left him with plenary powers. There were no adieux to make, for Annette declined to see him. Hetravelled to Brussels, and thence to Paris, going away with a reliefwhich was made the more complete by the latest intelligence the doctorhad brought him: there was to be no child of Annette's and his. Thathope or fear--and he had barely known which to think it--was over. 

At Montcourtois Madame la Baronne de Wyeth had been content to live inextreme simplicity, and her account of her own surroundings at Veryiersdid not express any dose approach to luxury; but in Paris she occupiedapartments of great splendour, had a considerable entourage about her, and entertained a limited number of charming people, who were all moreor less celebrated. Her music was as fine as anything that could be gotin Paris, for she knew all the great singers and instrumentalists, andthough the season was about at an end, there was still enough genius inthe basket to pick and choose from. 

It was with a wildly beating heart that Paul alighted at her door, andas he stood awaiting her in the luxuriously furnished salon which wasthe centrepiece of her apartments, his knees trembled with agitation. He was there to meet for the first time the woman he loved. That wasstrange and yet true. When he had last seen her he had not yet grown tolove her, or, if he had, he had granted himself no knowledge of it. Butnow he loved, and he had confessed his love, and what was potentiallya return avowal had been made by her. And they were to meet justas friends. There was to be no word spoken of all the passion whichthrilled and filled his heart and tingled through his veins. 

She came at last in a gentle silken rustle, dressed already for thereception of the guests who were expected to arrive an hour later. Shehad accorded him this one _tęte-ā-tęte_--this and no other. She wastransfigured in his eyes, and did indeed show to her best advantage infull toilette. The lucent rosy whiteness of arms and shoulders seemed todazzle him. 

He extended both hands to her, and she came forward with her lithe gaitand a smile of great sweetness, and took them in her own. 

'Gertrude!' he whispered, and she answered with the one word 'Paul!' andhad his life depended upon it, he could not have spoken further at thatinstant. 

'I am very glad to see you, Paul, ' she said, 'very glad indeed. ' Shereleased one of his hands, and by the other led him to a causeuse nearone of the splendidly curtained windows. 'But what has happened to you?she asked. 'My poor Paul, you are ill! You are not yourself at all. There are brown circles round your eyes, and your cheeks have fallen in, and you are growing positively gray at the temples. '

'I am not ill, ' Paul answered, trying to smile. 'I have had a somewhattrying experience of late, and I am here to forget it. '

'May I know of it?' she asked

'No, ' said Paul; 'the topic is forbidden. '

She laughed gaily and blushed a little. 

'Now, that is very clever, and very wicked of you, ' she purred. 'Thattopic is not to be approached even elliptically. But really and truly, my poor Paul, you are not well, and I shall see that you take propercare of yourself. You will take a glass of wine at once. '

'No, ' he said, waving a hand against her as she made a motion to rise. 

'You used not to contradict my orders, ' she told him, 'and you shall notdo it now. I can give you a really excellent glass of champagne--not alady's champagne, be it understood, a man's wine--a connoisseur's. '

He made no further protest, and she rang a small silver bell near herhand. A grave serving-man appeared in answer to this summons, receivedhis mistress's order, and glided away again. 

'I have all your news?' the Baroness asked, turning to her guest again. 

'All, ' he answered--' all there is to tell. '

He had known perfectly well at one time that she was not strictly abeautiful woman. He had been able to analyze her, to admit very fineeyes and teeth, and a clear, if somewhat florid, glow of complexion. Hehad granted, further, fine hair, and very beautiful hands and arms. Buthe wondered at himself, and could have laughed at his own blindness. Thepower of analysis had gone out of him because he was in love. She wasmerely a soft, dazzling splendour in aspect now, and every look and toneand attitude was a witchery and a wonder. 

'I have not seen you in evening dress before to-night, Paul, ' she said. 'I like you in evening dress. It is a great test of a man's distinction. It is cruel to all but the few. It is distinctly not cruel to you. '

'I am proud to be approved of, ' he answered, trying to speak lightly. 

The grave serving-man brought in the wine, which proved worthy of thehostess's praise. Paul was grateful for it, for it helped to steady hisshaken nerve. He felt pretty much as he imagined a man might feel whowas learning to stand under fire. 

'It was kind of you, ' he said, 'to give me this one hour to myself. Ishall try to learn my lesson in it I want to assure you how much I havelaid your injunction to heart, and to promise you that from this timeforth you shall be implicitly obeyed. When I wrote that wild letter toyou at Venders I had not the faintest hope of your forgiveness. I neednot tell you how I thank you for it, how I shall strive to show mygratitude. But, indeed, you are my Anthea, Gertrude, and may command meanything. '

'Another man would not have found forgiveness, Paul, ' she answered, turning away her head, and looking downward. 'I do not deny to you nowthat I was deeply amazed, and, at first, humiliated. Then for a timeI was angry, and I had to ask myself of what indiscretion I had beenguilty to lay me open to the receipt of such a letter from my dearestfriend. But we women are weak creatures where the affections areconcerned, and I felt that I could not afford to lose you, Paul. Youwill not make it necessary for me to lose you?'

'No, ' he declared. 'No spoken word of mine shall hurt you. God knowswhat you have been to me since first I met you. ' She raised her handagainst him and looked up with a glance of appeal. 'Oh, surely I may saythis!' he urged. 'I have been through dark days, Gertrude. I am young, and reputation and fortune are calling to me, and I have put a millstoneabout my neck, and but for your friendship I should have broken myheart. '

'Paul, ' she said, 'my poor boy! My poor, dear boy! I think I would givemy life if I could comfort you. '

'You do comfort me, ' he answered. 'You are the one comfort I have. Ishall learn in time to think of you as if you were a saint in heaven. '

'Oh!' she purred, 'you dear, simple-souled enthusiast! Don't you knowyet--haven't you found it out, that simple truth?--that when a man hasrelegated a living woman to the position of a saint in heaven he hasceased to care about her? I am not going to turn _you_ into a sanctifiedfigure. '

'I should scarcely look for that, ' said Paul, with a momentary gleam ofhumour. 

'I am going to keep you for a living, large-brained, human-heartedfriend, and I hope that if we do not see too much of each other, we mayboth grow content with that arrangement. '

She spoke with a smiling vivacity, but she set a delicate little trifleof lace and cambric to her eyes, and then looked up and smiled again. 

'You do not wish, ' he asked, 'that we should see much of each other?'His face was very gloomy. 

'I mean, ' she said gently, laying her hand upon his shoulder, andlooking into his mournful eyes, 'that we should be discreet I do notmean that at all as regards the opinion of others, for there I can trustmyself and you without a fear. I mean with respect to ourselves. It willnot be well for your own happiness that we should meet often as we aremeeting now. '

She rose, and moved away from him a little, standing with the fingersof her hands interlaced, and the palms downward. This is a very pleasingsort of attitude when adopted by the right kind of person. Taken inconjunction with a pensive, sidelong droop of the head, it will yieldan expression of gently sorrowing coy confidence when employed by acompetent artist. 

'You will promise me, ' said the Baroness, with a voice not whollysteady, 'that you will never repeat to me what I am going to tell you. '

'You may command me anything, ' Paul answered. 'I promise. '

'It will not be well, ' she went on, repeating the words she had spokenso little a while before, 'for your own happiness that we should meetoften as we are meeting now. Nor will it be well for mine, Paul. Thatis why I have hesitated so long before I have dared to permit you to seeme--before I have dared to permit myself to see you. I am strong enoughnow to trust myself, and I put faith, too, in your friendship and yourchivalry. You will not add to my unhappiness?'

Paul also had left his seat. He stood almost at her shoulder. He wasnear enough to have taken her in his arms. 

'Gertrude, ' he murmured, 'if anything could add to what I feel for you, this would do it. You shall have my tenderest adoration, my constantobedience. '

She turned her head slowly, as if she did it almost against her will. She raised her eyes and looked at him with a strange steadfastness. Shespoke in a soft, half-whisper. 

'This is our good-bye to love. We have met and we have spoken, and wepart again. In half an hour we shall meet as friends, and never, never, never again as we part now. '

She faced round upon him. Her fingers unlaced themselves and she stoodwith both arms open to him. For one burning instant he held her. 

'Your promise!' she whispered, in a frightened voice. 'Your promise, Paul! Your promise!'

He suffered her to escape, and she drew herself away lingeringly, withthe same strange steadfast glance. 

'Good-bye, my lover. Good-bye, my king. I shall never meet him again. Ishall come back to meet my friend. '

The words were but breathed so as to reach the ear, and she turned andwalked droopingly from the room. So might a bruised lily have been borneaway. 

As for Paul, he had half an hour before the earliest guest was expectedto arrive, and he tried hard to compose himself. It was heavy work, forhe was constantly rolling down the hill of endeavour with exclamationsof wonder and worship. What a woman! What a pearl among women! Whatcandour! What courage! What tenderness! What purity! What beauty! Hewas at the height of felicity and the depth of misery with such rapidalternations that he lost the sense of difference, and could nottell one from the other. But when the half-hour of waiting had almostvanished he drank another glass of the wine his _déesse_ had commandedfor him, and was at least prepared to face the world with a pretence ofself-possession. 

The guests began to arrive. There were but six more, and all weremasculine. The Baroness made a radiant entrance to greet them. She madePaul known to each of them in turn, and all were men of mark. He heardeverywhere a name which had been long familiar to him, but the latestcomer of all, whom he had not found time to notice, was familiar insomething more than name. For it was Ralston--Ralston the great, who hadbeen the god of his boyhood--Ralston with his big gray head worn on oneshoulder or another, with the look of fighting wisdom in his face, quiteas of old. 

'Mr. Ralston, ' said the hostess, 'you must know my young friend Mr. Armstrong. We saw his comedy together, you remember. '

Ralston remembered, and seemed to remember more than the name. 

'We have met before this?' he asked. 

'Once, ' Paul replied. 

'Castle Barfield?'

'Exactly. '

'If you'd rather shelve that----'

'Certainly not--between ourselves. '

The hostess took the escort of the eminent diplomatist who was the_doyen_ of the party. The men followed as it pleased them. Ralston andPaul went last. 

'I am a prophet, ' said Ralston, subduing that richly hoarse voice ofhis. 'I told you you would do, and you have done. '

CHAPTER XXII

The evening was memorable to Paul for many reasons. There was not agreat deal of the talk to carry away with one; but if it had not thesolid brilliance of the diamond, it had the cheaper glitter of thesharded glass epigram which sparkles and cuts--an admirable substituteon most occasions, though it has the disadvantage of leaving dangerousfragments for people to tread upon. The conversation was carried onexclusively in French, and, though Paul's ears were quick enough to keepabreast of it, his tongue was not, and he was a silent listener forthe most part Ralston, having pathetically bidden farewell to ease andEnglish, seemed as much at home as any person at table; but he toldPaul, as they walked home together, that he hated to speak a foreignlanguage. 

'Give me the old familiar tool that one has handled since babyhood. Seehow it adjusts itself to the hand! how one can carve with it! with howmuch comfort and dexterity! English, besides that, is the only languagein the world. The things that are not to be said in English are notworth thinking--if they are speakable at all; and some things are not. Look up yonder!' They were in the Place Vendôme. His upward gesture sentPaul's eyes to the sky, which was sown thick with stars. 'Do you carefor a talk across a whisky-and-soda and a cigar?' asked Ralston. 'I amhere in the Rue Castiglione. Come to my room. I have the right nectar. Ibring it with me when I come to Paris, and let them charge for corkage. '

When the guests had scattered, Paul had looked for one more private wordwith Gertrude; but she had left him no excuse to linger. She had saidher 'Good-bye, Paul, ' with an almost icy sweetness. He wanted to getaway into solitude to think about her, and was half inclined to excusehimself from Ralston. 

'Dear little, queer little body, our hostess, eh? Have you known herlong?'

'Not very long, ' Paul answered 'But she and you seemed to have quiteancient memories. '

If Ralston would talk about Gertrude, he would be glad to sit with himtill morning light. 

'Oh, I?' said Ralston--'I have known her from her childhood. If shemakes any secret of her affairs, I mustn't babble, though. Do you knowthe Baron?'

'Not personally. '

'Ah, well---- This way in. I am no higher than the first-floor, and weneedn't trouble the man at the lift. Here's the room. And now that I'mon my own territory, let me say how glad I am to have lighted uponyou again. I've often wondered what you were making of yourself. "Paul Armstrong" is individual enough, and when I saw the name on theplay-bill, I recalled it, and wondered if it meant you. Whisky, soda, cigars. Now we are provided for. '

Paul made himself look as disengaged and easy as possible. 

'You asked me if I knew the Baron. What kind of man is he? A strangesort of fellow, rather--one-and-thirty--to be indifferent to such awoman: brilliant, amiable, charming. '

He spoke with no enthusiasm. He wanted to talk about Gertrude, but hedid not mean to betray his own concerns. 

'The Baron's a very decent fellow; but he has a rather muddy Germanaccent, and he can't understand the lady's verses. There's nothingworse than that in it. She elects to travel; he elects to stay at home. There's no sort of scandal or impropriety. She's a dear little woman, and a good little woman, and she has the French-American _pschutt_, as the idiot word goes now. She's a bit of a sentimentalist, and anexquisite flirt, but the most genuine little creature, too. If shewouldn't flirt, she'd be too good for this world. '

'Flirt!' cried Paul, in so much horror that Ralston laughed aloud. 

'I have taken advantage of my demi-semi-clerical dignity, ' he said, 'topreach many sermons to her on that particular. Mind you, she's a mostestimable woman; and, as you said just now, brilliant and amiableand charming. But she flirts--she flirts with me; and, if I were notentrenched behind the fortress of threescore years, she'd enslave me asshe enslaves everybody else. There's an Isolation of the Soul which isvery effective at short range. Do you happen to have met it yet?'

Was Ralston warning him of set purpose? Had he observed anything--anylittle subtle thing--which had told him how the land lay? Was heconceivably speaking as the husbands friend? Was his speech accidentalor designed? Whatever it might be, and it was certainly enough todiscomfit the listener greatly, it was not enough to shake his faithin Gertrude. When he found time to think about it, he marvelled that soshrewd a man as Ralston should have formed so mistaken an estimate of acharacter so sincere and transparent. 

If ever a woman had laid the pure recesses of her heart and soul opento the inspection of a human eye, Gertrude had done so. He was confidentthat he knew her, and it seemed to him that no two hearts had ever livedtogether in an intimacy at once so chaste and fiery. Gertrude a flirt?The tenderness she had shown him that night a pretence? The thing wasso incredible and ridiculous that it was not worth while to botherone's brains with it for even the fraction of a minute. He had found hissoul's partner--the twin Half of the Pear--and he was more than contentwith his discovery. 

Whether Ralston meant much or little, whether, indeed, he virtuallymeant nothing or anything, Paul could not guess; but he was uneasybeneath the humorous gravity of the elder's eye, and he changed thetheme. They had a good hour together, and shook hands and parted witha mutual liking, and at the instant at which he reached the street Paulwas free to take up his station at his end of the telepathic wire and tocall Gertrude to the other. He walked miles and miles whilst engaged inthis wholesome and reasonable enterprise, and at length, without inthe least knowing how he had got there, found himself, dog-tired, in astrange quarter of the city. He rambled on until he met a gendarme, whoput him upon his way, and within ten minutes of this encounter heawoke with a start to the fact that he was pacing the pavement of thethoroughfare in which he had first seen Annette. The interregnumof fatigue which had come in between his passionate dreams and thisreminder of the sordid realities of his lot went for nothing. The dreamand the truth flashed together like the electric opposites in clouds andawoke a rare thunderstorm within doors. But by the time he had got tohis hotel this was over, and he crawled wearily upstairs to a firelessroom, the air of which struck chill and lonely. The apartment in itselfwas well enough, and not many years before he would have thought itpalatial in its stateliness and luxury; but he would have given athousand pounds at that instant if he could have translated himself tothe old kitchen hearth at home and into the sight of the old familiarfaces. He had taken a little champagne before dinner, a moderateallowance of wine in the course of the meal, and two rather liberaltumblers of whisky-and-soda with Ralston. This was not the directionin which he was accustomed to approach excess, but he remembered gladlythat he had a carafe of brandy in the room. He was chill and tired, andin that contradictory condition of discomfort in which a man is at oncepainfully sleepy and distressfully wide awake. He poured a quantityof spirit into a tumbler, filled the glass to the brim with water, undressed, blew out his candles, and went to bed, and the demons ofa sleepless night came to him and tormented him. The opening line ofTennyson's 'Love and Duty' got into his brain and ticked there: 'Of lovethat never found its earthly close, what sequel?' It recurred with adamnable iteration. He tried all the devices for wooing slumber he hadever heard of. He assembled an innumerable flock of sheep, for he hadthe knack of making pictures in his mind, and he set them one by one toleap through a gap in a hedge, counting them as they went by. He hadnot counted a dozen when the words were back again: 'Of love that neverfound its earthly close, what sequel?'

He repeated the experiment scores of times, but it was alwaysinterrupted by the same query. He set an unending line of soldiers onthe march, all as like each other as peas in the same pod. He resolutelydenuded his mind of thought; he repeated the multiplication table. Itwas all of no service; the question came back remorselessly, and at lasthe set himself to face it. It was dismal enough to look at To think ofthe world without Gertrude was to conceive a barren waste in which itwas worth no man's while to dwell. To anticipate a life-long continuanceof the experiences and emotions of the past three months was scarcelyto invite a more cheerful prospect To hint, even in his own thoughts, atany attempt to draw her from her own height of purity was a profanation. The quarters and the hours chimed, until the gray spring dawn creptthrough the interstices of the blinds, and fatigue grew more leaden thanever. But the devil of insomnia was unconquerable. He relit his candles, found a book, and tried to read; but that was as hopeless as the rest. 

He had no claim to call upon Gertrude again until he learned that it washer goodwill and pleasure he should do so; but he was not forbidden towrite, and there at least was an occupation to which he could bend hismind. He dressed and sat down, dull and haggard, to the task. He wrotepage on page, feeling as though he dipped his pen in his own heart'sblood; but when he came to read what he had written, it was no morewhat he had meant it to be than a Hortus Siccus is a living garden, ora mummy a live Prometheus. He wrote at last: 'I cannot bear thisbanishment in nearness, and if I am not to see you I must go away. Ihave had a night of fever, and have not slept I dare not trust myselfto write, but for pity's sake let me have an answer by the messenger whobrings this. '

He fixed in his mind ten o'clock as the earliest possible hour at whichhe could venture to have the note delivered, and until then he mustneeds have patience. When he went to place his missive in the handsof the concierge, with instructions for the time of its delivery, theservants had only just begun to stir about the house. He had come downgreat-coated and gloved, as if for an early walk, but the walk was nomore than a pretext to allay some remotely imaginable suspicion on thepart of the concierge. 

'Imust leave this with you now, ' he said, 'because it must be deliveredat ten o'clock precisely, and I shall probably not be able to returntill later. The messenger will wait for an answer. '

The man promised that his instructions should be obeyed, and he walkedinto the streets feeling quite aimless and forlorn, and with thefatigues of the night still heavy on him. He had not gone far when hefound a fiacre, and bade the man drive to the Bois and back, and fillup two hours with the journey. Now, the chill morning air and the brightlight falling on tired eyes began to work upon him, and in a littlewhile he was peacefully asleep. The cocher awoke him at the door of hishotel. He looked at his watch, and it was ten o'clock to the minute. Hisheart turned a somersault as he thought that this was the hour at whichGertrude would receive his letter. Breakfast was out of question, butby this time either the Bodega or the English bar would be open, andhe needed a stimulant of some sort before he could face an interviewif such a favour were to be accorded him. It would be unreasonable toexpect that the messenger would return in less than half an hour, and hespent that time in the society of a glass of well-watered absinthe andthe English newspapers of yesterday. He read industriously, but theonly printed words which reached his consciousness were those of thetheatrical advertisement which told him that the joint work of Messrs. George Darco and Paul Armstrong was still being played nightly tocrowded houses. That did not interest him in the least, and the newsof Parliament and the police courts might as well have been written inSanscrit for all the impression it made upon him. 

He endured his own impatience resolutely for the stated time, and thenwalked back to the hotel. His messenger had not yet returned, but therein the vestibule was Ralston, in his brigandish sombrero and his blackvelvet jacket, looking so fit and wholesome that Paul envied him. 

'I have just met two of the boys, 'said Ralston, 'and we are going tobreakfast at the Poule d'Or at twelve o'clock. Will you make one of us?I can promise you good talk, and honest fare, and wholesome wine. '

'I should like it, ' Paul answered awkwardly; 'but the fact is, I can'ttell whether I am free to go. I dare say I shall be able to give you ananswer in an hour, if that will do?'

'We must make it do, ' said Ralston, and at that instant Paul's messengerreturned, and handed to him a large envelope of faint saffron tone. 

It bore an armorial device on one side in gold and scarlet, and on theother a superscription in a handwriting which had been so trained toaffectation that it was recognisable at a glance to anyone who had onceseen it. 

'You will excuse me, ' said Paul; 'I may have to answer this at once. '

He stepped a little on one side and broke the envelope open with thecertainty in his mind that Ralston had noticed his eagerness and sawhow his fingers trembled. The thick embossed notepaper held three wordsonly, or, rather, two words and an initial: 'Breakfast, noon. --G. ' Hisface flushed with triumph, and he turned impulsively on Ralston. 

'I find, ' he said, with a vivacity in strong contrast with his previousmanner, 'that I can't come to-day, but I hope you'll give me anotherchance. Supposing you and your friends are at liberty for this evening, will you bring them to dine with me? I can trust the Poule d'Or; I knowit of old. '

'Good, ' said Ralston. 'If they are at liberty, we'll be there. What timeshall we say? Seven?'

'Seven, ' Paul answered brightly. 

But a new confusion fell upon him. Not a muscle of Ralston's swarthyclear-cut face or the full-bearded lips moved, but there was a dancinglittle demon of not more than half-malicious humour in his eyes. 

'Seven, ' Paul repeated. 'You'll excuse me now? You won't think my hasteunfriendly?'

'My dear fellow!' cried Ralston, the fun rioting in his eyes by thistime, though his features were as still as those of a graven image. 

'Well, ' said Paul, with a desperate, fruitless effort to recoverhimself, 'until seven. '

Ralston shook hands and went his way, and Paul raced upstairs two stepsat a time and burst into the room he had left less than three hours agoin a mood so cheerless and despondent He kissed the letter and clappedit to his heart, and strolled up and down exulting. He was not to bedismissed; he was not to be sent into the desert, after all. 

And, then, what about Ralston? It was really a most unpleasant, a mostunlucky, chance which had brought him there at that particularinstant. There was no blinking the fact that Ralston had enjoyed Paul'sdiscomfiture, and his talk of the previous night came back to mind--thefun he had made of the Isolated Soul; his good-humoured allowancefor the one foible in the character of a lady whom he had known fromchildhood, and for whom he professed both affection and esteem. Itmatters not how impossible a suggestion of this kind may seem to alover's mind. His rejection of it with a natural scorn is of nomanner of consequence except inasmuch as it confirms his loyalty. Thesuggestion will stick and will worry, and it will stick the longer andworry the more because it will make the sufferer suspicious of himself. 'Trust me not at all, or all in all, ' is a native motto for the manof candid soul, and for him an implanted mistrust will not touchhis mistress, though it may anguish him with a sense of his ownunworthiness. 

But--for the time, at least--these things were no more than meretrickeries of self-torment for Paul's mind, and he was on fire to meetthe mid-day. He got out his handsomest morning raiment and brushed itwith his own hands, and made a second toilet lest there should bea speck on cuff or collar after the morning's drive, and then hepromenaded the streets at a snail's pace to kill the hour whichintervened between himself and heaven. 

Heaven was a trifle chilly when, after all this patient waiting, hereached its portals. Gertrude was like frozen honey. She met him in anexquisite morning confection of the latest Parisian design--a something, to the uninstructed male eye, between a peignoir and a tea-gown, butof costly simplicity, and of colours cunningly suited to match Madame'scomplexion in the daylight. The table was exquisitely appointed, but toPaul's dismay the couverts laid upon it were as for apart as the lengthof the table would permit. He looked so comically discomfited at thisdiscovery, and his face so easily expressed his disappointment, thatGertrude laughed and relented. 

'Well, M. Paul, ' she said, still laughing, 'I will make a side-dish ofyou, ' and with her own pretty hands she re-arranged the table, assigninghim a position with great demureness in the exact centre of it. 

Paul would have made at least an effort to break through the crust ofsweet ice which enveloped her this morning but for the presence of apiquante small brunette of a waiting-maid, who stood on guard, as itwere, over a service-table at the end of the apartment. 

'My maid, ' said Gertrude, 'neither speaks nor understands a word of anylanguage but her own, but I can assure you that she has eyes, and canuse them. She invariably attends me at breakfast, and to send her awaywould be----'

She paused. 

'What would it be? said Paul. 'Surely Madame la Baronne de Wyeth has theright to choose what form of service she pleases at her own table?'

'Madame la Baronne, ' replied the lady, with a slight curtsey, 'haschosen. '

'But surely, Gertrude----' Paul began. 

She stopped him with a significant gesture of the hand. 

'Not my Christian name this morning, if you please. And remember, ' sheadded, 'my little watch-dog there has eyes, as I have already told you, and though she knows nothing of English, I should guess her to be a veryfair judge of tone. Come now, you stupid boy, ' she continued in a voiceso level and cool that no one who did not understand her words couldhave guessed their purport, 'I will make a bargain with you. If you willbe kind to me, I will be kind to you. If I receive here a distinguishedand handsome young Englishman all alone--if in order to receive him Imake a marked alteration in my household appointments---- Come, now, isit worth while to go on with that?'

'No, ' said Paul, calling his stage practice to his aid, and followingher lead, ' it is not worth while; but, ' he added with a ceremoniousbow, 'I shall not break my heart if I must needs go on with Madame laBaronne. The right which you have given me to use a dearer name is soprecious to me '--he drew out his watch and pretended to compare it withthe fairy pendule on the mantel-shelf--'is so precious, ' he continued, 'that I cannot resign it, and if I am absolutely driven to it inself-defence, I shall have to invent a dearer name. '

'Now, that, M. Paul, 'said Madame, with her tone and face of chillsweetness, 'is excellently well done, except for the one littlecircumstance that you do not disguise your ardour. I read in your eyes, 'she said as calmly as if she were announcing a trifle of news she hadread in the morning's papers, 'all the fervour of your mind, and I donot wish to read it there--that is to say, I do not wish my little maidto read it there. '

'Well, ' said Paul, 'I will try. If you will let me say what I want tosay, I will keep a straight face over it. '

'Within measure, ' said the lady, with a passing touch of gaiety--'withinmeasure. '

'Most things have their measure, ' Paul answered, 'until you come to thecrucial matters of the heart, and they go beyond measure. '

The maid broke in at this point to ask if Madame la Baronne would beserved. 

'At once, ' said the mistress, and waved Paul to his place. He bowed andtook it. The maid served a number of elegant kickshaws, and the graveserving-man who had superintended the dinner-table on the previousevening entered with a bottle of hock in a cradle and stealthilywithdrew. 

'You gave me but little time, ' said Gertrude, 'to prepare for you, butI think you will find that we have done very well. Try that hock, M. Paul. '

Paul looked down his nose, and in a dry-at-dust voice recited the firstverse of old Ben's immortal lyric. His voice quavered a little on thelast lines--

'But might I of Jove's nectar sip, I would not change from thine!' andGertrude broke in with a laugh and an airy little wave of her hand. 

'Now, my dear M. Paul, ' she said, 'you are really and truly admirable. That is quite perfect, and if you will promise me, upon your sacred wordof honour as a man, not to betray me by a word or a look, I will tellyou something I never told you before. I have never admired you so much, or loved you so dearly, as I do at this hour. You must believe me, ' shecontinued, pushing her plate away and beckoning the maid with a slightbackward gesture of the head, 'I hate this tone of persiflage, but whatis there left for us if we would be blamelessly alone, and yet speak ourhearts to each other?'

'Madame, ' said Paul, 'I find it a masterstroke of genius. ' Theirtones were ice on both sides, but their words were fire. The maid mostprobably thought her mistress bored, and the guest a dullard. She hadseemed at first interested in the new arrival, but she lapsed now intoan attitude of indifference, and the dangerous pretence went on. Inthis intoxicating whirl of passion, when interchange of vows was offeredunder the necessity of constant watchfulness and self-guardianship, themeal was not an important matter. 

'But, ' said Gertrude, 'my dear Paul, you must really do justice to mytable; the pretence must be absolute. '

'I will try to make it so, ' he answered; but the luxurious meal had nomore relish for him than if it had been desert sand. He struggled withit manfully, however, and contrived to keep astride his end of thesee-saw of pretence. 

Who are the best and who the worst of women? Did any man ever venture toimpugn the fair fame of Madame la Baronne de Wyeth? Yet, had the devila better ally anywhere than this delicate little purring white-breastedepicure in the varying flavours of the ruined soul? Oh, the devil is, ofcourse, a symbol! Let the phrase pass. 

But the Paul Armstrong of ten years later, perched in his fog-boundeyrie, staring along the unseen gorge? He tells himself that had shebeen what he believed her, he might have been elsewhere than where hefinds himself. There had been but a surface ash upon the seeming ruinof a life. There was something still to build upon, but she must needsdestroy what was left. There was wholesome blood in the veins of the manwho aspired to rebuild, and it was she who poisoned its fount. 

'"Queen bee of the honey asps, "' quoth Paul of the eyrie: and he wasback in Paris. 

He was back at Gertrude's table, the worshipped, the immaculate Gertrudeof those days. 

They had reached the end of the repast, and coffee was served in littlecups of eggshell china encased in filigree gold. 

'A gift from the Khedive, ' she said, indicating these. 'Sardou was withme when I was in Alexandria. ' She laughed, and what with her eyes, towhich a single glass of the rare hock had given an added sparkle, andwhat with her faultless teeth, she fairly dazzled on her companion. 'Yes, that is the creature's absurd name. Sardou is the solemn personagewho has been waiting upon us all the morning, and his godfathers andgodmothers had the impertinence to baptize him in the name of Victor. Iwas telling you that Sardou was with me in Alexandria when the Khedivewas so gracious as to offer me this little souvenir, and I implored hisHighness that he might be permitted to make a study in coffee in thepalace kitchen. He made it, and the result is adorable. _Inter alia_, 'she said in the same tone, 'you, too, are adorable this morning, andnow I think I may snatch a longed-for moment and tell you so in earnest. Juliette, bring me a letter you will find upon my toilet-table, and callSardou. '

Juliette tripped out like a stage soubrette, demurely pert from crownto sole. Possibly--just possibly--she guessed; probably she guessednothing. The suggestion was no more than a suggestion in the mind of thewatcher of all these bygone scenes. 

Paul rose, but Gertrude waved him back. 

'Not yet, ' she whispered, 'not yet. '

He sat down again, his senses all awhirl with the aching desire he hadto hold her in his arms. 

'You must not allow Sardou's masterpiece to grow cold, ' said Gertrude;and Juliette came tripping back again, with the grave man at her heels. 'You will take this to the post, ' said Madame la Baronne, indicatingthe letter on the salver the maid carried. 'You will see it registeredpersonally, and bring me the receipt. '

The grave man bowed, and retired, letter in hand. 

'You like your coffee, Mr. Armstrong? And, oh, Juliette, bring to methat last little portfolio of watercolour drawings. You know where youwill find them?'

'But, yes, Madame la Baronne, but they were locked in the escritoire. '

'You will find the key, ' said the Baroness, sipping her coffee, 'in mypurse. Make haste, for M. Armstrong has but a moment to spare. '

Juliette ran with a swirl of petticoats upstairs. Gertrude followed thefootsteps with alert ear and eye. Ear and eye alike seemed to listen. She rose to her feet and stretched her arms with an imploring gesture. 

'Does this make amends to you?' she murmured. 'To me it atones for all'

'No, no; be careful Mind my hair, you silly darling--mind my hair! Shallyou be content to wait for this just now and then? Oh, Paul, Paul, Paul!how hard it is! Go now--go. Quickly! Sip your coffee, Paul, and try tolook as little unnatural as you can. She is quicker than I fancied. I've always a cigar to offer a departing breakfast guest. Juliette, thecigars. '

Juliette laid down the small portfolio she carried, and pricked away athird time. 

'You love me?' he said hoarsely. 

The sound of his own voice was in his ears, after everything that hadhappened. 

'I adore you!'she responded. 'You know it all now. But duty calls youone way and me another. And oh, Paul, "of love that never found itsearthly close, what sequel?"'

'The very words, ' he cried, 'that ticked in my brain all night'

'You must look at the portfolio, ' she murmured. 'Est tu content de moi?

'Je t'aime!' and with fumbling fingers he untied the strings of theportfolio. 

And now was Paul Armstrong the tame cat of Madame la Baronne de Wyeth, and earned his title well in many cities, from St Petersburg to Cadiz, and from London to Cairo. 

CHAPTER XXIII

It would appear that in the course of time Gertrude grew a little tiredof Paul's ceaseless devotion. It is quite likely that she sometimesfound him in the way, and she was deprived of her best conversationaltheme. It was of no use to try to revive the legend of the Isolated Soulany longer, because of the frequent and earnest confession which hadbeen made of the final discovery of a spiritual rapport absolute andcomplete. Paul and his angel had lived on terms of so much intimacy thatthey had earned the right to be acidulous with each other upon occasion. Her pruderies and her abandonments of prudery afforded between them anatmosphere as unwholesome as it was easily possible for a man offervent temperament to live in. Work of the hard and healthful sort waspractically abandoned. There was a good deal of verse-turning done, andan anonymous volume of sonnets entitled 'Dialogues of the Soul' made amomentary splash on the surface of the literary deep, and then sank likea pebble to the bottom. The book distilled a faint odour of eroticism, a scent of the epicene; but the degenerates, sniffing it, thought poorlyof it because of its want of downright rancidity, and the people ofwhom crowds are made misliked it for a better reason. Paul, with adiminishing exchequer, found himself aware of the first flat literaryfailure of his lifetime. 

The exchequer failed rapidly, and there were several contributoryreasons. In the first place, the Baroness had any amount of money tospend, and it was essential that anyone who aspired to follow her aboutthe capitals of Europe on equal terms should live at a high rate. Then, Annette had proclaimed her rights of freedom, and had escaped fromLaurent and his forces, and had run up bills in Paris, and in London, and elsewhere. The most successful of comedies will pass out of vogue. To be idle, to be extravagant in one's own person, and to be milkedperpetually by the extravagance of another--could better ways to ruin bediscovered?

The two had their first real tiff at Naples on a Christmas Eve. Gertrudehad set up a sheep-dog in the person of one Mrs. Diedrich, a sour andsallow remnant of New England fashion and beauty, a lady who both on herhusband's side and her own claimed all the splendours of Knickerbockerdescent. The husband was dead, the fortune--except for a meagre bone ortwo with little meat thereon--was eaten all away. Mrs. Diedrich and thesympathetic Gertrude's mother had been friends. There was nothing morenatural or more befitting than that the wealthy Baroness de Wyeth shouldfind an asylum for this superannuated slave of fortune, though Paul knewperfectly well that she was no more than a buckler against scandal atthe first. But reasonable as he was compelled to admit such a precautionto be, he was not very long in discovering that the impoverished ladywas a buckler against himself, and that she was used to prevent thatold familiar laying of heads together, and the old familiar communion ofhearts, in which, by dint of careful manoeuvring, a bare sixty secondsmight sometimes he snatched for a solitude of two. 

There should have been a drive that afternoon--Gertrude and Paul, withMrs. Diedrich to play gooseberry--and Mrs. Diedrich had fallen ill. Paulpresented himself at the appointed hour, and no Gertrude was there tomeet him. Instead of the Presence a note couched in the chilliest terms:

'Dear Friend, 'Mrs. Diedrich is shockingly unwell to-day, and I cannot leave her. Profoundest regrets for a lost pleasure. 

'Sincerely, 'G. De W. '

'My luck!' said Paul bitterly to himself; for he had been more than oncedisappointed of late. But he found grace enough to express his sorrow, send his compliments and good wishes, and to withdraw. He went strollingabout in unknown ways, with all manner of unpleasant things to think of. He not only made his momentary disappointment the greatest of them all, but strove to make it so. And yet the others would intrude. Here was aletter from Darco expressing grave disappointment with the end of thesecond act of their latest piece. Darco coughing up his stammeringgutturals as a speaker of English was one man, and Darco with a pen inhis hand was another. 

'It crumbles, ' wrote the critic, 'at the very instant at which it shouldtriumph. It is vague, unconvincing, wrong. You leave me unanswered forsix whole weeks, and at the end you send me this incoherent sandheap, when your promises had given me the right to expect a solid piece ofwell-worked marble. I do not know whether you are well or ill, whetheryou desire to continue the work or no. All of which I am certain is thatthe piece is wanted for March, and that we cannot work together atthis distance. I will meet you where you like--Paris, Brussels, Vienna, London, Hong Kong. It is all one to me so long as I get you back to workin time. But, for whatever reason, this second act is so written thatit will not do. And I cannot wait I am a poet, but I am a poet withouta language. If you will not be my interpreter, I must find another. Isfriendship friendship, or is business business? In the name of both Iask you to meet me and to work with me. '

Look at it how he would, and distort his own perspective as he might, Darco's angry and outspoken appeal was larger than anything his duty toGertrude might ask of him. But, to tell the whole truth, his senseof duty was his curse, because the sense itself had grown distorted. Because of some rooted infirmity of character, he must needs be trueto the ideal which least merited truth. He saw this fact throughout hiscareer. He had bowed at foolish shrines. Gertrude--oh yes, Gertrude wasimpeccable. But just as he was wasting the heart of ardent manhood now, he had wasted the heart of youth and the heart of boyhood The career wasall of a piece. Born to be fooled, whether by a village coquette, orhis own loftiest, or his own lowest, or by practised _femme de feu_ and_femme de glace_ in one--always born to be fooled, frustrated, enticedto the throwing away of real passion and of real power. 

And over and above all these, arrange them in what imaginary perspectivehe might choose, the sordid side of things, the bills--bills fromlodging-house keepers of the better sort, from hotels, from milliners, and from modistes--and the shrinking exchequer, which barely, when allclaims were satisfied, would leave him so much as two hundred and fiftypounds. 

What had his year and a half of dalliance brought him? A dream ofpleasure, a desert ache of hunger, an occasional delirious spur toappetite. Now, what in the name of common-sense is the good of itall? And is Gertrude any better, after all, than an innocent Delilah, trapping no Samson, but a fool unmuscled, who has no strength to breakthe weakest of her withes? Innocent Delilah! He never profaned her inhis thought. 

But in this mood--with his conscience, literary-artistic and simplyhuman, entirely endorsing old Darco's reproof of his work and hisevasions; with a financial crevasse at his feet, and Annette choppingaway his standing-place, and his own extravagances melting his footholdlike butter in the sun; with a barren future staring him in the face--hewas disposed alike to remorse and penitence. 

The city in which he rambled was strange to him, and, according to hisfashion when absorbed in thought, he took any turning which suggesteditself, and lost himself in a labyrinth of byways. He had done the samekind of thing in a hundred towns and cities without any result worthmentioning, but just for once he was destined to find a purpose wrappedup in the folds of this simple habit. 

He was plodding along miserably enough, and did not know whether he wereat Naples or the North Pole, when a familiar voice awoke him from hisbitter reveries, and he looked about him to discover that he was betweena high wall and & hedge of aloes on a strip of grass which had nopathway on it, and apparently led nowhere. He had a vague idea that hehad set out in this direction upon a footpath more or less distinct, andmaking a _volte-face_, he saw that the path had come to a termination ata door in the high wall a wicket's length behind him. 

The voice he had heard was the voice of Gertrude, and the words it hadspoken were: 'Ah! but my dear friend, that inevitable, that unceasingisolation of the mind!'

A swift pang of jealousy ran through him, and he listened with an almostfierce anxiety. There was nothing in his nature to induce him to playthe eavesdropper, but he could not have refrained from listening justthen had it been to save his soul. Some deep undetermined murmur of avoice in answer seemed to reach his ears, but they were drumming so tothe startled music of his heart that his sense failed to record it. He went back swiftly and stealthily to the spot at which the pathwayterminated, and there he found an old green-painted door in a smallarchway in the wall. It half drooped upon its rusty hinges, and acrossthe gap it left between its own rim and the postern, he had view enoughto tell him whither his rambling footsteps had led him. He was lookingat the terraced gardens in the rear of the Baroness's hotel, and whilsthe looked Gertrude herself floated into sight. Some trifle of a lacemantilla was thrown over her head, and in her right hand she balanceda parasol daintily between thumb and finger. Her companion was a manapparently of middle age, frock-coated, silk-hatted, booted and glovedas if for Rotten Row. He bore himself with an air of distinction, andthe looker-on saw the gloved hand caress a big moustache of sweepingsilver. The owner of the moustache was bending over the Baroness withan unmistakable air of gallant attention, and Paul's blood boiledwithin him. He had no real sense of the impulse which moved him, and nocalculation as to what might happen; but he pushed the door aside, and, entering the garden, walked along the gravelled main path which led tothe hotel. He made a feint of holding his head straight, and of lookingneither to left nor right, but he watched Gertrude and her companionwith a keen sidelong glance. His brisk footstep set a pebble rollingin the pathway, and a second later he heard his own name called. Alow-growing orange-tree, all lustrous with globes of green and gold andshiny leafage, had intercepted his view of the pair for just the instantwhich intervened between the sound and the call. 

'Mr. Armstrong, ' said Gertrude's voice, 'Mr. Armstrong!' He turned in apretence of amazement, and, hat in hand, crossed a small space of turf. 

'I had just sent round to you, ' said the smiling little lady, 'at yourhotel. ' She transferred the parasol to her left hand, and held out theright in an almost effusive greeting. 'I suppose you have not been backyet?'

'No, ' Paul answered. 'I have been walking and had lost myself, until Irecognised the garden through the open door yonder. Then I made sure ofmyself again, and thought I might secure a short-cut home. '

'How fortunate!' said Gertrude, smiling; 'and how curious, too!' sheadded. 'At the very moment at which I caught sight of you your namewas in my mind. Are you a believer in the Aura, Colonel Brunton--thesomething which envelops personality and diffuses itself in such amanner that you recognise a friend's presence before you are made awareof it by sight or hearing? Don't you recognise the reality of thosethings? But, oh, I forgot! You gentlemen are, I am afraid, strangersto each other. This is Colonel Brunton, our great traveller in theHimalayas and Thibet, and this is Mr. Paul Armstrong, the author ofI dare not say how many charming books and comedies--Mr. Darco'scollaborateur. '

'Whose work, ' said Colonel Brunton in a voice typically American, butprofoundly deep, 'I have, bafore my trip to Asia, seen performed with asplendid eclaw both in London and New York. I am proud to meet you, Mr. Armstrong. '

He was a rugged man, brown as a sun-burned brick, with a cascadingmoustache of silver, jet-black eyebrows, and eyes which danced defianceat his gray hairs and wrinkles. Paul could do no less than accept thehearty hand he offered, and Gertrude set herself to soothe him. 

'You know, ' she said, laying her finger-tips upon his arm, 'you are avery inattentive cavalier, Mr. Armstrong. Poor Mrs. Diedrich was takenill so suddenly and alarmingly that I had time to do no more than justto scribble that little hasty note to you. You might at least havepaused to make inquiry. '

'That would never have done, ' said Paul 'One does not inquire into alady's decision at any moment. '

He spoke with a capital assumption of gaiety, but to the keen instinctof that experienced trifler with hearts it was an assumption only, and Gertrude turned the question with the easy skill of a woman of theworld. 

'Those geological researches now, ' she said, with a charming air ofmocking schoolgirl ignorance about such matters. 'Do you really meanto tell me that right away in the Himalayas you found the same littleprotozoic blot in the same limestone that you find in our own Andes? Hasthat little creature really built the mountains of the world? Why, it isthe story of the Coral Islands over again; but on what an enormous scale, 'Dear me, what creatures of a day we are!'

Colonel Brunton, who, as it appeared, was a member of many learnedsocieties, and a most indefatigable besieger of the world's inaccessibleplaces, turned out to be a man of so much simplicity, sincerity, andcharm, and Gertrude drew him to his best so skilfully, that it was noteasy to be sulky for a long time together in his society. It was Paul'scue to disguise himself as far as possible, and this delightful Americanhelped him greatly. He could barely think of the man as a rival; he wasso very upright, downright complimentary. 

'Why, Lord!' he said once in the course of that afternoon's talk, 'whenyou were in short frocks, and I was over head and ears in love withyou----'

The Baroness snatched a fan which girdled her, and tapped him with itreprovingly. 

'Well, ' he said, twinkling, 'when all is said and done, habit is theconqueror. I got into that habit when you were a baby: twenty years ago, I'll swear, though it's not legitimate, I know, to guess a lady's age. I've found a new habit since--a Satanic habit--of going to and fro aboutthe earth, and roaming up and down on it, but I have never forgotten theold one. '

The Baroness laughed and made fun of this proclamation, which wasaccompanied by certain old-fashioned bows and flourishes of deportment. 

'But now, ' she said, 'I must really run away and look after my patient, and must leave you, gentlemen, to console each other for my loss. I leftMrs. Diedrich asleep, and could just afford to snatch half an hour forso old a friend as you, Colonel If you care to come back and have teawith me at six, I shall be glad to meet you, if I may dare run awayagain. But if I _should_ be compelled to send down my excuses, you willunderstand. '

She had already started a movement towards the hotel, and the two mensauntered along with her, one on either side. She left them in theflower-perfumed dimness of the shaded hall, and the whole business ofthe afternoon had by this time so explained and reconciled itself toPaul's mind that he would have been a brute to fret about it longer. 

'I say, ' said the Colonel, 'I have been for three years outsidecivilization, and I should like a John Collins. I came here last nightby the Messagerie Maritime. They are good people, and they cook as wellas anybody can be expected to cook outside the United States, buttheir ideas of drink are curiously simple. Can you be my guide, Mr. Armstrong?'

'Need I guide you farther?' asked Paul 'I should fancy that yourmaterials are to be found here in an absurd plenty, and if you have askilful hand----'

'Sir, ' said the Colonel, with a burlesque flourish, interrupting him, 'there is not a man from Marble Head to the Golden Gate who can make aJohn Collins to compare with mine. '

Paul knew the house, and led his new acquaintance to a shady verandawhere a polyglot waiter chipped his ice to his fancy, found him lemon, pounded sugar, fresh mint, square-faced Hollands, and syphon-water, andleft the Colonel compounding in a high state of content. 

'This is like home, ' he said, 'bar the celestial straw, the use of whichthese blahsted Continentals have not learned. This is quite like home. Three years I have been roughing it, up hill and down dale, camp andfield Seen a little bit o'fightin' on the Burmah side 'long of yourBritish troops. 

Mr. Armstrong; better boys I do _not_ want to meet And here's to themand you, sir. But, Lord!'--he caressed his tumbler with a lean brownhand, and looked contemplatively into space--'I must smoke. Try aBurmese cigarette, sir. Lord 'I land here last night after three years. I just break my journey on the way to London, and I run against thelittle girl that broke my heart when I was fifteen years of age, andbroke it again when I was one-and-twenty, and would just go on breakingit for the mere fun of the thing for the next million years, if she andme could only live as long. '

'I beg your pardon, sir, ' said Paul, in a cold insolence which made himhot to think of a thousand times later, 'have you been drinking?'

'Well, I guess, ' said Mr. Brunton, and, leaning back in his deck-chair, drew a great volume of smoke into his lungs, expelled it in a cloud, andlaughed; 'after a three years' drought, the man who is not game todrink deserves to go dry. But, by Heaven, sir, to strike up against thatmighty little flirt after a space of fifteen years--to come across itall again by accident! Look here! I land out of the _Grande Marie deLuxembourg_ at Naples, with no more idea of revivin' old times than ofescapin' into the next century, and who's the first person that Imeet but little Gertie, and what's the first word that I hear but theisolation of the soul!'

Paul sat in a chill, tense agony. 

'I was, ' said the Colonel, growing more and more clearly articulate inaccordance with his needs, 'about as full up as any Christian need bewhen I landed, and I was going to bed like a clean Christian gentleman. Then I ran up against Gertie. I have been Turkish bathed, I have beensluiced and washed and shaved and perfumed, and I can stand and talkstraight. What do you say? What would you have said about me amongstthe oranges and lemons in the garden there?' He sat up in a momentaryfierceness. 'Am I intoxicated, or, at least, was I till I turnedthe lock-gate winch and set the waters foaming? No, sir, but in thatprofoundly philosophic observation of life your works declare you willhave observed the state in which a man becomes drunk-sober. 

He brims over after that stage. That I allow. He brims over, sir--hebrims over, sir. If it is of any humorous value to you to makeobservations of the present case, _I_ am brimming over, sir. '

The clean-cut, travel-hardened, sun-stained man was slipping from hisoriginal place in Paul's mind, like a statue built in clay too soft tosupport its own weight. He slipped at the chin, at the mouth, atthe base of the nostril, at the eyebrow, and yet, in spite of thesedeflections from the original, he appeared to recover himself withan extraordinary swiftness at moments, and to be again the alert, adventurous creature of the woods and wilds his extraordinary careerproclaimed him. 

It was in a moment of supreme sobriety that he touched Paul's arm andsaid:

'I'll tell you all about little Gertie right away. '

CHAPTER XXIV

The Colonel's capacity for the holding of liquid substances lookedabnormal even to a man of Paul's experience. 

'Thirst is now assuaged, ' he said solemnly at the end of his third deeptumbler, 'and a man may begin to enjoy himself. There ought to be a boyhere who can make a cocktail. '

He kept the boy fairly busy, and he talked. He had recovered himselfcuriously, and there was now no more than a hint of coming intoxicationin his eye and in his voice. It seemed as if he had arrived at a settledstage, and was able to make a longish stay there. 

'You're pretty thick with our little friend, ain't you?' he asked, rolling round in his seat. 

'If you are speaking of the lady who left us a little while ago----'

'Why, certainly, ' said the Colonel. 

'I have the honour of her friendship, ' said Paul with an icy air. 

The Colonel was no longer smoking, but he chewed the end of his cigarwith a lazy appetite, and he smiled. 

'Funny little devil she is, ' he said contemplatively. 'Women are odd, however you take 'em; but she's odder than odd. By God, sir, she'sodder than Dick's hat-band! I suppose she wants me to believe that she'sforgotten how I bowled her out years ago. Soul! Heart 'It was before shegot married. She made me believe that I was the only man she ever cameacross who had either. There were twenty-three of us met in New YorkCity, and we had a dinner on the strength of it. I was that mad, sir, atthe time, I drummed up the whole contingent. I believe that eveningleft some of us a little sore, but it cured us, and little Gertie hadthree-and-twenty play-fellows the fewer next morning. And I'm damned ifshe didn't open fire on me again in the first half-hour after all theseyears. It's funny, ain't it?'

'I am afraid I must bid you good-afternoon, sir, ' said Paul. 'And if youwill permit a stranger to intrude in your affairs, I would suggest thatyou should make that cocktail your last. '

'Wha-at?' asked the Colonel, placidly smiling, and eating his cigar. 'Should we have made it four-and-twenty if you had been in Noo Yawk Cityat the time of that banquet. '

'I beg your pardon, sir, ' Paul answered stiffly. 'I don't care tocontinue this conversation, and I will take the liberty to end it. '

'I say, ' said the Colonel, 'wait there. I never began a quarrel in mylife, Mr. Armstrong, but I have ended--lemme see----' He began to countupon his fingers with an inward look. 'I have ended eight, ' he said. 

'Do you wish to quarrel now?' Paul demanded. 

'Why, no, sir, no, ' said the Colonel; 'I am a man of peace. But when youpresoom, sir, to dictate what a man shall drink, and when you presoomto object to the theme upon which he chooses to converse--why, don't yousee?'

'No, ' said Paul, 'I do not see. If you choose to renew this conversationto-morrow, that is my hotel, and I shall be pleased to meet you there atany hour before noon. '

'Now, ' the Colonel answered, taking him by the sleeve in alcoholicfriendship, 'you are becoming shirty, and your tone is warlike. Andthat, Mr. Armstrong, is unreasonable. Perhaps you know now that I am anold traveller. I'm a little bit of an explorer, sir, and I have neverobjected to being guided over a bit of country that I didn't know, ifI happened to meet a man that knew it Now, that's enough said, Mr. Armstrong. If you find my conversation distasteful, just damn my eyesand go. But don't you let me hear you. You can curse outside to yourheart's content, and, you see, that needn't breed a quarrel. '

'Very well, ' said Paul. The Solemn drunken man made him laugh in spiteof his own anger and bewildered misery of mind. 'Whatever cursing I mayhave to do shall be done outside. '

'Good, ' the Colonel answered, and having by this time eaten his cigar toits burned ash, he ejected the remnant and permitted Paul to escape. 

As he came out upon the mild widespread sunshine of the street at theclose of the afternoon, he seemed to realize himself for the first timein his whole life. He did not trouble himself to curse the Colonel, but he cursed Paul Armstrong soundly, and, striding rapidly towards hishotel, resolved on instant action. He mounted to his own room, and therehe wrote a letter. 

'I must see you, ' it ran, 'and I must see you to-day. I must catchto-morrow's train for London, and I cannot guess when I may be able toreturn. I have neglected both work and business too long, and I mustshake myself awake. On the whole, perhaps the kindest and best thing youcould do for me would be to send me away for good and all. I have livedin a fool's dream too long. '

There was much more, but this was the gist of it, and the writer sealedand despatched it, not daring to tempt himself to a new effort byreading it over. The answer reached him in an hour:

'What is it, my poor friend, which has so disturbed you as to prompt youto the writing of such a letter as I have just received? I had thoughtmyself safe in counting upon your esteem. If you are really called toLondon by affairs of urgency, I must not keep you, and, of course, Ishould be hurt if you went without telling me good-bye. It happens thatI have engaged to dine at table-d'hôte tonight with passing friends, butI shall be free at ten o'clock. Ask for me then. '

Paul had been conscious and jealous of a good many small rivalries sincehe and the Baroness had first set up that platonic communion of soulin which they had now lived so long, but on the whole he had to confessthat Gertrude had acted with complete discretion in these matters, and he had been repeatedly forced to admit to himself that he had beenunable to find any real ground for his tremors. He had never once felthimself in actual danger of being deposed from his position of highpriest in that ridiculous temple. When a man is in love with a woman, hecannot be expected to judge her actions or her meaning wisely, and theBaroness's platonics, with the little flashes of earthly fire in amongstthem here and there, had always seemed to him to indicate a naturethrobbing with fervour which was held in restraint only by a delicacy ofequal charm and beauty, and a lofty moral sense. But he was easily opento the influence of other men's opinions, and he had never been able tothink of Ralston's smile without an inward twinge which had sometimesamounted to an actual tenor. Suppose he were merely being played withby a heartless woman, who found it minister to her vanity to have himperpetually dangling at her heels in public and burning incense inprivate before her day by day? Suppose he were throwing away the bestand freshest years of his manhood in the pursuit of such a mockingshadow? These, of course, were a sort of lover's blasphemies against hisidol, and he resented them with all his heart and soul, exactly as anyother worshipper would resent the insinuations of the devil against thepowers and perfections of his deity. His resentment could not leadhim to oblivion, and his memory of Ralston's humorous and mischievousenjoyment was with him often. And now came this American man, thisboozing Colonel, with none of Ralston's reticence, and apparently withnone of his respect for the character of a lady whom he had known longand well, and the coarser accusation travelled on the same lines as theother, and only differed from it in going a good deal further. 

'I will know to-night, ' Paul said to himself savagely a hundred timesin the course of that afternoon and evening, and when at length theslow hours had rolled themselves on to the time of his appointment, he presented himself in the vestibule of the Baroness's hotel in acondition of tragic resolve. 

Gertrude was there in the very act of saying farewell to her _passagčre_American friends, and he thought to himself, with as much of anger asadmiration, that he had never seen her look altogether so charmingas she did at that instant. The vivacity of colouring which commonlydistinguished her was softened, and the unaccustomed pallor of her facelent a tender softness to her whole aspect. Her eyes, too, had lostsomething of their brilliance, and seemed faintly humid. He could havesworn that she had been crying, but when she turned to meet him afterthe departure of her friends, there was a gentle sparkle of welcome inher face, and she held out her beautiful jewelled little hand with acharming frankness. 

'I am so glad you are here, ' she said, 'and I was so much afraid thatthose dear tiresome people were going to overstay their time, and that Ishould have to keep you waiting. '

She had a hooded opera-cloak thrown over her left arm, and she heldthis out to him, and turned away so that he might adjust it about hershoulders. 

'It is a lovely night, ' she said, 'like a night in our Indian summer indear old Massachusetts. Let us talk in the garden, Paul. '

He walked by her side, still half saturnine, but in part conqueredalready by the soft seduction of her voice and face. He did not speak aword until they reached the garden terrace, and then only in answer toher question:

'You must really go, Paul?'

'Yes, ' he answered gloomily, 'I must really go. '

For the season of the year it was a wonderful night even for Naples. The air was like balm, and was loaded with the scent of flowers. Lightstwinkled here and there about the garden, and the moon shone broad andbright almost at the zenith, half drowning the lustre of the stars inthe haze of light it spread. Scattered about the gardens were a dozenparties, more or less, all chattering gaily, and here and there disposedto frolic Their presence jarred on Paul, but there was no removing it Heallowed Gertrude to lead the way, and she; strolling in pensive silence, brought him to a shaded avenue on the western side of the garden, wherea gentleman and lady were promenading slowly arm-in-arm away from them. Gertrude laid a hand upon his arm, and stood still until the couple infront had strayed out of hearing, and then resumed her pensive march. 

'How came you, Paul, ' she asked, looking suddenly up to him, 'to writeso strange a letter?'

'I had to write it, ' Paul answered in a constricted voice, in which acertain note of anger sounded. It disturbed him to find that his resolvewas melting away from him, and he felt that he must needs harden hisheart if be were but partly to fulfil his purpose. 'What is there in theletter, ' he asked therefore, 'which you find strange?

'You have never told me, ' she responded, 'one word of your purpose untilthis afternoon, and you are leaving me tomorrow. Is not that a littlestrange, Paul?'

Her voice trembled and almost broke upon his name. 

'I knew nothing of it myself until yesterday, ' he answered 'I have hadletters of the most urgent importance, and must answer them in person. '

'How long do you expect to be away, ' she asked. 

'The one wise thing, ' he answered, 'I could do would be to stay awayaltogether. '

'Ah, Paul, ' she half whispered, wreathing her arm through his, 'thereis your "fool's dream" again. What do you mean by the "fool's dream"?Haven't we been happy for a time?'

'Is it happiness, ' Paul asked, 'to pay for a week's emptiness andlonging with one minute of delirium? Is it a happy thing to be so seton one unattainable hope as to be able, dreaming or waking, to think ofnothing else? A man is not to be made happy by the life I live. '

'Paul, ' she whispered, 'what more can you ask than I have given you?'

'Everything, ' he answered. 

She drew her arm away lingeringly. He let it go, and for a minute theywalked in silence side by side. They reached the avenue, and turned backagain. 

'Can you tell me anything, ' she asked after this pause--'do you care totell me anything about your business in England. '

'That's simple enough, ' he answered. 'I am within some few months ofpoverty, and I must get to work again. I have had a tremendous letterfrom old Darco, slanging me for breach of faith, and for having sent hima piece of intolerably bad work. I have deserved every word he has tosay, and now I must make amends to him. '

'You have not been fortunate in your work lately?'she asked. 

'I have not been fortunate, ' he answered; 'I have been so far fromfortunate that' I have been writing like an untrained schoolboy. I couldhave done better before I was fifteen. '

'But why is that? she asked. 'Your mind should only just now beripening. Your time is all your own. '

'There is not one minute of my time my own, ' he answered in asmouldering wrathfulness. 

'Why not?' she questioned. 

'Come, ' said Paul, 'isn't that just a little disingenuous? Don't youknow why not? Here am I, ' he went on, 'as I do most solemnly believe, as madly in love as ever man was in the history of the world; petted, encouraged, and caressed, and ignored, and repulsed, until in the insaneweakness of my own nature I have let all manhood ooze out of me. I amunlike Hamlet, my dear Gertrude. I am both to be fretted and playedupon. '

'Played upon?' she said reproachfully. 

'Played upon, ' he repeated with what sounded like a weightydeliberation. 

Gertrude began to cry, and set a dainty handkerchief to her eyes, butshe said nothing, and Paul's only resource was to go on talking, to keephimself in sight of his own injuries. 

'You and I made a bargain, Gertrude: we were to be friends, and nomore than friends. You have known all along how much it cost me tokeep within those limits; and have you helped me? I put that to yourconscience. '

'Helped you?' she asked, pausing once more in her walk, and looking upat him in an innocent bewilderment. 

'Helped me, ' he repeated stonily. 'The words are plain enough. '

There was a garden-seat near at hand. She hastened to it, and sinkingdown upon it, seemed to surrender herself to tears. He moved moodilyafter her, and stood looking down at the pathway, tracing haphazardfigures on its moss-grown surface with the cane he carried. 

'I understand you now, ' sobbed Gertrude. 'I have a right to reproachmyself because my own undisciplined heart has gone beyond controlsometimes; but does it lie in your province, Paul, to blame me for that?Have I not an equal right, ' she went on, 'to tell you that you have nothelped me in the daily struggle I have had to make? You are unjust, youare ungenerous. I could never have believed it of you. '

'I can foresee nothing, ' Paul said, 'but misery. '

'Nor can I, ' she answered. She rose and faced him, and in the patch ofmoonlight in which she stood he could see that her tears at least werereal. 'What you have to say to me, in effect, ' she said, with an airof sudden quiet dignity, but with a quiver in her voice, 'is just this:that I am a heartless coquette, and have never cared for you; that Ihave wilfully lured you on to your own unhappiness. If you reallythink that, Paul, if it means anything more than a mere passing gustof temper, we had better say good-bye at once. I have at least an equalright to bring the same charge against you, but I should disdain toharbour such a thought about you. There are many ways in which you maybe cruel to a woman, Paul, and be forgiven, but you must not woundher pride in that way. That is the cruellest stab of all. The blade ispoisoned, dear, and the wound will rankle for a lifetime. '

'Tell me, ' he said, with his eyes blazing upon her, and the guardedvoice in which he spoke shaking--'tell me that you have really caredfor me; tell me, on your conscience and your honour, that you have notdeliberately led me to this madness. '

'You can ask me that? she said. 'You can insult me so?'

'I ask it, ' he responded. 

'If my conduct has not shown it clearly, ' said Gertrude, 'it is quite invain to protest. I have given you better proof than words. '

'There is only one proof, ' Paul answered. 'Are you strong enough tobrave the world with me?'

'No, no, ' she whispered; 'you must not ask me that I am not afraid ofthe world, but I am afraid of my own conscience. '

'Do you think, ' he asked passionately, 'that love could not sanctify aunion such as ours? Be my Georges Sand, and I will be your De Musset; bemy Stella, and I will be your Swift. '

'You choose your instances unfortunately, Mr. Armstrong, ' Gertrudeanswered. 'Georges and Alfred lived to write vile and bitter books abouteach other, and Stella broke her heart under the despotism of a brute. Ido not care for such a prospect. '

The 'Mr. Armstrong 'lashed him like an actual whip, and under the stingof it he barely followed the meaning of what came after. He was sostaggered that he could only repeat the words:

'Mr. Armstrong. '

'You force me to my defence, ' she answered gently. 'I am a woman, Paul;but I have my code of honour. '

'Im Gott's und Teufel's namen, ' he groaned, 'what is it? You give melips and arms; you have sworn you love me. What is loyalty?'

She drew herself to her full height:

'I do not pretend to define loyalty, ' she said; 'but I know it when Isee it. It may be less definite than insult; but the last, at least, isclearly outlined. I have been mistaken, and I will correct my error now. Good-bye, Mr. Armstrong. '

'Good-bye, ' said Paul. 

She lingered for a mere instant as if in expectation of some furtheradieu, but he had none to offer. He saw no more clearly now into thetruth than he had done at the beginning of the interview, but he had ina measure hardened himself by the spoken definition of his own attitude, and, partly because he could not as yet retreat from it, he permittedher to go without another word She floated away in the alternate softsplendour of the moon and the deep shadow of the overhanging boughs, andhe watched her gloomily until her figure disappeared at the end of theavenue. He stood for a minute or two with a vacant mind, digging hiswalking-cane into the dry, friable earth at his feet, and scoring thethin, scum-like growth of moss upon it with unmeaning lines. Then he lita cigar, and, avoiding the crowded vestibule, skirted the dark westernwall of the hotel, and so walked homeward. The thing was done now, and, whether it were rightly done or wrongly he cared very little for themoment He stood at one of those pauses of emotion in which the mind isable logically to balance pros and cons without the intervention of anygust of feeling. If Gertrude were really what she professed to be, hehad acted with great cruelty. If she were not what she professed to be, he had acted with great wisdom for the first time in his life so far asthe woman as protagonist was concerned He looked at the probabilities onboth sides with a cynical coolness which would have been impossible tohim at any earlier stage in his career. He had met but two men who hadknown the Baroness de Wyeth well, and they had both looked upon her frompretty much the same standpoint. Ralston's view was the more genial, buteven in his opinion she was a born flirt, a creature who loved to tyreher chariot-wheels with hearts; and in the view of the coarser mind shewas a coquette mere and simple--a Queen Rabesqurat, who kept a sackfulof the human eyes which had turned to her in adoration. Then, in spiteof momentary indifference, his nerves tingled and his blood sparkled atthe memory of that rare and fleeting instant at which she had seemed tosurrender herself to his embraces, and to make him immortal with a kiss. All the same, he could look on that fine second's immortality with acold indifference when the thrill was over. Granted the very lowestscale for passion, could the thing be real? Could he, for example, havestayed the torrent of his own blood in full course? He laughed to thinkof it, and a line and a half of his favourite poet sang in his brain:

'And thy passions matched with mine Are as moonlight unto sunlight, andas water unto wine. '

On the whole he began to conceive that he had done rightly, and in thathalf-belief, which drew slowly towards conviction, he went to bed andslept in a stolidity which surprised him later. The fact was that he wasless resolved than tired. 

Whilst he was at his deepest sleep a thundering summons at his dooraroused him. A dream which came between the first prelude to thisorchestral drumming and his awaking had advised him of a fainterdisturbance, but by the time he was fairly awake the knocking had grownso exigent that it bade fair to raise the house. 

'Come in I' he cried, and suddenly remembering that he had locked thedoor before getting into bed, he scrambled out in the darkness andturned back the key. 'What the devil is the matter here?' he asked, andthe night porter of the hotel handed him a letter. 

'I was told, sir, 'he said, in indifferent French, 'to deliver this atonce, but the messenger is gone, and there is no answer called for. '

There was light enough in the corridor to read by, and Paul recognisedGertrude's superscription. 

'Thank you, ' he answered. 'Light the gas for me in my room, and thatwill do. '

The man obeyed, bowed himself out, and went his way, closing the doorbehind him. 

The letter Paul held in his hand was bulky, and when he had brokenthe envelope open he found that it held no fewer than seven sheets ofGertrude's crested paper. They were all covered in a hasty and sprawlinghand, and on the first page was a scrawled date and a 'Sir' which hadbeen written with so much energy that the upward sweeping course of thepen had bespattered the whole white surface with inky dots of greater orless magnitude. 

'I had thought you my friend, ' the epistle began; 'you have professedto be something more, and, as 'have heard you say, the greater shouldinclude the less. '

There the writing suddenly changed in character, and the letter went on, as it were, in calmer and more measured cali-graphic accents. 

'How could you treat me so, knowing my friendship and even my foolishfondness? Was it not cruel to urge me as you did? I will confess to youwhat I have striven in vain to disguise. Had we met in earlier days, hadI known you before I was bound in honour to the course I am compelledto run until my footsteps lead me to my grave, I might have been ahappy woman. But a woman may love, and may yet place her honour beforeeverything. I shall not care if, when I am dead and gone, you choose toboast that you won a woman's heart, and I will not even put you onyour honour now to keep this silly secret; but you shall not go from mewithout my assurance of this one fact. When I married, marriage was tome a sacrament, and if it were not for that------ But no more of this, dear Paul Dear, dear, and dearest Paul! I hardly know how I am writing, but the anguish you have caused me is unspeakable, and I am not guardedin my words. A woman's heart may err, and her principle of honour mayyet be strong. I bid you good-bye with an aching heart, and I wish youall good fortune. It would seem that our stars are in opposition to eachother, and fighting against each other in their courses. I agree withyou in thinking that we are best apart, but I shall watch your careerwith a more than sisterly devotion, and my heart tells me that I shallhave the right to acclaim your future. '

The letter said much more than this so far as the mere extension of thesame sentiments might appear to be concerned, but in effect this was alluntil the final paragraph was reached. 

'I have adhered to duty, ' this ran, 'and I will. Nothing--neither thethought of your suffering nor of my own--shall draw me from it, but Irecognise none the less the kindred soul I should have met had I beenfortunate--as I am far from being. Write this in your private memoirsof me: "She loved too well, yet wisely, " and think sometimes that it ispossible for a woman to feel sometimes like a man, and to think I "couldnot love thee, dear, so well, loved I not honour more. "

'I shall not add another word to this, ' Gertrude concluded, 'except tosay, I wish you all prosperity, all happiness. But just this rememberalways, that if I were a mischievous influence in your life, I meant itfar otherwise, and I am always your devoted friend and well-wisher. 

'G. DEW. '

For some reason or another by no means clear to himself the letter movedPaul less than it seemed to him that it should have done. He read itsitting in his pyjamas on the bedside, kicking his bare heels againstthe valance, and when he had done with it he tossed it on to thecentre table, on which his manuscripts, now too rarely looked at, layscattered, and said rather grimly:

'Footlights. '

Then he mused awhile, half desiring to confirm the word, and halfrecalling it. He had made many desperate efforts to be loyal in histhoughts, but he was less disposed to struggle in that direction thanhe had been. His mind strayed back to Ralston, and to the bibulousexplorer. Memory went further than either of them, and carried him backto the days when he had broken his career in two for the sake of MissBelmont, old Darco's Middle Jarley Prown. ' He had played the flattraitor to Darco once already for the sake of one woman, and now, ashe began to see, he was once more using him very ill for the sake ofanother. He sat kicking his heels against the valance of the bed, and thinking. May Gold, Norah MacMulty, the dreadful hour of the lostinnocence, Claudia, Annette, Gertrude--what an incredible list offollies for one man to have committed! He grew intensely bitter andself-disdainful. 

There was no answer for the letter of the heart-wounded Gertrude. Hewas not quite sure whether he were a mere insensate brute or no, buthe packed, and took the homeward train without a word of farewell. IfGertrude's friendship were a real thing, he was a beast unspeakable. If it were a selfish sentimental sham--why, then--anything. He began totaste life with a very nausea of weariness. 

But when London was reached, and the physical fatigue of travel shakenoff, and the tornado of Darco's energies had engulfed him as of old, he found himself another man. Darco was terrible at their earliestinterview. 

'Led me haf a look at you, ' he said, dragging Paul to his study-window. 'What haf you peen doing with yourseluf? I have known an Armstrong forsome years who was rather a glever vellow. Vot? Ant now I gome agross anArmstrong who is a plithering impecile. Eh?'

'Now, my dear Darco, 'Paul answered, 'I dare say that your criticism ofthe stuff I sent you is quite just I haven't, indeed, the remotest doubtabout it But I have been out of health and worried, and now I am herefor work. You shall have the best I can give you. '

'I shall speag to you, ' said Darco, 'with an egsdreme blain-ness. I hafnot forgotten our first parting. You did not dreat me well. '

'I know I didn't, ' Paul said. 

'Ant now, ' continued Darco, refusing to be mollified all at once, 'youhaf wasted months of valuable dime, ant you ant I are both the poorerby hundrets ant hundrets of pounts. I will haf your bromise, your sacredwort of honour, before I will gollaborate again, that you will no moreblay with me these farces. I like you, yourself, Armstrong. I am veryfont of you. I haf a very creat atmiration for your worg. But you hafnot been reliaple. You haf no right to resent what I am sayink. '

'I have some excuses, of which I can't talk, ' said Paul; 'but I don'tresent what you are saying. I am very sorry to have kept you waiting. Ipromise you that you shall have all my time and all my best energies forthis one spell of work in any case. After that----'

'Veil, ' said Darco, 'afder that?

'Heaven knows!' Paul answered. 'Don't say any more just now, Darco. Letus go to work. '

Darco looked at him for a second or two, and began then to stump aboutthe room. 

'Goot! he said suddenly; 'let us go to work. '

To work they went. Whatever else might be said for Darco, it was atleast impossible to brood in his society. The man's tireless enthusiasmdid one of two things for everybody with whom he encountered. Itrepelled either through terror or distaste, or it inspired a sentimentwhich corresponded with itself. He frightened timid people; he made thepugnacious angry and resentful. But here and there he kindled a fire. 

Paul's love for work had gone to sleep very soundly, but Darco'sstorming awoke it, and in a day or two the new remedy had got hold ofhim, and he came back to a moderately healthy state of mind. He wrote toGertrude, and she responded, and a peace was patched between them, butit was not easy on either side to climb back to the old existence ofconfidence, and Paul at least was shaken in allegiance. Nor was thisall, for he had begun to have some apprehension of his own character, and to take soundings of those emotional shallows which had alwaysseemed to him so profound. When a man has once learned to distrust hisown raptures they do not rise easily. 

He took up his quarters with Darco, and they worked all day together, and, on occasion, far into the night, for they were entered on a raceagainst time, and an extended run of the piece which then held the stageat Darco's theatre meant loss. Act by act was put in rehearsal asit left the writers' hands, and the final scenes were written in thetheatre itself, and the parts copied in one of the dressing-rooms. Forthe last fortnight of the work there was time to think of nothingelse, and when the very tag was written there was labour enough left tosatisfy even Darco. 

No better medicine for Paul's malady could have been prescribed thanhe found in this ceaseless mental occupation. It shook him out ofhis useless moonings, and brought his mind back to its old healthyelasticity, and when at last the decisive night came, and the play wentwith a roar from start to finish, he went to bed to sleep the clockround, and awoke to triumph. 

Out of an idea which had cropped up in the course of work, and hadbeen abandoned as being too heavy to be employed as a mere episode, theindefatigable Darco had already constructed a new plot, and was fain tobegin at once upon its development. But Paul insisted upon at least afortnight's holiday, and carried his point. There was no further fear offinancial embarrassment for many months to come. Annette's liabilitieswere paid. A lawyer was engaged to make settled arrangements with her, and for awhile there was a clear prospect and free air to breathe. Thencame the new work, carried on at a less fiery pressure than the old, butyet pursued with diligence. It lasted six months, and was not likelyto be in demand for another half-year. Gertrude was back in Paris, and thither went Paul, prepared to study the platonic theory in a morephilosophical spirit than he had hitherto displayed. She was charming. She could not easily cease to be charm ing, but she maddened no longer, and if she had had a heart at all, her lover's extreme placidity mighthave piqued her into love. It could not do that, but it served tointroduce upon the scene an episode of some humour. 

Madame la Baronne de Wyeth could not exist without an adorer. It wasan agreeable thing enough to have two at a time, and would have beenagreeable to have had a dozen had the creatures been manageable. Mr. Ricardo P. Janes, of Boston, Massachusetts, was a young man of excellentfamily connections, and in enjoyment of liberal means. He was a veryhandsome boy of four- or five-and-twenty, and having a taste for art andthe Muses in general, he was studying in the atelier of a famous Frenchpainter. He took life seriously, and wrote nice verses. He was simpleand enthusiastic, pure-minded and romantic, and altogether eligible asa candidate for a place in the list of Gertrude's soulful friends. When Paul reached Paris he had an immediate introduction to this younggentleman, and conceived a real liking for him. There was hardly anescape from the recognition of the fact that Mr. Janes, in his serious, romantic way, was in love with Gertrude, but it was evident that he hadbeen held well in hand, and that with him the platonic path had strictbarriers, beyond which he did not even aspire to pass. He made Paul hisconfidant when the two came to intimacy, as they very easily did; andfrom his simple talk the elder learned again a great deal of what he hadlearned already from Gertrude--how, for instance, there was a certainisolation of the soul from which it was impossible to escape even in theclosest and most genuine friendship, and how the Individual was nevertruly apprehended by any other Individual, but was doomed to go itsway in eternal solitude towards its goal. Mr. Janes, despite hisromanticisms and enthusiasms, was in the main a sensible young man, andhe would not have said these things had he known or guessed thattheir ground of inspiration would be recognised by his companion. ButGertrude's ideas had seemed to him--they would appear to have seemedso to many for a time--to hold a most true and beautiful though sadphilosophy, and he was of that time of life when such thoughts arefull of serious interest and charm. Had Mr. Janes appeared nine monthsearlier under the same conditions, Paul would probably have conceiveda fiery hatred for him, but now he felt a kind of superiority tohim, which was in part cynical, and in part affectionate, and in partself-disdainful. He had gone thrilling at all this for years on end, because it came from the lips of a pretty and engaging woman, withwhom it was no more than a canting shibboleth. Of course it helped todisillusionize him, and he began even to see that Gertrude was not asbeautiful as he had once believed her to be. This is almost a fatalsymptom in the history of love's decay, unless the perception beattended, as it is in happy cases, by the perception of new beautieswhose presence more than atones for the absence of the old. And Pauldid not find new beauties. Gertrude was simply a pretty woman now, and apretty woman is a very different creature from an angel whose effulgenceso dazzles that it blinds the eyes. It was pleasant enough to philanderwith her, to touch the skirts of topics which had once been dangerous, but were dangerous no longer, but the glamour was gone, and young Mr. Janes had done as much to banish it in a single fortnight as Ralstonand the bibulous explorer and the nine months of diligent labour all puttogether. 

It happened that the Baroness herself planned a little pleasure trip, which resulted in the closing of this chapter of Paul Armstrong's life. It placed him incidentally in a position of extreme awkwardness, andhe was never able to decide whether he had acted well or ill in it. Thepoint may be reckoned a fine one. 

Gertrude had made accidental acquaintance with a charming old house inthe neighbourhood of Fontainebleau, a country château of the old-worldsort, which was for sale, with all its furniture, its plate and itspictures, and a rather exceptionally good library. Failing a sale, it was provisionally for hire, and she, having, always, practicallyunlimited funds at her disposal, was inclined to take it and to spendsome half-year in retirement, within easy reach of the capital and herfriends, whilst she added the last touches to a volume of poems on whichshe had been engaged from time to time for some three or four years pastShe was in negotiation for the place, and just by way of experimentshe had thought it a charming idea to give a little--a verylittle--house-party there. There were to be only five people--Gertrude'sown Knickerbocker sheepdog, then one Comtesse de Cassault, Gertrudeherself, and Mr. Janes and Paul. The servants of the departed familywere available for a day; a chef and one or two kitchen assistants mightbe sent down from Paris. The party would assemble in time for luncheon, would spend the afternoon in a country excursion, would return todinner, and so Pariswards by a special train. It was a pretty programme, and would cost M. Le Baron de Wyeth a pretty penny, but the lastconsideration was Gertrude's affair alone. The Comtesse de Cassault wasa beautiful person, a flirt of the demurest kind. The Knickerbocker wasvirtually nobody. In effect it was a _partie carrée_ and bade fair to beenjoyable. 

It was the very loveliest of October days, and Paul began his adventuresby a little accident to the voiture which should have borne him to thestation. It was no very great matter, but he found himself entangledwith the horses of an omnibus, and though he escaped personal injury, apart from an inconsiderable bruise or two, he had to make an awkwardjump for safety, and, falling, split the knees of his trousers, andplastered his shirt-cuffs with the mud which an overnight shower hadleft behind. This petty disaster involved a return home, and the loss ofhis train. He despatched a wire and made inquiries. The quickest way ofarriving at his destination appeared to be to book by train to a pointsome ten miles from it, and then to secure a conveyance of some sortto get the rest of the distance. He was turned out at a lonely ruralstation with no vehicle for hire within miles. Very good, he would makethe best of a small misfortune, and would walk. He got directed by astupid peasant, and set off in the wrong direction. When he had walkedsome two miles out of his way, he made further inquiries and retracedhis steps. The roads were a little heavy, the sun was hot, and Paul oflate had taken but little physical exercise. When, after three hourshard walking, he reached the retired chateau which was the scene of theday's festivity, luncheon had been over two hours before, and Gertrudeand her party were away for a drive. But Mr. Armstrong was expected andwas welcomed, and when he had a little repaired the ravages the journeyhad made upon his aspect, he was provided with a pleasant little repastand a bottle of excellent Moselle. The room in which he took thismeal was on the ground-floor, and was an extension from the originalbuilding. It stood a few feet above a sloping lawn, and it had wideFrench windows on either side of it A balcony travelled round it onthree sides, and on that which faced the sun heavy velvet curtains hadbeen drawn. A full light which brought no dazzle with it came in fromthe windows opposite. 

When Paul had finished his meal, which he ate with great relish afterthe unaccustomed exercise of the day, he explored the balcony, andfinding on the sunny side one of those long American cane-chairs which, when furnished with cushions, offer so agreeable a lounge, he sat downthere and smoked a cigar. A while ago the small contretemps which haddelayed him would have caused him profound trouble, or, at least, hewould have made himself think so; but he took the matter quite easilynow, and occupied himself in rehearsing the history he would haveto tell on his hostess's return. The day was exquisitely mild, thetemperature perfect, now that he was no longer in hasty effort; he hadeaten heartily, had half emptied the bottle of excellent Moselle, and hewas very tired. Before he had begun to realize fairly the fact that hewas drowsy, he had fallen asleep. 

When he awoke there were voices in the room he had quitted some twohours before. The sun had gone down behind the trees in the bluedistance, and he was just a trifle stiff and chilly. He was barelyconscious of these things, when the voice of young Mr. Janes startledhim broad awake. 

'It is dangerous, ' said Mr. Janes; 'it is seriously dangerous. '

'Silly boy!' said Gertrude, in a voice half mocking and half caressing. 'How can an old woman like me be dangerous to the peace of a child likeyou?'

'It is not dangerous to you, Gertrude, ' said Mr. Janes, with a tremorwhich bespoke him very much in earnest 'I know your purity, and Ireverence it. I know that I have done wrong in speaking as I have done, but I could not help it I must go. '

'No, Ricardo, ' said Gertrude, 'you must not go. You must only put thisfoolish fancy by--it is only a foolish fancy--and there will be no needto disturb a friendship which has been so sweet, so valuable, to both ofus. '

By this time it occurred suddenly to Paul that he had perhaps heardenough, but he had hitherto been held so entirely by surprise that hehad not had time to think that this conversation was not intended forhis ears. He arose, and began to creep stealthily away, when he saw thatthe curtains through which he had passed from the room were partly openas he had left them. And whilst he stood irresolute, wondering howhe should escape, and trying to devise some means of declaring hispresence, the talk went on. 

'Oh, damn it all!' he said to himself desperately. 'It isn't my fault. I know that line of country pretty well, and I have been so oftenintroduced to it that I am hardly an intruder on it. I can't get awaywithout being seen, and that will be awkward for everybody. And I can'tstay here and listen to this rot. '

But the talk went on, and what with the absurd misery of his ownposition and the well-known lines the conversation followed, he wasfairly aflame with embarrassment and self-disdain. Exactly what thisgifted and amiable young ass of a Bostonian was doing, and saying, andthinking, and feeling, he had been doing, saying, thinking, feeling ayear ago. And Gertrude was playing with young Mr. Janes exactly asshe had played with young Mr. Armstrong. Mr. Janes took a good deal ofcoaxing--more than Paul had done--but the trained coquette was equal tothe task, and she brought him to the climax just as she had brought hispredecessor. And there was the one little embrace granted, and there wasa rustle of skirts, and the click of a door-latch, and Gertrude's voicesaid, 'You will stay _now_ Ricardo?' and Ricardo groaned. Then the doorwas closed, and there was silence. Then Ricardo groaned again, andPaul heard his disordered footsteps as he paced the room. The unwillinglistener returned to the cane-chair and stretched himself upon it withgreat stealth, and feigned sleep in case of contingencies. But afterfive dreary minutes young Mr. Janes withdrew, and the way of escape wasopen. 

Paul made his way to the drawing-room, and found there the Knickerbockerlady and the demure Countess, with whom he had already a slight butagreeable acquaintance. He had had time to recover his self-possession, and though he wished himself a hundred miles away, he did his best toset the kite of conversation flying. He was making an attempt in hissomewhat halting French to tell the story of his delay when Gertrudeentered, and he told the tale to her, leaving her to translate it. Hisnarrative was so vivacious that she trilled with laughter at it, andbroke in upon it with a rapid paraphrase in French here and there, sothat she and the Countess and the historian were all laughing heartilytogether when Mr. Janes came in with a sombre countenance, and made sofunereal an effort to join in the mirth that Paul was fiercely tickled. And whilst he made a comedy of the morning's accident for her amusement, he was thinking all the while, 'You heartless, cruel, dangerous littlejade!' and thinking it, too, with a real savagery of hatred. 'Howmany have you betrayed, ' he asked in his heart 'To how many hungers ofpassion deliberately awakened have you offered that heart of stone?'

The Baroness knew him mainly on the sentimental side, but that eveninghe launched out as a raconteur, and was gay and brilliant. Even Mr. Janes was awakened to sporadic laughter at the dinner-table, where theysat by preconcerted arrangement without the formality of evening-dress, and fared admirably from the _hors d'oeuvres_ to the coffee--a flawlessmeal. And dinner being over, they drove away under a noble moon to therailway-station, and bowled back to Paris. 

Paul, still with an air of gaiety, begged Gertrude to accord him tenminutes on the following day. 

'I have something to tell you, ' he said, 'in which I am sure you willtake the warmest interest. May I trespass on your time for just tenminutes in the morning? I got a curious little bit of intelligenceto-day which will carry me, I fancy, to the United States. '

'The United States? cried Gertrude. 'I can send you to the nicest peoplethere. But shall you be long away?'

'I shall be able to tell you that to-morrow, ' Paul answered. 'May I?

'Certainly, ' she replied graciously. 'Shall we all breakfast together attwelve?'

'I am sorry, ' said Paul, 'but for me that is impossible. But if I maysee you at a quarter to the hour----'

'Certainly, ' she said again. 

'Thank you, ' he said, and turning away somewhat abruptly, as he thoughtafterwards, he began to talk to the irresponsive Janes, who sat, as itwere, in fog. 

'You come with me?' said Paul to the young Bostonian when the terminuswas reached, and the final adieux had been said amongst the rest. 

'Well, no, ' said Mr. Janes. 'I am a little out of sorts for some reasonor another, and I think that I'll go home. '

'Well, then, ' said Paul, 'I go with you. It's all the same; but I havesomething to say to you. It won't keep, Janes, and whether you and Ilike it or no, it has to be spoken. '

'Oh, ' said Janes, 'that sounds serious!'

'Come to the Rue Castiglione with me, ' Paul answered, 'and I will tellyou exactly how serious it is. '

'Very well, ' the younger man answered, and Paul having chartered afiacre, they drove home together. 

Arrived at his hotel, Paul ordered, and his guest refused, awhisky-and-soda, and the two sat down at a table in Paul's bedroom. 

'Mr. Janes, ' he began, 'I hope very sincerely that what am about to saywill not wound you--much. It is sure to hurt you a little at first, butit is meant in friendship. Let me begin by telling you that for somethree years of my life, more or less, I made an unexampled ass of myselfabout a certain lady. And now let me confess that I was put intoa beastly corner this afternoon, and could not help overhearing aconversation in which the lady held a part. That conversation wasidentical in result, and almost identical in terms, with one in which Itook part about a year and a half ago. '

Young Mr. Janes set his elbows on the table, and rested his face uponhis hands. He was silent for a long time, but at last he said:

'I cannot judge of the delicacy or otherwise of your statement, Mr. Armstrong, but I leave Paris to-morrow morning, and I shall not return. I should have gone, sir, without this revelation from you, and I amsorry that you have made it. '

'I am not, ' said Paul stanchly. 'Nor do I think that you will be in alittle time. I wasted three years, Mr. Janes, in worship at that emptyshrine, and when I had most accidentally and most unwittingly surprisedanother worshipper----'

'Don't mock at it, for God's sake!' said young Mr. Janes. 'I'm goinghome. Good-night. I think you were right to tell me. I think I shouldhave done the same. You're going----' He paused there, and looked upwith a white face. 'You're going to see her in the morning?'

'On that one errand, ' Paul answered. 

'Well, ' said Mr. Janes, 'good-bye, Armstrong. '

He offered his hand, and Paul took it warmly. Janes went dejectedlyaway. 

At ten minutes before the strike of noon next day Paul and Gertrudemet for the last time. She came gaily towards him with both handsoutstretched in welcome, but her face changed as he stood before herwith no recognition of her proffered salute. 

'What is the matter?' she asked. 

'I am here to tell you, Gertrude, ' he responded. 'I told you a part ofmy adventures of yesterday, but I did not tell you all. When my walk wasfinished I had luncheon, and after luncheon I lay down on a chair uponthe veranda and fell asleep there. I awoke at the moment when Mr. Janeswas telling you that it was dangerous. I had not the courage to breakin upon a conversation so intimate, and--may I say it?--so familiar. Icould not get away without a risk of being seen, and so I stayed where Iwas. '

She had gone white to the lips, and she was trembling, but she facedhim. 

'Oh, ' she said, 'I had thought you a little worthier than that! Aneavesdropper!'

'An eavesdropper!' Paul answered. 'That is understood; but not a willingone. You have wasted a good part of my life, but of that I have no rightto complain. But I do lament a little that you should have taken awaymy last illusion. I had learned a little of your adorable sex, Gertrude, before I met you, and nothing in my experience had taught me to thinkwell of it. But I believed I had found in you a proof of the monstrousfalsity of the belief into which I was being thrust. Well, you see, youconfirm that belief. I shall go to my grave now in the certainty thatone-half the world is made to wheedle and befool the other half, andthat every woman is born to treason as the sparks fly upward. You liedto me, Gertrude, and I believed you. You lured me on deliberately, witha cold cruelty for which there is no name. I shall never hate you aswell as I have loved you, for I have a rather poor capacity in that way. You found a man with a bruised heart, and for your own wicked pleasureyou set to work to torture him. There is no use in words, and I havesaid all I came to say. '

That was the end of that episode, and a minute later he was stridingalong the street. In three days he was aboard ship at Havre, and thedisconsolate Janes was one of his fellow-voyagers. 

CHAPTER XXV

If a philosopher were set to describe the best and the worst of life, hewould certainly have a considerable choice before him. But amongst thebest he would have to set down love, and amongst the worst he would haveto set down love's disillusion. The curse of age is indifference. Withthe increase of the years you come to a time when nothing matters. Anything which helps hearty youth this way is harmful. In ninety casesin a hundred age is a crime against the hopes of the world, and nothingages like cynicism. This is the beginning of senile decay. And what isa man to do who has lavished his heart, and has always found that thewoman has played counters of affectation against the sincere gold ofhis soul? Obviously he turns cynic, despising himself and his too cheapemotions; and to cheapen one's own emotions is to play the very devil. It was written from of old that a house divided against itself cannotstand, and a man who has learned to loathe one half of his own nature isnot stable. Even that he has a perfect right to do it does not help him. 

May Gold had fooled Paul Armstrong. Claudia Belmont had carried on thegame. So had Annette, and so had Gertrude. It was a wise man who wrotethat the net is spread in vain in the sight of any bird, but he wrotenonsense, all the same. The capturing net is the one to which we aremost accustomed. 

So with a heart filled with distrust, and misliking half the world, Paultravelled across the Atlantic, and sauntered about the United States. The money question was settled for the time being, if not definitely, and for a year or two he would have no occasion to think of ways andmeans. He got away into the prairies and the mountains, camped out, shooting and hunting, learned to sit a horse, learned to handle a gun, to build a tent, and to cook. 

Then he went back into civilization, and travelled on to San Francisco, and the western parts of Canada. And one day at Victoria, havingnothing better before him, he wandered on board a vessel which infour-and-twenty hours from that time was bound to sail for Japan. Hetook lunch with the proprietors and officers of this boat, and, almostbefore he knew it, had booked his passage for Yokohama. Why not see theworld?

There were ladies aboard, and they flirted with the stranger because hewas young and already famous, and more than average good-looking. Theyflirted demurely, and they flirted fiercely, and they flirted in all theways which are known to women; but for once in feminine experience theymet a man who was proof against all their charms, charmed they neverso wisely. To be dangerous to man's peace of mind a woman must inspirebelief, and in Paul's heart belief was dead. 

The ship went on to New Zealand, her port of call Dunedin. Why notNew Zealand? Why not see the world? More flirts aboard, and moreflirtations, but still the hitherto so susceptible heart unmoved. Thenext port of call Hobart Town, then Melbourne. Still, why not see theworld? More flirts and more flirtations, as if there were nothing butthe rustle of a petticoat which is worth taking notice of on the surfaceof the planet. But observe that the young man is spoiled, at least forthe time being. 

Possum and kangaroo shooting make good sport. Rabbits swarm in literalmillions. We grow very handy with the gun, very handy at building ashelter of any sort, or at cooking a dinner. 

Then back to New Zealand, and here the beginning of a new life. 

New Year's Eve, as it happens, and the exile's mind not unnaturallyfilled with thoughts of home. And tucked away in the further corner ofthe dining-room of the Grand Hotel the familiar figure of an Englishcomedian! who, when Paul last saw him, was playing in a piece writtenfar himself and Darco. 

'Hillo, Paul! Can't I get into any blooming corner of the world butsome old pal is bound to root me out?' 'How's trade?' said Paul. 'Goingstrong?' 'Bad, dear boy, ' the comedian answered. 'Bad as bad can be. Do me a turn, old fellow. Write me a play. I've brought out three, andthey're all rotten failures. Ask the press, and they'll tell youI'm coining money. Ask me, and I'll tell you I'm dropping it by thebarrelful. Been here long--eh?'

Paul was at the theatre again that night, for the first time since hehad left England, two years ago. Two years ago! Such a distance had beenplaced between him and Gertrude--between him and Annette!

A dreary farce in three acts greeted him, and ambitions awoke anew. Thecheery comedian asked:

'Why not try it on the dog? Give us a bit of human nature, dear child. Run it round these far outlying provinces. No harm to you if you makea failure; loads of minted money if you make a hit. What I always say, dear boy: minimize the risk of failure--eh?'

Paul took fire. He knew his man, and could fit him like a glove. 

'Where are you in ten weeks' time?' he asked 'Ten weeks? said thecomedian. 'Auckland. ' 'Good!' said Paul. 'We meet in Auckland. ' 'Rightyou are, ' said the comedian; and then they parted, and never met againfor years. 

But the talk set Paul at work again, and he laboured like a Trojan onthe shores of Lake Te Anau, with heath and sky and mountains for hiscomrades and inspirers, and when his play was finished he went backto civilization to discover that his comedian was well on his way toEngland. That mattered little enough. He sent a copy of the piece toDarco, and wandered hither and thither about the southern island untilby hazard he tumbled against a new fate in the person of a new comedian. 

'And you don't happen to have a play in your pocket, Mr. Armstrong? saidhe, in the first hour of their acquaintanceship. 

'As it happens, 'said Paul, 'I have. You may read it this afternoon. '

There was a business chaffer, and the affair was virtually settled. Paulwas to read the play to the company of the travelling comedian on themorrow. 

He presented himself at the theatre at the appointed hour, and themanager kept him waiting for a minute or two whilst he harangued thebaggage-man. 

'You'll know her by this portrait: she's small; she's veryordinary-looking; she wears her hair in a topknot, with a hat stuck overit about so high'--he held his arms abroad. 'Excuse me, Mr. Armstrong, we are all ready for you with the exception of a lady who will be herein half an hour. I wired for her a week ago to Australia The boatwas signalled two hours since. Since we must wait, you won't mind myutilizing the half-hour?'

'Pray go on, ' said Paul; and, seating himself upon a rolled-up bale ofcarpet, surrendered his mind to ennui. 

In due time the lady for whose help the company waited appeared. Theplay was read, the characters were apportioned, and the date of thefirst production was fixed Paul took no special note of the new arrival, and, indeed, she did not seem specially notable. She was little morethan a child, with a child's stature but a woman's figure. She hadbrown eyes and brown hair, and she wore a dress of brown velvet. She wasstrange to the crowd about her, so it seemed; for she was introducedto every member of it, and she scrutinized everybody with a childlikemixture of frankness and reticence. 

'Like a little brown mouse, ' said Paul to himself, 'peeping out ofher cranny at an assemblage of cats, without quite knowing the cat'sproclivity. '

Beyond this she was Miss Madge Hampton, an amateur of some small privatemeans, and he thought no more about her. Rehearsal in an insignificantpart displayed her as capable and willing to be taught. 

The company never stayed more than a week in any one town, and for aconsiderable part of the time went bushwhacking from place to place, taking one-night stands! and crawling by sleepy railways amongst someof the most exquisite scenery of the land. Paul had nothing betterto do--had, indeed, nothing else to do--and found a pleasure in thisrevival of old experiences. It reminded him of the ancient days withDarco, which now looked so far away, and he surrendered himself, as hehad always done, to the interests of the moment and the hour. A fairproportion of the working day was spent in travel, and sometimes, asthey crossed the exquisite plain of flowering green, with the snowcappedmountains in the distance, the ladies of the company would cry out atsight of some especial bank of wild flowers, and the conductor wouldstop the leisurely train to let them go out and cull bouquets. At somesuch excursions Paul assisted, and, whether by hazard or goodwill, hefound himself oftener by the side of Miss Madge Hampton than elsewhere. He had himself been born to the inheritance of a most inordinatemouthful of provincial accent, and since he had studied and learned tospeak almost every dialect known to the little islands which are thecentre of our Empire, his ear had grown nice and critical. The ladiesand gentlemen of the company, with the exception of the famous andadmirable comedian who led them, were all of colonial education, andthey all spoke with the accent the existence of which our colonialbrethren and sisters so strenuously deny. It was, of course, thelanguage of fashion, as they knew it, but it was, as it still is, perilously near the English of Mile End, and the ear of the Englishman, grown critical through many studies, used to ache at it. The leader ofthe troupe talked the English of the stage, which, after all, is perhapsnot quite the English of the cultured Englishman, but was not altogetherintolerable. But, by some accident, Miss Hampton had no trace of theaccent which disfigured the speech of her companions, and this littlefact of itself accounted for something in the very gradual intimacywhich grew up between herself and Paul. 

The train was sauntering along in its customary easy-going fashion, whenit came to a halt at the signal of a man in corduroy trousers, a flannelshirt which had once been scarlet, and a felt hat of no colour. Thesignaller sat upon a fence and wanted a chat with the driver, who wasquite willing, in the course of his leisurely progress, to spare himhalf an hour or so. 

'If you ladies, ' said the conductor, 'would like to stretch yourselves, there's any amount of flowers to be got here, and there's time to waste. There's no run back except on a Saturday, and an hour or two in the timeof arrival won't make no difference. '

So the ladies got down and went flower-hunting, whilst the driver andthe stoker and the guard sat on the fence together and talked politicsand the latest mail from England. 

Paul went out with the rest, and the party chanced upon a marshy pieceof land where a species of purple iris grew in great profusion. Therewas a cry of delight at the sunlit patch of colour, and everybodycharged down upon it, with the result that half of the travellers werebogged to the knees, and there was a good deal of pully-hauley businessgone through before the last adventuress was extricated. Miss MadgeHampton fell to Paul's share by accident of mere neighbourhood, and shestretched out her little brown-kid-gloved hand to him with an air oftimid appeal. He pulled stanchly, but the ground gave way beneath him, and before he knew it she was in his arms. There was a laugh all round, and a blush on both sides, but the lady was on firm earth again, andin a minute or two the drawling call of the conductor brought the partyback to the train. The journey was renewed, and the incident forgottenby everybody save the dramatist, who sat coiled in his corner, with hiseyes fixed upon a book which he might as well have held upside-down. The women of the company, five in number, were chattering like a nestof starlings, shrilling high against the slow rumble of the wheels. MissHampton alone was silent amongst them. Their talk was of matrimony, andthe leading lady sparkled out with an engaging inquiry which embracedthe whole carriageful. 

'And what about Miss Hampton?'

'Oh, ' said the little brown lady demurely, 'I shall die an old maid!'

It was at this instant that a singular and yet accustomed pang assailedthe dramatist's heart. He ought to have known it well enough, in allconscience, for he had already had an opportunity of studying it fourtimes over. May Gold had taught it, and Claudia had taught it, andAnnette for a fleeting instant, and Gertrude through a heavy year ortwo. He looked at the smiling little face before him, and it took a newsweetness in his eyes. If he had had his absolute will at that moment, he would have taken its owner in his arms, and have cried 'No!' toher protestation. But, then, it is difficult to do these things inthe presence of a whole carriageful of people who make a professionof comedy, and he restrained himself, wondering a little why such animpulse should have assailed him. Yet from that time forward he began towatch and to listen for the monitions of his own heart, which of itselfis a dangerous thing for any susceptible young man to do, and he beganto find charms in Miss Hampton which were quite separate from theexceptional delicacy of her English speech. He knew very well that hehad no right to fall in love with any woman; he was bound to Annette; hewas tied to her so long as she should live. But being newly awakened toa sense of the weakness which had pursued him through his life so far, he became afraid, and watched his own emotions with a jealous care. 

The man who is born to fall in love will do it, whatever happens; butthere are, of course, ways and ways of doing it, and this particular wayof keeping guard over the emotions is perhaps as swift as any. 

He held the figure at arm's length, as it were, and critically surveyedit. Why, he asked himself repeatedly, should this simple littlepersonality appeal to him so strongly? To say the most and the least ofit, it was feminine, and he had made up his mind about the sex when hehad quitted Gertrude. He had honestly despaired of finding a woman whowas not either a coquette or a fool, and he had taught himself to usethe whole sex after the manner of his conception; and now the cynicfeeling into which he had conspired with circumstance to school himselfwas breaking up again, and, with all his knowledge of the world, he felthimself helpless. 

There never was a tale of this sort which came to a definite end withoutthe aid of circumstances which were not planned by either party to thecoming contract. It befell that the only married woman of the corps, whotravelled with a child of seven, took cold, and had to be left behind. The child, playing, neglected, about the hotel, sustained some injuryin the lift which plied between the upper and the lower stories. Thecompany was only twenty miles away, and Paul, learning the news, boughtgrapes and jellies for the younger invalid and wines for the elder, andchartered a carriage to the town where they were staying. Half a milebefore him was a hooded vehicle, which kept its relative place, more orless, throughout the journey. It was full in sight until the outlyingstreets of the town were reached, and it came into view again when hearrived at his destination--drawn up before the hotel door, and empty. A moment's interview with the manageress gave him the right to mountthe stairs, and, when he tapped at the door of the room in which theinvalids reposed, a voice he had not expected to hear bade him come in. There was Miss Hampton, of whom he had been thinking a good deal toomuch of late, sitting with the child upon her knees, and holding a grapeabove his lips. The child pouted for it, and he and the mother and thevisitor were all laughing together. 

'I beg your pardon, ' said the intruder clumsily; 'I had expected to findyou alone. I have driven over with these little odds and ends in the wayof medical comforts for the boy. '

He stood confused, and laid his burden on the table which stood in thecentre of the room. 

'Didn't you guess, ' laughed the little mother from the couch on whichshe lay, 'that Miss Hampton would be here before you?'

'No, ' said Paul. 'If I had guessed, I should not have intruded. You'lltake these things for the little fellow, won't you?'

'You're not going yet, Mr. Armstrong?' said the lady on the couch. 'Youand Miss Hampton will have a nice little ride back together. '

'I should not dream, ' said Paul, 'of intruding on Miss Hampton, and Imust go back at once. '

He had no business in front of him, but he dreaded himself, and he wasafraid of a _tęte-ā-tęte_ with the plain little woman with the browneyes. 

'But, ' said mamma, lifting her head from the arm of the sofa, andcasting upon him the look of _ingenue_ archness which was almost hersole fortune on the boards, 'Miss Hampton's horse has cast a shoe, andthe shoeing-smith is miles away. Did you ride or drive, Mr. Armstrong?I'm sure you couldn't have ridden with all those nice things you'vebeen so kind to bring me. You must have driven, and you must drive MissHampton home again. Isn't it kind of her to have come over to see mefrom such a distance 'Just look and see: I'm actually smothered in wineand grapes and jelly and flowers. And wasn't it kind of you, too, Mr. Armstrong, to think of me just at the same moment! And wasn't it kind ofMiss Hampton's horse to cast a shoe so that you would be obliged to goback together, whether you meant it or no?'

Miss Hampton was bending over the boy, and her face was hidden; but oneblushing cheek gave warranty for the rest, and it was evident to Paulthat she was as embarrassed as himself. She spoke icily: 'Mr. Armstrongwas not aware that I was coming here. I must go at once. I have no doubtthe landlord will be able to find me another driver. '

'Now, why on earth, 'asked the little actress from her sofa, 'should twopeople who know each other as well as you do take two carriages to drivealong the self-same road? Now, when you come to think of it, isn't thatabsurd! And such a chance for a spoon, too, all along that quiet road!'

'Good-afternoon, dear, ' said Miss Hampton, setting down the child, andoffering an Arctic kiss to the reclining lady; 'I must go. '

With that she swept from the room with an air of dignity and confusion, and Paul shook hands with the invalid and followed her. 

CHAPTER XXVI

There are just as many different ways of falling in love as there arecharacters and temperaments, and even the same man--unless he be afellow of no originality--will not fall in love twice in the samefashion. As to the wisdom or righteousness or the mere everyday questionof plain honour involved in the permission which Paul Armstrong gavehimself to fall in love at all, under the conditions in which he stood, there seemed room for no illusion. He should by this time have beensomething of a man of the world, and might reasonably be supposed to beacting with his eyes open to consequences. He had his compunctions bythe hundred, his hoverings by the way, and turnings back from it. Butmany delicate signs which would have been invisible to him had he beenless interested persuaded him that love lay ready for him, and after allthe follies of his slaveries here and there, he persuaded himself thatif he could but accept it, it was of a kind to atone for all that hadgone before. And why, he asked himself, if this were true, should hestand for ever in loneliness? It was in him to be constant if only truthwere met with truth. He could have been faithful to Claudia. He couldhave been faithful to Annette. He could have been faithful to Gertrude. And though no man whose sense of the humour of life does not leave himwholly blind to the comedy of his own existence could fail to see thebitter jest that lay here against himself, he urged the point seriously. He _had_ been true in each case until faith had grown into blind folly, and bare respect for an old idol had become impossible. The one crime ofhis life had been acted against himself. He had believed Annette, and inthe mere feebleness of acquiescence he had hung a weight about his neckwhich he was doomed to carry as long as her life should last. 

And now, had he the right to redress the wrong he had inflicted uponhimself? Feeble always, always a drifter, a good deal of a coward in hisway of shrinking from avoidable pain, but never deliberately cruel orselfish. And now, was he to do a deliberately cruel and selfish thing?Or was as much mischief as might well be done wrought already?

For months had gone by, and the drifting policy had brought him plainlyto the question, Was this quiet, sweet little girl in love with him?No blame to her if it were so. He had signalled her from the first forattention and companionship, and she knew nothing of his history. Shehad no guess as to the fatal bond which held him. Every day he knew herbetter. Her mind and heart opened out before him like twin flowers, fullof purity and sweet odour. 

She was courage incarnate, and her hatred of cruelty was a passion. Ahulking blackguard of a teamster was cruelly flogging an overladen horseone day, and Madge, at the risk of her life, was in amongst the trafficof the street in a flash, and stood between the beast and his dumbvictim voiceless and pale with rage, her little figure at its heightand her eyes blazing. Paul's chance presence and the neighbourhood ofa policeman were probably answerable for the peaceful solution of thisepisode, for the girl had snatched the whip from the bully's hand, andhe was in an attitude which threatened violence when Paul intervened. 

'My dear child!' said Paul in a tone of remonstrance as he conducted herfrom the scene. 

'Oh, ' she broke in, with her little teeth clenched, 'I couldn't bearit!'

He saw the folly of reproof and held his tongue, and when they came insight of the theatre she ran indoors and escaped him. 

He had fallen into a habit of walking home with her when the night'swork was over, and saying good-bye to her at the door of her lodgings. This fact made her mightily unpopular with the ladies of the company, who saw no reason why she should be thus distinguished, and the snubsshe took disposed him to be more attentive to her. 

They drifted closer, but no confidences were exchanged between them. 

The company made for Australia, and there were six days of travelaboard a well-found steamer, and this gave more than ample time for theposition to solidify. There were long promenades on deck by moonlightand starlight, and the two found a perch in the bows out of the wayof all observation and regard, and there exchanged all manner ofconfidences. The girl's simple life unrolled itself--its hopes, itsambitions! its home affections. She talked of her reading, of her music, of all the little intimacies of home-life. Before the brief voyage wasover he seemed, to his own apprehension, to know his companion morecompletely than he had ever known man or woman, and he was hourly moreand more in love with her. He was feather-headed and irresponsibleenough to be happy in the circumstances for hours at a time, but when hewas alone, and his heart was no longer flattered by the worship she soinnocently offered, the skeleton he carried about with him came out ofits cupboard and seemed to mop and mow before him in derision. He wasbound hand and foot to his fate, and the bonds were not to be severedThere was Annette in far-away London and Paris dragging out a miserableand ignominious life, which was likely to last as long as his own, andhe could see no hope of freedom. With every passing day he feltmore clearly that he was bent upon an inexcusable wrong, and yet, sostrangely fashioned is the conscience of a man who is without the powerof will, all his self-reproaches did but add to the tenderness andfervour of his desire. 

The steamer reached its destination late upon a Saturday, and Sunday wasa holiday. Paul and Madge spent the day together, wandering on a longstretch of sandy coast which lay between the port and the brightgreen waters of the sea; and all the time there was a growing senseof inevitability in his mind. He knew that he was going to ask forhappiness, and that he was prepared to pay his self-respect and manhoodfor it. The talk was of trifles in the morning until they strolledhome to luncheon; it was of trifles again in the afternoon until theystrolled home to dinner, and it was of trifles still when they set outin the yellow sunset to saunter once more in a scene which had alreadygrown strangely memorable and familiar. There were no sunset clouds, butthe pageant of the dying day had a sort of sullen and pathetic beauty. The blazing sun dropped behind the far-off sea-line, and a great band ofsaffron rimmed the whole horizon, fading into palest green as it spreadupward, and this in turn melted into a blue which at the zenith lookedunfathomable. A full moon, which had until now been invisible, lookeddown from the very centre of the sky. There was none of the lingeringtwilight of more temperate climates. The change from broad daylight, inwhich every outline and detail of the landscape was accented strongly, to the dim, mystic and diffused radiance of the moon and stars was likean episode in a transformation-scene at the theatre. A mere ten minuteshad sufficed to change the whole character and sentiment of the scene. It was like walking out of one world into another, and a rude chorus ofvoices, accompanied by the sounds of a banjo and a concertina, came fromsome body of merrymakers beyond a distant island in the bay. It movedaway farther and farther into the distance until the harshness wassoftened to an almost spiritual melody, and after awhile it reached theear only at uncertain intervals. 

They came to a place at which they had rested in the afternoon. Somehigh tide of long ago had deposited here a great wreath of wrack, ahundred yards inland, and piled up in places to a height of some twelvefeet. There were scores of cushiony resting-places here like greatluxurious arm-chairs, and the wrack when disturbed by a touch gave outdry and stinging odours of sea-salt and iodine. 

Paul, with a mere motion of the hand to his companion, threw himselfinto one of the hollows, and she took a seat at a little distance fromhim. He lay, the brim of his hat sheltering his eyes from the moonlight, and stared at the spangled vault above him, where the stars seemed tohang from threads of gold and silver as if they were upheld by an actualtangible roof. He knew that his hour had come, but he obeyed the impulsewhich controlled him with an infinite self-accusation. 

'Madge, ' he said, rolling over where he lay and stretching out his handtowards her. It fell upon her own, and she made no motion to evadehim. It was the first caress he had ever offered her, and her tacitacceptance of it hurried him into passion. 'Madge, ' he said again; 'dearlittle Madge!'

She glanced at him for an instant only, and in the moonlight her eyesglinted with sudden tears. 

'I have no right, ' he said, 'to speak to you like this. I have had noright to claim your companionship as I have done since we first began toknow each other. '

She was quite silent; but under his light caress he felt her handtremble, and she glanced at him once more and looked away again. 

'I have not had a happy life, ' he went on, 'but that ought to dispose meto do what I can to keep unhappiness out of the lives of other people. If I tell you that I am very conscious of having deceived you, of havingleft you in the dark about myself in respect to things you have a rightto know, what shall you say to me? What will you think of me?'

Again she turned to look at him, and this time her glance rested on him, but still she made no answer. 

Paul withdrew his hand, sat upright, and began mechanically to chargehis pipe and to smoke. 

'I met an utterly worthless woman many years ago, ' he began, after along pause, 'and I threw my life away upon her. We were married, andshe is still alive. She is likely to live for many years to come; and, indeed, there is no probability of escape from her. It is not likelythat she and I will ever see each other any more; but I am legally boundto her so long as she shall live. I ought to have told you this monthsago. '

He rose and began to pace up and down the sands before her. He looked upat her from time to time, and her eyes followed him as he moved. Nota sound escaped her lips, but her fast-flowing tears glittered on hercheeks like rain. 

'I should have told you, ' he cried, writhing between self-accusation andself-excuse, 'but I had not the courage to put an end to a time whichhas been so lull of sweetness, so full of a mad kind of hope which Ishould never have admitted to my heart I know, ' he went on, pausingdesperately before her, 'what must be in your mind. I know that you areasking how I dared to draw you on to such a friendship as ours has beenthrough an acted lie, and how I have dared at last to tell the truth Ihave postponed so long. You have a right to be wounded; you have aright to be angry. You will do yourself the merest justice if you teachyourself to despise and hate me; and if you tell me to go away at onceand darken your life no further, I will do it But let me say just thisone thing: whatever my cowardly silence may seem to prove, I have neverhad a thought of you that has not been full of the profoundest respectand reverence. You know now the truth about me, and you know that inspite of it I have made love to you for months past. I can't tell whata high-minded and pure-hearted woman may feel in such a case. I can'tguess if such a woman could find it in her nature to accept the lifelongworship and affection of a man who is circumstanced as I am, if shecould find the courage and self-sacrifice to join her destinies with abroken life like mine. Oh, if it were possible!' he cried, 'and oh, ifit were possible that I could nourish such a hope in fancy, and not knowin my inmost heart that only a scoundrel could be guilty of it! There, Madge, it is all said now. It had to be said, but I shall never forgivemyself for having said it. '

The accusations he brought against himself were just as real as thepassion and despair which urged him on. 

The Solitary, in his smoke-clouded mountain eyrie, surveyed all this, ashe had surveyed the varied experiences of life which had passed beforeit in clear vision through his mind, and still the passion and despairand the self-accusing, self-excusing thoughts were as real to him asthey had been at the moment he recalled. He accepted that reality as aproof, scarcely needed, of the already established shallowness of hisown nature--a brawling stream always ready to rave round any littleimpediment in its path; a mere miniature of the torrent, with noresolute strength or purpose in it, but full of a fussy vivacity andself-importance which he could most heartily and bitterly despise. All his life long the same futile story repeated: the same headlongimpetuosity, the same want of steadfast force, the same absence ofcontrol. And yet, even in the depth of self-reproach, he could not denyto himself some hint of purpose which had an honest meaning in his mind, and, looking back, he saw that he had found an entrance to a purer andbetter life than he had known before. Had he been worthy of the trust heasked for, he would have blamed himself less for asking. Tears were hotand harsh in his throat as the scene unrolled itself before him. 

Paul Armstrong--the Paul Armstrong of those irrevocable bygoneyears--was striking up and down the sand, and the girl was still weepingwithout a sound, when the Exile's thought flew back to them. It was asif a curtain had descended for an instant only, and had risen again toreveal the same actors in the same scene. 

'I had better leave you now, Madge, ' said Paul, half maddened by thesight of the uncomplaining grief he had awakened. 'I will watch you homeas soon as you care to go, but I won't intrude upon you any longer. '

The slight figure rose from its seat upon the wrack, and stood beforehim with downcast and averted head, but he could still see thetears falling like diamond-drops in the clear moonlight. He turnedirresolutely away, but he had made only a single step before he wasvividly back again with an impulsive and imploring hand upon hershoulder. 

'Tell me, ' he said, 'that you forgive me. Tell me that you will be ableto think of me when I am gone with something--some feeling that will notbe all contempt. You won't always despise me, will you, Madge?'

'I shall never despise you, ' she answered, in a voice she could barelycontrol; 'I shall always remember this time. '

'And you don't hate me for having spoken?'

She looked up at him with a strange smile, which was so tender and sofull of pity that he caught his breath at the sight of it. 

'No, ' she said, 'I shall never hate you. I must be as truthful as youhave been. I must tell you that I had heard something of what you havetold me before we left New Zealand. I didn't know if it were true, and Idid not even wish to ask. '

He stood still with that unconscious hand upon her shoulder, and hisheart gave a leap as he asked:

'You knew I loved you, Madge--you knew I loved you?'

'I was quite sure of that, 'she answered 'I have believed it for a longtime. '

'Madge, ' he said, 'are you strong enough--are you brave enough--can youput such faith in me? Can you believe that I will lay a life's unfailingdevotion at your feet--that the very fact that there can be no legal tiebetween us will make me always all the truer to you? I swear to you thatif you trust yourself to me, my whole life shall be one act of gratitudefor your faith and courage, and that no act or word of mine shall evercause you to regret the compact. '

Her tears had ceased to fall, and when she next looked at him her facewas grave, and looked in the moonlight as pale as snow. 

'If I were alone, ' she answered, 'you should have my answer now, but Ihave others to consider. '

'Oh, who, ' he cried, 'can come between us?'

'Let us go home, ' she answered simply and bravely. 'I must have timeto think. Please say no more to me to-night. ' She moved away, and Paul, taking his place beside her, walked in silence 'There is no one, ' shesaid, when they had traversed a hundred yards or more, 'who has a rightto dictate what my life shall be; but I have never done anything withoutmy mother's knowledge and consent, and I never shall. '

Paul had passed from despair almost to certainty, but this chilled himsuddenly. 

'Ah, ' he said, with a gasping breath, 'is there any mother in the worldwho would consent to such a scheme?'

'You must write to me, ' she answered, 'such a letter as I can send toher. I will write, too, and I will ask her not to answer until she hasseen us both. '

'That rings a death-knell, ' said Paul 'I have no hope of consent in sucha case. '

'I can't tell, ' she answered simply, 'but there is no other way. '

'And yet you love me, Madge?' said Paul. She made no answer, and he drewnearer to her, and put an arm about her shoulder. 'You love me, littleMadge?' he urged her. 

She gave a sigh of acquiescence, a half-breathed 'Yes. '

'And you could deny your own heart and mine? You could let me go awayalone, and live alone yourself, with an empty heartache?'

Her answer came, like an echo of a former tone, just the samehalf-breathed token of assent. There was a quiet resolution in it, forall it was so softly spoken, which bound him to silence for a time. 

There was more strength of resolution, more power and purpose, expressed thus simply than he had ever been conscious of himself, and herecognised that fact quite clearly. 

They walked from this time forth in silence, until at the outskirts ofthe town they reached the small and retired hotel at which the girl hadtaken lodgings, and there they parted formally enough. 

'You will write?' she asked, holding out her hand to him in token ofdismissal. 

'I will write, ' he answered, taking her hand, and bowing over it. 

There were some Sabbath loiterers in the street, and it was necessarythat the two should part undemonstratively. 

Paul, as he walked to his own more pretentious hostel, recognised thefact that for good or evil he had shot his bolt There was nothing atthat hour of which he was more certain than that his present destiny andthe destiny of Madge lay in the hands of a woman he had never seen, and he did not even attempt to disguise from himself the overwhelmingprobability against an affirmative answer to his hopes. He was verymiserably certain that he had no right to hope, and that accusingconscience of his which never permitted him to stray without rebuke, andyet had never been worth a farthing to him in his whole career, worriedhim without ceasing. But he knew enough of himself already to havelearned that the fault of character which had wrecked him was halfmade up of reluctance to add pain to pain. It is not always the whollyselfish wrongdoer who is answerable for the greater sorrows of life. Itis assuredly not he who suffers in his own person; but, worse than that, the tender-hearted, conscience-worried man of feeble will is alwaysafraid of causing a slight grief by retracing a mistaken step, and sogoes on inevitably to the creation of troubles which appal him when hecomes to contemplate them in after-hours. And to have a full theoreticalknowledge of this fact enforced by years of experience is to begifted with no safeguard. 'To be weak'--there is no wiser saying amongthe utterances of the wise--'to be weak is to be miserable. ' To be afool and to know it is the extreme of misery, and this extreme does notfall to the lot of those who are extremest in folly. 

What Paul wrote that night is barely worth chronicling, and may befairly constructed by anyone who has so far pursued his story. But theExile, sitting over the embers of the fire at which he had cooked hiscoarse mid-day meal, threw himself backward on the trodden grass, and, groping behind the flap of the tent, dragged his brown canvas bagtowards him, and having made a search among its contents, found a heapof stained, crumpled and disordered papers, one of which he smoothedout upon his knee and read. It had been given to him in that firstunspeakably tranquil and happy year which Madge and he had spenttogether in Europe. It was the first blotted draft of the letter to hermother with which she had accompanied his own, and it ran thus:

'My darling Mother, 'I am putting this into a separate envelope, and on the envelope I amwriting to ask you to read Mr. Armstrong's letter to me before you readmy own. He has explained everything there, and now I must make my appealto you. I have promised that I will do nothing without your consent, and I am not very hopeful that I shall secure it. You know that I am notlight-minded, or in the habit of saying what I do not mean, and I shallonly tell you this: I love him with my whole heart and mind, and if youdecide that we are to part I shall accept your decision, but I shallnever know a happy day again. Paul is not only a great man but a goodone. '

(The reader had faced this blow so often that he was ready for it, but he had no guard against it, and it struck home so heavily that hegroaned aloud. )

'I know now, partly from what I have lately learned from other people, partly from what he told me last night, but mainly from the letter youhave read, the story of his life, and I know how profoundly unhappy ithas been. I want to comfort and sustain him, and I am not afraid to faceall the difficulties which lie before me. I can hear a clear call toduty, and I am sure that his love and mine will strengthen me to do it. You have never known me to be frivolous or foolish in my thoughts aboutsuch things as these, and until we can all three meet together, you musthave patience with me. It would be wrong and cruel on my side tothrow everything upon you, and I shall not ask you to make yourselfresponsible for what you may think my wrong-doing. There are a hundredthousand things in my heart which I cannot say, and amongst them allthere is the dreadful fear that I may have lost your respect. But youought to know the truth, and the whole truth. I have not lost my own, and I cannot believe that I shall ever have the right to be ashamed. '

There was much more than this. There were half-articulate expressions ofaffection and fear of an agony of regret for a possible severance. Andthrough it all there beamed like a star, steadfast and unobscured intempest, the loyal heart, the uncountable soul which, in whatsoevererror, knows love and fealty as its only guides. 

CHAPTER XXVII

By far the greater part of the theoretical wisdom of the world comes tous in the shape of legacies bequeathed by fools. A fool is not a personwithout knowledge or understanding--that is an ignoramus. The truefool--the only fool worthy of a wise man's contemplation--is the man whoknows and understands, and habitually refrains from acting accordingto knowledge and understanding. It is the record of the follies of suchpeople which has built up the world's wisdom. From that record we havelearned amongst many other things that the fool of understanding has oneeternal refuge from himself which he seeks with a full knowledge of thefact that the shelter it affords is illusory, and that the path by whichit leads him can only conduct him to greater dangers than those fromwhich he is striving to escape. It is too late to go back now, quoth thefool; the business must be gone through to the end. Thus if this briefdiagnosis be of any value, the root of folly is to be found in the decayof will. Few men had reason to hold this belief more firmly than PaulArmstrong, and yet even now, when whatever was best in his own naturewas more seriously engaged than it had ever been before, he went on tothe consummation of a most undoubted and most cruel wrong, on the poorpretence that every stage he passed towards it made the passage of thenext stage inevitable. 

If ever it had seemed clear to him that it was too late to retire itseemed clearer now, and indeed he had so involved himself that itbecame to him alike and equally criminal to retreat or to advance. Butby-and-by a solace for his miseries brought a solution of perplexity. Since he had taken so tremendous a responsibility upon himself, sincethere was now no escape from it without an act of brutality at the merethought of which his heart revolted, there grew up within him such aresolve and such a sense of protective tenderness as had been hithertoimpossible for him. Poor little Madge was to be victimized, but the _viadolorosa_ which she would tread unendingly should at least be strewnwith flowers, and the victim herself should be beautifully garlanded. His life should be one act of worship in return for her self-sacrifice. His devotion should offer such a challenge to the censure of the worldthat all reproach should shrink away ashamed. There never had been socomplete an atonement as he would offer. 

The nauseous pill of self-reproach was so thickly sugared and gilded bythis inspiration that in a while he was not only able to take it withoutmaking wry faces, but with an actual sense of relish and self-approval. This was naturally a good deal dashed by the coming interview withMadge's mother, about whose unknown personality there began to clustersome self-contradictory ideas. That lady would be a most unnaturalmother if she rejected the proposal he had to lay before her, and a mostunnatural mother if she accepted it. In his reflections, according tohis mood, he saw either horn of this dilemma so clearly that the othervanished from his mind, but it always assumed its proper reality again, and made its companion altogether visionary. 

When at last the fatal hour for the interview arrived, he went to therendezvous in a pitiable state of hope and fear. He had always his wholelife through carried all his eggs in one basket, and had been incapableof undertaking more than one emotional enterprise at a time. To loseMadge now would be to lose everything, and his former experiences ofthe healing powers of time--which were possibly numerous and strikingenough--were of no value to him. Obeying the directions he had received, he chartered a cab, and after a half-hour's tumultuous journey foundhimself alighting before a pretty villa in Prahran, with a well-orderedgarden in front of it full of English shrubs and flowers, amidst whichwere interspersed a number of sub-tropic plants and trees. He was shownwith no delay into a shaded room, where he had some difficulty in makingout the figure of a gray-haired lady who sat in an arm-chair to receivehim, and who did not rise at his entrance. Madge was standing near her, and as the dazzling effect of the bright sunshine of the streets passedfrom his eyes he saw the sign of many tears in the two faces before him. 

There was an embarrassing silence, which lasted for a full half-minute, and Paul stood there conscious of the mother's scrutiny, and feelinglike a criminal in the dock. The girl herself was the first who foundcourage and self-control to speak. 

'Mother dear, ' she said in an uncertain voice, 'this is Mr. Armstrong. '

The elder lady nodded, and with a slight gesture of the hand motionedthe visitor to a chair. Paul obeyed the gesture, and waited in silence. 

'You will understand, ' the lady of the house began, 'how wretchedlysorry I am to see you. ' Paul bowed an assent to this, and could butacknowledge that the unpromising exordium was natural. 'My daughter hasnever had a secret from me in her life until within the last few months. She has written of you in her letters from time to time, but neverled me to fancy that you were making love to her. I believe you are amarried man, Mr. Armstrong?'

'I am married, ' Paul responded in a voice so strangled and unlike hisown that it positively startled him. 

'I cannot help knowing, ' said Mrs. Hampton, 'that I have made a veryserious mistake in giving way to my daughter's desire to go upon thestage. But I trusted her so completely that I had no fear at all of whathas happened. You must know, Mr. Armstrong, that you have misbehavedyourself most cruelly. '

'I have said so to myself a thousand times, ' said Paul, 'and I have nodefence to offer now. '

'You have done a wicked and a cruel thing, 'pursued the mother. 'You havebrought my daughter into opposition with me for the first time in herlife, and you have filled her head with ideas which can only lead tosuffering and disgrace. '

'Forgive me, Mrs. Hampton, ' Paul said. 'I have acted precipitously andwrongly, and I am much to blame; but I have never striven for an instantto confuse Miss Hampton's mind. If I have won her love, I have done ithalf unconsciously, and it began in friendship and esteem. I ought, Iknow now, to have told her of that miserable tie which binds me; butat first I did not think it necessary to speak a word about that. A manwould have to be a rare coxcomb, ' he went on, 'to think it needful thathe should make public proclamation of a fact like that. My life has beenruined for years past, and I did not care to talk about it I did notdream of harm until harm was done. '

'I can only say, Mr. Armstrong, 'the mother answered, 'that there can beno discussion about this matter, and that I rely upon my daughter to dojustice to herself. She will learn in a little while to know that youhave done her a very serious wrong, and that will help her to live hertrouble down. '

'Madam, ' cried Paul, rising to his feet, and speaking with animpassioned swiftness, 'I beseech you to listen to me for one minuteonly; if I try to justify myself in some small degree, you willunderstand my purpose. At an age when life is opening for most men Ihad tied myself to a hopeless burden. I found myself shut out from everychance of happiness; such a thing as home I dared not even dream of. Thelaw can afford me no relief from the snare into which I have fallen;I am excluded from everything that makes life bright to other men. Myexperiences of woman's friendship have not been happy, and I had cometo the belief that I was condemned to go through life withoutcompanionship. I met your daughter; we found that our minds cametogether in whatever was best in both of us. I declare that I neverspoke one word of love to her until the night on which she made mepromise to write the letter which she sent to you. I must not--darenot--speak of scruples on your side. They are no scruples; they arestern and cruel facts which can only be surmounted by great courage. Butthey have been surmounted by others, and we believe--Madge and I bothbelieve--that we have the courage and the constancy to face them. Madgetells me that without your consent our case is hopeless. I know howunlikely it is that it should be given; but if it should be given--if byany chance you should be brought to change your present mind--I promiseyou by everything that men hold sacred that I will honour and treasureher and cherish her as my true wife in the sight of God and men, andthat the tie on my side will be not less binding, but beyond measuremore sacred because her claim appeals only to honour and manhood, and isnot enforced by law. I plead for myself, Mrs. Hampton, and you will tellme with perfect justice that you are not called upon in the remotestdegree to consult my wishes or to sympathize with any grief I may havebrought upon myself. But there is another side to the question, andyour daughter will tell you if I am right in thinking it a million timesstronger than my own. You have known her and have loved her tenderly allher life. I have known her for little more than half a year; but I amsure of this: her affections are not lightly engaged or easily castaway. '

She had raised her hand against him more than once as if to interrupthim, but he had not checked the impetuous torrent of his speech until hehad poured out all he had to say. Now, with a forlorn outward gesture ofthe hands, and a lax dropping of them to either side, he stood awaitingjudgment. 

Madge broke silence for the second time. 

'There is no need for Mr. Armstrong to stay longer now. You and I musttalk together, mother; and I will write to him to-night. '

Her face was of a striking pallor, except where the salt of tears hadscalded it; but she spoke with an entire possession of herself, and Paulwondered at her steadfastness and courage. 

'There is one thing more, 'he said: 'if you can be brought to sanctionthis union, sanctify it by coming with us both to Europe. Live withus, and help me to secure Madge's happiness. Your presence there wouldsilence every wicked tongue, and if we made no secret of the truth, butdared the world together, we should find, I know, that it would dealkindly with us. '

He stood for a moment, and, receiving no reply, bowed and walked blindlytowards a door which communicated with another room. Madge called tohim, 'This way, ' and went out into the hall before him. 

'Is this to be our last parting, I wonder?' he asked hoarsely. 

She shook her head with a weary lifting of the fine arched brows as ifto say she could find no answer, and then withdrew without word or sign, leaving him to quit the house unattended. 

He fumbled half blindly until he found his hat and cane, and then he hadto fumble for the door, for the whole place was heavily shadowed fromthe blazing sun outside, and his eyesight and his hands were each lessserviceable to him than usual. At first the broad sunshine fell uponhis eyes like a sudden vivid heat upon a wound, and in his agitationand half-blindness he found himself walking away from the quarter of thecity to which he had meant to direct his steps. Correcting this error ina minute or two, he turned and made for his hotel with a mind so shakenand vacant that he seemed to have no thoughts at all. A man who hasbeen passionately in love three times before he has begun to vergeupon middle age may easily be thought too inflammable a subject to bedeserving of much pity, but a man may be keenly in sympathy with himselfwithout enlisting the sympathy of other people, and Paul was here asalways heroically and tragically in earnest. Without seeking apologiesfor him too far afield, there is a kind of nature which burns intenselywithin itself, and will break out into violence of smoke and flame withthe intrusion of any new emotional material, just as there is a naturenot more intense which will burn equably and clearly whatever new supplyof fuel may be heaped upon it. 

There is no need to dwell upon the time of waiting, the miserableloiterings in bedroom, corridor and entrance-hall, the aimless perusalof newspapers which conveyed no meaning to the mind, the taking up andlaying down of petty occupations, and all the other signs and tokensof suspense. Time and the hour wear out the roughest day, and as Paullingered over the dessert of a barely tasted dinner, a note reached himin Madge's handwriting. It contained these words only:

'There is no change. I dare not hope, and I dare not despair. I may havenews for you to-morrow, but what it may be I must not guess. 

'M. '

This was cold comfort, but he had not expected more, and he strolledaway in sheer vacuity of heart and thought to the principal theatre ofthe city, where just then a bright comic opera was running. The lights, the gay music, the brilliantly-dressed crowd upon the stage, made noimpression on his mind, and his saturnine and gloomy face was in suchcontrast to the loud hilarity of the audience that he felt himself ablot upon the house, and at the first fall of the curtain withdrewinto the streets, where he wandered listlessly until midnight He wasfatigued, and slept heavily for some hours, but he was awake againlong before the household was astir, and suffered all the wearinessand chagrin which assailed the unoccupied mind in hours of suspense anddoubt. Another brief note reached him by the first post. 

'Mother has spoken a great deal to-night of my brother George, who, asyou know, is already in London. I do not know what to think of this, andI can scarcely dare to fancy what I should so much like to believe. Ishall not write again until I have something definite to tell you, butwhether we ever meet again or no, you shall see my whole heart for once. I love you, and I know that I shall always love you. Is it unwomanly--isit too bold to tell you this so soon? Will you think that I am tooeasily persuaded about myself? I hope not. But whatever happens, even ifI never see you or hear your voice again, I shall not change or forgetanything that has happened in all this beautiful and dreadful time. 

'All yours, and always yours, 'Madge. '

This had been brought to him as he sat dressed in his bedroom, wonderingif any message would reach him, and he had locked his door to be alonewith Fate before he had broken the seal of the wax, which bore a dovewith an olive-branch, and the motto _Esperez_. He read the tendermessage with its proclamation of unshakable fidelity thrice over, and then rising, began to pace up and down the room. A cry ofself-accusation rose to his lips. 

'My God!' he asked himself, 'what have I done? What _have_ I done?'

There was no room for doubt in all his mind. There are some truths whichmanifest themselves so clearly to the heart that they are not tobe resisted. He had found fidelity at last after all his foolishresearches. It had seemed to him the priceless jewel of the world, andhe had been willing to barter all his life for it. It was here at last, and he was so far beggared that he had no price to offer in payment forit which was worth a thousandth part its value. He was bankrupt and hadsought to buy this treasure, and must now needs go through life as aswindler. Even if his hopes were granted, what had he to pay? He knewat this moment as clearly as if he had even then been enlightened bythe events of later years that there were scores of women who would drawtheir skirts away in a real disdain of an association of which they werenot worthy. And he knew also that if his own hopes failed him he hadspoiled the one life in the whole world he would fain have done his bestto gladden. 

The next pause lasted long. Day after day went by and no message came. It is not more than justice to chronicle the fact that Paul Armstrongdid grow for once in his life to feel more for another than for himself, and if he suffered anguish, as he did, it was on Madge's account muchrather than his own. The cry her confession had wrung from him wasalways in his mind: 'What have I done? My God, what _have_ I done?'

These days were a stern discipline, but they came to an end at last. Anote reached him at the end of a week in which Mrs. Hampton presentedher compliments to Mr. Armstrong, with a request that he would call thatafternoon at five o'clock. This, of course, conveyed no certainty to himin either one direction or another, but it awoke an extraordinary tumultin his mind, and he found himself in the neighbourhood of the Prahranvilla a full hour before the time appointed. He sauntered in thebroiling heat and blinding light until he lost himself repeatedly instrange places and rang at the doors of strange houses to inquire hisway back again, quite frenzied by the fear of missing his appointment Ineffect, he arrived at the instant, and was ushered into the room he hadalready visited. Mrs. Hampton sat there, looking very pale and stern, he thought, and she rose upon his entrance and offered him her hand. Itseemed to him that this cost her a considerable effort, and she resumedher seat without a word. Madge was there also, but she exchanged nogreeting with Paul, and did not even meet his glance. The hostesstouched a bell upon the table which stood near her, and after a silentpause a trim parlourmaid brought in a tray upon which was set out thematerials for afternoon tea. Mrs. Hampton began to busy herself aboutthe tray, and Madge handed a cup of tea to Paul. 

'I may tell you, Mr. Armstrong, ' said Madge's mother, 'that, if youthink it worth while to call it winning, you have won. You have verynearly broken an old woman's heart in doing it, and you may break agirl's heart into the bargain before you have done. But my son George isin London, and I have made up my mind to let Madge go home and joinhim there. Her sister will go with her and will be her companion on thevoyage, and I shall follow so soon as I can dispose of my interests inthis country. I am uprooting my household and leaving all my friends;and I am doing it, Mr. Armstrong, for a man of whom I know next tonothing. I am almost certain that I am not acting wisely, and I amnot quite sure that I am not acting wickedly. I know out of my ownexperience of the world that marriage can make a woman miserable ifit were blessed by all the parsons living, but you are taking aresponsibility a great deal bigger than that of any husband, and Iam taking such a responsibility as no mother ought to take. And now, Madge, ' she said, 'I want to speak to Mr. Armstrong in private for oneminute. Come back when I call you. '

Madge stole obediently away, and when the door had closed behind her, Mrs. Hampton leaned forward and spoke in a half-whisper, with her handstretched out before the listener like a hovering bird. 

'I have my child's promise, ' she said, 'and I know that I can trust toit But I must have your undertaking that you will place her safely inher brother's hands, and that you will treat her with as much respect asif she were engaged to be married to you. '

'Madam, ' Paul broke out, 'I pledge myself absolutely. I could hold nopledge so sacred. '

'I shall follow, ' said Mrs. Hampton, 'within two or three months. My child will have had another half-year in which to know you and tounderstand your intentions towards her. I have no fear of her; butif you violate your promise in the slightest, you will act like ascoundrel, and I have Madge's undertaking that she will be candid withme. There is no more to be said now until we meet in England. I maytell you just this, Mr. Armstrong: we two have spent every night sinceI first saw you in each other's arms in tears. I am giving you a proofthat I think well of you on very slender grounds. If you are in theleast worthy my good opinion, you will think sometimes of what I havejust told you. '

He stooped and kissed her hand, and when she drew it away there was asingle tear upon it. 

'I had rather get the wrench over, ' she said, 'and have done with it. It will seem quite natural that I should go home and join my family inLondon, and I shall explain nothing beyond that. ' She rose and openedthe door and called her daughter by name. 'It is all over, ' she said, when Madge returned. 'I have but one hope, and that is that you maynever live to blame your mother's weakness. I should have done foryour father what you are doing if there had been any need for it, and Ishould have done it in the face of all the world. And now I want tobe alone a little to--to'--her voice faltered suddenly, and her eyesbrimmed with tears--'to say my prayers, and, if I have done wrong, tobeg God's forgiveness. Go out into the garden, children, and leave mehere. '

So into the wide garden, cooled with the shade of Englishfruit-trees--peach and pear and plum and apple--the two wandered, fartoo disturbed by happiness as yet to be content But in Paul's hearta new well of tenderness began to open--a spring of tenderness andyearning which seemed to overflow every cranny of his nature. To pay forthis, to scrape up from the bankrupt remnants of life something by wayof thanks-offering, to devote himself heart and soul and mind and bodyto that one aim, to discipline himself to a lofty and unresting ambitionfor that one aim's sake, to win a fortune, to win a solid renown inwhich his love should shine reflected and sit enshrined--all this waswith him in one confused conglomerate of gratitude and hope and love. 

'No woman, ' he said, 'ever showed a greater trust I shall never beworthy of it, but it shall be the one endless study of my life to beless unworthy. '

He took her, unresisting, to his arms. Their lips met for the firsttime, and two souls seemed to tremble into one. 

CHAPTER XXVIII

Paul knew that Madge and he were to have a travelling companion on thevoyage, and that the companion was to be Madge's sister, but he did notmeet her until he stepped aboard the steamer bound for Tilbury Docksfrom Adelaide. Her name was Phyllis, but for some reason or no reasonher own small world had elected to call her Bill, and to that name onlyshe gave willing answer, unless she were flattered from the memory ofshort frocks by being addressed as Miss Hampton. She was a child ofastonishing beauty, with eyes like stars and the face of a young angel, and people who did not know her received an impression of sanctity andinnocence when they beheld her. A complete knowledge of her characterrevealed her as an incorrigible imp, utterly without a sense of dangerunder any circumstances her experience had so far led her to encounter, and, apart from that, a compound--a furious compound on either side--ofjealousy and affection. It would, perhaps, be more just to say affectionand jealousy, for Bill's heart was hot with love for those for whomshe cared at all, and her jealousy was but the natural product ofher affection. It was not until the boat reached Colombo that Billcondescended to accept a solitary advance from Paul. Until then sheresented every minute he spent in her sister's society and every wordhe addressed to her, but once enlisted she became a sort oflovers' watch-dog, and held all intruders at bay. 

The steamer was lying for four-and-twenty hours in the harbour atColombo, and everybody who was at liberty was delighted to snatch a dayashore. Paul and Madge and Bill made the customary globe-trotter's roundThey lunched at the hotel at Point de Galles, saw the usual conjurersand snake-charmers, drove to the usual Buddhist temple, dined in town, and went aboard again. Bill, who had hitherto proved an unmitigatednuisance, behaved with a fine discretion throughout the day, and it wasonly half an hour after her appointed bedtime that she pointedly madePaul aware of her existence. He was lounging in a deck-chair and smokinga cigar when the young lady took a place at his side. 

'Look here, ' she said, with the boyish off-handedness which belonged toher. 'I want you and me to be friends. '

'Why not?' said Paul. 'I'm agreeable if you are. '

'Have I been good to-day?' the imp asked, laying her head upon hisshoulder, and turning up those starlike, unfathomable eyes of hers. 

'You have behaved like an angel for temper, ' Paul responded, 'and likean elderly diplomatist for discretion. '

'You are satisfied?' said Bill, rolling her golden curls in herTam-o'-Shanter cap. 

'I am not merely satisfied, William, ' Paul responded. 'Words fail me toexpress my gratitude. '

'Don't you begin to chaff me, ' said Bill. 'If you do, I shan't make thebargain I was going to. '

'I assure you, ' said Paul, 'that I was never more serious in my life. I swear it by the most sacred of man's possessions--gold. This is anEnglish sovereign. '

'For me?' asked Bill, her lambent eyes regarding him as if no thought ofgreed or bribery could touch the angel's soul which shone through them. 

'For you, ' said Paul. 

'Right oh!' Bill replied, biting at the coin with her milk-white teeth, and then bestowing it in her pocket. 'Now, if you'll promise never toleave Madge alone about one thing, I'll be as good--as good--you can'tguess anything as good as I'll be. '

'There's no such thing as a one-sided bargain, ' said Paul, 'and youmust let me know what you expect from me in answer to this astonishingconfession. '

'Don't you chaff me, ' said Bill, still rolling her golden head upon hisshoulder, and beaming on him with those eyes of innocence. 'I might behaving a sweetheart of my own one of these days. Don't you think that'slikely?'

'I don't mind betting, ' Paul answered, 'that you'll have fifty--'

Bill sat up straight in her deck-chair, clasped her hands with avivid gesture, and looked skyward with a glance pure as the heavensthemselves. 

'What a lark!' she breathed--' oh, what a lark! Fifty? Do you thinkthey'd all come together?' she asked with a sudden eagerness, as if herlife depended on the answer. 

'Say, five at a time, ' said Paul--'ten per annum; that will give youfive years to deal with them, beginning, we will say, about two yearsfrom now. '

'But that's where I want to come in, ' said Bill 'I want to begin atonce. '

'There is no need to be in a hurry, ' Paul answered. 'There is plenty oftime before you. '

'Oh yes, ' said Bill thoughtfully. 'But, then, you see, I don't want towaste any of it. Now, I just want to tell you what I want you to do forme. I want you to din it into Madge's ears, morning, noon, and night, that it's time that I should do my hair up and wear long frocks. '

'And if I undertake that mission?' Paul asked

'We're friends, ' cried Bill, rising and holding out her hand 'You'llsee, ' she added, 'I can be just as nice as I have been nasty. '

From this time forward the voyage was like a happy dream. Suez andNaples and Gibraltar were full of interest and wonder to the untravelledMadge, and the Mediterranean was smooth as a pond through all the lovelydays and nights of the European spring. The Bay of Biscay so far beliedits stormy reputation that there was scarcely a heave upon its surface, and at last the shores of England came in sight, sacred and beautiful tothe eyes of a girl born and bred in the Colonies. Then came Tilbury, andat Tilbury brother George was waiting to bid his sisters welcome. 

Paul was happy and content enough to be in the mood to like anybody andeverybody, and an inward suggestion that he was not favourablyimpressed with brother George presented itself only to be discounted andignominiously turned out of doors at once. As Tennyson has said, 'It isnot true that second thoughts are best, but first and third, which area riper first. ' Brother George was undeniably good-looking after hisfashion. He was well set up and a little over the middle height. He wasvery perfectly groomed, and had very fine, regular, white teeth which hewas a little too fond of showing in a rather mechanical smile. His eyeswere rather too closely set either for beauty or for character, and hismanner was a trifle over-suave. 

Bill, who had been promoted after her own desires, fell upon him likean avalanche, and being at first unrecognised in her aspect of grown-upyoung lady, embarrassed brother George considerably. But there was sucha laugh at this as set all four in high spirits, and there were so manyquestions and answers that the time of waiting for the train passed in aflash. 

The quartette lunched together at a restaurant in town, and brotherGeorge carried off his sisters to the apartments he had secured for themin the house in which he lodged. But before he went a little episode, which was afterwards renewed in various forms until it grew monotonous, occurred. Brother George naturally played the host at the restaurant, and spread a generous and delicate feast, but on the presentation of thebill was struck through with chagrin at the discovery that he had losthis purse. That he had brought it from home was beyond cavil in hismind, for had he not paid his cab-fare and the other expenses from it?It was an awkward beginning of an acquaintance, as he allowed withan embarrassed smile, but if Mr. Armstrong would be his banker for aday---- Mr. Armstrong was happy enough to be willing to be any man'sbanker at that moment, and brother George borrowed a ten-pound notewith many expressions of regret and obligation. He forgot this littletransaction so completely, that it was not so much as mentioned for ayear or two; but brother George gave clear proof later on that he wasnot the man to leave unworked any social patch which at the first strokeof the hoe would yield so promising a little harvest, and first and lastquite a handsome income in a small way accrued to brother George at theexpense of brother George's sister's lover. 

It is not when a man is happy, and the errors of his life have not yetyielded their inevitable crop of suffering, that conscience bestirsitself. Things went smoothly with Paul Armstrong. His plays prosperedand yielded rich returns. A volume of verses gave him something morethan the reputation of the average minor poet There was no more popularman at his clubs than he, and, if he had cared for it, he might havebeen something of a social lion. As it was, he met many notable peopleon terms of intimacy, and reckoned himself as rich in friendships as anyman alive; and, when the six months' probation was over, he and Madgewent quietly away together to spend in Paris a honeymoon which had notbeen consecrated by any rite of the Church, and entered upon a weddedlife which was not even sanctioned by the registrar. Madge becameinformally Mrs. Paul Armstrong, and, under that style and title, wasintroduced to a dozen of Paul's intimates who were in no doubt as tothe facts of the case, and to hundreds of other people who acceptedthe pretence without a thought of inquiry. The whole family livedtogether--Madge and her mother, Bill and brother George--and things wentsmoothly for two or three prosperous and happy years. In mere prosperityand happiness there is little to record, but the heart of the Exile inthe mountains yearned over that vanished time in a bitter and unavailingregret. How sweet it had been! With how tender a gradation the firstpassion of delight in possession had softened into friendship, andthe calm love of happily wedded people, and the delicious intimatecamaraderie which springs of the unbroken companionship of board andbed, and the sharing of every little confidence of life!

The past was obliterated; it was wiped out as cleanly as if it hadbeen written on a slate, and a wet sponge had been passed over it. Practically it was forgotten, but the obliterated record sprang to lightagain with an unlooked-for, dreadful swiftness. 

Bill by this time had developed into Miss Hampton, and was a grown-upyoung lady in real earnest, with lovers by the dozen. She and Paul werechums, and she had no secrets from him. Her face alone was bright enoughto have made sunshine in any house; but it happened one day that Paul, returning from rehearsal, found it blank with astonishment and pain. Shehad evidently been waiting and listening for him; for at the instant atwhich his latch-key clicked in the lock, she threw the hall-door open, and, as he entered, closed it silently, almost stealthily, behind him. Then, with her hand upon his shoulder, she led him to his study--theplainly furnished little workshop which looked out on the trim suburbangarden. This was the room in which he had spent the richest and mostprosperous hours of the only tranquil years he had known, and it washere that he was fated to meet the death-blow to his happiness. 

'What is the matter?' he asked--'what has happened? Where is Madge?'

'She is in her own room, ' Phyllis answered, her eyes wide with terror, and her pretty Australian roses all vanished from her cheeks. 'Motherand she have locked themselves in together, and Madge is crying herheart out Oh, Paul, Paul, ' she cried, clasping her hands, 'what have youdone?'

With that she broke into sudden weeping, and Paul stood amazed, with achill terror, as yet unrecognised, clutching at his heart. 

'What have I done?' he echoed--' what _have_ I done, dear?'

'Done!' she flashed at him, drawing her hands away from her streamingeyes, and throwing them passionately apart 'Oh, Paul, we have all lovedyou so, and honoured you so, and now----'

She cast herself into an arm-chair with a reckless abandonment, andcried bitterly. The chill hand at Paul's heart grew icy, but even yet hedid not recognise his fear. 

'For mercy's sake, Bill, tell me!'

She flashed to her feet in a second, and looked at him from head to footwith a burning scorn. 

'Never call me by that name again, 'she said, through her clenched whiteteeth. 'You ask me what you have done? You have ruined Madge's life andbroken her heart, and mine, ' she cried, striking her clenched hand uponher breast--'and mine!'

She went raging up and down the room like a lovely fury, her hairdisordered, her eyes flashing, and her cheeks new-crimsoned with anger. 

'Tell me--tell me, ' he besought her, 'what has happened. '

'This has happened, ' she answered, with a sudden tense quiet: 'your wifehas been here--your wife, an overdressed, painted French trull, so drunkthat she could barely stand. '

'Good God!' said Paul. He laid his hand upon a bookshelf, and stoodswaying there as if he were about to fall. 'What brought her here?' hegasped. 

'You don't deny it?' said the girl, speaking with the same tense quietas before. 

'No, no, ' said Paul, 'I don't deny it What brought her here?'

'She came to assert her rights, ' said Phyllis, with a bitingindignation. 'She came to warn us that she was setting the law inmotion, and that she would drag Madge's name--you hear? Madge'sname--through the mud of the Divorce Court; and only this morning Iloved you, and respected you, and believed in you. '

'I must see Madge, ' said Paul. 

'You shall not!' she cried, flashing to the door, and setting her backagainst it. 

But the door was opened from without, and Madge was here. Paul openedhis arms to her, and she laid her pale face against his breast. 

'I have feared it always, ' she said, 'and it has come at last. My poor, poor Paul 'how you must have suffered!'

'Your poor, poor Paul, ' said Phyllis, in a voice of bitterest disdain, 'is a very fitting object for your pity. My personal recommendation isthat your poor Paul should drown himself. '

'You don't understand, dear, ' Madge answered her--' you don'tunderstand. Paul has done me no wrong. We did not take you into ourconfidence, because you were too young; but there has been no disguiseamong the rest of us. I knew of this before Paul and I resolved to spendour lives together. Mother knew it; George knew it; you know it now, dear. Will it part us, Bill?'

The girl's face changed from angry scorn to pure bewilderment, and thenagain to pity. 

'Come here, Madge, ' she cried, opening her arms wide, and speaking witha sobbing voice; 'come here. '

She hugged her sister fiercely, and cried over her. 

'I can understand, ' she said--'I can understand. ' She repeated the wordsagain and again. 'It isn't a pretty thing to have to face; but it's yourtrouble, darling, and we must stick together. As for me, ' she added, with a new outbreak of tears, which a laugh made half hysteric, 'I shallstick like wax. '

Annette's threat was no _brutum fulmen_, as the society newspapers soonbegan to show. Paragraphs appeared here and there indicating that theunprosperous matrimonial affairs of a popular playwright would shortlyexcite the interest of the public; and one day Paul, driving alongthe Strand, and finding his cab momentarily arrested by a block in thetraffic, was frozen to the marrow by the sight of a newspaper placardwhich by way of sole contents bore the words, 'Who is the real Mrs. Armstrong? Divorce proceedings instituted against a famous playwright. '

At first his thought was: 'Some enemy has done this;' but he knew thejournal and most of the influential members of its staff, and he couldnot guess that he counted an enemy among them. He had dined with theeditor a week before at the same club-table, and had found him not lesscordial than he had ever been before. 

'I suppose the man is justified, ' Paul thought when the power ofreflection returned to him. 'The whole story is on its way to the publicears, and neither he nor any other man can stop it It's his business tobe first in the field with it if he can. '

He turned his cab homeward, for he had no heart to face the people hehad meant to meet, and on his way, just to gratify the natural instinctof self-torture, he bought a copy of the journal, and read there thatMessrs. Berry and Smythe, the well-known firm of solicitors in Lincoln'sInn, had that day filed a petition for divorce against Mr. PaulArmstrong, the well-known dramatist, and that remarkable revelationswere expected. 

For these past few years home had seemed Paradise. He had never for anyfraction of an instant wavered in his love, and use and wont had helpedto set a seal of sanctity upon it With the passage of the months andyears, with the growth of many intimate acquaintanceships, and not a fewcloser and dearer ties about him, home had grown to be as sacred tohim as if the union on which it was founded had been blessed by allthe priests of all the churches. No purer and more tranquil spirit ofaffectionate loyalty had breathed in any home in England, and now thebalm of his soul was vitriol, and that which had been the bread of lifeto him was steeped in gall and wormwood. The very honest purpose of hislife, his constant and sober pursuit of a worthy fame, recoiled upon himhere as if it had been in itself a crime. Not to have striven, to havebeen content with a dull obscurity of fortune, to have wasted his daysin idleness and his nights in foolish revel, would have seemed a happiercourse to him. And as it was the better part of life which chastisedhim most cruelly, so it was the best and worthiest affection he had everknown which turned upon him with a cup of poison in its hand and badehim drink it to the dregs. Life and the world are so made that onlythe most desolate can suffer by themselves. If by any trick of magic hecould have borne his chastisement alone, he would have accepted it withsomething like a scorn of fate. 

He had discharged his cab within a hundred yards of home, and had readthe stinging paragraph beneath a lamp-post almost at his own doorstep. He entered the house noiselessly, and from Madge's music-room therefloated down to him the sound of Chopin's great Funeral March. Sheplayed this and some other favourites of her own as few musicians playthem, for music had been the one delight of her life, and but for thefleeting theatrical ambition, and for Paul, she might have become famousas an executant He stood in the hall to listen as the alternate wail andtriumph filled and thrilled the air, and thinking that she was alone, hestrolled silently to his dressing-room, and then in smoking-jacket andslippers went to join her. Except for the glow of the fire the room wasin darkness, and a voice which came out of the darkness startled him. 

'I had prepared myself to wait for hours, ' said the voice; and Ralstonemerged from a shadowed corner with an outstretched hand--Ralston, withhis big sagacious head, all unexpectedly silver-white, and moustacheand beard of snow, but with the same old hand-grip, and the samehalf-dictatorial, half-affectionate tone. Madge struck a resolvingchord, rose, and with a kiss and a whispered 'I know the news, ' slippedfrom the room before he could make an effort to detain her. 

'Can we have a light on things?' said Ralston, in that hoarsely musicalgrowl of his. He struck a match as he spoke, and lit the gas, and thenmarched sturdily to the door and closed it. 'You know me--you, PaulArmstrong, ' he said, turning to face the master of the house. 'I havespent a fighting life, but I have never known a downright murderous fittill now. Have you seen this?'

'Yes, ' said Paul, ' I've seen it. '

The journal Ralston haled from his pocket and held towards him was afellow to that he had just thrown away in the street. 

'The carrion-hunting hound!' cried Ralston; 'I read this, and I camestraight here. I knew there was no hiding it from your wife. I say "yourwife, " and I hold by the word until faith and friendship are as dead aslast year's leaves. She had to see it, Armstrong, and it was better thata friend should bring it to her. Now, mind you, we who know her rallyround. We may be only two or three, but we are a fighting colony. I amby way of being a cleric, but I don't always cut my linguistic coatto suit my cloth, and my word at this hour is, Damn the bestialecclesiastical bigotry which seeks to tie the bodies of men and womentogether when their souls are sundered! Here is a man reported withinthis last fortnight as having been arrested the day after his marriageat a registrar's office, and as having been since then condemned topenal servitude for life. Is that fact a relief to the woman who washis victim? Not a bit of it Let her contract a new marriage, and the lawwill indict her for bigamy. She must live in loneliness, or be classedwith harlots. Here is a man I know, an outlying parishioner of mine, whose wife is hopelessly and incurably insane. Is there any releasefrom the marriage-bond for him? Not a chance of it. There are a hundredthousand people of this country, men and women, so saturated anddemoralized with drink that only an overwhelming Christian pity couldbear to touch 'em with a barge-pole--husbands intolerable to wives, wives intolerable to husbands, live corpses with corruption distillingat each pore--and this filthy marriage law, which is the last relicof Christianity's worst barbarism, binds quick and wholesome flesh tostinking death, and bids them fester together in the legal pit. I setone honest man's curse upon that shameless and abominable creed, and Iwould not take my hand away from my seal though I went to the stake forsetting it there. '

He broke into a stormy laugh, and clapped Paul boisterously upon theshoulder. 

'And now, ' he said, with a sudden change of voice and manner, 'that wehave got rid of the froth of passion, let me offer you one cup of thesound wine of reason. Fight this business through, Paul Armstrong. Don'tgive way by half a barleycorn. The story, as it tells against you, willbe made known. The truth, as your friends know it, must come out aswell. If I had time to read up for the bar, and pass my examinations, I would ask nothing better than to be your counsel. Face the music, Armstrong, and you may help the cause of justice. It is time that thisunion of quick and dead were done with, and that the ecclesiastic fetishrag which makes its wickedness respectable were burned. '

CHAPTER XXIX

There were the usual legal delays, and public interest in the case wouldhave slumbered had it not been for the newspapers. But a steady-goingEngland, on whose John Bull qualities of reticence and solidity we havebeen prone to pride ourselves, does occasionally betray a quicker andmore curious spirit than it commonly desires to be credited with, andthere is no pole to stir it from its hybernating sleep which reachesso far and punches the fat ribs so soundly as the pole of scandal. Thepress was in one of its occasional Jedburgh justice moods, and was readyto afford impartial trial when it had hanged its victim, and not before. 

Paul Armstrong was adjudged a Lothario of the wickeder sort, a purposedbetrayer of hearts and destinies. 'If, as the complainant in thismelancholy case avers, ' or 'If, as the depositions already filed wouldappear to indicate, ' the defendant was an unlimited rascal; and if thatwere so, he _was_ an unlimited rascal, and there an end. A thousandmen file past the bar of official and unofficial justice without muchcomment They are branded, more or less justly, in accord with theirdeserts, and having been first ignored, are altogether forgotten. Butevery here and there, for some scarcely notable peculiarity, a man orwoman is fairly hunted down by the moral pack, mangled and branded, as it were, on a noble moral speculation, and left to quiver for theremnant of his lifetime. 

In these days Paul Armstrong pondered much and often over the saying ofthe man who had been his master in the arts of fiction and the drama:'Men reserve their bitterest repentances for their best actions. ' Ifonly he had played the man of the world towards Annette instead ofplaying the Quixote, how different a position he would have held towardsthe moral pack! To marry your mistress under no compulsion, but merelyin the desire to relieve the last sufferings of a parting soul, tosacrifice a year or two of pulsing ambitions to this act of charity, hadnot in itself appeared an act of wickedness. Nor had it seemed whollyintolerable from his own point of view that, after a struggleprolonged beyond the needs of decency, he should have run away from thecontaminations which belonged inevitably to a life spent in the societyof an incurable dipsomaniac. Nor could he as yet blame himself overmuchif he had at last yielded to the claims of that domesticity whichoffered him involuntary shelter: the invitations of a home of love andconfidence; an atmosphere in which no cloud hovered which could not bepuffed away in a cloud of tobacco smoke, or shattered into nothing bythe clear breath of a single friendly laugh. It was not quite anhonest view of the case--no man surveying his own circumstances is everentirely honest--but to himself the question was convincing, Who wouldnot have hastened from that hell to find this heaven?

Ralston at least stood undauntedly by him, and inveighed with angeragainst what he proclaimed to be an unnatural law. 

'Do you know Constantinople?' he asked one evening as the two sattogether. 

'Yes, ' Paul answered; 'I know it tourist fashion. I stayed a week thereonce. '

'You remember the tribes of yellow dogs who make night hideous?' Ralstonquestioned. 'They hunt in packs, and eat any raffle of the streets whichmay be thrown to 'em. I've seen 'em wolfing cardboard boxes that havebeen swept out of the drapers' shops in the early morning, the poorhungry devils! They'd fall across any intruder from another parishand crunch him hide and bones. But they never attack one another, andthere's no record of one yellow dog who tried to eat another yellow dogwho belonged to the same gang. There's a mighty difference between thecanine and the human, eh? You're one of our breed, Armstrong--yellowdog of the yellow dog quill-driving tribe--and your comrades haven't thegentlemanly instinct of the Constantinople cur. They get round you andworry you, ' he declaimed, rising, and striding about the room, withan occasional double-handed clutch at the lapels of his coat, his onegesture of rage--'they worry you for their twopenny-halfpenny mouthfulof lineage, and they'd gnaw their own mothers out of their coffins forthe same reward. '

'As bad as that?' asked Paul, with a dreary little laugh. 

'As bad as that, sir!' Ralston declared wrathfully, though he toolaughed a moment at his own vehemence. 

But the fighting Ralston was on fire with his theme, and returned to itoften. 

'You had a namesake once, ' he said, 'who was an Apostle. He talked witha centurion, who told him, "With a great price I obtained this freedom. "With a great price! I wonder if it were like the price we pay for whatwe call the freedom of the press. I fought for that in my own day, fought and suffered, and paid in coin and heart's blood, and I haveasked myself since if I am glad or sorry that I won. Are we the betterfor having bred this vulture crowd?'

The hot heart of the advocate warmed the cold heart of the sufferer fromtime to time, but neither long nor often. The coals of anger willnot burn freely on any honest hearth when the conscience of the ownercompels him to turn down the damper every other minute. 

The cause in the Law Courts lingered, and the seasons changed Paul'sfriendships stopped away--not by ones or twos, but in battalions. Poorlittle Madge could go nowhere, and ceased to wish to go anywhere, tofind herself brushing against offended skirts whose owners drew themaway from pollution. 

'In all my foolish life, ' Paul told Ralston, 'I have known onethoroughly good woman. '

'Lucky bargee!' said Ralston. 'Not one man in a million has yourchance. '

'One woman, ' Paul went on, 'as pure as a daisy, who could surrender herwhole life for the sake of love--a creature who never spoke an unkindword or thought an unkind thought of any living sister, or dead one, forthat matter. '

He choked. He could go no further for the time. 

'I know her, ' said Ralston--'I know her. '

'And women, ' said Paul, 'who are not worthy to unlace her shoescold-shoulder her, and look at her with contempt. I dare cry the historyof two or three on the housetops. '

'And if you dared--what good?' Ralston asked. 

'There is no God, ' cried Paul; 'there is no justice in the world. '

'There is a God, ' said Ralston, 'and there is very little justice. Whoare we that we should cry out for justice? We are here to learn. Andlook here, Paul Armstrong: the biggest and hardest lesson set us is tolearn long views. '

'Long views?' said Paul, staring at him. 

'Long views, ' Ralston repeated steadily. 'I know what I'm talking aboutWe are learners, and learners in the lowest class. That's nonsense, ' hecorrected himself, 'and I hate exaggeration, though I am guilty of it ahundred times a day. But we are learners, and, whether our class is highor low makes little difference to the fact that there is much to learn. The man who is the stronger and the better for his trouble is thescholar who goes to the top of the class. Look ahead, man, and askwhether Paul Armstrong is to be a firmer or a flabbier small element inGod's great universe for what is now befalling him. Your own action haschosen you to be a sort of martyr in a big cause. We are on the fringeof the sex-fight, so far; but before our children are grown men andwomen, the battle will be in full swing. We have got to settle thisquestion of the sanctity of marriage. What a certain kind of animalcalls "free love" is of the beast and bestial; but a reasoned and loyallove between man and woman is a beautiful and noble thing, and it is notthe less beautiful and noble because it has not been sanctified bythe payment of seven-and-sixpence to the Inland Revenue. You have aprinciple to fight for, and you have Madge to fight for. By the God Iworship, ' he cried, in sudden wrath, 'I would fight for the principleagainst death itself, and for a woman like Madge I would die at a slowfire. '

'But, Ralston, ' Paul besought him--'Ralston, you don't understand. Youfind animation there; but it is there my weakness lies. Do you think Icare for myself?'

'Of course I do, ' said Ralston. 'If you hadn't cared for yourself youwould never have brought a child like Madge into such an evil as this. '

'That's true enough, ' said Paul; 'that's truth itself. '

He laid his elbows on the table, and leaned his head disconsolately uponhis hands. His companion shook him by the shoulder in the rough amitywhich men use with one another. 

'Look here, Armstrong: willy-nilly, you're the champion of a greatcause, and you have the sweetest woman in the world to fight for. Don'tflaunt the flag insolently--in the present temper of the public thatwill never do--but stand by it all the same. So far as you're concerned, Armstrong, it's a selfish accident that turns you Squire of Dames; butyou're in the tourney now, and you've got to behave respectably. '

'If you mean by behaving respectably that I've got to hold by Madge, andlive all this down if I can, and do my best to flutter through life on abroken wing, I am with you. '

'I mean that, and more than that, ' said Ralston. 'Turn your next play onthis theme; turn your next book on it. Never mind the odium of seemingto fight a selfish battle; you're past that now. Your story is thatthe man mires his feet in the ordinary manner, that he makes a fool ofhimself in the usual fashion; that the saving woman comes to him pureand clean, and does her healthful, beautiful work for him at such acost as you know of. Whether her life is tragedy modified or tragedyunalloyed rests with the story-teller; but you're there to champion thatinnocence. '

'You recoiled from a little tube of manuscript once, ' said Paul, 'as ifit had held a poisonous explosive. Do you remember? Ralston laughed andnodded. 'If you're bolder now, I'll show you something. '

'I am bolder now, ' said Ralston; and Paul, leaving him for a moment, raced upstairs, and, having made a brief search in his study, returnedwith a big sheaf of type-written matter in his hand. 

'There is my case, ' he said. 'Old Darco calls it madness to challengesuch a truth in such a fashion. Weldon will take the piece and play it. He will produce it anonymously by preference, but as I choose. I chooseto have my fling at the world, and to take it without disguise. Tell mewhen you have read it. '

'I am your man, ' cried Ralston, catching at the paper. 

'I don't know whether I have done well or ill in doing it, ' said Paul. 'Isuppose there never was a writer who didn't hawk the secret of his soulabout the streets--if he had a secret and a soul. '

'More of this hereafter, ' Ralston said, and bore away the manuscriptthat night. 

There had been little need to spur Paul to courage on this matter. Thewiser thing might have been to counsel him to moderation. He had set hisback to his corner already. 

But just hereabouts a small thing happened which had, as small thingswill, an undue influence upon his mind. There was loose on Fleet Streetat this time an extraordinary devil of a man of genius whose appropriatereal name was Wild-blood. 

He had dropped that too characteristic patronymic, and had renamedhimself, with a touch of mocking cynicism which only those who knewhim understood, Wilder. What scholarship was possible for six- orseven-and-twenty was his. That he was more or less crazed with muchlearning and more drink was generally understood of him. Men of smalloriginality and some memory said of Wilder that he could knock a slangsong into Greek iambics in five minutes. His most fervent admirers were, perhaps, poor judges of Greek iambics. Fleet Street may at one time havebeen familiar with that kind of thing, but is not nowadays. But Wilder'sreputation soared on higher voices than those of the journalisticcrowd, and he was, beyond dispute, a person of genius--one of those odddistorted bundles of broken nerve who help to establish the theory thatfine thinking, a noble vocabulary, deep scholarship, and foolish livingare neighbours and hard to separate. 

With this very queer fish Paul had established a certain intimacy. Theman, as a matter of course, was periodically hard up, and he had cometo the stage when it was here five shillings and there half a crown asa charge for the charm of his society with the most casual ofacquaintances. He made his breakfast on a salt-spoonful of cayenne and aglass of brandy, and he passed from intellectual godhood to a hiccupingimbecility in a breath. At from four to five in the afternoon he carriedhis lofty head and a prematurely pimpled countenance into some unwatchedobscurity. He habitually emerged from this hiding-place within an hourof midnight, and thence his flight was an owl's. 

The social chill which surrounded Paul's household had grown arctic, andMadge, Mrs. Hampton, and Phyllis had all been bundled away to Ostend, in a sunken identity. The house in which the cause of disturbance hadso long been unreasonably happy was closed. The servants had beendismissed, and a commissionaire and his wife lived in the basement. Paulhad taken lodgings at a Fleet Street hostelry, and thither in the deadof night came Wilder and other night-birds, to the much disturbance ofthe porter at the grille. It chanced one night that Wilder came witha declaration that he had found his soul's salvation through beer. Hisstream of life should flow, so he declared, through Burton-on-Trent. Hewas done with noxious liquids, and proposed to bathe his spirit clearin the vats of Bass and Allsopp. Wilder was-not outside the sphere ofreformation, and Guinness would share with the others the credit of hisuprising. He drank a tankard or two of each and either as an evidence ofgood faith, and he left an hour after midnight, more sober than Paul hadever known him at such a time. He had talked a heap of brilliant senseand nonsense, and had borrowed two half crowns. Paul went to bedalmost regretting the loss of even this mad companionship, and tossed, half-dozing, on a shifting sea of troubles. Suddenly, when he had lostall consciousness of time and place, there came a thundering summonsat his door, and in answer to his startled call there came in a hugepoliceman in a greatcoat and a helmet, and behind him a quaking waiterwith a candle in a glass funnel. The officer appealed to a piece ofpaper he carried in his hand. 

'Paul Armstrong, ' he read, with a brogue as wide as the ocean. 'Is thatyou?'

'That is my name, ' said Paul. 

'Then ye're wanted, ' said the official. 

'Wanted? Where?'

'At Bow Street, 'the official answered stolidly. 

Paul rolled round to consult his watch. It indicated three o'clockwithin a minute or so. 

'What on earth am I wanted at Bow Street for?' he asked in greatbewilderment. 

'Party of the name of Wilder, ' said the officer, referring once more tohis paper. 'Says you're his first cousin, and that you'll bail him out. '

'Wilder? First cousin?' His mind was fogged with broken sleep. 'Oh, thatfellow! What has he been doing?'

The man in uniform consulted his paper again, and read out:

'Dhrunk and dishortherly. '

'And he had the cheek to send you here and to say that I'm his firstcousin?'

'Yes, sorr. '

'Well, ' said Paul, with a brief laugh, 'I don't know that I've anythingbetter to do. Wait downstairs whilst I dress, and have a cab ready ifyou can find one. Give the officer a drink, waiter. '

In a weary fashion he was tickled by this incident; and when he hadmade a hasty toilette he descended, and was driven to Bow Street, where, after a spell of waiting, he was introduced to his 'first cousin' in acorridor. 

'What's all this, Wilder?'he asked. 

'It's this, me man, ' said Wilder. 'I took a fancy to declaim a favouritelittle bit of Euripides in Endell Street, and a uniformed ass came alongand ran me in. And being penniless as I am----'

'Penniless!' said Paul 'You had five shillings to my certain knowledge. '

'Oh, I had, ' said Wilder, 'but I met some poor devil that was harderup than I am--at least, he said so--and I bestowed it on him with myblessing. '

'We know your name, Mr. Armstrong, ' said the officer who had the man ofgenius in his charge, 'and if you'll be surety that the gentleman will behere at ten o'clock this morning, he can go. '

'You want my word for that only?'

'That will be enough, sir. '

'Very well; he shall be here. '

'He shall be here, ' said Wilder, 'and the idiot who brought him hereshall have a lesson. '

'You take my tip, sir, ' said the officer. 'You was pretty fairlyfull, and you was very noisy, and you cracked on pretty awful. Talkof eloquence, ' said the officer, interrupting himself to turn to Paul. 'I've heard a thing or two in my time--it comes here, you know, sir, inthe way of business--but I've never met anybody as could hold a candleto this gentleman. '

Wilder smiled, and pulled up a dirty apology for a collar with an air ofself-applause. 

'But what I want to advise is this, sir, ' said the officer genially:'Say nothing, and it's five bob and costs, and there's an end of it;make a song about it, and it's forty shillings or a month, and it getsinto all the papers. For this is a shop, sir, where the more you saythe more you pay. And that's the truth about justice in a general waythroughout the land, and so you'll find, sir, if you'll take the troubleto look into it. The more you say the more you pay. That's the fruitof thirty years' experience, sir, and you'll find it pretty sound Saynothing, and a little thing blows over. Make a talk about it, and itlasts, as you might say, for ever. The more you say, the more you pay. '

Paul was not greatly inclined to idle superstition as a general thing, but the thrice-repeated saying stuck to him. The fancy came into hismind that he had been aroused thus oddly in the middle of the night onpurpose that he might hear it, and have it dinned into his mind byforce of repetition. There was no reason under heaven why he shouldhave attended the insolent call of Mr. Wilder, and he had not evenbeen conscious of a kindly impulse towards the man. There was a sort ofprovidential finger laid upon his own sense here. Of course, he deniedthe belief, but it was active with him none the less. It was so activethat he resigned all the preparations he had contemplated for his owndefence, and absented himself from London. 

During his absence the case of Armstrong against Armstrong was heard inthe Divorce Court. A Boanerges of a Queen's Counsel was entrusted withAnnette's side of it. He made a speech, and that speech was reported ina hundred journals. Had it been true, the unlucky Paul would have been acomrade for the devil, but there was no defence, and it passed as true. Paul read the speech, and came tearing back express to London in atumult of rage and resentment. He was a day behind the fair, and coulddo nothing. The world seemed to ring of him, and he had abandoned allmeans of redress. He was publicly shunned, and shunned for ever. 

So fruitful may be the smallest accident of life that this chanceepisode with the drunken Wilder and the foolish resolve to which it ledseemed to have darkened Paul's skies for good and all. He might havebeaten Boanerges on every point save one, and have come out of the fightwith but one wound in place of a hundred, and that very far from fatalNow he felt stabbed to death, and seemed to bleed at every pore. 

The manager who was under contract with him to produce the comedy thefirst manuscript of which he had placed in Ralston's hands, called tosee him, and advised strongly against production--at all events, for thepresent The suffering fool was furious, and would listen to no reason. 

'I put three thousand pounds behind it, ' he cried. 'I give you that asa guarantee. The play is a good play, and the public will listen to it, slander or no slander. '

Playgoers remember the first nightof 'Myra'--the yells, howls, whistles, cat-calls which made the whole three acts a pantomime in dumb show. Themoral tiger was awake. 

The play ran in spite of all and everything, and ran at the author'scost It came to a sudden end in the middle of a week, when the author'slast cheque was returned with an official 'N. S. ' marked upon it Thelately prosperous dramatist was ruined. 

Thus the man and his memories are growing nearer and nearer to eachother, and very soon they must meet. There is yet but a year to traversebefore the Dreamer and the Dream stand face to lace with actual Fact andTime. It is a year of frustrated hope and barren effort, of surrendersand shames. It is a year of anonymity for one thing, for his nameis worse than worthless to him, and he hides it. There is a book yetextant, written in a black gall which is made fluent to the pen by adistillation of wormwood, and this is Paul Armstrong's latest expressionof his views of the world, which, if the book were true, one would takeas a vast and daily injustice, in which there is no saving grace of anysort whatever. Ralston alone knew in what fiery haste this bitter volumewas gathered out of the desert of the writer's soul. It served onepurpose, since it provided Madge with at least a staff of silverwith which to beat the wolf from the door. The wild beast bayed andthreatened, but it never actually crossed the threshold. The discreditedman kept himself alive by scraps of anonymous journalism, until ahalf-chance suggestion of fortune bore him away to the United States asa member of a theatrical company of no great merit, which clung togetherthrough desperately failing fortunes for a month or two, and then, dissolving, left him stranded. 

He floated, a pseudonymous unit, acting, writing, lecturing. Somehow orother the weekly two or three pounds reached Madge, and the wolf stillhowled outside her door and found no entrance. 

When the spiritual anatomy of a man is displaced and the gall-bladdertakes on the function of the heart, it is far from being well with himat the moment, and in these days it was very far from being well withPaul Armstrong. Yet the jaundiced fit served its turn, and evenwhilst its anguish burned and nauseated, he began to ask one wholesomequestion: 'For whose shortcoming, for whose wrong-doing, for whosevirtues turned vicious, and whose vices tuned to airs of virtue, do Ithus suffer?' The answer was at first confused and loud. Annette'sname was noisy in it Claudia's sounded there. So did Gertrude's. Andof course the poor writhing worm must needs arraign Fate, Destiny, the Maker of the Earth, whatever It or He might be. But these voicesstilled, because, when all was said and done, the man was not whollya fool, and out of his heart came the wounding answer to his question:'You, Paul Armstrong--you and none other! Neither this false friend, nor that fraudulent lover, nor any Destiny whatsoever, but just PaulArmstrong, to whom this bundle of sensibilities was entrusted forsafe-carriage, and who in bearing his parcel here and there has spilledits contents with great recklessness, and with devilish consequence tohimself. ' And this voice grew into the tolling of a great Despair, forthere was nothing to be done with this Paul Armstrong in the way ofreparation or amendment, and there was no way of being rid of him saveby suicide, and a doubt of the efficacy of that cure was heavy on him. To endure the unendurable, this was his burthen; to be yoked throughtime with this dolt and fool. Wretchedest of miserable fates, to loatheone's own soul, to find the most despicable of creatures enclosed withinone's own skin. To play Siamese twin to a pustulous convict were atrifle beside this. To be your own black beast; to loathe your own soul;with a full heart to despise your own understanding--this is to startupon Despair's Last Journey in one sense or another, to find either thegulf or the gates of hope. For the alternative is eternal, and it willyet be known to all men--if not here, then elsewhere--that the way tothe heights of spiritual wealth lies through the valley of spiritualbankruptcy, and that a man's follies are as contributory to his soul'ssalvation as his loftiest aspirations and his most ardent struggles. Ralston spoke wisely when he said, 'We lose to learn value. ' We shallcarry our cargo more carefully next time for having once shipwrecked it. The gates of hope are a better goal to aim for than the gulf, becausethe mariner saves time and suffering by passing through them, but thelesson is that no shipwreck is final. 

Was it, in truth, the father's voice, the authentic voice of WilliamArmstrong, Paul's physical begetter, which preached this gospel throughthe lonely days and waking nights? The Exile could not tell, yet hebelieved, and the faith grew within him, that God's inexorable justiceand infinite mercy are one and the same, that the human spirit which hasnot sinned knows no virtue, that the flower of the soul's hope strikesits root in the soil of the soul's despair. 

This learned, all is learned. The great trust and the great distrustalike are mastered. Courage and Humbleness have kissed each other, andthe man steers between, safe in their companionship whatever seas mayroar. 

The faith grew, but it was not clear, nor destined to be clear, untilthe divine hour of its true dawning was appointed, and that hour was notlong delayed. 

Paul Armstrong had tracked memory from its earliest dawn till now. Thepictured image of himself he had so long followed in fancy drew closer, until he and it merged into each other, and the shade and he were one. 

He had listened all day for the accustomed clangour of the trains, andhad heard nothing. The brown-red smoke-fog had grown denser and moredense, and now it stung throat and eyes with its acrid and pungentatoms. The air was thick and hot, and objects only a score of yards awaywere but just visible. The runnel at the tent-door had barely a voiceof its own. Paul guessed rightly that its course lay through a tract offorest fire, and that the greater part of its volume had evaporated inthe heat. The river in the gorge plunged and thundered. The nightcame down, and a blind glare of dull red seemed to show itself above, revealing nothing else. For the first time since the forest fires hadbegun to smoulder, the dead air took a sense of motion. It stirred witha long, sluggish heave, and brought with it a dreadful heat, and a noisealtogether disproportionate to the pace at which it moved--the sound ofa mighty tempest. It breathed fitfully, heavily, and as if with labour;but at every breath it blew a fervent heat along, and at every breaththere rose the same threatening roar of sound. There was somethingmassive and ponderous in this strange noise. It was as if a sea inunmeasured storm were billowing nearer and nearer. And surely that redglow was brightening. The trunks of giant trees were silhouetted on it. 

Then with one slow heave, beginning like a sigh, but gathering in pace, the wind awoke, and in one minute it blew a hurricane. And with it camea voice--the voice of league on league of smouldering forest leapinginto a roar of flame. The air burned with a sudden crimson. Themonstrous noise of the torrent was drowned, and went unheard. The wind, with a sudden access of its force, was sucked along the valley by theamazing indraught of the fire, and it raged past him with such violenceas to bring him to his knees. The smoke, which had hung without formthrough so many days, was ripped and twisted and dragged and beaten intoa thousand writhing and tormented shapes. They went hurling down thewind as if that unspeakable voice of the parent fire had called them, and there were nothing for it but this mad answer to the appeal. 

It seemed impossible that the roaring noise should augment itself, andyet it grew and grew and grew--Niagara twenty-fold, Niagara fifty-fold, Niagara a hundred-fold. The eye discerned more and more as the windcleared the air, and at last the panorama stood revealed in horridsplendour. On either side the canon the lower hills were all aflame. They tossed aloft pyramids of brightness; they burned dull-red insheltered hollows; they flared fantastically on open heights;they brightened and darkened with mile-long undulations, and swiftshudderings from blind black to blinding white, and then from thatsupreme of light to black again. These changes were wrought withdazzling swiftness. A flame which writhed over many acres flapped likethe loosened end of a sail and vanished in the twinkling of an eye, and before the watcher could have cried out that it was gone, flaunteditself again at the sky, which overhung it like an inverted bowl ofred-hot copper. 

The fire displayed a myriad inequalities in the landscape which wereunseen in open day. It scaled ridge after ridge, and each in turn stoodout against the blackness of the mountain on which an instant before ithad seemed to nestle closely. It charged each acclivity with appallingstrength, but there were times when the assaulting line wavered, -andretired as if the walls of darkness held a living force which hadat times the power to beat it down. Then with a rush the height wascarried; hell's victorious banner floated over one more conqueredcitadel, and the roar of triumph deepened. 

At times the fire seemed to carve the darkness like a knife wieldedswiftly by some invisible giant hand. At times, catching the face ofsome lofty wooded cliff, it soared up like a rocket and left a trailingline which faded wholly as if the night had been triumphant there andhad won back a portion of its invaded ground. 

For hours there did not seem a moment at which the watcher's life wasworth purchase at a pin's fee, but the wind flawed madly here and there, and as if by constantly recurring miracle he stood safe. Tarred on bythe wind, the fire climbed from sunset to near dawn. It climbed until itreached the feet of the eternal snows. Then one insulted mountain loosedan avalanche, and then another and another, until the incredible conesof fire were ridged with black. 

Paul Armstrong threw himself upon the ground and slept when the fireswere miles and miles away. He awoke after many hours with an achingsense of light upon his eyes. The sun was high already, and the skieswere clear. The valley and the mountains lay before him bare and black, with many spirals of dove-coloured smoke rising thinly here and there. And the man thought within himself:

'After great mischief, peace. In a single year the fire-weed will havemade this waste a fairy-land. The time will come when there will be leftno token of this desolation. Nature endures no lasting loss, and is thesoul less vital?'

And he believed the things it was ordained that he should believe, andhe bowed his head in prayer with tears of penitence and self-abasement. 

'What is left to me?' he asked. 

His father's voice spoke inwardly in answer, apart from his will, outside his will, as it had spoken from the first. 

'Duty!' said the voice. 'Bid the fire-flowers blossom in the wastedspaces of your own soul. '

His tears gripped him at the throat with art almost intolerable anguish, and with such a passion as no man can experience twice in life herenounced his own despair. 

THE END

BILLING AND SONS, LTD. , PRINTERS, GUILDFORD