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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of To Love, by Margaret Peterson
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: To Love
+
+Author: Margaret Peterson
+
+Release Date: September 3, 2008 [EBook #26519]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TO LOVE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by David Clarke, Carla Foust and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber's note
+
+
+Minor punctuation errors have been corrected without notice. Several
+words were spelled in two different ways and not corrected; they
+are listed at the end of this book. A few obvious typographical errors
+have been corrected, and they are also listed at the end.
+
+
+
+"_To Love_"
+
+    "_To love is the great amulet which makes
+              the world a garden._"
+
+                                             _R. L. STEVENSON_
+
+"_TO LOVE_"
+
+_By Margaret Peterson : Author of_
+
+"_The Lure of the Little Drum," "Tony Bellew," etc._
+
+_LONDON: HURST AND BLACKETT, LTD.
+PATERNOSTER HOUSE, E.C. :: :: 1917_
+
+"TO LOVE"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+    "Oh, but the door that waits a friend
+       Swings open to the day.
+     There stood no warder at my gate
+       To bid love stand or stay."
+
+
+"You don't believe in marriage, and I can't afford to marry"--Gilbert
+Stanning laughed, but the sound was not very mirthful and his eyes, as
+he glanced at his companion, were uneasy and not quite honest. "We are
+the right sort of people to drift together, aren't we, Joan?" His hands
+as he spoke were restless, fidgeting with a piece of string which he
+tied and untied repeatedly.
+
+Joan Rutherford sat very straight in her chair, her eyes looking out in
+front of her. His words had called just the faintest tinge of colour to
+her cheeks. It was not exactly a beautiful face, but it was above
+everything else lovable and appealing. Joan was twenty-three, yet she
+looked still a child; the lines of her face were all a little
+indefinite, except the obstinacy of her chin and the frankness of her
+eyes. Her one claim to beauty, indeed, lay in those eyes; wide,
+innocent, unfathomable, sometimes green, sometimes brown flecked with
+gold. They seemed to hint at tragedy, yet they were far more often
+laughter-filled than anything else. For the rest, Joan was an ordinary
+independent young lady of the twentieth century who had lived in London
+"on her own" for six months.
+
+How her independence had come about is a complicated story. It had not
+been with the approval of her people; the only people she possessed
+being an old uncle and aunt who lived in the country. All Joan's nearer
+relations were dead; had died when she was still a child; Uncle John and
+Aunt Janet had seen to her bringing up. But at twenty-two and a-half
+Joan had suddenly rebelled against the quiet monotony of their home
+life. She had broken it to them gently at first, with an obstinate
+resolve to get her own way at the back of her mind; in the end, as is
+usually the case when youth pits itself against age, she had won the
+day. Uncle John had agreed to a small but adequate allowance, Aunt Janet
+had wept a few rather bitter tears in private, and Joan had come to
+London to train as a secretary, according to herself. They had taken
+rooms for her in the house of a lady Aunt Janet had known in girlhood,
+and there Joan had dutifully remained. It was not very lively, but she
+had a sense of gratitude in her heart towards Aunt Janet which prevented
+her from moving. Joan was not thinking of all this as she sat there, nor
+was she exactly seeing the sweep of grass that spread out in front of
+them, nor the flowering shrubs on every side. Hyde Park was ablaze with
+flowers on this hot summer's day and in addition a whole bed of
+heliotrope was in bloom just behind their chairs. The faint sweet scent
+of the flowers mixed with Joan's thoughts and brought a quick vision of
+Aunt Janet. But more deeply still her mind was struggling with a desire
+to know what exactly it was that swayed her when Gilbert Stanning spoke
+to her, or when--as more often than not--he in some way or other
+contrived to touch her. She had met him first at a dance that she had
+been taken to by another girl and she had known him now about four
+months. It was strange and a little disturbing the tumult his eyes waked
+in her heart. The first time he had kissed her, one evening when they
+had been driving home from the theatre in a taxi, she had turned and
+clung to him, because suddenly it had seemed as if the whole world was
+sweeping away from her. Gilbert had taken the action to mean that she
+loved him; he had never wavered from that belief since. He possessed
+every spare minute of her days, he kissed her whenever he could, and
+Joan never objected. Only oddly, at moments such as this, her mind would
+suddenly push forward the terse argument:
+
+"Do you love him, or is it just the little animal in you that likes all
+he has to give?"
+
+Joan was often greatly disturbed about what she called the beast side of
+her. During her year in London, under the guidance of another girl far
+older and wiser than herself, she had plunged recklessly into all sorts
+of knowledge, gleaned mostly from books such as Aunt Janet and even
+Uncle John had never heard of, far less read. So Joan knew that there is
+a beast side to all human nature, and she was for ever pausing to probe
+this or that sensation down to its root. Her books had taught her other
+theories too, and very young, very impetuous by nature, Joan rushed to a
+full acceptance of the facts over which older women were debating. The
+sanctity of marriage, for instance, was a myth invented by man because
+he wished to keep women enslaved. Free love was the only beautiful
+relationship that could exist between the sexes. Frankness and free
+speech between men and women was another rule Joan asserted, in
+pursuance of which she had long since threshed out the complicated
+question of marriage with Gilbert. It was all rather childish and silly,
+yet pathetic beyond the scope of tears, if you looked into Joan's sunlit
+eyes and caught the play of dimples round her mouth. Rather as if you
+were to come suddenly upon a child playing with a live shell.
+
+What Gilbert Stanning thought of it all is another matter; Joan with all
+her book-learned wisdom had not fathomed his character. He was a man
+about thirty-two, good-looking, indolent and selfish. He had just enough
+money to be intensely comfortable, provided he spent it all on himself,
+and Gilbert certainly succeeded in being comfortable. There had been a
+good many women in Gilbert's life of one kind and another, but he had
+never known anyone like Joan before. At times her startling mixture of
+knowledge and innocence amazed him, and she had fascinated him from the
+first. He was a man easily fascinated by the little feminine things in a
+woman. The way Joan's hair grew in curls at the nape of her neck
+fascinated him, the soft red of her mouth, the way the lashes lay like a
+spread-out fan on her cheeks and the quick changing lights and colours
+in those eyes themselves. With Gilbert, when he wanted a thing he
+generally got it, by fair means or foul; for the moment he wanted Joan
+passionately, almost insanely. But the way in which she made the path
+easy for his desire sometimes startled him; he could not make up his
+mind whether she was playing some very deep game at his expense or
+whether she really loved him to the exclusion of all caution.
+
+It was this problem which he had been more or less trying to solve this
+afternoon. At Joan's continued silence he leaned forward and put his
+hand over hers where they lay on her lap.
+
+"What are you dreaming of, little girl?" he asked.
+
+The odd flutter which his touch always caused was shaking Joan's heart;
+she tried, however, to face him indifferently, summoning up a smile.
+
+"I was thinking," she corrected, "not dreaming."
+
+"Well, the thoughts, then," asked the man, his fingers moved caressingly
+up and down her hand, "what were they?"
+
+"I was thinking," began Joan slowly; her eyes fell from his and she
+stirred restlessly. "What did you mean just now when you spoke about
+drifting together?" she asked.
+
+"Little Miss Pretence," he whispered, "as if you didn't know what I
+meant. If I were well off," he said suddenly (perhaps for the moment he
+really meant it), "I would make you marry me whether you had new ideas
+about it or not."
+
+"Being well off wouldn't have anything to do with it," Joan answered,
+"it is more degrading to marry for money than anything else."
+
+"Sometimes I believe you think that we are degrading altogether," the
+man said; he watched the colour creep into her face, "God knows we are
+not much to boast of, and that is the truth."
+
+Joan struggled with the problem in her mind. "There ought not to be
+anything degrading about love," she said finally, and this time it was
+his eyes that fell away from hers.
+
+For a little they sat silent, Joan, for some reason known only to
+herself, fighting against a strong inclination to cry. Gilbert had taken
+away his hands, he sat back in his chair, his feet thrust out, head
+down, eyes glooming at the dust. Joan stole a glance at him and felt a
+sudden intense admiration for the beauty of his clean-cut profile, his
+sleek, well-groomed head. Instinctively she put out a timid hand and
+touched him.
+
+"Are you angry with me about something?" she asked.
+
+It may have been that during that pause Gilbert had been forming a good
+resolution with all that was best in him to keep from spoiling this
+girl's life. Her eyes perhaps had touched on some slumbering chord of
+conscience. Her movement though, the little whispered words, drove all
+thoughts except the ones which centred round his desire from his mind.
+
+"Joan," he said quickly, his hands caught at hers again, "let us stop
+playing this game of make-believe. Let us face the future one way or
+another. I love you, I want you. If you love me, come to me, dear, as
+you say there can be nothing degrading in love. Let us live our lives
+together in the new best way."
+
+It was all clap-trap nonsense and he did not believe a word of it, but
+the force of his passion was unmistakable. It frightened and held Joan.
+
+"You mean----" she whispered.
+
+"I mean that I want you to come and live at my place," he answered. "I
+have a decent little flat, as you know. That is not living on my money,
+O proud and haughty one"--he was so sure of his victory that he could
+afford to laugh--"you shall buy your own food if you like. And you shall
+be free, as free as you are now, and--I, Joan," his voice thrilled
+through her, "I shall love you and love you and love you till you waken
+to see the world in quite a new light. Joan!"
+
+His face was very close against hers, the scent of the heliotrope had
+grown on the sudden stronger and more piercingly sweet, perhaps because
+the sun had vanished behind the distant line of trees and a little
+breeze from the oncoming night was blowing across the flower-beds
+towards them. The quick-gathering twilight seemed to be shutting them
+in; people passed along the path, young sweethearting couples too happy
+in each other to notice anyone else. The tumult in Joan's mind died down
+and grew very still, a sense of well-being and content invaded her
+heart.
+
+"Yes"--she spoke the word so softly he hardly heard--"I'll come,
+Gilbert." Then she threw back her head a little and laughed, gay,
+confident laughter. "It will be rather fun, won't it?" she said.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+    "Oh, wisdom never comes when it is gold,
+     And the great price we pay for it full worth.
+     We have it only when we are half earth,
+     Little avails that coinage to the old."
+
+                                             GEORGE MEREDITH.
+
+
+It was not quite so much "rather fun" as Joan had expected. It had, she
+discovered, its serious and unpleasant side. Serious, because of the
+strange undreamt-of woman that it awoke within her, and unpleasant
+because of the deceit and the telling of lies which Gilbert insisted it
+must involve. Joan hated deceit, she had one of those natures that can
+never be really happy with an unconfessed lie on their mind.
+
+Gilbert won her to do as he thought necessary, first by persuasion and
+then by using the power which he had discovered he could wield over her
+by his touch.
+
+"For my sake, darling," he argued, "it is all right for us because we
+understand each other, but the world would certainly describe me as a
+cad."
+
+So for his sake Joan told Mrs. Thomas, with whom she had been living,
+that she had accepted a residential post as private secretary; packed up
+her boxes and took her departure amidst a shower of good wishes and
+warnings as to how she was to hold her own and not be put upon. To Aunt
+Janet, with a painful twinge of regret, Joan wrote the same lie. She
+wanted to tell the truth to Aunt Janet more even than she wanted to live
+it out aloud to herself. The memory of Aunt Janet's face with its kindly
+deep-set eyes kept her miserable and uncomfortable, and the home letters
+brought no more a feeling of pleasure, only a sense of shame and
+distaste.
+
+How silly it was to connect shame with what she and Gilbert had chosen
+as life! Yet, unfortunately for her peace of mind, the word was
+constantly reverting to her thoughts. "It is the telling lies that I am
+ashamed of," she would argue hotly to herself, and she would shut her
+heart to the still small voice and throw herself because of it with more
+zest than ever into their life together.
+
+Gilbert's flat was high up in one of the top stories of a block of
+buildings which fronts on to Knightsbridge, bright, airy and cheerful.
+Not too big, "Just room for the two of us and we shut the world
+outside," as Gilbert took pleasure in saying. It only consisted of four
+rooms, their bedroom and dressing-room, the sitting-room and Gilbert's
+smoking-room, a place that he talked vaguely of working in and where he
+could entertain his men friends, without bothering Joan, when they
+called to see him.
+
+The windows of their bedroom opened out over the green of the Park.
+Sometimes the scent of the heliotrope crept up even as far as that;
+whenever it did Joan would have to hold her breath and stand quite still
+because the fragrance brought--not Aunt Janet now--but Gilbert before
+her. It had blown in just like that the first night she had been in the
+room; the memories it could rouse were bewildering, intoxicating, and
+yet ... Joan would have to push the disturbing thoughts from her and run
+to find Gilbert if he were anywhere in their tiny domain, to perch on
+the arm of his chair and rub her face against his coat. His presence
+could drive away the vague feeling of uneasiness, his hands could win
+her back to placid contentment or wake in her the restless passionate
+desire which she judged to be love.
+
+It had been on one of these occasions that, running to find Gilbert, she
+had flung open the door of his smoking-room and got well inside before
+she discovered that he had some men with him. Gilbert lifted his head
+with a frown, that she noticed, while the guests struggled to their
+feet. There was a little silence while they all looked at her, then,
+with a muttered excuse, she retreated, closing the door behind her. But
+before it quite shut she heard one of the men laugh and say:
+
+"Hulloa, Stanning, so that is the secret of our bachelor flat is it?
+thought you had been lying very low this last two months."
+
+She did not catch Gilbert's reply, she only knew that the sense of shame
+which had been but a fleeting vision before had suddenly taken sharp,
+strong hold of her. She stood almost as it were battling against tears.
+
+That evening across their small dining-table, after the waiter from the
+restaurant downstairs had served the coffee and left them, she spoke to
+Gilbert, crumbling her bread with nervous fingers, finding it difficult
+to meet his eyes.
+
+"Those men," she said, "who were here this afternoon, what do they
+think of me? I mean," she flushed quickly, "what do they think I am?"
+
+"Think you are," Gilbert repeated, "my dear girl, I suppose they could
+see you were a woman."
+
+"I mean, had you told them, did they know about us?"
+
+"Silly kid," he smiled at her indulgently, "the world is not so
+fearfully interested in our doings."
+
+"No, but they are your friends," the hazel eyes meeting his held some
+wistful question. "Wouldn't they wonder, doesn't it seem funny that they
+shouldn't be my friends too?"
+
+Gilbert rose, conscious of a little impatience. The strange thing was
+that since the very commencement of their life together his conscience
+had not been as easy as he would have liked to have had it. Joan's ideas
+had been so ridiculously simple and straightforward, she was almost a
+child, he had discovered, in her knowledge and thoughts. Not that he was
+a person to pay much attention to principles when they came in contact
+with his desires, only it annoyed and irritated him to find she could
+waken an undreamt of conscience in this way. He shook off the feeling,
+however, with a little laugh, and, rising from the table, crossed over
+to her, standing behind her, drawing her head back against his heart.
+
+"Not satisfied with our solitude," he teased; "find it dull?"
+
+"No, it's not that," she answered; she had to fight against the
+temptation to let things go, to lift up her lips for his kiss. "It's
+because--well, you didn't introduce me, they must have thought it
+queer."
+
+"Oh, hang it all, dear," he remonstrated, "I could not pass you off as
+my wife or sister, they would know it was not true. What do you want to
+know them for anyhow? Sclater works at the office with me and the other
+man is a pal of his, I have never met him before."
+
+"I see," she agreed; he had not at all understood her, but she doubted
+if she could quite explain herself. "It doesn't matter, Gilbert." She
+sat a little away from him, sweeping the crumbs together with her
+fingers.
+
+Behind her back Gilbert shrugged his shoulders and allowed the frown to
+show for a second on his face. Then he turned aside and lit a cigarette.
+
+"Let's do a theatre to-night, Joan," he suggested, "I am just in the
+mood for it."
+
+She was not just in the mood for it, but she went; and after the theatre
+they had supper at the Monico and Gilbert ordered a bottle of champagne
+to cheer them up; with the lights and music all round them and Gilbert's
+face opposite her, his lips smiling at her, his eyes caressing her, Joan
+forgot her mood of uneasiness. In the taxi going home she crept close up
+against him, liking to feel the strong hold of his arms.
+
+"You love me, and I love you, don't I, Gilbert?" she whispered; "that is
+all that really counts."
+
+"It counts more than all the world," he answered, and stooped to kiss
+her upturned lips.
+
+She made no new friends in her life with him, the old ones naturally
+fell rather into the background; it was impossible to keep up girl
+friendships when she was never able to ask any of them home with her.
+Once she went back to see Mrs. Thomas, but the torrent of questions,
+none of which could be answered truthfully, had paralysed her. She had
+sat dumb and apparently sulky. Mrs. Thomas had written afterwards to
+Aunt Janet:
+
+     "I do not think Joan can be really happy in her new post. She
+     is quite changed, no longer her bright, cheery self."
+
+And that had called forth a long letter from Aunt Janet to Joan. If she
+was not happy and did not feel well she was to leave at once. It had
+been her own wish to go to London, they had never liked the idea. "You
+would not believe, Joan, how dull the house is with only John and me in
+it, we miss your singing and laughter about the place. Come back home,
+dear; even if it is only for a holiday, we shall be delighted."
+
+There was a hint behind the letter that unless she had a satisfactory
+reply at once she or Uncle John would come up to London to see Joan for
+themselves! Joan could imagine the agitation and yet firm purpose which
+would preface the journey. She wrote hastily. She was perfectly happy
+and ridiculously underworked. Everyone was so good to her, one day soon
+she would take a day off and run down and see them, they should see how
+well she was looking.
+
+But the writing of the letter brought tears to her eyes, and when it was
+sealed up and pushed safely out of harm's way she sat and cried and
+cried. Once or twice lately she had had these storms of tears, she was
+so unused to crying that she could not account for them in any way
+except that she hated having to tell lies. That was it, she hated having
+to tell lies.
+
+It was about a fortnight later that Gilbert at breakfast one morning
+looked up from a letter which the early post had brought him with a
+frown of intense annoyance on his face. Also he said "Damn!" very
+clearly and distinctly.
+
+Joan pushed aside the paper and looked at him.
+
+"Anything wrong?" she asked; "is it business, or money, or----"
+
+"No, it is only the mater," he answered quickly; "she writes to say she
+is coming to pay me a little visit, that I am to see if I can get her a
+room somewhere in the building, she is going to spend two or three days
+shopping in town and hopes to see a lot of me."
+
+"Oh," said Joan rather blankly. Gilbert never talked very much of his
+people; once he had shown her a photograph of his mother because she had
+teased him till he produced it. "Don't you like the idea? Gilbert, was
+that what you said 'damn' about?"
+
+"Not exactly," his eyes travelled round the room; "you'll have to clear
+out, you know," he said abruptly.
+
+"You mean you want her to have our room and take another one in the
+building for yourself?" asked Joan. "I daresay Mrs. Thomas would give me
+a bed for a night or two."
+
+"Yes, that is it," he agreed; "and you will have to hide away all traces
+of yourself, mustn't leave anything suspicious lying about. The old lady
+might have given me a day or two's notice;" he had returned to his
+letter, "hang it all, she says she will be here to-morrow."
+
+Joan had pushed her chair back and stood up, her breakfast unfinished.
+She was staring at his down-bent head, struggling with a wild desire to
+scream, to cry out against the curtain of shame he was so wilfully
+sweeping across their life together. She fought down the impulse though
+and moved over to the window.
+
+"You want me to go away and hide?" she asked from there, her voice
+dangerously quiet.
+
+He glanced up at her. "Keep out of the mater's way," he acknowledged,
+"she would have seven fits."
+
+"Why?" asked Joan.
+
+"Why," he repeated, "good Lord, you don't know the mater. She----"
+
+Joan interrupted. "You are ashamed of me," she spoke quickly, her face
+had flushed. "You have always been a little ashamed of me. You have
+never really looked at it as I did. I thought----" she broke off and
+turned away from him, stupid hot tears were blinding her eyes, she did
+not want to cry, it was so useless and childish.
+
+Gilbert stuffed his mother's letter into his pocket and rose to his
+feet, stretching a little as he moved.
+
+"Don't be ridiculous, kiddie," he said, "you must see it would not do
+for you to meet the mater. She is old-fashioned and--well, she would not
+understand."
+
+"We could make her understand," Joan whispered, "if she saw we both
+really meant it."
+
+"Well, I don't want you to try," he answered bluntly.
+
+"Don't you feel the same about me as if I were your wife?" She knew he
+was close beside her, but she did not turn to look at him.
+
+Gilbert put an arm round her and drew her close. "Of course I do," he
+said, "but mother wouldn't. One does not exactly introduce one's mother
+to one's mistress."
+
+The inclination to tears had left Joan, a very set calm had taken its
+place. Suddenly she knew, as she stood there stiff held within the
+circle of his arms, that it was all ended. The dream, if it had been a
+dream, was finished, she could not live in it any longer.
+
+"Very well," she agreed listlessly. "I will see about going away, the
+place shall be all ready for her to-morrow."
+
+She moved away from him, he did not notice how purposely she shook the
+touch of his hands from off her.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+    "Out of my dreams,
+       I fashioned a flower;
+     Nursed it within my heart,
+       Thought it my dower.
+     What wind is this that creeps within and blows
+     Roughly away the petals of my rose?"
+
+                                              M. P.
+
+
+"That is the end of lying," whispered Joan.
+
+She threw down her cloak to keep the corner seat in the carriage and
+stepped out on to the platform to see if she could catch sight of a
+paper boy.
+
+She had not seen Gilbert since the morning. He had had an appointment in
+the city, he had left it to her to get the flat ready for his mother.
+And she had done everything, there was nothing that she could reproach
+herself with. She had engaged an extra room for Gilbert on the next
+floor, she had bought fresh flowers, she had made the place look as
+pretty as possible. It had not taken her long to do her own packing,
+there was nothing of hers left anywhere about. And all morning she had
+kept the window overlooking the Park tight shut. The scent of flowers
+should bring no disturbing memories to weaken her resolve. Then when
+everything had been quite settled she had sat down to write just a short
+note to Gilbert.
+
+     "I have tried to make you understand a little of all I felt
+     this morning, but it was not any use. You cannot understand.
+     It is just that we have always looked at things differently. I
+     cannot live with you any more, Gilbert; what is the use of
+     trying to explain. It is better just to say--as we agreed that
+     either of us should be free to say--it is all finished, and
+     good-bye."
+
+She had propped the letter up for him to find, where she knew he would
+look first of all, by his pipe and matches on the mantelpiece. Now she
+had taken her ticket to Wrotham and wired Aunt Janet to say she was
+coming. But as she stood waiting for the train to start it occurred to
+her that she was really watching to see Gilbert's slim, well-built
+figure push its way through the crowd towards her. The thought made her
+uneasy, she hoped he would have been late getting home; she doubted her
+strength of will to stand against him should he appear in person to
+persuade her.
+
+He did not come, however, and presently with a great deal of noise and
+excitement, whistles blowing and doors slamming, the train was off and
+she could sit back in her corner seat with a strange sense of
+pleasurable excitement at having so far achieved her purpose.
+
+Uncle John was at the station to meet her. A straight-held old
+figure--in his young days he had been in the army and very
+good-looking--now the bristling moustache was white and the hair grew in
+little tufts either side of an otherwise bald head. Ever since Joan
+could first remember him Uncle John had moved in a world separate from
+the rest of the household and entirely his own. It was not that he took
+no interest in them, it was just that he appeared to forget them for
+long intervals, talking very seldom, and when he did always about the
+days that were past. He had never married, but there had been one great
+love in his life. Aunt Janet had told Joan all about it, a girl who had
+died many years ago; after her death Uncle John had lived for nothing
+but his regiment. Then he had had to leave it because old age had called
+for retirement, and he had sent for Aunt Janet to come and keep house
+for him and together they had settled down in the old home at
+Wrotham--both unmarried, both very quiet and content to live in the
+past. Then Joan had descended on them, a riotous, long-legged,
+long-haired girl of eight, the child of a very much younger, little
+known brother.
+
+With the coming of Joan, new life and new surprising interest had
+awakened in Aunt Janet's heart, but Uncle John had remained impervious
+to the influence. He was very fond of Joan in his way, but he scarcely
+ever noticed and he certainly knew nothing about her. He had realized
+her less and less as she grew up; when he spoke or thought of her now it
+was always as still a child.
+
+"You are a nice young lady," he greeted her good-humouredly, stooping to
+kiss Joan at the station; "your Aunt Janet was sure this sudden return
+meant a breakdown. She is all of a twitter, so to speak, and would have
+been here to meet you herself only we have got a Miss Abercrombie
+staying with us. Where's the luggage?"
+
+"I have only brought my small things with me," Joan explained, "the rest
+are coming on. I am sorry Aunt Janet is worried, and who is Miss
+Abercrombie?"
+
+"Friend of your aunt's," he answered; he took her bag from her. "I have
+brought the trap, Janet thought you might be too delicate to walk." He
+chuckled to himself at the thought and picking up the reins climbed
+into the cart beside her. "Don't think Sally has been out twice since
+you left, see how fat she has got."
+
+The little brown pony certainly answered to the implication. Her sides
+bulged against the shafts and bald patches were manifesting themselves,
+caused by the friction.
+
+"What have you been doing then?" asked Joan; "why haven't you been out?"
+
+"Nothing to go for," he answered, "and I have been too busy in the
+garden. Extended that bit down through the wood." The garden was his one
+great hobby.
+
+"And Aunt Janet," Joan questioned, "she always used to like taking Sally
+out."
+
+"I suppose that was when you were here;" he looked down at her sideways,
+"she missed you, I think, but she potters about the village sometimes."
+He relapsed into silence, and Joan could see that his thoughts were once
+more far away.
+
+Several of the villagers came out as they passed through the little
+village street to bob greetings to the young lady of the manor, as they
+had always called Joan. Wrotham did not boast many county families;
+there was no squire, for instance. The Rutherfords occupied the old
+manor house and filled the position to a great extent, but they owned
+none of the land in the neighbourhood, and the villagers were not really
+their tenants. And beyond the Rutherfords there was no one in the
+village who could undertake parochial work except the vicar, a
+hard-working, conscientiously mild gentleman, with a small income and a
+large family. He could give plenty of spiritual advice and assistance,
+but little else; the old people and the invalids of the parish looked to
+Aunt Janet for soups and warm clothes and kindly interest.
+
+Wrotham boasted a doctor too. As Joan remembered him he had been a
+gentleman of very rubicund complexion and rough manners. Village gossip
+had held that he was too fond of the bottle, but when sober he was
+kindly and efficient enough for their small needs. He had been
+unmarried and had lived under the charge of a slovenly housekeeper. As
+the Rutherfords drove past his house, a square brick building with a
+front door that opened on to the village street, Joan noticed an
+unfamiliar air of spruce cleanliness about the front door and the window
+blinds.
+
+"Dr. Simpson has had a spring cleaning," she said, pointing out the
+transformation to Colonel Rutherford.
+
+He came out of his reverie, whatever it was, and glanced at the house.
+"No," he said, "Simpson has left. There are new people in there. Grant
+is their name, I think. Young chap and his sister and their old mother.
+Came to call the other day; nice people, but very ignorant about
+gardens. Your aunt has taken a great fancy to the young man."
+
+With that the trap turned into the wide open gates of the manor, and
+Joan, seeing the old house, was conscious of a quick rush of
+contentment. She had come home; how good it was to be home.
+
+The house, a beautiful grey building of the Tudor days, stood snug and
+warm amid a perfect bower of giant trees. Ivy and creepers of all sorts
+clung to its stones and crept up its walls, long tendrils of vivid
+green. The drive swept round a beautifully kept lawn and vanished
+through a stone gateway leading into the stable-yard. It was only a
+pretence at a garden in front. Uncle John always held that the open
+space which lay at the back of the house and on to which the
+drawing-room windows opened was the real thing. There, was more green
+grass, which centuries of care and weeding and rolling had transformed
+into a veritable soft velvet carpet of exquisite colour that stretched
+out and down till it met the wood of tall trees that fringed the garden.
+Flowers were encouraged to grow wild under those trees; in spring it was
+a paradise of wild daffodils and tulips. That was Aunt Janet's
+arrangement; Uncle John liked his gardens to be orderly. He was
+responsible for the straight, tidy flower-beds, for the rose gardens,
+for the lavender clumps that grew down at the foot of the vegetable
+garden. For lavender is not really an ornamental flower and Uncle John
+only tolerated it because of Aunt Janet's scent-sachets.
+
+Beautiful and old and infinitely peaceful, the sight and colour of it
+could bring back childhood and a sense of safety to Joan, a sense that
+Uncle John's figure and face--dear and familiar as they were--had been
+quite unable to do. London, her life with Gilbert, the rack and tumult
+of her thoughts during the past six months appeared almost as a dream
+when seen against this dear old background.
+
+Aunt Janet was waiting their arrival in the hall, and Joan, clambering
+down out of the trap, ran straight into those outstretched arms.
+
+"Oh, Aunt Janet, it is good to be back," she gasped. Then she drew away
+a little to take in the tall, trim figure dressed all in black save for
+a touch of white at neck and wrists; the face stern and narrow, lit by a
+pair of very dark eyes, the firm, thin-cut mouth, the dark hair, showing
+grey in places, brushed back so smooth and straight and wound in little
+plaits round and round the neat head. "You are just the same as ever,"
+Joan said. "Oh, Aunt Janet, it is good to get back."
+
+The dark eyes, softened for the moment by something like tears, smiled
+at her. "Of course I am just the same, child. What did you expect? And
+you?"
+
+"Oh, I am I," Joan answered; her laughter sounded unreal even to
+herself.
+
+"You have been ill," contradicted Miss Rutherford, "it is plain to see
+all over your face. Thank God, I have got you back."
+
+She brushed aside the sentiment, since it was a thing she did not always
+approve of.
+
+"Come away in and have your tea. John, leave Mary to carry up Joan's
+boxes; she will get Dick to help her; they are too heavy for you. Your
+uncle is getting old," she went on, talking brusquely as she helped
+Joan off with her coat, "he feels things these days."
+
+"I haven't been away more than a year, Aunt Janet," laughed Joan; "you
+talk as if it had been centuries."
+
+"It has seemed long," the other woman answered; her eyes were hungry on
+the girl's face as if she sought for something that kept eluding her. "A
+year is a long time to people of our age."
+
+"Dear, silly, old Aunt Janet." Joan hugged her. "You are not a second
+older nor the tiniest fragment different to what you used to be. I know
+you don't like being hugged; it makes you untidy; but you have simply
+got to be just once more."
+
+"You always were harum-scarum," remonstrated Aunt Janet, under this
+outburst. She did not, however, offer any real objection and they went
+into the drawing-room hand-in-hand.
+
+A small, thin lady rose to greet them at their entrance and Joan was
+introduced to Miss Abercrombie. Everything about Miss Abercrombie,
+except her size, seemed to denote strength--strength of purpose,
+strength of will, strength of love and hate. She gave Joan the
+impression--and hers was a face that demanded study, Joan found herself
+looking at it again and again--of having come through great battles
+against fate. And if she had not won--the tell-tale lines of discontent
+that hung about her mouth did not betoken victory--at least she had not
+been absolutely defeated. She had carried the banner of her convictions
+through thick and thin.
+
+Joan was roused to a sudden curiosity to know what those convictions
+were and a desire to have the same courage granted to herself. It gave
+her a thrill of pleasure to hear that Miss Abercrombie would be staying
+on for some time. She was a schoolmistress, it appeared, only just
+lately health had interfered with her duties and it was then that Aunt
+Janet had persuaded her, after many attempts, to take a real holiday and
+spend it at Wrotham.
+
+"Sheer vice on my part, agreeing," Miss Abercrombie told Joan with a
+laugh; "but everyone argued with me all at once and I succumbed."
+
+"Just in time," Aunt Janet reminded her; "I was going to have given up
+asking you; even friendship has its limits."
+
+They had tea in the drawing-room with the windows open on to the garden
+and a small, bright fire burning in the grate. Aunt Janet said she had
+discovered a nip in the air that morning and was sure Joan would feel
+cold after London. Uncle John wandered in and drank a cup of tea and
+wandered out again without paying much attention to anyone.
+
+Aunt Janet sat and watched Joan, and the girl, conscious of the scrutiny
+and restless under those brown eyes as she had always been restless in
+the old days with a childish, unconfessed sin on her conscience, talked
+as lightly and as quickly as she could upon every topic under the sun to
+Miss Abercrombie. And Miss Abercrombie rose like a sportswoman to the
+need. She was too clever a reader of character not to feel the strain
+which rested between her two companions. She knew Aunt Janet through and
+through, the stern loyalty, the unbending precision of a nature slow to
+anger, full of love, but more inclined to justice than mercy where
+wrongdoing was concerned. And Joan--well, she had only known Joan half
+an hour, but Aunt Janet had been talking of nothing else for the last
+fortnight.
+
+They kept the subject of Joan's life in London very well at bay for some
+time, but presently Aunt Janet, breaking a silence that had held her,
+leaned forward and interrupted their discussion.
+
+"You have not told us why you left, Joan," she said, "or what has been
+settled about your plans. Are you on leave, or have you come away for
+good?"
+
+Miss Abercrombie watched the faint pink rise up over the girl's face and
+die away again, leaving a rather unnatural pallor.
+
+"I have left," Joan was answering. "I----" Suddenly she looked up and
+for a moment she and Miss Abercrombie stared at each other. It was as if
+Joan was asking for help and the other woman trying to give it by the
+very steadiness of her eyes. Then Joan turned. "Aunt Janet," she said,
+hurrying a little over the words, "I want to ask you to let us not talk
+of my time in London. It--it was not what I meant it to be, perhaps
+because of my own fault, but----"
+
+"You were not happy," said Aunt Janet; her love rose to meet the appeal.
+"I never really thought you were. I am content to have you back, Joan;
+we will let the rest slip away into the past."
+
+"Thank you," whispered Joan; the burden of lying, it seemed, had
+followed her, even into this safe retreat; "perhaps some day, later on,
+I will try and tell you about it, Aunt Janet."
+
+"Just as you like, dear." Aunt Janet pressed the hand in hers and at
+that moment Mary, the servant-girl, appeared in the doorway with a
+somewhat perturbed countenance.
+
+"Please, mum, there is that Bridget girl from the village and her
+mother; will you see them a minute?"
+
+The charity and sweetness left Miss Rutherford's face as if an artist
+had drawn a sponge across some painting. "I'll come directly," she said
+stiffly; "make them wait in my little room, Mary."
+
+"The village scandal," Miss Abercrombie remarked, as the door closed
+behind the servant; "how are you working it out, Janet? Don't be too
+hard on the unrighteous; it is your one little failing."
+
+"I hardly think it is a subject which can be discussed before Joan,"
+Miss Rutherford answered. She rose and moved to the door. "I have always
+kept her very much a child, Ann; will you remember that in talking to
+her."
+
+Miss Abercrombie waited till the door shut, then her eyes came back to
+Joan. The child had grown into a woman, she realized; what would that
+knowledge cost her old friend? Then she laughed, but not unkindly.
+
+"I know someone else who has kept herself a child," she said, "and it
+makes the outlook of her mind a little narrow. Oh, well! you won't like
+me to speak disrespectfully of that very dear creature, your aunt. Will
+you come for a stroll down to the woods or are you longing to unpack?"
+
+Joan chose the latter, because, for a second, despite her instantaneous
+liking for Miss Abercrombie, she was a little afraid. She wanted to set
+her thoughts in order too, to try and win back to the glad joy which she
+had first felt at being home, and which had been dispelled by Aunt
+Janet's questions and her own evasive replies.
+
+"I will do my unpacking, I think," she said, "and put my room straight."
+She met the blue eyes again, kindly yet keen in their scrutiny. "I
+understand what you mean about Aunt Janet," she added; "I have felt it
+too, and, Miss Abercrombie, I am not quite such a child as she thinks; I
+could not help growing up."
+
+"I know that, my dear," the other answered, "and God gave us our eyes to
+see both good and evil with; that is a thing your Aunt Janet is apt to
+forget. Well, run away and do your unpacking; we will meet later on at
+dinner."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+    "I have forgotten you! Wherefore my days
+        Run gladly, as in those white hours gone by
+        Before I learnt to love you. Now have I
+     Returned to that old freedom, where the rays
+     Of your strange wonder no more shall amaze
+        My spirit."
+
+                                             ANON.
+
+
+If you see trouble in the back of a girl's eyes look always for a man in
+the case. That was Miss Abercrombie's philosophy of life. Girls do not
+as a rule get into trouble over money, for debts or gambling. She had
+spent the whole of her practical life in studying girls; she knew fairly
+well the ins and outs of their complicated natures. Joan was in trouble
+of sorts; what then had become of the man? Until the time came when the
+girl would be driven to speak--and Miss Abercrombie was sure the time
+would come sooner or later--she was content to stay silent and observant
+in the background of events. Often Joan felt as though the shrewd eyes
+were drawing the unwilling truth from behind her mask of indifference,
+and she was, in a way, afraid of the little, alert woman who seemed to
+be taking such an intense though silent interest in her.
+
+For the first fortnight Gilbert wrote every day. To begin with, his
+letters were cheerful. He was inclined, indeed, to chaff her for losing
+her temper over his mother's visit.
+
+     "The old lady is gone," he wrote on the third day. "You can
+     come back with perfect safety. She never smelt a rat, but
+     tried to talk to me very seriously about taking unto myself a
+     wife. It was on the tip of my tongue once or twice to tell her
+     that I was already as good as married. Don't keep on being
+     stuffy, Joan, hurry up and come back. You can't think what a
+     lot I miss you, little girl, or how much I want you."
+
+It was the first of his letters that she made any attempt to answer and
+her reply was not easy to write. She had come very suddenly to her
+decision as she had stood within the circle of Gilbert's arms that
+morning and answered his arguments about his mother. Now she was
+realizing that for weeks before that her allegiance had been wavering.
+She had no wish to go back to him. She could not understand herself, but
+the fact was self-evident, even though the scent of heliotrope haunted
+her days and crept into the land of her dreams. Her letter, when it was
+finished, struck her as cold and stupid, yet she let it go; she could
+not somehow make her meaning any clearer.
+
+     "Dear Gilbert," she wrote, "I am sorry you do not seem to be
+     understanding that what I wrote in my first letter is really
+     true. It is all finished between us and I am not coming back.
+     There is not anything else to say, except that I should be
+     happier if you did not go on writing. Nothing can change me,
+     and it only keeps open old thoughts."
+
+He wrote in answer to that a furiously angry, altogether unpleasant
+letter. Joan read it with shrinking horror, it seemed to lay bare all
+that she had been only half aware of before, the ugliness, the smallness
+of what she had at first thought was love.
+
+     "If you try to marry anyone else," the letter ended on a
+     cruelly ugly note, "remember I can spoil your little game for
+     you, Joan. There is no man who will marry you when they learn
+     the truth."
+
+She tore up his other letters after that; the very sight of his
+handwriting brought hot shame to her heart.
+
+How much the people of the house noticed she hardly knew. Aunt Janet
+had fallen into the habit of watching her covertly, pathetically; she
+was trying in her own way to read the secret hidden away behind a
+changed Joan. But she did her best to keep her curiosity out of sight;
+she was very gentle, very anxious to divert Joan's thoughts and keep her
+happy.
+
+Uncle John, of course, noticed nothing. Joan helped him to potter about
+in the garden--they were building a rookery down by the woods--or
+sometimes she would take him for long walks and he would stump along
+beside her wrapped in indifferent silence, or else, carried away by some
+reminiscence of the old days, would start talking about the regiment and
+the places where he had been stationed. It was only Miss Abercrombie
+that Joan was really uneasy with, and the end of Miss Abercrombie's
+visit was in sight.
+
+One afternoon, on a day which had seen one of Gilbert's unopened letters
+destroyed, Joan and Miss Abercrombie started out together soon after tea
+to take a basin of jelly to one of Aunt Janet's pet invalids who lived
+in a cottage away out at what was called the Four Cross Roads.
+
+It was one of those very fine blue days common to September. Just a nip
+of cold in the air, the forerunner of winter, and overhead the leaves on
+the trees turning all their various reds and golds for autumn.
+
+"The sky gives one a great sense of distance this afternoon," Miss
+Abercrombie said presently. "You never see a sky like this in towns;
+that is why you get into the habit of thinking things out of
+proportion."
+
+"What makes you say that?" asked Joan; "I mean, how does the distance of
+the sky affect it?"
+
+"Oh, well, it makes one feel small," the other answered, "unimportant;
+as if the affairs that worry our hearts out are, after all, of very
+little consequence in the scheme of existence."
+
+"They are our life," Joan argued, "one has to worry and work things out
+for oneself."
+
+"You are a Browningite," laughed Miss Abercrombie; she glanced up
+sideways at her companion.
+
+"'As it were better youth
+  Should strive through acts uncouth
+  Towards making, than repose on aught found made.'
+
+He is right in a way, though, mind you, I don't know that it pays women
+to do much in the struggling line."
+
+"I do wonder why you say that," said Joan; "you have always struck me as
+being, above everything else, a fighter."
+
+"Probably why my advice lies along other directions," admitted Miss
+Abercrombie; "it is extremely uncomfortable to be a pioneer."
+
+"But in the end, even if you have won nothing, it brings you the courage
+of having stuck to your convictions."
+
+"Yes," Miss Abercrombie answered dryly, "it certainly brings you that."
+
+They walked in silence again for a while, turning into a short cut to
+their destination across the fields.
+
+"Your aunt has got convictions too." Miss Abercrombie reopened the
+conversation, evidently her thoughts had been working along the same
+lines. "They are uncomfortable things; witness the judgment she metes
+out to that unfortunate girl in the village."
+
+"You mean Bridget?" Joan's voice had suddenly a touch of fear in it;
+Miss Abercrombie stole a quick look at her. "I was asking Mary about her
+the other day."
+
+"Immorality, your aunt calls it," sniffed Miss Abercrombie, "and for
+that she would quite willingly, good, kind woman as she is, make this
+child--Bridget is seventeen, you know--an outcast for the rest of her
+life. Immorality!"
+
+"What would you call it?" questioned Joan; she spoke stiffly, for she
+was singularly uneasy under the discussion, yet she had always wanted to
+argue the matter out with Miss Abercrombie.
+
+"I hate the word 'immoral' to begin with," the little woman went on;
+"not that I am exactly out against regulations. Laws and customs have
+come into being, there is little doubt about that, to protect the weak
+against the strong. The peculiar thing about them is that they always
+wreak their punishments on the weak. Poor Bridget, even without your
+aunt's judgment, she pays the penalty, doesn't she?"
+
+"I suppose Aunt Janet is a little hard about these things," Joan
+admitted. "You see, the idea of going against laws and things has never
+occurred to her. She has always obeyed, she has never wanted to do
+anything else."
+
+"Quite so," agreed Miss Abercrombie; "my dear, don't let us talk about
+it any more. I always lose my temper, and I hate losing my temper with
+someone whom I love as much as I do your Aunt Janet."
+
+"But I am interested in what you think," Joan went on slowly; the red
+crept into her cheeks. "I don't believe in marriage myself; I think
+people ought to live together if and when they want to, and leave each
+other when they like."
+
+Miss Abercrombie stared with dismay at the flushed face. "My dear," she
+said, and her tone had fallen upon far greater seriousness than the
+former discussion had evoked, "both of those are very rash statements.
+The problem of life is unfortunately not quite so easily settled."
+
+"But marriage," Joan argued, "marriage, which tries to tie down in hard
+bonds something which ought only to be of the spirit--I think it is
+hideous, hideous! I could never marry."
+
+"No," agreed Miss Abercrombie, "a great many of us feel like that when
+we are young and hot-headed. I nearly said empty-headed. Then we read
+fat books about the divine right of Motherhood, Free Love and State
+Maternity. All very well in the abstract and fine theories to argue
+about, but they do not work in real life. Believe me, the older you get
+the more and more you realize how far away they all are from the ideal.
+Marriage may be sometimes a mistaken solution, but at present it is the
+only one we have."
+
+"Why do you say that?" asked Joan; for the first time she turned and
+looked at her companion. "Do you really believe it is true?"
+
+"Yes," nodded Miss Abercrombie. "My dear," she put a hand on Joan's arm,
+"we women have got to remember that our actions never stand by
+themselves alone. Someone else has always to foot the bill for what we
+do. I said just now that laws had been evolved to protect the weak;
+well, marriage protects the child."
+
+"But if two people love each other," Joan tried to argue, but her words
+were bringing a cold chill of fear to her heart even as she spoke, "what
+other protection can be needed?"
+
+"Love is something that no one can define," stated Miss Abercrombie;
+"but centuries have gone to prove that it is not as binding as marriage,
+and for the sake of the children the man and woman must be bound. That
+is the long and short of all the arguments."
+
+"If there is no child?" Joan's fear prompted her to the question; she
+spoke it almost in a whisper.
+
+Miss Abercrombie paused in her act of unlatching the gate, for they had
+arrived at the cottage by now, to look up at her. "Ah, there you open
+wider fields," she assented, "only childless people are and must be the
+exceptions. One cannot lay down laws for the exceptions."
+
+Mrs. Starkey, the invalid old lady, was garrulous, and delighted to see
+them. So anxious to tell them all her ailments and scraps of gossip that
+by the time they got away it was quite late and already the sun was
+sinking behind the range of hills at the back of the village.
+
+"We will have to hurry," Joan said. "Aunt Janet gets so fussed if one is
+out after dark."
+
+Hurrying precluded any reopening of the subject they had been
+discussing, but Joan's mind was busy with all the thoughts it had roused
+as they walked. The faint hint of fear that had stirred to life in her
+when Miss Abercrombie had spoken of Bridget was fast waking to very
+definite panic. She could feel it tugging at her heart and making her
+breathing fast and difficult. Supposing that the vaguely-dreamed-of
+possibility had crystallized into fact in her case? How would Aunt Janet
+think of it; what changes would it bring into her life?
+
+As they turned into the little village street they came straight into a
+crowd of people standing round an open cottage door. The crowd was
+strangely quiet, talking amongst themselves in whispers, but from within
+the cottage came the sound of wailing, the hysterical crying of old age.
+
+Miss Abercrombie, with Joan following, pushed her way to the front, and
+with awed faces the villagers drew back to let them pass. At the open
+door Sam Jones, the village constable, an old man who had known Joan in
+her very young days, put out his hand.
+
+"Don't you go in now, miss," he said, "it is not for the likes of you to
+see, and you can do no good. Besides which, your aunt is there already."
+
+But Joan paid no attention to him and, pushing past his outstretched
+hand, followed Miss Abercrombie.
+
+The inside of the cottage was dimly lit, and scattered with a profuse
+collection of what appeared to be kitchen utensils, dishes and clothes,
+all flung about in confusion. The only light in the place glinted on the
+long deal table and the stiff dead figure stretched out on it, still and
+quiet, with white, vacant face and lifeless arms that hung down on
+either side. Water was oozing out of the clothes and dripping from the
+unbound hair; it had gathered already into little pools on the floor. In
+the darkest corner of the room a crouched-up form sat sobbing
+hopelessly, and by the figure on the table Aunt Janet stood, her face in
+shadow, since she was above the shade of the lamp, but her hands
+singularly white and gentle-looking as they moved about drying the dead
+girl's face, pushing the wet, clogged hair from eyes and mouth.
+
+Joan paused just within the door, the terror of that figure on the table
+holding her spellbound, but Miss Abercrombie moved brusquely forward so
+that she stood in the lamplight confronting Aunt Janet.
+
+"So," she said, quick and sharp, yet not over loud, the people outside
+could not have heard, "Bridget has found this way out. A kinder way than
+your stern judgment, Janet. Poor little girl."
+
+"I did not judge," Miss Rutherford answered stiffly, "'the wages of sin
+is death.'"
+
+"Yet you can be kind to her now," snorted Miss Abercrombie; "it would
+not have been wasted had you been a little kinder before. Forgive me,
+Janet, I speak quickly, without thinking. You live up to your precepts;
+everyone has to do that."
+
+The old woman in the corner lifted her face to look at them; perhaps she
+thought that in some way or other they were reviling the dead, for she
+staggered to her feet and crossed over to the table.
+
+"It was fear made her do it," she wailed; "fear, and because we spoke
+her harsh. I hated the shame of it all. Yet, God knows, I would have
+stood by her in the end. My little girl, my little Bridget!" Sobs choked
+her, she fell to her knees, pressing her lips to one of the cold, stiff
+hands.
+
+Joan saw Aunt Janet stoop and lay a gentle hand on the heaving
+shoulders, she heard, too, a movement of the crowd outside and saw the
+Vicar's good-natured, perturbed face appear in the doorway. Behind him
+again was a younger man, stern-faced, with quiet, very steady blue eyes
+and a firm-lined mouth. All this she noticed, why she could not have
+explained, for the man was a perfect stranger to her; then the fear and
+giddiness which all this time she had been fighting against gained the
+upper hand and, swaying a little, she moved forward with the intention
+of getting outside, only to fall in a dead faint across the doorway of
+the cottage.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+    "Love wakes men, once a lifetime each
+     They lift their heavy heads and look.
+
+       *     *     *     *     *
+
+     And some give thanks, and some blaspheme,
+       And most forget, but either way
+     That, and the child's unheeded dream
+       Is all the light of all their day."
+
+
+The Grants were sitting at breakfast in their small, red-walled
+dining-room. Richard, commonly called Dick, at the end of the table,
+Mabel at the one side and Mrs. Grant in the seat of honour at the top.
+Wherever Mrs. Grant sat was the seat of honour; she was that kind of old
+lady. Marvellously handsome still, despite her age, with a commanding
+presence and a nature which had sublime contempt for everyone and
+everything except herself, she sailed through life exacting service from
+all and obedience from her children. Why they obeyed her they could not
+have themselves explained; perhaps it was an inheritance from the dead
+Mr. Grant, who had worshipped his wife as if she had been some divinity.
+In her own way Mrs. Grant had always been gracious and kindly to her
+husband, but he had been altogether a nonentity in her life. Before the
+children were old enough to see why, they realized that Daddy was only
+the man who made the money in their house. Mother spent it, buying the
+luxuries with which they were surrounded, the magnificent toys which
+they disregarded, as is the way of children, the splendidly expensive
+clothes, which were a perfect burden to them. Then, just when Dick was
+beginning to understand, Mr. Grant died.
+
+       *     *     *     *     *
+
+He had sent for his son--Dick was about eighteen then--and spoken to him
+just before the end came.
+
+"You will have to look after your mother, Dick," he had said, clutching
+at the young, strong hands; "she has always been looked after. She has
+never had to rough things in her life. And you won't be any too well
+off. Promise me, promise me, you will always give her of your best."
+
+"Of course, I promise, Dad," he had answered.
+
+Further conversation between then had ceased because Mrs. Grant swept
+into the room, regal even in the face of death. Dick remembered the
+incident afterwards with a little twitch of his lips because it was so
+typical of his mother and it was just at this period that he had begun
+to criticize her. The sick-room had been in shadowed gloom until her
+entry; the lights hurt the fast-failing eyes.
+
+"I cannot sit in the dark," stated Mrs. Grant, as she settled herself,
+with a delightful rustle of silk and a wave of perfume, beside the bed.
+"You know that, Harry. It always has depressed me, hasn't it?"
+
+"Turn up the lights, Dick," whispered the man, his hand had closed on
+one of hers; happiness flooded his heart at her presence.
+
+"But you know they hurt your eyes," Dick expostulated; he was new to
+death, yet he could read the signs well enough to know his father was
+dying.
+
+"Harry can lie with his eyes shut," answered Mrs. Grant calmly. There
+was no disagreeableness in her tone: her selfishness was on too gigantic
+a scale for her ever to be disagreeable.
+
+And Dick had turned up the lights and gone fuming from the room,
+conscious for the time being of a sense of dislike for his mother's
+perfection!
+
+It soon faded though; he had been trained too thoroughly in his youth.
+Once he said to Mabel hotly:
+
+"Why does Mother cry for Dad? She did not really love him, and she just
+delighted in buying all that expensive and becoming mourning."
+
+And Mabel had surprised him by replying: "Mother does not really love
+anyone but herself."
+
+The remark sounded odd from Mabel, who spent her life slaving with
+apparent devotion in her mother's service. She was a tall, rather
+colourless girl, with big grey eyes and a quaint-shaped mouth that was
+always very silent. She moved through the background of their lives
+doing things for mother. She had always done that; Dick wondered
+sometimes whether the soul within her would ever flame into open
+rebellion, but it never did.
+
+By the time Dick had passed his various exams, and was ready to take up
+a practice somewhere, Mrs. Grant and Mabel had been practically
+everywhere on the Continent.
+
+"Money is running short," Mabel wrote crisply to Dick; "cannot you do
+anything in the way of taking a house and settling down, so as to make a
+home for Mother and me?"
+
+Dick's ambitions lay in the direction of bachelor's diggings and work in
+London. He thrust them aside and bought what was supposed to be a very
+good and flourishing practice at Birmingham. Unfortunately Mrs. Grant
+took a violent dislike to Birmingham. Their house was gloomy and got on
+her nerves; the air, she said, was laden with smoke which irritated her
+throat. She developed a cough, quite the most annoying sound that Dick
+had ever imagined, and he was not easy to irritate. Mother coughed from
+the time she woke till the time she went to sleep--coughed and
+remembered old times and wept for Harry, who would at least have taken
+care not to expose her to such overwhelming discomfort.
+
+At the end of six months Dick threw up the practice in despair and
+placed himself at her disposal. They put in a year in London, but what
+Dick earned was quite insufficient to cope with what Mrs. Grant spent
+and things went from bad to worse.
+
+Mabel never offered any advice until she was asked but when Dick spoke
+to her finally she was quite definite.
+
+"You have got to take Mother in hand," she said. "Father never did. He
+spent his life making money for her to spend, but there is no reason why
+you should. Get a small practice somewhere in the country where there
+are no shops and just tell Mother you are going to settle there for five
+years at least."
+
+"She will get another cough," argued Dick.
+
+"You must let her cough, it won't hurt her," answered Mabel.
+
+Undoubtedly Mrs. Grant did not approve of Wrotham to begin with, but it
+had its advantages, even for her. She settled very quickly into the role
+of Lady Bountiful; the villagers gazing upon her with such unmixed
+admiration that she was moved to remark to Mabel that it was really
+pleasant doing things for such grateful people. Dick provided her with a
+victoria and horse in place of the usual doctor's trap, and she could
+drive abroad to visit this or that protégé in truly regal style. It
+meant that Dick had to pay all his visits, and some of them very far off
+and at all sorts of unseasonable hours, on a bicycle, but he never
+grudged making sacrifices of that kind for her. No one admired his
+mother in the abstract more than Dick did.
+
+Mabel perhaps resented the extra work it entailed on him, for she loved
+Dick with the whole force of her self-restrained heart. But, as usual,
+she kept silent. The villagers could see that she drove out in
+attendance on Mrs. Grant, but to them she was only an uninteresting
+shadow that waited on the other's splendour. They often wondered among
+themselves how Mrs. Grant could have a daughter as drab and
+uninteresting as Miss Grant; they did not realize how, like a vampire,
+the older woman lived upon the younger one's vitality. People like Mrs.
+Grant exist at the expense of those they come in contact with. You
+either have to live for them or away from them.
+
+On this particular morning Dick finished his breakfast before either his
+mother or sister, and pushing back his chair, asked, as he had always
+asked since the days of his childhood, if he might rise.
+
+"Before I am finished, Dick?" remonstrated Mrs. Grant; "it is not very
+polite, dear."
+
+"I know," Dick apologized, "but the truth is I have an early call to pay
+this morning. The people of the Manor House have sent for me; Miss
+Rutherford the younger is not awfully well, or something."
+
+"Miss Rutherford the younger?" repeated his mother; "I did not know
+there was a younger; I have never seen her, have I, Mabel?"
+
+"I don't suppose so," Dick answered for his sister; "she has been away
+in London."
+
+"What is the matter with her?" asked Mrs. Grant. "Why do they want you
+to see her?"
+
+"I can't know that till I have seen her, can I? Last night she happened
+to come into the Rendle cottage just after they had brought that poor
+girl home, and the sight must have upset her; anyway she fainted. I
+expect that is what Miss Rutherford is worried about."
+
+"It is hardly polite of her not to have brought her niece to call on
+me," said Mrs. Grant. "Still, if you are going there, dear, and the girl
+doesn't seem well, tell them I shall be only too happy to come and fetch
+her for a drive some afternoon. I daresay my carriage is more
+comfortable than that ramshackle old trap of theirs."
+
+"You are a dear to think of it," he said, stooping to kiss her good-bye.
+"If you can spare Mabel this afternoon, Mother, I thought perhaps she
+might come into Sevenoaks with me. I have got to attend a meeting there,
+and it will be an outing for her."
+
+"If Mabel would like to go, of course she must," Mrs. Grant agreed. "I
+shall be a little lonely, and to-day is the day I am supposed to have my
+hair shampooed. Not that it really matters."
+
+"I could not go any way," Mabel put in for herself. "Mr. Jarvis is
+coming to tea, Dick; he asked himself last week."
+
+She followed her brother out to the front door.
+
+"The day is going to be full of disagreeables for you," he said, as they
+stood waiting for his bicycle to be brought round. "Mother's shampoo, I
+know what that involves, and Mr. Jarvis. Nuisance the fellow is; why
+can't he see that you dislike him?"
+
+"Oh, I don't exactly," she answered, without meeting his eyes.
+
+She hated him like poison, Dick knew. He wondered rather vaguely why
+Mabel had lied to him, generally speaking they were too good friends for
+that to be necessary. Then he dismissed the subject, and his thoughts
+turned again to the girl he was on his way to see. He had been thinking
+a great deal of Joan since he had first seen her. The startled,
+child-like face, the wide frightened eyes, had impressed themselves on
+his mind the night before. He had lifted her in his arms and carried her
+outside; the poise of her thrown-back head against his arm stayed in his
+mind, a very warm memory. Poor little girl, it must have been horrible
+for her to have come in from the gay placidness of her own life and
+thoughts to the stark tragedy of Bridget Rendle's death.
+
+He was very ignorant and very reverent in his thoughts about women. He
+could imagine Joan's sweet, well-ordered life, the fragrance of youth
+hung about his idea of her. Bridget Rendle had been a girl too, younger
+perhaps than the other one; but Bridget had dipped into the waters of
+life, and sorrow and sin had closed over her. The two girls were as far
+apart as the poles, it seemed almost irreverent to think of them in the
+same breath.
+
+Aunt Janet met him in the hall when she heard of his arrival.
+
+"I have not told my niece about sending for you," she said; "it might
+only make her nervous. I am very alarmed about her, Dr. Grant. She has
+been home now three weeks and she is really not at all like herself.
+Then that faint last night. I am afraid of fainting-fits; my mother, I
+may as well tell you, died very suddenly from a heart-attack."
+
+"It is not likely to be anything of that sort," he told her.
+"Yesterday's tragedy was quite sufficient to upset very strong nerves."
+
+"I hope not," Aunt Janet agreed; "anyway, I shall feel happier once you
+have seen her. Will you come this way?"
+
+She led him through the house to a room on the other side of the
+drawing-room which had been fitted up as a special sanctum for Joan
+since her return from London.
+
+"I am nervous," she admitted to the doctor with her hand on the
+door-knob, "she will perhaps be annoyed at my having sent for you." Then
+she opened the door and they passed in.
+
+Joan was sitting in the far corner near the open window, a book on her
+lap. But she was not pretending to read; Dick could have sworn that she
+had been crying as they came in. As she saw her aunt was not alone she
+stood up quickly and the book fell unheeded to the floor.
+
+"This is the doctor, dear," Aunt Janet began nervously. "I asked him to
+call and see you. You need a tonic, I am sure you do."
+
+"You sent for him," whispered Joan. Dick felt horribly uncomfortable; it
+was impossible not to sense the tragedy which hung heavy in the air.
+"Why, oh why, have you done that, Aunt Janet?"
+
+"I was afraid," the other began; "last night you----" Rather waveringly
+she came to a full stop, staring at Joan.
+
+The girl had drawn herself up to her full height. She faced them as
+someone brought suddenly to bay, her hands clenched at her sides, two
+flags of colour flaming in her cheeks.
+
+"I was going to have told you," she said, addressing herself solely to
+Aunt Janet, "now you have brought him in he must know it too. But I do
+not need him to tell me what is the matter with me; I found it out for
+myself last night. I am not ashamed, I do not even hold that I have done
+anything wrong; I would have told you before only I did not know it was
+going to come to this, and for the rest it was like a shut book in my
+life that I did not want to have to open or look at again. I am like
+Bridget Rendle," she said, head held very high. "I am going to have a
+baby. Bridget was afraid and ashamed, but I am neither. I have done
+nothing to be ashamed of."
+
+The telling of it sapped at her much boasted courage, and left her
+whiter than the white wall-paper; Dick could see that she had some ado
+to keep back her tears.
+
+Aunt Janet seemed to have been paralysed; she stayed where she was,
+stiff, stricken, and Dick, glancing at her, thought he had never seen
+such anguish and terror combined on a human face. He felt himself
+completely forgotten in this crisis. The two women stared at each other.
+Twice Aunt Janet moistened her lips and tried to speak, but the words
+died in her throat. When she succeeded at last her voice was scarce
+recognizable.
+
+"You said--like Bridget Rendle," she whispered; "did you mean what you
+said?"
+
+"Yes," answered Joan.
+
+The older woman turned towards the door. She walked as if blind, her
+hands groping before her. "God!" Dick heard her say under her breath,
+"Dear God, what have I done that this should come upon me?"
+
+As she reached the door Joan called to her, her voice sharp with fear.
+"Aunt Janet, Aunt Janet, aren't you going to say anything to me?"
+
+"I must hold my tongue," the other answered stiffly, "or I shall curse
+that which I have loved." Suddenly the anguish in her flamed to white
+beat. "I would rather have known you dead," she said, and passed swiftly
+from the room.
+
+Joan took a step forward, and her foot touched on the book she had let
+fall. Mechanically she stooped to pick it up, then, because her knees
+were in reality giving way under her, she stumbled to the chair and sat
+down again. She seemed to have forgotten the man standing by the door,
+she just sat there, hands folded in her lap, with her white face and
+great brown eyes looking unseeingly at the garden.
+
+Dick moved uneasily. He had not the slightest idea what he ought to do;
+he felt horribly like an intruder. And he was intensely sorry for the
+girl, even though behind this sorrow lay the shock of a half-formed
+ideal which she had shattered in his mind. Finally he submerged the man
+in the doctor and moved towards her.
+
+"I am most awfully sorry for you," he said, "will you let me help you if
+I can? There may be some mistake, and anyway I could give you something
+to help with those fainting-fits."
+
+Joan brought her eyes away from the garden and looked at him. "No," she
+said, "there is no mistake and I do not make a habit of fainting.
+Yesterday it was different, perhaps I realized definitely and for the
+first time what it would all mean. I saw Aunt Janet's face as she spoke
+of the dead girl, and ... I do not know why I am telling you all this,"
+she broke off, "it cannot be very interesting, but I do not want you to
+think that I feel as Bridget Rendle felt."
+
+"No," he agreed, "you are facing it with more courage than she had been
+taught to have."
+
+"It is not a question of courage," Joan answered. He was not
+understanding her, she realized, and for some stupid reason it hurt that
+he should not, but she must not stoop to further explanations. She stood
+up, making a stern effort at absolute calmness.
+
+"Good-bye," she said, "I am sorry you should have been troubled to come
+and that you should have had to go through this sort of scene."
+
+"Good-bye," was all he could answer.
+
+At the door he turned to look back at her. "If you should need help of
+any sort at any time," he said, "will you send for me? I should like to
+feel you were going to do that."
+
+"I cannot promise," she answered, "you see, I shall probably be leaving
+here quite soon."
+
+And with that he had to be content to leave her.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+    "And bending down beside the glowing bars
+     Murmur, a little sadly, how love fled
+     And paced upon the mountains overhead,
+     And hid his face amid a crowd of stars."
+
+
+Mabel had shampooed her mother's hair, following out with unending
+patience the minute instructions which the process always involved. She
+had rinsed it in four relays of hot water, two of lukewarm and one of
+cold; she had dried it with the hard towel for the scalp and the soft
+towel for the hair. She had rubbed brilliantine in to give it the
+approved gloss. The whole proceeding had lasted fully two hours; now she
+stood and brushed out the long fine threads of grey turning to silver
+with just the steady gentle pressure which was necessary and which,
+according to Mrs. Grant, no one but Mabel was capable of producing.
+
+Mrs. Grant liked to have her hair brushed for half an hour after a
+shampoo, it soothed the irritated nerves. From behind her mother's back
+Mabel could see her own face in the glass, the sallow cheeks flushed
+from her exertions, the grey, black-lashed eyes tired and a little
+angry. Once, long ago, during one of their journeys on the continent,
+there had been a young naval officer who had loved Mabel for those grey
+eyes of hers. He had raved about the way the lashes lay like a fringe of
+shadow round them. He had called them "Dream Eyes," and once he had
+kissed the lids close shut over them with hard, passionate kisses.
+Whenever Mabel looked at her eyes in the glass she thought of Jack
+Donald. She had loved him and she had sent him away because of Mother.
+He had only been able to offer her his love and the pay of a lieutenant
+in the Navy; he had not even shown that he liked Mother, he had resented
+the way Mabel slaved for her. Of course the outlook had been absurd, and
+Mrs. Grant had said so very plainly. If Mabel married it would have to
+be someone wealthy someone elderly enough to understand that Mother must
+live with them. But when he went he took with him all the dreams of
+Mabel's life; she never looked out into the future to make plans now,
+she could only look back into the past that held her memories.
+
+"I hope," said Mrs. Grant suddenly breaking in on her thoughts, "that
+Dick does not fall in love with this young lady at the Manor."
+
+"Why not?" asked Mabel, "he must fall in love sooner or later."
+
+"Well, then, it must be later and with someone who has a great deal of
+money. We are quite badly enough off as it is."
+
+"You and I could go away again on our own," suggested Mabel, "you know
+you said the other day that Wrotham was getting on your nerves."
+
+"Don't be ridiculous," snapped Mrs. Grant, "I should like to know what
+you think we should live on once Dick has a wife. You say you won't
+marry Mr. Jarvis or anyone else."
+
+"No," Mabel admitted, "but because I won't marry it hardly seems fair
+that we should stand in the way of Dick's doing so."
+
+"What do you intend to imply by 'standing in the way'? Really Mabel,
+sometimes I wonder if you have any love for me, you so habitually and
+wilfully misconstrue my sentences. Surely it is permissible" (Mrs.
+Grant's sigh was a model of motherly affection) "for a mother to wish
+to keep her son, her eldest born, to herself for a little longer. One
+loses them so once they marry."
+
+Mabel concealed a swift, rather bitter, smile. "I did not mean to
+misconstrue anything," she said, "only just the other day I was thinking
+that perhaps we did rather hamper Dick. He is twenty-seven, you know; it
+is funny he has never wanted to marry."
+
+"He is waiting for the right girl," Mrs. Grant sighed again.
+
+"And if he happens to find her," thought Mabel to herself, there was no
+use saying the words aloud, "we are to do our best to prevent him having
+her. Poor old Dick." Her eyes waked to sudden, vivid affection as she
+thought of him.
+
+She ran downstairs presently, Mrs. Grant having retired to rest after
+exertions, to meet Dick just coming in. He had done a round of visits
+after his call at the Manor house. Visits which had included one to the
+Rendles' cottage, where he had seen the principal figure of last night's
+tragedy laid out, as her mother said, for decent burial, "even though it
+baint a going to be Christian."
+
+The girl had been dressed in something white; white flowers, great
+beautiful-headed chrysanthemums, lay between her folded hands and
+against her face. She had been a handsome girl, death had robbed her of
+her vivid colouring, but it had given her in its stead something
+dignified and withdrawn, a look of suffering and yet great peace.
+
+Mrs. Rendle was more resigned too this morning; she had cried her heart
+quiet through the night.
+
+"Bridget is better so," she could confide to Dick as he stood looking
+down at the girl, "the shame is done away with, sir, and God will look
+to the sin. I hold there ain't much to fear there, even though they
+won't bury her in the churchyard."
+
+"No, I don't think there is much to fear," he agreed. "I am sorry about
+the burial, Mrs. Rendle, I have tried to argue the matter out with the
+vicar."
+
+"Oh, that is not to be helped," she answered. "God will rest her soul
+wherever she be. Miss Rutherford sent those flowers," she added, "she
+was rare set agin Bridget to begin with, but she be softened down."
+
+That brought the other tragedy which he had witnessed this morning back
+to his mind. Not that he had really forgotten it. The picture of Joan,
+her head high, her cheeks flushed, was one that had imprinted itself
+very strongly upon his memory. He had given up trying to understand how
+such a thing could have happened, his own vague happy thoughts of her
+stirred wistfully behind the new knowledge. And he could not dismiss her
+altogether from the throne he had designed for her to occupy. There must
+be some explanation; if only he had not been such an absolute stranger
+perhaps she would have told him a little more, have given him a chance
+to understand.
+
+"Well," asked Mabel, "is she nice, Dick, did you like her?" Her eyes
+were quick to notice the new shadow of trouble on his face.
+
+"Very nice, I think," he answered, hoping his voice sounded as
+indifferent as he meant it to, "but I really did not see much of her and
+she is going back to London almost at once." He went past her on into
+the dining-room. "Is lunch nearly ready," he asked, "I have got to catch
+that 2.5, you know."
+
+"I'll see about it," Mabel said, "Mother is having hers upstairs."
+
+She turned away to comply, but all the time she was hurrying up the
+maidservant, and later, while she and Dick sat opposite each other,
+rather silent, through lunch, her eyes and mind were busy trying to read
+the secret of Dick's manner. The girl had impressed him strongly, that
+was evident, but why should she have occasioned this gloom in Dick who
+so very rarely allowed anything or anybody to ruffle his cheery good
+humour?
+
+He rode off without letting her glean any explanation, and Mabel
+wandered into the drawing-room to get it ready for Mrs. Grant's
+descent. Had Dick really fallen in love? She remembered once before when
+he had been about eighteen or nineteen, how there had been a girl whom
+he had rather shyly confessed himself enamoured of. But since the damsel
+had been quite five years his senior the romance, to Mabel's relief, had
+faded away. Yet if Dick were ever really to fall in love it would be a
+deep and unshakable tie; he would be as his father had been, all
+faithful to the one woman in his life.
+
+It was remembering her father that suddenly brought Mabel's thoughts
+back to her mother whose absorbing personality had stood so like a giant
+shadow across all their lives. Would Dick's love be strong enough to
+fight against his sense of duty and mother's selfishness, for most
+certainly mother would not help him to achieve his desire unless it ran
+along the same lines as her own. And if mother prevailed what would life
+mean for Dick? The same dry empty dreariness that her own days
+contained, the restless hopes that died too hard, the unsatisfied, cruel
+dreams? No, no! She had not fought to save her own happiness, but she
+would fight to the last inch to save Dick's.
+
+Almost as if in answer to her heart's wild outcry the front-door bell
+rang, and looking up she saw the short stout figure which of late had
+taken to haunting her thoughts on the door-step.
+
+Mr. Jarvis was an elderly man inclined to be fat, with round, heavy
+face, very thick about the jaws and unpleasantly small eyes. Yet the
+expression of the man's face was not altogether disagreeable and a
+certain shrewd humour showed in the lines of his mouth. He had lived for
+forty-two years in Wrotham, travelling twice a year to London in
+connection with his business, but never venturing further afield. His
+house, a magnificent farm building, lay about twelve miles away on the
+other side of Wrotham station. It had come down to him through
+generations of Jarvises, he was reputed to be marvellously wealthy, and
+he had no shyness about admitting the fact. His favourite topics of
+conversation were money and horses. He had never married, village gossip
+could have given you lurid details as to the why and the wherefore had
+you been willing to listen. Mr. Jarvis himself would have put it more
+plainly. The only woman he had ever had the least affection for had
+neither expected nor desired matrimony; she had been content to live
+with him as his housekeeper. This woman had been dead three years when
+Jarvis first met Mabel. Quite apart from the fact that of late he had
+been feeling that it was time he got married, Jarvis had been attracted
+to Mabel from the first. She was such a contrast to the other women he
+had known; he admired enormously her slim delicacy, her faintly coloured
+face, her grey eyes. He liked her way of talking, too, and the long
+silences which held her; her quiet dignity, the way she moved. He placed
+her on a pedestal in his thoughts, which was a thing he had never dreamt
+of doing for any other woman, and before long his admiration melted into
+love. Then being forty-two the disease took rapid and tense possession.
+He was only happy when he was with her, able to talk to her now and
+again, to watch her always.
+
+Dick's impression was that Mabel hated the man. He disliked him himself,
+which perhaps coloured his view, for hate was not quite what Mabel felt.
+Had Mr. Jarvis been content to just like her she would have tolerated
+and more or less liked him. She had thought him, to begin with, a funny,
+in a way rather pathetic, little man. Ugly, and Mabel had such an
+instinctive sympathy for anything ugly or unloved. So, to begin with,
+she had been kind to him; then one day Mrs. Grant had opened her eyes to
+the evident admiration of the man, mentioning at the same time that from
+the money point of view he would be a good match, and suddenly Mabel had
+known that she was afraid. Afraid, without exactly knowing why, very
+much as is the hapless sheep on his way to the slaughter-house.
+
+As the maid ushered in Mr. Jarvis a minute or two later this feeling of
+fear caught at Mabel's heart, and in answer to its summons the warm
+blood flushed to face and neck as she stood up to receive him.
+
+"I am early," stammered the man, his eyes on her new-wakened beauty, for
+it was only in her lack of colour that Mabel's want of prettiness lay,
+"but I came on purpose, I wanted to catch you alone."
+
+Mabel took what was almost a despairing look at the clock. "Mother won't
+be down for quite half an hour," she said, "so you have succeeded. Shall
+we stay here or will you come down to the garden? I want to show you my
+Black Prince rose, it is not doing at all well."
+
+She moved to the window which opened doorways on to the garden, but Mr.
+Jarvis made no attempt to follow her.
+
+"Let us stay here," he said, "what I have got to say won't take long and
+we can do the roses afterwards when Mrs. Grant is about. I guess you
+could help me a bit if you only chose to," he went on, his voice
+curiously gruff and unready, "but you won't, you won't even look at me.
+I suppose those great grey eyes of yours hate the sight of me, and I am
+a damned fool to put my heart into words. But I have got to," she heard
+him move close to her and how quickly he was breathing, "I love you, you
+pale, thin slip of a girl, I want you as a wife, will you marry me?"
+
+The silence when he had finished speaking lay heavy between them. Mabel
+let him take her hand, though the moist warmth of his gave her a little
+shudder of aversion, but by no strength of will could she lift her eyes
+to look at him. She stood as immovable as a statue and the man, watching
+her from out of his small shrewd eyes, smiled a little bitterly.
+
+"You hate the thought like poison," he said, "yet you don't throw off my
+hand or yell out your 'No.' Something is in the balance then. Well,
+marry me for my money, Mabel. I had rather it were love, but if there is
+anything about me that can win you, I am not going to give you up."
+
+That flicked at her pride and the honesty of it appealed to her. She
+lifted her eyes and for the first time she became aware of the real
+kindness that lay in his.
+
+"I have never hated you," she said slowly, "but I don't and can't love
+you. Will you take that as your answer?"
+
+The man shook his head. "I was not fool enough to ask--'Do you love
+me?'" he reminded her; "what I want to know is, 'Will you marry me?'"
+
+"Without love?"--her eyes besought him--"marriage must be hideous."
+
+"I will risk it if you will," he answered. "Sit down, let us talk it
+out."
+
+He had won back his self-possession, though his eyes were still eager in
+their demand. Mabel sat down on the window-seat and he pulled up a chair
+at a little distance from her.
+
+"Look here," he began, "it is like this. I am not a young man, probably
+I am twelve to fourteen years older than you. If you have heard what the
+village scandal says about me you can take it from me that it is true;
+it is better that you should know the worst at once. But until I met
+you, this I can swear before God, I have never really loved. It is not a
+question of money this time; I would give my soul to win you. And I
+don't want you as I have wanted the other women in my life; I want you
+as my wife."
+
+"Yet you can buy me just as you could them," Mabel whispered.
+
+"No"--again he shook his head. "I am not making that mistake either. I
+know just why I can buy you. Anyway, let us put that aside. This is the
+case as I see it. I have money, heaps of it; I have a good large house
+and servants eating their heads off. I will make Mrs. Grant comfortable;
+she will live with us, of course, and she is welcome to everything I
+have got; and I love you. That is the one great drawback, isn't it? The
+question is. Will you be able to put up with it?"
+
+Away in the back of Mabel's mind another voice whispered, "I love you."
+She had to shut her lids over the "Dream Eyes," to hold back the tears.
+
+"Even if things were different," she said, "I could not love you; I have
+always loved someone else."
+
+Mr. Jarvis sat back in his chair with a quick frown. "Any chance of his
+marrying you?" he asked.
+
+"No," she had to admit, "there has never been any chance of that."
+
+"I see"--he looked up at her and down again at his podgy, fat hands,
+clenched together. "My offer still holds good," he said abruptly.
+
+"Oh, I don't know what to say or what to do." Mabel's calm broke, she
+stood up nervously. It almost seemed as if the walls of the room were
+closing in on her. "There are so many things to think of; Mother and
+Dick and----"
+
+Perhaps he understood the softening of her voice as she spoke of Dick,
+for he looked up at her quickly.
+
+"Yes, there is your brother," he agreed. "I guess he is pretty tired
+having to look after you two, and he is a clever lad; there ought to be
+a future before him if he has his chance. Put the weight on to my
+shoulders, Mabel; they are better able to bear it."
+
+She turned to him breathlessly; it was quite true what he was saying
+about Dick. Dick had his own life to make. "I have told you the truth,"
+she said. "I don't love you, probably there will be times when I shall
+hate you. If you are not afraid of that, if you are ready to take Mother
+and me and let us spend your money in return for that, then--I will
+marry you."
+
+Mr. Jarvis got quickly to his feet. "You mean it?" he gasped; his face
+was almost purple, he came to her, catching her hands in his. "You mean
+it? Mind you, Mabel, you have got to put up with my loving you. I am
+not pretending that I am the kind of man who will leave you alone."
+
+"I mean it," she answered, very cold and quiet, because it seemed as if
+all the tears in her heart had suddenly hardened into a lump of stone.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+    "I ride to a tourney with sordid things,
+     They grant no quarter, but what care I?
+
+       *     *     *     *     *
+
+     I have bartered and begged, I have cheated and lied,
+     But now, however the battle betide,
+     Uncowed by the clamour, I ride ride, ride!"
+
+                                             VICTOR STARBUCK.
+
+
+Joan did not see Aunt Janet again. Miss Abercrombie carried messages
+backwards and forwards between the two, but even Miss Abercrombie's
+level-headed arguments could not move Aunt Janet from the position she
+had taken up. And Miss Abercrombie was quite able to realize how much
+her old friend was suffering.
+
+"I never knew a broken heart could bring so much pain," she told Joan;
+"but every time I look at your aunt I realize that physical suffering is
+as nothing compared to the torture of her thoughts."
+
+"Why cannot she try to understand. Let me go to her," Joan pleaded. "If
+only I can speak to her I shall make her understand."
+
+But Miss Abercrombie shook her head. "No, child," she said, "it would be
+quite useless and under the circumstances you must respect her wishes. I
+am fearfully sorry for both of you; I know that it is hurting you, too,
+but when you have wilfully or inadvertently killed a person's belief in
+you the only thing you can do is to keep out of their way. Time is the
+one healer for such wounds."
+
+The tears smarted in Joan's eyes, yet up till now she had not cried
+once. Hurt pride, hurt love, struggled for expression, but words seemed
+so useless.
+
+"I had better hurry up and get away," she said; "I suppose Aunt Janet
+hates the thought of my being near her even."
+
+Miss Abercrombie watched her with kindly eyes. The tragedy she had
+suspected on the first night was worse even than she had imagined. It
+stared at her out of the old, fierce face upstairs, it slipped into her
+thoughts of what this girl's future was going to be.
+
+"Have you made any plans?" she asked; "do you know at all where to go?"
+
+"Does it matter very much?" Joan answered bitterly.
+
+"My dear," Miss Abercrombie spoke gently, "I am making no attempt to
+criticize, and I certainly have no right to judge, but you have a very
+hard fight before you and you will not win through if you go into it in
+that spirit. I do not want to ask questions, you would probably resent
+them, but will you tell me one thing. Does the man know about what is
+going to happen?"
+
+"No," answered Joan. "It wouldn't make any difference if he did. It is
+not even as if he had persuaded me to go and live with him; I want you
+to understand that I went of my own free will because I thought it was
+right."
+
+"You will write and tell him," suggested Miss Abercrombie. "That is only
+fair to him and yourself."
+
+"No," Joan said again, "it was the one thing he was most afraid of; I
+would not stoop to ask him to share it with me."
+
+Miss Abercrombie put out a quick hand. "You are forgetting that now
+there is someone else who is dependent on how you fight and whether you
+win through. You may say, 'I stand alone in this,' yet there is someone
+else who will have to share in paying the cost."
+
+The colour swept from Joan's cheek; she choked back the hard lump in her
+throat. "We will have to pay it together," she said. "I cannot ask
+anyone else to help."
+
+The tears, long held back, came then and she turned away quickly. Miss
+Abercrombie watched her in silence for a minute or two. At last she
+spoke. "You poor thing," she said slowly and quietly; "you poor, foolish
+child."
+
+Joan turned to her quickly. "You are thinking that I am a coward," she
+said, "that I am making but a poor beginnings to my fight. But it isn't
+that, not exactly. I shall have courage enough when it comes to the
+time. But just now it is hurting me so to hurt Aunt Janet; I had not
+reckoned on that, I did not know that you could kill love so quickly."
+
+"You can't," Miss Abercrombie answered. "If her love were dead all this
+would not be hurting her any more."
+
+So Joan packed up her trunks again, fighting all the time against the
+impulse which prompted her to do nothing but cry and cry and cry. The
+chill of Aunt Janet's attitude seemed to have descended on the whole
+household. They could have no idea of the real trouble, but they felt
+the shadow and moved about limply, talking to each other in whispers.
+Miss Janet was reputed to be ill, anyway, she was keeping her room, and
+Miss Joan was packing up to go away; two facts which did not work in
+well together. No wonder the servants were restless and unhappy.
+
+Uncle John met Joan on her way upstairs late that evening. His usually
+grave, uninterested face wore an expression of absolute amazement, it
+almost amounted to fear.
+
+"Will you come into my room for a minute," he said, holding the door
+open for her to pass.
+
+Once inside, he turned and stared at her; she had never imagined his
+face could have worn such an expression. She saw him trying to speak,
+groping for words, as it were, and she stayed tongue-tied before him.
+Her day had been so tumultuous that now she was tired out, indifferent
+as to what might happen next.
+
+"Your aunt has told me," he said at last. "I find it almost impossible
+to believe, and in a way I blame myself. We should never have allowed
+you to go away as we did." He paused to breathe heavily. "I am an old
+man, but not too old to make a fight for our honour. Will you give me
+this man's name and address, Joan?"
+
+She had not paused to think that they would look on it as their honour
+which she had played with. His rather pitiful dignity hurt her more than
+anything that had gone before.
+
+"I cannot do that," she answered; "there is nothing exactly that you
+could blame him for. I did what I did out of my own free will and
+because I thought it was right."
+
+He still stared at her. "Right," he repeated; "you use the word in a
+strange sense, surely; and as for blaming him"--she saw how suddenly his
+hands clenched, the knuckles standing out white--"if you will let me
+know where to find him, I will settle that between us."
+
+Joan moved towards the door. "I cannot," she said; "please, Uncle John,
+don't ask me any more. I have hurt your honour; it must be me that you
+punish. I am going away to-morrow, let me go out of your life
+altogether. I shall not make any attempt to come back."
+
+"You are going to him?" he questioned. "Before God, if you do that I
+will find you out and----"
+
+"No," she interrupted, "you need not be afraid; I am not going back to
+him."
+
+With her hand on the door she heard him order her to come back as he had
+not finished what he had to say, and she stayed where she was, not
+turning again to look at him.
+
+"You are being stubborn in your sin." How strange the words sounded from
+Uncle John, who had never said a cross word to her in his life. "Very
+well, then, there is nothing for us to do except, as you say, to try and
+forget that we have ever loved you. When you go out of our house
+to-morrow it shall be the end. Your aunt is with me in this. But you
+shall have money; it shall be paid to you regularly through my
+solicitor, and to-night I am writing to him to tell him to render you
+every assistance he can. You can go there whenever you are in need of
+help. Miss Abercrombie has also promised your aunt, I believe, to do
+what she can for you."
+
+"I would rather not take any money from you," whispered Joan; "I will be
+able to earn enough to keep myself."
+
+"When you are doing that," he answered grimly, "you may communicate with
+the solicitor and he will put the money aside for such time as you may
+need it. But until then you owe it to us to use our money in preference
+to what could only be given to you in charity or disgrace."
+
+She waited in silence for some minutes after his last words. If she
+could have run to him then and cried out her fear and dismay and regret,
+perhaps some peace might have been achieved between them which would
+have helped to smooth out the tangle of their lives. But Joan was
+hopelessly dumb. She had gone into her escapade with light laughter on
+her lips, now she was paying the cost. One cannot take the world and
+readjust it to one's own beliefs. That was the lesson she was to learn
+through loneliness and tears. This breaking of home ties was only the
+first step in the lesson.
+
+She stole out of his presence at last and up to her own room. Her
+packing was all finished, she had dismantled the walls of her pictures,
+the tables of her books. Everything she possessed had been given to her
+by either Uncle John or Aunt Janet. Christmas presents, Easter presents,
+birthday presents, presents for no particular excuse except that she was
+their little girl and they loved her. It seemed to Joan as if into the
+black box which contained all these treasures she had laid away also
+their love for her. It took on almost the appearance of a coffin and
+she hated it.
+
+Miss Abercrombie saw her off at the station next morning. She had given
+Joan several addresses where she could look for rooms and was coming up
+to London in about a month herself, and would take Joan back with her
+into the country. "I want you to remember, though," she added, "that you
+can always come to me any time before that if you feel inclined. You
+need not even write; just turn up; you have my address; I shall always
+be glad to have you. I want to help you through what I know is going to
+be a very bitter time."
+
+"Thank you," Joan answered; but even at the time she had a ridiculous
+feeling that Miss Abercrombie was very glad to be seeing the last of
+her.
+
+After the train had slid out of the station and the small, purposeful
+figure had vanished from sight she sat back and tried to collect her
+thoughts to review the situation. She was feeling tired and desperately
+unhappy. They had let her see, even these dear people whom of all others
+in the world she loved, that she had gone outside their pale. She was in
+their eyes an outcast, a leper. She was afraid to see in other people's
+eyes the look of horror and agony which she had read in Aunt Janet's. Of
+what use was her book-learned wisdom in the face of this, it vanished
+into thin air. Hopeless, ashamed, yet a little defiant, Joan sat and
+stared at the opposite wall of the railway carriage.
+
+At Victoria Station she put her luggage into the cloak-room, deciding to
+see what could be done in the way of rooms, without the expense of going
+from place to place in a cab. The places Miss Abercrombie had
+recommended her to struck her as being expensive, and it seemed to her
+tortured nerves as if the landladies viewed her with distrustful eyes.
+She finally decided to take a bus down to Chelsea; she remembered having
+heard from someone that Chelsea was a cheap and frankly Bohemian place
+to live in.
+
+London was not looking its very best on this particular morning. A
+green-grey fog enshrouded shops and houses, the Park was an invisible
+blur and the atmosphere smarted in people's eyes and irritated their
+throats. Despite the contrariness of the weather, Joan clambered on to
+the top of the bus, she felt she could not face the inside stuffiness.
+She was tired and, had she but owned to it, hungry. It was already late
+afternoon and she had only had a cup of coffee and a bun since her
+arrival.
+
+As the bus jolted and bumped down Park Lane and then along
+Knightsbridge, she sat huddled up and miserable on the back seat, the
+day being well in accord with her mood. She was only dimly aware that
+they were passing the flat where she and Gilbert had lived, she was more
+acutely conscious of the couple who sat just in front of her--the man's
+arm flung round the girl's shoulders, her head very close to his.
+
+Waves of misery closed round Joan. A memory, which had not troubled her
+for some time, of Gilbert's hands about her and the scent of heliotrope,
+stirred across her mind. She could feel the hot tears splashing on her
+ungloved hands, a fit of sobbing gulped at her throat. Lest she should
+altogether lose control of herself she rose quickly and fumbled her way
+down the steps. The bus had just reached the corner of Sloane Street.
+She would go across the Park, she decided, and have her cry out. It was
+no use going to look for rooms in her present state, no landlady would
+dream of having her.
+
+Half blinded by her tears and the fog combined, she turned and started
+to cross the road. Voices yelled at her from either side, a motor car
+with enormous headlights came straight at her out of the fog. Joan
+hesitated, if she had stayed quite still the danger would have flashed
+past her, but she was already too unnerved to judge of what her action
+should be. As if fascinated by the lights she shut her eyes and moved
+blindly towards them.
+
+There were more sharp shouts, a great grinding noise of brakes and
+rushing wheels brought to a sudden pause, then the darkness of black,
+absolute night surged over and beyond the pain which for a moment had
+held Joan. She floated out, so it seemed, on to a sea of nothingness,
+and a great peace settled about her heart.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+    "With heart made empty of delight
+       And hands that held no more fair things;
+     I questioned her;--'What shall requite
+       The savour of my offerings?'"
+
+                                             E. NESBIT.
+
+
+"You have got your back against the wall, you have got to fight, you
+have got to fight, to fight!"
+
+The words pounded across Joan's mind over and over again. She struggled
+in obedience to their message against the waves of sleep that lapped her
+round. Struggled and fought, till at last, after what seemed like
+centuries of darkness, she won back to light and opened her eyes.
+
+She was lying in a long narrow bed, one of many, ranged on both sides
+down the hospital walls. Large windows, set very high up, opened on to
+grey skies and a flood of rather cold sunshine. At the foot of her bed,
+watching her with impartial eyes, stood a man, and beside him two
+nurses, their neat pink dresses and starched aprons rustling a little as
+they moved.
+
+Joan's eyes, wide and bewildered, met the doctor's, and he leant forward
+and smiled.
+
+"That's better," he said, "you have got to make an effort towards living
+yourself, young lady." He nodded and turned to the nurse at his right
+hand. "How long has she been in now, Nurse?"
+
+"Ten days to-morrow," the woman answered, "and except for the first day,
+when she moaned a good deal and talked about having to fight, she has
+scarce seemed to be conscious."
+
+Joan's lips, prompted by the insistent voice within her, repeated, "I
+have got to fight," stiffly.
+
+The doctor came a little nearer and stooped to hear the words, "Yes," he
+agreed, "that is right, you have got to fight. See if you can get her to
+talk now and again, Nurse," he added; "she wants rousing, otherwise
+there is nothing radically to keep her back."
+
+Joan's face, however, seemed to linger in his mind, for, as he was about
+to leave the ward after his tour of inspection, he turned again to the
+elder nurse in charge.
+
+"Have you been able to find out anything about bed 14?" he asked.
+
+"No, sir. We have had no inquiries and there was nothing in any of her
+pockets except a cloak-room ticket for Victoria Station."
+
+"Humph," he commented, "yet she must have relations. She does not look
+the friendless waif type."
+
+Nurse Taylor pursed up her lips. She had her own opinion as to the
+patient in bed 14. "There was the unfortunate circumstance of her
+condition," she mentioned; "the girl may very well have been desperate
+and lonely."
+
+"Anyway, she hasn't any right to be left like this," the doctor
+retorted. "If you can get her to talk about relations, find out where
+they are and send for them. That is my advice."
+
+Nurse Taylor owned a great many excellent qualities; tact and compassion
+were not among them. Long years spent in a profession which brought her
+daily into contact with human sin and human suffering had done nothing
+to soften her outlook or smooth down the hard, straight lines which she
+had laid down for her own and everyone else's guidance. She disapproved
+of Joan, but obedience to the doctor's orders was a religion to her;
+even where she disapproved she always implicitly carried them out.
+
+Next day, therefore, she stopped for quite a long time at Joan's bed,
+talking in her toneless, high voice. Had Joan any people who could be
+written to, what was her home address, would they not be worried at
+hearing nothing from her?
+
+Joan could only shake her head to all the questions. Very vaguely and in
+detached fragments she was beginning to remember the time that had
+preceded her accident. The memory of Aunt Janet's face and Uncle John's
+parting words was like an open wound, it bled at every touch and she
+shrank from Nurse Taylor's pointed questions. She remembered how she had
+sat on the top of the bus with the black weight of misery on her heart
+and of how the tears had come. She had been looking for rooms; that
+recollection followed hard on the heels of the other.
+
+When she was well enough to get about she would have to start looking
+for rooms again, for she had quite definitely made up her mind not to be
+a burden to Miss Abercrombie. It was her own fight; when she had
+gathered her strength about her, she would fight it out alone and make a
+success of it. Half wistfully she looked into the future and dreamt
+about the baby that was coming into her life. She would have to learn to
+live down this feeling of shame that burnt at her heart as she thought
+of him. He would be all hers, a small life to make of it what she
+pleased. Well, she would have to see that she made it fine and gay and
+brave. Shame should not enter into their lives, not if she fought hard
+enough.
+
+Nurse Taylor described her to the junior afterwards as a most stubborn
+and hardened type of girl.
+
+"The poor thing has hardly got her wits about her yet," the other
+answered; "she is very little trouble in the wards, we have had worse."
+
+"Well, the doctor can question her himself next time," Nurse Taylor
+snorted. "I am not here to be snubbed by her sort."
+
+She did not, however, let the matter drop entirely. At the end of her
+third week Joan was promoted to an armchair in the verandah and there
+one afternoon, after the teas had been handed round, Nurse Taylor
+brought her a visitor. A tall, sad-faced, elderly woman, who walked
+with a curiously deprecating movement, seeming to apologize for every
+step she took. Yet kindliness and a certain strength shone at Joan from
+behind the large, round-rimmed glasses she wore, and her mouth was clean
+cut and sharp.
+
+"This is Mrs. Westwood." Nurse Taylor introduced them briefly. "She
+wants to have a little talk with you, Miss Rutherford. If I were you I
+should tell her about things," she added pointedly. "I do not know if
+you have any plans made, but you are up for discharge next week."
+
+She bustled off and Mrs. Westwood drew up a chair and sat down close to
+Joan, staring at the girl with short-sighted, pink-lidded eyes.
+
+"You will wonder who I am," she said at last. "Perhaps you have never
+noticed me before, but I am a very frequent visitor. We run a mission in
+the South-West of London, with the object of helping young girls. I want
+you to talk to me about yourself, to be quite frank with me and to
+remember, if I seem to usurp on your privacy, that I am an older woman
+and that my only wish is to help you."
+
+"It is very kind of you," began Joan, "but----"
+
+"You may not need material help," the woman put in hastily; "but,
+spiritually, who is not in need of help from God."
+
+Joan could think of no suitable reply for this and they sat in silence,
+the woman studying her face intently. Then presently, flushing with the
+earnestness of her purpose, she put out a cold hand and took Joan's.
+
+"I think they have left it to me to tell you," she said. "The little
+life that was within you has been killed by your accident."
+
+The colour flamed to Joan's face. A sense of awe and a feeling of
+intense relief surged up in her. "Oh, what a good thing!" she gasped,
+almost before she realized what she said.
+
+Mrs. Westwood sat back in her chair, her eyes no longer looked at Joan.
+"The child which God had given you even in your sin," she said stiffly.
+
+Joan leaned forward quickly. "I did not mean just that," she said, "and
+yet I did. You do not know, you can't guess, how afraid I was getting.
+Everyone's hand against me, and even the people who had most loved me
+seeming to hate me because of this."
+
+Her voice trailed into silence before the stern disapproval of the other
+woman's face. Yet once having started, she was driven on to speak all
+the jumble of thoughts that had lain in her mind these last two months.
+
+"I was not ashamed or afraid, to begin with," she hurried the words out.
+"It had not seemed to me wrong. I lived with him because I thought I
+loved him and we did not want to get married. Then one day he let me
+see--oh, no, I am not being quite truthful, for I had seen it
+before--that he was in reality ashamed of our life together. He was
+acting against his convictions because it amused him. I could not bear
+that, it seemed to drag our life together through the mud, and I left
+him."
+
+She could see that Mrs. Westwood was not making the slightest attempt to
+understand her; still she went wildly on:
+
+"I went home and it seemed all right. My life with him faded away; I
+suppose I had never really loved him. Then, then they found out about
+what was going to happen and they turned against me, even Aunt Janet;"
+her voice broke on the words, she buried her face in her arms, crying
+like a child. "Aunt Janet, Aunt Janet," she whispered again and again
+through her tears.
+
+Mrs. Westwood waited till the storm had spent itself, there was no sign
+of softening upon her face. Remorse and regret she could understand and
+condone, but this excusing of self, as she called Joan's explanation,
+struck her as being inexcusably bad.
+
+"And do you now congratulate yourself that by this accident," she laid
+special stress on the word, "you are to escape the punishment of your
+sin?"
+
+Joan raised tear-drowned eyes. "Haven't I been punished enough," she
+asked, "for something that I did not think was a sin?"
+
+"We cannot make or unmake God's laws in our thoughts," the other
+answered; "you were wilfully blind to the knowledge that was in your
+heart."
+
+"Oh, no," Joan began. Mrs. Westwood swept the remark aside and stood up.
+
+"We will not argue about it," she said; "I realize that you are not yet
+looking for the comfort or promise of pardon which I could lead you to.
+But, my child, do not delude yourself into the belief that thus easily
+have you set aside the consequences of your evil. God is not mocked,
+neither does He sleep. If you should ever be in any real need of help,"
+she ended abruptly, "help which would serve to make you strong in the
+face of temptation, come to us, our doors are always open."
+
+She dropped a card bearing the address of the mission on Joan's lap and
+turned to go. Joan saw her call Nurse Taylor and say a few words to her
+on the way out. For herself she sat on in the dusk. Outside the lamps
+had been lit, they shone on wet pavements and huge, lurching omnibuses,
+on fast-driven taxis and a policeman standing alone in the middle of the
+road. To-morrow she would have to write to Miss Abercrombie and tell her
+there was no further need for her very kindly assistance; then she would
+have to make new plans and arrangements for herself in the future. She
+would try for a room in one of the girls' clubs that Miss Abercrombie
+had given her a letter to. She had been shy of going there before, but
+it would be different now. She could slip back into life and take up her
+share, forgetting, since the fear was past, the nightmare of terror
+which had held her heart before. For she had been afraid, what was the
+use of trying to blind her eyes to the truth? She had not had the
+courage of her convictions, she had not even wanted to carry her banner
+through the fight. She was glad, to the very bottom of her heart she was
+glad, that there was no more need for fighting.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+    "Let this be said between us here,
+       One's love grows green when one turns grey;
+     This year knows nothing of last year,
+       To-morrow has no more to say
+              To yesterday."
+
+                                             A. SWINBURNE.
+
+
+Dick could not bring himself to approve of his sister's marriage. He
+made no attempt to conceal his real opinion on the subject. In one very
+heated interview with Mabel herself he labelled it as disgusting to
+marry a man whom you disliked for his money, or for the things his money
+can give you.
+
+"But I do not dislike him," Mabel answered, as once before. She was
+sitting in a low armchair by the window, a piece of sewing in her hands.
+She laid her work down to look up at him. "He is very fond of me and he
+will be very good to Mother and myself. There are worse reasons than
+that for marrying, surely."
+
+"It is Mother, then," stormed Dick. "You are doing it because of
+Mother."
+
+Mabel shook her head. "No," she said; "I am doing it because to me it
+seems right and as if it would bring most happiness to all of us. I am
+not even quite sure that Mother approves."
+
+She need not have had any misgivings on that point. Mrs. Grant was
+absolutely in her element arranging for the marriage. Mabel had never
+been quite the beautiful daughter that Mrs. Grant would have liked, that
+she should marry a Mr. Jarvis was to be expected; he had at least got
+money, which was always something to be thankful for. She took over the
+refurnishing and redecorating of his house with eager hands.
+
+"Mabel has always been accustomed to luxury, Tom," she told Mr. Jarvis;
+"until Harry died she never wanted for a thing which money could give
+her."
+
+"And she shall not want now," he answered gravely.
+
+Only once he remarked to Mabel afterwards, showing perhaps the trend of
+his thoughts: "We appear to be furnishing our house to please your
+mother, Mabel; seems a pity I cannot save you the trouble of marrying me
+by asking her instead."
+
+Mabel stirred a little uneasily. "In pleasing her you are pleasing me,"
+she answered, and with a shrug of his shoulders he turned away from the
+subject.
+
+Mrs. Grant had her own rooms papered with white satin paper and very
+delicately outlined in gold; she ransacked the Jarvis heirlooms to find
+appropriate furniture for such a setting, and succeeded very well. The
+bills for her various suggested improvements passed through Mr. Jarvis'
+hands, and he commented on them to Mabel with a grim smile.
+
+"She knows how to spend money," he said. "Dick must certainly have found
+the responsibility heavy."
+
+"She has never learned how not to spend," Mabel explained; "but you must
+not pass what you think unnecessary."
+
+"My dear, it is part of our bargain," he answered; "I shall not shrink
+from my share any more than you will."
+
+Mrs. Grant fought very strenuously for a wedding in London, but here for
+once Mabel opposed her firmly, and the idea had to be abandoned.
+
+"It means, of course, that most of my dearest friends will not be able
+to come, but I suppose I need not expect that to weigh against your
+determination," was one of the many arguments she tried, and: "I never
+dreamed that a daughter of mine would insist upon this hole-and-corner
+way of getting married" another.
+
+"It almost looks as if you were ashamed of the man," she said somewhat
+spitefully to Mabel, the day the wedding-dress was tried on. "When your
+father and I were married the church was simply packed. I had a lovely
+gown"--her thoughts wandered into kindlier channels--"and Harry was very
+much in love. I remember his hand shaking as he tried to slip the ring
+on to my finger. I suppose you love Mr. Jarvis?"
+
+The abrupt question coming after the vague memories startled Mabel into
+sudden rigidness. "I suppose I do," she answered, her white-clad figure
+mocked her from the glass. "One does love one's husband, doesn't one?"
+
+"Mabel"--Mrs. Grant's voice sounded righteous indignation--"you do say
+such extraordinary things sometimes and about such solemn subjects. But
+if you do really love him, then why this desire for secrecy?"
+
+"Dear Mother, being married in the parish church instead of in St.
+Paul's is not exactly secrecy or a wild desire to hide something on my
+part. I have always hated big fashionable weddings."
+
+She slipped out of the dress and laid it down on the bed. Mrs. Grant
+viewed her with discontented eyes.
+
+"I cannot pretend to understand you," she grumbled, "and I don't know
+why you talk of St. Paul's. I never suggested such a place; Harry and I
+were married at St. Mary's, Kensington."
+
+Dick, when consulted on the matter, proved even less amenable. "I
+dislike the whole affair," he answered gruffly; "please don't ask me
+where it should take place."
+
+He ran up to London himself the week before the wedding. A vague and
+rather incoherent wish to meet Joan again had kept him restless ever
+since her abrupt departure. He did not attempt to define his thoughts in
+any way. The girl had interested him, and startled him out of the even
+tenor of his beliefs. He hated to think of her turned adrift and left,
+as the possibility was she had been left, to fend for herself. He had
+not seen the elder Miss Rutherford since his visit, but rumour in the
+village ran that Miss Joan had got into disgrace of sorts and been sent
+away. The servants from the Manor spoke with bated breath of the change
+which had come over the household; of how Miss Joan's rooms had been
+locked and her pictures taken down. The world is horribly hard to women
+when they leave the beaten paths of respectability; he could not bear to
+think of what she might be suffering, of where it might lead her.
+
+He walked about somewhat aimlessly for his few days in town, but the
+chance of meeting anyone in this way is very remote, and of course he
+did not succeed. He could not, however, shake away the depression which
+the thought of her brought him.
+
+Mabel came to sit in his smoking-room the night before her wedding, Mrs.
+Grant having gone early to bed.
+
+"Did you see anyone up in town?" she asked.
+
+Dick shook his head, puffing at his pipe. "Not a soul I knew," he
+commented, "except Mathews about my job. Wish I hadn't gone; London is a
+depressing place."
+
+"You rather hoped to meet someone, didn't you?" asked Mabel.
+
+Dick glanced up at her and away again quickly. "What makes you ask
+that?" he said.
+
+Mabel let the curtain fall back into place; she had been peering out
+into the street, and turned to face him. "You have shut me outside
+things, Dick," she spoke slowly, "this last month, ever since my
+engagement; but shutting me out can't keep me from knowing. You only saw
+that girl over at the Manor once, but she has been in your thoughts ever
+since." She came forward, perching herself on the arm of his chair as
+had been her habit in the old days, one arm thrown round his shoulders
+to support herself. "Little brother," she asked, "did you think I should
+not know when you fell in love?"
+
+Fell in love! How completely the thought startled him. Of course Mabel
+was utterly mistaken in her wild conjectures. To throw aside the doubt
+he turned quickly, and put a hand over hers where it lay near him.
+
+"Why do you say I have shut you out?" he parried her question. "Because
+I lost my temper over your engagement?"
+
+"No." Mabel shook her head. "It was not exactly because of that. I know
+you have not understood, Dick; I am not even sure that I want you to;
+and I know that that helped to build a wall between us, but that was not
+what began it. Never mind"--she bent and kissed the top of his head--"if
+your secret is not ready to share you shall keep it a little longer to
+yourself. You will go up to London, won't you, Dick, after Tom and I
+have come back and Mother has settled down?"
+
+"I suppose so," he agreed; "but I want to get away for a bit first, if I
+can. Spoke to Mathews when I was in town and he has promised to keep his
+eyes open for a job on one of those P. and O. liners for me."
+
+"I see," she said; "but when you come back you will settle in town and
+sometimes you will spare us week-ends from your very strenuous career,
+won't you?"
+
+"Of course," he answered; his hand tightened on hers. "Mabel," he said
+suddenly, "you are happy, aren't you; it isn't because of me or anyone
+else that you are getting married, is it?"
+
+He was not looking at her, therefore she did not have to lie with her
+eyes. "I am quite happy," she answered softly. "Dear, stupid Dick, how
+you have fretted your heart out about my happiness."
+
+"I know," he admitted, "I could not bear to think--I mean, love somehow
+stands for such a lot in people's lives, I----" he broke off, and stood
+up abruptly. "You will think I am a sentimental ass, but I have always
+wanted you to have the best of things, Mabel, and I have been horribly
+afraid that Fate, or Mother, or perhaps even I, were shoving you into
+taking the second best."
+
+"You have wanted the best for me, Dick," she answered, "that counts for
+a lot."
+
+Then one of those dull silences fell between them that come sometimes to
+two people who love with their whole hearts and who have been trying to
+speak some of their thoughts to each other--a silence that stood between
+them almost as it were with a drawn sword, while Dick puffed at his pipe
+and Mabel stared at her white hands, showing up against the darkness of
+her dress. Then finally she moved, standing up, and just for a second
+their eyes met.
+
+"Good-night," she said across the silence, "it is late, Dick, I meant to
+be in bed ages ago."
+
+"Good-night," he answered, and she turned quickly and went from the
+room.
+
+Mrs. Grant kept everyone, including herself, in a state of unexplained
+fuss from the moment when early morning light woke her on the day of
+Mabel's marriage till the moment when, much to Dick's embarrassment, she
+collapsed into his arms, sobbing bitterly, in the vestry where they had
+all gone to sign their names.
+
+At the reception she slightly recovered her spirits, but broke down
+again when the time came for the couple to depart. They were going to
+Paris for a fortnight's honey-moon; Mabel had stipulated that they
+should not be away for longer than that. Jarvis Hall was ready for their
+return; already Mrs. Grant was using one of the motors and ordering
+crested paper with the address on it for her own letters. But Dick,
+Mabel knew, was simply aching to be quit of it all, and away on his own.
+He had arranged to hand over the practice and proposed to take a two
+years' trip abroad. It was only in the complete freedom of Dick that she
+would know that part of her plan was being fulfilled.
+
+When she drew back her head after the final farewells had been waved and
+the house was out of sight it was to meet Jarvis' intent, short-sighted
+stare. His glasses magnified the pupils of his eyes to an unusual extent
+when he was looking straight at anyone.
+
+"Well," he said, "that's done. Till the last moment, Mabel, I rather
+wondered if you would go through with it. But I might have known," he
+went on quickly, "you are not the sort to shrink from a bargain once it
+is made."
+
+Her hand lay passive in his, she did not even stir when he leaned
+forward to kiss her. What he had said was perfectly true, the bargain
+had been made, she was not one of those who shirk payment.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+    "And you shall learn how salt his food who fares
+     Upon another's bread; how steep his path,
+     Who treadeth up and down another's stairs."
+
+                                             D. G. ROSSETTI.
+
+
+There are some natures which cannot live with any happiness in drab
+surroundings. Atmosphere affects everyone more or less; but whereas
+there are a few fortunate ones who can rise triumphant to a certain
+contentment through squalor and ugliness, there are a great many more
+who find even cheerfulness very hard to attain to under like
+circumstances.
+
+The shut-in dinginess of Digby Street, the gloomy aspect of Shamrock
+House, cast such a chill across Joan's spirits that, as she stood
+hesitating with her hand on the bell, the instinct came to her to
+scramble back into the cab and tell the man to drive her anywhere away
+from such a neighbourhood. Of course it was absurd, and the cabman did
+not look as if he would be in the least willing to comply. He had
+treated her with a supercilious disbelief in there being any tip for him
+as soon as he had heard of her destination. Joan had gone to Victoria
+Station to collect her luggage, and it had been both late and dark
+before the need for a cab had arisen. She had elected not to leave the
+hospital till after tea; somehow, when it had come near to going, her
+courage, which she had been bolstering up with hope and promises of what
+she should do in her new life, had vanished into thin air. Perhaps more
+than anything else she lacked the physical strength which would have
+enabled her to look cheerfully into the future. The hospital had been a
+place of refuge, she hated to leave it.
+
+This feeling grew upon her more and more as she sat back in a corner of
+the cab while it rumbled along the Vauxhall Bridge Road. There seemed
+always to be a tram passing, huge giant vehicles that shook the earth
+and made a great deal of noise in their going. The houses on either side
+were dingy, singularly unattractive-looking buildings, and the further
+the cab crawled away from Victoria Street the deeper the shade of
+poverty and dirt that descended on the surroundings. Digby Street and
+Shamrock House were the culminating stroke to Joan's depression.
+
+Miss Abercrombie had written recommending it to her as a Girls' Club
+where she would probably get companionship and advice on the question of
+work. "You won't like it," she had added, "but it is very conveniently
+situated and ridiculously cheap." So Joan had described her destination
+to the cabman as a ladies' club, somewhere in Digby Street. He had
+answered with a sniff, for it was here that he had lost sight of his
+tip, that he supposed she meant the Home for Working Girls that lay in
+those parts. Looking up at the large, red-fronted building, with its
+countless uncurtained windows, Joan realized that the man's description
+was probably nearer the truth than her own.
+
+She was to learn later that on this particular occasion she saw Digby
+Street at its very worst, for it was Saturday night, and barrows of
+fish, meat and vegetables stood along the pavements, illuminated by
+flares of light so that all the ugliness was only too apparent. Little
+children played in and out, under the barrows and along the gutters; a
+public-house stood at the corner near Shamrock House, and exactly
+opposite the Salvation Army added its brass band and shrill voices to
+the general tumult.
+
+Joan's first timid attempt at the bell produced no answer, nor her
+second. By this time the cabman had dismounted her box and stood staring
+at her in sullen disapproval, while a couple of very drunk but cheerful
+costers argued with each other as to whether they ought not to help the
+young lady to get in. Her third effort was perhaps more violent, for, to
+her relief, she could see the dim light in the hall being turned up and
+the door was opened on the chain and very slightly ajar. A couple of
+bright eyes peered at her through this opening, then, having apparently
+satisfied their owner that Joan was neither dangerous nor drunk, the
+door was further opened, and Joan could see into the red-tiled hall and
+passage with its numbered, white-painted doors.
+
+"What do you want?" asked the lady of the eyes; a small, plump person
+with grey hair brushed back very straight from an apple-red face.
+
+"I want a room," Joan explained. "I have been recommended to come here.
+I do hope you have one to spare."
+
+The little lady moved aside and beckoned to the cabman. "You can come
+in," she said, "and the man had better fetch in your box. I thought it
+was one of those troublesome children when you first rang, it was so
+very violent, and they make a point of trying to break the bells."
+
+"I am so sorry," Joan murmured meekly, an apology she realized was
+expected from her. "I was so dreadfully tired and no one seemed to be
+going to answer."
+
+"We do not keep a staff of servants to answer the bell day and night,"
+the woman answered. "Still, I am sorry you were kept waiting. Will you
+come in here"--she opened a door a little way down the passage--"this is
+my office. I must see your letter of recommendation before I let you
+talk about the rooms, that is one of our rules."
+
+Joan paid the cabman and followed her inquisitor into the office. Miss
+Nigel let down the front of the desk, opened a large ledger and donned a
+pair of spectacles. "Now," she said, "who are you, what are your
+references, and who recommended you?"
+
+Fortunately Miss Abercrombie had remembered to send a letter of
+introduction. Joan produced it and handed it to Miss Nigel. "My name is
+Joan Rutherford," she added; "I did not know about having to have
+references."
+
+Miss Nigel peered at her over the tops of her glasses; she only used
+them for reading and could not see out of them for other purposes. "We
+have to make a point of it in most cases," she answered, "but also I
+judge by appearances. In your case this letter from Miss
+Abercrombie--her name is in our books although I do not know her
+personally--will be quite sufficient. Now, how much do you want to pay?"
+
+"As little as possible," Joan confessed, "only I would like to have a
+room to myself."
+
+"Quite so," the other agreed, "and in any case, all our cubicles are
+taken. They are, of course, cheaper than anything else." She ran her
+finger down the lines of the ledger. "I can let you have a room on the
+top floor which will work out to fifteen and six a week. That includes
+breakfast, late dinner, lights and baths. There is a certain amount of
+attendance, but we expect the girls to make their own beds and keep the
+rooms tidy."
+
+Fifteen and six a week. Joan attempted to make a rapid calculation in
+her head, but gave up the idea. It sounded at least quite absurdly
+cheap, she would not have to spend very much of Uncle John's allowance
+before she got some work to do for herself. The future seemed suddenly
+to shut her in to a life enclosed by the brick walls of Shamrock House
+with its attendant neighbourhood of Digby Street.
+
+"That will do," she answered, "it sounds very nice."
+
+"Yes," agreed Miss Nigel; she closed the desk and stood up, "for the
+price, we offer exceptional advantages. If you will carry up what you
+need for to-night, I will show you to your rooms."
+
+It occurred to Joan as she followed her guide up flights of carpetless
+stone stairs that her new abode resembled a prison more than anything
+else. The long bare passages were broken up by countless doors all
+numbered and painted white in contrast to the brick-coloured walls. The
+sound of their footsteps echoed mournfully through the bareness and
+seeming desolation of the place. From one of the landing windows she
+caught a blurred picture of the streets outside, the lit-up barrows, the
+crowd just emerging from the public-house. She was to get very used and
+very hardened to the life in Digby Street, but on this, her first
+evening, it caught at her senses with a cold touch of fear.
+
+On the top floor of all Miss Nigel opened the first door along the
+passage and ushered Joan into the room that was to be hers. It was so
+small that its one window occupied practically the whole space of the
+front wall. A narrow bed stood along one side, and between this and the
+opposite wall there was scarce room for a chair. At the foot of the bed
+stood the wash-stand and the chest of drawers facing each other, with a
+very narrow space in between them. But it was all scrupulously clean,
+with white-washed walls and well-scrubbed furniture, and the windows
+opened over the roofs of the neighbouring houses. Very far up in the
+darkness of the sky outside a star twinkled and danced.
+
+Miss Nigel looked round at the room with evident satisfaction. "You will
+be comfortable here, I think," she said; "we do our best to make the
+girls happy. We expect them, however, to conform to our rules; you will
+find them explained in this book." She placed a little blue pamphlet on
+the dressing-table. "Lights are put out at ten, and if you are later
+than that, you have to pay a small fine for being let in, a threepenny
+door fee, we call it. Everyone is requested to make as little noise as
+possible in their rooms or along the passages, and to be punctual for
+dinner."
+
+With one more look round she turned to go. Half-way out, however, a
+kindly thought struck her, and she looked back at Joan.
+
+"Dinner is at seven-thirty," she said. "I expect you will be glad to
+have it and get to bed. You look very tired."
+
+Joan would have liked to ask if she could have dinner upstairs, but one
+glance at the book of rules and regulations decided her against the
+idea. Shamrock House evidently admitted of no such luxury, and on second
+thoughts, how ridiculous it was to suppose that dinner could be carried
+up five flights of stairs for the benefit of someone paying fifteen and
+six a week all told. She was too tired and too depressed to face the
+prospect of a meal downstairs, she would just have to go to bed without
+dinner, she concluded.
+
+The House woke to life as she lay there, evidently the inhabitants
+returned about this time. Joan remembered the cabman's somewhat blunt
+description and smiled at the memory. A Home for Working Girls. That was
+why it had seemed so silent and deserted before, shops and offices do
+not shut till after six. But now the workers were coming home, she could
+hear their feet along the passages, the slamming of doors, voices and
+laughter from the room next hers. Home! This narrow, cold room, those
+endless stairs and passages outside, they were to be home for the
+future. The hot tears pricked in her eyes, but she fought against tears.
+After all, she had been very lucky to find it, it was cheap, it was
+clean; other girls lived here and were happy, someone had laughed next
+door.
+
+"I have got to take you firmly in hand," Joan argued with her
+depression. "It is no use making a fuss about things that are all my own
+fault. I tried to play with life and I did not succeed. It is too big
+and hard. If I had wanted to work it out differently I ought to have
+been very strong. But I am not strong, I am only just ordinary. This is
+my chance again, and in the plain, straight way I must win through." She
+spoke the words almost aloud, as if challenging fate: "I will win
+through."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+    "Will my strength last me? Did not someone say
+     The way was ever easier all the way?"
+
+                                             H. C. BEECHING.
+
+
+Youth can nearly always rely upon sleep to build up new strength, new
+hope, new courage. If you have got to a stage in your life when sleep
+fails you, if night means merely a long tortured pause from the noises
+of the world, in which the beating of your heart seems unbearably loud,
+then indeed you have reached to the uttermost edge of despair. Joan
+slept, heavily and dreamlessly, save that there was some vague hint of
+happiness in her mind, till she was wakened in the morning by a most
+violent bell ringing. The dressing-bell at Shamrock House, which went at
+seven o'clock, was carried by a maid up and down every passage, so that
+there was not the slightest chance of anyone oversleeping themselves.
+
+Joan dressed quickly; the faint aroma of happiness which her sleep had
+brought her, and which amounted to cheerfulness, stayed with her. She
+remembered how Miss Abercrombie had once said to her: "Oh, you are a
+Browningite," and smiled at the phrase, repeating to herself another
+verse of the same poem:
+
+    "And I shall thereupon
+     Take rest ere I be gone,
+     Once more on my adventure brave and new."
+
+She felt almost confident of success this morning; her mind was busy
+with plans of the work she would find. She was glad to feel herself one
+in a giant hive of workers, all girls like herself, cutting out their
+lives for themselves, earning their own living.
+
+Breakfast brought with it a slight disillusionment. The dining-room in
+Shamrock House is in the basement; chill and dreary of aspect, its
+windows always dirty and unopenable, because at the slightest excuse of
+an open window the small boys of the neighbourhood will make it their
+target for all kinds of filth. Rotting vegetables, apple-cores,
+scrapings of mud; there is quite sufficient of all that outside the
+windows without encouraging it to come in. Six long deal tables occupy
+the space of the room, and it is one of the few amusements which the
+children of Digby Street possess to gather at the railings and watch the
+inhabitants of Shamrock House being fed.
+
+It was the last flight of stairs into the basement which damped Joan's
+enthusiasm for her new home. As she stood hesitating in the doorway, for
+there were a great many people in the room, and the tables seemed
+crowded, she caught Miss Nigel's eye.
+
+"You will find a seat over there," the lady called out to her, waving a
+hand in the direction of the furthest table. "Help yourself to bacon,
+which is on the hot case near the fire, and come here for your tea or
+coffee. By the way, which do you like?"
+
+Joan asked for tea, and having secured her cup and a small piece of
+unappetizing bacon, she found her way over to the indicated table. A
+girl sat at the head of it, and since she was ensconced behind a
+newspaper and apparently paying no attention to anybody, Joan chose the
+chair next her. She felt on the sudden shy and unwilling to make friends
+with anyone, the chill of the room was striking into her heart.
+
+She had presently to rouse her neighbour, however, to ask her to pass
+the salt, and at that the girl lifted a pair of penetrating eyes and
+fixed Joan with an intent stare.
+
+"New arrival?" she asked.
+
+"Yes," Joan admitted. "I came last night."
+
+"Humph!" the girl commented. "Well, don't touch the jam this morning. It
+is peculiar to Shamrock House--plum-stones, raspberry-pips and glue."
+She swept the information at Joan and returned to her paper.
+
+She was a big girl with rather a heavy face and strong, capable-looking
+hands. Despite her manners, which were undeniably bad, Joan would almost
+have described her as distinguished but for the fact that the word
+sounded ridiculous amid such surroundings.
+
+"Looking for work?" the girl asked presently.
+
+"Yes," Joan answered again, "only I am not sure what sort of work to
+look for, or what I should like to do."
+
+The girl lifted her eyes to stare at her once again. "It isn't generally
+a case of 'like,'" she said, "more often it is necessity. In that
+case"--she reached out a long arm for the bread--"Fate does not as a
+rule give you much time in which to make up your mind; she pushes you
+into something which you hate like hell for the rest of your life."
+
+"You aren't very cheerful," remonstrated Joan.
+
+"Oh, well, I never am that," agreed the other, "nor polite. You ask Miss
+Nigel if you want a true estimate of my manners. But I have lived here
+ten years now and I have seen girls like you drift in and out by the
+score. The feeding or the general atmosphere doesn't agree with them,
+and our ranks are maintained by beings of a coarser make, as you may see
+for yourself."
+
+She rose, crumpling her paper into a ball and throwing it under the
+table.
+
+"My name is Rose Brent," she said. "What is yours?"
+
+"Rutherford," Joan answered, "Joan Rutherford. I hope I shan't drift
+quite as quickly as you foretell," she added.
+
+Secretarial work was what she had really made up her mind to try for,
+though she had not had the courage to confess as much to her breakfast
+companion. She had, after all, had a certain amount of training in that
+and hoped not to find it so very impossible to get a post as a beginner
+somewhere. Her first visit to the nearest registry office, however,
+served to show her that her very slight experience was going to be of
+little use to her. The registry lady was kind, sufficiently interested
+to appear amiable, but not at all reassuring in her views as to Joan's
+prospects.
+
+"I am afraid I cannot hold out very much hope," she said, after five
+minutes' crisp questioning of Joan. "You have, you see, so very few
+qualifications, and the market is rather over-stocked with girls who can
+do just a little. My strong advice to you is to continue your shorthand;
+when you are a little more experienced in that we ought to have no
+difficulty in placing you. Good morning; please see that the hall door
+shuts properly, the latch is very weak."
+
+Her business-like manner, the absolute efficiency which shone around
+her, and the crowded aspect of the waiting-room--all girls who could do
+just a little, Joan presumed--caused her heart to sink. Finding work was
+not going to be as easy as she had first supposed.
+
+She roamed from office to office after that for several days, to be met
+everywhere with the same slight encouragement and frail promises to
+help. Finally, thoroughly discouraged, she bought papers instead, and
+turned to a strict perusal of their various advertisements.
+
+One in particular caught her eye.
+
+"Wanted a pupil shorthand typist. Tuition in return for services.--Apply
+Miss Bacon, 2, Baker Street, W."
+
+It was late in the afternoon of the day before Joan found her way to
+Baker Street, for she had had several other places to call at and she
+was in addition very tired. Going from place to place in search of work
+had reduced her to a painful knowledge of her own absolute incompetency
+and the general uselessness of life. A brass plate on the door of No. 2
+conveyed the information: "Miss Bacon. Fourth floor. Shorthand and
+Typing. Please ring and walk up."
+
+Joan rang and followed the instructions. On the very top landing a girl
+stood, holding a candle in her hand, for up here there was no light of
+any sort. The grease dripped down her skirt and on to the floor.
+
+"Do you want Miss Bacon?" she asked.
+
+Joan nodded, too breathless to say anything.
+
+The girl turned into the dim interior and threw open a door, snuffing
+the candle at the same time.
+
+"If you will wait here," she said, "Miss Bacon will be with you in a
+minute."
+
+Joan looked round on a moderately large, dust-smothered room. Dust, that
+is to say, was the first thing to strike the eye of the beholder. The
+windows were thick in dust, it lay on tables and chairs and on the two
+typewriters standing unused in a corner of the room. The room gave one
+the impression of being singularly uninhabited. Then the door opened and
+shut again, and Joan turned to face the owner.
+
+Miss Bacon's figure, like her furniture, seemed to have taken on a
+coating of dust. Timid eyes looked out at Joan from behind pince-nez set
+rather crookedly on a thin nose. One side of her face, from eye to chin,
+was disfigured by an unsightly bruise. Miss Bacon dabbed a handkerchief
+to it continually and started explaining its presence at once.
+
+"You may be surprised at my face"--her voice, like her eyes, was
+timid--"but I am short-sighted and last night stumbled on the stairs,
+hitting my face against the top step. It was exceedingly painful, but it
+is better now. What can I do for you?"
+
+Joan murmured something sympathetic about the top step, and explained
+that she had come in answer to the advertisement. Miss Bacon's face
+fell. "I had hoped you were a client," she owned. Then she pulled
+forward a chair for herself and asked Joan to be seated.
+
+It appeared that Joan would receive excellent tuition in shorthand and
+free use of the typewriters. If any typing work came in she would be
+expected to help with it, but for the rest she could devote the whole
+of her time to studying and practising on the machines. Miss Bacon was a
+little vague as to the other pupils, but Joan gathered that there was a
+shorthand class and two other typewriters in another room.
+
+"My other pupils are, of course, on a different footing," Miss Bacon
+told her. "Generally I require a fee of at least ten guineas, but in
+your case, as I shall require you to do a little work for me, I shall be
+content to take less. That is to say, four guineas, everything
+included."
+
+"There is nothing about paying in the advertisement," Joan ventured. "I
+am afraid it is quite impossible for me to pay that."
+
+Miss Bacon took off her glasses and polished them with nervous hands. "I
+do not want to seem unreasonable," she said; "after you have worked for
+me you will certainly be able to obtain a well-paid post elsewhere; my
+pupils invariably move on in that way. I guarantee, of course, to find
+situations. If I could meet you in any way--supposing you paid me two
+guineas now and two guineas when you moved on?"
+
+"It is awfully kind of you"--Joan hesitated on the words--"but I am
+afraid I can't really afford it, not even that."
+
+Miss Bacon relinquished the idea with a heartfelt sigh. "My dear," she
+confided suddenly, "I know what poverty is. Shall we say one pound to
+begin with?--you must remember that these are very exceptional terms."
+
+Joan thought a moment. It seemed almost certain, from what she had
+gleaned from the various agencies, that getting a post without training
+was an impossibility, and most of the training centres asked for at
+least twenty-five guineas. Perhaps in refusing this offer she was
+letting a good chance slip by her, and, though she hated to make free
+use of it, there was always Uncle John's money, to fall back on.
+
+"I think I will come if you will let me do it in that way," she decided
+finally; "when would you like me to start?--to-morrow?"
+
+"The sooner the better." Miss Bacon rose with a smile of almost intense
+relief. "I have had no one for the last fortnight and the place is
+getting very untidy. You will pay the first pound in advance," she
+added; "I hope you will bring it with you to-morrow."
+
+She seemed painfully anxious for the money; if Joan had not been so
+tired she might have thought the fact suspicious. As it was she went
+back to Shamrock House with a lightened heart. It was not a very
+attractive or promising post; if she were to judge by outside
+appearances and by Miss Bacon's last remark her chief duties were to
+include those of general cleaning up and dusting. But that would be all
+in the day's work. Some little confidence and hope were beginning to
+creep back into her heart. She had secured her first post; Miss Bacon
+held out vague visions of the triumphs to which it might lead. Surely in
+time she would get away from the nightmare of the last two months; in
+time even Aunt Janet would forgive her, and meanwhile her foot was on
+the lowest rung of the ladder; work should be her world in future. She
+would work and fight and win. There was still, as Miss Abercrombie would
+have said, a banner to be carried. She would carry it now to the end.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+    "Our life is spent in little things,
+       In little cares our hearts are drowned;
+     We move with heavy laden wings
+       In the same narrow round."
+
+
+For the first week in her new post Joan was kept very busy putting
+things--as Miss Bacon described it--to rights. She had also, she
+discovered, to run errands for Miss Bacon several times during the
+course of a day; to buy paper for the typewriters, to fetch Miss
+Bacon's lunch, on one occasion to buy some cooling lotion for Miss
+Bacon's bruise. Of the other pupils she saw no sign, and even the girl
+who had admitted her on the first night did not put in an appearance,
+but this Miss Bacon explained by saying that Edith was delicate and
+often forced to stay away through ill health.
+
+Joan refrained from asking questions; she realized herself that she had
+stumbled on to something that was nearly a tragedy. The hunted look in
+Miss Bacon's face, the signs of poverty, the absolute lack of work told
+their own tale. As a running business 2, Baker Street, was an evident
+failure, but there was no reason why, with a little application, she
+should not make it serve her purpose as a school. The lack of tuition
+was its one great drawback; there seemed no signs whatsoever of the
+promised shorthand lessons. Finally Joan plucked up her courage one
+morning in the second week, and invaded Miss Bacon's private office.
+
+"What about my shorthand?" she inquired from just within the doorway;
+"when shall I begin?"
+
+Miss Bacon had changed her shoes for a pair of bedroom slippers and was
+occupying the arm-chair, immersed in the newspaper. She started at
+Joan's abrupt question, the movement jerking the glasses from off her
+nose. She picked them up nervously and blinked at Joan.
+
+"What did you say?--shorthand? Oh, yes, of course! It is really Edith's
+duty to take you in that; still, as she is not here, I propose to
+dictate to you myself after lunch. My first duty in the mornings is to
+master the newspaper; there might be some openings advertised." She
+turned again to her news-sheet. "Why not employ yourself practising on
+the typewriter?" she suggested.
+
+Joan would have liked to reply that she was tired of practising
+sentences on the typewriter and hungry for some real work to do, but she
+had not the heart to be unkind to the poor little woman. She spent a
+disconsolate morning and stayed out for lunch longer than usual. On her
+return Miss Bacon was waiting for her on the top of the stairs.
+
+"My dear," she said in an excited voice, "some work has come in. A man
+has just brought it, and he must have it by to-morrow morning. I hope
+you will be able to get it done, for I have promised, and a lot may
+depend on it."
+
+So much depended on it that she herself decided to help Joan with the
+work. She was not, it appeared, even as experienced as Joan, and by 6.30
+the two of them had only completed about half the typing. Joan's back
+ached and her fingers tingled, but Miss Bacon's eyes behind the glasses
+were strained to the verge of tears, two hectic spots of colour burned
+in her cheeks and her fingers stumbled and faltered over the keys.
+
+As the clock struck seven Joan straightened herself with a sigh of
+relief.
+
+"It is no use," she said, "we cannot get it done; he will have to wait
+for his silly old papers."
+
+The blood died suddenly out of Miss Bacon's face, her mouth trembled.
+"It must be done," she answered; "you do not understand. It is the first
+work that has been brought to us for weeks. The man is a stranger; if it
+is well done and up to time he will give us some more; besides he will
+pay"--for a second she lifted her eyes and looked at Joan--"I must have
+the money," she said.
+
+Her face, working under the stress of some strong emotion, was painful
+to see. She was so weak, so useless, so driven. Joan looked away hastily
+and went on with her work. From time to time, though, she stole a glance
+at Miss Bacon. It was dreadful to know that the poor old woman was
+crying; quietly, hopelessly, great drops that splashed on to her fingers
+as they stumbled over the keys.
+
+At last Joan could bear it no longer, she rose quickly and crossed over
+to Miss Bacon, putting her hands over the useless fingers.
+
+"Don't you bother with it any more, Miss Bacon," she said. "I am nearly
+through with my share now and I can come early to-morrow and get it all
+done before breakfast. It is silly to work away at it now when we are
+both tired out."
+
+Miss Bacon gulped down her tears and looked up nervously. "You think you
+can," she asked; "you have realized how important it is?"
+
+"Yes," Joan told her, "and I know I can. I won't disappoint you, really
+I won't. Let us go across the road and get some tea before we go home,"
+she suggested.
+
+Miss Bacon looked away again hastily. "You go," she muttered, "I don't
+need tea, I----"
+
+"You are going to come and have tea with me," Joan interrupted. It had
+flashed on her that Miss Bacon had not even the money for that.
+
+Over the hot buttered toast and the tea Miss Bacon poured out her
+troubles to Joan. They came, once she had started, in an unquenchable
+flood of reminiscences. The little woman had reached the last inch of
+endurance; the kindly sympathy, the touch of Joan's hands broke down all
+barriers of reserve or caution. She had been a governess, it appeared,
+and during all her years of service she had laid by enough money to buy
+the business at Baker Street.
+
+"I got it cheap," she owned. "I can see now that the other people must
+have failed too, and I have no head for business. I am absolutely at the
+end of things now; if I died to-morrow it would be a pauper's funeral. I
+often think of that when I see a gorgeous hearse and procession passing
+through the street."
+
+Her words were ridiculous, but real tragedy looked out of her eyes.
+"Ruin stares me in the face," she went on, "from every paper I read,
+from every person I meet. I have no money, not even enough to buy food,
+as you have guessed. Ruin! and I have not the courage to get out of it
+all. I have never been very brave."
+
+"But I think you have been brave," Joan tried to reassure her. "You
+have held on for so long alone. And I expect we have turned a corner
+now, things will be better to-morrow."
+
+Miss Bacon stared at her teacup with hopeless eyes. "That is what I used
+to think at first," she said, "to-morrow will be better than to-day--it
+never has been yet."
+
+She rose to go, and Joan, prompted by a sudden quick desire to help,
+leant forward and caught hold of her coat. The tragedy of the withered
+figure, the stupid, aimless face, struck her as the cruellest thing she
+had yet seen in life. What were her own troubles compared to this
+other's dull facing of loneliness, failure and death.
+
+"You must cheer up, you really must," she begged; "and as for the money
+part, let me pay down the rest of my fee now. I have got three pounds
+out with me; do take it, please do, you see it really is yours."
+
+Taking the money seemed to add an extra gloom to Miss Bacon's outlook;
+none the less she did not require very much persuading, and Joan,
+pressing it into her hand, piloted her across the road and saw her into
+the Underground station.
+
+It was the last glimpse she was to have of the quaint figure which had
+crossed her life for so short a time, but that she did not realize. She
+only knew that her heart ached because she had been able to do so little
+to help, and because Miss Bacon's story had brought suddenly to her mind
+a knowledge of how terribly hard life can be to those who are not strong
+enough to stand against it.
+
+True to her word, she arrived at Baker Street very early the next
+morning and the momentous piece of typewriting was finished before Miss
+Bacon's usual hour of arrival. Joan put it on the table with the old
+lady's paper and went out to get some breakfast, as she had had to leave
+Shamrock House before seven.
+
+She was greeted on her return by the girl who had let her in on the
+first night. There was a man with her who had taken possession of Miss
+Bacon's chair and who was reading the paper morosely, both elbows on the
+table.
+
+He glanced up at Joan as she entered. "Is this Miss Bacon, by any
+chance?" he asked, bringing out the words with a certain grim defiance.
+
+Edith interrupted Joan's disclaimer by a shrill laugh. "Lor' bless you,
+no, she is one of the pupils, same as me." She turned to Joan. "Did you
+pay anything to join?" she asked. Joan resented the familiarity of her
+tone. "Would have liked to have warned you the other night, but Bacon
+was too nippy."
+
+Joan flushed slightly. Disregarding the interruption she spoke quickly,
+answering the man's question:
+
+"Miss Bacon must be ill, I am afraid," she said; "it is so very late for
+her, she is nearly always here by ten. She will probably be here
+to-morrow if you care to come again."
+
+Again Edith giggled and the man frowned heavily.
+
+"Well, she probably won't," he answered. "She has done a bunk, that's
+the long and short of it, and there is not a blasted penny of what she
+owes me paid. Damn the woman with her whining, wheezing letters, 'Do
+give me time--I'll pay in time.' Might have known it would end in her
+bunking."
+
+"I don't think you ought to speak of her like that," Joan attempted;
+"after all, it is only that she does not happen to be here this morning.
+She would have let me know if she had not been coming back."
+
+"Oh, would she?" growled the man; "well, I don't care a blasted hell
+what you think. I don't need to be taught my business by the likes of
+you."
+
+From the passage to which she had retired Edith attracted Joan's
+attention by violent signs. "There is no use arguing with him," she
+announced in an audible whisper, "he's fair mad; this is about the tenth
+time he's missed her. Come out here a minute, I want to talk to you."
+
+Joan went reluctantly. She disliked the girl instinctively, she
+disliked the dirty white blouse from which the red neck rose, ornamented
+by a string of cheap pearls, and the greasy black ribbon which bound up
+Edith's head of curls.
+
+"Are you being a fool?" the girl asked, "or are you trying to kid that
+man? Haven't you cottoned to old Bacon's game yet?"
+
+"I am sorry for Miss Bacon, if that is what you mean," Joan answered
+stiffly.
+
+"Sorry!" Edith's face was expressive of vast contempt. "That won't save
+you from much in this world. I tell you one thing, if you lent the old
+hag any money yesterday you won't see her again this side of the grave,
+so there isn't any use your hanging about here waiting for that."
+
+Joan favoured her with a little collected stare. "Thank you," she said,
+"it is very thoughtful of you to think of warning me." She left her and
+walked back deliberately into the room where the man was sitting. "There
+were some typed sheets lying on the top of the paper," she said; "do you
+mind letting me have them back."
+
+"Yes I do," he answered briefly; "man called in for them a little while
+back and that is five shillings towards what the old hag owes me,
+anyhow."
+
+It was in its way rather humorous that she should have worked so hard to
+put five shillings into such an objectionable pocket. Joan felt strongly
+tempted to argue the matter with him, but discretion proving wiser than
+valour, she left him to his spoils and retired into the other room. She
+would not leave the place, she decided, in case Miss Bacon did turn up;
+it would be very disagreeable for her to have to face such a man by
+herself.
+
+By lunch time the man stalked away full of threats as to what he would
+do, and Edith went with him. Joan stayed on till six, and there was
+still no sign of Miss Bacon. It was strange that she should neither have
+telephoned nor written.
+
+Over dinner at Shamrock House that night she told Rose Brent the story
+of her fortnight's adventure, ending up with the rash impulse which had
+led her to pay up the four guineas because Miss Bacon had seemed in such
+bitter need. The girl met her tale with abrupt laughter.
+
+"I am afraid what your unpleasant acquaintance of this morning told you
+is probably true," she said. "After all, if you went and handed out four
+guineas it was a direct temptation to the poor old woman to get away
+on."
+
+"I don't believe she would take it just for that," Joan tried to argue.
+"I know she wanted it awfully badly, but it was to help her pull through
+and things were going to run better afterwards. I don't believe she
+would just take it and slip away without saying a word to me."
+
+"Faith in human nature is all very well," the other answered, "but it is
+awfully apt to let you down, especially in the working world."
+
+"I shall go on believing for a bit," Joan said; "she was looking so
+awfully ill yesterday, it may just be that she could not come up to
+office to-day."
+
+"May be," Rose agreed. "When you are tired of waiting for the return of
+the prodigal let me know and I will see if I cannot get you in
+somewhere. I ought to be able to help. And look here, my child, never
+you pay another penny for tuition on those lines; you could get all the
+learning you need at the County Council Night Schools, and it is a good
+deal cheaper."
+
+Joan put in two days at No. 2, Baker Street, waiting for the return of
+Miss Bacon or for some message which might explain her absence, but
+nothing and no one came. On the morning of the third day she found that
+the stout and bad-tempered man had carried out his vague threats. The
+place had been taken possession of, already they were removing the
+typewriters and tables under the direction of a bailiff. Even the plate
+bearing Miss Bacon's name had vanished, and boards announcing the top
+flat to let flaunted themselves from the area railings.
+
+After that Joan gave up the hope. Sometimes she wondered if after all
+Miss Bacon had found the necessary courage to be done with it all, and
+if her silence betokened death. It was more likely though that the poor
+old lady had merely sunk one rung lower on the ladder of self-esteem and
+was dragging out a miserable existence somewhere in the outside purlieus
+of London.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+    "Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp,
+     Or what's a heaven for?"
+
+                                             R. BROWNING.
+
+
+Following Rose's suggestion, and because for the time being there really
+seemed nothing for her to do, unless she could show herself a little
+better trained, Joan joined the County Council Night Schools in the
+neighbourhood. She would go there five evenings in the week; three for
+shorthand and two for typing. Her fellow scholars were drawn from all
+ages and all ranks--clerks, office boys, and grey-headed men; girls with
+their hair still in pig-tails, and elderly women with patient, strained
+faces, who would sit at their desks plodding through the intricacies of
+shorthand and paying very little attention to what went on all round
+them.
+
+The boy and girl section of the community indulged in a little rough and
+tumble love-making. Even long office hours and the deadly monotony of
+standing behind desk or counter all day could not quite do away with the
+riotous spirit of youth. They giggled and chattered among themselves,
+and passed surreptitious notes from one form to the other when Mr.
+Phillips was not looking.
+
+Mr. Phillips, the shorthand master, was a red-faced, extremely irascible
+little man. He came to these classes from some other school in the city
+where he had been teaching all day, and naturally, by the time evening
+arrived, his none too placid temper had been stretched to
+breaking-point. He was extremely impatient with any non-comprehension
+of his complicated method of instruction; and he would pass from row to
+row, after his dictation had been finished, snatching away the papers
+from his paralysed pupils and tearing them into fragments had the
+exercise been badly done.
+
+Joan noticed the man who sat next her on the first and every night. He
+was quite the worst person she had ever seen at learning anything. He
+was not by any means young, grey already showed in the hair above his
+ears, and his forehead wrinkled with innumerable lines. He had, she
+thought, the most pathetic eyes, large and honest, but quite
+irredeemably stupid.
+
+"I can't make head or tale of it," he confessed to her on the second
+night. "And Mr. Phillips gets so annoyed with me, it only muddles me
+more."
+
+"Why do you bother to learn?" she asked. It seemed rather strange that a
+man of his age should have to struggle with so elementary a subject.
+
+"I have worked in an office for the last ten years," he explained. "The
+new boss has suddenly decided that shorthand is necessary. I don't
+know," he spoke rather vaguely, his eyes wandering round the room, "but
+it is just possible he might ask me to go if I did not master it. I have
+been there so long I hardly like to have to look for another place."
+
+"It seems such a shame," Joan told Rose afterwards, "that these people
+can never get a place where they feel really safe. They live always
+expecting to be turned off at a moment's notice, or to have somebody put
+in on top of them. Everybody seems to be fighting against everybody
+else; doesn't anyone ever stop to help?"
+
+The older girl laughed. "Why, yes," she said. "The world, or at least
+the people in it, are not so bad as all that. Only life is a case of
+push and struggle, and it is only natural that people should want to get
+the best they can for their money. Also it wouldn't be fair if the ones
+who worked best were not preferred to the others."
+
+Mr. Simpson, Joan's perplexed friend of the shorthand class, was
+certainly one of the stupidest people she had ever met, yet she was
+terribly sorry for him. He was the butt of the class, which did not add
+to the hilarity of his position, because of the torrent of abuse which
+he always drew from Mr. Phillips at some stage in the evening.
+
+"Now," Mr. Phillips would call out, starting the lesson by a blackboard
+demonstration, "silence and attention, please."
+
+He would draw a series of strokes and dashes on the blackboard, calling
+out their various meanings, and the class would set itself to copy them.
+The lesson would proceed for some time in silence, save for Mr.
+Phillips' voice, but presently the bewilderment caused by so many new
+outlines would terrify Mr. Simpson and he would lean forward to
+interrupt, stammering, as he always did when nervous.
+
+"Why is 'M' made like that?" he would say. "Wouldn't it be much better
+if it were made the other way?"
+
+"Why, why?" Mr. Phillips would thunder. "If you would just learn what
+you are taught, sir, and not try to think, it would be a great deal
+pleasanter for the rest of us."
+
+Mr. Simpson would get a little red under the onslaught, but his eyes
+always retained their patient, perplexed expression. He seemed
+impervious to the impression he created in the back row. "Laughing-stock
+of the whole class," Mr. Phillips called him in a moment of extreme
+irritation, and the expression caught on.
+
+"I am so silly," he said to Joan. "I really am not surprised that they
+think me funny."
+
+She was the one person who was ever nice to him or who did attempt to
+explain things to him. Sometimes they would get there a little early and
+she would go over his exercises with him. He might be thick-skinned to
+the want of tolerance which the rest of the class meted out to him; he
+was undoubtedly grateful to Joan for the kindness she showed him.
+
+One evening on his way to class he plucked up courage to purchase a
+small buttonhole for her, and blushed a very warm red when Joan took his
+offering with a smile and pinned it into her coat.
+
+"How nice of you," she said. "I love violets, and these smell so sweet."
+
+"They are not half sweet enough for you," he managed to say, stuttering
+furiously.
+
+Joan had a moment's uneasiness. Surely the wretched little man was not
+going to fall in love with her? She glanced sideways at him during the
+class and what she saw reassured her. His clothes, his dirty hands, his
+whole appearance, put him in a different world to herself. However kind
+she might be to him, he surely could not fail to recognize that it was
+only the same kindness which would prompt her to cross the road to give
+a penny to a beggar?
+
+Unfortunately Mr. Simpson belonged to a class which is very slow to
+recognize any difference in rank save that of wealth. He was a humble
+little man before Joan, but that was because he was by nature humble,
+and also because he was in love. He thought her very wonderful and
+beautiful beyond his range of words, but he imagined her as coming from
+much the same kind of home as his own, and she seemed to exist in the
+same strata of life.
+
+A night or two after the flower episode he fixed adoring eyes on her and
+asked if he might be allowed to see her home.
+
+"Well, it is rather out of your way," Joan remonstrated, she had so
+often seen him trudge off in the opposite direction.
+
+"That is of no consequence," he replied, with his usual stutter.
+
+The streets were dark, quiet, and deserted. Now and then as they hurried
+along, for Joan walked as fast as she could to ward off conversation,
+they passed a solitary policeman doing his beat, and dim, scarce seen
+lovers emerged out of the shadows holding each other's hands.
+
+"Will you not take my arm?" Mr. Simpson ventured presently. He was
+slightly out of breath in his effort to keep up with her.
+
+"No, thank you," Joan answered. The whole occurrence was too ridiculous,
+yet for once in her life her sense of humour was failing her. "And I
+wish you would not bother to come any further, it is quite unnecessary."
+
+Her tone was more than chilly. Mr. Simpson, however remained undaunted.
+His slow and ponderous mind had settled on a certain course; it would
+need more than a little chilliness to turn it from its purpose.
+
+"I was going to ask you," he went on, "whether you would do me the
+honour of coming to the theatre one evening? If you have a mind that
+turns that way sometimes."
+
+"No, thank you," answered Joan once more. "I never go to theatres, and I
+shouldn't go with you in any case," she added desperately, as a final
+resource.
+
+"I meant no offence," the man answered, humble as ever. "I should always
+act straight by a girl, and for you----"
+
+"Oh, don't, please don't," Joan interrupted. She stopped in her walk and
+faced round on him. "Can't you see how impossible it would be for
+me----" she broke off abruptly, rather ashamed of her outburst. "I am
+going to be a snob in a minute, if I am not careful," she finished to
+herself.
+
+"I know I am not amusing, or anything," the man went on; "but you have
+always seemed so kind and considerate. If I have offended in any way, I
+am more than sorry."
+
+Joan felt that he was frowning as he always frowned in hopeless
+perplexity over his shorthand.
+
+"I am not offended," she tried to explain more gently. "Only, please do
+not ask me to go out with you again, or offer to walk home with me. Here
+we are anyway, this is where I live." She turned at the bottom of
+Shamrock House steps and held out her hand to him. "Good-night," she
+said.
+
+Simpson did not take her hand, instead he stared up at her; she could
+see how shiny and red his face was under the lamp.
+
+"You are not angry with me?" he stuttered.
+
+"Why, no, of course not," Joan prevaricated. Then she ran up the steps
+and let herself into the hall without looking back at him.
+
+For two or three days she attempted to ignore the man's presence in
+class next her, and Simpson himself in no way intruded. He had taken her
+snubbing like a man; from the height of his dreams he had fallen into an
+apathetic despair; the only effect it had on him was to make him
+stupider than ever at his work. Then one evening, with a face working
+rather painfully, he told her that he did not intend to come any more.
+
+"I am going to another centre," he said, gathering his books together
+and not looking at her.
+
+"Has Mr. Phillips been too much for you?" she asked, wilfully ignoring
+the deeper meaning behind his words.
+
+"No," he answered, "it is not that. It may seem quite absurd," he went
+on laboriously, "but I want to ask you to let me have your note-book. I
+have got a new one to give you in its place." He produced a packet from
+his pocket and held it out to her.
+
+Later on, when she thought over the thing, she smiled. A note-book
+seemed so singularly unromantic, but at the time she felt nearer tears.
+The look in his eyes haunted her for many days. She had been the one
+glimpse of romance in his dreary existence, and she had had to kill the
+dream so ruthlessly.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+    "It seems her heart was not washed clean
+        Of tinted dreams of 'Might have been.'"
+
+                                             RUTH YOUNG.
+
+
+There followed a weary time for Joan. The poem she had repeated on her
+first morning at Shamrock House had to be recalled again and again and
+fell away finally from its glad meaning in the bitter disillusionment
+which looking for work entailed. Wherein lay the value of cheerfulness
+when day after day saw her weary and dispirited from a fruitless search,
+from hope-chilling visits to registry offices, from unsuccessful
+applications in answer to the advertisements which thronged the morning
+papers? She went at it at first eagerly, hopefully. "To-day I shall
+succeed," was her waking motto. But every evening brought its tale of
+disappointment.
+
+"There is no one in the world as useless as I am," she thought finally.
+
+"It is only just a bad season," Rose Brent tried to cheer her up; "there
+is lots of unemployment about; we will find something for you soon."
+
+But to Joan it seemed as if the iron of being absolutely unwanted was
+entering into her soul.
+
+There was only one shred of comfort in all this dreariness. Life at
+Shamrock House was so cheap that she was eating up but very little of
+Uncle John's allowance. She wondered sometimes if the old people at home
+ever asked at the Bank as to how her money matters stood, or had they
+shut her so completely out of their lives that even that was of no
+interest to them? Miss Abercrombie wrote fairly regularly, but though
+she could give Joan news of the home people she had to admit that Aunt
+Janet never mentioned or alluded to her niece in any way.
+
+"She is harder than I thought she could be," wrote Miss Abercrombie; "or
+is it perhaps that you have killed her heart?"
+
+Once Joan's pride fell so low that she found herself writing Aunt Janet
+a pathetic, vague appeal to be allowed to creep back into the shelter of
+the old life. But she tore the letter up in the morning and scattered
+its little pieces along the gutter of Digby Street. Digby Street was
+sucking into its undercurrents her youth, her cheerfulness, her hope;
+only pride was left, she must make a little struggle to hold on to
+pride, and then news came from Miss Abercrombie that Aunt Janet had been
+ill and that the Rutherfords had gone abroad. Apart from her fruitless
+journeys in search of work, her days held nothing. She so dreaded the
+atmosphere of Shamrock House that very often she would have to walk
+herself tired out of all feeling before she could go back there;
+sometimes she cried night after night, weak, stupid tears, shut up in
+the dreariness of her little room, and very often her thoughts turned
+back to Gilbert--the comfort of their little flat, the theatres, the
+suppers, the dances and the passion-held nights when he had loved her.
+More and more she thought of Gilbert as the dreariness of Digby Street
+closed round her days.
+
+If her baby had lived, would life have been easier for her, or would it
+only have meant--as she had first believed in her days of panic that
+it would mean--an added hardship, a haunting shame? It was the lack of
+love in her life that left so aching a void, the fact that apparently no
+one cared or heeded what became of her. The baby would at least have
+brought love to her, in its little hands, in its weak strength that
+looked to her for shelter.
+
+"I should be happier," she said once stormily to Rose, "if I could have
+a cat to keep. I think I shall buy a kitten."
+
+The other girl had looked at her, smiling dryly. "Pets are strictly
+against the rules in Shamrock House," she reminded her.
+
+It was in one of her very despondent moods that Joan first met the young
+man with blue eyes. She never knew him by any name, and their
+acquaintance, or whatever it could be called, came to an abrupt end on
+the first occasion when he ventured to speak to her. Womanlike, she had
+been longing for him to do so for some time, but resented it bitterly
+when he did. Perhaps something faintly contemptuous, a shadowed hint
+that he had noticed her interest in him, flamed up the desire to snub
+him in her heart, or perhaps it was a feeling of self-shame to find
+herself so poor a beggar at friendship's gate.
+
+For a week he had met her at the same place and followed her on her way
+down Victoria Street. Then one night, just as they came under the lights
+of Vauxhall Clock tower, he spoke to her.
+
+"Doing anything to-night?" he said. "Shall we dine together?"
+
+She turned from him in a white heat of anger, more with herself than
+with him, though that, of course, it was not given him to know. But he
+caught a glimpse of her face and read his answer, and since he was in
+reality a nice boy, and insult had been the last thought in his mind, he
+took off his hat quickly and apologized.
+
+"I am sure I beg your pardon," he said; "I can see that I have made a
+mistake."
+
+Joan did not answer him, she had moved quickly away in the direction of
+Digby Street, but as she passed by the dingy houses she knew that he was
+not following any more, and she felt the hot, hard lump in her throat
+which is so difficult to swallow. She had wanted to go to dinner with
+him, she had wanted to, that was the thought that mocked at her all
+night.
+
+It was one evening about a fortnight after that episode that Rose called
+Joan into her room on their way upstairs.
+
+"I want to talk to you," she said, closing the door behind them. "Has
+Miss Nigel spoken yet?"
+
+"To me?" asked Joan; "what about?"
+
+"I see, then, she hasn't," Rose answered, "but she will soon. Did you
+notice that the night before last Miss Wembly, who sits at the next
+table to ours, had a guest to dinner?"
+
+"No," Joan admitted; "but why? What has it got to do with me?"
+
+"I am coming to that," the other answered; she stood with her head
+averted, looking for a cigarette. "I am always a damned silent person
+myself," she went on, "and I do not think anyone can accuse me of being
+curious about their pasts. I do not want to know a blessed thing about
+yours, for instance, but that guest of Miss Wembly's was a nurse from
+St. George's Hospital."
+
+"Oh," said Joan blankly; she was standing just within the door, her back
+against the clothes that hung on it.
+
+"Well," Rose hurried on, "it has gone all round the place like
+lightning. They aren't fond of you because they hate me and we are
+friends. Yesterday one of them took the story to Miss Nigel and she is
+going to ask you to leave."
+
+"What story?" asked Joan; she had not followed the other's swift
+deduction.
+
+Rose lit a cigarette and held out the case to Joan. "Have one," she
+said, "and come and sit down. As I said before, I am not asking for
+personal history, I am telling you the facts as they affect this place.
+They say you were to have had a baby, and you are not married."
+
+She shrugged her shoulders and sank into a chair.
+
+"You mean," whispered Joan, "that the nurse told them that?"
+
+"I suppose so," Rose admitted; "anyway, Miss Nigel spoke of it to me
+to-day. She is not a bad sort, Miss Nigel, she was very kind to me once,
+but she is going to tell you to go."
+
+"What have you thought of it?" asked Joan.
+
+"I don't think about other people's affairs," Rose answered. "Come and
+sit down, I have got some jam for you after the powder, for I believe I
+have found a job for you. But first you must move into diggings, these
+clubs are all in a league, every one of them will be shut to you."
+
+"You are not bothering to ask if it is true," said Joan. She moved
+forward and sat down, her hands clenched on her lap. "I suppose----"
+
+Rose interrupted, putting a swift hand on hers. "Don't," she said,
+"don't deny it or tell me the truth, whichever you were thinking of
+doing. It does not matter to me. Because I like you I have interfered as
+much as I have so that you may be prepared for Miss Nigel's attack." She
+smiled. "It will be an attack too--having a baby and no husband to
+people like Miss Nigel is worse than any criminal offence."
+
+"Yes," Joan admitted. A vision of Aunt Janet's horror-stricken face came
+across her mind. "When I heard that it had been killed in the accident,
+I was glad, glad. I had not got the courage to go on and brave it out. I
+was glad to think that I could start life again, that no one would know
+or look at me like the people at home had looked at me when they knew.
+And now----"
+
+"And now?" Rose repeated; she was studying Joan's face with her eyes
+half closed, a peculiar trick she had when her thoughts were unpleasant.
+
+"And now it doesn't seem worth while going on any longer," Joan burst
+forth. "There must be other lives that are better worth living than
+this. Do you know that for the last ten days I have made fifteen
+shillings addressing envelopes from nine till six. It would be better,
+surely it would be better, to be what people call bad!"
+
+Rose watched the flushed face. "If a life of that sort would give you
+any pleasure," she spoke slowly, "I should say live it by all means. The
+trouble is, it would not please you. If you care to listen, I will tell
+you a bit of my own story. It is not altogether pleasant, but in your
+present frame of mind it will not do you any harm to hear it."
+
+She paused a moment, head thrown back, blowing smoke-rings to the
+ceiling.
+
+"I came to London ten years ago," she began presently, "and I was
+twenty-one at the time. I had been keeping house for a brother in India,
+and I had had a good time, but a spirit of restlessness had come upon me
+and I would not leave him alone till he let me come home and start on my
+own. I had, of course, no people. Poor brother, he gave way after many
+arguments, knowing as little as I did about the life here, and I came.
+He died the year afterwards of enteric. I had been on an allowance from
+him before, but when he died that stopped and I was left absolutely
+penniless. You have had a bad time in that way, but I had a worse one.
+Still I was young and strong, and, above all, I was a fighter, so I won
+through. I got a post as typist in a city office and I drifted to
+Shamrock House. My working hours were lengthy, sometimes it was after
+half-past seven before I came out of office. Then I would hurry through
+the crowded streets, as you do now, and always that walk, through gaily
+lighted pleasure-seeking crowds, would end for me in the dark dreariness
+where Great Smith Street turns away from Victoria Street, a ten-minute
+walk through one of London's poorest neighbourhoods, and--Shamrock
+House! Those were the days in which I did my hardest kicking against
+fate; it was so unjust, so unfair, and all the while youth and power to
+enjoy, which is the heritage of youth, were slipping past me. That is
+how you feel, isn't it?" she asked suddenly.
+
+"Yes," Joan said.
+
+"I know," Rose answered softly; "well, wait and hear. I was in this
+mood, and feeling more than usually desperate, when I met the woman. I
+need not give her a name, not even to you; I doubt if I ever knew her
+real one. I had seen her several times, perhaps she had noticed me,
+though she had quaint, unseeing eyes that appeared to gaze through you
+blankly. She was a beautiful woman with an arresting beauty hard to
+define, and she used, as far as I could see, neither paint nor powder.
+One evening, just as I was turning into Great Smith Street, I found her
+at my elbow.
+
+"'You live down there,' she asked in a curious, expressionless way as if
+she hardly expected an answer.
+
+"I was startled at her talking to me and at the same time interested.
+
+"'Yes,' I said.
+
+"'It is dark and very dreary,' she went on, talking almost to herself,
+'why do you choose such a life?'
+
+"I think the bitterness of my mood must have sounded in my answer, for
+suddenly she turned to me and laid a hand on my arm.
+
+"'Leave it then,' she whispered, her face close up against mine, 'leave
+it, come home with me.'
+
+"'Home with you,' I repeated, thoroughly astonished, and at that moment
+a policeman, tall and stolid, strolled across the road towards us.
+
+"'Don't let him hear what we are saying,' whispered the extraordinary
+woman; 'just turn back with me a little way and I will explain to you.'
+
+"Well, I went. Perhaps you can realize why, and I saw for a little into
+the outside edge of life as lived by these women. I wonder how I can
+best convey to you the horror and pity of it, for we--despite the
+greyness of our lives--have something within ourselves to which we can
+turn, but they have weighed even hopes and dreams with the weights of
+shame, and found their poor value in pounds, shillings and pence. That
+is why their eyes as they pass you in the streets are so blank and
+expressionless. Each new day brings them nothing, they have learnt all
+things, and the groundwork of their knowledge is--sin."
+
+She rose abruptly and moved across to the window, pulling aside the
+blue-tinted curtains, staring out over miles and miles of roof-covered
+London. From far in the distance Big Ben shone down on her, a round, dim
+face in the darkness.
+
+"You are wondering why I stayed with the woman," she went on presently.
+"The answer is easy and may make you smile. I met a man, one of the many
+she brought to the house, and fell in love with him. I was stupid enough
+to forget my surroundings and the circumstances under which he had met
+me, or I dreamt that to him also they were only the outside wrappers of
+fate, easy to fling aside. Does it sound like a thrilling romance, and
+am I making myself out to be the heroine of one crowded hour of glorious
+life? Because my hour was never glorious."
+
+She repeated the last word with a wry laugh and turned to face Joan. "I
+don't know why I have raked up all this," she said. "I thought it had
+lost its power to hurt; but I was mistaken. I have liked you, perhaps
+that is the reason, and I have wanted to save you from making the same
+mistake as myself. For before you plunge out of monotony you must see
+that there is nothing in your heart that can be hurt, as these women
+have to be hurt every hour of their lives."
+
+Joan could find nothing to say; the other girl's confidence had been so
+overpowering, it left her tongue-tied and stupid. Rose came back after a
+little silence and sat down opposite her again.
+
+"I am sorry," she said, "I have talked you into a mood of black
+depression; never mind, perhaps you will have learnt something from it
+none the less. And meanwhile, things are going to be better for you; it
+is no loss having to leave Shamrock House, otherwise you might grow into
+the house as I have. You will have to see about getting a room
+to-morrow, and then if you can meet me in the afternoon, I will take you
+and introduce you to your job. It is quite a nice one, I hope you will
+like it."
+
+Joan stood up. "I don't know what to say," she began; "you--oh, if only
+we could wipe out the past," she flamed into sudden rebellion, "and
+start afresh."
+
+Rose laughed. "I don't know about that," she said--the inevitable
+cigarette was in her mouth again--"_I_ for one would be very unwilling
+to lose a wisdom which has been so dearly bought."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+    "No one has any more right to go about unhappy than he has to go
+     about ill bred."
+
+                                             R. L. STEVENSON.
+
+
+Joan was not to start her new work till the following Monday. She was to
+be typist--her first real post filled her with some degree of
+self-conscious pride--to the Editor of the _Evening Herald_. Rose had
+herself worked on the paper some years ago and was a friend of the
+Editor's.
+
+"I want you to give a girl I know a chance, Mr. Strangman," she had
+pleaded; "she is clever and well-educated, but she needs experience.
+Take her, there is a good man, while your slack time is on, and she will
+be game for anything when you get busy again."
+
+Mr. Strangman twisted long nervous fingers into strange positions.
+
+"I don't know about this girl," he said; "we are never slack at the
+office."
+
+It was a pet fallacy of his that he was the hardest-worked man in
+London. Rose smiled. "But her typing is quite good," she argued, "and
+you are such an easy dictator, I am sure she will get on all right."
+
+She had been exceptionally pleased when Mr. Strangman reluctantly gave
+way. Joan would, she hoped, take kindly to newspaper work, and it might
+open up new roads to her.
+
+Meanwhile Joan had been out on her own and taken a room for herself in a
+house standing in a quiet, withdrawn square in the neighbourhood of
+King's Road, Chelsea. To call it a room was to dignify it by a title to
+which it could lay no real claim. It was an attic, up the last rickety
+flight of stairs, with roofs that sloped down within two feet of the
+ground, and a diminutive window from which one could get but the barest
+glimpse of the skies. Still it had possibilities, its aspect was not so
+terribly common-place as had been that of the other rooms which Joan had
+seen that morning. The sloping roofs, the small pane of glass which
+looked out higher than the neighbouring chimney-tops, were in their way
+attractive. She would take it, she told a somewhat surprised landlady,
+and would pay--everything included--ten shillings a week for the noble
+apartment. The "everything included" swept in breakfast--"Such as a
+young lady like yourself would eat, Miss"--the woman told her, and
+attendance. Suppers and fires she would have to provide for herself,
+though Mrs. Carew was prepared to cook for her; lunch, of course, fell
+in office hours.
+
+On Saturday, therefore, and having forestalled Miss Nigel's request by
+announcing that she was leaving for good, Joan moved her luggage over to
+her new home and took possession.
+
+"I am going to like it better than I liked being at Shamrock House," she
+told Rose, who had come to assist in the moving. "It is more my own, I
+can do just as I like here."
+
+Rose was craning her neck to see out of the window's limited compass.
+"Just as you like," she repeated, laughing as she spoke, "on twenty-five
+shillings a week and an attic. You are not ambitious, my child."
+
+She turned round to face the room; even in mid afternoon, with the sun
+shining outside, it was dim--the corners in positive darkness. "I don't
+think I should have chosen it," she said; "there is no sun, and"--she
+shook the thought off--"who else is in the house, did you ask?"
+
+"There was not any need to," Joan answered. "Mrs. Carew, that is my
+landlady, you know, told me all their family histories while I was
+making up my mind whether I would come or not. Wait a minute," she
+paused in her unpacking to tick them off on her fingers. "There is the
+ground floor lady, who is an artist's model. No need to work just now
+though, for the last gentleman that painted her took a fancy to her and
+is paying for her at present. Drawing-room floor, old foreign lady who
+never seems to get out of bed. Second floor, retired army officer, 'fond
+of drink, more's the pity,'" she mimicked Mrs. Carew's voice, "and
+second floor back, young lady actress, who is not perhaps as good as she
+might be, 'but there, you can't always be blaming people'; and third
+floor, me! Doesn't sound respectable does it? But after Miss Nigel I am
+afraid of respectability."
+
+Rose watched her with narrowed eyes. "It sounds anything but
+respectable," she agreed; "do not make a fool of yourself, kid, it won't
+be worth it, it never is."
+
+"I am not likely to," Joan answered her. "My one real regret in leaving
+Shamrock House is that I shall not have you to talk to, oh, and the
+baths. Mrs. Carew does not hold with carrying too much water up these
+stairs."
+
+"I am glad I rank before the baths," Rose laughed. She extricated
+herself from behind the luggage. "I will come and look you up
+sometimes," she announced, "though it probably won't be often; I am a
+bad hand at stirring myself out to see anyone in the evenings.
+Good-night, and I hope you will get on all right with Strangman, he is a
+kind little man really."
+
+She went. Joan sat listening to her feet echoing down the stairs; a
+mouse could set the whole house creaking. She felt very much alone;
+Shamrock House, full as it had been of uncongenial companions, had yet
+been able to offer some distraction from one's own society.
+
+The new office, to which she wended her way on the Monday morning, lay
+in a side alley opening off Fleet Street, a rickety old building, busy
+as a hive of bees in swarming time. The steep, wooden stairs, after she
+had been asked her business by the janitor in the box office and put in
+charge of a very small, very dirty boy, led her up and up into the heart
+of the building--past wide-open doors where numerous men sat at desks,
+the floor round them strewn with papers; up again, past rooms where the
+engines throbbed and panted, shaking the building with their noisy
+vibrations; up still further, till they landed her at that withdrawn and
+sacred sanctum, the Editor's room. Here worked Mr. Strangman
+and his satellites; spiders, in fact, in the centre of their
+cleverly-constructed web, throwing out feelers in search of news to all
+quarters of the globe.
+
+Anything less like a spider than Mr. Strangman it would have been
+difficult to imagine. He was an alert, nervous man, with bright, kind
+eyes, a flexible mouth and very restless hands. His whole nature hung on
+wires, as if--which was indeed the case--his mental capacity was too big
+and overpowering for his physical strength. His manners under the strain
+of work were jerky and abrupt, but otherwise he was a very kindly and
+genial man. To Joan he was excessively polite, and so afraid that her
+capabilities might not come up to his expectations that for the first
+few days he left her practically with no work to do. She sat in a large,
+well-lit--if draughty--room, opposite Mr. Strangman at his table.
+
+It was one of her duties, she discovered, to keep the aforesaid table
+tidy, and in time she learned that here more than anywhere else she
+could be of service to the man. He had an awe-inspiring way of piling up
+his desk with scraps of paper, cuttings, and slips, and stray
+manuscripts, and it was always under the most appalling muddle that the
+one small, indispensable news-slip would hide itself.
+
+The Magazine Page-faker and the News-gleaner sat in the same room, the
+latter at a table next Joan. He was a stout man with a beaming smile and
+an inexhaustible supply of good temper. He would sit over his work,
+which as far as she could see consisted solely of running his eye over
+the day's papers and cutting out what appeared to be workable news,
+making a great deal of noise with his feet on the floor, a gigantic
+cutting-out scissors in his hand and a whistle which never varied its
+tune from early morning till late in the evening--a soft, subdued,
+under-his-breath whistle, Joan never even discovered what the tune was.
+He was, despite this disadvantage, an indefatigable worker and an
+ever-ready helper, always willing to do other people's work for them if
+necessary.
+
+Of the other people on the staff Joan saw very little; the reporters
+came early in the morning to take their orders for the day, and threw in
+their copy downstairs in the evening. Sometimes they would come upstairs
+to discuss some feature of their day's work with Mr. Strangman, or to
+put in an article to the Literary Editor, but, as a whole, she hardly
+learned to know them, even by name. Then there were the office boys, a
+moving, fluctuating crowd; always in mischief, always dirty, always
+irrepressibly cheerful. For the rest, her work--one might almost say her
+life--lay between the four walls of the office room, with the shaking
+vibrations of the engines under her feet and the musty, curious smell of
+papers in the making and pile upon pile of papers that had been made all
+round her.
+
+She arrived at 9.30 and left about 6 p.m., and by then she was too
+numbed--for the working of a typewriter is monotonous work--to do
+anything save walk with the hurrying crowds as far as Charing Cross and
+take a bus from there to Montague Square. But since work filled her days
+she had less time for discontent or depression. Sometimes she would be
+tempted to wander off the direct route on her way home and she would
+walk up to Piccadilly and past the region of brightly-lighted shops,
+watching the faces in the crowd round her, envying those who met friends
+and stopped to talk to them, following with rather wistful eyes the
+couples who passed, hand clasped in hand; but generally speaking she was
+too tired in the evenings to do anything save go straight home, eat a
+hasty supper and tumble into bed.
+
+Of Rose she saw, as the other had prophesied, very little. Joan realized
+that friendship, if their brief companionship could have been called
+such, counted for very little in Rose's life. The girl seemed entirely
+to ignore her once she was from constant sight, and since Joan could not
+herself call at Shamrock House and Rose habitually forgot to pay her
+promised visits, the friendship, such as it had been, faded away into
+the past.
+
+The other inhabitants of 6, Montague Square, she saw very rarely.
+Occasionally she would encounter Miss Drummond, the downstairs tenant,
+paying off her taxi at the door--a tall, handsome girl, rather overblown
+in her beauty, who invariably stared at Joan with haughty defiance and
+stalked into her own room, calling loudly for Mrs. Carew. Once Joan had
+stumbled over the retired military gentleman from the second floor,
+sound asleep, in a very undignified position, half way up her own little
+stairs. The incident had brought with it a shudder of fear, and from
+that day onwards Joan was always careful to lock her door at night.
+
+Miss Fanny Bellairs, the erring damsel on the second floor back, kept
+such strange hours that she was never visible; but Mrs. Carew had a
+large stock of not very savoury anecdotes about her which she would
+recount to Joan during the process of laying supper. As not even an
+earthquake would have stopped Mrs. Carew's desire to impart information,
+Joan gave up the attempt to silence her. Indeed, she sometimes listened
+with a certain amount of curiosity, and Fanny Bellairs assumed a
+marvellous personality and appearance in her mind's eye.
+
+That the original did not in the least come up to her expectations was
+something of a surprise. About three months after her first arrival at
+Montague Square Joan reached home rather late one evening to find her
+room already occupied. A girl sat, her feet tucked underneath her, on
+the principal chair under the lamplight; she had been crying, for a
+tight, damp ball of a handkerchief lay on the floor, and at the sound of
+Joan's entry she turned a tear-stained face to greet her.
+
+"I thought you were never coming"--the voice held a plaintive sob in
+it--"and I am that down-hearted and miserable."
+
+Joan put down her things hastily and came across. "I am so sorry," she
+said, groping through her mind to discover who her visitor might be;
+"did Mrs. Carew tell you I was in?--how stupid of her."
+
+The girl in the chair gulped back her tears and laughed. "No, she
+didn't," she contradicted; "she told me that you wouldn't want to see me
+if you were in; that the likes of you did not know the likes of me, and
+that I was not to come up. But I came"--she held out impulsive hands. "I
+guess you aren't angry," she said; "when I get the silly hump, which
+isn't often, I go mad if I have to stay by myself. I'll be as good
+as"--she glanced round the room--"as good as you," she finished, "if you
+will let me stay."
+
+"Why, of course," said Joan. "I don't know what Mrs. Carew can have been
+talking about. I don't know you, so I can't see how she can have thought
+I would not want to see you."
+
+"I can though." The girl shook forward a sudden halo of curls and
+laughed in a way which it was impossible to resist. "I am Fanny, from
+downstairs, and Mrs. Carew is a silly old woman who talks a lot, but she
+is not stupid enough not to know the difference between a girl like you
+and a fly-by-night like me. Now I have shocked you," she went on
+breathlessly, seeing Joan's flush, "just when I was setting out to be
+good. I'll bite my tongue out and start again."
+
+She coughed once with alarming intensity. Joan moved slowly away and
+took off her hat and coat. So this was Fanny Bellairs, the girl whose
+doings provided such a purple background for her own dull existence. She
+looked again at the little figure, lying back now, eyes closed, lips
+tremulous from the struggle for breath which her fit of coughing had
+brought her. It was a perfectly-fashioned face, though when Joan had
+time to study it, she could see that the colouring was just a little
+crudely put on and that it had smudged in the shadows under her eyes
+where the tears had lain. She was such a thin, small slip of a girl,
+too, little dimpled hands and a baby face under the gold curls. Fanny
+opened her eyes at that moment, wide and innocent, and answered Joan's
+glance with a wistful smile.
+
+"Thinking of all Mrs. Carew ever said about me?" she asked. "I am not as
+bad as she sometimes paints me. Still"--she stood up--"I'll go, if you
+would rather I did. Hate to make a nuisance of myself."
+
+She moved slowly--it was, in reality, reluctantly--towards the door, and
+Joan came out of her reverie with a start.
+
+"Please don't go," she said quickly. "You must think I am awfully rude,
+but really I was not thinking about Mrs. Carew or anything so
+disagreeable. I was thinking how pretty you were, and wondering how old
+you could be."
+
+The girl at the door stopped and turned back. Laughter filled her eyes,
+yet there was a little hint of mockery behind the mirth.
+
+"Go on!" she said, "you and your thoughts! I know just what they were,
+my dear; but it doesn't matter to me, I am used to it. Twenty-two, at
+your service, mum"--she came a little away from the door and swept Joan
+a curtsey--"and everything my own, even my hair, though you mayn't
+believe it."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+    "Pale dreams arise, swift heart-beats yearn,
+     Up, up, some ecstasy to learn!
+     The spirit dares not speak, afar
+     Youth lures its fellow, like a star."
+
+                                             ANON.
+
+
+Fanny was a real daughter of joy. The name is given to many who in no
+sense of the word near its meaning. To Fanny, to be alive was to laugh;
+she had a nature which shook aside the degradation of her profession
+much as a small London sparrow will shake the filthy water of the
+gutters from off his sky-plumed wings. She brought such an atmosphere of
+sunshine and laughter into Joan's life that the other girl grew to lean
+on it. The friendship between them ripened very quickly; on Fanny's side
+it amounted almost to love. Who knows what starvation of the heart side
+of her went to build up all that she felt for Joan? Through the dreary
+days that followed, and they sapped in passing at Joan's health and
+courage, Fanny was nearly always at hand, with fresh flowers for the
+attic, with tempting fruit for Joan to eat in place of the supper which
+night after night she rejected. Fanny would sometimes be away for weeks
+at a time. She still followed her profession as an actress, Mrs. Carew
+would tell Joan, and on those occasions Joan missed her intolerably. But
+Fanny herself never spoke about her life, and Joan never questioned her.
+
+Autumn faded into winter; winter blew itself out in a cold and
+boisterous March, and spring crept back to London. Nowhere else in the
+world does she come so suddenly, or catch at your heart with the same
+sense of soft joy. You meet her, she catches you unawares, so to say,
+with your winter clothes on.
+
+"What is this?" she whispers, blowing against your cheeks. "Surely you
+have forgotten my birthday, or you would never have come out in those
+drab old clothes."
+
+Then with a little shake of her skirts she is gone, and your eyes are
+opened to the fact that the trees have put forth brave green buds, and
+that yellow crocuses and white snowdrops are dancing and curtseying to
+you from odd corners of the Park.
+
+Joan's life at the _Evening Herald_ Office, once the first novelty had
+worn off, and because it was spring outside, became very monotonous and
+very tiring. She nearly always ended the days conscious of a ridiculous
+desire to cry at everything. Because the buses were crowded, because the
+supper was greasy and unappetizing, or because Fanny was not at home to
+welcome her.
+
+There was one afternoon in particular, on a hot, airless day in June,
+when Joan reached the last point of her endurance. Everything had
+combined to make the office unendurable. One of Mr. Strangman's most
+agitated moods held him. Early in the morning he had indulged in a wordy
+argument with Chester, the Literary Page editor, on the question of
+whether or not the telephone was to be used by the office boys to 'phone
+telegrams through to the post office. It was a custom just founded by
+Strangman and it saved a certain amount of time, but Chester--a thin,
+over-worked, intellectual-ridden gentleman, was driven nearly mad by
+occult messages, such as the following:
+
+"Hulloa, hulloa, is that telegrams? Take a message please for the
+_Evening Herald_. What, can't hear? That's your fault, I am shouting and
+my mouth is near the tube. Look alive, miss. Listening? Well: to Davids.
+D for daddy, a for apples, v for varnish, i for I. I said I for i! Got
+it now? D for daddy again," and so on.
+
+"The truth of it is," said Mr. Chester, during a pause in one of these
+wordy tussles, "I, or that telephone, will have to go, Strangman. I
+cannot work with it going on."
+
+"My dear fellow"--Strangman was all agitation at once--"what is to be
+done? The messages must go and I must hear them sent or the boys would
+put in wrong words. I am sure it is not any pleasanter for me than it is
+for you; I have also got to work."
+
+"T for Tommy, I keep telling you--Tommy, Tommy," the lad at the 'phone
+shrieked triumphantly.
+
+Mr. Chester threw down his papers, pushed back his chair, and rose,
+tragic purpose on his face.
+
+"It is not to be borne," he ejaculated.
+
+"Oh, very well," stuttered Mr. Strangman, "that means, I suppose, that I
+shall have to do the 'phoning myself. Here, boy, get out, give me that."
+
+And thereupon the message started over again, but this time breathed in
+Mr. Strangman's powerful whisper.
+
+He certainly seemed to be able to manipulate it with less noise, only he
+soon wearied of the effort, and future wires were deputed to Joan. So,
+in addition to her other tasks, she had had the peculiarly irritating
+one of trying to induce attention into post office telephone girls.
+
+Then, too, Mr. Strangman had not felt in the mood to dictate letters,
+with the result that at a quarter to six seven of them had to be altered
+and retyped. Joan was still sitting at her machine in a corner of the
+hot, noisy office, beating out: "Dear Sir, In answer to yours, etc.,"
+when the clock struck six. Her back ached, her eyes throbbed, she was
+conscious of a feeling of intense hatred against mild, inoffensive Mr.
+Strangman.
+
+That gentleman, having discovered the lateness of the hour by chance,
+kept her another quarter of an hour apologizing before he signed the
+letters.
+
+Then he looked up at her suddenly.
+
+"Do you think," he said, "that you could report on the dresses for us
+to-morrow night at the Artists' Ball?"
+
+"I report?" Joan looked at him in astonishment; women reporters were
+disapproved of on the _Evening Herald_.
+
+"I know it is unusual," Mr. Strangman admitted. "But Jones is ill, and
+our other men will all be busy on important turns. I just thought of
+you in passing; it is a pity to waste the ticket."
+
+"I could try." Joan made an effort to keep the eagerness out of her
+voice.
+
+"Yes, that is it, you could try. We should not want much," he added;
+"and it is not part of your duties as a secretary; still, you might
+enjoy it, eh?"
+
+"Why, I should love it," she assented; hate was fast merging back into
+liking.
+
+Strangman cackled his customary nervous laugh. "Then that is settled,"
+he said, "and here is the ticket. You will have to have a fancy dress,
+hire it, I suppose, since the time is so short. That, and a taxi there
+and back, will come out of the paper. Hope it is a good show, for your
+sake."
+
+Afterwards, when she looked back at that evening, at the Artists' Ball,
+Joan was ashamed to remember the eager heat of excitement which took
+possession of her from the moment when she stepped out of the _Evening
+Herald_ taxi and ran along the passage to the ladies' cloak-room. She
+had, it seemed to her, no excuse; she was not young enough to have made
+it pardonable and she had long ago decided that the intoxication of life
+could be no longer hers. Its loss was to be part of the bitter lesson
+fate had taught her. Yet as she saw herself in the glass, a ridiculous
+figure in black flounces with just one scarlet rose pinned at her waist
+and another nodding on the brim of her hat, she could not keep the
+excitement from sparkling in her eyes and the colour of youth was
+certainly flaming in her cheeks. Fanny had fitted her out with clever
+fingers as a black Pierrette. A Pierrette, taken from the leaves of some
+old French book, with her hair done in little dropping curls just
+faintly powdered, as if a mist of snow lay over the brown.
+
+She was young, after all, and the music called to her with insistent
+voice. "I am looking nice," Joan confided to her reflection, "and I will
+have a good time just for to-night."
+
+Then she turned and went quickly, walking with light feet and eager eyes
+that sought for adventure into the crowded room.
+
+It gave her first of all an immense sense of space. The whole opera
+house had been converted into a ballroom. There were hundreds of people
+present, and every imaginable fancy dress under the sun. Brilliant
+colours, bright lights and the constant movement of the crowd made up a
+scene of kaleidoscopic splendour.
+
+There was a waltz in progress and Joan stood for a little with her back
+to a pillar of one of the boxes, bewildered by the noise and moving
+colours. Standing opposite her, in the shadow of the other looped-up
+curtain, was a man. A Pierrot to her Pierrette, only his costume was
+carried out in white, and on his head, instead of the orthodox hat, he
+wore a tight-bound black handkerchief. His eyes, for some reason, made
+her restless. It was not that he stared exactly, the man's whole figure
+was too blatantly bored for that, but there was something in their
+expression which made her look and look again. At their sixth exchange
+of glances the man smiled, or so it seemed to Joan, but the next moment
+his face was sombre again. None the less there had been something in her
+idea, for before the next couple of dancers swung past her the man had
+moved from the shadow of his curtain and was standing near her.
+
+"Don't think it is awful impudence on my part," he said, "but are you
+here all alone?"
+
+Now there was just something in his voice that, as far as most women
+were concerned would sweep away all barriers. He spoke, in short, like a
+gentleman. Joan looked up at him.
+
+"Yes," she admitted; she caught her breath on a little laugh. "I am here
+as a reporter, you know; it is business and pleasure combined."
+
+Once more his eyes made her uncomfortable and she dropped hers quickly.
+
+"That is strange," said the man gravely, "for I am a reporter too."
+
+He was certainly not speaking the truth. Joan was not inclined to
+believe that Fleet Street had ever produced reporters the least like her
+companion. Still, what did it matter? just for this evening she would
+throw aside convention and have a good time.
+
+"How awfully fortunate," she answered, "because you will be able to help
+me. I am new to the game."
+
+"Well then," he suggested, "let us dance to the finish of this waltz and
+I will point out a few of the celebrities as we pass them."
+
+Just for a second Joan hesitated, but her feet were tingling to be
+dancing.
+
+"Couldn't we do it better standing here?" she parried.
+
+"No," he assured her, "we could not do it at all unless we dance;
+movement helps my memory."
+
+He was a most perfect dancer. No one, so numberless women would have
+told Joan, could hold you just as Robert Landon did, steer you untouched
+through the most crowded ballroom as he did, make himself and you, for
+the time being, seem part and parcel of the swaying tune, the strange
+enchantment of a waltz.
+
+Joan was flushed and a little breathless at the close; they had danced
+until the last notes died on the air, and she had forgotten her mission,
+the celebrities, everything, indeed, except the dance and its
+bewildering melody. The man looked down at her as she stood beside him,
+an eager light awake in his eyes. His voice, however, was cool and
+friendly.
+
+"You dance much too well to be a reporter," he said.
+
+"What a ridiculous remark!" Joan retorted; "one cannot dance all day,
+can one? Besides, I am not even a real reporter. I am only a typist."
+
+"That is worse, to think of you as that is impossible," he said. "Let us
+go outside and find somewhere to sit."
+
+"But what about our reporting," Joan remonstrated; "I thought you were
+going to point out celebrities?"
+
+"Time enough for that," he answered. "I am going to take you out on to a
+balcony meanwhile. There will only be the stars to look at us, and I am
+going to pretend you are a fairy and that you live in the heart of a
+rose, not a typist or any such awful thing."
+
+Joan laughed. "I wish you could see my attic," she said. "It is such a
+funny rose for any fairy to live in."
+
+They sat out four dances, or was it more? Joan lost count. Out here on
+the balcony, with only the stars as chaperon and a pulse of music
+calling to them from the ballroom, time sped past on silver wings. For
+Joan the evening was a dream; to-morrow morning she would wake, put on
+her old blue coat and skirt, catch her bus at the corner of the square
+and spend the day in sorting and arranging Mr. Strangman's papers.
+To-night she was content to watch the bubble held before her by this
+man's soft words, his strange, intent eyes; she made no attempt to
+investigate it too closely. But for Landon the evening was one step
+along an impulse he intended to follow to the end. He was busy laying
+sure foundations, learning all there was to know of Joan's life and
+surroundings, of the difficulties that might lie in the way of his
+desire, of the barriers he might have to pull down.
+
+"Things are not going to end here," he told Joan, as, the last dance
+finished, they stood among the crowd waiting for a taxi. He had helped
+her on with her cloak and the feel of his strong warm hands on her
+shoulder had sent the blood rushing to Joan's heart.
+
+"I don't see how it is not going to end," she answered; "you must
+remember I am not even a reporter."
+
+"No, and I am," he smiled; "I had forgotten."
+
+He moved to face her, and putting his hands over hers, fastened up her
+cloak for her. It seemed his hands lingered over the task, and finally
+stayed just holding hers lightly.
+
+"I am going to see it does not end, none the less," he said. "I shall
+come and fetch you at your office this day next week and you shall dine
+with me somewhere and go on to a theatre. What time do you get out of
+office?"
+
+"At about six," Joan answered; "but how can you? Why, we do not even
+know each other's names!"
+
+"No more we do, and I don't want to, do you?" He smiled down at her
+undecided eyes. "I would rather think of you as Pierrette than Miss
+anything, and I shall be Pierrot. It is a romance, Pierrette; will you
+play it?"
+
+"Yes," she answered slowly, but her eyes fell away from his.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+    "Aye, thought and brain were there, some kind
+     Of faculty that men mistake
+     For talent, when their wits are blind,--
+     An aptitude to mar and break
+     What others diligently make."
+
+                                             A. L. GORDON.
+
+
+Impulse had always been a guiding factor in Robert Landon's life. If he
+saw a thing and wanted it, impulse would prompt him to reach out his
+hand and snatch it; if the thing were beyond his reach, he would
+climb--if necessary--over the heart of his best friend to obtain it;
+should it prove of very fragile substance and break in his hands, he
+would throw it away, but its loss, or the possible harm he had inflicted
+in his efforts to obtain it, brought no regrets. He made love
+deliriously, on fire himself for the moment, but never once had he so
+far forgot himself as to come from the flame in any way singed. Many
+tragedies lay behind the man, for impulse is hardly a safe guide through
+life; but he himself was essentially too level-headed, too selfish, to
+be the one who suffered.
+
+He had spoken and danced and made love to Joan on an impulse. Beyond
+that, he set himself down seriously and painstakingly to win her. Most
+women, he knew, like to be carried forward on the wings of a
+swift-rushing desire, but there was some strange force of reserve behind
+this girl's constant disregard of his real meaning in the game they
+played. She was willing, almost anxious to be friends; it did not take
+him long to find out how lonely and dreary had been the life she was
+leading. She went out with him daily; it became a recognized thing for
+him to fetch her in his small car every evening at office. Sometimes
+they would dine together at one of the many little French restaurants in
+Soho, and go to a theatre afterwards; sometimes they would just drive
+about the crowded lighted streets, or slip into the Park for a stroll,
+leaving the car in charge of some urchin for a couple of pennies. Since
+he was out on the trail, as his friends would have said, every other
+interest in his life was given up to his impulse to beat down this
+girl's reserve, but all his attempts at passionate love-making left her
+unresponsive. She would draw back, as it were, into her shell, and for
+days she would avoid meeting him. Going out some back way at the office
+and never being at home when he called at Montague Square. Then he would
+write little notes to her and bribe the office-boy to deliver them,
+begging her pardon most humbly--he played his cards, it may be noticed,
+very seriously--imploring her to be friends again. And Joan would
+forgive him and for a little they would be the best of companions.
+
+But through it all, and though she shut her eyes more or less to the
+trend of events, Joan's mind refused to be satisfied. She was restless
+and at times unhappy; she had her hours of wondering where it would all
+end, her spells of imagination when she saw Landon asking her to marry
+him. When she thought about it at all it always ended like that, for she
+could not blind her eyes to the fact of the man's love for her. Then she
+would shun his society, and endeavour to build up a wall of reserve
+between them, for it was her answer to his question that she could not
+bring herself to face.
+
+It was on one of these occasions that she made up her mind definitely to
+break with him altogether. She wrote him a short note, saying that she
+was going to be dreadfully busy at office and that as she had another
+girl coming to stay with her--both statements equally untrue--she was
+afraid it would be no use his calling to fetch her.
+
+Landon accepted this attitude in silence, though one may believe it did
+something to fan the flame of his passion, and for ten whole days he
+left her entirely alone. Then he wrote.
+
+Joan found the letter waiting for her on the hall table when she came
+home one evening after a peculiarly dull and colourless day. It had been
+delivered by hand and was addressed simply to "Pierrette, In the Attic."
+Mrs. Carew must have been a little surprised at such a designation. Joan
+took it upstairs to read, lingering over the opening of it with a
+pleasurable thrill. The days had been very grey lacking his
+companionship.
+
+"Dear Pierrette," Landon had written, "is our romance finished, and why?
+The only thing I have left to comfort me is a crushed red rose. You wore
+it the first evening we ever met. Pierrette, you are forgetting that it
+is summer. How can you wake each morning to blue skies and be
+conventional? Summer is nearly over, and you do not know what you are
+missing. Come out and play with me, Pierrette; I will not kiss even your
+hands if you object. I can take you down next Sunday to a garden that I
+know of on the river, and you shall pick red roses. Will you not come,
+Pierrette?"
+
+Joan sat on in the dark of her little attic (for if the lamp was not
+required before supper Mrs. Carew had a way of not bringing it up until
+it was quite dark) with the letter on her lap. She was making up her
+mind to tell Landon about Gilbert, about her principles which had been
+rather roughly shaken, about her ideas, which still held obstinate root
+in her mind. If he loved her enough not to mind what was past, why
+should she not marry him? She had proved once how bitter it was to stand
+against the convictions of the world alone. His fortnight's absence had
+shown her how unbearable the dullness of her days had become; she could
+not struggle on much longer. Her mind played with the prospect of
+consenting, of how it would open up new worlds to her, of what a change
+it would bring into her life.
+
+It was with a conviction anyway that great things might be in the
+balance that she stepped into Landon's car on Sunday afternoon and
+settled herself back against the cushions. They disregarded the
+fortnight's lapse in their friendship; neither referred to it in any
+way, and Landon was exceptionally cheerful and full of conversation on
+the drive out. Joan was content to sit quiet and listen and to let her
+eyes, tired of dusty files and hours of typewriting, feast on the
+country as they flashed past.
+
+The garden that he had promised her proved all that his descriptions had
+claimed. It lay at the back of an old stone house, off the high road and
+away from the haunts of the ordinary holiday makers. Landon had chanced
+on it once and the place had taken a great hold on his imagination. One
+could be so alone at the foot of the garden, where it sloped down to the
+water's edge, that one could fancy oneself in a world of one's own.
+
+The house itself was a quaint, old-fashioned building with small rooms
+and tiny windows, but the walled-in garden where the roses grew, and the
+river garden, which stretched right down to the brim of the river with
+its fruit trees and tall scented grasses, were both beautiful. They had
+tea out there, and they picnicked on the grass, watching the sun's
+reflections playing hide and seek in the river.
+
+After tea, Landon insisted on strolling round and collecting all the
+roses he could lay his hands on for Joan. He threw them finally, a heavy
+heap of scented blossoms, on to her lap. He said their colour was
+reflected in her cheeks, their beauty in her eyes.
+
+"It is a shame to have picked them so early," Joan remonstrated; "they
+will die now before we get home."
+
+"Let them," he answered, "at least they have had their day and done well
+in it." He threw himself down on the grass beside her. "Aren't they
+glorious, Pierrette?" he said; but his eyes were not on the flowers.
+
+Joan stirred uneasily. The great moment was drawing closer and closer,
+she was growing afraid, as are all women when the sound of Love's wings
+comes too near them.
+
+"I wish you wouldn't call me by that name any more," she said,
+"because----"
+
+"Well, why because?" Landon asked as she hesitated. "One of the things
+that do not seem quite right to you, like kissing, or holding hands?" He
+took up one of the roses from her lap and pulled it to pieces with
+ruthless hands. "What a puritan you are!" he went on abruptly. "Do you
+know we can only love once, isn't your heart hungry for life, Pierrette?
+Sometimes your eyes are."
+
+"Don't!" said Joan quickly, "that is another thing I wish you would not
+do, make personal remarks; it makes me feel uncomfortable."
+
+"Why don't you tell the truth?" he asked fiercely. "Why don't you say
+afraid?"
+
+"Because it does not," she answered; her eyes, however, would not meet
+his. "I think uncomfortable describes it better."
+
+Landon stared at her with sombre eyes. He was beginning to tire of their
+pretty game of make believe; perhaps impulse was waning within him.
+Anyway he felt he had wasted enough time on the chase. But to-day Joan
+seemed very charming, and her fear, for he could see plainly enough that
+she was afraid, was fanning the flame of his desire into a new spurt of
+life.
+
+"I am going to make love to you, Pierrette," he said; "I am going to
+wake up that cold heart of yours. Does the thought frighten you,
+Pierrette? because even that won't prevent me doing it."
+
+He had drawn her close to him, she could feel his arms round her like
+strong bands of iron. Joan lifted a face from which all the colour had
+fled to his.
+
+"Don't, please don't!" Her bewildered mind struggled with all the
+carefully thought-out things she was going to have said to him. But the
+crisis was too overwhelming for her; she could only remember the one
+final thought that had been with her. "You may not want to marry me when
+you know about me," she whispered, and ended her words with a sob.
+
+The man laughed triumphantly. "I don't want to marry you," he answered,
+"I want to love you and make you for a little love me, and this is how I
+begin the lesson." He bent his face to hers quickly, kissing her
+passionately, fiercely, on the lips.
+
+For a second such a tumult of passionate amazement shook Joan that she
+stayed quiet in his arms. Then everything that was strong, all the
+inherited purity in her nature, came to her aid and summoned her
+fighting forces to resist. She struggled in his arms furiously, she had
+not known she held such stores of strength; then she wrenched herself
+free and stood up. Fear, if fear had been the cause of her early
+discomfort, had certainly left her; it was blind, passionate rage that
+held her silent before him.
+
+The man rose to his feet and essayed a laugh, but it was rather a
+strained effort. "That was a most undignified proceeding, Pierrette," he
+said; "what on earth made you do it?"
+
+"How dared you?" flamed Joan. "How dared you speak to me, touch me like
+that?"
+
+"Dared?" the man answered; he was watching her with mocking eyes and
+something evil had come to life on his face. Cold anger that she should
+have made a fool of him and a baulked passion which could very easily
+turn to hate. "This outburst is surely a little ridiculous. What did
+you think I wanted out of the game? Did it really occur to you that I
+was going to ask you to marry me? My dear girl!" He shrugged his
+shoulders, conveying by that movement a vast amount of contempt for her
+dreams. "And as for the rest, I have never yet met a woman who objected
+to being kissed, though some of them may pretend they do."
+
+Joan stared at him; he had stooped and was gathering up the roses that
+lay between them. Rage was creeping away from her and leaving her with a
+dull sense of undignified defeat. Once again she had pitted the ideal of
+a dream against a man's harsh reality, and lost. Love! She had dreamed
+that this man loved her, she had held herself unworthy of the honour he
+paid her. This was what his honour amounted to--"I have never yet met a
+woman who objected to being kissed."
+
+She turned away and walked blindly towards the house.
+
+Landon caught her up before she reached the gate of the garden. His arms
+were full of the roses and apparently he had won back to his usual good
+nature.
+
+"Having made ourselves thoroughly disagreeable to each other," he said,
+"let us make it up again for the time being. It is all rather absurd,
+and you have got to get back to town somehow or other."
+
+He helped her into the car with just his usual solicitude, tucking the
+rug round her and laying the pile of roses on her lap; but on the way
+home he was very silent and from the moment they started till the time
+came for saying good-bye he did not speak a word to her.
+
+As they stood together, while Joan was opening the door with her latch
+key, he put his hand for a moment over hers.
+
+"Good-bye, Pierrette," he said, "I am sorry you won't have anything to
+do with me. I should have made you happy and given you a good time.
+Sometimes it is a pity to aim too high; you are apt to miss things
+altogether."
+
+Fanny was waiting in Joan's room when she got back, tucked up in her
+favourite position in the arm-chair. She had been away for the last ten
+days on one of her periodical trips. "My!" she gasped, disentangling
+herself to greet the other; "what roses, honey! Straight from the
+country, aren't they, and a car--I can hear it buzzing outside. Is it
+your young man?" She paused on the thought tip-toe with excitement, her
+eyes studying Joan across the flowers she had seized. "And is he
+straight? the other sort won't do for you; you would hate yourself in a
+week."
+
+Joan subsided on to the bed, taking off her hat with hands that shook
+over the task.
+
+"No," she answered, "he is not straight, Fanny; but it doesn't matter,
+because I have finished with him. Take away the flowers with you, will
+you? they seem to have given me a headache."
+
+Fanny dropped the roses in a shower and trod them under foot as she ran
+to Joan. "He has hurt you;" she spoke fiercely, flinging her arms round
+the other girl. "God, how I hate men at times! He has hurt you, honey."
+
+"Only my pride," Joan admitted; but the tears so long held back came in
+a flood now; she laid her head down on Fanny's shoulder and sobbed and
+sobbed.
+
+The other girl waited till the storm had passed; then she rose to her
+feet and bundling the roses together with an aggressive movement opened
+the door and flung them out into the passage.
+
+"I have got an idea," she said; "you have been about fed up with office
+for months past. Well, why not chuck it? Come with me. I have got a job
+in a show that is going on tour next week. There is room in the chorus,
+I know; come with me, won't you?"
+
+Her earnestness made Joan laugh. "What shall I come as, Fanny? I cannot
+sing, and I have never acted in my life."
+
+"That is nothing," Fanny went on impatiently. "You are young, you are
+pretty; you can dance, I suppose, and look nice. I can get you taken on
+to-morrow, for old Daddy Brown, that is the manager, is a friend of
+mine, and while he is a friend he will do anything for me. Oh, come, do
+come." She caught hold of Joan's hands. "It will be great, we shall be
+together, and I will show you that there is fun in life; fun, and love,
+and laughter."
+
+She was laughing herself hysterically, her figure seemed poised as if
+for an instant outbreak into the dance she spoke of. Joan watched her
+with envious eyes. Fanny's philosophy in life was so plain to see. She
+took things that came her way with eager hands; she seemed to pass
+unscathed, unsullied, through the dregs of life and find mirth in the
+dreariest surroundings. And to-day Landon had broken down one more
+barrier of the pride which kept Joan's feet upon the pathway of
+self-respect. Of what use were her ideals since they could not bring her
+even one half hour's happiness? The road stretched out in front of her
+empty and sunless.
+
+These thoughts swept through her mind almost in the space of a second.
+Then she rose quickly to her feet.
+
+"I'll come, Fanny," she said; "it really amounts to turning my back on a
+battle; still I will come."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+    "To fill the hour--that is happiness: to fill
+     The hour and leave no crevice for repentance."
+
+                                             ANON.
+
+
+"Daddy Brown, this is the girl I spoke to you about; will she do?"
+
+That had been Joan's introduction to the manager of the Brown travelling
+company. He was a large man, with his neck set in such rolls of fat that
+quick movement was an impossibility. His eyes, small and surrounded by
+a multitude of wrinkles, were bloodshot, but for all that excessively
+keen. Joan felt as they swept over her that she was being appraised,
+classed, and put aside under her correct value in the man's brain. His
+hair, which in youth must have grown thick and curly, had fallen off
+almost entirely from the top of his head, leaving a small island
+sprouting alone in the midst of the baldness. This was known among the
+company as "The Danger Mark," for when the skin round it flushed red a
+fearful storm was brewing for somebody.
+
+He sat in front of a table littered with papers, in a small, rather
+dirty office, the windows of which opened on to Bedford Street. With the
+window open, as he kept it, the noise of the Strand traffic was plainly
+audible.
+
+He eyed Joan slowly and methodically; then his glance turned back to
+Fanny. "What can she do?" he asked heavily.
+
+"Oh, everything," Fanny answered with a little gasp; "and she can share
+my dressing-room and all that."
+
+"Humph!" grunted the man; once more his small, shrewd eyes travelled all
+over Joan.
+
+"Well, perhaps, she will do." He agreed finally, "Mind you are in time
+at the station to-morrow. Cut along now, girls, I am busy."
+
+Fanny was jubilant all the way home. "I thought I should be able to work
+it," she bubbled; "it will be fun, honey, to-morrow we are due at
+Tonbridge and the tour ends at Sevenoaks. All little places this time.
+But mind you, it is the first rung of the ladder for you. Brown's is a
+good company to start with. _Country Girl_, _Merry Widow_, _Waltz
+Dream_." She ticked them all off on her fingers one by one. "You are
+glad about it, aren't you?" she broke off suddenly to ask.
+
+"Of course I am glad," Joan answered quickly, "and it is sweet of you to
+have got it for me. Perhaps I am a little nervous; it strikes me one
+might get very frightened of Mr. Brown."
+
+"What, Daddy? He is all right if you know how to manage him, and he
+won't bother you." Fanny took a quick look at her. "You aren't his
+sort."
+
+Was she really glad? Joan pondered the matter over when Fanny had at
+last betaken herself to her own room. At any rate she had, as it were,
+burnt her boats. She had left the _Evening Herald_, she had told Mrs.
+Carew to sublet her rooms. At least it would be good to get away from
+London for a bit.
+
+Mrs. Carew had been quite frank and decided in her views on the subject.
+
+"For a young lady like you to go off with the likes of 'er," this
+referred to Fanny, "it hardly seems seemly to me, Miss. Not that Miss
+Bellairs ain't all right in her own way, but it is not your way. Mark my
+words, Miss, you will regret it."
+
+"And if I do," Joan had answered, "I can always leave and come back
+here, can't I, Mrs. Carew? I am sure you will always do your best to put
+me up even if this room is let."
+
+"If I have a corner; Miss, you shall 'ave it and welcome. Nice and quiet
+young lady you have always been, and I know something of young ladies, I
+do."
+
+It was evident, even in her efforts to be polite, that she considered
+Joan's present line of action to be one of deterioration. Was it, after
+all, a wise move, Joan wondered rather vaguely, as she packed away her
+few possessions. There was a great deal in Fanny's nature that she
+disapproved of, that could at times even fill her with disgust. In
+itself, that would merely hold her from ever coming to look at life from
+Fanny's standpoint. And perhaps she would find in the existence, which
+Fanny claimed to be full of love and laughter, something to satisfy the
+dull aching discontent which had wrenched at her heart all this last
+summer. Aunt Janet, Uncle John, the old home-life, the atmosphere of
+love and admiration, these had been torn from her, she needed something
+to take their place.
+
+They met the rest of the company next day at the station. Fanny
+introduced them all to Joan, rather breathlessly.
+
+"Mr. Strachan, who plays our hero, and who is the idol of the stalls.
+Mr. O'Malley, our comic man. Mr. Whistler, who does heavy father parts,
+wig and all. Mr. Jimmy Rolls, who dances on light toes and who prompts
+when nothing else is doing. The ladies, honey, take their names on
+trust, you will find them out sooner or later."
+
+There were, Joan discovered, eight other ladies in the company. She
+never knew more than four of them. Mrs. O'Malley, Grace Binning, a small
+soft-voiced girl, Rhoda Tompkins, and Rose Weyland--a very
+golden-haired, dark-eyebrowed lady, who had been in some far back
+period, so Fanny contrived to whisper, a flame of Brown's.
+
+Of the men, Joan liked Mr. Strachan best; he was an ugly man with very
+pleasant eyes and a rare smile that lit up the whole of his face. He
+seemed quiet, she thought, and rather apart from the others.
+
+The journey down to Tonbridge proved slightly disastrous. To begin with,
+thanks to Daddy Brown himself, the company missed the best train of the
+day and had to travel by one that meant two changes. On arrival at
+Tonbridge at four o'clock in the afternoon they found that one of the
+stage property boxes had gone astray. Considering that they were billed
+to appear that evening at eight and the next train did not arrive till
+ten-thirty, the prospect was not a promising one.
+
+"Always merry and bright," as Jimmie, the stage prompter, remarked in an
+aside to Strachan. "By the way, is it the _Arcadians_ that we are doing
+to-night?"
+
+"How the hell can we do anything," growled Daddy Brown, the patch of
+skin round his danger-mark showed alarmingly red, "if that box does not
+appear. Who was the blasted idiot who was supposed to be looking after
+it?"
+
+"Well, it was and it was not me, Sir," Jimmie acknowledged; "the truth
+is that I saw it labelled all right and left it with the rest of the
+luggage to look after itself. I suppose----"
+
+"Oh, what is the use of talking," Brown broke in impatiently; he had
+thrust his hat back on his fiery head, the lines of fat above his collar
+shone with perspiration. "You had better go on, all of you, and see
+about getting rooms; the first rehearsal is in an hour, box or no box,
+and don't you forget it."
+
+"I don't see," wailed Mrs. O'Malley, almost as soon as his back was
+turned, "how we are to live through this sort of thing. What is the use
+of a rehearsal if none of our things are going to turn up?"
+
+"I guess there will be a performance whether or no," Fanny told her.
+"Come along, honey," this to Joan, "seize up your bag and follow me; we
+have got to find diggings of sorts before the hour is up."
+
+Joan found, as they trudged from lodging-house to lodging-house, that
+the theatrical profession was apparently very unpopular in Tonbridge. As
+Fanny remarked, it was always as well to tell the old ladies what to
+expect, but the very mention of the word theatre caused a chill to
+descend on the prospective landladies' faces. They found rooms finally
+in one of the smaller side streets; a fair-sized double bedroom, and a
+tiny little sitting-room. The house had the added advantage of being
+very near the theatre, which was just as well, for they had barely time
+to settle with the woman before they had to hurry off for the rehearsal.
+
+"It won't do to be late," Fanny confided to Joan. "Daddy is in an awful
+temper; we shan't get any champagne to-night unless some of us soothe
+him down."
+
+At the small tin-roofed theatre supreme chaos reigned upon the stage and
+behind it. Daddy Brown, his hat thrown off, his coat discarded, stormed
+and raged at everyone within hearing. _The Country Girl_ had replaced
+_The Arcadians_ on the bill; it was an old favourite and less
+troublesome to stage. Fanny was to play _Molly_; it was a part that she
+might have been born for. Daddy Brown won back to his good humour as he
+watched her; her voice, clear and sweet, carried with it a certain
+untouched charm of youth, for Fanny put her whole heart into her work.
+
+Joan felt herself infected by the other's spirit, she joined in the
+singing, laughing with real merriment at her chorus partner. The stage
+boards cracked and creaked, the man at the piano watched the performers
+with admiring eyes--the music was so familiar that it was quite
+unnecessary for him to follow the notes. Daddy Brown and the box office
+man, sole occupants of the stalls, saw fit to applaud as the chorus
+swung to a breathless pause.
+
+"That's good, that's good," Brown shouted. "Just once more again please,
+ladies, then we'll call a rest. Don't want to tire you out before
+to-night."
+
+The dance flourished to its second end and Fanny flung herself exhausted
+against the wings. Her cough was troubling her again, shaking her thin
+body, fighting its way through her tightened throat.
+
+"It's worth it though," she laughed in answer to Joan's remonstrance;
+"it is the only time I really live when I am dancing, you see."
+
+The rehearsal dragged out its weary length, but not until Brown had
+reduced all the company to such a state of exhaustion that they could
+raise no quiver of protest to any of his orders. A man of iron himself,
+he extracted and expected from the people under him the same powers of
+endurance which he himself possessed. Since Fanny and Joan could not go
+home to their lodgings, the time being too short, Strachan escorted them
+out to obtain a meal of sorts before the evening's performance. Short of
+Daddy Brown's hotel, which stood close to the theatre and which they
+were all reluctant to try, there did not appear to be any restaurants in
+the neighbourhood and they ended up by having a kind of high tea at a
+little baker's. "Eggs are splendid things to act on," Strachan told
+Joan.
+
+The girls, however, on their return found a bottle of champagne and two
+glasses waiting for them in Fanny's dressing-room. It had been sent with
+Mr. Brown's compliments to Miss Bellairs. The sight of it sent up
+Fanny's spirits with a bound.
+
+"I did not know how I was going to get through the evening," she
+confessed, "but this will put new life into us."
+
+She insisted upon Joan having a glass, and the latter, conscious that in
+her present state of tiredness she could hardly stand, far less dance,
+sipped a little of the clear, bubbling liquid--sipped till the small
+room grew large, till her feet seemed to tread on air, and her eyes
+shone and sparkled like the brightest of stars on a dark night.
+
+The theatre after that, the crowded rows of faces, the music and the
+thunder of applause--the audience were good-tempered and inclined to be
+amused at anything--passed before her like some gorgeous light-flecked
+dream. When the soldiers in the back row took up the words of Fanny's
+song and shouted the refrain she felt swept along on the wings of
+success.
+
+At the fall of the curtain Daddy Brown patted her on the back. He was by
+this time radiant with cheerfulness once more.
+
+"You will do, young lady," he said. "We'll have to see if we can't work
+in a special dance for you;" and Fanny flung her arms round Joan in wild
+joy. "You're made, honey," she whispered, "if Brown has noticed you,
+you're made. I always said you could dance."
+
+It was very thrilling and exciting, but the champagne was beginning to
+lose its effect. The world was growing grey again. Joan's head throbbed,
+and she felt self-consciously inclined to make a fool of herself. She
+sat very silent through the supper to which Brown treated the company at
+his hotel. There were about twenty people present, nearly all men; Joan
+wondered where they had been collected from, and she did not quite like
+the look of any of them. Fanny was making a great deal of noise, and
+how funny and tawdry their faces looked under the bright light. After
+supper there was a dance, the table was pushed aside, and someone--Joan
+saw with surprise that it was Daddy Brown--pounded away at a one-step on
+the piano. Everyone danced, the men, since there were not enough ladies
+to go around, with each other.
+
+Fanny, wilder, gayer than ever, skirts held very high, showed off a new
+cake-walk in the centre of the room. Her companion, a young,
+weak-looking youth, was evidently far from sober, and the more intricate
+the step, the more hopelessly did he become entangled with his own feet,
+amidst shouts of amusement from the onlookers.
+
+Joan turned presently--she had narrowly escaped being dragged into the
+dance by a noisily cheerful gentleman--to find Strachan standing beside
+her. He was watching her with some shade of curiosity.
+
+"Why don't you go home?" he suggested; "it isn't amusing you and I can
+see you are tired. We get used to these kind of shows after a time."
+
+"I think I will," Joan agreed; "no one will mind if I do, will they?"
+
+"Not they, most of them are incapable of noticing anything." A cynical
+smile stirred on his face. "It is no wonder," he commented, "that we are
+known as a danger to provincial towns. You see the state of confusion we
+reduce the young bloods to." His eyes passed round the room and came
+back to Joan with a shade of apology in them. "A bad night, for your
+first experience," he said; "we are not always as noisy as this. Come
+along though, I'll see you home, if I may, my rooms are somewhere down
+your street."
+
+Joan lay awake long after she had got into bed, and when she did at last
+drop off to sleep it was to dream strange, noise-haunted dreams, that
+brought her little rest. It was morning, for a faint golden light was
+invading the room, when she woke to find Fanny standing at the foot of
+the bed. A different Fanny to any Joan had ever seen before, tired and
+blowsy-looking, her hair pulled about her face, the colour rubbed in
+patches from her cheeks and lips.
+
+"My word, it has been a night;" she stood swaying and peering at Joan.
+"It's life though, isn't it, honey?"
+
+Then a wild fit of coughing seized her and Joan had to scramble out of
+bed and give what help she could. There was no hope of sleep after that,
+and when Fanny had been helped to bed Joan took up a chair to the window
+and drew aside the curtain.
+
+Her mind was a tumult of angry thoughts, but her heart ached miserably.
+If this was what Fanny called life and laughter, she had no wish to live
+it.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+    "I did not choose thee, dearest. It was Love
+     That made the choice, not I."
+
+                                             W. S. BLUNT.
+
+
+All the way up the river from the Nore after they had picked up the
+pilot the ship moved through a dense fog. A huge P. & O. liner, heavily
+laden with passengers and mails, she had to proceed cautiously, like
+some blind giant, emitting every two minutes a dolorous wail from her
+foghorns.
+
+"Clear the way, I am coming," was the substance of the weird sound, and
+in answer to it shrill whistles sounded on all sides, from small fleets
+of fishing-boats, coal hulks, and cargo boats bound from far-off lands.
+
+"We are here too," they panted in answer; "don't run us down, please."
+
+It was eerie work, even for the passengers, who remained in blissful
+ignorance of the danger of their situation. By rights the ship should
+have been in dock before breakfast; they had planned the night before
+that an early dawn should see them awake and preparing to land; yet here
+was eleven o'clock, and from what the more hardy of them could learn by
+direct questioning of those in authority, they had not as yet passed
+Canvey Island. Dick Grant, ship's doctor and therefore free of access to
+inquirers, underwent a searching examination from all and sundry. The P.
+& O. regulations are, that the officers shall not talk or in any way
+become friendly with any of the passengers; the ship's doctor and the
+purser share the responsibility of looking after their clients' comfort,
+well-being, and amusement. On occasions such as a fog, when the hearts
+of passengers are naturally full of questions as to where they are, how
+long will the fog last, is there any danger, and ought we to have on our
+life-belts, these two afore-mentioned officials have a busy time. Dick
+felt that Barton, the purser in question, had played him rather a shabby
+trick, for Barton had asserted that the work of sorting out passengers'
+luggage and seeing to their valuables would confine him to his office
+till the ship docked, which excuse left Dick alone to cope with the
+fog-produced situation.
+
+Dick had been at sea now for close on two years. He had shifted from
+ship to ship, had visited most of the ports in the near and far East.
+This was his last voyage; he was going to go back and take up life in
+London. From Marseilles he had written to Mabel telling her to expect
+him the week-end after they got in.
+
+His journeyings had given him many and varied experiences. The blue eyes
+had taken unto themselves some of that unwavering facing of life which
+seems to come almost always into the eyes of people who spend their
+lives upon the sea. He had learned to be patient and long-suffering with
+the oddities of his patients, passengers who passed through his hands on
+their brief journeyings; he had seen the pathos of the sick who were
+shipped with the full knowledge that they would die ere the first port
+was reached, simply because the wistful ache of home-sickness would not
+allow them to rest. Home-sickness! Dick had known it keep a man alive
+till the grey cliffs of Dover grew out of the sea and he could fall back
+dead and satisfied.
+
+Board ship throws people together into appalling intimacy; Love springs
+full-winged into being in the course of an afternoon; passion burns at
+red-heat through drowsy, moon-filled nights. Almost wilfully, to begin
+with, Dick had flung himself into romance after romance; perhaps unknown
+to himself, he sought to satisfy the hunger of heart which could throb
+in answer to a dream, but which all reality left untouched. He played at
+love lightly; he had an ingrained reverence for women that even
+intercourse with Anglo-Indian grass-widows and the girl who revels in a
+board-ship flirtation was unable altogether to eradicate. He made love,
+that is to say, only to those women who first and openly made love to
+him; but it is to be doubted whether even the most ardent of them could
+boast that Dicky Grant had ever been in love with them. They slipped out
+of his ken when they disembarked at their various ports, and the
+photographs with which they dowered him hardly served to keep him in
+mind of their names. And a certain weariness had grown up in his heart;
+he felt glad that this was to be his last voyage. He had put in two good
+crowded years, but he was no nearer realizing his dream than he had been
+on the day when Mabel had said to him: "Did you think I should not know
+when you fell in love?"
+
+Dick was thinking of this remark of Mabel's as he stood by himself for
+the time being, right up by the front of the ship peering into the fog,
+and with the thought came a memory of the girl with the brown eyes who
+had stood to face him, her hands clenched at her sides, as she told her
+piteous tale. Piteous, because of its very bravado. "I am not afraid or
+ashamed," she had claimed, while fear stared out of her eyes and shame
+flung the colour to her face. What had the past two years brought her?
+Had she stood with her back to the wall of public opinion and fought her
+fight, or had the forces of contempt and blame been too strong for her?
+
+A very light hand on his arm brought him out of his thoughts with a
+start, and he turned to find a small, daintily-clad lady standing beside
+him.
+
+"How much longer shall we be?" she asked; "and when am I going to see
+you again, Dicky, once we land?"
+
+She had called him Dicky from the second day of their acquaintance. Mrs.
+Hayter always called men by their Christian names, or by nicknames
+invented by herself.
+
+Dick let his eyes linger over her before he answered--immaculately
+dressed as ever--the wildest storm saw Mrs. Hayter with her hair waved,
+the other ladies claimed--small, piquante face, blue eyes and a
+marvellous complexion despite her many seasons spent in the East. She
+was the wife of an Indian Civilian, a tall, grey-headed man, who had
+come on board to see her off at Bombay. Dick had been rather struck with
+the tragedy of the man's face, that once he had seen it; he connected it
+always for some unexplainable reason with Mrs. Hayter's small, soft
+hands and the slumberous fire in her blue eyes. Not that Dick was not
+friendly with Mrs. Hayter; he had had on the contrary rather a
+fierce-tempered flirtation with her. Once, under the spell of a night
+all purple sea and sky and dim set stars, he had caught her to him and
+kissed her. Kissed the eager, laughing mouth, the warm, soft neck, just
+where the little pulse beat in the hollow of her throat. She had
+practically asked him to kiss her, yet that, he reflected in his cooler
+mood the next morning, was no excuse for his conduct, and, rather
+ashamed of himself, he had succeeded in avoiding her fairly well until
+this moment. He had not the slightest desire to kiss her again; that was
+always the sad end to all his venturings into the kingdom of romance.
+
+"Where are you going to?" he answered her last question first; "if it is
+anywhere near London, I shall hope to look you up."
+
+Mrs. Hayter laughed, a little caught-in laugh. "Look me up, Dicky,
+between you and me! Never mind, you funny, shy, big boy, you shall put
+it that way if you like. As a matter of fact, I am going to stay at the
+Knightsbridge Hotel for a week or so on my way through to my husband's
+people. Why don't you come there too?"
+
+The invitation in her voice was unmistakable and set his teeth on edge.
+"It's too expensive for me," he answered shortly; "but I will come and
+call one day if I may."
+
+"Of course," she agreed, "let's make it dinner the day after to-morrow.
+Dicky," she moved a little closer to him, "is it me or yourself you are
+angry with about the other night?"
+
+"Myself," Dick said dryly, and had no time for more, for on the second a
+shiver shook the ship, throwing Mrs. Hayter forcibly against him, and
+the air was suddenly clamorous with shrill whistles, cries, and the
+quick throb of engines reversed.
+
+Through the fog, which with a seeming malignity was lifting, veil upon
+thick veil, now that the mischief was accomplished, Dick could see the
+faint outlines of land; gaunt trees and a house, quite near at hand,
+certainly within call. Mrs. Hayter was in a paroxysm of terror,
+murmuring her fright and strange endearing terms all jumbled together,
+and the deck had waked to life; they seemed in the centre of a curious,
+nerve-ridden crowd. It was all very embarrassing; Dick had to hold on to
+Mrs. Hayter because he knew she would fall if he let her go, and she
+clung to him, arms thrown round his neck, golden hair brushing against
+his chin.
+
+"There's not a particle of danger," a strong voice shouted from
+somewhere in the crowd. Dick could recognize it as the captain's.
+"Please don't get alarmed, ladies, it is quite unnecessary, with any
+luck we will be off almost immediately."
+
+In that he proved incorrect, for, heavily weighted as the _India_ was,
+she stayed firmly fixed in Thames mud. By slow degrees the fog lifted
+and showed the long lines of the shore, and the solitary house standing
+out like a sentinel in the surrounding flatness.
+
+Dick had succeeded in disentangling Mrs. Hayter's arms and had escorted
+her to a seat.
+
+"I am afraid I have given myself away hopelessly," she whispered,
+clutching him with rather a shaky hand. "Did anybody see us?"
+
+"Everybody, I should think," he told her gravely, "But, after all, most
+things are excusable in a possible wreck."
+
+"Yes," she agreed, "only Mrs. Sandeman is all eyes to my doings, and on
+one occasion she even wrote Robert. Cat!"
+
+The last expression was full of vindictiveness. Dick was seized with a
+disgust for his own share in the proceedings; he hoped devoutly that
+Mrs. Sandeman, a rather austere-faced, tight-lipped woman, would not
+write and disturb Robert's peace of mind for any doings of his. Also he
+took a mental resolve to see no more of Mrs. Hayter.
+
+By four o'clock all the passengers, with a mild proportion of their
+luggage, had been transferred to small tugs for transport to Tilbury;
+for on a further examination into the state of affairs it had been found
+that the _India_ would probably remain where she was until a certain
+lightening of her freight should make it easier for her to refloat.
+
+It was three days later, in fact, before Dick reached London. He found
+two letters waiting for him at his club; one from Mabel, telling him how
+glad they would be to see him, could he not make it earlier than the
+week-end; and one from Mrs. Hayter. Would he come and dine with her that
+evening? He need not trouble to answer, she was dining all alone and
+would not wait for him after half-past seven.
+
+"If you can't come to dinner," she had added, "look in afterwards; there
+is something I rather particularly want to say to you."
+
+He dressed for the evening meal in a vague state of discontent. He had
+not the slightest intention of going to Mrs. Hayter's, still the thought
+of her, waiting for him and expecting him, made him uneasy. At one
+moment he meditated telephoning to her to tell her he was unavoidably
+prevented from coming, but dismissed the excuse as being too palpably a
+lie. He was restless, too, and at a loss as to how to spend his evening,
+the loneliness of being by himself in London after a two years' absence
+was beginning to oppress him. None of his old pals seemed to be in
+town--anyway they did not turn up at the club. Finally he decided to
+look in at the Empire, or one of the neighbouring music-halls, and
+strolled forth in that direction.
+
+London certainly seemed no emptier than usual. Streams of motor-cars,
+taxis, and buses hurried along Piccadilly, the streets were busy with
+people coming and going. Out of the shadows just by the Burlington
+Arcade a woman spoke to him--little whispered words that he could pass
+on without noticing; but she had brushed against him as she spoke, the
+heavy scent she used seemed to cling to him, and he had been conscious
+in the one brief glance he had given her, that she was young, pretty,
+brown-eyed. The incident touched on his mind like the flick of a whip.
+He stared at the other women as they passed him, meeting always the same
+bold yet weary invitation of their eyes, the smile which betokened
+nothing of mirth. And as he stared and passed and stared again it grew
+on him that he was in reality searching for someone, searching those
+street faces in the same way as once before he had sought among the
+passers-by for one girl's face. The thought was no sooner matured than
+he hated it--and now he tried to keep his eyes off these women passing
+by, loathing the thought of their nightly pilgrimage, of their
+shame-haunted trade.
+
+The Empire performance hardly served to distract his thoughts. He was
+out in the streets again before the ballet turn came on even. It had
+started to rain, a slight, indefinite drizzle; Leicester Square
+presented a drab and dingy appearance. The blaze of lights from the
+surrounding theatres shone on wet streets and slippery pavements. A
+drunken woman who had been ejected from the public-house at the corner
+stood leaning against a neighbouring lamp-post; her hat had fallen
+askew, stray, ragged wisps of hair hung about her face, from time to
+time she lifted up her voice and shouted at the children who had
+gathered in a ring to watch her antics. Life was horribly, hurtfully
+ugly at times. Dick would have liked to have shaken his shoulders free
+of it all and known himself back once more on the wind-swept deck of an
+outgoing steamer.
+
+He strode off in the direction of Trafalgar Square, and still dim,
+draggled shapes haunted his footsteps, leered at him from the shadows,
+brushed against him as he passed. As he turned into the lighted purlieus
+of the Strand he paused for a moment, undecided which course to take
+next, and it was then that he saw Joan again.
+
+She was standing a little in front of him on the edge of the pavement,
+evidently waiting for a bus. Another girl stood near her, talking in
+quick, childish excitement, recounting some conversation, for she acted
+the parts as she spoke. Joan seemed to pay very little attention to her
+companion, though occasionally she smiled in answer to the other's
+laughter.
+
+He had recognized her at once! Now he stood with his eyes glued on her,
+taking in every detail of her appearance--the wide-brimmed hat, the
+little lace collar showing outside her jacket, the neat shoes.
+
+Even as she talked Fanny's bird-like eyes darted here and there among
+the crowd and lit presently on the young man, so palpably staring at her
+companion. She edged nearer to Joan and nudged her.
+
+"You have got off, honey," she whispered. "Turn your eyes slowly and you
+will catch such a look of devotion as will keep you in comfort for the
+rest of your life."
+
+Joan flushed: Fanny could always succeed in bringing the hot blush to
+her face, even though she had been on tour with the company now for two
+months. Also she still resented being stared at, though Fanny was doing
+her best to break her in to that most necessary adjunct of their
+profession. Rather haughtily, therefore, she turned, and for a second
+his eyes met hers, bringing a quick, disturbing memory which she could
+in no way place.
+
+At any other time Dick would have taken off his hat and claimed
+acquaintance; just for the present moment, though, something held him
+spellbound, staring. Fanny giggled, and Joan, having had time to raise
+her feelings to a proper pitch of anger, let her eyes pass very coldly
+and calmly from the top of the young man's hat to the tip of his boots
+and back again. Contempt and dislike were in the glance, what Fanny
+called her "Kill the worm" expression. Then No. 11 motor-bus plunged
+alongside, and "Here we are at last!" called Fanny, dragging at Joan's
+arm.
+
+With a sense of victory in her heart, since the young man had obviously
+been quelled by her anger, Joan climbed up to the top of the bus and sat
+down in a seat out of sight. Fanny, however, turned to have a final look
+at the enemy from the top step. As the bus moved, she saw him shake
+himself out of his trance and start forward.
+
+"Good-night," she called in cheerfully affectionate tones; the conductor
+turned to stare up at her. "Some other day; can't be done to-night,
+sonny."
+
+Then she subsided, almost weak with laughter at her own joke, beside a
+righteously irritated Joan.
+
+"Nearly had the cheek to follow us, mind you," she told her, amid gasps;
+"properly smitten, he was."
+
+"I wish you had not called out to him," said Joan stiffly. "It is so--so
+undignified."
+
+Fanny quelled her laughter and looked up at Joan. "Undignified," she
+repeated; "it stopped him from coming, anyway. You don't look at things
+the right way, honey. One must not be disagreeable or rude to men in our
+trade, but one can often choke them off by laughing at them."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+    "Love lent is mortal, lavished, is divine.
+     Not by its intake is love's fount supplied,
+     But by the ceaseless outrush of its tide."
+
+
+"And there is little Dickie," Mabel said; she stood, one hand on the
+cot, her grey eyes lowered--"he has brought such happiness into my life
+that sometimes I am afraid."
+
+The baby. Some women were like that, Dick knew. A child could build anew
+their world for them and make it radiant with a heaven-sent wonder. He
+had never thought of Mabel as a mother. He had been almost afraid to
+meet her after two years away--her letters had given him no clue to her
+feelings; but then she rarely wrote of herself and she had never been
+the sort of person to complain. So he had come down to Sevenoaks rather
+wondering what he would find, remembering their last talk together the
+day before her wedding. Mabel had met him at the station and driven him
+back to the house in their car. She had talked chiefly about himself;
+was he glad to be back?--had he enjoyed the years away?--what plans had
+he made for the future? But her face, her quiet grey eyes had spoken for
+her. He knew she was happy, only the reason, the foundation of this
+happiness, had been a mystery to him until this moment.
+
+"Little Dickie," he repeated, leaning forward to peer at the small atom
+of humanity who lay fast asleep. "You have called it after me, then?"
+
+Mabel nodded. "Of course; and don't call him 'it,' Dick; he is a boy."
+
+A sudden intuition came to her, she lifted her eyes to Dick's. "Tom
+wanted him called that, too," she said, speaking a little quickly; "but
+that is not wonderful, because Tom always wants just exactly what he
+thinks I do. We will go downstairs now, shall we, Dick? You know Mother
+insisted upon a dinner-party in your honour this evening, and we are
+going on to some awful theatre in Sevenoaks afterwards."
+
+"Good Lord!" groaned Dick; "why did you let her?"
+
+"I thought you wouldn't be too pleased," Mabel admitted; "but surely you
+must remember that it is no use arguing with mother about what she
+calls--amusing us. She took the tickets as a pleasant surprise yesterday
+when she was in Sevenoaks. As Tom says, 'Let's be amused with a good
+grace.' Dick"--she paused on the lowest step to look up at him--"you
+haven't the slightest idea of how good Tom is; he spoils mother almost
+as much as father did, and yet he manages her."
+
+"And you," said Dick, "are absolutely and entirely happy, Mabel?"
+
+"Absolutely and entirely," she answered; he could see the truth of her
+words shining in her eyes.
+
+Mrs. Grant loved dinner-parties and going-on to the theatre. It is to be
+believed that she imagined that the younger people enjoyed them too,
+because, for herself, she invariably went to sleep half-way through the
+most brilliant performance--earlier, were the show not quite so good.
+Dick remembered many unpleasant entertainments in his youth which could
+be traced to this passion of Mrs. Grant's. She would drill them into
+amusement, becoming excessively annoyed with them did they not show
+immediate appreciation, and pleasure is too fragile a dream for such
+treatment; it can be very easily destroyed.
+
+Dick and Mabel found her downstairs, giving the final orders as to the
+setting out of the table to a harassed and sulky-looking maid.
+Everything had always to be done in Mrs. Grant's own particular way,
+even down to the placing of the salt-spoons. She was the bane of the
+servants' lives when they were new-comers; if they lived through the
+persecution they learned how best to avoid her gimlet eyes and could get
+a certain amount of amusement out of hoodwinking her. Dick contrived to
+display the correct amount of pleasure at the festivity in prospect for
+him. He wondered at the back of his mind how glad his mother really was
+to see him, and strolled away upstairs presently to his own room to
+unpack and change.
+
+The first had already been accomplished for him by Tom's valet, and the
+man apparently proposed to stay and help him change, murmuring something
+about a hot bath being ready.
+
+"Thanks," answered Dick, "then I will manage for myself; you need not
+wait."
+
+He stood for some time, the man having slipped discreetly away, staring
+out of the wide-open window. It was still late summer, and the days
+stayed very hot. Beyond the well-kept lawn at the back of the house the
+fields stretched away till they reached the fringe of the forest, and
+above the trees again rose the chalk hills that lay, he knew, just
+behind Wrotham. He was thinking vaguely of many things as he stood
+there; first of Mabel and the new happiness shining in her eyes. Mabel
+and her small son; thank heaven, she had won through to such content,
+for if anyone deserved to be happy it was Mabel. Then little moments
+from the past two years strayed into his mind. Hot, sun-blazing ports,
+with their crowds of noisy, gesticulating natives; the very brazen blue
+of an Indian sky over an Indian sea; the moonlit night that had made him
+kiss Mrs. Hayter; he could almost feel for one second the throb of her
+heart against his. Then, like a flash, as if all his other thoughts had
+been but a shifting background for this, the principal one, Joan's face
+swung up before him. Where had she been going to that night? Who had her
+companion been? Why had not he had the courage to speak to her, to
+follow her at least, and find out where she lived? She was in London,
+anyway; he would have, even at the risk of hurting Mabel's feelings, to
+get back to London as soon as possible. It was a huge place, certainly,
+to look for just one person in, but Fate would bring them together
+again; he had learned to be a believer in Fate. There was truth, then,
+behind all the strange stories one heard about Love. A girl's voice,
+some face in the crowd, and a man's heart was all on flame. The waters
+of common-sense could do nothing to quench that fire. He would search,
+ridiculous and absurd as it seemed, till he found her--and then.... His
+thoughts broke off abruptly; there was a sound from downstairs which
+might be the dinner-bell, and he had not even had his bath yet.
+
+The dinner-party, specially arranged by Mrs. Grant for Dick's benefit,
+consisted of a Mr. and Mrs. Bevis, who lived in a large new house on the
+other side of the park, their two daughters, Dr. English, who had taken
+Dick's place at Wrotham, and a young man from Sevenoaks itself. "Someone
+in a bank," as Mrs. Grant described him.
+
+Dick's health was drunk and his mother insisted on "Just a little
+speech, dear boy," which thoroughly upset his temper for the rest of the
+evening, so that he found it difficult to be even decently polite to the
+eldest Miss Bevis, whom he had taken in to dinner. The talk turned,
+after the speech-making episode, to the theatre they were bound for, Mr.
+Jarvis asking young Swetenham if he knew anything of the company and
+what it was like.
+
+"Rather," the youth answered, "been twice myself this time already. They
+are real good for travellers. Some jolly pretty girls among them."
+
+"Musical comedy, isn't it?" Mrs. Bevis asked. "Dorothy has always so
+wanted to see _The Merry Widow_."
+
+"Well, that is what they are playing to-night," Swetenham assured her,
+"and I hear it is Miss Bellairs' best part. She is good, mind you, in
+most things, and there is a girl who dances top-hole."
+
+"I don't know why we have never heard of it before," Mrs. Bevis
+meandered gently on; "it is so clever of you, Mrs. Grant, to have found
+that there was a theatre in Sevenoaks at all. I am sure we never dreamed
+of there being one."
+
+"They use the town hall," Dr. English put in. "If we can guarantee a
+large enough audience, I expect they will favour us at Wrotham."
+
+"Oh, what a splendid idea," cried the youngest Miss Bevis; "fancy a real
+live theatrical company in Wrotham."
+
+"I hope it will stay at 'fancy,'" grunted Mr. Bevis. "From what I
+remember of travelling companies, Wrotham is better without them."
+
+Despite all Swetenham's praise and the Miss Bevis' enthusiastic
+anticipation Dick settled into his seat in the fourth row of the
+so-called stalls with the firm conviction that he was going to be
+thoroughly bored.
+
+"The one consolation," he whispered to Mabel on their way in, "is that
+mother will not be able to sleep comfortably. I don't want to appear
+vicious, but really that is a consolation."
+
+Mrs. Grant had apparently come to the same conclusion herself, for she
+was expressing great dissatisfaction in a queenly manner to the timid
+programme seller.
+
+"Are these the best seats in the house?" they could hear her say. "It is
+quite absurd to expect anyone to sit in them for a whole evening."
+
+Mabel had to laugh at Dick's remark, then she went forward to soothe her
+troubled parent as much as possible. "It isn't like a London theatre,
+mother, and Tom has ordered one of the cars to stay just outside. The
+minute you get tired he will take you straight home. He says he does not
+mind, as he has so often seen _The Merry Widow_ before."
+
+"Oh, well," Mrs. Grant sighed, and settled her weighty body into one of
+the creaking, straight-backed wooden chairs of which the stalls were
+composed. "So long as you young people enjoy yourselves I do not really
+mind."
+
+Swetenham had purchased a stack of programmes and was pointing out the
+stars on the list to the youngest Miss Bevis. The back of the hall was
+rapidly filling, and one or two other parties strolled into the stalls.
+The orchestra had already commenced to play the overture rather shakily.
+
+"Music, and bad music at that," groaned Dick inwardly. He took a
+despairing glance round him and wondered if it would be possible to go
+and lose himself after the first act. Then the lights went out abruptly
+and the curtain went up.
+
+The beginning chorus dragged distinctly; Dick heard Swetenham whispering
+to his companions that it would be better when the principals came on.
+In this he proved correct, for the _Merry Widow_ girl could sing, and
+she could also act. Fanny's prettiness, her quick, light way of moving,
+shone out in contrast to her surroundings. High and sweet above the
+uncertain accompaniment her voice rose triumphant. The back of the house
+thundered with applause at the end of her song.
+
+"Now wait," announced Swetenham, "the girl who dances comes on here. She
+hasn't any business to, it is not in the play, but old Brown finds it a
+good draw."
+
+Mechanically the stage had been cleared, the characters sitting rather
+stiffly round the ball-room scene while the orchestra was making quite a
+good effort at "The Merry Widow Waltz." There was a second's pause, then
+down from the steps at the back of the stage came a girl; slim,
+straight-held, her eyes looking out over the audience as if they saw
+some vision beyond. It had taken Daddy Brown three very heated lessons
+to teach Joan this exact entrance. She was to move forward to the centre
+of the stage as if in a dream, almost sleep-walking, Fanny had
+suggested, the music was calling her. She was to begin her dance
+languidly, unwillingly, till note by note the melody crept into her
+veins and set all her blood tingling. "Now for abandon," Daddy Brown
+would exclaim, thumping the top of the piano with his baton. "That is
+right, my girl, fling yourself into it." And Joan had learned her
+lesson well, Daddy Brown and Fanny between them had wakened a talent to
+life in her which she had not known she possessed. Dance, yes, she could
+dance. The music seemed to give her wings. If she had seen her own
+performance she would probably have been a little shocked; she did not
+in the least realize how vividly she answered the call.
+
+When she had finished she stood, flushed and breathless, listening to
+the shouted and clapped applause.
+
+"Do it again, miss," a man's voice sounded from back in the hall. She
+tried to find him, to smile at him--that was more of Fanny's teaching.
+But Daddy Brown allowed no encores, it was only for a minute that she
+stood there, bowing and smiling, in her ridiculously short, flounced
+skirt and baby bodice, then the rest of the chorus moved out to take
+their places, and she vanished into the side wings again.
+
+From the moment of her entry till the last flutter of her skirts as she
+ran off, Dick sat as if mesmerized, leaning slightly forward, his hands
+clenched. Every movement of her body had stabbed, as it were, at his
+heart. He had not heard the call of the music, he could not guess at the
+spirit that was awake in her, he only saw the abandon--of which Daddy
+Brown was so proud--the painted face, the smiles which came and went so
+gaily at the shouted applause. Common-sense might not kill love, but
+this! The knowledge that even this could not kill love was what clenched
+his hands.
+
+At the end of the first act Swetenham leant across and asked if he was
+coming out for a drink. It may have been that the younger man had
+noticed Dick's intense interest in the dancer, or perhaps it was merely
+because he wished to air a familiarity which struck him as delightfully
+bold, anyway, as they strolled about outside he put a suggestion to
+Dick.
+
+"If you can arrange to stay on after the show," he said, "and would
+care to, I could take you round and introduce you to those two girls,
+the one who dances and Miss Bellairs."
+
+"Miss Bellairs," Dick repeated stupidly, his mind was grappling with a
+far bigger problem than young Swetenham could guess at.
+
+"Yes," the other answered, "I met her last time she was down here, and
+the other is a great pal of hers."
+
+He looked sideways at his companion as they went in under the lights; it
+occurred to him that Grant was either in a bad temper or had a headache,
+he looked anyway not in the least jovial. Swetenham almost regretted his
+rash invitation.
+
+"Thank you," Dick was saying, speaking almost mechanically, "I should
+like to come very much. It doesn't in the least matter about getting
+home."
+
+Swetenham glanced at him again. "If it comes to that," he said, "I have
+a motor-bike I could run you in on."
+
+The fellow, it suddenly dawned on him, had gone clean off his head about
+one of the girls. Swetenham could understand and sympathize with him in
+that.
+
+Dick managed to convey the information that he was staying on to Mabel
+during the third act. She looked a little astonished; Dick, in the old
+days, had been so scornful about young men's stage amusements. Anyway,
+it did not affect the party very much, for Mrs. Grant and Mr. Jarvis had
+already gone home, and Mabel was giving Dr. English a lift.
+
+"Shall I send the motor back for you?" she asked, just as they moved
+away.
+
+Dick shook his head. "Swetenham is going to give me a lift out," he
+answered her, and Dr. English chuckled an explanation as they rolled
+away.
+
+"What it is to be young, eh, Mrs. Jarvis? One can find beauty even in
+the chorus of a travelling company."
+
+But was that the explanation? Mabel wondered. Dick's face had not
+looked as if he had found anything beautiful in the performance.
+
+Swetenham and Dick made their way round to the side entrance of the town
+hall which acted as stage door on these occasions, after they had seen
+the rest of the party off, and Swetenham found someone to take his card
+up to Miss Bellairs.
+
+"We might take them out to supper at the 'Grand,'" he suggested, as they
+waited about for the answer. "I don't know about the new girl, but Miss
+Bellairs is always good fun."
+
+"Yes," agreed Dick half-heartedly. He was already regretting the impulse
+which had made him come. What should he do, or how feel or act, when he
+really met Joan face to face? His throat seemed ridiculously dry, and he
+was conscious of a hot sense of nervousness all over him which made the
+atmosphere of the night very oppressive. The boy who had run up with
+Swetenham's card came back presently with a message.
+
+"Would the gentlemen come upstairs, Miss Bellairs was just taking off
+her make-up."
+
+"Come on," Swetenham whispered to Dick; "Fanny is a caution, she doesn't
+mind a bit what sort of state you see her in."
+
+The boy led them up the stairs, through a small door and across what was
+evidently the back of the stage. At the foot of some steps on the
+further side he came to pause outside a door on which he knocked
+violently.
+
+"Come in," Fanny's voice shrilled from inside; "don't mind us."
+
+The boy with a grin threw the door open and indicated with his thumb
+that Swetenham and Dick might advance. He winked at them as they passed
+him, a fund of malignant impudence in his eyes. The room inside was
+small and scattered with a profusion of clothes. Fanny, attired in a
+long silk dressing wrap, sat on a low chair by the only table, very busy
+with a grease-pot and a soft rag removing the paint from her face. She
+turned to smile at Swetenham and held out her hand to Dick when he was
+introduced with a disarming air of absolute frankness.
+
+"You catch me not looking my best," she acknowledged; "just take a seat,
+dears; I'll be as beautiful as ever in a jiffy."
+
+Joan--Dick's eyes found her at once--was standing in a corner of the
+room behind the door. She had changed into a blouse and skirt, but the
+change had evidently only just been completed. The fluffy flounces of
+her dancing skirt lay on the ground beside her and the make-up was still
+on her face. At this close range it gave her eyes a curiously beautiful
+appearance--the heavy lashes, the dark-smudged shadows, adding to their
+size and brilliancy. She did not come forward to greet the two men, but
+she lifted those strange eyes and returned Dick's glance with a stare in
+which defiance and a rather hurt self-consciousness were oddly mixed.
+
+The tumult of anger and regret which had surged up in his heart as he
+had watched her dance died away as he looked at her; pity, and an
+intense desire to shield her, took its place. He moved forward
+impulsively, and Fanny, noticing the movement, turned with a little
+laugh.
+
+"I had forgotten," she said; "my manners are perfectly scandalous. Joan,
+come out of your corner and be introduced. Mr. Swetenham is going to
+take us to supper at the 'Grand,' so he has just confided into my
+shell-like ear. I can do with a bit of supper, can't you?"
+
+Joan dragged her eyes away from Dick. The painted lashes lay like stiff
+threads of black against her cheeks. "I don't think I will come," she
+answered. "I am tired to-night, Fanny, and I shan't be amusing."
+
+She turned away and reached up for her hat, which hung on a peg just
+above her head. "I think I would rather go straight home," she added.
+
+Fanny sprang to her feet and caught at her companion with impulsive
+hands, dragging her into the centre of the room.
+
+"Nonsense," she said, "you want cheering up far more than I do. Here,
+gentlemen," she went on, "you perceive a young lady suffering from an
+attack of the blues. If you will wait two minutes I'll make her face
+respectable--doesn't do to shock Sevenoaks--and we will all go to
+supper. Meanwhile let me introduce you--Miss Rutherford, known in the
+company as Sylvia Leicester, the some dancer of the Brown show."
+
+"If Miss Rutherford does not feel up to supper," Dick suggested--he
+wanted, if possible, to help the girl out of her difficulty; he realized
+that she did not want to come--"let us make it another night, or perhaps
+you could all come to lunch with me to-morrow?"
+
+Again Joan had lifted her eyes and was watching him, but now the
+defiance was uppermost in her mind. His face, to begin with, had worried
+her; the faint hint of having seen him somewhere before had been
+perplexing. She always disliked the way Fanny would welcome the most
+promiscuous acquaintances in their joint dressing-room at all times. She
+thought now that it must have been contempt which she had read in this
+man's eyes, and apart from their attraction--for in an indefinite way
+they had attracted her--the idea spurred her to instant rebellion.
+
+"No, let's go to supper," she exclaimed; "Fanny is quite right, I do
+want to be cheered up. Let's eat, drink, and be merry."
+
+She turned rather feverishly and started rubbing the make-up off her
+face with Fanny's rag. The other girl, meanwhile, slipped behind a
+curtain which hung across one side of the room and finished her
+dressing, carrying on an animated conversation with Swetenham all the
+time.
+
+Dick drew a little closer to Joan. "Why do you come?" he asked. "You
+know you hate it and us."
+
+Under the vanishing paint the colour flamed to Joan's face and died
+away-again. "Because I want to," she said; "and as for hating--you are
+wrong there; I don't hate anything or anyone, except, perhaps, myself."
+The last words were so low he hardly heard them.
+
+They strolled across to the Grand Hotel; it was Fanny's suggestion that
+they should not bother with a cab. She walked between the two men, a
+hand on each of them. Joan walked the further side of Swetenham, and
+Dick had no chance of seeing her even, but he knew that she was very
+silent, and, he could gather, depressed. At supper, which they had
+served in a little private room, and over the champagne, she won back to
+a certain hilarity of spirit. Swetenham was entirely immersed in amusing
+and being amused by Fanny, and Joan set herself--Dick fancied it was
+deliberately--to talk and laugh. It was almost as if she were afraid of
+any silence that might fall between them. He did not help her very much;
+he was content to watch her. Absurd as it may seem, he knew himself to
+be almost happy because she was so near him, because the fancied dream
+of the last two years had come to sudden reality. The other feelings,
+the disgust and disappointment which had lain behind their first
+meeting, were for the time being forgotten. Now and again he met her
+eyes and felt, from the odd pulse of happiness that leapt in his heart,
+that his long search was over. So triumphantly does love rise over the
+obstacles of common sense and worldly knowledge--love, which takes no
+count of time, degrees, or place.
+
+He had her to himself on the way home, for Fanny had elected to go for a
+spin in Swetenham's side-car, suggesting that Dick and Joan should go
+home and wait up for them.
+
+"We shan't be long," Swetenham assured Dick, remembering too late his
+promise to take the other man home, "and it is all right waiting there,
+they have got a sitting-room."
+
+So Joan and Dick walked home through the silent streets and all pretence
+of gaiety fell away from Joan. She walked without speaking, head held
+very high, moving beside him, her face scarce discernible under the
+shadow of her hat. It was not to be believed that she was quite
+conscious of all she meant to this man; but she could not fail to know
+that he was attracted to her, she could not help feeling the warmth with
+which his thoughts surrounded her. And how does Love come to a woman?
+Not on the same quick-rushing wings which carry men's desires forward.
+Love creeps in more assiduously to a woman's thoughts. He brings with
+him first a sense of shyness, a rather wistful longing to be more worthy
+of his homage. Unconsciously Joan struggled with this intrusion into her
+life. The man had nice eyes, but she resented the tumult they roused in
+her. Why was he not content to find in her just a momentary amusement,
+why did his eyes wake this vague, uncomfortable feeling of shame in
+her heart; shame against herself and her surroundings?
+
+At the door of the lodgings she turned to him; for the first time he
+could see her face, lit up by a neighbouring lamp.
+
+"Do you want to come in?" she asked, her voice hesitated on the words.
+"I do not want to ask you," her eyes said as plainly as possible.
+
+"No," he answered, "I would much rather you did not ask me to." Then
+suddenly he smiled at her. "We are going to be friends," he said. "I
+have a feeling that I have been looking for you for years; I am not
+going to let you go, once found."
+
+He said the words so very earnestly, there was no hint of mockery in
+them, it could not seem that he was laughing at her. She put her hand
+into the one he held out.
+
+"Well, friends," she said; an odd note of hesitation sounded in her
+voice.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+    "Love can tell, and Love alone,
+     Whence the million stars were strewn;
+     Why each atom knows its own;
+     How, in spite of woe and death,
+     Gay is life, and sweet is breath."
+
+                                             R. BRIDGES.
+
+
+Dick walked home. It was a good long tramp, but he was glad of the
+exercise and the opportunity it gave him to arrange his thoughts into
+some sort of order. He had spoken to Joan, carried away by the moment,
+as they stood to say good-night, impelled to frankness by the appeal of
+her eyes. Now, slowly, reason gathered all its forces together to argue
+against his inclination. It would be wiser to break his half-made
+promise to the girl, and stay out of her life altogether. Immeasurable
+difficulties lay in the way of his marrying her. There was the child,
+her present position, his people's feelings and his own dismay as he had
+watched her dancing on the stage and seen her smiling and radiant from
+the applause it awoke. He had built his dreams on a five minutes' memory
+and for two years the girl's eyes had haunted him, but none the less it
+was surely rather absurd. Even love, strong, mysterious power as it is,
+can be suppressed and killed if a man really puts his mind to it.
+
+At this moment, though of course Dick was not aware of the psychological
+happening, Love raised a defiant head amid the whirl of his thoughts and
+laughed at him--laughed deliberately, the sound echoing with all the old
+joy of the world, and Dick fell to thinking about Joan again. Her eyes,
+the way she walked, the undercurrent of sadness that had lain behind her
+gaiety. How good it would be to take her away from all the drabness of
+her present life and to bring real laughter, real happiness to her lips
+and eyes!
+
+"I will marry her," he decided stormily, as he turned in to the drive of
+the house. "Why have I been arguing about it all this time? It is what I
+had made up my mind to do two years ago. I will marry her."
+
+And again Love laughed, filling his heart with an indefinable glow of
+gladness.
+
+His night mood stayed with him the next morning and started him singing
+most riotously in his bath. Mabel heard him and smiled to herself. It
+was good to listen, to him and know him so cheerful; whatever it was
+that had disturbed him the night before had evidently vanished this
+morning.
+
+After breakfast, as was always her custom in summer, she took little
+Dickie out on to the lawn to sit under the big wide trees that threw so
+grateful a shade across the green. Big Dick joined them there with his
+pipe and he sat beside them in silence. It was very pleasant in the
+garden with the bluest of blue skies overhead and the baby chuckling and
+crowing in the very first rapture of life on the grass at their feet.
+Presently, however, a stern nurse descended on the scene and laughter
+was changed to tears for one short minute before the young gentleman,
+protesting but half-heartedly, was removed. Then Dick turned to Mabel.
+
+"I am going in to Sevenoaks again," he announced, "and shall probably
+spend the day there. Would you like me to explain myself, Mabel?"
+
+"Why, yes, if you care to," she answered, "and if there is anything to
+explain."
+
+Dick nodded in apparent triumph. "Yes," he said, "there is something to
+explain all right, Mabel." He smiled at her with his eyes. "I have got a
+secret, I'll give you three guesses to reach it."
+
+"No," Mabel spoke quickly, "I would rather you told me, Dick. Do you
+remember how once before I tried to dash in on your secret and how you
+shut me out. When it is ready to tell, I thought then, he will tell it
+me."
+
+"Well, it is ready now," Dick said. "In a way it is the same old secret.
+I was shy of it in those days, Mabel, but last night it dawned on me
+that it was the only thing worth having in the world. I am in love,
+insanely and ridiculously. Do you know, if you asked me, I should tell
+you with the most prompt conceit that to-day is a beautiful, gorgeously
+fine day just because I woke up to it knowing that I was in love."
+
+A spasm of half-formed jealousy snatched at Mabel's heart. She had
+always wanted Dick to fall in love and marry some nice girl, yet the
+reality was a little disturbing.
+
+"Dick," she exclaimed, "and you never told me, you never said a word
+about it in your letters."
+
+"I could not," he answered, "because in a way it only happened last
+night. Wait," he put his hand on her knee because she seemed to be going
+to say something. "Let me explain it first and then do your bit of
+arguing, for I know you are going to argue. You spoke just now about
+that other talk we once had before your marriage; do you remember what
+you said to me then? 'Did you think I should not know when you fell in
+love?' You had guessed the secret in my heart, Mabel, almost before I
+knew it myself." He leant forward, she noticed that suddenly his face
+flushed a very warm red. "Last night I saw her again; she was the
+dancer, you may have noticed her yourself. That was why I stayed behind.
+I wanted to put myself to the test, I wanted to meet her again."
+
+He sat up straight and looked at her; she could see that some strong
+emotion was making it very difficult for him to speak.
+
+"It is not any use trying to explain love, is it?" he asked. "I only
+know that I have always loved her, that I shall love her to the end."
+
+Mabel sat stiffly silent. She could not meet his eyes. She was thinking
+of all the scandal which had leapt to life round Joan's name once the
+Rutherfords had left the village. She was remembering how last night Tom
+had said: "That little dancer girl is hot stuff."
+
+"Dick," she forced herself to speak presently, "I have got to tell you,
+though it hurts and you will hate me for doing it, but this girl is not
+the kind of person you can ever marry, Dick. It is a kind of
+infatuation"--she struggled to make her meaning clear without using
+cruel words--"if you knew the truth about her, if----"
+
+He stopped her quickly. "I know," he answered, "I have always known."
+
+She turned to face him. "You knew," she gasped, "about the child?"
+
+"Yes," he nodded, his eyes were very steady as they met hers. "That day
+when I was called in to see her, do you remember, she spoke out before
+her aunt and myself. She told us she was like Bridget Rendle. 'I am
+going to have a baby,' she said, 'but I am not ashamed or afraid. I have
+done nothing to be ashamed of.' Do you know how sometimes," he went on
+slowly, "you can see straight into a person's soul through their eyes.
+Well, I saw into hers that day and, before God, Mabel, it was white and
+innocent as a child's. I did not understand at the time, I have not
+understood since, what brought her to that cross way in her life, but
+nothing will alter my opinion. Some day I hope she will explain things,
+I am content to wait for that."
+
+What could she find to say to him? Her mind groped through a nightmare
+of horror. Dick's happiness meant so much to her, she had planned and
+thought of it ever since she could remember.
+
+"Love is sometimes blind," she whispered at last. "Oh, my dear, don't
+throw away your life on a dream."
+
+"My love has wide-open eyes," he answered, "and nothing weighs in the
+balance against it."
+
+"Don't tell the others, Dick," she pleaded on their way back to the
+house; "leave it a little longer, think it out more carefully."
+
+"Very well," he agreed, "and for that matter, Mabel, there is as yet
+nothing to tell. I only let you into my secret because, well, you are
+you, and I want you to meet her. You will be able to judge then for
+yourself better than you can from all my ravings."
+
+She did not answer his suggestion then, but later on, as he was getting
+into the car to drive to Sevenoaks, she ran down the steps to him.
+
+"Dick," she said quickly, "ask her to come out to tea some day and bring
+one of the other girls if she likes. Tom is never in to tea; there will
+just be mother and me."
+
+"Bless you," he answered; his eyes beamed at her. "What a brick you are,
+Mabel, I knew you would turn up trumps about it."
+
+It took him some time to persuade Joan to accept the proffered
+invitation. It took her, for one thing, too near her old home, and for
+another she was more than a little disturbed by all Fanny's remarks on
+the subject. Fanny had come back from her drive with Swetenham full of
+exciting information to give Joan about "the new victim," as she would
+call Dick.
+
+"Do you know, honey," she confided, waking Joan out of a well simulated
+slumber, "I believe he is the same young man as was so taken with you
+that evening in the Strand. You remember the day we spent in town? It is
+love at first sight, that is what it is. Young Sockie"--that was her
+name for Swetenham, invented because of his gorgeous socks--"tells me he
+has never seen a chap so bowled over as the new victim was by your
+dancing, and he asked to be brought round and introduced. Did you catch
+him staring at you all through the dinner, and, honey, did he try to
+kiss you when he brought you home?"
+
+"Of course not," Joan remonstrated; "I wish you would stop talking
+nonsense and get into bed. It is awfully late and I was asleep."
+
+"That is only another sign then," Fanny went on, quite impervious to the
+other's requests. "You take it from me, honey, if a man falls really in
+love he is shy of kissing you. Thinks it is kind of irreverent to begin
+with. You mark my words, he will be round again to-morrow. Honey," she
+had a final shot at Joan's peace of mind just before she fell asleep,
+"if you play your cards well, that man will marry you, he is just the
+kind that does."
+
+Joan lay thinking of Fanny's remarks long after the other had fallen
+asleep. She was a little annoyed to find how much impression the man had
+made on her; the idea was alarming to one who fancied herself as immune
+as she did from any such attraction. But until Fanny had burst in she
+had been pleased enough with the vague thoughts which his eyes had waked
+to life. If you took the dream down and analysed it as Fanny had rather
+ruthlessly done, it became untenable. Probably this man only thought of
+her as Landon had thought of her; she was not content to burn her
+fingers in the same fire.
+
+Short of being extremely disagreeable, however, she could not avoid
+going out to lunch with him the next day, as Fanny had already accepted
+the invitation, and once with him, it was impossible not to be friends
+with Dick, he set himself so assiduously to please her. He did not make
+love to her; Fanny would have said he just loved her. There is delicate
+distinction between the two, and instinctively Joan grew to feel at her
+ease with him; when they laughed, which they did very often, their
+laughter had won back to the glad mirth of children.
+
+Fanny watched over the romance with motherly eyes. She had, in fact, set
+her heart upon Joan marrying the young man. He came to the theatre every
+evening, but it was not until the sixth day of their acquaintance that
+Fanny was able to arrange for him to spend the afternoon alone with
+Joan. She had tried often enough before, but Joan had been too wary. On
+this particular afternoon, half way through lunch and after the three of
+them had just arranged to go out into the country for tea, Fanny
+suddenly discovered that she had most faithfully promised to go for a
+drive that afternoon in young Swetenham's side-car.
+
+"I am so awfully sorry," she smiled at them sweetly, "but it doesn't
+really matter; you two will be just as happy without me."
+
+"We could put it off and go to-morrow," suggested Joan quickly.
+
+"We can go to-morrow too," Dick argued, and Fanny laughed at him.
+
+"Don't disappoint him, honey, it's a shame," she said with unblushing
+effrontery, "and if it is a chaperon you are wanting, why, Sockie and I
+will meet you out there."
+
+So it was arranged, and Dick and Joan started off alone. They were to
+drive out to a farmhouse that Swetenham knew of, where you got the most
+delicious jam for tea. Joan was a little shy of Dick to begin with,
+sitting beside him tongue-tied, and never letting her eyes meet his.
+From time to time, when he was busy with the steering, she would steal a
+glance at him from under her lashes. His face gave her a great sense of
+security and trust, but at times her memory still struggled with the
+thought that she had met him somewhere before.
+
+Dick, turning suddenly, caught her looking at him, and for a second his
+eyes spoke a message which caused both their hearts to stand still.
+
+"Were you really afraid of coming out with me alone?" he asked abruptly;
+he had perhaps been a little hurt by the suggestion.
+
+"No, of course not," Joan answered; she hoped he did not notice how
+curiously shaken the moment had left her. "Only I thought it would
+probably be more lively if we waited till we could take Fanny with us. I
+am sometimes smitten with such awful blanks in my conversation."
+
+"One does not always need to talk," he said; "it is supposed to be one
+of the tests of friendship when you can stay silent and not be bored.
+Well, we are friends, aren't we?"
+
+"I suppose so," Joan agreed; "at least you have been very kind to us and
+we do all the things you ask us to."
+
+"Doesn't it amount to more than that?" Dick asked; his eyes were busy
+with the road in front of him. "I had hoped you would let me give you
+advice and talk to you like a father and all that sort of thing." His
+face was perfectly serious and she could hear the earnestness behind his
+chaff.
+
+"What were you going to advise me about?" she asked.
+
+"Well, it is this theatre game." Dick plunged in boldly once the subject
+had been started. "You don't like it, you know, and you aren't a bit
+suited to it. Sometimes when I see you dance and hear the people
+clapping you I could go out and say things--really nasty things."
+
+"You don't like it?" she said. "I have tried to do other things too,"
+she went on quickly, "but you know I am not awfully much good at
+anything. When I first started in London, it is two years ago now, I
+used to boast about having put my hand to the plough. I used to say I
+wouldn't turn back from my own particular furrow, however dull and ugly
+it was. But I haven't been very much use at it, I have failed over and
+over again."
+
+"There are failures and failures," he answered. "There was a book I read
+once, I don't remember its name or much about it, but there was a
+sentence in it that stuck in my mind: 'Real courage, means courage to
+stand up against the shocks of life--sorrow and pain and separation, and
+still have the force left to make of the remainder something fine and
+gay and brave.' I think you have still got that sort of courage left."
+
+"No," whispered Joan. She looked away from him, for her eyes were
+miserably full of tears. "I haven't even got that left."
+
+They had tea, the four of them, for strange to tell Fanny did deem it
+expedient to keep her promise, and it was after tea that Dick first
+mooted the idea of their coming out to tea with his people the next day.
+
+Fanny was prompt in her acceptance. "Of course we'll come, won't we,
+honey," she said. "My new muslin will just come in for it."
+
+"It won't be a party," Dick explained, his eyes were on Joan, "just the
+mother and my sister. Not very lively I am afraid, still it is a pretty
+place and I'll drive you both ways."
+
+He came to the theatre again that night. Fanny pointed him out to Joan
+in a little aside as she stood beside her in the wings, but Joan had
+already seen him for herself. She could put no heart into her dancing
+that night, and she ran off the stage quickly when the music ceased, not
+waiting to take her applause.
+
+"Feeling ill to-night?" Daddy Brown asked her. He eyed her at the same
+time somewhat sternly; he disapproved of signs of weakness in any of the
+company.
+
+"I suppose I am tired," Joan answered. Only her own heart knew that it
+was because a certain couple of blue eyes had shown her that they wished
+she would not dance. "I am getting into a ridiculous state," she argued
+to herself; "why should it matter to me what he thinks? It must not, it
+must not."
+
+"You did not dance at all well to-night, honey," Fanny added her meed of
+blame as the two of them were undressing for the night. "But there, I
+know what is wrong with you. You are in love, bless your heart, and so
+is he. Never took his eyes off you while you were dancing, my dear--I
+watched him."
+
+The rather hurt feeling in Joan's heart burst into sudden fire. "I am
+not in love," she said, "and neither is he. Men do not fall in love with
+girls like us, and if you say another word about it, Fanny, I won't go
+out to tea to-morrow; I won't, I won't!"
+
+Fanny could only shrug her shoulders. The words "girls like us" rather
+flicked at her pride. Later on, however, when they were both in bed and
+the room in darkness save for the light thrown across the shadows by the
+street lamp outside, she called softly across to Joan:
+
+"You are wrong, honey," she said, "about men and love. They do fall in
+love with us, sometimes, bless them, even though we aren't worth it. And
+anyway, you are different, why shouldn't he love you?"
+
+Joan made no answer, only when she fell asleep at last it was against a
+little damp patch of pillow and the lashes that lay along her cheeks
+were weighed down by tears.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+    "A man who has faith must be prepared not only to be a martyr, but
+     to be a fool."
+
+                                             C. CHESTERTON.
+
+
+It did not need much intuition on Mrs. Grant's part to know herself
+suspicious of Dick's behaviour. She listened to Mabel's information
+about the two young ladies he was bringing to tea with her eyes lowered.
+Mabel had not volunteered the information till Mrs. Grant had noticed
+that there were two extra cups provided for tea. They always had tea
+out under the trees if it was fine enough, so there had been nothing
+surprising in that, but Mrs. Grant's eyes had spotted the extra cups
+even while they stayed piled up one within the other in the shade of the
+silver tea-pot.
+
+"Two girls to tea," she commented; "who are they, Mabel?"
+
+"Well, I really don't know," Mabel admitted, nobly untruthful, out of a
+desire not to prejudice Mrs. Grant from the beginning. "I fancy Dick met
+them at Sevenoaks, anyway, he was having lunch with them yesterday."
+
+"And dinner every day this week," supplemented Mrs. Grant. "Did he meet
+them on his travels?"
+
+"He did not say so," Mabel answered, "only just that he was seeing a
+good deal of them at Sevenoaks, and I thought it would be nice to ask
+them out here."
+
+"Mabel," said Mrs. Grant, with intense seriousness; she lifted her eyes
+from her work and fixed them on her daughter, "do you not think it is
+very probable that Dick has become entangled? I have even wondered
+lately whether he may not be secretly married to some awful woman."
+
+"Dear mother," laughed Mabel--though the first part of the sentence
+rather hurt her, it was the truth--"why secretly married? What has Dick
+done to deserve such a suspicion?"
+
+"His manner has been peculiar ever since the first night he came home,"
+Mrs. Grant explained, "and he has an uneasy way of trying not to be left
+with me alone. The other day I thought of going to see him very early in
+the morning when I happened to be unable to sleep, and, Mabel, his door
+was locked!"
+
+"If you had knocked he would probably have opened it," Mabel suggested.
+"It is hardly likely that he keeps his wife concealed upstairs, is it?"
+
+"You may laugh," Mrs. Grant spoke with an expression of hurt pride on
+her countenance, "but surely a mother can see things in her son which
+other people miss. Dick is in love, and not nicely in love, or he would
+not be so shy about it."
+
+Further discussion was prevented, for at this point the motor, bringing
+Dick and his guests, came round the sweep of the drive and drew up at
+the front door. Mabel went across the lawn to meet them. She had
+schooled herself to this meeting for Dick's sake, and to please him; she
+could not, however, pretend to any pleasure in the prospect. It was only
+natural that she should view Joan with distrust. Dick had allowed
+himself to become entangled; all unknowingly Mother had expressed the
+matter in a nutshell.
+
+She picked out Joan as being the girl at once; her eyes sped past
+Fanny's muslin-clad figure even as she was greeting her, and rested on
+the other girl's face. Pale, for Joan was very nervous of this
+afternoon, wide-eyed, the soft brown hair tucked away under the small,
+round-shaped hat. She was pretty and very young-looking. Mabel, seeing
+her, and remembering all the old stories in connection with her, was
+suddenly sorry for her very childishness. Then she hardened her heart;
+the innocence must at least be assumed, and the girl--Mabel had made up
+her mind as to that--should not win Dick as a husband without some
+effort being made to prevent her.
+
+Because of this sense of antagonism between them, for Joan had not
+missed the swift glance, the cold hardening of her hostess' face, it was
+a relief to have Fanny between them. Fanny was talking very hard and
+fast, it was quite unnecessary for anyone else to say anything.
+
+"My," she gasped, standing and staring round her with frank approval,
+"you have a beautiful place here. Dr. Grant has been telling us about it
+till we were mad to see it. Joan and I live in London; there is not much
+in the way of trees round our place, nothing but houses, and dirty
+pavements and motor-buses. I always say"--she took Mabel into her
+confidence with perfect friendliness--"that there is nothing so
+disagreeable in this world as a dirty pavement; don't you agree with
+me?"
+
+"The country is nicer than town, certainly," Mabel answered. "We are
+having tea over there under the trees; will you come straight across, or
+would you like to go in and take off your motor-veils?"
+
+"We will do nicely as we are," Fanny did all the talking for the two of
+them; Joan so far had not opened her lips. "It is such a little drive
+from Sevenoaks, and I am just dying for tea."
+
+Mabel led the way across the lawn, with Fanny chattering volubly beside
+her, and Dick followed with Joan.
+
+"The sister is a dear," he tried to tell her on the way across, for in
+some way he suddenly felt the tension which had fallen between the two
+women; "only she is most awfully shy. She is one of those people who
+take a lot of knowing."
+
+"And I am one of the people that she doesn't want to know," Joan
+answered. She was angry with herself for having come. A feeling of
+having lost caste, of being a stranger within these other people's
+friendship, possessed her. It set Dick's kindliness, his evident
+attraction on a plane of patronage, and brought her to a sullen mood of
+despair. Why had she ventured back on to the borderline of this life
+that had once been hers? Mabel's cold, extreme politeness seemed to push
+her further and further beyond the pale.
+
+Tea under these circumstances would have been a trying meal if it had
+not been for Fanny. Fanny had dressed with great care for this party,
+and she had also made many mental resolutions to "mind what she was
+saying." Her harshest critic could not have said that she had not made
+herself look pretty; it was only Joan's hurt eyes that could discover
+the jarring note everywhere in the carefully-thought-out costume. And
+Fanny realized that Joan, for some reason or other, was suffering from
+an attack of the sulks. She plunged because of it more and more
+recklessly into conversation. Fanny always felt that silence was a
+thing to be avoided at all costs.
+
+"The War will make a lot of difference to us," she attempted finally,
+all preceding efforts having fallen a little flat. "Daddy Brown says, if
+there is war between Germany and England, there won't be any Spring
+tours."
+
+"But of course there will not be War," Mrs. Grant put in with great
+precision; "the idea is impossible nowadays. And may I ask what a Spring
+tour is?"?
+
+"Tom says the city is getting very uneasy," Mabel plunged into the
+breach. "It does seem an absurd idea, but of course Germany has been
+aching to fight us for years."
+
+"Horrors, the Germans, don't you think?" chipped in Fanny; "they do eat
+so nastily."
+
+"No doubt you meet a great many foreigners, travelling about as you do,"
+Mrs. Grant agreed politely.
+
+"Do you know this part of the country at all?"? Mabel questioned Joan,
+then flushed herself at the absurdity of the question; "I suppose not,
+if you live most of your time in London."
+
+Joan lifted hard eyes. "I lived down here as a child," she said stiffly.
+
+"And in London"--Mabel was doing her best to be friendly--"have you nice
+rooms? Dick tells me you live all alone; I mean that your home is not
+there."
+
+"I live in an attic," Joan answered again, "and I have no home."
+
+"Your son is ever so much too fond of the theatre," Fanny's voice broke
+across their monosyllabic conversation. "He is there every night, Mrs.
+Grant."
+
+"And do you also go to the theatre every night?" Joan heard the
+petrified astonishment in Mrs. Grant's tone and caught the agitated
+glance which Mabel directed to Dick. The misery in her woke to sharp
+temper.
+
+"Fanny has let the cat out of the bag," she said, leaning forward and
+speaking directly to Mrs. Grant. "But I am afraid it is unpleasantly
+true. We are on the stage, you know; Dr. Grant ought to have warned you;
+it was hardly fair to let you meet us without telling you."
+
+A pained silence fell on the party; Mrs. Grant's face was a perfect
+study; Dick's had flushed dull red. Mabel stirred uneasily and made an
+attempt to gather her diplomacy about her.
+
+"It was not a case of warning us," she began; "you forget that we saw
+you ourselves the other night when you played _The Merry Widow_. Won't
+you have some more tea, Miss Leicester?"--Joan had been introduced to
+them under that name.
+
+A great nervousness had descended upon Fanny. She had talked a great
+deal too much, she knew, and probably Joan was furiously angry with her.
+But beyond that was the knowledge that she had--as she would have
+expressed it herself--upset Joan's apple-cart. Real contrition shone in
+the nervous smile she directed at Mrs. Grant.
+
+"I'm that sorry," she said, "if I have said anything that annoyed you;
+but you mustn't mix me up with Joan; she is quite different. I----"
+
+"Fanny!" Joan interrupted the jumbled explanation. "You have nothing to
+apologize for. We eat and look very much like ordinary people, don't
+we?"--she stared at Mabel as she spoke--"it is only just our manners,
+and morals that are a trifle peculiar. If you are ready, Fanny, I think
+we had better be getting back."
+
+Dick stood up abruptly; he did not meet Mabel's eyes, but she could see
+that his face was very white and angry.
+
+"I am driving you back," he said, "if you do not mind waiting here I
+will fetch the motor round."
+
+He took the girl's side straight away without hesitation. Mabel caught
+her breath on the bitter words that rose to her lips. Joan's outburst
+had been an extraordinary breach of good manners; nothing that had
+happened could in any way excuse or condone it. Yet it was not Joan
+that Dick was angry with, but herself.
+
+"I very much regret you should feel as you do," she said to Joan, after
+Dick had gone off to fetch the motor; "your friend and yourself were my
+guests; we none of us had the slightest desire to be rude to you."
+
+"Oh, no," flamed Joan in answer; "you did not want to be rude, you just
+wanted to make us understand quite plainly the difference that lay
+between us. And you have made us realize it, and it is I that have been
+rude. Come along, Fanny"--the motor could be seen coming along the
+drive; she swept to her feet--"let us go without talking any more about
+it."
+
+She turned, saying no good-byes, and walked away from them. Fanny
+hesitated a moment, her eyes held a pathetic appeal and there were tears
+near the surface. She felt she had ruined Joan's chances of a suitable
+marriage.
+
+"I am sorry," she whispered; "it all began beautifully, and--Joan isn't
+like me," she hurried out again, "she is proud and--well, you would
+understand"--she appealed to Mabel--"for you are proud, too--if you had
+to earn your money as she has to."
+
+Then she turned and hurried after her retreating companion. Something
+that she had said stayed, however, like a little pin-prick, in Mabel's
+thoughts. It brought her to a sudden realization of Joan's feelings and
+regret that she had not succeeded in being nicer to the girl.
+
+"If Dick is married to either of those two young ladies," said Mrs.
+Grant heavily, "he is ruined already." She rose majestically and
+gathered up her work. "I have been thoroughly upset," she announced,
+"and must go and lie down. Perhaps when Dick comes back you will point
+out to him that some explanation is necessary to me for the
+extraordinary scene I have just been through. I shall be ready to see
+him in an hour."
+
+Fanny wept a few tears on the drive home. It had all been her fault, she
+explained between sniffs to Joan.
+
+"And I promised not to talk too much," she gulped. "Oh, honey, don't let
+it stand between him and you"--she nodded at Dick's back, for he was
+occupying the front seat alone--"I shall never forgive myself if you
+do."
+
+"Don't fuss, Fanny," Joan answered; she was beginning to feel thoroughly
+ashamed of her ill-mannered outburst. "And for goodness' sake don't cry.
+You have not brought anything more between us than has always been
+there."
+
+"Oh, I wish we hadn't gone," wailed Fanny. "He wants to marry you, Joan;
+they always do if they introduce their mothers to you."
+
+For no reason whatsoever, for she had not thought of him for months, a
+memory of Gilbert flashed into Joan's mind. Her eyes were fixed on the
+back of Dick's head, and it was strange--the feeling that surged over
+her as she brought these, the two men in her life, before her mind's
+eye. Perhaps it was only at that very moment that she realized her love
+for Dick; realized it and fought against it in the same breath. She had
+known him so short a time; he had been kind to her; but what, after all,
+did that amount to? When the company left Sevenoaks he would probably
+never see her or think of her again. Does one build love from so
+fleeting a fancy?
+
+None the less the thought brought her to a mood of gentleness and she
+could not bear to let him go away thinking her still hurt and angry. As
+he helped her out of the car she smiled at him.
+
+"I am sorry that I lost my temper and was rude," she said. Fanny had
+fled indoors and left them tactfully alone. "I don't know what you must
+think of me." Her eyes fell away from his, he saw the slow red creeping
+into her cheeks.
+
+"Don't," he spoke quickly, he was for the moment feeling very vindictive
+against Mabel. "When you apologize you make it ten times worse. It was
+not your fault the least little bit in the world."
+
+"But it was," she answered; she looked up at him. "If you must have the
+honest truth, I was jealous from the moment I got out there. And
+jealousy hurts sometimes, you know, especially when it is mixed up with
+memories of something you once had and have lost for ever."
+
+"That is nonsense," Dick said. It was in his heart to propose there and
+then, but he held it back. "I meant you to enjoy yourself, I hoped you
+would like Mabel, and you did not--thanks to her own amiability. Am I
+forgiven?"
+
+"We forgive each other," she answered; she put her hand into his, "and
+good-night, if not good-bye. To-morrow is our last performance, you
+know, we leave the next day."
+
+"And even with that it is not good-bye," he told her. "I shall be at the
+theatre to-morrow night."
+
+Mrs. Grant and Dick had one very stormy and decided interview. That is
+to say, Mrs. Grant stormed and wept, Dick merely stated quite quietly
+and very definitely that he intended to follow Joan to London and that
+he was going to do his best to make her marry him.
+
+"You do not mind how much you break my heart," Mrs. Grant sobbed, "your
+mother is of no consequence to you. My years of love and devotion to you
+when you were a baby count for nothing. You throw them all aside for
+this impossible, outrageous girl."
+
+"Nothing is to be gained by calling her names," Dick answered, "and
+there is no reason why your heart should break, Mother. When you see her
+again----"
+
+"Never," interrupted Mrs. Grant dramatically, "never. Even as your wife
+I shall always refuse to meet her."
+
+"You must do as you please about that," Dick answered, and turned and
+went from the room.
+
+Upstairs he met Mabel just coming out of the nursery and would have
+passed her without speaking, but that she put out a hand to stop him.
+
+"Dick," she said, "you are awfully angry with me, I know, and I realize
+that more or less it was my fault. But I wanted and I still want to be
+friends with her. You know how sometimes, even against one's will, one
+stiffens up and cannot talk."
+
+"I know you never were any use at dissembling," he answered. "I had
+hoped you might like her, but you evidently did not do that."
+
+"I do not think I gave myself a chance," Mabel spoke slowly. "I had been
+arguing against her in my own mind ever since you told me about her. You
+see I am being truthful, Dick. It was just because one half of me wanted
+to like her and the other half did not, that the result was so
+disastrous."
+
+Dick laughed. "Disastrous just about describes it," he admitted. "I am
+going to marry her, Mabel, though mother does threaten to break her
+heart."
+
+"I know," Mabel nodded. "I knew from the very first moment I saw your
+eyes when they looked at her. Perhaps that was what made the unpleasant
+side of me so frigid. Will you give me her address, Dick, in London?
+Next week, when I am up there with Tom, I will call and make it up with
+her. If I go all alone I shall be able to explain things."
+
+"And what about mother's broken heart?" Dick questioned.
+
+Mabel shook her head. "It won't break," she said. "As soon as you are
+married she will start thinking that she arranged the match and saying
+what a good one it is."
+
+Again Dick laughed, but there was more lightness in the sound now. He
+put his two hands on her shoulders and looked down at her.
+
+"You are a good sort, Mabel," he said; "this afternoon I thought you
+were the most horrible sister a man could have, and that just shows how
+little even I know you."
+
+"No," she answered; her eyes held a shadow of pain in them. "It is not
+that, it is just that a man in love is sometimes blind to everything and
+everybody excepting the woman he is in love with. She is a lucky girl,
+Dick, I nope she realizes how lucky."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+    "But through all the joy I knew--I only--
+       How the hostel of my heart lay bare and cold,
+     Silent of its music, and how lonely!
+       Never, though you crown me with your gold.
+       Shall I find that little chamber as of old!"
+
+                                             F. BANNERMAN.
+
+
+Brown called an early rehearsal next morning. They were to play _The
+Waltz Dream_ as their last performance, for on leaving Sevenoaks the
+company was to break up, and just at the very last moment, before the
+curtain had come down on the previous night's performance, Grace
+Binning--the girl who usually played the part of Franzi--had fallen down
+and sprained her ankle. Who was to play her part? Fanny proposed Joan
+for the vacant place, but Brown was dubious, and Joan herself not at all
+anxious for the honour. She had more or less understudied the part,
+every member of the chorus took it in turn to understudy; but the
+question was whether it would not be better if Fanny's understudy took
+the part of the Princess and Fanny played Franzi. It was a character
+which she had often scored it. Against this had to be set the fact that
+Fanny's voice was needed for songs which the Princess had to sing, and
+that Franzi had very little singing to do. What she did have could be
+very largely cut.
+
+Anyway the whole company assembled at 10.30, and Brown put them through
+their paces. Finally he decided on Joan; she had already achieved
+popularity by her dancing, the audience would be kind to her. If she
+saved up her voice for her duet with Strachan and her one little solo at
+the fall of the curtain, Brown thought she might be heard beyond the
+footlights.
+
+"Now look slippy," he ordered, "only the principals need stay. We will
+just run through the thing, Miss Leicester, and see if you know what to
+do."
+
+Joan found herself living out the part of Franzi as she rehearsed. It
+seemed somehow to fit into her own feelings.
+
+    "Now love has come to me, I pray,
+       That while I have the chance to,
+     I still may have the heart to play
+       A tune that you can dance to."
+
+Franzi's one brief night of love which shone out, showing all the world
+golden, and then the little singer creeping back into the shadows with a
+broken heart but gay words on her lips.
+
+    "I still may have the heart to play
+        A tune that you can dance to."
+
+Brown thought as he watched her that she showed promise as an actress.
+Why had he not noticed it before. He meditated a proposal by which she
+should be persuaded to join the company again when it started out on its
+Spring tour. Fanny had told him that Joan was tired of the life and
+meant to go back to office work, but if she had talent, that was of
+course absurd. Perhaps he had not done enough to encourage her.
+To-morrow he would have a good long talk with her and point out to her
+just how things stood.
+
+Fanny, too, was impressed by Joan's powers. "You act as if you really
+meant it, honey," she said. "You make me want to cry in that last bit
+where Franzi goes off and leaves me, a bloated aristocrat on the throne,
+with my erring husband beside me. You make me think you feel it."
+
+"Perhaps I do," Joan answered; "perhaps I am going back alone."
+
+"But why," Fanny cried out; she ran to Joan and threw her arms round the
+other girl, they were in the dressing-room making up for the evening
+performance. "Why, honey? He is ready to go with you."
+
+"And the Prince was ready to go with Franzi," Joan answered, "but she
+would not take him, not back into her land of shadows. Oh, Fanny, you
+are a dear, romantic soul, but you don't understand. Once, long ago when
+I was young, doesn't that sound romantic, there were two paths open to
+me and I chose the one which has to be travelled alone. If I dragged him
+on to it now it would only hurt him. You would not want to hurt
+something you loved," her voice dropped to a whisper, "would you?"
+
+"No," Fanny admitted. She had drawn a little back and was watching Joan
+with wide eyes. "But----" she broke off abruptly. "I haven't any right
+to ask," she said, "but do you mean that there is something which you
+have done that you would be ashamed to tell him."
+
+"Not exactly ashamed," Joan answered, "it would hurt him to know, that
+is all. I came to London two years ago because I was going to have a
+baby. It was never born, because I was in an accident a few months
+before it should have come."
+
+"But why tell him, why tell him?" Fanny clamoured. "Men have lots of
+secrets in their lives which they don't tell to good women, why must
+they want to know all about our pasts. I have always thought I should
+tell a man just exactly as much as I wanted to and not a whisper more.
+Honey," she drew close again and caught hold of Joan's hands, "it
+doesn't pay to tell them, the better they are the more they bring it up
+against you. If they don't say anything you can see it in their eyes.
+'She has been bad once,' they say, 'she may always be bad again.'"
+
+"Yes," agreed Joan. "It does not pay to tell them, as you say. That is
+why I am going to go back to my own shadows alone, because if you love a
+person you cannot keep a secret from him."
+
+"But it wouldn't exactly be a secret," Fanny pleaded, "it would just be
+something that it was no business of his to know."
+
+Joan laughed. "Your philosophy of life, Fanny, is delightful. But if you
+don't hurry up with your dressing you will be late when the call boy
+comes."
+
+She had the dressing-room to herself presently, for she did not have to
+appear until the second act, and as she sat there, reading over her
+part, the call boy put in his head with an impish grin.
+
+"A gentleman left these for you, miss," he held out a large bunch of
+violets, "most particular you should get them before you went on, he
+was, and he will be round again after the show. Same gentleman," he
+winked at her, "as has been here most regular like since the third
+night."
+
+"All right, Tommy, thank you," Joan answered. She held out her hands for
+the violets. They were very sweet-scented and heavy; she let them fall
+on the dressing-table, but after Tommy had vanished, whistling shrilly
+along the passage, she bent forward and buried her cheeks and lips in
+their fragrance. Her tears smarted in her eyes. This man had grown so
+suddenly dear to her that it hurt her almost more than she could bear to
+shut him out of her life.
+
+When Fanny danced into the room presently it was to find her standing
+before the looking-glass, and against the soft blue of her waistbelt the
+violets showed up almost like a stain.
+
+"He's there," Fanny told her, "third from centre in the second row.
+Young Swetenham is with him, but none of the women folk, praise be to
+heaven. Have you asked him to the supper afterwards?"
+
+"No," Joan admitted, "and, Fanny, if it could possibly be arranged and
+Brown would not be very hurt, would it matter if I did not come myself?
+I feel so much more like going home to bed."
+
+"Doesn't do to mope," Fanny remonstrated. "Why not bring him along and
+have one good evening to finish?"
+
+She studied the other's face. "There," she added impulsively, "if you
+don't feel like it you shan't be made to do it. Bother Daddy Brown and
+his feelings. You stay here quiet and let us all get away; we will be
+walking over to the 'Queen's,' you see, then you can slip out after we
+have gone and cut home on your own. I will tell Brown you are
+over-wrought after the show, it is quite natural you should be."
+
+"Yes," admitted Joan; she hesitated on her way out, for the call boy had
+just run down the passage shouting her name, "and, Fanny, if he is
+there"--she met the other girl's eyes just for a moment--"take him along
+with you, will you? I--I am afraid of meeting him to-night."
+
+Joan caught Dick's eyes just for a second before she began her first
+song, but she was careful not to look his way again. For the rest she
+moved and acted in a dream, not conscious of the theatre or the
+audience. Yet she knew she must be playing her part passably well, for
+Strachan whispered to her at the end of the duet: "You are doing
+splendidly." And Brown himself was waiting to greet her with
+congratulations when she ran into the wings for a moment.
+
+The heat of the theatre killed her violets; they were crushed and dead
+at the end of the second act, yet when she changed for the third she
+picked them up and pinned them in again. Franzi's part in the third act
+is very brief. She is called in to give evidence of the Prince's
+infidelity, and instead she persuades the Princess that her husband has
+always loved her. Then, as the happy pair kiss one another at the back
+of the stage, Franzi turns to the audience, taking them, as it were,
+into her confidence:
+
+    "Now love has come to me, I pray,
+       That while I have the chance to,
+     I still may have the heart to play
+       A tune that you can dance to."
+
+Joan's voice broke on the last line, the little sob on which she caught
+her breath was more effective than any carefully-thought-out tragedy.
+With her eyes held by those other eyes in the audience she took the
+violets from her belt and held them, just for a second, to her lips.
+Then they fell from her hands and she stood, her last farewell said,
+straight and silent, while the house shouted over what they considered
+to be a very fine piece of acting. They would have liked to have had her
+back to bow to them after the fall of the curtain, but Joan would not
+go, and Fanny brought Brown to realize that if the girl were worried in
+any way she would probably wax hysterical.
+
+"Fine acting," Brown kept repeating over and over again. Joan heard him
+vaguely. He was so impressed by it, however, that he sent for some
+champagne and insisted on their all drinking her health on the spot.
+There, however, he was content to leave it, and presently the company
+slipped away, one after the other, and Joan and Fanny were left alone.
+
+"You really think you won't come on, honey?" Fanny tried a final
+argument before she followed the others. "He has sent up his card, you
+know; he is waiting downstairs for you."
+
+"I simply can't, Fanny," Joan answered. "You go, like a dear, tell him
+anything you like; that I have gone on with Brown, or that I am coming
+later; only just persuade him to go away with you, that's all I ask."
+
+Fanny looked at her reflectively, but she did not say anything further,
+gathering her cloak round her and going from the room.
+
+Joan waited till the place seemed silent and deserted save for the call
+boy's shrill whistle as he strolled round, locking up the various
+dressing-rooms. She did not want him to see her as she groped her way
+back to the front of the stage and stooped to feel in the dark for her
+bunch of violets. It was quite ridiculous, but she could not leave them
+to lie there all night and be swept into the rubbish-basket in the
+morning. It took her a minute or two, but at last her hands closed on
+them and she stood up and moved into the light just as he came dashing
+along the passage.
+
+"Hulloa," he called out to her, "you still here, miss? Everyone else has
+gone. You might have got shut in."
+
+"I am just going myself," she answered; "and I knew you were here,
+Tommy; I heard you."
+
+He followed her to the door and stood watching her along the street with
+curious eyes. To his mind it seemed strange that she should have stayed
+on after the others had gone. It betokened something that she wished to
+hide from prying eyes, and his were not satisfied till he saw a man's
+figure come forward out of the darkness and meet her.
+
+"Thought as much," commented Tommy, the worldly-wise. "Gent of the
+violets, I suppose. Not likely they would be going to a crowded
+supper-party."
+
+"I thought you were never coming," Dick was saying quickly to Joan.
+"Miss Bellairs told me you weren't feeling very well and were going
+straight home. I was just screwing up my courage to come upstairs and
+find out for myself what had happened to you."
+
+So Fanny had failed her. Joan, guessing the other's purpose, smiled
+ruthfully.
+
+"I had a headache," she admitted, "and I could not face a supper-party.
+I am so sorry you should have waited about, though; I had hoped you
+would go on with Fanny."
+
+"Hoped!" said Dick. "Did you think I would?"
+
+They had turned in the direction of the girls' lodgings and were walking
+very fast. Joan set the pace, also she was rather obstinately silent.
+Dick walked in silence, too, but for another reason. Clamorous words
+were in his heart; he did not wish to say them. Not yet, not here. Up in
+London, in her own place, when she would be free from the surroundings
+and trappings of theatrical life, he was going to ask her to marry him.
+Till then, and since his heart would carry on in this ridiculous way
+because she was near him, there was nothing for it but silence.
+
+At the door of the house, though, he found his tongue out of a desire to
+keep her with him a little longer.
+
+"You played splendidly to-night," he said, holding her hand. "Were those
+my violets you kissed at the end?"
+
+"Yes," she answered; the words were almost a whisper, she stood before
+him, eyes lowered, breathing a little fast as if afraid.
+
+The spell of the night, the force of his own emotion shook Dick out of
+his self-control. The street was empty and dimly lit, the houses on
+either side shuttered and dark. The two of them were alone, and suddenly
+all his carefully thought-out plans went to the wind.
+
+"Joan," he whispered. She was all desirable with her little fluttered
+breath, her eyes that fell from his, her soft, warm hand. "Joan!"
+
+Joan lifted shut eyes and trembling lips to his; she made no protest as
+he drew her into his arms, his kiss lifted her for the time being into a
+heaven of great content. So they clung together for a breathing-space,
+then Joan woke out of her dream and shuddered away from him, hiding her
+face in her hands.
+
+"Oh, don't," she begged, "please, please don't!"
+
+Her words, the very piteousness of her appeal, remembering all her
+circumstances, hurt Dick. "My dear," he said, "don't you understand;
+have I made you afraid? I love you; I have always loved you. I was going
+to have waited to ask you to marry me until next week when I came to you
+in town. But to-night, because I love you, because you are going away
+to-morrow, I couldn't keep sensible any longer. And anyway, Joan, what
+does it matter?--to-day or to-morrow, the question will always be the
+same. I love you, will you marry me, dear? No, wait." He saw her
+movement to answer. "I don't really want you to say anything now, I
+would rather wait till we meet in town next week. You are not angry with
+me, are you, Joan? You are not afraid of my love?"
+
+But Joan could make no answer, only she turned from him and ran up the
+steps; the bunch of violets lay where she had dropped them when he
+caught her hands, but neither of them noticed it. He saw her face for a
+second against the lighted hall and a little to his dismay he could see
+that she was crying. Then she had gone and the door shut to behind her
+quickly.
+
+Dick waited about for a little, but she made no sign, and finally he
+turned rather disconsolately away. One thought, however, was left to
+comfort him through the night, the memory of her soft, yielding hands,
+the glad surrender of her lips.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+    "Ah, sweet, and we too, can we bring
+       One sigh back, bid one smile revive?
+     Can God restore one ruined thing,
+         Or he who slays our souls alive
+              Make dead things thrive?"
+
+                                             A. C. SWINBURNE.
+
+
+Early morning brought Joan a letter from Dick. She had hardly slept all
+night. Once she had got up, determined to write him; the truth would
+look more cold and formal in a letter, but her courage had failed her,
+and instead she had sat crouched over the table, her body shaken with a
+storm of tears. Then Fanny had come in, an after-supper Fanny, noisy and
+sentimental, and she had had to be helped to bed, coughing and
+explaining that "life was good if you only knew how to live it." Joan
+had crept back to her own bed once the other girl had fallen asleep, and
+she had lain with wide eyes watching the night turn from blackness to
+soft grey, from grey to clear, bright yellow. There were dark shadows
+round her eyes in the morning, and her face was white and
+strained-looking.
+
+     "DEAR HEART," Dick had written:
+
+     "Is it cheek to begin a letter like that to you? Only after
+     last night I seem to know that you love me and that is all
+     that really matters. I am coming to 6, Montague Square, on
+     Tuesday afternoon at five o'clock to get my answer. Doesn't
+     that sound precise? I would like to come to-day, but I won't
+     because I don't want to hurry you. Oh, dear heart, I love
+     you!--I have loved you for longer than you know of just at
+     present. That is one of the things I am going to explain to
+     you on Tuesday,
+
+                                         "Yours ever,
+                                             "DICK GRANT."
+
+Fanny was much perturbed by Joan's appearance when she was sufficiently
+awake to notice it.
+
+"My, honey, you do look bad," she gasped. "Daddy Brown will see I was
+talking the truth last night, which is a good thing in one way. He was
+most particularly anxious to see you last night, was very fussed when he
+found you hadn't come." She paused and studied Joan's face from under
+her lashes. "Did you meet him?" she inquired finally.
+
+"Yes," Joan admitted; she turned away from the other's inquisitive eyes.
+"He walked home with me."
+
+"I told him you had a headache and were not coming to supper with us,"
+Fanny confessed. "It is no use being annoyed with me, honey. I thought
+it over and it seemed to me that by saying 'No' to him because of
+something that happened before he knew you, you were cutting off your
+nose to spite your face. Not that I personally should tell him," she
+added reflectively; "he is too straight himself to understand a woman
+doing wrong; but that is for you to decide. One thing I do know: it
+won't make a pin's worth of difference to his wanting to marry you; he
+is too much in love for that."
+
+She was saying aloud the fear which had knocked at Joan's heart all
+night. It might be true that Dick was too much in love to let what she
+had to tell him stand between them. But afterwards, when love had had
+time to cool, when trust and good-fellowship would be called on to take
+the place of passion, when he saw her, perhaps, with his child in her
+arms, how would he look at her then? Would he not remember and regret,
+would not a shadow stand between them, a shadow from the one sin which
+no man can forgive in a woman? She was like a creature brought to bay;
+he had guessed that she loved him; what arguments could she use, how
+stand firm in her denial against that knowledge?
+
+For a little she had thought of the possibility of his taking her just
+as Gilbert had done. She was not worthy to be his wife, but she would be
+content, she knew, to follow him to the end of the world. Not because
+she viewed the matter now in the same light as she had done in those
+days. She had never loved Gilbert; if she had, shame and disgrace would
+have been powerless to drive her from his side, and she would have
+wanted him to marry her, just as now she wanted marriage with Dick. It
+seemed to her that, despite pioneers and rebels and the need for greater
+freedom, which she and girls like her had been fighting for, the initial
+fact remained and would always remain the same. When you loved you
+wanted to belong to the man absolutely and entirely; freedom counted for
+very little, you wanted to give him your life, you wanted to have the
+right to bear his children. That was what it all came down to in the
+end; Love was bigger and stronger than any ideas, and marriage had been
+built upon the law of Love.
+
+       *     *     *     *     *
+
+Daddy Brown came round in the course of the morning to talk over his new
+idea for Joan's future. It appeared that if she was willing to think it
+over, he would pay for her to have singing and dancing lessons during
+the winter. That was, of course, provided the War did not come off. If
+it did, as he had said once before to Fanny, there would not be any
+Spring tours for the Brown Company.
+
+"But war isn't likely," he spoke heavily. "England has too much to lose
+to go running into it if she can steer clear, and there's my offer, my
+girl. I think, from what I saw last night, that if you like to put your
+heart into it you ought to make something of an actress. You have
+distinct ability, and you have charm, which is on the good side too."
+
+Joan was hardly in the mood to pay much attention to her future
+prospects; the present loomed too forbiddingly ahead of her. She would
+let him know, she told him finally; she was most awfully grateful to him
+for his suggestion, but she must have at least a fortnight to think
+things out and decide what she was going to do.
+
+"Very well," Brown agreed, he rose to take his leave; "but mind you, it
+is worth considering, young lady; you don't get such an offer every
+day."
+
+Fanny was staying behind for another day; she had some amusement in
+store with Swetenham which she did not want to miss, but the rest of the
+company, Joan included, caught the three o'clock train back to town.
+Joan could not refuse to go with them, but the journey was one long
+torture to her; she wanted to get right away by herself; there was only
+one day left in which to plan and make ready for Dick's visit. Some of
+Brown's ponderous remarks as to the probable effect of a war on the
+theatrical profession had filtered down to the junior members of the
+company. They talked together rather mournfully as to what the winter
+might be going to mean for them. "If it knocks pantomimes, we are done,"
+Grace Binning summed up the situation. But Grace Binning was inclined to
+be mournful; as Mrs. O'Malley said, her sprained ankle would keep her
+out of work in any case for six weeks.
+
+At Victoria Station Strachan ferreted out Joan's luggage and hailed a
+taxi for her.
+
+"Good-bye," he said to her at the last--they had always been very good
+friends, with a little encouragement he might have considered himself in
+love with her--"and good luck. Also, if you will excuse me saying so,
+Miss Rutherford, I should marry that faithful young man. You are not a
+bit suited or happy in our life."
+
+Then he drew back his head quickly and smiled at her as the taxi started
+off.
+
+Joan had written to Mrs. Carew, asking her to see about a room, and
+found to her relief that her old attic was still at her disposal.
+
+"Thought you would find it homelike," Mrs. Carew panted up the stairs in
+front of her, "and for that matter it has been shut up since you left.
+Bad year for letting this has been."
+
+Obviously the room had been shut up since she left. Joan struggled with
+the fast-closed window and threw it open, but even so the place retained
+an atmosphere of overpowering stuffiness, and presently, not staying to
+unpack or open the letter which had been waiting for her on the hall
+table, she sallied out again in search of fresh air.
+
+She would walk to Knightsbridge, she decided, and so on through the
+Park. If she tired herself out perhaps she would be able to sleep when
+she went to bed, and sleep was what she needed almost more than anything
+else.
+
+The Park was deserted and sun-swept; it had been an exceptionally hot
+summer, the trees and bushes seemed smothered under a weight of dust.
+Joan found a seat in sight of one of the stretches of water and opened
+her letter. It was from Miss Abercrombie, that she had known from the
+envelope, and written from the Rutherford home at Wrotham.
+
+     "DEAR JOAN," the letter ran:
+
+     "Your people are home, they have just come back from abroad
+     and had a very tiresome journey over because of the
+     mobilization on the Continent. Janet wrote, or rather your
+     uncle wrote for her, asking me to be here to meet them. Janet
+     is very ill, she will never be able to walk or stand up again
+     in her life. They have tried all sorts of things for her
+     abroad, now it has come to the last. All day, and most of the
+     night, for she sleeps very badly, she lies flat on her back,
+     and all the time her eyes seem to be watching for something.
+     She speaks very little, everything seems to be shut away in
+     her heart, but yesterday--after having first talked the matter
+     over with your uncle--I went up to her room and asked her
+     point blank: 'Janet, aren't you eating out your heart for
+     Joan?' and she nodded stiffly, the tears in her eyes. So I sat
+     right down and told her all about you: about your accident,
+     about the hard (child, I know it has been hard) fight you have
+     had, and at the end I said: 'Shall I send for her, Janet?'
+     This time when she nodded the tears were streaming down her
+     face. So I am sending for you. Don't let pride or anger stand
+     between you, enough anguish has been caused already on both
+     sides, and she is practically dying. Come, child, show a
+     charity which your struggle will have taught you, and help to
+     make her going a little easier, for she has always loved you,
+     and her heart breaks for the need of you."
+
+It was a very sentimental letter for Miss Abercrombie to have written.
+And Aunt Janet was dying; quite long ago Joan had forgiven the hardness
+from her, there was no bitterness in her heart now, only a great sense
+of pity. She would go, of course she would go. Like a flash it came to
+her that she might just slip away and leave no address, no message to
+Dick. But even with the thought came the knowledge that she would only
+be shelving the difficulty for a little; he would wait, he would search
+till he found her. She did not think he would be very easy to put off.
+
+With Miss Abercrombie's letter open on her lap, she sat and watched the
+people passing by her. She was thinking of all her life since she had
+first come to London; Gilbert, their time together--strange how that
+memory had no more power to hurt--the black days that had followed, Rose
+and Fanny. Of them all perhaps she had loved Fanny the best; Fanny's
+philosophy of life was so delightfully simple, she was like some little
+animal that followed every fresh impulse. And she never seemed to regret
+or pay for her misdeeds. Apparently when you sinned calmly in the full
+knowledge that it was sin, you paid no penalty; it was only when you
+sinned attempting to make new laws for yourself and calling it no sin
+that the burden of retribution was so heavy to bear.
+
+A man was coming down the path towards her; she did not notice him,
+although he was staring at her rather intently. Opposite to her he came
+to a pause and took off his hat.
+
+"Hallo," he said, "I am not mistaken, am I, it is Pierrette."
+
+She lifted startled eyes to his and Landon laughed at her. He had
+forgotten all about her till this moment, but just for the time being he
+was at a loose end in London when all his friends were out of town, and
+with no new passion on to entertain him. Pierrette, were she willing,
+would fill in the gap pleasantly; they had not parted the best of
+friends, but he had forgotten just enough for that memory not to rankle.
+He sat down on the chair beside her and took one of her hands in his.
+
+"Where have you been, Pierrette? And what have you been doing? Also,
+are you not glad to see me, and whose love letter were you reading?"
+
+"It is not a love letter." Joan took her hand away and folding up Miss
+Abercrombie's letter, slipped it into her purse. "It is from my people,
+asking me to come home, and I am going."
+
+"Going, when I have only just found you again!"
+
+His tone, his whole manner was unbearably familiar. Joan turned with
+quick words of resentment on her lips, but they were never said. A
+sudden thought came across her brain. Here was something with which she
+could fight down and kill Dick's purpose. Better, far better than any
+confession of hers, better than any stating of the truth, however
+bluntly put, would be this man's easy familiarity, his almost air of
+ownership. She found herself staring at Landon. What had she ever seen
+in him that was either pleasant or attractive? She hated his eyes, and
+the way they looked at her, the too evident care which had been expended
+on his appearance, his long, shapely hands.
+
+"Well, Pierrette, when you have finished studying my personal
+appearance," Landon broke in, "perhaps you will explain yourself more
+explicitly. Why are you flying from me just when I have found you? And,
+Pierrette, what about supper to-night at Les Gobelins?"
+
+"I can't do that," Joan spoke quickly. She had clenched her hands in her
+lap; he did not notice that, but he could see that the colour had fled
+from her face. "And I have got to go away the day after to-morrow. But
+couldn't you come and have tea with me to-morrow at 6, Montague Square?
+Do, please do."
+
+What was she driving at? Landon caught his breath on a laugh. Was it the
+last final flutter before she had to go back to home life and having her
+wings cut? Or was she throwing herself into his arms after having fought
+so furiously--he remembered that she had fought the last time, perhaps
+she had learned her lesson; perhaps the poor little devil had really
+fallen in love with him, and had been eating her heart out all this
+time. That was almost amusing. She had never, even in their days of
+greatest friendship, asked him into her room before, though he had often
+suggested coming.
+
+"Why, Pierrette, of course," he said. Then he laughed out loud. "And
+I'll bring some red roses, afterwards we will go out to supper, and it
+shall be like old times."
+
+"Afterwards," Joan repeated. The excitement had left her, she sounded on
+the instant very tired, "I don't know about afterwards, but bring the
+red roses and come at half-past four, will you?" She stood up, "I must
+go home," she said, "I have got to pack and get everything ready before
+to-morrow."
+
+He could not understand her mood in the least, but he could draw his own
+conclusions from her invitation. It set him whistling softly on his way
+home. The tune he selected was one that was being played everywhere in
+London at the time. It fitted into his thoughts excellently:
+
+    "Just a little love, a little kiss,
+     I will give my life for this."
+
+Poor, silly little Pierrette! Why had she fought with him before and
+wasted so much precious time? As a matter of fact, he broke off his
+whistle as the startling truth flashed on him, he might quite easily
+have forgotten all about her in the interval, and then where would she
+have been?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+    "I have left you behind
+     In the path of the past;
+     With the white breath of flowers,
+     With the best of God's hours,
+     I have left you at last."
+
+                                             DORA SIGERSON.
+
+
+Mrs. Carew was in a state of discontent which amounted almost to anger.
+
+"I knew such kind of things were bound to happen," she grumbled
+fiercely, "if she joined in with a girl like that Miss Bellairs. I have
+never held and I never will hold with young ladies having men to tea in
+their bedrooms."
+
+"Why don't you just tell her so?" suggested her helpmate from his
+customary entrenched position in an armchair behind the newspaper. "It
+would be a good deal cheaper than breaking the kitchen china, Maria."
+
+"Tell her!" snorted Mrs. Carew. "She don't give me a chance. Cool as a
+cucumber she turns to me this morning, she says: 'Oh, I've two gentlemen
+to tea this afternoon, Mrs. Carew, just show them up when they come.'
+Then she 'ops it out of the front door like a rabbit. 'Gentlemen,'
+indeed, and she with not so much as a screen round her bed."
+
+"Perhaps they are her brothers," ventured Mr. Carew.
+
+Mrs. Carew came to a pause beside him and swept aside his paper.
+"Brothers!" she repeated, "now, Arthur, you know better than to say
+that. What I say and what I always shall say is: Let 'em do what they
+like outside, poor motherless girls that they are, but in my house
+things have got to be run straight. I won't have them bringing men in
+here."
+
+"Well, hang it all, Maria, what do you want me to do? Go upstairs and
+turn the gents out?"
+
+"We'll see," said Mrs. Carew darkly. She grabbed up the tea-tray and
+made for the door. "To-morrow I shall tell her it is not to happen
+again."
+
+"All right, you tell her," her husband muttered behind her retreating
+back. "Can't think, though, why you don't leave the girls alone. However
+they start it always ends that way. You and I have seen quite a number
+take to the streets, and you don't do much to prevent them short of
+grumbling at them."
+
+"They shan't do it in my house," reiterated Mrs. Carew; she stumped in
+dignified protest from the room, and upstairs to the offender's attic.
+
+The first guest had already arrived, so Mrs. Carew could not voice her
+disapproval; she expressed it, however, in a glare which she directed
+towards him, and the noise with which she dumped down the tea-tray. The
+room was full of flowers, which did not add to her approval; she
+detected in them a sure sign of immorality. Great, beautiful red roses,
+nodding from every vase, filling the air with their rather heavy scent.
+The visitor also inspired her with a sense of distrust. He looked what
+Mrs. Carew described as "a man about town." She had been fond of Joan;
+behind her anger lay a small hurt sense of pity; she was too nice a
+young lady to go the way of the others.
+
+She opened the door to Dick a little later with a sour face, and she did
+not even trouble to take him upstairs.
+
+"Miss Rutherford is high up as you can get"--she jerked her thumb
+upwards--"it's the only door on the landing, you can't mistake it."
+
+With that she left him, and Dick found his own way upstairs. He had
+stayed away all day till the exact hour he had named, with some
+difficulty, but with a punctilious sense of doing right. Joan had not
+answered his letter and he looked upon her silence as an admission that
+she loved him, but there were a great many things between them that
+would have to be talked over first coldly and sensibly. He had thought
+the matter out and he had decided that he would not leave it all to her,
+to tell or not to tell as she thought best, which had been his first
+idea. He would help her by telling her that he had always known, and
+that it made no difference. He wanted to make her confession as easy as
+possible.
+
+It was not until after he had knocked that he realized with a shock of
+disappointment that Joan was not alone. He could hear her talking to
+somebody, then she moved across the room and pulled the door open. He
+saw only her first of all, his eyes sought hers and stayed there. He
+could notice that she seemed very pale, and almost frightened looking,
+and that she had dressed for the afternoon in black. Some long clinging
+stuff, and up near where the blouse opened at the neck she had pinned in
+one red rose, its warm and velvety petals lying against the white of her
+neck. The room seemed full of the scent of the roses too, and a little
+oppressive. Dick held his breath as he looked at her; to him she seemed
+so beautiful as to be almost amazing; then he came a little further into
+the room and his eyes took in the other occupant. A man sat, or rather
+lounged, on the sofa, pulled up under the window. He was watching the
+meeting with curious eyes, and in his hands he held another rose, the
+same sort as the one Joan wore. When Dick's eyes met his, he smiled, and
+laying the rose aside, stood up.
+
+"Did not know it was to be a tea-party, Pierrette," he said, "you ought
+to have warned me."
+
+Joan had shut the door and moved forward into the centre of the room.
+She was evidently very nervous over something; Landon was more than a
+little amused, though also inclined to be annoyed.
+
+"Oh, it isn't a tea-party," she was saying. "It's just us three. Doctor
+Grant, this is Mr. Landon. Will you have this chair?--it is really the
+only one which is quite safe to sit on."
+
+Dick took the proffered chair stiffly; he was conscious of a bitter
+sense of disappointment, tinged with disapproval. It was, of course,
+different for himself, but he loathed to see the other man so much at
+home in this quaint little dust-laden attic where Joan lived. Her bed
+stood against the wall, a black counterpane of sorts thrown across it;
+her brush and comb, the little silver things for her dressing-table were
+scattered about on the top of the chest of drawers standing near. The
+place would have been sacred to him; but how did this other man look at
+it? And why had Joan asked him? Was it a deliberate attempt to shield
+herself from something she dreaded? or did it mean that, after all, she
+had only been playing with him--that the fluttered surrender of her lips
+had been but a flirt's last fling in the game of passion? If a man is
+really very much in love, as was Dick, and something occurs to make him
+lose his temper, it is sure to end in rapid and sometimes lasting
+disaster. After the first five minutes Dick made no attempt even to be
+polite to Landon. Rage, blind, merciless rage, and a sense of having
+made a damned fool of himself, throbbed in his mind as he watched Joan
+talking to the other man, and saw the evident familiarity which lay
+between them. Yet he could not get up and go away; he would not leave
+her, not till he had hurt her as much as she was now hurting him.
+
+For Landon, the amusement of baiting the other man's evident misery soon
+palled. He was a little annoyed himself that Joan should have seen fit
+to drag him in as such a cat's-paw, for a very few minutes of their
+threesome had shown him what his part was intended to be. It meant in
+addition that the girl had fooled him, and that he had wasted his
+background of red roses. It was all very annoying and a very stupid way
+of spending the afternoon, for no one could imagine that there was any
+amusement to be got out of a bad tea in squalid surroundings--thus
+mercilessly but almost truthfully did he dismiss the atmosphere of
+Joan's attic--with a girl palpably in love with someone else. Landon
+rose presently with his most languid air of boredom.
+
+"Sorry, Pierrette," he said; "must fly, but I leave my roses behind me
+as a memory. They are not what I should call my lucky flower." He turned
+to Dick, who stood up with a grim face and stern-set mouth. "Good-bye,
+Doctor Grant; delighted to have met you: if Pierrette feels like it, get
+her to tell you about our last venture into the rose world. Romantic
+tale, isn't it, Pierrette?" He laughed, lifting her hand to his heart
+very impressively. "But ours has always been a romance, hasn't it? That
+is why we christened each other Pierrot and Pierrette." He let go her
+hand and bowed gravely. Joan followed him to the door. "I'll come and
+see you out," she said; she had not realized until the moment came how
+horribly afraid she was of Dick. "You might lose your way."
+
+"Oh no," Landon assured her; he shot one last slightly vindictive glance
+at Dick; "I know it by heart." Then he laughed and went from the room,
+shutting the door behind him.
+
+Joan stayed where she was, a seeming weight on her lids, which prevented
+her lifting her eyes to look at Dick. But she was intensely conscious of
+him, and round her heart something had closed like a band of iron. At
+last, since he said nothing and made no sign, she moved forward blindly
+and sat down in the nearest chair.
+
+"Aren't you ever going to speak again?" she whispered.
+
+Her words shook Dick out of his silent self-restraint. Hot anger,
+passionate reproaches, fought for speech in his throat; he drove them
+back.
+
+"Is this your answer to my question?" he said finally. "It would have
+been simpler to have put it some other way. But you may at least
+congratulate yourself on having succeeded. You have killed something
+that I had thought to be almost eternal." He drew in his breath sharply,
+but passion was shaking him now, it had to have its say. "I have loved
+you," he went on hoarsely, "ever since I first saw you. Common sense has
+argued against you; pride has fought to throw you out of my life; but
+against everything your face has lived triumphant. I don't know why God
+makes us feel like that for women of your stamp, why we should bring
+such great ideals to so poor a shrine. I am talking arrant nonsense,
+just raving at you, you think, and I sound rather absurd even to myself.
+Only--my God! you don't know what you have done--you have broken my
+faith in you; it was the strongest, the best thing in my life."
+
+Joan crouched down in the chair; she seemed to be trying to get as far
+away from his voice as possible; she sat with her head buried in her
+arms.
+
+"I built up a dream about you two years ago," Dick went on. "You don't
+remember anything about me; but our meeting, your face as you stood that
+day with your back to the wall, were stamped on my heart as with a
+branding-iron. Of all the foolish things that a man could do perhaps I
+chose the worst; for ever as I stood and watched you the shadow of shame
+grew up beside you, and other people turned away from you. But I thought
+I saw further than the rest; I imagined that I had seen through your
+eyes, because already I loved them, into your soul. There is some
+mistake here, I argued, some mystery which she herself shall one day
+make clear to me." Joan had lifted her head and was staring at him.
+"From that day I started building my dream. I went abroad, but the
+memory of your face went with me; I used to make love to other women,
+but it was because I looked for you in their eyes. Then I came home and
+I saw you again. Suddenly my dream crystallized into clear, unshakable
+fact; I loved, I had always loved you; nothing that other people could
+say against you would have any effect. It lay just with you, and to-day
+you have given me your answer and broken with your own hand the dream."
+
+He turned towards the door; Joan staggered to her feet and ran to him.
+The vague memory in her mind had leapt to life; his eyes had often
+reminded her of someone. She remembered now that he was the young doctor
+that Aunt Janet had sent for. She remembered her own defiance as she had
+faced him and the pity in his eyes.
+
+"Dick," she whispered, "Dick, I didn't know, I didn't understand. I
+thought--oh, don't go away and leave me just like this, I might
+explain." Her torrent of words broke down before the look on his face;
+she fell to her knees, clutching at his hands. "Won't you listen? It was
+because I was afraid to tell you; I was afraid, afraid."
+
+Her position, the paroxysm of tears which, once they came, she could in
+no way stop, disquieted him. He shook her hands from him. "And because
+you were afraid," he said stiffly, "I suppose you had the other man here
+to protect you." Then his mood changed.
+
+"Whatever you have done," he said, "it isn't any business of mine.
+Please forgive me for ranting like a schoolmaster, and please don't cry
+like that. While I sat there watching that other man and feeling that
+everything my heart had been set on was falling to pieces all round me,
+I wanted to hurt you back again. It's a pugnacious sensation that one
+gets sometimes, but it's gone now; I don't want you to be hurt. It was
+not your fault that I lifted you up in my heart like that; it is not
+altogether your fault that you have fallen. Perhaps you did not know how
+cruel you were being when you had that other man here to make clear to
+me something you did not wish to put into words yourself. I have said
+some beastly things to you, and I am sorry for them. Please don't let
+them worry you for long."
+
+Then he had gone, before she had time to speak or lift her hands to hold
+him. Gone, and as she crouched against the door the sound of his feet
+trod into her heart, each step a throb of agony.
+
+Mrs. Carew was holding forth to Fanny in the hall as Dick swung past
+them. He did not glance at them even, and Fanny did not have a chance to
+call out to him, he went so rapidly, slamming the door behind him.
+
+"Not as how they haven't left at seasonable hours," Mrs. Carew went
+rambling on; "but I 'as always said and always will say, I don't hold
+with such doings in my house."
+
+"What doings?" Fanny expostulated. "For goodness, old Carew, do try and
+make yourself more clear; who has been carrying on and how?"
+
+"Miss Rutherford," Mrs. Carew announced. She was viewing Fanny with
+unfriendly suspicion. "Only came back from this 'ere theatrical show
+yesterday, and to-day she has two men to tea with her in her bedroom."
+
+"Two men?" repeated Fanny. "Did you know they were coming?"
+
+"Ask them," snorted Mrs. Carew. "And what I said is----"
+
+"Oh, run away, Carew," Fanny broke in, "with your nasty suspicion. It's
+all my bad example, you'll be saying next. Bring up some tea for me,
+there's an old dear; I'm fairly parched for a drink."
+
+But before she went into her own room Fanny ran upstairs and knocked
+softly oh Joan's door. There was no answer and no sound from within the
+room; yet when she tried turning the handle, and pushing her foot
+against the door, it was to find it locked. What did it all mean? Two
+men to tea, Dick's face as he had passed through the hall, and Joan's
+locked door? That was a problem which Fanny set herself to disentangle
+in her own particular way.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI
+
+    "Of all strange things in this strange new world
+       Most strange is this;
+     Ever my lips must speak and smile
+       Without your kiss.
+     Ever mine eyes must see, despite
+       Those eyes they miss."
+
+                                             F. HEASLIP LEE.
+
+
+How Joan lived through the hours that followed she never knew. Heart and
+brain seemed paralysed; things had lost their power to hurt. When Fanny
+crept upstairs in the early morning and knocked timidly at the door,
+Joan opened it to her. She had no wish to see Fanny; she did not want to
+talk about yesterday, or explain what had happened; but vaguely through
+her absolute misery she realized that life had still to be gone on with,
+and that Fanny was one of the items of life which it was no use trying
+to disregard. As a matter of fact, until she opened the door and caught
+Fanny's look of dismay, she did not remember that she was still in her
+black afternoon frock, nor the fact that she had spent most of the night
+crouched against the door as Dick had left her.
+
+"Oh, my dear, my dear!" Fanny whispered; she came quickly into the room
+and threw warm, loving arms round Joan. "You haven't been to bed at all;
+why didn't you let me in last night? I'd have helped you somehow or
+other."
+
+Joan stood limply in the embrace, but she did not turn and cling to
+Fanny, or weep as the other girl rather wished she would.
+
+"How ridiculous of me," she answered. "I must look a strange sight this
+morning."
+
+Fanny became practical on the moment, since sympathy was evidently not
+desired. "Well, you'll start right away now," she stated, "and get out
+of your things. It's early yet, only about seven; I will brush your hair
+for you, and you will slip into bed. You needn't get up until late
+to-day, you know."
+
+"I haven't the slightest desire to sleep," Joan told her; none the less
+she was obeying the other's commands. "And I have got to catch an early
+train."
+
+"You are going away?" gasped Fanny.
+
+"Back home," Joan answered. "They have sent for me; my aunt has been
+ill. Oh, it's not for good, Fanny"--she almost laughed at the other's
+amazed face--"I shall be back here before long."
+
+"I hope not;" Fanny spoke, for her, fiercely. "I shall hate to lose you,
+honey, but after all I don't stand for much, and you aren't meant for
+this kind of world. You can't get the fun out of it I can, it only hurts
+you." She was brushing out the soft brown hair. "What happened
+yesterday?" she asked suddenly, her head on one side.
+
+Joan moved from under the deft hands and stood up. "You want to know why
+I am looking like a tragedy queen this morning," she said. "It isn't
+strange you should be curious; I must seem quite mad. Yesterday"--she
+caught her hands to her throat--"was what might be called a disastrous
+failure. I tried to be very clever, and I was nothing but a most awful
+fool. He knew, he had known all the time, the thing which I had been so
+afraid to tell him. It had not made any difference to his loving me, but
+yesterday I had that other man here, you remember him, don't you? You
+might almost recognize his roses." Her eyes wandered round the room, her
+hands came away slowly from her throat; she had seemed to be near tears,
+but suddenly the outburst passed. "That's all," she said dryly, "Dick
+drew his own conclusions from the man being here. I tried to explain, at
+least I think I tried to explain. I know I wanted to hold him back, but
+he threw aside my hands and went from the room. I shan't ever see him
+again, Fanny, and the funny thing is that it doesn't really seem to
+matter this morning."
+
+"Oh, you poor thing," Fanny whispered again. She did not say much else,
+because for the present words were useless. Otherwise her own mind was
+full of consoling reflections. A man, after all, is not so easily turned
+aside from what must have been a very big purpose in his life. Already
+Fanny could look into the future and say "Bless you, my children," in
+her heart. She had been afraid, drawing her conclusions from Dick's face
+and Joan's silence, that things were very much worse. Joan might, for
+instance, have told the truth, and Dick, man-like, might have resented
+it.
+
+She ran downstairs presently and came up again with the breakfast,
+fussing round Joan till the other made an attempt to eat something,
+pouring out her tea for her, buttering her toast. "I should very much
+like to see you have a jolly good cry, honey," she confessed when the
+pretence at breakfast had finished. "It would do you a world of good.
+But since you don't seem able to, I shall pull the curtains and you must
+try and sleep. I'll come and call you again at ten."
+
+Joan lay quite still in the dim and curtained room, but she did not
+either sleep or cry. She did not even think very much. She could just
+see the pattern of the wall-paper, and her mind occupied itself in
+counting the roses and in working out how the line in between made
+squares or diamonds.
+
+It was like that all day; little things came to her assistance and
+interested her enormously. The collection of flowers which Fanny had got
+on her new hat; the map on the wall of the railway carriage; the fact
+that the station master at Wrotham seemed to have grown very thin, and
+was brushing his hair a new way. Uncle John met her as once before at
+the station, and almost without thinking Joan lifted her face. He
+stooped very gravely to kiss it. "You are welcome home, Joan," he said.
+"We have been lonely without you."
+
+The sound of his voice brought back to her mind the last time he had
+spoken to her, and she was suddenly nervous and tongue-tied. A fat Sally
+still rubbed her sides against the shafts, nothing had been changed. It
+was just about this time she had come home two years ago, only now
+nervousness and a confused sense of memories that hurt intolerably swept
+aside all thoughts of pleasure and relief.
+
+Uncle John made no further remark after his greeting until they were
+driving down the village street. Then he turned to her suddenly.
+
+"There is going to be war between England and Germany," he said. "Did
+you see any signs of excitement in London this morning?"
+
+War! Joan realized on the instant that for the past four days she had
+not even looked at a paper. Daddy Brown had mentioned some such
+possibility in connection with his Spring tour, and the members of the
+company had discussed the prospect with varying shades of excitement on
+their way up to London. But for herself, her own interests, her own
+griefs had so swamped her that she had not even noticed the greater
+tragedy which loomed ahead. Yet what a curious thrill lay in the word;
+it could rouse her to sudden interest as nothing else had been able to
+do all day; she could feel the nerves in her body tighten, and she sat a
+little more erect.
+
+"War, with Germany!" she repeated. "I haven't read the papers, Uncle
+John. Has it come as near as that?"
+
+"They have invaded Belgium," he answered, "on their way through into
+France. We couldn't stand aside now if we wanted to. To-night, I expect
+war will be declared. That was why I asked you if you had seen any signs
+of excitement in the streets; the papers say that the crowds have been
+clamouring for war for the last three days."
+
+She could not tell him that she had sat in the cab counting the daisies
+in Fanny's hat. "What will it mean?" she asked.
+
+"Something bigger than we have ever tackled before," he answered. "It
+will mean millions of money and millions of men. I don't see much down
+here, grubbing about among my plants and weeds, but I have kept an eye
+on Germany." A most unusual excitement was shaking him. "In my young
+days it was a myth, 'one day Germany will declare war on us.' It has
+come true too late for me. I'd give everything I possess to get back
+into the regiment, but they wouldn't have me. This will be a
+world-shaking war, and I am too old to take part in it." The excitement
+left his voice as they turned in at the gate. "Your aunt is very ill,"
+he said. "I meant to have warned you before, but somehow I can't think
+of anything but the one thing these days. You must not be shocked at her
+appearance."
+
+Miss Abercrombie was waiting to receive them where Aunt Janet had waited
+for their other home-coming. "Did you bring any news from London?" she
+asked quickly; the same light shone in her eyes as in Uncle John's. "Has
+anything been settled yet?"
+
+Joan shook her head. "I have been living this last week with my eyes
+shut," she confessed; "till Uncle John told me, I did not even know that
+anything was going to happen."
+
+Miss Abercrombie looked beyond her; the blue eyes had narrowed, a
+strange expression of intentness showed in her face. "I have always
+tried not to," she said, "and yet I have always hated the Germans. I
+wish I was a man." She turned abruptly. "But come upstairs, child, your
+aunt had her couch moved close to the window this morning, she has lain
+watching the drive all day. You will find her very changed," she added.
+"Try not to show any signs of fear. She is very sensitive as to the
+impression she creates. Every week it creeps a little higher, now she
+cannot even move her hand. From the neck downwards she is like a log of
+wood."
+
+"And she is dying?" whispered Joan.
+
+"Mercifully," the other answered. "My dear, we could not pray for
+anything else."
+
+She opened the door and motioned to Joan to go in. "I have brought her
+to you, Janet," she said. "Now is your heart satisfied?"
+
+Joan waited for a moment in the doorway. A long, low couch stood by the
+window, the curtains were drawn back and the head of the couch had been
+raised up, so that a full stream of light fell upon the figure lying on
+it. But Aunt Janet's face itself was a little in the shadow, and for the
+moment it looked very much like Joan's old memories. The straight,
+braided hair, the little touch of white at the throat, the dark,
+searching eyes. A nurse, a trim upheld figure in blue, stood a little
+behind the couch out of sight of Aunt Janet's eyes, so that she could
+frown and beckon to Joan to come forward unseen by the woman on the
+couch. But Aunt Janet had noticed the slight hesitation, her face broke
+into the most wistful smile that Joan had ever seen.
+
+"I can't hold out my arms to you, Joan," she said; "but my heart aches
+for you, all the same."
+
+Joan took a little step forward; "Aunt Janet," she whispered. Then all
+that had been bitter between them vanished, and much as she had used to
+do, when as a child she sought the shelter of those dear arms, she ran
+forward, and, kneeling by the couch, pressed her warm cheek against the
+lifelessness of the other's hand. "I have come home, Aunt Janet," she
+said, "I have come home."
+
+The nurse with one glance at her patient's face tiptoed from the room,
+leaving them alone together, and for a little they stayed silent just
+close touching like that. Presently Aunt Janet spoke, little whispered
+words.
+
+"I hardened my heart," she said, "I would not let you creep back; even
+when God argued with me I would not listen. My life finished when I sent
+you from me, Joan, but so long as I could hold myself upright and get
+about, I would not listen. I am a hard, grim old woman, and I took it
+upon myself to judge, which is after all a thing we should leave to God.
+This is my punishment--you are so near to me, yet I cannot lift a hand
+to touch you. I shall never feel your fingers clinging to mine again."
+
+"Oh, hush, hush, Aunt Janet," Joan pleaded. "Why should you talk of
+punishment?"
+
+"When you were a child," the old voice went on again, "you would run to
+me at the end of your day's playing. 'Read me a story,' you would say,
+and then we would sit hand in hand while I read aloud to you something
+you knew almost by heart. When I dream now I feel your little warm hands
+in mine, but I can't feel your lips, Joan, not even when you lay them
+against my hand as you do now. Nor your tears, dear, silly child, I have
+made you cry with my grumbling. Joan, look up and see the happiness in
+my eyes to have you back."
+
+And Joan looked. "I never meant to hurt you as I did, Aunt Janet," she
+said; "do you believe that?"
+
+Just for a second the lids closed down over the dark eyes. "I hurt
+myself," Aunt Janet answered, "far more than you hurt me. Put your face
+down close, so that I can kiss you just once, and then you shall draw up
+a chair and we will talk sensibly. Nurse will be severe to-night if I
+excite myself."
+
+Miss Abercrombie put her head in at the door presently and suggested
+taking Joan downstairs to tea. "Nurse is just bringing up yours," she
+said. "I know from the expression of her face that she thinks it is time
+that you had a little rest."
+
+"Very well," Aunt Janet agreed, "take her away, Ann, but bring her back
+again before I go to bed. Has any news come through yet?"
+
+Miss Abercrombie shook her head. "Colonel Rutherford has just gone over
+to the station to find out," she added.
+
+Uncle John came back with no further information. He was evidently in a
+strong state of agitation, he confessed that the question which the
+Government was settling was like a weight on his own conscience. "It is
+a question of honour," he kept repeating, "England cannot stand aside."
+
+    "'Know we not well how seventy times seven
+        Wronging our mighty arms with rust,
+      We dared not do the will of Heaven,
+        Lest Heaven should hurl us in the dust.'"
+
+Miss Abercrombie quoted to him.
+
+He stared at her with puzzled old eyes. "I don't think that can apply to
+England," he said. "And in this case the people won't let them. We must
+have war."
+
+A curious, restless spirit seemed to have invaded the household. Joan
+sat with Aunt Janet for a little after dinner till the nurse said it was
+time for bed, after that she and Miss Abercrombie, talking only in fits
+and starts, waited up for Colonel Rutherford, who had once more tramped
+down to the station in search of news.
+
+"Nothing has come through," he had to admit on his return; "but I have
+arranged with the people of the telegraph office to send on a message
+should it come. We had better get off to bed meanwhile."
+
+Tired as she was, Joan fell asleep almost at once, to dream of
+Dick--Dick attired, through some connection of her thoughts, in shining
+armour with a sword in his hand. The ringing of a bell woke her, and
+then the sound of people whispering in the hall. She was out of bed in a
+second, and with a dressing-gown half pulled about her, she ran to the
+top of the stairs. The hall was lit up, the front door open. Uncle John
+was at it, talking to a man outside; Miss Abercrombie stood a little
+behind him, a telegram form in her hand. She looked up at the sound of
+Joan's feet. "It's war," she called softly. "We declared war to-night."
+
+From somewhere further along the passage there was the abrupt sound of a
+door being thrown open. "Miss Abercrombie, Colonel Rutherford," the
+nurse's voice called, "quick, quick! I am afraid Miss Rutherford is
+dying! Someone must run for the doctor at once, please."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII
+
+    "Life is good, joy runs high,
+     Between English earth and sky;
+     Death is death, but we shall die
+     To the song on your bugles blown--England,
+     To the stars on your bugles blown."
+
+                                             W. E. HENLEY.
+
+
+Dick went out into the still night air from the close atmosphere of
+Joan's room, his mind a seething battleground of emotions--anger, and
+hurt pride, and a still small sense of pain, which as time passed grew
+so greatly in proportion that it exceeded both the other sensations. He
+had said very bitterly to Joan that she had broken his dream, but,
+because it had been broken, it none the less had the power to hurt
+intolerably. Each fragment throbbed with a hot sense of injustice and
+self-pity. He had not the slightest idea what to do with himself: every
+prospect seemed equally distasteful. He walked, to begin with, furiously
+and rather aimlessly down in the direction of the Embankment. The
+exercise, such as it was, dulled his senses and quieted a little the
+tumult of his mind. He found himself thinking of other things. The men
+to-day in his Club had been discussing the possibility of war, they had
+been planning what they would do; instinctively, since the thought of
+Joan and the scene he had just left were too tender for much probing,
+his mind turned to that. As he stamped along he resolved, without
+thinking very deeply about it, that he would volunteer for active
+service, and speculated on the possibility of his getting taken on at
+once.
+
+"Doctors will be very needful in this war," one man had said at the
+Club.
+
+"Yes, by Gad," another had answered. "We have got some devilish
+contrivances these days for killing our brother men."
+
+Looked at from that point of view, the idea seemed strange, and Dick
+caught his breath on the thought. What would war mean? Hundreds of men
+would be killed--hundreds, why it would be more like thousands. He had
+read descriptions of the South African war, he had talked with men who
+had been all through it.
+
+"We doctors see the awful side of war, I can tell you," an old doctor
+had once told him. "To the others it may seem flags flying, drums
+beating, and a fine uplifting spectacle; but we see the horrors, the
+shattered bodies, the eyes that pray for death. It's a ghastly affair."
+
+And yet there was something in the thought which flamed at Dick's heart
+and made him throw his head up. It was the beating of drums, the call of
+the bugles that he heard as he thought of it; the blood tingled in his
+veins, he forgot that other pain which had driven him forth so restless
+a short hour ago.
+
+The great dark waters of the river had some special message to give him
+this evening. He stood for a little watching them; lights flamed along
+the Embankment, the bridges lay across the intervening darkness like
+coloured lanterns fastened on a string. Over on the other side he could
+see the trees of Battersea Park, and beyond that again the huddled pile
+of houses and wharfs and warehouses that crowded down to the water's
+edge. He was suddenly aware, as he stood there, of a passionate love for
+this old, grey city, this slow-moving mass of dark waters. It symbolized
+something which the thought of war had stirred awake in his heart. He
+had a hot sense of love and pride and pity all mingled, he felt somehow
+as if the city were his, and as if an enemy's hand had been stretched
+out to spoil it. The drumming, the flag-waving, and the noise of bugles
+were still astir in his imagination, but the river had called something
+else to life behind their glamour. It did not occur to him to call it
+love of country, yet that was what it was.
+
+His walk brought him out in the end by the Houses of Parliament, and he
+found himself in the midst of a large crowd. It swayed and surged now
+this way and now that, as is the way of crowds. The outskirts of it
+reached right up to and around Trafalgar Square. When Dick had fought
+his way up Parliament Street he could see a mass of people moving about
+the National Gallery, and right above them Nelson's statue stood out
+black against the sky.
+
+"If they want war, these bally Germans," someone in the crowd suddenly
+shouted in a very hoarse and beery voice, "let's give it them."
+
+"Yes, by God!" another answered. "Good old England, let's stand by our
+word."
+
+"We have got men behind the guns," declaimed a third.
+
+But such words were only as the foam thrown up by a great sea; the
+multitude did no real shouting, the spirit that moved them was too
+earnest for that. There were women among the crowd, their eager, excited
+faces caught Dick's attention. Some were crying hysterically, but most
+of them faced the matter in the same way that their menkind did. Dick
+could find no words to describe the curious feeling which gripped him,
+but he knew himself one of this vast multitude, all thinking the same
+thoughts, all answering to the same heart-beats. It was as if the
+meaning of the word citizen had suddenly been made clear to his heart.
+
+He moved with the shifting of the crowd as far as Trafalgar Square, and
+here some of the intense seriousness of the strain was broken, for
+round and about the stately lions of Nelson's statue a noisy battle was
+raging. Several Peace parties, decked with banners inscribed "No War"
+and "Let us have peace," were coming in for a very rough five minutes at
+the hands of the crowd. Rather to his own surprise Dick found himself
+partaking in the battle, with a sense of jubilant pride in his prowess
+to hit out. He had a German as his opponent, which was a stroke of luck
+in itself, but in a calmer moment which followed on the arrival of the
+police, he thought to himself that even that was hardly an excuse for
+hitting a man who was desirous of keeping the world's peace. Still the
+incident had exhilarated him, he was more than ever a part of the crowd,
+and he went with them as far as Buckingham Palace. Some impulse to see
+the King had come upon the people; they gathered in the square in front
+of the Palace, and waited in confident patience for him to appear.
+
+Dick was standing at the far end of the Square, pressed up against the
+railings. In front of him stood two women, they were evidently strangers
+to each other, yet their excitement had made them friends, and they
+stood holding hands. One was a tall, eager-faced girl; Dick could not
+see the other woman's face, but from her voice he imagined her to be a
+good deal older and rather superior in class to the girl. It was the
+younger one's spirit, however, that was infectious.
+
+"Isn't it fine?" she was saying. "Aren't you proud to be English? I feel
+as if my heart was going to jump out of my mouth. They are our men," she
+went on breathlessly; "it is a most wonderful thought, and of course
+they will win through, but a lot of them will die first. Oh, I do hate
+the Germans!" Her whole face flushed with passionate resentment.
+
+"One need not hate a nation because one goes to war with it," the other
+woman answered. Dick thought her voice sounded very tired.
+
+"Yes, one need," the girl flamed. "We women can't fight, but we can
+hate. Perhaps we shouldn't hate so much if we could fight," she added as
+a concession.
+
+"I am married to a German," Dick heard the other woman say bitterly. "I
+can't hate him."
+
+He saw the girl's quick face of horror and the way she stood away from
+her companion, but just at that moment some impulse surged the crowd
+forward and he lost sight of them. Yet the memory of the woman's voice
+and the words she had said haunted him. War would mean that, then, the
+tearing apart of families, the wrecking of home life.
+
+"The King, the King!" the crowd yelled and shouted in a million voices.
+"God save the King."
+
+Dick looked up to the Palace windows; a slight, small figure had come
+out on to one of the balconies and stood looking down on the faces of
+the people. Cheer upon cheer rose to greet him, the multitude rocked and
+swayed with their acclamation, then above the general noise came the
+sound of measured music, not a band, but just the people singing in
+unison:
+
+    "God save our gracious King,
+     Long live our noble King,
+             God save the King."
+
+The notes rose and swelled and filled the air, the cry of a nation's
+heart, the loyalty of a people towards their King.
+
+The sheer emotion of it shook Dick out of the sense of revelry which had
+come upon him during his fight. He pushed his way through the crowd, and
+climbed over the railings into the darkness of St. James's Park. It was
+officially closed for the night, but Dick had no doubt that a small
+bribe at the other side would let him out. The Queen and the little
+Princes had joined the King on the balcony. Looking back he could see
+them very faintly, the Prince was standing to the salute, the Queen was
+waving her handkerchief.
+
+His Club was crowded with men, all equally excited, all talking very
+fast. Someone had just come back from the House. War was a dead
+certainty now, mobilization had been ordered, the Fleet was ready.
+
+"Our Army is the problem, there will have to be conscription," was the
+general vote.
+
+Dick stayed and talked with the rest of them till long after twelve.
+Morning should see him offering his services to the War Office; if they
+would not have him as a doctor he could always enlist. One thing was
+certain, he must by hook or by crook be amongst the first to go.
+
+"We will have to send an Expeditionary Force right now," the general
+opinion had been, "if we are to do any good."
+
+Dick thought vaguely of what it would all mean: the excitement, the
+thrill, an army on the march, camp life, military discipline, and his
+share of work in hospital. "Roll up your sleeves and get at them," his
+South African friend had described it to him. "I can tell you, you don't
+have much time to think when they are bringing in the wounded by the
+hundred."
+
+Not till just as he was turning into bed did he think again of Joan.
+Such is the place which love takes in a man's thoughts when war is in
+the balance. The knowledge of her deceit and his broken dream hurt him
+less in proportion, for the time he had forgotten it. He had been brutal
+to her, he realized; he had left her crouched up on the floor crying her
+heart out. Why had she cried?--she had achieved her purpose, for she
+could only have had one reason in asking the other man to meet him. He
+could only suppose that he had frightened her by his evident bad temper,
+and for that he was sorry. He was not angry with her any longer. She had
+looked very beautiful in her clinging black dress, with the red rose
+pinned in at her throat. And even the rose had been a gift from the
+other man. Well, it was all ended; for two years he had dreamed about
+love, for one hour he had known its bitterness. He would shut it
+absolutely outside of his life now, he would never, he need never,
+thanks to the new interests which were crowding in, think of Joan again.
+
+He opened his window before getting into bed and leaned out. The streets
+were deserted and quiet, the people had shouted themselves hoarse and
+gone home. Under the nearest lamp-post a policeman stood, a solid,
+magnificent figure of law and order, and overhead in a very dark sky
+countless little stars shone and twinkled. On the verge of war! What
+would the next still slumbering months bring to the world, and could he
+forget Joan? Is not love rather a thing which nothing can kill, which no
+grave can cover, no time ignore?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII
+
+    "Errors, like straws, upon the surface flow;
+     He who would search for pearls must dive below."
+
+                                             ANON.
+
+
+The wave of enthusiasm caused by the War swept even Fanny into its
+whirlpool of emotion. For several days she haunted the streets,
+following now this crowd, now that; buying innumerable papers, singing
+patriotic songs, cheering the soldiers as they passed. She wanted to
+dash out into the road, to throw her arms round the young soldiers and
+to kiss them, she was for the time being passionately in love with them.
+It was her one pathetic and rather mistaken method of expressing the
+patriotism which surged up in her. She could not have explained this
+sensation, she only knew that something was so stirred within her that
+she wanted to give--to give of her very best to these men who symbolized
+the spirit of the country to her. Poor, hot-hearted little Fanny; she
+and a great many like her came in for a good deal of blame during the
+days that followed, yet the instinct which drove them was the same that
+prompted the boys to enlist. If Fanny had been a man she would have
+been one of the first at the recruiting station. So submerged was she in
+her new excitement that Joan and Dick in their trouble slipped entirely
+out of her mind, only to come back, with the knowledge that she had
+failed to do anything to help, when, on coming back one afternoon to
+Montague Square, she saw Mabel standing on the steps of No. 6. To be
+correct, Mabel had just finished talking to Mrs. Carew and was turning
+away. Fanny hastened her walk to a run and caught the other up just as
+she left the step.
+
+"You were asking to see Joan, Miss Rutherford," she panted. "Won't you
+come in and let me tell you about her?"
+
+Mabel had hardly recognized her. Fanny, dressed up in her best to meet
+Joan's possible future relations, and Fanny in her London garments,
+which consisted of a very tight dress slit up to well within sight of
+her knee, and a rakish little hat, were two very different people. And
+whereas the Fanny of Sevenoaks had been a little vulgar but most
+undeniably pretty, this Fanny was absolutely impossible--the kind of
+person one hardly liked to be seen talking to. Yet there was something
+in the girl's face, the frank appeal of her eyes, perhaps, that held
+Mabel against her will.
+
+"The woman tells me that Miss Rutherford has left," she spoke stiffly.
+"I was really only going to call upon her."
+
+"Yes, I know she's gone," Fanny nodded, "back to her people. But there
+is something between her and your brother that awfully badly wants to be
+explained. Won't you come in and let me tell you? Oh, do, please do."
+
+She had caught hold of the other's sleeve and was practically leading
+her back up the steps. Mabel had not seen Dick since he had left
+Sevenoaks. He had written a note to their hotel saying he was most
+awfully busy, his application for service had been accepted, but pending
+his being attached to any unit he was putting in the time examining
+recruits. He had not mentioned Joan, Mabel had noticed that; still she
+had promised to call and make it up with the girl, and Mabel was a
+person who always religiously kept her promises. But if there had been
+any disagreement, as Fanny's anxiety to explain showed, then surely it
+was so much the better. Here and now she would wash her hands of the
+affair and start hoping once again for something better for Dick.
+
+Fanny had opened the door by this time and had led the way inside. "My
+room is three flights up," she said. "Will you mind that? Also it is
+probably dreadfully untidy. It generally is."
+
+This was where Mabel, following the wise guidance of her head, ought to
+have said: "I am not coming, I really haven't time," or some excuse of
+that sort. Instead she stepped meekly inside and followed the girl
+upstairs. Perhaps some memory of Dick's face as he had spoken of Joan
+prompted her, or perhaps it was just because she felt that in some small
+way she owed Joan a reparation.
+
+Fanny's room was certainly untidy. Every chair was occupied by an
+assortment of clothes, for before she had gone out that morning Fanny
+had had a rummage for a special pair of silk stockings that were the
+pride of her heart. She bundled most of the garments on to the bed and
+wheeled forward the armchair for Mabel to sit in.
+
+"I never can keep tidy," she acknowledged. "It used to make Joan fair
+sick when we shared rooms on tour. Joan is so different from me."
+Suddenly she threw aside pretence and dropped down on her knees before
+the armchair, squatting back on her heels to look at Mabel. "That is
+what I do want you to understand," she said, earnestly. "Joan is as
+different to me as soap to dirt. She is a lady, you probably saw that; I
+am not. She is good; I don't suppose I ever have been. She is clean all
+through, and she loves your brother so much that she wanted to break her
+heart to keep him happy." She looked down at her hands for a second,
+then up again quickly. "I'll tell you, it won't do any harm. Mind you,
+usually, I say a secret is a secret though I mayn't look the sort that
+can keep one. Joan told me about it at the beginning when I chaffed her
+about his loving her; and he does, you know he does. It seems that when
+she first came to London she had funny ideas in her head--innocent, I
+should call it, and sort of inclined to trust men--anyway, she lived
+with some man and there was to have been a baby," she brought the
+information out with a sort of gasp.
+
+"I knew that," Mabel answered, "and because of it I tried to persuade my
+brother not to marry her."
+
+"I suppose it is only natural you should," Fanny admitted, "though to me
+it seems that when a woman has a baby like that, she pays for all the
+fun that went before." She threw back her head a little and laughed.
+"Oh, I'm not moral, I know that, but Joan is, that's what I want you to
+understand. Anyway, Joan left the man, or he left her, which is more
+likely, and the baby was never born. Joan was run over in the street one
+day and was ill in hospital for a month. That was what Joan came up
+against," she went on, "when she fell in love with your brother. Tell
+him, I said, it won't make a pin's worth of difference to his love--and
+it wouldn't. But Joan did not believe me, she had learned to be afraid
+of good people, some of them had been real nasty to her, and she was
+afraid."
+
+"She need not have been," Mabel said. The girl was so earnest in the
+defence of her friend that one could not help liking her. "Dick knew
+about it all the time."
+
+Fanny nodded. "Yes, Joan told me that on the day after he had been here.
+It would have been fairer if he had said so from the beginning. You
+see," she leant forward, most intense in her explanation, "Joan thought,
+and thought and thought, till she was really silly with thinking. He had
+told her he was coming here on Monday to ask her to marry him, and she
+loved him. I should have held my tongue about things, or whispered them
+to him as I lay in his arms, holding on to him so that he could not
+push me away, but Joan isn't my sort. She just couldn't bear to tell
+him, I guess she was afraid to see his face alter and grow hard. Do you
+blame her because she was afraid? I don't really know the rest of the
+story," she finished, "because I was away, but I think Joan got hold of
+the silly notion that the best thing to do was to have another man
+hanging about here when Dr. Grant called. She thought it would make him
+angry, and that he would change his mind about wanting to marry her on
+the spot. And she pretty well succeeded. I had just got back and was
+standing in the hall, when Dr. Grant got back from her room and went
+out. He did not notice me, his face was set white and stern like
+people's faces are when they have just had to shoot a dog they loved.
+The other man meant nothing to her, nothing; why she hasn't even seen
+him for months, and she never liked him. Oh, can't you explain to your
+brother, he would listen to you." She put her hand on Mabel's knee in
+her earnestness and pulled herself a little nearer. "It's breaking both
+their hearts, and it's all such a silly mistake."
+
+"Are you not asking rather a lot from me?" Mabel said quietly; she met
+the other's eyes frankly. "Putting aside all ideas, moral or immoral,
+don't you understand that it is only natural that I should want my
+brother to marry some girl who had not been through all that Miss
+Rutherford has?"
+
+The quick tears sprang to Fanny's eyes. "If he loves her," she claimed,
+"is not that all that matters?"
+
+"He may love again," Mabel reminded her.
+
+Fanny withdrew her hand and stayed quiet, looking down at the ground,
+blinking back her tears. "You won't help," she said presently. "I see
+what you mean, it doesn't matter to you what happens to her." She lifted
+her head defiantly and sprang to her feet. "Well, it doesn't matter, not
+very much. I believe in love more than you do, it seems, for I do not
+believe that your brother will love again, and sooner or later he will
+come back to her." She paused in her declamation and glanced at Mabel.
+"Is he going to the War?" she asked quickly.
+
+"Yes," Mabel assented; she had stood up too and was drawing on her
+gloves. "He may go at any moment, as soon as they need him. You think I
+am awfully hard," she went on; "perhaps I am. Dick means a lot to me; if
+I find that this is breaking his heart I will tell him, will you believe
+that? But if he can find happiness elsewhere I shall be glad, that is
+all."
+
+Fanny huddled herself up in the armchair and did a good cry after she
+had gone. Joan's thread of happiness seemed more tangled than ever; her
+efforts to undo the knots had not been very successful. There was only
+her belief in the strength of Dick's love to fall back on, and love--as
+Fanny knew from her own experience--is sometimes only a weathercock in
+disguise, blown this way and that by the winds of fate.
+
+The night post brought a letter from Joan. It was written on black-edged
+notepaper:
+
+     "DEAR FANNY,
+
+     "Aunt Janet is dead. She died the night after I got here. The
+     nurse says it was the joy of seeing me again that killed her.
+     She was glad to have me back, I read that in her eyes, and it
+     is the one fact that helps me to face things. Death stands
+     between us now, yet we are closer to each other than we have
+     been these last two years. And she loved me all the time,
+     Fanny; sometimes it seems as if love could be very
+     unforgiving. I must stay on down here for the time being;
+     Uncle John needs someone, and he is content that it should be
+     me. The War overhangs and overshadows everything, and it is
+     going to be a hard winter for us all. I suppose he hasn't been
+     back" (Fanny knew who was meant by "he") "to see me. It's
+     stupid of me to ask, but hope is so horribly hard to kill.
+
+                                         "Yours ever,
+
+                                             "JOAN."
+
+Fanny wrote in answer that evening, but she made no mention of Mabel's
+visit. "Dr. Grant has joined, I hear," she put rather vaguely. "But of
+course one knew he would. All the decent men are going. London is just
+too wonderful, honey, I can't keep out of the streets. All day there are
+soldiers going past; I love them all, with a sort of love that makes you
+feel you want to be good, and gives you a lump in your throat. They say
+we have already sent thousands of men to Belgium, though there has not
+been a word about it in the papers, but I met a poor woman in the crowd
+to-day who had just said good-bye to her son. I wish I had got a son,
+only, of course, he would not be old enough to fight, would he? Write me
+sometimes, honey, and don't lose heart. Things will come all right for
+you in the end, I sort of know they will."
+
+To Joan her letter brought very little comfort despite its last
+sentence. Dick had joined; it did not matter how Fanny had come by the
+news, Joan never doubted its truth. He would be among the first to go,
+that she had always known, but would he make no sign, hold out no hand,
+before he left? The War was shaking down barriers, bringing together
+families who perhaps had not been on speaking terms for years, knitting
+up old friendships. Would he not give her some chance to explain, to set
+herself right in his eyes? That was all she asked for; not that he
+should love her again, but just that they should be friends, before he
+went out into the darkness of a war to which so many were to go and so
+few return.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX
+
+    "Who dies, if England lives?"
+
+                                             RUDYARD KIPLING.
+
+
+The black days of September lay like a cloud over the whole country.
+News came of the fall of Namur; the retreat from Mons; the German Army
+before the gates of Paris. There was one Sunday evening when the
+newspaper boys ran almost gleefully up and down the London streets,
+shouting in shrill voices: "The whole of the British Expeditionary Force
+cut to pieces." The nation's heart stood still to hear; the faces of the
+men and women going about their ordinary work took on a strained, set
+expression. The beating of drums, the blowing of trumpets, the cheering
+of crowds died away; a new stern feeling entered into the meaning of
+war.
+
+Dick felt sometimes as if all were expressed in the one word England.
+The name was written across all their minds as they stared into the
+future waiting for the news, real news of that handful of men standing
+with their backs to the walls of Paris, facing the mighty strength of
+the German Army. England! What did it matter if some hearts called it
+Scotland, some Ireland, some the greater far-off land of the Dominions?
+the meaning was the same. It was the country that was threatened, the
+country that stood in danger; as one man the people rallied to the cry
+of Motherland. And over in France, with their backs to the walls of
+Paris, the soldiers fought well!
+
+"Who dies, if England lives?" Kipling wrote in those early days of the
+war, putting into words the meaning which throbbed in the hearts of the
+people. Statesmen might say that they fought for the scrap of paper, for
+an outraged Belgium, because of an agreement binding Great Britain to
+France; the people knew that they fought for England! And to stay at
+home and wait with your eyes staring into the darkness was harder
+perhaps than to stand with your back to the wall and fight. They were
+black days for the watchers, those early days of the War.
+
+The one thought affected everyone in a different way. The look in their
+eyes was the same, but they used a different method of expressing it.
+Dick threw himself heart and soul into his work; he could not talk about
+the War or discuss how things were going on, and he was kept fairly
+busy, he had little time for talking. All day he examined men; boys,
+lying frankly about their age in order to get in; old men, well beyond
+the limit, telling their untruths with wistful, anxious eyes. Men who
+tried so hard to hide this or that infirmity, who argued if they were
+not considered fit, who whitened under the blow of refusal, and went
+from the room with bitten lips. From early morning till late at evening,
+Dick sat there, and all day the stream of old men, young men, and boys
+passed before him.
+
+Fanny took it in quite a different way. Silence was torture to her; she
+had to talk. She was afraid and desperately in earnest. The love in her
+heart was poured out at the foot of this new ideal, and to Fanny,
+England was typified in the soldiers. The night on which the paper boys
+ran abroad shrieking their first casualty list Fanny lay face downwards
+on her bed and sobbed her heart out. She visualized the troops she had
+watched marching through London, their straight-held figures, their
+merry faces, their laughing eyes, the songs they had shouted and
+whistled haunted her mind. They had not seemed to be marching to death;
+people had stood on the edge of the pavement to cheer them, and
+now--"cut to pieces"--that was how the papers put it. It made her more
+passionately attached to the ones that were left. It is no exaggeration
+to say that quite gladly and freely Fanny would have given her life for
+any--not one particular--soldier. Something of the spirit of
+mother-love woke in her attitude towards them.
+
+Down in quiet, sleepy little Wrotham the tide of war beat less
+furiously. Uncle John would sometimes lose his temper completely because
+the place as a whole remained so apathetic. The villagers did not do
+much reading of the papers; the fact that the parson had a new prayer
+introduced into the service impressed them with a sense of war more than
+anything else. But even Wrotham felt the outside fringe of London's
+anxiety during the days of that autumn. One by one, rather sheepishly,
+the young men came forward. They would like to be soldiers, they would
+like to have a whack at them there Germans. No thought of treaties or
+broken pledges stirred them, but England was written across their minds
+just the same. Uncle John woke to new life; he had been eating out his
+heart, knowing himself useless and on the shelf, when every nerve in his
+body was straining to be up and doing. He instituted himself as
+recruiter-in-chief to the district. He would walk for miles if he heard
+there was a likely young man to be found at the end of his tramp; his
+face would glow with pride did he but catch one fine, healthy-looking
+specimen.
+
+He inaugurated little meetings, too, at which the Vicar presided, and
+Uncle John held forth. Bluntly and plainly he showed the people their
+duty, speaking to them as he had used to speak in the old days to his
+soldiers. And over their beer in the neighbouring public-house the men
+would repeat his remarks, weigh up his arguments, agree or disagree with
+his sentiments. They had a very strong respect for him, that at least
+was certain; before Christmas he had persuaded every available unmarried
+man to enlist.
+
+The married men were a problem; Joan felt that perhaps more than Uncle
+John did. Winter was coming on; there were the children to clothe and
+feed; the women were beginning to be afraid. Sometimes Joan would
+accompany Uncle John on his tramps abroad, and she would watch the
+wife's face as Uncle John brought all his persuasion to bear on the man;
+she would see it wake first to fear, and then to resentment. She was
+sorry for them; how could one altogether blame them if they cried, "Let
+the unmarried men go first." Yet once their man had gone, they fell back
+on odd reserves of pride and acquiescence. There was very little wailing
+done in the hundreds of small homes scattered all over England; with
+brave faces the women turned to their extra burden of work. Just as much
+as in the great ones of the land, "for England" burned across their
+hearts.
+
+Joan's life had settled down, but for the outside clamour of events,
+into very quiet routine. Her two years' life in London was melting away
+into a dream; only Dick and her love for Dick stood out with any
+intensity, and since Dick made no sign to her, held out no hand, she
+tried as much as possible to shut him from her thoughts. Aunt Janet had
+died in her sleep the night war was declared; she had never waked to
+consciousness. When the doctor, hastily fetched by Uncle John, had
+reached her room, she had been already dead--smiling a little, as if the
+last dream which had come to haunt her sleep had been a pleasant one.
+
+"Joy killed her," the nurse declared. Certainly she lay as if very
+content and untroubled.
+
+"I believe," Miss Abercrombie told Joan, "that she was only staying
+alive to see you. My dear, you must not blame yourself in any way; she
+is so much better out of it all."
+
+"No, I don't blame myself," Joan answered. "We had made friends before
+she died; there isn't a wall between us any longer."
+
+The villagers ransacked their gardens to send flowers to the funeral.
+Aunt Janet's grave was heaped up with them, but in a day or two they
+withered, and old Jim carried them away on his leaf heap. After that
+every week Joan took down just a handful and laid them where she
+thought the closed hands would be, and, because in so doing she seemed
+to draw a little closer to Aunt Janet, and through Aunt Janet to the
+great God beyond, her thoughts would turn into prayer as she stood by
+the grave. "Dear God, keep him always safe," she would whisper. Then
+like a formless flash of light the word "England" would steal across her
+prayer; she did not need to put the feeling into words; just like an
+offering she laid it before her thought of God and knew its meaning
+would be understood. So thousands of men and women pray, brought by a
+sense of their own helplessness in this great struggle near to the
+throne of God. And always the name of England whispers across their
+prayers.
+
+Just when the battle of the Marne was at its turning-point Dick got his
+orders to go. He was given under a week to get ready in, the unit, a
+field hospital, was to start on Saturday and the order came on Monday.
+One more day had to be put in at the recruiting depot; he could not
+leave them in the lurch; Tuesday he spent getting his kit together,
+Wednesday evening saw him down at Sevenoaks.
+
+As once before, Mabel was at the station to meet him. "It's come, then,"
+she said. "Tom is wild with envy. Age, you know, limits him to a
+volunteer home defence league."
+
+"Bad luck," answered Dick. "Of course I am very bucked to be really
+going, Mabel. It is not enlivening to sit and pass recruits all day
+long."
+
+"No," she agreed. "One wants to be up and doing. I hope I am not awfully
+disloyal or dreadfully selfish, but I cannot help being glad that my
+baby is a baby. Mother has knitted countless woollies for you"--she
+changed the subject abruptly; "it has added to poor Tom's discontent. He
+has to try on innumerable sleeping-helmets and wind-mufflers round his
+neck to see if they are long enough. Yesterday he talked rather
+dramatically of enlisting as a stretcher-bearer and going, out with
+you, but they wouldn't have him, would they?"
+
+Dick laughed, but he could realize the bitterness of the other man's
+position when Tom spoke to him that night over their port wine.
+
+"Mabel is so pleased at keeping both her men under her wing," he
+confided, "that she doesn't at all realize how galling it is to be out
+of things. I would give most things, except Mabel and the boy, to be ten
+years younger."
+
+"Still, you have Mabel and the boy," Dick reminded him. "It comes
+awfully hard on the women having to give up their men."
+
+"That's beyond the point," Tom answered. "And bless you, don't you know
+the women are proud to do it?"
+
+"But pride doesn't mend a broken life," Dick tried to argue against his
+own conviction.
+
+Tom shook his head. "It helps somehow," he said. "Mabel was talking to
+some woman in the village yesterday, who has sent three sons to the war,
+and whose eldest, who is a married man and did not go, died last week.
+'I am almost ashamed of him, Mum,' the woman told Mabel; 'It is not as
+if he had been killed at the war.' Oh, well, what's the use of grousing;
+here I am, and here I stick; but if the Germans come over, I'll have a
+shot at them whatever regulations a grandmotherly Government may take
+for our protection. And you're all right, my lad, you are not leaving a
+woman behind you."
+
+That night, after he had gone up to his own room, the thought of Joan
+came to haunt Dick. For two months he had not let himself think of her;
+work and other interests had more or less crowded her out of his heart.
+But the sudden, though long expected, call to action brought him, so to
+speak, to the verge of his own feeling. Other things fell away; he was
+face to face once again with the knowledge that he loved her, and that
+one cannot even starve love to death. He wanted her, he needed her; what
+did other things, such as anger and hurt pride, count against that. He
+had only kissed her once in his life, and the sudden, passionate hunger
+for the touch of her lips shook his heart to a prompt knowledge of the
+truth. He must see her again before he left, for it might be that death
+would find him out there. War had seemed more of a game to begin with;
+that first evening when he had shouted with the others round Trafalgar
+Square he had not connected War with Death, but now it seemed as if they
+walked hand in hand. He could not die without first seeing Joan again.
+
+He thought of writing her a short note asking her to be in when he
+called, but the post from Jarvis Hall did not go out till after twelve;
+he could get to London quicker himself. After breakfast he told Mabel
+that he found he had to go away for the day.
+
+"Something you have forgotten--couldn't you write for it, Dick?" she
+asked. "It seems such a shame, because we shall only have one more day
+of you."
+
+"No," he answered; he did not lift his eyes to look at her. "As a matter
+of fact it is somebody that I must see."
+
+He had not written about or mentioned Joan since he had gone away from
+Sevenoaks last; Mabel had hoped the episode was forgotten. It came to
+her suddenly that it was Joan he was speaking of, and she remembered
+Fanny's long, breathless explanation and the girl's rather pathetic
+belief that she would do something to help. She could not, however, say
+anything to him before the others.
+
+"Will the eleven-thirty do for you?" Tom was asking. "Because I have got
+to take the car in then."
+
+"It seems a little unreasonable, Dick," Mrs. Grant put in. She had not
+been the best of friends with him since their violent scene together;
+her voice took on a querulous tone when she spoke to him. "Who can there
+be in London, that you suddenly find you must see?" She, too, for the
+moment, was thinking of the outrageous girl.
+
+"I am sorry," Dick answered. "It is my own fault for not having gone
+before. I'll try and get back to-morrow."
+
+Mabel caught him afterwards alone on his way out to the garden to smoke
+a pipe. She slipped a hand through his arm and went with him.
+
+"Mother is upset," she confided. "I don't think she can be awfully well;
+just lately she cries very easily."
+
+"She always used to"--Dick's voice was not very sympathetic. "Do you
+remember how angry I was at the way she cried when father died?"
+
+"Yes," Mabel nodded. "All the same, she does love you, Dick; it is a
+funny sort of love, perhaps, but as she gets older it seems to me that
+she gets softer, less selfish. And, Dick, I think she feels--as indeed I
+do, too--that you have grown away from us. It is not the War, though
+that takes men from us women, too; it is more just as if we were out of
+sympathy with one another. Are we?"
+
+"What a funny thought." Dick smiled down at her. "There has never been,
+as you know, much sympathy between mother and myself. But for you,
+Mabel, things will always be the same between us. I trust you with
+everything I have."
+
+"And yet you aren't quite trusting me now," she answered. "You are going
+up to London to see this girl, aren't you, Dick?--and all this time you
+have never written or spoken to me about her."
+
+"I have been trying to forget," he confessed. "I thought, because of
+something she did to me, that I was strong enough to shut her outside my
+life. But last night the old battle began again in my mind, and I know
+that I must see her before I go out. It is more than probable, Mabel,
+that I shall not come back. I can't go out into the darkness without
+seeing her again."
+
+Mabel's hand tightened on his arm. "You mustn't say that, Dick," she
+whispered. "You have got to come back."
+
+They walked in silence and still Mabel debated the question in her mind.
+Should she stand out of events, and let them, shape themselves? If Dick
+went to London and found Joan gone, what would he do then? Perhaps he
+would not see Fanny and the landlady would not be able to tell him where
+Joan was. Wrotham would be the last place in which he would look for
+her, and on Saturday he was leaving for the front. It was only just for
+a second that her mind wavered; she had initially too straight a nature
+for deceit.
+
+"Dick," she said, coming to a standstill and looking up at him, "you
+needn't go to London. Miss Rutherford"--she hesitated on the
+word--"Joan, is back at Wrotham."
+
+"At Wrotham?" he repeated, staring at her.
+
+"Yes," she answered, "Old Miss Rutherford died two months ago. They had
+sent for Joan; I believe she arrived the day her aunt died, and she has
+stayed there ever since. Once or twice I have met her out with Colonel
+Rutherford. No, wait"--she hurried on, once she had begun. "There is
+something else I must tell you. I went, you know, to see her in London,
+but I found that she had left. As I was coming away I met the other
+girl--I cannot remember her name, but she came here to tea--she insisted
+on my going back with her; she had something she wanted to tell me about
+Joan. It was a long, rather jumbled story, Dick; only two facts stand
+out of it. One was that the baby was never born; Joan was in some sort
+of accident when she first went back to London; and the other thing was
+that this girl wanted me to use my influence to persuade you that Joan
+really loved you; that what had angered you that night was all a
+mistake." She broke off short, and began again quickly. "I did not
+promise, Dick; in fact I told the girl I would do nothing to interfere.
+'If he can find his happiness anywhere else I shall be glad,' I said.
+And that is what I felt. I don't try and excuse myself; I never wanted
+you to marry her if you could forget her, and, Dick, I almost hoped you
+had--I was not going to remind you."
+
+"I see," said Dick. His pipe had gone out. He lit it again slowly and
+methodically. "Mabel," he said suddenly, "if I can persuade Joan to
+marry me before I go out, will you be nice to her as my wife?"
+
+"You can't marry her, Dick," Mabel remonstrated, "there isn't time. But
+if you will trust me again beyond this, I promise to be as nice to her
+as you would like me to be."
+
+"But I can, and what's more, I will," Dick answered. "I've
+shilly-shallied long enough. If she'll have me, and it would serve me
+jolly well right if she turned me down--it shall be a special licence at
+a registry office on Saturday morning. My train doesn't leave till
+two-thirty." He stood up very tall and straight. Mabel thought she had
+never seen him look so glad to be alive. "And now," he added, "I am
+going straight across to ask her. Wish me luck, Mabel."
+
+She stood up, too, and put both her hands on his. "You aren't angry with
+me?" she whispered. "Dick, from the bottom of my heart, I do wish you
+luck, as you call it."
+
+"Angry? Lord bless you, no!" he said, and suddenly he bent and kissed
+her. "You've argued about it, Mabel, but then I always knew you would
+argue. I trust you to be good to her after I'm gone; what more can I
+say?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX
+
+    "But love is the great amulet which makes the World a Garden."
+
+                                             ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.
+
+
+Colonel Rutherford and Joan had had breakfast early that morning, for
+Uncle John was going to London to attend some big meeting, at which,
+much to his own secret gratification, he had been asked to speak. He
+rehearsed the greater part of what he was going to say to Joan during
+breakfast, and on their way down to the station. He had long ago
+forgiven, or forgotten, which was more probable still, Joan's exile from
+his good graces. After Aunt Janet's funeral, when Joan had spoken to
+him rather nervously, suggesting her return to London, he had stared at
+her with unfeigned astonishment.
+
+"Back to London," he had said, "whatever for?"
+
+"To get some more work to do," Joan suggested.
+
+His shaggy eyebrows drew together in a frown. "Preposterous notion," he
+answered. "I never did agree with it. So long as a girl has a home, what
+does she want to work for? Besides, now your aunt is not here, who is
+going to look after the house and things?"
+
+The question seemed unanswerable, and since he had apparently forgiven
+the past, why should she remind him? She realized, too, that he needed
+her. She wrote asking Fanny to send on her things, and settled down to
+try and fill her mind and heart, as much as possible, with the daily
+round of small duties which are involved in the keeping of a house.
+
+This morning on her way back from the station, having seen Uncle John
+into his train for London, she let fat Sally walk a lot of the way. The
+country seemed to be asleep; for miles all round she could see across
+field after field, not a creature moving, not a soul in sight, only a
+little dust round a bend of the road showed where a motor-car had just
+passed. It occurred to her that her life had been just like that; the
+quiet, seeming, non-existence of the country; a flashing past of life
+which left its cloud of dust behind, and then the quiet closing round
+her again.
+
+    "The daily round, the common task,
+     Shall furnish all we need to ask."
+
+She hummed it under her breath.
+
+    "Room to deny ourselves--"
+
+Perhaps that was the lesson that she had needed to learn, for in the old
+days her watchword had been:
+
+    "Room to fulfil myself."
+
+If it was not for Uncle John now she would have liked to have gone back
+to London and thrown herself into some sort of work. Women would be
+needed before long, the papers said, to do the work of the men who must
+be sent to the firing-line. But Uncle John was surely the work to her
+hand; she would do it with what heart she had, even though the long
+hours of sewing or knitting gave her too much time to think.
+
+Sally having been handed over to the stable-boy, Joan betook herself
+into the dining-room. Thursday was the day on which the flowers were
+done; Mary had already spread the table with newspaper, and collected
+the vases from all over the house. They had been cleaned and fresh water
+put in them; she was allowed to do as little work as possible, but the
+empty flower-basket and the scissors stood waiting at her hand. The
+gardener would really have preferred to have done the flower-cutting
+himself, but Aunt Janet had always insisted upon doing it, and Joan
+carried on the custom. There were only a few late roses left, but she
+gathered an armful of big white daisies.
+
+As she came back from the hall Joan saw Dick waiting for her. The maid
+had let him in and gone to find "Miss Joan." Strangely enough the first
+thought that came into her mind was not a memory of the last time that
+they had met or a wonder as to why he was here; she could see that he
+was in khaki, and to her it meant only one thing. He was going to the
+front, he had come to say good-bye to her before he went. All the colour
+left her face, she stared at him, the basket swinging on her arm, the
+daisies clutched against her black dress.
+
+"Joan," Dick said quickly; he came towards her. "Joan, didn't the maid
+find you, didn't they tell you I was here? What's the matter, dear; why
+are you frightened?"
+
+He took the flowers and the basket from her and laid them down on the
+hall table. Mary coming back at the moment, saw them standing hand in
+hand, and ran to the kitchen to tell the others that Miss Joan's young
+man had come at last.
+
+"Isn't there somewhere you can take me where we can talk?" Dick was
+saying. "I have such an awful lot to say to you."
+
+"You have come to say good-bye," Joan answered. She looked up at him,
+her lips quivered a little. "You are going out there."
+
+Then he knew why she had been afraid, and behind his pity he was glad.
+
+"Joan," he whispered again, and quite simply she drew closer to him and
+laid her cheek against his coat, "does it really matter to you, dear?"
+
+His arms were round her, yet they did not hold her as tightly as she
+clung to him. "Must you go?" she said breathlessly. "There are such
+hundreds of others; must you go?"
+
+Dick could not find any words to put the great beating of his heart
+into, so he just held her close and laid his lips, against her hair.
+
+"Take me into that little room where I first saw you," he said
+presently. "I have remembered it often, Joan; I have always wanted to
+come back to it, and have you explain things to me there."
+
+She drew a little away and looked up at him. "What you thought of me the
+other night"--she spoke of it is yesterday, the months in between had
+slipped awry--"wasn't true, Dick. I----"
+
+He drew her to him quickly again, and this time he kissed her lips.
+"Let's forget it," he said softly. "I have only got to-day and
+to-morrow, I don't want to remember what a self-satisfied prig I was."
+
+"Is it to be as soon as that?" she asked. "And I shall only have had you
+for so short a time."
+
+"It is a short time," Dick assented. "But I am going to make the best
+of it; you wait till you have heard my plans."
+
+He laughed at her because she pointed out that the flowers could not be
+left to die, but he helped her to arrange them in the tall, clean vases.
+They won back to a brief, almost childish, happiness over the work, but
+when the last vase had been finished and carried back to its proper
+place, he caught hold of her hands again.
+
+"Now," he said, "let's talk real hard, honest sense; but first, where's
+my room?"
+
+She led him silently to the little room behind the drawing-room. She had
+taken it over again since her return; the pictures she liked best were
+on the walls, her books lay about on the table. The same armchair stood
+by the window; he could almost see her as he had seen her that first
+morning, her great brown eyes, wakened to newfound fear, staring into
+the garden.
+
+"You shall sit here," he said, leading her to the chair. It rather
+worried him to see the dumb misery in her eyes. "And I shall sit down on
+the floor at your feet. I can hold your hands and I can see your face,
+and your whole adorable self is near to me, that's what my heart has
+been hungering for. Now--will you marry me the day after to-morrow,
+before I go?"
+
+"Dick," she said quickly; she was speaking out of the pain in her heart,
+"why do you ask me? Why have you come back? Haven't you been fighting
+against it all this time because you knew that I--because some part of
+you doesn't want to marry me?"
+
+His eyes never wavered from hers, but he lifted the hands he held to his
+lips and kissed them. "When I saw you again in that theatre in
+Sevenoaks," he said, "it is perfectly true, one side of me argued with
+the other. When I came to your rooms and found that other man there,
+green jealousy just made me blind, and pride--which was distinctly
+jarred, Joan"--he tried to wake an answering smile in her eyes--"kept
+me away all this time."
+
+"Then why have you come back?" she repeated.
+
+"Because I love you," he answered. "It is a very hackneyed word, dear,
+but it means a lot."
+
+"But it doesn't always stay--love," she said. "Supposing if afterwards
+those thoughts came back to worry you. What would it mean to me if I saw
+them in your eyes?"
+
+"There isn't any reason why they should. Listen, dear"--he let go her
+hands and sat up very straight. "Let's go over it carefully and
+sensibly, and lay this bugbear of pain once and for all. Before you knew
+me or I knew you, you loved somebody else. Perhaps you only thought you
+loved him; anyway, I hope so; I am jealous enough of him as it is. Dear,
+I don't ask you to explain why you gave yourself to this man, whether it
+was impulse, or ignorance, or curiosity. So many things go to make up
+our lives; it is only to ourselves that we are really accountable. After
+to-day we won't dig over the past again. At the time it did not prevent
+me falling in love with you; for two years I thought about you
+sometimes, dreamed of you often. I made love to a good many other women
+in between; don't think that I show up radiantly white in comparison to
+you; but I loved just you all the time. I saw you in London once, the
+day after I landed, and I made up my mind then to find out where you
+lived, and to try and persuade you to marry me."
+
+He waited a minute or two; his eyes had gone out to the garden; he could
+see the tall daisies of which Joan had carried an armful waving against
+the dark wall behind them. Then he looked back at her very frankly.
+
+"It is no use trying to pretend," he said, "that I was not shocked when
+I first saw you dancing. You see, we men have got into a habit of
+dividing women into two classes, and you had suddenly, so it seemed to
+me, got into the wrong one. Dear little girl, I don't want to hurt
+you"--he put his hand on her knee and drew a little closer, so that she
+could feel him leaning against her. "I am just telling you all the
+stupid thoughts that were in me, so that you can at last understand that
+I love you. It only took me half a night to realize the mistake I had
+made, and then I set about--you may have noticed it--to make you love
+me. When I came up to London I had made up my mind that you did love me;
+I was walking as it were on air. It was a very nasty shock that
+afternoon in your room, Joan; I went away from it feeling as if the end
+of the world had come."
+
+"Oh, I know, I know," she said quickly. "And I had meant it to hurt you.
+I wanted to shake you out of what I thought was only a dream. I had not
+the courage to tell you, and yet, that is not quite true. I was afraid
+if I told you, and if you saw that I loved you at the same time, you
+would not let it make any difference. I did not want you to spoil your
+life, Dick."
+
+"You dear girl!" he answered. "On Monday," he went on slowly, "I got my
+orders for France. They are what I had been wanting and hoping for ever
+since the War started, and yet, till they came, funnily enough, I never
+realized what they meant. It seems strange to talk of death, or even to
+think of it, when one is young and so horribly full of life as I am--yet
+somehow this brings it near to me. It is not a question of facing it
+with the courage of which the papers write such a lot; the truth is,
+that one looks at it just for a moment, and then ordinary things push it
+aside. Next to death, Joan, there is only one big thing in the world,
+and that is Love. I had to see you again before I went; I had to find
+out if you loved me. I wanted to hold you, so that the feel of you
+should go with me in my dreams; to kiss you, so that the touch of your
+lips should stay on mine, even if death did put a cold hand across them.
+He is not going to"--he laughed suddenly and stood up, drawing her into
+his arms--"your face shall go before me, dear, and in the end I shall
+come home to you."
+
+"What can I say?" Joan whispered, "You know I love you. Take me then,
+Dick, and do as you wish with me."
+
+They talked over the problem of his people and her people after they had
+won back to a certain degree of sense, and Dick told Joan of how Mabel
+had wished him luck just as he started out.
+
+"You are going to be great friends," he said, "and Mother will come
+round too, she always does."
+
+"I am less afraid of your Mother than I am of Mabel," Joan confessed. "I
+don't believe Mabel will ever like me."
+
+Dick stayed to lunch and waited on afterwards to see Colonel Rutherford.
+He had extracted a promise from Joan to marry him on Saturday by special
+licence. He would have to go up to town to see about it himself the next
+day; he wanted to leave everything arranged and settled for her first.
+He and Joan walked down to the woods after lunch, and Joan tried to tell
+him of her first year in London, and of some of the motives that had
+driven her. He listened in silence; he was conscious more of jealousy
+than anything else; he was glad when she passed on to talk of her later
+struggles in London; of Shamrock House, of Rose Brent and Fanny.
+
+"And that man I met at your place," he asked. "You did not even think
+you loved him, did you, Joan?"
+
+"No," she answered quickly, "never, Dick, and he had never been to my
+room before. He just pretended he had been to annoy you because I
+suppose he saw it would hurt me."
+
+Colonel Rutherford arrived for tea very tired, but jubilant at the
+success of the meeting, which had brought in a hundred recruits. He did
+not remember anything about Dick, but was delighted to see him because
+he was in uniform. The news of the other's early departure to the front
+filled Colonel Rutherford with envy.
+
+"What wouldn't I give to be your age, young man," he grunted.
+
+Joan slipped away and left them after tea, and it was then that Dick
+broached the subject of their marriage.
+
+"I have loved her for two years," he said simply, "and I have persuaded
+her to marry me before I leave on Saturday. There is no reason why I
+should not marry, and if I die she will get my small amount of money,
+and a pension."
+
+Colonel Rutherford went rather an uncomfortable shade of red. "You said
+just now," he said, "that you were the doctor here two years ago. Did
+you know my niece in those days?"
+
+"I only saw her once," Dick admitted. "I was called in professionally,
+but I loved her from the moment I saw her, sir."
+
+"God bless my soul!" murmured Colonel Rutherford. A faint fragrance from
+his own romance seemed to come to him from out the past. "Then you know
+all about what I was considering it would be my painful duty to tell
+you."
+
+"Yes," Dick answered, "I know."
+
+The other man came suddenly to him and held out his hand. "I don't know
+you," he said, "but I like you. We were very hard on Joan two years ago;
+I have often thought of it since; I should like to see a little
+happiness come into her life and I believe you will be able to give it
+her. I am glad."
+
+"Thank you," Dick said. They shook hands quite gravely as men will.
+"Then I may marry her on Saturday?"
+
+"Why, certainly, boy," the other answered; "And she shall live with me
+till you come back."
+
+"You are very lucky, Joan," he said to his niece after Dick had gone
+away. "He is an extremely nice chap, that. I hope you realize how lucky
+you are."
+
+Joan did not answer him in so many words. She just kissed him good-night
+and ran out of the room. To-night of all nights she needed Aunt Janet;
+she threw a shawl round her shoulders presently and stole out. The
+cemetery lay just across the road, she could slip into it without
+attracting any attention. This time she brought no gift of flowers, only
+she knelt by the grave, and whispered her happiness in the prayer she
+prayed.
+
+"God keep him always, and bring him back to me."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXI
+
+    "God gave us grace to love you
+       Men whom our hearts hold dear;
+     We too have faced the battle
+       Striving to hide our fear.
+
+    "God gave us strength to send you,
+       Courage to let you go;
+     All that it meant to lose you
+       Only our sad hearts know.
+
+    "Yet by your very manhood
+       Hold we your honour fast.
+     God shall give joy to England
+       When you come home at last."
+
+
+Not till she felt Mabel's soft warm lips on her cheek and knew herself
+held in the other's arms, did Joan wake to the fact that the marriage
+was finished and that she was Dick's wife. All the morning she had moved
+and answered questions and smiled, when other people smiled, in a sort
+of trance, out of which she was afraid to waken. The only fact that
+stood out very clear was that Dick was going away in the afternoon;
+every time she saw a clock it showed that the afternoon was so many
+minutes nearer.
+
+"You have got to help me to be brave," she had said to Dick the night
+before. "Other women let their men go, and make no outward fuss. I don't
+want to be different to them."
+
+"And you won't be," he had answered, kissing her. "If you feel like
+crying, just look at me, and as your lord and master, I'll frown at you
+to show that I don't approve."
+
+He himself was in the wildest, most hilarious of spirits. As he had said
+to Joan, the thought of death had only touched upon his mind for a
+second; now the mere idea of it seemed ridiculous. He was going out to
+help in a great fight, and he was going to marry Joan. She would be
+waiting for him when he came back; what could a man want more?
+
+The Rutherfords came up on Friday to spend the night before the wedding
+in town, and in the evening Joan and Dick went to a theatre. It was,
+needless to say, his idea, but he did it with a notion that it would
+cheer Joan up. If you want to know real misery, sit through a musical
+comedy with someone you love more than the whole world next to you, and
+with the knowledge that he is going to the War the next day in your
+heart. Joan thought of it every moment. When the curtain was up and the
+audience in darkness, Dick would slip his hand into hers and hold it,
+but his eyes followed the events on the stage, and he could laugh quite
+cheerfully at the funny man's antics. Joan never even looked at them;
+she sat with her eyes on Dick, just watching him all the time. When they
+had driven back to the hotel at which the Rutherfords were staying, and
+in the taxi Dick had taken her into his arms and rather fiercely made
+her swear that she loved him, that she was glad to be marrying him, some
+shadow from her anguish had touched on him, it seemed he could not let
+her go. "Damn to-morrow!" he said hoarsely, and held her so close that
+the pressure hurt, yet she was glad of the pain as it came from him.
+
+She could not ask him into the hotel, for they had no private
+sitting-room, so they said good-night to each other on the steps, with
+the taxi driver and the hotel porter watching them.
+
+"To-morrow, then, at twelve," Dick had whispered. "But I am going to
+bring Mabel round before then; she gets up at about eleven, I think."
+
+"To-morrow," Joan answered; her eyes would not let him go.
+
+They stood staring at each other for a minute or two while the taxi-cab
+driver busied himself with the engine of his car, and the hall porter
+walked discreetly out of sight. Then Dick lifted his hand quickly to the
+salute and turned away.
+
+"Drive like hell!" he said to the man. "Anywhere you please, but end me
+up at the Junior Conservative Club."
+
+"Couldn't even kiss her," communed the man to himself. "That's the worst
+of being a toff. Can't kiss your girl if anyone else happens to be
+about."
+
+Mabel had been very nice to Joan the next morning. She had buried all
+thoughts of jealousy and dismay, and when she looked into the other
+girl's eyes she forgave her everything and was only intensely sorry for
+her. Mrs. Grant had, very fortunately, as Dick said, stuck to her
+opinion and refused to have anything to do with the wedding. She had
+said good-bye to Dick on Friday morning with a wild outburst of tears,
+but he could not really feel that it meant very much to her.
+
+"Mother will have forgotten in a week that she disapproved," Mabel told
+Joan. "You must very often come and spend the day with us."
+
+Then they had driven down to the registry office, all four of them, and
+in a dark, rather dingy little room, a man with a curiously irritating
+voice had read aloud something to them from a book. Now they stood
+outside in the sunshine again, Mabel had kissed Joan, and Uncle John was
+blinking at her out of old eyes that showed a suspicion of tears in
+them. A big clock opposite told her the time was a quarter to one; in an
+hour and three-quarters Dick would be gone.
+
+They had lunch in a little private room at a restaurant close to
+Victoria Station. Joan tried to eat, and tried to laugh and talk with
+the others, because Mabel had whispered to her on the way in: "You've
+got to help Dick through the next hour, it isn't going to be easy for
+him." And that had made Joan look at him with new eyes, and she could
+see that his face was very white, and that he seemed almost afraid to
+look at her.
+
+After lunch Mabel and Colonel Rutherford went on ahead and left the two
+young people to say their good-bye alone. When they had gone Dick pushed
+the things in front of him on the table aside, and laid his head down on
+his hands. "My God!" she heard him say, "I wish I had not got to go."
+
+He had been so pleased before, so excited over his different
+preparations, so wildly keen to be really on the move at last. Joan ran
+to him quickly; kneeling on the floor by his side, throwing her arms
+around him. Her own fears were forgotten in her desire to make him brave
+again.
+
+"It won't be for long, Dick," she whispered. "I know something right
+inside my heart tells me that you will come back. It is only like
+putting aside our happiness for a little. Dear, you would be wretched if
+you could not go. Just having me would not make up to you for that."
+
+He turned and caught her to him quickly. "If I had had you," he said
+harshly, "it would be different. It would make going so much easier."
+
+"You will come back," she answered softly. Her eyes held his, their
+hearts beat close and fast against each other.
+
+"It seems," he said a minute or two later, "that it is you who are
+helping me not to make a fuss, and not the other way about as we
+arranged." He stood up, slowly lifting her with him. "It is time we were
+off, Joan," he said. "And upon my soul, I need some courage, little
+girl. What can you do for me?"
+
+"Well, if I cry," suggested Joan, her head a little on one side--she
+must be cheerful, she realized; it was funny, but in this she could be
+stronger than he, and she must be for his sake--"I am sure you would get
+so annoyed that the rest would be forgotten."
+
+"If I see you cry," he threatened, "I shall get out even after the train
+has started, and that will mean all sorts of slurs on my reputation."
+
+They walked across to Victoria Station and came in at once to a scene of
+indescribable noise and confusion. Besides Dick's unit there was a
+regiment going. The men stood lined up in the big square yard of the
+station. Some had women with them, wives and mothers and sweethearts;
+children clung to the women's skirts, unnoticed and frightened into
+quietness by the sight and sound of their mothers' grief. Railway
+officials, looking very important and frightfully overworked, ran in and
+out of the crowd. The train was standing at the platform, part of it
+already full, nearly every window had its little group of anxious-faced
+women, trying to say good-bye to their respective relatives in the
+carriage.
+
+Dick and Joan walked the length of the train, and found that Dick's man
+had stowed away his things and reserved a place for his master in one of
+the front carriages. Then Colonel Rutherford and Mabel joined them and
+they all talked, trying to keep up an animated conversation as to the
+weather; would the Channel crossing be very rough; what chance was there
+of his going to Boulogne instead of to Havre; Joan stood close to Dick,
+just touching him; there was something rather pathetic in the way she
+did not attempt to close her hand upon the roughness of his coat, but
+was content to feel it brushing against her. The regimental band had
+struck up "Tipperary"; the men were being marshalled to take their
+places in the train. Joan wondered if the band played so loud and so
+persistently to drown the noise of the women's crying. One young wife
+had hysterics, and had to be carried away screaming. They saw the
+husband, he had fallen out of the ranks to try and hold the girl when
+the crying first began, now he stood and stared after her as they
+carried her away. Quite a boy, very white about the face, and with
+misery in his eyes. Joan felt a wave of resentment against the woman;
+she had no right, because she loved him, to make his going so much the
+harder to bear.
+
+A porter ran along the platform calling out, "Take your seats, please,
+take your seats." Uncle John was shaking hands and saying good-bye to
+Dick, "I'll look after her for you," Joan heard him say. Then Mabel
+moved between them for a second, and pulling down Dick's head, kissed
+him. After that, it seemed, she was left alone with Dick; Colonel
+Rutherford and Mabel had gone away. How desperately her hand for the
+second clutched on to the piece of his coat that was near to her! She
+could not let him go, could not, could not. The engine whistle emitted a
+long thin squeak, the soldiers at the back of the train had started
+singing the refrain of "Tipperary." Just for a second his arms were
+round her, his lips had brushed against hers. That was all it amounted
+to, but she had looked up at him and she had seen the need in his eyes.
+
+"Good-bye," she whispered. There was not a vestige of tears or fright in
+her voice. "You will be back soon, Dick. It is never good-bye."
+
+"No," he agreed. "Never good-bye."
+
+Then he had gone; not a minute too soon, for the train had already
+started. She could not even see his face at the window, a great
+blackness had come over her eyes, but she stood very straight held,
+waving and smiling.
+
+A crowd of the soldiers' wives ran past her up the platform, trying to
+catch on to the hands held out to them from the windows. The men cheered
+and sang and sang again. It could only have been one or two seconds that
+she stood there, then slowly the blackness lifted from her eyes. A word
+had risen in her heart, she said it almost aloud; the sound of it pushed
+aside her tears and brought her a strange comfort. "England." It was the
+name that had floated at the back of her prayers always when she prayed
+for Dick. She was glad that he had gone, even the misery in her heart
+could not flood out that gladness: "Who dies, if England lives?"
+
+Mabel was standing near her and slipped her hand into hers. "Come away,
+dear," she heard Mabel say; "Colonel Rutherford has got a taxi for us."
+
+Joan was grateful to Mabel. She realized suddenly that the other woman,
+who had also loved Dick, had been content to stand aside at the last and
+leave them alone. She turned to her like a child turns for comfort to
+someone whom instinctively it knows it can trust.
+
+"I have been good," she said, "haven't I? I haven't shed a tear. Dick
+said I wasn't to, and, Mabel, you know, I am glad that he has gone.
+There are some things that matter more than just loving a person, aren't
+there?"
+
+"Honour, and duty, and the soul of man," Mabel answered. She laughed, a
+little strange sound that held tears within it. "Oh, yes, Joan, you are
+right to be glad that he has gone. It will make the future so much more
+worth having."
+
+"Yes," Joan whispered. Her eyes looked out over the crowded station; the
+little groups of weeping women; the sadder faces of those who did not
+weep and yet were hopeless. Her own eyes were full of great faith and a
+radiant promise. "He will come back, I know he will come back," she
+said.
+
+Outside the band played ceaselessly and untiringly to drown the sound of
+the women's tears:
+
+    "It's a long way to Tipperary,
+       It's a long way to go;
+     It's a long way to Tipperary
+       To the dearest girl I know.
+
+    "Farewell, Piccadilly, farewell, Leicester Square,
+     It's a long, long way to Tipperary
+     But my heart's right there."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+THE END
+
+
+_Printed at The Chapel River Press, Kingston, Surrey._
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Transcriber's note
+
+
+Minor punctuation errors have been corrected without notice. The
+following words were spelled in two different ways and were not changed:
+
+arm-chair, armchair
+ball-room, ballroom
+over-worked, overworked
+
+A few obvious typographical errors have been corrected and are listed
+below.
+
+Page 11: "older women were belating" changed to "older women were debating".
+
+Page 22: "settled the had sat" changed to "settled she had sat".
+
+Page 32: "at firs thought was love" changed to "at first thought was love".
+
+Page 51: "must be ome explanation" changed to "must be some explanation".
+
+Page 53: "ushered in M Jarr.vis" changed to "ushered in Mr. Jarvis".
+
+Page 59: "talking to each other in whsipers" changed to "talking to each
+         other in whispers"
+
+Page 81: "Half-olay out," changed to "Half-way out,".
+
+Page 107: "the crowded steeets" changed to "the crowded streets".
+
+Page 140: "ladies to go ground" changed to "ladies to go around".
+
+Page 151: "found her downstars" changed to "found her downstairs".
+
+Page 162: "s not to be believed" changed to "was not to be believed".
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of To Love, by Margaret Peterson
+
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+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of To Love, by Margaret Peterson
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: To Love
+
+Author: Margaret Peterson
+
+Release Date: September 3, 2008 [EBook #26519]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TO LOVE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by David Clarke, Carla Foust and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+
+
+<div class="transnote">
+
+<h3>Transcriber's note</h3>
+<p> A Table of Contents has been created for the HTML version.
+Minor punctuation errors have been corrected without notice. Several
+words were spelled in two different ways and not corrected; they
+are listed at the end of this book. A few obvious typographical errors have
+    been corrected, and they are indicated with
+    a <a class="correction" title="like this" href="#tnotes">mouse-hover</a>
+    and are also listed at the
+    <a href="#tnotes">end</a>.
+</p>
+</div>
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><i>"To Love</i>"</h2>
+
+<h4>"<i>To love is the great amulet which makes<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 0.5em;">the world a garden.</span></i>"</h4>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><i><b>R. L. STEVENSON</b></i></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span></p>
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+
+<h1>"<i>TO LOVE</i>"</h1>
+
+<h2><i>By Margaret Peterson : Author of</i></h2>
+
+<h3>"<i>The Lure of the Little Drum," "Tony Bellew," etc.</i></h3>
+<p><br /><br /></p>
+<h3><i>LONDON: HURST AND BLACKETT, LTD.</i></h3>
+<h3><i>PATERNOSTER HOUSE, E.C. :: :: 1917</i></h3>
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span></p>
+<!-- Autogenerated TOC. Modify or delete as required. -->
+<h4>
+<a href="#CHAPTER_I"><b>CHAPTER I</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_II"><b>CHAPTER II</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_III"><b>CHAPTER III</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_IV"><b>CHAPTER IV</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_V"><b>CHAPTER V</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_VI"><b>CHAPTER VI</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_VII"><b>CHAPTER VII</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_VIII"><b>CHAPTER VIII</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_IX"><b>CHAPTER IX</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_X"><b>CHAPTER X</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XI"><b>CHAPTER XI</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XII"><b>CHAPTER XII</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XIII"><b>CHAPTER XIII</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XIV"><b>CHAPTER XIV</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XV"><b>CHAPTER XV</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XVI"><b>CHAPTER XVI</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XVII"><b>CHAPTER XVII</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XVIII"><b>CHAPTER XVIII</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XIX"><b>CHAPTER XIX</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XX"><b>CHAPTER XX</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XXI"><b>CHAPTER XXI</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XXII"><b>CHAPTER XXII</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XXIII"><b>CHAPTER XXIII</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XXIV"><b>CHAPTER XXIV</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XXV"><b>CHAPTER XXV</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XXVI"><b>CHAPTER XXVI</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XXVII"><b>CHAPTER XXVII</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XXVIII"><b>CHAPTER XXVIII</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XXIX"><b>CHAPTER XXIX</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XXX"><b>CHAPTER XXX</b></a><br />
+<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXI"><b>CHAPTER XXXI</b></a><br />
+</h4>
+<!-- End Autogenerated TOC. -->
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span></p>
+
+<h1>"TO LOVE"</h1>
+
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a>CHAPTER I</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"Oh, but the door that waits a friend<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Swings open to the day.<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;There stood no warder at my gate<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;To bid love stand or stay."</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+<p>"You don't believe in marriage, and I can't afford to marry"&mdash;Gilbert
+Stanning laughed, but the sound was not very mirthful and his eyes, as
+he glanced at his companion, were uneasy and not quite honest. "We are
+the right sort of people to drift together, aren't we, Joan?" His hands
+as he spoke were restless, fidgeting with a piece of string which he
+tied and untied repeatedly.</p>
+
+<p>Joan Rutherford sat very straight in her chair, her eyes looking out in
+front of her. His words had called just the faintest tinge of colour to
+her cheeks. It was not exactly a beautiful face, but it was above
+everything else lovable and appealing. Joan was twenty-three, yet she
+looked still a child; the lines of her face were all a little
+indefinite, except the obstinacy of her chin and the frankness of her
+eyes. Her one claim to beauty, indeed, lay in those eyes; wide,
+innocent, unfathomable, sometimes green, sometimes brown flecked with
+gold. They seemed to hint at tragedy, yet they were far more often
+laughter-filled than anything else. For the rest, Joan was an ordinary
+independent young lady of the twentieth century who had lived in London
+"on her own" for six months.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span></p><p>How her independence had come about is a complicated story. It had not
+been with the approval of her people; the only people she possessed
+being an old uncle and aunt who lived in the country. All Joan's nearer
+relations were dead; had died when she was still a child; Uncle John and
+Aunt Janet had seen to her bringing up. But at twenty-two and a-half
+Joan had suddenly rebelled against the quiet monotony of their home
+life. She had broken it to them gently at first, with an obstinate
+resolve to get her own way at the back of her mind; in the end, as is
+usually the case when youth pits itself against age, she had won the
+day. Uncle John had agreed to a small but adequate allowance, Aunt Janet
+had wept a few rather bitter tears in private, and Joan had come to
+London to train as a secretary, according to herself. They had taken
+rooms for her in the house of a lady Aunt Janet had known in girlhood,
+and there Joan had dutifully remained. It was not very lively, but she
+had a sense of gratitude in her heart towards Aunt Janet which prevented
+her from moving. Joan was not thinking of all this as she sat there, nor
+was she exactly seeing the sweep of grass that spread out in front of
+them, nor the flowering shrubs on every side. Hyde Park was ablaze with
+flowers on this hot summer's day and in addition a whole bed of
+heliotrope was in bloom just behind their chairs. The faint sweet scent
+of the flowers mixed with Joan's thoughts and brought a quick vision of
+Aunt Janet. But more deeply still her mind was struggling with a desire
+to know what exactly it was that swayed her when Gilbert Stanning spoke
+to her, or when&mdash;as more often than not&mdash;he in some way or other
+contrived to touch her. She had met him first at a dance that she had
+been taken to by another girl and she had known him now about four
+months. It was strange and a little disturbing the tumult his eyes waked
+in her heart. The first time he had kissed her, one evening when they
+had been driving home from the theatre in a taxi, she had turned and
+clung to him, because suddenly it had seemed as if the whole world was
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span>sweeping away from her. Gilbert had taken the action to mean that she
+loved him; he had never wavered from that belief since. He possessed
+every spare minute of her days, he kissed her whenever he could, and
+Joan never objected. Only oddly, at moments such as this, her mind would
+suddenly push forward the terse argument:</p>
+
+<p>"Do you love him, or is it just the little animal in you that likes all
+he has to give?"</p>
+
+<p>Joan was often greatly disturbed about what she called the beast side of
+her. During her year in London, under the guidance of another girl far
+older and wiser than herself, she had plunged recklessly into all sorts
+of knowledge, gleaned mostly from books such as Aunt Janet and even
+Uncle John had never heard of, far less read. So Joan knew that there is
+a beast side to all human nature, and she was for ever pausing to probe
+this or that sensation down to its root. Her books had taught her other
+theories too, and very young, very impetuous by nature, Joan rushed to a
+full acceptance of the facts over which older women were
+<a name="corr1" id="corr1"></a><a class="correction" href="#cn1" title="changed from 'belating'">debating</a>. The
+sanctity of marriage, for instance, was a myth invented by man because
+he wished to keep women enslaved. Free love was the only beautiful
+relationship that could exist between the sexes. Frankness and free
+speech between men and women was another rule Joan asserted, in
+pursuance of which she had long since threshed out the complicated
+question of marriage with Gilbert. It was all rather childish and silly,
+yet pathetic beyond the scope of tears, if you looked into Joan's sunlit
+eyes and caught the play of dimples round her mouth. Rather as if you
+were to come suddenly upon a child playing with a live shell.</p>
+
+<p>What Gilbert Stanning thought of it all is another matter; Joan with all
+her book-learned wisdom had not fathomed his character. He was a man
+about thirty-two, good-looking, indolent and selfish. He had just enough
+money to be intensely comfortable, provided he spent it all on himself,
+and Gilbert certainly succeeded in being comfortable. There had been a
+good many women in Gilbert's<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> life of one kind and another, but he had
+never known anyone like Joan before. At times her startling mixture of
+knowledge and innocence amazed him, and she had fascinated him from the
+first. He was a man easily fascinated by the little feminine things in a
+woman. The way Joan's hair grew in curls at the nape of her neck
+fascinated him, the soft red of her mouth, the way the lashes lay like a
+spread-out fan on her cheeks and the quick changing lights and colours
+in those eyes themselves. With Gilbert, when he wanted a thing he
+generally got it, by fair means or foul; for the moment he wanted Joan
+passionately, almost insanely. But the way in which she made the path
+easy for his desire sometimes startled him; he could not make up his
+mind whether she was playing some very deep game at his expense or
+whether she really loved him to the exclusion of all caution.</p>
+
+<p>It was this problem which he had been more or less trying to solve this
+afternoon. At Joan's continued silence he leaned forward and put his
+hand over hers where they lay on her lap.</p>
+
+<p>"What are you dreaming of, little girl?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>The odd flutter which his touch always caused was shaking Joan's heart;
+she tried, however, to face him indifferently, summoning up a smile.</p>
+
+<p>"I was thinking," she corrected, "not dreaming."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, the thoughts, then," asked the man, his fingers moved caressingly
+up and down her hand, "what were they?"</p>
+
+<p>"I was thinking," began Joan slowly; her eyes fell from his and she
+stirred restlessly. "What did you mean just now when you spoke about
+drifting together?" she asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Little Miss Pretence," he whispered, "as if you didn't know what I
+meant. If I were well off," he said suddenly (perhaps for the moment he
+really meant it), "I would make you marry me whether you had new ideas
+about it or not."</p>
+
+<p>"Being well off wouldn't have anything to do with it,"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span> Joan answered,
+"it is more degrading to marry for money than anything else."</p>
+
+<p>"Sometimes I believe you think that we are degrading altogether," the
+man said; he watched the colour creep into her face, "God knows we are
+not much to boast of, and that is the truth."</p>
+
+<p>Joan struggled with the problem in her mind. "There ought not to be
+anything degrading about love," she said finally, and this time it was
+his eyes that fell away from hers.</p>
+
+<p>For a little they sat silent, Joan, for some reason known only to
+herself, fighting against a strong inclination to cry. Gilbert had taken
+away his hands, he sat back in his chair, his feet thrust out, head
+down, eyes glooming at the dust. Joan stole a glance at him and felt a
+sudden intense admiration for the beauty of his clean-cut profile, his
+sleek, well-groomed head. Instinctively she put out a timid hand and
+touched him.</p>
+
+<p>"Are you angry with me about something?" she asked.</p>
+
+<p>It may have been that during that pause Gilbert had been forming a good
+resolution with all that was best in him to keep from spoiling this
+girl's life. Her eyes perhaps had touched on some slumbering chord of
+conscience. Her movement though, the little whispered words, drove all
+thoughts except the ones which centred round his desire from his mind.</p>
+
+<p>"Joan," he said quickly, his hands caught at hers again, "let us stop
+playing this game of make-believe. Let us face the future one way or
+another. I love you, I want you. If you love me, come to me, dear, as
+you say there can be nothing degrading in love. Let us live our lives
+together in the new best way."</p>
+
+<p>It was all clap-trap nonsense and he did not believe a word of it, but
+the force of his passion was unmistakable. It frightened and held Joan.</p>
+
+<p>"You mean&mdash;&mdash;" she whispered.</p>
+
+<p>"I mean that I want you to come and live at my place,"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span> he answered. "I
+have a decent little flat, as you know. That is not living on my money,
+O proud and haughty one"&mdash;he was so sure of his victory that he could
+afford to laugh&mdash;"you shall buy your own food if you like. And you shall
+be free, as free as you are now, and&mdash;I, Joan," his voice thrilled
+through her, "I shall love you and love you and love you till you waken
+to see the world in quite a new light. Joan!"</p>
+
+<p>His face was very close against hers, the scent of the heliotrope had
+grown on the sudden stronger and more piercingly sweet, perhaps because
+the sun had vanished behind the distant line of trees and a little
+breeze from the oncoming night was blowing across the flower-beds
+towards them. The quick-gathering twilight seemed to be shutting them
+in; people passed along the path, young sweethearting couples too happy
+in each other to notice anyone else. The tumult in Joan's mind died down
+and grew very still, a sense of well-being and content invaded her
+heart.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes"&mdash;she spoke the word so softly he hardly heard&mdash;"I'll come,
+Gilbert." Then she threw back her head a little and laughed, gay,
+confident laughter. "It will be rather fun, won't it?" she said.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>CHAPTER II</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"Oh, wisdom never comes when it is gold,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;And the great price we pay for it full worth.<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;We have it only when we are half earth,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Little avails that coinage to the old."</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><span class="smcap"><b>George Meredith.</b></span></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+<p>It was not quite so much "rather fun" as Joan had expected. It had, she
+discovered, its serious and unpleasant side. Serious, because of the
+strange undreamt-of woman that it awoke within her, and unpleasant
+because of the deceit and the telling of lies which Gilbert insisted it
+must<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> involve. Joan hated deceit, she had one of those natures that can
+never be really happy with an unconfessed lie on their mind.</p>
+
+<p>Gilbert won her to do as he thought necessary, first by persuasion and
+then by using the power which he had discovered he could wield over her
+by his touch.</p>
+
+<p>"For my sake, darling," he argued, "it is all right for us because we
+understand each other, but the world would certainly describe me as a
+cad."</p>
+
+<p>So for his sake Joan told Mrs. Thomas, with whom she had been living,
+that she had accepted a residential post as private secretary; packed up
+her boxes and took her departure amidst a shower of good wishes and
+warnings as to how she was to hold her own and not be put upon. To Aunt
+Janet, with a painful twinge of regret, Joan wrote the same lie. She
+wanted to tell the truth to Aunt Janet more even than she wanted to live
+it out aloud to herself. The memory of Aunt Janet's face with its kindly
+deep-set eyes kept her miserable and uncomfortable, and the home letters
+brought no more a feeling of pleasure, only a sense of shame and
+distaste.</p>
+
+<p>How silly it was to connect shame with what she and Gilbert had chosen
+as life! Yet, unfortunately for her peace of mind, the word was
+constantly reverting to her thoughts. "It is the telling lies that I am
+ashamed of," she would argue hotly to herself, and she would shut her
+heart to the still small voice and throw herself because of it with more
+zest than ever into their life together.</p>
+
+<p>Gilbert's flat was high up in one of the top stories of a block of
+buildings which fronts on to Knightsbridge, bright, airy and cheerful.
+Not too big, "Just room for the two of us and we shut the world
+outside," as Gilbert took pleasure in saying. It only consisted of four
+rooms, their bedroom and dressing-room, the sitting-room and Gilbert's
+smoking-room, a place that he talked vaguely of working in and where he
+could entertain his men friends, without bothering Joan, when they
+called to see him.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>The windows of their bedroom opened out over the green of the Park.
+Sometimes the scent of the heliotrope crept up even as far as that;
+whenever it did Joan would have to hold her breath and stand quite still
+because the fragrance brought&mdash;not Aunt Janet now&mdash;but Gilbert before
+her. It had blown in just like that the first night she had been in the
+room; the memories it could rouse were bewildering, intoxicating, and
+yet ... Joan would have to push the disturbing thoughts from her and run
+to find Gilbert if he were anywhere in their tiny domain, to perch on
+the arm of his chair and rub her face against his coat. His presence
+could drive away the vague feeling of uneasiness, his hands could win
+her back to placid contentment or wake in her the restless passionate
+desire which she judged to be love.</p>
+
+<p>It had been on one of these occasions that, running to find Gilbert, she
+had flung open the door of his smoking-room and got well inside before
+she discovered that he had some men with him. Gilbert lifted his head
+with a frown, that she noticed, while the guests struggled to their
+feet. There was a little silence while they all looked at her, then,
+with a muttered excuse, she retreated, closing the door behind her. But
+before it quite shut she heard one of the men laugh and say:</p>
+
+<p>"Hulloa, Stanning, so that is the secret of our bachelor flat is it?
+thought you had been lying very low this last two months."</p>
+
+<p>She did not catch Gilbert's reply, she only knew that the sense of shame
+which had been but a fleeting vision before had suddenly taken sharp,
+strong hold of her. She stood almost as it were battling against tears.</p>
+
+<p>That evening across their small dining-table, after the waiter from the
+restaurant downstairs had served the coffee and left them, she spoke to
+Gilbert, crumbling her bread with nervous fingers, finding it difficult
+to meet his eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"Those men," she said, "who were here this afternoon,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span> what do they
+think of me? I mean," she flushed quickly, "what do they think I am?"</p>
+
+<p>"Think you are," Gilbert repeated, "my dear girl, I suppose they could
+see you were a woman."</p>
+
+<p>"I mean, had you told them, did they know about us?"</p>
+
+<p>"Silly kid," he smiled at her indulgently, "the world is not so
+fearfully interested in our doings."</p>
+
+<p>"No, but they are your friends," the hazel eyes meeting his held some
+wistful question. "Wouldn't they wonder, doesn't it seem funny that they
+shouldn't be my friends too?"</p>
+
+<p>Gilbert rose, conscious of a little impatience. The strange thing was
+that since the very commencement of their life together his conscience
+had not been as easy as he would have liked to have had it. Joan's ideas
+had been so ridiculously simple and straightforward, she was almost a
+child, he had discovered, in her knowledge and thoughts. Not that he was
+a person to pay much attention to principles when they came in contact
+with his desires, only it annoyed and irritated him to find she could
+waken an undreamt of conscience in this way. He shook off the feeling,
+however, with a little laugh, and, rising from the table, crossed over
+to her, standing behind her, drawing her head back against his heart.</p>
+
+<p>"Not satisfied with our solitude," he teased; "find it dull?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, it's not that," she answered; she had to fight against the
+temptation to let things go, to lift up her lips for his kiss. "It's
+because&mdash;well, you didn't introduce me, they must have thought it
+queer."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, hang it all, dear," he remonstrated, "I could not pass you off as
+my wife or sister, they would know it was not true. What do you want to
+know them for anyhow? Sclater works at the office with me and the other
+man is a pal of his, I have never met him before."</p>
+
+<p>"I see," she agreed; he had not at all understood her,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span> but she doubted
+if she could quite explain herself. "It doesn't matter, Gilbert." She
+sat a little away from him, sweeping the crumbs together with her
+fingers.</p>
+
+<p>Behind her back Gilbert shrugged his shoulders and allowed the frown to
+show for a second on his face. Then he turned aside and lit a cigarette.</p>
+
+<p>"Let's do a theatre to-night, Joan," he suggested, "I am just in the
+mood for it."</p>
+
+<p>She was not just in the mood for it, but she went; and after the theatre
+they had supper at the Monico and Gilbert ordered a bottle of champagne
+to cheer them up; with the lights and music all round them and Gilbert's
+face opposite her, his lips smiling at her, his eyes caressing her, Joan
+forgot her mood of uneasiness. In the taxi going home she crept close up
+against him, liking to feel the strong hold of his arms.</p>
+
+<p>"You love me, and I love you, don't I, Gilbert?" she whispered; "that is
+all that really counts."</p>
+
+<p>"It counts more than all the world," he answered, and stooped to kiss
+her upturned lips.</p>
+
+<p>She made no new friends in her life with him, the old ones naturally
+fell rather into the background; it was impossible to keep up girl
+friendships when she was never able to ask any of them home with her.
+Once she went back to see Mrs. Thomas, but the torrent of questions,
+none of which could be answered truthfully, had paralysed her. She had
+sat dumb and apparently sulky. Mrs. Thomas had written afterwards to
+Aunt Janet:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"I do not think Joan can be really happy in her new post.
+She is quite changed, no longer her bright, cheery self."</p></div>
+
+<p>And that had called forth a long letter from Aunt Janet to Joan. If she
+was not happy and did not feel well she was to leave at once. It had
+been her own wish to go to London, they had never liked the idea. "You
+would not<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span> believe, Joan, how dull the house is with only John and me in
+it, we miss your singing and laughter about the place. Come back home,
+dear; even if it is only for a holiday, we shall be delighted."</p>
+
+<p>There was a hint behind the letter that unless she had a satisfactory
+reply at once she or Uncle John would come up to London to see Joan for
+themselves! Joan could imagine the agitation and yet firm purpose which
+would preface the journey. She wrote hastily. She was perfectly happy
+and ridiculously underworked. Everyone was so good to her, one day soon
+she would take a day off and run down and see them, they should see how
+well she was looking.</p>
+
+<p>But the writing of the letter brought tears to her eyes, and when it was
+sealed up and pushed safely out of harm's way she sat and cried and
+cried. Once or twice lately she had had these storms of tears, she was
+so unused to crying that she could not account for them in any way
+except that she hated having to tell lies. That was it, she hated having
+to tell lies.</p>
+
+<p>It was about a fortnight later that Gilbert at breakfast one morning
+looked up from a letter which the early post had brought him with a
+frown of intense annoyance on his face. Also he said "Damn!" very
+clearly and distinctly.</p>
+
+<p>Joan pushed aside the paper and looked at him.</p>
+
+<p>"Anything wrong?" she asked; "is it business, or money, or&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"No, it is only the mater," he answered quickly; "she writes to say she
+is coming to pay me a little visit, that I am to see if I can get her a
+room somewhere in the building, she is going to spend two or three days
+shopping in town and hopes to see a lot of me."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh," said Joan rather blankly. Gilbert never talked very much of his
+people; once he had shown her a photograph of his mother because she had
+teased him till he produced it. "Don't you like the idea? Gilbert, was
+that what you said 'damn' about?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Not exactly," his eyes travelled round the room; "you'll have to clear
+out, you know," he said abruptly.</p>
+
+<p>"You mean you want her to have our room and take another one in the
+building for yourself?" asked Joan. "I daresay Mrs. Thomas would give me
+a bed for a night or two."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, that is it," he agreed; "and you will have to hide away all traces
+of yourself, mustn't leave anything suspicious lying about. The old lady
+might have given me a day or two's notice;" he had returned to his
+letter, "hang it all, she says she will be here to-morrow."</p>
+
+<p>Joan had pushed her chair back and stood up, her breakfast unfinished.
+She was staring at his down-bent head, struggling with a wild desire to
+scream, to cry out against the curtain of shame he was so wilfully
+sweeping across their life together. She fought down the impulse though
+and moved over to the window.</p>
+
+<p>"You want me to go away and hide?" she asked from there, her voice
+dangerously quiet.</p>
+
+<p>He glanced up at her. "Keep out of the mater's way," he acknowledged,
+"she would have seven fits."</p>
+
+<p>"Why?" asked Joan.</p>
+
+<p>"Why," he repeated, "good Lord, you don't know the mater. She&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Joan interrupted. "You are ashamed of me," she spoke quickly, her face
+had flushed. "You have always been a little ashamed of me. You have
+never really looked at it as I did. I thought&mdash;&mdash;" she broke off and
+turned away from him, stupid hot tears were blinding her eyes, she did
+not want to cry, it was so useless and childish.</p>
+
+<p>Gilbert stuffed his mother's letter into his pocket and rose to his
+feet, stretching a little as he moved.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't be ridiculous, kiddie," he said, "you must see it would not do
+for you to meet the mater. She is old-fashioned and&mdash;well, she would not
+understand."</p>
+
+<p>"We could make her understand," Joan whispered, "if she saw we both
+really meant it."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Well, I don't want you to try," he answered bluntly.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you feel the same about me as if I were your wife?" She knew he
+was close beside her, but she did not turn to look at him.</p>
+
+<p>Gilbert put an arm round her and drew her close. "Of course I do," he
+said, "but mother wouldn't. One does not exactly introduce one's mother
+to one's mistress."</p>
+
+<p>The inclination to tears had left Joan, a very set calm had taken its
+place. Suddenly she knew, as she stood there stiff held within the
+circle of his arms, that it was all ended. The dream, if it had been a
+dream, was finished, she could not live in it any longer.</p>
+
+<p>"Very well," she agreed listlessly. "I will see about going away, the
+place shall be all ready for her to-morrow."</p>
+
+<p>She moved away from him, he did not notice how purposely she shook the
+touch of his hands from off her.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a>CHAPTER III</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"Out of my dreams,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;I fashioned a flower;<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Nursed it within my heart,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Thought it my dower.<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;What wind is this that creeps within and blows<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Roughly away the petals of my rose?"</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;">
+<b><span class="smcap">M. P.</span></b></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+<p>"That is the end of lying," whispered Joan.</p>
+
+<p>She threw down her cloak to keep the corner seat in the carriage and
+stepped out on to the platform to see if she could catch sight of a
+paper boy.</p>
+
+<p>She had not seen Gilbert since the morning. He had had an appointment in
+the city, he had left it to her to get the flat ready for his mother.
+And she had done everything, there was nothing that she could reproach
+herself with. She had engaged an extra room for Gilbert on the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> next
+floor, she had bought fresh flowers, she had made the place look as
+pretty as possible. It had not taken her long to do her own packing,
+there was nothing of hers left anywhere about. And all morning she had
+kept the window overlooking the Park tight shut. The scent of flowers
+should bring no disturbing memories to weaken her resolve. Then when
+everything had been quite settled
+<a name="corr2" id="corr2"></a><a class="correction" href="#cn2" title="changed from 'the'">she</a>
+had sat down to write just a short
+note to Gilbert.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"I have tried to make you understand a little of all I felt
+this morning, but it was not any use. You cannot understand.
+It is just that we have always looked at things differently. I
+cannot live with you any more, Gilbert; what is the use of
+trying to explain. It is better just to say&mdash;as we agreed that
+either of us should be free to say&mdash;it is all finished, and
+good-bye."</p></div>
+
+<p>She had propped the letter up for him to find, where she knew he would
+look first of all, by his pipe and matches on the mantelpiece. Now she
+had taken her ticket to Wrotham and wired Aunt Janet to say she was
+coming. But as she stood waiting for the train to start it occurred to
+her that she was really watching to see Gilbert's slim, well-built
+figure push its way through the crowd towards her. The thought made her
+uneasy, she hoped he would have been late getting home; she doubted her
+strength of will to stand against him should he appear in person to
+persuade her.</p>
+
+<p>He did not come, however, and presently with a great deal of noise and
+excitement, whistles blowing and doors slamming, the train was off and
+she could sit back in her corner seat with a strange sense of
+pleasurable excitement at having so far achieved her purpose.</p>
+
+<p>Uncle John was at the station to meet her. A straight-held old
+figure&mdash;in his young days he had been in the army and very
+good-looking&mdash;now the bristling moustache was white and the hair grew in
+little tufts either side of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> an otherwise bald head. Ever since Joan
+could first remember him Uncle John had moved in a world separate from
+the rest of the household and entirely his own. It was not that he took
+no interest in them, it was just that he appeared to forget them for
+long intervals, talking very seldom, and when he did always about the
+days that were past. He had never married, but there had been one great
+love in his life. Aunt Janet had told Joan all about it, a girl who had
+died many years ago; after her death Uncle John had lived for nothing
+but his regiment. Then he had had to leave it because old age had called
+for retirement, and he had sent for Aunt Janet to come and keep house
+for him and together they had settled down in the old home at
+Wrotham&mdash;both unmarried, both very quiet and content to live in the
+past. Then Joan had descended on them, a riotous, long-legged,
+long-haired girl of eight, the child of a very much younger, little
+known brother.</p>
+
+<p>With the coming of Joan, new life and new surprising interest had
+awakened in Aunt Janet's heart, but Uncle John had remained impervious
+to the influence. He was very fond of Joan in his way, but he scarcely
+ever noticed and he certainly knew nothing about her. He had realized
+her less and less as she grew up; when he spoke or thought of her now it
+was always as still a child.</p>
+
+<p>"You are a nice young lady," he greeted her good-humouredly, stooping to
+kiss Joan at the station; "your Aunt Janet was sure this sudden return
+meant a breakdown. She is all of a twitter, so to speak, and would have
+been here to meet you herself only we have got a Miss Abercrombie
+staying with us. Where's the luggage?"</p>
+
+<p>"I have only brought my small things with me," Joan explained, "the rest
+are coming on. I am sorry Aunt Janet is worried, and who is Miss
+Abercrombie?"</p>
+
+<p>"Friend of your aunt's," he answered; he took her bag from her. "I have
+brought the trap, Janet thought you might be too delicate to walk." He
+chuckled to himself at the thought and picking up the reins climbed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span>
+into the cart beside her. "Don't think Sally has been out twice since
+you left, see how fat she has got."</p>
+
+<p>The little brown pony certainly answered to the implication. Her sides
+bulged against the shafts and bald patches were manifesting themselves,
+caused by the friction.</p>
+
+<p>"What have you been doing then?" asked Joan; "why haven't you been out?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing to go for," he answered, "and I have been too busy in the
+garden. Extended that bit down through the wood." The garden was his one
+great hobby.</p>
+
+<p>"And Aunt Janet," Joan questioned, "she always used to like taking Sally
+out."</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose that was when you were here;" he looked down at her sideways,
+"she missed you, I think, but she potters about the village sometimes."
+He relapsed into silence, and Joan could see that his thoughts were once
+more far away.</p>
+
+<p>Several of the villagers came out as they passed through the little
+village street to bob greetings to the young lady of the manor, as they
+had always called Joan. Wrotham did not boast many county families;
+there was no squire, for instance. The Rutherfords occupied the old
+manor house and filled the position to a great extent, but they owned
+none of the land in the neighbourhood, and the villagers were not really
+their tenants. And beyond the Rutherfords there was no one in the
+village who could undertake parochial work except the vicar, a
+hard-working, conscientiously mild gentleman, with a small income and a
+large family. He could give plenty of spiritual advice and assistance,
+but little else; the old people and the invalids of the parish looked to
+Aunt Janet for soups and warm clothes and kindly interest.</p>
+
+<p>Wrotham boasted a doctor too. As Joan remembered him he had been a
+gentleman of very rubicund complexion and rough manners. Village gossip
+had held that he was too fond of the bottle, but when sober he was
+kindly and efficient enough for their small needs. He had been
+un<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span>married and had lived under the charge of a slovenly housekeeper. As
+the Rutherfords drove past his house, a square brick building with a
+front door that opened on to the village street, Joan noticed an
+unfamiliar air of spruce cleanliness about the front door and the window
+blinds.</p>
+
+<p>"Dr. Simpson has had a spring cleaning," she said, pointing out the
+transformation to Colonel Rutherford.</p>
+
+<p>He came out of his reverie, whatever it was, and glanced at the house.
+"No," he said, "Simpson has left. There are new people in there. Grant
+is their name, I think. Young chap and his sister and their old mother.
+Came to call the other day; nice people, but very ignorant about
+gardens. Your aunt has taken a great fancy to the young man."</p>
+
+<p>With that the trap turned into the wide open gates of the manor, and
+Joan, seeing the old house, was conscious of a quick rush of
+contentment. She had come home; how good it was to be home.</p>
+
+<p>The house, a beautiful grey building of the Tudor days, stood snug and
+warm amid a perfect bower of giant trees. Ivy and creepers of all sorts
+clung to its stones and crept up its walls, long tendrils of vivid
+green. The drive swept round a beautifully kept lawn and vanished
+through a stone gateway leading into the stable-yard. It was only a
+pretence at a garden in front. Uncle John always held that the open
+space which lay at the back of the house and on to which the
+drawing-room windows opened was the real thing. There, was more green
+grass, which centuries of care and weeding and rolling had transformed
+into a veritable soft velvet carpet of exquisite colour that stretched
+out and down till it met the wood of tall trees that fringed the garden.
+Flowers were encouraged to grow wild under those trees; in spring it was
+a paradise of wild daffodils and tulips. That was Aunt Janet's
+arrangement; Uncle John liked his gardens to be orderly. He was
+responsible for the straight, tidy flower-beds, for the rose gardens,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span>
+for the lavender clumps that grew down at the foot of the vegetable
+garden. For lavender is not really an ornamental flower and Uncle John
+only tolerated it because of Aunt Janet's scent-sachets.</p>
+
+<p>Beautiful and old and infinitely peaceful, the sight and colour of it
+could bring back childhood and a sense of safety to Joan, a sense that
+Uncle John's figure and face&mdash;dear and familiar as they were&mdash;had been
+quite unable to do. London, her life with Gilbert, the rack and tumult
+of her thoughts during the past six months appeared almost as a dream
+when seen against this dear old background.</p>
+
+<p>Aunt Janet was waiting their arrival in the hall, and Joan, clambering
+down out of the trap, ran straight into those outstretched arms.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, Aunt Janet, it is good to be back," she gasped. Then she drew away
+a little to take in the tall, trim figure dressed all in black save for
+a touch of white at neck and wrists; the face stern and narrow, lit by a
+pair of very dark eyes, the firm, thin-cut mouth, the dark hair, showing
+grey in places, brushed back so smooth and straight and wound in little
+plaits round and round the neat head. "You are just the same as ever,"
+Joan said. "Oh, Aunt Janet, it is good to get back."</p>
+
+<p>The dark eyes, softened for the moment by something like tears, smiled
+at her. "Of course I am just the same, child. What did you expect? And
+you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I am I," Joan answered; her laughter sounded unreal even to
+herself.</p>
+
+<p>"You have been ill," contradicted Miss Rutherford, "it is plain to see
+all over your face. Thank God, I have got you back."</p>
+
+<p>She brushed aside the sentiment, since it was a thing she did not always
+approve of.</p>
+
+<p>"Come away in and have your tea. John, leave Mary to carry up Joan's
+boxes; she will get Dick to help her; they are too heavy for you. Your
+uncle is getting old,"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span> she went on, talking brusquely as she helped
+Joan off with her coat, "he feels things these days."</p>
+
+<p>"I haven't been away more than a year, Aunt Janet," laughed Joan; "you
+talk as if it had been centuries."</p>
+
+<p>"It has seemed long," the other woman answered; her eyes were hungry on
+the girl's face as if she sought for something that kept eluding her. "A
+year is a long time to people of our age."</p>
+
+<p>"Dear, silly, old Aunt Janet." Joan hugged her. "You are not a second
+older nor the tiniest fragment different to what you used to be. I know
+you don't like being hugged; it makes you untidy; but you have simply
+got to be just once more."</p>
+
+<p>"You always were harum-scarum," remonstrated Aunt Janet, under this
+outburst. She did not, however, offer any real objection and they went
+into the drawing-room hand-in-hand.</p>
+
+<p>A small, thin lady rose to greet them at their entrance and Joan was
+introduced to Miss Abercrombie. Everything about Miss Abercrombie,
+except her size, seemed to denote strength&mdash;strength of purpose,
+strength of will, strength of love and hate. She gave Joan the
+impression&mdash;and hers was a face that demanded study, Joan found herself
+looking at it again and again&mdash;of having come through great battles
+against fate. And if she had not won&mdash;the tell-tale lines of discontent
+that hung about her mouth did not betoken victory&mdash;at least she had not
+been absolutely defeated. She had carried the banner of her convictions
+through thick and thin.</p>
+
+<p>Joan was roused to a sudden curiosity to know what those convictions
+were and a desire to have the same courage granted to herself. It gave
+her a thrill of pleasure to hear that Miss Abercrombie would be staying
+on for some time. She was a schoolmistress, it appeared, only just
+lately health had interfered with her duties and it was then that Aunt
+Janet had persuaded her, after many attempts, to take a real holiday and
+spend it at Wrotham.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Sheer vice on my part, agreeing," Miss Abercrombie told Joan with a
+laugh; "but everyone argued with me all at once and I succumbed."</p>
+
+<p>"Just in time," Aunt Janet reminded her; "I was going to have given up
+asking you; even friendship has its limits."</p>
+
+<p>They had tea in the drawing-room with the windows open on to the garden
+and a small, bright fire burning in the grate. Aunt Janet said she had
+discovered a nip in the air that morning and was sure Joan would feel
+cold after London. Uncle John wandered in and drank a cup of tea and
+wandered out again without paying much attention to anyone.</p>
+
+<p>Aunt Janet sat and watched Joan, and the girl, conscious of the scrutiny
+and restless under those brown eyes as she had always been restless in
+the old days with a childish, unconfessed sin on her conscience, talked
+as lightly and as quickly as she could upon every topic under the sun to
+Miss Abercrombie. And Miss Abercrombie rose like a sportswoman to the
+need. She was too clever a reader of character not to feel the strain
+which rested between her two companions. She knew Aunt Janet through and
+through, the stern loyalty, the unbending precision of a nature slow to
+anger, full of love, but more inclined to justice than mercy where
+wrongdoing was concerned. And Joan&mdash;well, she had only known Joan half
+an hour, but Aunt Janet had been talking of nothing else for the last
+fortnight.</p>
+
+<p>They kept the subject of Joan's life in London very well at bay for some
+time, but presently Aunt Janet, breaking a silence that had held her,
+leaned forward and interrupted their discussion.</p>
+
+<p>"You have not told us why you left, Joan," she said, "or what has been
+settled about your plans. Are you on leave, or have you come away for
+good?"</p>
+
+<p>Miss Abercrombie watched the faint pink rise up over the girl's face and
+die away again, leaving a rather unnatural pallor.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"I have left," Joan was answering. "I&mdash;&mdash;" Suddenly she looked up and
+for a moment she and Miss Abercrombie stared at each other. It was as if
+Joan was asking for help and the other woman trying to give it by the
+very steadiness of her eyes. Then Joan turned. "Aunt Janet," she said,
+hurrying a little over the words, "I want to ask you to let us not talk
+of my time in London. It&mdash;it was not what I meant it to be, perhaps
+because of my own fault, but&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"You were not happy," said Aunt Janet; her love rose to meet the appeal.
+"I never really thought you were. I am content to have you back, Joan;
+we will let the rest slip away into the past."</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you," whispered Joan; the burden of lying, it seemed, had
+followed her, even into this safe retreat; "perhaps some day, later on,
+I will try and tell you about it, Aunt Janet."</p>
+
+<p>"Just as you like, dear." Aunt Janet pressed the hand in hers and at
+that moment Mary, the servant-girl, appeared in the doorway with a
+somewhat perturbed countenance.</p>
+
+<p>"Please, mum, there is that Bridget girl from the village and her
+mother; will you see them a minute?"</p>
+
+<p>The charity and sweetness left Miss Rutherford's face as if an artist
+had drawn a sponge across some painting. "I'll come directly," she said
+stiffly; "make them wait in my little room, Mary."</p>
+
+<p>"The village scandal," Miss Abercrombie remarked, as the door closed
+behind the servant; "how are you working it out, Janet? Don't be too
+hard on the unrighteous; it is your one little failing."</p>
+
+<p>"I hardly think it is a subject which can be discussed before Joan,"
+Miss Rutherford answered. She rose and moved to the door. "I have always
+kept her very much a child, Ann; will you remember that in talking to
+her."</p>
+
+<p>Miss Abercrombie waited till the door shut, then her eyes came back to
+Joan. The child had grown into a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span> woman, she realized; what would that
+knowledge cost her old friend? Then she laughed, but not unkindly.</p>
+
+<p>"I know someone else who has kept herself a child," she said, "and it
+makes the outlook of her mind a little narrow. Oh, well! you won't like
+me to speak disrespectfully of that very dear creature, your aunt. Will
+you come for a stroll down to the woods or are you longing to unpack?"</p>
+
+<p>Joan chose the latter, because, for a second, despite her instantaneous
+liking for Miss Abercrombie, she was a little afraid. She wanted to set
+her thoughts in order too, to try and win back to the glad joy which she
+had first felt at being home, and which had been dispelled by Aunt
+Janet's questions and her own evasive replies.</p>
+
+<p>"I will do my unpacking, I think," she said, "and put my room straight."
+She met the blue eyes again, kindly yet keen in their scrutiny. "I
+understand what you mean about Aunt Janet," she added; "I have felt it
+too, and, Miss Abercrombie, I am not quite such a child as she thinks; I
+could not help growing up."</p>
+
+<p>"I know that, my dear," the other answered, "and God gave us our eyes to
+see both good and evil with; that is a thing your Aunt Janet is apt to
+forget. Well, run away and do your unpacking; we will meet later on at
+dinner."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"I have forgotten you! Wherefore my days<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Run gladly, as in those white hours gone by<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Before I learnt to love you. Now have I<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Returned to that old freedom, where the rays<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Of your strange wonder no more shall amaze<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;My spirit."</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;">
+<span class="smcap"><b>Anon</b>.</span></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>If you see trouble in the back of a girl's eyes look always for a man in
+the case. That was Miss Abercrombie's philosophy of life. Girls do not
+as a rule get into trouble over money, for debts or gambling. She had
+spent the whole of her practical life in studying girls; she knew fairly
+well the ins and outs of their complicated natures. Joan was in trouble
+of sorts; what then had become of the man? Until the time came when the
+girl would be driven to speak&mdash;and Miss Abercrombie was sure the time
+would come sooner or later&mdash;she was content to stay silent and observant
+in the background of events. Often Joan felt as though the shrewd eyes
+were drawing the unwilling truth from behind her mask of indifference,
+and she was, in a way, afraid of the little, alert woman who seemed to
+be taking such an intense though silent interest in her.</p>
+
+<p>For the first fortnight Gilbert wrote every day. To begin with, his
+letters were cheerful. He was inclined, indeed, to chaff her for losing
+her temper over his mother's visit.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"The old lady is gone," he wrote on the third day. "You can
+come back with perfect safety. She never smelt a rat, but
+tried to talk to me very seriously about taking unto myself a
+wife. It was on the tip of my tongue once or twice to tell her
+that I was already as good as married. Don't keep on being
+stuffy, Joan, hurry up and come back.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span> You can't think what a
+lot I miss you, little girl, or how much I want you."</p></div>
+
+<p>It was the first of his letters that she made any attempt to answer and
+her reply was not easy to write. She had come very suddenly to her
+decision as she had stood within the circle of Gilbert's arms that
+morning and answered his arguments about his mother. Now she was
+realizing that for weeks before that her allegiance had been wavering.
+She had no wish to go back to him. She could not understand herself, but
+the fact was self-evident, even though the scent of heliotrope haunted
+her days and crept into the land of her dreams. Her letter, when it was
+finished, struck her as cold and stupid, yet she let it go; she could
+not somehow make her meaning any clearer.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"Dear Gilbert," she wrote, "I am sorry you do not seem to be
+understanding that what I wrote in my first letter is really
+true. It is all finished between us and I am not coming back.
+There is not anything else to say, except that I should be
+happier if you did not go on writing. Nothing can change me,
+and it only keeps open old thoughts."</p></div>
+
+<p>He wrote in answer to that a furiously angry, altogether unpleasant
+letter. Joan read it with shrinking horror, it seemed to lay bare all
+that she had been only half aware of before, the ugliness, the smallness
+of what she had at
+<a name="corr3" id="corr3"></a><a class="correction" href="#cn3" title="changed from 'firs'">first</a>
+thought was love.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"If you try to marry anyone else," the letter ended on a
+cruelly ugly note, "remember I can spoil your little game for
+you, Joan. There is no man who will marry you when they learn
+the truth."</p></div>
+
+<p>She tore up his other letters after that; the very sight of his
+handwriting brought hot shame to her heart.</p>
+
+<p>How much the people of the house noticed she hardly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span> knew. Aunt Janet
+had fallen into the habit of watching her covertly, pathetically; she
+was trying in her own way to read the secret hidden away behind a
+changed Joan. But she did her best to keep her curiosity out of sight;
+she was very gentle, very anxious to divert Joan's thoughts and keep her
+happy.</p>
+
+<p>Uncle John, of course, noticed nothing. Joan helped him to potter about
+in the garden&mdash;they were building a rookery down by the woods&mdash;or
+sometimes she would take him for long walks and he would stump along
+beside her wrapped in indifferent silence, or else, carried away by some
+reminiscence of the old days, would start talking about the regiment and
+the places where he had been stationed. It was only Miss Abercrombie
+that Joan was really uneasy with, and the end of Miss Abercrombie's
+visit was in sight.</p>
+
+<p>One afternoon, on a day which had seen one of Gilbert's unopened letters
+destroyed, Joan and Miss Abercrombie started out together soon after tea
+to take a basin of jelly to one of Aunt Janet's pet invalids who lived
+in a cottage away out at what was called the Four Cross Roads.</p>
+
+<p>It was one of those very fine blue days common to September. Just a nip
+of cold in the air, the forerunner of winter, and overhead the leaves on
+the trees turning all their various reds and golds for autumn.</p>
+
+<p>"The sky gives one a great sense of distance this afternoon," Miss
+Abercrombie said presently. "You never see a sky like this in towns;
+that is why you get into the habit of thinking things out of
+proportion."</p>
+
+<p>"What makes you say that?" asked Joan; "I mean, how does the distance of
+the sky affect it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, well, it makes one feel small," the other answered, "unimportant;
+as if the affairs that worry our hearts out are, after all, of very
+little consequence in the scheme of existence."</p>
+
+<p>"They are our life," Joan argued, "one has to worry and work things out
+for oneself."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"You are a Browningite," laughed Miss Abercrombie; she glanced up
+sideways at her companion.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 15em;">"'As it were better youth</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 15.5em;">Should strive through acts uncouth</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 15.5em;">Towards making, than repose on aught found made.'</span><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>He is right in a way, though, mind you, I don't know that it pays women
+to do much in the struggling line."</p>
+
+<p>"I do wonder why you say that," said Joan; "you have always struck me as
+being, above everything else, a fighter."</p>
+
+<p>"Probably why my advice lies along other directions," admitted Miss
+Abercrombie; "it is extremely uncomfortable to be a pioneer."</p>
+
+<p>"But in the end, even if you have won nothing, it brings you the courage
+of having stuck to your convictions."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," Miss Abercrombie answered dryly, "it certainly brings you that."</p>
+
+<p>They walked in silence again for a while, turning into a short cut to
+their destination across the fields.</p>
+
+<p>"Your aunt has got convictions too." Miss Abercrombie reopened the
+conversation, evidently her thoughts had been working along the same
+lines. "They are uncomfortable things; witness the judgment she metes
+out to that unfortunate girl in the village."</p>
+
+<p>"You mean Bridget?" Joan's voice had suddenly a touch of fear in it;
+Miss Abercrombie stole a quick look at her. "I was asking Mary about her
+the other day."</p>
+
+<p>"Immorality, your aunt calls it," sniffed Miss Abercrombie, "and for
+that she would quite willingly, good, kind woman as she is, make this
+child&mdash;Bridget is seventeen, you know&mdash;an outcast for the rest of her
+life. Immorality!"</p>
+
+<p>"What would you call it?" questioned Joan; she spoke stiffly, for she
+was singularly uneasy under the discussion, yet she had always wanted to
+argue the matter out with Miss Abercrombie.</p>
+
+<p>"I hate the word 'immoral' to begin with," the little<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span> woman went on;
+"not that I am exactly out against regulations. Laws and customs have
+come into being, there is little doubt about that, to protect the weak
+against the strong. The peculiar thing about them is that they always
+wreak their punishments on the weak. Poor Bridget, even without your
+aunt's judgment, she pays the penalty, doesn't she?"</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose Aunt Janet is a little hard about these things," Joan
+admitted. "You see, the idea of going against laws and things has never
+occurred to her. She has always obeyed, she has never wanted to do
+anything else."</p>
+
+<p>"Quite so," agreed Miss Abercrombie; "my dear, don't let us talk about
+it any more. I always lose my temper, and I hate losing my temper with
+someone whom I love as much as I do your Aunt Janet."</p>
+
+<p>"But I am interested in what you think," Joan went on slowly; the red
+crept into her cheeks. "I don't believe in marriage myself; I think
+people ought to live together if and when they want to, and leave each
+other when they like."</p>
+
+<p>Miss Abercrombie stared with dismay at the flushed face. "My dear," she
+said, and her tone had fallen upon far greater seriousness than the
+former discussion had evoked, "both of those are very rash statements.
+The problem of life is unfortunately not quite so easily settled."</p>
+
+<p>"But marriage," Joan argued, "marriage, which tries to tie down in hard
+bonds something which ought only to be of the spirit&mdash;I think it is
+hideous, hideous! I could never marry."</p>
+
+<p>"No," agreed Miss Abercrombie, "a great many of us feel like that when
+we are young and hot-headed. I nearly said empty-headed. Then we read
+fat books about the divine right of Motherhood, Free Love and State
+Maternity. All very well in the abstract and fine theories to argue
+about, but they do not work in real life. Believe me, the older you get
+the more and more you realize how far<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> away they all are from the ideal.
+Marriage may be sometimes a mistaken solution, but at present it is the
+only one we have."</p>
+
+<p>"Why do you say that?" asked Joan; for the first time she turned and
+looked at her companion. "Do you really believe it is true?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," nodded Miss Abercrombie. "My dear," she put a hand on Joan's arm,
+"we women have got to remember that our actions never stand by
+themselves alone. Someone else has always to foot the bill for what we
+do. I said just now that laws had been evolved to protect the weak;
+well, marriage protects the child."</p>
+
+<p>"But if two people love each other," Joan tried to argue, but her words
+were bringing a cold chill of fear to her heart even as she spoke, "what
+other protection can be needed?"</p>
+
+<p>"Love is something that no one can define," stated Miss Abercrombie;
+"but centuries have gone to prove that it is not as binding as marriage,
+and for the sake of the children the man and woman must be bound. That
+is the long and short of all the arguments."</p>
+
+<p>"If there is no child?" Joan's fear prompted her to the question; she
+spoke it almost in a whisper.</p>
+
+<p>Miss Abercrombie paused in her act of unlatching the gate, for they had
+arrived at the cottage by now, to look up at her. "Ah, there you open
+wider fields," she assented, "only childless people are and must be the
+exceptions. One cannot lay down laws for the exceptions."</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Starkey, the invalid old lady, was garrulous, and delighted to see
+them. So anxious to tell them all her ailments and scraps of gossip that
+by the time they got away it was quite late and already the sun was
+sinking behind the range of hills at the back of the village.</p>
+
+<p>"We will have to hurry," Joan said. "Aunt Janet gets so fussed if one is
+out after dark."</p>
+
+<p>Hurrying precluded any reopening of the subject they had been
+discussing, but Joan's mind was busy with all the thoughts it had roused
+as they walked. The faint hint<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> of fear that had stirred to life in her
+when Miss Abercrombie had spoken of Bridget was fast waking to very
+definite panic. She could feel it tugging at her heart and making her
+breathing fast and difficult. Supposing that the vaguely-dreamed-of
+possibility had crystallized into fact in her case? How would Aunt Janet
+think of it; what changes would it bring into her life?</p>
+
+<p>As they turned into the little village street they came straight into a
+crowd of people standing round an open cottage door. The crowd was
+strangely quiet, talking amongst themselves in whispers, but from within
+the cottage came the sound of wailing, the hysterical crying of old age.</p>
+
+<p>Miss Abercrombie, with Joan following, pushed her way to the front, and
+with awed faces the villagers drew back to let them pass. At the open
+door Sam Jones, the village constable, an old man who had known Joan in
+her very young days, put out his hand.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you go in now, miss," he said, "it is not for the likes of you to
+see, and you can do no good. Besides which, your aunt is there already."</p>
+
+<p>But Joan paid no attention to him and, pushing past his outstretched
+hand, followed Miss Abercrombie.</p>
+
+<p>The inside of the cottage was dimly lit, and scattered with a profuse
+collection of what appeared to be kitchen utensils, dishes and clothes,
+all flung about in confusion. The only light in the place glinted on the
+long deal table and the stiff dead figure stretched out on it, still and
+quiet, with white, vacant face and lifeless arms that hung down on
+either side. Water was oozing out of the clothes and dripping from the
+unbound hair; it had gathered already into little pools on the floor. In
+the darkest corner of the room a crouched-up form sat sobbing
+hopelessly, and by the figure on the table Aunt Janet stood, her face in
+shadow, since she was above the shade of the lamp, but her hands
+singularly white and gentle-looking as they moved about drying the dead
+girl's face, pushing the wet, clogged hair from eyes and mouth.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Joan paused just within the door, the terror of that figure on the table
+holding her spellbound, but Miss Abercrombie moved brusquely forward so
+that she stood in the lamplight confronting Aunt Janet.</p>
+
+<p>"So," she said, quick and sharp, yet not over loud, the people outside
+could not have heard, "Bridget has found this way out. A kinder way than
+your stern judgment, Janet. Poor little girl."</p>
+
+<p>"I did not judge," Miss Rutherford answered stiffly, "'the wages of sin
+is death.'"</p>
+
+<p>"Yet you can be kind to her now," snorted Miss Abercrombie; "it would
+not have been wasted had you been a little kinder before. Forgive me,
+Janet, I speak quickly, without thinking. You live up to your precepts;
+everyone has to do that."</p>
+
+<p>The old woman in the corner lifted her face to look at them; perhaps she
+thought that in some way or other they were reviling the dead, for she
+staggered to her feet and crossed over to the table.</p>
+
+<p>"It was fear made her do it," she wailed; "fear, and because we spoke
+her harsh. I hated the shame of it all. Yet, God knows, I would have
+stood by her in the end. My little girl, my little Bridget!" Sobs choked
+her, she fell to her knees, pressing her lips to one of the cold, stiff
+hands.</p>
+
+<p>Joan saw Aunt Janet stoop and lay a gentle hand on the heaving
+shoulders, she heard, too, a movement of the crowd outside and saw the
+Vicar's good-natured, perturbed face appear in the doorway. Behind him
+again was a younger man, stern-faced, with quiet, very steady blue eyes
+and a firm-lined mouth. All this she noticed, why she could not have
+explained, for the man was a perfect stranger to her; then the fear and
+giddiness which all this time she had been fighting against gained the
+upper hand and, swaying a little, she moved forward with the intention
+of getting outside, only to fall in a dead faint across the doorway of
+the cottage.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a>CHAPTER V</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"Love wakes men, once a lifetime each<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;They lift their heavy heads and look.</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<hr style="width: 35%;" />
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
+And some give thanks, and some blaspheme,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
+And most forget, but either way<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
+That, and the child's unheeded dream<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
+Is all the light of all their day."</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>The Grants were sitting at breakfast in their small, red-walled
+dining-room. Richard, commonly called Dick, at the end of the table,
+Mabel at the one side and Mrs. Grant in the seat of honour at the top.
+Wherever Mrs. Grant sat was the seat of honour; she was that kind of old
+lady. Marvellously handsome still, despite her age, with a commanding
+presence and a nature which had sublime contempt for everyone and
+everything except herself, she sailed through life exacting service from
+all and obedience from her children. Why they obeyed her they could not
+have themselves explained; perhaps it was an inheritance from the dead
+Mr. Grant, who had worshipped his wife as if she had been some divinity.
+In her own way Mrs. Grant had always been gracious and kindly to her
+husband, but he had been altogether a nonentity in her life. Before the
+children were old enough to see why, they realized that Daddy was only
+the man who made the money in their house. Mother spent it, buying the
+luxuries with which they were surrounded, the magnificent toys which
+they disregarded, as is the way of children, the splendidly expensive
+clothes, which were a perfect burden to them. Then, just when Dick was
+beginning to understand, Mr. Grant died.</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 35%;' />
+
+<p>He had sent for his son&mdash;Dick was about eighteen then&mdash;and spoken to him
+just before the end came.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"You will have to look after your mother, Dick," he had said, clutching
+at the young, strong hands; "she has always been looked after. She has
+never had to rough things in her life. And you won't be any too well
+off. Promise me, promise me, you will always give her of your best."</p>
+
+<p>"Of course, I promise, Dad," he had answered.</p>
+
+<p>Further conversation between then had ceased because Mrs. Grant swept
+into the room, regal even in the face of death. Dick remembered the
+incident afterwards with a little twitch of his lips because it was so
+typical of his mother and it was just at this period that he had begun
+to criticize her. The sick-room had been in shadowed gloom until her
+entry; the lights hurt the fast-failing eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"I cannot sit in the dark," stated Mrs. Grant, as she settled herself,
+with a delightful rustle of silk and a wave of perfume, beside the bed.
+"You know that, Harry. It always has depressed me, hasn't it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Turn up the lights, Dick," whispered the man, his hand had closed on
+one of hers; happiness flooded his heart at her presence.</p>
+
+<p>"But you know they hurt your eyes," Dick expostulated; he was new to
+death, yet he could read the signs well enough to know his father was
+dying.</p>
+
+<p>"Harry can lie with his eyes shut," answered Mrs. Grant calmly. There
+was no disagreeableness in her tone: her selfishness was on too gigantic
+a scale for her ever to be disagreeable.</p>
+
+<p>And Dick had turned up the lights and gone fuming from the room,
+conscious for the time being of a sense of dislike for his mother's
+perfection!</p>
+
+<p>It soon faded though; he had been trained too thoroughly in his youth.
+Once he said to Mabel hotly:</p>
+
+<p>"Why does Mother cry for Dad? She did not really love him, and she just
+delighted in buying all that expensive and becoming mourning."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>And Mabel had surprised him by replying: "Mother does not really love
+anyone but herself."</p>
+
+<p>The remark sounded odd from Mabel, who spent her life slaving with
+apparent devotion in her mother's service. She was a tall, rather
+colourless girl, with big grey eyes and a quaint-shaped mouth that was
+always very silent. She moved through the background of their lives
+doing things for mother. She had always done that; Dick wondered
+sometimes whether the soul within her would ever flame into open
+rebellion, but it never did.</p>
+
+<p>By the time Dick had passed his various exams, and was ready to take up
+a practice somewhere, Mrs. Grant and Mabel had been practically
+everywhere on the Continent.</p>
+
+<p>"Money is running short," Mabel wrote crisply to Dick; "cannot you do
+anything in the way of taking a house and settling down, so as to make a
+home for Mother and me?"</p>
+
+<p>Dick's ambitions lay in the direction of bachelor's diggings and work in
+London. He thrust them aside and bought what was supposed to be a very
+good and flourishing practice at Birmingham. Unfortunately Mrs. Grant
+took a violent dislike to Birmingham. Their house was gloomy and got on
+her nerves; the air, she said, was laden with smoke which irritated her
+throat. She developed a cough, quite the most annoying sound that Dick
+had ever imagined, and he was not easy to irritate. Mother coughed from
+the time she woke till the time she went to sleep&mdash;coughed and
+remembered old times and wept for Harry, who would at least have taken
+care not to expose her to such overwhelming discomfort.</p>
+
+<p>At the end of six months Dick threw up the practice in despair and
+placed himself at her disposal. They put in a year in London, but what
+Dick earned was quite insufficient to cope with what Mrs. Grant spent
+and things went from bad to worse.</p>
+
+<p>Mabel never offered any advice until she was asked<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> but when Dick spoke
+to her finally she was quite definite.</p>
+
+<p>"You have got to take Mother in hand," she said. "Father never did. He
+spent his life making money for her to spend, but there is no reason why
+you should. Get a small practice somewhere in the country where there
+are no shops and just tell Mother you are going to settle there for five
+years at least."</p>
+
+<p>"She will get another cough," argued Dick.</p>
+
+<p>"You must let her cough, it won't hurt her," answered Mabel.</p>
+
+<p>Undoubtedly Mrs. Grant did not approve of Wrotham to begin with, but it
+had its advantages, even for her. She settled very quickly into the role
+of Lady Bountiful; the villagers gazing upon her with such unmixed
+admiration that she was moved to remark to Mabel that it was really
+pleasant doing things for such grateful people. Dick provided her with a
+victoria and horse in place of the usual doctor's trap, and she could
+drive abroad to visit this or that prot&eacute;g&eacute; in truly regal style. It
+meant that Dick had to pay all his visits, and some of them very far off
+and at all sorts of unseasonable hours, on a bicycle, but he never
+grudged making sacrifices of that kind for her. No one admired his
+mother in the abstract more than Dick did.</p>
+
+<p>Mabel perhaps resented the extra work it entailed on him, for she loved
+Dick with the whole force of her self-restrained heart. But, as usual,
+she kept silent. The villagers could see that she drove out in
+attendance on Mrs. Grant, but to them she was only an uninteresting
+shadow that waited on the other's splendour. They often wondered among
+themselves how Mrs. Grant could have a daughter as drab and
+uninteresting as Miss Grant; they did not realize how, like a vampire,
+the older woman lived upon the younger one's vitality. People like Mrs.
+Grant exist at the expense of those they come in contact with. You
+either have to live for them or away from them.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>On this particular morning Dick finished his breakfast before either his
+mother or sister, and pushing back his chair, asked, as he had always
+asked since the days of his childhood, if he might rise.</p>
+
+<p>"Before I am finished, Dick?" remonstrated Mrs. Grant; "it is not very
+polite, dear."</p>
+
+<p>"I know," Dick apologized, "but the truth is I have an early call to pay
+this morning. The people of the Manor House have sent for me; Miss
+Rutherford the younger is not awfully well, or something."</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Rutherford the younger?" repeated his mother; "I did not know
+there was a younger; I have never seen her, have I, Mabel?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't suppose so," Dick answered for his sister; "she has been away
+in London."</p>
+
+<p>"What is the matter with her?" asked Mrs. Grant. "Why do they want you
+to see her?"</p>
+
+<p>"I can't know that till I have seen her, can I? Last night she happened
+to come into the Rendle cottage just after they had brought that poor
+girl home, and the sight must have upset her; anyway she fainted. I
+expect that is what Miss Rutherford is worried about."</p>
+
+<p>"It is hardly polite of her not to have brought her niece to call on
+me," said Mrs. Grant. "Still, if you are going there, dear, and the girl
+doesn't seem well, tell them I shall be only too happy to come and fetch
+her for a drive some afternoon. I daresay my carriage is more
+comfortable than that ramshackle old trap of theirs."</p>
+
+<p>"You are a dear to think of it," he said, stooping to kiss her good-bye.
+"If you can spare Mabel this afternoon, Mother, I thought perhaps she
+might come into Sevenoaks with me. I have got to attend a meeting there,
+and it will be an outing for her."</p>
+
+<p>"If Mabel would like to go, of course she must," Mrs. Grant agreed. "I
+shall be a little lonely, and to-day is the day I am supposed to have my
+hair shampooed. Not that it really matters."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"I could not go any way," Mabel put in for herself. "Mr. Jarvis is
+coming to tea, Dick; he asked himself last week."</p>
+
+<p>She followed her brother out to the front door.</p>
+
+<p>"The day is going to be full of disagreeables for you," he said, as they
+stood waiting for his bicycle to be brought round. "Mother's shampoo, I
+know what that involves, and Mr. Jarvis. Nuisance the fellow is; why
+can't he see that you dislike him?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I don't exactly," she answered, without meeting his eyes.</p>
+
+<p>She hated him like poison, Dick knew. He wondered rather vaguely why
+Mabel had lied to him, generally speaking they were too good friends for
+that to be necessary. Then he dismissed the subject, and his thoughts
+turned again to the girl he was on his way to see. He had been thinking
+a great deal of Joan since he had first seen her. The startled,
+child-like face, the wide frightened eyes, had impressed themselves on
+his mind the night before. He had lifted her in his arms and carried her
+outside; the poise of her thrown-back head against his arm stayed in his
+mind, a very warm memory. Poor little girl, it must have been horrible
+for her to have come in from the gay placidness of her own life and
+thoughts to the stark tragedy of Bridget Rendle's death.</p>
+
+<p>He was very ignorant and very reverent in his thoughts about women. He
+could imagine Joan's sweet, well-ordered life, the fragrance of youth
+hung about his idea of her. Bridget Rendle had been a girl too, younger
+perhaps than the other one; but Bridget had dipped into the waters of
+life, and sorrow and sin had closed over her. The two girls were as far
+apart as the poles, it seemed almost irreverent to think of them in the
+same breath.</p>
+
+<p>Aunt Janet met him in the hall when she heard of his arrival.</p>
+
+<p>"I have not told my niece about sending for you," she said; "it might
+only make her nervous. I am very<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span> alarmed about her, Dr. Grant. She has
+been home now three weeks and she is really not at all like herself.
+Then that faint last night. I am afraid of fainting-fits; my mother, I
+may as well tell you, died very suddenly from a heart-attack."</p>
+
+<p>"It is not likely to be anything of that sort," he told her.
+"Yesterday's tragedy was quite sufficient to upset very strong nerves."</p>
+
+<p>"I hope not," Aunt Janet agreed; "anyway, I shall feel happier once you
+have seen her. Will you come this way?"</p>
+
+<p>She led him through the house to a room on the other side of the
+drawing-room which had been fitted up as a special sanctum for Joan
+since her return from London.</p>
+
+<p>"I am nervous," she admitted to the doctor with her hand on the
+door-knob, "she will perhaps be annoyed at my having sent for you." Then
+she opened the door and they passed in.</p>
+
+<p>Joan was sitting in the far corner near the open window, a book on her
+lap. But she was not pretending to read; Dick could have sworn that she
+had been crying as they came in. As she saw her aunt was not alone she
+stood up quickly and the book fell unheeded to the floor.</p>
+
+<p>"This is the doctor, dear," Aunt Janet began nervously. "I asked him to
+call and see you. You need a tonic, I am sure you do."</p>
+
+<p>"You sent for him," whispered Joan. Dick felt horribly uncomfortable; it
+was impossible not to sense the tragedy which hung heavy in the air.
+"Why, oh why, have you done that, Aunt Janet?"</p>
+
+<p>"I was afraid," the other began; "last night you&mdash;&mdash;" Rather waveringly
+she came to a full stop, staring at Joan.</p>
+
+<p>The girl had drawn herself up to her full height. She faced them as
+someone brought suddenly to bay, her hands clenched at her sides, two
+flags of colour flaming in her cheeks.</p>
+
+<p>"I was going to have told you," she said, addressing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> herself solely to
+Aunt Janet, "now you have brought him in he must know it too. But I do
+not need him to tell me what is the matter with me; I found it out for
+myself last night. I am not ashamed, I do not even hold that I have done
+anything wrong; I would have told you before only I did not know it was
+going to come to this, and for the rest it was like a shut book in my
+life that I did not want to have to open or look at again. I am like
+Bridget Rendle," she said, head held very high. "I am going to have a
+baby. Bridget was afraid and ashamed, but I am neither. I have done
+nothing to be ashamed of."</p>
+
+<p>The telling of it sapped at her much boasted courage, and left her
+whiter than the white wall-paper; Dick could see that she had some ado
+to keep back her tears.</p>
+
+<p>Aunt Janet seemed to have been paralysed; she stayed where she was,
+stiff, stricken, and Dick, glancing at her, thought he had never seen
+such anguish and terror combined on a human face. He felt himself
+completely forgotten in this crisis. The two women stared at each other.
+Twice Aunt Janet moistened her lips and tried to speak, but the words
+died in her throat. When she succeeded at last her voice was scarce
+recognizable.</p>
+
+<p>"You said&mdash;like Bridget Rendle," she whispered; "did you mean what you
+said?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," answered Joan.</p>
+
+<p>The older woman turned towards the door. She walked as if blind, her
+hands groping before her. "God!" Dick heard her say under her breath,
+"Dear God, what have I done that this should come upon me?"</p>
+
+<p>As she reached the door Joan called to her, her voice sharp with fear.
+"Aunt Janet, Aunt Janet, aren't you going to say anything to me?"</p>
+
+<p>"I must hold my tongue," the other answered stiffly, "or I shall curse
+that which I have loved." Suddenly the anguish in her flamed to white
+beat. "I would rather have known you dead," she said, and passed swiftly
+from the room.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Joan took a step forward, and her foot touched on the book she had let
+fall. Mechanically she stooped to pick it up, then, because her knees
+were in reality giving way under her, she stumbled to the chair and sat
+down again. She seemed to have forgotten the man standing by the door,
+she just sat there, hands folded in her lap, with her white face and
+great brown eyes looking unseeingly at the garden.</p>
+
+<p>Dick moved uneasily. He had not the slightest idea what he ought to do;
+he felt horribly like an intruder. And he was intensely sorry for the
+girl, even though behind this sorrow lay the shock of a half-formed
+ideal which she had shattered in his mind. Finally he submerged the man
+in the doctor and moved towards her.</p>
+
+<p>"I am most awfully sorry for you," he said, "will you let me help you if
+I can? There may be some mistake, and anyway I could give you something
+to help with those fainting-fits."</p>
+
+<p>Joan brought her eyes away from the garden and looked at him. "No," she
+said, "there is no mistake and I do not make a habit of fainting.
+Yesterday it was different, perhaps I realized definitely and for the
+first time what it would all mean. I saw Aunt Janet's face as she spoke
+of the dead girl, and ... I do not know why I am telling you all this,"
+she broke off, "it cannot be very interesting, but I do not want you to
+think that I feel as Bridget Rendle felt."</p>
+
+<p>"No," he agreed, "you are facing it with more courage than she had been
+taught to have."</p>
+
+<p>"It is not a question of courage," Joan answered. He was not
+understanding her, she realized, and for some stupid reason it hurt that
+he should not, but she must not stoop to further explanations. She stood
+up, making a stern effort at absolute calmness.</p>
+
+<p>"Good-bye," she said, "I am sorry you should have been troubled to come
+and that you should have had to go through this sort of scene."</p>
+
+<p>"Good-bye," was all he could answer.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>At the door he turned to look back at her. "If you should need help of
+any sort at any time," he said, "will you send for me? I should like to
+feel you were going to do that."</p>
+
+<p>"I cannot promise," she answered, "you see, I shall probably be leaving
+here quite soon."</p>
+
+<p>And with that he had to be content to leave her.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"And bending down beside the glowing bars<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Murmur, a little sadly, how love fled<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;And paced upon the mountains overhead,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;And hid his face amid a crowd of stars."</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>Mabel had shampooed her mother's hair, following out with unending
+patience the minute instructions which the process always involved. She
+had rinsed it in four relays of hot water, two of lukewarm and one of
+cold; she had dried it with the hard towel for the scalp and the soft
+towel for the hair. She had rubbed brilliantine in to give it the
+approved gloss. The whole proceeding had lasted fully two hours; now she
+stood and brushed out the long fine threads of grey turning to silver
+with just the steady gentle pressure which was necessary and which,
+according to Mrs. Grant, no one but Mabel was capable of producing.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Grant liked to have her hair brushed for half an hour after a
+shampoo, it soothed the irritated nerves. From behind her mother's back
+Mabel could see her own face in the glass, the sallow cheeks flushed
+from her exertions, the grey, black-lashed eyes tired and a little
+angry. Once, long ago, during one of their journeys on the continent,
+there had been a young naval officer who had loved Mabel for those grey
+eyes of hers. He had raved about the way the lashes lay like a fringe of
+shadow round them. He had called them "Dream Eyes," and once he had
+kissed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> the lids close shut over them with hard, passionate kisses.
+Whenever Mabel looked at her eyes in the glass she thought of Jack
+Donald. She had loved him and she had sent him away because of Mother.
+He had only been able to offer her his love and the pay of a lieutenant
+in the Navy; he had not even shown that he liked Mother, he had resented
+the way Mabel slaved for her. Of course the outlook had been absurd, and
+Mrs. Grant had said so very plainly. If Mabel married it would have to
+be someone wealthy someone elderly enough to understand that Mother must
+live with them. But when he went he took with him all the dreams of
+Mabel's life; she never looked out into the future to make plans now,
+she could only look back into the past that held her memories.</p>
+
+<p>"I hope," said Mrs. Grant suddenly breaking in on her thoughts, "that
+Dick does not fall in love with this young lady at the Manor."</p>
+
+<p>"Why not?" asked Mabel, "he must fall in love sooner or later."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, then, it must be later and with someone who has a great deal of
+money. We are quite badly enough off as it is."</p>
+
+<p>"You and I could go away again on our own," suggested Mabel, "you know
+you said the other day that Wrotham was getting on your nerves."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't be ridiculous," snapped Mrs. Grant, "I should like to know what
+you think we should live on once Dick has a wife. You say you won't
+marry Mr. Jarvis or anyone else."</p>
+
+<p>"No," Mabel admitted, "but because I won't marry it hardly seems fair
+that we should stand in the way of Dick's doing so."</p>
+
+<p>"What do you intend to imply by 'standing in the way'? Really Mabel,
+sometimes I wonder if you have any love for me, you so habitually and
+wilfully misconstrue my sentences. Surely it is permissible" (Mrs.
+Grant's sigh was a model of motherly affection) "for a mother to wish
+to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> keep her son, her eldest born, to herself for a little longer. One
+loses them so once they marry."</p>
+
+<p>Mabel concealed a swift, rather bitter, smile. "I did not mean to
+misconstrue anything," she said, "only just the other day I was thinking
+that perhaps we did rather hamper Dick. He is twenty-seven, you know; it
+is funny he has never wanted to marry."</p>
+
+<p>"He is waiting for the right girl," Mrs. Grant sighed again.</p>
+
+<p>"And if he happens to find her," thought Mabel to herself, there was no
+use saying the words aloud, "we are to do our best to prevent him having
+her. Poor old Dick." Her eyes waked to sudden, vivid affection as she
+thought of him.</p>
+
+<p>She ran downstairs presently, Mrs. Grant having retired to rest after
+exertions, to meet Dick just coming in. He had done a round of visits
+after his call at the Manor house. Visits which had included one to the
+Rendles' cottage, where he had seen the principal figure of last night's
+tragedy laid out, as her mother said, for decent burial, "even though it
+baint a going to be Christian."</p>
+
+<p>The girl had been dressed in something white; white flowers, great
+beautiful-headed chrysanthemums, lay between her folded hands and
+against her face. She had been a handsome girl, death had robbed her of
+her vivid colouring, but it had given her in its stead something
+dignified and withdrawn, a look of suffering and yet great peace.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Rendle was more resigned too this morning; she had cried her heart
+quiet through the night.</p>
+
+<p>"Bridget is better so," she could confide to Dick as he stood looking
+down at the girl, "the shame is done away with, sir, and God will look
+to the sin. I hold there ain't much to fear there, even though they
+won't bury her in the churchyard."</p>
+
+<p>"No, I don't think there is much to fear," he agreed. "I am sorry about
+the burial, Mrs. Rendle, I have tried to argue the matter out with the
+vicar."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Oh, that is not to be helped," she answered. "God will rest her soul
+wherever she be. Miss Rutherford sent those flowers," she added, "she
+was rare set agin Bridget to begin with, but she be softened down."</p>
+
+<p>That brought the other tragedy which he had witnessed this morning back
+to his mind. Not that he had really forgotten it. The picture of Joan,
+her head high, her cheeks flushed, was one that had imprinted itself
+very strongly upon his memory. He had given up trying to understand how
+such a thing could have happened, his own vague happy thoughts of her
+stirred wistfully behind the new knowledge. And he could not dismiss her
+altogether from the throne he had designed for her to occupy. There must
+be
+<a name="corr4" id="corr4"></a><a class="correction" href="#cn4" title="changed from 'ome'">some</a>
+explanation; if only he had not been such an absolute stranger
+perhaps she would have told him a little more, have given him a chance
+to understand.</p>
+
+<p>"Well," asked Mabel, "is she nice, Dick, did you like her?" Her eyes
+were quick to notice the new shadow of trouble on his face.</p>
+
+<p>"Very nice, I think," he answered, hoping his voice sounded as
+indifferent as he meant it to, "but I really did not see much of her and
+she is going back to London almost at once." He went past her on into
+the dining-room. "Is lunch nearly ready," he asked, "I have got to catch
+that 2.5, you know."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll see about it," Mabel said, "Mother is having hers upstairs."</p>
+
+<p>She turned away to comply, but all the time she was hurrying up the
+maidservant, and later, while she and Dick sat opposite each other,
+rather silent, through lunch, her eyes and mind were busy trying to read
+the secret of Dick's manner. The girl had impressed him strongly, that
+was evident, but why should she have occasioned this gloom in Dick who
+so very rarely allowed anything or anybody to ruffle his cheery good
+humour?</p>
+
+<p>He rode off without letting her glean any explanation, and Mabel
+wandered into the drawing-room to get it ready<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span> for Mrs. Grant's
+descent. Had Dick really fallen in love? She remembered once before when
+he had been about eighteen or nineteen, how there had been a girl whom
+he had rather shyly confessed himself enamoured of. But since the damsel
+had been quite five years his senior the romance, to Mabel's relief, had
+faded away. Yet if Dick were ever really to fall in love it would be a
+deep and unshakable tie; he would be as his father had been, all
+faithful to the one woman in his life.</p>
+
+<p>It was remembering her father that suddenly brought Mabel's thoughts
+back to her mother whose absorbing personality had stood so like a giant
+shadow across all their lives. Would Dick's love be strong enough to
+fight against his sense of duty and mother's selfishness, for most
+certainly mother would not help him to achieve his desire unless it ran
+along the same lines as her own. And if mother prevailed what would life
+mean for Dick? The same dry empty dreariness that her own days
+contained, the restless hopes that died too hard, the unsatisfied, cruel
+dreams? No, no! She had not fought to save her own happiness, but she
+would fight to the last inch to save Dick's.</p>
+
+<p>Almost as if in answer to her heart's wild outcry the front-door bell
+rang, and looking up she saw the short stout figure which of late had
+taken to haunting her thoughts on the door-step.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Jarvis was an elderly man inclined to be fat, with round, heavy
+face, very thick about the jaws and unpleasantly small eyes. Yet the
+expression of the man's face was not altogether disagreeable and a
+certain shrewd humour showed in the lines of his mouth. He had lived for
+forty-two years in Wrotham, travelling twice a year to London in
+connection with his business, but never venturing further afield. His
+house, a magnificent farm building, lay about twelve miles away on the
+other side of Wrotham station. It had come down to him through
+generations of Jarvises, he was reputed to be marvellously wealthy, and
+he had no<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span> shyness about admitting the fact. His favourite topics of
+conversation were money and horses. He had never married, village gossip
+could have given you lurid details as to the why and the wherefore had
+you been willing to listen. Mr. Jarvis himself would have put it more
+plainly. The only woman he had ever had the least affection for had
+neither expected nor desired matrimony; she had been content to live
+with him as his housekeeper. This woman had been dead three years when
+Jarvis first met Mabel. Quite apart from the fact that of late he had
+been feeling that it was time he got married, Jarvis had been attracted
+to Mabel from the first. She was such a contrast to the other women he
+had known; he admired enormously her slim delicacy, her faintly coloured
+face, her grey eyes. He liked her way of talking, too, and the long
+silences which held her; her quiet dignity, the way she moved. He placed
+her on a pedestal in his thoughts, which was a thing he had never dreamt
+of doing for any other woman, and before long his admiration melted into
+love. Then being forty-two the disease took rapid and tense possession.
+He was only happy when he was with her, able to talk to her now and
+again, to watch her always.</p>
+
+<p>Dick's impression was that Mabel hated the man. He disliked him himself,
+which perhaps coloured his view, for hate was not quite what Mabel felt.
+Had Mr. Jarvis been content to just like her she would have tolerated
+and more or less liked him. She had thought him, to begin with, a funny,
+in a way rather pathetic, little man. Ugly, and Mabel had such an
+instinctive sympathy for anything ugly or unloved. So, to begin with,
+she had been kind to him; then one day Mrs. Grant had opened her eyes to
+the evident admiration of the man, mentioning at the same time that from
+the money point of view he would be a good match, and suddenly Mabel had
+known that she was afraid. Afraid, without exactly knowing why, very
+much as is the hapless sheep on his way to the slaughter-house.</p>
+
+<p>As the maid ushered in
+<a name="corr5" id="corr5"></a><a class="correction" href="#cn5" title="changed from 'M Jarr.vis'">Mr. Jarvis</a>
+a minute or two later
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span>
+this feeling of
+fear caught at Mabel's heart, and in answer to its summons the warm
+blood flushed to face and neck as she stood up to receive him.</p>
+
+<p>"I am early," stammered the man, his eyes on her new-wakened beauty, for
+it was only in her lack of colour that Mabel's want of prettiness lay,
+"but I came on purpose, I wanted to catch you alone."</p>
+
+<p>Mabel took what was almost a despairing look at the clock. "Mother won't
+be down for quite half an hour," she said, "so you have succeeded. Shall
+we stay here or will you come down to the garden? I want to show you my
+Black Prince rose, it is not doing at all well."</p>
+
+<p>She moved to the window which opened doorways on to the garden, but Mr.
+Jarvis made no attempt to follow her.</p>
+
+<p>"Let us stay here," he said, "what I have got to say won't take long and
+we can do the roses afterwards when Mrs. Grant is about. I guess you
+could help me a bit if you only chose to," he went on, his voice
+curiously gruff and unready, "but you won't, you won't even look at me.
+I suppose those great grey eyes of yours hate the sight of me, and I am
+a damned fool to put my heart into words. But I have got to," she heard
+him move close to her and how quickly he was breathing, "I love you, you
+pale, thin slip of a girl, I want you as a wife, will you marry me?"</p>
+
+<p>The silence when he had finished speaking lay heavy between them. Mabel
+let him take her hand, though the moist warmth of his gave her a little
+shudder of aversion, but by no strength of will could she lift her eyes
+to look at him. She stood as immovable as a statue and the man, watching
+her from out of his small shrewd eyes, smiled a little bitterly.</p>
+
+<p>"You hate the thought like poison," he said, "yet you don't throw off my
+hand or yell out your 'No.' Something is in the balance then. Well,
+marry me for my money, Mabel. I had rather it were love, but if there is
+anything about me that can win you, I am not going to give you up."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>That flicked at her pride and the honesty of it appealed to her. She
+lifted her eyes and for the first time she became aware of the real
+kindness that lay in his.</p>
+
+<p>"I have never hated you," she said slowly, "but I don't and can't love
+you. Will you take that as your answer?"</p>
+
+<p>The man shook his head. "I was not fool enough to ask&mdash;'Do you love
+me?'" he reminded her; "what I want to know is, 'Will you marry me?'"</p>
+
+<p>"Without love?"&mdash;her eyes besought him&mdash;"marriage must be hideous."</p>
+
+<p>"I will risk it if you will," he answered. "Sit down, let us talk it
+out."</p>
+
+<p>He had won back his self-possession, though his eyes were still eager in
+their demand. Mabel sat down on the window-seat and he pulled up a chair
+at a little distance from her.</p>
+
+<p>"Look here," he began, "it is like this. I am not a young man, probably
+I am twelve to fourteen years older than you. If you have heard what the
+village scandal says about me you can take it from me that it is true;
+it is better that you should know the worst at once. But until I met
+you, this I can swear before God, I have never really loved. It is not a
+question of money this time; I would give my soul to win you. And I
+don't want you as I have wanted the other women in my life; I want you
+as my wife."</p>
+
+<p>"Yet you can buy me just as you could them," Mabel whispered.</p>
+
+<p>"No"&mdash;again he shook his head. "I am not making that mistake either. I
+know just why I can buy you. Anyway, let us put that aside. This is the
+case as I see it. I have money, heaps of it; I have a good large house
+and servants eating their heads off. I will make Mrs. Grant comfortable;
+she will live with us, of course, and she is welcome to everything I
+have got; and I love you. That<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span> is the one great drawback, isn't it? The
+question is. Will you be able to put up with it?"</p>
+
+<p>Away in the back of Mabel's mind another voice whispered, "I love you."
+She had to shut her lids over the "Dream Eyes," to hold back the tears.</p>
+
+<p>"Even if things were different," she said, "I could not love you; I have
+always loved someone else."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Jarvis sat back in his chair with a quick frown. "Any chance of his
+marrying you?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>"No," she had to admit, "there has never been any chance of that."</p>
+
+<p>"I see"&mdash;he looked up at her and down again at his podgy, fat hands,
+clenched together. "My offer still holds good," he said abruptly.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I don't know what to say or what to do." Mabel's calm broke, she
+stood up nervously. It almost seemed as if the walls of the room were
+closing in on her. "There are so many things to think of; Mother and
+Dick and&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Perhaps he understood the softening of her voice as she spoke of Dick,
+for he looked up at her quickly.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, there is your brother," he agreed. "I guess he is pretty tired
+having to look after you two, and he is a clever lad; there ought to be
+a future before him if he has his chance. Put the weight on to my
+shoulders, Mabel; they are better able to bear it."</p>
+
+<p>She turned to him breathlessly; it was quite true what he was saying
+about Dick. Dick had his own life to make. "I have told you the truth,"
+she said. "I don't love you, probably there will be times when I shall
+hate you. If you are not afraid of that, if you are ready to take Mother
+and me and let us spend your money in return for that, then&mdash;I will
+marry you."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Jarvis got quickly to his feet. "You mean it?" he gasped; his face
+was almost purple, he came to her, catching her hands in his. "You mean
+it? Mind you, Mabel, you have got to put up with my loving you. I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span> am
+not pretending that I am the kind of man who will leave you alone."</p>
+
+<p>"I mean it," she answered, very cold and quiet, because it seemed as if
+all the tears in her heart had suddenly hardened into a lump of stone.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"I ride to a tourney with sordid things,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;They grant no quarter, but what care I?</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<hr style='width: 35%;' />
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
+I have bartered and begged, I have cheated and lied,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
+But now, however the battle betide,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
+Uncowed by the clamour, I ride ride, ride!"</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><b><span class="smcap">Victor Starbuck.</span></b></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>Joan did not see Aunt Janet again. Miss Abercrombie carried messages
+backwards and forwards between the two, but even Miss Abercrombie's
+level-headed arguments could not move Aunt Janet from the position she
+had taken up. And Miss Abercrombie was quite able to realize how much
+her old friend was suffering.</p>
+
+<p>"I never knew a broken heart could bring so much pain," she told Joan;
+"but every time I look at your aunt I realize that physical suffering is
+as nothing compared to the torture of her thoughts."</p>
+
+<p>"Why cannot she try to understand. Let me go to her," Joan pleaded. "If
+only I can speak to her I shall make her understand."</p>
+
+<p>But Miss Abercrombie shook her head. "No, child," she said, "it would be
+quite useless and under the circumstances you must respect her wishes. I
+am fearfully sorry for both of you; I know that it is hurting you, too,
+but when you have wilfully or inadvertently killed a person's belief in
+you the only thing you can do is to keep out of their way. Time is the
+one healer for such wounds."</p>
+
+<p>The tears smarted in Joan's eyes, yet up till now she<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span> had not cried
+once. Hurt pride, hurt love, struggled for expression, but words seemed
+so useless.</p>
+
+<p>"I had better hurry up and get away," she said; "I suppose Aunt Janet
+hates the thought of my being near her even."</p>
+
+<p>Miss Abercrombie watched her with kindly eyes. The tragedy she had
+suspected on the first night was worse even than she had imagined. It
+stared at her out of the old, fierce face upstairs, it slipped into her
+thoughts of what this girl's future was going to be.</p>
+
+<p>"Have you made any plans?" she asked; "do you know at all where to go?"</p>
+
+<p>"Does it matter very much?" Joan answered bitterly.</p>
+
+<p>"My dear," Miss Abercrombie spoke gently, "I am making no attempt to
+criticize, and I certainly have no right to judge, but you have a very
+hard fight before you and you will not win through if you go into it in
+that spirit. I do not want to ask questions, you would probably resent
+them, but will you tell me one thing. Does the man know about what is
+going to happen?"</p>
+
+<p>"No," answered Joan. "It wouldn't make any difference if he did. It is
+not even as if he had persuaded me to go and live with him; I want you
+to understand that I went of my own free will because I thought it was
+right."</p>
+
+<p>"You will write and tell him," suggested Miss Abercrombie. "That is only
+fair to him and yourself."</p>
+
+<p>"No," Joan said again, "it was the one thing he was most afraid of; I
+would not stoop to ask him to share it with me."</p>
+
+<p>Miss Abercrombie put out a quick hand. "You are forgetting that now
+there is someone else who is dependent on how you fight and whether you
+win through. You may say, 'I stand alone in this,' yet there is someone
+else who will have to share in paying the cost."</p>
+
+<p>The colour swept from Joan's cheek; she choked back the hard lump in her
+throat. "We will have to pay it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span> together," she said. "I cannot ask
+anyone else to help."</p>
+
+<p>The tears, long held back, came then and she turned away quickly. Miss
+Abercrombie watched her in silence for a minute or two. At last she
+spoke. "You poor thing," she said slowly and quietly; "you poor, foolish
+child."</p>
+
+<p>Joan turned to her quickly. "You are thinking that I am a coward," she
+said, "that I am making but a poor beginnings to my fight. But it isn't
+that, not exactly. I shall have courage enough when it comes to the
+time. But just now it is hurting me so to hurt Aunt Janet; I had not
+reckoned on that, I did not know that you could kill love so quickly."</p>
+
+<p>"You can't," Miss Abercrombie answered. "If her love were dead all this
+would not be hurting her any more."</p>
+
+<p>So Joan packed up her trunks again, fighting all the time against the
+impulse which prompted her to do nothing but cry and cry and cry. The
+chill of Aunt Janet's attitude seemed to have descended on the whole
+household. They could have no idea of the real trouble, but they felt
+the shadow and moved about limply, talking to each other in
+<a name="corr6" id="corr6"></a><a class="correction" href="#cn6" title="changed from 'whsipers'">whispers</a>.
+Miss Janet was reputed to be ill, anyway, she was keeping her room, and
+Miss Joan was packing up to go away; two facts which did not work in
+well together. No wonder the servants were restless and unhappy.</p>
+
+<p>Uncle John met Joan on her way upstairs late that evening. His usually
+grave, uninterested face wore an expression of absolute amazement, it
+almost amounted to fear.</p>
+
+<p>"Will you come into my room for a minute," he said, holding the door
+open for her to pass.</p>
+
+<p>Once inside, he turned and stared at her; she had never imagined his
+face could have worn such an expression. She saw him trying to speak,
+groping for words, as it were, and she stayed tongue-tied before him.
+Her day<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span> had been so tumultuous that now she was tired out, indifferent
+as to what might happen next.</p>
+
+<p>"Your aunt has told me," he said at last. "I find it almost impossible
+to believe, and in a way I blame myself. We should never have allowed
+you to go away as we did." He paused to breathe heavily. "I am an old
+man, but not too old to make a fight for our honour. Will you give me
+this man's name and address, Joan?"</p>
+
+<p>She had not paused to think that they would look on it as their honour
+which she had played with. His rather pitiful dignity hurt her more than
+anything that had gone before.</p>
+
+<p>"I cannot do that," she answered; "there is nothing exactly that you
+could blame him for. I did what I did out of my own free will and
+because I thought it was right."</p>
+
+<p>He still stared at her. "Right," he repeated; "you use the word in a
+strange sense, surely; and as for blaming him"&mdash;she saw how suddenly his
+hands clenched, the knuckles standing out white&mdash;"if you will let me
+know where to find him, I will settle that between us."</p>
+
+<p>Joan moved towards the door. "I cannot," she said; "please, Uncle John,
+don't ask me any more. I have hurt your honour; it must be me that you
+punish. I am going away to-morrow, let me go out of your life
+altogether. I shall not make any attempt to come back."</p>
+
+<p>"You are going to him?" he questioned. "Before God, if you do that I
+will find you out and&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"No," she interrupted, "you need not be afraid; I am not going back to
+him."</p>
+
+<p>With her hand on the door she heard him order her to come back as he had
+not finished what he had to say, and she stayed where she was, not
+turning again to look at him.</p>
+
+<p>"You are being stubborn in your sin." How strange the words sounded from
+Uncle John, who had never said a cross word to her in his life. "Very
+well, then, there is nothing for us to do except, as you say, to try and
+forget<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span> that we have ever loved you. When you go out of our house
+to-morrow it shall be the end. Your aunt is with me in this. But you
+shall have money; it shall be paid to you regularly through my
+solicitor, and to-night I am writing to him to tell him to render you
+every assistance he can. You can go there whenever you are in need of
+help. Miss Abercrombie has also promised your aunt, I believe, to do
+what she can for you."</p>
+
+<p>"I would rather not take any money from you," whispered Joan; "I will be
+able to earn enough to keep myself."</p>
+
+<p>"When you are doing that," he answered grimly, "you may communicate with
+the solicitor and he will put the money aside for such time as you may
+need it. But until then you owe it to us to use our money in preference
+to what could only be given to you in charity or disgrace."</p>
+
+<p>She waited in silence for some minutes after his last words. If she
+could have run to him then and cried out her fear and dismay and regret,
+perhaps some peace might have been achieved between them which would
+have helped to smooth out the tangle of their lives. But Joan was
+hopelessly dumb. She had gone into her escapade with light laughter on
+her lips, now she was paying the cost. One cannot take the world and
+readjust it to one's own beliefs. That was the lesson she was to learn
+through loneliness and tears. This breaking of home ties was only the
+first step in the lesson.</p>
+
+<p>She stole out of his presence at last and up to her own room. Her
+packing was all finished, she had dismantled the walls of her pictures,
+the tables of her books. Everything she possessed had been given to her
+by either Uncle John or Aunt Janet. Christmas presents, Easter presents,
+birthday presents, presents for no particular excuse except that she was
+their little girl and they loved her. It seemed to Joan as if into the
+black box which contained all these treasures she had laid away also
+their love for her. It<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span> took on almost the appearance of a coffin and
+she hated it.</p>
+
+<p>Miss Abercrombie saw her off at the station next morning. She had given
+Joan several addresses where she could look for rooms and was coming up
+to London in about a month herself, and would take Joan back with her
+into the country. "I want you to remember, though," she added, "that you
+can always come to me any time before that if you feel inclined. You
+need not even write; just turn up; you have my address; I shall always
+be glad to have you. I want to help you through what I know is going to
+be a very bitter time."</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you," Joan answered; but even at the time she had a ridiculous
+feeling that Miss Abercrombie was very glad to be seeing the last of
+her.</p>
+
+<p>After the train had slid out of the station and the small, purposeful
+figure had vanished from sight she sat back and tried to collect her
+thoughts to review the situation. She was feeling tired and desperately
+unhappy. They had let her see, even these dear people whom of all others
+in the world she loved, that she had gone outside their pale. She was in
+their eyes an outcast, a leper. She was afraid to see in other people's
+eyes the look of horror and agony which she had read in Aunt Janet's. Of
+what use was her book-learned wisdom in the face of this, it vanished
+into thin air. Hopeless, ashamed, yet a little defiant, Joan sat and
+stared at the opposite wall of the railway carriage.</p>
+
+<p>At Victoria Station she put her luggage into the cloak-room, deciding to
+see what could be done in the way of rooms, without the expense of going
+from place to place in a cab. The places Miss Abercrombie had
+recommended her to struck her as being expensive, and it seemed to her
+tortured nerves as if the landladies viewed her with distrustful eyes.
+She finally decided to take a bus down to Chelsea; she remembered having
+heard from someone that Chelsea was a cheap and frankly Bohemian place
+to live in.</p>
+
+<p>London was not looking its very best on this particular<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span> morning. A
+green-grey fog enshrouded shops and houses, the Park was an invisible
+blur and the atmosphere smarted in people's eyes and irritated their
+throats. Despite the contrariness of the weather, Joan clambered on to
+the top of the bus, she felt she could not face the inside stuffiness.
+She was tired and, had she but owned to it, hungry. It was already late
+afternoon and she had only had a cup of coffee and a bun since her
+arrival.</p>
+
+<p>As the bus jolted and bumped down Park Lane and then along
+Knightsbridge, she sat huddled up and miserable on the back seat, the
+day being well in accord with her mood. She was only dimly aware that
+they were passing the flat where she and Gilbert had lived, she was more
+acutely conscious of the couple who sat just in front of her&mdash;the man's
+arm flung round the girl's shoulders, her head very close to his.</p>
+
+<p>Waves of misery closed round Joan. A memory, which had not troubled her
+for some time, of Gilbert's hands about her and the scent of heliotrope,
+stirred across her mind. She could feel the hot tears splashing on her
+ungloved hands, a fit of sobbing gulped at her throat. Lest she should
+altogether lose control of herself she rose quickly and fumbled her way
+down the steps. The bus had just reached the corner of Sloane Street.
+She would go across the Park, she decided, and have her cry out. It was
+no use going to look for rooms in her present state, no landlady would
+dream of having her.</p>
+
+<p>Half blinded by her tears and the fog combined, she turned and started
+to cross the road. Voices yelled at her from either side, a motor car
+with enormous headlights came straight at her out of the fog. Joan
+hesitated, if she had stayed quite still the danger would have flashed
+past her, but she was already too unnerved to judge of what her action
+should be. As if fascinated by the lights she shut her eyes and moved
+blindly towards them.</p>
+
+<p>There were more sharp shouts, a great grinding noise of brakes and
+rushing wheels brought to a sudden pause,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span> then the darkness of black,
+absolute night surged over and beyond the pain which for a moment had
+held Joan. She floated out, so it seemed, on to a sea of nothingness,
+and a great peace settled about her heart.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"With heart made empty of delight<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;And hands that held no more fair things;<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;I questioned her;&mdash;'What shall requite<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;The savour of my offerings?'"</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><span class="smcap"><b>E. Nesbit.</b></span></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>"You have got your back against the wall, you have got to fight, you
+have got to fight, to fight!"</p>
+
+<p>The words pounded across Joan's mind over and over again. She struggled
+in obedience to their message against the waves of sleep that lapped her
+round. Struggled and fought, till at last, after what seemed like
+centuries of darkness, she won back to light and opened her eyes.</p>
+
+<p>She was lying in a long narrow bed, one of many, ranged on both sides
+down the hospital walls. Large windows, set very high up, opened on to
+grey skies and a flood of rather cold sunshine. At the foot of her bed,
+watching her with impartial eyes, stood a man, and beside him two
+nurses, their neat pink dresses and starched aprons rustling a little as
+they moved.</p>
+
+<p>Joan's eyes, wide and bewildered, met the doctor's, and he leant forward
+and smiled.</p>
+
+<p>"That's better," he said, "you have got to make an effort towards living
+yourself, young lady." He nodded and turned to the nurse at his right
+hand. "How long has she been in now, Nurse?"</p>
+
+<p>"Ten days to-morrow," the woman answered, "and except for the first day,
+when she moaned a good deal and talked about having to fight, she has
+scarce seemed to be conscious."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Joan's lips, prompted by the insistent voice within her, repeated, "I
+have got to fight," stiffly.</p>
+
+<p>The doctor came a little nearer and stooped to hear the words, "Yes," he
+agreed, "that is right, you have got to fight. See if you can get her to
+talk now and again, Nurse," he added; "she wants rousing, otherwise
+there is nothing radically to keep her back."</p>
+
+<p>Joan's face, however, seemed to linger in his mind, for, as he was about
+to leave the ward after his tour of inspection, he turned again to the
+elder nurse in charge.</p>
+
+<p>"Have you been able to find out anything about bed 14?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>"No, sir. We have had no inquiries and there was nothing in any of her
+pockets except a cloak-room ticket for Victoria Station."</p>
+
+<p>"Humph," he commented, "yet she must have relations. She does not look
+the friendless waif type."</p>
+
+<p>Nurse Taylor pursed up her lips. She had her own opinion as to the
+patient in bed 14. "There was the unfortunate circumstance of her
+condition," she mentioned; "the girl may very well have been desperate
+and lonely."</p>
+
+<p>"Anyway, she hasn't any right to be left like this," the doctor
+retorted. "If you can get her to talk about relations, find out where
+they are and send for them. That is my advice."</p>
+
+<p>Nurse Taylor owned a great many excellent qualities; tact and compassion
+were not among them. Long years spent in a profession which brought her
+daily into contact with human sin and human suffering had done nothing
+to soften her outlook or smooth down the hard, straight lines which she
+had laid down for her own and everyone else's guidance. She disapproved
+of Joan, but obedience to the doctor's orders was a religion to her;
+even where she disapproved she always implicitly carried them out.</p>
+
+<p>Next day, therefore, she stopped for quite a long time at Joan's bed,
+talking in her toneless, high voice. Had Joan any people who could be
+written to, what was her home<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span> address, would they not be worried at
+hearing nothing from her?</p>
+
+<p>Joan could only shake her head to all the questions. Very vaguely and in
+detached fragments she was beginning to remember the time that had
+preceded her accident. The memory of Aunt Janet's face and Uncle John's
+parting words was like an open wound, it bled at every touch and she
+shrank from Nurse Taylor's pointed questions. She remembered how she had
+sat on the top of the bus with the black weight of misery on her heart
+and of how the tears had come. She had been looking for rooms; that
+recollection followed hard on the heels of the other.</p>
+
+<p>When she was well enough to get about she would have to start looking
+for rooms again, for she had quite definitely made up her mind not to be
+a burden to Miss Abercrombie. It was her own fight; when she had
+gathered her strength about her, she would fight it out alone and make a
+success of it. Half wistfully she looked into the future and dreamt
+about the baby that was coming into her life. She would have to learn to
+live down this feeling of shame that burnt at her heart as she thought
+of him. He would be all hers, a small life to make of it what she
+pleased. Well, she would have to see that she made it fine and gay and
+brave. Shame should not enter into their lives, not if she fought hard
+enough.</p>
+
+<p>Nurse Taylor described her to the junior afterwards as a most stubborn
+and hardened type of girl.</p>
+
+<p>"The poor thing has hardly got her wits about her yet," the other
+answered; "she is very little trouble in the wards, we have had worse."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, the doctor can question her himself next time," Nurse Taylor
+snorted. "I am not here to be snubbed by her sort."</p>
+
+<p>She did not, however, let the matter drop entirely. At the end of her
+third week Joan was promoted to an armchair in the verandah and there
+one afternoon, after the teas had been handed round, Nurse Taylor
+brought her a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span> visitor. A tall, sad-faced, elderly woman, who walked
+with a curiously deprecating movement, seeming to apologize for every
+step she took. Yet kindliness and a certain strength shone at Joan from
+behind the large, round-rimmed glasses she wore, and her mouth was clean
+cut and sharp.</p>
+
+<p>"This is Mrs. Westwood." Nurse Taylor introduced them briefly. "She
+wants to have a little talk with you, Miss Rutherford. If I were you I
+should tell her about things," she added pointedly. "I do not know if
+you have any plans made, but you are up for discharge next week."</p>
+
+<p>She bustled off and Mrs. Westwood drew up a chair and sat down close to
+Joan, staring at the girl with short-sighted, pink-lidded eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"You will wonder who I am," she said at last. "Perhaps you have never
+noticed me before, but I am a very frequent visitor. We run a mission in
+the South-West of London, with the object of helping young girls. I want
+you to talk to me about yourself, to be quite frank with me and to
+remember, if I seem to usurp on your privacy, that I am an older woman
+and that my only wish is to help you."</p>
+
+<p>"It is very kind of you," began Joan, "but&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"You may not need material help," the woman put in hastily; "but,
+spiritually, who is not in need of help from God."</p>
+
+<p>Joan could think of no suitable reply for this and they sat in silence,
+the woman studying her face intently. Then presently, flushing with the
+earnestness of her purpose, she put out a cold hand and took Joan's.</p>
+
+<p>"I think they have left it to me to tell you," she said. "The little
+life that was within you has been killed by your accident."</p>
+
+<p>The colour flamed to Joan's face. A sense of awe and a feeling of
+intense relief surged up in her. "Oh, what a good thing!" she gasped,
+almost before she realized what she said.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Westwood sat back in her chair, her eyes no longer<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span> looked at Joan.
+"The child which God had given you even in your sin," she said stiffly.</p>
+
+<p>Joan leaned forward quickly. "I did not mean just that," she said, "and
+yet I did. You do not know, you can't guess, how afraid I was getting.
+Everyone's hand against me, and even the people who had most loved me
+seeming to hate me because of this."</p>
+
+<p>Her voice trailed into silence before the stern disapproval of the other
+woman's face. Yet once having started, she was driven on to speak all
+the jumble of thoughts that had lain in her mind these last two months.</p>
+
+<p>"I was not ashamed or afraid, to begin with," she hurried the words out.
+"It had not seemed to me wrong. I lived with him because I thought I
+loved him and we did not want to get married. Then one day he let me
+see&mdash;oh, no, I am not being quite truthful, for I had seen it
+before&mdash;that he was in reality ashamed of our life together. He was
+acting against his convictions because it amused him. I could not bear
+that, it seemed to drag our life together through the mud, and I left
+him."</p>
+
+<p>She could see that Mrs. Westwood was not making the slightest attempt to
+understand her; still she went wildly on:</p>
+
+<p>"I went home and it seemed all right. My life with him faded away; I
+suppose I had never really loved him. Then, then they found out about
+what was going to happen and they turned against me, even Aunt Janet;"
+her voice broke on the words, she buried her face in her arms, crying
+like a child. "Aunt Janet, Aunt Janet," she whispered again and again
+through her tears.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Westwood waited till the storm had spent itself, there was no sign
+of softening upon her face. Remorse and regret she could understand and
+condone, but this excusing of self, as she called Joan's explanation,
+struck her as being inexcusably bad.</p>
+
+<p>"And do you now congratulate yourself that by this<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> accident," she laid
+special stress on the word, "you are to escape the punishment of your
+sin?"</p>
+
+<p>Joan raised tear-drowned eyes. "Haven't I been punished enough," she
+asked, "for something that I did not think was a sin?"</p>
+
+<p>"We cannot make or unmake God's laws in our thoughts," the other
+answered; "you were wilfully blind to the knowledge that was in your
+heart."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, no," Joan began. Mrs. Westwood swept the remark aside and stood up.</p>
+
+<p>"We will not argue about it," she said; "I realize that you are not yet
+looking for the comfort or promise of pardon which I could lead you to.
+But, my child, do not delude yourself into the belief that thus easily
+have you set aside the consequences of your evil. God is not mocked,
+neither does He sleep. If you should ever be in any real need of help,"
+she ended abruptly, "help which would serve to make you strong in the
+face of temptation, come to us, our doors are always open."</p>
+
+<p>She dropped a card bearing the address of the mission on Joan's lap and
+turned to go. Joan saw her call Nurse Taylor and say a few words to her
+on the way out. For herself she sat on in the dusk. Outside the lamps
+had been lit, they shone on wet pavements and huge, lurching omnibuses,
+on fast-driven taxis and a policeman standing alone in the middle of the
+road. To-morrow she would have to write to Miss Abercrombie and tell her
+there was no further need for her very kindly assistance; then she would
+have to make new plans and arrangements for herself in the future. She
+would try for a room in one of the girls' clubs that Miss Abercrombie
+had given her a letter to. She had been shy of going there before, but
+it would be different now. She could slip back into life and take up her
+share, forgetting, since the fear was past, the nightmare of terror
+which had held her heart before. For she had been afraid, what was the
+use of trying to blind her eyes to the truth? She had not had the
+courage of her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span> convictions, she had not even wanted to carry her banner
+through the fight. She was glad, to the very bottom of her heart she was
+glad, that there was no more need for fighting.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX"></a>CHAPTER IX</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"Let this be said between us here,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;One's love grows green when one turns grey;<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;This year knows nothing of last year,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;To-morrow has no more to say<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
+To yesterday."</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><span class="smcap"><b>A. Swinburne.</b></span></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+<p>Dick could not bring himself to approve of his sister's marriage. He
+made no attempt to conceal his real opinion on the subject. In one very
+heated interview with Mabel herself he labelled it as disgusting to
+marry a man whom you disliked for his money, or for the things his money
+can give you.</p>
+
+<p>"But I do not dislike him," Mabel answered, as once before. She was
+sitting in a low armchair by the window, a piece of sewing in her hands.
+She laid her work down to look up at him. "He is very fond of me and he
+will be very good to Mother and myself. There are worse reasons than
+that for marrying, surely."</p>
+
+<p>"It is Mother, then," stormed Dick. "You are doing it because of
+Mother."</p>
+
+<p>Mabel shook her head. "No," she said; "I am doing it because to me it
+seems right and as if it would bring most happiness to all of us. I am
+not even quite sure that Mother approves."</p>
+
+<p>She need not have had any misgivings on that point. Mrs. Grant was
+absolutely in her element arranging for the marriage. Mabel had never
+been quite the beautiful daughter that Mrs. Grant would have liked, that
+she should marry a Mr. Jarvis was to be expected; he had at<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span> least got
+money, which was always something to be thankful for. She took over the
+refurnishing and redecorating of his house with eager hands.</p>
+
+<p>"Mabel has always been accustomed to luxury, Tom," she told Mr. Jarvis;
+"until Harry died she never wanted for a thing which money could give
+her."</p>
+
+<p>"And she shall not want now," he answered gravely.</p>
+
+<p>Only once he remarked to Mabel afterwards, showing perhaps the trend of
+his thoughts: "We appear to be furnishing our house to please your
+mother, Mabel; seems a pity I cannot save you the trouble of marrying me
+by asking her instead."</p>
+
+<p>Mabel stirred a little uneasily. "In pleasing her you are pleasing me,"
+she answered, and with a shrug of his shoulders he turned away from the
+subject.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Grant had her own rooms papered with white satin paper and very
+delicately outlined in gold; she ransacked the Jarvis heirlooms to find
+appropriate furniture for such a setting, and succeeded very well. The
+bills for her various suggested improvements passed through Mr. Jarvis'
+hands, and he commented on them to Mabel with a grim smile.</p>
+
+<p>"She knows how to spend money," he said. "Dick must certainly have found
+the responsibility heavy."</p>
+
+<p>"She has never learned how not to spend," Mabel explained; "but you must
+not pass what you think unnecessary."</p>
+
+<p>"My dear, it is part of our bargain," he answered; "I shall not shrink
+from my share any more than you will."</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Grant fought very strenuously for a wedding in London, but here for
+once Mabel opposed her firmly, and the idea had to be abandoned.</p>
+
+<p>"It means, of course, that most of my dearest friends will not be able
+to come, but I suppose I need not expect that to weigh against your
+determination," was one of the many arguments she tried, and: "I never
+dreamed that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span> a daughter of mine would insist upon this hole-and-corner
+way of getting married" another.</p>
+
+<p>"It almost looks as if you were ashamed of the man," she said somewhat
+spitefully to Mabel, the day the wedding-dress was tried on. "When your
+father and I were married the church was simply packed. I had a lovely
+gown"&mdash;her thoughts wandered into kindlier channels&mdash;"and Harry was very
+much in love. I remember his hand shaking as he tried to slip the ring
+on to my finger. I suppose you love Mr. Jarvis?"</p>
+
+<p>The abrupt question coming after the vague memories startled Mabel into
+sudden rigidness. "I suppose I do," she answered, her white-clad figure
+mocked her from the glass. "One does love one's husband, doesn't one?"</p>
+
+<p>"Mabel"&mdash;Mrs. Grant's voice sounded righteous indignation&mdash;"you do say
+such extraordinary things sometimes and about such solemn subjects. But
+if you do really love him, then why this desire for secrecy?"</p>
+
+<p>"Dear Mother, being married in the parish church instead of in St.
+Paul's is not exactly secrecy or a wild desire to hide something on my
+part. I have always hated big fashionable weddings."</p>
+
+<p>She slipped out of the dress and laid it down on the bed. Mrs. Grant
+viewed her with discontented eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"I cannot pretend to understand you," she grumbled, "and I don't know
+why you talk of St. Paul's. I never suggested such a place; Harry and I
+were married at St. Mary's, Kensington."</p>
+
+<p>Dick, when consulted on the matter, proved even less amenable. "I
+dislike the whole affair," he answered gruffly; "please don't ask me
+where it should take place."</p>
+
+<p>He ran up to London himself the week before the wedding. A vague and
+rather incoherent wish to meet Joan again had kept him restless ever
+since her abrupt departure. He did not attempt to define his thoughts in
+any way. The girl had interested him, and startled him out of the even
+tenor of his beliefs. He hated to think of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span> her turned adrift and left,
+as the possibility was she had been left, to fend for herself. He had
+not seen the elder Miss Rutherford since his visit, but rumour in the
+village ran that Miss Joan had got into disgrace of sorts and been sent
+away. The servants from the Manor spoke with bated breath of the change
+which had come over the household; of how Miss Joan's rooms had been
+locked and her pictures taken down. The world is horribly hard to women
+when they leave the beaten paths of respectability; he could not bear to
+think of what she might be suffering, of where it might lead her.</p>
+
+<p>He walked about somewhat aimlessly for his few days in town, but the
+chance of meeting anyone in this way is very remote, and of course he
+did not succeed. He could not, however, shake away the depression which
+the thought of her brought him.</p>
+
+<p>Mabel came to sit in his smoking-room the night before her wedding, Mrs.
+Grant having gone early to bed.</p>
+
+<p>"Did you see anyone up in town?" she asked.</p>
+
+<p>Dick shook his head, puffing at his pipe. "Not a soul I knew," he
+commented, "except Mathews about my job. Wish I hadn't gone; London is a
+depressing place."</p>
+
+<p>"You rather hoped to meet someone, didn't you?" asked Mabel.</p>
+
+<p>Dick glanced up at her and away again quickly. "What makes you ask
+that?" he said.</p>
+
+<p>Mabel let the curtain fall back into place; she had been peering out
+into the street, and turned to face him. "You have shut me outside
+things, Dick," she spoke slowly, "this last month, ever since my
+engagement; but shutting me out can't keep me from knowing. You only saw
+that girl over at the Manor once, but she has been in your thoughts ever
+since." She came forward, perching herself on the arm of his chair as
+had been her habit in the old days, one arm thrown round his shoulders
+to support herself. "Little brother," she asked, "did you think I should
+not know when you fell in love?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Fell in love! How completely the thought startled him. Of course Mabel
+was utterly mistaken in her wild conjectures. To throw aside the doubt
+he turned quickly, and put a hand over hers where it lay near him.</p>
+
+<p>"Why do you say I have shut you out?" he parried her question. "Because
+I lost my temper over your engagement?"</p>
+
+<p>"No." Mabel shook her head. "It was not exactly because of that. I know
+you have not understood, Dick; I am not even sure that I want you to;
+and I know that that helped to build a wall between us, but that was not
+what began it. Never mind"&mdash;she bent and kissed the top of his head&mdash;"if
+your secret is not ready to share you shall keep it a little longer to
+yourself. You will go up to London, won't you, Dick, after Tom and I
+have come back and Mother has settled down?"</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose so," he agreed; "but I want to get away for a bit first, if I
+can. Spoke to Mathews when I was in town and he has promised to keep his
+eyes open for a job on one of those P. and O. liners for me."</p>
+
+<p>"I see," she said; "but when you come back you will settle in town and
+sometimes you will spare us week-ends from your very strenuous career,
+won't you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Of course," he answered; his hand tightened on hers. "Mabel," he said
+suddenly, "you are happy, aren't you; it isn't because of me or anyone
+else that you are getting married, is it?"</p>
+
+<p>He was not looking at her, therefore she did not have to lie with her
+eyes. "I am quite happy," she answered softly. "Dear, stupid Dick, how
+you have fretted your heart out about my happiness."</p>
+
+<p>"I know," he admitted, "I could not bear to think&mdash;I mean, love somehow
+stands for such a lot in people's lives, I&mdash;&mdash;" he broke off, and stood
+up abruptly. "You will think I am a sentimental ass, but I have always
+wanted you to have the best of things, Mabel, and I have been<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span> horribly
+afraid that Fate, or Mother, or perhaps even I, were shoving you into
+taking the second best."</p>
+
+<p>"You have wanted the best for me, Dick," she answered, "that counts for
+a lot."</p>
+
+<p>Then one of those dull silences fell between them that come sometimes to
+two people who love with their whole hearts and who have been trying to
+speak some of their thoughts to each other&mdash;a silence that stood between
+them almost as it were with a drawn sword, while Dick puffed at his pipe
+and Mabel stared at her white hands, showing up against the darkness of
+her dress. Then finally she moved, standing up, and just for a second
+their eyes met.</p>
+
+<p>"Good-night," she said across the silence, "it is late, Dick, I meant to
+be in bed ages ago."</p>
+
+<p>"Good-night," he answered, and she turned quickly and went from the
+room.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Grant kept everyone, including herself, in a state of unexplained
+fuss from the moment when early morning light woke her on the day of
+Mabel's marriage till the moment when, much to Dick's embarrassment, she
+collapsed into his arms, sobbing bitterly, in the vestry where they had
+all gone to sign their names.</p>
+
+<p>At the reception she slightly recovered her spirits, but broke down
+again when the time came for the couple to depart. They were going to
+Paris for a fortnight's honey-moon; Mabel had stipulated that they
+should not be away for longer than that. Jarvis Hall was ready for their
+return; already Mrs. Grant was using one of the motors and ordering
+crested paper with the address on it for her own letters. But Dick,
+Mabel knew, was simply aching to be quit of it all, and away on his own.
+He had arranged to hand over the practice and proposed to take a two
+years' trip abroad. It was only in the complete freedom of Dick that she
+would know that part of her plan was being fulfilled.</p>
+
+<p>When she drew back her head after the final farewells had been waved and
+the house was out of sight it was to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span> meet Jarvis' intent, short-sighted
+stare. His glasses magnified the pupils of his eyes to an unusual extent
+when he was looking straight at anyone.</p>
+
+<p>"Well," he said, "that's done. Till the last moment, Mabel, I rather
+wondered if you would go through with it. But I might have known," he
+went on quickly, "you are not the sort to shrink from a bargain once it
+is made."</p>
+
+<p>Her hand lay passive in his, she did not even stir when he leaned
+forward to kiss her. What he had said was perfectly true, the bargain
+had been made, she was not one of those who shirk payment.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_X" id="CHAPTER_X"></a>CHAPTER X</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"And you shall learn how salt his food who fares<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Upon another's bread; how steep his path,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Who treadeth up and down another's stairs."</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><span class="smcap"><b>D. G. Rossetti.</b></span></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>There are some natures which cannot live with any happiness in drab
+surroundings. Atmosphere affects everyone more or less; but whereas
+there are a few fortunate ones who can rise triumphant to a certain
+contentment through squalor and ugliness, there are a great many more
+who find even cheerfulness very hard to attain to under like
+circumstances.</p>
+
+<p>The shut-in dinginess of Digby Street, the gloomy aspect of Shamrock
+House, cast such a chill across Joan's spirits that, as she stood
+hesitating with her hand on the bell, the instinct came to her to
+scramble back into the cab and tell the man to drive her anywhere away
+from such a neighbourhood. Of course it was absurd, and the cabman did
+not look as if he would be in the least willing to comply. He had
+treated her with a supercilious disbelief in there being any tip for him
+as soon as he had heard of her destination. Joan had gone to Victoria
+Station to collect her luggage, and it had been both late and dark
+before the need<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span> for a cab had arisen. She had elected not to leave the
+hospital till after tea; somehow, when it had come near to going, her
+courage, which she had been bolstering up with hope and promises of what
+she should do in her new life, had vanished into thin air. Perhaps more
+than anything else she lacked the physical strength which would have
+enabled her to look cheerfully into the future. The hospital had been a
+place of refuge, she hated to leave it.</p>
+
+<p>This feeling grew upon her more and more as she sat back in a corner of
+the cab while it rumbled along the Vauxhall Bridge Road. There seemed
+always to be a tram passing, huge giant vehicles that shook the earth
+and made a great deal of noise in their going. The houses on either side
+were dingy, singularly unattractive-looking buildings, and the further
+the cab crawled away from Victoria Street the deeper the shade of
+poverty and dirt that descended on the surroundings. Digby Street and
+Shamrock House were the culminating stroke to Joan's depression.</p>
+
+<p>Miss Abercrombie had written recommending it to her as a Girls' Club
+where she would probably get companionship and advice on the question of
+work. "You won't like it," she had added, "but it is very conveniently
+situated and ridiculously cheap." So Joan had described her destination
+to the cabman as a ladies' club, somewhere in Digby Street. He had
+answered with a sniff, for it was here that he had lost sight of his
+tip, that he supposed she meant the Home for Working Girls that lay in
+those parts. Looking up at the large, red-fronted building, with its
+countless uncurtained windows, Joan realized that the man's description
+was probably nearer the truth than her own.</p>
+
+<p>She was to learn later that on this particular occasion she saw Digby
+Street at its very worst, for it was Saturday night, and barrows of
+fish, meat and vegetables stood along the pavements, illuminated by
+flares of light so that all the ugliness was only too apparent. Little
+children played in and out, under the barrows and along the gutters; a
+public-house stood at the corner near Shamrock House, and exactly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span>
+opposite the Salvation Army added its brass band and shrill voices to
+the general tumult.</p>
+
+<p>Joan's first timid attempt at the bell produced no answer, nor her
+second. By this time the cabman had dismounted her box and stood staring
+at her in sullen disapproval, while a couple of very drunk but cheerful
+costers argued with each other as to whether they ought not to help the
+young lady to get in. Her third effort was perhaps more violent, for, to
+her relief, she could see the dim light in the hall being turned up and
+the door was opened on the chain and very slightly ajar. A couple of
+bright eyes peered at her through this opening, then, having apparently
+satisfied their owner that Joan was neither dangerous nor drunk, the
+door was further opened, and Joan could see into the red-tiled hall and
+passage with its numbered, white-painted doors.</p>
+
+<p>"What do you want?" asked the lady of the eyes; a small, plump person
+with grey hair brushed back very straight from an apple-red face.</p>
+
+<p>"I want a room," Joan explained. "I have been recommended to come here.
+I do hope you have one to spare."</p>
+
+<p>The little lady moved aside and beckoned to the cabman. "You can come
+in," she said, "and the man had better fetch in your box. I thought it
+was one of those troublesome children when you first rang, it was so
+very violent, and they make a point of trying to break the bells."</p>
+
+<p>"I am so sorry," Joan murmured meekly, an apology she realized was
+expected from her. "I was so dreadfully tired and no one seemed to be
+going to answer."</p>
+
+<p>"We do not keep a staff of servants to answer the bell day and night,"
+the woman answered. "Still, I am sorry you were kept waiting. Will you
+come in here"&mdash;she opened a door a little way down the passage&mdash;"this is
+my office. I must see your letter of recommendation before I let you
+talk about the rooms, that is one of our rules."</p>
+
+<p>Joan paid the cabman and followed her inquisitor into<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span> the office. Miss
+Nigel let down the front of the desk, opened a large ledger and donned a
+pair of spectacles. "Now," she said, "who are you, what are your
+references, and who recommended you?"</p>
+
+<p>Fortunately Miss Abercrombie had remembered to send a letter of
+introduction. Joan produced it and handed it to Miss Nigel. "My name is
+Joan Rutherford," she added; "I did not know about having to have
+references."</p>
+
+<p>Miss Nigel peered at her over the tops of her glasses; she only used
+them for reading and could not see out of them for other purposes. "We
+have to make a point of it in most cases," she answered, "but also I
+judge by appearances. In your case this letter from Miss
+Abercrombie&mdash;her name is in our books although I do not know her
+personally&mdash;will be quite sufficient. Now, how much do you want to pay?"</p>
+
+<p>"As little as possible," Joan confessed, "only I would like to have a
+room to myself."</p>
+
+<p>"Quite so," the other agreed, "and in any case, all our cubicles are
+taken. They are, of course, cheaper than anything else." She ran her
+finger down the lines of the ledger. "I can let you have a room on the
+top floor which will work out to fifteen and six a week. That includes
+breakfast, late dinner, lights and baths. There is a certain amount of
+attendance, but we expect the girls to make their own beds and keep the
+rooms tidy."</p>
+
+<p>Fifteen and six a week. Joan attempted to make a rapid calculation in
+her head, but gave up the idea. It sounded at least quite absurdly
+cheap, she would not have to spend very much of Uncle John's allowance
+before she got some work to do for herself. The future seemed suddenly
+to shut her in to a life enclosed by the brick walls of Shamrock House
+with its attendant neighbourhood of Digby Street.</p>
+
+<p>"That will do," she answered, "it sounds very nice."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," agreed Miss Nigel; she closed the desk and stood up, "for the
+price, we offer exceptional advantages. If you<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span> will carry up what you
+need for to-night, I will show you to your rooms."</p>
+
+<p>It occurred to Joan as she followed her guide up flights of carpetless
+stone stairs that her new abode resembled a prison more than anything
+else. The long bare passages were broken up by countless doors all
+numbered and painted white in contrast to the brick-coloured walls. The
+sound of their footsteps echoed mournfully through the bareness and
+seeming desolation of the place. From one of the landing windows she
+caught a blurred picture of the streets outside, the lit-up barrows, the
+crowd just emerging from the public-house. She was to get very used and
+very hardened to the life in Digby Street, but on this, her first
+evening, it caught at her senses with a cold touch of fear.</p>
+
+<p>On the top floor of all Miss Nigel opened the first door along the
+passage and ushered Joan into the room that was to be hers. It was so
+small that its one window occupied practically the whole space of the
+front wall. A narrow bed stood along one side, and between this and the
+opposite wall there was scarce room for a chair. At the foot of the bed
+stood the wash-stand and the chest of drawers facing each other, with a
+very narrow space in between them. But it was all scrupulously clean,
+with white-washed walls and well-scrubbed furniture, and the windows
+opened over the roofs of the neighbouring houses. Very far up in the
+darkness of the sky outside a star twinkled and danced.</p>
+
+<p>Miss Nigel looked round at the room with evident satisfaction. "You will
+be comfortable here, I think," she said; "we do our best to make the
+girls happy. We expect them, however, to conform to our rules; you will
+find them explained in this book." She placed a little blue pamphlet on
+the dressing-table. "Lights are put out at ten, and if you are later
+than that, you have to pay a small fine for being let in, a threepenny
+door fee, we call it. Everyone is requested to make as little noise as
+possible in their rooms or along the passages, and to be punctual for
+dinner."</p>
+
+<p>With one more look round she turned to go.
+<a name="corr7" id="corr7"></a><a class="correction" href="#cn7" title="changed from 'Half-olay'">Half-way</a>
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span>
+out, however, a
+kindly thought struck her, and she looked back at Joan.</p>
+
+<p>"Dinner is at seven-thirty," she said. "I expect you will be glad to
+have it and get to bed. You look very tired."</p>
+
+<p>Joan would have liked to ask if she could have dinner upstairs, but one
+glance at the book of rules and regulations decided her against the
+idea. Shamrock House evidently admitted of no such luxury, and on second
+thoughts, how ridiculous it was to suppose that dinner could be carried
+up five flights of stairs for the benefit of someone paying fifteen and
+six a week all told. She was too tired and too depressed to face the
+prospect of a meal downstairs, she would just have to go to bed without
+dinner, she concluded.</p>
+
+<p>The House woke to life as she lay there, evidently the inhabitants
+returned about this time. Joan remembered the cabman's somewhat blunt
+description and smiled at the memory. A Home for Working Girls. That was
+why it had seemed so silent and deserted before, shops and offices do
+not shut till after six. But now the workers were coming home, she could
+hear their feet along the passages, the slamming of doors, voices and
+laughter from the room next hers. Home! This narrow, cold room, those
+endless stairs and passages outside, they were to be home for the
+future. The hot tears pricked in her eyes, but she fought against tears.
+After all, she had been very lucky to find it, it was cheap, it was
+clean; other girls lived here and were happy, someone had laughed next
+door.</p>
+
+<p>"I have got to take you firmly in hand," Joan argued with her
+depression. "It is no use making a fuss about things that are all my own
+fault. I tried to play with life and I did not succeed. It is too big
+and hard. If I had wanted to work it out differently I ought to have
+been very strong. But I am not strong, I am only just ordinary. This is
+my chance again, and in the plain, straight way I must win through." She
+spoke the words almost aloud, as if challenging fate: "I will win
+through."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XI" id="CHAPTER_XI"></a>CHAPTER XI</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"Will my strength last me? Did not someone say<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;The way was ever easier all the way?"</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><span class="smcap"><b>H. C. Beeching.</b></span></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>Youth can nearly always rely upon sleep to build up new strength, new
+hope, new courage. If you have got to a stage in your life when sleep
+fails you, if night means merely a long tortured pause from the noises
+of the world, in which the beating of your heart seems unbearably loud,
+then indeed you have reached to the uttermost edge of despair. Joan
+slept, heavily and dreamlessly, save that there was some vague hint of
+happiness in her mind, till she was wakened in the morning by a most
+violent bell ringing. The dressing-bell at Shamrock House, which went at
+seven o'clock, was carried by a maid up and down every passage, so that
+there was not the slightest chance of anyone oversleeping themselves.</p>
+
+<p>Joan dressed quickly; the faint aroma of happiness which her sleep had
+brought her, and which amounted to cheerfulness, stayed with her. She
+remembered how Miss Abercrombie had once said to her: "Oh, you are a
+Browningite," and smiled at the phrase, repeating to herself another
+verse of the same poem:</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 15em;">"And I shall thereupon</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 15.5em;">Take rest ere I be gone,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 15.5em;">Once more on my adventure brave and new."</span><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>She felt almost confident of success this morning; her mind was busy
+with plans of the work she would find. She was glad to feel herself one
+in a giant hive of workers, all girls like herself, cutting out their
+lives for themselves, earning their own living.</p>
+
+<p>Breakfast brought with it a slight disillusionment. The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span> dining-room in
+Shamrock House is in the basement; chill and dreary of aspect, its
+windows always dirty and unopenable, because at the slightest excuse of
+an open window the small boys of the neighbourhood will make it their
+target for all kinds of filth. Rotting vegetables, apple-cores,
+scrapings of mud; there is quite sufficient of all that outside the
+windows without encouraging it to come in. Six long deal tables occupy
+the space of the room, and it is one of the few amusements which the
+children of Digby Street possess to gather at the railings and watch the
+inhabitants of Shamrock House being fed.</p>
+
+<p>It was the last flight of stairs into the basement which damped Joan's
+enthusiasm for her new home. As she stood hesitating in the doorway, for
+there were a great many people in the room, and the tables seemed
+crowded, she caught Miss Nigel's eye.</p>
+
+<p>"You will find a seat over there," the lady called out to her, waving a
+hand in the direction of the furthest table. "Help yourself to bacon,
+which is on the hot case near the fire, and come here for your tea or
+coffee. By the way, which do you like?"</p>
+
+<p>Joan asked for tea, and having secured her cup and a small piece of
+unappetizing bacon, she found her way over to the indicated table. A
+girl sat at the head of it, and since she was ensconced behind a
+newspaper and apparently paying no attention to anybody, Joan chose the
+chair next her. She felt on the sudden shy and unwilling to make friends
+with anyone, the chill of the room was striking into her heart.</p>
+
+<p>She had presently to rouse her neighbour, however, to ask her to pass
+the salt, and at that the girl lifted a pair of penetrating eyes and
+fixed Joan with an intent stare.</p>
+
+<p>"New arrival?" she asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," Joan admitted. "I came last night."</p>
+
+<p>"Humph!" the girl commented. "Well, don't touch the jam this morning. It
+is peculiar to Shamrock House<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span>&mdash;plum-stones, raspberry-pips and glue."
+She swept the information at Joan and returned to her paper.</p>
+
+<p>She was a big girl with rather a heavy face and strong, capable-looking
+hands. Despite her manners, which were undeniably bad, Joan would almost
+have described her as distinguished but for the fact that the word
+sounded ridiculous amid such surroundings.</p>
+
+<p>"Looking for work?" the girl asked presently.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," Joan answered again, "only I am not sure what sort of work to
+look for, or what I should like to do."</p>
+
+<p>The girl lifted her eyes to stare at her once again. "It isn't generally
+a case of 'like,'" she said, "more often it is necessity. In that
+case"&mdash;she reached out a long arm for the bread&mdash;"Fate does not as a
+rule give you much time in which to make up your mind; she pushes you
+into something which you hate like hell for the rest of your life."</p>
+
+<p>"You aren't very cheerful," remonstrated Joan.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, well, I never am that," agreed the other, "nor polite. You ask Miss
+Nigel if you want a true estimate of my manners. But I have lived here
+ten years now and I have seen girls like you drift in and out by the
+score. The feeding or the general atmosphere doesn't agree with them,
+and our ranks are maintained by beings of a coarser make, as you may see
+for yourself."</p>
+
+<p>She rose, crumpling her paper into a ball and throwing it under the
+table.</p>
+
+<p>"My name is Rose Brent," she said. "What is yours?"</p>
+
+<p>"Rutherford," Joan answered, "Joan Rutherford. I hope I shan't drift
+quite as quickly as you foretell," she added.</p>
+
+<p>Secretarial work was what she had really made up her mind to try for,
+though she had not had the courage to confess as much to her breakfast
+companion. She had, after all, had a certain amount of training in that
+and hoped not to find it so very impossible to get a post as a beginner
+somewhere. Her first visit to the nearest registry<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span> office, however,
+served to show her that her very slight experience was going to be of
+little use to her. The registry lady was kind, sufficiently interested
+to appear amiable, but not at all reassuring in her views as to Joan's
+prospects.</p>
+
+<p>"I am afraid I cannot hold out very much hope," she said, after five
+minutes' crisp questioning of Joan. "You have, you see, so very few
+qualifications, and the market is rather over-stocked with girls who can
+do just a little. My strong advice to you is to continue your shorthand;
+when you are a little more experienced in that we ought to have no
+difficulty in placing you. Good morning; please see that the hall door
+shuts properly, the latch is very weak."</p>
+
+<p>Her business-like manner, the absolute efficiency which shone around
+her, and the crowded aspect of the waiting-room&mdash;all girls who could do
+just a little, Joan presumed&mdash;caused her heart to sink. Finding work was
+not going to be as easy as she had first supposed.</p>
+
+<p>She roamed from office to office after that for several days, to be met
+everywhere with the same slight encouragement and frail promises to
+help. Finally, thoroughly discouraged, she bought papers instead, and
+turned to a strict perusal of their various advertisements.</p>
+
+<p>One in particular caught her eye.</p>
+
+<p>"Wanted a pupil shorthand typist. Tuition in return for services.&mdash;Apply
+Miss Bacon, 2, Baker Street, W."</p>
+
+<p>It was late in the afternoon of the day before Joan found her way to
+Baker Street, for she had had several other places to call at and she
+was in addition very tired. Going from place to place in search of work
+had reduced her to a painful knowledge of her own absolute incompetency
+and the general uselessness of life. A brass plate on the door of No. 2
+conveyed the information: "Miss Bacon. Fourth floor. Shorthand and
+Typing. Please ring and walk up."</p>
+
+<p>Joan rang and followed the instructions. On the very<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span> top landing a girl
+stood, holding a candle in her hand, for up here there was no light of
+any sort. The grease dripped down her skirt and on to the floor.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you want Miss Bacon?" she asked.</p>
+
+<p>Joan nodded, too breathless to say anything.</p>
+
+<p>The girl turned into the dim interior and threw open a door, snuffing
+the candle at the same time.</p>
+
+<p>"If you will wait here," she said, "Miss Bacon will be with you in a
+minute."</p>
+
+<p>Joan looked round on a moderately large, dust-smothered room. Dust, that
+is to say, was the first thing to strike the eye of the beholder. The
+windows were thick in dust, it lay on tables and chairs and on the two
+typewriters standing unused in a corner of the room. The room gave one
+the impression of being singularly uninhabited. Then the door opened and
+shut again, and Joan turned to face the owner.</p>
+
+<p>Miss Bacon's figure, like her furniture, seemed to have taken on a
+coating of dust. Timid eyes looked out at Joan from behind pince-nez set
+rather crookedly on a thin nose. One side of her face, from eye to chin,
+was disfigured by an unsightly bruise. Miss Bacon dabbed a handkerchief
+to it continually and started explaining its presence at once.</p>
+
+<p>"You may be surprised at my face"&mdash;her voice, like her eyes, was
+timid&mdash;"but I am short-sighted and last night stumbled on the stairs,
+hitting my face against the top step. It was exceedingly painful, but it
+is better now. What can I do for you?"</p>
+
+<p>Joan murmured something sympathetic about the top step, and explained
+that she had come in answer to the advertisement. Miss Bacon's face
+fell. "I had hoped you were a client," she owned. Then she pulled
+forward a chair for herself and asked Joan to be seated.</p>
+
+<p>It appeared that Joan would receive excellent tuition in shorthand and
+free use of the typewriters. If any typing work came in she would be
+expected to help with it,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span> but for the rest she could devote the whole
+of her time to studying and practising on the machines. Miss Bacon was a
+little vague as to the other pupils, but Joan gathered that there was a
+shorthand class and two other typewriters in another room.</p>
+
+<p>"My other pupils are, of course, on a different footing," Miss Bacon
+told her. "Generally I require a fee of at least ten guineas, but in
+your case, as I shall require you to do a little work for me, I shall be
+content to take less. That is to say, four guineas, everything
+included."</p>
+
+<p>"There is nothing about paying in the advertisement," Joan ventured. "I
+am afraid it is quite impossible for me to pay that."</p>
+
+<p>Miss Bacon took off her glasses and polished them with nervous hands. "I
+do not want to seem unreasonable," she said; "after you have worked for
+me you will certainly be able to obtain a well-paid post elsewhere; my
+pupils invariably move on in that way. I guarantee, of course, to find
+situations. If I could meet you in any way&mdash;supposing you paid me two
+guineas now and two guineas when you moved on?"</p>
+
+<p>"It is awfully kind of you"&mdash;Joan hesitated on the words&mdash;"but I am
+afraid I can't really afford it, not even that."</p>
+
+<p>Miss Bacon relinquished the idea with a heartfelt sigh. "My dear," she
+confided suddenly, "I know what poverty is. Shall we say one pound to
+begin with?&mdash;you must remember that these are very exceptional terms."</p>
+
+<p>Joan thought a moment. It seemed almost certain, from what she had
+gleaned from the various agencies, that getting a post without training
+was an impossibility, and most of the training centres asked for at
+least twenty-five guineas. Perhaps in refusing this offer she was
+letting a good chance slip by her, and, though she hated to make free
+use of it, there was always Uncle John's money, to fall back on.</p>
+
+<p>"I think I will come if you will let me do it in that way,"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span> she decided
+finally; "when would you like me to start?&mdash;to-morrow?"</p>
+
+<p>"The sooner the better." Miss Bacon rose with a smile of almost intense
+relief. "I have had no one for the last fortnight and the place is
+getting very untidy. You will pay the first pound in advance," she
+added; "I hope you will bring it with you to-morrow."</p>
+
+<p>She seemed painfully anxious for the money; if Joan had not been so
+tired she might have thought the fact suspicious. As it was she went
+back to Shamrock House with a lightened heart. It was not a very
+attractive or promising post; if she were to judge by outside
+appearances and by Miss Bacon's last remark her chief duties were to
+include those of general cleaning up and dusting. But that would be all
+in the day's work. Some little confidence and hope were beginning to
+creep back into her heart. She had secured her first post; Miss Bacon
+held out vague visions of the triumphs to which it might lead. Surely in
+time she would get away from the nightmare of the last two months; in
+time even Aunt Janet would forgive her, and meanwhile her foot was on
+the lowest rung of the ladder; work should be her world in future. She
+would work and fight and win. There was still, as Miss Abercrombie would
+have said, a banner to be carried. She would carry it now to the end.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XII" id="CHAPTER_XII"></a>CHAPTER XII</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"Our life is spent in little things,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;In little cares our hearts are drowned;<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;We move with heavy laden wings<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;In the same narrow round."</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>For the first week in her new post Joan was kept very busy putting
+things&mdash;as Miss Bacon described it&mdash;to rights. She had also, she
+discovered, to run errands for Miss Bacon several times during the
+course of a day; to buy paper for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span> the typewriters, to fetch Miss
+Bacon's lunch, on one occasion to buy some cooling lotion for Miss
+Bacon's bruise. Of the other pupils she saw no sign, and even the girl
+who had admitted her on the first night did not put in an appearance,
+but this Miss Bacon explained by saying that Edith was delicate and
+often forced to stay away through ill health.</p>
+
+<p>Joan refrained from asking questions; she realized herself that she had
+stumbled on to something that was nearly a tragedy. The hunted look in
+Miss Bacon's face, the signs of poverty, the absolute lack of work told
+their own tale. As a running business 2, Baker Street, was an evident
+failure, but there was no reason why, with a little application, she
+should not make it serve her purpose as a school. The lack of tuition
+was its one great drawback; there seemed no signs whatsoever of the
+promised shorthand lessons. Finally Joan plucked up her courage one
+morning in the second week, and invaded Miss Bacon's private office.</p>
+
+<p>"What about my shorthand?" she inquired from just within the doorway;
+"when shall I begin?"</p>
+
+<p>Miss Bacon had changed her shoes for a pair of bedroom slippers and was
+occupying the arm-chair, immersed in the newspaper. She started at
+Joan's abrupt question, the movement jerking the glasses from off her
+nose. She picked them up nervously and blinked at Joan.</p>
+
+<p>"What did you say?&mdash;shorthand? Oh, yes, of course! It is really Edith's
+duty to take you in that; still, as she is not here, I propose to
+dictate to you myself after lunch. My first duty in the mornings is to
+master the newspaper; there might be some openings advertised." She
+turned again to her news-sheet. "Why not employ yourself practising on
+the typewriter?" she suggested.</p>
+
+<p>Joan would have liked to reply that she was tired of practising
+sentences on the typewriter and hungry for some real work to do, but she
+had not the heart to be unkind to the poor little woman. She spent a
+disconsolate<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span> morning and stayed out for lunch longer than usual. On her
+return Miss Bacon was waiting for her on the top of the stairs.</p>
+
+<p>"My dear," she said in an excited voice, "some work has come in. A man
+has just brought it, and he must have it by to-morrow morning. I hope
+you will be able to get it done, for I have promised, and a lot may
+depend on it."</p>
+
+<p>So much depended on it that she herself decided to help Joan with the
+work. She was not, it appeared, even as experienced as Joan, and by 6.30
+the two of them had only completed about half the typing. Joan's back
+ached and her fingers tingled, but Miss Bacon's eyes behind the glasses
+were strained to the verge of tears, two hectic spots of colour burned
+in her cheeks and her fingers stumbled and faltered over the keys.</p>
+
+<p>As the clock struck seven Joan straightened herself with a sigh of
+relief.</p>
+
+<p>"It is no use," she said, "we cannot get it done; he will have to wait
+for his silly old papers."</p>
+
+<p>The blood died suddenly out of Miss Bacon's face, her mouth trembled.
+"It must be done," she answered; "you do not understand. It is the first
+work that has been brought to us for weeks. The man is a stranger; if it
+is well done and up to time he will give us some more; besides he will
+pay"&mdash;for a second she lifted her eyes and looked at Joan&mdash;"I must have
+the money," she said.</p>
+
+<p>Her face, working under the stress of some strong emotion, was painful
+to see. She was so weak, so useless, so driven. Joan looked away hastily
+and went on with her work. From time to time, though, she stole a glance
+at Miss Bacon. It was dreadful to know that the poor old woman was
+crying; quietly, hopelessly, great drops that splashed on to her fingers
+as they stumbled over the keys.</p>
+
+<p>At last Joan could bear it no longer, she rose quickly and crossed over
+to Miss Bacon, putting her hands over the useless fingers.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Don't you bother with it any more, Miss Bacon," she said. "I am nearly
+through with my share now and I can come early to-morrow and get it all
+done before breakfast. It is silly to work away at it now when we are
+both tired out."</p>
+
+<p>Miss Bacon gulped down her tears and looked up nervously. "You think you
+can," she asked; "you have realized how important it is?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," Joan told her, "and I know I can. I won't disappoint you, really
+I won't. Let us go across the road and get some tea before we go home,"
+she suggested.</p>
+
+<p>Miss Bacon looked away again hastily. "You go," she muttered, "I don't
+need tea, I&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"You are going to come and have tea with me," Joan interrupted. It had
+flashed on her that Miss Bacon had not even the money for that.</p>
+
+<p>Over the hot buttered toast and the tea Miss Bacon poured out her
+troubles to Joan. They came, once she had started, in an unquenchable
+flood of reminiscences. The little woman had reached the last inch of
+endurance; the kindly sympathy, the touch of Joan's hands broke down all
+barriers of reserve or caution. She had been a governess, it appeared,
+and during all her years of service she had laid by enough money to buy
+the business at Baker Street.</p>
+
+<p>"I got it cheap," she owned. "I can see now that the other people must
+have failed too, and I have no head for business. I am absolutely at the
+end of things now; if I died to-morrow it would be a pauper's funeral. I
+often think of that when I see a gorgeous hearse and procession passing
+through the street."</p>
+
+<p>Her words were ridiculous, but real tragedy looked out of her eyes.
+"Ruin stares me in the face," she went on, "from every paper I read,
+from every person I meet. I have no money, not even enough to buy food,
+as you have guessed. Ruin! and I have not the courage to get out of it
+all. I have never been very brave."</p>
+
+<p>"But I think you have been brave," Joan tried to re<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span>assure her. "You
+have held on for so long alone. And I expect we have turned a corner
+now, things will be better to-morrow."</p>
+
+<p>Miss Bacon stared at her teacup with hopeless eyes. "That is what I used
+to think at first," she said, "to-morrow will be better than to-day&mdash;it
+never has been yet."</p>
+
+<p>She rose to go, and Joan, prompted by a sudden quick desire to help,
+leant forward and caught hold of her coat. The tragedy of the withered
+figure, the stupid, aimless face, struck her as the cruellest thing she
+had yet seen in life. What were her own troubles compared to this
+other's dull facing of loneliness, failure and death.</p>
+
+<p>"You must cheer up, you really must," she begged; "and as for the money
+part, let me pay down the rest of my fee now. I have got three pounds
+out with me; do take it, please do, you see it really is yours."</p>
+
+<p>Taking the money seemed to add an extra gloom to Miss Bacon's outlook;
+none the less she did not require very much persuading, and Joan,
+pressing it into her hand, piloted her across the road and saw her into
+the Underground station.</p>
+
+<p>It was the last glimpse she was to have of the quaint figure which had
+crossed her life for so short a time, but that she did not realize. She
+only knew that her heart ached because she had been able to do so little
+to help, and because Miss Bacon's story had brought suddenly to her mind
+a knowledge of how terribly hard life can be to those who are not strong
+enough to stand against it.</p>
+
+<p>True to her word, she arrived at Baker Street very early the next
+morning and the momentous piece of typewriting was finished before Miss
+Bacon's usual hour of arrival. Joan put it on the table with the old
+lady's paper and went out to get some breakfast, as she had had to leave
+Shamrock House before seven.</p>
+
+<p>She was greeted on her return by the girl who had let her in on the
+first night. There was a man with her who<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span> had taken possession of Miss
+Bacon's chair and who was reading the paper morosely, both elbows on the
+table.</p>
+
+<p>He glanced up at Joan as she entered. "Is this Miss Bacon, by any
+chance?" he asked, bringing out the words with a certain grim defiance.</p>
+
+<p>Edith interrupted Joan's disclaimer by a shrill laugh. "Lor' bless you,
+no, she is one of the pupils, same as me." She turned to Joan. "Did you
+pay anything to join?" she asked. Joan resented the familiarity of her
+tone. "Would have liked to have warned you the other night, but Bacon
+was too nippy."</p>
+
+<p>Joan flushed slightly. Disregarding the interruption she spoke quickly,
+answering the man's question:</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Bacon must be ill, I am afraid," she said; "it is so very late for
+her, she is nearly always here by ten. She will probably be here
+to-morrow if you care to come again."</p>
+
+<p>Again Edith giggled and the man frowned heavily.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, she probably won't," he answered. "She has done a bunk, that's
+the long and short of it, and there is not a blasted penny of what she
+owes me paid. Damn the woman with her whining, wheezing letters, 'Do
+give me time&mdash;I'll pay in time.' Might have known it would end in her
+bunking."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't think you ought to speak of her like that," Joan attempted;
+"after all, it is only that she does not happen to be here this morning.
+She would have let me know if she had not been coming back."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, would she?" growled the man; "well, I don't care a blasted hell
+what you think. I don't need to be taught my business by the likes of
+you."</p>
+
+<p>From the passage to which she had retired Edith attracted Joan's
+attention by violent signs. "There is no use arguing with him," she
+announced in an audible whisper, "he's fair mad; this is about the tenth
+time he's missed her. Come out here a minute, I want to talk to you."</p>
+
+<p>Joan went reluctantly. She disliked the girl instinc<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span>tively, she
+disliked the dirty white blouse from which the red neck rose, ornamented
+by a string of cheap pearls, and the greasy black ribbon which bound up
+Edith's head of curls.</p>
+
+<p>"Are you being a fool?" the girl asked, "or are you trying to kid that
+man? Haven't you cottoned to old Bacon's game yet?"</p>
+
+<p>"I am sorry for Miss Bacon, if that is what you mean," Joan answered
+stiffly.</p>
+
+<p>"Sorry!" Edith's face was expressive of vast contempt. "That won't save
+you from much in this world. I tell you one thing, if you lent the old
+hag any money yesterday you won't see her again this side of the grave,
+so there isn't any use your hanging about here waiting for that."</p>
+
+<p>Joan favoured her with a little collected stare. "Thank you," she said,
+"it is very thoughtful of you to think of warning me." She left her and
+walked back deliberately into the room where the man was sitting. "There
+were some typed sheets lying on the top of the paper," she said; "do you
+mind letting me have them back."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes I do," he answered briefly; "man called in for them a little while
+back and that is five shillings towards what the old hag owes me,
+anyhow."</p>
+
+<p>It was in its way rather humorous that she should have worked so hard to
+put five shillings into such an objectionable pocket. Joan felt strongly
+tempted to argue the matter with him, but discretion proving wiser than
+valour, she left him to his spoils and retired into the other room. She
+would not leave the place, she decided, in case Miss Bacon did turn up;
+it would be very disagreeable for her to have to face such a man by
+herself.</p>
+
+<p>By lunch time the man stalked away full of threats as to what he would
+do, and Edith went with him. Joan stayed on till six, and there was
+still no sign of Miss Bacon. It was strange that she should neither have
+telephoned nor written.</p>
+
+<p>Over dinner at Shamrock House that night she told<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span> Rose Brent the story
+of her fortnight's adventure, ending up with the rash impulse which had
+led her to pay up the four guineas because Miss Bacon had seemed in such
+bitter need. The girl met her tale with abrupt laughter.</p>
+
+<p>"I am afraid what your unpleasant acquaintance of this morning told you
+is probably true," she said. "After all, if you went and handed out four
+guineas it was a direct temptation to the poor old woman to get away
+on."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't believe she would take it just for that," Joan tried to argue.
+"I know she wanted it awfully badly, but it was to help her pull through
+and things were going to run better afterwards. I don't believe she
+would just take it and slip away without saying a word to me."</p>
+
+<p>"Faith in human nature is all very well," the other answered, "but it is
+awfully apt to let you down, especially in the working world."</p>
+
+<p>"I shall go on believing for a bit," Joan said; "she was looking so
+awfully ill yesterday, it may just be that she could not come up to
+office to-day."</p>
+
+<p>"May be," Rose agreed. "When you are tired of waiting for the return of
+the prodigal let me know and I will see if I cannot get you in
+somewhere. I ought to be able to help. And look here, my child, never
+you pay another penny for tuition on those lines; you could get all the
+learning you need at the County Council Night Schools, and it is a good
+deal cheaper."</p>
+
+<p>Joan put in two days at No. 2, Baker Street, waiting for the return of
+Miss Bacon or for some message which might explain her absence, but
+nothing and no one came. On the morning of the third day she found that
+the stout and bad-tempered man had carried out his vague threats. The
+place had been taken possession of, already they were removing the
+typewriters and tables under the direction of a bailiff. Even the plate
+bearing Miss Bacon's name had vanished, and boards announcing the top
+flat to let flaunted themselves from the area railings.</p>
+
+<p>After that Joan gave up the hope. Sometimes she<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span> wondered if after all
+Miss Bacon had found the necessary courage to be done with it all, and
+if her silence betokened death. It was more likely though that the poor
+old lady had merely sunk one rung lower on the ladder of self-esteem and
+was dragging out a miserable existence somewhere in the outside purlieus
+of London.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIII" id="CHAPTER_XIII"></a>CHAPTER XIII</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Or what's a heaven for?</b>"</td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><span class="smcap"><b>R. Browning.</b></span></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>Following Rose's suggestion, and because for the time being there really
+seemed nothing for her to do, unless she could show herself a little
+better trained, Joan joined the County Council Night Schools in the
+neighbourhood. She would go there five evenings in the week; three for
+shorthand and two for typing. Her fellow scholars were drawn from all
+ages and all ranks&mdash;clerks, office boys, and grey-headed men; girls with
+their hair still in pig-tails, and elderly women with patient, strained
+faces, who would sit at their desks plodding through the intricacies of
+shorthand and paying very little attention to what went on all round
+them.</p>
+
+<p>The boy and girl section of the community indulged in a little rough and
+tumble love-making. Even long office hours and the deadly monotony of
+standing behind desk or counter all day could not quite do away with the
+riotous spirit of youth. They giggled and chattered among themselves,
+and passed surreptitious notes from one form to the other when Mr.
+Phillips was not looking.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Phillips, the shorthand master, was a red-faced, extremely irascible
+little man. He came to these classes from some other school in the city
+where he had been teaching all day, and naturally, by the time evening
+arrived, his none too placid temper had been stretched to
+breaking-<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span>point. He was extremely impatient with any non-comprehension
+of his complicated method of instruction; and he would pass from row to
+row, after his dictation had been finished, snatching away the papers
+from his paralysed pupils and tearing them into fragments had the
+exercise been badly done.</p>
+
+<p>Joan noticed the man who sat next her on the first and every night. He
+was quite the worst person she had ever seen at learning anything. He
+was not by any means young, grey already showed in the hair above his
+ears, and his forehead wrinkled with innumerable lines. He had, she
+thought, the most pathetic eyes, large and honest, but quite
+irredeemably stupid.</p>
+
+<p>"I can't make head or tale of it," he confessed to her on the second
+night. "And Mr. Phillips gets so annoyed with me, it only muddles me
+more."</p>
+
+<p>"Why do you bother to learn?" she asked. It seemed rather strange that a
+man of his age should have to struggle with so elementary a subject.</p>
+
+<p>"I have worked in an office for the last ten years," he explained. "The
+new boss has suddenly decided that shorthand is necessary. I don't
+know," he spoke rather vaguely, his eyes wandering round the room, "but
+it is just possible he might ask me to go if I did not master it. I have
+been there so long I hardly like to have to look for another place."</p>
+
+<p>"It seems such a shame," Joan told Rose afterwards, "that these people
+can never get a place where they feel really safe. They live always
+expecting to be turned off at a moment's notice, or to have somebody put
+in on top of them. Everybody seems to be fighting against everybody
+else; doesn't anyone ever stop to help?"</p>
+
+<p>The older girl laughed. "Why, yes," she said. "The world, or at least
+the people in it, are not so bad as all that. Only life is a case of
+push and struggle, and it is only natural that people should want to get
+the best they can for their money. Also it wouldn't be fair if the ones
+who worked best were not preferred to the others."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Mr. Simpson, Joan's perplexed friend of the shorthand class, was
+certainly one of the stupidest people she had ever met, yet she was
+terribly sorry for him. He was the butt of the class, which did not add
+to the hilarity of his position, because of the torrent of abuse which
+he always drew from Mr. Phillips at some stage in the evening.</p>
+
+<p>"Now," Mr. Phillips would call out, starting the lesson by a blackboard
+demonstration, "silence and attention, please."</p>
+
+<p>He would draw a series of strokes and dashes on the blackboard, calling
+out their various meanings, and the class would set itself to copy them.
+The lesson would proceed for some time in silence, save for Mr.
+Phillips' voice, but presently the bewilderment caused by so many new
+outlines would terrify Mr. Simpson and he would lean forward to
+interrupt, stammering, as he always did when nervous.</p>
+
+<p>"Why is 'M' made like that?" he would say. "Wouldn't it be much better
+if it were made the other way?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, why?" Mr. Phillips would thunder. "If you would just learn what
+you are taught, sir, and not try to think, it would be a great deal
+pleasanter for the rest of us."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Simpson would get a little red under the onslaught, but his eyes
+always retained their patient, perplexed expression. He seemed
+impervious to the impression he created in the back row. "Laughing-stock
+of the whole class," Mr. Phillips called him in a moment of extreme
+irritation, and the expression caught on.</p>
+
+<p>"I am so silly," he said to Joan. "I really am not surprised that they
+think me funny."</p>
+
+<p>She was the one person who was ever nice to him or who did attempt to
+explain things to him. Sometimes they would get there a little early and
+she would go over his exercises with him. He might be thick-skinned to
+the want of tolerance which the rest of the class meted out to him; he
+was undoubtedly grateful to Joan for the kindness she showed him.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>One evening on his way to class he plucked up courage to purchase a
+small buttonhole for her, and blushed a very warm red when Joan took his
+offering with a smile and pinned it into her coat.</p>
+
+<p>"How nice of you," she said. "I love violets, and these smell so sweet."</p>
+
+<p>"They are not half sweet enough for you," he managed to say, stuttering
+furiously.</p>
+
+<p>Joan had a moment's uneasiness. Surely the wretched little man was not
+going to fall in love with her? She glanced sideways at him during the
+class and what she saw reassured her. His clothes, his dirty hands, his
+whole appearance, put him in a different world to herself. However kind
+she might be to him, he surely could not fail to recognize that it was
+only the same kindness which would prompt her to cross the road to give
+a penny to a beggar?</p>
+
+<p>Unfortunately Mr. Simpson belonged to a class which is very slow to
+recognize any difference in rank save that of wealth. He was a humble
+little man before Joan, but that was because he was by nature humble,
+and also because he was in love. He thought her very wonderful and
+beautiful beyond his range of words, but he imagined her as coming from
+much the same kind of home as his own, and she seemed to exist in the
+same strata of life.</p>
+
+<p>A night or two after the flower episode he fixed adoring eyes on her and
+asked if he might be allowed to see her home.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, it is rather out of your way," Joan remonstrated, she had so
+often seen him trudge off in the opposite direction.</p>
+
+<p>"That is of no consequence," he replied, with his usual stutter.</p>
+
+<p>The streets were dark, quiet, and deserted. Now and then as they hurried
+along, for Joan walked as fast as she could to ward off conversation,
+they passed a solitary policeman doing his beat, and dim, scarce seen
+lovers emerged out of the shadows holding each other's hands.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Will you not take my arm?" Mr. Simpson ventured presently. He was
+slightly out of breath in his effort to keep up with her.</p>
+
+<p>"No, thank you," Joan answered. The whole occurrence was too ridiculous,
+yet for once in her life her sense of humour was failing her. "And I
+wish you would not bother to come any further, it is quite unnecessary."</p>
+
+<p>Her tone was more than chilly. Mr. Simpson, however remained undaunted.
+His slow and ponderous mind had settled on a certain course; it would
+need more than a little chilliness to turn it from its purpose.</p>
+
+<p>"I was going to ask you," he went on, "whether you would do me the
+honour of coming to the theatre one evening? If you have a mind that
+turns that way sometimes."</p>
+
+<p>"No, thank you," answered Joan once more. "I never go to theatres, and I
+shouldn't go with you in any case," she added desperately, as a final
+resource.</p>
+
+<p>"I meant no offence," the man answered, humble as ever. "I should always
+act straight by a girl, and for you&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, don't, please don't," Joan interrupted. She stopped in her walk and
+faced round on him. "Can't you see how impossible it would be for
+me&mdash;&mdash;" she broke off abruptly, rather ashamed of her outburst. "I am
+going to be a snob in a minute, if I am not careful," she finished to
+herself.</p>
+
+<p>"I know I am not amusing, or anything," the man went on; "but you have
+always seemed so kind and considerate. If I have offended in any way, I
+am more than sorry."</p>
+
+<p>Joan felt that he was frowning as he always frowned in hopeless
+perplexity over his shorthand.</p>
+
+<p>"I am not offended," she tried to explain more gently. "Only, please do
+not ask me to go out with you again, or offer to walk home with me. Here
+we are anyway, this is where I live." She turned at the bottom of
+Shamrock House steps and held out her hand to him. "Good-night," she
+said.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Simpson did not take her hand, instead he stared up at her; she could
+see how shiny and red his face was under the lamp.</p>
+
+<p>"You are not angry with me?" he stuttered.</p>
+
+<p>"Why, no, of course not," Joan prevaricated. Then she ran up the steps
+and let herself into the hall without looking back at him.</p>
+
+<p>For two or three days she attempted to ignore the man's presence in
+class next her, and Simpson himself in no way intruded. He had taken her
+snubbing like a man; from the height of his dreams he had fallen into an
+apathetic despair; the only effect it had on him was to make him
+stupider than ever at his work. Then one evening, with a face working
+rather painfully, he told her that he did not intend to come any more.</p>
+
+<p>"I am going to another centre," he said, gathering his books together
+and not looking at her.</p>
+
+<p>"Has Mr. Phillips been too much for you?" she asked, wilfully ignoring
+the deeper meaning behind his words.</p>
+
+<p>"No," he answered, "it is not that. It may seem quite absurd," he went
+on laboriously, "but I want to ask you to let me have your note-book. I
+have got a new one to give you in its place." He produced a packet from
+his pocket and held it out to her.</p>
+
+<p>Later on, when she thought over the thing, she smiled. A note-book
+seemed so singularly unromantic, but at the time she felt nearer tears.
+The look in his eyes haunted her for many days. She had been the one
+glimpse of romance in his dreary existence, and she had had to kill the
+dream so ruthlessly.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIV" id="CHAPTER_XIV"></a>CHAPTER XIV</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"It seems her heart was not washed clean<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Of tinted dreams of 'Might have been.'"</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><span class="smcap"><b>Ruth Young.</b></span></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>There followed a weary time for Joan. The poem she had repeated on her
+first morning at Shamrock House had to be recalled again and again and
+fell away finally from its glad meaning in the bitter disillusionment
+which looking for work entailed. Wherein lay the value of cheerfulness
+when day after day saw her weary and dispirited from a fruitless search,
+from hope-chilling visits to registry offices, from unsuccessful
+applications in answer to the advertisements which thronged the morning
+papers? She went at it at first eagerly, hopefully. "To-day I shall
+succeed," was her waking motto. But every evening brought its tale of
+disappointment.</p>
+
+<p>"There is no one in the world as useless as I am," she thought finally.</p>
+
+<p>"It is only just a bad season," Rose Brent tried to cheer her up; "there
+is lots of unemployment about; we will find something for you soon."</p>
+
+<p>But to Joan it seemed as if the iron of being absolutely unwanted was
+entering into her soul.</p>
+
+<p>There was only one shred of comfort in all this dreariness. Life at
+Shamrock House was so cheap that she was eating up but very little of
+Uncle John's allowance. She wondered sometimes if the old people at home
+ever asked at the Bank as to how her money matters stood, or had they
+shut her so completely out of their lives that even that was of no
+interest to them? Miss Abercrombie wrote fairly regularly, but though
+she could give Joan news of the home people she had to admit that Aunt
+Janet never mentioned or alluded to her niece in any way.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"She is harder than I thought she could be," wrote Miss Abercrombie; "or
+is it perhaps that you have killed her heart?"</p>
+
+<p>Once Joan's pride fell so low that she found herself writing Aunt Janet
+a pathetic, vague appeal to be allowed to creep back into the shelter of
+the old life. But she tore the letter up in the morning and scattered
+its little pieces along the gutter of Digby Street. Digby Street was
+sucking into its undercurrents her youth, her cheerfulness, her hope;
+only pride was left, she must make a little struggle to hold on to
+pride, and then news came from Miss Abercrombie that Aunt Janet had been
+ill and that the Rutherfords had gone abroad. Apart from her fruitless
+journeys in search of work, her days held nothing. She so dreaded the
+atmosphere of Shamrock House that very often she would have to walk
+herself tired out of all feeling before she could go back there;
+sometimes she cried night after night, weak, stupid tears, shut up in
+the dreariness of her little room, and very often her thoughts turned
+back to Gilbert&mdash;the comfort of their little flat, the theatres, the
+suppers, the dances and the passion-held nights when he had loved her.
+More and more she thought of Gilbert as the dreariness of Digby Street
+closed round her days.</p>
+
+<p>If her baby had lived, would life have been easier for her, or would it
+only have meant&mdash;as she had first believed in her days of panic that
+it would mean&mdash;an added hardship, a haunting shame? It was the lack of
+love in her life that left so aching a void, the fact that apparently no
+one cared or heeded what became of her. The baby would at least have
+brought love to her, in its little hands, in its weak strength that
+looked to her for shelter.</p>
+
+<p>"I should be happier," she said once stormily to Rose, "if I could have
+a cat to keep. I think I shall buy a kitten."</p>
+
+<p>The other girl had looked at her, smiling dryly. "Pets are strictly
+against the rules in Shamrock House," she reminded her.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>It was in one of her very despondent moods that Joan first met the young
+man with blue eyes. She never knew him by any name, and their
+acquaintance, or whatever it could be called, came to an abrupt end on
+the first occasion when he ventured to speak to her. Womanlike, she had
+been longing for him to do so for some time, but resented it bitterly
+when he did. Perhaps something faintly contemptuous, a shadowed hint
+that he had noticed her interest in him, flamed up the desire to snub
+him in her heart, or perhaps it was a feeling of self-shame to find
+herself so poor a beggar at friendship's gate.</p>
+
+<p>For a week he had met her at the same place and followed her on her way
+down Victoria Street. Then one night, just as they came under the lights
+of Vauxhall Clock tower, he spoke to her.</p>
+
+<p>"Doing anything to-night?" he said. "Shall we dine together?"</p>
+
+<p>She turned from him in a white heat of anger, more with herself than
+with him, though that, of course, it was not given him to know. But he
+caught a glimpse of her face and read his answer, and since he was in
+reality a nice boy, and insult had been the last thought in his mind, he
+took off his hat quickly and apologized.</p>
+
+<p>"I am sure I beg your pardon," he said; "I can see that I have made a
+mistake."</p>
+
+<p>Joan did not answer him, she had moved quickly away in the direction of
+Digby Street, but as she passed by the dingy houses she knew that he was
+not following any more, and she felt the hot, hard lump in her throat
+which is so difficult to swallow. She had wanted to go to dinner with
+him, she had wanted to, that was the thought that mocked at her all
+night.</p>
+
+<p>It was one evening about a fortnight after that episode that Rose called
+Joan into her room on their way upstairs.</p>
+
+<p>"I want to talk to you," she said, closing the door behind them. "Has
+Miss Nigel spoken yet?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"To me?" asked Joan; "what about?"</p>
+
+<p>"I see, then, she hasn't," Rose answered, "but she will soon. Did you
+notice that the night before last Miss Wembly, who sits at the next
+table to ours, had a guest to dinner?"</p>
+
+<p>"No," Joan admitted; "but why? What has it got to do with me?"</p>
+
+<p>"I am coming to that," the other answered; she stood with her head
+averted, looking for a cigarette. "I am always a damned silent person
+myself," she went on, "and I do not think anyone can accuse me of being
+curious about their pasts. I do not want to know a blessed thing about
+yours, for instance, but that guest of Miss Wembly's was a nurse from
+St. George's Hospital."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh," said Joan blankly; she was standing just within the door, her back
+against the clothes that hung on it.</p>
+
+<p>"Well," Rose hurried on, "it has gone all round the place like
+lightning. They aren't fond of you because they hate me and we are
+friends. Yesterday one of them took the story to Miss Nigel and she is
+going to ask you to leave."</p>
+
+<p>"What story?" asked Joan; she had not followed the other's swift
+deduction.</p>
+
+<p>Rose lit a cigarette and held out the case to Joan. "Have one," she
+said, "and come and sit down. As I said before, I am not asking for
+personal history, I am telling you the facts as they affect this place.
+They say you were to have had a baby, and you are not married."</p>
+
+<p>She shrugged her shoulders and sank into a chair.</p>
+
+<p>"You mean," whispered Joan, "that the nurse told them that?"</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose so," Rose admitted; "anyway, Miss Nigel spoke of it to me
+to-day. She is not a bad sort, Miss Nigel, she was very kind to me once,
+but she is going to tell you to go."</p>
+
+<p>"What have you thought of it?" asked Joan.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"I don't think about other people's affairs," Rose answered. "Come and
+sit down, I have got some jam for you after the powder, for I believe I
+have found a job for you. But first you must move into diggings, these
+clubs are all in a league, every one of them will be shut to you."</p>
+
+<p>"You are not bothering to ask if it is true," said Joan. She moved
+forward and sat down, her hands clenched on her lap. "I suppose&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Rose interrupted, putting a swift hand on hers. "Don't," she said,
+"don't deny it or tell me the truth, whichever you were thinking of
+doing. It does not matter to me. Because I like you I have interfered as
+much as I have so that you may be prepared for Miss Nigel's attack." She
+smiled. "It will be an attack too&mdash;having a baby and no husband to
+people like Miss Nigel is worse than any criminal offence."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," Joan admitted. A vision of Aunt Janet's horror-stricken face came
+across her mind. "When I heard that it had been killed in the accident,
+I was glad, glad. I had not got the courage to go on and brave it out. I
+was glad to think that I could start life again, that no one would know
+or look at me like the people at home had looked at me when they knew.
+And now&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"And now?" Rose repeated; she was studying Joan's face with her eyes
+half closed, a peculiar trick she had when her thoughts were unpleasant.</p>
+
+<p>"And now it doesn't seem worth while going on any longer," Joan burst
+forth. "There must be other lives that are better worth living than
+this. Do you know that for the last ten days I have made fifteen
+shillings addressing envelopes from nine till six. It would be better,
+surely it would be better, to be what people call bad!"</p>
+
+<p>Rose watched the flushed face. "If a life of that sort would give you
+any pleasure," she spoke slowly, "I should say live it by all means. The
+trouble is, it would not please you. If you care to listen, I will tell
+you a bit of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span> my own story. It is not altogether pleasant, but in your
+present frame of mind it will not do you any harm to hear it."</p>
+
+<p>She paused a moment, head thrown back, blowing smoke-rings to the
+ceiling.</p>
+
+<p>"I came to London ten years ago," she began presently, "and I was
+twenty-one at the time. I had been keeping house for a brother in India,
+and I had had a good time, but a spirit of restlessness had come upon me
+and I would not leave him alone till he let me come home and start on my
+own. I had, of course, no people. Poor brother, he gave way after many
+arguments, knowing as little as I did about the life here, and I came.
+He died the year afterwards of enteric. I had been on an allowance from
+him before, but when he died that stopped and I was left absolutely
+penniless. You have had a bad time in that way, but I had a worse one.
+Still I was young and strong, and, above all, I was a fighter, so I won
+through. I got a post as typist in a city office and I drifted to
+Shamrock House. My working hours were lengthy, sometimes it was after
+half-past seven before I came out of office. Then I would hurry through
+the crowded
+<a name="corr8" id="corr8"></a><a class="correction" href="#cn8" title="changed from 'steeets'">streets</a>,
+as you do now, and always that walk, through gaily
+lighted pleasure-seeking crowds, would end for me in the dark dreariness
+where Great Smith Street turns away from Victoria Street, a ten-minute
+walk through one of London's poorest neighbourhoods, and&mdash;Shamrock
+House! Those were the days in which I did my hardest kicking against
+fate; it was so unjust, so unfair, and all the while youth and power to
+enjoy, which is the heritage of youth, were slipping past me. That is
+how you feel, isn't it?" she asked suddenly.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," Joan said.</p>
+
+<p>"I know," Rose answered softly; "well, wait and hear. I was in this
+mood, and feeling more than usually desperate, when I met the woman. I
+need not give her a name, not even to you; I doubt if I ever knew her
+real one. I had seen her several times, perhaps she had noticed me,
+though<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span> she had quaint, unseeing eyes that appeared to gaze through you
+blankly. She was a beautiful woman with an arresting beauty hard to
+define, and she used, as far as I could see, neither paint nor powder.
+One evening, just as I was turning into Great Smith Street, I found her
+at my elbow.</p>
+
+<p>"'You live down there,' she asked in a curious, expressionless way as if
+she hardly expected an answer.</p>
+
+<p>"I was startled at her talking to me and at the same time interested.</p>
+
+<p>"'Yes,' I said.</p>
+
+<p>"'It is dark and very dreary,' she went on, talking almost to herself,
+'why do you choose such a life?'</p>
+
+<p>"I think the bitterness of my mood must have sounded in my answer, for
+suddenly she turned to me and laid a hand on my arm.</p>
+
+<p>"'Leave it then,' she whispered, her face close up against mine, 'leave
+it, come home with me.'</p>
+
+<p>"'Home with you,' I repeated, thoroughly astonished, and at that moment
+a policeman, tall and stolid, strolled across the road towards us.</p>
+
+<p>"'Don't let him hear what we are saying,' whispered the extraordinary
+woman; 'just turn back with me a little way and I will explain to you.'</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I went. Perhaps you can realize why, and I saw for a little into
+the outside edge of life as lived by these women. I wonder how I can
+best convey to you the horror and pity of it, for we&mdash;despite the
+greyness of our lives&mdash;have something within ourselves to which we can
+turn, but they have weighed even hopes and dreams with the weights of
+shame, and found their poor value in pounds, shillings and pence. That
+is why their eyes as they pass you in the streets are so blank and
+expressionless. Each new day brings them nothing, they have learnt all
+things, and the groundwork of their knowledge is&mdash;sin."</p>
+
+<p>She rose abruptly and moved across to the window,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span> pulling aside the
+blue-tinted curtains, staring out over miles and miles of roof-covered
+London. From far in the distance Big Ben shone down on her, a round, dim
+face in the darkness.</p>
+
+<p>"You are wondering why I stayed with the woman," she went on presently.
+"The answer is easy and may make you smile. I met a man, one of the many
+she brought to the house, and fell in love with him. I was stupid enough
+to forget my surroundings and the circumstances under which he had met
+me, or I dreamt that to him also they were only the outside wrappers of
+fate, easy to fling aside. Does it sound like a thrilling romance, and
+am I making myself out to be the heroine of one crowded hour of glorious
+life? Because my hour was never glorious."</p>
+
+<p>She repeated the last word with a wry laugh and turned to face Joan. "I
+don't know why I have raked up all this," she said. "I thought it had
+lost its power to hurt; but I was mistaken. I have liked you, perhaps
+that is the reason, and I have wanted to save you from making the same
+mistake as myself. For before you plunge out of monotony you must see
+that there is nothing in your heart that can be hurt, as these women
+have to be hurt every hour of their lives."</p>
+
+<p>Joan could find nothing to say; the other girl's confidence had been so
+overpowering, it left her tongue-tied and stupid. Rose came back after a
+little silence and sat down opposite her again.</p>
+
+<p>"I am sorry," she said, "I have talked you into a mood of black
+depression; never mind, perhaps you will have learnt something from it
+none the less. And meanwhile, things are going to be better for you; it
+is no loss having to leave Shamrock House, otherwise you might grow into
+the house as I have. You will have to see about getting a room
+to-morrow, and then if you can meet me in the afternoon, I will take you
+and introduce you to your job. It is quite a nice one, I hope you will
+like it."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Joan stood up. "I don't know what to say," she began; "you&mdash;oh, if only
+we could wipe out the past," she flamed into sudden rebellion, "and
+start afresh."</p>
+
+<p>Rose laughed. "I don't know about that," she said&mdash;the inevitable
+cigarette was in her mouth again&mdash;"<i>I</i> for one would be very unwilling
+to lose a wisdom which has been so dearly bought."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XV" id="CHAPTER_XV"></a>CHAPTER XV</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"No one has any more right to go about unhappy than he has to go about
+ill bred."</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><span class="smcap"><b>R. L. Stevenson.</b></span></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>Joan was not to start her new work till the following Monday. She was to
+be typist&mdash;her first real post filled her with some degree of
+self-conscious pride&mdash;to the Editor of the <i>Evening Herald</i>. Rose had
+herself worked on the paper some years ago and was a friend of the
+Editor's.</p>
+
+<p>"I want you to give a girl I know a chance, Mr. Strangman," she had
+pleaded; "she is clever and well-educated, but she needs experience.
+Take her, there is a good man, while your slack time is on, and she will
+be game for anything when you get busy again."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Strangman twisted long nervous fingers into strange positions.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know about this girl," he said; "we are never slack at the
+office."</p>
+
+<p>It was a pet fallacy of his that he was the hardest-worked man in
+London. Rose smiled. "But her typing is quite good," she argued, "and
+you are such an easy dictator, I am sure she will get on all right."</p>
+
+<p>She had been exceptionally pleased when Mr. Strangman reluctantly gave
+way. Joan would, she hoped, take kindly to newspaper work, and it might
+open up new roads to her.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Meanwhile Joan had been out on her own and taken a room for herself in a
+house standing in a quiet, withdrawn square in the neighbourhood of
+King's Road, Chelsea. To call it a room was to dignify it by a title to
+which it could lay no real claim. It was an attic, up the last rickety
+flight of stairs, with roofs that sloped down within two feet of the
+ground, and a diminutive window from which one could get but the barest
+glimpse of the skies. Still it had possibilities, its aspect was not so
+terribly common-place as had been that of the other rooms which Joan had
+seen that morning. The sloping roofs, the small pane of glass which
+looked out higher than the neighbouring chimney-tops, were in their way
+attractive. She would take it, she told a somewhat surprised landlady,
+and would pay&mdash;everything included&mdash;ten shillings a week for the noble
+apartment. The "everything included" swept in breakfast&mdash;"Such as a
+young lady like yourself would eat, Miss"&mdash;the woman told her, and
+attendance. Suppers and fires she would have to provide for herself,
+though Mrs. Carew was prepared to cook for her; lunch, of course, fell
+in office hours.</p>
+
+<p>On Saturday, therefore, and having forestalled Miss Nigel's request by
+announcing that she was leaving for good, Joan moved her luggage over to
+her new home and took possession.</p>
+
+<p>"I am going to like it better than I liked being at Shamrock House," she
+told Rose, who had come to assist in the moving. "It is more my own, I
+can do just as I like here."</p>
+
+<p>Rose was craning her neck to see out of the window's limited compass.
+"Just as you like," she repeated, laughing as she spoke, "on twenty-five
+shillings a week and an attic. You are not ambitious, my child."</p>
+
+<p>She turned round to face the room; even in mid afternoon, with the sun
+shining outside, it was dim&mdash;the corners in positive darkness. "I don't
+think I should have chosen it," she said; "there is no sun, and"&mdash;she<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span>
+shook the thought off&mdash;"who else is in the house, did you ask?"</p>
+
+<p>"There was not any need to," Joan answered. "Mrs. Carew, that is my
+landlady, you know, told me all their family histories while I was
+making up my mind whether I would come or not. Wait a minute," she
+paused in her unpacking to tick them off on her fingers. "There is the
+ground floor lady, who is an artist's model. No need to work just now
+though, for the last gentleman that painted her took a fancy to her and
+is paying for her at present. Drawing-room floor, old foreign lady who
+never seems to get out of bed. Second floor, retired army officer, 'fond
+of drink, more's the pity,'" she mimicked Mrs. Carew's voice, "and
+second floor back, young lady actress, who is not perhaps as good as she
+might be, 'but there, you can't always be blaming people'; and third
+floor, me! Doesn't sound respectable does it? But after Miss Nigel I am
+afraid of respectability."</p>
+
+<p>Rose watched her with narrowed eyes. "It sounds anything but
+respectable," she agreed; "do not make a fool of yourself, kid, it won't
+be worth it, it never is."</p>
+
+<p>"I am not likely to," Joan answered her. "My one real regret in leaving
+Shamrock House is that I shall not have you to talk to, oh, and the
+baths. Mrs. Carew does not hold with carrying too much water up these
+stairs."</p>
+
+<p>"I am glad I rank before the baths," Rose laughed. She extricated
+herself from behind the luggage. "I will come and look you up
+sometimes," she announced, "though it probably won't be often; I am a
+bad hand at stirring myself out to see anyone in the evenings.
+Good-night, and I hope you will get on all right with Strangman, he is a
+kind little man really."</p>
+
+<p>She went. Joan sat listening to her feet echoing down the stairs; a
+mouse could set the whole house creaking. She felt very much alone;
+Shamrock House, full as it had been of uncongenial companions, had yet
+been able to offer some distraction from one's own society.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>The new office, to which she wended her way on the Monday morning, lay
+in a side alley opening off Fleet Street, a rickety old building, busy
+as a hive of bees in swarming time. The steep, wooden stairs, after she
+had been asked her business by the janitor in the box office and put in
+charge of a very small, very dirty boy, led her up and up into the heart
+of the building&mdash;past wide-open doors where numerous men sat at desks,
+the floor round them strewn with papers; up again, past rooms where the
+engines throbbed and panted, shaking the building with their noisy
+vibrations; up still further, till they landed her at that withdrawn and
+sacred sanctum, the Editor's room. Here worked Mr. Strangman
+and his satellites; spiders, in fact, in the centre of their
+cleverly-constructed web, throwing out feelers in search of news to all
+quarters of the globe.</p>
+
+<p>Anything less like a spider than Mr. Strangman it would have been
+difficult to imagine. He was an alert, nervous man, with bright, kind
+eyes, a flexible mouth and very restless hands. His whole nature hung on
+wires, as if&mdash;which was indeed the case&mdash;his mental capacity was too big
+and overpowering for his physical strength. His manners under the strain
+of work were jerky and abrupt, but otherwise he was a very kindly and
+genial man. To Joan he was excessively polite, and so afraid that her
+capabilities might not come up to his expectations that for the first
+few days he left her practically with no work to do. She sat in a large,
+well-lit&mdash;if draughty&mdash;room, opposite Mr. Strangman at his table.</p>
+
+<p>It was one of her duties, she discovered, to keep the aforesaid table
+tidy, and in time she learned that here more than anywhere else she
+could be of service to the man. He had an awe-inspiring way of piling up
+his desk with scraps of paper, cuttings, and slips, and stray
+manuscripts, and it was always under the most appalling muddle that the
+one small, indispensable news-slip would hide itself.</p>
+
+<p>The Magazine Page-faker and the News-gleaner sat in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span> the same room, the
+latter at a table next Joan. He was a stout man with a beaming smile and
+an inexhaustible supply of good temper. He would sit over his work,
+which as far as she could see consisted solely of running his eye over
+the day's papers and cutting out what appeared to be workable news,
+making a great deal of noise with his feet on the floor, a gigantic
+cutting-out scissors in his hand and a whistle which never varied its
+tune from early morning till late in the evening&mdash;a soft, subdued,
+under-his-breath whistle, Joan never even discovered what the tune was.
+He was, despite this disadvantage, an indefatigable worker and an
+ever-ready helper, always willing to do other people's work for them if
+necessary.</p>
+
+<p>Of the other people on the staff Joan saw very little; the reporters
+came early in the morning to take their orders for the day, and threw in
+their copy downstairs in the evening. Sometimes they would come upstairs
+to discuss some feature of their day's work with Mr. Strangman, or to
+put in an article to the Literary Editor, but, as a whole, she hardly
+learned to know them, even by name. Then there were the office boys, a
+moving, fluctuating crowd; always in mischief, always dirty, always
+irrepressibly cheerful. For the rest, her work&mdash;one might almost say her
+life&mdash;lay between the four walls of the office room, with the shaking
+vibrations of the engines under her feet and the musty, curious smell of
+papers in the making and pile upon pile of papers that had been made all
+round her.</p>
+
+<p>She arrived at 9.30 and left about 6 p.m., and by then she was too
+numbed&mdash;for the working of a typewriter is monotonous work&mdash;to do
+anything save walk with the hurrying crowds as far as Charing Cross and
+take a bus from there to Montague Square. But since work filled her days
+she had less time for discontent or depression. Sometimes she would be
+tempted to wander off the direct route on her way home and she would
+walk up to Piccadilly and past the region of brightly-lighted shops,
+watching the faces in the crowd round her, envying those who met friends
+and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span> stopped to talk to them, following with rather wistful eyes the
+couples who passed, hand clasped in hand; but generally speaking she was
+too tired in the evenings to do anything save go straight home, eat a
+hasty supper and tumble into bed.</p>
+
+<p>Of Rose she saw, as the other had prophesied, very little. Joan realized
+that friendship, if their brief companionship could have been called
+such, counted for very little in Rose's life. The girl seemed entirely
+to ignore her once she was from constant sight, and since Joan could not
+herself call at Shamrock House and Rose habitually forgot to pay her
+promised visits, the friendship, such as it had been, faded away into
+the past.</p>
+
+<p>The other inhabitants of 6, Montague Square, she saw very rarely.
+Occasionally she would encounter Miss Drummond, the downstairs tenant,
+paying off her taxi at the door&mdash;a tall, handsome girl, rather overblown
+in her beauty, who invariably stared at Joan with haughty defiance and
+stalked into her own room, calling loudly for Mrs. Carew. Once Joan had
+stumbled over the retired military gentleman from the second floor,
+sound asleep, in a very undignified position, half way up her own little
+stairs. The incident had brought with it a shudder of fear, and from
+that day onwards Joan was always careful to lock her door at night.</p>
+
+<p>Miss Fanny Bellairs, the erring damsel on the second floor back, kept
+such strange hours that she was never visible; but Mrs. Carew had a
+large stock of not very savoury anecdotes about her which she would
+recount to Joan during the process of laying supper. As not even an
+earthquake would have stopped Mrs. Carew's desire to impart information,
+Joan gave up the attempt to silence her. Indeed, she sometimes listened
+with a certain amount of curiosity, and Fanny Bellairs assumed a
+marvellous personality and appearance in her mind's eye.</p>
+
+<p>That the original did not in the least come up to her expectations was
+something of a surprise. About three<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span> months after her first arrival at
+Montague Square Joan reached home rather late one evening to find her
+room already occupied. A girl sat, her feet tucked underneath her, on
+the principal chair under the lamplight; she had been crying, for a
+tight, damp ball of a handkerchief lay on the floor, and at the sound of
+Joan's entry she turned a tear-stained face to greet her.</p>
+
+<p>"I thought you were never coming"&mdash;the voice held a plaintive sob in
+it&mdash;"and I am that down-hearted and miserable."</p>
+
+<p>Joan put down her things hastily and came across. "I am so sorry," she
+said, groping through her mind to discover who her visitor might be;
+"did Mrs. Carew tell you I was in?&mdash;how stupid of her."</p>
+
+<p>The girl in the chair gulped back her tears and laughed. "No, she
+didn't," she contradicted; "she told me that you wouldn't want to see me
+if you were in; that the likes of you did not know the likes of me, and
+that I was not to come up. But I came"&mdash;she held out impulsive hands. "I
+guess you aren't angry," she said; "when I get the silly hump, which
+isn't often, I go mad if I have to stay by myself. I'll be as good
+as"&mdash;she glanced round the room&mdash;"as good as you," she finished, "if you
+will let me stay."</p>
+
+<p>"Why, of course," said Joan. "I don't know what Mrs. Carew can have been
+talking about. I don't know you, so I can't see how she can have thought
+I would not want to see you."</p>
+
+<p>"I can though." The girl shook forward a sudden halo of curls and
+laughed in a way which it was impossible to resist. "I am Fanny, from
+downstairs, and Mrs. Carew is a silly old woman who talks a lot, but she
+is not stupid enough not to know the difference between a girl like you
+and a fly-by-night like me. Now I have shocked you," she went on
+breathlessly, seeing Joan's flush, "just when I was setting out to be
+good. I'll bite my tongue out and start again."</p>
+
+<p>She coughed once with alarming intensity. Joan moved<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span> slowly away and
+took off her hat and coat. So this was Fanny Bellairs, the girl whose
+doings provided such a purple background for her own dull existence. She
+looked again at the little figure, lying back now, eyes closed, lips
+tremulous from the struggle for breath which her fit of coughing had
+brought her. It was a perfectly-fashioned face, though when Joan had
+time to study it, she could see that the colouring was just a little
+crudely put on and that it had smudged in the shadows under her eyes
+where the tears had lain. She was such a thin, small slip of a girl,
+too, little dimpled hands and a baby face under the gold curls. Fanny
+opened her eyes at that moment, wide and innocent, and answered Joan's
+glance with a wistful smile.</p>
+
+<p>"Thinking of all Mrs. Carew ever said about me?" she asked. "I am not as
+bad as she sometimes paints me. Still"&mdash;she stood up&mdash;"I'll go, if you
+would rather I did. Hate to make a nuisance of myself."</p>
+
+<p>She moved slowly&mdash;it was, in reality, reluctantly&mdash;towards the door, and
+Joan came out of her reverie with a start.</p>
+
+<p>"Please don't go," she said quickly. "You must think I am awfully rude,
+but really I was not thinking about Mrs. Carew or anything so
+disagreeable. I was thinking how pretty you were, and wondering how old
+you could be."</p>
+
+<p>The girl at the door stopped and turned back. Laughter filled her eyes,
+yet there was a little hint of mockery behind the mirth.</p>
+
+<p>"Go on!" she said, "you and your thoughts! I know just what they were,
+my dear; but it doesn't matter to me, I am used to it. Twenty-two, at
+your service, mum"&mdash;she came a little away from the door and swept Joan
+a curtsey&mdash;"and everything my own, even my hair, though you mayn't
+believe it."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVI" id="CHAPTER_XVI"></a>CHAPTER XVI</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"Pale dreams arise, swift heart-beats yearn,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Up, up, some ecstasy to learn!<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;The spirit dares not speak, afar<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Youth lures its fellow, like a star."</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><span class="smcap"><b>Anon.</b></span></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>Fanny was a real daughter of joy. The name is given to many who in no
+sense of the word near its meaning. To Fanny, to be alive was to laugh;
+she had a nature which shook aside the degradation of her profession
+much as a small London sparrow will shake the filthy water of the
+gutters from off his sky-plumed wings. She brought such an atmosphere of
+sunshine and laughter into Joan's life that the other girl grew to lean
+on it. The friendship between them ripened very quickly; on Fanny's side
+it amounted almost to love. Who knows what starvation of the heart side
+of her went to build up all that she felt for Joan? Through the dreary
+days that followed, and they sapped in passing at Joan's health and
+courage, Fanny was nearly always at hand, with fresh flowers for the
+attic, with tempting fruit for Joan to eat in place of the supper which
+night after night she rejected. Fanny would sometimes be away for weeks
+at a time. She still followed her profession as an actress, Mrs. Carew
+would tell Joan, and on those occasions Joan missed her intolerably. But
+Fanny herself never spoke about her life, and Joan never questioned her.</p>
+
+<p>Autumn faded into winter; winter blew itself out in a cold and
+boisterous March, and spring crept back to London. Nowhere else in the
+world does she come so suddenly, or catch at your heart with the same
+sense of soft joy. You meet her, she catches you unawares, so to say,
+with your winter clothes on.</p>
+
+<p>"What is this?" she whispers, blowing against your<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span> cheeks. "Surely you
+have forgotten my birthday, or you would never have come out in those
+drab old clothes."</p>
+
+<p>Then with a little shake of her skirts she is gone, and your eyes are
+opened to the fact that the trees have put forth brave green buds, and
+that yellow crocuses and white snowdrops are dancing and curtseying to
+you from odd corners of the Park.</p>
+
+<p>Joan's life at the <i>Evening Herald</i> Office, once the first novelty had
+worn off, and because it was spring outside, became very monotonous and
+very tiring. She nearly always ended the days conscious of a ridiculous
+desire to cry at everything. Because the buses were crowded, because the
+supper was greasy and unappetizing, or because Fanny was not at home to
+welcome her.</p>
+
+<p>There was one afternoon in particular, on a hot, airless day in June,
+when Joan reached the last point of her endurance. Everything had
+combined to make the office unendurable. One of Mr. Strangman's most
+agitated moods held him. Early in the morning he had indulged in a wordy
+argument with Chester, the Literary Page editor, on the question of
+whether or not the telephone was to be used by the office boys to 'phone
+telegrams through to the post office. It was a custom just founded by
+Strangman and it saved a certain amount of time, but Chester&mdash;a thin,
+over-worked, intellectual-ridden gentleman, was driven nearly mad by
+occult messages, such as the following:</p>
+
+<p>"Hulloa, hulloa, is that telegrams? Take a message please for the
+<i>Evening Herald</i>. What, can't hear? That's your fault, I am shouting and
+my mouth is near the tube. Look alive, miss. Listening? Well: to Davids.
+D for daddy, a for apples, v for varnish, i for I. I said I for i! Got
+it now? D for daddy again," and so on.</p>
+
+<p>"The truth of it is," said Mr. Chester, during a pause in one of these
+wordy tussles, "I, or that telephone, will have to go, Strangman. I
+cannot work with it going on."</p>
+
+<p>"My dear fellow"&mdash;Strangman was all agitation at once&mdash;"what is to be
+done? The messages must go and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span> I must hear them sent or the boys would
+put in wrong words. I am sure it is not any pleasanter for me than it is
+for you; I have also got to work."</p>
+
+<p>"T for Tommy, I keep telling you&mdash;Tommy, Tommy," the lad at the 'phone
+shrieked triumphantly.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Chester threw down his papers, pushed back his chair, and rose,
+tragic purpose on his face.</p>
+
+<p>"It is not to be borne," he ejaculated.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, very well," stuttered Mr. Strangman, "that means, I suppose, that I
+shall have to do the 'phoning myself. Here, boy, get out, give me that."</p>
+
+<p>And thereupon the message started over again, but this time breathed in
+Mr. Strangman's powerful whisper.</p>
+
+<p>He certainly seemed to be able to manipulate it with less noise, only he
+soon wearied of the effort, and future wires were deputed to Joan. So,
+in addition to her other tasks, she had had the peculiarly irritating
+one of trying to induce attention into post office telephone girls.</p>
+
+<p>Then, too, Mr. Strangman had not felt in the mood to dictate letters,
+with the result that at a quarter to six seven of them had to be altered
+and retyped. Joan was still sitting at her machine in a corner of the
+hot, noisy office, beating out: "Dear Sir, In answer to yours, etc.,"
+when the clock struck six. Her back ached, her eyes throbbed, she was
+conscious of a feeling of intense hatred against mild, inoffensive Mr.
+Strangman.</p>
+
+<p>That gentleman, having discovered the lateness of the hour by chance,
+kept her another quarter of an hour apologizing before he signed the
+letters.</p>
+
+<p>Then he looked up at her suddenly.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you think," he said, "that you could report on the dresses for us
+to-morrow night at the Artists' Ball?"</p>
+
+<p>"I report?" Joan looked at him in astonishment; women reporters were
+disapproved of on the <i>Evening Herald</i>.</p>
+
+<p>"I know it is unusual," Mr. Strangman admitted. "But Jones is ill, and
+our other men will all be busy on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span> important turns. I just thought of
+you in passing; it is a pity to waste the ticket."</p>
+
+<p>"I could try." Joan made an effort to keep the eagerness out of her
+voice.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, that is it, you could try. We should not want much," he added;
+"and it is not part of your duties as a secretary; still, you might
+enjoy it, eh?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, I should love it," she assented; hate was fast merging back into
+liking.</p>
+
+<p>Strangman cackled his customary nervous laugh. "Then that is settled,"
+he said, "and here is the ticket. You will have to have a fancy dress,
+hire it, I suppose, since the time is so short. That, and a taxi there
+and back, will come out of the paper. Hope it is a good show, for your
+sake."</p>
+
+<p>Afterwards, when she looked back at that evening, at the Artists' Ball,
+Joan was ashamed to remember the eager heat of excitement which took
+possession of her from the moment when she stepped out of the <i>Evening
+Herald</i> taxi and ran along the passage to the ladies' cloak-room. She
+had, it seemed to her, no excuse; she was not young enough to have made
+it pardonable and she had long ago decided that the intoxication of life
+could be no longer hers. Its loss was to be part of the bitter lesson
+fate had taught her. Yet as she saw herself in the glass, a ridiculous
+figure in black flounces with just one scarlet rose pinned at her waist
+and another nodding on the brim of her hat, she could not keep the
+excitement from sparkling in her eyes and the colour of youth was
+certainly flaming in her cheeks. Fanny had fitted her out with clever
+fingers as a black Pierrette. A Pierrette, taken from the leaves of some
+old French book, with her hair done in little dropping curls just
+faintly powdered, as if a mist of snow lay over the brown.</p>
+
+<p>She was young, after all, and the music called to her with insistent
+voice. "I am looking nice," Joan confided to her reflection, "and I will
+have a good time just for to-night."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Then she turned and went quickly, walking with light feet and eager eyes
+that sought for adventure into the crowded room.</p>
+
+<p>It gave her first of all an immense sense of space. The whole opera
+house had been converted into a ballroom. There were hundreds of people
+present, and every imaginable fancy dress under the sun. Brilliant
+colours, bright lights and the constant movement of the crowd made up a
+scene of kaleidoscopic splendour.</p>
+
+<p>There was a waltz in progress and Joan stood for a little with her back
+to a pillar of one of the boxes, bewildered by the noise and moving
+colours. Standing opposite her, in the shadow of the other looped-up
+curtain, was a man. A Pierrot to her Pierrette, only his costume was
+carried out in white, and on his head, instead of the orthodox hat, he
+wore a tight-bound black handkerchief. His eyes, for some reason, made
+her restless. It was not that he stared exactly, the man's whole figure
+was too blatantly bored for that, but there was something in their
+expression which made her look and look again. At their sixth exchange
+of glances the man smiled, or so it seemed to Joan, but the next moment
+his face was sombre again. None the less there had been something in her
+idea, for before the next couple of dancers swung past her the man had
+moved from the shadow of his curtain and was standing near her.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't think it is awful impudence on my part," he said, "but are you
+here all alone?"</p>
+
+<p>Now there was just something in his voice that, as far as most women
+were concerned would sweep away all barriers. He spoke, in short, like a
+gentleman. Joan looked up at him.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," she admitted; she caught her breath on a little laugh. "I am here
+as a reporter, you know; it is business and pleasure combined."</p>
+
+<p>Once more his eyes made her uncomfortable and she dropped hers quickly.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"That is strange," said the man gravely, "for I am a reporter too."</p>
+
+<p>He was certainly not speaking the truth. Joan was not inclined to
+believe that Fleet Street had ever produced reporters the least like her
+companion. Still, what did it matter? just for this evening she would
+throw aside convention and have a good time.</p>
+
+<p>"How awfully fortunate," she answered, "because you will be able to help
+me. I am new to the game."</p>
+
+<p>"Well then," he suggested, "let us dance to the finish of this waltz and
+I will point out a few of the celebrities as we pass them."</p>
+
+<p>Just for a second Joan hesitated, but her feet were tingling to be
+dancing.</p>
+
+<p>"Couldn't we do it better standing here?" she parried.</p>
+
+<p>"No," he assured her, "we could not do it at all unless we dance;
+movement helps my memory."</p>
+
+<p>He was a most perfect dancer. No one, so numberless women would have
+told Joan, could hold you just as Robert Landon did, steer you untouched
+through the most crowded ballroom as he did, make himself and you, for
+the time being, seem part and parcel of the swaying tune, the strange
+enchantment of a waltz.</p>
+
+<p>Joan was flushed and a little breathless at the close; they had danced
+until the last notes died on the air, and she had forgotten her mission,
+the celebrities, everything, indeed, except the dance and its
+bewildering melody. The man looked down at her as she stood beside him,
+an eager light awake in his eyes. His voice, however, was cool and
+friendly.</p>
+
+<p>"You dance much too well to be a reporter," he said.</p>
+
+<p>"What a ridiculous remark!" Joan retorted; "one cannot dance all day,
+can one? Besides, I am not even a real reporter. I am only a typist."</p>
+
+<p>"That is worse, to think of you as that is impossible," he said. "Let us
+go outside and find somewhere to sit."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"But what about our reporting," Joan remonstrated; "I thought you were
+going to point out celebrities?"</p>
+
+<p>"Time enough for that," he answered. "I am going to take you out on to a
+balcony meanwhile. There will only be the stars to look at us, and I am
+going to pretend you are a fairy and that you live in the heart of a
+rose, not a typist or any such awful thing."</p>
+
+<p>Joan laughed. "I wish you could see my attic," she said. "It is such a
+funny rose for any fairy to live in."</p>
+
+<p>They sat out four dances, or was it more? Joan lost count. Out here on
+the balcony, with only the stars as chaperon and a pulse of music
+calling to them from the ballroom, time sped past on silver wings. For
+Joan the evening was a dream; to-morrow morning she would wake, put on
+her old blue coat and skirt, catch her bus at the corner of the square
+and spend the day in sorting and arranging Mr. Strangman's papers.
+To-night she was content to watch the bubble held before her by this
+man's soft words, his strange, intent eyes; she made no attempt to
+investigate it too closely. But for Landon the evening was one step
+along an impulse he intended to follow to the end. He was busy laying
+sure foundations, learning all there was to know of Joan's life and
+surroundings, of the difficulties that might lie in the way of his
+desire, of the barriers he might have to pull down.</p>
+
+<p>"Things are not going to end here," he told Joan, as, the last dance
+finished, they stood among the crowd waiting for a taxi. He had helped
+her on with her cloak and the feel of his strong warm hands on her
+shoulder had sent the blood rushing to Joan's heart.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't see how it is not going to end," she answered; "you must
+remember I am not even a reporter."</p>
+
+<p>"No, and I am," he smiled; "I had forgotten."</p>
+
+<p>He moved to face her, and putting his hands over hers, fastened up her
+cloak for her. It seemed his hands lingered over the task, and finally
+stayed just holding hers lightly.</p>
+
+<p>"I am going to see it does not end, none the less," he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span> said. "I shall
+come and fetch you at your office this day next week and you shall dine
+with me somewhere and go on to a theatre. What time do you get out of
+office?"</p>
+
+<p>"At about six," Joan answered; "but how can you? Why, we do not even
+know each other's names!"</p>
+
+<p>"No more we do, and I don't want to, do you?" He smiled down at her
+undecided eyes. "I would rather think of you as Pierrette than Miss
+anything, and I shall be Pierrot. It is a romance, Pierrette; will you
+play it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," she answered slowly, but her eyes fell away from his.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVII" id="CHAPTER_XVII"></a>CHAPTER XVII</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"Aye, thought and brain were there, some kind<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Of faculty that men mistake<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;For talent, when their wits are blind,&mdash;<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;An aptitude to mar and break<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;What others diligently make."</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><span class="smcap"><b>A. L. Gordon.</b></span></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>Impulse had always been a guiding factor in Robert Landon's life. If he
+saw a thing and wanted it, impulse would prompt him to reach out his
+hand and snatch it; if the thing were beyond his reach, he would
+climb&mdash;if necessary&mdash;over the heart of his best friend to obtain it;
+should it prove of very fragile substance and break in his hands, he
+would throw it away, but its loss, or the possible harm he had inflicted
+in his efforts to obtain it, brought no regrets. He made love
+deliriously, on fire himself for the moment, but never once had he so
+far forgot himself as to come from the flame in any way singed. Many
+tragedies lay behind the man, for impulse is hardly a safe guide through
+life; but he himself was essentially too level-headed, too selfish, to
+be the one who suffered.</p>
+
+<p>He had spoken and danced and made love to Joan on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span> an impulse. Beyond
+that, he set himself down seriously and painstakingly to win her. Most
+women, he knew, like to be carried forward on the wings of a
+swift-rushing desire, but there was some strange force of reserve behind
+this girl's constant disregard of his real meaning in the game they
+played. She was willing, almost anxious to be friends; it did not take
+him long to find out how lonely and dreary had been the life she was
+leading. She went out with him daily; it became a recognized thing for
+him to fetch her in his small car every evening at office. Sometimes
+they would dine together at one of the many little French restaurants in
+Soho, and go to a theatre afterwards; sometimes they would just drive
+about the crowded lighted streets, or slip into the Park for a stroll,
+leaving the car in charge of some urchin for a couple of pennies. Since
+he was out on the trail, as his friends would have said, every other
+interest in his life was given up to his impulse to beat down this
+girl's reserve, but all his attempts at passionate love-making left her
+unresponsive. She would draw back, as it were, into her shell, and for
+days she would avoid meeting him. Going out some back way at the office
+and never being at home when he called at Montague Square. Then he would
+write little notes to her and bribe the office-boy to deliver them,
+begging her pardon most humbly&mdash;he played his cards, it may be noticed,
+very seriously&mdash;imploring her to be friends again. And Joan would
+forgive him and for a little they would be the best of companions.</p>
+
+<p>But through it all, and though she shut her eyes more or less to the
+trend of events, Joan's mind refused to be satisfied. She was restless
+and at times unhappy; she had her hours of wondering where it would all
+end, her spells of imagination when she saw Landon asking her to marry
+him. When she thought about it at all it always ended like that, for she
+could not blind her eyes to the fact of the man's love for her. Then she
+would shun his society, and endeavour to build up a wall of reserve
+between<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span> them, for it was her answer to his question that she could not
+bring herself to face.</p>
+
+<p>It was on one of these occasions that she made up her mind definitely to
+break with him altogether. She wrote him a short note, saying that she
+was going to be dreadfully busy at office and that as she had another
+girl coming to stay with her&mdash;both statements equally untrue&mdash;she was
+afraid it would be no use his calling to fetch her.</p>
+
+<p>Landon accepted this attitude in silence, though one may believe it did
+something to fan the flame of his passion, and for ten whole days he
+left her entirely alone. Then he wrote.</p>
+
+<p>Joan found the letter waiting for her on the hall table when she came
+home one evening after a peculiarly dull and colourless day. It had been
+delivered by hand and was addressed simply to "Pierrette, In the Attic."
+Mrs. Carew must have been a little surprised at such a designation. Joan
+took it upstairs to read, lingering over the opening of it with a
+pleasurable thrill. The days had been very grey lacking his
+companionship.</p>
+
+<p>"Dear Pierrette," Landon had written, "is our romance finished, and why?
+The only thing I have left to comfort me is a crushed red rose. You wore
+it the first evening we ever met. Pierrette, you are forgetting that it
+is summer. How can you wake each morning to blue skies and be
+conventional? Summer is nearly over, and you do not know what you are
+missing. Come out and play with me, Pierrette; I will not kiss even your
+hands if you object. I can take you down next Sunday to a garden that I
+know of on the river, and you shall pick red roses. Will you not come,
+Pierrette?"</p>
+
+<p>Joan sat on in the dark of her little attic (for if the lamp was not
+required before supper Mrs. Carew had a way of not bringing it up until
+it was quite dark) with the letter on her lap. She was making up her
+mind to tell Landon about Gilbert, about her principles which had been
+rather roughly shaken, about her ideas, which still held obstinate<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span> root
+in her mind. If he loved her enough not to mind what was past, why
+should she not marry him? She had proved once how bitter it was to stand
+against the convictions of the world alone. His fortnight's absence had
+shown her how unbearable the dullness of her days had become; she could
+not struggle on much longer. Her mind played with the prospect of
+consenting, of how it would open up new worlds to her, of what a change
+it would bring into her life.</p>
+
+<p>It was with a conviction anyway that great things might be in the
+balance that she stepped into Landon's car on Sunday afternoon and
+settled herself back against the cushions. They disregarded the
+fortnight's lapse in their friendship; neither referred to it in any
+way, and Landon was exceptionally cheerful and full of conversation on
+the drive out. Joan was content to sit quiet and listen and to let her
+eyes, tired of dusty files and hours of typewriting, feast on the
+country as they flashed past.</p>
+
+<p>The garden that he had promised her proved all that his descriptions had
+claimed. It lay at the back of an old stone house, off the high road and
+away from the haunts of the ordinary holiday makers. Landon had chanced
+on it once and the place had taken a great hold on his imagination. One
+could be so alone at the foot of the garden, where it sloped down to the
+water's edge, that one could fancy oneself in a world of one's own.</p>
+
+<p>The house itself was a quaint, old-fashioned building with small rooms
+and tiny windows, but the walled-in garden where the roses grew, and the
+river garden, which stretched right down to the brim of the river with
+its fruit trees and tall scented grasses, were both beautiful. They had
+tea out there, and they picnicked on the grass, watching the sun's
+reflections playing hide and seek in the river.</p>
+
+<p>After tea, Landon insisted on strolling round and collecting all the
+roses he could lay his hands on for Joan. He threw them finally, a heavy
+heap of scented blossoms, on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span> to her lap. He said their colour was
+reflected in her cheeks, their beauty in her eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"It is a shame to have picked them so early," Joan remonstrated; "they
+will die now before we get home."</p>
+
+<p>"Let them," he answered, "at least they have had their day and done well
+in it." He threw himself down on the grass beside her. "Aren't they
+glorious, Pierrette?" he said; but his eyes were not on the flowers.</p>
+
+<p>Joan stirred uneasily. The great moment was drawing closer and closer,
+she was growing afraid, as are all women when the sound of Love's wings
+comes too near them.</p>
+
+<p>"I wish you wouldn't call me by that name any more," she said,
+"because&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, why because?" Landon asked as she hesitated. "One of the things
+that do not seem quite right to you, like kissing, or holding hands?" He
+took up one of the roses from her lap and pulled it to pieces with
+ruthless hands. "What a puritan you are!" he went on abruptly. "Do you
+know we can only love once, isn't your heart hungry for life, Pierrette?
+Sometimes your eyes are."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't!" said Joan quickly, "that is another thing I wish you would not
+do, make personal remarks; it makes me feel uncomfortable."</p>
+
+<p>"Why don't you tell the truth?" he asked fiercely. "Why don't you say
+afraid?"</p>
+
+<p>"Because it does not," she answered; her eyes, however, would not meet
+his. "I think uncomfortable describes it better."</p>
+
+<p>Landon stared at her with sombre eyes. He was beginning to tire of their
+pretty game of make believe; perhaps impulse was waning within him.
+Anyway he felt he had wasted enough time on the chase. But to-day Joan
+seemed very charming, and her fear, for he could see plainly enough that
+she was afraid, was fanning the flame of his desire into a new spurt of
+life.</p>
+
+<p>"I am going to make love to you, Pierrette," he said; "I am going to
+wake up that cold heart of yours. Does<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span> the thought frighten you,
+Pierrette? because even that won't prevent me doing it."</p>
+
+<p>He had drawn her close to him, she could feel his arms round her like
+strong bands of iron. Joan lifted a face from which all the colour had
+fled to his.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't, please don't!" Her bewildered mind struggled with all the
+carefully thought-out things she was going to have said to him. But the
+crisis was too overwhelming for her; she could only remember the one
+final thought that had been with her. "You may not want to marry me when
+you know about me," she whispered, and ended her words with a sob.</p>
+
+<p>The man laughed triumphantly. "I don't want to marry you," he answered,
+"I want to love you and make you for a little love me, and this is how I
+begin the lesson." He bent his face to hers quickly, kissing her
+passionately, fiercely, on the lips.</p>
+
+<p>For a second such a tumult of passionate amazement shook Joan that she
+stayed quiet in his arms. Then everything that was strong, all the
+inherited purity in her nature, came to her aid and summoned her
+fighting forces to resist. She struggled in his arms furiously, she had
+not known she held such stores of strength; then she wrenched herself
+free and stood up. Fear, if fear had been the cause of her early
+discomfort, had certainly left her; it was blind, passionate rage that
+held her silent before him.</p>
+
+<p>The man rose to his feet and essayed a laugh, but it was rather a
+strained effort. "That was a most undignified proceeding, Pierrette," he
+said; "what on earth made you do it?"</p>
+
+<p>"How dared you?" flamed Joan. "How dared you speak to me, touch me like
+that?"</p>
+
+<p>"Dared?" the man answered; he was watching her with mocking eyes and
+something evil had come to life on his face. Cold anger that she should
+have made a fool of him and a baulked passion which could very easily
+turn to hate. "This outburst is surely a little ridiculous.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span> What did
+you think I wanted out of the game? Did it really occur to you that I
+was going to ask you to marry me? My dear girl!" He shrugged his
+shoulders, conveying by that movement a vast amount of contempt for her
+dreams. "And as for the rest, I have never yet met a woman who objected
+to being kissed, though some of them may pretend they do."</p>
+
+<p>Joan stared at him; he had stooped and was gathering up the roses that
+lay between them. Rage was creeping away from her and leaving her with a
+dull sense of undignified defeat. Once again she had pitted the ideal of
+a dream against a man's harsh reality, and lost. Love! She had dreamed
+that this man loved her, she had held herself unworthy of the honour he
+paid her. This was what his honour amounted to&mdash;"I have never yet met a
+woman who objected to being kissed."</p>
+
+<p>She turned away and walked blindly towards the house.</p>
+
+<p>Landon caught her up before she reached the gate of the garden. His arms
+were full of the roses and apparently he had won back to his usual good
+nature.</p>
+
+<p>"Having made ourselves thoroughly disagreeable to each other," he said,
+"let us make it up again for the time being. It is all rather absurd,
+and you have got to get back to town somehow or other."</p>
+
+<p>He helped her into the car with just his usual solicitude, tucking the
+rug round her and laying the pile of roses on her lap; but on the way
+home he was very silent and from the moment they started till the time
+came for saying good-bye he did not speak a word to her.</p>
+
+<p>As they stood together, while Joan was opening the door with her latch
+key, he put his hand for a moment over hers.</p>
+
+<p>"Good-bye, Pierrette," he said, "I am sorry you won't have anything to
+do with me. I should have made you happy and given you a good time.
+Sometimes it is a pity to aim too high; you are apt to miss things
+altogether."</p>
+
+<p>Fanny was waiting in Joan's room when she got back,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span> tucked up in her
+favourite position in the arm-chair. She had been away for the last ten
+days on one of her periodical trips. "My!" she gasped, disentangling
+herself to greet the other; "what roses, honey! Straight from the
+country, aren't they, and a car&mdash;I can hear it buzzing outside. Is it
+your young man?" She paused on the thought tip-toe with excitement, her
+eyes studying Joan across the flowers she had seized. "And is he
+straight? the other sort won't do for you; you would hate yourself in a
+week."</p>
+
+<p>Joan subsided on to the bed, taking off her hat with hands that shook
+over the task.</p>
+
+<p>"No," she answered, "he is not straight, Fanny; but it doesn't matter,
+because I have finished with him. Take away the flowers with you, will
+you? they seem to have given me a headache."</p>
+
+<p>Fanny dropped the roses in a shower and trod them under foot as she ran
+to Joan. "He has hurt you;" she spoke fiercely, flinging her arms round
+the other girl. "God, how I hate men at times! He has hurt you, honey."</p>
+
+<p>"Only my pride," Joan admitted; but the tears so long held back came in
+a flood now; she laid her head down on Fanny's shoulder and sobbed and
+sobbed.</p>
+
+<p>The other girl waited till the storm had passed; then she rose to her
+feet and bundling the roses together with an aggressive movement opened
+the door and flung them out into the passage.</p>
+
+<p>"I have got an idea," she said; "you have been about fed up with office
+for months past. Well, why not chuck it? Come with me. I have got a job
+in a show that is going on tour next week. There is room in the chorus,
+I know; come with me, won't you?"</p>
+
+<p>Her earnestness made Joan laugh. "What shall I come as, Fanny? I cannot
+sing, and I have never acted in my life."</p>
+
+<p>"That is nothing," Fanny went on impatiently. "You<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span> are young, you are
+pretty; you can dance, I suppose, and look nice. I can get you taken on
+to-morrow, for old Daddy Brown, that is the manager, is a friend of
+mine, and while he is a friend he will do anything for me. Oh, come, do
+come." She caught hold of Joan's hands. "It will be great, we shall be
+together, and I will show you that there is fun in life; fun, and love,
+and laughter."</p>
+
+<p>She was laughing herself hysterically, her figure seemed poised as if
+for an instant outbreak into the dance she spoke of. Joan watched her
+with envious eyes. Fanny's philosophy in life was so plain to see. She
+took things that came her way with eager hands; she seemed to pass
+unscathed, unsullied, through the dregs of life and find mirth in the
+dreariest surroundings. And to-day Landon had broken down one more
+barrier of the pride which kept Joan's feet upon the pathway of
+self-respect. Of what use were her ideals since they could not bring her
+even one half hour's happiness? The road stretched out in front of her
+empty and sunless.</p>
+
+<p>These thoughts swept through her mind almost in the space of a second.
+Then she rose quickly to her feet.</p>
+
+<p>"I'll come, Fanny," she said; "it really amounts to turning my back on a
+battle; still I will come."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVIII" id="CHAPTER_XVIII"></a>CHAPTER XVIII</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"To fill the hour&mdash;that is happiness: to fill<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;The hour and leave no crevice for repentance."</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><span class="smcap"><b>Anon.</b></span></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>"Daddy Brown, this is the girl I spoke to you about; will she do?"</p>
+
+<p>That had been Joan's introduction to the manager of the Brown travelling
+company. He was a large man, with his neck set in such rolls of fat that
+quick movement was an impossibility. His eyes, small and surrounded by<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span>
+a multitude of wrinkles, were bloodshot, but for all that excessively
+keen. Joan felt as they swept over her that she was being appraised,
+classed, and put aside under her correct value in the man's brain. His
+hair, which in youth must have grown thick and curly, had fallen off
+almost entirely from the top of his head, leaving a small island
+sprouting alone in the midst of the baldness. This was known among the
+company as "The Danger Mark," for when the skin round it flushed red a
+fearful storm was brewing for somebody.</p>
+
+<p>He sat in front of a table littered with papers, in a small, rather
+dirty office, the windows of which opened on to Bedford Street. With the
+window open, as he kept it, the noise of the Strand traffic was plainly
+audible.</p>
+
+<p>He eyed Joan slowly and methodically; then his glance turned back to
+Fanny. "What can she do?" he asked heavily.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, everything," Fanny answered with a little gasp; "and she can share
+my dressing-room and all that."</p>
+
+<p>"Humph!" grunted the man; once more his small, shrewd eyes travelled all
+over Joan.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, perhaps, she will do." He agreed finally, "Mind you are in time
+at the station to-morrow. Cut along now, girls, I am busy."</p>
+
+<p>Fanny was jubilant all the way home. "I thought I should be able to work
+it," she bubbled; "it will be fun, honey, to-morrow we are due at
+Tonbridge and the tour ends at Sevenoaks. All little places this time.
+But mind you, it is the first rung of the ladder for you. Brown's is a
+good company to start with. <i>Country Girl</i>, <i>Merry Widow</i>, <i>Waltz
+Dream</i>." She ticked them all off on her fingers one by one. "You are
+glad about it, aren't you?" she broke off suddenly to ask.</p>
+
+<p>"Of course I am glad," Joan answered quickly, "and it is sweet of you to
+have got it for me. Perhaps I am a little nervous; it strikes me one
+might get very frightened of Mr. Brown."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"What, Daddy? He is all right if you know how to manage him, and he
+won't bother you." Fanny took a quick look at her. "You aren't his
+sort."</p>
+
+<p>Was she really glad? Joan pondered the matter over when Fanny had at
+last betaken herself to her own room. At any rate she had, as it were,
+burnt her boats. She had left the <i>Evening Herald</i>, she had told Mrs.
+Carew to sublet her rooms. At least it would be good to get away from
+London for a bit.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Carew had been quite frank and decided in her views on the subject.</p>
+
+<p>"For a young lady like you to go off with the likes of 'er," this
+referred to Fanny, "it hardly seems seemly to me, Miss. Not that Miss
+Bellairs ain't all right in her own way, but it is not your way. Mark my
+words, Miss, you will regret it."</p>
+
+<p>"And if I do," Joan had answered, "I can always leave and come back
+here, can't I, Mrs. Carew? I am sure you will always do your best to put
+me up even if this room is let."</p>
+
+<p>"If I have a corner; Miss, you shall 'ave it and welcome. Nice and quiet
+young lady you have always been, and I know something of young ladies, I
+do."</p>
+
+<p>It was evident, even in her efforts to be polite, that she considered
+Joan's present line of action to be one of deterioration. Was it, after
+all, a wise move, Joan wondered rather vaguely, as she packed away her
+few possessions. There was a great deal in Fanny's nature that she
+disapproved of, that could at times even fill her with disgust. In
+itself, that would merely hold her from ever coming to look at life from
+Fanny's standpoint. And perhaps she would find in the existence, which
+Fanny claimed to be full of love and laughter, something to satisfy the
+dull aching discontent which had wrenched at her heart all this last
+summer. Aunt Janet, Uncle John, the old home-life, the atmosphere of
+love and admiration, these had been torn from her, she needed something
+to take their place.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>They met the rest of the company next day at the station. Fanny
+introduced them all to Joan, rather breathlessly.</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Strachan, who plays our hero, and who is the idol of the stalls.
+Mr. O'Malley, our comic man. Mr. Whistler, who does heavy father parts,
+wig and all. Mr. Jimmy Rolls, who dances on light toes and who prompts
+when nothing else is doing. The ladies, honey, take their names on
+trust, you will find them out sooner or later."</p>
+
+<p>There were, Joan discovered, eight other ladies in the company. She
+never knew more than four of them. Mrs. O'Malley, Grace Binning, a small
+soft-voiced girl, Rhoda Tompkins, and Rose Weyland&mdash;a very
+golden-haired, dark-eyebrowed lady, who had been in some far back
+period, so Fanny contrived to whisper, a flame of Brown's.</p>
+
+<p>Of the men, Joan liked Mr. Strachan best; he was an ugly man with very
+pleasant eyes and a rare smile that lit up the whole of his face. He
+seemed quiet, she thought, and rather apart from the others.</p>
+
+<p>The journey down to Tonbridge proved slightly disastrous. To begin with,
+thanks to Daddy Brown himself, the company missed the best train of the
+day and had to travel by one that meant two changes. On arrival at
+Tonbridge at four o'clock in the afternoon they found that one of the
+stage property boxes had gone astray. Considering that they were billed
+to appear that evening at eight and the next train did not arrive till
+ten-thirty, the prospect was not a promising one.</p>
+
+<p>"Always merry and bright," as Jimmie, the stage prompter, remarked in an
+aside to Strachan. "By the way, is it the <i>Arcadians</i> that we are doing
+to-night?"</p>
+
+<p>"How the hell can we do anything," growled Daddy Brown, the patch of
+skin round his danger-mark showed alarmingly red, "if that box does not
+appear. Who was the blasted idiot who was supposed to be looking after
+it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, it was and it was not me, Sir," Jimmie acknowledged; "the truth
+is that I saw it labelled all right and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span> left it with the rest of the
+luggage to look after itself. I suppose&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, what is the use of talking," Brown broke in impatiently; he had
+thrust his hat back on his fiery head, the lines of fat above his collar
+shone with perspiration. "You had better go on, all of you, and see
+about getting rooms; the first rehearsal is in an hour, box or no box,
+and don't you forget it."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't see," wailed Mrs. O'Malley, almost as soon as his back was
+turned, "how we are to live through this sort of thing. What is the use
+of a rehearsal if none of our things are going to turn up?"</p>
+
+<p>"I guess there will be a performance whether or no," Fanny told her.
+"Come along, honey," this to Joan, "seize up your bag and follow me; we
+have got to find diggings of sorts before the hour is up."</p>
+
+<p>Joan found, as they trudged from lodging-house to lodging-house, that
+the theatrical profession was apparently very unpopular in Tonbridge. As
+Fanny remarked, it was always as well to tell the old ladies what to
+expect, but the very mention of the word theatre caused a chill to
+descend on the prospective landladies' faces. They found rooms finally
+in one of the smaller side streets; a fair-sized double bedroom, and a
+tiny little sitting-room. The house had the added advantage of being
+very near the theatre, which was just as well, for they had barely time
+to settle with the woman before they had to hurry off for the rehearsal.</p>
+
+<p>"It won't do to be late," Fanny confided to Joan. "Daddy is in an awful
+temper; we shan't get any champagne to-night unless some of us soothe
+him down."</p>
+
+<p>At the small tin-roofed theatre supreme chaos reigned upon the stage and
+behind it. Daddy Brown, his hat thrown off, his coat discarded, stormed
+and raged at everyone within hearing. <i>The Country Girl</i> had replaced
+<i>The Arcadians</i> on the bill; it was an old favourite and less
+troublesome to stage. Fanny was to play <i>Molly</i>; it was a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span> part that she
+might have been born for. Daddy Brown won back to his good humour as he
+watched her; her voice, clear and sweet, carried with it a certain
+untouched charm of youth, for Fanny put her whole heart into her work.</p>
+
+<p>Joan felt herself infected by the other's spirit, she joined in the
+singing, laughing with real merriment at her chorus partner. The stage
+boards cracked and creaked, the man at the piano watched the performers
+with admiring eyes&mdash;the music was so familiar that it was quite
+unnecessary for him to follow the notes. Daddy Brown and the box office
+man, sole occupants of the stalls, saw fit to applaud as the chorus
+swung to a breathless pause.</p>
+
+<p>"That's good, that's good," Brown shouted. "Just once more again please,
+ladies, then we'll call a rest. Don't want to tire you out before
+to-night."</p>
+
+<p>The dance flourished to its second end and Fanny flung herself exhausted
+against the wings. Her cough was troubling her again, shaking her thin
+body, fighting its way through her tightened throat.</p>
+
+<p>"It's worth it though," she laughed in answer to Joan's remonstrance;
+"it is the only time I really live when I am dancing, you see."</p>
+
+<p>The rehearsal dragged out its weary length, but not until Brown had
+reduced all the company to such a state of exhaustion that they could
+raise no quiver of protest to any of his orders. A man of iron himself,
+he extracted and expected from the people under him the same powers of
+endurance which he himself possessed. Since Fanny and Joan could not go
+home to their lodgings, the time being too short, Strachan escorted them
+out to obtain a meal of sorts before the evening's performance. Short of
+Daddy Brown's hotel, which stood close to the theatre and which they
+were all reluctant to try, there did not appear to be any restaurants in
+the neighbourhood and they ended up by having a kind of high tea at a
+little baker's. "Eggs are splendid things to act on," Strachan told
+Joan.</p>
+
+<p>The girls, however, on their return found a bottle of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span> champagne and two
+glasses waiting for them in Fanny's dressing-room. It had been sent with
+Mr. Brown's compliments to Miss Bellairs. The sight of it sent up
+Fanny's spirits with a bound.</p>
+
+<p>"I did not know how I was going to get through the evening," she
+confessed, "but this will put new life into us."</p>
+
+<p>She insisted upon Joan having a glass, and the latter, conscious that in
+her present state of tiredness she could hardly stand, far less dance,
+sipped a little of the clear, bubbling liquid&mdash;sipped till the small
+room grew large, till her feet seemed to tread on air, and her eyes
+shone and sparkled like the brightest of stars on a dark night.</p>
+
+<p>The theatre after that, the crowded rows of faces, the music and the
+thunder of applause&mdash;the audience were good-tempered and inclined to be
+amused at anything&mdash;passed before her like some gorgeous light-flecked
+dream. When the soldiers in the back row took up the words of Fanny's
+song and shouted the refrain she felt swept along on the wings of
+success.</p>
+
+<p>At the fall of the curtain Daddy Brown patted her on the back. He was by
+this time radiant with cheerfulness once more.</p>
+
+<p>"You will do, young lady," he said. "We'll have to see if we can't work
+in a special dance for you;" and Fanny flung her arms round Joan in wild
+joy. "You're made, honey," she whispered, "if Brown has noticed you,
+you're made. I always said you could dance."</p>
+
+<p>It was very thrilling and exciting, but the champagne was beginning to
+lose its effect. The world was growing grey again. Joan's head throbbed,
+and she felt self-consciously inclined to make a fool of herself. She
+sat very silent through the supper to which Brown treated the company at
+his hotel. There were about twenty people present, nearly all men; Joan
+wondered where they had been collected from, and she did not quite like
+the look of any of them. Fanny was making a great deal of noise, and
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span>
+how funny and tawdry their faces looked under the bright light. After
+supper there was a dance, the table was pushed aside, and someone&mdash;Joan
+saw with surprise that it was Daddy Brown&mdash;pounded away at a one-step on
+the piano. Everyone danced, the men, since there were not enough ladies
+to go
+<a name="corr9" id="corr9"></a><a class="correction" href="#cn9" title="changed from 'ground'">around</a>,
+with each other.</p>
+
+<p>Fanny, wilder, gayer than ever, skirts held very high, showed off a new
+cake-walk in the centre of the room. Her companion, a young,
+weak-looking youth, was evidently far from sober, and the more intricate
+the step, the more hopelessly did he become entangled with his own feet,
+amidst shouts of amusement from the onlookers.</p>
+
+<p>Joan turned presently&mdash;she had narrowly escaped being dragged into the
+dance by a noisily cheerful gentleman&mdash;to find Strachan standing beside
+her. He was watching her with some shade of curiosity.</p>
+
+<p>"Why don't you go home?" he suggested; "it isn't amusing you and I can
+see you are tired. We get used to these kind of shows after a time."</p>
+
+<p>"I think I will," Joan agreed; "no one will mind if I do, will they?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not they, most of them are incapable of noticing anything." A cynical
+smile stirred on his face. "It is no wonder," he commented, "that we are
+known as a danger to provincial towns. You see the state of confusion we
+reduce the young bloods to." His eyes passed round the room and came
+back to Joan with a shade of apology in them. "A bad night, for your
+first experience," he said; "we are not always as noisy as this. Come
+along though, I'll see you home, if I may, my rooms are somewhere down
+your street."</p>
+
+<p>Joan lay awake long after she had got into bed, and when she did at last
+drop off to sleep it was to dream strange, noise-haunted dreams, that
+brought her little rest. It was morning, for a faint golden light was
+invading the room, when she woke to find Fanny standing at the foot of
+the bed. A different Fanny to any Joan had ever seen<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span> before, tired and
+blowsy-looking, her hair pulled about her face, the colour rubbed in
+patches from her cheeks and lips.</p>
+
+<p>"My word, it has been a night;" she stood swaying and peering at Joan.
+"It's life though, isn't it, honey?"</p>
+
+<p>Then a wild fit of coughing seized her and Joan had to scramble out of
+bed and give what help she could. There was no hope of sleep after that,
+and when Fanny had been helped to bed Joan took up a chair to the window
+and drew aside the curtain.</p>
+
+<p>Her mind was a tumult of angry thoughts, but her heart ached miserably.
+If this was what Fanny called life and laughter, she had no wish to live
+it.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIX" id="CHAPTER_XIX"></a>CHAPTER XIX</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"I did not choose thee, dearest. It was Love<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;That made the choice, not I."</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><span class="smcap"><b>W. S. Blunt.</b></span></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>All the way up the river from the Nore after they had picked up the
+pilot the ship moved through a dense fog. A huge P. &amp; O. liner, heavily
+laden with passengers and mails, she had to proceed cautiously, like
+some blind giant, emitting every two minutes a dolorous wail from her
+foghorns.</p>
+
+<p>"Clear the way, I am coming," was the substance of the weird sound, and
+in answer to it shrill whistles sounded on all sides, from small fleets
+of fishing-boats, coal hulks, and cargo boats bound from far-off lands.</p>
+
+<p>"We are here too," they panted in answer; "don't run us down, please."</p>
+
+<p>It was eerie work, even for the passengers, who remained in blissful
+ignorance of the danger of their situation. By rights the ship should
+have been in dock before breakfast; they had planned the night before
+that an early dawn should see them awake and preparing to land; yet here
+was eleven o'clock, and from what the more hardy of them could<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span> learn by
+direct questioning of those in authority, they had not as yet passed
+Canvey Island. Dick Grant, ship's doctor and therefore free of access to
+inquirers, underwent a searching examination from all and sundry. The P.
+&amp; O. regulations are, that the officers shall not talk or in any way
+become friendly with any of the passengers; the ship's doctor and the
+purser share the responsibility of looking after their clients' comfort,
+well-being, and amusement. On occasions such as a fog, when the hearts
+of passengers are naturally full of questions as to where they are, how
+long will the fog last, is there any danger, and ought we to have on our
+life-belts, these two afore-mentioned officials have a busy time. Dick
+felt that Barton, the purser in question, had played him rather a shabby
+trick, for Barton had asserted that the work of sorting out passengers'
+luggage and seeing to their valuables would confine him to his office
+till the ship docked, which excuse left Dick alone to cope with the
+fog-produced situation.</p>
+
+<p>Dick had been at sea now for close on two years. He had shifted from
+ship to ship, had visited most of the ports in the near and far East.
+This was his last voyage; he was going to go back and take up life in
+London. From Marseilles he had written to Mabel telling her to expect
+him the week-end after they got in.</p>
+
+<p>His journeyings had given him many and varied experiences. The blue eyes
+had taken unto themselves some of that unwavering facing of life which
+seems to come almost always into the eyes of people who spend their
+lives upon the sea. He had learned to be patient and long-suffering with
+the oddities of his patients, passengers who passed through his hands on
+their brief journeyings; he had seen the pathos of the sick who were
+shipped with the full knowledge that they would die ere the first port
+was reached, simply because the wistful ache of home-sickness would not
+allow them to rest. Home-sickness! Dick had known it keep a man alive
+till the grey cliffs of Dover grew out of the sea and he could fall back
+dead and satisfied.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Board ship throws people together into appalling intimacy; Love springs
+full-winged into being in the course of an afternoon; passion burns at
+red-heat through drowsy, moon-filled nights. Almost wilfully, to begin
+with, Dick had flung himself into romance after romance; perhaps unknown
+to himself, he sought to satisfy the hunger of heart which could throb
+in answer to a dream, but which all reality left untouched. He played at
+love lightly; he had an ingrained reverence for women that even
+intercourse with Anglo-Indian grass-widows and the girl who revels in a
+board-ship flirtation was unable altogether to eradicate. He made love,
+that is to say, only to those women who first and openly made love to
+him; but it is to be doubted whether even the most ardent of them could
+boast that Dicky Grant had ever been in love with them. They slipped out
+of his ken when they disembarked at their various ports, and the
+photographs with which they dowered him hardly served to keep him in
+mind of their names. And a certain weariness had grown up in his heart;
+he felt glad that this was to be his last voyage. He had put in two good
+crowded years, but he was no nearer realizing his dream than he had been
+on the day when Mabel had said to him: "Did you think I should not know
+when you fell in love?"</p>
+
+<p>Dick was thinking of this remark of Mabel's as he stood by himself for
+the time being, right up by the front of the ship peering into the fog,
+and with the thought came a memory of the girl with the brown eyes who
+had stood to face him, her hands clenched at her sides, as she told her
+piteous tale. Piteous, because of its very bravado. "I am not afraid or
+ashamed," she had claimed, while fear stared out of her eyes and shame
+flung the colour to her face. What had the past two years brought her?
+Had she stood with her back to the wall of public opinion and fought her
+fight, or had the forces of contempt and blame been too strong for her?</p>
+
+<p>A very light hand on his arm brought him out of his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span> thoughts with a
+start, and he turned to find a small, daintily-clad lady standing beside
+him.</p>
+
+<p>"How much longer shall we be?" she asked; "and when am I going to see
+you again, Dicky, once we land?"</p>
+
+<p>She had called him Dicky from the second day of their acquaintance. Mrs.
+Hayter always called men by their Christian names, or by nicknames
+invented by herself.</p>
+
+<p>Dick let his eyes linger over her before he answered&mdash;immaculately
+dressed as ever&mdash;the wildest storm saw Mrs. Hayter with her hair waved,
+the other ladies claimed&mdash;small, piquante face, blue eyes and a
+marvellous complexion despite her many seasons spent in the East. She
+was the wife of an Indian Civilian, a tall, grey-headed man, who had
+come on board to see her off at Bombay. Dick had been rather struck with
+the tragedy of the man's face, that once he had seen it; he connected it
+always for some unexplainable reason with Mrs. Hayter's small, soft
+hands and the slumberous fire in her blue eyes. Not that Dick was not
+friendly with Mrs. Hayter; he had had on the contrary rather a
+fierce-tempered flirtation with her. Once, under the spell of a night
+all purple sea and sky and dim set stars, he had caught her to him and
+kissed her. Kissed the eager, laughing mouth, the warm, soft neck, just
+where the little pulse beat in the hollow of her throat. She had
+practically asked him to kiss her, yet that, he reflected in his cooler
+mood the next morning, was no excuse for his conduct, and, rather
+ashamed of himself, he had succeeded in avoiding her fairly well until
+this moment. He had not the slightest desire to kiss her again; that was
+always the sad end to all his venturings into the kingdom of romance.</p>
+
+<p>"Where are you going to?" he answered her last question first; "if it is
+anywhere near London, I shall hope to look you up."</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Hayter laughed, a little caught-in laugh. "Look me up, Dicky,
+between you and me! Never mind, you funny, shy, big boy, you shall put
+it that way if you like.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span> As a matter of fact, I am going to stay at the
+Knightsbridge Hotel for a week or so on my way through to my husband's
+people. Why don't you come there too?"</p>
+
+<p>The invitation in her voice was unmistakable and set his teeth on edge.
+"It's too expensive for me," he answered shortly; "but I will come and
+call one day if I may."</p>
+
+<p>"Of course," she agreed, "let's make it dinner the day after to-morrow.
+Dicky," she moved a little closer to him, "is it me or yourself you are
+angry with about the other night?"</p>
+
+<p>"Myself," Dick said dryly, and had no time for more, for on the second a
+shiver shook the ship, throwing Mrs. Hayter forcibly against him, and
+the air was suddenly clamorous with shrill whistles, cries, and the
+quick throb of engines reversed.</p>
+
+<p>Through the fog, which with a seeming malignity was lifting, veil upon
+thick veil, now that the mischief was accomplished, Dick could see the
+faint outlines of land; gaunt trees and a house, quite near at hand,
+certainly within call. Mrs. Hayter was in a paroxysm of terror,
+murmuring her fright and strange endearing terms all jumbled together,
+and the deck had waked to life; they seemed in the centre of a curious,
+nerve-ridden crowd. It was all very embarrassing; Dick had to hold on to
+Mrs. Hayter because he knew she would fall if he let her go, and she
+clung to him, arms thrown round his neck, golden hair brushing against
+his chin.</p>
+
+<p>"There's not a particle of danger," a strong voice shouted from
+somewhere in the crowd. Dick could recognize it as the captain's.
+"Please don't get alarmed, ladies, it is quite unnecessary, with any
+luck we will be off almost immediately."</p>
+
+<p>In that he proved incorrect, for, heavily weighted as the <i>India</i> was,
+she stayed firmly fixed in Thames mud. By slow degrees the fog lifted
+and showed the long lines of the shore, and the solitary house standing
+out like a sentinel in the surrounding flatness.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Dick had succeeded in disentangling Mrs. Hayter's arms and had escorted
+her to a seat.</p>
+
+<p>"I am afraid I have given myself away hopelessly," she whispered,
+clutching him with rather a shaky hand. "Did anybody see us?"</p>
+
+<p>"Everybody, I should think," he told her gravely, "But, after all, most
+things are excusable in a possible wreck."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," she agreed, "only Mrs. Sandeman is all eyes to my doings, and on
+one occasion she even wrote Robert. Cat!"</p>
+
+<p>The last expression was full of vindictiveness. Dick was seized with a
+disgust for his own share in the proceedings; he hoped devoutly that
+Mrs. Sandeman, a rather austere-faced, tight-lipped woman, would not
+write and disturb Robert's peace of mind for any doings of his. Also he
+took a mental resolve to see no more of Mrs. Hayter.</p>
+
+<p>By four o'clock all the passengers, with a mild proportion of their
+luggage, had been transferred to small tugs for transport to Tilbury;
+for on a further examination into the state of affairs it had been found
+that the <i>India</i> would probably remain where she was until a certain
+lightening of her freight should make it easier for her to refloat.</p>
+
+<p>It was three days later, in fact, before Dick reached London. He found
+two letters waiting for him at his club; one from Mabel, telling him how
+glad they would be to see him, could he not make it earlier than the
+week-end; and one from Mrs. Hayter. Would he come and dine with her that
+evening? He need not trouble to answer, she was dining all alone and
+would not wait for him after half-past seven.</p>
+
+<p>"If you can't come to dinner," she had added, "look in afterwards; there
+is something I rather particularly want to say to you."</p>
+
+<p>He dressed for the evening meal in a vague state of discontent. He had
+not the slightest intention of going to Mrs. Hayter's, still the thought
+of her, waiting for him and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span> expecting him, made him uneasy. At one
+moment he meditated telephoning to her to tell her he was unavoidably
+prevented from coming, but dismissed the excuse as being too palpably a
+lie. He was restless, too, and at a loss as to how to spend his evening,
+the loneliness of being by himself in London after a two years' absence
+was beginning to oppress him. None of his old pals seemed to be in
+town&mdash;anyway they did not turn up at the club. Finally he decided to
+look in at the Empire, or one of the neighbouring music-halls, and
+strolled forth in that direction.</p>
+
+<p>London certainly seemed no emptier than usual. Streams of motor-cars,
+taxis, and buses hurried along Piccadilly, the streets were busy with
+people coming and going. Out of the shadows just by the Burlington
+Arcade a woman spoke to him&mdash;little whispered words that he could pass
+on without noticing; but she had brushed against him as she spoke, the
+heavy scent she used seemed to cling to him, and he had been conscious
+in the one brief glance he had given her, that she was young, pretty,
+brown-eyed. The incident touched on his mind like the flick of a whip.
+He stared at the other women as they passed him, meeting always the same
+bold yet weary invitation of their eyes, the smile which betokened
+nothing of mirth. And as he stared and passed and stared again it grew
+on him that he was in reality searching for someone, searching those
+street faces in the same way as once before he had sought among the
+passers-by for one girl's face. The thought was no sooner matured than
+he hated it&mdash;and now he tried to keep his eyes off these women passing
+by, loathing the thought of their nightly pilgrimage, of their
+shame-haunted trade.</p>
+
+<p>The Empire performance hardly served to distract his thoughts. He was
+out in the streets again before the ballet turn came on even. It had
+started to rain, a slight, indefinite drizzle; Leicester Square
+presented a drab and dingy appearance. The blaze of lights from the
+surround<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span>ing theatres shone on wet streets and slippery pavements. A
+drunken woman who had been ejected from the public-house at the corner
+stood leaning against a neighbouring lamp-post; her hat had fallen
+askew, stray, ragged wisps of hair hung about her face, from time to
+time she lifted up her voice and shouted at the children who had
+gathered in a ring to watch her antics. Life was horribly, hurtfully
+ugly at times. Dick would have liked to have shaken his shoulders free
+of it all and known himself back once more on the wind-swept deck of an
+outgoing steamer.</p>
+
+<p>He strode off in the direction of Trafalgar Square, and still dim,
+draggled shapes haunted his footsteps, leered at him from the shadows,
+brushed against him as he passed. As he turned into the lighted purlieus
+of the Strand he paused for a moment, undecided which course to take
+next, and it was then that he saw Joan again.</p>
+
+<p>She was standing a little in front of him on the edge of the pavement,
+evidently waiting for a bus. Another girl stood near her, talking in
+quick, childish excitement, recounting some conversation, for she acted
+the parts as she spoke. Joan seemed to pay very little attention to her
+companion, though occasionally she smiled in answer to the other's
+laughter.</p>
+
+<p>He had recognized her at once! Now he stood with his eyes glued on her,
+taking in every detail of her appearance&mdash;the wide-brimmed hat, the
+little lace collar showing outside her jacket, the neat shoes.</p>
+
+<p>Even as she talked Fanny's bird-like eyes darted here and there among
+the crowd and lit presently on the young man, so palpably staring at her
+companion. She edged nearer to Joan and nudged her.</p>
+
+<p>"You have got off, honey," she whispered. "Turn your eyes slowly and you
+will catch such a look of devotion as will keep you in comfort for the
+rest of your life."</p>
+
+<p>Joan flushed: Fanny could always succeed in bringing the hot blush to
+her face, even though she had been on tour with the company now for two
+months. Also she still<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span> resented being stared at, though Fanny was doing
+her best to break her in to that most necessary adjunct of their
+profession. Rather haughtily, therefore, she turned, and for a second
+his eyes met hers, bringing a quick, disturbing memory which she could
+in no way place.</p>
+
+<p>At any other time Dick would have taken off his hat and claimed
+acquaintance; just for the present moment, though, something held him
+spellbound, staring. Fanny giggled, and Joan, having had time to raise
+her feelings to a proper pitch of anger, let her eyes pass very coldly
+and calmly from the top of the young man's hat to the tip of his boots
+and back again. Contempt and dislike were in the glance, what Fanny
+called her "Kill the worm" expression. Then No. 11 motor-bus plunged
+alongside, and "Here we are at last!" called Fanny, dragging at Joan's
+arm.</p>
+
+<p>With a sense of victory in her heart, since the young man had obviously
+been quelled by her anger, Joan climbed up to the top of the bus and sat
+down in a seat out of sight. Fanny, however, turned to have a final look
+at the enemy from the top step. As the bus moved, she saw him shake
+himself out of his trance and start forward.</p>
+
+<p>"Good-night," she called in cheerfully affectionate tones; the conductor
+turned to stare up at her. "Some other day; can't be done to-night,
+sonny."</p>
+
+<p>Then she subsided, almost weak with laughter at her own joke, beside a
+righteously irritated Joan.</p>
+
+<p>"Nearly had the cheek to follow us, mind you," she told her, amid gasps;
+"properly smitten, he was."</p>
+
+<p>"I wish you had not called out to him," said Joan stiffly. "It is so&mdash;so
+undignified."</p>
+
+<p>Fanny quelled her laughter and looked up at Joan. "Undignified," she
+repeated; "it stopped him from coming, anyway. You don't look at things
+the right way, honey. One must not be disagreeable or rude to men in our
+trade, but one can often choke them off by laughing at them."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XX" id="CHAPTER_XX"></a>CHAPTER XX</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"Love lent is mortal, lavished, is divine.<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Not by its intake is love's fount supplied,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;But by the ceaseless outrush of its tide."</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>"And there is little Dickie," Mabel said; she stood, one hand on the
+cot, her grey eyes lowered&mdash;"he has brought such happiness into my life
+that sometimes I am afraid."</p>
+
+<p>The baby. Some women were like that, Dick knew. A child could build anew
+their world for them and make it radiant with a heaven-sent wonder. He
+had never thought of Mabel as a mother. He had been almost afraid to
+meet her after two years away&mdash;her letters had given him no clue to her
+feelings; but then she rarely wrote of herself and she had never been
+the sort of person to complain. So he had come down to Sevenoaks rather
+wondering what he would find, remembering their last talk together the
+day before her wedding. Mabel had met him at the station and driven him
+back to the house in their car. She had talked chiefly about himself;
+was he glad to be back?&mdash;had he enjoyed the years away?&mdash;what plans had
+he made for the future? But her face, her quiet grey eyes had spoken for
+her. He knew she was happy, only the reason, the foundation of this
+happiness, had been a mystery to him until this moment.</p>
+
+<p>"Little Dickie," he repeated, leaning forward to peer at the small atom
+of humanity who lay fast asleep. "You have called it after me, then?"</p>
+
+<p>Mabel nodded. "Of course; and don't call him 'it,' Dick; he is a boy."</p>
+
+<p>A sudden intuition came to her, she lifted her eyes to Dick's. "Tom
+wanted him called that, too," she said, speaking a little quickly; "but
+that is not wonderful,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span> because Tom always wants just exactly what he
+thinks I do. We will go downstairs now, shall we, Dick? You know Mother
+insisted upon a dinner-party in your honour this evening, and we are
+going on to some awful theatre in Sevenoaks afterwards."</p>
+
+<p>"Good Lord!" groaned Dick; "why did you let her?"</p>
+
+<p>"I thought you wouldn't be too pleased," Mabel admitted; "but surely you
+must remember that it is no use arguing with mother about what she
+calls&mdash;amusing us. She took the tickets as a pleasant surprise yesterday
+when she was in Sevenoaks. As Tom says, 'Let's be amused with a good
+grace.' Dick"&mdash;she paused on the lowest step to look up at him&mdash;"you
+haven't the slightest idea of how good Tom is; he spoils mother almost
+as much as father did, and yet he manages her."</p>
+
+<p>"And you," said Dick, "are absolutely and entirely happy, Mabel?"</p>
+
+<p>"Absolutely and entirely," she answered; he could see the truth of her
+words shining in her eyes.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Grant loved dinner-parties and going-on to the theatre. It is to be
+believed that she imagined that the younger people enjoyed them too,
+because, for herself, she invariably went to sleep half-way through the
+most brilliant performance&mdash;earlier, were the show not quite so good.
+Dick remembered many unpleasant entertainments in his youth which could
+be traced to this passion of Mrs. Grant's. She would drill them into
+amusement, becoming excessively annoyed with them did they not show
+immediate appreciation, and pleasure is too fragile a dream for such
+treatment; it can be very easily destroyed.</p>
+
+<p>Dick and Mabel found her
+<a name="corr10" id="corr10"></a><a class="correction" href="#cn10" title="changed from 'downstars'">downstairs</a>,
+giving the final orders as to the
+setting out of the table to a harassed and sulky-looking maid.
+Everything had always to be done in Mrs. Grant's own particular way,
+even down to the placing of the salt-spoons. She was the bane of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span>
+servants' lives when they were new-comers; if they lived through the
+persecution they learned how best to avoid her gimlet eyes and could get
+a certain amount of amusement out of hoodwinking her. Dick contrived to
+display the correct amount of pleasure at the festivity in prospect for
+him. He wondered at the back of his mind how glad his mother really was
+to see him, and strolled away upstairs presently to his own room to
+unpack and change.</p>
+
+<p>The first had already been accomplished for him by Tom's valet, and the
+man apparently proposed to stay and help him change, murmuring something
+about a hot bath being ready.</p>
+
+<p>"Thanks," answered Dick, "then I will manage for myself; you need not
+wait."</p>
+
+<p>He stood for some time, the man having slipped discreetly away, staring
+out of the wide-open window. It was still late summer, and the days
+stayed very hot. Beyond the well-kept lawn at the back of the house the
+fields stretched away till they reached the fringe of the forest, and
+above the trees again rose the chalk hills that lay, he knew, just
+behind Wrotham. He was thinking vaguely of many things as he stood
+there; first of Mabel and the new happiness shining in her eyes. Mabel
+and her small son; thank heaven, she had won through to such content,
+for if anyone deserved to be happy it was Mabel. Then little moments
+from the past two years strayed into his mind. Hot, sun-blazing ports,
+with their crowds of noisy, gesticulating natives; the very brazen blue
+of an Indian sky over an Indian sea; the moonlit night that had made him
+kiss Mrs. Hayter; he could almost feel for one second the throb of her
+heart against his. Then, like a flash, as if all his other thoughts had
+been but a shifting background for this, the principal one, Joan's face
+swung up before him. Where had she been going to that night? Who had her
+companion been? Why had not he had the courage to speak to her, to
+follow her at least, and find out where she lived? She was in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span> London,
+anyway; he would have, even at the risk of hurting Mabel's feelings, to
+get back to London as soon as possible. It was a huge place, certainly,
+to look for just one person in, but Fate would bring them together
+again; he had learned to be a believer in Fate. There was truth, then,
+behind all the strange stories one heard about Love. A girl's voice,
+some face in the crowd, and a man's heart was all on flame. The waters
+of common-sense could do nothing to quench that fire. He would search,
+ridiculous and absurd as it seemed, till he found her&mdash;and then.... His
+thoughts broke off abruptly; there was a sound from downstairs which
+might be the dinner-bell, and he had not even had his bath yet.</p>
+
+<p>The dinner-party, specially arranged by Mrs. Grant for Dick's benefit,
+consisted of a Mr. and Mrs. Bevis, who lived in a large new house on the
+other side of the park, their two daughters, Dr. English, who had taken
+Dick's place at Wrotham, and a young man from Sevenoaks itself. "Someone
+in a bank," as Mrs. Grant described him.</p>
+
+<p>Dick's health was drunk and his mother insisted on "Just a little
+speech, dear boy," which thoroughly upset his temper for the rest of the
+evening, so that he found it difficult to be even decently polite to the
+eldest Miss Bevis, whom he had taken in to dinner. The talk turned,
+after the speech-making episode, to the theatre they were bound for, Mr.
+Jarvis asking young Swetenham if he knew anything of the company and
+what it was like.</p>
+
+<p>"Rather," the youth answered, "been twice myself this time already. They
+are real good for travellers. Some jolly pretty girls among them."</p>
+
+<p>"Musical comedy, isn't it?" Mrs. Bevis asked. "Dorothy has always so
+wanted to see <i>The Merry Widow</i>."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, that is what they are playing to-night," Swetenham assured her,
+"and I hear it is Miss Bellairs' best part. She is good, mind you, in
+most things, and there is a girl who dances top-hole."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know why we have never heard of it before,"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span> Mrs. Bevis
+meandered gently on; "it is so clever of you, Mrs. Grant, to have found
+that there was a theatre in Sevenoaks at all. I am sure we never dreamed
+of there being one."</p>
+
+<p>"They use the town hall," Dr. English put in. "If we can guarantee a
+large enough audience, I expect they will favour us at Wrotham."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, what a splendid idea," cried the youngest Miss Bevis; "fancy a real
+live theatrical company in Wrotham."</p>
+
+<p>"I hope it will stay at 'fancy,'" grunted Mr. Bevis. "From what I
+remember of travelling companies, Wrotham is better without them."</p>
+
+<p>Despite all Swetenham's praise and the Miss Bevis' enthusiastic
+anticipation Dick settled into his seat in the fourth row of the
+so-called stalls with the firm conviction that he was going to be
+thoroughly bored.</p>
+
+<p>"The one consolation," he whispered to Mabel on their way in, "is that
+mother will not be able to sleep comfortably. I don't want to appear
+vicious, but really that is a consolation."</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Grant had apparently come to the same conclusion herself, for she
+was expressing great dissatisfaction in a queenly manner to the timid
+programme seller.</p>
+
+<p>"Are these the best seats in the house?" they could hear her say. "It is
+quite absurd to expect anyone to sit in them for a whole evening."</p>
+
+<p>Mabel had to laugh at Dick's remark, then she went forward to soothe her
+troubled parent as much as possible. "It isn't like a London theatre,
+mother, and Tom has ordered one of the cars to stay just outside. The
+minute you get tired he will take you straight home. He says he does not
+mind, as he has so often seen <i>The Merry Widow</i> before."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, well," Mrs. Grant sighed, and settled her weighty body into one of
+the creaking, straight-backed wooden chairs of which the stalls were
+composed. "So long as you young people enjoy yourselves I do not really
+mind."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Swetenham had purchased a stack of programmes and was pointing out the
+stars on the list to the youngest Miss Bevis. The back of the hall was
+rapidly filling, and one or two other parties strolled into the stalls.
+The orchestra had already commenced to play the overture rather shakily.</p>
+
+<p>"Music, and bad music at that," groaned Dick inwardly. He took a
+despairing glance round him and wondered if it would be possible to go
+and lose himself after the first act. Then the lights went out abruptly
+and the curtain went up.</p>
+
+<p>The beginning chorus dragged distinctly; Dick heard Swetenham whispering
+to his companions that it would be better when the principals came on.
+In this he proved correct, for the <i>Merry Widow</i> girl could sing, and
+she could also act. Fanny's prettiness, her quick, light way of moving,
+shone out in contrast to her surroundings. High and sweet above the
+uncertain accompaniment her voice rose triumphant. The back of the house
+thundered with applause at the end of her song.</p>
+
+<p>"Now wait," announced Swetenham, "the girl who dances comes on here. She
+hasn't any business to, it is not in the play, but old Brown finds it a
+good draw."</p>
+
+<p>Mechanically the stage had been cleared, the characters sitting rather
+stiffly round the ball-room scene while the orchestra was making quite a
+good effort at "The Merry Widow Waltz." There was a second's pause, then
+down from the steps at the back of the stage came a girl; slim,
+straight-held, her eyes looking out over the audience as if they saw
+some vision beyond. It had taken Daddy Brown three very heated lessons
+to teach Joan this exact entrance. She was to move forward to the centre
+of the stage as if in a dream, almost sleep-walking, Fanny had
+suggested, the music was calling her. She was to begin her dance
+languidly, unwillingly, till note by note the melody crept into her
+veins and set all her blood tingling. "Now for abandon," Daddy Brown
+would exclaim, thumping the top of the piano with his baton. "That is
+right,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span> my girl, fling yourself into it." And Joan had learned her
+lesson well, Daddy Brown and Fanny between them had wakened a talent to
+life in her which she had not known she possessed. Dance, yes, she could
+dance. The music seemed to give her wings. If she had seen her own
+performance she would probably have been a little shocked; she did not
+in the least realize how vividly she answered the call.</p>
+
+<p>When she had finished she stood, flushed and breathless, listening to
+the shouted and clapped applause.</p>
+
+<p>"Do it again, miss," a man's voice sounded from back in the hall. She
+tried to find him, to smile at him&mdash;that was more of Fanny's teaching.
+But Daddy Brown allowed no encores, it was only for a minute that she
+stood there, bowing and smiling, in her ridiculously short, flounced
+skirt and baby bodice, then the rest of the chorus moved out to take
+their places, and she vanished into the side wings again.</p>
+
+<p>From the moment of her entry till the last flutter of her skirts as she
+ran off, Dick sat as if mesmerized, leaning slightly forward, his hands
+clenched. Every movement of her body had stabbed, as it were, at his
+heart. He had not heard the call of the music, he could not guess at the
+spirit that was awake in her, he only saw the abandon&mdash;of which Daddy
+Brown was so proud&mdash;the painted face, the smiles which came and went so
+gaily at the shouted applause. Common-sense might not kill love, but
+this! The knowledge that even this could not kill love was what clenched
+his hands.</p>
+
+<p>At the end of the first act Swetenham leant across and asked if he was
+coming out for a drink. It may have been that the younger man had
+noticed Dick's intense interest in the dancer, or perhaps it was merely
+because he wished to air a familiarity which struck him as delightfully
+bold, anyway, as they strolled about outside he put a suggestion to
+Dick.</p>
+
+<p>"If you can arrange to stay on after the show," he said,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span> "and would
+care to, I could take you round and introduce you to those two girls,
+the one who dances and Miss Bellairs."</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Bellairs," Dick repeated stupidly, his mind was grappling with a
+far bigger problem than young Swetenham could guess at.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," the other answered, "I met her last time she was down here, and
+the other is a great pal of hers."</p>
+
+<p>He looked sideways at his companion as they went in under the lights; it
+occurred to him that Grant was either in a bad temper or had a headache,
+he looked anyway not in the least jovial. Swetenham almost regretted his
+rash invitation.</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you," Dick was saying, speaking almost mechanically, "I should
+like to come very much. It doesn't in the least matter about getting
+home."</p>
+
+<p>Swetenham glanced at him again. "If it comes to that," he said, "I have
+a motor-bike I could run you in on."</p>
+
+<p>The fellow, it suddenly dawned on him, had gone clean off his head about
+one of the girls. Swetenham could understand and sympathize with him in
+that.</p>
+
+<p>Dick managed to convey the information that he was staying on to Mabel
+during the third act. She looked a little astonished; Dick, in the old
+days, had been so scornful about young men's stage amusements. Anyway,
+it did not affect the party very much, for Mrs. Grant and Mr. Jarvis had
+already gone home, and Mabel was giving Dr. English a lift.</p>
+
+<p>"Shall I send the motor back for you?" she asked, just as they moved
+away.</p>
+
+<p>Dick shook his head. "Swetenham is going to give me a lift out," he
+answered her, and Dr. English chuckled an explanation as they rolled
+away.</p>
+
+<p>"What it is to be young, eh, Mrs. Jarvis? One can find beauty even in
+the chorus of a travelling company."</p>
+
+<p>But was that the explanation? Mabel wondered.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span> Dick's face had not
+looked as if he had found anything beautiful in the performance.</p>
+
+<p>Swetenham and Dick made their way round to the side entrance of the town
+hall which acted as stage door on these occasions, after they had seen
+the rest of the party off, and Swetenham found someone to take his card
+up to Miss Bellairs.</p>
+
+<p>"We might take them out to supper at the 'Grand,'" he suggested, as they
+waited about for the answer. "I don't know about the new girl, but Miss
+Bellairs is always good fun."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," agreed Dick half-heartedly. He was already regretting the impulse
+which had made him come. What should he do, or how feel or act, when he
+really met Joan face to face? His throat seemed ridiculously dry, and he
+was conscious of a hot sense of nervousness all over him which made the
+atmosphere of the night very oppressive. The boy who had run up with
+Swetenham's card came back presently with a message.</p>
+
+<p>"Would the gentlemen come upstairs, Miss Bellairs was just taking off
+her make-up."</p>
+
+<p>"Come on," Swetenham whispered to Dick; "Fanny is a caution, she doesn't
+mind a bit what sort of state you see her in."</p>
+
+<p>The boy led them up the stairs, through a small door and across what was
+evidently the back of the stage. At the foot of some steps on the
+further side he came to pause outside a door on which he knocked
+violently.</p>
+
+<p>"Come in," Fanny's voice shrilled from inside; "don't mind us."</p>
+
+<p>The boy with a grin threw the door open and indicated with his thumb
+that Swetenham and Dick might advance. He winked at them as they passed
+him, a fund of malignant impudence in his eyes. The room inside was
+small and scattered with a profusion of clothes. Fanny, attired in a
+long silk dressing wrap, sat on a low chair by the only table, very busy
+with a grease-pot and a soft rag removing the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span> paint from her face. She
+turned to smile at Swetenham and held out her hand to Dick when he was
+introduced with a disarming air of absolute frankness.</p>
+
+<p>"You catch me not looking my best," she acknowledged; "just take a seat,
+dears; I'll be as beautiful as ever in a jiffy."</p>
+
+<p>Joan&mdash;Dick's eyes found her at once&mdash;was standing in a corner of the
+room behind the door. She had changed into a blouse and skirt, but the
+change had evidently only just been completed. The fluffy flounces of
+her dancing skirt lay on the ground beside her and the make-up was still
+on her face. At this close range it gave her eyes a curiously beautiful
+appearance&mdash;the heavy lashes, the dark-smudged shadows, adding to their
+size and brilliancy. She did not come forward to greet the two men, but
+she lifted those strange eyes and returned Dick's glance with a stare in
+which defiance and a rather hurt self-consciousness were oddly mixed.</p>
+
+<p>The tumult of anger and regret which had surged up in his heart as he
+had watched her dance died away as he looked at her; pity, and an
+intense desire to shield her, took its place. He moved forward
+impulsively, and Fanny, noticing the movement, turned with a little
+laugh.</p>
+
+<p>"I had forgotten," she said; "my manners are perfectly scandalous. Joan,
+come out of your corner and be introduced. Mr. Swetenham is going to
+take us to supper at the 'Grand,' so he has just confided into my
+shell-like ear. I can do with a bit of supper, can't you?"</p>
+
+<p>Joan dragged her eyes away from Dick. The painted lashes lay like stiff
+threads of black against her cheeks. "I don't think I will come," she
+answered. "I am tired to-night, Fanny, and I shan't be amusing."</p>
+
+<p>She turned away and reached up for her hat, which hung on a peg just
+above her head. "I think I would rather go straight home," she added.</p>
+
+<p>Fanny sprang to her feet and caught at her companion<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span> with impulsive
+hands, dragging her into the centre of the room.</p>
+
+<p>"Nonsense," she said, "you want cheering up far more than I do. Here,
+gentlemen," she went on, "you perceive a young lady suffering from an
+attack of the blues. If you will wait two minutes I'll make her face
+respectable&mdash;doesn't do to shock Sevenoaks&mdash;and we will all go to
+supper. Meanwhile let me introduce you&mdash;Miss Rutherford, known in the
+company as Sylvia Leicester, the some dancer of the Brown show."</p>
+
+<p>"If Miss Rutherford does not feel up to supper," Dick suggested&mdash;he
+wanted, if possible, to help the girl out of her difficulty; he realized
+that she did not want to come&mdash;"let us make it another night, or perhaps
+you could all come to lunch with me to-morrow?"</p>
+
+<p>Again Joan had lifted her eyes and was watching him, but now the
+defiance was uppermost in her mind. His face, to begin with, had worried
+her; the faint hint of having seen him somewhere before had been
+perplexing. She always disliked the way Fanny would welcome the most
+promiscuous acquaintances in their joint dressing-room at all times. She
+thought now that it must have been contempt which she had read in this
+man's eyes, and apart from their attraction&mdash;for in an indefinite way
+they had attracted her&mdash;the idea spurred her to instant rebellion.</p>
+
+<p>"No, let's go to supper," she exclaimed; "Fanny is quite right, I do
+want to be cheered up. Let's eat, drink, and be merry."</p>
+
+<p>She turned rather feverishly and started rubbing the make-up off her
+face with Fanny's rag. The other girl, meanwhile, slipped behind a
+curtain which hung across one side of the room and finished her
+dressing, carrying on an animated conversation with Swetenham all the
+time.</p>
+
+<p>Dick drew a little closer to Joan. "Why do you come?" he asked. "You
+know you hate it and us."</p>
+
+<p>Under the vanishing paint the colour flamed to Joan's face and died
+away-again. "Because I want to," she said;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span> "and as for hating&mdash;you are
+wrong there; I don't hate anything or anyone, except, perhaps, myself."
+The last words were so low he hardly heard them.</p>
+
+<p>They strolled across to the Grand Hotel; it was Fanny's suggestion that
+they should not bother with a cab. She walked between the two men, a
+hand on each of them. Joan walked the further side of Swetenham, and
+Dick had no chance of seeing her even, but he knew that she was very
+silent, and, he could gather, depressed. At supper, which they had
+served in a little private room, and over the champagne, she won back to
+a certain hilarity of spirit. Swetenham was entirely immersed in amusing
+and being amused by Fanny, and Joan set herself&mdash;Dick fancied it was
+deliberately&mdash;to talk and laugh. It was almost as if she were afraid of
+any silence that might fall between them. He did not help her very much;
+he was content to watch her. Absurd as it may seem, he knew himself to
+be almost happy because she was so near him, because the fancied dream
+of the last two years had come to sudden reality. The other feelings,
+the disgust and disappointment which had lain behind their first
+meeting, were for the time being forgotten. Now and again he met her
+eyes and felt, from the odd pulse of happiness that leapt in his heart,
+that his long search was over. So triumphantly does love rise over the
+obstacles of common sense and worldly knowledge&mdash;love, which takes no
+count of time, degrees, or place.</p>
+
+<p>He had her to himself on the way home, for Fanny had elected to go for a
+spin in Swetenham's side-car, suggesting that Dick and Joan should go
+home and wait up for them.</p>
+
+<p>"We shan't be long," Swetenham assured Dick, remembering too late his
+promise to take the other man home, "and it is all right waiting there,
+they have got a sitting-room."</p>
+
+<p>So Joan and Dick walked home through the silent streets and all pretence
+of gaiety fell away from Joan. She walked without speaking, head held
+very high, moving beside him, her face scarce discernible under the
+shadow of her hat. It<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span>
+<a name="corr11" id="corr11"></a><a class="correction" href="#cn11" title="changed from 's'">was</a>
+not to be believed that she was quite
+conscious of all she meant to this man; but she could not fail to know
+that he was attracted to her, she could not help feeling the warmth with
+which his thoughts surrounded her. And how does Love come to a woman?
+Not on the same quick-rushing wings which carry men's desires forward.
+Love creeps in more assiduously to a woman's thoughts. He brings with
+him first a sense of shyness, a rather wistful longing to be more worthy
+of his homage. Unconsciously Joan struggled with this intrusion into her
+life. The man had nice eyes, but she resented the tumult they roused in
+her. Why was he not content to find in her just a momentary amusement,
+why did his eyes wake this vague, uncomfortable feeling of shame in
+her heart; shame against herself and her surroundings?</p>
+
+<p>At the door of the lodgings she turned to him; for the first time he
+could see her face, lit up by a neighbouring lamp.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you want to come in?" she asked, her voice hesitated on the words.
+"I do not want to ask you," her eyes said as plainly as possible.</p>
+
+<p>"No," he answered, "I would much rather you did not ask me to." Then
+suddenly he smiled at her. "We are going to be friends," he said. "I
+have a feeling that I have been looking for you for years; I am not
+going to let you go, once found."</p>
+
+<p>He said the words so very earnestly, there was no hint of mockery in
+them, it could not seem that he was laughing at her. She put her hand
+into the one he held out.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, friends," she said; an odd note of hesitation sounded in her
+voice.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXI" id="CHAPTER_XXI"></a>CHAPTER XXI</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"Love can tell, and Love alone,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Whence the million stars were strewn;<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Why each atom knows its own;<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;How, in spite of woe and death,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Gay is life, and sweet is breath."</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><span class="smcap"><b>R. Bridges.</b></span></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>Dick walked home. It was a good long tramp, but he was glad of the
+exercise and the opportunity it gave him to arrange his thoughts into
+some sort of order. He had spoken to Joan, carried away by the moment,
+as they stood to say good-night, impelled to frankness by the appeal of
+her eyes. Now, slowly, reason gathered all its forces together to argue
+against his inclination. It would be wiser to break his half-made
+promise to the girl, and stay out of her life altogether. Immeasurable
+difficulties lay in the way of his marrying her. There was the child,
+her present position, his people's feelings and his own dismay as he had
+watched her dancing on the stage and seen her smiling and radiant from
+the applause it awoke. He had built his dreams on a five minutes' memory
+and for two years the girl's eyes had haunted him, but none the less it
+was surely rather absurd. Even love, strong, mysterious power as it is,
+can be suppressed and killed if a man really puts his mind to it.</p>
+
+<p>At this moment, though of course Dick was not aware of the psychological
+happening, Love raised a defiant head amid the whirl of his thoughts and
+laughed at him&mdash;laughed deliberately, the sound echoing with all the old
+joy of the world, and Dick fell to thinking about Joan again. Her eyes,
+the way she walked, the undercurrent of sadness that had lain behind her
+gaiety. How good it would be to take her away from all the drabness of
+her present life and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span> to bring real laughter, real happiness to her lips
+and eyes!</p>
+
+<p>"I will marry her," he decided stormily, as he turned in to the drive of
+the house. "Why have I been arguing about it all this time? It is what I
+had made up my mind to do two years ago. I will marry her."</p>
+
+<p>And again Love laughed, filling his heart with an indefinable glow of
+gladness.</p>
+
+<p>His night mood stayed with him the next morning and started him singing
+most riotously in his bath. Mabel heard him and smiled to herself. It
+was good to listen, to him and know him so cheerful; whatever it was
+that had disturbed him the night before had evidently vanished this
+morning.</p>
+
+<p>After breakfast, as was always her custom in summer, she took little
+Dickie out on to the lawn to sit under the big wide trees that threw so
+grateful a shade across the green. Big Dick joined them there with his
+pipe and he sat beside them in silence. It was very pleasant in the
+garden with the bluest of blue skies overhead and the baby chuckling and
+crowing in the very first rapture of life on the grass at their feet.
+Presently, however, a stern nurse descended on the scene and laughter
+was changed to tears for one short minute before the young gentleman,
+protesting but half-heartedly, was removed. Then Dick turned to Mabel.</p>
+
+<p>"I am going in to Sevenoaks again," he announced, "and shall probably
+spend the day there. Would you like me to explain myself, Mabel?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, yes, if you care to," she answered, "and if there is anything to
+explain."</p>
+
+<p>Dick nodded in apparent triumph. "Yes," he said, "there is something to
+explain all right, Mabel." He smiled at her with his eyes. "I have got a
+secret, I'll give you three guesses to reach it."</p>
+
+<p>"No," Mabel spoke quickly, "I would rather you told me, Dick. Do you
+remember how once before I tried to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span> dash in on your secret and how you
+shut me out. When it is ready to tell, I thought then, he will tell it
+me."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, it is ready now," Dick said. "In a way it is the same old secret.
+I was shy of it in those days, Mabel, but last night it dawned on me
+that it was the only thing worth having in the world. I am in love,
+insanely and ridiculously. Do you know, if you asked me, I should tell
+you with the most prompt conceit that to-day is a beautiful, gorgeously
+fine day just because I woke up to it knowing that I was in love."</p>
+
+<p>A spasm of half-formed jealousy snatched at Mabel's heart. She had
+always wanted Dick to fall in love and marry some nice girl, yet the
+reality was a little disturbing.</p>
+
+<p>"Dick," she exclaimed, "and you never told me, you never said a word
+about it in your letters."</p>
+
+<p>"I could not," he answered, "because in a way it only happened last
+night. Wait," he put his hand on her knee because she seemed to be going
+to say something. "Let me explain it first and then do your bit of
+arguing, for I know you are going to argue. You spoke just now about
+that other talk we once had before your marriage; do you remember what
+you said to me then? 'Did you think I should not know when you fell in
+love?' You had guessed the secret in my heart, Mabel, almost before I
+knew it myself." He leant forward, she noticed that suddenly his face
+flushed a very warm red. "Last night I saw her again; she was the
+dancer, you may have noticed her yourself. That was why I stayed behind.
+I wanted to put myself to the test, I wanted to meet her again."</p>
+
+<p>He sat up straight and looked at her; she could see that some strong
+emotion was making it very difficult for him to speak.</p>
+
+<p>"It is not any use trying to explain love, is it?" he asked. "I only
+know that I have always loved her, that I shall love her to the end."</p>
+
+<p>Mabel sat stiffly silent. She could not meet his eyes.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span> She was thinking
+of all the scandal which had leapt to life round Joan's name once the
+Rutherfords had left the village. She was remembering how last night Tom
+had said: "That little dancer girl is hot stuff."</p>
+
+<p>"Dick," she forced herself to speak presently, "I have got to tell you,
+though it hurts and you will hate me for doing it, but this girl is not
+the kind of person you can ever marry, Dick. It is a kind of
+infatuation"&mdash;she struggled to make her meaning clear without using
+cruel words&mdash;"if you knew the truth about her, if&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>He stopped her quickly. "I know," he answered, "I have always known."</p>
+
+<p>She turned to face him. "You knew," she gasped, "about the child?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," he nodded, his eyes were very steady as they met hers. "That day
+when I was called in to see her, do you remember, she spoke out before
+her aunt and myself. She told us she was like Bridget Rendle. 'I am
+going to have a baby,' she said, 'but I am not ashamed or afraid. I have
+done nothing to be ashamed of.' Do you know how sometimes," he went on
+slowly, "you can see straight into a person's soul through their eyes.
+Well, I saw into hers that day and, before God, Mabel, it was white and
+innocent as a child's. I did not understand at the time, I have not
+understood since, what brought her to that cross way in her life, but
+nothing will alter my opinion. Some day I hope she will explain things,
+I am content to wait for that."</p>
+
+<p>What could she find to say to him? Her mind groped through a nightmare
+of horror. Dick's happiness meant so much to her, she had planned and
+thought of it ever since she could remember.</p>
+
+<p>"Love is sometimes blind," she whispered at last. "Oh, my dear, don't
+throw away your life on a dream."</p>
+
+<p>"My love has wide-open eyes," he answered, "and nothing weighs in the
+balance against it."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't tell the others, Dick," she pleaded on their<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span> way back to the
+house; "leave it a little longer, think it out more carefully."</p>
+
+<p>"Very well," he agreed, "and for that matter, Mabel, there is as yet
+nothing to tell. I only let you into my secret because, well, you are
+you, and I want you to meet her. You will be able to judge then for
+yourself better than you can from all my ravings."</p>
+
+<p>She did not answer his suggestion then, but later on, as he was getting
+into the car to drive to Sevenoaks, she ran down the steps to him.</p>
+
+<p>"Dick," she said quickly, "ask her to come out to tea some day and bring
+one of the other girls if she likes. Tom is never in to tea; there will
+just be mother and me."</p>
+
+<p>"Bless you," he answered; his eyes beamed at her. "What a brick you are,
+Mabel, I knew you would turn up trumps about it."</p>
+
+<p>It took him some time to persuade Joan to accept the proffered
+invitation. It took her, for one thing, too near her old home, and for
+another she was more than a little disturbed by all Fanny's remarks on
+the subject. Fanny had come back from her drive with Swetenham full of
+exciting information to give Joan about "the new victim," as she would
+call Dick.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you know, honey," she confided, waking Joan out of a well simulated
+slumber, "I believe he is the same young man as was so taken with you
+that evening in the Strand. You remember the day we spent in town? It is
+love at first sight, that is what it is. Young Sockie"&mdash;that was her
+name for Swetenham, invented because of his gorgeous socks&mdash;"tells me he
+has never seen a chap so bowled over as the new victim was by your
+dancing, and he asked to be brought round and introduced. Did you catch
+him staring at you all through the dinner, and, honey, did he try to
+kiss you when he brought you home?"</p>
+
+<p>"Of course not," Joan remonstrated; "I wish you<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span> would stop talking
+nonsense and get into bed. It is awfully late and I was asleep."</p>
+
+<p>"That is only another sign then," Fanny went on, quite impervious to the
+other's requests. "You take it from me, honey, if a man falls really in
+love he is shy of kissing you. Thinks it is kind of irreverent to begin
+with. You mark my words, he will be round again to-morrow. Honey," she
+had a final shot at Joan's peace of mind just before she fell asleep,
+"if you play your cards well, that man will marry you, he is just the
+kind that does."</p>
+
+<p>Joan lay thinking of Fanny's remarks long after the other had fallen
+asleep. She was a little annoyed to find how much impression the man had
+made on her; the idea was alarming to one who fancied herself as immune
+as she did from any such attraction. But until Fanny had burst in she
+had been pleased enough with the vague thoughts which his eyes had waked
+to life. If you took the dream down and analysed it as Fanny had rather
+ruthlessly done, it became untenable. Probably this man only thought of
+her as Landon had thought of her; she was not content to burn her
+fingers in the same fire.</p>
+
+<p>Short of being extremely disagreeable, however, she could not avoid
+going out to lunch with him the next day, as Fanny had already accepted
+the invitation, and once with him, it was impossible not to be friends
+with Dick, he set himself so assiduously to please her. He did not make
+love to her; Fanny would have said he just loved her. There is delicate
+distinction between the two, and instinctively Joan grew to feel at her
+ease with him; when they laughed, which they did very often, their
+laughter had won back to the glad mirth of children.</p>
+
+<p>Fanny watched over the romance with motherly eyes. She had, in fact, set
+her heart upon Joan marrying the young man. He came to the theatre every
+evening, but<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span> it was not until the sixth day of their acquaintance that
+Fanny was able to arrange for him to spend the afternoon alone with
+Joan. She had tried often enough before, but Joan had been too wary. On
+this particular afternoon, half way through lunch and after the three of
+them had just arranged to go out into the country for tea, Fanny
+suddenly discovered that she had most faithfully promised to go for a
+drive that afternoon in young Swetenham's side-car.</p>
+
+<p>"I am so awfully sorry," she smiled at them sweetly, "but it doesn't
+really matter; you two will be just as happy without me."</p>
+
+<p>"We could put it off and go to-morrow," suggested Joan quickly.</p>
+
+<p>"We can go to-morrow too," Dick argued, and Fanny laughed at him.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't disappoint him, honey, it's a shame," she said with unblushing
+effrontery, "and if it is a chaperon you are wanting, why, Sockie and I
+will meet you out there."</p>
+
+<p>So it was arranged, and Dick and Joan started off alone. They were to
+drive out to a farmhouse that Swetenham knew of, where you got the most
+delicious jam for tea. Joan was a little shy of Dick to begin with,
+sitting beside him tongue-tied, and never letting her eyes meet his.
+From time to time, when he was busy with the steering, she would steal a
+glance at him from under her lashes. His face gave her a great sense of
+security and trust, but at times her memory still struggled with the
+thought that she had met him somewhere before.</p>
+
+<p>Dick, turning suddenly, caught her looking at him, and for a second his
+eyes spoke a message which caused both their hearts to stand still.</p>
+
+<p>"Were you really afraid of coming out with me alone?" he asked abruptly;
+he had perhaps been a little hurt by the suggestion.</p>
+
+<p>"No, of course not," Joan answered; she hoped he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span> did not notice how
+curiously shaken the moment had left her. "Only I thought it would
+probably be more lively if we waited till we could take Fanny with us. I
+am sometimes smitten with such awful blanks in my conversation."</p>
+
+<p>"One does not always need to talk," he said; "it is supposed to be one
+of the tests of friendship when you can stay silent and not be bored.
+Well, we are friends, aren't we?"</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose so," Joan agreed; "at least you have been very kind to us and
+we do all the things you ask us to."</p>
+
+<p>"Doesn't it amount to more than that?" Dick asked; his eyes were busy
+with the road in front of him. "I had hoped you would let me give you
+advice and talk to you like a father and all that sort of thing." His
+face was perfectly serious and she could hear the earnestness behind his
+chaff.</p>
+
+<p>"What were you going to advise me about?" she asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, it is this theatre game." Dick plunged in boldly once the subject
+had been started. "You don't like it, you know, and you aren't a bit
+suited to it. Sometimes when I see you dance and hear the people
+clapping you I could go out and say things&mdash;really nasty things."</p>
+
+<p>"You don't like it?" she said. "I have tried to do other things too,"
+she went on quickly, "but you know I am not awfully much good at
+anything. When I first started in London, it is two years ago now, I
+used to boast about having put my hand to the plough. I used to say I
+wouldn't turn back from my own particular furrow, however dull and ugly
+it was. But I haven't been very much use at it, I have failed over and
+over again."</p>
+
+<p>"There are failures and failures," he answered. "There was a book I read
+once, I don't remember its name or much about it, but there was a
+sentence in it that stuck<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span> in my mind: 'Real courage, means courage to
+stand up against the shocks of life&mdash;sorrow and pain and separation, and
+still have the force left to make of the remainder something fine and
+gay and brave.' I think you have still got that sort of courage left."</p>
+
+<p>"No," whispered Joan. She looked away from him, for her eyes were
+miserably full of tears. "I haven't even got that left."</p>
+
+<p>They had tea, the four of them, for strange to tell Fanny did deem it
+expedient to keep her promise, and it was after tea that Dick first
+mooted the idea of their coming out to tea with his people the next day.</p>
+
+<p>Fanny was prompt in her acceptance. "Of course we'll come, won't we,
+honey," she said. "My new muslin will just come in for it."</p>
+
+<p>"It won't be a party," Dick explained, his eyes were on Joan, "just the
+mother and my sister. Not very lively I am afraid, still it is a pretty
+place and I'll drive you both ways."</p>
+
+<p>He came to the theatre again that night. Fanny pointed him out to Joan
+in a little aside as she stood beside her in the wings, but Joan had
+already seen him for herself. She could put no heart into her dancing
+that night, and she ran off the stage quickly when the music ceased, not
+waiting to take her applause.</p>
+
+<p>"Feeling ill to-night?" Daddy Brown asked her. He eyed her at the same
+time somewhat sternly; he disapproved of signs of weakness in any of the
+company.</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose I am tired," Joan answered. Only her own heart knew that it
+was because a certain couple of blue eyes had shown her that they wished
+she would not dance. "I am getting into a ridiculous state," she argued
+to herself; "why should it matter to me what he thinks? It must not, it
+must not."</p>
+
+<p>"You did not dance at all well to-night, honey," Fanny added her meed of
+blame as the two of them were un<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span>dressing for the night. "But there, I
+know what is wrong with you. You are in love, bless your heart, and so
+is he. Never took his eyes off you while you were dancing, my dear&mdash;I
+watched him."</p>
+
+<p>The rather hurt feeling in Joan's heart burst into sudden fire. "I am
+not in love," she said, "and neither is he. Men do not fall in love with
+girls like us, and if you say another word about it, Fanny, I won't go
+out to tea to-morrow; I won't, I won't!"</p>
+
+<p>Fanny could only shrug her shoulders. The words "girls like us" rather
+flicked at her pride. Later on, however, when they were both in bed and
+the room in darkness save for the light thrown across the shadows by the
+street lamp outside, she called softly across to Joan:</p>
+
+<p>"You are wrong, honey," she said, "about men and love. They do fall in
+love with us, sometimes, bless them, even though we aren't worth it. And
+anyway, you are different, why shouldn't he love you?"</p>
+
+<p>Joan made no answer, only when she fell asleep at last it was against a
+little damp patch of pillow and the lashes that lay along her cheeks
+were weighed down by tears.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXII" id="CHAPTER_XXII"></a>CHAPTER XXII</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"A man who has faith must be prepared not only to be a martyr, but to
+be a fool."</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><span class="smcap"><b>C. Chesterton.</b></span></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>It did not need much intuition on Mrs. Grant's part to know herself
+suspicious of Dick's behaviour. She listened to Mabel's information
+about the two young ladies he was bringing to tea with her eyes lowered.
+Mabel had not volunteered the information till Mrs. Grant had noticed
+that there were two extra cups provided for tea. They<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span> always had tea
+out under the trees if it was fine enough, so there had been nothing
+surprising in that, but Mrs. Grant's eyes had spotted the extra cups
+even while they stayed piled up one within the other in the shade of the
+silver tea-pot.</p>
+
+<p>"Two girls to tea," she commented; "who are they, Mabel?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I really don't know," Mabel admitted, nobly untruthful, out of a
+desire not to prejudice Mrs. Grant from the beginning. "I fancy Dick met
+them at Sevenoaks, anyway, he was having lunch with them yesterday."</p>
+
+<p>"And dinner every day this week," supplemented Mrs. Grant. "Did he meet
+them on his travels?"</p>
+
+<p>"He did not say so," Mabel answered, "only just that he was seeing a
+good deal of them at Sevenoaks, and I thought it would be nice to ask
+them out here."</p>
+
+<p>"Mabel," said Mrs. Grant, with intense seriousness; she lifted her eyes
+from her work and fixed them on her daughter, "do you not think it is
+very probable that Dick has become entangled? I have even wondered
+lately whether he may not be secretly married to some awful woman."</p>
+
+<p>"Dear mother," laughed Mabel&mdash;though the first part of the sentence
+rather hurt her, it was the truth&mdash;"why secretly married? What has Dick
+done to deserve such a suspicion?"</p>
+
+<p>"His manner has been peculiar ever since the first night he came home,"
+Mrs. Grant explained, "and he has an uneasy way of trying not to be left
+with me alone. The other day I thought of going to see him very early in
+the morning when I happened to be unable to sleep, and, Mabel, his door
+was locked!"</p>
+
+<p>"If you had knocked he would probably have opened it," Mabel suggested.
+"It is hardly likely that he keeps his wife concealed upstairs, is it?"</p>
+
+<p>"You may laugh," Mrs. Grant spoke with an expression of hurt pride on
+her countenance, "but surely a mother can<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span> see things in her son which
+other people miss. Dick is in love, and not nicely in love, or he would
+not be so shy about it."</p>
+
+<p>Further discussion was prevented, for at this point the motor, bringing
+Dick and his guests, came round the sweep of the drive and drew up at
+the front door. Mabel went across the lawn to meet them. She had
+schooled herself to this meeting for Dick's sake, and to please him; she
+could not, however, pretend to any pleasure in the prospect. It was only
+natural that she should view Joan with distrust. Dick had allowed
+himself to become entangled; all unknowingly Mother had expressed the
+matter in a nutshell.</p>
+
+<p>She picked out Joan as being the girl at once; her eyes sped past
+Fanny's muslin-clad figure even as she was greeting her, and rested on
+the other girl's face. Pale, for Joan was very nervous of this
+afternoon, wide-eyed, the soft brown hair tucked away under the small,
+round-shaped hat. She was pretty and very young-looking. Mabel, seeing
+her, and remembering all the old stories in connection with her, was
+suddenly sorry for her very childishness. Then she hardened her heart;
+the innocence must at least be assumed, and the girl&mdash;Mabel had made up
+her mind as to that&mdash;should not win Dick as a husband without some
+effort being made to prevent her.</p>
+
+<p>Because of this sense of antagonism between them, for Joan had not
+missed the swift glance, the cold hardening of her hostess' face, it was
+a relief to have Fanny between them. Fanny was talking very hard and
+fast, it was quite unnecessary for anyone else to say anything.</p>
+
+<p>"My," she gasped, standing and staring round her with frank approval,
+"you have a beautiful place here. Dr. Grant has been telling us about it
+till we were mad to see it. Joan and I live in London; there is not much
+in the way of trees round our place, nothing but houses, and dirty
+pavements and motor-buses. I always say"&mdash;she took Mabel into her
+confidence with perfect friendliness&mdash;"that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span> there is nothing so
+disagreeable in this world as a dirty pavement; don't you agree with
+me?"</p>
+
+<p>"The country is nicer than town, certainly," Mabel answered. "We are
+having tea over there under the trees; will you come straight across, or
+would you like to go in and take off your motor-veils?"</p>
+
+<p>"We will do nicely as we are," Fanny did all the talking for the two of
+them; Joan so far had not opened her lips. "It is such a little drive
+from Sevenoaks, and I am just dying for tea."</p>
+
+<p>Mabel led the way across the lawn, with Fanny chattering volubly beside
+her, and Dick followed with Joan.</p>
+
+<p>"The sister is a dear," he tried to tell her on the way across, for in
+some way he suddenly felt the tension which had fallen between the two
+women; "only she is most awfully shy. She is one of those people who
+take a lot of knowing."</p>
+
+<p>"And I am one of the people that she doesn't want to know," Joan
+answered. She was angry with herself for having come. A feeling of
+having lost caste, of being a stranger within these other people's
+friendship, possessed her. It set Dick's kindliness, his evident
+attraction on a plane of patronage, and brought her to a sullen mood of
+despair. Why had she ventured back on to the borderline of this life
+that had once been hers? Mabel's cold, extreme politeness seemed to push
+her further and further beyond the pale.</p>
+
+<p>Tea under these circumstances would have been a trying meal if it had
+not been for Fanny. Fanny had dressed with great care for this party,
+and she had also made many mental resolutions to "mind what she was
+saying." Her harshest critic could not have said that she had not made
+herself look pretty; it was only Joan's hurt eyes that could discover
+the jarring note everywhere in the carefully-thought-out costume. And
+Fanny realized that Joan, for some reason or other, was suffering from
+an attack of the sulks. She plunged because of it more and more
+recklessly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span> into conversation. Fanny always felt that silence was a
+thing to be avoided at all costs.</p>
+
+<p>"The War will make a lot of difference to us," she attempted finally,
+all preceding efforts having fallen a little flat. "Daddy Brown says, if
+there is war between Germany and England, there won't be any Spring
+tours."</p>
+
+<p>"But of course there will not be War," Mrs. Grant put in with great
+precision; "the idea is impossible nowadays. And may I ask what a Spring
+tour is?"?</p>
+
+<p>"Tom says the city is getting very uneasy," Mabel plunged into the
+breach. "It does seem an absurd idea, but of course Germany has been
+aching to fight us for years."</p>
+
+<p>"Horrors, the Germans, don't you think?" chipped in Fanny; "they do eat
+so nastily."</p>
+
+<p>"No doubt you meet a great many foreigners, travelling about as you do,"
+Mrs. Grant agreed politely.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you know this part of the country at all?"? Mabel questioned Joan,
+then flushed herself at the absurdity of the question; "I suppose not,
+if you live most of your time in London."</p>
+
+<p>Joan lifted hard eyes. "I lived down here as a child," she said stiffly.</p>
+
+<p>"And in London"&mdash;Mabel was doing her best to be friendly&mdash;"have you nice
+rooms? Dick tells me you live all alone; I mean that your home is not
+there."</p>
+
+<p>"I live in an attic," Joan answered again, "and I have no home."</p>
+
+<p>"Your son is ever so much too fond of the theatre," Fanny's voice broke
+across their monosyllabic conversation. "He is there every night, Mrs.
+Grant."</p>
+
+<p>"And do you also go to the theatre every night?" Joan heard the
+petrified astonishment in Mrs. Grant's tone and caught the agitated
+glance which Mabel directed to Dick. The misery in her woke to sharp
+temper.</p>
+
+<p>"Fanny has let the cat out of the bag," she said, leaning<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span> forward and
+speaking directly to Mrs. Grant. "But I am afraid it is unpleasantly
+true. We are on the stage, you know; Dr. Grant ought to have warned you;
+it was hardly fair to let you meet us without telling you."</p>
+
+<p>A pained silence fell on the party; Mrs. Grant's face was a perfect
+study; Dick's had flushed dull red. Mabel stirred uneasily and made an
+attempt to gather her diplomacy about her.</p>
+
+<p>"It was not a case of warning us," she began; "you forget that we saw
+you ourselves the other night when you played <i>The Merry Widow</i>. Won't
+you have some more tea, Miss Leicester?"&mdash;Joan had been introduced to
+them under that name.</p>
+
+<p>A great nervousness had descended upon Fanny. She had talked a great
+deal too much, she knew, and probably Joan was furiously angry with her.
+But beyond that was the knowledge that she had&mdash;as she would have
+expressed it herself&mdash;upset Joan's apple-cart. Real contrition shone in
+the nervous smile she directed at Mrs. Grant.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm that sorry," she said, "if I have said anything that annoyed you;
+but you mustn't mix me up with Joan; she is quite different. I&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Fanny!" Joan interrupted the jumbled explanation. "You have nothing to
+apologize for. We eat and look very much like ordinary people, don't
+we?"&mdash;she stared at Mabel as she spoke&mdash;"it is only just our manners,
+and morals that are a trifle peculiar. If you are ready, Fanny, I think
+we had better be getting back."</p>
+
+<p>Dick stood up abruptly; he did not meet Mabel's eyes, but she could see
+that his face was very white and angry.</p>
+
+<p>"I am driving you back," he said, "if you do not mind waiting here I
+will fetch the motor round."</p>
+
+<p>He took the girl's side straight away without hesitation. Mabel caught
+her breath on the bitter words that rose to her lips. Joan's outburst
+had been an extraordinary breach of good manners; nothing that had
+happened could<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span> in any way excuse or condone it. Yet it was not Joan
+that Dick was angry with, but herself.</p>
+
+<p>"I very much regret you should feel as you do," she said to Joan, after
+Dick had gone off to fetch the motor; "your friend and yourself were my
+guests; we none of us had the slightest desire to be rude to you."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, no," flamed Joan in answer; "you did not want to be rude, you just
+wanted to make us understand quite plainly the difference that lay
+between us. And you have made us realize it, and it is I that have been
+rude. Come along, Fanny"&mdash;the motor could be seen coming along the
+drive; she swept to her feet&mdash;"let us go without talking any more about
+it."</p>
+
+<p>She turned, saying no good-byes, and walked away from them. Fanny
+hesitated a moment, her eyes held a pathetic appeal and there were tears
+near the surface. She felt she had ruined Joan's chances of a suitable
+marriage.</p>
+
+<p>"I am sorry," she whispered; "it all began beautifully, and&mdash;Joan isn't
+like me," she hurried out again, "she is proud and&mdash;well, you would
+understand"&mdash;she appealed to Mabel&mdash;"for you are proud, too&mdash;if you had
+to earn your money as she has to."</p>
+
+<p>Then she turned and hurried after her retreating companion. Something
+that she had said stayed, however, like a little pin-prick, in Mabel's
+thoughts. It brought her to a sudden realization of Joan's feelings and
+regret that she had not succeeded in being nicer to the girl.</p>
+
+<p>"If Dick is married to either of those two young ladies," said Mrs.
+Grant heavily, "he is ruined already." She rose majestically and
+gathered up her work. "I have been thoroughly upset," she announced,
+"and must go and lie down. Perhaps when Dick comes back you will point
+out to him that some explanation is necessary to me for the
+extraordinary scene I have just been through. I shall be ready to see
+him in an hour."</p>
+
+<p>Fanny wept a few tears on the drive home. It had all been her fault, she
+explained between sniffs to Joan.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"And I promised not to talk too much," she gulped. "Oh, honey, don't let
+it stand between him and you"&mdash;she nodded at Dick's back, for he was
+occupying the front seat alone&mdash;"I shall never forgive myself if you
+do."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't fuss, Fanny," Joan answered; she was beginning to feel thoroughly
+ashamed of her ill-mannered outburst. "And for goodness' sake don't cry.
+You have not brought anything more between us than has always been
+there."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I wish we hadn't gone," wailed Fanny. "He wants to marry you, Joan;
+they always do if they introduce their mothers to you."</p>
+
+<p>For no reason whatsoever, for she had not thought of him for months, a
+memory of Gilbert flashed into Joan's mind. Her eyes were fixed on the
+back of Dick's head, and it was strange&mdash;the feeling that surged over
+her as she brought these, the two men in her life, before her mind's
+eye. Perhaps it was only at that very moment that she realized her love
+for Dick; realized it and fought against it in the same breath. She had
+known him so short a time; he had been kind to her; but what, after all,
+did that amount to? When the company left Sevenoaks he would probably
+never see her or think of her again. Does one build love from so
+fleeting a fancy?</p>
+
+<p>None the less the thought brought her to a mood of gentleness and she
+could not bear to let him go away thinking her still hurt and angry. As
+he helped her out of the car she smiled at him.</p>
+
+<p>"I am sorry that I lost my temper and was rude," she said. Fanny had
+fled indoors and left them tactfully alone. "I don't know what you must
+think of me." Her eyes fell away from his, he saw the slow red creeping
+into her cheeks.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't," he spoke quickly, he was for the moment feeling very vindictive
+against Mabel. "When you apologize you make it ten times worse. It was
+not your fault the least little bit in the world."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"But it was," she answered; she looked up at him. "If you must have the
+honest truth, I was jealous from the moment I got out there. And
+jealousy hurts sometimes, you know, especially when it is mixed up with
+memories of something you once had and have lost for ever."</p>
+
+<p>"That is nonsense," Dick said. It was in his heart to propose there and
+then, but he held it back. "I meant you to enjoy yourself, I hoped you
+would like Mabel, and you did not&mdash;thanks to her own amiability. Am I
+forgiven?"</p>
+
+<p>"We forgive each other," she answered; she put her hand into his, "and
+good-night, if not good-bye. To-morrow is our last performance, you
+know, we leave the next day."</p>
+
+<p>"And even with that it is not good-bye," he told her. "I shall be at the
+theatre to-morrow night."</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Grant and Dick had one very stormy and decided interview. That is
+to say, Mrs. Grant stormed and wept, Dick merely stated quite quietly
+and very definitely that he intended to follow Joan to London and that
+he was going to do his best to make her marry him.</p>
+
+<p>"You do not mind how much you break my heart," Mrs. Grant sobbed, "your
+mother is of no consequence to you. My years of love and devotion to you
+when you were a baby count for nothing. You throw them all aside for
+this impossible, outrageous girl."</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing is to be gained by calling her names," Dick answered, "and
+there is no reason why your heart should break, Mother. When you see her
+again&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Never," interrupted Mrs. Grant dramatically, "never. Even as your wife
+I shall always refuse to meet her."</p>
+
+<p>"You must do as you please about that," Dick answered, and turned and
+went from the room.</p>
+
+<p>Upstairs he met Mabel just coming out of the nursery and would have
+passed her without speaking, but that she put out a hand to stop him.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Dick," she said, "you are awfully angry with me, I know, and I realize
+that more or less it was my fault. But I wanted and I still want to be
+friends with her. You know how sometimes, even against one's will, one
+stiffens up and cannot talk."</p>
+
+<p>"I know you never were any use at dissembling," he answered. "I had
+hoped you might like her, but you evidently did not do that."</p>
+
+<p>"I do not think I gave myself a chance," Mabel spoke slowly. "I had been
+arguing against her in my own mind ever since you told me about her. You
+see I am being truthful, Dick. It was just because one half of me wanted
+to like her and the other half did not, that the result was so
+disastrous."</p>
+
+<p>Dick laughed. "Disastrous just about describes it," he admitted. "I am
+going to marry her, Mabel, though mother does threaten to break her
+heart."</p>
+
+<p>"I know," Mabel nodded. "I knew from the very first moment I saw your
+eyes when they looked at her. Perhaps that was what made the unpleasant
+side of me so frigid. Will you give me her address, Dick, in London?
+Next week, when I am up there with Tom, I will call and make it up with
+her. If I go all alone I shall be able to explain things."</p>
+
+<p>"And what about mother's broken heart?" Dick questioned.</p>
+
+<p>Mabel shook her head. "It won't break," she said. "As soon as you are
+married she will start thinking that she arranged the match and saying
+what a good one it is."</p>
+
+<p>Again Dick laughed, but there was more lightness in the sound now. He
+put his two hands on her shoulders and looked down at her.</p>
+
+<p>"You are a good sort, Mabel," he said; "this afternoon I thought you
+were the most horrible sister a man could have, and that just shows how
+little even I know you."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"No," she answered; her eyes held a shadow of pain in them. "It is not
+that, it is just that a man in love is sometimes blind to everything and
+everybody excepting the woman he is in love with. She is a lucky girl,
+Dick, I nope she realizes how lucky."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXIII" id="CHAPTER_XXIII"></a>CHAPTER XXIII</h2>
+
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"But through all the joy I knew&mdash;I only&mdash;<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;How the hostel of my heart lay bare and cold,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Silent of its music, and how lonely!<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Never, though you crown me with your gold.<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Shall I find that little chamber as of old!"</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><span class="smcap"><b>F. Bannerman.</b></span></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+<p>Brown called an early rehearsal next morning. They were to play <i>The
+Waltz Dream</i> as their last performance, for on leaving Sevenoaks the
+company was to break up, and just at the very last moment, before the
+curtain had come down on the previous night's performance, Grace
+Binning&mdash;the girl who usually played the part of Franzi&mdash;had fallen down
+and sprained her ankle. Who was to play her part? Fanny proposed Joan
+for the vacant place, but Brown was dubious, and Joan herself not at all
+anxious for the honour. She had more or less understudied the part,
+every member of the chorus took it in turn to understudy; but the
+question was whether it would not be better if Fanny's understudy took
+the part of the Princess and Fanny played Franzi. It was a character
+which she had often scored it. Against this had to be set the fact that
+Fanny's voice was needed for songs which the Princess had to sing, and
+that Franzi had very little singing to do. What she did have could be
+very largely cut.</p>
+
+<p>Anyway the whole company assembled at 10.30, and Brown put them through
+their paces. Finally he decided on Joan; she had already achieved
+popularity by her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span> dancing, the audience would be kind to her. If she
+saved up her voice for her duet with Strachan and her one little solo at
+the fall of the curtain, Brown thought she might be heard beyond the
+footlights.</p>
+
+<p>"Now look slippy," he ordered, "only the principals need stay. We will
+just run through the thing, Miss Leicester, and see if you know what to
+do."</p>
+
+<p>Joan found herself living out the part of Franzi as she rehearsed. It
+seemed somehow to fit into her own feelings.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 15em;">"Now love has come to me, I pray,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 16.5em;">That while I have the chance to,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 15.5em;">I still may have the heart to play</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 16.5em;">A tune that you can dance to."</span><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>Franzi's one brief night of love which shone out, showing all the world
+golden, and then the little singer creeping back into the shadows with a
+broken heart but gay words on her lips.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 15em;">"I still may have the heart to play</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 16.5em;">A tune that you can dance to."</span><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>Brown thought as he watched her that she showed promise as an actress.
+Why had he not noticed it before. He meditated a proposal by which she
+should be persuaded to join the company again when it started out on its
+Spring tour. Fanny had told him that Joan was tired of the life and
+meant to go back to office work, but if she had talent, that was of
+course absurd. Perhaps he had not done enough to encourage her.
+To-morrow he would have a good long talk with her and point out to her
+just how things stood.</p>
+
+<p>Fanny, too, was impressed by Joan's powers. "You act as if you really
+meant it, honey," she said. "You make me want to cry in that last bit
+where Franzi goes off and leaves me, a bloated aristocrat on the throne,
+with my erring husband beside me. You make me think you feel it."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps I do," Joan answered; "perhaps I am going back alone."</p>
+
+<p>"But why," Fanny cried out; she ran to Joan and threw her arms round the
+other girl, they were in the dressing-room making up for the evening
+performance. "Why, honey? He is ready to go with you."</p>
+
+<p>"And the Prince was ready to go with Franzi," Joan answered, "but she
+would not take him, not back into her land of shadows. Oh, Fanny, you
+are a dear, romantic soul, but you don't understand. Once, long ago when
+I was young, doesn't that sound romantic, there were two paths open to
+me and I chose the one which has to be travelled alone. If I dragged him
+on to it now it would only hurt him. You would not want to hurt
+something you loved," her voice dropped to a whisper, "would you?"</p>
+
+<p>"No," Fanny admitted. She had drawn a little back and was watching Joan
+with wide eyes. "But&mdash;&mdash;" she broke off abruptly. "I haven't any right
+to ask," she said, "but do you mean that there is something which you
+have done that you would be ashamed to tell him."</p>
+
+<p>"Not exactly ashamed," Joan answered, "it would hurt him to know, that
+is all. I came to London two years ago because I was going to have a
+baby. It was never born, because I was in an accident a few months
+before it should have come."</p>
+
+<p>"But why tell him, why tell him?" Fanny clamoured. "Men have lots of
+secrets in their lives which they don't tell to good women, why must
+they want to know all about our pasts. I have always thought I should
+tell a man just exactly as much as I wanted to and not a whisper more.
+Honey," she drew close again and caught hold of Joan's hands, "it
+doesn't pay to tell them, the better they are the more they bring it up
+against you. If they don't say anything you can see it in their eyes.
+'She has been bad once,' they say, 'she may always be bad again.'"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Yes," agreed Joan. "It does not pay to tell them, as you say. That is
+why I am going to go back to my own shadows alone, because if you love a
+person you cannot keep a secret from him."</p>
+
+<p>"But it wouldn't exactly be a secret," Fanny pleaded, "it would just be
+something that it was no business of his to know."</p>
+
+<p>Joan laughed. "Your philosophy of life, Fanny, is delightful. But if you
+don't hurry up with your dressing you will be late when the call boy
+comes."</p>
+
+<p>She had the dressing-room to herself presently, for she did not have to
+appear until the second act, and as she sat there, reading over her
+part, the call boy put in his head with an impish grin.</p>
+
+<p>"A gentleman left these for you, miss," he held out a large bunch of
+violets, "most particular you should get them before you went on, he
+was, and he will be round again after the show. Same gentleman," he
+winked at her, "as has been here most regular like since the third
+night."</p>
+
+<p>"All right, Tommy, thank you," Joan answered. She held out her hands for
+the violets. They were very sweet-scented and heavy; she let them fall
+on the dressing-table, but after Tommy had vanished, whistling shrilly
+along the passage, she bent forward and buried her cheeks and lips in
+their fragrance. Her tears smarted in her eyes. This man had grown so
+suddenly dear to her that it hurt her almost more than she could bear to
+shut him out of her life.</p>
+
+<p>When Fanny danced into the room presently it was to find her standing
+before the looking-glass, and against the soft blue of her waistbelt the
+violets showed up almost like a stain.</p>
+
+<p>"He's there," Fanny told her, "third from centre in the second row.
+Young Swetenham is with him, but none of the women folk, praise be to
+heaven. Have you asked him to the supper afterwards?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"No," Joan admitted, "and, Fanny, if it could possibly be arranged and
+Brown would not be very hurt, would it matter if I did not come myself?
+I feel so much more like going home to bed."</p>
+
+<p>"Doesn't do to mope," Fanny remonstrated. "Why not bring him along and
+have one good evening to finish?"</p>
+
+<p>She studied the other's face. "There," she added impulsively, "if you
+don't feel like it you shan't be made to do it. Bother Daddy Brown and
+his feelings. You stay here quiet and let us all get away; we will be
+walking over to the 'Queen's,' you see, then you can slip out after we
+have gone and cut home on your own. I will tell Brown you are
+over-wrought after the show, it is quite natural you should be."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," admitted Joan; she hesitated on her way out, for the call boy had
+just run down the passage shouting her name, "and, Fanny, if he is
+there"&mdash;she met the other girl's eyes just for a moment&mdash;"take him along
+with you, will you? I&mdash;I am afraid of meeting him to-night."</p>
+
+<p>Joan caught Dick's eyes just for a second before she began her first
+song, but she was careful not to look his way again. For the rest she
+moved and acted in a dream, not conscious of the theatre or the
+audience. Yet she knew she must be playing her part passably well, for
+Strachan whispered to her at the end of the duet: "You are doing
+splendidly." And Brown himself was waiting to greet her with
+congratulations when she ran into the wings for a moment.</p>
+
+<p>The heat of the theatre killed her violets; they were crushed and dead
+at the end of the second act, yet when she changed for the third she
+picked them up and pinned them in again. Franzi's part in the third act
+is very brief. She is called in to give evidence of the Prince's
+infidelity, and instead she persuades the Princess that her husband has
+always loved her. Then, as the happy pair<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span> kiss one another at the back
+of the stage, Franzi turns to the audience, taking them, as it were,
+into her confidence:</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 15em;">"Now love has come to me, I pray,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 16.5em;">That while I have the chance to,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 15.5em;">I still may have the heart to play</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 16.5em;">A tune that you can dance to."</span><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>Joan's voice broke on the last line, the little sob on which she caught
+her breath was more effective than any carefully-thought-out tragedy.
+With her eyes held by those other eyes in the audience she took the
+violets from her belt and held them, just for a second, to her lips.
+Then they fell from her hands and she stood, her last farewell said,
+straight and silent, while the house shouted over what they considered
+to be a very fine piece of acting. They would have liked to have had her
+back to bow to them after the fall of the curtain, but Joan would not
+go, and Fanny brought Brown to realize that if the girl were worried in
+any way she would probably wax hysterical.</p>
+
+<p>"Fine acting," Brown kept repeating over and over again. Joan heard him
+vaguely. He was so impressed by it, however, that he sent for some
+champagne and insisted on their all drinking her health on the spot.
+There, however, he was content to leave it, and presently the company
+slipped away, one after the other, and Joan and Fanny were left alone.</p>
+
+<p>"You really think you won't come on, honey?" Fanny tried a final
+argument before she followed the others. "He has sent up his card, you
+know; he is waiting downstairs for you."</p>
+
+<p>"I simply can't, Fanny," Joan answered. "You go, like a dear, tell him
+anything you like; that I have gone on with Brown, or that I am coming
+later; only just persuade him to go away with you, that's all I ask."</p>
+
+<p>Fanny looked at her reflectively, but she did not say anything further,
+gathering her cloak round her and going from the room.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Joan waited till the place seemed silent and deserted save for the call
+boy's shrill whistle as he strolled round, locking up the various
+dressing-rooms. She did not want him to see her as she groped her way
+back to the front of the stage and stooped to feel in the dark for her
+bunch of violets. It was quite ridiculous, but she could not leave them
+to lie there all night and be swept into the rubbish-basket in the
+morning. It took her a minute or two, but at last her hands closed on
+them and she stood up and moved into the light just as he came dashing
+along the passage.</p>
+
+<p>"Hulloa," he called out to her, "you still here, miss? Everyone else has
+gone. You might have got shut in."</p>
+
+<p>"I am just going myself," she answered; "and I knew you were here,
+Tommy; I heard you."</p>
+
+<p>He followed her to the door and stood watching her along the street with
+curious eyes. To his mind it seemed strange that she should have stayed
+on after the others had gone. It betokened something that she wished to
+hide from prying eyes, and his were not satisfied till he saw a man's
+figure come forward out of the darkness and meet her.</p>
+
+<p>"Thought as much," commented Tommy, the worldly-wise. "Gent of the
+violets, I suppose. Not likely they would be going to a crowded
+supper-party."</p>
+
+<p>"I thought you were never coming," Dick was saying quickly to Joan.
+"Miss Bellairs told me you weren't feeling very well and were going
+straight home. I was just screwing up my courage to come upstairs and
+find out for myself what had happened to you."</p>
+
+<p>So Fanny had failed her. Joan, guessing the other's purpose, smiled
+ruthfully.</p>
+
+<p>"I had a headache," she admitted, "and I could not face a supper-party.
+I am so sorry you should have waited about, though; I had hoped you
+would go on with Fanny."</p>
+
+<p>"Hoped!" said Dick. "Did you think I would?"</p>
+
+<p>They had turned in the direction of the girls' lodgings and were walking
+very fast. Joan set the pace, also she was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span> rather obstinately silent.
+Dick walked in silence, too, but for another reason. Clamorous words
+were in his heart; he did not wish to say them. Not yet, not here. Up in
+London, in her own place, when she would be free from the surroundings
+and trappings of theatrical life, he was going to ask her to marry him.
+Till then, and since his heart would carry on in this ridiculous way
+because she was near him, there was nothing for it but silence.</p>
+
+<p>At the door of the house, though, he found his tongue out of a desire to
+keep her with him a little longer.</p>
+
+<p>"You played splendidly to-night," he said, holding her hand. "Were those
+my violets you kissed at the end?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," she answered; the words were almost a whisper, she stood before
+him, eyes lowered, breathing a little fast as if afraid.</p>
+
+<p>The spell of the night, the force of his own emotion shook Dick out of
+his self-control. The street was empty and dimly lit, the houses on
+either side shuttered and dark. The two of them were alone, and suddenly
+all his carefully thought-out plans went to the wind.</p>
+
+<p>"Joan," he whispered. She was all desirable with her little fluttered
+breath, her eyes that fell from his, her soft, warm hand. "Joan!"</p>
+
+<p>Joan lifted shut eyes and trembling lips to his; she made no protest as
+he drew her into his arms, his kiss lifted her for the time being into a
+heaven of great content. So they clung together for a breathing-space,
+then Joan woke out of her dream and shuddered away from him, hiding her
+face in her hands.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, don't," she begged, "please, please don't!"</p>
+
+<p>Her words, the very piteousness of her appeal, remembering all her
+circumstances, hurt Dick. "My dear," he said, "don't you understand;
+have I made you afraid? I love you; I have always loved you. I was going
+to have waited to ask you to marry me until next week when I came to you
+in town. But to-night, because I love you, because you<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span> are going away
+to-morrow, I couldn't keep sensible any longer. And anyway, Joan, what
+does it matter?&mdash;to-day or to-morrow, the question will always be the
+same. I love you, will you marry me, dear? No, wait." He saw her
+movement to answer. "I don't really want you to say anything now, I
+would rather wait till we meet in town next week. You are not angry with
+me, are you, Joan? You are not afraid of my love?"</p>
+
+<p>But Joan could make no answer, only she turned from him and ran up the
+steps; the bunch of violets lay where she had dropped them when he
+caught her hands, but neither of them noticed it. He saw her face for a
+second against the lighted hall and a little to his dismay he could see
+that she was crying. Then she had gone and the door shut to behind her
+quickly.</p>
+
+<p>Dick waited about for a little, but she made no sign, and finally he
+turned rather disconsolately away. One thought, however, was left to
+comfort him through the night, the memory of her soft, yielding hands,
+the glad surrender of her lips.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXIV" id="CHAPTER_XXIV"></a>CHAPTER XXIV</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"Ah, sweet, and we too, can we bring<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;One sigh back, bid one smile revive?<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Can God restore one ruined thing,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Or he who slays our souls alive<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Make dead things thrive?"</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><span class="smcap"><b>A. C. Swinburne.</b></span></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>Early morning brought Joan a letter from Dick. She had hardly slept all
+night. Once she had got up, determined to write him; the truth would
+look more cold and formal in a letter, but her courage had failed her,
+and instead she had sat crouched over the table, her body shaken with a
+storm of tears. Then Fanny had come in, an after-supper Fanny, noisy and
+sentimental, and she had had to be helped<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span> to bed, coughing and
+explaining that "life was good if you only knew how to live it." Joan
+had crept back to her own bed once the other girl had fallen asleep, and
+she had lain with wide eyes watching the night turn from blackness to
+soft grey, from grey to clear, bright yellow. There were dark shadows
+round her eyes in the morning, and her face was white and
+strained-looking.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"<span class="smcap">Dear Heart</span>," Dick had written:</p>
+
+<p>"Is it cheek to begin a letter like that to you? Only after
+last night I seem to know that you love me and that is all
+that really matters. I am coming to 6, Montague Square, on
+Tuesday afternoon at five o'clock to get my answer. Doesn't
+that sound precise? I would like to come to-day, but I won't
+because I don't want to hurry you. Oh, dear heart, I love
+you!&mdash;I have loved you for longer than you know of just at
+present. That is one of the things I am going to explain to
+you on Tuesday,</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 25em;">"Yours ever,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;">"<span class="smcap">Dick Grant.</span>"</span><br />
+</p></div>
+
+<p>Fanny was much perturbed by Joan's appearance when she was sufficiently
+awake to notice it.</p>
+
+<p>"My, honey, you do look bad," she gasped. "Daddy Brown will see I was
+talking the truth last night, which is a good thing in one way. He was
+most particularly anxious to see you last night, was very fussed when he
+found you hadn't come." She paused and studied Joan's face from under
+her lashes. "Did you meet him?" she inquired finally.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," Joan admitted; she turned away from the other's inquisitive eyes.
+"He walked home with me."</p>
+
+<p>"I told him you had a headache and were not coming to supper with us,"
+Fanny confessed. "It is no use being annoyed with me, honey. I thought
+it over and it seemed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span> to me that by saying 'No' to him because of
+something that happened before he knew you, you were cutting off your
+nose to spite your face. Not that I personally should tell him," she
+added reflectively; "he is too straight himself to understand a woman
+doing wrong; but that is for you to decide. One thing I do know: it
+won't make a pin's worth of difference to his wanting to marry you; he
+is too much in love for that."</p>
+
+<p>She was saying aloud the fear which had knocked at Joan's heart all
+night. It might be true that Dick was too much in love to let what she
+had to tell him stand between them. But afterwards, when love had had
+time to cool, when trust and good-fellowship would be called on to take
+the place of passion, when he saw her, perhaps, with his child in her
+arms, how would he look at her then? Would he not remember and regret,
+would not a shadow stand between them, a shadow from the one sin which
+no man can forgive in a woman? She was like a creature brought to bay;
+he had guessed that she loved him; what arguments could she use, how
+stand firm in her denial against that knowledge?</p>
+
+<p>For a little she had thought of the possibility of his taking her just
+as Gilbert had done. She was not worthy to be his wife, but she would be
+content, she knew, to follow him to the end of the world. Not because
+she viewed the matter now in the same light as she had done in those
+days. She had never loved Gilbert; if she had, shame and disgrace would
+have been powerless to drive her from his side, and she would have
+wanted him to marry her, just as now she wanted marriage with Dick. It
+seemed to her that, despite pioneers and rebels and the need for greater
+freedom, which she and girls like her had been fighting for, the initial
+fact remained and would always remain the same. When you loved you
+wanted to belong to the man absolutely and entirely; freedom counted for
+very little, you wanted to give him your life, you wanted to have the
+right to bear his children. That was what it all came down to in the
+end;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span> Love was bigger and stronger than any ideas, and marriage had been
+built upon the law of Love.</p>
+
+<hr style='width: 35%;' />
+
+<p>Daddy Brown came round in the course of the morning to talk over his new
+idea for Joan's future. It appeared that if she was willing to think it
+over, he would pay for her to have singing and dancing lessons during
+the winter. That was, of course, provided the War did not come off. If
+it did, as he had said once before to Fanny, there would not be any
+Spring tours for the Brown Company.</p>
+
+<p>"But war isn't likely," he spoke heavily. "England has too much to lose
+to go running into it if she can steer clear, and there's my offer, my
+girl. I think, from what I saw last night, that if you like to put your
+heart into it you ought to make something of an actress. You have
+distinct ability, and you have charm, which is on the good side too."</p>
+
+<p>Joan was hardly in the mood to pay much attention to her future
+prospects; the present loomed too forbiddingly ahead of her. She would
+let him know, she told him finally; she was most awfully grateful to him
+for his suggestion, but she must have at least a fortnight to think
+things out and decide what she was going to do.</p>
+
+<p>"Very well," Brown agreed, he rose to take his leave; "but mind you, it
+is worth considering, young lady; you don't get such an offer every
+day."</p>
+
+<p>Fanny was staying behind for another day; she had some amusement in
+store with Swetenham which she did not want to miss, but the rest of the
+company, Joan included, caught the three o'clock train back to town.
+Joan could not refuse to go with them, but the journey was one long
+torture to her; she wanted to get right away by herself; there was only
+one day left in which to plan and make ready for Dick's visit. Some of
+Brown's ponderous remarks as to the probable effect of a war on the
+theatrical profession had filtered down to the junior members of the
+company. They talked together rather mournfully as to what the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span> winter
+might be going to mean for them. "If it knocks pantomimes, we are done,"
+Grace Binning summed up the situation. But Grace Binning was inclined to
+be mournful; as Mrs. O'Malley said, her sprained ankle would keep her
+out of work in any case for six weeks.</p>
+
+<p>At Victoria Station Strachan ferreted out Joan's luggage and hailed a
+taxi for her.</p>
+
+<p>"Good-bye," he said to her at the last&mdash;they had always been very good
+friends, with a little encouragement he might have considered himself in
+love with her&mdash;"and good luck. Also, if you will excuse me saying so,
+Miss Rutherford, I should marry that faithful young man. You are not a
+bit suited or happy in our life."</p>
+
+<p>Then he drew back his head quickly and smiled at her as the taxi started
+off.</p>
+
+<p>Joan had written to Mrs. Carew, asking her to see about a room, and
+found to her relief that her old attic was still at her disposal.</p>
+
+<p>"Thought you would find it homelike," Mrs. Carew panted up the stairs in
+front of her, "and for that matter it has been shut up since you left.
+Bad year for letting this has been."</p>
+
+<p>Obviously the room had been shut up since she left. Joan struggled with
+the fast-closed window and threw it open, but even so the place retained
+an atmosphere of overpowering stuffiness, and presently, not staying to
+unpack or open the letter which had been waiting for her on the hall
+table, she sallied out again in search of fresh air.</p>
+
+<p>She would walk to Knightsbridge, she decided, and so on through the
+Park. If she tired herself out perhaps she would be able to sleep when
+she went to bed, and sleep was what she needed almost more than anything
+else.</p>
+
+<p>The Park was deserted and sun-swept; it had been an exceptionally hot
+summer, the trees and bushes seemed smothered under a weight of dust.
+Joan found a seat in sight of one of the stretches of water and opened
+her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span> letter. It was from Miss Abercrombie, that she had known from the
+envelope, and written from the Rutherford home at Wrotham.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"<span class="smcap">Dear Joan</span>," the letter ran:</p>
+
+<p>"Your people are home, they have just come back from abroad
+and had a very tiresome journey over because of the
+mobilization on the Continent. Janet wrote, or rather your
+uncle wrote for her, asking me to be here to meet them. Janet
+is very ill, she will never be able to walk or stand up again
+in her life. They have tried all sorts of things for her
+abroad, now it has come to the last. All day, and most of the
+night, for she sleeps very badly, she lies flat on her back,
+and all the time her eyes seem to be watching for something.
+She speaks very little, everything seems to be shut away in
+her heart, but yesterday&mdash;after having first talked the matter
+over with your uncle&mdash;I went up to her room and asked her
+point blank: 'Janet, aren't you eating out your heart for
+Joan?' and she nodded stiffly, the tears in her eyes. So I sat
+right down and told her all about you: about your accident,
+about the hard (child, I know it has been hard) fight you have
+had, and at the end I said: 'Shall I send for her, Janet?'
+This time when she nodded the tears were streaming down her
+face. So I am sending for you. Don't let pride or anger stand
+between you, enough anguish has been caused already on both
+sides, and she is practically dying. Come, child, show a
+charity which your struggle will have taught you, and help to
+make her going a little easier, for she has always loved you,
+and her heart breaks for the need of you."</p></div>
+
+<p>It was a very sentimental letter for Miss Abercrombie to have written.
+And Aunt Janet was dying; quite long ago Joan had forgiven the hardness
+from her, there was no bitterness in her heart now, only a great sense
+of pity.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span> She would go, of course she would go. Like a flash it came to
+her that she might just slip away and leave no address, no message to
+Dick. But even with the thought came the knowledge that she would only
+be shelving the difficulty for a little; he would wait, he would search
+till he found her. She did not think he would be very easy to put off.</p>
+
+<p>With Miss Abercrombie's letter open on her lap, she sat and watched the
+people passing by her. She was thinking of all her life since she had
+first come to London; Gilbert, their time together&mdash;strange how that
+memory had no more power to hurt&mdash;the black days that had followed, Rose
+and Fanny. Of them all perhaps she had loved Fanny the best; Fanny's
+philosophy of life was so delightfully simple, she was like some little
+animal that followed every fresh impulse. And she never seemed to regret
+or pay for her misdeeds. Apparently when you sinned calmly in the full
+knowledge that it was sin, you paid no penalty; it was only when you
+sinned attempting to make new laws for yourself and calling it no sin
+that the burden of retribution was so heavy to bear.</p>
+
+<p>A man was coming down the path towards her; she did not notice him,
+although he was staring at her rather intently. Opposite to her he came
+to a pause and took off his hat.</p>
+
+<p>"Hallo," he said, "I am not mistaken, am I, it is Pierrette."</p>
+
+<p>She lifted startled eyes to his and Landon laughed at her. He had
+forgotten all about her till this moment, but just for the time being he
+was at a loose end in London when all his friends were out of town, and
+with no new passion on to entertain him. Pierrette, were she willing,
+would fill in the gap pleasantly; they had not parted the best of
+friends, but he had forgotten just enough for that memory not to rankle.
+He sat down on the chair beside her and took one of her hands in his.</p>
+
+<p>"Where have you been, Pierrette? And what have<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span> you been doing? Also,
+are you not glad to see me, and whose love letter were you reading?"</p>
+
+<p>"It is not a love letter." Joan took her hand away and folding up Miss
+Abercrombie's letter, slipped it into her purse. "It is from my people,
+asking me to come home, and I am going."</p>
+
+<p>"Going, when I have only just found you again!"</p>
+
+<p>His tone, his whole manner was unbearably familiar. Joan turned with
+quick words of resentment on her lips, but they were never said. A
+sudden thought came across her brain. Here was something with which she
+could fight down and kill Dick's purpose. Better, far better than any
+confession of hers, better than any stating of the truth, however
+bluntly put, would be this man's easy familiarity, his almost air of
+ownership. She found herself staring at Landon. What had she ever seen
+in him that was either pleasant or attractive? She hated his eyes, and
+the way they looked at her, the too evident care which had been expended
+on his appearance, his long, shapely hands.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, Pierrette, when you have finished studying my personal
+appearance," Landon broke in, "perhaps you will explain yourself more
+explicitly. Why are you flying from me just when I have found you? And,
+Pierrette, what about supper to-night at Les Gobelins?"</p>
+
+<p>"I can't do that," Joan spoke quickly. She had clenched her hands in her
+lap; he did not notice that, but he could see that the colour had fled
+from her face. "And I have got to go away the day after to-morrow. But
+couldn't you come and have tea with me to-morrow at 6, Montague Square?
+Do, please do."</p>
+
+<p>What was she driving at? Landon caught his breath on a laugh. Was it the
+last final flutter before she had to go back to home life and having her
+wings cut? Or was she throwing herself into his arms after having fought
+so furiously&mdash;he remembered that she had fought the last time, perhaps
+she had learned her lesson; perhaps the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span> poor little devil had really
+fallen in love with him, and had been eating her heart out all this
+time. That was almost amusing. She had never, even in their days of
+greatest friendship, asked him into her room before, though he had often
+suggested coming.</p>
+
+<p>"Why, Pierrette, of course," he said. Then he laughed out loud. "And
+I'll bring some red roses, afterwards we will go out to supper, and it
+shall be like old times."</p>
+
+<p>"Afterwards," Joan repeated. The excitement had left her, she sounded on
+the instant very tired, "I don't know about afterwards, but bring the
+red roses and come at half-past four, will you?" She stood up, "I must
+go home," she said, "I have got to pack and get everything ready before
+to-morrow."</p>
+
+<p>He could not understand her mood in the least, but he could draw his own
+conclusions from her invitation. It set him whistling softly on his way
+home. The tune he selected was one that was being played everywhere in
+London at the time. It fitted into his thoughts excellently:</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 15em;">"Just a little love, a little kiss,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 15.5em;">I will give my life for this."</span><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>Poor, silly little Pierrette! Why had she fought with him before and
+wasted so much precious time? As a matter of fact, he broke off his
+whistle as the startling truth flashed on him, he might quite easily
+have forgotten all about her in the interval, and then where would she
+have been?<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXV" id="CHAPTER_XXV"></a>CHAPTER XXV</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"I have left you behind<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;In the path of the past;<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;With the white breath of flowers,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;With the best of God's hours,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;I have left you at last."</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><span class="smcap"><b>Dora Sigerson.</b></span></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>Mrs. Carew was in a state of discontent which amounted almost to anger.</p>
+
+<p>"I knew such kind of things were bound to happen," she grumbled
+fiercely, "if she joined in with a girl like that Miss Bellairs. I have
+never held and I never will hold with young ladies having men to tea in
+their bedrooms."</p>
+
+<p>"Why don't you just tell her so?" suggested her helpmate from his
+customary entrenched position in an armchair behind the newspaper. "It
+would be a good deal cheaper than breaking the kitchen china, Maria."</p>
+
+<p>"Tell her!" snorted Mrs. Carew. "She don't give me a chance. Cool as a
+cucumber she turns to me this morning, she says: 'Oh, I've two gentlemen
+to tea this afternoon, Mrs. Carew, just show them up when they come.'
+Then she 'ops it out of the front door like a rabbit. 'Gentlemen,'
+indeed, and she with not so much as a screen round her bed."</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps they are her brothers," ventured Mr. Carew.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Carew came to a pause beside him and swept aside his paper.
+"Brothers!" she repeated, "now, Arthur, you know better than to say
+that. What I say and what I always shall say is: Let 'em do what they
+like outside, poor motherless girls that they are, but in my house
+things have got to be run straight. I won't have them bringing men in
+here."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Well, hang it all, Maria, what do you want me to do? Go upstairs and
+turn the gents out?"</p>
+
+<p>"We'll see," said Mrs. Carew darkly. She grabbed up the tea-tray and
+made for the door. "To-morrow I shall tell her it is not to happen
+again."</p>
+
+<p>"All right, you tell her," her husband muttered behind her retreating
+back. "Can't think, though, why you don't leave the girls alone. However
+they start it always ends that way. You and I have seen quite a number
+take to the streets, and you don't do much to prevent them short of
+grumbling at them."</p>
+
+<p>"They shan't do it in my house," reiterated Mrs. Carew; she stumped in
+dignified protest from the room, and upstairs to the offender's attic.</p>
+
+<p>The first guest had already arrived, so Mrs. Carew could not voice her
+disapproval; she expressed it, however, in a glare which she directed
+towards him, and the noise with which she dumped down the tea-tray. The
+room was full of flowers, which did not add to her approval; she
+detected in them a sure sign of immorality. Great, beautiful red roses,
+nodding from every vase, filling the air with their rather heavy scent.
+The visitor also inspired her with a sense of distrust. He looked what
+Mrs. Carew described as "a man about town." She had been fond of Joan;
+behind her anger lay a small hurt sense of pity; she was too nice a
+young lady to go the way of the others.</p>
+
+<p>She opened the door to Dick a little later with a sour face, and she did
+not even trouble to take him upstairs.</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Rutherford is high up as you can get"&mdash;she jerked her thumb
+upwards&mdash;"it's the only door on the landing, you can't mistake it."</p>
+
+<p>With that she left him, and Dick found his own way upstairs. He had
+stayed away all day till the exact hour he had named, with some
+difficulty, but with a punctilious sense of doing right. Joan had not
+answered his letter<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span> and he looked upon her silence as an admission that
+she loved him, but there were a great many things between them that
+would have to be talked over first coldly and sensibly. He had thought
+the matter out and he had decided that he would not leave it all to her,
+to tell or not to tell as she thought best, which had been his first
+idea. He would help her by telling her that he had always known, and
+that it made no difference. He wanted to make her confession as easy as
+possible.</p>
+
+<p>It was not until after he had knocked that he realized with a shock of
+disappointment that Joan was not alone. He could hear her talking to
+somebody, then she moved across the room and pulled the door open. He
+saw only her first of all, his eyes sought hers and stayed there. He
+could notice that she seemed very pale, and almost frightened looking,
+and that she had dressed for the afternoon in black. Some long clinging
+stuff, and up near where the blouse opened at the neck she had pinned in
+one red rose, its warm and velvety petals lying against the white of her
+neck. The room seemed full of the scent of the roses too, and a little
+oppressive. Dick held his breath as he looked at her; to him she seemed
+so beautiful as to be almost amazing; then he came a little further into
+the room and his eyes took in the other occupant. A man sat, or rather
+lounged, on the sofa, pulled up under the window. He was watching the
+meeting with curious eyes, and in his hands he held another rose, the
+same sort as the one Joan wore. When Dick's eyes met his, he smiled, and
+laying the rose aside, stood up.</p>
+
+<p>"Did not know it was to be a tea-party, Pierrette," he said, "you ought
+to have warned me."</p>
+
+<p>Joan had shut the door and moved forward into the centre of the room.
+She was evidently very nervous over something; Landon was more than a
+little amused, though also inclined to be annoyed.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, it isn't a tea-party," she was saying. "It's just us three. Doctor
+Grant, this is Mr. Landon. Will you<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span> have this chair?&mdash;it is really the
+only one which is quite safe to sit on."</p>
+
+<p>Dick took the proffered chair stiffly; he was conscious of a bitter
+sense of disappointment, tinged with disapproval. It was, of course,
+different for himself, but he loathed to see the other man so much at
+home in this quaint little dust-laden attic where Joan lived. Her bed
+stood against the wall, a black counterpane of sorts thrown across it;
+her brush and comb, the little silver things for her dressing-table were
+scattered about on the top of the chest of drawers standing near. The
+place would have been sacred to him; but how did this other man look at
+it? And why had Joan asked him? Was it a deliberate attempt to shield
+herself from something she dreaded? or did it mean that, after all, she
+had only been playing with him&mdash;that the fluttered surrender of her lips
+had been but a flirt's last fling in the game of passion? If a man is
+really very much in love, as was Dick, and something occurs to make him
+lose his temper, it is sure to end in rapid and sometimes lasting
+disaster. After the first five minutes Dick made no attempt even to be
+polite to Landon. Rage, blind, merciless rage, and a sense of having
+made a damned fool of himself, throbbed in his mind as he watched Joan
+talking to the other man, and saw the evident familiarity which lay
+between them. Yet he could not get up and go away; he would not leave
+her, not till he had hurt her as much as she was now hurting him.</p>
+
+<p>For Landon, the amusement of baiting the other man's evident misery soon
+palled. He was a little annoyed himself that Joan should have seen fit
+to drag him in as such a cat's-paw, for a very few minutes of their
+threesome had shown him what his part was intended to be. It meant in
+addition that the girl had fooled him, and that he had wasted his
+background of red roses. It was all very annoying and a very stupid way
+of spending the afternoon, for no one could imagine that there was any
+amusement to be got out of a bad tea in squalid surroundings&mdash;thus
+merci<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span>lessly but almost truthfully did he dismiss the atmosphere of
+Joan's attic&mdash;with a girl palpably in love with someone else. Landon
+rose presently with his most languid air of boredom.</p>
+
+<p>"Sorry, Pierrette," he said; "must fly, but I leave my roses behind me
+as a memory. They are not what I should call my lucky flower." He turned
+to Dick, who stood up with a grim face and stern-set mouth. "Good-bye,
+Doctor Grant; delighted to have met you: if Pierrette feels like it, get
+her to tell you about our last venture into the rose world. Romantic
+tale, isn't it, Pierrette?" He laughed, lifting her hand to his heart
+very impressively. "But ours has always been a romance, hasn't it? That
+is why we christened each other Pierrot and Pierrette." He let go her
+hand and bowed gravely. Joan followed him to the door. "I'll come and
+see you out," she said; she had not realized until the moment came how
+horribly afraid she was of Dick. "You might lose your way."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh no," Landon assured her; he shot one last slightly vindictive glance
+at Dick; "I know it by heart." Then he laughed and went from the room,
+shutting the door behind him.</p>
+
+<p>Joan stayed where she was, a seeming weight on her lids, which prevented
+her lifting her eyes to look at Dick. But she was intensely conscious of
+him, and round her heart something had closed like a band of iron. At
+last, since he said nothing and made no sign, she moved forward blindly
+and sat down in the nearest chair.</p>
+
+<p>"Aren't you ever going to speak again?" she whispered.</p>
+
+<p>Her words shook Dick out of his silent self-restraint. Hot anger,
+passionate reproaches, fought for speech in his throat; he drove them
+back.</p>
+
+<p>"Is this your answer to my question?" he said finally. "It would have
+been simpler to have put it some other way. But you may at least
+congratulate yourself on having<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span> succeeded. You have killed something
+that I had thought to be almost eternal." He drew in his breath sharply,
+but passion was shaking him now, it had to have its say. "I have loved
+you," he went on hoarsely, "ever since I first saw you. Common sense has
+argued against you; pride has fought to throw you out of my life; but
+against everything your face has lived triumphant. I don't know why God
+makes us feel like that for women of your stamp, why we should bring
+such great ideals to so poor a shrine. I am talking arrant nonsense,
+just raving at you, you think, and I sound rather absurd even to myself.
+Only&mdash;my God! you don't know what you have done&mdash;you have broken my
+faith in you; it was the strongest, the best thing in my life."</p>
+
+<p>Joan crouched down in the chair; she seemed to be trying to get as far
+away from his voice as possible; she sat with her head buried in her
+arms.</p>
+
+<p>"I built up a dream about you two years ago," Dick went on. "You don't
+remember anything about me; but our meeting, your face as you stood that
+day with your back to the wall, were stamped on my heart as with a
+branding-iron. Of all the foolish things that a man could do perhaps I
+chose the worst; for ever as I stood and watched you the shadow of shame
+grew up beside you, and other people turned away from you. But I thought
+I saw further than the rest; I imagined that I had seen through your
+eyes, because already I loved them, into your soul. There is some
+mistake here, I argued, some mystery which she herself shall one day
+make clear to me." Joan had lifted her head and was staring at him.
+"From that day I started building my dream. I went abroad, but the
+memory of your face went with me; I used to make love to other women,
+but it was because I looked for you in their eyes. Then I came home and
+I saw you again. Suddenly my dream crystallized into clear, unshakable
+fact; I loved, I had always loved you; nothing that other people could
+say against you would have any effect. It lay just with you,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span> and to-day
+you have given me your answer and broken with your own hand the dream."</p>
+
+<p>He turned towards the door; Joan staggered to her feet and ran to him.
+The vague memory in her mind had leapt to life; his eyes had often
+reminded her of someone. She remembered now that he was the young doctor
+that Aunt Janet had sent for. She remembered her own defiance as she had
+faced him and the pity in his eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"Dick," she whispered, "Dick, I didn't know, I didn't understand. I
+thought&mdash;oh, don't go away and leave me just like this, I might
+explain." Her torrent of words broke down before the look on his face;
+she fell to her knees, clutching at his hands. "Won't you listen? It was
+because I was afraid to tell you; I was afraid, afraid."</p>
+
+<p>Her position, the paroxysm of tears which, once they came, she could in
+no way stop, disquieted him. He shook her hands from him. "And because
+you were afraid," he said stiffly, "I suppose you had the other man here
+to protect you." Then his mood changed.</p>
+
+<p>"Whatever you have done," he said, "it isn't any business of mine.
+Please forgive me for ranting like a schoolmaster, and please don't cry
+like that. While I sat there watching that other man and feeling that
+everything my heart had been set on was falling to pieces all round me,
+I wanted to hurt you back again. It's a pugnacious sensation that one
+gets sometimes, but it's gone now; I don't want you to be hurt. It was
+not your fault that I lifted you up in my heart like that; it is not
+altogether your fault that you have fallen. Perhaps you did not know how
+cruel you were being when you had that other man here to make clear to
+me something you did not wish to put into words yourself. I have said
+some beastly things to you, and I am sorry for them. Please don't let
+them worry you for long."</p>
+
+<p>Then he had gone, before she had time to speak or lift her hands to hold
+him. Gone, and as she crouched against the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span> door the sound of his feet
+trod into her heart, each step a throb of agony.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Carew was holding forth to Fanny in the hall as Dick swung past
+them. He did not glance at them even, and Fanny did not have a chance to
+call out to him, he went so rapidly, slamming the door behind him.</p>
+
+<p>"Not as how they haven't left at seasonable hours," Mrs. Carew went
+rambling on; "but I 'as always said and always will say, I don't hold
+with such doings in my house."</p>
+
+<p>"What doings?" Fanny expostulated. "For goodness, old Carew, do try and
+make yourself more clear; who has been carrying on and how?"</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Rutherford," Mrs. Carew announced. She was viewing Fanny with
+unfriendly suspicion. "Only came back from this 'ere theatrical show
+yesterday, and to-day she has two men to tea with her in her bedroom."</p>
+
+<p>"Two men?" repeated Fanny. "Did you know they were coming?"</p>
+
+<p>"Ask them," snorted Mrs. Carew. "And what I said is&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, run away, Carew," Fanny broke in, "with your nasty suspicion. It's
+all my bad example, you'll be saying next. Bring up some tea for me,
+there's an old dear; I'm fairly parched for a drink."</p>
+
+<p>But before she went into her own room Fanny ran upstairs and knocked
+softly oh Joan's door. There was no answer and no sound from within the
+room; yet when she tried turning the handle, and pushing her foot
+against the door, it was to find it locked. What did it all mean? Two
+men to tea, Dick's face as he had passed through the hall, and Joan's
+locked door? That was a problem which Fanny set herself to disentangle
+in her own particular way.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXVI" id="CHAPTER_XXVI"></a>CHAPTER XXVI</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"Of all strange things in this strange new world<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Most strange is this;<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Ever my lips must speak and smile<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Without your kiss.<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Ever mine eyes must see, despite<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Those eyes they miss."</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><span class="smcap"><b>F. Heaslip Lee.</b></span></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>How Joan lived through the hours that followed she never knew. Heart and
+brain seemed paralysed; things had lost their power to hurt. When Fanny
+crept upstairs in the early morning and knocked timidly at the door,
+Joan opened it to her. She had no wish to see Fanny; she did not want to
+talk about yesterday, or explain what had happened; but vaguely through
+her absolute misery she realized that life had still to be gone on with,
+and that Fanny was one of the items of life which it was no use trying
+to disregard. As a matter of fact, until she opened the door and caught
+Fanny's look of dismay, she did not remember that she was still in her
+black afternoon frock, nor the fact that she had spent most of the night
+crouched against the door as Dick had left her.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, my dear, my dear!" Fanny whispered; she came quickly into the room
+and threw warm, loving arms round Joan. "You haven't been to bed at all;
+why didn't you let me in last night? I'd have helped you somehow or
+other."</p>
+
+<p>Joan stood limply in the embrace, but she did not turn and cling to
+Fanny, or weep as the other girl rather wished she would.</p>
+
+<p>"How ridiculous of me," she answered. "I must look a strange sight this
+morning."</p>
+
+<p>Fanny became practical on the moment, since sympathy<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span> was evidently not
+desired. "Well, you'll start right away now," she stated, "and get out
+of your things. It's early yet, only about seven; I will brush your hair
+for you, and you will slip into bed. You needn't get up until late
+to-day, you know."</p>
+
+<p>"I haven't the slightest desire to sleep," Joan told her; none the less
+she was obeying the other's commands. "And I have got to catch an early
+train."</p>
+
+<p>"You are going away?" gasped Fanny.</p>
+
+<p>"Back home," Joan answered. "They have sent for me; my aunt has been
+ill. Oh, it's not for good, Fanny"&mdash;she almost laughed at the other's
+amazed face&mdash;"I shall be back here before long."</p>
+
+<p>"I hope not;" Fanny spoke, for her, fiercely. "I shall hate to lose you,
+honey, but after all I don't stand for much, and you aren't meant for
+this kind of world. You can't get the fun out of it I can, it only hurts
+you." She was brushing out the soft brown hair. "What happened
+yesterday?" she asked suddenly, her head on one side.</p>
+
+<p>Joan moved from under the deft hands and stood up. "You want to know why
+I am looking like a tragedy queen this morning," she said. "It isn't
+strange you should be curious; I must seem quite mad. Yesterday"&mdash;she
+caught her hands to her throat&mdash;"was what might be called a disastrous
+failure. I tried to be very clever, and I was nothing but a most awful
+fool. He knew, he had known all the time, the thing which I had been so
+afraid to tell him. It had not made any difference to his loving me, but
+yesterday I had that other man here, you remember him, don't you? You
+might almost recognize his roses." Her eyes wandered round the room, her
+hands came away slowly from her throat; she had seemed to be near tears,
+but suddenly the outburst passed. "That's all," she said dryly, "Dick
+drew his own conclusions from the man being here. I tried to explain, at
+least I think I tried to explain. I know I wanted to hold him back, but
+he threw aside my<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span> hands and went from the room. I shan't ever see him
+again, Fanny, and the funny thing is that it doesn't really seem to
+matter this morning."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, you poor thing," Fanny whispered again. She did not say much else,
+because for the present words were useless. Otherwise her own mind was
+full of consoling reflections. A man, after all, is not so easily turned
+aside from what must have been a very big purpose in his life. Already
+Fanny could look into the future and say "Bless you, my children," in
+her heart. She had been afraid, drawing her conclusions from Dick's face
+and Joan's silence, that things were very much worse. Joan might, for
+instance, have told the truth, and Dick, man-like, might have resented
+it.</p>
+
+<p>She ran downstairs presently and came up again with the breakfast,
+fussing round Joan till the other made an attempt to eat something,
+pouring out her tea for her, buttering her toast. "I should very much
+like to see you have a jolly good cry, honey," she confessed when the
+pretence at breakfast had finished. "It would do you a world of good.
+But since you don't seem able to, I shall pull the curtains and you must
+try and sleep. I'll come and call you again at ten."</p>
+
+<p>Joan lay quite still in the dim and curtained room, but she did not
+either sleep or cry. She did not even think very much. She could just
+see the pattern of the wall-paper, and her mind occupied itself in
+counting the roses and in working out how the line in between made
+squares or diamonds.</p>
+
+<p>It was like that all day; little things came to her assistance and
+interested her enormously. The collection of flowers which Fanny had got
+on her new hat; the map on the wall of the railway carriage; the fact
+that the station master at Wrotham seemed to have grown very thin, and
+was brushing his hair a new way. Uncle John met her as once before at
+the station, and almost without thinking Joan lifted her face. He
+stooped very gravely<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span> to kiss it. "You are welcome home, Joan," he said.
+"We have been lonely without you."</p>
+
+<p>The sound of his voice brought back to her mind the last time he had
+spoken to her, and she was suddenly nervous and tongue-tied. A fat Sally
+still rubbed her sides against the shafts, nothing had been changed. It
+was just about this time she had come home two years ago, only now
+nervousness and a confused sense of memories that hurt intolerably swept
+aside all thoughts of pleasure and relief.</p>
+
+<p>Uncle John made no further remark after his greeting until they were
+driving down the village street. Then he turned to her suddenly.</p>
+
+<p>"There is going to be war between England and Germany," he said. "Did
+you see any signs of excitement in London this morning?"</p>
+
+<p>War! Joan realized on the instant that for the past four days she had
+not even looked at a paper. Daddy Brown had mentioned some such
+possibility in connection with his Spring tour, and the members of the
+company had discussed the prospect with varying shades of excitement on
+their way up to London. But for herself, her own interests, her own
+griefs had so swamped her that she had not even noticed the greater
+tragedy which loomed ahead. Yet what a curious thrill lay in the word;
+it could rouse her to sudden interest as nothing else had been able to
+do all day; she could feel the nerves in her body tighten, and she sat a
+little more erect.</p>
+
+<p>"War, with Germany!" she repeated. "I haven't read the papers, Uncle
+John. Has it come as near as that?"</p>
+
+<p>"They have invaded Belgium," he answered, "on their way through into
+France. We couldn't stand aside now if we wanted to. To-night, I expect
+war will be declared. That was why I asked you if you had seen any signs
+of excitement in the streets; the papers say that the crowds have been
+clamouring for war for the last three days."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>She could not tell him that she had sat in the cab counting the daisies
+in Fanny's hat. "What will it mean?" she asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Something bigger than we have ever tackled before," he answered. "It
+will mean millions of money and millions of men. I don't see much down
+here, grubbing about among my plants and weeds, but I have kept an eye
+on Germany." A most unusual excitement was shaking him. "In my young
+days it was a myth, 'one day Germany will declare war on us.' It has
+come true too late for me. I'd give everything I possess to get back
+into the regiment, but they wouldn't have me. This will be a
+world-shaking war, and I am too old to take part in it." The excitement
+left his voice as they turned in at the gate. "Your aunt is very ill,"
+he said. "I meant to have warned you before, but somehow I can't think
+of anything but the one thing these days. You must not be shocked at her
+appearance."</p>
+
+<p>Miss Abercrombie was waiting to receive them where Aunt Janet had waited
+for their other home-coming. "Did you bring any news from London?" she
+asked quickly; the same light shone in her eyes as in Uncle John's. "Has
+anything been settled yet?"</p>
+
+<p>Joan shook her head. "I have been living this last week with my eyes
+shut," she confessed; "till Uncle John told me, I did not even know that
+anything was going to happen."</p>
+
+<p>Miss Abercrombie looked beyond her; the blue eyes had narrowed, a
+strange expression of intentness showed in her face. "I have always
+tried not to," she said, "and yet I have always hated the Germans. I
+wish I was a man." She turned abruptly. "But come upstairs, child, your
+aunt had her couch moved close to the window this morning, she has lain
+watching the drive all day. You will find her very changed," she added.
+"Try not to show any signs of fear. She is very sensitive as to the
+impression she creates. Every week it creeps a little<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span> higher, now she
+cannot even move her hand. From the neck downwards she is like a log of
+wood."</p>
+
+<p>"And she is dying?" whispered Joan.</p>
+
+<p>"Mercifully," the other answered. "My dear, we could not pray for
+anything else."</p>
+
+<p>She opened the door and motioned to Joan to go in. "I have brought her
+to you, Janet," she said. "Now is your heart satisfied?"</p>
+
+<p>Joan waited for a moment in the doorway. A long, low couch stood by the
+window, the curtains were drawn back and the head of the couch had been
+raised up, so that a full stream of light fell upon the figure lying on
+it. But Aunt Janet's face itself was a little in the shadow, and for the
+moment it looked very much like Joan's old memories. The straight,
+braided hair, the little touch of white at the throat, the dark,
+searching eyes. A nurse, a trim upheld figure in blue, stood a little
+behind the couch out of sight of Aunt Janet's eyes, so that she could
+frown and beckon to Joan to come forward unseen by the woman on the
+couch. But Aunt Janet had noticed the slight hesitation, her face broke
+into the most wistful smile that Joan had ever seen.</p>
+
+<p>"I can't hold out my arms to you, Joan," she said; "but my heart aches
+for you, all the same."</p>
+
+<p>Joan took a little step forward; "Aunt Janet," she whispered. Then all
+that had been bitter between them vanished, and much as she had used to
+do, when as a child she sought the shelter of those dear arms, she ran
+forward, and, kneeling by the couch, pressed her warm cheek against the
+lifelessness of the other's hand. "I have come home, Aunt Janet," she
+said, "I have come home."</p>
+
+<p>The nurse with one glance at her patient's face tiptoed from the room,
+leaving them alone together, and for a little they stayed silent just
+close touching like that. Presently Aunt Janet spoke, little whispered
+words.</p>
+
+<p>"I hardened my heart," she said, "I would not let<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span> you creep back; even
+when God argued with me I would not listen. My life finished when I sent
+you from me, Joan, but so long as I could hold myself upright and get
+about, I would not listen. I am a hard, grim old woman, and I took it
+upon myself to judge, which is after all a thing we should leave to God.
+This is my punishment&mdash;you are so near to me, yet I cannot lift a hand
+to touch you. I shall never feel your fingers clinging to mine again."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, hush, hush, Aunt Janet," Joan pleaded. "Why should you talk of
+punishment?"</p>
+
+<p>"When you were a child," the old voice went on again, "you would run to
+me at the end of your day's playing. 'Read me a story,' you would say,
+and then we would sit hand in hand while I read aloud to you something
+you knew almost by heart. When I dream now I feel your little warm hands
+in mine, but I can't feel your lips, Joan, not even when you lay them
+against my hand as you do now. Nor your tears, dear, silly child, I have
+made you cry with my grumbling. Joan, look up and see the happiness in
+my eyes to have you back."</p>
+
+<p>And Joan looked. "I never meant to hurt you as I did, Aunt Janet," she
+said; "do you believe that?"</p>
+
+<p>Just for a second the lids closed down over the dark eyes. "I hurt
+myself," Aunt Janet answered, "far more than you hurt me. Put your face
+down close, so that I can kiss you just once, and then you shall draw up
+a chair and we will talk sensibly. Nurse will be severe to-night if I
+excite myself."</p>
+
+<p>Miss Abercrombie put her head in at the door presently and suggested
+taking Joan downstairs to tea. "Nurse is just bringing up yours," she
+said. "I know from the expression of her face that she thinks it is time
+that you had a little rest."</p>
+
+<p>"Very well," Aunt Janet agreed, "take her away, Ann, but bring her back
+again before I go to bed. Has any news come through yet?"</p>
+
+<p>Miss Abercrombie shook her head. "Colonel Ruther<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span>ford has just gone over
+to the station to find out," she added.</p>
+
+<p>Uncle John came back with no further information. He was evidently in a
+strong state of agitation, he confessed that the question which the
+Government was settling was like a weight on his own conscience. "It is
+a question of honour," he kept repeating, "England cannot stand aside."</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 15em;">"'Know we not well how seventy times seven</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 16.5em;">Wronging our mighty arms with rust,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 15.5em;">We dared not do the will of Heaven,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 16.5em;">Lest Heaven should hurl us in the dust.'"</span><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>Miss Abercrombie quoted to him.</p>
+
+<p>He stared at her with puzzled old eyes. "I don't think that can apply to
+England," he said. "And in this case the people won't let them. We must
+have war."</p>
+
+<p>A curious, restless spirit seemed to have invaded the household. Joan
+sat with Aunt Janet for a little after dinner till the nurse said it was
+time for bed, after that she and Miss Abercrombie, talking only in fits
+and starts, waited up for Colonel Rutherford, who had once more tramped
+down to the station in search of news.</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing has come through," he had to admit on his return; "but I have
+arranged with the people of the telegraph office to send on a message
+should it come. We had better get off to bed meanwhile."</p>
+
+<p>Tired as she was, Joan fell asleep almost at once, to dream of
+Dick&mdash;Dick attired, through some connection of her thoughts, in shining
+armour with a sword in his hand. The ringing of a bell woke her, and
+then the sound of people whispering in the hall. She was out of bed in a
+second, and with a dressing-gown half pulled about her, she ran to the
+top of the stairs. The hall was lit up, the front door open. Uncle John
+was at it, talking to a man outside; Miss Abercrombie stood a little
+behind him,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span> a telegram form in her hand. She looked up at the sound of
+Joan's feet. "It's war," she called softly. "We declared war to-night."</p>
+
+<p>From somewhere further along the passage there was the abrupt sound of a
+door being thrown open. "Miss Abercrombie, Colonel Rutherford," the
+nurse's voice called, "quick, quick! I am afraid Miss Rutherford is
+dying! Someone must run for the doctor at once, please."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXVII" id="CHAPTER_XXVII"></a>CHAPTER XXVII</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"Life is good, joy runs high,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Between English earth and sky;<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Death is death, but we shall die<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;To the song on your bugles blown&mdash;England,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;To the stars on your bugles blown."</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><span class="smcap"><b>W. E. Henley.</b></span></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>Dick went out into the still night air from the close atmosphere of
+Joan's room, his mind a seething battleground of emotions&mdash;anger, and
+hurt pride, and a still small sense of pain, which as time passed grew
+so greatly in proportion that it exceeded both the other sensations. He
+had said very bitterly to Joan that she had broken his dream, but,
+because it had been broken, it none the less had the power to hurt
+intolerably. Each fragment throbbed with a hot sense of injustice and
+self-pity. He had not the slightest idea what to do with himself: every
+prospect seemed equally distasteful. He walked, to begin with, furiously
+and rather aimlessly down in the direction of the Embankment. The
+exercise, such as it was, dulled his senses and quieted a little the
+tumult of his mind. He found himself thinking of other things. The men
+to-day in his Club had been discussing the possibility of war, they had
+been planning what they would do; instinctively, since the thought of
+Joan and the scene he had just left were too tender for much probing,
+his mind turned to that. As<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span> he stamped along he resolved, without
+thinking very deeply about it, that he would volunteer for active
+service, and speculated on the possibility of his getting taken on at
+once.</p>
+
+<p>"Doctors will be very needful in this war," one man had said at the
+Club.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, by Gad," another had answered. "We have got some devilish
+contrivances these days for killing our brother men."</p>
+
+<p>Looked at from that point of view, the idea seemed strange, and Dick
+caught his breath on the thought. What would war mean? Hundreds of men
+would be killed&mdash;hundreds, why it would be more like thousands. He had
+read descriptions of the South African war, he had talked with men who
+had been all through it.</p>
+
+<p>"We doctors see the awful side of war, I can tell you," an old doctor
+had once told him. "To the others it may seem flags flying, drums
+beating, and a fine uplifting spectacle; but we see the horrors, the
+shattered bodies, the eyes that pray for death. It's a ghastly affair."</p>
+
+<p>And yet there was something in the thought which flamed at Dick's heart
+and made him throw his head up. It was the beating of drums, the call of
+the bugles that he heard as he thought of it; the blood tingled in his
+veins, he forgot that other pain which had driven him forth so restless
+a short hour ago.</p>
+
+<p>The great dark waters of the river had some special message to give him
+this evening. He stood for a little watching them; lights flamed along
+the Embankment, the bridges lay across the intervening darkness like
+coloured lanterns fastened on a string. Over on the other side he could
+see the trees of Battersea Park, and beyond that again the huddled pile
+of houses and wharfs and warehouses that crowded down to the water's
+edge. He was suddenly aware, as he stood there, of a passionate love for
+this old, grey city, this slow-moving mass of dark waters. It symbolized
+something which the thought of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span> war had stirred awake in his heart. He
+had a hot sense of love and pride and pity all mingled, he felt somehow
+as if the city were his, and as if an enemy's hand had been stretched
+out to spoil it. The drumming, the flag-waving, and the noise of bugles
+were still astir in his imagination, but the river had called something
+else to life behind their glamour. It did not occur to him to call it
+love of country, yet that was what it was.</p>
+
+<p>His walk brought him out in the end by the Houses of Parliament, and he
+found himself in the midst of a large crowd. It swayed and surged now
+this way and now that, as is the way of crowds. The outskirts of it
+reached right up to and around Trafalgar Square. When Dick had fought
+his way up Parliament Street he could see a mass of people moving about
+the National Gallery, and right above them Nelson's statue stood out
+black against the sky.</p>
+
+<p>"If they want war, these bally Germans," someone in the crowd suddenly
+shouted in a very hoarse and beery voice, "let's give it them."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, by God!" another answered. "Good old England, let's stand by our
+word."</p>
+
+<p>"We have got men behind the guns," declaimed a third.</p>
+
+<p>But such words were only as the foam thrown up by a great sea; the
+multitude did no real shouting, the spirit that moved them was too
+earnest for that. There were women among the crowd, their eager, excited
+faces caught Dick's attention. Some were crying hysterically, but most
+of them faced the matter in the same way that their menkind did. Dick
+could find no words to describe the curious feeling which gripped him,
+but he knew himself one of this vast multitude, all thinking the same
+thoughts, all answering to the same heart-beats. It was as if the
+meaning of the word citizen had suddenly been made clear to his heart.</p>
+
+<p>He moved with the shifting of the crowd as far as Trafalgar Square, and
+here some of the intense seriousness of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span> the strain was broken, for
+round and about the stately lions of Nelson's statue a noisy battle was
+raging. Several Peace parties, decked with banners inscribed "No War"
+and "Let us have peace," were coming in for a very rough five minutes at
+the hands of the crowd. Rather to his own surprise Dick found himself
+partaking in the battle, with a sense of jubilant pride in his prowess
+to hit out. He had a German as his opponent, which was a stroke of luck
+in itself, but in a calmer moment which followed on the arrival of the
+police, he thought to himself that even that was hardly an excuse for
+hitting a man who was desirous of keeping the world's peace. Still the
+incident had exhilarated him, he was more than ever a part of the crowd,
+and he went with them as far as Buckingham Palace. Some impulse to see
+the King had come upon the people; they gathered in the square in front
+of the Palace, and waited in confident patience for him to appear.</p>
+
+<p>Dick was standing at the far end of the Square, pressed up against the
+railings. In front of him stood two women, they were evidently strangers
+to each other, yet their excitement had made them friends, and they
+stood holding hands. One was a tall, eager-faced girl; Dick could not
+see the other woman's face, but from her voice he imagined her to be a
+good deal older and rather superior in class to the girl. It was the
+younger one's spirit, however, that was infectious.</p>
+
+<p>"Isn't it fine?" she was saying. "Aren't you proud to be English? I feel
+as if my heart was going to jump out of my mouth. They are our men," she
+went on breathlessly; "it is a most wonderful thought, and of course
+they will win through, but a lot of them will die first. Oh, I do hate
+the Germans!" Her whole face flushed with passionate resentment.</p>
+
+<p>"One need not hate a nation because one goes to war with it," the other
+woman answered. Dick thought her voice sounded very tired.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, one need," the girl flamed. "We women can't<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span> fight, but we can
+hate. Perhaps we shouldn't hate so much if we could fight," she added as
+a concession.</p>
+
+<p>"I am married to a German," Dick heard the other woman say bitterly. "I
+can't hate him."</p>
+
+<p>He saw the girl's quick face of horror and the way she stood away from
+her companion, but just at that moment some impulse surged the crowd
+forward and he lost sight of them. Yet the memory of the woman's voice
+and the words she had said haunted him. War would mean that, then, the
+tearing apart of families, the wrecking of home life.</p>
+
+<p>"The King, the King!" the crowd yelled and shouted in a million voices.
+"God save the King."</p>
+
+<p>Dick looked up to the Palace windows; a slight, small figure had come
+out on to one of the balconies and stood looking down on the faces of
+the people. Cheer upon cheer rose to greet him, the multitude rocked and
+swayed with their acclamation, then above the general noise came the
+sound of measured music, not a band, but just the people singing in
+unison:</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 15em;">"God save our gracious King,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 15.5em;">Long live our noble King,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 18.5em;">God save the King."</span><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>The notes rose and swelled and filled the air, the cry of a nation's
+heart, the loyalty of a people towards their King.</p>
+
+<p>The sheer emotion of it shook Dick out of the sense of revelry which had
+come upon him during his fight. He pushed his way through the crowd, and
+climbed over the railings into the darkness of St. James's Park. It was
+officially closed for the night, but Dick had no doubt that a small
+bribe at the other side would let him out. The Queen and the little
+Princes had joined the King on the balcony. Looking back he could see
+them very faintly, the Prince was standing to the salute, the Queen was
+waving her handkerchief.</p>
+
+<p>His Club was crowded with men, all equally excited, all<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span> talking very
+fast. Someone had just come back from the House. War was a dead
+certainty now, mobilization had been ordered, the Fleet was ready.</p>
+
+<p>"Our Army is the problem, there will have to be conscription," was the
+general vote.</p>
+
+<p>Dick stayed and talked with the rest of them till long after twelve.
+Morning should see him offering his services to the War Office; if they
+would not have him as a doctor he could always enlist. One thing was
+certain, he must by hook or by crook be amongst the first to go.</p>
+
+<p>"We will have to send an Expeditionary Force right now," the general
+opinion had been, "if we are to do any good."</p>
+
+<p>Dick thought vaguely of what it would all mean: the excitement, the
+thrill, an army on the march, camp life, military discipline, and his
+share of work in hospital. "Roll up your sleeves and get at them," his
+South African friend had described it to him. "I can tell you, you don't
+have much time to think when they are bringing in the wounded by the
+hundred."</p>
+
+<p>Not till just as he was turning into bed did he think again of Joan.
+Such is the place which love takes in a man's thoughts when war is in
+the balance. The knowledge of her deceit and his broken dream hurt him
+less in proportion, for the time he had forgotten it. He had been brutal
+to her, he realized; he had left her crouched up on the floor crying her
+heart out. Why had she cried?&mdash;she had achieved her purpose, for she
+could only have had one reason in asking the other man to meet him. He
+could only suppose that he had frightened her by his evident bad temper,
+and for that he was sorry. He was not angry with her any longer. She had
+looked very beautiful in her clinging black dress, with the red rose
+pinned in at her throat. And even the rose had been a gift from the
+other man. Well, it was all ended; for two years he had dreamed about
+love, for one hour he had known its bitterness. He would shut it
+absolutely outside of his life now, he would never, he need<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span> never,
+thanks to the new interests which were crowding in, think of Joan again.</p>
+
+<p>He opened his window before getting into bed and leaned out. The streets
+were deserted and quiet, the people had shouted themselves hoarse and
+gone home. Under the nearest lamp-post a policeman stood, a solid,
+magnificent figure of law and order, and overhead in a very dark sky
+countless little stars shone and twinkled. On the verge of war! What
+would the next still slumbering months bring to the world, and could he
+forget Joan? Is not love rather a thing which nothing can kill, which no
+grave can cover, no time ignore?</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXVIII" id="CHAPTER_XXVIII"></a>CHAPTER XXVIII</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"Errors, like straws, upon the surface flow;<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;He who would search for pearls must dive below."</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><span class="smcap"><b>Anon.</b></span></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>The wave of enthusiasm caused by the War swept even Fanny into its
+whirlpool of emotion. For several days she haunted the streets,
+following now this crowd, now that; buying innumerable papers, singing
+patriotic songs, cheering the soldiers as they passed. She wanted to
+dash out into the road, to throw her arms round the young soldiers and
+to kiss them, she was for the time being passionately in love with them.
+It was her one pathetic and rather mistaken method of expressing the
+patriotism which surged up in her. She could not have explained this
+sensation, she only knew that something was so stirred within her that
+she wanted to give&mdash;to give of her very best to these men who symbolized
+the spirit of the country to her. Poor, hot-hearted little Fanny; she
+and a great many like her came in for a good deal of blame during the
+days that followed, yet the instinct which drove them was the same that
+prompted the boys to enlist. If Fanny had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span> been a man she would have
+been one of the first at the recruiting station. So submerged was she in
+her new excitement that Joan and Dick in their trouble slipped entirely
+out of her mind, only to come back, with the knowledge that she had
+failed to do anything to help, when, on coming back one afternoon to
+Montague Square, she saw Mabel standing on the steps of No. 6. To be
+correct, Mabel had just finished talking to Mrs. Carew and was turning
+away. Fanny hastened her walk to a run and caught the other up just as
+she left the step.</p>
+
+<p>"You were asking to see Joan, Miss Rutherford," she panted. "Won't you
+come in and let me tell you about her?"</p>
+
+<p>Mabel had hardly recognized her. Fanny, dressed up in her best to meet
+Joan's possible future relations, and Fanny in her London garments,
+which consisted of a very tight dress slit up to well within sight of
+her knee, and a rakish little hat, were two very different people. And
+whereas the Fanny of Sevenoaks had been a little vulgar but most
+undeniably pretty, this Fanny was absolutely impossible&mdash;the kind of
+person one hardly liked to be seen talking to. Yet there was something
+in the girl's face, the frank appeal of her eyes, perhaps, that held
+Mabel against her will.</p>
+
+<p>"The woman tells me that Miss Rutherford has left," she spoke stiffly.
+"I was really only going to call upon her."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, I know she's gone," Fanny nodded, "back to her people. But there
+is something between her and your brother that awfully badly wants to be
+explained. Won't you come in and let me tell you? Oh, do, please do."</p>
+
+<p>She had caught hold of the other's sleeve and was practically leading
+her back up the steps. Mabel had not seen Dick since he had left
+Sevenoaks. He had written a note to their hotel saying he was most
+awfully busy, his application for service had been accepted, but pending
+his being attached to any unit he was putting in the time examining
+recruits. He had not mentioned Joan, Mabel<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span> had noticed that; still she
+had promised to call and make it up with the girl, and Mabel was a
+person who always religiously kept her promises. But if there had been
+any disagreement, as Fanny's anxiety to explain showed, then surely it
+was so much the better. Here and now she would wash her hands of the
+affair and start hoping once again for something better for Dick.</p>
+
+<p>Fanny had opened the door by this time and had led the way inside. "My
+room is three flights up," she said. "Will you mind that? Also it is
+probably dreadfully untidy. It generally is."</p>
+
+<p>This was where Mabel, following the wise guidance of her head, ought to
+have said: "I am not coming, I really haven't time," or some excuse of
+that sort. Instead she stepped meekly inside and followed the girl
+upstairs. Perhaps some memory of Dick's face as he had spoken of Joan
+prompted her, or perhaps it was just because she felt that in some small
+way she owed Joan a reparation.</p>
+
+<p>Fanny's room was certainly untidy. Every chair was occupied by an
+assortment of clothes, for before she had gone out that morning Fanny
+had had a rummage for a special pair of silk stockings that were the
+pride of her heart. She bundled most of the garments on to the bed and
+wheeled forward the armchair for Mabel to sit in.</p>
+
+<p>"I never can keep tidy," she acknowledged. "It used to make Joan fair
+sick when we shared rooms on tour. Joan is so different from me."
+Suddenly she threw aside pretence and dropped down on her knees before
+the armchair, squatting back on her heels to look at Mabel. "That is
+what I do want you to understand," she said, earnestly. "Joan is as
+different to me as soap to dirt. She is a lady, you probably saw that; I
+am not. She is good; I don't suppose I ever have been. She is clean all
+through, and she loves your brother so much that she wanted to break her
+heart to keep him happy." She looked down at her hands for a second,
+then up again quickly. "I'll tell you, it won't do any harm. Mind you,
+usually, I say a secret<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[Pg 224]</a></span> is a secret though I mayn't look the sort that
+can keep one. Joan told me about it at the beginning when I chaffed her
+about his loving her; and he does, you know he does. It seems that when
+she first came to London she had funny ideas in her head&mdash;innocent, I
+should call it, and sort of inclined to trust men&mdash;anyway, she lived
+with some man and there was to have been a baby," she brought the
+information out with a sort of gasp.</p>
+
+<p>"I knew that," Mabel answered, "and because of it I tried to persuade my
+brother not to marry her."</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose it is only natural you should," Fanny admitted, "though to me
+it seems that when a woman has a baby like that, she pays for all the
+fun that went before." She threw back her head a little and laughed.
+"Oh, I'm not moral, I know that, but Joan is, that's what I want you to
+understand. Anyway, Joan left the man, or he left her, which is more
+likely, and the baby was never born. Joan was run over in the street one
+day and was ill in hospital for a month. That was what Joan came up
+against," she went on, "when she fell in love with your brother. Tell
+him, I said, it won't make a pin's worth of difference to his love&mdash;and
+it wouldn't. But Joan did not believe me, she had learned to be afraid
+of good people, some of them had been real nasty to her, and she was
+afraid."</p>
+
+<p>"She need not have been," Mabel said. The girl was so earnest in the
+defence of her friend that one could not help liking her. "Dick knew
+about it all the time."</p>
+
+<p>Fanny nodded. "Yes, Joan told me that on the day after he had been here.
+It would have been fairer if he had said so from the beginning. You
+see," she leant forward, most intense in her explanation, "Joan thought,
+and thought and thought, till she was really silly with thinking. He had
+told her he was coming here on Monday to ask her to marry him, and she
+loved him. I should have held my tongue about things, or whispered them
+to him as I lay in his arms, holding on to him so that he could<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span> not
+push me away, but Joan isn't my sort. She just couldn't bear to tell
+him, I guess she was afraid to see his face alter and grow hard. Do you
+blame her because she was afraid? I don't really know the rest of the
+story," she finished, "because I was away, but I think Joan got hold of
+the silly notion that the best thing to do was to have another man
+hanging about here when Dr. Grant called. She thought it would make him
+angry, and that he would change his mind about wanting to marry her on
+the spot. And she pretty well succeeded. I had just got back and was
+standing in the hall, when Dr. Grant got back from her room and went
+out. He did not notice me, his face was set white and stern like
+people's faces are when they have just had to shoot a dog they loved.
+The other man meant nothing to her, nothing; why she hasn't even seen
+him for months, and she never liked him. Oh, can't you explain to your
+brother, he would listen to you." She put her hand on Mabel's knee in
+her earnestness and pulled herself a little nearer. "It's breaking both
+their hearts, and it's all such a silly mistake."</p>
+
+<p>"Are you not asking rather a lot from me?" Mabel said quietly; she met
+the other's eyes frankly. "Putting aside all ideas, moral or immoral,
+don't you understand that it is only natural that I should want my
+brother to marry some girl who had not been through all that Miss
+Rutherford has?"</p>
+
+<p>The quick tears sprang to Fanny's eyes. "If he loves her," she claimed,
+"is not that all that matters?"</p>
+
+<p>"He may love again," Mabel reminded her.</p>
+
+<p>Fanny withdrew her hand and stayed quiet, looking down at the ground,
+blinking back her tears. "You won't help," she said presently. "I see
+what you mean, it doesn't matter to you what happens to her." She lifted
+her head defiantly and sprang to her feet. "Well, it doesn't matter, not
+very much. I believe in love more than you do, it seems, for I do not
+believe that your brother will love again, and sooner or later he will
+come back to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[Pg 226]</a></span> her." She paused in her declamation and glanced at Mabel.
+"Is he going to the War?" she asked quickly.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," Mabel assented; she had stood up too and was drawing on her
+gloves. "He may go at any moment, as soon as they need him. You think I
+am awfully hard," she went on; "perhaps I am. Dick means a lot to me; if
+I find that this is breaking his heart I will tell him, will you believe
+that? But if he can find happiness elsewhere I shall be glad, that is
+all."</p>
+
+<p>Fanny huddled herself up in the armchair and did a good cry after she
+had gone. Joan's thread of happiness seemed more tangled than ever; her
+efforts to undo the knots had not been very successful. There was only
+her belief in the strength of Dick's love to fall back on, and love&mdash;as
+Fanny knew from her own experience&mdash;is sometimes only a weathercock in
+disguise, blown this way and that by the winds of fate.</p>
+
+<p>The night post brought a letter from Joan. It was written on black-edged
+notepaper:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"<span class="smcap">Dear Fanny,</span></p>
+
+<p>"Aunt Janet is dead. She died the night after I got here. The
+nurse says it was the joy of seeing me again that killed her.
+She was glad to have me back, I read that in her eyes, and it
+is the one fact that helps me to face things. Death stands
+between us now, yet we are closer to each other than we have
+been these last two years. And she loved me all the time,
+Fanny; sometimes it seems as if love could be very
+unforgiving. I must stay on down here for the time being;
+Uncle John needs someone, and he is content that it should be
+me. The War overhangs and overshadows everything, and it is
+going to be a hard winter for us all. I suppose he hasn't been
+back" (Fanny knew who was meant by "he") "to see me. It's
+stupid of me to ask, but hope is so horribly hard to kill.</p></div>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 25em;">"Yours ever,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;">"<span class="smcap">Joan.</span>"</span><br />
+</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Fanny wrote in answer that evening, but she made no mention of Mabel's
+visit. "Dr. Grant has joined, I hear," she put rather vaguely. "But of
+course one knew he would. All the decent men are going. London is just
+too wonderful, honey, I can't keep out of the streets. All day there are
+soldiers going past; I love them all, with a sort of love that makes you
+feel you want to be good, and gives you a lump in your throat. They say
+we have already sent thousands of men to Belgium, though there has not
+been a word about it in the papers, but I met a poor woman in the crowd
+to-day who had just said good-bye to her son. I wish I had got a son,
+only, of course, he would not be old enough to fight, would he? Write me
+sometimes, honey, and don't lose heart. Things will come all right for
+you in the end, I sort of know they will."</p>
+
+<p>To Joan her letter brought very little comfort despite its last
+sentence. Dick had joined; it did not matter how Fanny had come by the
+news, Joan never doubted its truth. He would be among the first to go,
+that she had always known, but would he make no sign, hold out no hand,
+before he left? The War was shaking down barriers, bringing together
+families who perhaps had not been on speaking terms for years, knitting
+up old friendships. Would he not give her some chance to explain, to set
+herself right in his eyes? That was all she asked for; not that he
+should love her again, but just that they should be friends, before he
+went out into the darkness of a war to which so many were to go and so
+few return.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[Pg 228]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXIX" id="CHAPTER_XXIX"></a>CHAPTER XXIX</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"Who dies, if England lives?"</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><span class="smcap"><b>Rudyard Kipling.</b></span></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>The black days of September lay like a cloud over the whole country.
+News came of the fall of Namur; the retreat from Mons; the German Army
+before the gates of Paris. There was one Sunday evening when the
+newspaper boys ran almost gleefully up and down the London streets,
+shouting in shrill voices: "The whole of the British Expeditionary Force
+cut to pieces." The nation's heart stood still to hear; the faces of the
+men and women going about their ordinary work took on a strained, set
+expression. The beating of drums, the blowing of trumpets, the cheering
+of crowds died away; a new stern feeling entered into the meaning of
+war.</p>
+
+<p>Dick felt sometimes as if all were expressed in the one word England.
+The name was written across all their minds as they stared into the
+future waiting for the news, real news of that handful of men standing
+with their backs to the walls of Paris, facing the mighty strength of
+the German Army. England! What did it matter if some hearts called it
+Scotland, some Ireland, some the greater far-off land of the Dominions?
+the meaning was the same. It was the country that was threatened, the
+country that stood in danger; as one man the people rallied to the cry
+of Motherland. And over in France, with their backs to the walls of
+Paris, the soldiers fought well!</p>
+
+<p>"Who dies, if England lives?" Kipling wrote in those early days of the
+war, putting into words the meaning which throbbed in the hearts of the
+people. Statesmen might say that they fought for the scrap of paper, for
+an outraged Belgium, because of an agreement binding<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span> Great Britain to
+France; the people knew that they fought for England! And to stay at
+home and wait with your eyes staring into the darkness was harder
+perhaps than to stand with your back to the wall and fight. They were
+black days for the watchers, those early days of the War.</p>
+
+<p>The one thought affected everyone in a different way. The look in their
+eyes was the same, but they used a different method of expressing it.
+Dick threw himself heart and soul into his work; he could not talk about
+the War or discuss how things were going on, and he was kept fairly
+busy, he had little time for talking. All day he examined men; boys,
+lying frankly about their age in order to get in; old men, well beyond
+the limit, telling their untruths with wistful, anxious eyes. Men who
+tried so hard to hide this or that infirmity, who argued if they were
+not considered fit, who whitened under the blow of refusal, and went
+from the room with bitten lips. From early morning till late at evening,
+Dick sat there, and all day the stream of old men, young men, and boys
+passed before him.</p>
+
+<p>Fanny took it in quite a different way. Silence was torture to her; she
+had to talk. She was afraid and desperately in earnest. The love in her
+heart was poured out at the foot of this new ideal, and to Fanny,
+England was typified in the soldiers. The night on which the paper boys
+ran abroad shrieking their first casualty list Fanny lay face downwards
+on her bed and sobbed her heart out. She visualized the troops she had
+watched marching through London, their straight-held figures, their
+merry faces, their laughing eyes, the songs they had shouted and
+whistled haunted her mind. They had not seemed to be marching to death;
+people had stood on the edge of the pavement to cheer them, and
+now&mdash;"cut to pieces"&mdash;that was how the papers put it. It made her more
+passionately attached to the ones that were left. It is no exaggeration
+to say that quite gladly and freely Fanny would have given her life for
+any&mdash;not one parti<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span>cular&mdash;soldier. Something of the spirit of
+mother-love woke in her attitude towards them.</p>
+
+<p>Down in quiet, sleepy little Wrotham the tide of war beat less
+furiously. Uncle John would sometimes lose his temper completely because
+the place as a whole remained so apathetic. The villagers did not do
+much reading of the papers; the fact that the parson had a new prayer
+introduced into the service impressed them with a sense of war more than
+anything else. But even Wrotham felt the outside fringe of London's
+anxiety during the days of that autumn. One by one, rather sheepishly,
+the young men came forward. They would like to be soldiers, they would
+like to have a whack at them there Germans. No thought of treaties or
+broken pledges stirred them, but England was written across their minds
+just the same. Uncle John woke to new life; he had been eating out his
+heart, knowing himself useless and on the shelf, when every nerve in his
+body was straining to be up and doing. He instituted himself as
+recruiter-in-chief to the district. He would walk for miles if he heard
+there was a likely young man to be found at the end of his tramp; his
+face would glow with pride did he but catch one fine, healthy-looking
+specimen.</p>
+
+<p>He inaugurated little meetings, too, at which the Vicar presided, and
+Uncle John held forth. Bluntly and plainly he showed the people their
+duty, speaking to them as he had used to speak in the old days to his
+soldiers. And over their beer in the neighbouring public-house the men
+would repeat his remarks, weigh up his arguments, agree or disagree with
+his sentiments. They had a very strong respect for him, that at least
+was certain; before Christmas he had persuaded every available unmarried
+man to enlist.</p>
+
+<p>The married men were a problem; Joan felt that perhaps more than Uncle
+John did. Winter was coming on; there were the children to clothe and
+feed; the women were beginning to be afraid. Sometimes Joan<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span> would
+accompany Uncle John on his tramps abroad, and she would watch the
+wife's face as Uncle John brought all his persuasion to bear on the man;
+she would see it wake first to fear, and then to resentment. She was
+sorry for them; how could one altogether blame them if they cried, "Let
+the unmarried men go first." Yet once their man had gone, they fell back
+on odd reserves of pride and acquiescence. There was very little wailing
+done in the hundreds of small homes scattered all over England; with
+brave faces the women turned to their extra burden of work. Just as much
+as in the great ones of the land, "for England" burned across their
+hearts.</p>
+
+<p>Joan's life had settled down, but for the outside clamour of events,
+into very quiet routine. Her two years' life in London was melting away
+into a dream; only Dick and her love for Dick stood out with any
+intensity, and since Dick made no sign to her, held out no hand, she
+tried as much as possible to shut him from her thoughts. Aunt Janet had
+died in her sleep the night war was declared; she had never waked to
+consciousness. When the doctor, hastily fetched by Uncle John, had
+reached her room, she had been already dead&mdash;smiling a little, as if the
+last dream which had come to haunt her sleep had been a pleasant one.</p>
+
+<p>"Joy killed her," the nurse declared. Certainly she lay as if very
+content and untroubled.</p>
+
+<p>"I believe," Miss Abercrombie told Joan, "that she was only staying
+alive to see you. My dear, you must not blame yourself in any way; she
+is so much better out of it all."</p>
+
+<p>"No, I don't blame myself," Joan answered. "We had made friends before
+she died; there isn't a wall between us any longer."</p>
+
+<p>The villagers ransacked their gardens to send flowers to the funeral.
+Aunt Janet's grave was heaped up with them, but in a day or two they
+withered, and old Jim carried them away on his leaf heap. After that
+every week<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[Pg 232]</a></span> Joan took down just a handful and laid them where she
+thought the closed hands would be, and, because in so doing she seemed
+to draw a little closer to Aunt Janet, and through Aunt Janet to the
+great God beyond, her thoughts would turn into prayer as she stood by
+the grave. "Dear God, keep him always safe," she would whisper. Then
+like a formless flash of light the word "England" would steal across her
+prayer; she did not need to put the feeling into words; just like an
+offering she laid it before her thought of God and knew its meaning
+would be understood. So thousands of men and women pray, brought by a
+sense of their own helplessness in this great struggle near to the
+throne of God. And always the name of England whispers across their
+prayers.</p>
+
+<p>Just when the battle of the Marne was at its turning-point Dick got his
+orders to go. He was given under a week to get ready in, the unit, a
+field hospital, was to start on Saturday and the order came on Monday.
+One more day had to be put in at the recruiting depot; he could not
+leave them in the lurch; Tuesday he spent getting his kit together,
+Wednesday evening saw him down at Sevenoaks.</p>
+
+<p>As once before, Mabel was at the station to meet him. "It's come, then,"
+she said. "Tom is wild with envy. Age, you know, limits him to a
+volunteer home defence league."</p>
+
+<p>"Bad luck," answered Dick. "Of course I am very bucked to be really
+going, Mabel. It is not enlivening to sit and pass recruits all day
+long."</p>
+
+<p>"No," she agreed. "One wants to be up and doing. I hope I am not awfully
+disloyal or dreadfully selfish, but I cannot help being glad that my
+baby is a baby. Mother has knitted countless woollies for you"&mdash;she
+changed the subject abruptly; "it has added to poor Tom's discontent. He
+has to try on innumerable sleeping-helmets and wind-mufflers round his
+neck to see if they are long enough. Yesterday he talked rather
+dramatically of enlisting as a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span> stretcher-bearer and going, out with
+you, but they wouldn't have him, would they?"</p>
+
+<p>Dick laughed, but he could realize the bitterness of the other man's
+position when Tom spoke to him that night over their port wine.</p>
+
+<p>"Mabel is so pleased at keeping both her men under her wing," he
+confided, "that she doesn't at all realize how galling it is to be out
+of things. I would give most things, except Mabel and the boy, to be ten
+years younger."</p>
+
+<p>"Still, you have Mabel and the boy," Dick reminded him. "It comes
+awfully hard on the women having to give up their men."</p>
+
+<p>"That's beyond the point," Tom answered. "And bless you, don't you know
+the women are proud to do it?"</p>
+
+<p>"But pride doesn't mend a broken life," Dick tried to argue against his
+own conviction.</p>
+
+<p>Tom shook his head. "It helps somehow," he said. "Mabel was talking to
+some woman in the village yesterday, who has sent three sons to the war,
+and whose eldest, who is a married man and did not go, died last week.
+'I am almost ashamed of him, Mum,' the woman told Mabel; 'It is not as
+if he had been killed at the war.' Oh, well, what's the use of grousing;
+here I am, and here I stick; but if the Germans come over, I'll have a
+shot at them whatever regulations a grandmotherly Government may take
+for our protection. And you're all right, my lad, you are not leaving a
+woman behind you."</p>
+
+<p>That night, after he had gone up to his own room, the thought of Joan
+came to haunt Dick. For two months he had not let himself think of her;
+work and other interests had more or less crowded her out of his heart.
+But the sudden, though long expected, call to action brought him, so to
+speak, to the verge of his own feeling. Other things fell away; he was
+face to face once again with the knowledge that he loved her, and that
+one cannot even starve love to death. He wanted her, he needed her; what
+did other things, such as anger and hurt pride, count against<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a></span> that. He
+had only kissed her once in his life, and the sudden, passionate hunger
+for the touch of her lips shook his heart to a prompt knowledge of the
+truth. He must see her again before he left, for it might be that death
+would find him out there. War had seemed more of a game to begin with;
+that first evening when he had shouted with the others round Trafalgar
+Square he had not connected War with Death, but now it seemed as if they
+walked hand in hand. He could not die without first seeing Joan again.</p>
+
+<p>He thought of writing her a short note asking her to be in when he
+called, but the post from Jarvis Hall did not go out till after twelve;
+he could get to London quicker himself. After breakfast he told Mabel
+that he found he had to go away for the day.</p>
+
+<p>"Something you have forgotten&mdash;couldn't you write for it, Dick?" she
+asked. "It seems such a shame, because we shall only have one more day
+of you."</p>
+
+<p>"No," he answered; he did not lift his eyes to look at her. "As a matter
+of fact it is somebody that I must see."</p>
+
+<p>He had not written about or mentioned Joan since he had gone away from
+Sevenoaks last; Mabel had hoped the episode was forgotten. It came to
+her suddenly that it was Joan he was speaking of, and she remembered
+Fanny's long, breathless explanation and the girl's rather pathetic
+belief that she would do something to help. She could not, however, say
+anything to him before the others.</p>
+
+<p>"Will the eleven-thirty do for you?" Tom was asking. "Because I have got
+to take the car in then."</p>
+
+<p>"It seems a little unreasonable, Dick," Mrs. Grant put in. She had not
+been the best of friends with him since their violent scene together;
+her voice took on a querulous tone when she spoke to him. "Who can there
+be in London, that you suddenly find you must see?" She, too, for the
+moment, was thinking of the outrageous girl.</p>
+
+<p>"I am sorry," Dick answered. "It is my own fault for not having gone
+before. I'll try and get back to-morrow."</p>
+
+<p>Mabel caught him afterwards alone on his way out to the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span> garden to smoke
+a pipe. She slipped a hand through his arm and went with him.</p>
+
+<p>"Mother is upset," she confided. "I don't think she can be awfully well;
+just lately she cries very easily."</p>
+
+<p>"She always used to"&mdash;Dick's voice was not very sympathetic. "Do you
+remember how angry I was at the way she cried when father died?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," Mabel nodded. "All the same, she does love you, Dick; it is a
+funny sort of love, perhaps, but as she gets older it seems to me that
+she gets softer, less selfish. And, Dick, I think she feels&mdash;as indeed I
+do, too&mdash;that you have grown away from us. It is not the War, though
+that takes men from us women, too; it is more just as if we were out of
+sympathy with one another. Are we?"</p>
+
+<p>"What a funny thought." Dick smiled down at her. "There has never been,
+as you know, much sympathy between mother and myself. But for you,
+Mabel, things will always be the same between us. I trust you with
+everything I have."</p>
+
+<p>"And yet you aren't quite trusting me now," she answered. "You are going
+up to London to see this girl, aren't you, Dick?&mdash;and all this time you
+have never written or spoken to me about her."</p>
+
+<p>"I have been trying to forget," he confessed. "I thought, because of
+something she did to me, that I was strong enough to shut her outside my
+life. But last night the old battle began again in my mind, and I know
+that I must see her before I go out. It is more than probable, Mabel,
+that I shall not come back. I can't go out into the darkness without
+seeing her again."</p>
+
+<p>Mabel's hand tightened on his arm. "You mustn't say that, Dick," she
+whispered. "You have got to come back."</p>
+
+<p>They walked in silence and still Mabel debated the question in her mind.
+Should she stand out of events, and let them, shape themselves? If Dick
+went to London and found Joan gone, what would he do then? Perhaps<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[Pg 236]</a></span> he
+would not see Fanny and the landlady would not be able to tell him where
+Joan was. Wrotham would be the last place in which he would look for
+her, and on Saturday he was leaving for the front. It was only just for
+a second that her mind wavered; she had initially too straight a nature
+for deceit.</p>
+
+<p>"Dick," she said, coming to a standstill and looking up at him, "you
+needn't go to London. Miss Rutherford"&mdash;she hesitated on the
+word&mdash;"Joan, is back at Wrotham."</p>
+
+<p>"At Wrotham?" he repeated, staring at her.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," she answered, "Old Miss Rutherford died two months ago. They had
+sent for Joan; I believe she arrived the day her aunt died, and she has
+stayed there ever since. Once or twice I have met her out with Colonel
+Rutherford. No, wait"&mdash;she hurried on, once she had begun. "There is
+something else I must tell you. I went, you know, to see her in London,
+but I found that she had left. As I was coming away I met the other
+girl&mdash;I cannot remember her name, but she came here to tea&mdash;she insisted
+on my going back with her; she had something she wanted to tell me about
+Joan. It was a long, rather jumbled story, Dick; only two facts stand
+out of it. One was that the baby was never born; Joan was in some sort
+of accident when she first went back to London; and the other thing was
+that this girl wanted me to use my influence to persuade you that Joan
+really loved you; that what had angered you that night was all a
+mistake." She broke off short, and began again quickly. "I did not
+promise, Dick; in fact I told the girl I would do nothing to interfere.
+'If he can find his happiness anywhere else I shall be glad,' I said.
+And that is what I felt. I don't try and excuse myself; I never wanted
+you to marry her if you could forget her, and, Dick, I almost hoped you
+had&mdash;I was not going to remind you."</p>
+
+<p>"I see," said Dick. His pipe had gone out. He lit it again slowly and
+methodically. "Mabel," he said suddenly,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[Pg 237]</a></span> "if I can persuade Joan to
+marry me before I go out, will you be nice to her as my wife?"</p>
+
+<p>"You can't marry her, Dick," Mabel remonstrated, "there isn't time. But
+if you will trust me again beyond this, I promise to be as nice to her
+as you would like me to be."</p>
+
+<p>"But I can, and what's more, I will," Dick answered. "I've
+shilly-shallied long enough. If she'll have me, and it would serve me
+jolly well right if she turned me down&mdash;it shall be a special licence at
+a registry office on Saturday morning. My train doesn't leave till
+two-thirty." He stood up very tall and straight. Mabel thought she had
+never seen him look so glad to be alive. "And now," he added, "I am
+going straight across to ask her. Wish me luck, Mabel."</p>
+
+<p>She stood up, too, and put both her hands on his. "You aren't angry with
+me?" she whispered. "Dick, from the bottom of my heart, I do wish you
+luck, as you call it."</p>
+
+<p>"Angry? Lord bless you, no!" he said, and suddenly he bent and kissed
+her. "You've argued about it, Mabel, but then I always knew you would
+argue. I trust you to be good to her after I'm gone; what more can I
+say?"</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXX" id="CHAPTER_XXX"></a>CHAPTER XXX</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"But love is the great amulet which makes the World a Garden."</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 30em;"><span class="smcap"><b>Robert Louis Stevenson.</b></span></span>
+</p>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>Colonel Rutherford and Joan had had breakfast early that morning, for
+Uncle John was going to London to attend some big meeting, at which,
+much to his own secret gratification, he had been asked to speak. He
+rehearsed the greater part of what he was going to say to Joan during
+breakfast, and on their way down to the station. He had long ago
+forgiven, or forgotten, which was more probable still, Joan's exile from
+his good graces. After Aunt Janet's<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[Pg 238]</a></span> funeral, when Joan had spoken to
+him rather nervously, suggesting her return to London, he had stared at
+her with unfeigned astonishment.</p>
+
+<p>"Back to London," he had said, "whatever for?"</p>
+
+<p>"To get some more work to do," Joan suggested.</p>
+
+<p>His shaggy eyebrows drew together in a frown. "Preposterous notion," he
+answered. "I never did agree with it. So long as a girl has a home, what
+does she want to work for? Besides, now your aunt is not here, who is
+going to look after the house and things?"</p>
+
+<p>The question seemed unanswerable, and since he had apparently forgiven
+the past, why should she remind him? She realized, too, that he needed
+her. She wrote asking Fanny to send on her things, and settled down to
+try and fill her mind and heart, as much as possible, with the daily
+round of small duties which are involved in the keeping of a house.</p>
+
+<p>This morning on her way back from the station, having seen Uncle John
+into his train for London, she let fat Sally walk a lot of the way. The
+country seemed to be asleep; for miles all round she could see across
+field after field, not a creature moving, not a soul in sight, only a
+little dust round a bend of the road showed where a motor-car had just
+passed. It occurred to her that her life had been just like that; the
+quiet, seeming, non-existence of the country; a flashing past of life
+which left its cloud of dust behind, and then the quiet closing round
+her again.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 15em;">"The daily round, the common task,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 15.5em;">Shall furnish all we need to ask."</span><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>She hummed it under her breath.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 15em;">"Room to deny ourselves&mdash;"</span><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>Perhaps that was the lesson that she had needed to learn, for in the old
+days her watchword had been:</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 15em;">"Room to fulfil myself."</span><br />
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[Pg 239]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>If it was not for Uncle John now she would have liked to have gone back
+to London and thrown herself into some sort of work. Women would be
+needed before long, the papers said, to do the work of the men who must
+be sent to the firing-line. But Uncle John was surely the work to her
+hand; she would do it with what heart she had, even though the long
+hours of sewing or knitting gave her too much time to think.</p>
+
+<p>Sally having been handed over to the stable-boy, Joan betook herself
+into the dining-room. Thursday was the day on which the flowers were
+done; Mary had already spread the table with newspaper, and collected
+the vases from all over the house. They had been cleaned and fresh water
+put in them; she was allowed to do as little work as possible, but the
+empty flower-basket and the scissors stood waiting at her hand. The
+gardener would really have preferred to have done the flower-cutting
+himself, but Aunt Janet had always insisted upon doing it, and Joan
+carried on the custom. There were only a few late roses left, but she
+gathered an armful of big white daisies.</p>
+
+<p>As she came back from the hall Joan saw Dick waiting for her. The maid
+had let him in and gone to find "Miss Joan." Strangely enough the first
+thought that came into her mind was not a memory of the last time that
+they had met or a wonder as to why he was here; she could see that he
+was in khaki, and to her it meant only one thing. He was going to the
+front, he had come to say good-bye to her before he went. All the colour
+left her face, she stared at him, the basket swinging on her arm, the
+daisies clutched against her black dress.</p>
+
+<p>"Joan," Dick said quickly; he came towards her. "Joan, didn't the maid
+find you, didn't they tell you I was here? What's the matter, dear; why
+are you frightened?"</p>
+
+<p>He took the flowers and the basket from her and laid<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[Pg 240]</a></span> them down on the
+hall table. Mary coming back at the moment, saw them standing hand in
+hand, and ran to the kitchen to tell the others that Miss Joan's young
+man had come at last.</p>
+
+<p>"Isn't there somewhere you can take me where we can talk?" Dick was
+saying. "I have such an awful lot to say to you."</p>
+
+<p>"You have come to say good-bye," Joan answered. She looked up at him,
+her lips quivered a little. "You are going out there."</p>
+
+<p>Then he knew why she had been afraid, and behind his pity he was glad.</p>
+
+<p>"Joan," he whispered again, and quite simply she drew closer to him and
+laid her cheek against his coat, "does it really matter to you, dear?"</p>
+
+<p>His arms were round her, yet they did not hold her as tightly as she
+clung to him. "Must you go?" she said breathlessly. "There are such
+hundreds of others; must you go?"</p>
+
+<p>Dick could not find any words to put the great beating of his heart
+into, so he just held her close and laid his lips, against her hair.</p>
+
+<p>"Take me into that little room where I first saw you," he said
+presently. "I have remembered it often, Joan; I have always wanted to
+come back to it, and have you explain things to me there."</p>
+
+<p>She drew a little away and looked up at him. "What you thought of me the
+other night"&mdash;she spoke of it is yesterday, the months in between had
+slipped awry&mdash;"wasn't true, Dick. I&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>He drew her to him quickly again, and this time he kissed her lips.
+"Let's forget it," he said softly. "I have only got to-day and
+to-morrow, I don't want to remember what a self-satisfied prig I was."</p>
+
+<p>"Is it to be as soon as that?" she asked. "And I shall only have had you
+for so short a time."</p>
+
+<p>"It is a short time," Dick assented. "But I am going<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[Pg 241]</a></span> to make the best
+of it; you wait till you have heard my plans."</p>
+
+<p>He laughed at her because she pointed out that the flowers could not be
+left to die, but he helped her to arrange them in the tall, clean vases.
+They won back to a brief, almost childish, happiness over the work, but
+when the last vase had been finished and carried back to its proper
+place, he caught hold of her hands again.</p>
+
+<p>"Now," he said, "let's talk real hard, honest sense; but first, where's
+my room?"</p>
+
+<p>She led him silently to the little room behind the drawing-room. She had
+taken it over again since her return; the pictures she liked best were
+on the walls, her books lay about on the table. The same armchair stood
+by the window; he could almost see her as he had seen her that first
+morning, her great brown eyes, wakened to newfound fear, staring into
+the garden.</p>
+
+<p>"You shall sit here," he said, leading her to the chair. It rather
+worried him to see the dumb misery in her eyes. "And I shall sit down on
+the floor at your feet. I can hold your hands and I can see your face,
+and your whole adorable self is near to me, that's what my heart has
+been hungering for. Now&mdash;will you marry me the day after to-morrow,
+before I go?"</p>
+
+<p>"Dick," she said quickly; she was speaking out of the pain in her heart,
+"why do you ask me? Why have you come back? Haven't you been fighting
+against it all this time because you knew that I&mdash;because some part of
+you doesn't want to marry me?"</p>
+
+<p>His eyes never wavered from hers, but he lifted the hands he held to his
+lips and kissed them. "When I saw you again in that theatre in
+Sevenoaks," he said, "it is perfectly true, one side of me argued with
+the other. When I came to your rooms and found that other man there,
+green jealousy just made me blind, and pride&mdash;which was distinctly
+jarred, Joan"&mdash;he tried to wake an<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[Pg 242]</a></span> answering smile in her eyes&mdash;"kept
+me away all this time."</p>
+
+<p>"Then why have you come back?" she repeated.</p>
+
+<p>"Because I love you," he answered. "It is a very hackneyed word, dear,
+but it means a lot."</p>
+
+<p>"But it doesn't always stay&mdash;love," she said. "Supposing if afterwards
+those thoughts came back to worry you. What would it mean to me if I saw
+them in your eyes?"</p>
+
+<p>"There isn't any reason why they should. Listen, dear"&mdash;he let go her
+hands and sat up very straight. "Let's go over it carefully and
+sensibly, and lay this bugbear of pain once and for all. Before you knew
+me or I knew you, you loved somebody else. Perhaps you only thought you
+loved him; anyway, I hope so; I am jealous enough of him as it is. Dear,
+I don't ask you to explain why you gave yourself to this man, whether it
+was impulse, or ignorance, or curiosity. So many things go to make up
+our lives; it is only to ourselves that we are really accountable. After
+to-day we won't dig over the past again. At the time it did not prevent
+me falling in love with you; for two years I thought about you
+sometimes, dreamed of you often. I made love to a good many other women
+in between; don't think that I show up radiantly white in comparison to
+you; but I loved just you all the time. I saw you in London once, the
+day after I landed, and I made up my mind then to find out where you
+lived, and to try and persuade you to marry me."</p>
+
+<p>He waited a minute or two; his eyes had gone out to the garden; he could
+see the tall daisies of which Joan had carried an armful waving against
+the dark wall behind them. Then he looked back at her very frankly.</p>
+
+<p>"It is no use trying to pretend," he said, "that I was not shocked when
+I first saw you dancing. You see, we men have got into a habit of
+dividing women into two classes, and you had suddenly, so it seemed to
+me, got<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[Pg 243]</a></span> into the wrong one. Dear little girl, I don't want to hurt
+you"&mdash;he put his hand on her knee and drew a little closer, so that she
+could feel him leaning against her. "I am just telling you all the
+stupid thoughts that were in me, so that you can at last understand that
+I love you. It only took me half a night to realize the mistake I had
+made, and then I set about&mdash;you may have noticed it&mdash;to make you love
+me. When I came up to London I had made up my mind that you did love me;
+I was walking as it were on air. It was a very nasty shock that
+afternoon in your room, Joan; I went away from it feeling as if the end
+of the world had come."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I know, I know," she said quickly. "And I had meant it to hurt you.
+I wanted to shake you out of what I thought was only a dream. I had not
+the courage to tell you, and yet, that is not quite true. I was afraid
+if I told you, and if you saw that I loved you at the same time, you
+would not let it make any difference. I did not want you to spoil your
+life, Dick."</p>
+
+<p>"You dear girl!" he answered. "On Monday," he went on slowly, "I got my
+orders for France. They are what I had been wanting and hoping for ever
+since the War started, and yet, till they came, funnily enough, I never
+realized what they meant. It seems strange to talk of death, or even to
+think of it, when one is young and so horribly full of life as I am&mdash;yet
+somehow this brings it near to me. It is not a question of facing it
+with the courage of which the papers write such a lot; the truth is,
+that one looks at it just for a moment, and then ordinary things push it
+aside. Next to death, Joan, there is only one big thing in the world,
+and that is Love. I had to see you again before I went; I had to find
+out if you loved me. I wanted to hold you, so that the feel of you
+should go with me in my dreams; to kiss you, so that the touch of your
+lips should stay on mine, even if death did put a cold hand across them.
+He is not going to"&mdash;he laughed suddenly and stood up, drawing her into
+his arms&mdash;"your<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[Pg 244]</a></span> face shall go before me, dear, and in the end I shall
+come home to you."</p>
+
+<p>"What can I say?" Joan whispered, "You know I love you. Take me then,
+Dick, and do as you wish with me."</p>
+
+<p>They talked over the problem of his people and her people after they had
+won back to a certain degree of sense, and Dick told Joan of how Mabel
+had wished him luck just as he started out.</p>
+
+<p>"You are going to be great friends," he said, "and Mother will come
+round too, she always does."</p>
+
+<p>"I am less afraid of your Mother than I am of Mabel," Joan confessed. "I
+don't believe Mabel will ever like me."</p>
+
+<p>Dick stayed to lunch and waited on afterwards to see Colonel Rutherford.
+He had extracted a promise from Joan to marry him on Saturday by special
+licence. He would have to go up to town to see about it himself the next
+day; he wanted to leave everything arranged and settled for her first.
+He and Joan walked down to the woods after lunch, and Joan tried to tell
+him of her first year in London, and of some of the motives that had
+driven her. He listened in silence; he was conscious more of jealousy
+than anything else; he was glad when she passed on to talk of her later
+struggles in London; of Shamrock House, of Rose Brent and Fanny.</p>
+
+<p>"And that man I met at your place," he asked. "You did not even think
+you loved him, did you, Joan?"</p>
+
+<p>"No," she answered quickly, "never, Dick, and he had never been to my
+room before. He just pretended he had been to annoy you because I
+suppose he saw it would hurt me."</p>
+
+<p>Colonel Rutherford arrived for tea very tired, but jubilant at the
+success of the meeting, which had brought in a hundred recruits. He did
+not remember anything about Dick, but was delighted to see him because
+he was in uniform. The news of the other's early departure to the front
+filled Colonel Rutherford with envy.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[Pg 245]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"What wouldn't I give to be your age, young man," he grunted.</p>
+
+<p>Joan slipped away and left them after tea, and it was then that Dick
+broached the subject of their marriage.</p>
+
+<p>"I have loved her for two years," he said simply, "and I have persuaded
+her to marry me before I leave on Saturday. There is no reason why I
+should not marry, and if I die she will get my small amount of money,
+and a pension."</p>
+
+<p>Colonel Rutherford went rather an uncomfortable shade of red. "You said
+just now," he said, "that you were the doctor here two years ago. Did
+you know my niece in those days?"</p>
+
+<p>"I only saw her once," Dick admitted. "I was called in professionally,
+but I loved her from the moment I saw her, sir."</p>
+
+<p>"God bless my soul!" murmured Colonel Rutherford. A faint fragrance from
+his own romance seemed to come to him from out the past. "Then you know
+all about what I was considering it would be my painful duty to tell
+you."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," Dick answered, "I know."</p>
+
+<p>The other man came suddenly to him and held out his hand. "I don't know
+you," he said, "but I like you. We were very hard on Joan two years ago;
+I have often thought of it since; I should like to see a little
+happiness come into her life and I believe you will be able to give it
+her. I am glad."</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you," Dick said. They shook hands quite gravely as men will.
+"Then I may marry her on Saturday?"</p>
+
+<p>"Why, certainly, boy," the other answered; "And she shall live with me
+till you come back."</p>
+
+<p>"You are very lucky, Joan," he said to his niece after Dick had gone
+away. "He is an extremely nice chap, that. I hope you realize how lucky
+you are."</p>
+
+<p>Joan did not answer him in so many words. She just kissed him good-night
+and ran out of the room. To-night<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[Pg 246]</a></span> of all nights she needed Aunt Janet;
+she threw a shawl round her shoulders presently and stole out. The
+cemetery lay just across the road, she could slip into it without
+attracting any attention. This time she brought no gift of flowers, only
+she knelt by the grave, and whispered her happiness in the prayer she
+prayed.</p>
+
+<p>"God keep him always, and bring him back to me."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXI" id="CHAPTER_XXXI"></a>CHAPTER XXXI</h2>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"God gave us grace to love you<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Men whom our hearts hold dear;<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;We too have faced the battle<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Striving to hide our fear.</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"God gave us strength to send you,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Courage to let you go;<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;All that it meant to lose you<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Only our sad hearts know.</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<table summary="chap_poem">
+<tr><td class="tdl"><b>"Yet by your very manhood<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Hold we your honour fast.<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;God shall give joy to England<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;When you come home at last."</b></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+
+
+<p>Not till she felt Mabel's soft warm lips on her cheek and knew herself
+held in the other's arms, did Joan wake to the fact that the marriage
+was finished and that she was Dick's wife. All the morning she had moved
+and answered questions and smiled, when other people smiled, in a sort
+of trance, out of which she was afraid to waken. The only fact that
+stood out very clear was that Dick was going away in the afternoon;
+every time she saw a clock it showed that the afternoon was so many
+minutes nearer.</p>
+
+<p>"You have got to help me to be brave," she had said to Dick the night
+before. "Other women let their men go, and make no outward fuss. I don't
+want to be different to them."</p>
+
+<p>"And you won't be," he had answered, kissing her.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[Pg 247]</a></span>
+"If you feel like crying, just look at me, and as your lord and master,
+I'll frown at you to show that I don't approve."</p>
+
+<p>He himself was in the wildest, most hilarious of spirits. As he had said
+to Joan, the thought of death had only touched upon his mind for a
+second; now the mere idea of it seemed ridiculous. He was going out to
+help in a great fight, and he was going to marry Joan. She would be
+waiting for him when he came back; what could a man want more?</p>
+
+<p>The Rutherfords came up on Friday to spend the night before the wedding
+in town, and in the evening Joan and Dick went to a theatre. It was,
+needless to say, his idea, but he did it with a notion that it would
+cheer Joan up. If you want to know real misery, sit through a musical
+comedy with someone you love more than the whole world next to you, and
+with the knowledge that he is going to the War the next day in your
+heart. Joan thought of it every moment. When the curtain was up and the
+audience in darkness, Dick would slip his hand into hers and hold it,
+but his eyes followed the events on the stage, and he could laugh quite
+cheerfully at the funny man's antics. Joan never even looked at them;
+she sat with her eyes on Dick, just watching him all the time. When they
+had driven back to the hotel at which the Rutherfords were staying, and
+in the taxi Dick had taken her into his arms and rather fiercely made
+her swear that she loved him, that she was glad to be marrying him, some
+shadow from her anguish had touched on him, it seemed he could not let
+her go. "Damn to-morrow!" he said hoarsely, and held her so close that
+the pressure hurt, yet she was glad of the pain as it came from him.</p>
+
+<p>She could not ask him into the hotel, for they had no private
+sitting-room, so they said good-night to each other on the steps, with
+the taxi driver and the hotel porter watching them.</p>
+
+<p>"To-morrow, then, at twelve," Dick had whispered.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[Pg 248]</a></span>
+"But I am going to bring Mabel round before then; she gets up at about
+eleven, I think."</p>
+
+<p>"To-morrow," Joan answered; her eyes would not let him go.</p>
+
+<p>They stood staring at each other for a minute or two while the taxi-cab
+driver busied himself with the engine of his car, and the hall porter
+walked discreetly out of sight. Then Dick lifted his hand quickly to the
+salute and turned away.</p>
+
+<p>"Drive like hell!" he said to the man. "Anywhere you please, but end me
+up at the Junior Conservative Club."</p>
+
+<p>"Couldn't even kiss her," communed the man to himself. "That's the worst
+of being a toff. Can't kiss your girl if anyone else happens to be
+about."</p>
+
+<p>Mabel had been very nice to Joan the next morning. She had buried all
+thoughts of jealousy and dismay, and when she looked into the other
+girl's eyes she forgave her everything and was only intensely sorry for
+her. Mrs. Grant had, very fortunately, as Dick said, stuck to her
+opinion and refused to have anything to do with the wedding. She had
+said good-bye to Dick on Friday morning with a wild outburst of tears,
+but he could not really feel that it meant very much to her.</p>
+
+<p>"Mother will have forgotten in a week that she disapproved," Mabel told
+Joan. "You must very often come and spend the day with us."</p>
+
+<p>Then they had driven down to the registry office, all four of them, and
+in a dark, rather dingy little room, a man with a curiously irritating
+voice had read aloud something to them from a book. Now they stood
+outside in the sunshine again, Mabel had kissed Joan, and Uncle John was
+blinking at her out of old eyes that showed a suspicion of tears in
+them. A big clock opposite told her the time was a quarter to one; in an
+hour and three-quarters Dick would be gone.</p>
+
+<p>They had lunch in a little private room at a restaurant close to
+Victoria Station. Joan tried to eat, and tried to laugh and talk with
+the others, because Mabel had whis<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[Pg 249]</a></span>pered to her on the way in: "You've
+got to help Dick through the next hour, it isn't going to be easy for
+him." And that had made Joan look at him with new eyes, and she could
+see that his face was very white, and that he seemed almost afraid to
+look at her.</p>
+
+<p>After lunch Mabel and Colonel Rutherford went on ahead and left the two
+young people to say their good-bye alone. When they had gone Dick pushed
+the things in front of him on the table aside, and laid his head down on
+his hands. "My God!" she heard him say, "I wish I had not got to go."</p>
+
+<p>He had been so pleased before, so excited over his different
+preparations, so wildly keen to be really on the move at last. Joan ran
+to him quickly; kneeling on the floor by his side, throwing her arms
+around him. Her own fears were forgotten in her desire to make him brave
+again.</p>
+
+<p>"It won't be for long, Dick," she whispered. "I know something right
+inside my heart tells me that you will come back. It is only like
+putting aside our happiness for a little. Dear, you would be wretched if
+you could not go. Just having me would not make up to you for that."</p>
+
+<p>He turned and caught her to him quickly. "If I had had you," he said
+harshly, "it would be different. It would make going so much easier."</p>
+
+<p>"You will come back," she answered softly. Her eyes held his, their
+hearts beat close and fast against each other.</p>
+
+<p>"It seems," he said a minute or two later, "that it is you who are
+helping me not to make a fuss, and not the other way about as we
+arranged." He stood up, slowly lifting her with him. "It is time we were
+off, Joan," he said. "And upon my soul, I need some courage, little
+girl. What can you do for me?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, if I cry," suggested Joan, her head a little on one side&mdash;she
+must be cheerful, she realized; it was funny, but in this she could be
+stronger than he, and she must be for his sake&mdash;"I am sure you would get
+so annoyed that the rest would be forgotten."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[Pg 250]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"If I see you cry," he threatened, "I shall get out even after the train
+has started, and that will mean all sorts of slurs on my reputation."</p>
+
+<p>They walked across to Victoria Station and came in at once to a scene of
+indescribable noise and confusion. Besides Dick's unit there was a
+regiment going. The men stood lined up in the big square yard of the
+station. Some had women with them, wives and mothers and sweethearts;
+children clung to the women's skirts, unnoticed and frightened into
+quietness by the sight and sound of their mothers' grief. Railway
+officials, looking very important and frightfully overworked, ran in and
+out of the crowd. The train was standing at the platform, part of it
+already full, nearly every window had its little group of anxious-faced
+women, trying to say good-bye to their respective relatives in the
+carriage.</p>
+
+<p>Dick and Joan walked the length of the train, and found that Dick's man
+had stowed away his things and reserved a place for his master in one of
+the front carriages. Then Colonel Rutherford and Mabel joined them and
+they all talked, trying to keep up an animated conversation as to the
+weather; would the Channel crossing be very rough; what chance was there
+of his going to Boulogne instead of to Havre; Joan stood close to Dick,
+just touching him; there was something rather pathetic in the way she
+did not attempt to close her hand upon the roughness of his coat, but
+was content to feel it brushing against her. The regimental band had
+struck up "Tipperary"; the men were being marshalled to take their
+places in the train. Joan wondered if the band played so loud and so
+persistently to drown the noise of the women's crying. One young wife
+had hysterics, and had to be carried away screaming. They saw the
+husband, he had fallen out of the ranks to try and hold the girl when
+the crying first began, now he stood and stared after her as they
+carried her away. Quite a boy, very white about the face, and with
+misery in his eyes. Joan felt a wave of resentment against the woman;
+she<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[Pg 251]</a></span> had no right, because she loved him, to make his going so much the
+harder to bear.</p>
+
+<p>A porter ran along the platform calling out, "Take your seats, please,
+take your seats." Uncle John was shaking hands and saying good-bye to
+Dick, "I'll look after her for you," Joan heard him say. Then Mabel
+moved between them for a second, and pulling down Dick's head, kissed
+him. After that, it seemed, she was left alone with Dick; Colonel
+Rutherford and Mabel had gone away. How desperately her hand for the
+second clutched on to the piece of his coat that was near to her! She
+could not let him go, could not, could not. The engine whistle emitted a
+long thin squeak, the soldiers at the back of the train had started
+singing the refrain of "Tipperary." Just for a second his arms were
+round her, his lips had brushed against hers. That was all it amounted
+to, but she had looked up at him and she had seen the need in his eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"Good-bye," she whispered. There was not a vestige of tears or fright in
+her voice. "You will be back soon, Dick. It is never good-bye."</p>
+
+<p>"No," he agreed. "Never good-bye."</p>
+
+<p>Then he had gone; not a minute too soon, for the train had already
+started. She could not even see his face at the window, a great
+blackness had come over her eyes, but she stood very straight held,
+waving and smiling.</p>
+
+<p>A crowd of the soldiers' wives ran past her up the platform, trying to
+catch on to the hands held out to them from the windows. The men cheered
+and sang and sang again. It could only have been one or two seconds that
+she stood there, then slowly the blackness lifted from her eyes. A word
+had risen in her heart, she said it almost aloud; the sound of it pushed
+aside her tears and brought her a strange comfort. "England." It was the
+name that had floated at the back of her prayers always when she prayed
+for Dick. She was glad that he had gone, even the misery in her heart
+could not flood out that gladness: "Who dies, if England lives?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[Pg 252]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Mabel was standing near her and slipped her hand into hers. "Come away,
+dear," she heard Mabel say; "Colonel Rutherford has got a taxi for us."</p>
+
+<p>Joan was grateful to Mabel. She realized suddenly that the other woman,
+who had also loved Dick, had been content to stand aside at the last and
+leave them alone. She turned to her like a child turns for comfort to
+someone whom instinctively it knows it can trust.</p>
+
+<p>"I have been good," she said, "haven't I? I haven't shed a tear. Dick
+said I wasn't to, and, Mabel, you know, I am glad that he has gone.
+There are some things that matter more than just loving a person, aren't
+there?"</p>
+
+<p>"Honour, and duty, and the soul of man," Mabel answered. She laughed, a
+little strange sound that held tears within it. "Oh, yes, Joan, you are
+right to be glad that he has gone. It will make the future so much more
+worth having."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," Joan whispered. Her eyes looked out over the crowded station; the
+little groups of weeping women; the sadder faces of those who did not
+weep and yet were hopeless. Her own eyes were full of great faith and a
+radiant promise. "He will come back, I know he will come back," she
+said.</p>
+
+<p>Outside the band played ceaselessly and untiringly to drown the sound of
+the women's tears:</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 15em;">"It's a long way to Tipperary,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 16.5em;">It's a long way to go;</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 15.5em;">It's a long way to Tipperary</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 16.5em;">To the dearest girl I know.</span><br />
+<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 15em;">"Farewell, Piccadilly, farewell, Leicester Square,</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 15.5em;">It's a long, long way to Tipperary</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 15.5em;">But my heart's right there."</span><br />
+</p>
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+
+<h4>
+THE END
+</h4>
+
+<p><br /></p>
+<h4><i>Printed at The Chapel River Press, Kingston, Surrey.</i></h4>
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+
+<div class="transnote">
+<h3><a name="tnotes" id="tnotes"></a>
+Transcriber's note</h3>
+<p>Minor punctuation errors have been corrected without notice. The
+following words were spelled in two different ways and were not changed:<br /></p>
+
+<p>
+arm-chair, armchair<br />
+ball-room, ballroom<br />
+over-worked, overworked</p>
+
+<p>A few obvious typographical errors have been corrected and are listed
+below.</p>
+
+<p>Page 11: "older women were belating" changed to "older women were
+<a name="cn1" id="cn1"></a><a href="#corr1">debating</a>".</p>
+
+<p>Page 22: "settled the had sat" changed to "settled
+<a name="cn2" id="cn2"></a><a href="#corr2">she</a>
+had sat".</p>
+
+<p>Page 32: "at firs thought was love" changed to "at
+<a name="cn3" id="cn3"></a><a href="#corr3">first</a>
+thought was love".</p>
+
+<p>Page 51: "must be ome explanation" changed to "must be
+<a name="cn4" id="cn4"></a><a href="#corr4">some</a> explanation".</p>
+
+<p>Page 53: "ushered in M Jarr.vis" changed to "ushered in
+<a name="cn5" id="cn5"></a><a href="#corr5">Mr. Jarvis</a>".
+</p>
+
+<p>Page 59: "talking to each other in whsipers" changed to "talking to each
+other in
+<a name="cn6" id="cn6"></a><a href="#corr6">whispers"</a></p>
+
+<p>Page 81: "Half-olay out," changed to "
+<a name="cn7" id="cn7"></a><a href="#corr7">Half-way</a> out,".</p>
+
+<p>Page 107: "the crowded steeets" changed to "the crowded
+<a name="cn8" id="cn8"></a><a href="#corr8">streets</a>".</p>
+
+<p>Page 140: "ladies to go ground" changed to "ladies to go
+<a name="cn9" id="cn9"></a><a href="#corr9">around</a>".</p>
+
+<p>Page 151: "found her downstars" changed to "found her
+<a name="cn10" id="cn10"></a><a href="#corr10">downstairs</a>".</p>
+
+<p>Page 162: "s not to be believed" changed to "
+<a name="cn11" id="cn11"></a><a href="#corr11">was</a>
+not to be believed".</p>
+</div>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of To Love, by Margaret Peterson
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of To Love, by Margaret Peterson
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: To Love
+
+Author: Margaret Peterson
+
+Release Date: September 3, 2008 [EBook #26519]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TO LOVE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by David Clarke, Carla Foust and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber's note
+
+
+Minor punctuation errors have been corrected without notice. Several
+words were spelled in two different ways and not corrected; they
+are listed at the end of this book. A few obvious typographical errors
+have been corrected, and they are also listed at the end.
+
+
+
+"_To Love_"
+
+    "_To love is the great amulet which makes
+              the world a garden._"
+
+                                             _R. L. STEVENSON_
+
+"_TO LOVE_"
+
+_By Margaret Peterson : Author of_
+
+"_The Lure of the Little Drum," "Tony Bellew," etc._
+
+_LONDON: HURST AND BLACKETT, LTD.
+PATERNOSTER HOUSE, E.C. :: :: 1917_
+
+"TO LOVE"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+    "Oh, but the door that waits a friend
+       Swings open to the day.
+     There stood no warder at my gate
+       To bid love stand or stay."
+
+
+"You don't believe in marriage, and I can't afford to marry"--Gilbert
+Stanning laughed, but the sound was not very mirthful and his eyes, as
+he glanced at his companion, were uneasy and not quite honest. "We are
+the right sort of people to drift together, aren't we, Joan?" His hands
+as he spoke were restless, fidgeting with a piece of string which he
+tied and untied repeatedly.
+
+Joan Rutherford sat very straight in her chair, her eyes looking out in
+front of her. His words had called just the faintest tinge of colour to
+her cheeks. It was not exactly a beautiful face, but it was above
+everything else lovable and appealing. Joan was twenty-three, yet she
+looked still a child; the lines of her face were all a little
+indefinite, except the obstinacy of her chin and the frankness of her
+eyes. Her one claim to beauty, indeed, lay in those eyes; wide,
+innocent, unfathomable, sometimes green, sometimes brown flecked with
+gold. They seemed to hint at tragedy, yet they were far more often
+laughter-filled than anything else. For the rest, Joan was an ordinary
+independent young lady of the twentieth century who had lived in London
+"on her own" for six months.
+
+How her independence had come about is a complicated story. It had not
+been with the approval of her people; the only people she possessed
+being an old uncle and aunt who lived in the country. All Joan's nearer
+relations were dead; had died when she was still a child; Uncle John and
+Aunt Janet had seen to her bringing up. But at twenty-two and a-half
+Joan had suddenly rebelled against the quiet monotony of their home
+life. She had broken it to them gently at first, with an obstinate
+resolve to get her own way at the back of her mind; in the end, as is
+usually the case when youth pits itself against age, she had won the
+day. Uncle John had agreed to a small but adequate allowance, Aunt Janet
+had wept a few rather bitter tears in private, and Joan had come to
+London to train as a secretary, according to herself. They had taken
+rooms for her in the house of a lady Aunt Janet had known in girlhood,
+and there Joan had dutifully remained. It was not very lively, but she
+had a sense of gratitude in her heart towards Aunt Janet which prevented
+her from moving. Joan was not thinking of all this as she sat there, nor
+was she exactly seeing the sweep of grass that spread out in front of
+them, nor the flowering shrubs on every side. Hyde Park was ablaze with
+flowers on this hot summer's day and in addition a whole bed of
+heliotrope was in bloom just behind their chairs. The faint sweet scent
+of the flowers mixed with Joan's thoughts and brought a quick vision of
+Aunt Janet. But more deeply still her mind was struggling with a desire
+to know what exactly it was that swayed her when Gilbert Stanning spoke
+to her, or when--as more often than not--he in some way or other
+contrived to touch her. She had met him first at a dance that she had
+been taken to by another girl and she had known him now about four
+months. It was strange and a little disturbing the tumult his eyes waked
+in her heart. The first time he had kissed her, one evening when they
+had been driving home from the theatre in a taxi, she had turned and
+clung to him, because suddenly it had seemed as if the whole world was
+sweeping away from her. Gilbert had taken the action to mean that she
+loved him; he had never wavered from that belief since. He possessed
+every spare minute of her days, he kissed her whenever he could, and
+Joan never objected. Only oddly, at moments such as this, her mind would
+suddenly push forward the terse argument:
+
+"Do you love him, or is it just the little animal in you that likes all
+he has to give?"
+
+Joan was often greatly disturbed about what she called the beast side of
+her. During her year in London, under the guidance of another girl far
+older and wiser than herself, she had plunged recklessly into all sorts
+of knowledge, gleaned mostly from books such as Aunt Janet and even
+Uncle John had never heard of, far less read. So Joan knew that there is
+a beast side to all human nature, and she was for ever pausing to probe
+this or that sensation down to its root. Her books had taught her other
+theories too, and very young, very impetuous by nature, Joan rushed to a
+full acceptance of the facts over which older women were debating. The
+sanctity of marriage, for instance, was a myth invented by man because
+he wished to keep women enslaved. Free love was the only beautiful
+relationship that could exist between the sexes. Frankness and free
+speech between men and women was another rule Joan asserted, in
+pursuance of which she had long since threshed out the complicated
+question of marriage with Gilbert. It was all rather childish and silly,
+yet pathetic beyond the scope of tears, if you looked into Joan's sunlit
+eyes and caught the play of dimples round her mouth. Rather as if you
+were to come suddenly upon a child playing with a live shell.
+
+What Gilbert Stanning thought of it all is another matter; Joan with all
+her book-learned wisdom had not fathomed his character. He was a man
+about thirty-two, good-looking, indolent and selfish. He had just enough
+money to be intensely comfortable, provided he spent it all on himself,
+and Gilbert certainly succeeded in being comfortable. There had been a
+good many women in Gilbert's life of one kind and another, but he had
+never known anyone like Joan before. At times her startling mixture of
+knowledge and innocence amazed him, and she had fascinated him from the
+first. He was a man easily fascinated by the little feminine things in a
+woman. The way Joan's hair grew in curls at the nape of her neck
+fascinated him, the soft red of her mouth, the way the lashes lay like a
+spread-out fan on her cheeks and the quick changing lights and colours
+in those eyes themselves. With Gilbert, when he wanted a thing he
+generally got it, by fair means or foul; for the moment he wanted Joan
+passionately, almost insanely. But the way in which she made the path
+easy for his desire sometimes startled him; he could not make up his
+mind whether she was playing some very deep game at his expense or
+whether she really loved him to the exclusion of all caution.
+
+It was this problem which he had been more or less trying to solve this
+afternoon. At Joan's continued silence he leaned forward and put his
+hand over hers where they lay on her lap.
+
+"What are you dreaming of, little girl?" he asked.
+
+The odd flutter which his touch always caused was shaking Joan's heart;
+she tried, however, to face him indifferently, summoning up a smile.
+
+"I was thinking," she corrected, "not dreaming."
+
+"Well, the thoughts, then," asked the man, his fingers moved caressingly
+up and down her hand, "what were they?"
+
+"I was thinking," began Joan slowly; her eyes fell from his and she
+stirred restlessly. "What did you mean just now when you spoke about
+drifting together?" she asked.
+
+"Little Miss Pretence," he whispered, "as if you didn't know what I
+meant. If I were well off," he said suddenly (perhaps for the moment he
+really meant it), "I would make you marry me whether you had new ideas
+about it or not."
+
+"Being well off wouldn't have anything to do with it," Joan answered,
+"it is more degrading to marry for money than anything else."
+
+"Sometimes I believe you think that we are degrading altogether," the
+man said; he watched the colour creep into her face, "God knows we are
+not much to boast of, and that is the truth."
+
+Joan struggled with the problem in her mind. "There ought not to be
+anything degrading about love," she said finally, and this time it was
+his eyes that fell away from hers.
+
+For a little they sat silent, Joan, for some reason known only to
+herself, fighting against a strong inclination to cry. Gilbert had taken
+away his hands, he sat back in his chair, his feet thrust out, head
+down, eyes glooming at the dust. Joan stole a glance at him and felt a
+sudden intense admiration for the beauty of his clean-cut profile, his
+sleek, well-groomed head. Instinctively she put out a timid hand and
+touched him.
+
+"Are you angry with me about something?" she asked.
+
+It may have been that during that pause Gilbert had been forming a good
+resolution with all that was best in him to keep from spoiling this
+girl's life. Her eyes perhaps had touched on some slumbering chord of
+conscience. Her movement though, the little whispered words, drove all
+thoughts except the ones which centred round his desire from his mind.
+
+"Joan," he said quickly, his hands caught at hers again, "let us stop
+playing this game of make-believe. Let us face the future one way or
+another. I love you, I want you. If you love me, come to me, dear, as
+you say there can be nothing degrading in love. Let us live our lives
+together in the new best way."
+
+It was all clap-trap nonsense and he did not believe a word of it, but
+the force of his passion was unmistakable. It frightened and held Joan.
+
+"You mean----" she whispered.
+
+"I mean that I want you to come and live at my place," he answered. "I
+have a decent little flat, as you know. That is not living on my money,
+O proud and haughty one"--he was so sure of his victory that he could
+afford to laugh--"you shall buy your own food if you like. And you shall
+be free, as free as you are now, and--I, Joan," his voice thrilled
+through her, "I shall love you and love you and love you till you waken
+to see the world in quite a new light. Joan!"
+
+His face was very close against hers, the scent of the heliotrope had
+grown on the sudden stronger and more piercingly sweet, perhaps because
+the sun had vanished behind the distant line of trees and a little
+breeze from the oncoming night was blowing across the flower-beds
+towards them. The quick-gathering twilight seemed to be shutting them
+in; people passed along the path, young sweethearting couples too happy
+in each other to notice anyone else. The tumult in Joan's mind died down
+and grew very still, a sense of well-being and content invaded her
+heart.
+
+"Yes"--she spoke the word so softly he hardly heard--"I'll come,
+Gilbert." Then she threw back her head a little and laughed, gay,
+confident laughter. "It will be rather fun, won't it?" she said.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+    "Oh, wisdom never comes when it is gold,
+     And the great price we pay for it full worth.
+     We have it only when we are half earth,
+     Little avails that coinage to the old."
+
+                                             GEORGE MEREDITH.
+
+
+It was not quite so much "rather fun" as Joan had expected. It had, she
+discovered, its serious and unpleasant side. Serious, because of the
+strange undreamt-of woman that it awoke within her, and unpleasant
+because of the deceit and the telling of lies which Gilbert insisted it
+must involve. Joan hated deceit, she had one of those natures that can
+never be really happy with an unconfessed lie on their mind.
+
+Gilbert won her to do as he thought necessary, first by persuasion and
+then by using the power which he had discovered he could wield over her
+by his touch.
+
+"For my sake, darling," he argued, "it is all right for us because we
+understand each other, but the world would certainly describe me as a
+cad."
+
+So for his sake Joan told Mrs. Thomas, with whom she had been living,
+that she had accepted a residential post as private secretary; packed up
+her boxes and took her departure amidst a shower of good wishes and
+warnings as to how she was to hold her own and not be put upon. To Aunt
+Janet, with a painful twinge of regret, Joan wrote the same lie. She
+wanted to tell the truth to Aunt Janet more even than she wanted to live
+it out aloud to herself. The memory of Aunt Janet's face with its kindly
+deep-set eyes kept her miserable and uncomfortable, and the home letters
+brought no more a feeling of pleasure, only a sense of shame and
+distaste.
+
+How silly it was to connect shame with what she and Gilbert had chosen
+as life! Yet, unfortunately for her peace of mind, the word was
+constantly reverting to her thoughts. "It is the telling lies that I am
+ashamed of," she would argue hotly to herself, and she would shut her
+heart to the still small voice and throw herself because of it with more
+zest than ever into their life together.
+
+Gilbert's flat was high up in one of the top stories of a block of
+buildings which fronts on to Knightsbridge, bright, airy and cheerful.
+Not too big, "Just room for the two of us and we shut the world
+outside," as Gilbert took pleasure in saying. It only consisted of four
+rooms, their bedroom and dressing-room, the sitting-room and Gilbert's
+smoking-room, a place that he talked vaguely of working in and where he
+could entertain his men friends, without bothering Joan, when they
+called to see him.
+
+The windows of their bedroom opened out over the green of the Park.
+Sometimes the scent of the heliotrope crept up even as far as that;
+whenever it did Joan would have to hold her breath and stand quite still
+because the fragrance brought--not Aunt Janet now--but Gilbert before
+her. It had blown in just like that the first night she had been in the
+room; the memories it could rouse were bewildering, intoxicating, and
+yet ... Joan would have to push the disturbing thoughts from her and run
+to find Gilbert if he were anywhere in their tiny domain, to perch on
+the arm of his chair and rub her face against his coat. His presence
+could drive away the vague feeling of uneasiness, his hands could win
+her back to placid contentment or wake in her the restless passionate
+desire which she judged to be love.
+
+It had been on one of these occasions that, running to find Gilbert, she
+had flung open the door of his smoking-room and got well inside before
+she discovered that he had some men with him. Gilbert lifted his head
+with a frown, that she noticed, while the guests struggled to their
+feet. There was a little silence while they all looked at her, then,
+with a muttered excuse, she retreated, closing the door behind her. But
+before it quite shut she heard one of the men laugh and say:
+
+"Hulloa, Stanning, so that is the secret of our bachelor flat is it?
+thought you had been lying very low this last two months."
+
+She did not catch Gilbert's reply, she only knew that the sense of shame
+which had been but a fleeting vision before had suddenly taken sharp,
+strong hold of her. She stood almost as it were battling against tears.
+
+That evening across their small dining-table, after the waiter from the
+restaurant downstairs had served the coffee and left them, she spoke to
+Gilbert, crumbling her bread with nervous fingers, finding it difficult
+to meet his eyes.
+
+"Those men," she said, "who were here this afternoon, what do they
+think of me? I mean," she flushed quickly, "what do they think I am?"
+
+"Think you are," Gilbert repeated, "my dear girl, I suppose they could
+see you were a woman."
+
+"I mean, had you told them, did they know about us?"
+
+"Silly kid," he smiled at her indulgently, "the world is not so
+fearfully interested in our doings."
+
+"No, but they are your friends," the hazel eyes meeting his held some
+wistful question. "Wouldn't they wonder, doesn't it seem funny that they
+shouldn't be my friends too?"
+
+Gilbert rose, conscious of a little impatience. The strange thing was
+that since the very commencement of their life together his conscience
+had not been as easy as he would have liked to have had it. Joan's ideas
+had been so ridiculously simple and straightforward, she was almost a
+child, he had discovered, in her knowledge and thoughts. Not that he was
+a person to pay much attention to principles when they came in contact
+with his desires, only it annoyed and irritated him to find she could
+waken an undreamt of conscience in this way. He shook off the feeling,
+however, with a little laugh, and, rising from the table, crossed over
+to her, standing behind her, drawing her head back against his heart.
+
+"Not satisfied with our solitude," he teased; "find it dull?"
+
+"No, it's not that," she answered; she had to fight against the
+temptation to let things go, to lift up her lips for his kiss. "It's
+because--well, you didn't introduce me, they must have thought it
+queer."
+
+"Oh, hang it all, dear," he remonstrated, "I could not pass you off as
+my wife or sister, they would know it was not true. What do you want to
+know them for anyhow? Sclater works at the office with me and the other
+man is a pal of his, I have never met him before."
+
+"I see," she agreed; he had not at all understood her, but she doubted
+if she could quite explain herself. "It doesn't matter, Gilbert." She
+sat a little away from him, sweeping the crumbs together with her
+fingers.
+
+Behind her back Gilbert shrugged his shoulders and allowed the frown to
+show for a second on his face. Then he turned aside and lit a cigarette.
+
+"Let's do a theatre to-night, Joan," he suggested, "I am just in the
+mood for it."
+
+She was not just in the mood for it, but she went; and after the theatre
+they had supper at the Monico and Gilbert ordered a bottle of champagne
+to cheer them up; with the lights and music all round them and Gilbert's
+face opposite her, his lips smiling at her, his eyes caressing her, Joan
+forgot her mood of uneasiness. In the taxi going home she crept close up
+against him, liking to feel the strong hold of his arms.
+
+"You love me, and I love you, don't I, Gilbert?" she whispered; "that is
+all that really counts."
+
+"It counts more than all the world," he answered, and stooped to kiss
+her upturned lips.
+
+She made no new friends in her life with him, the old ones naturally
+fell rather into the background; it was impossible to keep up girl
+friendships when she was never able to ask any of them home with her.
+Once she went back to see Mrs. Thomas, but the torrent of questions,
+none of which could be answered truthfully, had paralysed her. She had
+sat dumb and apparently sulky. Mrs. Thomas had written afterwards to
+Aunt Janet:
+
+     "I do not think Joan can be really happy in her new post. She
+     is quite changed, no longer her bright, cheery self."
+
+And that had called forth a long letter from Aunt Janet to Joan. If she
+was not happy and did not feel well she was to leave at once. It had
+been her own wish to go to London, they had never liked the idea. "You
+would not believe, Joan, how dull the house is with only John and me in
+it, we miss your singing and laughter about the place. Come back home,
+dear; even if it is only for a holiday, we shall be delighted."
+
+There was a hint behind the letter that unless she had a satisfactory
+reply at once she or Uncle John would come up to London to see Joan for
+themselves! Joan could imagine the agitation and yet firm purpose which
+would preface the journey. She wrote hastily. She was perfectly happy
+and ridiculously underworked. Everyone was so good to her, one day soon
+she would take a day off and run down and see them, they should see how
+well she was looking.
+
+But the writing of the letter brought tears to her eyes, and when it was
+sealed up and pushed safely out of harm's way she sat and cried and
+cried. Once or twice lately she had had these storms of tears, she was
+so unused to crying that she could not account for them in any way
+except that she hated having to tell lies. That was it, she hated having
+to tell lies.
+
+It was about a fortnight later that Gilbert at breakfast one morning
+looked up from a letter which the early post had brought him with a
+frown of intense annoyance on his face. Also he said "Damn!" very
+clearly and distinctly.
+
+Joan pushed aside the paper and looked at him.
+
+"Anything wrong?" she asked; "is it business, or money, or----"
+
+"No, it is only the mater," he answered quickly; "she writes to say she
+is coming to pay me a little visit, that I am to see if I can get her a
+room somewhere in the building, she is going to spend two or three days
+shopping in town and hopes to see a lot of me."
+
+"Oh," said Joan rather blankly. Gilbert never talked very much of his
+people; once he had shown her a photograph of his mother because she had
+teased him till he produced it. "Don't you like the idea? Gilbert, was
+that what you said 'damn' about?"
+
+"Not exactly," his eyes travelled round the room; "you'll have to clear
+out, you know," he said abruptly.
+
+"You mean you want her to have our room and take another one in the
+building for yourself?" asked Joan. "I daresay Mrs. Thomas would give me
+a bed for a night or two."
+
+"Yes, that is it," he agreed; "and you will have to hide away all traces
+of yourself, mustn't leave anything suspicious lying about. The old lady
+might have given me a day or two's notice;" he had returned to his
+letter, "hang it all, she says she will be here to-morrow."
+
+Joan had pushed her chair back and stood up, her breakfast unfinished.
+She was staring at his down-bent head, struggling with a wild desire to
+scream, to cry out against the curtain of shame he was so wilfully
+sweeping across their life together. She fought down the impulse though
+and moved over to the window.
+
+"You want me to go away and hide?" she asked from there, her voice
+dangerously quiet.
+
+He glanced up at her. "Keep out of the mater's way," he acknowledged,
+"she would have seven fits."
+
+"Why?" asked Joan.
+
+"Why," he repeated, "good Lord, you don't know the mater. She----"
+
+Joan interrupted. "You are ashamed of me," she spoke quickly, her face
+had flushed. "You have always been a little ashamed of me. You have
+never really looked at it as I did. I thought----" she broke off and
+turned away from him, stupid hot tears were blinding her eyes, she did
+not want to cry, it was so useless and childish.
+
+Gilbert stuffed his mother's letter into his pocket and rose to his
+feet, stretching a little as he moved.
+
+"Don't be ridiculous, kiddie," he said, "you must see it would not do
+for you to meet the mater. She is old-fashioned and--well, she would not
+understand."
+
+"We could make her understand," Joan whispered, "if she saw we both
+really meant it."
+
+"Well, I don't want you to try," he answered bluntly.
+
+"Don't you feel the same about me as if I were your wife?" She knew he
+was close beside her, but she did not turn to look at him.
+
+Gilbert put an arm round her and drew her close. "Of course I do," he
+said, "but mother wouldn't. One does not exactly introduce one's mother
+to one's mistress."
+
+The inclination to tears had left Joan, a very set calm had taken its
+place. Suddenly she knew, as she stood there stiff held within the
+circle of his arms, that it was all ended. The dream, if it had been a
+dream, was finished, she could not live in it any longer.
+
+"Very well," she agreed listlessly. "I will see about going away, the
+place shall be all ready for her to-morrow."
+
+She moved away from him, he did not notice how purposely she shook the
+touch of his hands from off her.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+    "Out of my dreams,
+       I fashioned a flower;
+     Nursed it within my heart,
+       Thought it my dower.
+     What wind is this that creeps within and blows
+     Roughly away the petals of my rose?"
+
+                                              M. P.
+
+
+"That is the end of lying," whispered Joan.
+
+She threw down her cloak to keep the corner seat in the carriage and
+stepped out on to the platform to see if she could catch sight of a
+paper boy.
+
+She had not seen Gilbert since the morning. He had had an appointment in
+the city, he had left it to her to get the flat ready for his mother.
+And she had done everything, there was nothing that she could reproach
+herself with. She had engaged an extra room for Gilbert on the next
+floor, she had bought fresh flowers, she had made the place look as
+pretty as possible. It had not taken her long to do her own packing,
+there was nothing of hers left anywhere about. And all morning she had
+kept the window overlooking the Park tight shut. The scent of flowers
+should bring no disturbing memories to weaken her resolve. Then when
+everything had been quite settled she had sat down to write just a short
+note to Gilbert.
+
+     "I have tried to make you understand a little of all I felt
+     this morning, but it was not any use. You cannot understand.
+     It is just that we have always looked at things differently. I
+     cannot live with you any more, Gilbert; what is the use of
+     trying to explain. It is better just to say--as we agreed that
+     either of us should be free to say--it is all finished, and
+     good-bye."
+
+She had propped the letter up for him to find, where she knew he would
+look first of all, by his pipe and matches on the mantelpiece. Now she
+had taken her ticket to Wrotham and wired Aunt Janet to say she was
+coming. But as she stood waiting for the train to start it occurred to
+her that she was really watching to see Gilbert's slim, well-built
+figure push its way through the crowd towards her. The thought made her
+uneasy, she hoped he would have been late getting home; she doubted her
+strength of will to stand against him should he appear in person to
+persuade her.
+
+He did not come, however, and presently with a great deal of noise and
+excitement, whistles blowing and doors slamming, the train was off and
+she could sit back in her corner seat with a strange sense of
+pleasurable excitement at having so far achieved her purpose.
+
+Uncle John was at the station to meet her. A straight-held old
+figure--in his young days he had been in the army and very
+good-looking--now the bristling moustache was white and the hair grew in
+little tufts either side of an otherwise bald head. Ever since Joan
+could first remember him Uncle John had moved in a world separate from
+the rest of the household and entirely his own. It was not that he took
+no interest in them, it was just that he appeared to forget them for
+long intervals, talking very seldom, and when he did always about the
+days that were past. He had never married, but there had been one great
+love in his life. Aunt Janet had told Joan all about it, a girl who had
+died many years ago; after her death Uncle John had lived for nothing
+but his regiment. Then he had had to leave it because old age had called
+for retirement, and he had sent for Aunt Janet to come and keep house
+for him and together they had settled down in the old home at
+Wrotham--both unmarried, both very quiet and content to live in the
+past. Then Joan had descended on them, a riotous, long-legged,
+long-haired girl of eight, the child of a very much younger, little
+known brother.
+
+With the coming of Joan, new life and new surprising interest had
+awakened in Aunt Janet's heart, but Uncle John had remained impervious
+to the influence. He was very fond of Joan in his way, but he scarcely
+ever noticed and he certainly knew nothing about her. He had realized
+her less and less as she grew up; when he spoke or thought of her now it
+was always as still a child.
+
+"You are a nice young lady," he greeted her good-humouredly, stooping to
+kiss Joan at the station; "your Aunt Janet was sure this sudden return
+meant a breakdown. She is all of a twitter, so to speak, and would have
+been here to meet you herself only we have got a Miss Abercrombie
+staying with us. Where's the luggage?"
+
+"I have only brought my small things with me," Joan explained, "the rest
+are coming on. I am sorry Aunt Janet is worried, and who is Miss
+Abercrombie?"
+
+"Friend of your aunt's," he answered; he took her bag from her. "I have
+brought the trap, Janet thought you might be too delicate to walk." He
+chuckled to himself at the thought and picking up the reins climbed
+into the cart beside her. "Don't think Sally has been out twice since
+you left, see how fat she has got."
+
+The little brown pony certainly answered to the implication. Her sides
+bulged against the shafts and bald patches were manifesting themselves,
+caused by the friction.
+
+"What have you been doing then?" asked Joan; "why haven't you been out?"
+
+"Nothing to go for," he answered, "and I have been too busy in the
+garden. Extended that bit down through the wood." The garden was his one
+great hobby.
+
+"And Aunt Janet," Joan questioned, "she always used to like taking Sally
+out."
+
+"I suppose that was when you were here;" he looked down at her sideways,
+"she missed you, I think, but she potters about the village sometimes."
+He relapsed into silence, and Joan could see that his thoughts were once
+more far away.
+
+Several of the villagers came out as they passed through the little
+village street to bob greetings to the young lady of the manor, as they
+had always called Joan. Wrotham did not boast many county families;
+there was no squire, for instance. The Rutherfords occupied the old
+manor house and filled the position to a great extent, but they owned
+none of the land in the neighbourhood, and the villagers were not really
+their tenants. And beyond the Rutherfords there was no one in the
+village who could undertake parochial work except the vicar, a
+hard-working, conscientiously mild gentleman, with a small income and a
+large family. He could give plenty of spiritual advice and assistance,
+but little else; the old people and the invalids of the parish looked to
+Aunt Janet for soups and warm clothes and kindly interest.
+
+Wrotham boasted a doctor too. As Joan remembered him he had been a
+gentleman of very rubicund complexion and rough manners. Village gossip
+had held that he was too fond of the bottle, but when sober he was
+kindly and efficient enough for their small needs. He had been
+unmarried and had lived under the charge of a slovenly housekeeper. As
+the Rutherfords drove past his house, a square brick building with a
+front door that opened on to the village street, Joan noticed an
+unfamiliar air of spruce cleanliness about the front door and the window
+blinds.
+
+"Dr. Simpson has had a spring cleaning," she said, pointing out the
+transformation to Colonel Rutherford.
+
+He came out of his reverie, whatever it was, and glanced at the house.
+"No," he said, "Simpson has left. There are new people in there. Grant
+is their name, I think. Young chap and his sister and their old mother.
+Came to call the other day; nice people, but very ignorant about
+gardens. Your aunt has taken a great fancy to the young man."
+
+With that the trap turned into the wide open gates of the manor, and
+Joan, seeing the old house, was conscious of a quick rush of
+contentment. She had come home; how good it was to be home.
+
+The house, a beautiful grey building of the Tudor days, stood snug and
+warm amid a perfect bower of giant trees. Ivy and creepers of all sorts
+clung to its stones and crept up its walls, long tendrils of vivid
+green. The drive swept round a beautifully kept lawn and vanished
+through a stone gateway leading into the stable-yard. It was only a
+pretence at a garden in front. Uncle John always held that the open
+space which lay at the back of the house and on to which the
+drawing-room windows opened was the real thing. There, was more green
+grass, which centuries of care and weeding and rolling had transformed
+into a veritable soft velvet carpet of exquisite colour that stretched
+out and down till it met the wood of tall trees that fringed the garden.
+Flowers were encouraged to grow wild under those trees; in spring it was
+a paradise of wild daffodils and tulips. That was Aunt Janet's
+arrangement; Uncle John liked his gardens to be orderly. He was
+responsible for the straight, tidy flower-beds, for the rose gardens,
+for the lavender clumps that grew down at the foot of the vegetable
+garden. For lavender is not really an ornamental flower and Uncle John
+only tolerated it because of Aunt Janet's scent-sachets.
+
+Beautiful and old and infinitely peaceful, the sight and colour of it
+could bring back childhood and a sense of safety to Joan, a sense that
+Uncle John's figure and face--dear and familiar as they were--had been
+quite unable to do. London, her life with Gilbert, the rack and tumult
+of her thoughts during the past six months appeared almost as a dream
+when seen against this dear old background.
+
+Aunt Janet was waiting their arrival in the hall, and Joan, clambering
+down out of the trap, ran straight into those outstretched arms.
+
+"Oh, Aunt Janet, it is good to be back," she gasped. Then she drew away
+a little to take in the tall, trim figure dressed all in black save for
+a touch of white at neck and wrists; the face stern and narrow, lit by a
+pair of very dark eyes, the firm, thin-cut mouth, the dark hair, showing
+grey in places, brushed back so smooth and straight and wound in little
+plaits round and round the neat head. "You are just the same as ever,"
+Joan said. "Oh, Aunt Janet, it is good to get back."
+
+The dark eyes, softened for the moment by something like tears, smiled
+at her. "Of course I am just the same, child. What did you expect? And
+you?"
+
+"Oh, I am I," Joan answered; her laughter sounded unreal even to
+herself.
+
+"You have been ill," contradicted Miss Rutherford, "it is plain to see
+all over your face. Thank God, I have got you back."
+
+She brushed aside the sentiment, since it was a thing she did not always
+approve of.
+
+"Come away in and have your tea. John, leave Mary to carry up Joan's
+boxes; she will get Dick to help her; they are too heavy for you. Your
+uncle is getting old," she went on, talking brusquely as she helped
+Joan off with her coat, "he feels things these days."
+
+"I haven't been away more than a year, Aunt Janet," laughed Joan; "you
+talk as if it had been centuries."
+
+"It has seemed long," the other woman answered; her eyes were hungry on
+the girl's face as if she sought for something that kept eluding her. "A
+year is a long time to people of our age."
+
+"Dear, silly, old Aunt Janet." Joan hugged her. "You are not a second
+older nor the tiniest fragment different to what you used to be. I know
+you don't like being hugged; it makes you untidy; but you have simply
+got to be just once more."
+
+"You always were harum-scarum," remonstrated Aunt Janet, under this
+outburst. She did not, however, offer any real objection and they went
+into the drawing-room hand-in-hand.
+
+A small, thin lady rose to greet them at their entrance and Joan was
+introduced to Miss Abercrombie. Everything about Miss Abercrombie,
+except her size, seemed to denote strength--strength of purpose,
+strength of will, strength of love and hate. She gave Joan the
+impression--and hers was a face that demanded study, Joan found herself
+looking at it again and again--of having come through great battles
+against fate. And if she had not won--the tell-tale lines of discontent
+that hung about her mouth did not betoken victory--at least she had not
+been absolutely defeated. She had carried the banner of her convictions
+through thick and thin.
+
+Joan was roused to a sudden curiosity to know what those convictions
+were and a desire to have the same courage granted to herself. It gave
+her a thrill of pleasure to hear that Miss Abercrombie would be staying
+on for some time. She was a schoolmistress, it appeared, only just
+lately health had interfered with her duties and it was then that Aunt
+Janet had persuaded her, after many attempts, to take a real holiday and
+spend it at Wrotham.
+
+"Sheer vice on my part, agreeing," Miss Abercrombie told Joan with a
+laugh; "but everyone argued with me all at once and I succumbed."
+
+"Just in time," Aunt Janet reminded her; "I was going to have given up
+asking you; even friendship has its limits."
+
+They had tea in the drawing-room with the windows open on to the garden
+and a small, bright fire burning in the grate. Aunt Janet said she had
+discovered a nip in the air that morning and was sure Joan would feel
+cold after London. Uncle John wandered in and drank a cup of tea and
+wandered out again without paying much attention to anyone.
+
+Aunt Janet sat and watched Joan, and the girl, conscious of the scrutiny
+and restless under those brown eyes as she had always been restless in
+the old days with a childish, unconfessed sin on her conscience, talked
+as lightly and as quickly as she could upon every topic under the sun to
+Miss Abercrombie. And Miss Abercrombie rose like a sportswoman to the
+need. She was too clever a reader of character not to feel the strain
+which rested between her two companions. She knew Aunt Janet through and
+through, the stern loyalty, the unbending precision of a nature slow to
+anger, full of love, but more inclined to justice than mercy where
+wrongdoing was concerned. And Joan--well, she had only known Joan half
+an hour, but Aunt Janet had been talking of nothing else for the last
+fortnight.
+
+They kept the subject of Joan's life in London very well at bay for some
+time, but presently Aunt Janet, breaking a silence that had held her,
+leaned forward and interrupted their discussion.
+
+"You have not told us why you left, Joan," she said, "or what has been
+settled about your plans. Are you on leave, or have you come away for
+good?"
+
+Miss Abercrombie watched the faint pink rise up over the girl's face and
+die away again, leaving a rather unnatural pallor.
+
+"I have left," Joan was answering. "I----" Suddenly she looked up and
+for a moment she and Miss Abercrombie stared at each other. It was as if
+Joan was asking for help and the other woman trying to give it by the
+very steadiness of her eyes. Then Joan turned. "Aunt Janet," she said,
+hurrying a little over the words, "I want to ask you to let us not talk
+of my time in London. It--it was not what I meant it to be, perhaps
+because of my own fault, but----"
+
+"You were not happy," said Aunt Janet; her love rose to meet the appeal.
+"I never really thought you were. I am content to have you back, Joan;
+we will let the rest slip away into the past."
+
+"Thank you," whispered Joan; the burden of lying, it seemed, had
+followed her, even into this safe retreat; "perhaps some day, later on,
+I will try and tell you about it, Aunt Janet."
+
+"Just as you like, dear." Aunt Janet pressed the hand in hers and at
+that moment Mary, the servant-girl, appeared in the doorway with a
+somewhat perturbed countenance.
+
+"Please, mum, there is that Bridget girl from the village and her
+mother; will you see them a minute?"
+
+The charity and sweetness left Miss Rutherford's face as if an artist
+had drawn a sponge across some painting. "I'll come directly," she said
+stiffly; "make them wait in my little room, Mary."
+
+"The village scandal," Miss Abercrombie remarked, as the door closed
+behind the servant; "how are you working it out, Janet? Don't be too
+hard on the unrighteous; it is your one little failing."
+
+"I hardly think it is a subject which can be discussed before Joan,"
+Miss Rutherford answered. She rose and moved to the door. "I have always
+kept her very much a child, Ann; will you remember that in talking to
+her."
+
+Miss Abercrombie waited till the door shut, then her eyes came back to
+Joan. The child had grown into a woman, she realized; what would that
+knowledge cost her old friend? Then she laughed, but not unkindly.
+
+"I know someone else who has kept herself a child," she said, "and it
+makes the outlook of her mind a little narrow. Oh, well! you won't like
+me to speak disrespectfully of that very dear creature, your aunt. Will
+you come for a stroll down to the woods or are you longing to unpack?"
+
+Joan chose the latter, because, for a second, despite her instantaneous
+liking for Miss Abercrombie, she was a little afraid. She wanted to set
+her thoughts in order too, to try and win back to the glad joy which she
+had first felt at being home, and which had been dispelled by Aunt
+Janet's questions and her own evasive replies.
+
+"I will do my unpacking, I think," she said, "and put my room straight."
+She met the blue eyes again, kindly yet keen in their scrutiny. "I
+understand what you mean about Aunt Janet," she added; "I have felt it
+too, and, Miss Abercrombie, I am not quite such a child as she thinks; I
+could not help growing up."
+
+"I know that, my dear," the other answered, "and God gave us our eyes to
+see both good and evil with; that is a thing your Aunt Janet is apt to
+forget. Well, run away and do your unpacking; we will meet later on at
+dinner."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+    "I have forgotten you! Wherefore my days
+        Run gladly, as in those white hours gone by
+        Before I learnt to love you. Now have I
+     Returned to that old freedom, where the rays
+     Of your strange wonder no more shall amaze
+        My spirit."
+
+                                             ANON.
+
+
+If you see trouble in the back of a girl's eyes look always for a man in
+the case. That was Miss Abercrombie's philosophy of life. Girls do not
+as a rule get into trouble over money, for debts or gambling. She had
+spent the whole of her practical life in studying girls; she knew fairly
+well the ins and outs of their complicated natures. Joan was in trouble
+of sorts; what then had become of the man? Until the time came when the
+girl would be driven to speak--and Miss Abercrombie was sure the time
+would come sooner or later--she was content to stay silent and observant
+in the background of events. Often Joan felt as though the shrewd eyes
+were drawing the unwilling truth from behind her mask of indifference,
+and she was, in a way, afraid of the little, alert woman who seemed to
+be taking such an intense though silent interest in her.
+
+For the first fortnight Gilbert wrote every day. To begin with, his
+letters were cheerful. He was inclined, indeed, to chaff her for losing
+her temper over his mother's visit.
+
+     "The old lady is gone," he wrote on the third day. "You can
+     come back with perfect safety. She never smelt a rat, but
+     tried to talk to me very seriously about taking unto myself a
+     wife. It was on the tip of my tongue once or twice to tell her
+     that I was already as good as married. Don't keep on being
+     stuffy, Joan, hurry up and come back. You can't think what a
+     lot I miss you, little girl, or how much I want you."
+
+It was the first of his letters that she made any attempt to answer and
+her reply was not easy to write. She had come very suddenly to her
+decision as she had stood within the circle of Gilbert's arms that
+morning and answered his arguments about his mother. Now she was
+realizing that for weeks before that her allegiance had been wavering.
+She had no wish to go back to him. She could not understand herself, but
+the fact was self-evident, even though the scent of heliotrope haunted
+her days and crept into the land of her dreams. Her letter, when it was
+finished, struck her as cold and stupid, yet she let it go; she could
+not somehow make her meaning any clearer.
+
+     "Dear Gilbert," she wrote, "I am sorry you do not seem to be
+     understanding that what I wrote in my first letter is really
+     true. It is all finished between us and I am not coming back.
+     There is not anything else to say, except that I should be
+     happier if you did not go on writing. Nothing can change me,
+     and it only keeps open old thoughts."
+
+He wrote in answer to that a furiously angry, altogether unpleasant
+letter. Joan read it with shrinking horror, it seemed to lay bare all
+that she had been only half aware of before, the ugliness, the smallness
+of what she had at first thought was love.
+
+     "If you try to marry anyone else," the letter ended on a
+     cruelly ugly note, "remember I can spoil your little game for
+     you, Joan. There is no man who will marry you when they learn
+     the truth."
+
+She tore up his other letters after that; the very sight of his
+handwriting brought hot shame to her heart.
+
+How much the people of the house noticed she hardly knew. Aunt Janet
+had fallen into the habit of watching her covertly, pathetically; she
+was trying in her own way to read the secret hidden away behind a
+changed Joan. But she did her best to keep her curiosity out of sight;
+she was very gentle, very anxious to divert Joan's thoughts and keep her
+happy.
+
+Uncle John, of course, noticed nothing. Joan helped him to potter about
+in the garden--they were building a rookery down by the woods--or
+sometimes she would take him for long walks and he would stump along
+beside her wrapped in indifferent silence, or else, carried away by some
+reminiscence of the old days, would start talking about the regiment and
+the places where he had been stationed. It was only Miss Abercrombie
+that Joan was really uneasy with, and the end of Miss Abercrombie's
+visit was in sight.
+
+One afternoon, on a day which had seen one of Gilbert's unopened letters
+destroyed, Joan and Miss Abercrombie started out together soon after tea
+to take a basin of jelly to one of Aunt Janet's pet invalids who lived
+in a cottage away out at what was called the Four Cross Roads.
+
+It was one of those very fine blue days common to September. Just a nip
+of cold in the air, the forerunner of winter, and overhead the leaves on
+the trees turning all their various reds and golds for autumn.
+
+"The sky gives one a great sense of distance this afternoon," Miss
+Abercrombie said presently. "You never see a sky like this in towns;
+that is why you get into the habit of thinking things out of
+proportion."
+
+"What makes you say that?" asked Joan; "I mean, how does the distance of
+the sky affect it?"
+
+"Oh, well, it makes one feel small," the other answered, "unimportant;
+as if the affairs that worry our hearts out are, after all, of very
+little consequence in the scheme of existence."
+
+"They are our life," Joan argued, "one has to worry and work things out
+for oneself."
+
+"You are a Browningite," laughed Miss Abercrombie; she glanced up
+sideways at her companion.
+
+"'As it were better youth
+  Should strive through acts uncouth
+  Towards making, than repose on aught found made.'
+
+He is right in a way, though, mind you, I don't know that it pays women
+to do much in the struggling line."
+
+"I do wonder why you say that," said Joan; "you have always struck me as
+being, above everything else, a fighter."
+
+"Probably why my advice lies along other directions," admitted Miss
+Abercrombie; "it is extremely uncomfortable to be a pioneer."
+
+"But in the end, even if you have won nothing, it brings you the courage
+of having stuck to your convictions."
+
+"Yes," Miss Abercrombie answered dryly, "it certainly brings you that."
+
+They walked in silence again for a while, turning into a short cut to
+their destination across the fields.
+
+"Your aunt has got convictions too." Miss Abercrombie reopened the
+conversation, evidently her thoughts had been working along the same
+lines. "They are uncomfortable things; witness the judgment she metes
+out to that unfortunate girl in the village."
+
+"You mean Bridget?" Joan's voice had suddenly a touch of fear in it;
+Miss Abercrombie stole a quick look at her. "I was asking Mary about her
+the other day."
+
+"Immorality, your aunt calls it," sniffed Miss Abercrombie, "and for
+that she would quite willingly, good, kind woman as she is, make this
+child--Bridget is seventeen, you know--an outcast for the rest of her
+life. Immorality!"
+
+"What would you call it?" questioned Joan; she spoke stiffly, for she
+was singularly uneasy under the discussion, yet she had always wanted to
+argue the matter out with Miss Abercrombie.
+
+"I hate the word 'immoral' to begin with," the little woman went on;
+"not that I am exactly out against regulations. Laws and customs have
+come into being, there is little doubt about that, to protect the weak
+against the strong. The peculiar thing about them is that they always
+wreak their punishments on the weak. Poor Bridget, even without your
+aunt's judgment, she pays the penalty, doesn't she?"
+
+"I suppose Aunt Janet is a little hard about these things," Joan
+admitted. "You see, the idea of going against laws and things has never
+occurred to her. She has always obeyed, she has never wanted to do
+anything else."
+
+"Quite so," agreed Miss Abercrombie; "my dear, don't let us talk about
+it any more. I always lose my temper, and I hate losing my temper with
+someone whom I love as much as I do your Aunt Janet."
+
+"But I am interested in what you think," Joan went on slowly; the red
+crept into her cheeks. "I don't believe in marriage myself; I think
+people ought to live together if and when they want to, and leave each
+other when they like."
+
+Miss Abercrombie stared with dismay at the flushed face. "My dear," she
+said, and her tone had fallen upon far greater seriousness than the
+former discussion had evoked, "both of those are very rash statements.
+The problem of life is unfortunately not quite so easily settled."
+
+"But marriage," Joan argued, "marriage, which tries to tie down in hard
+bonds something which ought only to be of the spirit--I think it is
+hideous, hideous! I could never marry."
+
+"No," agreed Miss Abercrombie, "a great many of us feel like that when
+we are young and hot-headed. I nearly said empty-headed. Then we read
+fat books about the divine right of Motherhood, Free Love and State
+Maternity. All very well in the abstract and fine theories to argue
+about, but they do not work in real life. Believe me, the older you get
+the more and more you realize how far away they all are from the ideal.
+Marriage may be sometimes a mistaken solution, but at present it is the
+only one we have."
+
+"Why do you say that?" asked Joan; for the first time she turned and
+looked at her companion. "Do you really believe it is true?"
+
+"Yes," nodded Miss Abercrombie. "My dear," she put a hand on Joan's arm,
+"we women have got to remember that our actions never stand by
+themselves alone. Someone else has always to foot the bill for what we
+do. I said just now that laws had been evolved to protect the weak;
+well, marriage protects the child."
+
+"But if two people love each other," Joan tried to argue, but her words
+were bringing a cold chill of fear to her heart even as she spoke, "what
+other protection can be needed?"
+
+"Love is something that no one can define," stated Miss Abercrombie;
+"but centuries have gone to prove that it is not as binding as marriage,
+and for the sake of the children the man and woman must be bound. That
+is the long and short of all the arguments."
+
+"If there is no child?" Joan's fear prompted her to the question; she
+spoke it almost in a whisper.
+
+Miss Abercrombie paused in her act of unlatching the gate, for they had
+arrived at the cottage by now, to look up at her. "Ah, there you open
+wider fields," she assented, "only childless people are and must be the
+exceptions. One cannot lay down laws for the exceptions."
+
+Mrs. Starkey, the invalid old lady, was garrulous, and delighted to see
+them. So anxious to tell them all her ailments and scraps of gossip that
+by the time they got away it was quite late and already the sun was
+sinking behind the range of hills at the back of the village.
+
+"We will have to hurry," Joan said. "Aunt Janet gets so fussed if one is
+out after dark."
+
+Hurrying precluded any reopening of the subject they had been
+discussing, but Joan's mind was busy with all the thoughts it had roused
+as they walked. The faint hint of fear that had stirred to life in her
+when Miss Abercrombie had spoken of Bridget was fast waking to very
+definite panic. She could feel it tugging at her heart and making her
+breathing fast and difficult. Supposing that the vaguely-dreamed-of
+possibility had crystallized into fact in her case? How would Aunt Janet
+think of it; what changes would it bring into her life?
+
+As they turned into the little village street they came straight into a
+crowd of people standing round an open cottage door. The crowd was
+strangely quiet, talking amongst themselves in whispers, but from within
+the cottage came the sound of wailing, the hysterical crying of old age.
+
+Miss Abercrombie, with Joan following, pushed her way to the front, and
+with awed faces the villagers drew back to let them pass. At the open
+door Sam Jones, the village constable, an old man who had known Joan in
+her very young days, put out his hand.
+
+"Don't you go in now, miss," he said, "it is not for the likes of you to
+see, and you can do no good. Besides which, your aunt is there already."
+
+But Joan paid no attention to him and, pushing past his outstretched
+hand, followed Miss Abercrombie.
+
+The inside of the cottage was dimly lit, and scattered with a profuse
+collection of what appeared to be kitchen utensils, dishes and clothes,
+all flung about in confusion. The only light in the place glinted on the
+long deal table and the stiff dead figure stretched out on it, still and
+quiet, with white, vacant face and lifeless arms that hung down on
+either side. Water was oozing out of the clothes and dripping from the
+unbound hair; it had gathered already into little pools on the floor. In
+the darkest corner of the room a crouched-up form sat sobbing
+hopelessly, and by the figure on the table Aunt Janet stood, her face in
+shadow, since she was above the shade of the lamp, but her hands
+singularly white and gentle-looking as they moved about drying the dead
+girl's face, pushing the wet, clogged hair from eyes and mouth.
+
+Joan paused just within the door, the terror of that figure on the table
+holding her spellbound, but Miss Abercrombie moved brusquely forward so
+that she stood in the lamplight confronting Aunt Janet.
+
+"So," she said, quick and sharp, yet not over loud, the people outside
+could not have heard, "Bridget has found this way out. A kinder way than
+your stern judgment, Janet. Poor little girl."
+
+"I did not judge," Miss Rutherford answered stiffly, "'the wages of sin
+is death.'"
+
+"Yet you can be kind to her now," snorted Miss Abercrombie; "it would
+not have been wasted had you been a little kinder before. Forgive me,
+Janet, I speak quickly, without thinking. You live up to your precepts;
+everyone has to do that."
+
+The old woman in the corner lifted her face to look at them; perhaps she
+thought that in some way or other they were reviling the dead, for she
+staggered to her feet and crossed over to the table.
+
+"It was fear made her do it," she wailed; "fear, and because we spoke
+her harsh. I hated the shame of it all. Yet, God knows, I would have
+stood by her in the end. My little girl, my little Bridget!" Sobs choked
+her, she fell to her knees, pressing her lips to one of the cold, stiff
+hands.
+
+Joan saw Aunt Janet stoop and lay a gentle hand on the heaving
+shoulders, she heard, too, a movement of the crowd outside and saw the
+Vicar's good-natured, perturbed face appear in the doorway. Behind him
+again was a younger man, stern-faced, with quiet, very steady blue eyes
+and a firm-lined mouth. All this she noticed, why she could not have
+explained, for the man was a perfect stranger to her; then the fear and
+giddiness which all this time she had been fighting against gained the
+upper hand and, swaying a little, she moved forward with the intention
+of getting outside, only to fall in a dead faint across the doorway of
+the cottage.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+    "Love wakes men, once a lifetime each
+     They lift their heavy heads and look.
+
+       *     *     *     *     *
+
+     And some give thanks, and some blaspheme,
+       And most forget, but either way
+     That, and the child's unheeded dream
+       Is all the light of all their day."
+
+
+The Grants were sitting at breakfast in their small, red-walled
+dining-room. Richard, commonly called Dick, at the end of the table,
+Mabel at the one side and Mrs. Grant in the seat of honour at the top.
+Wherever Mrs. Grant sat was the seat of honour; she was that kind of old
+lady. Marvellously handsome still, despite her age, with a commanding
+presence and a nature which had sublime contempt for everyone and
+everything except herself, she sailed through life exacting service from
+all and obedience from her children. Why they obeyed her they could not
+have themselves explained; perhaps it was an inheritance from the dead
+Mr. Grant, who had worshipped his wife as if she had been some divinity.
+In her own way Mrs. Grant had always been gracious and kindly to her
+husband, but he had been altogether a nonentity in her life. Before the
+children were old enough to see why, they realized that Daddy was only
+the man who made the money in their house. Mother spent it, buying the
+luxuries with which they were surrounded, the magnificent toys which
+they disregarded, as is the way of children, the splendidly expensive
+clothes, which were a perfect burden to them. Then, just when Dick was
+beginning to understand, Mr. Grant died.
+
+       *     *     *     *     *
+
+He had sent for his son--Dick was about eighteen then--and spoken to him
+just before the end came.
+
+"You will have to look after your mother, Dick," he had said, clutching
+at the young, strong hands; "she has always been looked after. She has
+never had to rough things in her life. And you won't be any too well
+off. Promise me, promise me, you will always give her of your best."
+
+"Of course, I promise, Dad," he had answered.
+
+Further conversation between then had ceased because Mrs. Grant swept
+into the room, regal even in the face of death. Dick remembered the
+incident afterwards with a little twitch of his lips because it was so
+typical of his mother and it was just at this period that he had begun
+to criticize her. The sick-room had been in shadowed gloom until her
+entry; the lights hurt the fast-failing eyes.
+
+"I cannot sit in the dark," stated Mrs. Grant, as she settled herself,
+with a delightful rustle of silk and a wave of perfume, beside the bed.
+"You know that, Harry. It always has depressed me, hasn't it?"
+
+"Turn up the lights, Dick," whispered the man, his hand had closed on
+one of hers; happiness flooded his heart at her presence.
+
+"But you know they hurt your eyes," Dick expostulated; he was new to
+death, yet he could read the signs well enough to know his father was
+dying.
+
+"Harry can lie with his eyes shut," answered Mrs. Grant calmly. There
+was no disagreeableness in her tone: her selfishness was on too gigantic
+a scale for her ever to be disagreeable.
+
+And Dick had turned up the lights and gone fuming from the room,
+conscious for the time being of a sense of dislike for his mother's
+perfection!
+
+It soon faded though; he had been trained too thoroughly in his youth.
+Once he said to Mabel hotly:
+
+"Why does Mother cry for Dad? She did not really love him, and she just
+delighted in buying all that expensive and becoming mourning."
+
+And Mabel had surprised him by replying: "Mother does not really love
+anyone but herself."
+
+The remark sounded odd from Mabel, who spent her life slaving with
+apparent devotion in her mother's service. She was a tall, rather
+colourless girl, with big grey eyes and a quaint-shaped mouth that was
+always very silent. She moved through the background of their lives
+doing things for mother. She had always done that; Dick wondered
+sometimes whether the soul within her would ever flame into open
+rebellion, but it never did.
+
+By the time Dick had passed his various exams, and was ready to take up
+a practice somewhere, Mrs. Grant and Mabel had been practically
+everywhere on the Continent.
+
+"Money is running short," Mabel wrote crisply to Dick; "cannot you do
+anything in the way of taking a house and settling down, so as to make a
+home for Mother and me?"
+
+Dick's ambitions lay in the direction of bachelor's diggings and work in
+London. He thrust them aside and bought what was supposed to be a very
+good and flourishing practice at Birmingham. Unfortunately Mrs. Grant
+took a violent dislike to Birmingham. Their house was gloomy and got on
+her nerves; the air, she said, was laden with smoke which irritated her
+throat. She developed a cough, quite the most annoying sound that Dick
+had ever imagined, and he was not easy to irritate. Mother coughed from
+the time she woke till the time she went to sleep--coughed and
+remembered old times and wept for Harry, who would at least have taken
+care not to expose her to such overwhelming discomfort.
+
+At the end of six months Dick threw up the practice in despair and
+placed himself at her disposal. They put in a year in London, but what
+Dick earned was quite insufficient to cope with what Mrs. Grant spent
+and things went from bad to worse.
+
+Mabel never offered any advice until she was asked but when Dick spoke
+to her finally she was quite definite.
+
+"You have got to take Mother in hand," she said. "Father never did. He
+spent his life making money for her to spend, but there is no reason why
+you should. Get a small practice somewhere in the country where there
+are no shops and just tell Mother you are going to settle there for five
+years at least."
+
+"She will get another cough," argued Dick.
+
+"You must let her cough, it won't hurt her," answered Mabel.
+
+Undoubtedly Mrs. Grant did not approve of Wrotham to begin with, but it
+had its advantages, even for her. She settled very quickly into the role
+of Lady Bountiful; the villagers gazing upon her with such unmixed
+admiration that she was moved to remark to Mabel that it was really
+pleasant doing things for such grateful people. Dick provided her with a
+victoria and horse in place of the usual doctor's trap, and she could
+drive abroad to visit this or that protege in truly regal style. It
+meant that Dick had to pay all his visits, and some of them very far off
+and at all sorts of unseasonable hours, on a bicycle, but he never
+grudged making sacrifices of that kind for her. No one admired his
+mother in the abstract more than Dick did.
+
+Mabel perhaps resented the extra work it entailed on him, for she loved
+Dick with the whole force of her self-restrained heart. But, as usual,
+she kept silent. The villagers could see that she drove out in
+attendance on Mrs. Grant, but to them she was only an uninteresting
+shadow that waited on the other's splendour. They often wondered among
+themselves how Mrs. Grant could have a daughter as drab and
+uninteresting as Miss Grant; they did not realize how, like a vampire,
+the older woman lived upon the younger one's vitality. People like Mrs.
+Grant exist at the expense of those they come in contact with. You
+either have to live for them or away from them.
+
+On this particular morning Dick finished his breakfast before either his
+mother or sister, and pushing back his chair, asked, as he had always
+asked since the days of his childhood, if he might rise.
+
+"Before I am finished, Dick?" remonstrated Mrs. Grant; "it is not very
+polite, dear."
+
+"I know," Dick apologized, "but the truth is I have an early call to pay
+this morning. The people of the Manor House have sent for me; Miss
+Rutherford the younger is not awfully well, or something."
+
+"Miss Rutherford the younger?" repeated his mother; "I did not know
+there was a younger; I have never seen her, have I, Mabel?"
+
+"I don't suppose so," Dick answered for his sister; "she has been away
+in London."
+
+"What is the matter with her?" asked Mrs. Grant. "Why do they want you
+to see her?"
+
+"I can't know that till I have seen her, can I? Last night she happened
+to come into the Rendle cottage just after they had brought that poor
+girl home, and the sight must have upset her; anyway she fainted. I
+expect that is what Miss Rutherford is worried about."
+
+"It is hardly polite of her not to have brought her niece to call on
+me," said Mrs. Grant. "Still, if you are going there, dear, and the girl
+doesn't seem well, tell them I shall be only too happy to come and fetch
+her for a drive some afternoon. I daresay my carriage is more
+comfortable than that ramshackle old trap of theirs."
+
+"You are a dear to think of it," he said, stooping to kiss her good-bye.
+"If you can spare Mabel this afternoon, Mother, I thought perhaps she
+might come into Sevenoaks with me. I have got to attend a meeting there,
+and it will be an outing for her."
+
+"If Mabel would like to go, of course she must," Mrs. Grant agreed. "I
+shall be a little lonely, and to-day is the day I am supposed to have my
+hair shampooed. Not that it really matters."
+
+"I could not go any way," Mabel put in for herself. "Mr. Jarvis is
+coming to tea, Dick; he asked himself last week."
+
+She followed her brother out to the front door.
+
+"The day is going to be full of disagreeables for you," he said, as they
+stood waiting for his bicycle to be brought round. "Mother's shampoo, I
+know what that involves, and Mr. Jarvis. Nuisance the fellow is; why
+can't he see that you dislike him?"
+
+"Oh, I don't exactly," she answered, without meeting his eyes.
+
+She hated him like poison, Dick knew. He wondered rather vaguely why
+Mabel had lied to him, generally speaking they were too good friends for
+that to be necessary. Then he dismissed the subject, and his thoughts
+turned again to the girl he was on his way to see. He had been thinking
+a great deal of Joan since he had first seen her. The startled,
+child-like face, the wide frightened eyes, had impressed themselves on
+his mind the night before. He had lifted her in his arms and carried her
+outside; the poise of her thrown-back head against his arm stayed in his
+mind, a very warm memory. Poor little girl, it must have been horrible
+for her to have come in from the gay placidness of her own life and
+thoughts to the stark tragedy of Bridget Rendle's death.
+
+He was very ignorant and very reverent in his thoughts about women. He
+could imagine Joan's sweet, well-ordered life, the fragrance of youth
+hung about his idea of her. Bridget Rendle had been a girl too, younger
+perhaps than the other one; but Bridget had dipped into the waters of
+life, and sorrow and sin had closed over her. The two girls were as far
+apart as the poles, it seemed almost irreverent to think of them in the
+same breath.
+
+Aunt Janet met him in the hall when she heard of his arrival.
+
+"I have not told my niece about sending for you," she said; "it might
+only make her nervous. I am very alarmed about her, Dr. Grant. She has
+been home now three weeks and she is really not at all like herself.
+Then that faint last night. I am afraid of fainting-fits; my mother, I
+may as well tell you, died very suddenly from a heart-attack."
+
+"It is not likely to be anything of that sort," he told her.
+"Yesterday's tragedy was quite sufficient to upset very strong nerves."
+
+"I hope not," Aunt Janet agreed; "anyway, I shall feel happier once you
+have seen her. Will you come this way?"
+
+She led him through the house to a room on the other side of the
+drawing-room which had been fitted up as a special sanctum for Joan
+since her return from London.
+
+"I am nervous," she admitted to the doctor with her hand on the
+door-knob, "she will perhaps be annoyed at my having sent for you." Then
+she opened the door and they passed in.
+
+Joan was sitting in the far corner near the open window, a book on her
+lap. But she was not pretending to read; Dick could have sworn that she
+had been crying as they came in. As she saw her aunt was not alone she
+stood up quickly and the book fell unheeded to the floor.
+
+"This is the doctor, dear," Aunt Janet began nervously. "I asked him to
+call and see you. You need a tonic, I am sure you do."
+
+"You sent for him," whispered Joan. Dick felt horribly uncomfortable; it
+was impossible not to sense the tragedy which hung heavy in the air.
+"Why, oh why, have you done that, Aunt Janet?"
+
+"I was afraid," the other began; "last night you----" Rather waveringly
+she came to a full stop, staring at Joan.
+
+The girl had drawn herself up to her full height. She faced them as
+someone brought suddenly to bay, her hands clenched at her sides, two
+flags of colour flaming in her cheeks.
+
+"I was going to have told you," she said, addressing herself solely to
+Aunt Janet, "now you have brought him in he must know it too. But I do
+not need him to tell me what is the matter with me; I found it out for
+myself last night. I am not ashamed, I do not even hold that I have done
+anything wrong; I would have told you before only I did not know it was
+going to come to this, and for the rest it was like a shut book in my
+life that I did not want to have to open or look at again. I am like
+Bridget Rendle," she said, head held very high. "I am going to have a
+baby. Bridget was afraid and ashamed, but I am neither. I have done
+nothing to be ashamed of."
+
+The telling of it sapped at her much boasted courage, and left her
+whiter than the white wall-paper; Dick could see that she had some ado
+to keep back her tears.
+
+Aunt Janet seemed to have been paralysed; she stayed where she was,
+stiff, stricken, and Dick, glancing at her, thought he had never seen
+such anguish and terror combined on a human face. He felt himself
+completely forgotten in this crisis. The two women stared at each other.
+Twice Aunt Janet moistened her lips and tried to speak, but the words
+died in her throat. When she succeeded at last her voice was scarce
+recognizable.
+
+"You said--like Bridget Rendle," she whispered; "did you mean what you
+said?"
+
+"Yes," answered Joan.
+
+The older woman turned towards the door. She walked as if blind, her
+hands groping before her. "God!" Dick heard her say under her breath,
+"Dear God, what have I done that this should come upon me?"
+
+As she reached the door Joan called to her, her voice sharp with fear.
+"Aunt Janet, Aunt Janet, aren't you going to say anything to me?"
+
+"I must hold my tongue," the other answered stiffly, "or I shall curse
+that which I have loved." Suddenly the anguish in her flamed to white
+beat. "I would rather have known you dead," she said, and passed swiftly
+from the room.
+
+Joan took a step forward, and her foot touched on the book she had let
+fall. Mechanically she stooped to pick it up, then, because her knees
+were in reality giving way under her, she stumbled to the chair and sat
+down again. She seemed to have forgotten the man standing by the door,
+she just sat there, hands folded in her lap, with her white face and
+great brown eyes looking unseeingly at the garden.
+
+Dick moved uneasily. He had not the slightest idea what he ought to do;
+he felt horribly like an intruder. And he was intensely sorry for the
+girl, even though behind this sorrow lay the shock of a half-formed
+ideal which she had shattered in his mind. Finally he submerged the man
+in the doctor and moved towards her.
+
+"I am most awfully sorry for you," he said, "will you let me help you if
+I can? There may be some mistake, and anyway I could give you something
+to help with those fainting-fits."
+
+Joan brought her eyes away from the garden and looked at him. "No," she
+said, "there is no mistake and I do not make a habit of fainting.
+Yesterday it was different, perhaps I realized definitely and for the
+first time what it would all mean. I saw Aunt Janet's face as she spoke
+of the dead girl, and ... I do not know why I am telling you all this,"
+she broke off, "it cannot be very interesting, but I do not want you to
+think that I feel as Bridget Rendle felt."
+
+"No," he agreed, "you are facing it with more courage than she had been
+taught to have."
+
+"It is not a question of courage," Joan answered. He was not
+understanding her, she realized, and for some stupid reason it hurt that
+he should not, but she must not stoop to further explanations. She stood
+up, making a stern effort at absolute calmness.
+
+"Good-bye," she said, "I am sorry you should have been troubled to come
+and that you should have had to go through this sort of scene."
+
+"Good-bye," was all he could answer.
+
+At the door he turned to look back at her. "If you should need help of
+any sort at any time," he said, "will you send for me? I should like to
+feel you were going to do that."
+
+"I cannot promise," she answered, "you see, I shall probably be leaving
+here quite soon."
+
+And with that he had to be content to leave her.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+    "And bending down beside the glowing bars
+     Murmur, a little sadly, how love fled
+     And paced upon the mountains overhead,
+     And hid his face amid a crowd of stars."
+
+
+Mabel had shampooed her mother's hair, following out with unending
+patience the minute instructions which the process always involved. She
+had rinsed it in four relays of hot water, two of lukewarm and one of
+cold; she had dried it with the hard towel for the scalp and the soft
+towel for the hair. She had rubbed brilliantine in to give it the
+approved gloss. The whole proceeding had lasted fully two hours; now she
+stood and brushed out the long fine threads of grey turning to silver
+with just the steady gentle pressure which was necessary and which,
+according to Mrs. Grant, no one but Mabel was capable of producing.
+
+Mrs. Grant liked to have her hair brushed for half an hour after a
+shampoo, it soothed the irritated nerves. From behind her mother's back
+Mabel could see her own face in the glass, the sallow cheeks flushed
+from her exertions, the grey, black-lashed eyes tired and a little
+angry. Once, long ago, during one of their journeys on the continent,
+there had been a young naval officer who had loved Mabel for those grey
+eyes of hers. He had raved about the way the lashes lay like a fringe of
+shadow round them. He had called them "Dream Eyes," and once he had
+kissed the lids close shut over them with hard, passionate kisses.
+Whenever Mabel looked at her eyes in the glass she thought of Jack
+Donald. She had loved him and she had sent him away because of Mother.
+He had only been able to offer her his love and the pay of a lieutenant
+in the Navy; he had not even shown that he liked Mother, he had resented
+the way Mabel slaved for her. Of course the outlook had been absurd, and
+Mrs. Grant had said so very plainly. If Mabel married it would have to
+be someone wealthy someone elderly enough to understand that Mother must
+live with them. But when he went he took with him all the dreams of
+Mabel's life; she never looked out into the future to make plans now,
+she could only look back into the past that held her memories.
+
+"I hope," said Mrs. Grant suddenly breaking in on her thoughts, "that
+Dick does not fall in love with this young lady at the Manor."
+
+"Why not?" asked Mabel, "he must fall in love sooner or later."
+
+"Well, then, it must be later and with someone who has a great deal of
+money. We are quite badly enough off as it is."
+
+"You and I could go away again on our own," suggested Mabel, "you know
+you said the other day that Wrotham was getting on your nerves."
+
+"Don't be ridiculous," snapped Mrs. Grant, "I should like to know what
+you think we should live on once Dick has a wife. You say you won't
+marry Mr. Jarvis or anyone else."
+
+"No," Mabel admitted, "but because I won't marry it hardly seems fair
+that we should stand in the way of Dick's doing so."
+
+"What do you intend to imply by 'standing in the way'? Really Mabel,
+sometimes I wonder if you have any love for me, you so habitually and
+wilfully misconstrue my sentences. Surely it is permissible" (Mrs.
+Grant's sigh was a model of motherly affection) "for a mother to wish
+to keep her son, her eldest born, to herself for a little longer. One
+loses them so once they marry."
+
+Mabel concealed a swift, rather bitter, smile. "I did not mean to
+misconstrue anything," she said, "only just the other day I was thinking
+that perhaps we did rather hamper Dick. He is twenty-seven, you know; it
+is funny he has never wanted to marry."
+
+"He is waiting for the right girl," Mrs. Grant sighed again.
+
+"And if he happens to find her," thought Mabel to herself, there was no
+use saying the words aloud, "we are to do our best to prevent him having
+her. Poor old Dick." Her eyes waked to sudden, vivid affection as she
+thought of him.
+
+She ran downstairs presently, Mrs. Grant having retired to rest after
+exertions, to meet Dick just coming in. He had done a round of visits
+after his call at the Manor house. Visits which had included one to the
+Rendles' cottage, where he had seen the principal figure of last night's
+tragedy laid out, as her mother said, for decent burial, "even though it
+baint a going to be Christian."
+
+The girl had been dressed in something white; white flowers, great
+beautiful-headed chrysanthemums, lay between her folded hands and
+against her face. She had been a handsome girl, death had robbed her of
+her vivid colouring, but it had given her in its stead something
+dignified and withdrawn, a look of suffering and yet great peace.
+
+Mrs. Rendle was more resigned too this morning; she had cried her heart
+quiet through the night.
+
+"Bridget is better so," she could confide to Dick as he stood looking
+down at the girl, "the shame is done away with, sir, and God will look
+to the sin. I hold there ain't much to fear there, even though they
+won't bury her in the churchyard."
+
+"No, I don't think there is much to fear," he agreed. "I am sorry about
+the burial, Mrs. Rendle, I have tried to argue the matter out with the
+vicar."
+
+"Oh, that is not to be helped," she answered. "God will rest her soul
+wherever she be. Miss Rutherford sent those flowers," she added, "she
+was rare set agin Bridget to begin with, but she be softened down."
+
+That brought the other tragedy which he had witnessed this morning back
+to his mind. Not that he had really forgotten it. The picture of Joan,
+her head high, her cheeks flushed, was one that had imprinted itself
+very strongly upon his memory. He had given up trying to understand how
+such a thing could have happened, his own vague happy thoughts of her
+stirred wistfully behind the new knowledge. And he could not dismiss her
+altogether from the throne he had designed for her to occupy. There must
+be some explanation; if only he had not been such an absolute stranger
+perhaps she would have told him a little more, have given him a chance
+to understand.
+
+"Well," asked Mabel, "is she nice, Dick, did you like her?" Her eyes
+were quick to notice the new shadow of trouble on his face.
+
+"Very nice, I think," he answered, hoping his voice sounded as
+indifferent as he meant it to, "but I really did not see much of her and
+she is going back to London almost at once." He went past her on into
+the dining-room. "Is lunch nearly ready," he asked, "I have got to catch
+that 2.5, you know."
+
+"I'll see about it," Mabel said, "Mother is having hers upstairs."
+
+She turned away to comply, but all the time she was hurrying up the
+maidservant, and later, while she and Dick sat opposite each other,
+rather silent, through lunch, her eyes and mind were busy trying to read
+the secret of Dick's manner. The girl had impressed him strongly, that
+was evident, but why should she have occasioned this gloom in Dick who
+so very rarely allowed anything or anybody to ruffle his cheery good
+humour?
+
+He rode off without letting her glean any explanation, and Mabel
+wandered into the drawing-room to get it ready for Mrs. Grant's
+descent. Had Dick really fallen in love? She remembered once before when
+he had been about eighteen or nineteen, how there had been a girl whom
+he had rather shyly confessed himself enamoured of. But since the damsel
+had been quite five years his senior the romance, to Mabel's relief, had
+faded away. Yet if Dick were ever really to fall in love it would be a
+deep and unshakable tie; he would be as his father had been, all
+faithful to the one woman in his life.
+
+It was remembering her father that suddenly brought Mabel's thoughts
+back to her mother whose absorbing personality had stood so like a giant
+shadow across all their lives. Would Dick's love be strong enough to
+fight against his sense of duty and mother's selfishness, for most
+certainly mother would not help him to achieve his desire unless it ran
+along the same lines as her own. And if mother prevailed what would life
+mean for Dick? The same dry empty dreariness that her own days
+contained, the restless hopes that died too hard, the unsatisfied, cruel
+dreams? No, no! She had not fought to save her own happiness, but she
+would fight to the last inch to save Dick's.
+
+Almost as if in answer to her heart's wild outcry the front-door bell
+rang, and looking up she saw the short stout figure which of late had
+taken to haunting her thoughts on the door-step.
+
+Mr. Jarvis was an elderly man inclined to be fat, with round, heavy
+face, very thick about the jaws and unpleasantly small eyes. Yet the
+expression of the man's face was not altogether disagreeable and a
+certain shrewd humour showed in the lines of his mouth. He had lived for
+forty-two years in Wrotham, travelling twice a year to London in
+connection with his business, but never venturing further afield. His
+house, a magnificent farm building, lay about twelve miles away on the
+other side of Wrotham station. It had come down to him through
+generations of Jarvises, he was reputed to be marvellously wealthy, and
+he had no shyness about admitting the fact. His favourite topics of
+conversation were money and horses. He had never married, village gossip
+could have given you lurid details as to the why and the wherefore had
+you been willing to listen. Mr. Jarvis himself would have put it more
+plainly. The only woman he had ever had the least affection for had
+neither expected nor desired matrimony; she had been content to live
+with him as his housekeeper. This woman had been dead three years when
+Jarvis first met Mabel. Quite apart from the fact that of late he had
+been feeling that it was time he got married, Jarvis had been attracted
+to Mabel from the first. She was such a contrast to the other women he
+had known; he admired enormously her slim delicacy, her faintly coloured
+face, her grey eyes. He liked her way of talking, too, and the long
+silences which held her; her quiet dignity, the way she moved. He placed
+her on a pedestal in his thoughts, which was a thing he had never dreamt
+of doing for any other woman, and before long his admiration melted into
+love. Then being forty-two the disease took rapid and tense possession.
+He was only happy when he was with her, able to talk to her now and
+again, to watch her always.
+
+Dick's impression was that Mabel hated the man. He disliked him himself,
+which perhaps coloured his view, for hate was not quite what Mabel felt.
+Had Mr. Jarvis been content to just like her she would have tolerated
+and more or less liked him. She had thought him, to begin with, a funny,
+in a way rather pathetic, little man. Ugly, and Mabel had such an
+instinctive sympathy for anything ugly or unloved. So, to begin with,
+she had been kind to him; then one day Mrs. Grant had opened her eyes to
+the evident admiration of the man, mentioning at the same time that from
+the money point of view he would be a good match, and suddenly Mabel had
+known that she was afraid. Afraid, without exactly knowing why, very
+much as is the hapless sheep on his way to the slaughter-house.
+
+As the maid ushered in Mr. Jarvis a minute or two later this feeling of
+fear caught at Mabel's heart, and in answer to its summons the warm
+blood flushed to face and neck as she stood up to receive him.
+
+"I am early," stammered the man, his eyes on her new-wakened beauty, for
+it was only in her lack of colour that Mabel's want of prettiness lay,
+"but I came on purpose, I wanted to catch you alone."
+
+Mabel took what was almost a despairing look at the clock. "Mother won't
+be down for quite half an hour," she said, "so you have succeeded. Shall
+we stay here or will you come down to the garden? I want to show you my
+Black Prince rose, it is not doing at all well."
+
+She moved to the window which opened doorways on to the garden, but Mr.
+Jarvis made no attempt to follow her.
+
+"Let us stay here," he said, "what I have got to say won't take long and
+we can do the roses afterwards when Mrs. Grant is about. I guess you
+could help me a bit if you only chose to," he went on, his voice
+curiously gruff and unready, "but you won't, you won't even look at me.
+I suppose those great grey eyes of yours hate the sight of me, and I am
+a damned fool to put my heart into words. But I have got to," she heard
+him move close to her and how quickly he was breathing, "I love you, you
+pale, thin slip of a girl, I want you as a wife, will you marry me?"
+
+The silence when he had finished speaking lay heavy between them. Mabel
+let him take her hand, though the moist warmth of his gave her a little
+shudder of aversion, but by no strength of will could she lift her eyes
+to look at him. She stood as immovable as a statue and the man, watching
+her from out of his small shrewd eyes, smiled a little bitterly.
+
+"You hate the thought like poison," he said, "yet you don't throw off my
+hand or yell out your 'No.' Something is in the balance then. Well,
+marry me for my money, Mabel. I had rather it were love, but if there is
+anything about me that can win you, I am not going to give you up."
+
+That flicked at her pride and the honesty of it appealed to her. She
+lifted her eyes and for the first time she became aware of the real
+kindness that lay in his.
+
+"I have never hated you," she said slowly, "but I don't and can't love
+you. Will you take that as your answer?"
+
+The man shook his head. "I was not fool enough to ask--'Do you love
+me?'" he reminded her; "what I want to know is, 'Will you marry me?'"
+
+"Without love?"--her eyes besought him--"marriage must be hideous."
+
+"I will risk it if you will," he answered. "Sit down, let us talk it
+out."
+
+He had won back his self-possession, though his eyes were still eager in
+their demand. Mabel sat down on the window-seat and he pulled up a chair
+at a little distance from her.
+
+"Look here," he began, "it is like this. I am not a young man, probably
+I am twelve to fourteen years older than you. If you have heard what the
+village scandal says about me you can take it from me that it is true;
+it is better that you should know the worst at once. But until I met
+you, this I can swear before God, I have never really loved. It is not a
+question of money this time; I would give my soul to win you. And I
+don't want you as I have wanted the other women in my life; I want you
+as my wife."
+
+"Yet you can buy me just as you could them," Mabel whispered.
+
+"No"--again he shook his head. "I am not making that mistake either. I
+know just why I can buy you. Anyway, let us put that aside. This is the
+case as I see it. I have money, heaps of it; I have a good large house
+and servants eating their heads off. I will make Mrs. Grant comfortable;
+she will live with us, of course, and she is welcome to everything I
+have got; and I love you. That is the one great drawback, isn't it? The
+question is. Will you be able to put up with it?"
+
+Away in the back of Mabel's mind another voice whispered, "I love you."
+She had to shut her lids over the "Dream Eyes," to hold back the tears.
+
+"Even if things were different," she said, "I could not love you; I have
+always loved someone else."
+
+Mr. Jarvis sat back in his chair with a quick frown. "Any chance of his
+marrying you?" he asked.
+
+"No," she had to admit, "there has never been any chance of that."
+
+"I see"--he looked up at her and down again at his podgy, fat hands,
+clenched together. "My offer still holds good," he said abruptly.
+
+"Oh, I don't know what to say or what to do." Mabel's calm broke, she
+stood up nervously. It almost seemed as if the walls of the room were
+closing in on her. "There are so many things to think of; Mother and
+Dick and----"
+
+Perhaps he understood the softening of her voice as she spoke of Dick,
+for he looked up at her quickly.
+
+"Yes, there is your brother," he agreed. "I guess he is pretty tired
+having to look after you two, and he is a clever lad; there ought to be
+a future before him if he has his chance. Put the weight on to my
+shoulders, Mabel; they are better able to bear it."
+
+She turned to him breathlessly; it was quite true what he was saying
+about Dick. Dick had his own life to make. "I have told you the truth,"
+she said. "I don't love you, probably there will be times when I shall
+hate you. If you are not afraid of that, if you are ready to take Mother
+and me and let us spend your money in return for that, then--I will
+marry you."
+
+Mr. Jarvis got quickly to his feet. "You mean it?" he gasped; his face
+was almost purple, he came to her, catching her hands in his. "You mean
+it? Mind you, Mabel, you have got to put up with my loving you. I am
+not pretending that I am the kind of man who will leave you alone."
+
+"I mean it," she answered, very cold and quiet, because it seemed as if
+all the tears in her heart had suddenly hardened into a lump of stone.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+    "I ride to a tourney with sordid things,
+     They grant no quarter, but what care I?
+
+       *     *     *     *     *
+
+     I have bartered and begged, I have cheated and lied,
+     But now, however the battle betide,
+     Uncowed by the clamour, I ride ride, ride!"
+
+                                             VICTOR STARBUCK.
+
+
+Joan did not see Aunt Janet again. Miss Abercrombie carried messages
+backwards and forwards between the two, but even Miss Abercrombie's
+level-headed arguments could not move Aunt Janet from the position she
+had taken up. And Miss Abercrombie was quite able to realize how much
+her old friend was suffering.
+
+"I never knew a broken heart could bring so much pain," she told Joan;
+"but every time I look at your aunt I realize that physical suffering is
+as nothing compared to the torture of her thoughts."
+
+"Why cannot she try to understand. Let me go to her," Joan pleaded. "If
+only I can speak to her I shall make her understand."
+
+But Miss Abercrombie shook her head. "No, child," she said, "it would be
+quite useless and under the circumstances you must respect her wishes. I
+am fearfully sorry for both of you; I know that it is hurting you, too,
+but when you have wilfully or inadvertently killed a person's belief in
+you the only thing you can do is to keep out of their way. Time is the
+one healer for such wounds."
+
+The tears smarted in Joan's eyes, yet up till now she had not cried
+once. Hurt pride, hurt love, struggled for expression, but words seemed
+so useless.
+
+"I had better hurry up and get away," she said; "I suppose Aunt Janet
+hates the thought of my being near her even."
+
+Miss Abercrombie watched her with kindly eyes. The tragedy she had
+suspected on the first night was worse even than she had imagined. It
+stared at her out of the old, fierce face upstairs, it slipped into her
+thoughts of what this girl's future was going to be.
+
+"Have you made any plans?" she asked; "do you know at all where to go?"
+
+"Does it matter very much?" Joan answered bitterly.
+
+"My dear," Miss Abercrombie spoke gently, "I am making no attempt to
+criticize, and I certainly have no right to judge, but you have a very
+hard fight before you and you will not win through if you go into it in
+that spirit. I do not want to ask questions, you would probably resent
+them, but will you tell me one thing. Does the man know about what is
+going to happen?"
+
+"No," answered Joan. "It wouldn't make any difference if he did. It is
+not even as if he had persuaded me to go and live with him; I want you
+to understand that I went of my own free will because I thought it was
+right."
+
+"You will write and tell him," suggested Miss Abercrombie. "That is only
+fair to him and yourself."
+
+"No," Joan said again, "it was the one thing he was most afraid of; I
+would not stoop to ask him to share it with me."
+
+Miss Abercrombie put out a quick hand. "You are forgetting that now
+there is someone else who is dependent on how you fight and whether you
+win through. You may say, 'I stand alone in this,' yet there is someone
+else who will have to share in paying the cost."
+
+The colour swept from Joan's cheek; she choked back the hard lump in her
+throat. "We will have to pay it together," she said. "I cannot ask
+anyone else to help."
+
+The tears, long held back, came then and she turned away quickly. Miss
+Abercrombie watched her in silence for a minute or two. At last she
+spoke. "You poor thing," she said slowly and quietly; "you poor, foolish
+child."
+
+Joan turned to her quickly. "You are thinking that I am a coward," she
+said, "that I am making but a poor beginnings to my fight. But it isn't
+that, not exactly. I shall have courage enough when it comes to the
+time. But just now it is hurting me so to hurt Aunt Janet; I had not
+reckoned on that, I did not know that you could kill love so quickly."
+
+"You can't," Miss Abercrombie answered. "If her love were dead all this
+would not be hurting her any more."
+
+So Joan packed up her trunks again, fighting all the time against the
+impulse which prompted her to do nothing but cry and cry and cry. The
+chill of Aunt Janet's attitude seemed to have descended on the whole
+household. They could have no idea of the real trouble, but they felt
+the shadow and moved about limply, talking to each other in whispers.
+Miss Janet was reputed to be ill, anyway, she was keeping her room, and
+Miss Joan was packing up to go away; two facts which did not work in
+well together. No wonder the servants were restless and unhappy.
+
+Uncle John met Joan on her way upstairs late that evening. His usually
+grave, uninterested face wore an expression of absolute amazement, it
+almost amounted to fear.
+
+"Will you come into my room for a minute," he said, holding the door
+open for her to pass.
+
+Once inside, he turned and stared at her; she had never imagined his
+face could have worn such an expression. She saw him trying to speak,
+groping for words, as it were, and she stayed tongue-tied before him.
+Her day had been so tumultuous that now she was tired out, indifferent
+as to what might happen next.
+
+"Your aunt has told me," he said at last. "I find it almost impossible
+to believe, and in a way I blame myself. We should never have allowed
+you to go away as we did." He paused to breathe heavily. "I am an old
+man, but not too old to make a fight for our honour. Will you give me
+this man's name and address, Joan?"
+
+She had not paused to think that they would look on it as their honour
+which she had played with. His rather pitiful dignity hurt her more than
+anything that had gone before.
+
+"I cannot do that," she answered; "there is nothing exactly that you
+could blame him for. I did what I did out of my own free will and
+because I thought it was right."
+
+He still stared at her. "Right," he repeated; "you use the word in a
+strange sense, surely; and as for blaming him"--she saw how suddenly his
+hands clenched, the knuckles standing out white--"if you will let me
+know where to find him, I will settle that between us."
+
+Joan moved towards the door. "I cannot," she said; "please, Uncle John,
+don't ask me any more. I have hurt your honour; it must be me that you
+punish. I am going away to-morrow, let me go out of your life
+altogether. I shall not make any attempt to come back."
+
+"You are going to him?" he questioned. "Before God, if you do that I
+will find you out and----"
+
+"No," she interrupted, "you need not be afraid; I am not going back to
+him."
+
+With her hand on the door she heard him order her to come back as he had
+not finished what he had to say, and she stayed where she was, not
+turning again to look at him.
+
+"You are being stubborn in your sin." How strange the words sounded from
+Uncle John, who had never said a cross word to her in his life. "Very
+well, then, there is nothing for us to do except, as you say, to try and
+forget that we have ever loved you. When you go out of our house
+to-morrow it shall be the end. Your aunt is with me in this. But you
+shall have money; it shall be paid to you regularly through my
+solicitor, and to-night I am writing to him to tell him to render you
+every assistance he can. You can go there whenever you are in need of
+help. Miss Abercrombie has also promised your aunt, I believe, to do
+what she can for you."
+
+"I would rather not take any money from you," whispered Joan; "I will be
+able to earn enough to keep myself."
+
+"When you are doing that," he answered grimly, "you may communicate with
+the solicitor and he will put the money aside for such time as you may
+need it. But until then you owe it to us to use our money in preference
+to what could only be given to you in charity or disgrace."
+
+She waited in silence for some minutes after his last words. If she
+could have run to him then and cried out her fear and dismay and regret,
+perhaps some peace might have been achieved between them which would
+have helped to smooth out the tangle of their lives. But Joan was
+hopelessly dumb. She had gone into her escapade with light laughter on
+her lips, now she was paying the cost. One cannot take the world and
+readjust it to one's own beliefs. That was the lesson she was to learn
+through loneliness and tears. This breaking of home ties was only the
+first step in the lesson.
+
+She stole out of his presence at last and up to her own room. Her
+packing was all finished, she had dismantled the walls of her pictures,
+the tables of her books. Everything she possessed had been given to her
+by either Uncle John or Aunt Janet. Christmas presents, Easter presents,
+birthday presents, presents for no particular excuse except that she was
+their little girl and they loved her. It seemed to Joan as if into the
+black box which contained all these treasures she had laid away also
+their love for her. It took on almost the appearance of a coffin and
+she hated it.
+
+Miss Abercrombie saw her off at the station next morning. She had given
+Joan several addresses where she could look for rooms and was coming up
+to London in about a month herself, and would take Joan back with her
+into the country. "I want you to remember, though," she added, "that you
+can always come to me any time before that if you feel inclined. You
+need not even write; just turn up; you have my address; I shall always
+be glad to have you. I want to help you through what I know is going to
+be a very bitter time."
+
+"Thank you," Joan answered; but even at the time she had a ridiculous
+feeling that Miss Abercrombie was very glad to be seeing the last of
+her.
+
+After the train had slid out of the station and the small, purposeful
+figure had vanished from sight she sat back and tried to collect her
+thoughts to review the situation. She was feeling tired and desperately
+unhappy. They had let her see, even these dear people whom of all others
+in the world she loved, that she had gone outside their pale. She was in
+their eyes an outcast, a leper. She was afraid to see in other people's
+eyes the look of horror and agony which she had read in Aunt Janet's. Of
+what use was her book-learned wisdom in the face of this, it vanished
+into thin air. Hopeless, ashamed, yet a little defiant, Joan sat and
+stared at the opposite wall of the railway carriage.
+
+At Victoria Station she put her luggage into the cloak-room, deciding to
+see what could be done in the way of rooms, without the expense of going
+from place to place in a cab. The places Miss Abercrombie had
+recommended her to struck her as being expensive, and it seemed to her
+tortured nerves as if the landladies viewed her with distrustful eyes.
+She finally decided to take a bus down to Chelsea; she remembered having
+heard from someone that Chelsea was a cheap and frankly Bohemian place
+to live in.
+
+London was not looking its very best on this particular morning. A
+green-grey fog enshrouded shops and houses, the Park was an invisible
+blur and the atmosphere smarted in people's eyes and irritated their
+throats. Despite the contrariness of the weather, Joan clambered on to
+the top of the bus, she felt she could not face the inside stuffiness.
+She was tired and, had she but owned to it, hungry. It was already late
+afternoon and she had only had a cup of coffee and a bun since her
+arrival.
+
+As the bus jolted and bumped down Park Lane and then along
+Knightsbridge, she sat huddled up and miserable on the back seat, the
+day being well in accord with her mood. She was only dimly aware that
+they were passing the flat where she and Gilbert had lived, she was more
+acutely conscious of the couple who sat just in front of her--the man's
+arm flung round the girl's shoulders, her head very close to his.
+
+Waves of misery closed round Joan. A memory, which had not troubled her
+for some time, of Gilbert's hands about her and the scent of heliotrope,
+stirred across her mind. She could feel the hot tears splashing on her
+ungloved hands, a fit of sobbing gulped at her throat. Lest she should
+altogether lose control of herself she rose quickly and fumbled her way
+down the steps. The bus had just reached the corner of Sloane Street.
+She would go across the Park, she decided, and have her cry out. It was
+no use going to look for rooms in her present state, no landlady would
+dream of having her.
+
+Half blinded by her tears and the fog combined, she turned and started
+to cross the road. Voices yelled at her from either side, a motor car
+with enormous headlights came straight at her out of the fog. Joan
+hesitated, if she had stayed quite still the danger would have flashed
+past her, but she was already too unnerved to judge of what her action
+should be. As if fascinated by the lights she shut her eyes and moved
+blindly towards them.
+
+There were more sharp shouts, a great grinding noise of brakes and
+rushing wheels brought to a sudden pause, then the darkness of black,
+absolute night surged over and beyond the pain which for a moment had
+held Joan. She floated out, so it seemed, on to a sea of nothingness,
+and a great peace settled about her heart.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+    "With heart made empty of delight
+       And hands that held no more fair things;
+     I questioned her;--'What shall requite
+       The savour of my offerings?'"
+
+                                             E. NESBIT.
+
+
+"You have got your back against the wall, you have got to fight, you
+have got to fight, to fight!"
+
+The words pounded across Joan's mind over and over again. She struggled
+in obedience to their message against the waves of sleep that lapped her
+round. Struggled and fought, till at last, after what seemed like
+centuries of darkness, she won back to light and opened her eyes.
+
+She was lying in a long narrow bed, one of many, ranged on both sides
+down the hospital walls. Large windows, set very high up, opened on to
+grey skies and a flood of rather cold sunshine. At the foot of her bed,
+watching her with impartial eyes, stood a man, and beside him two
+nurses, their neat pink dresses and starched aprons rustling a little as
+they moved.
+
+Joan's eyes, wide and bewildered, met the doctor's, and he leant forward
+and smiled.
+
+"That's better," he said, "you have got to make an effort towards living
+yourself, young lady." He nodded and turned to the nurse at his right
+hand. "How long has she been in now, Nurse?"
+
+"Ten days to-morrow," the woman answered, "and except for the first day,
+when she moaned a good deal and talked about having to fight, she has
+scarce seemed to be conscious."
+
+Joan's lips, prompted by the insistent voice within her, repeated, "I
+have got to fight," stiffly.
+
+The doctor came a little nearer and stooped to hear the words, "Yes," he
+agreed, "that is right, you have got to fight. See if you can get her to
+talk now and again, Nurse," he added; "she wants rousing, otherwise
+there is nothing radically to keep her back."
+
+Joan's face, however, seemed to linger in his mind, for, as he was about
+to leave the ward after his tour of inspection, he turned again to the
+elder nurse in charge.
+
+"Have you been able to find out anything about bed 14?" he asked.
+
+"No, sir. We have had no inquiries and there was nothing in any of her
+pockets except a cloak-room ticket for Victoria Station."
+
+"Humph," he commented, "yet she must have relations. She does not look
+the friendless waif type."
+
+Nurse Taylor pursed up her lips. She had her own opinion as to the
+patient in bed 14. "There was the unfortunate circumstance of her
+condition," she mentioned; "the girl may very well have been desperate
+and lonely."
+
+"Anyway, she hasn't any right to be left like this," the doctor
+retorted. "If you can get her to talk about relations, find out where
+they are and send for them. That is my advice."
+
+Nurse Taylor owned a great many excellent qualities; tact and compassion
+were not among them. Long years spent in a profession which brought her
+daily into contact with human sin and human suffering had done nothing
+to soften her outlook or smooth down the hard, straight lines which she
+had laid down for her own and everyone else's guidance. She disapproved
+of Joan, but obedience to the doctor's orders was a religion to her;
+even where she disapproved she always implicitly carried them out.
+
+Next day, therefore, she stopped for quite a long time at Joan's bed,
+talking in her toneless, high voice. Had Joan any people who could be
+written to, what was her home address, would they not be worried at
+hearing nothing from her?
+
+Joan could only shake her head to all the questions. Very vaguely and in
+detached fragments she was beginning to remember the time that had
+preceded her accident. The memory of Aunt Janet's face and Uncle John's
+parting words was like an open wound, it bled at every touch and she
+shrank from Nurse Taylor's pointed questions. She remembered how she had
+sat on the top of the bus with the black weight of misery on her heart
+and of how the tears had come. She had been looking for rooms; that
+recollection followed hard on the heels of the other.
+
+When she was well enough to get about she would have to start looking
+for rooms again, for she had quite definitely made up her mind not to be
+a burden to Miss Abercrombie. It was her own fight; when she had
+gathered her strength about her, she would fight it out alone and make a
+success of it. Half wistfully she looked into the future and dreamt
+about the baby that was coming into her life. She would have to learn to
+live down this feeling of shame that burnt at her heart as she thought
+of him. He would be all hers, a small life to make of it what she
+pleased. Well, she would have to see that she made it fine and gay and
+brave. Shame should not enter into their lives, not if she fought hard
+enough.
+
+Nurse Taylor described her to the junior afterwards as a most stubborn
+and hardened type of girl.
+
+"The poor thing has hardly got her wits about her yet," the other
+answered; "she is very little trouble in the wards, we have had worse."
+
+"Well, the doctor can question her himself next time," Nurse Taylor
+snorted. "I am not here to be snubbed by her sort."
+
+She did not, however, let the matter drop entirely. At the end of her
+third week Joan was promoted to an armchair in the verandah and there
+one afternoon, after the teas had been handed round, Nurse Taylor
+brought her a visitor. A tall, sad-faced, elderly woman, who walked
+with a curiously deprecating movement, seeming to apologize for every
+step she took. Yet kindliness and a certain strength shone at Joan from
+behind the large, round-rimmed glasses she wore, and her mouth was clean
+cut and sharp.
+
+"This is Mrs. Westwood." Nurse Taylor introduced them briefly. "She
+wants to have a little talk with you, Miss Rutherford. If I were you I
+should tell her about things," she added pointedly. "I do not know if
+you have any plans made, but you are up for discharge next week."
+
+She bustled off and Mrs. Westwood drew up a chair and sat down close to
+Joan, staring at the girl with short-sighted, pink-lidded eyes.
+
+"You will wonder who I am," she said at last. "Perhaps you have never
+noticed me before, but I am a very frequent visitor. We run a mission in
+the South-West of London, with the object of helping young girls. I want
+you to talk to me about yourself, to be quite frank with me and to
+remember, if I seem to usurp on your privacy, that I am an older woman
+and that my only wish is to help you."
+
+"It is very kind of you," began Joan, "but----"
+
+"You may not need material help," the woman put in hastily; "but,
+spiritually, who is not in need of help from God."
+
+Joan could think of no suitable reply for this and they sat in silence,
+the woman studying her face intently. Then presently, flushing with the
+earnestness of her purpose, she put out a cold hand and took Joan's.
+
+"I think they have left it to me to tell you," she said. "The little
+life that was within you has been killed by your accident."
+
+The colour flamed to Joan's face. A sense of awe and a feeling of
+intense relief surged up in her. "Oh, what a good thing!" she gasped,
+almost before she realized what she said.
+
+Mrs. Westwood sat back in her chair, her eyes no longer looked at Joan.
+"The child which God had given you even in your sin," she said stiffly.
+
+Joan leaned forward quickly. "I did not mean just that," she said, "and
+yet I did. You do not know, you can't guess, how afraid I was getting.
+Everyone's hand against me, and even the people who had most loved me
+seeming to hate me because of this."
+
+Her voice trailed into silence before the stern disapproval of the other
+woman's face. Yet once having started, she was driven on to speak all
+the jumble of thoughts that had lain in her mind these last two months.
+
+"I was not ashamed or afraid, to begin with," she hurried the words out.
+"It had not seemed to me wrong. I lived with him because I thought I
+loved him and we did not want to get married. Then one day he let me
+see--oh, no, I am not being quite truthful, for I had seen it
+before--that he was in reality ashamed of our life together. He was
+acting against his convictions because it amused him. I could not bear
+that, it seemed to drag our life together through the mud, and I left
+him."
+
+She could see that Mrs. Westwood was not making the slightest attempt to
+understand her; still she went wildly on:
+
+"I went home and it seemed all right. My life with him faded away; I
+suppose I had never really loved him. Then, then they found out about
+what was going to happen and they turned against me, even Aunt Janet;"
+her voice broke on the words, she buried her face in her arms, crying
+like a child. "Aunt Janet, Aunt Janet," she whispered again and again
+through her tears.
+
+Mrs. Westwood waited till the storm had spent itself, there was no sign
+of softening upon her face. Remorse and regret she could understand and
+condone, but this excusing of self, as she called Joan's explanation,
+struck her as being inexcusably bad.
+
+"And do you now congratulate yourself that by this accident," she laid
+special stress on the word, "you are to escape the punishment of your
+sin?"
+
+Joan raised tear-drowned eyes. "Haven't I been punished enough," she
+asked, "for something that I did not think was a sin?"
+
+"We cannot make or unmake God's laws in our thoughts," the other
+answered; "you were wilfully blind to the knowledge that was in your
+heart."
+
+"Oh, no," Joan began. Mrs. Westwood swept the remark aside and stood up.
+
+"We will not argue about it," she said; "I realize that you are not yet
+looking for the comfort or promise of pardon which I could lead you to.
+But, my child, do not delude yourself into the belief that thus easily
+have you set aside the consequences of your evil. God is not mocked,
+neither does He sleep. If you should ever be in any real need of help,"
+she ended abruptly, "help which would serve to make you strong in the
+face of temptation, come to us, our doors are always open."
+
+She dropped a card bearing the address of the mission on Joan's lap and
+turned to go. Joan saw her call Nurse Taylor and say a few words to her
+on the way out. For herself she sat on in the dusk. Outside the lamps
+had been lit, they shone on wet pavements and huge, lurching omnibuses,
+on fast-driven taxis and a policeman standing alone in the middle of the
+road. To-morrow she would have to write to Miss Abercrombie and tell her
+there was no further need for her very kindly assistance; then she would
+have to make new plans and arrangements for herself in the future. She
+would try for a room in one of the girls' clubs that Miss Abercrombie
+had given her a letter to. She had been shy of going there before, but
+it would be different now. She could slip back into life and take up her
+share, forgetting, since the fear was past, the nightmare of terror
+which had held her heart before. For she had been afraid, what was the
+use of trying to blind her eyes to the truth? She had not had the
+courage of her convictions, she had not even wanted to carry her banner
+through the fight. She was glad, to the very bottom of her heart she was
+glad, that there was no more need for fighting.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+    "Let this be said between us here,
+       One's love grows green when one turns grey;
+     This year knows nothing of last year,
+       To-morrow has no more to say
+              To yesterday."
+
+                                             A. SWINBURNE.
+
+
+Dick could not bring himself to approve of his sister's marriage. He
+made no attempt to conceal his real opinion on the subject. In one very
+heated interview with Mabel herself he labelled it as disgusting to
+marry a man whom you disliked for his money, or for the things his money
+can give you.
+
+"But I do not dislike him," Mabel answered, as once before. She was
+sitting in a low armchair by the window, a piece of sewing in her hands.
+She laid her work down to look up at him. "He is very fond of me and he
+will be very good to Mother and myself. There are worse reasons than
+that for marrying, surely."
+
+"It is Mother, then," stormed Dick. "You are doing it because of
+Mother."
+
+Mabel shook her head. "No," she said; "I am doing it because to me it
+seems right and as if it would bring most happiness to all of us. I am
+not even quite sure that Mother approves."
+
+She need not have had any misgivings on that point. Mrs. Grant was
+absolutely in her element arranging for the marriage. Mabel had never
+been quite the beautiful daughter that Mrs. Grant would have liked, that
+she should marry a Mr. Jarvis was to be expected; he had at least got
+money, which was always something to be thankful for. She took over the
+refurnishing and redecorating of his house with eager hands.
+
+"Mabel has always been accustomed to luxury, Tom," she told Mr. Jarvis;
+"until Harry died she never wanted for a thing which money could give
+her."
+
+"And she shall not want now," he answered gravely.
+
+Only once he remarked to Mabel afterwards, showing perhaps the trend of
+his thoughts: "We appear to be furnishing our house to please your
+mother, Mabel; seems a pity I cannot save you the trouble of marrying me
+by asking her instead."
+
+Mabel stirred a little uneasily. "In pleasing her you are pleasing me,"
+she answered, and with a shrug of his shoulders he turned away from the
+subject.
+
+Mrs. Grant had her own rooms papered with white satin paper and very
+delicately outlined in gold; she ransacked the Jarvis heirlooms to find
+appropriate furniture for such a setting, and succeeded very well. The
+bills for her various suggested improvements passed through Mr. Jarvis'
+hands, and he commented on them to Mabel with a grim smile.
+
+"She knows how to spend money," he said. "Dick must certainly have found
+the responsibility heavy."
+
+"She has never learned how not to spend," Mabel explained; "but you must
+not pass what you think unnecessary."
+
+"My dear, it is part of our bargain," he answered; "I shall not shrink
+from my share any more than you will."
+
+Mrs. Grant fought very strenuously for a wedding in London, but here for
+once Mabel opposed her firmly, and the idea had to be abandoned.
+
+"It means, of course, that most of my dearest friends will not be able
+to come, but I suppose I need not expect that to weigh against your
+determination," was one of the many arguments she tried, and: "I never
+dreamed that a daughter of mine would insist upon this hole-and-corner
+way of getting married" another.
+
+"It almost looks as if you were ashamed of the man," she said somewhat
+spitefully to Mabel, the day the wedding-dress was tried on. "When your
+father and I were married the church was simply packed. I had a lovely
+gown"--her thoughts wandered into kindlier channels--"and Harry was very
+much in love. I remember his hand shaking as he tried to slip the ring
+on to my finger. I suppose you love Mr. Jarvis?"
+
+The abrupt question coming after the vague memories startled Mabel into
+sudden rigidness. "I suppose I do," she answered, her white-clad figure
+mocked her from the glass. "One does love one's husband, doesn't one?"
+
+"Mabel"--Mrs. Grant's voice sounded righteous indignation--"you do say
+such extraordinary things sometimes and about such solemn subjects. But
+if you do really love him, then why this desire for secrecy?"
+
+"Dear Mother, being married in the parish church instead of in St.
+Paul's is not exactly secrecy or a wild desire to hide something on my
+part. I have always hated big fashionable weddings."
+
+She slipped out of the dress and laid it down on the bed. Mrs. Grant
+viewed her with discontented eyes.
+
+"I cannot pretend to understand you," she grumbled, "and I don't know
+why you talk of St. Paul's. I never suggested such a place; Harry and I
+were married at St. Mary's, Kensington."
+
+Dick, when consulted on the matter, proved even less amenable. "I
+dislike the whole affair," he answered gruffly; "please don't ask me
+where it should take place."
+
+He ran up to London himself the week before the wedding. A vague and
+rather incoherent wish to meet Joan again had kept him restless ever
+since her abrupt departure. He did not attempt to define his thoughts in
+any way. The girl had interested him, and startled him out of the even
+tenor of his beliefs. He hated to think of her turned adrift and left,
+as the possibility was she had been left, to fend for herself. He had
+not seen the elder Miss Rutherford since his visit, but rumour in the
+village ran that Miss Joan had got into disgrace of sorts and been sent
+away. The servants from the Manor spoke with bated breath of the change
+which had come over the household; of how Miss Joan's rooms had been
+locked and her pictures taken down. The world is horribly hard to women
+when they leave the beaten paths of respectability; he could not bear to
+think of what she might be suffering, of where it might lead her.
+
+He walked about somewhat aimlessly for his few days in town, but the
+chance of meeting anyone in this way is very remote, and of course he
+did not succeed. He could not, however, shake away the depression which
+the thought of her brought him.
+
+Mabel came to sit in his smoking-room the night before her wedding, Mrs.
+Grant having gone early to bed.
+
+"Did you see anyone up in town?" she asked.
+
+Dick shook his head, puffing at his pipe. "Not a soul I knew," he
+commented, "except Mathews about my job. Wish I hadn't gone; London is a
+depressing place."
+
+"You rather hoped to meet someone, didn't you?" asked Mabel.
+
+Dick glanced up at her and away again quickly. "What makes you ask
+that?" he said.
+
+Mabel let the curtain fall back into place; she had been peering out
+into the street, and turned to face him. "You have shut me outside
+things, Dick," she spoke slowly, "this last month, ever since my
+engagement; but shutting me out can't keep me from knowing. You only saw
+that girl over at the Manor once, but she has been in your thoughts ever
+since." She came forward, perching herself on the arm of his chair as
+had been her habit in the old days, one arm thrown round his shoulders
+to support herself. "Little brother," she asked, "did you think I should
+not know when you fell in love?"
+
+Fell in love! How completely the thought startled him. Of course Mabel
+was utterly mistaken in her wild conjectures. To throw aside the doubt
+he turned quickly, and put a hand over hers where it lay near him.
+
+"Why do you say I have shut you out?" he parried her question. "Because
+I lost my temper over your engagement?"
+
+"No." Mabel shook her head. "It was not exactly because of that. I know
+you have not understood, Dick; I am not even sure that I want you to;
+and I know that that helped to build a wall between us, but that was not
+what began it. Never mind"--she bent and kissed the top of his head--"if
+your secret is not ready to share you shall keep it a little longer to
+yourself. You will go up to London, won't you, Dick, after Tom and I
+have come back and Mother has settled down?"
+
+"I suppose so," he agreed; "but I want to get away for a bit first, if I
+can. Spoke to Mathews when I was in town and he has promised to keep his
+eyes open for a job on one of those P. and O. liners for me."
+
+"I see," she said; "but when you come back you will settle in town and
+sometimes you will spare us week-ends from your very strenuous career,
+won't you?"
+
+"Of course," he answered; his hand tightened on hers. "Mabel," he said
+suddenly, "you are happy, aren't you; it isn't because of me or anyone
+else that you are getting married, is it?"
+
+He was not looking at her, therefore she did not have to lie with her
+eyes. "I am quite happy," she answered softly. "Dear, stupid Dick, how
+you have fretted your heart out about my happiness."
+
+"I know," he admitted, "I could not bear to think--I mean, love somehow
+stands for such a lot in people's lives, I----" he broke off, and stood
+up abruptly. "You will think I am a sentimental ass, but I have always
+wanted you to have the best of things, Mabel, and I have been horribly
+afraid that Fate, or Mother, or perhaps even I, were shoving you into
+taking the second best."
+
+"You have wanted the best for me, Dick," she answered, "that counts for
+a lot."
+
+Then one of those dull silences fell between them that come sometimes to
+two people who love with their whole hearts and who have been trying to
+speak some of their thoughts to each other--a silence that stood between
+them almost as it were with a drawn sword, while Dick puffed at his pipe
+and Mabel stared at her white hands, showing up against the darkness of
+her dress. Then finally she moved, standing up, and just for a second
+their eyes met.
+
+"Good-night," she said across the silence, "it is late, Dick, I meant to
+be in bed ages ago."
+
+"Good-night," he answered, and she turned quickly and went from the
+room.
+
+Mrs. Grant kept everyone, including herself, in a state of unexplained
+fuss from the moment when early morning light woke her on the day of
+Mabel's marriage till the moment when, much to Dick's embarrassment, she
+collapsed into his arms, sobbing bitterly, in the vestry where they had
+all gone to sign their names.
+
+At the reception she slightly recovered her spirits, but broke down
+again when the time came for the couple to depart. They were going to
+Paris for a fortnight's honey-moon; Mabel had stipulated that they
+should not be away for longer than that. Jarvis Hall was ready for their
+return; already Mrs. Grant was using one of the motors and ordering
+crested paper with the address on it for her own letters. But Dick,
+Mabel knew, was simply aching to be quit of it all, and away on his own.
+He had arranged to hand over the practice and proposed to take a two
+years' trip abroad. It was only in the complete freedom of Dick that she
+would know that part of her plan was being fulfilled.
+
+When she drew back her head after the final farewells had been waved and
+the house was out of sight it was to meet Jarvis' intent, short-sighted
+stare. His glasses magnified the pupils of his eyes to an unusual extent
+when he was looking straight at anyone.
+
+"Well," he said, "that's done. Till the last moment, Mabel, I rather
+wondered if you would go through with it. But I might have known," he
+went on quickly, "you are not the sort to shrink from a bargain once it
+is made."
+
+Her hand lay passive in his, she did not even stir when he leaned
+forward to kiss her. What he had said was perfectly true, the bargain
+had been made, she was not one of those who shirk payment.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+    "And you shall learn how salt his food who fares
+     Upon another's bread; how steep his path,
+     Who treadeth up and down another's stairs."
+
+                                             D. G. ROSSETTI.
+
+
+There are some natures which cannot live with any happiness in drab
+surroundings. Atmosphere affects everyone more or less; but whereas
+there are a few fortunate ones who can rise triumphant to a certain
+contentment through squalor and ugliness, there are a great many more
+who find even cheerfulness very hard to attain to under like
+circumstances.
+
+The shut-in dinginess of Digby Street, the gloomy aspect of Shamrock
+House, cast such a chill across Joan's spirits that, as she stood
+hesitating with her hand on the bell, the instinct came to her to
+scramble back into the cab and tell the man to drive her anywhere away
+from such a neighbourhood. Of course it was absurd, and the cabman did
+not look as if he would be in the least willing to comply. He had
+treated her with a supercilious disbelief in there being any tip for him
+as soon as he had heard of her destination. Joan had gone to Victoria
+Station to collect her luggage, and it had been both late and dark
+before the need for a cab had arisen. She had elected not to leave the
+hospital till after tea; somehow, when it had come near to going, her
+courage, which she had been bolstering up with hope and promises of what
+she should do in her new life, had vanished into thin air. Perhaps more
+than anything else she lacked the physical strength which would have
+enabled her to look cheerfully into the future. The hospital had been a
+place of refuge, she hated to leave it.
+
+This feeling grew upon her more and more as she sat back in a corner of
+the cab while it rumbled along the Vauxhall Bridge Road. There seemed
+always to be a tram passing, huge giant vehicles that shook the earth
+and made a great deal of noise in their going. The houses on either side
+were dingy, singularly unattractive-looking buildings, and the further
+the cab crawled away from Victoria Street the deeper the shade of
+poverty and dirt that descended on the surroundings. Digby Street and
+Shamrock House were the culminating stroke to Joan's depression.
+
+Miss Abercrombie had written recommending it to her as a Girls' Club
+where she would probably get companionship and advice on the question of
+work. "You won't like it," she had added, "but it is very conveniently
+situated and ridiculously cheap." So Joan had described her destination
+to the cabman as a ladies' club, somewhere in Digby Street. He had
+answered with a sniff, for it was here that he had lost sight of his
+tip, that he supposed she meant the Home for Working Girls that lay in
+those parts. Looking up at the large, red-fronted building, with its
+countless uncurtained windows, Joan realized that the man's description
+was probably nearer the truth than her own.
+
+She was to learn later that on this particular occasion she saw Digby
+Street at its very worst, for it was Saturday night, and barrows of
+fish, meat and vegetables stood along the pavements, illuminated by
+flares of light so that all the ugliness was only too apparent. Little
+children played in and out, under the barrows and along the gutters; a
+public-house stood at the corner near Shamrock House, and exactly
+opposite the Salvation Army added its brass band and shrill voices to
+the general tumult.
+
+Joan's first timid attempt at the bell produced no answer, nor her
+second. By this time the cabman had dismounted her box and stood staring
+at her in sullen disapproval, while a couple of very drunk but cheerful
+costers argued with each other as to whether they ought not to help the
+young lady to get in. Her third effort was perhaps more violent, for, to
+her relief, she could see the dim light in the hall being turned up and
+the door was opened on the chain and very slightly ajar. A couple of
+bright eyes peered at her through this opening, then, having apparently
+satisfied their owner that Joan was neither dangerous nor drunk, the
+door was further opened, and Joan could see into the red-tiled hall and
+passage with its numbered, white-painted doors.
+
+"What do you want?" asked the lady of the eyes; a small, plump person
+with grey hair brushed back very straight from an apple-red face.
+
+"I want a room," Joan explained. "I have been recommended to come here.
+I do hope you have one to spare."
+
+The little lady moved aside and beckoned to the cabman. "You can come
+in," she said, "and the man had better fetch in your box. I thought it
+was one of those troublesome children when you first rang, it was so
+very violent, and they make a point of trying to break the bells."
+
+"I am so sorry," Joan murmured meekly, an apology she realized was
+expected from her. "I was so dreadfully tired and no one seemed to be
+going to answer."
+
+"We do not keep a staff of servants to answer the bell day and night,"
+the woman answered. "Still, I am sorry you were kept waiting. Will you
+come in here"--she opened a door a little way down the passage--"this is
+my office. I must see your letter of recommendation before I let you
+talk about the rooms, that is one of our rules."
+
+Joan paid the cabman and followed her inquisitor into the office. Miss
+Nigel let down the front of the desk, opened a large ledger and donned a
+pair of spectacles. "Now," she said, "who are you, what are your
+references, and who recommended you?"
+
+Fortunately Miss Abercrombie had remembered to send a letter of
+introduction. Joan produced it and handed it to Miss Nigel. "My name is
+Joan Rutherford," she added; "I did not know about having to have
+references."
+
+Miss Nigel peered at her over the tops of her glasses; she only used
+them for reading and could not see out of them for other purposes. "We
+have to make a point of it in most cases," she answered, "but also I
+judge by appearances. In your case this letter from Miss
+Abercrombie--her name is in our books although I do not know her
+personally--will be quite sufficient. Now, how much do you want to pay?"
+
+"As little as possible," Joan confessed, "only I would like to have a
+room to myself."
+
+"Quite so," the other agreed, "and in any case, all our cubicles are
+taken. They are, of course, cheaper than anything else." She ran her
+finger down the lines of the ledger. "I can let you have a room on the
+top floor which will work out to fifteen and six a week. That includes
+breakfast, late dinner, lights and baths. There is a certain amount of
+attendance, but we expect the girls to make their own beds and keep the
+rooms tidy."
+
+Fifteen and six a week. Joan attempted to make a rapid calculation in
+her head, but gave up the idea. It sounded at least quite absurdly
+cheap, she would not have to spend very much of Uncle John's allowance
+before she got some work to do for herself. The future seemed suddenly
+to shut her in to a life enclosed by the brick walls of Shamrock House
+with its attendant neighbourhood of Digby Street.
+
+"That will do," she answered, "it sounds very nice."
+
+"Yes," agreed Miss Nigel; she closed the desk and stood up, "for the
+price, we offer exceptional advantages. If you will carry up what you
+need for to-night, I will show you to your rooms."
+
+It occurred to Joan as she followed her guide up flights of carpetless
+stone stairs that her new abode resembled a prison more than anything
+else. The long bare passages were broken up by countless doors all
+numbered and painted white in contrast to the brick-coloured walls. The
+sound of their footsteps echoed mournfully through the bareness and
+seeming desolation of the place. From one of the landing windows she
+caught a blurred picture of the streets outside, the lit-up barrows, the
+crowd just emerging from the public-house. She was to get very used and
+very hardened to the life in Digby Street, but on this, her first
+evening, it caught at her senses with a cold touch of fear.
+
+On the top floor of all Miss Nigel opened the first door along the
+passage and ushered Joan into the room that was to be hers. It was so
+small that its one window occupied practically the whole space of the
+front wall. A narrow bed stood along one side, and between this and the
+opposite wall there was scarce room for a chair. At the foot of the bed
+stood the wash-stand and the chest of drawers facing each other, with a
+very narrow space in between them. But it was all scrupulously clean,
+with white-washed walls and well-scrubbed furniture, and the windows
+opened over the roofs of the neighbouring houses. Very far up in the
+darkness of the sky outside a star twinkled and danced.
+
+Miss Nigel looked round at the room with evident satisfaction. "You will
+be comfortable here, I think," she said; "we do our best to make the
+girls happy. We expect them, however, to conform to our rules; you will
+find them explained in this book." She placed a little blue pamphlet on
+the dressing-table. "Lights are put out at ten, and if you are later
+than that, you have to pay a small fine for being let in, a threepenny
+door fee, we call it. Everyone is requested to make as little noise as
+possible in their rooms or along the passages, and to be punctual for
+dinner."
+
+With one more look round she turned to go. Half-way out, however, a
+kindly thought struck her, and she looked back at Joan.
+
+"Dinner is at seven-thirty," she said. "I expect you will be glad to
+have it and get to bed. You look very tired."
+
+Joan would have liked to ask if she could have dinner upstairs, but one
+glance at the book of rules and regulations decided her against the
+idea. Shamrock House evidently admitted of no such luxury, and on second
+thoughts, how ridiculous it was to suppose that dinner could be carried
+up five flights of stairs for the benefit of someone paying fifteen and
+six a week all told. She was too tired and too depressed to face the
+prospect of a meal downstairs, she would just have to go to bed without
+dinner, she concluded.
+
+The House woke to life as she lay there, evidently the inhabitants
+returned about this time. Joan remembered the cabman's somewhat blunt
+description and smiled at the memory. A Home for Working Girls. That was
+why it had seemed so silent and deserted before, shops and offices do
+not shut till after six. But now the workers were coming home, she could
+hear their feet along the passages, the slamming of doors, voices and
+laughter from the room next hers. Home! This narrow, cold room, those
+endless stairs and passages outside, they were to be home for the
+future. The hot tears pricked in her eyes, but she fought against tears.
+After all, she had been very lucky to find it, it was cheap, it was
+clean; other girls lived here and were happy, someone had laughed next
+door.
+
+"I have got to take you firmly in hand," Joan argued with her
+depression. "It is no use making a fuss about things that are all my own
+fault. I tried to play with life and I did not succeed. It is too big
+and hard. If I had wanted to work it out differently I ought to have
+been very strong. But I am not strong, I am only just ordinary. This is
+my chance again, and in the plain, straight way I must win through." She
+spoke the words almost aloud, as if challenging fate: "I will win
+through."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+    "Will my strength last me? Did not someone say
+     The way was ever easier all the way?"
+
+                                             H. C. BEECHING.
+
+
+Youth can nearly always rely upon sleep to build up new strength, new
+hope, new courage. If you have got to a stage in your life when sleep
+fails you, if night means merely a long tortured pause from the noises
+of the world, in which the beating of your heart seems unbearably loud,
+then indeed you have reached to the uttermost edge of despair. Joan
+slept, heavily and dreamlessly, save that there was some vague hint of
+happiness in her mind, till she was wakened in the morning by a most
+violent bell ringing. The dressing-bell at Shamrock House, which went at
+seven o'clock, was carried by a maid up and down every passage, so that
+there was not the slightest chance of anyone oversleeping themselves.
+
+Joan dressed quickly; the faint aroma of happiness which her sleep had
+brought her, and which amounted to cheerfulness, stayed with her. She
+remembered how Miss Abercrombie had once said to her: "Oh, you are a
+Browningite," and smiled at the phrase, repeating to herself another
+verse of the same poem:
+
+    "And I shall thereupon
+     Take rest ere I be gone,
+     Once more on my adventure brave and new."
+
+She felt almost confident of success this morning; her mind was busy
+with plans of the work she would find. She was glad to feel herself one
+in a giant hive of workers, all girls like herself, cutting out their
+lives for themselves, earning their own living.
+
+Breakfast brought with it a slight disillusionment. The dining-room in
+Shamrock House is in the basement; chill and dreary of aspect, its
+windows always dirty and unopenable, because at the slightest excuse of
+an open window the small boys of the neighbourhood will make it their
+target for all kinds of filth. Rotting vegetables, apple-cores,
+scrapings of mud; there is quite sufficient of all that outside the
+windows without encouraging it to come in. Six long deal tables occupy
+the space of the room, and it is one of the few amusements which the
+children of Digby Street possess to gather at the railings and watch the
+inhabitants of Shamrock House being fed.
+
+It was the last flight of stairs into the basement which damped Joan's
+enthusiasm for her new home. As she stood hesitating in the doorway, for
+there were a great many people in the room, and the tables seemed
+crowded, she caught Miss Nigel's eye.
+
+"You will find a seat over there," the lady called out to her, waving a
+hand in the direction of the furthest table. "Help yourself to bacon,
+which is on the hot case near the fire, and come here for your tea or
+coffee. By the way, which do you like?"
+
+Joan asked for tea, and having secured her cup and a small piece of
+unappetizing bacon, she found her way over to the indicated table. A
+girl sat at the head of it, and since she was ensconced behind a
+newspaper and apparently paying no attention to anybody, Joan chose the
+chair next her. She felt on the sudden shy and unwilling to make friends
+with anyone, the chill of the room was striking into her heart.
+
+She had presently to rouse her neighbour, however, to ask her to pass
+the salt, and at that the girl lifted a pair of penetrating eyes and
+fixed Joan with an intent stare.
+
+"New arrival?" she asked.
+
+"Yes," Joan admitted. "I came last night."
+
+"Humph!" the girl commented. "Well, don't touch the jam this morning. It
+is peculiar to Shamrock House--plum-stones, raspberry-pips and glue."
+She swept the information at Joan and returned to her paper.
+
+She was a big girl with rather a heavy face and strong, capable-looking
+hands. Despite her manners, which were undeniably bad, Joan would almost
+have described her as distinguished but for the fact that the word
+sounded ridiculous amid such surroundings.
+
+"Looking for work?" the girl asked presently.
+
+"Yes," Joan answered again, "only I am not sure what sort of work to
+look for, or what I should like to do."
+
+The girl lifted her eyes to stare at her once again. "It isn't generally
+a case of 'like,'" she said, "more often it is necessity. In that
+case"--she reached out a long arm for the bread--"Fate does not as a
+rule give you much time in which to make up your mind; she pushes you
+into something which you hate like hell for the rest of your life."
+
+"You aren't very cheerful," remonstrated Joan.
+
+"Oh, well, I never am that," agreed the other, "nor polite. You ask Miss
+Nigel if you want a true estimate of my manners. But I have lived here
+ten years now and I have seen girls like you drift in and out by the
+score. The feeding or the general atmosphere doesn't agree with them,
+and our ranks are maintained by beings of a coarser make, as you may see
+for yourself."
+
+She rose, crumpling her paper into a ball and throwing it under the
+table.
+
+"My name is Rose Brent," she said. "What is yours?"
+
+"Rutherford," Joan answered, "Joan Rutherford. I hope I shan't drift
+quite as quickly as you foretell," she added.
+
+Secretarial work was what she had really made up her mind to try for,
+though she had not had the courage to confess as much to her breakfast
+companion. She had, after all, had a certain amount of training in that
+and hoped not to find it so very impossible to get a post as a beginner
+somewhere. Her first visit to the nearest registry office, however,
+served to show her that her very slight experience was going to be of
+little use to her. The registry lady was kind, sufficiently interested
+to appear amiable, but not at all reassuring in her views as to Joan's
+prospects.
+
+"I am afraid I cannot hold out very much hope," she said, after five
+minutes' crisp questioning of Joan. "You have, you see, so very few
+qualifications, and the market is rather over-stocked with girls who can
+do just a little. My strong advice to you is to continue your shorthand;
+when you are a little more experienced in that we ought to have no
+difficulty in placing you. Good morning; please see that the hall door
+shuts properly, the latch is very weak."
+
+Her business-like manner, the absolute efficiency which shone around
+her, and the crowded aspect of the waiting-room--all girls who could do
+just a little, Joan presumed--caused her heart to sink. Finding work was
+not going to be as easy as she had first supposed.
+
+She roamed from office to office after that for several days, to be met
+everywhere with the same slight encouragement and frail promises to
+help. Finally, thoroughly discouraged, she bought papers instead, and
+turned to a strict perusal of their various advertisements.
+
+One in particular caught her eye.
+
+"Wanted a pupil shorthand typist. Tuition in return for services.--Apply
+Miss Bacon, 2, Baker Street, W."
+
+It was late in the afternoon of the day before Joan found her way to
+Baker Street, for she had had several other places to call at and she
+was in addition very tired. Going from place to place in search of work
+had reduced her to a painful knowledge of her own absolute incompetency
+and the general uselessness of life. A brass plate on the door of No. 2
+conveyed the information: "Miss Bacon. Fourth floor. Shorthand and
+Typing. Please ring and walk up."
+
+Joan rang and followed the instructions. On the very top landing a girl
+stood, holding a candle in her hand, for up here there was no light of
+any sort. The grease dripped down her skirt and on to the floor.
+
+"Do you want Miss Bacon?" she asked.
+
+Joan nodded, too breathless to say anything.
+
+The girl turned into the dim interior and threw open a door, snuffing
+the candle at the same time.
+
+"If you will wait here," she said, "Miss Bacon will be with you in a
+minute."
+
+Joan looked round on a moderately large, dust-smothered room. Dust, that
+is to say, was the first thing to strike the eye of the beholder. The
+windows were thick in dust, it lay on tables and chairs and on the two
+typewriters standing unused in a corner of the room. The room gave one
+the impression of being singularly uninhabited. Then the door opened and
+shut again, and Joan turned to face the owner.
+
+Miss Bacon's figure, like her furniture, seemed to have taken on a
+coating of dust. Timid eyes looked out at Joan from behind pince-nez set
+rather crookedly on a thin nose. One side of her face, from eye to chin,
+was disfigured by an unsightly bruise. Miss Bacon dabbed a handkerchief
+to it continually and started explaining its presence at once.
+
+"You may be surprised at my face"--her voice, like her eyes, was
+timid--"but I am short-sighted and last night stumbled on the stairs,
+hitting my face against the top step. It was exceedingly painful, but it
+is better now. What can I do for you?"
+
+Joan murmured something sympathetic about the top step, and explained
+that she had come in answer to the advertisement. Miss Bacon's face
+fell. "I had hoped you were a client," she owned. Then she pulled
+forward a chair for herself and asked Joan to be seated.
+
+It appeared that Joan would receive excellent tuition in shorthand and
+free use of the typewriters. If any typing work came in she would be
+expected to help with it, but for the rest she could devote the whole
+of her time to studying and practising on the machines. Miss Bacon was a
+little vague as to the other pupils, but Joan gathered that there was a
+shorthand class and two other typewriters in another room.
+
+"My other pupils are, of course, on a different footing," Miss Bacon
+told her. "Generally I require a fee of at least ten guineas, but in
+your case, as I shall require you to do a little work for me, I shall be
+content to take less. That is to say, four guineas, everything
+included."
+
+"There is nothing about paying in the advertisement," Joan ventured. "I
+am afraid it is quite impossible for me to pay that."
+
+Miss Bacon took off her glasses and polished them with nervous hands. "I
+do not want to seem unreasonable," she said; "after you have worked for
+me you will certainly be able to obtain a well-paid post elsewhere; my
+pupils invariably move on in that way. I guarantee, of course, to find
+situations. If I could meet you in any way--supposing you paid me two
+guineas now and two guineas when you moved on?"
+
+"It is awfully kind of you"--Joan hesitated on the words--"but I am
+afraid I can't really afford it, not even that."
+
+Miss Bacon relinquished the idea with a heartfelt sigh. "My dear," she
+confided suddenly, "I know what poverty is. Shall we say one pound to
+begin with?--you must remember that these are very exceptional terms."
+
+Joan thought a moment. It seemed almost certain, from what she had
+gleaned from the various agencies, that getting a post without training
+was an impossibility, and most of the training centres asked for at
+least twenty-five guineas. Perhaps in refusing this offer she was
+letting a good chance slip by her, and, though she hated to make free
+use of it, there was always Uncle John's money, to fall back on.
+
+"I think I will come if you will let me do it in that way," she decided
+finally; "when would you like me to start?--to-morrow?"
+
+"The sooner the better." Miss Bacon rose with a smile of almost intense
+relief. "I have had no one for the last fortnight and the place is
+getting very untidy. You will pay the first pound in advance," she
+added; "I hope you will bring it with you to-morrow."
+
+She seemed painfully anxious for the money; if Joan had not been so
+tired she might have thought the fact suspicious. As it was she went
+back to Shamrock House with a lightened heart. It was not a very
+attractive or promising post; if she were to judge by outside
+appearances and by Miss Bacon's last remark her chief duties were to
+include those of general cleaning up and dusting. But that would be all
+in the day's work. Some little confidence and hope were beginning to
+creep back into her heart. She had secured her first post; Miss Bacon
+held out vague visions of the triumphs to which it might lead. Surely in
+time she would get away from the nightmare of the last two months; in
+time even Aunt Janet would forgive her, and meanwhile her foot was on
+the lowest rung of the ladder; work should be her world in future. She
+would work and fight and win. There was still, as Miss Abercrombie would
+have said, a banner to be carried. She would carry it now to the end.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+    "Our life is spent in little things,
+       In little cares our hearts are drowned;
+     We move with heavy laden wings
+       In the same narrow round."
+
+
+For the first week in her new post Joan was kept very busy putting
+things--as Miss Bacon described it--to rights. She had also, she
+discovered, to run errands for Miss Bacon several times during the
+course of a day; to buy paper for the typewriters, to fetch Miss
+Bacon's lunch, on one occasion to buy some cooling lotion for Miss
+Bacon's bruise. Of the other pupils she saw no sign, and even the girl
+who had admitted her on the first night did not put in an appearance,
+but this Miss Bacon explained by saying that Edith was delicate and
+often forced to stay away through ill health.
+
+Joan refrained from asking questions; she realized herself that she had
+stumbled on to something that was nearly a tragedy. The hunted look in
+Miss Bacon's face, the signs of poverty, the absolute lack of work told
+their own tale. As a running business 2, Baker Street, was an evident
+failure, but there was no reason why, with a little application, she
+should not make it serve her purpose as a school. The lack of tuition
+was its one great drawback; there seemed no signs whatsoever of the
+promised shorthand lessons. Finally Joan plucked up her courage one
+morning in the second week, and invaded Miss Bacon's private office.
+
+"What about my shorthand?" she inquired from just within the doorway;
+"when shall I begin?"
+
+Miss Bacon had changed her shoes for a pair of bedroom slippers and was
+occupying the arm-chair, immersed in the newspaper. She started at
+Joan's abrupt question, the movement jerking the glasses from off her
+nose. She picked them up nervously and blinked at Joan.
+
+"What did you say?--shorthand? Oh, yes, of course! It is really Edith's
+duty to take you in that; still, as she is not here, I propose to
+dictate to you myself after lunch. My first duty in the mornings is to
+master the newspaper; there might be some openings advertised." She
+turned again to her news-sheet. "Why not employ yourself practising on
+the typewriter?" she suggested.
+
+Joan would have liked to reply that she was tired of practising
+sentences on the typewriter and hungry for some real work to do, but she
+had not the heart to be unkind to the poor little woman. She spent a
+disconsolate morning and stayed out for lunch longer than usual. On her
+return Miss Bacon was waiting for her on the top of the stairs.
+
+"My dear," she said in an excited voice, "some work has come in. A man
+has just brought it, and he must have it by to-morrow morning. I hope
+you will be able to get it done, for I have promised, and a lot may
+depend on it."
+
+So much depended on it that she herself decided to help Joan with the
+work. She was not, it appeared, even as experienced as Joan, and by 6.30
+the two of them had only completed about half the typing. Joan's back
+ached and her fingers tingled, but Miss Bacon's eyes behind the glasses
+were strained to the verge of tears, two hectic spots of colour burned
+in her cheeks and her fingers stumbled and faltered over the keys.
+
+As the clock struck seven Joan straightened herself with a sigh of
+relief.
+
+"It is no use," she said, "we cannot get it done; he will have to wait
+for his silly old papers."
+
+The blood died suddenly out of Miss Bacon's face, her mouth trembled.
+"It must be done," she answered; "you do not understand. It is the first
+work that has been brought to us for weeks. The man is a stranger; if it
+is well done and up to time he will give us some more; besides he will
+pay"--for a second she lifted her eyes and looked at Joan--"I must have
+the money," she said.
+
+Her face, working under the stress of some strong emotion, was painful
+to see. She was so weak, so useless, so driven. Joan looked away hastily
+and went on with her work. From time to time, though, she stole a glance
+at Miss Bacon. It was dreadful to know that the poor old woman was
+crying; quietly, hopelessly, great drops that splashed on to her fingers
+as they stumbled over the keys.
+
+At last Joan could bear it no longer, she rose quickly and crossed over
+to Miss Bacon, putting her hands over the useless fingers.
+
+"Don't you bother with it any more, Miss Bacon," she said. "I am nearly
+through with my share now and I can come early to-morrow and get it all
+done before breakfast. It is silly to work away at it now when we are
+both tired out."
+
+Miss Bacon gulped down her tears and looked up nervously. "You think you
+can," she asked; "you have realized how important it is?"
+
+"Yes," Joan told her, "and I know I can. I won't disappoint you, really
+I won't. Let us go across the road and get some tea before we go home,"
+she suggested.
+
+Miss Bacon looked away again hastily. "You go," she muttered, "I don't
+need tea, I----"
+
+"You are going to come and have tea with me," Joan interrupted. It had
+flashed on her that Miss Bacon had not even the money for that.
+
+Over the hot buttered toast and the tea Miss Bacon poured out her
+troubles to Joan. They came, once she had started, in an unquenchable
+flood of reminiscences. The little woman had reached the last inch of
+endurance; the kindly sympathy, the touch of Joan's hands broke down all
+barriers of reserve or caution. She had been a governess, it appeared,
+and during all her years of service she had laid by enough money to buy
+the business at Baker Street.
+
+"I got it cheap," she owned. "I can see now that the other people must
+have failed too, and I have no head for business. I am absolutely at the
+end of things now; if I died to-morrow it would be a pauper's funeral. I
+often think of that when I see a gorgeous hearse and procession passing
+through the street."
+
+Her words were ridiculous, but real tragedy looked out of her eyes.
+"Ruin stares me in the face," she went on, "from every paper I read,
+from every person I meet. I have no money, not even enough to buy food,
+as you have guessed. Ruin! and I have not the courage to get out of it
+all. I have never been very brave."
+
+"But I think you have been brave," Joan tried to reassure her. "You
+have held on for so long alone. And I expect we have turned a corner
+now, things will be better to-morrow."
+
+Miss Bacon stared at her teacup with hopeless eyes. "That is what I used
+to think at first," she said, "to-morrow will be better than to-day--it
+never has been yet."
+
+She rose to go, and Joan, prompted by a sudden quick desire to help,
+leant forward and caught hold of her coat. The tragedy of the withered
+figure, the stupid, aimless face, struck her as the cruellest thing she
+had yet seen in life. What were her own troubles compared to this
+other's dull facing of loneliness, failure and death.
+
+"You must cheer up, you really must," she begged; "and as for the money
+part, let me pay down the rest of my fee now. I have got three pounds
+out with me; do take it, please do, you see it really is yours."
+
+Taking the money seemed to add an extra gloom to Miss Bacon's outlook;
+none the less she did not require very much persuading, and Joan,
+pressing it into her hand, piloted her across the road and saw her into
+the Underground station.
+
+It was the last glimpse she was to have of the quaint figure which had
+crossed her life for so short a time, but that she did not realize. She
+only knew that her heart ached because she had been able to do so little
+to help, and because Miss Bacon's story had brought suddenly to her mind
+a knowledge of how terribly hard life can be to those who are not strong
+enough to stand against it.
+
+True to her word, she arrived at Baker Street very early the next
+morning and the momentous piece of typewriting was finished before Miss
+Bacon's usual hour of arrival. Joan put it on the table with the old
+lady's paper and went out to get some breakfast, as she had had to leave
+Shamrock House before seven.
+
+She was greeted on her return by the girl who had let her in on the
+first night. There was a man with her who had taken possession of Miss
+Bacon's chair and who was reading the paper morosely, both elbows on the
+table.
+
+He glanced up at Joan as she entered. "Is this Miss Bacon, by any
+chance?" he asked, bringing out the words with a certain grim defiance.
+
+Edith interrupted Joan's disclaimer by a shrill laugh. "Lor' bless you,
+no, she is one of the pupils, same as me." She turned to Joan. "Did you
+pay anything to join?" she asked. Joan resented the familiarity of her
+tone. "Would have liked to have warned you the other night, but Bacon
+was too nippy."
+
+Joan flushed slightly. Disregarding the interruption she spoke quickly,
+answering the man's question:
+
+"Miss Bacon must be ill, I am afraid," she said; "it is so very late for
+her, she is nearly always here by ten. She will probably be here
+to-morrow if you care to come again."
+
+Again Edith giggled and the man frowned heavily.
+
+"Well, she probably won't," he answered. "She has done a bunk, that's
+the long and short of it, and there is not a blasted penny of what she
+owes me paid. Damn the woman with her whining, wheezing letters, 'Do
+give me time--I'll pay in time.' Might have known it would end in her
+bunking."
+
+"I don't think you ought to speak of her like that," Joan attempted;
+"after all, it is only that she does not happen to be here this morning.
+She would have let me know if she had not been coming back."
+
+"Oh, would she?" growled the man; "well, I don't care a blasted hell
+what you think. I don't need to be taught my business by the likes of
+you."
+
+From the passage to which she had retired Edith attracted Joan's
+attention by violent signs. "There is no use arguing with him," she
+announced in an audible whisper, "he's fair mad; this is about the tenth
+time he's missed her. Come out here a minute, I want to talk to you."
+
+Joan went reluctantly. She disliked the girl instinctively, she
+disliked the dirty white blouse from which the red neck rose, ornamented
+by a string of cheap pearls, and the greasy black ribbon which bound up
+Edith's head of curls.
+
+"Are you being a fool?" the girl asked, "or are you trying to kid that
+man? Haven't you cottoned to old Bacon's game yet?"
+
+"I am sorry for Miss Bacon, if that is what you mean," Joan answered
+stiffly.
+
+"Sorry!" Edith's face was expressive of vast contempt. "That won't save
+you from much in this world. I tell you one thing, if you lent the old
+hag any money yesterday you won't see her again this side of the grave,
+so there isn't any use your hanging about here waiting for that."
+
+Joan favoured her with a little collected stare. "Thank you," she said,
+"it is very thoughtful of you to think of warning me." She left her and
+walked back deliberately into the room where the man was sitting. "There
+were some typed sheets lying on the top of the paper," she said; "do you
+mind letting me have them back."
+
+"Yes I do," he answered briefly; "man called in for them a little while
+back and that is five shillings towards what the old hag owes me,
+anyhow."
+
+It was in its way rather humorous that she should have worked so hard to
+put five shillings into such an objectionable pocket. Joan felt strongly
+tempted to argue the matter with him, but discretion proving wiser than
+valour, she left him to his spoils and retired into the other room. She
+would not leave the place, she decided, in case Miss Bacon did turn up;
+it would be very disagreeable for her to have to face such a man by
+herself.
+
+By lunch time the man stalked away full of threats as to what he would
+do, and Edith went with him. Joan stayed on till six, and there was
+still no sign of Miss Bacon. It was strange that she should neither have
+telephoned nor written.
+
+Over dinner at Shamrock House that night she told Rose Brent the story
+of her fortnight's adventure, ending up with the rash impulse which had
+led her to pay up the four guineas because Miss Bacon had seemed in such
+bitter need. The girl met her tale with abrupt laughter.
+
+"I am afraid what your unpleasant acquaintance of this morning told you
+is probably true," she said. "After all, if you went and handed out four
+guineas it was a direct temptation to the poor old woman to get away
+on."
+
+"I don't believe she would take it just for that," Joan tried to argue.
+"I know she wanted it awfully badly, but it was to help her pull through
+and things were going to run better afterwards. I don't believe she
+would just take it and slip away without saying a word to me."
+
+"Faith in human nature is all very well," the other answered, "but it is
+awfully apt to let you down, especially in the working world."
+
+"I shall go on believing for a bit," Joan said; "she was looking so
+awfully ill yesterday, it may just be that she could not come up to
+office to-day."
+
+"May be," Rose agreed. "When you are tired of waiting for the return of
+the prodigal let me know and I will see if I cannot get you in
+somewhere. I ought to be able to help. And look here, my child, never
+you pay another penny for tuition on those lines; you could get all the
+learning you need at the County Council Night Schools, and it is a good
+deal cheaper."
+
+Joan put in two days at No. 2, Baker Street, waiting for the return of
+Miss Bacon or for some message which might explain her absence, but
+nothing and no one came. On the morning of the third day she found that
+the stout and bad-tempered man had carried out his vague threats. The
+place had been taken possession of, already they were removing the
+typewriters and tables under the direction of a bailiff. Even the plate
+bearing Miss Bacon's name had vanished, and boards announcing the top
+flat to let flaunted themselves from the area railings.
+
+After that Joan gave up the hope. Sometimes she wondered if after all
+Miss Bacon had found the necessary courage to be done with it all, and
+if her silence betokened death. It was more likely though that the poor
+old lady had merely sunk one rung lower on the ladder of self-esteem and
+was dragging out a miserable existence somewhere in the outside purlieus
+of London.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+    "Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp,
+     Or what's a heaven for?"
+
+                                             R. BROWNING.
+
+
+Following Rose's suggestion, and because for the time being there really
+seemed nothing for her to do, unless she could show herself a little
+better trained, Joan joined the County Council Night Schools in the
+neighbourhood. She would go there five evenings in the week; three for
+shorthand and two for typing. Her fellow scholars were drawn from all
+ages and all ranks--clerks, office boys, and grey-headed men; girls with
+their hair still in pig-tails, and elderly women with patient, strained
+faces, who would sit at their desks plodding through the intricacies of
+shorthand and paying very little attention to what went on all round
+them.
+
+The boy and girl section of the community indulged in a little rough and
+tumble love-making. Even long office hours and the deadly monotony of
+standing behind desk or counter all day could not quite do away with the
+riotous spirit of youth. They giggled and chattered among themselves,
+and passed surreptitious notes from one form to the other when Mr.
+Phillips was not looking.
+
+Mr. Phillips, the shorthand master, was a red-faced, extremely irascible
+little man. He came to these classes from some other school in the city
+where he had been teaching all day, and naturally, by the time evening
+arrived, his none too placid temper had been stretched to
+breaking-point. He was extremely impatient with any non-comprehension
+of his complicated method of instruction; and he would pass from row to
+row, after his dictation had been finished, snatching away the papers
+from his paralysed pupils and tearing them into fragments had the
+exercise been badly done.
+
+Joan noticed the man who sat next her on the first and every night. He
+was quite the worst person she had ever seen at learning anything. He
+was not by any means young, grey already showed in the hair above his
+ears, and his forehead wrinkled with innumerable lines. He had, she
+thought, the most pathetic eyes, large and honest, but quite
+irredeemably stupid.
+
+"I can't make head or tale of it," he confessed to her on the second
+night. "And Mr. Phillips gets so annoyed with me, it only muddles me
+more."
+
+"Why do you bother to learn?" she asked. It seemed rather strange that a
+man of his age should have to struggle with so elementary a subject.
+
+"I have worked in an office for the last ten years," he explained. "The
+new boss has suddenly decided that shorthand is necessary. I don't
+know," he spoke rather vaguely, his eyes wandering round the room, "but
+it is just possible he might ask me to go if I did not master it. I have
+been there so long I hardly like to have to look for another place."
+
+"It seems such a shame," Joan told Rose afterwards, "that these people
+can never get a place where they feel really safe. They live always
+expecting to be turned off at a moment's notice, or to have somebody put
+in on top of them. Everybody seems to be fighting against everybody
+else; doesn't anyone ever stop to help?"
+
+The older girl laughed. "Why, yes," she said. "The world, or at least
+the people in it, are not so bad as all that. Only life is a case of
+push and struggle, and it is only natural that people should want to get
+the best they can for their money. Also it wouldn't be fair if the ones
+who worked best were not preferred to the others."
+
+Mr. Simpson, Joan's perplexed friend of the shorthand class, was
+certainly one of the stupidest people she had ever met, yet she was
+terribly sorry for him. He was the butt of the class, which did not add
+to the hilarity of his position, because of the torrent of abuse which
+he always drew from Mr. Phillips at some stage in the evening.
+
+"Now," Mr. Phillips would call out, starting the lesson by a blackboard
+demonstration, "silence and attention, please."
+
+He would draw a series of strokes and dashes on the blackboard, calling
+out their various meanings, and the class would set itself to copy them.
+The lesson would proceed for some time in silence, save for Mr.
+Phillips' voice, but presently the bewilderment caused by so many new
+outlines would terrify Mr. Simpson and he would lean forward to
+interrupt, stammering, as he always did when nervous.
+
+"Why is 'M' made like that?" he would say. "Wouldn't it be much better
+if it were made the other way?"
+
+"Why, why?" Mr. Phillips would thunder. "If you would just learn what
+you are taught, sir, and not try to think, it would be a great deal
+pleasanter for the rest of us."
+
+Mr. Simpson would get a little red under the onslaught, but his eyes
+always retained their patient, perplexed expression. He seemed
+impervious to the impression he created in the back row. "Laughing-stock
+of the whole class," Mr. Phillips called him in a moment of extreme
+irritation, and the expression caught on.
+
+"I am so silly," he said to Joan. "I really am not surprised that they
+think me funny."
+
+She was the one person who was ever nice to him or who did attempt to
+explain things to him. Sometimes they would get there a little early and
+she would go over his exercises with him. He might be thick-skinned to
+the want of tolerance which the rest of the class meted out to him; he
+was undoubtedly grateful to Joan for the kindness she showed him.
+
+One evening on his way to class he plucked up courage to purchase a
+small buttonhole for her, and blushed a very warm red when Joan took his
+offering with a smile and pinned it into her coat.
+
+"How nice of you," she said. "I love violets, and these smell so sweet."
+
+"They are not half sweet enough for you," he managed to say, stuttering
+furiously.
+
+Joan had a moment's uneasiness. Surely the wretched little man was not
+going to fall in love with her? She glanced sideways at him during the
+class and what she saw reassured her. His clothes, his dirty hands, his
+whole appearance, put him in a different world to herself. However kind
+she might be to him, he surely could not fail to recognize that it was
+only the same kindness which would prompt her to cross the road to give
+a penny to a beggar?
+
+Unfortunately Mr. Simpson belonged to a class which is very slow to
+recognize any difference in rank save that of wealth. He was a humble
+little man before Joan, but that was because he was by nature humble,
+and also because he was in love. He thought her very wonderful and
+beautiful beyond his range of words, but he imagined her as coming from
+much the same kind of home as his own, and she seemed to exist in the
+same strata of life.
+
+A night or two after the flower episode he fixed adoring eyes on her and
+asked if he might be allowed to see her home.
+
+"Well, it is rather out of your way," Joan remonstrated, she had so
+often seen him trudge off in the opposite direction.
+
+"That is of no consequence," he replied, with his usual stutter.
+
+The streets were dark, quiet, and deserted. Now and then as they hurried
+along, for Joan walked as fast as she could to ward off conversation,
+they passed a solitary policeman doing his beat, and dim, scarce seen
+lovers emerged out of the shadows holding each other's hands.
+
+"Will you not take my arm?" Mr. Simpson ventured presently. He was
+slightly out of breath in his effort to keep up with her.
+
+"No, thank you," Joan answered. The whole occurrence was too ridiculous,
+yet for once in her life her sense of humour was failing her. "And I
+wish you would not bother to come any further, it is quite unnecessary."
+
+Her tone was more than chilly. Mr. Simpson, however remained undaunted.
+His slow and ponderous mind had settled on a certain course; it would
+need more than a little chilliness to turn it from its purpose.
+
+"I was going to ask you," he went on, "whether you would do me the
+honour of coming to the theatre one evening? If you have a mind that
+turns that way sometimes."
+
+"No, thank you," answered Joan once more. "I never go to theatres, and I
+shouldn't go with you in any case," she added desperately, as a final
+resource.
+
+"I meant no offence," the man answered, humble as ever. "I should always
+act straight by a girl, and for you----"
+
+"Oh, don't, please don't," Joan interrupted. She stopped in her walk and
+faced round on him. "Can't you see how impossible it would be for
+me----" she broke off abruptly, rather ashamed of her outburst. "I am
+going to be a snob in a minute, if I am not careful," she finished to
+herself.
+
+"I know I am not amusing, or anything," the man went on; "but you have
+always seemed so kind and considerate. If I have offended in any way, I
+am more than sorry."
+
+Joan felt that he was frowning as he always frowned in hopeless
+perplexity over his shorthand.
+
+"I am not offended," she tried to explain more gently. "Only, please do
+not ask me to go out with you again, or offer to walk home with me. Here
+we are anyway, this is where I live." She turned at the bottom of
+Shamrock House steps and held out her hand to him. "Good-night," she
+said.
+
+Simpson did not take her hand, instead he stared up at her; she could
+see how shiny and red his face was under the lamp.
+
+"You are not angry with me?" he stuttered.
+
+"Why, no, of course not," Joan prevaricated. Then she ran up the steps
+and let herself into the hall without looking back at him.
+
+For two or three days she attempted to ignore the man's presence in
+class next her, and Simpson himself in no way intruded. He had taken her
+snubbing like a man; from the height of his dreams he had fallen into an
+apathetic despair; the only effect it had on him was to make him
+stupider than ever at his work. Then one evening, with a face working
+rather painfully, he told her that he did not intend to come any more.
+
+"I am going to another centre," he said, gathering his books together
+and not looking at her.
+
+"Has Mr. Phillips been too much for you?" she asked, wilfully ignoring
+the deeper meaning behind his words.
+
+"No," he answered, "it is not that. It may seem quite absurd," he went
+on laboriously, "but I want to ask you to let me have your note-book. I
+have got a new one to give you in its place." He produced a packet from
+his pocket and held it out to her.
+
+Later on, when she thought over the thing, she smiled. A note-book
+seemed so singularly unromantic, but at the time she felt nearer tears.
+The look in his eyes haunted her for many days. She had been the one
+glimpse of romance in his dreary existence, and she had had to kill the
+dream so ruthlessly.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+    "It seems her heart was not washed clean
+        Of tinted dreams of 'Might have been.'"
+
+                                             RUTH YOUNG.
+
+
+There followed a weary time for Joan. The poem she had repeated on her
+first morning at Shamrock House had to be recalled again and again and
+fell away finally from its glad meaning in the bitter disillusionment
+which looking for work entailed. Wherein lay the value of cheerfulness
+when day after day saw her weary and dispirited from a fruitless search,
+from hope-chilling visits to registry offices, from unsuccessful
+applications in answer to the advertisements which thronged the morning
+papers? She went at it at first eagerly, hopefully. "To-day I shall
+succeed," was her waking motto. But every evening brought its tale of
+disappointment.
+
+"There is no one in the world as useless as I am," she thought finally.
+
+"It is only just a bad season," Rose Brent tried to cheer her up; "there
+is lots of unemployment about; we will find something for you soon."
+
+But to Joan it seemed as if the iron of being absolutely unwanted was
+entering into her soul.
+
+There was only one shred of comfort in all this dreariness. Life at
+Shamrock House was so cheap that she was eating up but very little of
+Uncle John's allowance. She wondered sometimes if the old people at home
+ever asked at the Bank as to how her money matters stood, or had they
+shut her so completely out of their lives that even that was of no
+interest to them? Miss Abercrombie wrote fairly regularly, but though
+she could give Joan news of the home people she had to admit that Aunt
+Janet never mentioned or alluded to her niece in any way.
+
+"She is harder than I thought she could be," wrote Miss Abercrombie; "or
+is it perhaps that you have killed her heart?"
+
+Once Joan's pride fell so low that she found herself writing Aunt Janet
+a pathetic, vague appeal to be allowed to creep back into the shelter of
+the old life. But she tore the letter up in the morning and scattered
+its little pieces along the gutter of Digby Street. Digby Street was
+sucking into its undercurrents her youth, her cheerfulness, her hope;
+only pride was left, she must make a little struggle to hold on to
+pride, and then news came from Miss Abercrombie that Aunt Janet had been
+ill and that the Rutherfords had gone abroad. Apart from her fruitless
+journeys in search of work, her days held nothing. She so dreaded the
+atmosphere of Shamrock House that very often she would have to walk
+herself tired out of all feeling before she could go back there;
+sometimes she cried night after night, weak, stupid tears, shut up in
+the dreariness of her little room, and very often her thoughts turned
+back to Gilbert--the comfort of their little flat, the theatres, the
+suppers, the dances and the passion-held nights when he had loved her.
+More and more she thought of Gilbert as the dreariness of Digby Street
+closed round her days.
+
+If her baby had lived, would life have been easier for her, or would it
+only have meant--as she had first believed in her days of panic that
+it would mean--an added hardship, a haunting shame? It was the lack of
+love in her life that left so aching a void, the fact that apparently no
+one cared or heeded what became of her. The baby would at least have
+brought love to her, in its little hands, in its weak strength that
+looked to her for shelter.
+
+"I should be happier," she said once stormily to Rose, "if I could have
+a cat to keep. I think I shall buy a kitten."
+
+The other girl had looked at her, smiling dryly. "Pets are strictly
+against the rules in Shamrock House," she reminded her.
+
+It was in one of her very despondent moods that Joan first met the young
+man with blue eyes. She never knew him by any name, and their
+acquaintance, or whatever it could be called, came to an abrupt end on
+the first occasion when he ventured to speak to her. Womanlike, she had
+been longing for him to do so for some time, but resented it bitterly
+when he did. Perhaps something faintly contemptuous, a shadowed hint
+that he had noticed her interest in him, flamed up the desire to snub
+him in her heart, or perhaps it was a feeling of self-shame to find
+herself so poor a beggar at friendship's gate.
+
+For a week he had met her at the same place and followed her on her way
+down Victoria Street. Then one night, just as they came under the lights
+of Vauxhall Clock tower, he spoke to her.
+
+"Doing anything to-night?" he said. "Shall we dine together?"
+
+She turned from him in a white heat of anger, more with herself than
+with him, though that, of course, it was not given him to know. But he
+caught a glimpse of her face and read his answer, and since he was in
+reality a nice boy, and insult had been the last thought in his mind, he
+took off his hat quickly and apologized.
+
+"I am sure I beg your pardon," he said; "I can see that I have made a
+mistake."
+
+Joan did not answer him, she had moved quickly away in the direction of
+Digby Street, but as she passed by the dingy houses she knew that he was
+not following any more, and she felt the hot, hard lump in her throat
+which is so difficult to swallow. She had wanted to go to dinner with
+him, she had wanted to, that was the thought that mocked at her all
+night.
+
+It was one evening about a fortnight after that episode that Rose called
+Joan into her room on their way upstairs.
+
+"I want to talk to you," she said, closing the door behind them. "Has
+Miss Nigel spoken yet?"
+
+"To me?" asked Joan; "what about?"
+
+"I see, then, she hasn't," Rose answered, "but she will soon. Did you
+notice that the night before last Miss Wembly, who sits at the next
+table to ours, had a guest to dinner?"
+
+"No," Joan admitted; "but why? What has it got to do with me?"
+
+"I am coming to that," the other answered; she stood with her head
+averted, looking for a cigarette. "I am always a damned silent person
+myself," she went on, "and I do not think anyone can accuse me of being
+curious about their pasts. I do not want to know a blessed thing about
+yours, for instance, but that guest of Miss Wembly's was a nurse from
+St. George's Hospital."
+
+"Oh," said Joan blankly; she was standing just within the door, her back
+against the clothes that hung on it.
+
+"Well," Rose hurried on, "it has gone all round the place like
+lightning. They aren't fond of you because they hate me and we are
+friends. Yesterday one of them took the story to Miss Nigel and she is
+going to ask you to leave."
+
+"What story?" asked Joan; she had not followed the other's swift
+deduction.
+
+Rose lit a cigarette and held out the case to Joan. "Have one," she
+said, "and come and sit down. As I said before, I am not asking for
+personal history, I am telling you the facts as they affect this place.
+They say you were to have had a baby, and you are not married."
+
+She shrugged her shoulders and sank into a chair.
+
+"You mean," whispered Joan, "that the nurse told them that?"
+
+"I suppose so," Rose admitted; "anyway, Miss Nigel spoke of it to me
+to-day. She is not a bad sort, Miss Nigel, she was very kind to me once,
+but she is going to tell you to go."
+
+"What have you thought of it?" asked Joan.
+
+"I don't think about other people's affairs," Rose answered. "Come and
+sit down, I have got some jam for you after the powder, for I believe I
+have found a job for you. But first you must move into diggings, these
+clubs are all in a league, every one of them will be shut to you."
+
+"You are not bothering to ask if it is true," said Joan. She moved
+forward and sat down, her hands clenched on her lap. "I suppose----"
+
+Rose interrupted, putting a swift hand on hers. "Don't," she said,
+"don't deny it or tell me the truth, whichever you were thinking of
+doing. It does not matter to me. Because I like you I have interfered as
+much as I have so that you may be prepared for Miss Nigel's attack." She
+smiled. "It will be an attack too--having a baby and no husband to
+people like Miss Nigel is worse than any criminal offence."
+
+"Yes," Joan admitted. A vision of Aunt Janet's horror-stricken face came
+across her mind. "When I heard that it had been killed in the accident,
+I was glad, glad. I had not got the courage to go on and brave it out. I
+was glad to think that I could start life again, that no one would know
+or look at me like the people at home had looked at me when they knew.
+And now----"
+
+"And now?" Rose repeated; she was studying Joan's face with her eyes
+half closed, a peculiar trick she had when her thoughts were unpleasant.
+
+"And now it doesn't seem worth while going on any longer," Joan burst
+forth. "There must be other lives that are better worth living than
+this. Do you know that for the last ten days I have made fifteen
+shillings addressing envelopes from nine till six. It would be better,
+surely it would be better, to be what people call bad!"
+
+Rose watched the flushed face. "If a life of that sort would give you
+any pleasure," she spoke slowly, "I should say live it by all means. The
+trouble is, it would not please you. If you care to listen, I will tell
+you a bit of my own story. It is not altogether pleasant, but in your
+present frame of mind it will not do you any harm to hear it."
+
+She paused a moment, head thrown back, blowing smoke-rings to the
+ceiling.
+
+"I came to London ten years ago," she began presently, "and I was
+twenty-one at the time. I had been keeping house for a brother in India,
+and I had had a good time, but a spirit of restlessness had come upon me
+and I would not leave him alone till he let me come home and start on my
+own. I had, of course, no people. Poor brother, he gave way after many
+arguments, knowing as little as I did about the life here, and I came.
+He died the year afterwards of enteric. I had been on an allowance from
+him before, but when he died that stopped and I was left absolutely
+penniless. You have had a bad time in that way, but I had a worse one.
+Still I was young and strong, and, above all, I was a fighter, so I won
+through. I got a post as typist in a city office and I drifted to
+Shamrock House. My working hours were lengthy, sometimes it was after
+half-past seven before I came out of office. Then I would hurry through
+the crowded streets, as you do now, and always that walk, through gaily
+lighted pleasure-seeking crowds, would end for me in the dark dreariness
+where Great Smith Street turns away from Victoria Street, a ten-minute
+walk through one of London's poorest neighbourhoods, and--Shamrock
+House! Those were the days in which I did my hardest kicking against
+fate; it was so unjust, so unfair, and all the while youth and power to
+enjoy, which is the heritage of youth, were slipping past me. That is
+how you feel, isn't it?" she asked suddenly.
+
+"Yes," Joan said.
+
+"I know," Rose answered softly; "well, wait and hear. I was in this
+mood, and feeling more than usually desperate, when I met the woman. I
+need not give her a name, not even to you; I doubt if I ever knew her
+real one. I had seen her several times, perhaps she had noticed me,
+though she had quaint, unseeing eyes that appeared to gaze through you
+blankly. She was a beautiful woman with an arresting beauty hard to
+define, and she used, as far as I could see, neither paint nor powder.
+One evening, just as I was turning into Great Smith Street, I found her
+at my elbow.
+
+"'You live down there,' she asked in a curious, expressionless way as if
+she hardly expected an answer.
+
+"I was startled at her talking to me and at the same time interested.
+
+"'Yes,' I said.
+
+"'It is dark and very dreary,' she went on, talking almost to herself,
+'why do you choose such a life?'
+
+"I think the bitterness of my mood must have sounded in my answer, for
+suddenly she turned to me and laid a hand on my arm.
+
+"'Leave it then,' she whispered, her face close up against mine, 'leave
+it, come home with me.'
+
+"'Home with you,' I repeated, thoroughly astonished, and at that moment
+a policeman, tall and stolid, strolled across the road towards us.
+
+"'Don't let him hear what we are saying,' whispered the extraordinary
+woman; 'just turn back with me a little way and I will explain to you.'
+
+"Well, I went. Perhaps you can realize why, and I saw for a little into
+the outside edge of life as lived by these women. I wonder how I can
+best convey to you the horror and pity of it, for we--despite the
+greyness of our lives--have something within ourselves to which we can
+turn, but they have weighed even hopes and dreams with the weights of
+shame, and found their poor value in pounds, shillings and pence. That
+is why their eyes as they pass you in the streets are so blank and
+expressionless. Each new day brings them nothing, they have learnt all
+things, and the groundwork of their knowledge is--sin."
+
+She rose abruptly and moved across to the window, pulling aside the
+blue-tinted curtains, staring out over miles and miles of roof-covered
+London. From far in the distance Big Ben shone down on her, a round, dim
+face in the darkness.
+
+"You are wondering why I stayed with the woman," she went on presently.
+"The answer is easy and may make you smile. I met a man, one of the many
+she brought to the house, and fell in love with him. I was stupid enough
+to forget my surroundings and the circumstances under which he had met
+me, or I dreamt that to him also they were only the outside wrappers of
+fate, easy to fling aside. Does it sound like a thrilling romance, and
+am I making myself out to be the heroine of one crowded hour of glorious
+life? Because my hour was never glorious."
+
+She repeated the last word with a wry laugh and turned to face Joan. "I
+don't know why I have raked up all this," she said. "I thought it had
+lost its power to hurt; but I was mistaken. I have liked you, perhaps
+that is the reason, and I have wanted to save you from making the same
+mistake as myself. For before you plunge out of monotony you must see
+that there is nothing in your heart that can be hurt, as these women
+have to be hurt every hour of their lives."
+
+Joan could find nothing to say; the other girl's confidence had been so
+overpowering, it left her tongue-tied and stupid. Rose came back after a
+little silence and sat down opposite her again.
+
+"I am sorry," she said, "I have talked you into a mood of black
+depression; never mind, perhaps you will have learnt something from it
+none the less. And meanwhile, things are going to be better for you; it
+is no loss having to leave Shamrock House, otherwise you might grow into
+the house as I have. You will have to see about getting a room
+to-morrow, and then if you can meet me in the afternoon, I will take you
+and introduce you to your job. It is quite a nice one, I hope you will
+like it."
+
+Joan stood up. "I don't know what to say," she began; "you--oh, if only
+we could wipe out the past," she flamed into sudden rebellion, "and
+start afresh."
+
+Rose laughed. "I don't know about that," she said--the inevitable
+cigarette was in her mouth again--"_I_ for one would be very unwilling
+to lose a wisdom which has been so dearly bought."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+    "No one has any more right to go about unhappy than he has to go
+     about ill bred."
+
+                                             R. L. STEVENSON.
+
+
+Joan was not to start her new work till the following Monday. She was to
+be typist--her first real post filled her with some degree of
+self-conscious pride--to the Editor of the _Evening Herald_. Rose had
+herself worked on the paper some years ago and was a friend of the
+Editor's.
+
+"I want you to give a girl I know a chance, Mr. Strangman," she had
+pleaded; "she is clever and well-educated, but she needs experience.
+Take her, there is a good man, while your slack time is on, and she will
+be game for anything when you get busy again."
+
+Mr. Strangman twisted long nervous fingers into strange positions.
+
+"I don't know about this girl," he said; "we are never slack at the
+office."
+
+It was a pet fallacy of his that he was the hardest-worked man in
+London. Rose smiled. "But her typing is quite good," she argued, "and
+you are such an easy dictator, I am sure she will get on all right."
+
+She had been exceptionally pleased when Mr. Strangman reluctantly gave
+way. Joan would, she hoped, take kindly to newspaper work, and it might
+open up new roads to her.
+
+Meanwhile Joan had been out on her own and taken a room for herself in a
+house standing in a quiet, withdrawn square in the neighbourhood of
+King's Road, Chelsea. To call it a room was to dignify it by a title to
+which it could lay no real claim. It was an attic, up the last rickety
+flight of stairs, with roofs that sloped down within two feet of the
+ground, and a diminutive window from which one could get but the barest
+glimpse of the skies. Still it had possibilities, its aspect was not so
+terribly common-place as had been that of the other rooms which Joan had
+seen that morning. The sloping roofs, the small pane of glass which
+looked out higher than the neighbouring chimney-tops, were in their way
+attractive. She would take it, she told a somewhat surprised landlady,
+and would pay--everything included--ten shillings a week for the noble
+apartment. The "everything included" swept in breakfast--"Such as a
+young lady like yourself would eat, Miss"--the woman told her, and
+attendance. Suppers and fires she would have to provide for herself,
+though Mrs. Carew was prepared to cook for her; lunch, of course, fell
+in office hours.
+
+On Saturday, therefore, and having forestalled Miss Nigel's request by
+announcing that she was leaving for good, Joan moved her luggage over to
+her new home and took possession.
+
+"I am going to like it better than I liked being at Shamrock House," she
+told Rose, who had come to assist in the moving. "It is more my own, I
+can do just as I like here."
+
+Rose was craning her neck to see out of the window's limited compass.
+"Just as you like," she repeated, laughing as she spoke, "on twenty-five
+shillings a week and an attic. You are not ambitious, my child."
+
+She turned round to face the room; even in mid afternoon, with the sun
+shining outside, it was dim--the corners in positive darkness. "I don't
+think I should have chosen it," she said; "there is no sun, and"--she
+shook the thought off--"who else is in the house, did you ask?"
+
+"There was not any need to," Joan answered. "Mrs. Carew, that is my
+landlady, you know, told me all their family histories while I was
+making up my mind whether I would come or not. Wait a minute," she
+paused in her unpacking to tick them off on her fingers. "There is the
+ground floor lady, who is an artist's model. No need to work just now
+though, for the last gentleman that painted her took a fancy to her and
+is paying for her at present. Drawing-room floor, old foreign lady who
+never seems to get out of bed. Second floor, retired army officer, 'fond
+of drink, more's the pity,'" she mimicked Mrs. Carew's voice, "and
+second floor back, young lady actress, who is not perhaps as good as she
+might be, 'but there, you can't always be blaming people'; and third
+floor, me! Doesn't sound respectable does it? But after Miss Nigel I am
+afraid of respectability."
+
+Rose watched her with narrowed eyes. "It sounds anything but
+respectable," she agreed; "do not make a fool of yourself, kid, it won't
+be worth it, it never is."
+
+"I am not likely to," Joan answered her. "My one real regret in leaving
+Shamrock House is that I shall not have you to talk to, oh, and the
+baths. Mrs. Carew does not hold with carrying too much water up these
+stairs."
+
+"I am glad I rank before the baths," Rose laughed. She extricated
+herself from behind the luggage. "I will come and look you up
+sometimes," she announced, "though it probably won't be often; I am a
+bad hand at stirring myself out to see anyone in the evenings.
+Good-night, and I hope you will get on all right with Strangman, he is a
+kind little man really."
+
+She went. Joan sat listening to her feet echoing down the stairs; a
+mouse could set the whole house creaking. She felt very much alone;
+Shamrock House, full as it had been of uncongenial companions, had yet
+been able to offer some distraction from one's own society.
+
+The new office, to which she wended her way on the Monday morning, lay
+in a side alley opening off Fleet Street, a rickety old building, busy
+as a hive of bees in swarming time. The steep, wooden stairs, after she
+had been asked her business by the janitor in the box office and put in
+charge of a very small, very dirty boy, led her up and up into the heart
+of the building--past wide-open doors where numerous men sat at desks,
+the floor round them strewn with papers; up again, past rooms where the
+engines throbbed and panted, shaking the building with their noisy
+vibrations; up still further, till they landed her at that withdrawn and
+sacred sanctum, the Editor's room. Here worked Mr. Strangman
+and his satellites; spiders, in fact, in the centre of their
+cleverly-constructed web, throwing out feelers in search of news to all
+quarters of the globe.
+
+Anything less like a spider than Mr. Strangman it would have been
+difficult to imagine. He was an alert, nervous man, with bright, kind
+eyes, a flexible mouth and very restless hands. His whole nature hung on
+wires, as if--which was indeed the case--his mental capacity was too big
+and overpowering for his physical strength. His manners under the strain
+of work were jerky and abrupt, but otherwise he was a very kindly and
+genial man. To Joan he was excessively polite, and so afraid that her
+capabilities might not come up to his expectations that for the first
+few days he left her practically with no work to do. She sat in a large,
+well-lit--if draughty--room, opposite Mr. Strangman at his table.
+
+It was one of her duties, she discovered, to keep the aforesaid table
+tidy, and in time she learned that here more than anywhere else she
+could be of service to the man. He had an awe-inspiring way of piling up
+his desk with scraps of paper, cuttings, and slips, and stray
+manuscripts, and it was always under the most appalling muddle that the
+one small, indispensable news-slip would hide itself.
+
+The Magazine Page-faker and the News-gleaner sat in the same room, the
+latter at a table next Joan. He was a stout man with a beaming smile and
+an inexhaustible supply of good temper. He would sit over his work,
+which as far as she could see consisted solely of running his eye over
+the day's papers and cutting out what appeared to be workable news,
+making a great deal of noise with his feet on the floor, a gigantic
+cutting-out scissors in his hand and a whistle which never varied its
+tune from early morning till late in the evening--a soft, subdued,
+under-his-breath whistle, Joan never even discovered what the tune was.
+He was, despite this disadvantage, an indefatigable worker and an
+ever-ready helper, always willing to do other people's work for them if
+necessary.
+
+Of the other people on the staff Joan saw very little; the reporters
+came early in the morning to take their orders for the day, and threw in
+their copy downstairs in the evening. Sometimes they would come upstairs
+to discuss some feature of their day's work with Mr. Strangman, or to
+put in an article to the Literary Editor, but, as a whole, she hardly
+learned to know them, even by name. Then there were the office boys, a
+moving, fluctuating crowd; always in mischief, always dirty, always
+irrepressibly cheerful. For the rest, her work--one might almost say her
+life--lay between the four walls of the office room, with the shaking
+vibrations of the engines under her feet and the musty, curious smell of
+papers in the making and pile upon pile of papers that had been made all
+round her.
+
+She arrived at 9.30 and left about 6 p.m., and by then she was too
+numbed--for the working of a typewriter is monotonous work--to do
+anything save walk with the hurrying crowds as far as Charing Cross and
+take a bus from there to Montague Square. But since work filled her days
+she had less time for discontent or depression. Sometimes she would be
+tempted to wander off the direct route on her way home and she would
+walk up to Piccadilly and past the region of brightly-lighted shops,
+watching the faces in the crowd round her, envying those who met friends
+and stopped to talk to them, following with rather wistful eyes the
+couples who passed, hand clasped in hand; but generally speaking she was
+too tired in the evenings to do anything save go straight home, eat a
+hasty supper and tumble into bed.
+
+Of Rose she saw, as the other had prophesied, very little. Joan realized
+that friendship, if their brief companionship could have been called
+such, counted for very little in Rose's life. The girl seemed entirely
+to ignore her once she was from constant sight, and since Joan could not
+herself call at Shamrock House and Rose habitually forgot to pay her
+promised visits, the friendship, such as it had been, faded away into
+the past.
+
+The other inhabitants of 6, Montague Square, she saw very rarely.
+Occasionally she would encounter Miss Drummond, the downstairs tenant,
+paying off her taxi at the door--a tall, handsome girl, rather overblown
+in her beauty, who invariably stared at Joan with haughty defiance and
+stalked into her own room, calling loudly for Mrs. Carew. Once Joan had
+stumbled over the retired military gentleman from the second floor,
+sound asleep, in a very undignified position, half way up her own little
+stairs. The incident had brought with it a shudder of fear, and from
+that day onwards Joan was always careful to lock her door at night.
+
+Miss Fanny Bellairs, the erring damsel on the second floor back, kept
+such strange hours that she was never visible; but Mrs. Carew had a
+large stock of not very savoury anecdotes about her which she would
+recount to Joan during the process of laying supper. As not even an
+earthquake would have stopped Mrs. Carew's desire to impart information,
+Joan gave up the attempt to silence her. Indeed, she sometimes listened
+with a certain amount of curiosity, and Fanny Bellairs assumed a
+marvellous personality and appearance in her mind's eye.
+
+That the original did not in the least come up to her expectations was
+something of a surprise. About three months after her first arrival at
+Montague Square Joan reached home rather late one evening to find her
+room already occupied. A girl sat, her feet tucked underneath her, on
+the principal chair under the lamplight; she had been crying, for a
+tight, damp ball of a handkerchief lay on the floor, and at the sound of
+Joan's entry she turned a tear-stained face to greet her.
+
+"I thought you were never coming"--the voice held a plaintive sob in
+it--"and I am that down-hearted and miserable."
+
+Joan put down her things hastily and came across. "I am so sorry," she
+said, groping through her mind to discover who her visitor might be;
+"did Mrs. Carew tell you I was in?--how stupid of her."
+
+The girl in the chair gulped back her tears and laughed. "No, she
+didn't," she contradicted; "she told me that you wouldn't want to see me
+if you were in; that the likes of you did not know the likes of me, and
+that I was not to come up. But I came"--she held out impulsive hands. "I
+guess you aren't angry," she said; "when I get the silly hump, which
+isn't often, I go mad if I have to stay by myself. I'll be as good
+as"--she glanced round the room--"as good as you," she finished, "if you
+will let me stay."
+
+"Why, of course," said Joan. "I don't know what Mrs. Carew can have been
+talking about. I don't know you, so I can't see how she can have thought
+I would not want to see you."
+
+"I can though." The girl shook forward a sudden halo of curls and
+laughed in a way which it was impossible to resist. "I am Fanny, from
+downstairs, and Mrs. Carew is a silly old woman who talks a lot, but she
+is not stupid enough not to know the difference between a girl like you
+and a fly-by-night like me. Now I have shocked you," she went on
+breathlessly, seeing Joan's flush, "just when I was setting out to be
+good. I'll bite my tongue out and start again."
+
+She coughed once with alarming intensity. Joan moved slowly away and
+took off her hat and coat. So this was Fanny Bellairs, the girl whose
+doings provided such a purple background for her own dull existence. She
+looked again at the little figure, lying back now, eyes closed, lips
+tremulous from the struggle for breath which her fit of coughing had
+brought her. It was a perfectly-fashioned face, though when Joan had
+time to study it, she could see that the colouring was just a little
+crudely put on and that it had smudged in the shadows under her eyes
+where the tears had lain. She was such a thin, small slip of a girl,
+too, little dimpled hands and a baby face under the gold curls. Fanny
+opened her eyes at that moment, wide and innocent, and answered Joan's
+glance with a wistful smile.
+
+"Thinking of all Mrs. Carew ever said about me?" she asked. "I am not as
+bad as she sometimes paints me. Still"--she stood up--"I'll go, if you
+would rather I did. Hate to make a nuisance of myself."
+
+She moved slowly--it was, in reality, reluctantly--towards the door, and
+Joan came out of her reverie with a start.
+
+"Please don't go," she said quickly. "You must think I am awfully rude,
+but really I was not thinking about Mrs. Carew or anything so
+disagreeable. I was thinking how pretty you were, and wondering how old
+you could be."
+
+The girl at the door stopped and turned back. Laughter filled her eyes,
+yet there was a little hint of mockery behind the mirth.
+
+"Go on!" she said, "you and your thoughts! I know just what they were,
+my dear; but it doesn't matter to me, I am used to it. Twenty-two, at
+your service, mum"--she came a little away from the door and swept Joan
+a curtsey--"and everything my own, even my hair, though you mayn't
+believe it."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+    "Pale dreams arise, swift heart-beats yearn,
+     Up, up, some ecstasy to learn!
+     The spirit dares not speak, afar
+     Youth lures its fellow, like a star."
+
+                                             ANON.
+
+
+Fanny was a real daughter of joy. The name is given to many who in no
+sense of the word near its meaning. To Fanny, to be alive was to laugh;
+she had a nature which shook aside the degradation of her profession
+much as a small London sparrow will shake the filthy water of the
+gutters from off his sky-plumed wings. She brought such an atmosphere of
+sunshine and laughter into Joan's life that the other girl grew to lean
+on it. The friendship between them ripened very quickly; on Fanny's side
+it amounted almost to love. Who knows what starvation of the heart side
+of her went to build up all that she felt for Joan? Through the dreary
+days that followed, and they sapped in passing at Joan's health and
+courage, Fanny was nearly always at hand, with fresh flowers for the
+attic, with tempting fruit for Joan to eat in place of the supper which
+night after night she rejected. Fanny would sometimes be away for weeks
+at a time. She still followed her profession as an actress, Mrs. Carew
+would tell Joan, and on those occasions Joan missed her intolerably. But
+Fanny herself never spoke about her life, and Joan never questioned her.
+
+Autumn faded into winter; winter blew itself out in a cold and
+boisterous March, and spring crept back to London. Nowhere else in the
+world does she come so suddenly, or catch at your heart with the same
+sense of soft joy. You meet her, she catches you unawares, so to say,
+with your winter clothes on.
+
+"What is this?" she whispers, blowing against your cheeks. "Surely you
+have forgotten my birthday, or you would never have come out in those
+drab old clothes."
+
+Then with a little shake of her skirts she is gone, and your eyes are
+opened to the fact that the trees have put forth brave green buds, and
+that yellow crocuses and white snowdrops are dancing and curtseying to
+you from odd corners of the Park.
+
+Joan's life at the _Evening Herald_ Office, once the first novelty had
+worn off, and because it was spring outside, became very monotonous and
+very tiring. She nearly always ended the days conscious of a ridiculous
+desire to cry at everything. Because the buses were crowded, because the
+supper was greasy and unappetizing, or because Fanny was not at home to
+welcome her.
+
+There was one afternoon in particular, on a hot, airless day in June,
+when Joan reached the last point of her endurance. Everything had
+combined to make the office unendurable. One of Mr. Strangman's most
+agitated moods held him. Early in the morning he had indulged in a wordy
+argument with Chester, the Literary Page editor, on the question of
+whether or not the telephone was to be used by the office boys to 'phone
+telegrams through to the post office. It was a custom just founded by
+Strangman and it saved a certain amount of time, but Chester--a thin,
+over-worked, intellectual-ridden gentleman, was driven nearly mad by
+occult messages, such as the following:
+
+"Hulloa, hulloa, is that telegrams? Take a message please for the
+_Evening Herald_. What, can't hear? That's your fault, I am shouting and
+my mouth is near the tube. Look alive, miss. Listening? Well: to Davids.
+D for daddy, a for apples, v for varnish, i for I. I said I for i! Got
+it now? D for daddy again," and so on.
+
+"The truth of it is," said Mr. Chester, during a pause in one of these
+wordy tussles, "I, or that telephone, will have to go, Strangman. I
+cannot work with it going on."
+
+"My dear fellow"--Strangman was all agitation at once--"what is to be
+done? The messages must go and I must hear them sent or the boys would
+put in wrong words. I am sure it is not any pleasanter for me than it is
+for you; I have also got to work."
+
+"T for Tommy, I keep telling you--Tommy, Tommy," the lad at the 'phone
+shrieked triumphantly.
+
+Mr. Chester threw down his papers, pushed back his chair, and rose,
+tragic purpose on his face.
+
+"It is not to be borne," he ejaculated.
+
+"Oh, very well," stuttered Mr. Strangman, "that means, I suppose, that I
+shall have to do the 'phoning myself. Here, boy, get out, give me that."
+
+And thereupon the message started over again, but this time breathed in
+Mr. Strangman's powerful whisper.
+
+He certainly seemed to be able to manipulate it with less noise, only he
+soon wearied of the effort, and future wires were deputed to Joan. So,
+in addition to her other tasks, she had had the peculiarly irritating
+one of trying to induce attention into post office telephone girls.
+
+Then, too, Mr. Strangman had not felt in the mood to dictate letters,
+with the result that at a quarter to six seven of them had to be altered
+and retyped. Joan was still sitting at her machine in a corner of the
+hot, noisy office, beating out: "Dear Sir, In answer to yours, etc.,"
+when the clock struck six. Her back ached, her eyes throbbed, she was
+conscious of a feeling of intense hatred against mild, inoffensive Mr.
+Strangman.
+
+That gentleman, having discovered the lateness of the hour by chance,
+kept her another quarter of an hour apologizing before he signed the
+letters.
+
+Then he looked up at her suddenly.
+
+"Do you think," he said, "that you could report on the dresses for us
+to-morrow night at the Artists' Ball?"
+
+"I report?" Joan looked at him in astonishment; women reporters were
+disapproved of on the _Evening Herald_.
+
+"I know it is unusual," Mr. Strangman admitted. "But Jones is ill, and
+our other men will all be busy on important turns. I just thought of
+you in passing; it is a pity to waste the ticket."
+
+"I could try." Joan made an effort to keep the eagerness out of her
+voice.
+
+"Yes, that is it, you could try. We should not want much," he added;
+"and it is not part of your duties as a secretary; still, you might
+enjoy it, eh?"
+
+"Why, I should love it," she assented; hate was fast merging back into
+liking.
+
+Strangman cackled his customary nervous laugh. "Then that is settled,"
+he said, "and here is the ticket. You will have to have a fancy dress,
+hire it, I suppose, since the time is so short. That, and a taxi there
+and back, will come out of the paper. Hope it is a good show, for your
+sake."
+
+Afterwards, when she looked back at that evening, at the Artists' Ball,
+Joan was ashamed to remember the eager heat of excitement which took
+possession of her from the moment when she stepped out of the _Evening
+Herald_ taxi and ran along the passage to the ladies' cloak-room. She
+had, it seemed to her, no excuse; she was not young enough to have made
+it pardonable and she had long ago decided that the intoxication of life
+could be no longer hers. Its loss was to be part of the bitter lesson
+fate had taught her. Yet as she saw herself in the glass, a ridiculous
+figure in black flounces with just one scarlet rose pinned at her waist
+and another nodding on the brim of her hat, she could not keep the
+excitement from sparkling in her eyes and the colour of youth was
+certainly flaming in her cheeks. Fanny had fitted her out with clever
+fingers as a black Pierrette. A Pierrette, taken from the leaves of some
+old French book, with her hair done in little dropping curls just
+faintly powdered, as if a mist of snow lay over the brown.
+
+She was young, after all, and the music called to her with insistent
+voice. "I am looking nice," Joan confided to her reflection, "and I will
+have a good time just for to-night."
+
+Then she turned and went quickly, walking with light feet and eager eyes
+that sought for adventure into the crowded room.
+
+It gave her first of all an immense sense of space. The whole opera
+house had been converted into a ballroom. There were hundreds of people
+present, and every imaginable fancy dress under the sun. Brilliant
+colours, bright lights and the constant movement of the crowd made up a
+scene of kaleidoscopic splendour.
+
+There was a waltz in progress and Joan stood for a little with her back
+to a pillar of one of the boxes, bewildered by the noise and moving
+colours. Standing opposite her, in the shadow of the other looped-up
+curtain, was a man. A Pierrot to her Pierrette, only his costume was
+carried out in white, and on his head, instead of the orthodox hat, he
+wore a tight-bound black handkerchief. His eyes, for some reason, made
+her restless. It was not that he stared exactly, the man's whole figure
+was too blatantly bored for that, but there was something in their
+expression which made her look and look again. At their sixth exchange
+of glances the man smiled, or so it seemed to Joan, but the next moment
+his face was sombre again. None the less there had been something in her
+idea, for before the next couple of dancers swung past her the man had
+moved from the shadow of his curtain and was standing near her.
+
+"Don't think it is awful impudence on my part," he said, "but are you
+here all alone?"
+
+Now there was just something in his voice that, as far as most women
+were concerned would sweep away all barriers. He spoke, in short, like a
+gentleman. Joan looked up at him.
+
+"Yes," she admitted; she caught her breath on a little laugh. "I am here
+as a reporter, you know; it is business and pleasure combined."
+
+Once more his eyes made her uncomfortable and she dropped hers quickly.
+
+"That is strange," said the man gravely, "for I am a reporter too."
+
+He was certainly not speaking the truth. Joan was not inclined to
+believe that Fleet Street had ever produced reporters the least like her
+companion. Still, what did it matter? just for this evening she would
+throw aside convention and have a good time.
+
+"How awfully fortunate," she answered, "because you will be able to help
+me. I am new to the game."
+
+"Well then," he suggested, "let us dance to the finish of this waltz and
+I will point out a few of the celebrities as we pass them."
+
+Just for a second Joan hesitated, but her feet were tingling to be
+dancing.
+
+"Couldn't we do it better standing here?" she parried.
+
+"No," he assured her, "we could not do it at all unless we dance;
+movement helps my memory."
+
+He was a most perfect dancer. No one, so numberless women would have
+told Joan, could hold you just as Robert Landon did, steer you untouched
+through the most crowded ballroom as he did, make himself and you, for
+the time being, seem part and parcel of the swaying tune, the strange
+enchantment of a waltz.
+
+Joan was flushed and a little breathless at the close; they had danced
+until the last notes died on the air, and she had forgotten her mission,
+the celebrities, everything, indeed, except the dance and its
+bewildering melody. The man looked down at her as she stood beside him,
+an eager light awake in his eyes. His voice, however, was cool and
+friendly.
+
+"You dance much too well to be a reporter," he said.
+
+"What a ridiculous remark!" Joan retorted; "one cannot dance all day,
+can one? Besides, I am not even a real reporter. I am only a typist."
+
+"That is worse, to think of you as that is impossible," he said. "Let us
+go outside and find somewhere to sit."
+
+"But what about our reporting," Joan remonstrated; "I thought you were
+going to point out celebrities?"
+
+"Time enough for that," he answered. "I am going to take you out on to a
+balcony meanwhile. There will only be the stars to look at us, and I am
+going to pretend you are a fairy and that you live in the heart of a
+rose, not a typist or any such awful thing."
+
+Joan laughed. "I wish you could see my attic," she said. "It is such a
+funny rose for any fairy to live in."
+
+They sat out four dances, or was it more? Joan lost count. Out here on
+the balcony, with only the stars as chaperon and a pulse of music
+calling to them from the ballroom, time sped past on silver wings. For
+Joan the evening was a dream; to-morrow morning she would wake, put on
+her old blue coat and skirt, catch her bus at the corner of the square
+and spend the day in sorting and arranging Mr. Strangman's papers.
+To-night she was content to watch the bubble held before her by this
+man's soft words, his strange, intent eyes; she made no attempt to
+investigate it too closely. But for Landon the evening was one step
+along an impulse he intended to follow to the end. He was busy laying
+sure foundations, learning all there was to know of Joan's life and
+surroundings, of the difficulties that might lie in the way of his
+desire, of the barriers he might have to pull down.
+
+"Things are not going to end here," he told Joan, as, the last dance
+finished, they stood among the crowd waiting for a taxi. He had helped
+her on with her cloak and the feel of his strong warm hands on her
+shoulder had sent the blood rushing to Joan's heart.
+
+"I don't see how it is not going to end," she answered; "you must
+remember I am not even a reporter."
+
+"No, and I am," he smiled; "I had forgotten."
+
+He moved to face her, and putting his hands over hers, fastened up her
+cloak for her. It seemed his hands lingered over the task, and finally
+stayed just holding hers lightly.
+
+"I am going to see it does not end, none the less," he said. "I shall
+come and fetch you at your office this day next week and you shall dine
+with me somewhere and go on to a theatre. What time do you get out of
+office?"
+
+"At about six," Joan answered; "but how can you? Why, we do not even
+know each other's names!"
+
+"No more we do, and I don't want to, do you?" He smiled down at her
+undecided eyes. "I would rather think of you as Pierrette than Miss
+anything, and I shall be Pierrot. It is a romance, Pierrette; will you
+play it?"
+
+"Yes," she answered slowly, but her eyes fell away from his.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+    "Aye, thought and brain were there, some kind
+     Of faculty that men mistake
+     For talent, when their wits are blind,--
+     An aptitude to mar and break
+     What others diligently make."
+
+                                             A. L. GORDON.
+
+
+Impulse had always been a guiding factor in Robert Landon's life. If he
+saw a thing and wanted it, impulse would prompt him to reach out his
+hand and snatch it; if the thing were beyond his reach, he would
+climb--if necessary--over the heart of his best friend to obtain it;
+should it prove of very fragile substance and break in his hands, he
+would throw it away, but its loss, or the possible harm he had inflicted
+in his efforts to obtain it, brought no regrets. He made love
+deliriously, on fire himself for the moment, but never once had he so
+far forgot himself as to come from the flame in any way singed. Many
+tragedies lay behind the man, for impulse is hardly a safe guide through
+life; but he himself was essentially too level-headed, too selfish, to
+be the one who suffered.
+
+He had spoken and danced and made love to Joan on an impulse. Beyond
+that, he set himself down seriously and painstakingly to win her. Most
+women, he knew, like to be carried forward on the wings of a
+swift-rushing desire, but there was some strange force of reserve behind
+this girl's constant disregard of his real meaning in the game they
+played. She was willing, almost anxious to be friends; it did not take
+him long to find out how lonely and dreary had been the life she was
+leading. She went out with him daily; it became a recognized thing for
+him to fetch her in his small car every evening at office. Sometimes
+they would dine together at one of the many little French restaurants in
+Soho, and go to a theatre afterwards; sometimes they would just drive
+about the crowded lighted streets, or slip into the Park for a stroll,
+leaving the car in charge of some urchin for a couple of pennies. Since
+he was out on the trail, as his friends would have said, every other
+interest in his life was given up to his impulse to beat down this
+girl's reserve, but all his attempts at passionate love-making left her
+unresponsive. She would draw back, as it were, into her shell, and for
+days she would avoid meeting him. Going out some back way at the office
+and never being at home when he called at Montague Square. Then he would
+write little notes to her and bribe the office-boy to deliver them,
+begging her pardon most humbly--he played his cards, it may be noticed,
+very seriously--imploring her to be friends again. And Joan would
+forgive him and for a little they would be the best of companions.
+
+But through it all, and though she shut her eyes more or less to the
+trend of events, Joan's mind refused to be satisfied. She was restless
+and at times unhappy; she had her hours of wondering where it would all
+end, her spells of imagination when she saw Landon asking her to marry
+him. When she thought about it at all it always ended like that, for she
+could not blind her eyes to the fact of the man's love for her. Then she
+would shun his society, and endeavour to build up a wall of reserve
+between them, for it was her answer to his question that she could not
+bring herself to face.
+
+It was on one of these occasions that she made up her mind definitely to
+break with him altogether. She wrote him a short note, saying that she
+was going to be dreadfully busy at office and that as she had another
+girl coming to stay with her--both statements equally untrue--she was
+afraid it would be no use his calling to fetch her.
+
+Landon accepted this attitude in silence, though one may believe it did
+something to fan the flame of his passion, and for ten whole days he
+left her entirely alone. Then he wrote.
+
+Joan found the letter waiting for her on the hall table when she came
+home one evening after a peculiarly dull and colourless day. It had been
+delivered by hand and was addressed simply to "Pierrette, In the Attic."
+Mrs. Carew must have been a little surprised at such a designation. Joan
+took it upstairs to read, lingering over the opening of it with a
+pleasurable thrill. The days had been very grey lacking his
+companionship.
+
+"Dear Pierrette," Landon had written, "is our romance finished, and why?
+The only thing I have left to comfort me is a crushed red rose. You wore
+it the first evening we ever met. Pierrette, you are forgetting that it
+is summer. How can you wake each morning to blue skies and be
+conventional? Summer is nearly over, and you do not know what you are
+missing. Come out and play with me, Pierrette; I will not kiss even your
+hands if you object. I can take you down next Sunday to a garden that I
+know of on the river, and you shall pick red roses. Will you not come,
+Pierrette?"
+
+Joan sat on in the dark of her little attic (for if the lamp was not
+required before supper Mrs. Carew had a way of not bringing it up until
+it was quite dark) with the letter on her lap. She was making up her
+mind to tell Landon about Gilbert, about her principles which had been
+rather roughly shaken, about her ideas, which still held obstinate root
+in her mind. If he loved her enough not to mind what was past, why
+should she not marry him? She had proved once how bitter it was to stand
+against the convictions of the world alone. His fortnight's absence had
+shown her how unbearable the dullness of her days had become; she could
+not struggle on much longer. Her mind played with the prospect of
+consenting, of how it would open up new worlds to her, of what a change
+it would bring into her life.
+
+It was with a conviction anyway that great things might be in the
+balance that she stepped into Landon's car on Sunday afternoon and
+settled herself back against the cushions. They disregarded the
+fortnight's lapse in their friendship; neither referred to it in any
+way, and Landon was exceptionally cheerful and full of conversation on
+the drive out. Joan was content to sit quiet and listen and to let her
+eyes, tired of dusty files and hours of typewriting, feast on the
+country as they flashed past.
+
+The garden that he had promised her proved all that his descriptions had
+claimed. It lay at the back of an old stone house, off the high road and
+away from the haunts of the ordinary holiday makers. Landon had chanced
+on it once and the place had taken a great hold on his imagination. One
+could be so alone at the foot of the garden, where it sloped down to the
+water's edge, that one could fancy oneself in a world of one's own.
+
+The house itself was a quaint, old-fashioned building with small rooms
+and tiny windows, but the walled-in garden where the roses grew, and the
+river garden, which stretched right down to the brim of the river with
+its fruit trees and tall scented grasses, were both beautiful. They had
+tea out there, and they picnicked on the grass, watching the sun's
+reflections playing hide and seek in the river.
+
+After tea, Landon insisted on strolling round and collecting all the
+roses he could lay his hands on for Joan. He threw them finally, a heavy
+heap of scented blossoms, on to her lap. He said their colour was
+reflected in her cheeks, their beauty in her eyes.
+
+"It is a shame to have picked them so early," Joan remonstrated; "they
+will die now before we get home."
+
+"Let them," he answered, "at least they have had their day and done well
+in it." He threw himself down on the grass beside her. "Aren't they
+glorious, Pierrette?" he said; but his eyes were not on the flowers.
+
+Joan stirred uneasily. The great moment was drawing closer and closer,
+she was growing afraid, as are all women when the sound of Love's wings
+comes too near them.
+
+"I wish you wouldn't call me by that name any more," she said,
+"because----"
+
+"Well, why because?" Landon asked as she hesitated. "One of the things
+that do not seem quite right to you, like kissing, or holding hands?" He
+took up one of the roses from her lap and pulled it to pieces with
+ruthless hands. "What a puritan you are!" he went on abruptly. "Do you
+know we can only love once, isn't your heart hungry for life, Pierrette?
+Sometimes your eyes are."
+
+"Don't!" said Joan quickly, "that is another thing I wish you would not
+do, make personal remarks; it makes me feel uncomfortable."
+
+"Why don't you tell the truth?" he asked fiercely. "Why don't you say
+afraid?"
+
+"Because it does not," she answered; her eyes, however, would not meet
+his. "I think uncomfortable describes it better."
+
+Landon stared at her with sombre eyes. He was beginning to tire of their
+pretty game of make believe; perhaps impulse was waning within him.
+Anyway he felt he had wasted enough time on the chase. But to-day Joan
+seemed very charming, and her fear, for he could see plainly enough that
+she was afraid, was fanning the flame of his desire into a new spurt of
+life.
+
+"I am going to make love to you, Pierrette," he said; "I am going to
+wake up that cold heart of yours. Does the thought frighten you,
+Pierrette? because even that won't prevent me doing it."
+
+He had drawn her close to him, she could feel his arms round her like
+strong bands of iron. Joan lifted a face from which all the colour had
+fled to his.
+
+"Don't, please don't!" Her bewildered mind struggled with all the
+carefully thought-out things she was going to have said to him. But the
+crisis was too overwhelming for her; she could only remember the one
+final thought that had been with her. "You may not want to marry me when
+you know about me," she whispered, and ended her words with a sob.
+
+The man laughed triumphantly. "I don't want to marry you," he answered,
+"I want to love you and make you for a little love me, and this is how I
+begin the lesson." He bent his face to hers quickly, kissing her
+passionately, fiercely, on the lips.
+
+For a second such a tumult of passionate amazement shook Joan that she
+stayed quiet in his arms. Then everything that was strong, all the
+inherited purity in her nature, came to her aid and summoned her
+fighting forces to resist. She struggled in his arms furiously, she had
+not known she held such stores of strength; then she wrenched herself
+free and stood up. Fear, if fear had been the cause of her early
+discomfort, had certainly left her; it was blind, passionate rage that
+held her silent before him.
+
+The man rose to his feet and essayed a laugh, but it was rather a
+strained effort. "That was a most undignified proceeding, Pierrette," he
+said; "what on earth made you do it?"
+
+"How dared you?" flamed Joan. "How dared you speak to me, touch me like
+that?"
+
+"Dared?" the man answered; he was watching her with mocking eyes and
+something evil had come to life on his face. Cold anger that she should
+have made a fool of him and a baulked passion which could very easily
+turn to hate. "This outburst is surely a little ridiculous. What did
+you think I wanted out of the game? Did it really occur to you that I
+was going to ask you to marry me? My dear girl!" He shrugged his
+shoulders, conveying by that movement a vast amount of contempt for her
+dreams. "And as for the rest, I have never yet met a woman who objected
+to being kissed, though some of them may pretend they do."
+
+Joan stared at him; he had stooped and was gathering up the roses that
+lay between them. Rage was creeping away from her and leaving her with a
+dull sense of undignified defeat. Once again she had pitted the ideal of
+a dream against a man's harsh reality, and lost. Love! She had dreamed
+that this man loved her, she had held herself unworthy of the honour he
+paid her. This was what his honour amounted to--"I have never yet met a
+woman who objected to being kissed."
+
+She turned away and walked blindly towards the house.
+
+Landon caught her up before she reached the gate of the garden. His arms
+were full of the roses and apparently he had won back to his usual good
+nature.
+
+"Having made ourselves thoroughly disagreeable to each other," he said,
+"let us make it up again for the time being. It is all rather absurd,
+and you have got to get back to town somehow or other."
+
+He helped her into the car with just his usual solicitude, tucking the
+rug round her and laying the pile of roses on her lap; but on the way
+home he was very silent and from the moment they started till the time
+came for saying good-bye he did not speak a word to her.
+
+As they stood together, while Joan was opening the door with her latch
+key, he put his hand for a moment over hers.
+
+"Good-bye, Pierrette," he said, "I am sorry you won't have anything to
+do with me. I should have made you happy and given you a good time.
+Sometimes it is a pity to aim too high; you are apt to miss things
+altogether."
+
+Fanny was waiting in Joan's room when she got back, tucked up in her
+favourite position in the arm-chair. She had been away for the last ten
+days on one of her periodical trips. "My!" she gasped, disentangling
+herself to greet the other; "what roses, honey! Straight from the
+country, aren't they, and a car--I can hear it buzzing outside. Is it
+your young man?" She paused on the thought tip-toe with excitement, her
+eyes studying Joan across the flowers she had seized. "And is he
+straight? the other sort won't do for you; you would hate yourself in a
+week."
+
+Joan subsided on to the bed, taking off her hat with hands that shook
+over the task.
+
+"No," she answered, "he is not straight, Fanny; but it doesn't matter,
+because I have finished with him. Take away the flowers with you, will
+you? they seem to have given me a headache."
+
+Fanny dropped the roses in a shower and trod them under foot as she ran
+to Joan. "He has hurt you;" she spoke fiercely, flinging her arms round
+the other girl. "God, how I hate men at times! He has hurt you, honey."
+
+"Only my pride," Joan admitted; but the tears so long held back came in
+a flood now; she laid her head down on Fanny's shoulder and sobbed and
+sobbed.
+
+The other girl waited till the storm had passed; then she rose to her
+feet and bundling the roses together with an aggressive movement opened
+the door and flung them out into the passage.
+
+"I have got an idea," she said; "you have been about fed up with office
+for months past. Well, why not chuck it? Come with me. I have got a job
+in a show that is going on tour next week. There is room in the chorus,
+I know; come with me, won't you?"
+
+Her earnestness made Joan laugh. "What shall I come as, Fanny? I cannot
+sing, and I have never acted in my life."
+
+"That is nothing," Fanny went on impatiently. "You are young, you are
+pretty; you can dance, I suppose, and look nice. I can get you taken on
+to-morrow, for old Daddy Brown, that is the manager, is a friend of
+mine, and while he is a friend he will do anything for me. Oh, come, do
+come." She caught hold of Joan's hands. "It will be great, we shall be
+together, and I will show you that there is fun in life; fun, and love,
+and laughter."
+
+She was laughing herself hysterically, her figure seemed poised as if
+for an instant outbreak into the dance she spoke of. Joan watched her
+with envious eyes. Fanny's philosophy in life was so plain to see. She
+took things that came her way with eager hands; she seemed to pass
+unscathed, unsullied, through the dregs of life and find mirth in the
+dreariest surroundings. And to-day Landon had broken down one more
+barrier of the pride which kept Joan's feet upon the pathway of
+self-respect. Of what use were her ideals since they could not bring her
+even one half hour's happiness? The road stretched out in front of her
+empty and sunless.
+
+These thoughts swept through her mind almost in the space of a second.
+Then she rose quickly to her feet.
+
+"I'll come, Fanny," she said; "it really amounts to turning my back on a
+battle; still I will come."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+    "To fill the hour--that is happiness: to fill
+     The hour and leave no crevice for repentance."
+
+                                             ANON.
+
+
+"Daddy Brown, this is the girl I spoke to you about; will she do?"
+
+That had been Joan's introduction to the manager of the Brown travelling
+company. He was a large man, with his neck set in such rolls of fat that
+quick movement was an impossibility. His eyes, small and surrounded by
+a multitude of wrinkles, were bloodshot, but for all that excessively
+keen. Joan felt as they swept over her that she was being appraised,
+classed, and put aside under her correct value in the man's brain. His
+hair, which in youth must have grown thick and curly, had fallen off
+almost entirely from the top of his head, leaving a small island
+sprouting alone in the midst of the baldness. This was known among the
+company as "The Danger Mark," for when the skin round it flushed red a
+fearful storm was brewing for somebody.
+
+He sat in front of a table littered with papers, in a small, rather
+dirty office, the windows of which opened on to Bedford Street. With the
+window open, as he kept it, the noise of the Strand traffic was plainly
+audible.
+
+He eyed Joan slowly and methodically; then his glance turned back to
+Fanny. "What can she do?" he asked heavily.
+
+"Oh, everything," Fanny answered with a little gasp; "and she can share
+my dressing-room and all that."
+
+"Humph!" grunted the man; once more his small, shrewd eyes travelled all
+over Joan.
+
+"Well, perhaps, she will do." He agreed finally, "Mind you are in time
+at the station to-morrow. Cut along now, girls, I am busy."
+
+Fanny was jubilant all the way home. "I thought I should be able to work
+it," she bubbled; "it will be fun, honey, to-morrow we are due at
+Tonbridge and the tour ends at Sevenoaks. All little places this time.
+But mind you, it is the first rung of the ladder for you. Brown's is a
+good company to start with. _Country Girl_, _Merry Widow_, _Waltz
+Dream_." She ticked them all off on her fingers one by one. "You are
+glad about it, aren't you?" she broke off suddenly to ask.
+
+"Of course I am glad," Joan answered quickly, "and it is sweet of you to
+have got it for me. Perhaps I am a little nervous; it strikes me one
+might get very frightened of Mr. Brown."
+
+"What, Daddy? He is all right if you know how to manage him, and he
+won't bother you." Fanny took a quick look at her. "You aren't his
+sort."
+
+Was she really glad? Joan pondered the matter over when Fanny had at
+last betaken herself to her own room. At any rate she had, as it were,
+burnt her boats. She had left the _Evening Herald_, she had told Mrs.
+Carew to sublet her rooms. At least it would be good to get away from
+London for a bit.
+
+Mrs. Carew had been quite frank and decided in her views on the subject.
+
+"For a young lady like you to go off with the likes of 'er," this
+referred to Fanny, "it hardly seems seemly to me, Miss. Not that Miss
+Bellairs ain't all right in her own way, but it is not your way. Mark my
+words, Miss, you will regret it."
+
+"And if I do," Joan had answered, "I can always leave and come back
+here, can't I, Mrs. Carew? I am sure you will always do your best to put
+me up even if this room is let."
+
+"If I have a corner; Miss, you shall 'ave it and welcome. Nice and quiet
+young lady you have always been, and I know something of young ladies, I
+do."
+
+It was evident, even in her efforts to be polite, that she considered
+Joan's present line of action to be one of deterioration. Was it, after
+all, a wise move, Joan wondered rather vaguely, as she packed away her
+few possessions. There was a great deal in Fanny's nature that she
+disapproved of, that could at times even fill her with disgust. In
+itself, that would merely hold her from ever coming to look at life from
+Fanny's standpoint. And perhaps she would find in the existence, which
+Fanny claimed to be full of love and laughter, something to satisfy the
+dull aching discontent which had wrenched at her heart all this last
+summer. Aunt Janet, Uncle John, the old home-life, the atmosphere of
+love and admiration, these had been torn from her, she needed something
+to take their place.
+
+They met the rest of the company next day at the station. Fanny
+introduced them all to Joan, rather breathlessly.
+
+"Mr. Strachan, who plays our hero, and who is the idol of the stalls.
+Mr. O'Malley, our comic man. Mr. Whistler, who does heavy father parts,
+wig and all. Mr. Jimmy Rolls, who dances on light toes and who prompts
+when nothing else is doing. The ladies, honey, take their names on
+trust, you will find them out sooner or later."
+
+There were, Joan discovered, eight other ladies in the company. She
+never knew more than four of them. Mrs. O'Malley, Grace Binning, a small
+soft-voiced girl, Rhoda Tompkins, and Rose Weyland--a very
+golden-haired, dark-eyebrowed lady, who had been in some far back
+period, so Fanny contrived to whisper, a flame of Brown's.
+
+Of the men, Joan liked Mr. Strachan best; he was an ugly man with very
+pleasant eyes and a rare smile that lit up the whole of his face. He
+seemed quiet, she thought, and rather apart from the others.
+
+The journey down to Tonbridge proved slightly disastrous. To begin with,
+thanks to Daddy Brown himself, the company missed the best train of the
+day and had to travel by one that meant two changes. On arrival at
+Tonbridge at four o'clock in the afternoon they found that one of the
+stage property boxes had gone astray. Considering that they were billed
+to appear that evening at eight and the next train did not arrive till
+ten-thirty, the prospect was not a promising one.
+
+"Always merry and bright," as Jimmie, the stage prompter, remarked in an
+aside to Strachan. "By the way, is it the _Arcadians_ that we are doing
+to-night?"
+
+"How the hell can we do anything," growled Daddy Brown, the patch of
+skin round his danger-mark showed alarmingly red, "if that box does not
+appear. Who was the blasted idiot who was supposed to be looking after
+it?"
+
+"Well, it was and it was not me, Sir," Jimmie acknowledged; "the truth
+is that I saw it labelled all right and left it with the rest of the
+luggage to look after itself. I suppose----"
+
+"Oh, what is the use of talking," Brown broke in impatiently; he had
+thrust his hat back on his fiery head, the lines of fat above his collar
+shone with perspiration. "You had better go on, all of you, and see
+about getting rooms; the first rehearsal is in an hour, box or no box,
+and don't you forget it."
+
+"I don't see," wailed Mrs. O'Malley, almost as soon as his back was
+turned, "how we are to live through this sort of thing. What is the use
+of a rehearsal if none of our things are going to turn up?"
+
+"I guess there will be a performance whether or no," Fanny told her.
+"Come along, honey," this to Joan, "seize up your bag and follow me; we
+have got to find diggings of sorts before the hour is up."
+
+Joan found, as they trudged from lodging-house to lodging-house, that
+the theatrical profession was apparently very unpopular in Tonbridge. As
+Fanny remarked, it was always as well to tell the old ladies what to
+expect, but the very mention of the word theatre caused a chill to
+descend on the prospective landladies' faces. They found rooms finally
+in one of the smaller side streets; a fair-sized double bedroom, and a
+tiny little sitting-room. The house had the added advantage of being
+very near the theatre, which was just as well, for they had barely time
+to settle with the woman before they had to hurry off for the rehearsal.
+
+"It won't do to be late," Fanny confided to Joan. "Daddy is in an awful
+temper; we shan't get any champagne to-night unless some of us soothe
+him down."
+
+At the small tin-roofed theatre supreme chaos reigned upon the stage and
+behind it. Daddy Brown, his hat thrown off, his coat discarded, stormed
+and raged at everyone within hearing. _The Country Girl_ had replaced
+_The Arcadians_ on the bill; it was an old favourite and less
+troublesome to stage. Fanny was to play _Molly_; it was a part that she
+might have been born for. Daddy Brown won back to his good humour as he
+watched her; her voice, clear and sweet, carried with it a certain
+untouched charm of youth, for Fanny put her whole heart into her work.
+
+Joan felt herself infected by the other's spirit, she joined in the
+singing, laughing with real merriment at her chorus partner. The stage
+boards cracked and creaked, the man at the piano watched the performers
+with admiring eyes--the music was so familiar that it was quite
+unnecessary for him to follow the notes. Daddy Brown and the box office
+man, sole occupants of the stalls, saw fit to applaud as the chorus
+swung to a breathless pause.
+
+"That's good, that's good," Brown shouted. "Just once more again please,
+ladies, then we'll call a rest. Don't want to tire you out before
+to-night."
+
+The dance flourished to its second end and Fanny flung herself exhausted
+against the wings. Her cough was troubling her again, shaking her thin
+body, fighting its way through her tightened throat.
+
+"It's worth it though," she laughed in answer to Joan's remonstrance;
+"it is the only time I really live when I am dancing, you see."
+
+The rehearsal dragged out its weary length, but not until Brown had
+reduced all the company to such a state of exhaustion that they could
+raise no quiver of protest to any of his orders. A man of iron himself,
+he extracted and expected from the people under him the same powers of
+endurance which he himself possessed. Since Fanny and Joan could not go
+home to their lodgings, the time being too short, Strachan escorted them
+out to obtain a meal of sorts before the evening's performance. Short of
+Daddy Brown's hotel, which stood close to the theatre and which they
+were all reluctant to try, there did not appear to be any restaurants in
+the neighbourhood and they ended up by having a kind of high tea at a
+little baker's. "Eggs are splendid things to act on," Strachan told
+Joan.
+
+The girls, however, on their return found a bottle of champagne and two
+glasses waiting for them in Fanny's dressing-room. It had been sent with
+Mr. Brown's compliments to Miss Bellairs. The sight of it sent up
+Fanny's spirits with a bound.
+
+"I did not know how I was going to get through the evening," she
+confessed, "but this will put new life into us."
+
+She insisted upon Joan having a glass, and the latter, conscious that in
+her present state of tiredness she could hardly stand, far less dance,
+sipped a little of the clear, bubbling liquid--sipped till the small
+room grew large, till her feet seemed to tread on air, and her eyes
+shone and sparkled like the brightest of stars on a dark night.
+
+The theatre after that, the crowded rows of faces, the music and the
+thunder of applause--the audience were good-tempered and inclined to be
+amused at anything--passed before her like some gorgeous light-flecked
+dream. When the soldiers in the back row took up the words of Fanny's
+song and shouted the refrain she felt swept along on the wings of
+success.
+
+At the fall of the curtain Daddy Brown patted her on the back. He was by
+this time radiant with cheerfulness once more.
+
+"You will do, young lady," he said. "We'll have to see if we can't work
+in a special dance for you;" and Fanny flung her arms round Joan in wild
+joy. "You're made, honey," she whispered, "if Brown has noticed you,
+you're made. I always said you could dance."
+
+It was very thrilling and exciting, but the champagne was beginning to
+lose its effect. The world was growing grey again. Joan's head throbbed,
+and she felt self-consciously inclined to make a fool of herself. She
+sat very silent through the supper to which Brown treated the company at
+his hotel. There were about twenty people present, nearly all men; Joan
+wondered where they had been collected from, and she did not quite like
+the look of any of them. Fanny was making a great deal of noise, and
+how funny and tawdry their faces looked under the bright light. After
+supper there was a dance, the table was pushed aside, and someone--Joan
+saw with surprise that it was Daddy Brown--pounded away at a one-step on
+the piano. Everyone danced, the men, since there were not enough ladies
+to go around, with each other.
+
+Fanny, wilder, gayer than ever, skirts held very high, showed off a new
+cake-walk in the centre of the room. Her companion, a young,
+weak-looking youth, was evidently far from sober, and the more intricate
+the step, the more hopelessly did he become entangled with his own feet,
+amidst shouts of amusement from the onlookers.
+
+Joan turned presently--she had narrowly escaped being dragged into the
+dance by a noisily cheerful gentleman--to find Strachan standing beside
+her. He was watching her with some shade of curiosity.
+
+"Why don't you go home?" he suggested; "it isn't amusing you and I can
+see you are tired. We get used to these kind of shows after a time."
+
+"I think I will," Joan agreed; "no one will mind if I do, will they?"
+
+"Not they, most of them are incapable of noticing anything." A cynical
+smile stirred on his face. "It is no wonder," he commented, "that we are
+known as a danger to provincial towns. You see the state of confusion we
+reduce the young bloods to." His eyes passed round the room and came
+back to Joan with a shade of apology in them. "A bad night, for your
+first experience," he said; "we are not always as noisy as this. Come
+along though, I'll see you home, if I may, my rooms are somewhere down
+your street."
+
+Joan lay awake long after she had got into bed, and when she did at last
+drop off to sleep it was to dream strange, noise-haunted dreams, that
+brought her little rest. It was morning, for a faint golden light was
+invading the room, when she woke to find Fanny standing at the foot of
+the bed. A different Fanny to any Joan had ever seen before, tired and
+blowsy-looking, her hair pulled about her face, the colour rubbed in
+patches from her cheeks and lips.
+
+"My word, it has been a night;" she stood swaying and peering at Joan.
+"It's life though, isn't it, honey?"
+
+Then a wild fit of coughing seized her and Joan had to scramble out of
+bed and give what help she could. There was no hope of sleep after that,
+and when Fanny had been helped to bed Joan took up a chair to the window
+and drew aside the curtain.
+
+Her mind was a tumult of angry thoughts, but her heart ached miserably.
+If this was what Fanny called life and laughter, she had no wish to live
+it.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+    "I did not choose thee, dearest. It was Love
+     That made the choice, not I."
+
+                                             W. S. BLUNT.
+
+
+All the way up the river from the Nore after they had picked up the
+pilot the ship moved through a dense fog. A huge P. & O. liner, heavily
+laden with passengers and mails, she had to proceed cautiously, like
+some blind giant, emitting every two minutes a dolorous wail from her
+foghorns.
+
+"Clear the way, I am coming," was the substance of the weird sound, and
+in answer to it shrill whistles sounded on all sides, from small fleets
+of fishing-boats, coal hulks, and cargo boats bound from far-off lands.
+
+"We are here too," they panted in answer; "don't run us down, please."
+
+It was eerie work, even for the passengers, who remained in blissful
+ignorance of the danger of their situation. By rights the ship should
+have been in dock before breakfast; they had planned the night before
+that an early dawn should see them awake and preparing to land; yet here
+was eleven o'clock, and from what the more hardy of them could learn by
+direct questioning of those in authority, they had not as yet passed
+Canvey Island. Dick Grant, ship's doctor and therefore free of access to
+inquirers, underwent a searching examination from all and sundry. The P.
+& O. regulations are, that the officers shall not talk or in any way
+become friendly with any of the passengers; the ship's doctor and the
+purser share the responsibility of looking after their clients' comfort,
+well-being, and amusement. On occasions such as a fog, when the hearts
+of passengers are naturally full of questions as to where they are, how
+long will the fog last, is there any danger, and ought we to have on our
+life-belts, these two afore-mentioned officials have a busy time. Dick
+felt that Barton, the purser in question, had played him rather a shabby
+trick, for Barton had asserted that the work of sorting out passengers'
+luggage and seeing to their valuables would confine him to his office
+till the ship docked, which excuse left Dick alone to cope with the
+fog-produced situation.
+
+Dick had been at sea now for close on two years. He had shifted from
+ship to ship, had visited most of the ports in the near and far East.
+This was his last voyage; he was going to go back and take up life in
+London. From Marseilles he had written to Mabel telling her to expect
+him the week-end after they got in.
+
+His journeyings had given him many and varied experiences. The blue eyes
+had taken unto themselves some of that unwavering facing of life which
+seems to come almost always into the eyes of people who spend their
+lives upon the sea. He had learned to be patient and long-suffering with
+the oddities of his patients, passengers who passed through his hands on
+their brief journeyings; he had seen the pathos of the sick who were
+shipped with the full knowledge that they would die ere the first port
+was reached, simply because the wistful ache of home-sickness would not
+allow them to rest. Home-sickness! Dick had known it keep a man alive
+till the grey cliffs of Dover grew out of the sea and he could fall back
+dead and satisfied.
+
+Board ship throws people together into appalling intimacy; Love springs
+full-winged into being in the course of an afternoon; passion burns at
+red-heat through drowsy, moon-filled nights. Almost wilfully, to begin
+with, Dick had flung himself into romance after romance; perhaps unknown
+to himself, he sought to satisfy the hunger of heart which could throb
+in answer to a dream, but which all reality left untouched. He played at
+love lightly; he had an ingrained reverence for women that even
+intercourse with Anglo-Indian grass-widows and the girl who revels in a
+board-ship flirtation was unable altogether to eradicate. He made love,
+that is to say, only to those women who first and openly made love to
+him; but it is to be doubted whether even the most ardent of them could
+boast that Dicky Grant had ever been in love with them. They slipped out
+of his ken when they disembarked at their various ports, and the
+photographs with which they dowered him hardly served to keep him in
+mind of their names. And a certain weariness had grown up in his heart;
+he felt glad that this was to be his last voyage. He had put in two good
+crowded years, but he was no nearer realizing his dream than he had been
+on the day when Mabel had said to him: "Did you think I should not know
+when you fell in love?"
+
+Dick was thinking of this remark of Mabel's as he stood by himself for
+the time being, right up by the front of the ship peering into the fog,
+and with the thought came a memory of the girl with the brown eyes who
+had stood to face him, her hands clenched at her sides, as she told her
+piteous tale. Piteous, because of its very bravado. "I am not afraid or
+ashamed," she had claimed, while fear stared out of her eyes and shame
+flung the colour to her face. What had the past two years brought her?
+Had she stood with her back to the wall of public opinion and fought her
+fight, or had the forces of contempt and blame been too strong for her?
+
+A very light hand on his arm brought him out of his thoughts with a
+start, and he turned to find a small, daintily-clad lady standing beside
+him.
+
+"How much longer shall we be?" she asked; "and when am I going to see
+you again, Dicky, once we land?"
+
+She had called him Dicky from the second day of their acquaintance. Mrs.
+Hayter always called men by their Christian names, or by nicknames
+invented by herself.
+
+Dick let his eyes linger over her before he answered--immaculately
+dressed as ever--the wildest storm saw Mrs. Hayter with her hair waved,
+the other ladies claimed--small, piquante face, blue eyes and a
+marvellous complexion despite her many seasons spent in the East. She
+was the wife of an Indian Civilian, a tall, grey-headed man, who had
+come on board to see her off at Bombay. Dick had been rather struck with
+the tragedy of the man's face, that once he had seen it; he connected it
+always for some unexplainable reason with Mrs. Hayter's small, soft
+hands and the slumberous fire in her blue eyes. Not that Dick was not
+friendly with Mrs. Hayter; he had had on the contrary rather a
+fierce-tempered flirtation with her. Once, under the spell of a night
+all purple sea and sky and dim set stars, he had caught her to him and
+kissed her. Kissed the eager, laughing mouth, the warm, soft neck, just
+where the little pulse beat in the hollow of her throat. She had
+practically asked him to kiss her, yet that, he reflected in his cooler
+mood the next morning, was no excuse for his conduct, and, rather
+ashamed of himself, he had succeeded in avoiding her fairly well until
+this moment. He had not the slightest desire to kiss her again; that was
+always the sad end to all his venturings into the kingdom of romance.
+
+"Where are you going to?" he answered her last question first; "if it is
+anywhere near London, I shall hope to look you up."
+
+Mrs. Hayter laughed, a little caught-in laugh. "Look me up, Dicky,
+between you and me! Never mind, you funny, shy, big boy, you shall put
+it that way if you like. As a matter of fact, I am going to stay at the
+Knightsbridge Hotel for a week or so on my way through to my husband's
+people. Why don't you come there too?"
+
+The invitation in her voice was unmistakable and set his teeth on edge.
+"It's too expensive for me," he answered shortly; "but I will come and
+call one day if I may."
+
+"Of course," she agreed, "let's make it dinner the day after to-morrow.
+Dicky," she moved a little closer to him, "is it me or yourself you are
+angry with about the other night?"
+
+"Myself," Dick said dryly, and had no time for more, for on the second a
+shiver shook the ship, throwing Mrs. Hayter forcibly against him, and
+the air was suddenly clamorous with shrill whistles, cries, and the
+quick throb of engines reversed.
+
+Through the fog, which with a seeming malignity was lifting, veil upon
+thick veil, now that the mischief was accomplished, Dick could see the
+faint outlines of land; gaunt trees and a house, quite near at hand,
+certainly within call. Mrs. Hayter was in a paroxysm of terror,
+murmuring her fright and strange endearing terms all jumbled together,
+and the deck had waked to life; they seemed in the centre of a curious,
+nerve-ridden crowd. It was all very embarrassing; Dick had to hold on to
+Mrs. Hayter because he knew she would fall if he let her go, and she
+clung to him, arms thrown round his neck, golden hair brushing against
+his chin.
+
+"There's not a particle of danger," a strong voice shouted from
+somewhere in the crowd. Dick could recognize it as the captain's.
+"Please don't get alarmed, ladies, it is quite unnecessary, with any
+luck we will be off almost immediately."
+
+In that he proved incorrect, for, heavily weighted as the _India_ was,
+she stayed firmly fixed in Thames mud. By slow degrees the fog lifted
+and showed the long lines of the shore, and the solitary house standing
+out like a sentinel in the surrounding flatness.
+
+Dick had succeeded in disentangling Mrs. Hayter's arms and had escorted
+her to a seat.
+
+"I am afraid I have given myself away hopelessly," she whispered,
+clutching him with rather a shaky hand. "Did anybody see us?"
+
+"Everybody, I should think," he told her gravely, "But, after all, most
+things are excusable in a possible wreck."
+
+"Yes," she agreed, "only Mrs. Sandeman is all eyes to my doings, and on
+one occasion she even wrote Robert. Cat!"
+
+The last expression was full of vindictiveness. Dick was seized with a
+disgust for his own share in the proceedings; he hoped devoutly that
+Mrs. Sandeman, a rather austere-faced, tight-lipped woman, would not
+write and disturb Robert's peace of mind for any doings of his. Also he
+took a mental resolve to see no more of Mrs. Hayter.
+
+By four o'clock all the passengers, with a mild proportion of their
+luggage, had been transferred to small tugs for transport to Tilbury;
+for on a further examination into the state of affairs it had been found
+that the _India_ would probably remain where she was until a certain
+lightening of her freight should make it easier for her to refloat.
+
+It was three days later, in fact, before Dick reached London. He found
+two letters waiting for him at his club; one from Mabel, telling him how
+glad they would be to see him, could he not make it earlier than the
+week-end; and one from Mrs. Hayter. Would he come and dine with her that
+evening? He need not trouble to answer, she was dining all alone and
+would not wait for him after half-past seven.
+
+"If you can't come to dinner," she had added, "look in afterwards; there
+is something I rather particularly want to say to you."
+
+He dressed for the evening meal in a vague state of discontent. He had
+not the slightest intention of going to Mrs. Hayter's, still the thought
+of her, waiting for him and expecting him, made him uneasy. At one
+moment he meditated telephoning to her to tell her he was unavoidably
+prevented from coming, but dismissed the excuse as being too palpably a
+lie. He was restless, too, and at a loss as to how to spend his evening,
+the loneliness of being by himself in London after a two years' absence
+was beginning to oppress him. None of his old pals seemed to be in
+town--anyway they did not turn up at the club. Finally he decided to
+look in at the Empire, or one of the neighbouring music-halls, and
+strolled forth in that direction.
+
+London certainly seemed no emptier than usual. Streams of motor-cars,
+taxis, and buses hurried along Piccadilly, the streets were busy with
+people coming and going. Out of the shadows just by the Burlington
+Arcade a woman spoke to him--little whispered words that he could pass
+on without noticing; but she had brushed against him as she spoke, the
+heavy scent she used seemed to cling to him, and he had been conscious
+in the one brief glance he had given her, that she was young, pretty,
+brown-eyed. The incident touched on his mind like the flick of a whip.
+He stared at the other women as they passed him, meeting always the same
+bold yet weary invitation of their eyes, the smile which betokened
+nothing of mirth. And as he stared and passed and stared again it grew
+on him that he was in reality searching for someone, searching those
+street faces in the same way as once before he had sought among the
+passers-by for one girl's face. The thought was no sooner matured than
+he hated it--and now he tried to keep his eyes off these women passing
+by, loathing the thought of their nightly pilgrimage, of their
+shame-haunted trade.
+
+The Empire performance hardly served to distract his thoughts. He was
+out in the streets again before the ballet turn came on even. It had
+started to rain, a slight, indefinite drizzle; Leicester Square
+presented a drab and dingy appearance. The blaze of lights from the
+surrounding theatres shone on wet streets and slippery pavements. A
+drunken woman who had been ejected from the public-house at the corner
+stood leaning against a neighbouring lamp-post; her hat had fallen
+askew, stray, ragged wisps of hair hung about her face, from time to
+time she lifted up her voice and shouted at the children who had
+gathered in a ring to watch her antics. Life was horribly, hurtfully
+ugly at times. Dick would have liked to have shaken his shoulders free
+of it all and known himself back once more on the wind-swept deck of an
+outgoing steamer.
+
+He strode off in the direction of Trafalgar Square, and still dim,
+draggled shapes haunted his footsteps, leered at him from the shadows,
+brushed against him as he passed. As he turned into the lighted purlieus
+of the Strand he paused for a moment, undecided which course to take
+next, and it was then that he saw Joan again.
+
+She was standing a little in front of him on the edge of the pavement,
+evidently waiting for a bus. Another girl stood near her, talking in
+quick, childish excitement, recounting some conversation, for she acted
+the parts as she spoke. Joan seemed to pay very little attention to her
+companion, though occasionally she smiled in answer to the other's
+laughter.
+
+He had recognized her at once! Now he stood with his eyes glued on her,
+taking in every detail of her appearance--the wide-brimmed hat, the
+little lace collar showing outside her jacket, the neat shoes.
+
+Even as she talked Fanny's bird-like eyes darted here and there among
+the crowd and lit presently on the young man, so palpably staring at her
+companion. She edged nearer to Joan and nudged her.
+
+"You have got off, honey," she whispered. "Turn your eyes slowly and you
+will catch such a look of devotion as will keep you in comfort for the
+rest of your life."
+
+Joan flushed: Fanny could always succeed in bringing the hot blush to
+her face, even though she had been on tour with the company now for two
+months. Also she still resented being stared at, though Fanny was doing
+her best to break her in to that most necessary adjunct of their
+profession. Rather haughtily, therefore, she turned, and for a second
+his eyes met hers, bringing a quick, disturbing memory which she could
+in no way place.
+
+At any other time Dick would have taken off his hat and claimed
+acquaintance; just for the present moment, though, something held him
+spellbound, staring. Fanny giggled, and Joan, having had time to raise
+her feelings to a proper pitch of anger, let her eyes pass very coldly
+and calmly from the top of the young man's hat to the tip of his boots
+and back again. Contempt and dislike were in the glance, what Fanny
+called her "Kill the worm" expression. Then No. 11 motor-bus plunged
+alongside, and "Here we are at last!" called Fanny, dragging at Joan's
+arm.
+
+With a sense of victory in her heart, since the young man had obviously
+been quelled by her anger, Joan climbed up to the top of the bus and sat
+down in a seat out of sight. Fanny, however, turned to have a final look
+at the enemy from the top step. As the bus moved, she saw him shake
+himself out of his trance and start forward.
+
+"Good-night," she called in cheerfully affectionate tones; the conductor
+turned to stare up at her. "Some other day; can't be done to-night,
+sonny."
+
+Then she subsided, almost weak with laughter at her own joke, beside a
+righteously irritated Joan.
+
+"Nearly had the cheek to follow us, mind you," she told her, amid gasps;
+"properly smitten, he was."
+
+"I wish you had not called out to him," said Joan stiffly. "It is so--so
+undignified."
+
+Fanny quelled her laughter and looked up at Joan. "Undignified," she
+repeated; "it stopped him from coming, anyway. You don't look at things
+the right way, honey. One must not be disagreeable or rude to men in our
+trade, but one can often choke them off by laughing at them."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+    "Love lent is mortal, lavished, is divine.
+     Not by its intake is love's fount supplied,
+     But by the ceaseless outrush of its tide."
+
+
+"And there is little Dickie," Mabel said; she stood, one hand on the
+cot, her grey eyes lowered--"he has brought such happiness into my life
+that sometimes I am afraid."
+
+The baby. Some women were like that, Dick knew. A child could build anew
+their world for them and make it radiant with a heaven-sent wonder. He
+had never thought of Mabel as a mother. He had been almost afraid to
+meet her after two years away--her letters had given him no clue to her
+feelings; but then she rarely wrote of herself and she had never been
+the sort of person to complain. So he had come down to Sevenoaks rather
+wondering what he would find, remembering their last talk together the
+day before her wedding. Mabel had met him at the station and driven him
+back to the house in their car. She had talked chiefly about himself;
+was he glad to be back?--had he enjoyed the years away?--what plans had
+he made for the future? But her face, her quiet grey eyes had spoken for
+her. He knew she was happy, only the reason, the foundation of this
+happiness, had been a mystery to him until this moment.
+
+"Little Dickie," he repeated, leaning forward to peer at the small atom
+of humanity who lay fast asleep. "You have called it after me, then?"
+
+Mabel nodded. "Of course; and don't call him 'it,' Dick; he is a boy."
+
+A sudden intuition came to her, she lifted her eyes to Dick's. "Tom
+wanted him called that, too," she said, speaking a little quickly; "but
+that is not wonderful, because Tom always wants just exactly what he
+thinks I do. We will go downstairs now, shall we, Dick? You know Mother
+insisted upon a dinner-party in your honour this evening, and we are
+going on to some awful theatre in Sevenoaks afterwards."
+
+"Good Lord!" groaned Dick; "why did you let her?"
+
+"I thought you wouldn't be too pleased," Mabel admitted; "but surely you
+must remember that it is no use arguing with mother about what she
+calls--amusing us. She took the tickets as a pleasant surprise yesterday
+when she was in Sevenoaks. As Tom says, 'Let's be amused with a good
+grace.' Dick"--she paused on the lowest step to look up at him--"you
+haven't the slightest idea of how good Tom is; he spoils mother almost
+as much as father did, and yet he manages her."
+
+"And you," said Dick, "are absolutely and entirely happy, Mabel?"
+
+"Absolutely and entirely," she answered; he could see the truth of her
+words shining in her eyes.
+
+Mrs. Grant loved dinner-parties and going-on to the theatre. It is to be
+believed that she imagined that the younger people enjoyed them too,
+because, for herself, she invariably went to sleep half-way through the
+most brilliant performance--earlier, were the show not quite so good.
+Dick remembered many unpleasant entertainments in his youth which could
+be traced to this passion of Mrs. Grant's. She would drill them into
+amusement, becoming excessively annoyed with them did they not show
+immediate appreciation, and pleasure is too fragile a dream for such
+treatment; it can be very easily destroyed.
+
+Dick and Mabel found her downstairs, giving the final orders as to the
+setting out of the table to a harassed and sulky-looking maid.
+Everything had always to be done in Mrs. Grant's own particular way,
+even down to the placing of the salt-spoons. She was the bane of the
+servants' lives when they were new-comers; if they lived through the
+persecution they learned how best to avoid her gimlet eyes and could get
+a certain amount of amusement out of hoodwinking her. Dick contrived to
+display the correct amount of pleasure at the festivity in prospect for
+him. He wondered at the back of his mind how glad his mother really was
+to see him, and strolled away upstairs presently to his own room to
+unpack and change.
+
+The first had already been accomplished for him by Tom's valet, and the
+man apparently proposed to stay and help him change, murmuring something
+about a hot bath being ready.
+
+"Thanks," answered Dick, "then I will manage for myself; you need not
+wait."
+
+He stood for some time, the man having slipped discreetly away, staring
+out of the wide-open window. It was still late summer, and the days
+stayed very hot. Beyond the well-kept lawn at the back of the house the
+fields stretched away till they reached the fringe of the forest, and
+above the trees again rose the chalk hills that lay, he knew, just
+behind Wrotham. He was thinking vaguely of many things as he stood
+there; first of Mabel and the new happiness shining in her eyes. Mabel
+and her small son; thank heaven, she had won through to such content,
+for if anyone deserved to be happy it was Mabel. Then little moments
+from the past two years strayed into his mind. Hot, sun-blazing ports,
+with their crowds of noisy, gesticulating natives; the very brazen blue
+of an Indian sky over an Indian sea; the moonlit night that had made him
+kiss Mrs. Hayter; he could almost feel for one second the throb of her
+heart against his. Then, like a flash, as if all his other thoughts had
+been but a shifting background for this, the principal one, Joan's face
+swung up before him. Where had she been going to that night? Who had her
+companion been? Why had not he had the courage to speak to her, to
+follow her at least, and find out where she lived? She was in London,
+anyway; he would have, even at the risk of hurting Mabel's feelings, to
+get back to London as soon as possible. It was a huge place, certainly,
+to look for just one person in, but Fate would bring them together
+again; he had learned to be a believer in Fate. There was truth, then,
+behind all the strange stories one heard about Love. A girl's voice,
+some face in the crowd, and a man's heart was all on flame. The waters
+of common-sense could do nothing to quench that fire. He would search,
+ridiculous and absurd as it seemed, till he found her--and then.... His
+thoughts broke off abruptly; there was a sound from downstairs which
+might be the dinner-bell, and he had not even had his bath yet.
+
+The dinner-party, specially arranged by Mrs. Grant for Dick's benefit,
+consisted of a Mr. and Mrs. Bevis, who lived in a large new house on the
+other side of the park, their two daughters, Dr. English, who had taken
+Dick's place at Wrotham, and a young man from Sevenoaks itself. "Someone
+in a bank," as Mrs. Grant described him.
+
+Dick's health was drunk and his mother insisted on "Just a little
+speech, dear boy," which thoroughly upset his temper for the rest of the
+evening, so that he found it difficult to be even decently polite to the
+eldest Miss Bevis, whom he had taken in to dinner. The talk turned,
+after the speech-making episode, to the theatre they were bound for, Mr.
+Jarvis asking young Swetenham if he knew anything of the company and
+what it was like.
+
+"Rather," the youth answered, "been twice myself this time already. They
+are real good for travellers. Some jolly pretty girls among them."
+
+"Musical comedy, isn't it?" Mrs. Bevis asked. "Dorothy has always so
+wanted to see _The Merry Widow_."
+
+"Well, that is what they are playing to-night," Swetenham assured her,
+"and I hear it is Miss Bellairs' best part. She is good, mind you, in
+most things, and there is a girl who dances top-hole."
+
+"I don't know why we have never heard of it before," Mrs. Bevis
+meandered gently on; "it is so clever of you, Mrs. Grant, to have found
+that there was a theatre in Sevenoaks at all. I am sure we never dreamed
+of there being one."
+
+"They use the town hall," Dr. English put in. "If we can guarantee a
+large enough audience, I expect they will favour us at Wrotham."
+
+"Oh, what a splendid idea," cried the youngest Miss Bevis; "fancy a real
+live theatrical company in Wrotham."
+
+"I hope it will stay at 'fancy,'" grunted Mr. Bevis. "From what I
+remember of travelling companies, Wrotham is better without them."
+
+Despite all Swetenham's praise and the Miss Bevis' enthusiastic
+anticipation Dick settled into his seat in the fourth row of the
+so-called stalls with the firm conviction that he was going to be
+thoroughly bored.
+
+"The one consolation," he whispered to Mabel on their way in, "is that
+mother will not be able to sleep comfortably. I don't want to appear
+vicious, but really that is a consolation."
+
+Mrs. Grant had apparently come to the same conclusion herself, for she
+was expressing great dissatisfaction in a queenly manner to the timid
+programme seller.
+
+"Are these the best seats in the house?" they could hear her say. "It is
+quite absurd to expect anyone to sit in them for a whole evening."
+
+Mabel had to laugh at Dick's remark, then she went forward to soothe her
+troubled parent as much as possible. "It isn't like a London theatre,
+mother, and Tom has ordered one of the cars to stay just outside. The
+minute you get tired he will take you straight home. He says he does not
+mind, as he has so often seen _The Merry Widow_ before."
+
+"Oh, well," Mrs. Grant sighed, and settled her weighty body into one of
+the creaking, straight-backed wooden chairs of which the stalls were
+composed. "So long as you young people enjoy yourselves I do not really
+mind."
+
+Swetenham had purchased a stack of programmes and was pointing out the
+stars on the list to the youngest Miss Bevis. The back of the hall was
+rapidly filling, and one or two other parties strolled into the stalls.
+The orchestra had already commenced to play the overture rather shakily.
+
+"Music, and bad music at that," groaned Dick inwardly. He took a
+despairing glance round him and wondered if it would be possible to go
+and lose himself after the first act. Then the lights went out abruptly
+and the curtain went up.
+
+The beginning chorus dragged distinctly; Dick heard Swetenham whispering
+to his companions that it would be better when the principals came on.
+In this he proved correct, for the _Merry Widow_ girl could sing, and
+she could also act. Fanny's prettiness, her quick, light way of moving,
+shone out in contrast to her surroundings. High and sweet above the
+uncertain accompaniment her voice rose triumphant. The back of the house
+thundered with applause at the end of her song.
+
+"Now wait," announced Swetenham, "the girl who dances comes on here. She
+hasn't any business to, it is not in the play, but old Brown finds it a
+good draw."
+
+Mechanically the stage had been cleared, the characters sitting rather
+stiffly round the ball-room scene while the orchestra was making quite a
+good effort at "The Merry Widow Waltz." There was a second's pause, then
+down from the steps at the back of the stage came a girl; slim,
+straight-held, her eyes looking out over the audience as if they saw
+some vision beyond. It had taken Daddy Brown three very heated lessons
+to teach Joan this exact entrance. She was to move forward to the centre
+of the stage as if in a dream, almost sleep-walking, Fanny had
+suggested, the music was calling her. She was to begin her dance
+languidly, unwillingly, till note by note the melody crept into her
+veins and set all her blood tingling. "Now for abandon," Daddy Brown
+would exclaim, thumping the top of the piano with his baton. "That is
+right, my girl, fling yourself into it." And Joan had learned her
+lesson well, Daddy Brown and Fanny between them had wakened a talent to
+life in her which she had not known she possessed. Dance, yes, she could
+dance. The music seemed to give her wings. If she had seen her own
+performance she would probably have been a little shocked; she did not
+in the least realize how vividly she answered the call.
+
+When she had finished she stood, flushed and breathless, listening to
+the shouted and clapped applause.
+
+"Do it again, miss," a man's voice sounded from back in the hall. She
+tried to find him, to smile at him--that was more of Fanny's teaching.
+But Daddy Brown allowed no encores, it was only for a minute that she
+stood there, bowing and smiling, in her ridiculously short, flounced
+skirt and baby bodice, then the rest of the chorus moved out to take
+their places, and she vanished into the side wings again.
+
+From the moment of her entry till the last flutter of her skirts as she
+ran off, Dick sat as if mesmerized, leaning slightly forward, his hands
+clenched. Every movement of her body had stabbed, as it were, at his
+heart. He had not heard the call of the music, he could not guess at the
+spirit that was awake in her, he only saw the abandon--of which Daddy
+Brown was so proud--the painted face, the smiles which came and went so
+gaily at the shouted applause. Common-sense might not kill love, but
+this! The knowledge that even this could not kill love was what clenched
+his hands.
+
+At the end of the first act Swetenham leant across and asked if he was
+coming out for a drink. It may have been that the younger man had
+noticed Dick's intense interest in the dancer, or perhaps it was merely
+because he wished to air a familiarity which struck him as delightfully
+bold, anyway, as they strolled about outside he put a suggestion to
+Dick.
+
+"If you can arrange to stay on after the show," he said, "and would
+care to, I could take you round and introduce you to those two girls,
+the one who dances and Miss Bellairs."
+
+"Miss Bellairs," Dick repeated stupidly, his mind was grappling with a
+far bigger problem than young Swetenham could guess at.
+
+"Yes," the other answered, "I met her last time she was down here, and
+the other is a great pal of hers."
+
+He looked sideways at his companion as they went in under the lights; it
+occurred to him that Grant was either in a bad temper or had a headache,
+he looked anyway not in the least jovial. Swetenham almost regretted his
+rash invitation.
+
+"Thank you," Dick was saying, speaking almost mechanically, "I should
+like to come very much. It doesn't in the least matter about getting
+home."
+
+Swetenham glanced at him again. "If it comes to that," he said, "I have
+a motor-bike I could run you in on."
+
+The fellow, it suddenly dawned on him, had gone clean off his head about
+one of the girls. Swetenham could understand and sympathize with him in
+that.
+
+Dick managed to convey the information that he was staying on to Mabel
+during the third act. She looked a little astonished; Dick, in the old
+days, had been so scornful about young men's stage amusements. Anyway,
+it did not affect the party very much, for Mrs. Grant and Mr. Jarvis had
+already gone home, and Mabel was giving Dr. English a lift.
+
+"Shall I send the motor back for you?" she asked, just as they moved
+away.
+
+Dick shook his head. "Swetenham is going to give me a lift out," he
+answered her, and Dr. English chuckled an explanation as they rolled
+away.
+
+"What it is to be young, eh, Mrs. Jarvis? One can find beauty even in
+the chorus of a travelling company."
+
+But was that the explanation? Mabel wondered. Dick's face had not
+looked as if he had found anything beautiful in the performance.
+
+Swetenham and Dick made their way round to the side entrance of the town
+hall which acted as stage door on these occasions, after they had seen
+the rest of the party off, and Swetenham found someone to take his card
+up to Miss Bellairs.
+
+"We might take them out to supper at the 'Grand,'" he suggested, as they
+waited about for the answer. "I don't know about the new girl, but Miss
+Bellairs is always good fun."
+
+"Yes," agreed Dick half-heartedly. He was already regretting the impulse
+which had made him come. What should he do, or how feel or act, when he
+really met Joan face to face? His throat seemed ridiculously dry, and he
+was conscious of a hot sense of nervousness all over him which made the
+atmosphere of the night very oppressive. The boy who had run up with
+Swetenham's card came back presently with a message.
+
+"Would the gentlemen come upstairs, Miss Bellairs was just taking off
+her make-up."
+
+"Come on," Swetenham whispered to Dick; "Fanny is a caution, she doesn't
+mind a bit what sort of state you see her in."
+
+The boy led them up the stairs, through a small door and across what was
+evidently the back of the stage. At the foot of some steps on the
+further side he came to pause outside a door on which he knocked
+violently.
+
+"Come in," Fanny's voice shrilled from inside; "don't mind us."
+
+The boy with a grin threw the door open and indicated with his thumb
+that Swetenham and Dick might advance. He winked at them as they passed
+him, a fund of malignant impudence in his eyes. The room inside was
+small and scattered with a profusion of clothes. Fanny, attired in a
+long silk dressing wrap, sat on a low chair by the only table, very busy
+with a grease-pot and a soft rag removing the paint from her face. She
+turned to smile at Swetenham and held out her hand to Dick when he was
+introduced with a disarming air of absolute frankness.
+
+"You catch me not looking my best," she acknowledged; "just take a seat,
+dears; I'll be as beautiful as ever in a jiffy."
+
+Joan--Dick's eyes found her at once--was standing in a corner of the
+room behind the door. She had changed into a blouse and skirt, but the
+change had evidently only just been completed. The fluffy flounces of
+her dancing skirt lay on the ground beside her and the make-up was still
+on her face. At this close range it gave her eyes a curiously beautiful
+appearance--the heavy lashes, the dark-smudged shadows, adding to their
+size and brilliancy. She did not come forward to greet the two men, but
+she lifted those strange eyes and returned Dick's glance with a stare in
+which defiance and a rather hurt self-consciousness were oddly mixed.
+
+The tumult of anger and regret which had surged up in his heart as he
+had watched her dance died away as he looked at her; pity, and an
+intense desire to shield her, took its place. He moved forward
+impulsively, and Fanny, noticing the movement, turned with a little
+laugh.
+
+"I had forgotten," she said; "my manners are perfectly scandalous. Joan,
+come out of your corner and be introduced. Mr. Swetenham is going to
+take us to supper at the 'Grand,' so he has just confided into my
+shell-like ear. I can do with a bit of supper, can't you?"
+
+Joan dragged her eyes away from Dick. The painted lashes lay like stiff
+threads of black against her cheeks. "I don't think I will come," she
+answered. "I am tired to-night, Fanny, and I shan't be amusing."
+
+She turned away and reached up for her hat, which hung on a peg just
+above her head. "I think I would rather go straight home," she added.
+
+Fanny sprang to her feet and caught at her companion with impulsive
+hands, dragging her into the centre of the room.
+
+"Nonsense," she said, "you want cheering up far more than I do. Here,
+gentlemen," she went on, "you perceive a young lady suffering from an
+attack of the blues. If you will wait two minutes I'll make her face
+respectable--doesn't do to shock Sevenoaks--and we will all go to
+supper. Meanwhile let me introduce you--Miss Rutherford, known in the
+company as Sylvia Leicester, the some dancer of the Brown show."
+
+"If Miss Rutherford does not feel up to supper," Dick suggested--he
+wanted, if possible, to help the girl out of her difficulty; he realized
+that she did not want to come--"let us make it another night, or perhaps
+you could all come to lunch with me to-morrow?"
+
+Again Joan had lifted her eyes and was watching him, but now the
+defiance was uppermost in her mind. His face, to begin with, had worried
+her; the faint hint of having seen him somewhere before had been
+perplexing. She always disliked the way Fanny would welcome the most
+promiscuous acquaintances in their joint dressing-room at all times. She
+thought now that it must have been contempt which she had read in this
+man's eyes, and apart from their attraction--for in an indefinite way
+they had attracted her--the idea spurred her to instant rebellion.
+
+"No, let's go to supper," she exclaimed; "Fanny is quite right, I do
+want to be cheered up. Let's eat, drink, and be merry."
+
+She turned rather feverishly and started rubbing the make-up off her
+face with Fanny's rag. The other girl, meanwhile, slipped behind a
+curtain which hung across one side of the room and finished her
+dressing, carrying on an animated conversation with Swetenham all the
+time.
+
+Dick drew a little closer to Joan. "Why do you come?" he asked. "You
+know you hate it and us."
+
+Under the vanishing paint the colour flamed to Joan's face and died
+away-again. "Because I want to," she said; "and as for hating--you are
+wrong there; I don't hate anything or anyone, except, perhaps, myself."
+The last words were so low he hardly heard them.
+
+They strolled across to the Grand Hotel; it was Fanny's suggestion that
+they should not bother with a cab. She walked between the two men, a
+hand on each of them. Joan walked the further side of Swetenham, and
+Dick had no chance of seeing her even, but he knew that she was very
+silent, and, he could gather, depressed. At supper, which they had
+served in a little private room, and over the champagne, she won back to
+a certain hilarity of spirit. Swetenham was entirely immersed in amusing
+and being amused by Fanny, and Joan set herself--Dick fancied it was
+deliberately--to talk and laugh. It was almost as if she were afraid of
+any silence that might fall between them. He did not help her very much;
+he was content to watch her. Absurd as it may seem, he knew himself to
+be almost happy because she was so near him, because the fancied dream
+of the last two years had come to sudden reality. The other feelings,
+the disgust and disappointment which had lain behind their first
+meeting, were for the time being forgotten. Now and again he met her
+eyes and felt, from the odd pulse of happiness that leapt in his heart,
+that his long search was over. So triumphantly does love rise over the
+obstacles of common sense and worldly knowledge--love, which takes no
+count of time, degrees, or place.
+
+He had her to himself on the way home, for Fanny had elected to go for a
+spin in Swetenham's side-car, suggesting that Dick and Joan should go
+home and wait up for them.
+
+"We shan't be long," Swetenham assured Dick, remembering too late his
+promise to take the other man home, "and it is all right waiting there,
+they have got a sitting-room."
+
+So Joan and Dick walked home through the silent streets and all pretence
+of gaiety fell away from Joan. She walked without speaking, head held
+very high, moving beside him, her face scarce discernible under the
+shadow of her hat. It was not to be believed that she was quite
+conscious of all she meant to this man; but she could not fail to know
+that he was attracted to her, she could not help feeling the warmth with
+which his thoughts surrounded her. And how does Love come to a woman?
+Not on the same quick-rushing wings which carry men's desires forward.
+Love creeps in more assiduously to a woman's thoughts. He brings with
+him first a sense of shyness, a rather wistful longing to be more worthy
+of his homage. Unconsciously Joan struggled with this intrusion into her
+life. The man had nice eyes, but she resented the tumult they roused in
+her. Why was he not content to find in her just a momentary amusement,
+why did his eyes wake this vague, uncomfortable feeling of shame in
+her heart; shame against herself and her surroundings?
+
+At the door of the lodgings she turned to him; for the first time he
+could see her face, lit up by a neighbouring lamp.
+
+"Do you want to come in?" she asked, her voice hesitated on the words.
+"I do not want to ask you," her eyes said as plainly as possible.
+
+"No," he answered, "I would much rather you did not ask me to." Then
+suddenly he smiled at her. "We are going to be friends," he said. "I
+have a feeling that I have been looking for you for years; I am not
+going to let you go, once found."
+
+He said the words so very earnestly, there was no hint of mockery in
+them, it could not seem that he was laughing at her. She put her hand
+into the one he held out.
+
+"Well, friends," she said; an odd note of hesitation sounded in her
+voice.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+    "Love can tell, and Love alone,
+     Whence the million stars were strewn;
+     Why each atom knows its own;
+     How, in spite of woe and death,
+     Gay is life, and sweet is breath."
+
+                                             R. BRIDGES.
+
+
+Dick walked home. It was a good long tramp, but he was glad of the
+exercise and the opportunity it gave him to arrange his thoughts into
+some sort of order. He had spoken to Joan, carried away by the moment,
+as they stood to say good-night, impelled to frankness by the appeal of
+her eyes. Now, slowly, reason gathered all its forces together to argue
+against his inclination. It would be wiser to break his half-made
+promise to the girl, and stay out of her life altogether. Immeasurable
+difficulties lay in the way of his marrying her. There was the child,
+her present position, his people's feelings and his own dismay as he had
+watched her dancing on the stage and seen her smiling and radiant from
+the applause it awoke. He had built his dreams on a five minutes' memory
+and for two years the girl's eyes had haunted him, but none the less it
+was surely rather absurd. Even love, strong, mysterious power as it is,
+can be suppressed and killed if a man really puts his mind to it.
+
+At this moment, though of course Dick was not aware of the psychological
+happening, Love raised a defiant head amid the whirl of his thoughts and
+laughed at him--laughed deliberately, the sound echoing with all the old
+joy of the world, and Dick fell to thinking about Joan again. Her eyes,
+the way she walked, the undercurrent of sadness that had lain behind her
+gaiety. How good it would be to take her away from all the drabness of
+her present life and to bring real laughter, real happiness to her lips
+and eyes!
+
+"I will marry her," he decided stormily, as he turned in to the drive of
+the house. "Why have I been arguing about it all this time? It is what I
+had made up my mind to do two years ago. I will marry her."
+
+And again Love laughed, filling his heart with an indefinable glow of
+gladness.
+
+His night mood stayed with him the next morning and started him singing
+most riotously in his bath. Mabel heard him and smiled to herself. It
+was good to listen, to him and know him so cheerful; whatever it was
+that had disturbed him the night before had evidently vanished this
+morning.
+
+After breakfast, as was always her custom in summer, she took little
+Dickie out on to the lawn to sit under the big wide trees that threw so
+grateful a shade across the green. Big Dick joined them there with his
+pipe and he sat beside them in silence. It was very pleasant in the
+garden with the bluest of blue skies overhead and the baby chuckling and
+crowing in the very first rapture of life on the grass at their feet.
+Presently, however, a stern nurse descended on the scene and laughter
+was changed to tears for one short minute before the young gentleman,
+protesting but half-heartedly, was removed. Then Dick turned to Mabel.
+
+"I am going in to Sevenoaks again," he announced, "and shall probably
+spend the day there. Would you like me to explain myself, Mabel?"
+
+"Why, yes, if you care to," she answered, "and if there is anything to
+explain."
+
+Dick nodded in apparent triumph. "Yes," he said, "there is something to
+explain all right, Mabel." He smiled at her with his eyes. "I have got a
+secret, I'll give you three guesses to reach it."
+
+"No," Mabel spoke quickly, "I would rather you told me, Dick. Do you
+remember how once before I tried to dash in on your secret and how you
+shut me out. When it is ready to tell, I thought then, he will tell it
+me."
+
+"Well, it is ready now," Dick said. "In a way it is the same old secret.
+I was shy of it in those days, Mabel, but last night it dawned on me
+that it was the only thing worth having in the world. I am in love,
+insanely and ridiculously. Do you know, if you asked me, I should tell
+you with the most prompt conceit that to-day is a beautiful, gorgeously
+fine day just because I woke up to it knowing that I was in love."
+
+A spasm of half-formed jealousy snatched at Mabel's heart. She had
+always wanted Dick to fall in love and marry some nice girl, yet the
+reality was a little disturbing.
+
+"Dick," she exclaimed, "and you never told me, you never said a word
+about it in your letters."
+
+"I could not," he answered, "because in a way it only happened last
+night. Wait," he put his hand on her knee because she seemed to be going
+to say something. "Let me explain it first and then do your bit of
+arguing, for I know you are going to argue. You spoke just now about
+that other talk we once had before your marriage; do you remember what
+you said to me then? 'Did you think I should not know when you fell in
+love?' You had guessed the secret in my heart, Mabel, almost before I
+knew it myself." He leant forward, she noticed that suddenly his face
+flushed a very warm red. "Last night I saw her again; she was the
+dancer, you may have noticed her yourself. That was why I stayed behind.
+I wanted to put myself to the test, I wanted to meet her again."
+
+He sat up straight and looked at her; she could see that some strong
+emotion was making it very difficult for him to speak.
+
+"It is not any use trying to explain love, is it?" he asked. "I only
+know that I have always loved her, that I shall love her to the end."
+
+Mabel sat stiffly silent. She could not meet his eyes. She was thinking
+of all the scandal which had leapt to life round Joan's name once the
+Rutherfords had left the village. She was remembering how last night Tom
+had said: "That little dancer girl is hot stuff."
+
+"Dick," she forced herself to speak presently, "I have got to tell you,
+though it hurts and you will hate me for doing it, but this girl is not
+the kind of person you can ever marry, Dick. It is a kind of
+infatuation"--she struggled to make her meaning clear without using
+cruel words--"if you knew the truth about her, if----"
+
+He stopped her quickly. "I know," he answered, "I have always known."
+
+She turned to face him. "You knew," she gasped, "about the child?"
+
+"Yes," he nodded, his eyes were very steady as they met hers. "That day
+when I was called in to see her, do you remember, she spoke out before
+her aunt and myself. She told us she was like Bridget Rendle. 'I am
+going to have a baby,' she said, 'but I am not ashamed or afraid. I have
+done nothing to be ashamed of.' Do you know how sometimes," he went on
+slowly, "you can see straight into a person's soul through their eyes.
+Well, I saw into hers that day and, before God, Mabel, it was white and
+innocent as a child's. I did not understand at the time, I have not
+understood since, what brought her to that cross way in her life, but
+nothing will alter my opinion. Some day I hope she will explain things,
+I am content to wait for that."
+
+What could she find to say to him? Her mind groped through a nightmare
+of horror. Dick's happiness meant so much to her, she had planned and
+thought of it ever since she could remember.
+
+"Love is sometimes blind," she whispered at last. "Oh, my dear, don't
+throw away your life on a dream."
+
+"My love has wide-open eyes," he answered, "and nothing weighs in the
+balance against it."
+
+"Don't tell the others, Dick," she pleaded on their way back to the
+house; "leave it a little longer, think it out more carefully."
+
+"Very well," he agreed, "and for that matter, Mabel, there is as yet
+nothing to tell. I only let you into my secret because, well, you are
+you, and I want you to meet her. You will be able to judge then for
+yourself better than you can from all my ravings."
+
+She did not answer his suggestion then, but later on, as he was getting
+into the car to drive to Sevenoaks, she ran down the steps to him.
+
+"Dick," she said quickly, "ask her to come out to tea some day and bring
+one of the other girls if she likes. Tom is never in to tea; there will
+just be mother and me."
+
+"Bless you," he answered; his eyes beamed at her. "What a brick you are,
+Mabel, I knew you would turn up trumps about it."
+
+It took him some time to persuade Joan to accept the proffered
+invitation. It took her, for one thing, too near her old home, and for
+another she was more than a little disturbed by all Fanny's remarks on
+the subject. Fanny had come back from her drive with Swetenham full of
+exciting information to give Joan about "the new victim," as she would
+call Dick.
+
+"Do you know, honey," she confided, waking Joan out of a well simulated
+slumber, "I believe he is the same young man as was so taken with you
+that evening in the Strand. You remember the day we spent in town? It is
+love at first sight, that is what it is. Young Sockie"--that was her
+name for Swetenham, invented because of his gorgeous socks--"tells me he
+has never seen a chap so bowled over as the new victim was by your
+dancing, and he asked to be brought round and introduced. Did you catch
+him staring at you all through the dinner, and, honey, did he try to
+kiss you when he brought you home?"
+
+"Of course not," Joan remonstrated; "I wish you would stop talking
+nonsense and get into bed. It is awfully late and I was asleep."
+
+"That is only another sign then," Fanny went on, quite impervious to the
+other's requests. "You take it from me, honey, if a man falls really in
+love he is shy of kissing you. Thinks it is kind of irreverent to begin
+with. You mark my words, he will be round again to-morrow. Honey," she
+had a final shot at Joan's peace of mind just before she fell asleep,
+"if you play your cards well, that man will marry you, he is just the
+kind that does."
+
+Joan lay thinking of Fanny's remarks long after the other had fallen
+asleep. She was a little annoyed to find how much impression the man had
+made on her; the idea was alarming to one who fancied herself as immune
+as she did from any such attraction. But until Fanny had burst in she
+had been pleased enough with the vague thoughts which his eyes had waked
+to life. If you took the dream down and analysed it as Fanny had rather
+ruthlessly done, it became untenable. Probably this man only thought of
+her as Landon had thought of her; she was not content to burn her
+fingers in the same fire.
+
+Short of being extremely disagreeable, however, she could not avoid
+going out to lunch with him the next day, as Fanny had already accepted
+the invitation, and once with him, it was impossible not to be friends
+with Dick, he set himself so assiduously to please her. He did not make
+love to her; Fanny would have said he just loved her. There is delicate
+distinction between the two, and instinctively Joan grew to feel at her
+ease with him; when they laughed, which they did very often, their
+laughter had won back to the glad mirth of children.
+
+Fanny watched over the romance with motherly eyes. She had, in fact, set
+her heart upon Joan marrying the young man. He came to the theatre every
+evening, but it was not until the sixth day of their acquaintance that
+Fanny was able to arrange for him to spend the afternoon alone with
+Joan. She had tried often enough before, but Joan had been too wary. On
+this particular afternoon, half way through lunch and after the three of
+them had just arranged to go out into the country for tea, Fanny
+suddenly discovered that she had most faithfully promised to go for a
+drive that afternoon in young Swetenham's side-car.
+
+"I am so awfully sorry," she smiled at them sweetly, "but it doesn't
+really matter; you two will be just as happy without me."
+
+"We could put it off and go to-morrow," suggested Joan quickly.
+
+"We can go to-morrow too," Dick argued, and Fanny laughed at him.
+
+"Don't disappoint him, honey, it's a shame," she said with unblushing
+effrontery, "and if it is a chaperon you are wanting, why, Sockie and I
+will meet you out there."
+
+So it was arranged, and Dick and Joan started off alone. They were to
+drive out to a farmhouse that Swetenham knew of, where you got the most
+delicious jam for tea. Joan was a little shy of Dick to begin with,
+sitting beside him tongue-tied, and never letting her eyes meet his.
+From time to time, when he was busy with the steering, she would steal a
+glance at him from under her lashes. His face gave her a great sense of
+security and trust, but at times her memory still struggled with the
+thought that she had met him somewhere before.
+
+Dick, turning suddenly, caught her looking at him, and for a second his
+eyes spoke a message which caused both their hearts to stand still.
+
+"Were you really afraid of coming out with me alone?" he asked abruptly;
+he had perhaps been a little hurt by the suggestion.
+
+"No, of course not," Joan answered; she hoped he did not notice how
+curiously shaken the moment had left her. "Only I thought it would
+probably be more lively if we waited till we could take Fanny with us. I
+am sometimes smitten with such awful blanks in my conversation."
+
+"One does not always need to talk," he said; "it is supposed to be one
+of the tests of friendship when you can stay silent and not be bored.
+Well, we are friends, aren't we?"
+
+"I suppose so," Joan agreed; "at least you have been very kind to us and
+we do all the things you ask us to."
+
+"Doesn't it amount to more than that?" Dick asked; his eyes were busy
+with the road in front of him. "I had hoped you would let me give you
+advice and talk to you like a father and all that sort of thing." His
+face was perfectly serious and she could hear the earnestness behind his
+chaff.
+
+"What were you going to advise me about?" she asked.
+
+"Well, it is this theatre game." Dick plunged in boldly once the subject
+had been started. "You don't like it, you know, and you aren't a bit
+suited to it. Sometimes when I see you dance and hear the people
+clapping you I could go out and say things--really nasty things."
+
+"You don't like it?" she said. "I have tried to do other things too,"
+she went on quickly, "but you know I am not awfully much good at
+anything. When I first started in London, it is two years ago now, I
+used to boast about having put my hand to the plough. I used to say I
+wouldn't turn back from my own particular furrow, however dull and ugly
+it was. But I haven't been very much use at it, I have failed over and
+over again."
+
+"There are failures and failures," he answered. "There was a book I read
+once, I don't remember its name or much about it, but there was a
+sentence in it that stuck in my mind: 'Real courage, means courage to
+stand up against the shocks of life--sorrow and pain and separation, and
+still have the force left to make of the remainder something fine and
+gay and brave.' I think you have still got that sort of courage left."
+
+"No," whispered Joan. She looked away from him, for her eyes were
+miserably full of tears. "I haven't even got that left."
+
+They had tea, the four of them, for strange to tell Fanny did deem it
+expedient to keep her promise, and it was after tea that Dick first
+mooted the idea of their coming out to tea with his people the next day.
+
+Fanny was prompt in her acceptance. "Of course we'll come, won't we,
+honey," she said. "My new muslin will just come in for it."
+
+"It won't be a party," Dick explained, his eyes were on Joan, "just the
+mother and my sister. Not very lively I am afraid, still it is a pretty
+place and I'll drive you both ways."
+
+He came to the theatre again that night. Fanny pointed him out to Joan
+in a little aside as she stood beside her in the wings, but Joan had
+already seen him for herself. She could put no heart into her dancing
+that night, and she ran off the stage quickly when the music ceased, not
+waiting to take her applause.
+
+"Feeling ill to-night?" Daddy Brown asked her. He eyed her at the same
+time somewhat sternly; he disapproved of signs of weakness in any of the
+company.
+
+"I suppose I am tired," Joan answered. Only her own heart knew that it
+was because a certain couple of blue eyes had shown her that they wished
+she would not dance. "I am getting into a ridiculous state," she argued
+to herself; "why should it matter to me what he thinks? It must not, it
+must not."
+
+"You did not dance at all well to-night, honey," Fanny added her meed of
+blame as the two of them were undressing for the night. "But there, I
+know what is wrong with you. You are in love, bless your heart, and so
+is he. Never took his eyes off you while you were dancing, my dear--I
+watched him."
+
+The rather hurt feeling in Joan's heart burst into sudden fire. "I am
+not in love," she said, "and neither is he. Men do not fall in love with
+girls like us, and if you say another word about it, Fanny, I won't go
+out to tea to-morrow; I won't, I won't!"
+
+Fanny could only shrug her shoulders. The words "girls like us" rather
+flicked at her pride. Later on, however, when they were both in bed and
+the room in darkness save for the light thrown across the shadows by the
+street lamp outside, she called softly across to Joan:
+
+"You are wrong, honey," she said, "about men and love. They do fall in
+love with us, sometimes, bless them, even though we aren't worth it. And
+anyway, you are different, why shouldn't he love you?"
+
+Joan made no answer, only when she fell asleep at last it was against a
+little damp patch of pillow and the lashes that lay along her cheeks
+were weighed down by tears.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+    "A man who has faith must be prepared not only to be a martyr, but
+     to be a fool."
+
+                                             C. CHESTERTON.
+
+
+It did not need much intuition on Mrs. Grant's part to know herself
+suspicious of Dick's behaviour. She listened to Mabel's information
+about the two young ladies he was bringing to tea with her eyes lowered.
+Mabel had not volunteered the information till Mrs. Grant had noticed
+that there were two extra cups provided for tea. They always had tea
+out under the trees if it was fine enough, so there had been nothing
+surprising in that, but Mrs. Grant's eyes had spotted the extra cups
+even while they stayed piled up one within the other in the shade of the
+silver tea-pot.
+
+"Two girls to tea," she commented; "who are they, Mabel?"
+
+"Well, I really don't know," Mabel admitted, nobly untruthful, out of a
+desire not to prejudice Mrs. Grant from the beginning. "I fancy Dick met
+them at Sevenoaks, anyway, he was having lunch with them yesterday."
+
+"And dinner every day this week," supplemented Mrs. Grant. "Did he meet
+them on his travels?"
+
+"He did not say so," Mabel answered, "only just that he was seeing a
+good deal of them at Sevenoaks, and I thought it would be nice to ask
+them out here."
+
+"Mabel," said Mrs. Grant, with intense seriousness; she lifted her eyes
+from her work and fixed them on her daughter, "do you not think it is
+very probable that Dick has become entangled? I have even wondered
+lately whether he may not be secretly married to some awful woman."
+
+"Dear mother," laughed Mabel--though the first part of the sentence
+rather hurt her, it was the truth--"why secretly married? What has Dick
+done to deserve such a suspicion?"
+
+"His manner has been peculiar ever since the first night he came home,"
+Mrs. Grant explained, "and he has an uneasy way of trying not to be left
+with me alone. The other day I thought of going to see him very early in
+the morning when I happened to be unable to sleep, and, Mabel, his door
+was locked!"
+
+"If you had knocked he would probably have opened it," Mabel suggested.
+"It is hardly likely that he keeps his wife concealed upstairs, is it?"
+
+"You may laugh," Mrs. Grant spoke with an expression of hurt pride on
+her countenance, "but surely a mother can see things in her son which
+other people miss. Dick is in love, and not nicely in love, or he would
+not be so shy about it."
+
+Further discussion was prevented, for at this point the motor, bringing
+Dick and his guests, came round the sweep of the drive and drew up at
+the front door. Mabel went across the lawn to meet them. She had
+schooled herself to this meeting for Dick's sake, and to please him; she
+could not, however, pretend to any pleasure in the prospect. It was only
+natural that she should view Joan with distrust. Dick had allowed
+himself to become entangled; all unknowingly Mother had expressed the
+matter in a nutshell.
+
+She picked out Joan as being the girl at once; her eyes sped past
+Fanny's muslin-clad figure even as she was greeting her, and rested on
+the other girl's face. Pale, for Joan was very nervous of this
+afternoon, wide-eyed, the soft brown hair tucked away under the small,
+round-shaped hat. She was pretty and very young-looking. Mabel, seeing
+her, and remembering all the old stories in connection with her, was
+suddenly sorry for her very childishness. Then she hardened her heart;
+the innocence must at least be assumed, and the girl--Mabel had made up
+her mind as to that--should not win Dick as a husband without some
+effort being made to prevent her.
+
+Because of this sense of antagonism between them, for Joan had not
+missed the swift glance, the cold hardening of her hostess' face, it was
+a relief to have Fanny between them. Fanny was talking very hard and
+fast, it was quite unnecessary for anyone else to say anything.
+
+"My," she gasped, standing and staring round her with frank approval,
+"you have a beautiful place here. Dr. Grant has been telling us about it
+till we were mad to see it. Joan and I live in London; there is not much
+in the way of trees round our place, nothing but houses, and dirty
+pavements and motor-buses. I always say"--she took Mabel into her
+confidence with perfect friendliness--"that there is nothing so
+disagreeable in this world as a dirty pavement; don't you agree with
+me?"
+
+"The country is nicer than town, certainly," Mabel answered. "We are
+having tea over there under the trees; will you come straight across, or
+would you like to go in and take off your motor-veils?"
+
+"We will do nicely as we are," Fanny did all the talking for the two of
+them; Joan so far had not opened her lips. "It is such a little drive
+from Sevenoaks, and I am just dying for tea."
+
+Mabel led the way across the lawn, with Fanny chattering volubly beside
+her, and Dick followed with Joan.
+
+"The sister is a dear," he tried to tell her on the way across, for in
+some way he suddenly felt the tension which had fallen between the two
+women; "only she is most awfully shy. She is one of those people who
+take a lot of knowing."
+
+"And I am one of the people that she doesn't want to know," Joan
+answered. She was angry with herself for having come. A feeling of
+having lost caste, of being a stranger within these other people's
+friendship, possessed her. It set Dick's kindliness, his evident
+attraction on a plane of patronage, and brought her to a sullen mood of
+despair. Why had she ventured back on to the borderline of this life
+that had once been hers? Mabel's cold, extreme politeness seemed to push
+her further and further beyond the pale.
+
+Tea under these circumstances would have been a trying meal if it had
+not been for Fanny. Fanny had dressed with great care for this party,
+and she had also made many mental resolutions to "mind what she was
+saying." Her harshest critic could not have said that she had not made
+herself look pretty; it was only Joan's hurt eyes that could discover
+the jarring note everywhere in the carefully-thought-out costume. And
+Fanny realized that Joan, for some reason or other, was suffering from
+an attack of the sulks. She plunged because of it more and more
+recklessly into conversation. Fanny always felt that silence was a
+thing to be avoided at all costs.
+
+"The War will make a lot of difference to us," she attempted finally,
+all preceding efforts having fallen a little flat. "Daddy Brown says, if
+there is war between Germany and England, there won't be any Spring
+tours."
+
+"But of course there will not be War," Mrs. Grant put in with great
+precision; "the idea is impossible nowadays. And may I ask what a Spring
+tour is?"?
+
+"Tom says the city is getting very uneasy," Mabel plunged into the
+breach. "It does seem an absurd idea, but of course Germany has been
+aching to fight us for years."
+
+"Horrors, the Germans, don't you think?" chipped in Fanny; "they do eat
+so nastily."
+
+"No doubt you meet a great many foreigners, travelling about as you do,"
+Mrs. Grant agreed politely.
+
+"Do you know this part of the country at all?"? Mabel questioned Joan,
+then flushed herself at the absurdity of the question; "I suppose not,
+if you live most of your time in London."
+
+Joan lifted hard eyes. "I lived down here as a child," she said stiffly.
+
+"And in London"--Mabel was doing her best to be friendly--"have you nice
+rooms? Dick tells me you live all alone; I mean that your home is not
+there."
+
+"I live in an attic," Joan answered again, "and I have no home."
+
+"Your son is ever so much too fond of the theatre," Fanny's voice broke
+across their monosyllabic conversation. "He is there every night, Mrs.
+Grant."
+
+"And do you also go to the theatre every night?" Joan heard the
+petrified astonishment in Mrs. Grant's tone and caught the agitated
+glance which Mabel directed to Dick. The misery in her woke to sharp
+temper.
+
+"Fanny has let the cat out of the bag," she said, leaning forward and
+speaking directly to Mrs. Grant. "But I am afraid it is unpleasantly
+true. We are on the stage, you know; Dr. Grant ought to have warned you;
+it was hardly fair to let you meet us without telling you."
+
+A pained silence fell on the party; Mrs. Grant's face was a perfect
+study; Dick's had flushed dull red. Mabel stirred uneasily and made an
+attempt to gather her diplomacy about her.
+
+"It was not a case of warning us," she began; "you forget that we saw
+you ourselves the other night when you played _The Merry Widow_. Won't
+you have some more tea, Miss Leicester?"--Joan had been introduced to
+them under that name.
+
+A great nervousness had descended upon Fanny. She had talked a great
+deal too much, she knew, and probably Joan was furiously angry with her.
+But beyond that was the knowledge that she had--as she would have
+expressed it herself--upset Joan's apple-cart. Real contrition shone in
+the nervous smile she directed at Mrs. Grant.
+
+"I'm that sorry," she said, "if I have said anything that annoyed you;
+but you mustn't mix me up with Joan; she is quite different. I----"
+
+"Fanny!" Joan interrupted the jumbled explanation. "You have nothing to
+apologize for. We eat and look very much like ordinary people, don't
+we?"--she stared at Mabel as she spoke--"it is only just our manners,
+and morals that are a trifle peculiar. If you are ready, Fanny, I think
+we had better be getting back."
+
+Dick stood up abruptly; he did not meet Mabel's eyes, but she could see
+that his face was very white and angry.
+
+"I am driving you back," he said, "if you do not mind waiting here I
+will fetch the motor round."
+
+He took the girl's side straight away without hesitation. Mabel caught
+her breath on the bitter words that rose to her lips. Joan's outburst
+had been an extraordinary breach of good manners; nothing that had
+happened could in any way excuse or condone it. Yet it was not Joan
+that Dick was angry with, but herself.
+
+"I very much regret you should feel as you do," she said to Joan, after
+Dick had gone off to fetch the motor; "your friend and yourself were my
+guests; we none of us had the slightest desire to be rude to you."
+
+"Oh, no," flamed Joan in answer; "you did not want to be rude, you just
+wanted to make us understand quite plainly the difference that lay
+between us. And you have made us realize it, and it is I that have been
+rude. Come along, Fanny"--the motor could be seen coming along the
+drive; she swept to her feet--"let us go without talking any more about
+it."
+
+She turned, saying no good-byes, and walked away from them. Fanny
+hesitated a moment, her eyes held a pathetic appeal and there were tears
+near the surface. She felt she had ruined Joan's chances of a suitable
+marriage.
+
+"I am sorry," she whispered; "it all began beautifully, and--Joan isn't
+like me," she hurried out again, "she is proud and--well, you would
+understand"--she appealed to Mabel--"for you are proud, too--if you had
+to earn your money as she has to."
+
+Then she turned and hurried after her retreating companion. Something
+that she had said stayed, however, like a little pin-prick, in Mabel's
+thoughts. It brought her to a sudden realization of Joan's feelings and
+regret that she had not succeeded in being nicer to the girl.
+
+"If Dick is married to either of those two young ladies," said Mrs.
+Grant heavily, "he is ruined already." She rose majestically and
+gathered up her work. "I have been thoroughly upset," she announced,
+"and must go and lie down. Perhaps when Dick comes back you will point
+out to him that some explanation is necessary to me for the
+extraordinary scene I have just been through. I shall be ready to see
+him in an hour."
+
+Fanny wept a few tears on the drive home. It had all been her fault, she
+explained between sniffs to Joan.
+
+"And I promised not to talk too much," she gulped. "Oh, honey, don't let
+it stand between him and you"--she nodded at Dick's back, for he was
+occupying the front seat alone--"I shall never forgive myself if you
+do."
+
+"Don't fuss, Fanny," Joan answered; she was beginning to feel thoroughly
+ashamed of her ill-mannered outburst. "And for goodness' sake don't cry.
+You have not brought anything more between us than has always been
+there."
+
+"Oh, I wish we hadn't gone," wailed Fanny. "He wants to marry you, Joan;
+they always do if they introduce their mothers to you."
+
+For no reason whatsoever, for she had not thought of him for months, a
+memory of Gilbert flashed into Joan's mind. Her eyes were fixed on the
+back of Dick's head, and it was strange--the feeling that surged over
+her as she brought these, the two men in her life, before her mind's
+eye. Perhaps it was only at that very moment that she realized her love
+for Dick; realized it and fought against it in the same breath. She had
+known him so short a time; he had been kind to her; but what, after all,
+did that amount to? When the company left Sevenoaks he would probably
+never see her or think of her again. Does one build love from so
+fleeting a fancy?
+
+None the less the thought brought her to a mood of gentleness and she
+could not bear to let him go away thinking her still hurt and angry. As
+he helped her out of the car she smiled at him.
+
+"I am sorry that I lost my temper and was rude," she said. Fanny had
+fled indoors and left them tactfully alone. "I don't know what you must
+think of me." Her eyes fell away from his, he saw the slow red creeping
+into her cheeks.
+
+"Don't," he spoke quickly, he was for the moment feeling very vindictive
+against Mabel. "When you apologize you make it ten times worse. It was
+not your fault the least little bit in the world."
+
+"But it was," she answered; she looked up at him. "If you must have the
+honest truth, I was jealous from the moment I got out there. And
+jealousy hurts sometimes, you know, especially when it is mixed up with
+memories of something you once had and have lost for ever."
+
+"That is nonsense," Dick said. It was in his heart to propose there and
+then, but he held it back. "I meant you to enjoy yourself, I hoped you
+would like Mabel, and you did not--thanks to her own amiability. Am I
+forgiven?"
+
+"We forgive each other," she answered; she put her hand into his, "and
+good-night, if not good-bye. To-morrow is our last performance, you
+know, we leave the next day."
+
+"And even with that it is not good-bye," he told her. "I shall be at the
+theatre to-morrow night."
+
+Mrs. Grant and Dick had one very stormy and decided interview. That is
+to say, Mrs. Grant stormed and wept, Dick merely stated quite quietly
+and very definitely that he intended to follow Joan to London and that
+he was going to do his best to make her marry him.
+
+"You do not mind how much you break my heart," Mrs. Grant sobbed, "your
+mother is of no consequence to you. My years of love and devotion to you
+when you were a baby count for nothing. You throw them all aside for
+this impossible, outrageous girl."
+
+"Nothing is to be gained by calling her names," Dick answered, "and
+there is no reason why your heart should break, Mother. When you see her
+again----"
+
+"Never," interrupted Mrs. Grant dramatically, "never. Even as your wife
+I shall always refuse to meet her."
+
+"You must do as you please about that," Dick answered, and turned and
+went from the room.
+
+Upstairs he met Mabel just coming out of the nursery and would have
+passed her without speaking, but that she put out a hand to stop him.
+
+"Dick," she said, "you are awfully angry with me, I know, and I realize
+that more or less it was my fault. But I wanted and I still want to be
+friends with her. You know how sometimes, even against one's will, one
+stiffens up and cannot talk."
+
+"I know you never were any use at dissembling," he answered. "I had
+hoped you might like her, but you evidently did not do that."
+
+"I do not think I gave myself a chance," Mabel spoke slowly. "I had been
+arguing against her in my own mind ever since you told me about her. You
+see I am being truthful, Dick. It was just because one half of me wanted
+to like her and the other half did not, that the result was so
+disastrous."
+
+Dick laughed. "Disastrous just about describes it," he admitted. "I am
+going to marry her, Mabel, though mother does threaten to break her
+heart."
+
+"I know," Mabel nodded. "I knew from the very first moment I saw your
+eyes when they looked at her. Perhaps that was what made the unpleasant
+side of me so frigid. Will you give me her address, Dick, in London?
+Next week, when I am up there with Tom, I will call and make it up with
+her. If I go all alone I shall be able to explain things."
+
+"And what about mother's broken heart?" Dick questioned.
+
+Mabel shook her head. "It won't break," she said. "As soon as you are
+married she will start thinking that she arranged the match and saying
+what a good one it is."
+
+Again Dick laughed, but there was more lightness in the sound now. He
+put his two hands on her shoulders and looked down at her.
+
+"You are a good sort, Mabel," he said; "this afternoon I thought you
+were the most horrible sister a man could have, and that just shows how
+little even I know you."
+
+"No," she answered; her eyes held a shadow of pain in them. "It is not
+that, it is just that a man in love is sometimes blind to everything and
+everybody excepting the woman he is in love with. She is a lucky girl,
+Dick, I nope she realizes how lucky."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+    "But through all the joy I knew--I only--
+       How the hostel of my heart lay bare and cold,
+     Silent of its music, and how lonely!
+       Never, though you crown me with your gold.
+       Shall I find that little chamber as of old!"
+
+                                             F. BANNERMAN.
+
+
+Brown called an early rehearsal next morning. They were to play _The
+Waltz Dream_ as their last performance, for on leaving Sevenoaks the
+company was to break up, and just at the very last moment, before the
+curtain had come down on the previous night's performance, Grace
+Binning--the girl who usually played the part of Franzi--had fallen down
+and sprained her ankle. Who was to play her part? Fanny proposed Joan
+for the vacant place, but Brown was dubious, and Joan herself not at all
+anxious for the honour. She had more or less understudied the part,
+every member of the chorus took it in turn to understudy; but the
+question was whether it would not be better if Fanny's understudy took
+the part of the Princess and Fanny played Franzi. It was a character
+which she had often scored it. Against this had to be set the fact that
+Fanny's voice was needed for songs which the Princess had to sing, and
+that Franzi had very little singing to do. What she did have could be
+very largely cut.
+
+Anyway the whole company assembled at 10.30, and Brown put them through
+their paces. Finally he decided on Joan; she had already achieved
+popularity by her dancing, the audience would be kind to her. If she
+saved up her voice for her duet with Strachan and her one little solo at
+the fall of the curtain, Brown thought she might be heard beyond the
+footlights.
+
+"Now look slippy," he ordered, "only the principals need stay. We will
+just run through the thing, Miss Leicester, and see if you know what to
+do."
+
+Joan found herself living out the part of Franzi as she rehearsed. It
+seemed somehow to fit into her own feelings.
+
+    "Now love has come to me, I pray,
+       That while I have the chance to,
+     I still may have the heart to play
+       A tune that you can dance to."
+
+Franzi's one brief night of love which shone out, showing all the world
+golden, and then the little singer creeping back into the shadows with a
+broken heart but gay words on her lips.
+
+    "I still may have the heart to play
+        A tune that you can dance to."
+
+Brown thought as he watched her that she showed promise as an actress.
+Why had he not noticed it before. He meditated a proposal by which she
+should be persuaded to join the company again when it started out on its
+Spring tour. Fanny had told him that Joan was tired of the life and
+meant to go back to office work, but if she had talent, that was of
+course absurd. Perhaps he had not done enough to encourage her.
+To-morrow he would have a good long talk with her and point out to her
+just how things stood.
+
+Fanny, too, was impressed by Joan's powers. "You act as if you really
+meant it, honey," she said. "You make me want to cry in that last bit
+where Franzi goes off and leaves me, a bloated aristocrat on the throne,
+with my erring husband beside me. You make me think you feel it."
+
+"Perhaps I do," Joan answered; "perhaps I am going back alone."
+
+"But why," Fanny cried out; she ran to Joan and threw her arms round the
+other girl, they were in the dressing-room making up for the evening
+performance. "Why, honey? He is ready to go with you."
+
+"And the Prince was ready to go with Franzi," Joan answered, "but she
+would not take him, not back into her land of shadows. Oh, Fanny, you
+are a dear, romantic soul, but you don't understand. Once, long ago when
+I was young, doesn't that sound romantic, there were two paths open to
+me and I chose the one which has to be travelled alone. If I dragged him
+on to it now it would only hurt him. You would not want to hurt
+something you loved," her voice dropped to a whisper, "would you?"
+
+"No," Fanny admitted. She had drawn a little back and was watching Joan
+with wide eyes. "But----" she broke off abruptly. "I haven't any right
+to ask," she said, "but do you mean that there is something which you
+have done that you would be ashamed to tell him."
+
+"Not exactly ashamed," Joan answered, "it would hurt him to know, that
+is all. I came to London two years ago because I was going to have a
+baby. It was never born, because I was in an accident a few months
+before it should have come."
+
+"But why tell him, why tell him?" Fanny clamoured. "Men have lots of
+secrets in their lives which they don't tell to good women, why must
+they want to know all about our pasts. I have always thought I should
+tell a man just exactly as much as I wanted to and not a whisper more.
+Honey," she drew close again and caught hold of Joan's hands, "it
+doesn't pay to tell them, the better they are the more they bring it up
+against you. If they don't say anything you can see it in their eyes.
+'She has been bad once,' they say, 'she may always be bad again.'"
+
+"Yes," agreed Joan. "It does not pay to tell them, as you say. That is
+why I am going to go back to my own shadows alone, because if you love a
+person you cannot keep a secret from him."
+
+"But it wouldn't exactly be a secret," Fanny pleaded, "it would just be
+something that it was no business of his to know."
+
+Joan laughed. "Your philosophy of life, Fanny, is delightful. But if you
+don't hurry up with your dressing you will be late when the call boy
+comes."
+
+She had the dressing-room to herself presently, for she did not have to
+appear until the second act, and as she sat there, reading over her
+part, the call boy put in his head with an impish grin.
+
+"A gentleman left these for you, miss," he held out a large bunch of
+violets, "most particular you should get them before you went on, he
+was, and he will be round again after the show. Same gentleman," he
+winked at her, "as has been here most regular like since the third
+night."
+
+"All right, Tommy, thank you," Joan answered. She held out her hands for
+the violets. They were very sweet-scented and heavy; she let them fall
+on the dressing-table, but after Tommy had vanished, whistling shrilly
+along the passage, she bent forward and buried her cheeks and lips in
+their fragrance. Her tears smarted in her eyes. This man had grown so
+suddenly dear to her that it hurt her almost more than she could bear to
+shut him out of her life.
+
+When Fanny danced into the room presently it was to find her standing
+before the looking-glass, and against the soft blue of her waistbelt the
+violets showed up almost like a stain.
+
+"He's there," Fanny told her, "third from centre in the second row.
+Young Swetenham is with him, but none of the women folk, praise be to
+heaven. Have you asked him to the supper afterwards?"
+
+"No," Joan admitted, "and, Fanny, if it could possibly be arranged and
+Brown would not be very hurt, would it matter if I did not come myself?
+I feel so much more like going home to bed."
+
+"Doesn't do to mope," Fanny remonstrated. "Why not bring him along and
+have one good evening to finish?"
+
+She studied the other's face. "There," she added impulsively, "if you
+don't feel like it you shan't be made to do it. Bother Daddy Brown and
+his feelings. You stay here quiet and let us all get away; we will be
+walking over to the 'Queen's,' you see, then you can slip out after we
+have gone and cut home on your own. I will tell Brown you are
+over-wrought after the show, it is quite natural you should be."
+
+"Yes," admitted Joan; she hesitated on her way out, for the call boy had
+just run down the passage shouting her name, "and, Fanny, if he is
+there"--she met the other girl's eyes just for a moment--"take him along
+with you, will you? I--I am afraid of meeting him to-night."
+
+Joan caught Dick's eyes just for a second before she began her first
+song, but she was careful not to look his way again. For the rest she
+moved and acted in a dream, not conscious of the theatre or the
+audience. Yet she knew she must be playing her part passably well, for
+Strachan whispered to her at the end of the duet: "You are doing
+splendidly." And Brown himself was waiting to greet her with
+congratulations when she ran into the wings for a moment.
+
+The heat of the theatre killed her violets; they were crushed and dead
+at the end of the second act, yet when she changed for the third she
+picked them up and pinned them in again. Franzi's part in the third act
+is very brief. She is called in to give evidence of the Prince's
+infidelity, and instead she persuades the Princess that her husband has
+always loved her. Then, as the happy pair kiss one another at the back
+of the stage, Franzi turns to the audience, taking them, as it were,
+into her confidence:
+
+    "Now love has come to me, I pray,
+       That while I have the chance to,
+     I still may have the heart to play
+       A tune that you can dance to."
+
+Joan's voice broke on the last line, the little sob on which she caught
+her breath was more effective than any carefully-thought-out tragedy.
+With her eyes held by those other eyes in the audience she took the
+violets from her belt and held them, just for a second, to her lips.
+Then they fell from her hands and she stood, her last farewell said,
+straight and silent, while the house shouted over what they considered
+to be a very fine piece of acting. They would have liked to have had her
+back to bow to them after the fall of the curtain, but Joan would not
+go, and Fanny brought Brown to realize that if the girl were worried in
+any way she would probably wax hysterical.
+
+"Fine acting," Brown kept repeating over and over again. Joan heard him
+vaguely. He was so impressed by it, however, that he sent for some
+champagne and insisted on their all drinking her health on the spot.
+There, however, he was content to leave it, and presently the company
+slipped away, one after the other, and Joan and Fanny were left alone.
+
+"You really think you won't come on, honey?" Fanny tried a final
+argument before she followed the others. "He has sent up his card, you
+know; he is waiting downstairs for you."
+
+"I simply can't, Fanny," Joan answered. "You go, like a dear, tell him
+anything you like; that I have gone on with Brown, or that I am coming
+later; only just persuade him to go away with you, that's all I ask."
+
+Fanny looked at her reflectively, but she did not say anything further,
+gathering her cloak round her and going from the room.
+
+Joan waited till the place seemed silent and deserted save for the call
+boy's shrill whistle as he strolled round, locking up the various
+dressing-rooms. She did not want him to see her as she groped her way
+back to the front of the stage and stooped to feel in the dark for her
+bunch of violets. It was quite ridiculous, but she could not leave them
+to lie there all night and be swept into the rubbish-basket in the
+morning. It took her a minute or two, but at last her hands closed on
+them and she stood up and moved into the light just as he came dashing
+along the passage.
+
+"Hulloa," he called out to her, "you still here, miss? Everyone else has
+gone. You might have got shut in."
+
+"I am just going myself," she answered; "and I knew you were here,
+Tommy; I heard you."
+
+He followed her to the door and stood watching her along the street with
+curious eyes. To his mind it seemed strange that she should have stayed
+on after the others had gone. It betokened something that she wished to
+hide from prying eyes, and his were not satisfied till he saw a man's
+figure come forward out of the darkness and meet her.
+
+"Thought as much," commented Tommy, the worldly-wise. "Gent of the
+violets, I suppose. Not likely they would be going to a crowded
+supper-party."
+
+"I thought you were never coming," Dick was saying quickly to Joan.
+"Miss Bellairs told me you weren't feeling very well and were going
+straight home. I was just screwing up my courage to come upstairs and
+find out for myself what had happened to you."
+
+So Fanny had failed her. Joan, guessing the other's purpose, smiled
+ruthfully.
+
+"I had a headache," she admitted, "and I could not face a supper-party.
+I am so sorry you should have waited about, though; I had hoped you
+would go on with Fanny."
+
+"Hoped!" said Dick. "Did you think I would?"
+
+They had turned in the direction of the girls' lodgings and were walking
+very fast. Joan set the pace, also she was rather obstinately silent.
+Dick walked in silence, too, but for another reason. Clamorous words
+were in his heart; he did not wish to say them. Not yet, not here. Up in
+London, in her own place, when she would be free from the surroundings
+and trappings of theatrical life, he was going to ask her to marry him.
+Till then, and since his heart would carry on in this ridiculous way
+because she was near him, there was nothing for it but silence.
+
+At the door of the house, though, he found his tongue out of a desire to
+keep her with him a little longer.
+
+"You played splendidly to-night," he said, holding her hand. "Were those
+my violets you kissed at the end?"
+
+"Yes," she answered; the words were almost a whisper, she stood before
+him, eyes lowered, breathing a little fast as if afraid.
+
+The spell of the night, the force of his own emotion shook Dick out of
+his self-control. The street was empty and dimly lit, the houses on
+either side shuttered and dark. The two of them were alone, and suddenly
+all his carefully thought-out plans went to the wind.
+
+"Joan," he whispered. She was all desirable with her little fluttered
+breath, her eyes that fell from his, her soft, warm hand. "Joan!"
+
+Joan lifted shut eyes and trembling lips to his; she made no protest as
+he drew her into his arms, his kiss lifted her for the time being into a
+heaven of great content. So they clung together for a breathing-space,
+then Joan woke out of her dream and shuddered away from him, hiding her
+face in her hands.
+
+"Oh, don't," she begged, "please, please don't!"
+
+Her words, the very piteousness of her appeal, remembering all her
+circumstances, hurt Dick. "My dear," he said, "don't you understand;
+have I made you afraid? I love you; I have always loved you. I was going
+to have waited to ask you to marry me until next week when I came to you
+in town. But to-night, because I love you, because you are going away
+to-morrow, I couldn't keep sensible any longer. And anyway, Joan, what
+does it matter?--to-day or to-morrow, the question will always be the
+same. I love you, will you marry me, dear? No, wait." He saw her
+movement to answer. "I don't really want you to say anything now, I
+would rather wait till we meet in town next week. You are not angry with
+me, are you, Joan? You are not afraid of my love?"
+
+But Joan could make no answer, only she turned from him and ran up the
+steps; the bunch of violets lay where she had dropped them when he
+caught her hands, but neither of them noticed it. He saw her face for a
+second against the lighted hall and a little to his dismay he could see
+that she was crying. Then she had gone and the door shut to behind her
+quickly.
+
+Dick waited about for a little, but she made no sign, and finally he
+turned rather disconsolately away. One thought, however, was left to
+comfort him through the night, the memory of her soft, yielding hands,
+the glad surrender of her lips.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+    "Ah, sweet, and we too, can we bring
+       One sigh back, bid one smile revive?
+     Can God restore one ruined thing,
+         Or he who slays our souls alive
+              Make dead things thrive?"
+
+                                             A. C. SWINBURNE.
+
+
+Early morning brought Joan a letter from Dick. She had hardly slept all
+night. Once she had got up, determined to write him; the truth would
+look more cold and formal in a letter, but her courage had failed her,
+and instead she had sat crouched over the table, her body shaken with a
+storm of tears. Then Fanny had come in, an after-supper Fanny, noisy and
+sentimental, and she had had to be helped to bed, coughing and
+explaining that "life was good if you only knew how to live it." Joan
+had crept back to her own bed once the other girl had fallen asleep, and
+she had lain with wide eyes watching the night turn from blackness to
+soft grey, from grey to clear, bright yellow. There were dark shadows
+round her eyes in the morning, and her face was white and
+strained-looking.
+
+     "DEAR HEART," Dick had written:
+
+     "Is it cheek to begin a letter like that to you? Only after
+     last night I seem to know that you love me and that is all
+     that really matters. I am coming to 6, Montague Square, on
+     Tuesday afternoon at five o'clock to get my answer. Doesn't
+     that sound precise? I would like to come to-day, but I won't
+     because I don't want to hurry you. Oh, dear heart, I love
+     you!--I have loved you for longer than you know of just at
+     present. That is one of the things I am going to explain to
+     you on Tuesday,
+
+                                         "Yours ever,
+                                             "DICK GRANT."
+
+Fanny was much perturbed by Joan's appearance when she was sufficiently
+awake to notice it.
+
+"My, honey, you do look bad," she gasped. "Daddy Brown will see I was
+talking the truth last night, which is a good thing in one way. He was
+most particularly anxious to see you last night, was very fussed when he
+found you hadn't come." She paused and studied Joan's face from under
+her lashes. "Did you meet him?" she inquired finally.
+
+"Yes," Joan admitted; she turned away from the other's inquisitive eyes.
+"He walked home with me."
+
+"I told him you had a headache and were not coming to supper with us,"
+Fanny confessed. "It is no use being annoyed with me, honey. I thought
+it over and it seemed to me that by saying 'No' to him because of
+something that happened before he knew you, you were cutting off your
+nose to spite your face. Not that I personally should tell him," she
+added reflectively; "he is too straight himself to understand a woman
+doing wrong; but that is for you to decide. One thing I do know: it
+won't make a pin's worth of difference to his wanting to marry you; he
+is too much in love for that."
+
+She was saying aloud the fear which had knocked at Joan's heart all
+night. It might be true that Dick was too much in love to let what she
+had to tell him stand between them. But afterwards, when love had had
+time to cool, when trust and good-fellowship would be called on to take
+the place of passion, when he saw her, perhaps, with his child in her
+arms, how would he look at her then? Would he not remember and regret,
+would not a shadow stand between them, a shadow from the one sin which
+no man can forgive in a woman? She was like a creature brought to bay;
+he had guessed that she loved him; what arguments could she use, how
+stand firm in her denial against that knowledge?
+
+For a little she had thought of the possibility of his taking her just
+as Gilbert had done. She was not worthy to be his wife, but she would be
+content, she knew, to follow him to the end of the world. Not because
+she viewed the matter now in the same light as she had done in those
+days. She had never loved Gilbert; if she had, shame and disgrace would
+have been powerless to drive her from his side, and she would have
+wanted him to marry her, just as now she wanted marriage with Dick. It
+seemed to her that, despite pioneers and rebels and the need for greater
+freedom, which she and girls like her had been fighting for, the initial
+fact remained and would always remain the same. When you loved you
+wanted to belong to the man absolutely and entirely; freedom counted for
+very little, you wanted to give him your life, you wanted to have the
+right to bear his children. That was what it all came down to in the
+end; Love was bigger and stronger than any ideas, and marriage had been
+built upon the law of Love.
+
+       *     *     *     *     *
+
+Daddy Brown came round in the course of the morning to talk over his new
+idea for Joan's future. It appeared that if she was willing to think it
+over, he would pay for her to have singing and dancing lessons during
+the winter. That was, of course, provided the War did not come off. If
+it did, as he had said once before to Fanny, there would not be any
+Spring tours for the Brown Company.
+
+"But war isn't likely," he spoke heavily. "England has too much to lose
+to go running into it if she can steer clear, and there's my offer, my
+girl. I think, from what I saw last night, that if you like to put your
+heart into it you ought to make something of an actress. You have
+distinct ability, and you have charm, which is on the good side too."
+
+Joan was hardly in the mood to pay much attention to her future
+prospects; the present loomed too forbiddingly ahead of her. She would
+let him know, she told him finally; she was most awfully grateful to him
+for his suggestion, but she must have at least a fortnight to think
+things out and decide what she was going to do.
+
+"Very well," Brown agreed, he rose to take his leave; "but mind you, it
+is worth considering, young lady; you don't get such an offer every
+day."
+
+Fanny was staying behind for another day; she had some amusement in
+store with Swetenham which she did not want to miss, but the rest of the
+company, Joan included, caught the three o'clock train back to town.
+Joan could not refuse to go with them, but the journey was one long
+torture to her; she wanted to get right away by herself; there was only
+one day left in which to plan and make ready for Dick's visit. Some of
+Brown's ponderous remarks as to the probable effect of a war on the
+theatrical profession had filtered down to the junior members of the
+company. They talked together rather mournfully as to what the winter
+might be going to mean for them. "If it knocks pantomimes, we are done,"
+Grace Binning summed up the situation. But Grace Binning was inclined to
+be mournful; as Mrs. O'Malley said, her sprained ankle would keep her
+out of work in any case for six weeks.
+
+At Victoria Station Strachan ferreted out Joan's luggage and hailed a
+taxi for her.
+
+"Good-bye," he said to her at the last--they had always been very good
+friends, with a little encouragement he might have considered himself in
+love with her--"and good luck. Also, if you will excuse me saying so,
+Miss Rutherford, I should marry that faithful young man. You are not a
+bit suited or happy in our life."
+
+Then he drew back his head quickly and smiled at her as the taxi started
+off.
+
+Joan had written to Mrs. Carew, asking her to see about a room, and
+found to her relief that her old attic was still at her disposal.
+
+"Thought you would find it homelike," Mrs. Carew panted up the stairs in
+front of her, "and for that matter it has been shut up since you left.
+Bad year for letting this has been."
+
+Obviously the room had been shut up since she left. Joan struggled with
+the fast-closed window and threw it open, but even so the place retained
+an atmosphere of overpowering stuffiness, and presently, not staying to
+unpack or open the letter which had been waiting for her on the hall
+table, she sallied out again in search of fresh air.
+
+She would walk to Knightsbridge, she decided, and so on through the
+Park. If she tired herself out perhaps she would be able to sleep when
+she went to bed, and sleep was what she needed almost more than anything
+else.
+
+The Park was deserted and sun-swept; it had been an exceptionally hot
+summer, the trees and bushes seemed smothered under a weight of dust.
+Joan found a seat in sight of one of the stretches of water and opened
+her letter. It was from Miss Abercrombie, that she had known from the
+envelope, and written from the Rutherford home at Wrotham.
+
+     "DEAR JOAN," the letter ran:
+
+     "Your people are home, they have just come back from abroad
+     and had a very tiresome journey over because of the
+     mobilization on the Continent. Janet wrote, or rather your
+     uncle wrote for her, asking me to be here to meet them. Janet
+     is very ill, she will never be able to walk or stand up again
+     in her life. They have tried all sorts of things for her
+     abroad, now it has come to the last. All day, and most of the
+     night, for she sleeps very badly, she lies flat on her back,
+     and all the time her eyes seem to be watching for something.
+     She speaks very little, everything seems to be shut away in
+     her heart, but yesterday--after having first talked the matter
+     over with your uncle--I went up to her room and asked her
+     point blank: 'Janet, aren't you eating out your heart for
+     Joan?' and she nodded stiffly, the tears in her eyes. So I sat
+     right down and told her all about you: about your accident,
+     about the hard (child, I know it has been hard) fight you have
+     had, and at the end I said: 'Shall I send for her, Janet?'
+     This time when she nodded the tears were streaming down her
+     face. So I am sending for you. Don't let pride or anger stand
+     between you, enough anguish has been caused already on both
+     sides, and she is practically dying. Come, child, show a
+     charity which your struggle will have taught you, and help to
+     make her going a little easier, for she has always loved you,
+     and her heart breaks for the need of you."
+
+It was a very sentimental letter for Miss Abercrombie to have written.
+And Aunt Janet was dying; quite long ago Joan had forgiven the hardness
+from her, there was no bitterness in her heart now, only a great sense
+of pity. She would go, of course she would go. Like a flash it came to
+her that she might just slip away and leave no address, no message to
+Dick. But even with the thought came the knowledge that she would only
+be shelving the difficulty for a little; he would wait, he would search
+till he found her. She did not think he would be very easy to put off.
+
+With Miss Abercrombie's letter open on her lap, she sat and watched the
+people passing by her. She was thinking of all her life since she had
+first come to London; Gilbert, their time together--strange how that
+memory had no more power to hurt--the black days that had followed, Rose
+and Fanny. Of them all perhaps she had loved Fanny the best; Fanny's
+philosophy of life was so delightfully simple, she was like some little
+animal that followed every fresh impulse. And she never seemed to regret
+or pay for her misdeeds. Apparently when you sinned calmly in the full
+knowledge that it was sin, you paid no penalty; it was only when you
+sinned attempting to make new laws for yourself and calling it no sin
+that the burden of retribution was so heavy to bear.
+
+A man was coming down the path towards her; she did not notice him,
+although he was staring at her rather intently. Opposite to her he came
+to a pause and took off his hat.
+
+"Hallo," he said, "I am not mistaken, am I, it is Pierrette."
+
+She lifted startled eyes to his and Landon laughed at her. He had
+forgotten all about her till this moment, but just for the time being he
+was at a loose end in London when all his friends were out of town, and
+with no new passion on to entertain him. Pierrette, were she willing,
+would fill in the gap pleasantly; they had not parted the best of
+friends, but he had forgotten just enough for that memory not to rankle.
+He sat down on the chair beside her and took one of her hands in his.
+
+"Where have you been, Pierrette? And what have you been doing? Also,
+are you not glad to see me, and whose love letter were you reading?"
+
+"It is not a love letter." Joan took her hand away and folding up Miss
+Abercrombie's letter, slipped it into her purse. "It is from my people,
+asking me to come home, and I am going."
+
+"Going, when I have only just found you again!"
+
+His tone, his whole manner was unbearably familiar. Joan turned with
+quick words of resentment on her lips, but they were never said. A
+sudden thought came across her brain. Here was something with which she
+could fight down and kill Dick's purpose. Better, far better than any
+confession of hers, better than any stating of the truth, however
+bluntly put, would be this man's easy familiarity, his almost air of
+ownership. She found herself staring at Landon. What had she ever seen
+in him that was either pleasant or attractive? She hated his eyes, and
+the way they looked at her, the too evident care which had been expended
+on his appearance, his long, shapely hands.
+
+"Well, Pierrette, when you have finished studying my personal
+appearance," Landon broke in, "perhaps you will explain yourself more
+explicitly. Why are you flying from me just when I have found you? And,
+Pierrette, what about supper to-night at Les Gobelins?"
+
+"I can't do that," Joan spoke quickly. She had clenched her hands in her
+lap; he did not notice that, but he could see that the colour had fled
+from her face. "And I have got to go away the day after to-morrow. But
+couldn't you come and have tea with me to-morrow at 6, Montague Square?
+Do, please do."
+
+What was she driving at? Landon caught his breath on a laugh. Was it the
+last final flutter before she had to go back to home life and having her
+wings cut? Or was she throwing herself into his arms after having fought
+so furiously--he remembered that she had fought the last time, perhaps
+she had learned her lesson; perhaps the poor little devil had really
+fallen in love with him, and had been eating her heart out all this
+time. That was almost amusing. She had never, even in their days of
+greatest friendship, asked him into her room before, though he had often
+suggested coming.
+
+"Why, Pierrette, of course," he said. Then he laughed out loud. "And
+I'll bring some red roses, afterwards we will go out to supper, and it
+shall be like old times."
+
+"Afterwards," Joan repeated. The excitement had left her, she sounded on
+the instant very tired, "I don't know about afterwards, but bring the
+red roses and come at half-past four, will you?" She stood up, "I must
+go home," she said, "I have got to pack and get everything ready before
+to-morrow."
+
+He could not understand her mood in the least, but he could draw his own
+conclusions from her invitation. It set him whistling softly on his way
+home. The tune he selected was one that was being played everywhere in
+London at the time. It fitted into his thoughts excellently:
+
+    "Just a little love, a little kiss,
+     I will give my life for this."
+
+Poor, silly little Pierrette! Why had she fought with him before and
+wasted so much precious time? As a matter of fact, he broke off his
+whistle as the startling truth flashed on him, he might quite easily
+have forgotten all about her in the interval, and then where would she
+have been?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+    "I have left you behind
+     In the path of the past;
+     With the white breath of flowers,
+     With the best of God's hours,
+     I have left you at last."
+
+                                             DORA SIGERSON.
+
+
+Mrs. Carew was in a state of discontent which amounted almost to anger.
+
+"I knew such kind of things were bound to happen," she grumbled
+fiercely, "if she joined in with a girl like that Miss Bellairs. I have
+never held and I never will hold with young ladies having men to tea in
+their bedrooms."
+
+"Why don't you just tell her so?" suggested her helpmate from his
+customary entrenched position in an armchair behind the newspaper. "It
+would be a good deal cheaper than breaking the kitchen china, Maria."
+
+"Tell her!" snorted Mrs. Carew. "She don't give me a chance. Cool as a
+cucumber she turns to me this morning, she says: 'Oh, I've two gentlemen
+to tea this afternoon, Mrs. Carew, just show them up when they come.'
+Then she 'ops it out of the front door like a rabbit. 'Gentlemen,'
+indeed, and she with not so much as a screen round her bed."
+
+"Perhaps they are her brothers," ventured Mr. Carew.
+
+Mrs. Carew came to a pause beside him and swept aside his paper.
+"Brothers!" she repeated, "now, Arthur, you know better than to say
+that. What I say and what I always shall say is: Let 'em do what they
+like outside, poor motherless girls that they are, but in my house
+things have got to be run straight. I won't have them bringing men in
+here."
+
+"Well, hang it all, Maria, what do you want me to do? Go upstairs and
+turn the gents out?"
+
+"We'll see," said Mrs. Carew darkly. She grabbed up the tea-tray and
+made for the door. "To-morrow I shall tell her it is not to happen
+again."
+
+"All right, you tell her," her husband muttered behind her retreating
+back. "Can't think, though, why you don't leave the girls alone. However
+they start it always ends that way. You and I have seen quite a number
+take to the streets, and you don't do much to prevent them short of
+grumbling at them."
+
+"They shan't do it in my house," reiterated Mrs. Carew; she stumped in
+dignified protest from the room, and upstairs to the offender's attic.
+
+The first guest had already arrived, so Mrs. Carew could not voice her
+disapproval; she expressed it, however, in a glare which she directed
+towards him, and the noise with which she dumped down the tea-tray. The
+room was full of flowers, which did not add to her approval; she
+detected in them a sure sign of immorality. Great, beautiful red roses,
+nodding from every vase, filling the air with their rather heavy scent.
+The visitor also inspired her with a sense of distrust. He looked what
+Mrs. Carew described as "a man about town." She had been fond of Joan;
+behind her anger lay a small hurt sense of pity; she was too nice a
+young lady to go the way of the others.
+
+She opened the door to Dick a little later with a sour face, and she did
+not even trouble to take him upstairs.
+
+"Miss Rutherford is high up as you can get"--she jerked her thumb
+upwards--"it's the only door on the landing, you can't mistake it."
+
+With that she left him, and Dick found his own way upstairs. He had
+stayed away all day till the exact hour he had named, with some
+difficulty, but with a punctilious sense of doing right. Joan had not
+answered his letter and he looked upon her silence as an admission that
+she loved him, but there were a great many things between them that
+would have to be talked over first coldly and sensibly. He had thought
+the matter out and he had decided that he would not leave it all to her,
+to tell or not to tell as she thought best, which had been his first
+idea. He would help her by telling her that he had always known, and
+that it made no difference. He wanted to make her confession as easy as
+possible.
+
+It was not until after he had knocked that he realized with a shock of
+disappointment that Joan was not alone. He could hear her talking to
+somebody, then she moved across the room and pulled the door open. He
+saw only her first of all, his eyes sought hers and stayed there. He
+could notice that she seemed very pale, and almost frightened looking,
+and that she had dressed for the afternoon in black. Some long clinging
+stuff, and up near where the blouse opened at the neck she had pinned in
+one red rose, its warm and velvety petals lying against the white of her
+neck. The room seemed full of the scent of the roses too, and a little
+oppressive. Dick held his breath as he looked at her; to him she seemed
+so beautiful as to be almost amazing; then he came a little further into
+the room and his eyes took in the other occupant. A man sat, or rather
+lounged, on the sofa, pulled up under the window. He was watching the
+meeting with curious eyes, and in his hands he held another rose, the
+same sort as the one Joan wore. When Dick's eyes met his, he smiled, and
+laying the rose aside, stood up.
+
+"Did not know it was to be a tea-party, Pierrette," he said, "you ought
+to have warned me."
+
+Joan had shut the door and moved forward into the centre of the room.
+She was evidently very nervous over something; Landon was more than a
+little amused, though also inclined to be annoyed.
+
+"Oh, it isn't a tea-party," she was saying. "It's just us three. Doctor
+Grant, this is Mr. Landon. Will you have this chair?--it is really the
+only one which is quite safe to sit on."
+
+Dick took the proffered chair stiffly; he was conscious of a bitter
+sense of disappointment, tinged with disapproval. It was, of course,
+different for himself, but he loathed to see the other man so much at
+home in this quaint little dust-laden attic where Joan lived. Her bed
+stood against the wall, a black counterpane of sorts thrown across it;
+her brush and comb, the little silver things for her dressing-table were
+scattered about on the top of the chest of drawers standing near. The
+place would have been sacred to him; but how did this other man look at
+it? And why had Joan asked him? Was it a deliberate attempt to shield
+herself from something she dreaded? or did it mean that, after all, she
+had only been playing with him--that the fluttered surrender of her lips
+had been but a flirt's last fling in the game of passion? If a man is
+really very much in love, as was Dick, and something occurs to make him
+lose his temper, it is sure to end in rapid and sometimes lasting
+disaster. After the first five minutes Dick made no attempt even to be
+polite to Landon. Rage, blind, merciless rage, and a sense of having
+made a damned fool of himself, throbbed in his mind as he watched Joan
+talking to the other man, and saw the evident familiarity which lay
+between them. Yet he could not get up and go away; he would not leave
+her, not till he had hurt her as much as she was now hurting him.
+
+For Landon, the amusement of baiting the other man's evident misery soon
+palled. He was a little annoyed himself that Joan should have seen fit
+to drag him in as such a cat's-paw, for a very few minutes of their
+threesome had shown him what his part was intended to be. It meant in
+addition that the girl had fooled him, and that he had wasted his
+background of red roses. It was all very annoying and a very stupid way
+of spending the afternoon, for no one could imagine that there was any
+amusement to be got out of a bad tea in squalid surroundings--thus
+mercilessly but almost truthfully did he dismiss the atmosphere of
+Joan's attic--with a girl palpably in love with someone else. Landon
+rose presently with his most languid air of boredom.
+
+"Sorry, Pierrette," he said; "must fly, but I leave my roses behind me
+as a memory. They are not what I should call my lucky flower." He turned
+to Dick, who stood up with a grim face and stern-set mouth. "Good-bye,
+Doctor Grant; delighted to have met you: if Pierrette feels like it, get
+her to tell you about our last venture into the rose world. Romantic
+tale, isn't it, Pierrette?" He laughed, lifting her hand to his heart
+very impressively. "But ours has always been a romance, hasn't it? That
+is why we christened each other Pierrot and Pierrette." He let go her
+hand and bowed gravely. Joan followed him to the door. "I'll come and
+see you out," she said; she had not realized until the moment came how
+horribly afraid she was of Dick. "You might lose your way."
+
+"Oh no," Landon assured her; he shot one last slightly vindictive glance
+at Dick; "I know it by heart." Then he laughed and went from the room,
+shutting the door behind him.
+
+Joan stayed where she was, a seeming weight on her lids, which prevented
+her lifting her eyes to look at Dick. But she was intensely conscious of
+him, and round her heart something had closed like a band of iron. At
+last, since he said nothing and made no sign, she moved forward blindly
+and sat down in the nearest chair.
+
+"Aren't you ever going to speak again?" she whispered.
+
+Her words shook Dick out of his silent self-restraint. Hot anger,
+passionate reproaches, fought for speech in his throat; he drove them
+back.
+
+"Is this your answer to my question?" he said finally. "It would have
+been simpler to have put it some other way. But you may at least
+congratulate yourself on having succeeded. You have killed something
+that I had thought to be almost eternal." He drew in his breath sharply,
+but passion was shaking him now, it had to have its say. "I have loved
+you," he went on hoarsely, "ever since I first saw you. Common sense has
+argued against you; pride has fought to throw you out of my life; but
+against everything your face has lived triumphant. I don't know why God
+makes us feel like that for women of your stamp, why we should bring
+such great ideals to so poor a shrine. I am talking arrant nonsense,
+just raving at you, you think, and I sound rather absurd even to myself.
+Only--my God! you don't know what you have done--you have broken my
+faith in you; it was the strongest, the best thing in my life."
+
+Joan crouched down in the chair; she seemed to be trying to get as far
+away from his voice as possible; she sat with her head buried in her
+arms.
+
+"I built up a dream about you two years ago," Dick went on. "You don't
+remember anything about me; but our meeting, your face as you stood that
+day with your back to the wall, were stamped on my heart as with a
+branding-iron. Of all the foolish things that a man could do perhaps I
+chose the worst; for ever as I stood and watched you the shadow of shame
+grew up beside you, and other people turned away from you. But I thought
+I saw further than the rest; I imagined that I had seen through your
+eyes, because already I loved them, into your soul. There is some
+mistake here, I argued, some mystery which she herself shall one day
+make clear to me." Joan had lifted her head and was staring at him.
+"From that day I started building my dream. I went abroad, but the
+memory of your face went with me; I used to make love to other women,
+but it was because I looked for you in their eyes. Then I came home and
+I saw you again. Suddenly my dream crystallized into clear, unshakable
+fact; I loved, I had always loved you; nothing that other people could
+say against you would have any effect. It lay just with you, and to-day
+you have given me your answer and broken with your own hand the dream."
+
+He turned towards the door; Joan staggered to her feet and ran to him.
+The vague memory in her mind had leapt to life; his eyes had often
+reminded her of someone. She remembered now that he was the young doctor
+that Aunt Janet had sent for. She remembered her own defiance as she had
+faced him and the pity in his eyes.
+
+"Dick," she whispered, "Dick, I didn't know, I didn't understand. I
+thought--oh, don't go away and leave me just like this, I might
+explain." Her torrent of words broke down before the look on his face;
+she fell to her knees, clutching at his hands. "Won't you listen? It was
+because I was afraid to tell you; I was afraid, afraid."
+
+Her position, the paroxysm of tears which, once they came, she could in
+no way stop, disquieted him. He shook her hands from him. "And because
+you were afraid," he said stiffly, "I suppose you had the other man here
+to protect you." Then his mood changed.
+
+"Whatever you have done," he said, "it isn't any business of mine.
+Please forgive me for ranting like a schoolmaster, and please don't cry
+like that. While I sat there watching that other man and feeling that
+everything my heart had been set on was falling to pieces all round me,
+I wanted to hurt you back again. It's a pugnacious sensation that one
+gets sometimes, but it's gone now; I don't want you to be hurt. It was
+not your fault that I lifted you up in my heart like that; it is not
+altogether your fault that you have fallen. Perhaps you did not know how
+cruel you were being when you had that other man here to make clear to
+me something you did not wish to put into words yourself. I have said
+some beastly things to you, and I am sorry for them. Please don't let
+them worry you for long."
+
+Then he had gone, before she had time to speak or lift her hands to hold
+him. Gone, and as she crouched against the door the sound of his feet
+trod into her heart, each step a throb of agony.
+
+Mrs. Carew was holding forth to Fanny in the hall as Dick swung past
+them. He did not glance at them even, and Fanny did not have a chance to
+call out to him, he went so rapidly, slamming the door behind him.
+
+"Not as how they haven't left at seasonable hours," Mrs. Carew went
+rambling on; "but I 'as always said and always will say, I don't hold
+with such doings in my house."
+
+"What doings?" Fanny expostulated. "For goodness, old Carew, do try and
+make yourself more clear; who has been carrying on and how?"
+
+"Miss Rutherford," Mrs. Carew announced. She was viewing Fanny with
+unfriendly suspicion. "Only came back from this 'ere theatrical show
+yesterday, and to-day she has two men to tea with her in her bedroom."
+
+"Two men?" repeated Fanny. "Did you know they were coming?"
+
+"Ask them," snorted Mrs. Carew. "And what I said is----"
+
+"Oh, run away, Carew," Fanny broke in, "with your nasty suspicion. It's
+all my bad example, you'll be saying next. Bring up some tea for me,
+there's an old dear; I'm fairly parched for a drink."
+
+But before she went into her own room Fanny ran upstairs and knocked
+softly oh Joan's door. There was no answer and no sound from within the
+room; yet when she tried turning the handle, and pushing her foot
+against the door, it was to find it locked. What did it all mean? Two
+men to tea, Dick's face as he had passed through the hall, and Joan's
+locked door? That was a problem which Fanny set herself to disentangle
+in her own particular way.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI
+
+    "Of all strange things in this strange new world
+       Most strange is this;
+     Ever my lips must speak and smile
+       Without your kiss.
+     Ever mine eyes must see, despite
+       Those eyes they miss."
+
+                                             F. HEASLIP LEE.
+
+
+How Joan lived through the hours that followed she never knew. Heart and
+brain seemed paralysed; things had lost their power to hurt. When Fanny
+crept upstairs in the early morning and knocked timidly at the door,
+Joan opened it to her. She had no wish to see Fanny; she did not want to
+talk about yesterday, or explain what had happened; but vaguely through
+her absolute misery she realized that life had still to be gone on with,
+and that Fanny was one of the items of life which it was no use trying
+to disregard. As a matter of fact, until she opened the door and caught
+Fanny's look of dismay, she did not remember that she was still in her
+black afternoon frock, nor the fact that she had spent most of the night
+crouched against the door as Dick had left her.
+
+"Oh, my dear, my dear!" Fanny whispered; she came quickly into the room
+and threw warm, loving arms round Joan. "You haven't been to bed at all;
+why didn't you let me in last night? I'd have helped you somehow or
+other."
+
+Joan stood limply in the embrace, but she did not turn and cling to
+Fanny, or weep as the other girl rather wished she would.
+
+"How ridiculous of me," she answered. "I must look a strange sight this
+morning."
+
+Fanny became practical on the moment, since sympathy was evidently not
+desired. "Well, you'll start right away now," she stated, "and get out
+of your things. It's early yet, only about seven; I will brush your hair
+for you, and you will slip into bed. You needn't get up until late
+to-day, you know."
+
+"I haven't the slightest desire to sleep," Joan told her; none the less
+she was obeying the other's commands. "And I have got to catch an early
+train."
+
+"You are going away?" gasped Fanny.
+
+"Back home," Joan answered. "They have sent for me; my aunt has been
+ill. Oh, it's not for good, Fanny"--she almost laughed at the other's
+amazed face--"I shall be back here before long."
+
+"I hope not;" Fanny spoke, for her, fiercely. "I shall hate to lose you,
+honey, but after all I don't stand for much, and you aren't meant for
+this kind of world. You can't get the fun out of it I can, it only hurts
+you." She was brushing out the soft brown hair. "What happened
+yesterday?" she asked suddenly, her head on one side.
+
+Joan moved from under the deft hands and stood up. "You want to know why
+I am looking like a tragedy queen this morning," she said. "It isn't
+strange you should be curious; I must seem quite mad. Yesterday"--she
+caught her hands to her throat--"was what might be called a disastrous
+failure. I tried to be very clever, and I was nothing but a most awful
+fool. He knew, he had known all the time, the thing which I had been so
+afraid to tell him. It had not made any difference to his loving me, but
+yesterday I had that other man here, you remember him, don't you? You
+might almost recognize his roses." Her eyes wandered round the room, her
+hands came away slowly from her throat; she had seemed to be near tears,
+but suddenly the outburst passed. "That's all," she said dryly, "Dick
+drew his own conclusions from the man being here. I tried to explain, at
+least I think I tried to explain. I know I wanted to hold him back, but
+he threw aside my hands and went from the room. I shan't ever see him
+again, Fanny, and the funny thing is that it doesn't really seem to
+matter this morning."
+
+"Oh, you poor thing," Fanny whispered again. She did not say much else,
+because for the present words were useless. Otherwise her own mind was
+full of consoling reflections. A man, after all, is not so easily turned
+aside from what must have been a very big purpose in his life. Already
+Fanny could look into the future and say "Bless you, my children," in
+her heart. She had been afraid, drawing her conclusions from Dick's face
+and Joan's silence, that things were very much worse. Joan might, for
+instance, have told the truth, and Dick, man-like, might have resented
+it.
+
+She ran downstairs presently and came up again with the breakfast,
+fussing round Joan till the other made an attempt to eat something,
+pouring out her tea for her, buttering her toast. "I should very much
+like to see you have a jolly good cry, honey," she confessed when the
+pretence at breakfast had finished. "It would do you a world of good.
+But since you don't seem able to, I shall pull the curtains and you must
+try and sleep. I'll come and call you again at ten."
+
+Joan lay quite still in the dim and curtained room, but she did not
+either sleep or cry. She did not even think very much. She could just
+see the pattern of the wall-paper, and her mind occupied itself in
+counting the roses and in working out how the line in between made
+squares or diamonds.
+
+It was like that all day; little things came to her assistance and
+interested her enormously. The collection of flowers which Fanny had got
+on her new hat; the map on the wall of the railway carriage; the fact
+that the station master at Wrotham seemed to have grown very thin, and
+was brushing his hair a new way. Uncle John met her as once before at
+the station, and almost without thinking Joan lifted her face. He
+stooped very gravely to kiss it. "You are welcome home, Joan," he said.
+"We have been lonely without you."
+
+The sound of his voice brought back to her mind the last time he had
+spoken to her, and she was suddenly nervous and tongue-tied. A fat Sally
+still rubbed her sides against the shafts, nothing had been changed. It
+was just about this time she had come home two years ago, only now
+nervousness and a confused sense of memories that hurt intolerably swept
+aside all thoughts of pleasure and relief.
+
+Uncle John made no further remark after his greeting until they were
+driving down the village street. Then he turned to her suddenly.
+
+"There is going to be war between England and Germany," he said. "Did
+you see any signs of excitement in London this morning?"
+
+War! Joan realized on the instant that for the past four days she had
+not even looked at a paper. Daddy Brown had mentioned some such
+possibility in connection with his Spring tour, and the members of the
+company had discussed the prospect with varying shades of excitement on
+their way up to London. But for herself, her own interests, her own
+griefs had so swamped her that she had not even noticed the greater
+tragedy which loomed ahead. Yet what a curious thrill lay in the word;
+it could rouse her to sudden interest as nothing else had been able to
+do all day; she could feel the nerves in her body tighten, and she sat a
+little more erect.
+
+"War, with Germany!" she repeated. "I haven't read the papers, Uncle
+John. Has it come as near as that?"
+
+"They have invaded Belgium," he answered, "on their way through into
+France. We couldn't stand aside now if we wanted to. To-night, I expect
+war will be declared. That was why I asked you if you had seen any signs
+of excitement in the streets; the papers say that the crowds have been
+clamouring for war for the last three days."
+
+She could not tell him that she had sat in the cab counting the daisies
+in Fanny's hat. "What will it mean?" she asked.
+
+"Something bigger than we have ever tackled before," he answered. "It
+will mean millions of money and millions of men. I don't see much down
+here, grubbing about among my plants and weeds, but I have kept an eye
+on Germany." A most unusual excitement was shaking him. "In my young
+days it was a myth, 'one day Germany will declare war on us.' It has
+come true too late for me. I'd give everything I possess to get back
+into the regiment, but they wouldn't have me. This will be a
+world-shaking war, and I am too old to take part in it." The excitement
+left his voice as they turned in at the gate. "Your aunt is very ill,"
+he said. "I meant to have warned you before, but somehow I can't think
+of anything but the one thing these days. You must not be shocked at her
+appearance."
+
+Miss Abercrombie was waiting to receive them where Aunt Janet had waited
+for their other home-coming. "Did you bring any news from London?" she
+asked quickly; the same light shone in her eyes as in Uncle John's. "Has
+anything been settled yet?"
+
+Joan shook her head. "I have been living this last week with my eyes
+shut," she confessed; "till Uncle John told me, I did not even know that
+anything was going to happen."
+
+Miss Abercrombie looked beyond her; the blue eyes had narrowed, a
+strange expression of intentness showed in her face. "I have always
+tried not to," she said, "and yet I have always hated the Germans. I
+wish I was a man." She turned abruptly. "But come upstairs, child, your
+aunt had her couch moved close to the window this morning, she has lain
+watching the drive all day. You will find her very changed," she added.
+"Try not to show any signs of fear. She is very sensitive as to the
+impression she creates. Every week it creeps a little higher, now she
+cannot even move her hand. From the neck downwards she is like a log of
+wood."
+
+"And she is dying?" whispered Joan.
+
+"Mercifully," the other answered. "My dear, we could not pray for
+anything else."
+
+She opened the door and motioned to Joan to go in. "I have brought her
+to you, Janet," she said. "Now is your heart satisfied?"
+
+Joan waited for a moment in the doorway. A long, low couch stood by the
+window, the curtains were drawn back and the head of the couch had been
+raised up, so that a full stream of light fell upon the figure lying on
+it. But Aunt Janet's face itself was a little in the shadow, and for the
+moment it looked very much like Joan's old memories. The straight,
+braided hair, the little touch of white at the throat, the dark,
+searching eyes. A nurse, a trim upheld figure in blue, stood a little
+behind the couch out of sight of Aunt Janet's eyes, so that she could
+frown and beckon to Joan to come forward unseen by the woman on the
+couch. But Aunt Janet had noticed the slight hesitation, her face broke
+into the most wistful smile that Joan had ever seen.
+
+"I can't hold out my arms to you, Joan," she said; "but my heart aches
+for you, all the same."
+
+Joan took a little step forward; "Aunt Janet," she whispered. Then all
+that had been bitter between them vanished, and much as she had used to
+do, when as a child she sought the shelter of those dear arms, she ran
+forward, and, kneeling by the couch, pressed her warm cheek against the
+lifelessness of the other's hand. "I have come home, Aunt Janet," she
+said, "I have come home."
+
+The nurse with one glance at her patient's face tiptoed from the room,
+leaving them alone together, and for a little they stayed silent just
+close touching like that. Presently Aunt Janet spoke, little whispered
+words.
+
+"I hardened my heart," she said, "I would not let you creep back; even
+when God argued with me I would not listen. My life finished when I sent
+you from me, Joan, but so long as I could hold myself upright and get
+about, I would not listen. I am a hard, grim old woman, and I took it
+upon myself to judge, which is after all a thing we should leave to God.
+This is my punishment--you are so near to me, yet I cannot lift a hand
+to touch you. I shall never feel your fingers clinging to mine again."
+
+"Oh, hush, hush, Aunt Janet," Joan pleaded. "Why should you talk of
+punishment?"
+
+"When you were a child," the old voice went on again, "you would run to
+me at the end of your day's playing. 'Read me a story,' you would say,
+and then we would sit hand in hand while I read aloud to you something
+you knew almost by heart. When I dream now I feel your little warm hands
+in mine, but I can't feel your lips, Joan, not even when you lay them
+against my hand as you do now. Nor your tears, dear, silly child, I have
+made you cry with my grumbling. Joan, look up and see the happiness in
+my eyes to have you back."
+
+And Joan looked. "I never meant to hurt you as I did, Aunt Janet," she
+said; "do you believe that?"
+
+Just for a second the lids closed down over the dark eyes. "I hurt
+myself," Aunt Janet answered, "far more than you hurt me. Put your face
+down close, so that I can kiss you just once, and then you shall draw up
+a chair and we will talk sensibly. Nurse will be severe to-night if I
+excite myself."
+
+Miss Abercrombie put her head in at the door presently and suggested
+taking Joan downstairs to tea. "Nurse is just bringing up yours," she
+said. "I know from the expression of her face that she thinks it is time
+that you had a little rest."
+
+"Very well," Aunt Janet agreed, "take her away, Ann, but bring her back
+again before I go to bed. Has any news come through yet?"
+
+Miss Abercrombie shook her head. "Colonel Rutherford has just gone over
+to the station to find out," she added.
+
+Uncle John came back with no further information. He was evidently in a
+strong state of agitation, he confessed that the question which the
+Government was settling was like a weight on his own conscience. "It is
+a question of honour," he kept repeating, "England cannot stand aside."
+
+    "'Know we not well how seventy times seven
+        Wronging our mighty arms with rust,
+      We dared not do the will of Heaven,
+        Lest Heaven should hurl us in the dust.'"
+
+Miss Abercrombie quoted to him.
+
+He stared at her with puzzled old eyes. "I don't think that can apply to
+England," he said. "And in this case the people won't let them. We must
+have war."
+
+A curious, restless spirit seemed to have invaded the household. Joan
+sat with Aunt Janet for a little after dinner till the nurse said it was
+time for bed, after that she and Miss Abercrombie, talking only in fits
+and starts, waited up for Colonel Rutherford, who had once more tramped
+down to the station in search of news.
+
+"Nothing has come through," he had to admit on his return; "but I have
+arranged with the people of the telegraph office to send on a message
+should it come. We had better get off to bed meanwhile."
+
+Tired as she was, Joan fell asleep almost at once, to dream of
+Dick--Dick attired, through some connection of her thoughts, in shining
+armour with a sword in his hand. The ringing of a bell woke her, and
+then the sound of people whispering in the hall. She was out of bed in a
+second, and with a dressing-gown half pulled about her, she ran to the
+top of the stairs. The hall was lit up, the front door open. Uncle John
+was at it, talking to a man outside; Miss Abercrombie stood a little
+behind him, a telegram form in her hand. She looked up at the sound of
+Joan's feet. "It's war," she called softly. "We declared war to-night."
+
+From somewhere further along the passage there was the abrupt sound of a
+door being thrown open. "Miss Abercrombie, Colonel Rutherford," the
+nurse's voice called, "quick, quick! I am afraid Miss Rutherford is
+dying! Someone must run for the doctor at once, please."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII
+
+    "Life is good, joy runs high,
+     Between English earth and sky;
+     Death is death, but we shall die
+     To the song on your bugles blown--England,
+     To the stars on your bugles blown."
+
+                                             W. E. HENLEY.
+
+
+Dick went out into the still night air from the close atmosphere of
+Joan's room, his mind a seething battleground of emotions--anger, and
+hurt pride, and a still small sense of pain, which as time passed grew
+so greatly in proportion that it exceeded both the other sensations. He
+had said very bitterly to Joan that she had broken his dream, but,
+because it had been broken, it none the less had the power to hurt
+intolerably. Each fragment throbbed with a hot sense of injustice and
+self-pity. He had not the slightest idea what to do with himself: every
+prospect seemed equally distasteful. He walked, to begin with, furiously
+and rather aimlessly down in the direction of the Embankment. The
+exercise, such as it was, dulled his senses and quieted a little the
+tumult of his mind. He found himself thinking of other things. The men
+to-day in his Club had been discussing the possibility of war, they had
+been planning what they would do; instinctively, since the thought of
+Joan and the scene he had just left were too tender for much probing,
+his mind turned to that. As he stamped along he resolved, without
+thinking very deeply about it, that he would volunteer for active
+service, and speculated on the possibility of his getting taken on at
+once.
+
+"Doctors will be very needful in this war," one man had said at the
+Club.
+
+"Yes, by Gad," another had answered. "We have got some devilish
+contrivances these days for killing our brother men."
+
+Looked at from that point of view, the idea seemed strange, and Dick
+caught his breath on the thought. What would war mean? Hundreds of men
+would be killed--hundreds, why it would be more like thousands. He had
+read descriptions of the South African war, he had talked with men who
+had been all through it.
+
+"We doctors see the awful side of war, I can tell you," an old doctor
+had once told him. "To the others it may seem flags flying, drums
+beating, and a fine uplifting spectacle; but we see the horrors, the
+shattered bodies, the eyes that pray for death. It's a ghastly affair."
+
+And yet there was something in the thought which flamed at Dick's heart
+and made him throw his head up. It was the beating of drums, the call of
+the bugles that he heard as he thought of it; the blood tingled in his
+veins, he forgot that other pain which had driven him forth so restless
+a short hour ago.
+
+The great dark waters of the river had some special message to give him
+this evening. He stood for a little watching them; lights flamed along
+the Embankment, the bridges lay across the intervening darkness like
+coloured lanterns fastened on a string. Over on the other side he could
+see the trees of Battersea Park, and beyond that again the huddled pile
+of houses and wharfs and warehouses that crowded down to the water's
+edge. He was suddenly aware, as he stood there, of a passionate love for
+this old, grey city, this slow-moving mass of dark waters. It symbolized
+something which the thought of war had stirred awake in his heart. He
+had a hot sense of love and pride and pity all mingled, he felt somehow
+as if the city were his, and as if an enemy's hand had been stretched
+out to spoil it. The drumming, the flag-waving, and the noise of bugles
+were still astir in his imagination, but the river had called something
+else to life behind their glamour. It did not occur to him to call it
+love of country, yet that was what it was.
+
+His walk brought him out in the end by the Houses of Parliament, and he
+found himself in the midst of a large crowd. It swayed and surged now
+this way and now that, as is the way of crowds. The outskirts of it
+reached right up to and around Trafalgar Square. When Dick had fought
+his way up Parliament Street he could see a mass of people moving about
+the National Gallery, and right above them Nelson's statue stood out
+black against the sky.
+
+"If they want war, these bally Germans," someone in the crowd suddenly
+shouted in a very hoarse and beery voice, "let's give it them."
+
+"Yes, by God!" another answered. "Good old England, let's stand by our
+word."
+
+"We have got men behind the guns," declaimed a third.
+
+But such words were only as the foam thrown up by a great sea; the
+multitude did no real shouting, the spirit that moved them was too
+earnest for that. There were women among the crowd, their eager, excited
+faces caught Dick's attention. Some were crying hysterically, but most
+of them faced the matter in the same way that their menkind did. Dick
+could find no words to describe the curious feeling which gripped him,
+but he knew himself one of this vast multitude, all thinking the same
+thoughts, all answering to the same heart-beats. It was as if the
+meaning of the word citizen had suddenly been made clear to his heart.
+
+He moved with the shifting of the crowd as far as Trafalgar Square, and
+here some of the intense seriousness of the strain was broken, for
+round and about the stately lions of Nelson's statue a noisy battle was
+raging. Several Peace parties, decked with banners inscribed "No War"
+and "Let us have peace," were coming in for a very rough five minutes at
+the hands of the crowd. Rather to his own surprise Dick found himself
+partaking in the battle, with a sense of jubilant pride in his prowess
+to hit out. He had a German as his opponent, which was a stroke of luck
+in itself, but in a calmer moment which followed on the arrival of the
+police, he thought to himself that even that was hardly an excuse for
+hitting a man who was desirous of keeping the world's peace. Still the
+incident had exhilarated him, he was more than ever a part of the crowd,
+and he went with them as far as Buckingham Palace. Some impulse to see
+the King had come upon the people; they gathered in the square in front
+of the Palace, and waited in confident patience for him to appear.
+
+Dick was standing at the far end of the Square, pressed up against the
+railings. In front of him stood two women, they were evidently strangers
+to each other, yet their excitement had made them friends, and they
+stood holding hands. One was a tall, eager-faced girl; Dick could not
+see the other woman's face, but from her voice he imagined her to be a
+good deal older and rather superior in class to the girl. It was the
+younger one's spirit, however, that was infectious.
+
+"Isn't it fine?" she was saying. "Aren't you proud to be English? I feel
+as if my heart was going to jump out of my mouth. They are our men," she
+went on breathlessly; "it is a most wonderful thought, and of course
+they will win through, but a lot of them will die first. Oh, I do hate
+the Germans!" Her whole face flushed with passionate resentment.
+
+"One need not hate a nation because one goes to war with it," the other
+woman answered. Dick thought her voice sounded very tired.
+
+"Yes, one need," the girl flamed. "We women can't fight, but we can
+hate. Perhaps we shouldn't hate so much if we could fight," she added as
+a concession.
+
+"I am married to a German," Dick heard the other woman say bitterly. "I
+can't hate him."
+
+He saw the girl's quick face of horror and the way she stood away from
+her companion, but just at that moment some impulse surged the crowd
+forward and he lost sight of them. Yet the memory of the woman's voice
+and the words she had said haunted him. War would mean that, then, the
+tearing apart of families, the wrecking of home life.
+
+"The King, the King!" the crowd yelled and shouted in a million voices.
+"God save the King."
+
+Dick looked up to the Palace windows; a slight, small figure had come
+out on to one of the balconies and stood looking down on the faces of
+the people. Cheer upon cheer rose to greet him, the multitude rocked and
+swayed with their acclamation, then above the general noise came the
+sound of measured music, not a band, but just the people singing in
+unison:
+
+    "God save our gracious King,
+     Long live our noble King,
+             God save the King."
+
+The notes rose and swelled and filled the air, the cry of a nation's
+heart, the loyalty of a people towards their King.
+
+The sheer emotion of it shook Dick out of the sense of revelry which had
+come upon him during his fight. He pushed his way through the crowd, and
+climbed over the railings into the darkness of St. James's Park. It was
+officially closed for the night, but Dick had no doubt that a small
+bribe at the other side would let him out. The Queen and the little
+Princes had joined the King on the balcony. Looking back he could see
+them very faintly, the Prince was standing to the salute, the Queen was
+waving her handkerchief.
+
+His Club was crowded with men, all equally excited, all talking very
+fast. Someone had just come back from the House. War was a dead
+certainty now, mobilization had been ordered, the Fleet was ready.
+
+"Our Army is the problem, there will have to be conscription," was the
+general vote.
+
+Dick stayed and talked with the rest of them till long after twelve.
+Morning should see him offering his services to the War Office; if they
+would not have him as a doctor he could always enlist. One thing was
+certain, he must by hook or by crook be amongst the first to go.
+
+"We will have to send an Expeditionary Force right now," the general
+opinion had been, "if we are to do any good."
+
+Dick thought vaguely of what it would all mean: the excitement, the
+thrill, an army on the march, camp life, military discipline, and his
+share of work in hospital. "Roll up your sleeves and get at them," his
+South African friend had described it to him. "I can tell you, you don't
+have much time to think when they are bringing in the wounded by the
+hundred."
+
+Not till just as he was turning into bed did he think again of Joan.
+Such is the place which love takes in a man's thoughts when war is in
+the balance. The knowledge of her deceit and his broken dream hurt him
+less in proportion, for the time he had forgotten it. He had been brutal
+to her, he realized; he had left her crouched up on the floor crying her
+heart out. Why had she cried?--she had achieved her purpose, for she
+could only have had one reason in asking the other man to meet him. He
+could only suppose that he had frightened her by his evident bad temper,
+and for that he was sorry. He was not angry with her any longer. She had
+looked very beautiful in her clinging black dress, with the red rose
+pinned in at her throat. And even the rose had been a gift from the
+other man. Well, it was all ended; for two years he had dreamed about
+love, for one hour he had known its bitterness. He would shut it
+absolutely outside of his life now, he would never, he need never,
+thanks to the new interests which were crowding in, think of Joan again.
+
+He opened his window before getting into bed and leaned out. The streets
+were deserted and quiet, the people had shouted themselves hoarse and
+gone home. Under the nearest lamp-post a policeman stood, a solid,
+magnificent figure of law and order, and overhead in a very dark sky
+countless little stars shone and twinkled. On the verge of war! What
+would the next still slumbering months bring to the world, and could he
+forget Joan? Is not love rather a thing which nothing can kill, which no
+grave can cover, no time ignore?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII
+
+    "Errors, like straws, upon the surface flow;
+     He who would search for pearls must dive below."
+
+                                             ANON.
+
+
+The wave of enthusiasm caused by the War swept even Fanny into its
+whirlpool of emotion. For several days she haunted the streets,
+following now this crowd, now that; buying innumerable papers, singing
+patriotic songs, cheering the soldiers as they passed. She wanted to
+dash out into the road, to throw her arms round the young soldiers and
+to kiss them, she was for the time being passionately in love with them.
+It was her one pathetic and rather mistaken method of expressing the
+patriotism which surged up in her. She could not have explained this
+sensation, she only knew that something was so stirred within her that
+she wanted to give--to give of her very best to these men who symbolized
+the spirit of the country to her. Poor, hot-hearted little Fanny; she
+and a great many like her came in for a good deal of blame during the
+days that followed, yet the instinct which drove them was the same that
+prompted the boys to enlist. If Fanny had been a man she would have
+been one of the first at the recruiting station. So submerged was she in
+her new excitement that Joan and Dick in their trouble slipped entirely
+out of her mind, only to come back, with the knowledge that she had
+failed to do anything to help, when, on coming back one afternoon to
+Montague Square, she saw Mabel standing on the steps of No. 6. To be
+correct, Mabel had just finished talking to Mrs. Carew and was turning
+away. Fanny hastened her walk to a run and caught the other up just as
+she left the step.
+
+"You were asking to see Joan, Miss Rutherford," she panted. "Won't you
+come in and let me tell you about her?"
+
+Mabel had hardly recognized her. Fanny, dressed up in her best to meet
+Joan's possible future relations, and Fanny in her London garments,
+which consisted of a very tight dress slit up to well within sight of
+her knee, and a rakish little hat, were two very different people. And
+whereas the Fanny of Sevenoaks had been a little vulgar but most
+undeniably pretty, this Fanny was absolutely impossible--the kind of
+person one hardly liked to be seen talking to. Yet there was something
+in the girl's face, the frank appeal of her eyes, perhaps, that held
+Mabel against her will.
+
+"The woman tells me that Miss Rutherford has left," she spoke stiffly.
+"I was really only going to call upon her."
+
+"Yes, I know she's gone," Fanny nodded, "back to her people. But there
+is something between her and your brother that awfully badly wants to be
+explained. Won't you come in and let me tell you? Oh, do, please do."
+
+She had caught hold of the other's sleeve and was practically leading
+her back up the steps. Mabel had not seen Dick since he had left
+Sevenoaks. He had written a note to their hotel saying he was most
+awfully busy, his application for service had been accepted, but pending
+his being attached to any unit he was putting in the time examining
+recruits. He had not mentioned Joan, Mabel had noticed that; still she
+had promised to call and make it up with the girl, and Mabel was a
+person who always religiously kept her promises. But if there had been
+any disagreement, as Fanny's anxiety to explain showed, then surely it
+was so much the better. Here and now she would wash her hands of the
+affair and start hoping once again for something better for Dick.
+
+Fanny had opened the door by this time and had led the way inside. "My
+room is three flights up," she said. "Will you mind that? Also it is
+probably dreadfully untidy. It generally is."
+
+This was where Mabel, following the wise guidance of her head, ought to
+have said: "I am not coming, I really haven't time," or some excuse of
+that sort. Instead she stepped meekly inside and followed the girl
+upstairs. Perhaps some memory of Dick's face as he had spoken of Joan
+prompted her, or perhaps it was just because she felt that in some small
+way she owed Joan a reparation.
+
+Fanny's room was certainly untidy. Every chair was occupied by an
+assortment of clothes, for before she had gone out that morning Fanny
+had had a rummage for a special pair of silk stockings that were the
+pride of her heart. She bundled most of the garments on to the bed and
+wheeled forward the armchair for Mabel to sit in.
+
+"I never can keep tidy," she acknowledged. "It used to make Joan fair
+sick when we shared rooms on tour. Joan is so different from me."
+Suddenly she threw aside pretence and dropped down on her knees before
+the armchair, squatting back on her heels to look at Mabel. "That is
+what I do want you to understand," she said, earnestly. "Joan is as
+different to me as soap to dirt. She is a lady, you probably saw that; I
+am not. She is good; I don't suppose I ever have been. She is clean all
+through, and she loves your brother so much that she wanted to break her
+heart to keep him happy." She looked down at her hands for a second,
+then up again quickly. "I'll tell you, it won't do any harm. Mind you,
+usually, I say a secret is a secret though I mayn't look the sort that
+can keep one. Joan told me about it at the beginning when I chaffed her
+about his loving her; and he does, you know he does. It seems that when
+she first came to London she had funny ideas in her head--innocent, I
+should call it, and sort of inclined to trust men--anyway, she lived
+with some man and there was to have been a baby," she brought the
+information out with a sort of gasp.
+
+"I knew that," Mabel answered, "and because of it I tried to persuade my
+brother not to marry her."
+
+"I suppose it is only natural you should," Fanny admitted, "though to me
+it seems that when a woman has a baby like that, she pays for all the
+fun that went before." She threw back her head a little and laughed.
+"Oh, I'm not moral, I know that, but Joan is, that's what I want you to
+understand. Anyway, Joan left the man, or he left her, which is more
+likely, and the baby was never born. Joan was run over in the street one
+day and was ill in hospital for a month. That was what Joan came up
+against," she went on, "when she fell in love with your brother. Tell
+him, I said, it won't make a pin's worth of difference to his love--and
+it wouldn't. But Joan did not believe me, she had learned to be afraid
+of good people, some of them had been real nasty to her, and she was
+afraid."
+
+"She need not have been," Mabel said. The girl was so earnest in the
+defence of her friend that one could not help liking her. "Dick knew
+about it all the time."
+
+Fanny nodded. "Yes, Joan told me that on the day after he had been here.
+It would have been fairer if he had said so from the beginning. You
+see," she leant forward, most intense in her explanation, "Joan thought,
+and thought and thought, till she was really silly with thinking. He had
+told her he was coming here on Monday to ask her to marry him, and she
+loved him. I should have held my tongue about things, or whispered them
+to him as I lay in his arms, holding on to him so that he could not
+push me away, but Joan isn't my sort. She just couldn't bear to tell
+him, I guess she was afraid to see his face alter and grow hard. Do you
+blame her because she was afraid? I don't really know the rest of the
+story," she finished, "because I was away, but I think Joan got hold of
+the silly notion that the best thing to do was to have another man
+hanging about here when Dr. Grant called. She thought it would make him
+angry, and that he would change his mind about wanting to marry her on
+the spot. And she pretty well succeeded. I had just got back and was
+standing in the hall, when Dr. Grant got back from her room and went
+out. He did not notice me, his face was set white and stern like
+people's faces are when they have just had to shoot a dog they loved.
+The other man meant nothing to her, nothing; why she hasn't even seen
+him for months, and she never liked him. Oh, can't you explain to your
+brother, he would listen to you." She put her hand on Mabel's knee in
+her earnestness and pulled herself a little nearer. "It's breaking both
+their hearts, and it's all such a silly mistake."
+
+"Are you not asking rather a lot from me?" Mabel said quietly; she met
+the other's eyes frankly. "Putting aside all ideas, moral or immoral,
+don't you understand that it is only natural that I should want my
+brother to marry some girl who had not been through all that Miss
+Rutherford has?"
+
+The quick tears sprang to Fanny's eyes. "If he loves her," she claimed,
+"is not that all that matters?"
+
+"He may love again," Mabel reminded her.
+
+Fanny withdrew her hand and stayed quiet, looking down at the ground,
+blinking back her tears. "You won't help," she said presently. "I see
+what you mean, it doesn't matter to you what happens to her." She lifted
+her head defiantly and sprang to her feet. "Well, it doesn't matter, not
+very much. I believe in love more than you do, it seems, for I do not
+believe that your brother will love again, and sooner or later he will
+come back to her." She paused in her declamation and glanced at Mabel.
+"Is he going to the War?" she asked quickly.
+
+"Yes," Mabel assented; she had stood up too and was drawing on her
+gloves. "He may go at any moment, as soon as they need him. You think I
+am awfully hard," she went on; "perhaps I am. Dick means a lot to me; if
+I find that this is breaking his heart I will tell him, will you believe
+that? But if he can find happiness elsewhere I shall be glad, that is
+all."
+
+Fanny huddled herself up in the armchair and did a good cry after she
+had gone. Joan's thread of happiness seemed more tangled than ever; her
+efforts to undo the knots had not been very successful. There was only
+her belief in the strength of Dick's love to fall back on, and love--as
+Fanny knew from her own experience--is sometimes only a weathercock in
+disguise, blown this way and that by the winds of fate.
+
+The night post brought a letter from Joan. It was written on black-edged
+notepaper:
+
+     "DEAR FANNY,
+
+     "Aunt Janet is dead. She died the night after I got here. The
+     nurse says it was the joy of seeing me again that killed her.
+     She was glad to have me back, I read that in her eyes, and it
+     is the one fact that helps me to face things. Death stands
+     between us now, yet we are closer to each other than we have
+     been these last two years. And she loved me all the time,
+     Fanny; sometimes it seems as if love could be very
+     unforgiving. I must stay on down here for the time being;
+     Uncle John needs someone, and he is content that it should be
+     me. The War overhangs and overshadows everything, and it is
+     going to be a hard winter for us all. I suppose he hasn't been
+     back" (Fanny knew who was meant by "he") "to see me. It's
+     stupid of me to ask, but hope is so horribly hard to kill.
+
+                                         "Yours ever,
+
+                                             "JOAN."
+
+Fanny wrote in answer that evening, but she made no mention of Mabel's
+visit. "Dr. Grant has joined, I hear," she put rather vaguely. "But of
+course one knew he would. All the decent men are going. London is just
+too wonderful, honey, I can't keep out of the streets. All day there are
+soldiers going past; I love them all, with a sort of love that makes you
+feel you want to be good, and gives you a lump in your throat. They say
+we have already sent thousands of men to Belgium, though there has not
+been a word about it in the papers, but I met a poor woman in the crowd
+to-day who had just said good-bye to her son. I wish I had got a son,
+only, of course, he would not be old enough to fight, would he? Write me
+sometimes, honey, and don't lose heart. Things will come all right for
+you in the end, I sort of know they will."
+
+To Joan her letter brought very little comfort despite its last
+sentence. Dick had joined; it did not matter how Fanny had come by the
+news, Joan never doubted its truth. He would be among the first to go,
+that she had always known, but would he make no sign, hold out no hand,
+before he left? The War was shaking down barriers, bringing together
+families who perhaps had not been on speaking terms for years, knitting
+up old friendships. Would he not give her some chance to explain, to set
+herself right in his eyes? That was all she asked for; not that he
+should love her again, but just that they should be friends, before he
+went out into the darkness of a war to which so many were to go and so
+few return.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX
+
+    "Who dies, if England lives?"
+
+                                             RUDYARD KIPLING.
+
+
+The black days of September lay like a cloud over the whole country.
+News came of the fall of Namur; the retreat from Mons; the German Army
+before the gates of Paris. There was one Sunday evening when the
+newspaper boys ran almost gleefully up and down the London streets,
+shouting in shrill voices: "The whole of the British Expeditionary Force
+cut to pieces." The nation's heart stood still to hear; the faces of the
+men and women going about their ordinary work took on a strained, set
+expression. The beating of drums, the blowing of trumpets, the cheering
+of crowds died away; a new stern feeling entered into the meaning of
+war.
+
+Dick felt sometimes as if all were expressed in the one word England.
+The name was written across all their minds as they stared into the
+future waiting for the news, real news of that handful of men standing
+with their backs to the walls of Paris, facing the mighty strength of
+the German Army. England! What did it matter if some hearts called it
+Scotland, some Ireland, some the greater far-off land of the Dominions?
+the meaning was the same. It was the country that was threatened, the
+country that stood in danger; as one man the people rallied to the cry
+of Motherland. And over in France, with their backs to the walls of
+Paris, the soldiers fought well!
+
+"Who dies, if England lives?" Kipling wrote in those early days of the
+war, putting into words the meaning which throbbed in the hearts of the
+people. Statesmen might say that they fought for the scrap of paper, for
+an outraged Belgium, because of an agreement binding Great Britain to
+France; the people knew that they fought for England! And to stay at
+home and wait with your eyes staring into the darkness was harder
+perhaps than to stand with your back to the wall and fight. They were
+black days for the watchers, those early days of the War.
+
+The one thought affected everyone in a different way. The look in their
+eyes was the same, but they used a different method of expressing it.
+Dick threw himself heart and soul into his work; he could not talk about
+the War or discuss how things were going on, and he was kept fairly
+busy, he had little time for talking. All day he examined men; boys,
+lying frankly about their age in order to get in; old men, well beyond
+the limit, telling their untruths with wistful, anxious eyes. Men who
+tried so hard to hide this or that infirmity, who argued if they were
+not considered fit, who whitened under the blow of refusal, and went
+from the room with bitten lips. From early morning till late at evening,
+Dick sat there, and all day the stream of old men, young men, and boys
+passed before him.
+
+Fanny took it in quite a different way. Silence was torture to her; she
+had to talk. She was afraid and desperately in earnest. The love in her
+heart was poured out at the foot of this new ideal, and to Fanny,
+England was typified in the soldiers. The night on which the paper boys
+ran abroad shrieking their first casualty list Fanny lay face downwards
+on her bed and sobbed her heart out. She visualized the troops she had
+watched marching through London, their straight-held figures, their
+merry faces, their laughing eyes, the songs they had shouted and
+whistled haunted her mind. They had not seemed to be marching to death;
+people had stood on the edge of the pavement to cheer them, and
+now--"cut to pieces"--that was how the papers put it. It made her more
+passionately attached to the ones that were left. It is no exaggeration
+to say that quite gladly and freely Fanny would have given her life for
+any--not one particular--soldier. Something of the spirit of
+mother-love woke in her attitude towards them.
+
+Down in quiet, sleepy little Wrotham the tide of war beat less
+furiously. Uncle John would sometimes lose his temper completely because
+the place as a whole remained so apathetic. The villagers did not do
+much reading of the papers; the fact that the parson had a new prayer
+introduced into the service impressed them with a sense of war more than
+anything else. But even Wrotham felt the outside fringe of London's
+anxiety during the days of that autumn. One by one, rather sheepishly,
+the young men came forward. They would like to be soldiers, they would
+like to have a whack at them there Germans. No thought of treaties or
+broken pledges stirred them, but England was written across their minds
+just the same. Uncle John woke to new life; he had been eating out his
+heart, knowing himself useless and on the shelf, when every nerve in his
+body was straining to be up and doing. He instituted himself as
+recruiter-in-chief to the district. He would walk for miles if he heard
+there was a likely young man to be found at the end of his tramp; his
+face would glow with pride did he but catch one fine, healthy-looking
+specimen.
+
+He inaugurated little meetings, too, at which the Vicar presided, and
+Uncle John held forth. Bluntly and plainly he showed the people their
+duty, speaking to them as he had used to speak in the old days to his
+soldiers. And over their beer in the neighbouring public-house the men
+would repeat his remarks, weigh up his arguments, agree or disagree with
+his sentiments. They had a very strong respect for him, that at least
+was certain; before Christmas he had persuaded every available unmarried
+man to enlist.
+
+The married men were a problem; Joan felt that perhaps more than Uncle
+John did. Winter was coming on; there were the children to clothe and
+feed; the women were beginning to be afraid. Sometimes Joan would
+accompany Uncle John on his tramps abroad, and she would watch the
+wife's face as Uncle John brought all his persuasion to bear on the man;
+she would see it wake first to fear, and then to resentment. She was
+sorry for them; how could one altogether blame them if they cried, "Let
+the unmarried men go first." Yet once their man had gone, they fell back
+on odd reserves of pride and acquiescence. There was very little wailing
+done in the hundreds of small homes scattered all over England; with
+brave faces the women turned to their extra burden of work. Just as much
+as in the great ones of the land, "for England" burned across their
+hearts.
+
+Joan's life had settled down, but for the outside clamour of events,
+into very quiet routine. Her two years' life in London was melting away
+into a dream; only Dick and her love for Dick stood out with any
+intensity, and since Dick made no sign to her, held out no hand, she
+tried as much as possible to shut him from her thoughts. Aunt Janet had
+died in her sleep the night war was declared; she had never waked to
+consciousness. When the doctor, hastily fetched by Uncle John, had
+reached her room, she had been already dead--smiling a little, as if the
+last dream which had come to haunt her sleep had been a pleasant one.
+
+"Joy killed her," the nurse declared. Certainly she lay as if very
+content and untroubled.
+
+"I believe," Miss Abercrombie told Joan, "that she was only staying
+alive to see you. My dear, you must not blame yourself in any way; she
+is so much better out of it all."
+
+"No, I don't blame myself," Joan answered. "We had made friends before
+she died; there isn't a wall between us any longer."
+
+The villagers ransacked their gardens to send flowers to the funeral.
+Aunt Janet's grave was heaped up with them, but in a day or two they
+withered, and old Jim carried them away on his leaf heap. After that
+every week Joan took down just a handful and laid them where she
+thought the closed hands would be, and, because in so doing she seemed
+to draw a little closer to Aunt Janet, and through Aunt Janet to the
+great God beyond, her thoughts would turn into prayer as she stood by
+the grave. "Dear God, keep him always safe," she would whisper. Then
+like a formless flash of light the word "England" would steal across her
+prayer; she did not need to put the feeling into words; just like an
+offering she laid it before her thought of God and knew its meaning
+would be understood. So thousands of men and women pray, brought by a
+sense of their own helplessness in this great struggle near to the
+throne of God. And always the name of England whispers across their
+prayers.
+
+Just when the battle of the Marne was at its turning-point Dick got his
+orders to go. He was given under a week to get ready in, the unit, a
+field hospital, was to start on Saturday and the order came on Monday.
+One more day had to be put in at the recruiting depot; he could not
+leave them in the lurch; Tuesday he spent getting his kit together,
+Wednesday evening saw him down at Sevenoaks.
+
+As once before, Mabel was at the station to meet him. "It's come, then,"
+she said. "Tom is wild with envy. Age, you know, limits him to a
+volunteer home defence league."
+
+"Bad luck," answered Dick. "Of course I am very bucked to be really
+going, Mabel. It is not enlivening to sit and pass recruits all day
+long."
+
+"No," she agreed. "One wants to be up and doing. I hope I am not awfully
+disloyal or dreadfully selfish, but I cannot help being glad that my
+baby is a baby. Mother has knitted countless woollies for you"--she
+changed the subject abruptly; "it has added to poor Tom's discontent. He
+has to try on innumerable sleeping-helmets and wind-mufflers round his
+neck to see if they are long enough. Yesterday he talked rather
+dramatically of enlisting as a stretcher-bearer and going, out with
+you, but they wouldn't have him, would they?"
+
+Dick laughed, but he could realize the bitterness of the other man's
+position when Tom spoke to him that night over their port wine.
+
+"Mabel is so pleased at keeping both her men under her wing," he
+confided, "that she doesn't at all realize how galling it is to be out
+of things. I would give most things, except Mabel and the boy, to be ten
+years younger."
+
+"Still, you have Mabel and the boy," Dick reminded him. "It comes
+awfully hard on the women having to give up their men."
+
+"That's beyond the point," Tom answered. "And bless you, don't you know
+the women are proud to do it?"
+
+"But pride doesn't mend a broken life," Dick tried to argue against his
+own conviction.
+
+Tom shook his head. "It helps somehow," he said. "Mabel was talking to
+some woman in the village yesterday, who has sent three sons to the war,
+and whose eldest, who is a married man and did not go, died last week.
+'I am almost ashamed of him, Mum,' the woman told Mabel; 'It is not as
+if he had been killed at the war.' Oh, well, what's the use of grousing;
+here I am, and here I stick; but if the Germans come over, I'll have a
+shot at them whatever regulations a grandmotherly Government may take
+for our protection. And you're all right, my lad, you are not leaving a
+woman behind you."
+
+That night, after he had gone up to his own room, the thought of Joan
+came to haunt Dick. For two months he had not let himself think of her;
+work and other interests had more or less crowded her out of his heart.
+But the sudden, though long expected, call to action brought him, so to
+speak, to the verge of his own feeling. Other things fell away; he was
+face to face once again with the knowledge that he loved her, and that
+one cannot even starve love to death. He wanted her, he needed her; what
+did other things, such as anger and hurt pride, count against that. He
+had only kissed her once in his life, and the sudden, passionate hunger
+for the touch of her lips shook his heart to a prompt knowledge of the
+truth. He must see her again before he left, for it might be that death
+would find him out there. War had seemed more of a game to begin with;
+that first evening when he had shouted with the others round Trafalgar
+Square he had not connected War with Death, but now it seemed as if they
+walked hand in hand. He could not die without first seeing Joan again.
+
+He thought of writing her a short note asking her to be in when he
+called, but the post from Jarvis Hall did not go out till after twelve;
+he could get to London quicker himself. After breakfast he told Mabel
+that he found he had to go away for the day.
+
+"Something you have forgotten--couldn't you write for it, Dick?" she
+asked. "It seems such a shame, because we shall only have one more day
+of you."
+
+"No," he answered; he did not lift his eyes to look at her. "As a matter
+of fact it is somebody that I must see."
+
+He had not written about or mentioned Joan since he had gone away from
+Sevenoaks last; Mabel had hoped the episode was forgotten. It came to
+her suddenly that it was Joan he was speaking of, and she remembered
+Fanny's long, breathless explanation and the girl's rather pathetic
+belief that she would do something to help. She could not, however, say
+anything to him before the others.
+
+"Will the eleven-thirty do for you?" Tom was asking. "Because I have got
+to take the car in then."
+
+"It seems a little unreasonable, Dick," Mrs. Grant put in. She had not
+been the best of friends with him since their violent scene together;
+her voice took on a querulous tone when she spoke to him. "Who can there
+be in London, that you suddenly find you must see?" She, too, for the
+moment, was thinking of the outrageous girl.
+
+"I am sorry," Dick answered. "It is my own fault for not having gone
+before. I'll try and get back to-morrow."
+
+Mabel caught him afterwards alone on his way out to the garden to smoke
+a pipe. She slipped a hand through his arm and went with him.
+
+"Mother is upset," she confided. "I don't think she can be awfully well;
+just lately she cries very easily."
+
+"She always used to"--Dick's voice was not very sympathetic. "Do you
+remember how angry I was at the way she cried when father died?"
+
+"Yes," Mabel nodded. "All the same, she does love you, Dick; it is a
+funny sort of love, perhaps, but as she gets older it seems to me that
+she gets softer, less selfish. And, Dick, I think she feels--as indeed I
+do, too--that you have grown away from us. It is not the War, though
+that takes men from us women, too; it is more just as if we were out of
+sympathy with one another. Are we?"
+
+"What a funny thought." Dick smiled down at her. "There has never been,
+as you know, much sympathy between mother and myself. But for you,
+Mabel, things will always be the same between us. I trust you with
+everything I have."
+
+"And yet you aren't quite trusting me now," she answered. "You are going
+up to London to see this girl, aren't you, Dick?--and all this time you
+have never written or spoken to me about her."
+
+"I have been trying to forget," he confessed. "I thought, because of
+something she did to me, that I was strong enough to shut her outside my
+life. But last night the old battle began again in my mind, and I know
+that I must see her before I go out. It is more than probable, Mabel,
+that I shall not come back. I can't go out into the darkness without
+seeing her again."
+
+Mabel's hand tightened on his arm. "You mustn't say that, Dick," she
+whispered. "You have got to come back."
+
+They walked in silence and still Mabel debated the question in her mind.
+Should she stand out of events, and let them, shape themselves? If Dick
+went to London and found Joan gone, what would he do then? Perhaps he
+would not see Fanny and the landlady would not be able to tell him where
+Joan was. Wrotham would be the last place in which he would look for
+her, and on Saturday he was leaving for the front. It was only just for
+a second that her mind wavered; she had initially too straight a nature
+for deceit.
+
+"Dick," she said, coming to a standstill and looking up at him, "you
+needn't go to London. Miss Rutherford"--she hesitated on the
+word--"Joan, is back at Wrotham."
+
+"At Wrotham?" he repeated, staring at her.
+
+"Yes," she answered, "Old Miss Rutherford died two months ago. They had
+sent for Joan; I believe she arrived the day her aunt died, and she has
+stayed there ever since. Once or twice I have met her out with Colonel
+Rutherford. No, wait"--she hurried on, once she had begun. "There is
+something else I must tell you. I went, you know, to see her in London,
+but I found that she had left. As I was coming away I met the other
+girl--I cannot remember her name, but she came here to tea--she insisted
+on my going back with her; she had something she wanted to tell me about
+Joan. It was a long, rather jumbled story, Dick; only two facts stand
+out of it. One was that the baby was never born; Joan was in some sort
+of accident when she first went back to London; and the other thing was
+that this girl wanted me to use my influence to persuade you that Joan
+really loved you; that what had angered you that night was all a
+mistake." She broke off short, and began again quickly. "I did not
+promise, Dick; in fact I told the girl I would do nothing to interfere.
+'If he can find his happiness anywhere else I shall be glad,' I said.
+And that is what I felt. I don't try and excuse myself; I never wanted
+you to marry her if you could forget her, and, Dick, I almost hoped you
+had--I was not going to remind you."
+
+"I see," said Dick. His pipe had gone out. He lit it again slowly and
+methodically. "Mabel," he said suddenly, "if I can persuade Joan to
+marry me before I go out, will you be nice to her as my wife?"
+
+"You can't marry her, Dick," Mabel remonstrated, "there isn't time. But
+if you will trust me again beyond this, I promise to be as nice to her
+as you would like me to be."
+
+"But I can, and what's more, I will," Dick answered. "I've
+shilly-shallied long enough. If she'll have me, and it would serve me
+jolly well right if she turned me down--it shall be a special licence at
+a registry office on Saturday morning. My train doesn't leave till
+two-thirty." He stood up very tall and straight. Mabel thought she had
+never seen him look so glad to be alive. "And now," he added, "I am
+going straight across to ask her. Wish me luck, Mabel."
+
+She stood up, too, and put both her hands on his. "You aren't angry with
+me?" she whispered. "Dick, from the bottom of my heart, I do wish you
+luck, as you call it."
+
+"Angry? Lord bless you, no!" he said, and suddenly he bent and kissed
+her. "You've argued about it, Mabel, but then I always knew you would
+argue. I trust you to be good to her after I'm gone; what more can I
+say?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX
+
+    "But love is the great amulet which makes the World a Garden."
+
+                                             ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.
+
+
+Colonel Rutherford and Joan had had breakfast early that morning, for
+Uncle John was going to London to attend some big meeting, at which,
+much to his own secret gratification, he had been asked to speak. He
+rehearsed the greater part of what he was going to say to Joan during
+breakfast, and on their way down to the station. He had long ago
+forgiven, or forgotten, which was more probable still, Joan's exile from
+his good graces. After Aunt Janet's funeral, when Joan had spoken to
+him rather nervously, suggesting her return to London, he had stared at
+her with unfeigned astonishment.
+
+"Back to London," he had said, "whatever for?"
+
+"To get some more work to do," Joan suggested.
+
+His shaggy eyebrows drew together in a frown. "Preposterous notion," he
+answered. "I never did agree with it. So long as a girl has a home, what
+does she want to work for? Besides, now your aunt is not here, who is
+going to look after the house and things?"
+
+The question seemed unanswerable, and since he had apparently forgiven
+the past, why should she remind him? She realized, too, that he needed
+her. She wrote asking Fanny to send on her things, and settled down to
+try and fill her mind and heart, as much as possible, with the daily
+round of small duties which are involved in the keeping of a house.
+
+This morning on her way back from the station, having seen Uncle John
+into his train for London, she let fat Sally walk a lot of the way. The
+country seemed to be asleep; for miles all round she could see across
+field after field, not a creature moving, not a soul in sight, only a
+little dust round a bend of the road showed where a motor-car had just
+passed. It occurred to her that her life had been just like that; the
+quiet, seeming, non-existence of the country; a flashing past of life
+which left its cloud of dust behind, and then the quiet closing round
+her again.
+
+    "The daily round, the common task,
+     Shall furnish all we need to ask."
+
+She hummed it under her breath.
+
+    "Room to deny ourselves--"
+
+Perhaps that was the lesson that she had needed to learn, for in the old
+days her watchword had been:
+
+    "Room to fulfil myself."
+
+If it was not for Uncle John now she would have liked to have gone back
+to London and thrown herself into some sort of work. Women would be
+needed before long, the papers said, to do the work of the men who must
+be sent to the firing-line. But Uncle John was surely the work to her
+hand; she would do it with what heart she had, even though the long
+hours of sewing or knitting gave her too much time to think.
+
+Sally having been handed over to the stable-boy, Joan betook herself
+into the dining-room. Thursday was the day on which the flowers were
+done; Mary had already spread the table with newspaper, and collected
+the vases from all over the house. They had been cleaned and fresh water
+put in them; she was allowed to do as little work as possible, but the
+empty flower-basket and the scissors stood waiting at her hand. The
+gardener would really have preferred to have done the flower-cutting
+himself, but Aunt Janet had always insisted upon doing it, and Joan
+carried on the custom. There were only a few late roses left, but she
+gathered an armful of big white daisies.
+
+As she came back from the hall Joan saw Dick waiting for her. The maid
+had let him in and gone to find "Miss Joan." Strangely enough the first
+thought that came into her mind was not a memory of the last time that
+they had met or a wonder as to why he was here; she could see that he
+was in khaki, and to her it meant only one thing. He was going to the
+front, he had come to say good-bye to her before he went. All the colour
+left her face, she stared at him, the basket swinging on her arm, the
+daisies clutched against her black dress.
+
+"Joan," Dick said quickly; he came towards her. "Joan, didn't the maid
+find you, didn't they tell you I was here? What's the matter, dear; why
+are you frightened?"
+
+He took the flowers and the basket from her and laid them down on the
+hall table. Mary coming back at the moment, saw them standing hand in
+hand, and ran to the kitchen to tell the others that Miss Joan's young
+man had come at last.
+
+"Isn't there somewhere you can take me where we can talk?" Dick was
+saying. "I have such an awful lot to say to you."
+
+"You have come to say good-bye," Joan answered. She looked up at him,
+her lips quivered a little. "You are going out there."
+
+Then he knew why she had been afraid, and behind his pity he was glad.
+
+"Joan," he whispered again, and quite simply she drew closer to him and
+laid her cheek against his coat, "does it really matter to you, dear?"
+
+His arms were round her, yet they did not hold her as tightly as she
+clung to him. "Must you go?" she said breathlessly. "There are such
+hundreds of others; must you go?"
+
+Dick could not find any words to put the great beating of his heart
+into, so he just held her close and laid his lips, against her hair.
+
+"Take me into that little room where I first saw you," he said
+presently. "I have remembered it often, Joan; I have always wanted to
+come back to it, and have you explain things to me there."
+
+She drew a little away and looked up at him. "What you thought of me the
+other night"--she spoke of it is yesterday, the months in between had
+slipped awry--"wasn't true, Dick. I----"
+
+He drew her to him quickly again, and this time he kissed her lips.
+"Let's forget it," he said softly. "I have only got to-day and
+to-morrow, I don't want to remember what a self-satisfied prig I was."
+
+"Is it to be as soon as that?" she asked. "And I shall only have had you
+for so short a time."
+
+"It is a short time," Dick assented. "But I am going to make the best
+of it; you wait till you have heard my plans."
+
+He laughed at her because she pointed out that the flowers could not be
+left to die, but he helped her to arrange them in the tall, clean vases.
+They won back to a brief, almost childish, happiness over the work, but
+when the last vase had been finished and carried back to its proper
+place, he caught hold of her hands again.
+
+"Now," he said, "let's talk real hard, honest sense; but first, where's
+my room?"
+
+She led him silently to the little room behind the drawing-room. She had
+taken it over again since her return; the pictures she liked best were
+on the walls, her books lay about on the table. The same armchair stood
+by the window; he could almost see her as he had seen her that first
+morning, her great brown eyes, wakened to newfound fear, staring into
+the garden.
+
+"You shall sit here," he said, leading her to the chair. It rather
+worried him to see the dumb misery in her eyes. "And I shall sit down on
+the floor at your feet. I can hold your hands and I can see your face,
+and your whole adorable self is near to me, that's what my heart has
+been hungering for. Now--will you marry me the day after to-morrow,
+before I go?"
+
+"Dick," she said quickly; she was speaking out of the pain in her heart,
+"why do you ask me? Why have you come back? Haven't you been fighting
+against it all this time because you knew that I--because some part of
+you doesn't want to marry me?"
+
+His eyes never wavered from hers, but he lifted the hands he held to his
+lips and kissed them. "When I saw you again in that theatre in
+Sevenoaks," he said, "it is perfectly true, one side of me argued with
+the other. When I came to your rooms and found that other man there,
+green jealousy just made me blind, and pride--which was distinctly
+jarred, Joan"--he tried to wake an answering smile in her eyes--"kept
+me away all this time."
+
+"Then why have you come back?" she repeated.
+
+"Because I love you," he answered. "It is a very hackneyed word, dear,
+but it means a lot."
+
+"But it doesn't always stay--love," she said. "Supposing if afterwards
+those thoughts came back to worry you. What would it mean to me if I saw
+them in your eyes?"
+
+"There isn't any reason why they should. Listen, dear"--he let go her
+hands and sat up very straight. "Let's go over it carefully and
+sensibly, and lay this bugbear of pain once and for all. Before you knew
+me or I knew you, you loved somebody else. Perhaps you only thought you
+loved him; anyway, I hope so; I am jealous enough of him as it is. Dear,
+I don't ask you to explain why you gave yourself to this man, whether it
+was impulse, or ignorance, or curiosity. So many things go to make up
+our lives; it is only to ourselves that we are really accountable. After
+to-day we won't dig over the past again. At the time it did not prevent
+me falling in love with you; for two years I thought about you
+sometimes, dreamed of you often. I made love to a good many other women
+in between; don't think that I show up radiantly white in comparison to
+you; but I loved just you all the time. I saw you in London once, the
+day after I landed, and I made up my mind then to find out where you
+lived, and to try and persuade you to marry me."
+
+He waited a minute or two; his eyes had gone out to the garden; he could
+see the tall daisies of which Joan had carried an armful waving against
+the dark wall behind them. Then he looked back at her very frankly.
+
+"It is no use trying to pretend," he said, "that I was not shocked when
+I first saw you dancing. You see, we men have got into a habit of
+dividing women into two classes, and you had suddenly, so it seemed to
+me, got into the wrong one. Dear little girl, I don't want to hurt
+you"--he put his hand on her knee and drew a little closer, so that she
+could feel him leaning against her. "I am just telling you all the
+stupid thoughts that were in me, so that you can at last understand that
+I love you. It only took me half a night to realize the mistake I had
+made, and then I set about--you may have noticed it--to make you love
+me. When I came up to London I had made up my mind that you did love me;
+I was walking as it were on air. It was a very nasty shock that
+afternoon in your room, Joan; I went away from it feeling as if the end
+of the world had come."
+
+"Oh, I know, I know," she said quickly. "And I had meant it to hurt you.
+I wanted to shake you out of what I thought was only a dream. I had not
+the courage to tell you, and yet, that is not quite true. I was afraid
+if I told you, and if you saw that I loved you at the same time, you
+would not let it make any difference. I did not want you to spoil your
+life, Dick."
+
+"You dear girl!" he answered. "On Monday," he went on slowly, "I got my
+orders for France. They are what I had been wanting and hoping for ever
+since the War started, and yet, till they came, funnily enough, I never
+realized what they meant. It seems strange to talk of death, or even to
+think of it, when one is young and so horribly full of life as I am--yet
+somehow this brings it near to me. It is not a question of facing it
+with the courage of which the papers write such a lot; the truth is,
+that one looks at it just for a moment, and then ordinary things push it
+aside. Next to death, Joan, there is only one big thing in the world,
+and that is Love. I had to see you again before I went; I had to find
+out if you loved me. I wanted to hold you, so that the feel of you
+should go with me in my dreams; to kiss you, so that the touch of your
+lips should stay on mine, even if death did put a cold hand across them.
+He is not going to"--he laughed suddenly and stood up, drawing her into
+his arms--"your face shall go before me, dear, and in the end I shall
+come home to you."
+
+"What can I say?" Joan whispered, "You know I love you. Take me then,
+Dick, and do as you wish with me."
+
+They talked over the problem of his people and her people after they had
+won back to a certain degree of sense, and Dick told Joan of how Mabel
+had wished him luck just as he started out.
+
+"You are going to be great friends," he said, "and Mother will come
+round too, she always does."
+
+"I am less afraid of your Mother than I am of Mabel," Joan confessed. "I
+don't believe Mabel will ever like me."
+
+Dick stayed to lunch and waited on afterwards to see Colonel Rutherford.
+He had extracted a promise from Joan to marry him on Saturday by special
+licence. He would have to go up to town to see about it himself the next
+day; he wanted to leave everything arranged and settled for her first.
+He and Joan walked down to the woods after lunch, and Joan tried to tell
+him of her first year in London, and of some of the motives that had
+driven her. He listened in silence; he was conscious more of jealousy
+than anything else; he was glad when she passed on to talk of her later
+struggles in London; of Shamrock House, of Rose Brent and Fanny.
+
+"And that man I met at your place," he asked. "You did not even think
+you loved him, did you, Joan?"
+
+"No," she answered quickly, "never, Dick, and he had never been to my
+room before. He just pretended he had been to annoy you because I
+suppose he saw it would hurt me."
+
+Colonel Rutherford arrived for tea very tired, but jubilant at the
+success of the meeting, which had brought in a hundred recruits. He did
+not remember anything about Dick, but was delighted to see him because
+he was in uniform. The news of the other's early departure to the front
+filled Colonel Rutherford with envy.
+
+"What wouldn't I give to be your age, young man," he grunted.
+
+Joan slipped away and left them after tea, and it was then that Dick
+broached the subject of their marriage.
+
+"I have loved her for two years," he said simply, "and I have persuaded
+her to marry me before I leave on Saturday. There is no reason why I
+should not marry, and if I die she will get my small amount of money,
+and a pension."
+
+Colonel Rutherford went rather an uncomfortable shade of red. "You said
+just now," he said, "that you were the doctor here two years ago. Did
+you know my niece in those days?"
+
+"I only saw her once," Dick admitted. "I was called in professionally,
+but I loved her from the moment I saw her, sir."
+
+"God bless my soul!" murmured Colonel Rutherford. A faint fragrance from
+his own romance seemed to come to him from out the past. "Then you know
+all about what I was considering it would be my painful duty to tell
+you."
+
+"Yes," Dick answered, "I know."
+
+The other man came suddenly to him and held out his hand. "I don't know
+you," he said, "but I like you. We were very hard on Joan two years ago;
+I have often thought of it since; I should like to see a little
+happiness come into her life and I believe you will be able to give it
+her. I am glad."
+
+"Thank you," Dick said. They shook hands quite gravely as men will.
+"Then I may marry her on Saturday?"
+
+"Why, certainly, boy," the other answered; "And she shall live with me
+till you come back."
+
+"You are very lucky, Joan," he said to his niece after Dick had gone
+away. "He is an extremely nice chap, that. I hope you realize how lucky
+you are."
+
+Joan did not answer him in so many words. She just kissed him good-night
+and ran out of the room. To-night of all nights she needed Aunt Janet;
+she threw a shawl round her shoulders presently and stole out. The
+cemetery lay just across the road, she could slip into it without
+attracting any attention. This time she brought no gift of flowers, only
+she knelt by the grave, and whispered her happiness in the prayer she
+prayed.
+
+"God keep him always, and bring him back to me."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXI
+
+    "God gave us grace to love you
+       Men whom our hearts hold dear;
+     We too have faced the battle
+       Striving to hide our fear.
+
+    "God gave us strength to send you,
+       Courage to let you go;
+     All that it meant to lose you
+       Only our sad hearts know.
+
+    "Yet by your very manhood
+       Hold we your honour fast.
+     God shall give joy to England
+       When you come home at last."
+
+
+Not till she felt Mabel's soft warm lips on her cheek and knew herself
+held in the other's arms, did Joan wake to the fact that the marriage
+was finished and that she was Dick's wife. All the morning she had moved
+and answered questions and smiled, when other people smiled, in a sort
+of trance, out of which she was afraid to waken. The only fact that
+stood out very clear was that Dick was going away in the afternoon;
+every time she saw a clock it showed that the afternoon was so many
+minutes nearer.
+
+"You have got to help me to be brave," she had said to Dick the night
+before. "Other women let their men go, and make no outward fuss. I don't
+want to be different to them."
+
+"And you won't be," he had answered, kissing her. "If you feel like
+crying, just look at me, and as your lord and master, I'll frown at you
+to show that I don't approve."
+
+He himself was in the wildest, most hilarious of spirits. As he had said
+to Joan, the thought of death had only touched upon his mind for a
+second; now the mere idea of it seemed ridiculous. He was going out to
+help in a great fight, and he was going to marry Joan. She would be
+waiting for him when he came back; what could a man want more?
+
+The Rutherfords came up on Friday to spend the night before the wedding
+in town, and in the evening Joan and Dick went to a theatre. It was,
+needless to say, his idea, but he did it with a notion that it would
+cheer Joan up. If you want to know real misery, sit through a musical
+comedy with someone you love more than the whole world next to you, and
+with the knowledge that he is going to the War the next day in your
+heart. Joan thought of it every moment. When the curtain was up and the
+audience in darkness, Dick would slip his hand into hers and hold it,
+but his eyes followed the events on the stage, and he could laugh quite
+cheerfully at the funny man's antics. Joan never even looked at them;
+she sat with her eyes on Dick, just watching him all the time. When they
+had driven back to the hotel at which the Rutherfords were staying, and
+in the taxi Dick had taken her into his arms and rather fiercely made
+her swear that she loved him, that she was glad to be marrying him, some
+shadow from her anguish had touched on him, it seemed he could not let
+her go. "Damn to-morrow!" he said hoarsely, and held her so close that
+the pressure hurt, yet she was glad of the pain as it came from him.
+
+She could not ask him into the hotel, for they had no private
+sitting-room, so they said good-night to each other on the steps, with
+the taxi driver and the hotel porter watching them.
+
+"To-morrow, then, at twelve," Dick had whispered. "But I am going to
+bring Mabel round before then; she gets up at about eleven, I think."
+
+"To-morrow," Joan answered; her eyes would not let him go.
+
+They stood staring at each other for a minute or two while the taxi-cab
+driver busied himself with the engine of his car, and the hall porter
+walked discreetly out of sight. Then Dick lifted his hand quickly to the
+salute and turned away.
+
+"Drive like hell!" he said to the man. "Anywhere you please, but end me
+up at the Junior Conservative Club."
+
+"Couldn't even kiss her," communed the man to himself. "That's the worst
+of being a toff. Can't kiss your girl if anyone else happens to be
+about."
+
+Mabel had been very nice to Joan the next morning. She had buried all
+thoughts of jealousy and dismay, and when she looked into the other
+girl's eyes she forgave her everything and was only intensely sorry for
+her. Mrs. Grant had, very fortunately, as Dick said, stuck to her
+opinion and refused to have anything to do with the wedding. She had
+said good-bye to Dick on Friday morning with a wild outburst of tears,
+but he could not really feel that it meant very much to her.
+
+"Mother will have forgotten in a week that she disapproved," Mabel told
+Joan. "You must very often come and spend the day with us."
+
+Then they had driven down to the registry office, all four of them, and
+in a dark, rather dingy little room, a man with a curiously irritating
+voice had read aloud something to them from a book. Now they stood
+outside in the sunshine again, Mabel had kissed Joan, and Uncle John was
+blinking at her out of old eyes that showed a suspicion of tears in
+them. A big clock opposite told her the time was a quarter to one; in an
+hour and three-quarters Dick would be gone.
+
+They had lunch in a little private room at a restaurant close to
+Victoria Station. Joan tried to eat, and tried to laugh and talk with
+the others, because Mabel had whispered to her on the way in: "You've
+got to help Dick through the next hour, it isn't going to be easy for
+him." And that had made Joan look at him with new eyes, and she could
+see that his face was very white, and that he seemed almost afraid to
+look at her.
+
+After lunch Mabel and Colonel Rutherford went on ahead and left the two
+young people to say their good-bye alone. When they had gone Dick pushed
+the things in front of him on the table aside, and laid his head down on
+his hands. "My God!" she heard him say, "I wish I had not got to go."
+
+He had been so pleased before, so excited over his different
+preparations, so wildly keen to be really on the move at last. Joan ran
+to him quickly; kneeling on the floor by his side, throwing her arms
+around him. Her own fears were forgotten in her desire to make him brave
+again.
+
+"It won't be for long, Dick," she whispered. "I know something right
+inside my heart tells me that you will come back. It is only like
+putting aside our happiness for a little. Dear, you would be wretched if
+you could not go. Just having me would not make up to you for that."
+
+He turned and caught her to him quickly. "If I had had you," he said
+harshly, "it would be different. It would make going so much easier."
+
+"You will come back," she answered softly. Her eyes held his, their
+hearts beat close and fast against each other.
+
+"It seems," he said a minute or two later, "that it is you who are
+helping me not to make a fuss, and not the other way about as we
+arranged." He stood up, slowly lifting her with him. "It is time we were
+off, Joan," he said. "And upon my soul, I need some courage, little
+girl. What can you do for me?"
+
+"Well, if I cry," suggested Joan, her head a little on one side--she
+must be cheerful, she realized; it was funny, but in this she could be
+stronger than he, and she must be for his sake--"I am sure you would get
+so annoyed that the rest would be forgotten."
+
+"If I see you cry," he threatened, "I shall get out even after the train
+has started, and that will mean all sorts of slurs on my reputation."
+
+They walked across to Victoria Station and came in at once to a scene of
+indescribable noise and confusion. Besides Dick's unit there was a
+regiment going. The men stood lined up in the big square yard of the
+station. Some had women with them, wives and mothers and sweethearts;
+children clung to the women's skirts, unnoticed and frightened into
+quietness by the sight and sound of their mothers' grief. Railway
+officials, looking very important and frightfully overworked, ran in and
+out of the crowd. The train was standing at the platform, part of it
+already full, nearly every window had its little group of anxious-faced
+women, trying to say good-bye to their respective relatives in the
+carriage.
+
+Dick and Joan walked the length of the train, and found that Dick's man
+had stowed away his things and reserved a place for his master in one of
+the front carriages. Then Colonel Rutherford and Mabel joined them and
+they all talked, trying to keep up an animated conversation as to the
+weather; would the Channel crossing be very rough; what chance was there
+of his going to Boulogne instead of to Havre; Joan stood close to Dick,
+just touching him; there was something rather pathetic in the way she
+did not attempt to close her hand upon the roughness of his coat, but
+was content to feel it brushing against her. The regimental band had
+struck up "Tipperary"; the men were being marshalled to take their
+places in the train. Joan wondered if the band played so loud and so
+persistently to drown the noise of the women's crying. One young wife
+had hysterics, and had to be carried away screaming. They saw the
+husband, he had fallen out of the ranks to try and hold the girl when
+the crying first began, now he stood and stared after her as they
+carried her away. Quite a boy, very white about the face, and with
+misery in his eyes. Joan felt a wave of resentment against the woman;
+she had no right, because she loved him, to make his going so much the
+harder to bear.
+
+A porter ran along the platform calling out, "Take your seats, please,
+take your seats." Uncle John was shaking hands and saying good-bye to
+Dick, "I'll look after her for you," Joan heard him say. Then Mabel
+moved between them for a second, and pulling down Dick's head, kissed
+him. After that, it seemed, she was left alone with Dick; Colonel
+Rutherford and Mabel had gone away. How desperately her hand for the
+second clutched on to the piece of his coat that was near to her! She
+could not let him go, could not, could not. The engine whistle emitted a
+long thin squeak, the soldiers at the back of the train had started
+singing the refrain of "Tipperary." Just for a second his arms were
+round her, his lips had brushed against hers. That was all it amounted
+to, but she had looked up at him and she had seen the need in his eyes.
+
+"Good-bye," she whispered. There was not a vestige of tears or fright in
+her voice. "You will be back soon, Dick. It is never good-bye."
+
+"No," he agreed. "Never good-bye."
+
+Then he had gone; not a minute too soon, for the train had already
+started. She could not even see his face at the window, a great
+blackness had come over her eyes, but she stood very straight held,
+waving and smiling.
+
+A crowd of the soldiers' wives ran past her up the platform, trying to
+catch on to the hands held out to them from the windows. The men cheered
+and sang and sang again. It could only have been one or two seconds that
+she stood there, then slowly the blackness lifted from her eyes. A word
+had risen in her heart, she said it almost aloud; the sound of it pushed
+aside her tears and brought her a strange comfort. "England." It was the
+name that had floated at the back of her prayers always when she prayed
+for Dick. She was glad that he had gone, even the misery in her heart
+could not flood out that gladness: "Who dies, if England lives?"
+
+Mabel was standing near her and slipped her hand into hers. "Come away,
+dear," she heard Mabel say; "Colonel Rutherford has got a taxi for us."
+
+Joan was grateful to Mabel. She realized suddenly that the other woman,
+who had also loved Dick, had been content to stand aside at the last and
+leave them alone. She turned to her like a child turns for comfort to
+someone whom instinctively it knows it can trust.
+
+"I have been good," she said, "haven't I? I haven't shed a tear. Dick
+said I wasn't to, and, Mabel, you know, I am glad that he has gone.
+There are some things that matter more than just loving a person, aren't
+there?"
+
+"Honour, and duty, and the soul of man," Mabel answered. She laughed, a
+little strange sound that held tears within it. "Oh, yes, Joan, you are
+right to be glad that he has gone. It will make the future so much more
+worth having."
+
+"Yes," Joan whispered. Her eyes looked out over the crowded station; the
+little groups of weeping women; the sadder faces of those who did not
+weep and yet were hopeless. Her own eyes were full of great faith and a
+radiant promise. "He will come back, I know he will come back," she
+said.
+
+Outside the band played ceaselessly and untiringly to drown the sound of
+the women's tears:
+
+    "It's a long way to Tipperary,
+       It's a long way to go;
+     It's a long way to Tipperary
+       To the dearest girl I know.
+
+    "Farewell, Piccadilly, farewell, Leicester Square,
+     It's a long, long way to Tipperary
+     But my heart's right there."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+THE END
+
+
+_Printed at The Chapel River Press, Kingston, Surrey._
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Transcriber's note
+
+
+Minor punctuation errors have been corrected without notice. The
+following words were spelled in two different ways and were not changed:
+
+arm-chair, armchair
+ball-room, ballroom
+over-worked, overworked
+
+A few obvious typographical errors have been corrected and are listed
+below.
+
+Page 11: "older women were belating" changed to "older women were debating".
+
+Page 22: "settled the had sat" changed to "settled she had sat".
+
+Page 32: "at firs thought was love" changed to "at first thought was love".
+
+Page 51: "must be ome explanation" changed to "must be some explanation".
+
+Page 53: "ushered in M Jarr.vis" changed to "ushered in Mr. Jarvis".
+
+Page 59: "talking to each other in whsipers" changed to "talking to each
+         other in whispers"
+
+Page 81: "Half-olay out," changed to "Half-way out,".
+
+Page 107: "the crowded steeets" changed to "the crowded streets".
+
+Page 140: "ladies to go ground" changed to "ladies to go around".
+
+Page 151: "found her downstars" changed to "found her downstairs".
+
+Page 162: "s not to be believed" changed to "was not to be believed".
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of To Love, by Margaret Peterson
+
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