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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/38685-8.txt b/38685-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..69816e5 --- /dev/null +++ b/38685-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,12532 @@ +Project Gutenberg's The Truants, by A. E. W. (Alfred Edward Woodley) Mason + +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: The Truants + +Author: A. E. W. (Alfred Edward Woodley) Mason + +Release Date: January 27, 2012 [EBook #38685] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE TRUANTS *** + + + + +Produced by Charles Bowen, from page scans provided by the Web Archive + + + + + + + + +Transcriber's Notes: + + 1. Page scan source: + http://www.archive.org/details/truantsnovel00maso + + 2. The diphthong oe is represented by [oe]. + + + + + + THE TRUANTS + + + + + + + BY THE SAME AUTHOR + + + THE FOUR FEATHERS. + CLEMENTINA. + MIRANDA OF THE BALCONY. + THE WATCHERS. + THE COURTSHIP OF MORRICE BUCKLER. + THE PHILANDERERS. + LAWRENCE CLAVERING. + ENSIGN KNIGHTLEY, AND OTHER STORIES. + + + + + + + THE TRUANTS + + + + + BY + + A. E. W. MASON + + AUTHOR OF + + "THE FOUR FEATHERS," "MIRANDA OF THE BALCONY," + + ETC., ETC. + + + + + LONDON + + SMITH, ELDER & CO., 15, WATERLOO PLACE + + 1904 + + (_All rights reserved_) + + + + + + + PRINTED BY + + WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, + + LONDON AND BECCLES. + + + + + CONTENTS + + + CHAPTER + + I. Pamela Mardale learns a very little History. + + II. Pamela looks on. + + III. The Truants. + + IV. Tony Stretton makes a Proposal. + + V. Pamela makes a Promise. + + VI. News of Tony. + + VII. The Lady on the Stairs. + + VIII. Gideon's Fleece. + + IX. The New Road. + + X. Mr. Chase. + + XI. On the Dogger Bank. + + XII. Tony's Inspiration. + + XIII. Tony Stretton returns to Stepney. + + XIV. Tony Stretton pays a Visit to Berkeley Square. + + XV. Mr. Mudge comes to the Rescue. + + XVI. The Foreign Legion. + + XVII. Callon leaves England. + + XVIII. South of Ouargla. + + XIX. The Turnpike Gate. + + XX. Mr. Chase does not answer. + + XXI. Callon redivivus. + + XXII. Mr. Mudge's Confession. + + XXIII. Roquebrune Revisited. + + XXIV. The End of the Experiment. + + XXV. Tony Stretton bids Farewell to the Legion. + + XXVI. Bad News for Pamela. + + XXVII. "Balak!" + + XXVIII. Homewards. + + XXIX. Pamela meets a Stranger. + + XXX. M. Giraud again. + + XXXI. At the Réserve. + + XXXII. Husband and Wife. + + XXXIII. Millie's Story. + + XXXIV. The Next Morning. + + XXXV. The Little House in Deanery Street. + + XXXVI. The End. + + + + + + THE TRUANTS + + + + + CHAPTER I + + PAMELA MARDALE LEARNS A VERY LITTLE HISTORY + + +There were only two amongst all Pamela Mardale's friends who guessed +that anything was wrong with her; and those two included neither her +father nor her mother. Her mother, indeed, might have guessed, had she +been a different woman. But she was a woman of schemes and little +plots, who watched with concentration their immediate developments, +but had no eyes for any lasting consequence. And it was no doubt as +well for her peace of mind that she never guessed. But of the others +it was unlikely that any one would suspect the truth. For Pamela made +no outward sign. She hunted through the winter from her home under the +Croft Hill in Leicestershire; she went everywhere, as the saying is, +during the season in London; she held her own in her own world, +lacking neither good spirits nor the look of health. There were, +perhaps, two small peculiarities which marked her off from her +companions. She was interested in things rather than in persons, and +she preferred to talk to old men rather than to youths. But such +points, taken by themselves, were not of an importance to attract +attention. + +Yet there were two amongst her friends who suspected: Alan Warrisden +and the schoolmaster of Roquebrune, the little village carved out of +the hillside to the east of Monte Carlo. The schoolmaster was the +nearer to the truth, for he not only knew that something was amiss, he +suspected what the something was. But then he had a certain advantage, +since he had known Pamela Mardale when she was a child. Their +acquaintance came about in the following way-- + +He was leaning one evening of December over the parapet of the tiny +square beside the schoolhouse, when a servant from the Villa +Pontignard approached him. + +"Could M. Giraud make it convenient to call at the villa at noon +to-morrow?" the servant asked. "Madame Mardale was anxious to speak to +him." + +M. Giraud turned about with a glow of pleasure upon his face. + +"Certainly," he replied. "But nothing could be more simple. I will be +at the Villa Pontignard as the clock strikes." + +The servant bowed, and without another word paced away across the +square and up the narrow winding street of Roquebrune, leaving the +schoolmaster a little abashed at his display of eagerness. M. Giraud +recognised that in one man's mind, at all events, he was now set down +for a snob, for a lackey disguised as a schoolmaster. But the moment +of shame passed. He had no doubt as to the reason of the summons, and +he tingled with pride from head to foot. It was his little brochure +upon the history of the village--written with what timidity, and +printed at what cost to his meagre purse!--which had brought him +recognition from the lady of the villa upon the spur of the hill. +Looking upwards he could just see the white walls of the villa +glimmering through the dusk, he could imagine its garden of trim lawns +and dark cypresses falling from bank to bank in ordered tiers down the +hillside. + +"To-morrow at noon," he repeated to himself; and now he was seized +with a shiver of fear at the thought of the mistakes in behaviour +which he was likely to make. What if Madame Mardale asked him to +breakfast? There would be unfamiliar dishes to be eaten with +particular forks. Sometimes a knife should be used and sometimes not. +He turned back to the parapet with the thought that he had better, +perhaps, send up a note in the morning pleading his duties at the +school as a reason for breaking his engagement. But he was young, and +as he looked down the steep slope of rock on which the village is +perched, anticipation again got the better of fear. He began to build +up his life like a fairy palace from the foundation of this brief +message. + +A long lane of steps led winding down from the square, and his eyes +followed it, as his feet had often done, to the little railway station +by the sea through which people journeyed to and fro between the great +cities, westwards to France and Paris, eastwards to Rome and Italy. +His eyes followed the signal lights towards another station of many +lamps far away to the right, and as he looked there blazed out +suddenly other lights of a great size and a glowing brilliancy, lights +which had the look of amazing jewels discovered in an eastern cave. +These were the lights upon the terrace of Monte Carlo. The +schoolmaster had walked that terrace on his mornings of leisure, had +sat unnoticed on the benches, all worship of the women and their +daintiness, all envy of the men and the composure of their manner. He +knew none of them, and yet one of them had actually sent for him, and +had heard of his work. He was to speak with her at noon to-morrow. + +Let it be said at once that there was nothing of the lackey under the +schoolmaster's shabby coat. The visit which he was bidden to pay was +to him not so much a step upwards as outwards. Living always in this +remote high village, where the rock cropped out between the houses, +and the streets climbed through tunnels of rock, he was always +tormented with visions of great cities and thoroughfares ablaze; he +longed for the jostle of men, he craved for other companionship than +he could get in the village wineshop on the first floor, as a fainting +man craves for air. The stars came out above his head; it was a clear +night, and they had never shone brighter. The Mediterranean, dark and +noiseless, swept out at his feet beyond the woods of Cap Martin. But +he saw neither the Mediterranean nor any star. His eyes turned to the +glowing terrace upon his right, and to the red signal-lamps below the +terrace. + +M. Giraud kept his engagement punctually. The clock chimed upon the +mantelpiece a few seconds after he was standing in the drawing-room of +the Villa Pontignard, and before the clock had stopped chiming Mrs. +Mardale came in to him. She was a tall woman, who, in spite of her +years, still retained the elegance of her youth, but her face was hard +and a trifle querulous, and M. Giraud was utterly intimidated. On the +other hand, she had good manners, and the friendly simplicity with +which she greeted him began to set him at his ease. + +"You are a native of Roquebrune, Monsieur?" said she. + +"No, Madame, my father was a peasant at Aigues-Mortes. I was born +there," he replied frankly. + +"Yet you write, if I may say so, with the love of a native for his +village," she went on. M. Giraud was on the point of explaining. Mrs. +Mardale, however, was not in the least interested in his explanation, +and she asked him to sit down. + +"My daughter, Monsieur, has an English governess," she explained, "but +it seems a pity that she should spend her winters here and lose the +chance of becoming really proficient in French. The curé recommended +me to apply to you, and I sent for you to see whether we could arrange +that you should read history with her in French during your spare +hours." + +M. Giraud felt his head turning. Here was his opportunity so long +dreamed of come at last. It might be the beginning of a career--it was +at all events that first difficult step outwards. He was to be the +teacher in appearance; at the bottom of his heart he knew that he was +to be the pupil, he accepted the offer with enthusiasm, and the +arrangements were made. Three afternoons a week he was to spend an +hour at the Villa Pontignard. + +"Well, I hope the plan will succeed, said Mrs. Mardale, but she spoke +in a voice which showed that she had no great hopes of success. And as +M. Giraud replied that he would at all events do his best, she +rejoined plaintively-- + +"It is not of you, Monsieur, that I have any doubts. But you do not +know my daughter. She will learn nothing which she does not want to +learn, she will not endure any governess who is not entirely her +slave, and she is fifteen and she really must learn something." + +Pamela Mardale, indeed, was at this time the despair of her mother. +Mrs. Mardale had mapped out for her daughter an ideal career. She was +to be a model of decorum in the Early Victorian style, at once an +ornament for a drawing-room and an excellent housekeeper, and she was +subsequently to make a brilliant marriage. The weak point of the +scheme was that it left Pamela out of the reckoning. There was her +passion for horses for one thing, and her distinct refusal, besides, +to sit quietly in any drawing-room. When she was a child, horses had +been persons to Pamela rather than animals, and, as her conduct +showed, persons preferable by far to human beings. Visitors to the +house under Croft Hill were at times promised a sight of Pamela, and +indeed they sometimes did see a girl in a white frock, with long black +legs, and her hair tumbled all over her forehead, neighing and +prancing at them from behind the gate of the stable yard. But they did +not see her at closer quarters than that, and it was certain that if +by any chance her lessons were properly learnt, they had been learnt +upon the corn-bin in the stables. Portraits of Pamela at the age of +nine remain, and they show a girl who was very pretty, but who might +quite well have been a boy, with a mass of unruly dark hair, a pair of +active dark eyes, and a good-humoured face alertly watching for any +mischief which might come its way. + +Something of the troubles which M. Giraud was likely to find ahead of +him Mrs. Mardale disclosed that morning, and the schoolmaster returned +to his house filled with apprehensions. The apprehensions, however, +were not justified. The little schoolmaster was so shy, so timid, that +Pamela was disarmed. She could be gentle when she chose, and she chose +now. She saw, too, M. Giraud's anxiety to justify her mother's choice +of him, and she determined with a sense of extreme virtue to be a +credit to his teaching. They became friends, and thus one afternoon, +when they had taken their books out into the garden of the villa, M. +Giraud confided to her the history of the brochure which had made them +acquainted. + +"It was not love for Roquebrune which led me to write it," he said. +"It was, on the contrary, my discontent. I was tortured with longings, +I was not content with the children's lessons for my working hours, +and the wineshop for my leisure. I took long walks over Cap Martin to +Mentone, along the Corniche road to La Turbie, and up Mont Agel. But +still I had my longings as my constant companions, and since +everywhere I saw traces of antiquity, I wrote this little history as a +relief. It kept my thoughts away from the great world." + +The garden ran here to a point at the extreme end of that outcropping +spur of rock on which the villa was built. They were facing westwards, +and the sun was setting behind the hills. It lay red upon the +Mediterranean on their left, but the ravine and front was already +dark, and down the hillside the shadows of the trees were lengthening. +At their feet, a long way below, a stream tumbled and roared amongst +the oleanders in the depths of the ravine. Pamela sat gazing +downwards, her lips parted in a smile. + +"The great world," she said in a low voice of eagerness. "I wonder +what it's like." + +That afternoon marked a distinct step in their friendship, and +thereafter in the intervals of their reading they talked continually +upon this one point they had in common, their curiosity as to the life +of the world beyond their village. But it happened that Pamela did the +greater part of the talking, and one afternoon that fact occurred to +her. + +"You always listen now, Monsieur," she said. "Why have you grown so +silent?" + +"You know more than I do, Mademoiselle." + +"I?" she exclaimed in surprise. "I only know about horses." Then she +laughed. "Really, we both know nothing. We can only guess and guess." + +And that was the truth. Pamela's ideas of the world were as visionary, +as dreamlike as his, but they were not his, as he was quick to +recognise. The instincts of her class, her traditions, the influence +of her friends, were all audible in her voice as well as in her words. +To her the world was a great flower garden of pleasure with plenty of +room for horses. To him it was a crowded place of ennobling strife. + +"But it's pleasant work guessing," she continued, "isn't it? Then why +have you stopped?" + +"I will tell you, Mademoiselle. I am beginning to guess through your +eyes." + +The whistle of a train, the train from Paris, mounted through the +still air to their ears. + +"Well," said Pamela, with a shrug of impatience, "we shall both know +the truth some time." + +"You will, Mademoiselle," said the schoolmaster, suddenly falling out +of his dream. + +Pamela looked quickly at him. The idea that he would be left behind, +that he would stay here all his life listening to the sing-song drone +of the children in the schoolroom, teaching over and over again with +an infinite weariness the same elementary lessons, until he became +shabby and worn as the lesson-books he handled, had never struck her +till this moment. The trouble which clouded his face was reflected by +sympathy upon hers. + +"But you won't stay here," she said gently. "Oh no! Let me think!" and +she thought with a child's oblivion of obstacles and a child's +confidence. She imparted the wise result of her reflections to M. +Giraud the next afternoon. + +He came to the garden with his eyes fevered and his face drawn. + +"You are ill?" said Pamela. "We will not work to-day." + +"It's nothing," he replied. + +"Tell me," said she. + +M. Giraud looked out across the valley. + +"Two travellers came up to Roquebrune yesterday. I met them as I +walked home from here. I spoke to them and showed them the village, +and took them by the short cut of the steps down to the railway +station. They were from London. They talked of London and of Paris. +It's as well visitors come up to Roquebrune rarely. I have not slept +all night," and he clasped and unclasped his hands. + +"Hannibal crossed the Alps," said Pamela. "I read it in your book," +and then she shook a finger at him, just as the schoolmaster might +have done to one of his refractory pupils. + +"Listen," said she. "I have thought it all out." + +The schoolmaster composed himself into the attentive attitude of a +pupil. + +"You are to become a Deputy." + +That was the solution of the problem. Pamela saw no difficulties. He +would need a dress-suit of course for official occasions, which she +understood were numerous. A horse, too, would be of use, but that +didn't matter so much. The horse was regretfully given up. It might +come later, he must get elected first, never mind how. In a word, he +was as good as a Deputy already. And from a Deputy to the President of +the French Republic, the step after all was not so very long. "Though +I am not quite sure that I approve of Republics," said Pamela, very +seriously. + +However, that was the best she could do in the way of mapping out his +future, and the schoolmaster listened, seeing the world through her +eyes. Thus three winters passed and Pamela learned a very little +history. + +Towards the end of the third winter the history books were put away. +Pamela was now eighteen and looking eagerly forward to her first +season in London. And no doubt frocks and hats occupied more of her +thoughts than did the fortunes of the schoolmaster. Some remorse for +her forgetfulness seized her the day before she went away. It was a +morning of spring, and the schoolmaster saw her coming down the dark +narrow streets towards him. She was tall beyond the average, but +without ungainliness, long of limb and lightly built, and she walked +with the very step of youth. Her dark hair swept in two heavy waves +above her forehead, and was coiled down behind on the back of her +neck. Her throat rose straight and slim from the firm shoulders, and +her eyes glowed with anticipation. Though her hair was dark, she was +not sallow. Her face was no less fresh and clear than were her eyes, +and a soft colour like the bloom of a fruit brightened her cheeks. In +that old brown street she shone like a brilliant flower, and Giraud, +as he watched her, felt all at once that he could have no place in her +life, and in his humility he turned aside. But she ran after him and +caught him up. + +"I am going to-morrow," she said, and she tried to keep the look of +happiness out of her eyes, the thrill out of her voice. And she +failed. + +"It is good-bye, then," said he. + +"For a little while. I shall come back to Roquebrune in December." + +The schoolmaster smiled. + +"I shall look forward from to-day until that month comes. You will +have much to tell me." + +"Yes, shan't I?" she cried; and then, lest her eagerness should hurt +her friend, she added, "But I shall not forget our quiet afternoons on +the garden terrace." + +The recollection of them, however, was not strong enough to check +either her thoughts or their utterance. Later on perhaps, in after +years, she might in her musings return to that terrace and the +speculations they indulged in, and the fairy palaces they built, with +an envy of the ignorance and the high thoughts of youth. To-day she +was all alert to grasp the future in her hands. One can imagine her +looking much as she looked in those portraits of her childhood. + +"News of the great world," she cried. "I shall bring it back. We will +talk it over in Roquebrune and correct our guesses. For I shall know." + +As a fact, they never did talk over her news, but that she could not +foresee. She went on her way with a smile upon her face: all +confidence and courage, and expectation, a brilliant image of youth. +Giraud, as he watched her the proud poise of her head, the light +springing step, the thing of beauty and gentleness which she was, +breathed a prayer that no harm might come to her, and no grief ever +sadden her face. + +The next morning she went away, and the schoolmaster lost his one +glimpse of the outer world. But he lived upon the recollections of it, +and took again to his long walks on the Corniche road. The time hung +heavily upon his hands. He hungered for news, and no news came, and +when in the month of December he noticed that the shutters were opened +in the Villa Pontignard, and that there was a stir of servants about +the house, he felt that the shutters were being opened after a long +dark time from his one window on the outside world. He frequented the +little station from that moment. No "Rapide" passed from France on its +way to Italy during his leisure hours but he was there to watch its +passengers. Mrs. Mardale came first, and a fortnight afterwards Pamela +descended from a carriage with her maid. + +Giraud watched her with a thrill of longing. It was not merely his +friend who had returned, but his instructor, with new and wonderful +knowledge added to the old. + +Then came his first chilling moment of disillusion. It was quite +evident that she saw him as she was stepping on to the platform. Her +eyes went straight to his--and yet she turned away without the +slightest sign of recognition and busied herself about her luggage. +The world had spoilt her. That was his first thought, but he came to a +truer understanding afterwards. And indeed that thought had barely +become definite in his mind, when she turned again, and, holding out +her hand, came to him with a smile. + +"You are well?" she said. + +"Yes," said he. + +And they walked up the long flight of steps to Roquebrune, talking +banalities. She gave him none of the news for which he longed, and +they spoke not at all of the career which together they had mapped out +for him. All their long talks upon the terrace, their plans and their +speculations seemed in an instant to Giraud to have become part of a +pleasant, very foolish, and very distant past. He was aware of the +vast gulf between them. With a girl's inimitable quickness to adapt +herself to new surroundings, she had acquired in the few months of her +absence the ease, the polish, and the armour of a woman of the world. +He was still the village schoolmaster, the peasant tortured with vain +aspirations, feeding upon vain dreams; and in this moment he saw +himself very clearly. Her silence upon their plan helped him to see +himself thus. Had she still believed in that imagined career, surely +she would have spoken of it. In a word, he was still looking at the +world through her eyes. + +"You must come up to the villa," she said. "I shall look forward to +your coming." + +They were in the little square by the schoolhouse and he took the +words for his dismissal. She went up the hill alone and slowly, like +one that is tired. Giraud, watching her, could not but compare her +with the girl who had come lightly down that street a few months ago. +It dawned upon him that, though knowledge had been acquired, something +had gone, something perhaps more valuable, the elasticity from her +step, the eagerness from her eyes. + +Giraud did not go up to the villa of his own accord, but he was asked +to lunch in a week's time, and after lunch Pamela and he went out into +the garden. Instinctively they walked down to that corner on the point +of the bluff which overhung the ravine and the white torrent amongst +the oleanders in its depths. They had come indeed to the bench on +which they used to sit before Pamela was quite aware of the direction +their steps had taken. She drew back suddenly as she raised her head. + +"Oh no, not here," she cried, and she moved away quickly with a look +of pain. Giraud suddenly understood why she had turned away at the +railway station. Here they had dreamed, and the reality had shown the +dreams to be bitterly false, so false that the very place where they +had dreamed had become by its associations a place of pain. She had +needed for herself that first moment when she had stepped down from +the carriage. + +"The world must be the home of great troubles,' said Giraud, sadly. + +"And how do you know that?" Pamela asked with a smile. + +"From you," he replied simply. + +The answer was unexpected. Pamela stopped and looked at him with +startled eyes. + +"From me? I have said nothing--nothing at all." + +"Yet I know. How else should I know except from you, since through you +alone I see the world?" + +"A home of great troubles?" she repeated, speaking lightly. "Not for +all. You are serious, my friend, this afternoon, and you should not +be, for have I not come back?" + +The schoolmaster was not deceived by her evasion. There had come a +gravity into her manner, and a womanliness into her face, in a degree +more than natural at her years. + +"Let us talk of you for a change," said she. + +"Well, and what shall we say?" asked Giraud, and a constraint fell +upon them both. + +"We must forget those fine plans," he continued at length. "Is it not +so? I think I have learnt that too from you." + +"I hare said nothing," she interrupted quickly. + +"Precisely," said he, with a smile. "The school at Roquebrune will +send no Deputy to Paris." + +"Oh! why not?" said Pamela, but there was no conviction in her voice. +Giraud was not of the stern stuff + + + "To break his birth's invidious bar." + + +He had longings, but there was the end. + +"At all events," she said, turning to him with a great earnestness, +"we shall be friends always, whatever happens." + +The words were the death-knell to the schoolmaster's aspirations. They +conveyed so much more than was actually said. He took them bravely +enough. + +"That is a good thing," he said in all sincerity. "If I stay here all +my life, I shall still have the memory of the years when I taught you +history. I shall know, though I do not see you, that we are friends. +It is a great thing for me." + +"For me, too," said Pamela, looking straight into his eyes, and she +meant her words no less than he had meant his. Yet to both they had +the sound of a farewell. And in a way they were. They were the +farewell to the afternoons upon the terrace, they closed the door upon +their house of dreams. + +Giraud leaned that evening over the parapet in the little square of +Roquebrune. The Mediterranean lay dark and quiet far below, the +terrace of Monte Carlo glowed, and the red signal-lamps pointed out +the way to Paris. But he was no longer thinking of his fallen plans. +He was thinking of the girl up there in the villa who had been struck +by some blind blow of Destiny, who had grown a woman before her time. +It was a pity, it was a loss in the general sum of things which make +for joy. + +He had of course only his suspicions to go upon. But they were soon +strengthened. For Pamela fell into ill-health, and the period of +ill-health lasted all that winter. After those two years had passed, +she disappeared for a while altogether out of Giraud's sight. She came +no more to the Villa Pontignard, but stayed with her father and her +horses at her home in Leicestershire. Her mother came alone to +Roquebrune. + + + + + CHAPTER II + + PAMELA LOOKS ON + + +Alan Warrisden was one of the two men who had walked up to Roquebrune +on that afternoon of which M. Giraud spoke. But it was not until +Pamela had reached the age of twenty that he made her acquaintance at +Lady Millingham's house in Berkeley Square. He took her down to +dinner, and, to tell the truth, paid no particular attention either to +her looks or her conversation. His neighbour upon the other side +happened to be a friend whom he had not seen for some while, and for a +good part of the dinner he talked to her. A few days afterwards, +however, he called upon Lady Millingham, and she asked at once quite +eagerly-- + +"Well, what did you think of Pamela Mardale?" + +Warrisden was rather at a loss. He was evidently expected to answer +with enthusiasm, and he had not any very definite recollections on +which enthusiasm could be based. He did his best, however; but he was +unconvincing. Lady Millingham shrugged her shoulders and frowned. She +had been married precisely a year, and was engaged in plans for +marrying off all her friends with the greatest possible despatch. + +"I shall send you in with somebody quite old the next time you dine +here," she said severely, and she discoursed at some length upon +Pamela's charms. "She loves horses, and yet she's not a bit horsey," +she said in conclusion, "and there's really nothing better than that. +And just heaps of men have wanted to marry her." She leaned back +against her sofa and contemplated Warrisden with silent scorn. She had +set her heart upon this marriage more than upon any other. Of all the +possible marriages in London, there was not one, to her mind, so +suitable as this. Pamela Mardale came of one of the oldest families of +commoners in Leicestershire. The family was not well off, the estate +had shrunk year by year, and what was left was mortgaged, owing in +some degree to that villa at Roquebrune upon which Mrs. Mardale +insisted. Warrisden, on the other hand, was more than well off, his +family was known, and at the age of twenty-eight he was still dividing +his life between the season in London and shooting expeditions about +the world. And he had the look of a man who might do something more. + +That visit had its results. Warrisden met Pamela Mardale again and +realised that Lady Millingham's indignation had been justified. At the +end of that season he proposed, and was gently refused. But if he was +slow to move, he was also firm to persevere. He hunted with the Quorn +that winter, and during the following season he was persistently but +unobtrusively at her elbow; so that Pamela came, at all events, to +count upon him as a most reliable friend. Having duly achieved that +place in her thoughts, he disappeared for ten months and returned to +town one afternoon in the last week of June. There were letters +waiting for him in his rooms, and amongst them a card from Lady +Millingham inviting him to a dance upon that night. At eleven o'clock +his _coupé_ turned out of Piccadilly and entered Berkeley Square. At +the bottom of the square the lighted windows of the house blazed out +upon the night, the balconies were banked with flowers, and behind the +flowers, silhouetted against the light, were visible the thronged +faces of men and women. Warrisden leaned forward, scrutinising the +shapes of the heads, the contours of the faces. His sight, sharpened +by long practice over wide horizons, was of the keenest; he could see, +even at that distance, the flash of jewels on neck and shoulder. But +the face he looked for was not there. + +Lady Millingham, however, set his mind at case. + +"You are back, then?" she cried. + +"This afternoon." + +"You will find friends here." + +Warrisden passed on into the reception rooms. It seemed to him indeed +that all the friends he had ever made were gathered to this one house +on this particular evening. He was a tall man, and his height made him +noticeable upon most occasions. He was the more noticeable now by +reason of his sunburn and a certain look of exhilaration upon his +face. The season was drawing to its end, and brown faces were not so +usual but that the eyes turned to them. He spoke, however, the fewest +possible words to the men who greeted him, and he did not meet the +eyes of any woman. Yet he saw the women, and was in definite quest of +one of them. That might have been noticed by a careful observer, for +whenever he saw a man older than the rest talking to a girl he +quickened his pace that he might the sooner see that girl's face. He +barely looked into the ball-room at all, but kept to the corridors, +and, at last, in a doorway, came face to face with Pamela Mardale. He +saw her face light up, and the hand held out to him was even eagerly +extended. + +"Have you a dance to spare?" + +Pamela looked quickly round upon her neighbours. + +"Yes, this one," she answered. She bowed to her companion, a man, as +Warrisden expected, much older than herself, and led the way at once +towards the balcony. Warrisden saw a youth emerge from the throng and +come towards them. Pamela was tall, and she used her height at this +moment. She looked him in the face with so serene an indifference that +the youth drew back disconcerted. Pamela was deliberately cutting her +partners. + +Another man might have built upon the act, but Warrisden was shrewd, +and shrewdness had taught him long since to go warily in thought where +Pamela Mardale was concerned. She might merely be angry. He walked by +her side and said nothing. Even when they were seated on the balcony, +he left for her to speak first. She was sitting upon the outside +against the railing, so that the light from the windows streamed full +upon her face. He watched it, looking for the change which he desired. +But it had still the one fault he found with it. It was still too +sedate, too womanly for her years. It happened that they had found a +corner where flowers made a sort of screen, and they could talk in low +voices without being overheard. + +"I heard of you," she said. "You were shooting woodcock in Dalmatia." + +"That was at Christmas." + +"Yes. You were hurt there." + +"Not seriously," he replied. "A sheep-dog attacked me. They are savage +brutes, and indeed they have to be, there are so many wolves. The +worst of it is, if you are attacked, you mustn't kill the dog, or +there's trouble." + +"I heard of you again. You were at Quetta, getting together a +caravan." + +"That was in February. I crossed by the new trade route from Quetta to +Seistan." + +She had spoken in an indefinite tone, which left him with no clue to +her thoughts. Now, however she turned her eyes upon him, and said in a +lower voice, which was very gentle-- + +"Don't you think yon might have told me that you were going away for a +year?" + +Warrisden had gone away deliberately, and as deliberately he had +abstained from telling her of his intention. He had no answer to make +to her question, and he did not attempt to invent one. He sat still +and looked at her. She followed the question with another. +"Don't you think it would have been kinder if you had written to me +once or twice, instead of letting me hear about you from any chance +acquaintance?" + +Again he made no answer. For he had deliberately abstained from +writing. The gentleness with which she spoke was the most hopeful sign +for him which she had made that evening. He had expected a harsher +accusation. For Pamela made her claims upon her friends. They must put +her first or there was likely to be a deal of trouble. + +"Well," she said, with a shrug of her shoulders, "I hope you enjoyed +it." + +"Yes. I wish I could have thought you would have enjoyed it too. But +you wouldn't have." + +"No," she answered listlessly. + +Warrisden was silent. He had expected the answer, but he was none the +less disappointed to receive it. To him there was no century in the +history of the world comparable to that in which he lived. It had its +faults, of course. It was ugly and a trifle feverish, but to men of +his stamp, the men with means and energy, a new world with countless +opportunities had been opened up. Asia and Africa were theirs, and the +farthest islands of the sea. Pamela, however, turned her back on it. +The new trade route to Seistan had no message for her. She looked with +envy upon an earlier century. + +"Of course," he resumed, "it's pleasant to come back, if only as a +preparation for going away again." + +And then Pamela turned on him with her eyes wide open and a look of +actual trouble upon her face. + +"No," she said with emphasis. She leaned forward and lowered her +voice. "You have no right to work upon people and make them your +friends, if you mean, when you have made them your friends, to go away +without a word for ever so long. I have missed you very much." + +"I wanted you to miss me," he replied. + +"Yes, I thought so. But it wasn't fair," she said gently. "You see, I +have been quite fair with you. If you had gone away at once, if you +had left me alone when I said 'No' to you two years ago, then I should +have no right to complain. I should have no right to call you back. +But it's different now, and you willed that it should be different. +You stayed by me. Whenever I turned, there were you at my side. You +taught me to count on you, as I count on no one else. Yes, that's +true. Well, then, you have lost the right to turn your back now just +when it pleases you." + +"It wasn't because it pleased me." + +"No. I admit that," she agreed. "It was to make an experiment on me, +but the experiment was made at my expense. For after all you enjoyed +yourself," she added, with a laugh. + +Warrisden joined in the laugh. + +"It's quite true," he said. "I did." Then his voice dropped to the +same serious tone in which she had spoken. "Why not say the experiment +succeeded? Couldn't you say that?" + +Pamela shook her head. + +"No. I can give you no more now than I gave you a year ago, two years +ago, and that is not enough. Oh, I know," she continued hurriedly as +she saw that he was about to interrupt. "Lots of women are content to +begin with friendship. How they can, puzzles me. But I know they do +begin with nothing more than that, and very often it works out very +well. The friendship becomes more than friendship. But I can't begin +that way. I would if I could. But I can't." + +She leaned back in her chair, and sat for a while with her hands upon +her knees in an attitude extraordinarily still. The jingle of harness +in the square rose to Warrisden's ears, the clamour of the town came +muffled from the noisy streets. He looked upwards to the tender blue +of a summer sky where the stars shone like silver; and he leaned back +disheartened. He had returned to London, and nothing was changed. +There was the same busy life vociferous in its streets, and this girl +still sat in the midst of it with the same lassitude and quiescence. +She seemed to be waiting, not at all for something new to happen, but +for the things, which were happening, to cease, waiting with the +indifference of the very old. And she was quite young. She sat with +the delicate profile of her face outlined against the darkness; the +colour of youth was in her cheeks; the slender column of her throat, +the ripple of her dark hair, the grace of her attitude claimed her for +youth; she was fragrant with it from head to foot. And yet it seemed +that there was no youth in her blood. + +"So nothing has changed for you during these months," he said, deeply +disappointed. + +She turned her face quietly to him and smiled. "No," she answered, +"there has been no new road for me from Quetta to Seistan. I still +look on." + +There was the trouble. She just looked on, and to his thinking it was +not right that at her age she should do no more. A girl nowadays had +so many privileges, so many opportunities denied to her grandmother, +she could do so much more, she had so much more freedom, and yet +Pamela insisted upon looking on. If she had shown distress, it would +have been better. But no. She lived without deep feeling of any kind +in a determined isolation. She had built up a fence about herself, and +within it she sat untouched and alone. + +It was likely that no one else in the wide circle of her acquaintances +had noticed her detachment, and certainly to no one but Warrisden had +she admitted it. And it was only acknowledged to him after he had +found it out for himself. For she did not sit at home. On the +contrary, hardly a night passed during the season but she went to some +party. Only, wherever she went, she looked on. + +"And you still prefer old men to young ones?" he cried in a real +exasperation. + +"They talk more of things and less of persons," she explained. + +That was not right either. She ought to be interested in persons. +Warrisden rose abruptly from his chair. He was completely baffled. +Pamela was like the sleeping princess in the fairy tale, she lay girt +about with an impassable thicket of thorns. She was in a worse case, +indeed, for the princess in the story might have slept on till the end +of time, a thing of beauty. But was it possible for Pamela, so to +sleep to the end of life, he asked himself. Let her go on in her +indifference, and she might dwindle and grow narrow, her soul would be +starved and all the good of her be lost. Somehow a way must be forced +through the thicket, somehow she must be wakened. But he seemed no +nearer to finding that way than he had been two years ago, and she was +no nearer to her wakening. + +"No, there has been no change," he said, and as he spoke his eye was +caught by a bright light which suddenly flamed up in the window of a +dark house upon his right. The house had perplexed him more than once. +It took so little part in the life of the square, it so consistently +effaced itself from the gaieties of the people who lived about. Its +balconies were never banked with flowers, no visitors mounted its +steps; and even in the daytime it had a look of mystery. It may have +been that some dim analogy between that house and the question which +so baffled him arrested Warrisden's attention. It may have been merely +that he was by nature curious and observant. But he leaned forward +upon the balcony-rail. + +"Do you see that light?" he asked. "In the window on the second +floor?" + +"Yes." + +He took out his watch and noticed the time. It was just a quarter to +twelve. He laughed softly to himself and said-- + +"Wait a moment!" + +He watched the house for a few minutes without saying a word. Pamela +with a smile at his eagerness watched too. In a little while they saw +the door open and a man and a woman, both in evening dress, appear +upon the steps. Warrisden laughed again. + +"Wait," he said, as if he expected Pamela to interrupt. "You'll see +they won't whistle up a cab. They'll walk beyond the house and take +one quietly. Very likely they'll look up at the lighted window on the +second floor as though they were schoolboys who had escaped from their +dormitories, and were afraid of being caught by the master before they +had had their fun. There, do you see?" + +For as he spoke the man and the woman stopped and looked up. Had they +heard Warrisden's voice and obeyed his directions they could not have +more completely fulfilled his prediction. They had the very air of +truants. Apparently they were reassured. They walked along the +pavement until they were well past the house. Then they signalled to a +passing hansom. The cab-driver did not see them, yet they did not call +out, nor did the man whistle. They waited until another approached and +they beckoned to that. Warrisden watched the whole scene with the +keenest interest. As the two people got into the cab he laughed again +and turned back to Pamela. + +"Well?" she said, with a laugh of amusement, and the quiet +monosyllable, falling as it were with a cold splash upon his enjoyment +of the little scene, suddenly brought him back to the question which +was always latent in his mind. How was Pamela to be awakened? + +"It's a strange place, London," he said. "No doubt it seems stranger +to me, and more full of interesting people and interesting things just +because I have come back from very silent and very empty places. But +that house always puzzled me. I used to have rooms overlooking this +square, high up, over there," and he pointed to the eastern side of +the square towards Berkeley Street, "and what we have seen to-night +used to take place every night, and at the same hour. The light went +up in the room on the second floor, and the truants crept out. Guess +where they go to! The Savoy. They go and sit there amongst the lights +and the music for half an hour, then they come back to the dark house. +They live in the most curious isolation with the most curious +regularity. There are three of them altogether: an old man--it is his +light, I suppose, which went up on the second floor--and those two. I +know who they are. The old man is Sir John Stretton." + +"Oh!" said Pamela, with interest. + +"And the two people we saw are his son and his son's wife. I have +never met them. In fact, no one meets them. I don't know any one who +knows them." + +"Yes, you do," said Pamela, "I know them." And in her knowledge, +although Warrisden did not know it, lay the answer to the problem +which so perplexed him. + + + + + CHAPTER III + + THE TRUANTS + + +Warrisden turned quickly to Pamela. + +"You never mentioned them." + +"No," she replied with a smile. "But there's no mystery in my silence. +I simply haven't mentioned them because for two years I have lost +sight of them altogether. I used to meet them about, and I have been +to their house." + +"There?" asked Warrisden, with a nod towards the lighted window. + +"No; but to the house Millie and Mr. Stretton had in Deanery Street. +They gave that up two years ago when old Lady Stretton died. I thought +they had gone to live in the country." + +"And all the while they have been living here," exclaimed Warrisden. +He had spoken truthfully of himself. The events, and the people with +whom he came, however slightly, into contact always had interested and +amused him. It was his pleasure to fit his observations together until +he had constructed a little biography in his mind of each person with +whom he was acquainted. And there was never an incident of any +interest within his notice, but he sought the reason for it and kept +an eye open for its consequence. + +"Don't you see how strange the story is?" he went on. "They give up +their house upon Lady Stretton's death, and they come to live here +with Sir John. That's natural enough. Sir John's an old man. But they +live in such seclusion that even their friends think they have retired +into the country." + +"Yes, it is strange," Pamela admitted. And she added, "I was Millie +Stretton's bridesmaid." + +Upon Warrisden's request she told him what she knew of the couple who +lived in the dark house and played truant. Millie Stretton was the +daughter of a Judge in Ceylon who when Millie had reached the age of +seventeen had married a second time. The step-mother had lacked +discretion; from the very first she had claimed to exercise a complete +and undisputed authority; she had been at no pains to secure the +affections of her step-daughter. And very little trouble would have +been needed, for Millie was naturally affectionate. A girl without any +great depth of feeling, she responded easily to a show of kindness. +She found it neither difficult to make intimate friends, nor hard to +lose them. She was of the imitative type besides. She took her +thoughts and even her language from those who at the moment were by +her side. Thus her step-mother had the easiest of tasks but she did +not possess the necessary tact. She demanded obedience, and in return +offered tolerance. The household at Colombo, therefore, became for +Millie a roofstead rather than a home, and a year after this marriage +she betook herself and the few thousands of pounds which her mother +had bequeathed her to London. The ostensible reason for departure was +the invitation of Mrs. Charles Rawson, a friend of her mother's. But +Millie had made up her mind that a return to Ceylon was not to be +endured. Somehow she would manage to make a home or herself in +England. + +She found her path at once made easy. She was pretty, with the +prettiness of a child, she gave no trouble, she was fresh, she dressed +a drawing-room gracefully, he fitted neatly into her surroundings, she +picked up immediately the ways of thought and the jargon of her new +companions. In a word, with the remarkable receptivity which was hers, +she was very quickly at home in Mrs. Rawson's house. She became a +favourite no less for her modest friendliness than on account of her +looks. Mrs. Rawson, who was nearing middle age, but whose love of +amusements was not assuaged, rejoiced to have so attractive a +companion to take about with her. Millie, for her part, was very glad +to be so taken about. She had fallen from the obscure clouds into a +bright and wonderful world. + +It was at this time that Pamela Mardale first met Millicent Stretton, +or rather, one should say, Millicent Rundell, since Rundell was at +that time her name. They became friends, although so far as character +was concerned they had little in common. It may have been that the +difference between them was the actual cause of their friendship. +Certainly Millie came rather to lean upon her friend, admired her +strength, made her the repository of her confidences, and if she +received no confidences in return, she was content to believe that +there were none to make. It was at this time too that Millie fell in +with Lady Stretton. + +Lady Stretton, a tall old woman with the head of a Grenadier, had +the characteristic of Sir Anthony Absolute. There was no one so +good-tempered so long as she had her own way; and she generally had +it. + +"Lady Stretton saw that Millie was easily led," Pamela continued. "She +thought, for that reason, she would be a suitable wife for Tony, her +son, who was then a subaltern in the Coldstream. So she did all she +could to throw them together. She invited Millie up to her house in +Scotland, the house Lady Millingham now has, and Mr. Stretton fell in +love. He was evidently very fond of Millie, and Millie on her side +liked him quite as much as any one else. They were married. Lady +Stretton hired them the house I told you of, close to Park Lane, and +took a great deal of trouble to see that they were comfortable. You +see, they were toys for her. There, that's all I know. Are you +satisfied?" + +She leaned back in her chair, smiling at Warrisden's serious face. + +"And what about the old man, Sir John Stretton?" he asked. + +"I never met him," replied Pamela. "He never went out to parties, and +I never went to that house." + +As she concluded the sentence, a man looked on to the balcony and, +seeing them, withdrew. Pamela rose at once from her chair, and, with a +sudden movement of jealousy, Warrisden swung round and looked into the +room. The man was well past the middle age, stout of build, and with a +heavy careworn face with no pleasure in it at all. He was the man who +had been with Pamela when Warrisden had arrived. Warrisden turned back +to the girl with a smile of relief. + +"You are engaged?" + +"Yes, for this dance to Mr. Mudge," and she indicated the man who was +retiring. "But we shall meet again--at Newmarket, at all events. +Perhaps in Scotland too." + +She held out her hand to Warrisden, and, as he took it, her voice +dropped to a plea. + +"Please don't go away again without telling me first, without talking +it over, so that I may know where you are from month to month. Please +promise!" + +Warrisden promised, and went away from the house with her prayer +echoing in his ears. The very sound of her voice was audible to him, +and he never doubted the sincerity of its appeal. But if she set such +store on what she had, why was she content with just that and nothing +more, he asked himself. Why did she not claim a little more and give a +little more in return? Why did she come to a halt at friendship, a +mere turnpike on the great road, instead of passing through the gate +and going on down the appointed way. He did not know that she passed +the turnpike once, and that if she refused to venture on that path +again, it was because, knowing herself, she dared not. + +In the narrows of Berkeley Street Warrisden was shaken out of these +reflections. A hansom jingled past him, and by the light of the lamp +which hung at the back within it he caught a glimpse of the truants. +They were driving home to the dark house in the Square, and they sat +side by side silent and with troubled faces. Warrisden's thoughts went +back to what Pamela had told him that night. She had told him the +half, but not the perplexing, interesting half of their history. That +indeed Pamela could not tell, for she did not know Sir John Stretton, +and the old man's warped and churlish character alone explained it. + +It was by his doing that the truants gave up their cheery little house +in Deanery Street and came to live in Berkeley Square. The old man was +a miser, who during his wife's existence had not been allowed to +gratify his instincts. He made all the more ample amends after she had +died. The fine allowance on which the young couple had managed to keep +a pair of horses and a little brougham was stripped from them. + +"Why should I live alone?" said the old man. "I am old, Tony, and I +need some attention. The house is big, much too big for me, and the +servants are eating their heads off for the want of something to do." +There were indeed more servants than were needed. Servants were the +single luxury Sir John allowed himself. Their liveries were faded, +they themselves were insolent and untidy, but they were there, in the +great bare dining-room at dinner-time, in the hall when Sir John came +home of an afternoon. For the old man went out each day as the clock +struck three; he came back each evening at half-past six. He went out +alone, he returned alone, and he never went to his club. He took an +omnibus from the corner of Berkeley Street and journeyed eastwards as +far as Ludgate Hill. There he took a drink in the refreshment bar, +and, coming out, struck northwards into Holborn, where he turned +westwards, and walking as far as the inn at the corner of the +Tottenham Court Road, stepped for an hour into the private bar. Thence +he took another omnibus, and finally reached home, where his footmen +received him solemnly in the hall. To this home he brought Tony and +his wife. + +"There choose your own rooms, Tony," he said magnanimously. "What's +that? Money? But what for? You'll have it soon enough." + +Tony Stretton suggested that it was hardly possible for any man, +however careful, to retain a commission in the Coldstream without an +allowance. Sir John, a tall thin man, with high bald forehead, and a +prim puritanical face, looked at his son with a righteous severity. + +"A very expensive regiment. Leave it, Tony! And live quietly at home. +Look after your father, my boy, and you won't need money," and he +stalked upstairs leaving Tony aghast in the hall. Tony had to sit down +and think it over before he could quite realise the fate which had +over-taken him. Here he was, twenty-six years old brought up to spend +what he wanted and to ask for more when that was ended, and he was to +live quietly on nothing at all. He had no longer any profession, he +was not clever enough to enter upon a new one without some sort of +start and in addition he had a wife. His wife, it was true, had a few +thousands; they had remained untouched ever since the marriage and +Tony shrank from touching them now. He sat on one of the hall-chairs, +twisting his moustache and staring with his blank blue eyes at the +opposite wall. What in the world was he to do? Old Sir John was quite +aware of those few thousands. They might just as well be used now he +thought, and save him expense. Tony could pay them back after his +father was dead. Such was Sir John's plan and Tony had to fall in with +it. The horses and the brougham and all the furniture, the prints, the +pictures and the mirrors which had decked out so gaily the little +house in Deanery Street went to the hammer. Tony paid off his debts +and found himself with a hundred pounds in hand at the end; and when +that was gone he was forced to come to his wife. + +"Of course," said she, "we'll share what I have, Tony." + +"Yes, but we must go carefully," he replied. "Heaven knows how long we +will have to drag on like this." + +So the money question was settled, but that was in reality the least +of their troubles. Sir John, for the first time in his life, was +master in fact as well as in name. He had been no match for his wife, +but he was more than a match for his son. He was the fifth baronet of +his name, and yet there was no landed property. He was rich, and all +the money was safely tucked away in the public funds, and he could +bequeath it as he willed. He was in a position to put the screw on +Tony and his wife, and he did not let the opportunity slip. The love +of authority grew upon him. He became exacting and portentously +severe. In his black, shabby coat, with his long thin figure, and his +narrow face, he had the look of a cold self-righteous fanatic. You +would have believed that he was mortifying his son for the sake of his +son's soul, unless perchance you had peeped into that private bar in +the Tottenham Court Road and had seen him drinking gloomily alone. + +He laid down rules to which the unfortunate couple must needs conform. +They had to dine with him every night and to sit with him every +evening until he went to bed. It followed that they lost sight of +their friends, and every month isolated them more completely. The mere +humiliation of the position in which they stood caused them to shrink +more and more into their privacy. When they walked out in the +afternoon they kept away from the Park; when they played truant in the +evening, at the Savoy, they chose a little table in an obscure corner. +This was the real history of the truants with whose fortunes those of +Warrisden and Pamela were to be so closely intermingled. For that life +in the dark house was not to last. Even as Warrisden passed them in +Berkeley Street, Tony Stretton was saying over and over again in his +inactive mind-- + +"It can't go on. It can't go on!" + +In the after times, when the yapping of dogs in the street at night +would wake Tony from his sleep, and set him on dreaming of tent +villages in a wild country of flowers, or when the wind in the trees +would recall to him a little ship labouring on short steep seas in a +mist of spray, he always looked back to this night as that on which +the venture of his wife's fortunes and his own began. + + + + + CHAPTER IV + + TONY STRETTON MAKES A PROPOSAL + + +Regular as Warrisden had declared the lives of the truants to be, on +the night following the dance at Lady Millingham's there came a break +in the monotony of their habits. For once in a way they did not leave +the house in their search for light and colour as soon as they were +free. They stayed on in their own sitting-room. But it seemed that +they had nothing to speak about. Millie Stretton sat at the table, +staring at the wall in front of her, moody and despairing. Tony +Stretton leaned against the embrasure of the window, now and then +glancing remorsefully at his wife, now and then looking angrily up to +the ceiling where the heavy footsteps of a man treading up and down +the room above sounded measured and unceasing. + +Tony lifted a corner of the blind and looked out. + +"There's a party next door," he said, "there was another at Lady +Millingham's last night. You should have been at both, Millie, and you +were at neither. Upon my word, it's rough." + +He dropped the blind and came over to her side. He knew quite well +what parties and entertainments meant to her. She loved them, and it +seemed to him natural and right that she should. Light, admiration, +laughter and gaiety, and fine frocks--these things she was born to +enjoy, and he himself had in the old days taken a great pride in +watching her enjoyment. But it was not merely the feeling that she had +been stripped of what was her due through him which troubled him +to-night. Other and deeper thoughts were vaguely stirring in his mind. + +"We have quarrelled again to-night, Millie," he continued +remorsefully. "Here we are cooped up together with just ourselves to +rely upon to pull through these bad years, and we have quarrelled +again." + +Millie shrugged her shoulders. + +"How did it begin?" he asked. "Upon my word I don't remember. Oh yes, +I----" and Millie interrupted him. + +"What does it matter, Tony, how the quarrel began? It did begin, and +another will begin to-morrow. We can't help ourselves, and you have +given the reason. Here we are cooped up by ourselves with nothing else +to do." + +Tony pulled thoughtfully at his moustache. + +"And we swore off quarrelling, too. When was that?" + +"Yesterday." + +"Yesterday!" exclaimed Tony, with a start of surprise. "By George, so +it was. Only yesterday." + +Millie looked up at him, and the trouble upon his face brought a smile +to hers. She laid a hand upon his arm. + +"It's no use swearing off, Tony," she said. "We are both of us living +all the time in a state of exasperation. I just--tingle with it, +there's no other word. And the least, smallest thing which goes wrong +sets us quarrelling. I don't think either of us is to blame. The house +alone gets on our nerves, doesn't it? These great empty, silent, dingy +rooms, with their tarnished furniture. Oh! they are horrible! I wander +through them sometimes and it always seems to me that, a long time +ago, people lived here who suddenly felt one morning that they +couldn't stand it for a single moment longer, and ran out and locked +the street door behind them; and I have almost done it myself. The +very sunlight comes through the windows timidly, as if it knew it had +no right here at all." + +She leaned back in her chair, looking at Tony with eyes that were +hopeless and almost haggard. As Tony listened to her outburst the +remorse deepened on his face. + +"If I could have foreseen all this, I would have spared you it, +Millie," he said. "I would, upon my word." He drew up a chair to the +table, and, sitting down, said in a more cheerful voice, "Let's talk +it over, and see if we can't find a remedy." + +Millie shook her head. + +"We talked it over yesterday." + +"Yes, so we did." + +"And quarrelled an hour after we had talked it over." + +"We did that too," Tony agreed, despondently. His little spark of +hopefulness was put out and he sat in silence. His wife, too, did not +speak, and in a short while it occurred to him that the silence was +more complete than it had been a few minutes ago. It seemed that a +noise had ceased, and a noise which, unnoticed before, had become +noticeable by its cessation. He looked up to the ceiling. The heavy +footsteps no longer dragged upon the floor overhead. Tony sprang up. + +"There! He is in bed," he exclaimed. "Shall we go out?" + +"Not to-night," replied Millie. + +He could make no proposal that night which was welcomed, and as he +walked over to the mantelshelf and filled his pipe, there was +something in his attitude and bearing which showed to Millie that the +quick rebuff had hurt. + +"I can't pretend to-night, Tony, and that's the truth," she added in a +kinder voice. "For, after all, I do only pretend nowadays that I find +the Savoy amusing." + +Tony turned slowly round with the lighted match in his hand and stared +at his wife. He was a man slow in thought, and when his thoughts +compelled expression, laborious in words. The deeper thoughts which +had begun of late to take shape in his mind stirred again at her +words. + +"You have owned it," he said. + +"It had been pretence with you too, then?" she asked, looking up in +surprise. + +Tony puffed at his pipe. + +"Of late, yes," he replied. "Perhaps chiefly since I saw that you were +pretending." + +He came back to her side and looked for a long time steadily at her +while he thought. It was a surprise to Millie that he had noticed her +pretence, as much of a surprise as that he had been pretending too. +For she knew him to be at once slow to notice any change in others and +quick to betray it in himself. But she was not aware how wide a place +she filled in all his thoughts, partly because her own nature with its +facile emotions made her unable to conceive a devotion which was +engrossing, and partly because Tony himself had no aptitude for +expressing such a devotion, and indeed would have shrunk from its +expression had the aptitude been his. But she did fill that wide +place. Very slowly he had begun to watch her, very slowly and dimly +certain convictions were taking shape, very gradually he was drawing +nearer and nearer to a knowledge that a great risk must be taken and a +great sacrifice made partly by him, partly too by her. Some part of +his trouble he now spoke to her. + +"It wasn't pretence a year ago, Millie," he said wistfully. "That's +what bothers me. We enjoyed slipping away quietly when the house was +quiet, and snatching some of the light, some of the laughter the +others have any time they want it. It made up for the days, it was fun +then, Millie, wasn't it? Upon my word, I believe we enjoyed our life, +yes, even this life, a year ago. Do you remember how we used to drive +home, laughing over what we had seen, talking about the few people we +had spoken to? It wasn't until we had turned the latch-key in the +door, and crept into the hall----" + +"And passed the library door," Millie interrupted, with a little +shiver. + +Tony Stretton stopped for a moment. Then he resumed in a lower voice, +"Yes, it wasn't until we had passed the library door that the gloom +settled down again. But now the fun's all over, at the latest when the +lights go down in the supper room, and often before we have got to +them at all. We were happy last year"--and he shook her affectionately +by the arm--"that's what bothers me." + +His wife responded to the gentleness of his voice and action. + +"Never mind, Tony," she said. "Some day we shall look back on all of +it--this house and the empty rooms and the quarrels"--she hesitated +for a second--"Yes, and the library door; we shall look back on it all +and laugh." + +"Shall we?" said Tony, suddenly. His face was most serious, his voice +most doubtful. + +"Why, what do you mean?" asked Millie. Then she added reassuringly, +"It must end some time. Oh yes, it can't last for ever." + +"No," replied Tony; "but it can last just long enough." + +"Long enough for what?" + +"Long enough to spoil both our lives altogether." + +He was speaking with a manner which was quite strange to her. There +was a certainty in his voice, there was a gravity too. He had ceased +to leave the remedy of their plight to time and chance, since, through +two years, time and chance had failed them. He had been seriously +thinking, and as the result of thought he had come to definite +conclusions. Millie understood that there was much more behind the +words he had spoken and that he meant to say that much more to her +to-night. She was suddenly aware that she was face to face with issues +momentous to both of them. She began to be a little afraid. She looked +at Tony almost as if he were a stranger. + +"Tony," she said faintly, in deprecation. + +"We must face it, Millie," he went on steadily. "This life of ours +here in this house will come to an end, of course, but how will it +leave us, you and me? Soured, embittered, quarrelsome, or no longer +quarrelsome, but just indifferent to each other, bored by each other?" +He was speaking very slowly, choosing each word with difficulty. + +"Oh no," Millie protested. + +"It may be even worse than that. Suppose we passed beyond indifference +to dislike--yes, active dislike. We are both of us young, we can both +reasonably look forward to long lives, long lives of active dislike. +There might too be contempt on your side." + +Millie stared at her husband. + +"Contempt?" she said, echoing his words in surprise. + +"Yes. Here are you, most unhappy, and I take it sitting down. Contempt +might come from that." + +"But what else can you do?" she said. + +"Ah," said Tony, as though he had been waiting for that question, +couched in just those words. "Ask yourself that question often enough, +and contempt will come." + +This idea of contempt was a new one to Millie, and very likely her +husband was indiscreet in suggesting its possibility. But he was not +thinking at all of the unwisdom of his words. His thoughts were set on +saving the cherished intimacy of their life from the ruin which he saw +was likely to overtake it. He spoke out frankly, not counting the +risk. Millie, for her part, was not in the mood to estimate the truth +of what he said, although it remained in her memory. She was rather +confused by the new aspect which her husband wore. She foresaw that he +was working towards the disclosure of a plan; and the plan would +involve changes, great changes, very likely a step altogether into the +dark. And she hesitated. + +"We sha'n't alter, Tony," she said. "You can be sure of me, can't +you?" + +"But we are altering," he replied. "Already the alteration has begun. +Did we quarrel a year ago as we do now? We enjoyed those evenings when +we played truant, a year ago"; and then he indulged in a yet greater +indiscretion than any which he had yet allowed himself to utter. But +he was by nature simple and completely honest. Whatever occurred to +him, that he spoke without reserve, and the larger it loomed in his +thoughts the more strenuous was its utterance upon his lips. He took a +seat at the table by her side. + +"I know we are changing. I take myself, and I expect it is the same +with you. I am--it is difficult to express it--I am deadening. I am +getting insensible to the things which not very long ago moved me very +much. I once had a friend who fell ill of a slow paralysis, which +crept up his limbs little by little and he hardly noticed its advance. +I think that's happening with me. I am losing the associations--that's +the word I want--the associations which made one's recollections +valuable, and gave a colour to one's life. For instance, you sang a +song last night, Millie, one of those coon songs of yours--do you +remember? You sang it once in Scotland on a summer's night. I was +outside on the lawn, and past the islands across the water, which was +dark and still, I saw the lights in Oban bay. I thought I would never +hear that song again without seeing those lights in my mind far away +across the water, clustered together like the lights of a distant +town. Well, last night all those associations were somehow dead. I +remembered all right, but without any sort of feeling, that that song +was a landmark in one's life. It was merely you singing a song, or +rather it was merely some one singing a song." + +It was a laboured speech, and Tony was very glad to have got it over. + +"I am very sorry," replied Millie in a low voice. She did not show him +her face, and he had no notion whatever that his words could hardly +have failed to hurt. He was too intent upon convincing her, and too +anxious to put his belief before her with unmistakable clearness to +reflect in what spirit she might receive the words. That her first +thought would be "He no longer cares" never occurred to him at all, +and cheerfully misunderstanding her acquiescence, he went on-- + +"You see that's bad. It mustn't go on, Millie. Let's keep what we've +got. At all costs let us keep that!" + +"You mean we must go away?" said Millie, and Tony Stretton did not +answer. He rose from his chair and walked back to the fireplace and +knocked the ashes from his pipe. Millie was accustomed to long +intervals between her questions and his replies, but she was on the +alert now. Something in his movements and his attitude showed her that +he was not thinking of what answer he should make. He was already sure +upon that point. Only the particular answer he found difficult to +speak. She guessed it on the instant and stood up erect, in alarm. + +"You mean that you must go away, and that I must remain?" + +Tony turned round to her and nodded his head. + +"Alone! Here?" she exclaimed, looking round her with a shiver. + +"For a little while. Until I have made a home for you to come to. Only +till then, Millie. It needn't be so very long." + +"It will seem ages!" she cried, "however short it is. Tony, it's +impossible." + +The tedious days stretched before her in an endless and monotonous +succession. The great rooms would be yet more silent, and more empty +than they were; there would be a chill throughout all the house; the +old man's exactions would become yet more oppressive, since there +would be only one to bear them. She thought of the long dull evenings, +in the faded drawing-room. They were bad enough now, those long +evenings during which she read the evening paper aloud, and Sir John +slept, yet not so soundly but that he woke the instant her voice +stopped, and bade her continue. What would they be if Tony were gone, +if there were no hour or so at the end when they were free to play +truant if they willed? What she had said was true. She had been merely +pretending to enjoy their hour of truancy, but she would miss it none +the less. And in the midst of these thoughts she heard Tony's voice. + +"It sounds selfish, I know, but it isn't really. You see, I sha'n't +enjoy myself. I have not been brought up to know anything well or to +do anything well--anything, I mean, really useful--I'll have a pretty +hard time too." And then he described to her what he thought of doing. +He proposed to go out to one of the colonies, spend some months on a +farm as a hand, and when he had learned enough of the methods, and had +saved a little money, to get hold of a small farm to which he could +ask her to come. It was a pretty and a simple scheme, and it ignored +the great difficulties in the way, such as his ignorance and his lack +of capital. But he believed in it sincerely, and every word in his +short and broken sentences proved his belief. He had his way that +night with Millicent. She was capable of a quick fervour, though the +fervour might as quickly flicker out. She saw that the sacrifice was +really upon his side, for upon him would be the unaccustomed burden of +labour, and the labour would be strange and difficult. She rose to his +height since he was with her and speaking to her with all the +conviction of his soul. + +"Well, then, go," she cried. "I'll wait here, Tony, till you send for +me." + +And when she passed the library door that night she did not even +shrink. + + + + + CHAPTER V + + PAMELA MAKES A PROMISE + + +Millie's enthusiasm for her husband's plan increased each day. The +picture which his halting phrases evoked for her, of a little farm +very far away under Southern skies, charmed her more by reason of its +novelty than either she or Tony quite understood. In the evenings of +the following week, long after the footsteps overhead had ceased, they +sat choosing the site of their house and building it. It was to be the +exact opposite of their house of bondage. The windows should look out +over rolling country, the simple decorations should be bright of +colour, and through every cranny the sun should find its way. Millie's +hopes, indeed, easily outran her husband's. She counted the house +already built, and the door open for her coming. Colour and light +bathed it in beauty. + +"There's my little fortune, Tony," she said, when once or twice he +tried to check the leap of her anticipations; "that will provide the +capital." + +"I knew you would offer it," Tony replied simply. "Your help will +shorten our separation by a good deal. So I'll take half." + +"All!" cried Millie. + +"And what would you do when you wanted a new frock?" asked Tony, with +a smile. + +Millie shrugged her shoulders. + +"I shall join you so soon," she said. + +It dawned upon Tony that she was making too little of the burden which +she would be called upon to bear--the burden of dull lonely months in +that great shabby house. + +"It will be a little while before I can send for you, Millie," he +protested. But she paid no heed to the protest. She fetched her bank +book and added up the figures. + +"I have three thousand pounds," she said. + +"I'll borrow half," he repeated. "Of course, I am only borrowing. +Should things go wrong with me, you are sure to get it back in the +end." + +They drove down to Millie's bank the next morning, and fifteen hundred +pounds were transferred to his account. + +"Meanwhile," said Tony, as they came out of the door into Pall Mall, +"we have not yet settled where our farm is to be. I think I will go +and see Chase." + +"The man in Stepney Green?" Millie asked. + +"Yes. He's the man to help us." + +Tony called a cab and drove off. It was late in the afternoon when he +returned, and he had no opportunity to tell his wife the results of +his visit before dinner was announced. Millie was in a fever to hear +his news. Never, even in this house, had an evening seemed so long. +Sir John sat upright in his high-backed chair, and, as was his custom, +bade her read aloud the evening paper. But that task was beyond her. +She pleaded a headache and escaped. It seemed to her that hours passed +before Tony rejoined her. She had come to dread with an intense fear +that some hindrance would, at any moment, stop their plan. + +"Well?" she asked eagerly, when Tony at last came into their +sitting-room. + +"It's to be horses in Kentucky," answered Tony. "Farming wants more +knowledge and a long apprenticeship; but I know a little about +horses." + +"Splendid!" cried Millie. "You will go soon?" + +"In a week. A week is all I need." + +Millie was quiet for a little while. Then she asked, with an anxious +look-- + +"When do you mean to tell your father?" + +"To-morrow." + +"Don't," said she. She saw his face cloud, she was well aware of his +dislike of secrecies, but she was too much afraid that, somehow, at +the last moment an insuperable obstacle would bar the way. "Don't tell +him at all," she went on. "Leave a note for him. I will see that it is +given to him after you have gone. Then he can't stop you. Please do +this, I ask you." + +"How can he stop me? + +"I don't know; but I am afraid that he will. He could threaten to +disinherit you; if you disobeyed, he might carry out the threat. Give +him no opportunity to threaten." + +Very reluctantly Tony consented. He had all a man's objections to +concealments, she all a woman's liking for them; but she prevailed, +and since the moment of separation was very near, they began to +retrace their steps through the years of their married life, and back +beyond them to the days of their first acquaintance. Thus it happened +that Millie mentioned the name of Pamela Mardale, and suddenly Tony +drew himself upright in his chair. + +"Is she in town, I wonder?" he asked, rather of himself than of his +wife. + +"Most likely," Millie replied. "Why?" + +"I think I must try to see her before I go," said Tony, thoughtfully; +and more than once during the evening he looked with anxiety towards +his wife; but in his look there was some perplexity too. + +He tried next day; for he borrowed a horse from a friend, and rode out +into the Row at eleven o'clock. As he passed through the gates of Hyde +Park, he saw Pamela turning her horse on the edge of the sand. She saw +him at the same moment and waited. + +"You are a stranger here," she said, with a smile, as he joined her. + +"Here and everywhere," he replied. "I came out on purpose to find +you." + +Pamela glanced at Tony curiously. Only a few days had passed since +Warrisden had pointed out the truants from the window of Lady +Millingham's house, and had speculated upon the seclusion of their +lives. The memory of that evening was still fresh in her mind. + +"I want to ask you a question." + +"Ask it and I'll answer," she replied carelessly. + +"You were Millie's bridesmaid?" + +"Yes." + +"You saw a good deal of her before we were married?" + +"Yes." + +They were riding down the Row at a walk under the trees, Pamela +wondering to what these questions were to lead, Tony slowly +formulating the point which troubled him. + +"Before Millie and I were engaged," he went on, "before indeed there +was any likelihood of our being engaged, you once said to me something +about her." + +"I did?" + +"Yes. I remembered it last night. And it rather worries me. I should +like you to explain what you meant. You said, 'The man who marries her +should never leave her. If he goes away shooting big game, he should +take her with him. On no account must she be left behind.'" + +It was a day cloudless and bright. Over towards the Serpentine the +heat filled the air with a soft screen of mist, and at the bottom of +the Row the rhododendrons glowed. As Pamela and Tony went forward at a +walk the sunlight slanting through the leaves now shone upon their +faces and now left them in shade. And when it fell bright upon Pamela +it lit up a countenance which was greatly troubled. She did not, +however, deny that she had used the words. She did not pretend that +she had forgotten their application. + +"You remember what I said?" she remarked. "It is a long while ago." + +"Before that," he explained, "I had begun to notice all that was said +of Millie." + +"I spoke the words generally, perhaps too carelessly." + +"Yet not without a reason," Tony insisted. "That's not your way." + +Pamela made no reply for a moment or two. Then she patted her horse's +head, and said softly-- + +"Not without a reason." She admitted his contention frankly. She did +more, for she turned in her saddle towards him and, looking straight +into his face, said-- + +"I was not giving you advice at the time. But, had I been, I should +have said just those words. I say them again now." + +"Why?" + +Tony put his question very earnestly. He held Pamela in a great +respect, believing her clear-sighted beyond her fellows. He was indeed +a little timid in her presence as a rule, for she overawed him, though +all unconsciously. Nothing of this timidity, however, showed now. +"That was what I came out to ask you. Why?" + +Again Pamela attempted no evasion. + +"I can't tell you," she said quietly. + +"You promised." + +"I break the promise." + +Tony looked wistfully at his companion. That the perplexing words had +been spoken with a definite meaning he had felt sure from the moment +when he had remembered them. And her refusal to explain proved to him +that the meaning was a very serious one--one indeed which he ought to +know and take into account. + +"I ask you to explain," he urged, "because I _am_ going away, and I +_am_ leaving Millie behind." + +Pamela was startled. She turned quickly towards him. + +"Must you?" she said, and before he could answer she recovered from +her surprise. "Never mind," she continued; "shall we ride on?" and she +put her horse to a trot. It was not her business to advise or to +interfere. She had said too much already. She meant to remain the +looker-on. + +Stretton, however, was not upon this occasion to be so easily +suppressed. He kept level with her, and as they rode he told her +something of the life which Millie and he had led in the big lonely +house in Berkeley Square; and in spite of herself Pamela was +interested. She had a sudden wish that Alan Warrisden was riding with +them too, so that he might hear his mystery resolved; she had a sudden +vision of his face, keen as a boy's, as he listened. + +"I saw Millie and you a few nights ago. I was at a dance close by, and +I was surprised to see you. I thought you had left London," she said. + +"No; but I am leaving," Stretton returned; and he went on to describe +that idyllic future which Millie and he had allotted to themselves. +The summer sunlight was golden in the air about them; already it +seemed that new fresh life was beginning. "I shall breed horses in +Kentucky. I was recommended to it by an East End parson called Chase, +who runs a mission on Stepney Green. I used to keep order in a +billiard room at his mission one night a week, when I was quartered at +the Tower. A queer sort of creature, Chase; but his judgment's good, +and of course he is always meeting all sorts of people." + +"Chase?" Pamela repeated; and she retained the name in her memory. + +"But he doesn't know Millie," said Stretton, "and you do. And so what +you said troubles me very much. If I go away remembering your words +and not understanding them, I shall go away uneasy. I shall remain +uneasy." + +"I am sorry," Pamela replied. "I broke a rule of mine in saying what I +did, a rule not to interfere. And I see now that I did very wrong in +breaking it. I will not break it again. You must forget my words." + +There was a quiet decision in her manner which warned Tony that no +persuasions would induce her to explain. He gave up his attempt and +turned to another subject. + +"I have something else to ask--not a question this time, but a favour. +You could be a very staunch friend, Miss Mardale, if you chose. Millie +will be lonely after I have gone. You were a great friend of hers +once--be a friend of hers again." + +Pamela hesitated. The promise which he sought on the face of it no +doubt looked easy of fulfilment. But Tony Stretton had been right in +one conjecture. She had spoken the words which troubled him from a +definite reason, and that reason assured her now that this promise +might lay upon her a burden, and a burden of a heavy kind. And she +shrank from all burdens. On the other hand, there was no doubt that +she had caused Tony much uneasiness. He would go away, on a task +which, as she saw very clearly, would be more arduous by far than even +he suspected--he would go away troubled and perplexed. That could not +be helped. But she might lighten the trouble, and make the perplexity +less insistent, if she granted the favour which he sought. It seemed +churlish to refuse. + +"Very well," she said reluctantly. "I promise." + +Already Tony's face showed his relief. She had given her promise +reluctantly, but she would keep it now. Of that he felt assured, and, +bidding her good-bye, he turned his horse and cantered back. + +Pamela rode homewards more slowly. She had proposed to keep clear of +entanglements and responsibilities, and, behold! the meshes were about +her. She had undertaken a trust. In spite of herself she had ceased to +be the looker-on. + + + + + CHAPTER VI + + NEWS OF TONY + + +The promise which Pamela had given was a great relief to Tony; he went +about the work of preparing for his departure with an easier mind. It +was even in his thoughts when he stood with his wife upon the platform +of Euston station, five minutes before his train started for +Liverpool. + +"She will be a good friend, Millie," he said. "Count on her till I +send for you. I think I am right to go, even though I don't +understand----" + +He checked himself abruptly. Millie, however, paid heed only to the +first clause of his sentence. + +"Of course you are right," she said, with a confidence which brought +an answering smile to his face. + +She watched the red tail-light of the train until it disappeared, and +drove home alone to the big dreary house. It seemed ten times more +dreary, ten times more silent than ever before. She was really alone +now. But her confidence in herself and in Tony was still strong. "I +can wait," she said, and the consciousness of her courage rejoiced +her. She walked from room to room and sat for a few moments in each, +realising that the coldness, the dingy look of the furniture, and the +empty silence had no longer the power to oppress her. She even +hesitated at the library door with her fingers on the key. But it was +not until the next day that she unlocked it and threw it open. + +For Pamela, mindful of her promise, called in the afternoon. Millicent +was still uplifted by her confidence. + +"I can wait quite patiently," she said; and Pamela scrutinised her +with some anxiety. For Millicent was speaking feverishly, as though +she laboured under an excitement. Was her courage the mere +effervescence of that excitement, or was it a steady, durable thing? +Pamela led her friend on to speak of the life which she and Tony had +led in the big house, sounding her the while so that she might come +upon some answer to that question. And thus it happened that, as they +came down the stairs together, Millicent again stopped before the +library door. + +"Look!" she said. "This room always seemed to me typical of the whole +house, typical too of the lives we led in it." + +She unlocked the door suddenly and flung it open. The floor of the +library was below the level of the hall, and a smooth plane of wood +sloped down to it very gradually from the threshold. + +"There used to be steps here once, but before my time," said +Millicent. She went down into the room. Pamela followed her, and +understood why those two steps had been removed. Although the +book-shelves rose on every wall from floor to ceiling, it was not as a +library that this room was used. Heavy black curtains draped it with a +barbaric profusion. The centre of the room was clear of furniture, and +upon the carpet in that clear space was laid a purple drugget; and on +the drugget opposite to one another stood two strong wooden crutches. +The room was a mortuary chamber--nothing less. On those two crutches +the dead were to lie awaiting burial. + +Millie Stretton shook her shoulders with a kind of shiver. + +"Oh, how I used to hate this room, hate knowing that it was here, +prepared and ready!" + +Pamela could understand how the knowledge would work upon a woman of +emotions, whose nerves were already strung to exasperation by the life +she led. For even to her there was something eerie in the disposition +of the room. It looked out upon a dull yard of stone at the back of +the house; the light was very dim and the noise of the streets hardly +the faintest whisper; there was a chill and a dampness in the air. + +"How I hated it," Millie repeated. "I used to lie awake and think of +it. I used to imagine it more silent than any other of the silent +rooms, and emptier--emptier because day and night it seemed to claim +an inhabitant, and to claim it as a right. That was the horrible +thing. The room was waiting--waiting for us to be carried down that +wooden bridge and laid on the crutches here, each in our turn. It +became just a symbol of the whole house. For what is the house, +Pamela? A place that should have been a place of life, and is a place +merely expecting death. Look at the books reaching up to the ceiling, +never taken down, never read, for the room's a room for coffins. It +wasn't merely a symbol of the house--that wasn't the worst of it. It +was a sort of image of our lives, the old man's upstairs, Tony's and +mine down here. We were all doing nothing, neither suffering nor +enjoying, but just waiting--waiting for death. Nothing you see could +happen in this house but death. Until it came there would only be +silence and emptiness." + +Millie Stretton finished her outburst, and stood dismayed as though +the shadow of those past days were still about her. The words she had +spoken must have seemed exaggerated and even theatrical, but for the +aspect of her as she spoke them. Her whole frame shuddered, her face +had the shrinking look of fear. She recovered herself, however, in a +moment. + +"But that time's past," she said. "Tony's gone and I--I am waiting for +life now. I am only a lodger, you see. A month or two, and I pack my +boxes." + +She turned towards the door and stopped. The hall door had just at +that moment opened. Pamela heard a man's footsteps sound heavily upon +the floor of the hall and then upon the stairs. + +"My father-in-law," said Millie. + +"This was his doing?" asked Pamela. + +"Yes," replied Millie. "It's strange, isn't it? But there's something +stranger still." + +The footsteps had now ceased. Millie led the way back to her room. + +"When I got home yesterday," she related, "I had Tony's letter +announcing his departure taken up to Sir John. I waited for him to +send for me. He did not. I am not sure that I expected he would. You +see, he has never shown the least interest in us. However, when I went +up to my room to dress for dinner, I saw that the candles were all +lighted in Tony's room next door, and his clothes laid out upon the +bed. I went in and put the candles out--rather quickly." Her voice +shook a little upon those last two words. Pamela nodded her head as +though she understood, and Millicent went on, after a short pause-- + +"It troubled me to see them burning; it troubled me very much. And +when I came downstairs I told the footman the candles were not to be +lit again, since Tony had gone away. He answered that they had been +lit by Sir John's orders. At first I thought that Sir John had not +troubled to read the letter at all. I thought that all the more +because he never once, either during dinner or afterwards, mentioned +Tony's name or seemed to remark his absence. But it was not so. He has +given orders that every night the room is to be ready and the candles +lit as though Tony were here still, or might walk in at the door at +any moment. I suppose that after all in a queer way he cares." + +Again her voice faltered; and again a question rose up insistent in +Pamela's mind. She knew her friend, and it was out of her knowledge +that she had spoken long ago in Tony's presence when she had said, +"her husband should never leave her." It was evident that Tony's +departure had caused his wife great suffering. + +Millicent had let that fact escape in spite of her exaltation. Pamela +welcomed it, but she asked, "Was that regret a steady and durable +thing?" + +Pamela left London the next day with her question unanswered, and for +two months there was no opportunity for her of discovering an answer. +Often during that August and September, on the moors in Scotland, or +at her own home in Leicestershire, she would think of Millie Stretton, +in the hot and dusty town amongst the houses where the blinds were +drawn. She imagined her sitting over against the old stern impassive +man at dinner, or wearily reading to him his newspaper at night. Had +the regret dwindled to irritation, and the loneliness begotten +petulance? + +Indeed, those months were dull and wearisome enough for Millicent. No +change of significance came in the routine of that monotonous +household. Sir John went to his room perhaps a little earlier than had +been his wont, his footsteps dragged along the floor for a while +longer, and his light burned in the window after the dawn had come. +Finally he ceased to leave his room at all. But that was all. For +Millicent, however, the weeks passed easily. Each day brought her a +day nearer to the sunlit farm fronting the open plain. She marked the +weeks off in her diary with a growing relief; for news kept coming +from America, and the news was good. + +Early in October, Pamela passed through London on her way to Sussex, +and broke her journey that she might see her friend. + +"Frances Millingham is writing to you," she said. "She wants you to +stay with her in Leicestershire. I shall be there too. I hope you will +come." + +"When?" + +"At the beginning of the New Year." + +Millicent laughed. + +"I shall have left England before then. Tony will have made his way," +she said, with a joyous conviction. + +"There might be delays," Pamela suggested, in a very gentle voice. For +suddenly there had risen before her mind the picture of a terrace high +above a gorge dark with cypresses. She saw again the Mediterranean, +breaking in gold along the curving shore, and the gardens of the +Casino at Monte Carlo. She heard a young girl prophesying success upon +that terrace with no less certainty than Millicent had used. Her face +softened and her eyes shone with a very wistful look. She took out her +watch and glanced at it. It was five o'clock. The school children had +gone home by now from the little school-house in the square of +Roquebrune. Was the schoolmaster leaning over the parapet looking +downwards to the station or to the deserted walk in front of the +Casino? Was a train passing along the sea's edge towards France and +Paris? + +"One must expect delays, Millie," she insisted; and again Millie +laughed. + +"I have had letters. I am expecting another. It should have come a +fortnight since." And she told Pamela what the letters had contained. + +At first Tony had been a little bewildered by the activity of New +York, after his quiescent years. But he had soon made an acquaintance, +and the acquaintance had become a friend. The two men had determined +to go into partnership; a farm in Kentucky was purchased, each man +depositing an equal share of the purchase money. + +"Six weeks ago they left New York. Tony said I would not hear from him +at once." + +And while they were sitting together there came a knock upon the door, +and two letters were brought in for Millicent. One she tossed upon the +table. With the other in her hand she turned triumphantly to Pamela. + +"Do you mind?" she asked. "I have been waiting so long." + +"Read it, of course," said Pamela. + +Millie tore the letter open, and at once the light died out of her +eyes, and the smile vanished from her lips. + +"From New York," she said, halfway between perplexity and fear. "He +writes from New York." And with trembling fingers she turned over the +sheets and read the letter through. + +Pamela watched her, saw the blood ebb from her cheeks, and dejection +overspread her face. A great pity welled up in Pamela's heart, not +merely for the wife who read, but for the man who had penned that +letter--with what difficulty, she wondered, with how much pain! +Failure was the message which it carried. Millicent's trembling lips +told her that. And again the village of Roquebrune rose up before her +eyes as she gazed out of the window on the London square. What were +the words the schoolmaster had spoken when, stripped of his dreams, he +had confessed success was not for him? "We must forget these fine +plans. The school at Roquebrune will send no deputy to Paris." +Pamela's eyes grew dim. + +She stood looking out of the window for some while, but hearing no +movement she at length turned back again. The sheets of the letter had +fallen upon the floor, they lay scattered, written over in a round, +sprawling, schoolboy's hand. Millicent sat very still, her face most +weary and despairing. + +"It's all over," she said. "The friend was a swindler. He left the +train at a station on the way and disappeared. Tony went on, but there +was no farm. He is back in New York." + +"But the man can be found?" + +"He belongs to a gang. There is little chance, and Tony has no money. +He will take no more of mine." + +"He is coming home, then?" said Pamela. + +"No; he means to stay and retrieve his failures." + +Pamela said nothing, and Millicent appealed to her. "He will do that, +don't you think? Men have started badly before, and have succeeded, +and have not taken so very long to succeed." + +"No doubt," said Pamela; and she spoke with what hopefulness she +could. But she remembered Tony Stretton. Simplicity and good-humour +were amongst his chief qualities; he was a loyal friend, and he had +pluck. Was that enough? On the other hand, he had little knowledge and +little experience. The schoolmaster of Roquebrune and Tony Stretton +stood side by side in her thoughts. She was not, however, to be put to +the task of inventing encouragements. For before she could open her +lips again, Millicent said gently-- + +"Will you mind if I ask to be left alone? Come again as soon as you +can. But this afternoon----" Her voice broke so that she could not +finish her sentence, and she turned hastily away. However, she +recovered her self-control and went down the stairs with Pamela, and +as they came into the hall their eyes turned to the library door, and +then they looked at one another. Both remembered the conversation they +had had within that room. + +"What if you told Sir John?" said Pamela. "It seems that he does after +all care." + +"It would be of no use," said Millicent, shaking her head. "He would +only say, 'Let him come home,' and Tony will not. Besides, I never see +him now." + +"Never?" exclaimed Pamela. + +"No; he does not leave his room." She lowered her voice. "I do not +believe he ever will leave it again. It's not that he's really ill, +his doctor tells me, but he's slowly letting himself go." + +Pamela answered absently. Sir John Stretton and his ailments played a +small part in her thoughts. It seemed that the library was again to +become typical of the house, typical of the life its inhabitants led. +Nothing was to happen, then. There was to be a mere waiting for things +to cease. + +But a second letter was lying upstairs unopened on the table, and that +letter, harmless as it appeared, was strangely to influence Millicent +Stretton's life. It was many hours afterwards when Millicent opened +it, and, compared with the heavy tidings she had by the same post +received, it seemed utterly trifling and unimportant. It was no more +indeed than the invitation from Frances Millingham of which Pamela had +spoken. Pamela forgot it altogether when she heard the news which Tony +had sent, but she was to be affected by it too. For she had made a +promise to Tony Stretton, and, as he had foreseen, she would at any +cost fulfil it. + + + + + CHAPTER VII + + THE LADY ON THE STAIRS + + +Whitewebs, Frances Millingham's house in Leicestershire, was a long +white building with many level windows. The square main block of the +building rose in the centre two storeys high, and on each side a wing +of one storey projected. Behind the house a broad lawn sloped to the +bank of a clear and shallow trout stream, with an avenue of old elms +upon its left, and a rose garden upon its right. In front of the house +a paddock made a ring of green, and round this ring the carriage drive +circled from a white five-barred gate. Whitewebs stood in a flat grass +country. From the upper windows you looked over a wide plain of +meadows and old trees, so level that you had on a misty day almost an +illusion of a smooth sea and the masts of ships; from the lower, you +saw just as far as the nearest hedgerow, except in one quarter of the +compass. For to the south-west the ground rose very far away, and at +the limit of view three tall poplars, set in a tiny garden on the +hill's crest, stood clearly out against the sky like sentinels upon a +frontier. These three landmarks were visible for many miles around. +Pamela, however, saw nothing of them as she was driven over the three +miles from the station to Whitewebs. + +It was late on a February evening, and already dark. The snow had +fallen heavily during the last week, and as Pamela looked out through +the carriage windows she saw that the ground glimmered white on every +side; above the ground a mist thickened the night air, and the cold +was piercing. When she reached the house she found that Frances +Millingham was waiting for her alone in the big inner hall, with tea +ready; and the first question which she asked of her hostess was-- + +"Is Millie Stretton here?" + +"Yes," replied Frances Millingham. "She has been here a week." + +"I couldn't come before," said Pamela, rather remorsefully. "My father +was at home alone. How is Millie? I have not seen her for a long time. +Is she enjoying herself?" + +Pamela's conscience had been reproaching her all that afternoon. She +could plead in her own behalf that after the arrival of Tony's letter +with its message of failure, she had deferred her visit into the +country and had stayed in London for a week. But she had not returned +to London since, and consequently she had not seen her friend. She had +heard regularly from her, it is true; she also knew that there was yet +no likelihood of the hoped-for change in the life of that isolated +household in Berkeley Square. But there had been certain omissions of +late in Millicent's letters which began to make Pamela anxious. + +"Yes," Frances Millingham replied; "she seems to be happy enough." + +Lady Millingham related the names of her guests. There were twelve in +all, but the first ten may be omitted, for they are in no way +concerned with Pamela's history. The eleventh name, however, was that +of a friend. + +"John Mudge is here, too," said Frances Millingham; and Pamela said, +with a smile-- + +"I like him." + +John Mudge was that elderly man whom Allan Warrisden had seen with +Pamela at Lady Millingham's dance, the man with no pleasure in his +face. "And Mr. Lionel Callon," said Frances; "you know him." + +"Do I?" asked Pamela. + +"At all events, he knows you." + +It was no doubt a consequence of Pamela's deliberate plan never to be +more than an onlooker, that people who did not arouse her active +interest passed in and out of her acquaintanceship like shadows upon a +mirror. It might be that she had met Lionel Callon. She could not +remember. + +"A quarter past seven," said Frances Millingham, glancing at the +clock. "We dine at eight." + +Pamela dressed quickly in the hope that she might gain a few minutes +before dinner wherein to talk to Millicent. She came down the stairs +with this object a good quarter of an hour before eight, but she was +to be disappointed. The stairs descended into the big inner hall of +the house, and just below the roof of the hall they took a bend. As +Pamela came round this bend the hall was exposed to her eyes, and she +saw, below her, not Millicent at all, but the figure of a man. He was +standing by the fireplace, on her left hand as she descended, looking +into the fire indeed, so that his back was towards her. But at the +rustle of her frock he swung round quickly and looked up. He now moved +a few steps towards the foot of the stairs with a particular +eagerness. Pamela at that moment had just come round the bend, and was +on the small platform from which the final flight of steps began. The +staircase was dimly lit, and the panelling of the wall against which +it rested dark. Pamela took a step or two downwards, and the light of +the hall struck upon her face. The man came instantly to a dead stop, +and a passing disappointment was visible upon his upturned face. It +was evident that he was expecting some one else. Pamela on her side +was disappointed, too, for she had hoped to find Millicent. She went +down the stairs and stopped on the third step from the bottom. + +"How do you do, Miss Mardale?" said the man. "You have arrived at +last." + +The man was Lionel Callon. Pamela recognised him now that they stood +face to face; she _had_ met him, but she had retained no impression of +him in her memory. For the future, however, she would retain a very +distinct impression. For her instincts told her at once and clearly +that she thoroughly disliked the man. He was thirty-three in years, +and looked a trifle younger, although his hair was turning grey. He +was clean shaven, handsome beyond most men, and while his features +were of a classical regularity and of an almost feminine delicacy, +they were still not without character. There was determination in his +face, and his eyes were naturally watchful. It was his manner which +prompted Pamela's instinct of dislike. Assurance gave to it a hint of +arrogance; familiarity made it distasteful. He might have been her +host from the warmth of his welcome. Pamela put on her sedatest air. + +"I am quite well," she said, with just sufficient surprise to suggest +the question, "What in the world has my health to do with you?" She +came down the three steps, and added, "We are the first, I suppose." + +"There may be others in the drawing-room," said Callon, with a glance +towards the open door. But Pamela did not take the hint. For one thing +no sound of any voice was audible in that room; for another Mr. Callon +was plainly anxious to be rid of her. Even as he was speaking his +glance strayed past her up the staircase. Pamela disliked him; she +was, besides, disappointed by him of that private talk with Millicent +which she desired. She was in a mood for mischief. She changed her +manner at once, and, crossing over to the fireplace, engaged Mr. +Callon in conversation with the utmost cordiality, and as she talked +she began to be amused. Callon became positively uneasy; he could not +keep still, he answered her at random. For instance, she put to him a +question about the number of guests in the house. He did not answer at +all for a moment or two, and when he did speak, it was to say, "Will +the frost hold, do you think?" + +"There's no sign of a thaw to-night," replied Pamela; and the sounds +for which both were listening became audible--the shutting of a door +on the landing above, and then the rustle of a frock upon the stairs. +Mr. Callon was evidently at his wits' end what to do; and Pamela, +taking her elbow from the mantelpiece, said, with great sympathy-- + +"One feels a little in the way----" + +"Oh, not at all, Miss Mardale," Callon answered hurriedly, with a +flustered air. + +Pamela looked at her companion with the blankest stare of surprise. + +"I was going to say, when you interrupted me," she went on, "that one +feels a little in the way when one has brought a couple of horses, as +I have, and the frost holds." + +Callon grew red. He had fallen into a trap; his very hurry to +interrupt what appeared to be almost an apology betrayed that the lady +upon the stairs and Mr. Lionel Callon had arranged to come down early. +He had protested overmuch. However, he looked Pamela steadily in the +face, and said-- + +"I beg your pardon, Miss Mardale." + +He spoke loudly, rather too loudly for the ears of any one so near to +him as Pamela. The sentence, too, was uttered with a note of warning. +There was even a suggestion of command. The command was obeyed by the +lady on the stairs, for all at once the frock ceased to rustle, and +there was silence. Lionel Callon kept his eyes fixed upon Pamela's +face, but she did not look towards the stairs, and in a little while +again the sound was heard. But it diminished. The lady upon the stairs +was ascending, and a few minutes afterwards a door closed overhead. +She had beaten a retreat. + +Callon could not quite keep the relief which he felt out of his eyes +or the smile from his lips. Pamela noticed the change with amusement. +She was not in the mind to spare him uneasiness, and she said, looking +at the wall above the mantelpiece-- + +"This is an old mirror, don't you think? From what period would you +date it?" + +Callon's thoughts had been so intent upon the stairs that he had paid +no heed to the ornaments above the mantelshelf. Now, however, he took +note of them with a face grown at once anxious. The mirror was of an +oval shape and framed in gold. Under the pretence of admiring it, he +moved and stood behind Pamela, looking into the mirror over her +shoulder, seeing what she could see, and wondering how much she had +seen. He was to some extent relieved. The stairs were ill-lighted, the +panelling of the wall dark mahogany; moreover, the stairs bent round +into the hall just below the level of the roof, and at the bend the +lady on the stairs had stopped. Pamela could not have seen her face. +Pamela, indeed, had seen nothing more than a black satin slipper +arrested in the act of taking a step, and a black gown with some +touches of red at the waist. She had, however, noticed the attitude of +the wearer of the dress when the warning voice had brought her to a +stop. The lady had stooped down and had cautiously peered into the +hall. In this attitude she had been able to see, and yet had avoided +being seen. + +Pamela, however, did not relieve Mr. Callon of his suspense. She +walked into the drawing-room and waited, with an amused curiosity, for +the appearance of the black dress. It was long in coming, however. +Pamela had no doubt that it would come last, and in a hurry, as though +its wearer had been late in dressing. But Pamela was wrong. Millicent +Stretton came into the room dressed in a frock of white lace, and at +once dinner was announced. Pamela turned to Frances Millingham with a +startled face-- + +"Are we all here?" + +Frances Millingham looked round. + +"Yes;" and Lord Millingham at that moment offered his arm to Pamela. +As she took it, she looked at Millicent, who was just rising from her +chair. Millicent was wearing with her white dress black shoes and +stockings. She might be wearing them deliberately, of course; on the +other hand, she might be wearing them because she had not had time to +change them. It was Millicent, certainly, who had come down last. "I +beg your pardon, Miss Mardale," Callon had said, and it was upon the +"Miss Mardale" that his voice had risen. The emphasis of his warning +had been laid upon the name. + +As she placed her hand on her host's arm, Pamela said-- + +"It was very kind of Frances to ask Millie Stretton here." + +"Oh no," Lord Millingham replied. "You see, Frances knew her. We all +knew, besides, that she is a great friend of yours." + +"Yes," said Pamela; "I suppose everybody here knows that?" + +"Mrs. Stretton has talked of it," he answered, with a smile. + +The "Miss Mardale" might be a warning, then, to Millicent that her +friend had arrived--was actually then in the hall. There was certainly +no one but Millicent in that house who could have been conscious of +any need to shrink back at the warning, who would have changed her +dress to prevent a recognition; and Millicent herself need not have +feared the warning had there not been something to conceal--something +to conceal especially from Pamela, who had said, "I have promised your +husband I would be your friend." There was the heart of Pamela's +trouble. + +She gazed down the two lines of people at the dinner-table, hoping +against hope that she had overlooked some one. There was no one +wearing a black gown. All Pamela's amusement in outwitting Callon had +long since vanished. If Tony had only taken her advice without +question, she thought. "Millie's husband should never leave her. If he +goes away he should take her with him." The words rang in her mind all +through dinner like the refrain of a song of which one cannot get rid. +And at the back of her thoughts there steadily grew and grew a great +regret that she had ever promised Tony to befriend his wife. + +That Millicent was the lady on the stairs she no longer dared to +doubt. Had she doubted, her suspicions would have been confirmed +immediately dinner was over. In the drawing-room Millicent avoided any +chance of a private conversation, and since they had not met for so +long such avoidance was unnatural. Pamela, however, made no effort to +separate her friend from the other women. She had a plan in her mind, +and in pursuit of it she occupied a sofa, upon which there was just +room for two. She sat in the middle of the sofa, so that no one else +could sit on it, and just waited until the men came in. Some of them +crossed at once to Pamela, but she did not budge an inch. They were +compelled to stand. Finally, Mr. Mudge approached her, and immediately +she moved into one corner and bade him take the other. Mr. Mudge +accepted the position with alacrity. The others began to move away; a +couple of card-tables were made up. Pamela and John Mudge were left +alone. + +"You know every one here?" she asked. + +"No, very few." + +"Mr. Callon, at all events?" + +Mr. Mudge glanced shrewdly at his questioner. + +"Yes, I know him slightly," he answered. + +"Tell me what you know." + +Mr. Mudge sat for a moment or two with his hands upon his knees and +his eyes staring in front of him. Pamela knew his history, and +esteemed his judgment. He had built up a great contracting business +from the poorest beginnings, and he remained without bombast or +arrogance. He was to be met nowadays in many houses, and, while he had +acquired manners, he had lost nothing of his simplicity. The journey +from the Seven Dials to Belgrave Square is a test of furnace heat, and +John Mudge had betrayed no flaws. There was a certain forlornness, +too, in his manner which appealed particularly to Pamela. She guessed +that the apples, for which through a lifetime he had grasped, had +crumbled into ashes between his fingers. Sympathy taught her that the +man was lonely. He wandered through the world amidst a throng of +acquaintances; but how many friends had he, she wondered? She did not +interrupt his reflections, and he turned to her at last, with an air +of decision. + +"I am on strange ground here," he said, "as you know. I am the +outsider; and when I am on strange ground I go warily. If I am asked +what I think of this man or that I make it a rule to praise." + +"Yes; but not to me," said Pamela, with a smile. "I want to know the +truth to-night." + +Mudge looked at her deliberately, and no less deliberately he spoke-- + +"And I think you ought to know the truth to-night." + +Mudge, then, like the rest, knew that she was Millicent's friend. Was +it for that reason that she ought to know the truth? + +"I know Callon a little," he went on, "but I know a good deal about +him. Like most of the men who know him I dislike him heartily. Women, +on the other hand, like him, Miss Mardale--like him too well. Women +make extraordinary mistakes over men just as men do over women. They +can be very blind--like your friend----" + +Mudge paused for an appreciable time. Then he went on steadily-- + +"Like your friend Lady Millingham, who invites him here." + +Pamela was grateful for the delicacy with which the warning was +conveyed, but she did not misunderstand it. She had been told +indirectly, but no less definitely on that account, that Millie was +entangled. + +"Callon has good looks, of course," continued Mudge; and Pamela +uttered a little exclamation of contempt. Mudge smiled, but rather +sadly. + +"Oh, it's something. All people have not your haughty indifference to +good looks. He is tall, he has a face which is a face and not a +pudding. It's a good deal, Miss Mardale." + +Pamela looked in surprise at the stout, heavily-built bald man who +spoke. That he should ever have given a thought to how he looked was a +new idea to her. It struck her as pathetic. + +"But he is not merely good-looking. He is clever, persistent besides, +and, so far as I can judge, untroubled by a single scruple in the +management of his life. Altogether, Miss Mardale, a dangerous man. How +does he live?" he asked suddenly. + +"I neither know nor care," said Pamela. "Ah, but you should care," +replied Mudge. "The answer is instructive. He has a small income--two +hundred a year, perhaps; a mere nothing compared with what he +spends--and he never does an hour's work, as we understand work. Yet +he pays his card debts at his club, and they are sometimes heavy, and +he wants for nothing. How is it done? He has no prospect of an +inheritance, so post-obits are not the explanation." + +Mr. Mudge leaned back in his chair and waited. Pamela turned the +question over in her mind. "I can't guess how it's done," she said. +"And I can do no more than hint the answer," he replied. "He rides one +woman's horses, he drives another woman's phaeton, he is always on +hand to take a third to a theatre, or to make up a luncheon party with +a fourth. Shall we say he borrows money from a fifth? Shall we be +wrong in saying it?" And suddenly Mr. Mudge exclaimed, with a heat and +scorn which Pamela had never heard from him before, "A very +contemptible existence, anyway, Miss Mardale. But the man's not to be +despised, mind. No, that's the worst of it. Some day, perhaps, a +strong man will rise up and set his foot on him. Till that time he is +to be feared." And when Pamela by a gesture rejected the word, Mudge +repeated it. "Yes, feared. He makes his plans, Miss Mardale. Take a +purely imaginary case," and somehow, although he laid no ironic stress +on the word imaginary, and accompanied it with no look, but sat gazing +straight in front of him, Pamela was aware that it was a real case he +was going to cite. "Imagine a young and pretty woman coming to a house +where most of the guests were strangers to her; imagine her to be of a +friendly, unsuspecting temperament, rather lonely, perhaps, and either +unmarried or separated for a time from her husband. Add that she will +one day be very rich, or that her husband will be. Such a woman might +be his prey, unless----" + +Pamela looked up inquiringly. + +"Unless she had good friends to help her." + +Pamela's face, distressed before, grew yet more troubled now. The +burden of her promise was being forced upon her back. It seemed she +was not for one moment to be allowed to forget it. + +"I'll tell you my philosophy, Miss Mardale," Mudge continued, "and I +have inferred it from what I have seen. I do not believe that any man +really comes to good unless he has started in life with the ambition +to make a career for himself, with no help other than his hands and +his brains afford. Later on he will learn that women can be most +helpful; later on, as he gets towards middle life, as the years +shorten and shorten, he will see that he must use whatever extraneous +assistance comes his way. But he will begin with a fearless ambition +to suffice with his own hands and head." Mr. Mudge dropped from the +high level of his earnestness. He looked towards Lionel Callon, who +was seated at a card-table, and the contempt again crept into his +voice. "Now that man began life meaning to use all people he met, and +especially women. Women were to be his implements." Mr. Mudge smiled +suddenly. "He's listening," he said. + +"But he is too far away to hear," replied Pamela. + +"No doubt; but he knows we are speaking of him. Look, his attitude +shows it. This, you see, is his battleground, and he knows the arts of +his particular warfare. A drawing-room! Mr. Lionel Callon fights among +the teacups. Cajolery first, and God knows by what means afterwards. +But he wins, Miss Mardale; don't close your eyes to that! Look, I told +you he was listening. The rubber's over, and he's coming towards us. +Oh, he's alert upon his battle-ground! He knows what men think of him. +He's afraid lest I should tell what men think to you. But he comes too +late." + +Callon crossed to the sofa, and stood talking there until Frances +Millingham rose. Pamela turned to Mr. Mudge as she got up. + +"I thank you very much," she said gratefully. + +Mr. Mudge smiled. + +"No need for thanks," said he. "I am very glad you came to-night, for +I go away to-morrow." + +Pamela went to her room and sat down before the fire. What was to be +done, she wondered? She could not get Lionel Callon sent away from the +house. It would be no use even if she could, since Millie had an +address in town. She could not say a word openly. + +She raised her head and spoke to her maid. + +"Which is Mrs. Stretton's room?" And when she had the answer she rose +from her chair and stood, a figure of indecision. She did not plead +that John Mudge had exaggerated the danger; for she had herself +foreseen it long-ago, before Millie's marriage--even before Millie's +engagement. It was just because she had foreseen it that she had used +the words which had so rankled in Tony's memory. Bitterly she +regretted that she had ever used them; greatly she wished that she +could doubt their wisdom. But she could not. Let Millie's husband +leave her, she would grieve with all the strength of her nature; let +him come back soon, she would welcome him with a joy as great. Yes; +but he must come back _soon_. Otherwise she would grow used to his +absence; she would find his return an embarrassment, for it would be +the return of a stranger with the prerogative of a husband; she might +even have given to another the place he once held in her thoughts. And +the other might be a Lionel Callon. For this was Millicent's +character. She yielded too easily to affection, and she did not +readily distinguish between affection and the show of it. She paddled +in the shallows of passion, and flattered herself that she was +swimming in the depths. Grief she was capable of--yes; but a torrent +of tears obliterated it. Joy she knew; but it was a thrill with her +lasting an hour. + +Pamela walked along the passage and knocked at Millicent's door, +saying who she was. Millicent opened the door, and received her friend +with some constraint. + +"Can I come in?" said Pamela. + +"Of course," said Millie. + +They sat opposite to one another on each side of the fire. + +"I wanted to see you before I went to bed," said Pamela. "You have not +told me lately in your letters how Tony is getting on." + +Millie raised her hand to shield her face from the blaze of the fire. +She happened to shade it also from the eyes of Pamela; and she made no +reply. + +"Is he still in New York?" Pamela asked; and then Millie replied. + +"I do not know," she answered slowly. She let her hand fall, and +looked straight and defiantly at her friend. + +"I have not heard from him for a long while," she added; and as she +spoke there crept into her face a look of disdain. + + + + + CHAPTER VIII + + GIDEON'S FLEECE + + +Millicent was reluctant to add any word of explanation. She sat with +her eyes upon the fire, waiting, it seemed, until Pamela should see +fit to go. But Pamela remained, and of the two women she was the +stronger in will and character. She sat, with her eyes quietly resting +upon Millicent's face; and in a little while Millicent began +reluctantly to speak. As she spoke the disdainful droop of her lips +became more pronounced, and her words were uttered in a note of +petulance. + +"He _would_ stay to retrieve his failure. You remember?" she said. + +"Yes," replied Pamela. + +"I wrote to him again and again to come home, but he would not. I +couldn't make him see that he wasn't really a match for the people he +must compete with." + +Pamela nodded her head. + +"You wrote that to him?" + +Millicent lifted her face to Pamela's. + +"I put it, of course, with less frankness. I offered him, besides, the +rest of my money, so that he might try again; but he refused to take a +farthing more. It was unreasonable, don't you think? I could have got +on without it, but he couldn't. I was very sorry for him." + +"And you expressed your pity, too?" asked Pamela. + +"Yes, indeed," said Millicent, eagerly. "But he never would accept it. +He replied cheerfully that something was sure to happen soon, that he +would be sure to find an opening soon. But, of course, he never did. +It was not likely that with his inexperience he ever would." + +Tony's own words had recoiled upon him. On the evening when he had +first broached his plan to Millicent in Berkeley Square, he had laid +before her, amongst others, this very obstacle, thinking that she +ought to be aware of it, and never doubting but that he would surmount +it. The honesty of his nature had bidden him speak all that he had +thought, and he had spoken without a suspicion that his very frankness +might put in her mind an argument to belittle him. He had seemed +strong then, because he knew the difficulties, and counted them up +when she omitted them. His image was all the more pale and ineffectual +now because, foreknowing them well, he had not mastered them. + +"I wrote to him at last that it wasn't any use for him to go on with +the struggle. He would not tell me how he lived, or even where. I had +to send my letters to a post-office, and he called for them. He must +be living in want, in misery. I wrote to him that I had guessed as +much from his very reticence, and I said how sorry I was. Yet, in +spite of what I wrote," and here her voice hardened a little; she +showed herself as a woman really aggrieved, "in spite of what I wrote, +he answered me in a quite short letter, saying that I must not expect +to hear from him again until he had recovered from his defeat and was +re-established in my eyes. I can't understand that, can you?" + +"I think so," Pamela answered. She spoke gently. For there was +something to be said upon Millicent's side. The sudden collapse of her +exaggerated hopes, the dreary life she led, and her natural +disappointment at the failure of the man whom she had married, when +once he stepped down into the arena to combat with his fellow-men. +These things could not fail to provoke, in a nature so easily swayed +from extreme to extreme as Millicent's, impatience, anger, and a sense +of grievance. Pamela could hold the balance fairly enough to +understand that. But chiefly she was thinking of Tony--Tony hidden +away in some lodging in New York, a lodging so squalid that he would +not give the address, and vainly seeking for an opportunity whereby he +would make a rapid fortune; very likely going short of food, and +returning home at night to read over a letter from his wife of which +every line cried out to him, with a contemptuous pity, "You are a +failure. You are a failure. Come home." Pamela's heart went out in +pity, too. But there was no contempt in her pity. She could not but +admire the perseverance with which, on this, the first time that he +had ever walked hand in hand with misery, he endured its +companionship. + +"I think I understand," she said. "You say he answered you in that +short way in spite of what you wrote. I think it was not in spite of, +but because----" + +Millie Stretton shook her head. + +"No, that's not the reason," she replied. She gave one herself, and it +fairly startled Pamela. "Tony no longer cares for me. He means to go +out of my life altogether." + +Pamela remembered what store Tony had always set upon his wife, how he +had spoken of her that July morning in the park, and how he had looked +at the moment when he spoke. It was just because he cared so much that +he had taken his wild leap into the dark. That, at all events, she +believed, and in such a strain she replied. But Millicent would not be +persuaded. + +"Before Tony went away," she said stubbornly, "he let me see that he +no longer cared. He was losing the associations which used to be vivid +in his memory. Our marriage had just become a dull, ordinary thing. He +had lost the spirit in which he entered into it." + +Again Tony's indiscreet frankness had done him wrong. The coon song, +which was always to be associated in his mind with the summer night, +and the islets in the sea, and the broad stretch of water trembling +away in the moonlight across to the lights of the yachts in Oban Bay, +had become a mere coon song "sung by some one." Millicent had often +remembered and reflected upon that unfortunate sentence, and as her +disappointment in Tony increased and the pitying contempt gradually +crept into her mind, she read into it more and more of what Tony had +not meant. + +"I am sure you are wrong," said Pamela, very earnestly. "He went away +because he cared. He went away to keep your married life and his from +fading away into the colourless, dull, ordinary thing it so frequently +becomes. He has lost ground by his failure. No doubt your own letters +have shown that; and he is silent now in order to keep what he has. +You have said it yourself. He will not write until he is able to +re-establish himself in your thoughts." + +But would Tony succeed? _Could_ he succeed? The questions forced +themselves into her mind even while she was speaking, and she carried +them back to her room. The chances were all against him. Even if he +retrieved his failure, it would be a long time before that result was +reached--too long, perhaps, when his wife was Millicent, and such +creatures as Lionel Callon walked about the world. And he might never +succeed at all, he was so badly handicapped. + +Pamela was sorely tempted to leave the entanglement alone to unravel +itself. There was something which she could do. She was too honest to +close her eyes to that. But her own history rose up against her and +shook a warning finger. It had a message to her ears never so loudly +repeated as on this night. "Don't move a step. Look on! Look on!" She +knew herself well. She was by nature a partisan. Let her take this +trouble in hand and strive to set it right, her whole heart would soon +be set upon success. She was fond of Millicent already; she would +become fonder still in the effort to save her. She liked Tony very +much. The thought of him stoutly persevering, clinging to his one +ambition to keep his married life a bright and real thing in spite of +want and poverty--and even his wife's contempt, appealed to her with a +poignant strength. But she might fail. She had eaten of failure once, +and, after all these years, the taste of it was still most bitter in +her mouth. + +She fought her battle out over her dying fire, and at the end two +thoughts stood out clearly in her mind. She had given her promise to +Tony to be a good friend to his wife, and there was one thing which +she could do in fulfilment of her promise. + +She walked over to her window and flung it open. She was of the women +who look for signs; no story quite appealed to her like the story of +Gideon's Fleece. She looked for a sign now quite seriously. If a thaw +had set in, why, the world was going a little better with her, and +perhaps she might succeed. But the earth was iron-bound, and in the +still night she could hear a dry twig here and there snapping in the +frost. No, the world was not going well. She decided to wait until +things improved. + +But next day matters were worse. For one thing John Mudge went away, +and he was the only person in the house who interested her at all. +Furthermore, Lionel Callon stayed, and he announced some news. + +"I have been chosen to stand for Parliament at the next election," he +said; and he named an important constituency. Pamela noticed the look +of gratification, almost of pride, which shone at once on Millie's +face, and her heart sank. She interpreted Millie's thought, and +accurately. Here was a successful man, a man who had got on without +opportunities or means, simply by his own abilities; and there, far +away in New York, was her failure of a husband. Moreover, Callon and +Millicent were much together; they had even small secrets, to which in +conversation they referred. The world was not going well with Pamela, +and she waited for the fleece to be wet with dew. + +After four days, however, the frost showed signs of breaking. A thaw +actually set in that evening, and on the next morning two pieces of +good news arrived. In the first place, Pamela received a letter from +Alan Warrisden. There was nothing of importance in it, but it gave her +his actual address. In the second, Millie told Frances Millingham that +she had received news that Sir John Stretton was really failing, and +although there was no immediate danger, she must hold herself in +readiness to return to town. This to Pamela was really the best news +of all. This morning, at all events, Gideon's Fleece was wet. She +looked out some trains in the railway guide, and then sent a telegram +to Warrisden to come by a morning train. She would meet him at the +railway station. The one step in her power she was thus resolved to +take. + + + + + CHAPTER IX + + THE NEW ROAD + + +On the crest of that hill which was visible from the upper windows of +Whitewebs, a village straggled for a mile; and all day in the cottages +the looms were heard. The sound of looms, indeed, was always +associated with that village in the minds of Pamela Mardale and Alan +Warrisden, though they drove along its broad street but once, and a +few hours included all their visit. Those few hours, however, were +rich with consequence. For Pamela asked for help that day, and, in the +mere asking, gave, as women must; and she neither asked nor gave in +ignorance of what she did. The request might be small, the gift small, +too; but it set her and her friend in a new relation each to each, it +linked them in a common effort, it brought a new and a sweet intimacy +into both their lives. So that the noise of a loom was never heard by +them in the after times but there rose before their eyes, visible as a +picture, that grey chill day of February, the red-brick houses +crowding on the broad street in a picturesque irregularity, and the +three tall poplars tossing in the wind. The recollection brought +always a smile of tenderness to their faces; and in their thoughts +they had for the village a strange and fanciful name. It was just a +little Leicestershire village perched upon a hill, the village of +looms, the village of the three poplars. But they called it Quetta. + +At the very end of the street, and exactly opposite to the small house +from whose garden the poplars rose, there stood an inn. It was on the +edge of the hill, for just beyond the road dipped steeply down between +high hedges of brambles and elder trees, and, turning at the bottom of +the incline, wound thence through woods and level meadows towards +Leicester. It was the old coach road, and the great paved yard of the +inn and the long line of disused stables had once been noisy with the +shouts of ostlers and the crack of whips. Now only the carrier's cart +drove twice a week down the steep road to Leicester, and a faint +whistle from the low-lying land and a trail of smoke showed where now +the traffic ran. On the platform of the little roadside station, three +miles from the village, Pamela met Alan Warrisden on the morning after +she had sent off her telegram. She had a trap waiting at the door, and +as they mounted into it she said-- + +"I rode over to the village this morning and hired this dog-cart at +the inn. I am not expected to be back at Whitewebs until the +afternoon; so I thought we might lunch at the inn, and then a man can +drive you back to the station, while I ride home again." + +"It was bad going for a horse, wasn't it?" said Warrisden. + +The thaw had fairly set in; the roads, still hard as cement, ran with +water, and were most slippery. On each side patches of snow hung upon +the banks half melted, and the air was raw. + +"Yes, it was bad going," Pamela admitted. "But I could not wait. It +was necessary that I should see you to-day." + +She said no more at the moment, and Warrisden was content to sit by +her side as she drove, and wait. The road ran in a broad straight line +over the sloping ground. There was no vehicle, not even another +person, moving along it. Warrisden could see the line of houses ahead, +huddled against the sky, the spire of a church, and on his right the +three sentinel poplars. He was to see them all that afternoon. + +Pamela drove straight to the inn, where she had already ordered +luncheon; and it was not until luncheon was over that she drew up her +chair to the fire and spoke. + +"Won't you smoke?" she said first of all. "I want you to listen to +me." + +Warrisden lit a pipe and listened. + +"It is right that I should be very frank with you," she went on, "for +I am going to ask you to help me." + +"You need me, then?" said Warrisden. There was a leap in his voice +which brought the colour to her cheeks. + +"Very much," she said; and, with a smile, she asked, "Are you glad?" + +"Yes," he answered simply. + +"Yet the help may be difficult for you to give. It may occupy a long +time besides. I am not asking you for a mere hour or a day." + +The warning only brought a smile to Warrisden's face. + +"I don't think you understand," he said, "how much one wants to be +needed by those one needs." + +Indeed, even when that simple truth was spoken to her, it took Pamela +a little while to weigh it in her thoughts and give it credence. She +had travelled a long distance during these last years down her +solitary road. She began to understand that now. To need--actually to +need people, to feel a joy in being needed--here were emotions, +familiar to most, and no doubt at one time familiar to her, which +were, nevertheless, now very new and strange. At present she only +needed. Would a time come when she would go further still? When she +would feel a joy in being needed? The question flashed across her +mind. + +"Yes," she admitted, "no doubt that is true. But none the less there +must be no misunderstanding between you and me. I speak of myself, +although it is not for myself that I need your help; but I am not +blind. I know it will be for my sake that you give it, and I do not +want you to give it in any ignorance of me, or, perhaps"--and she +glanced at him almost shyly--"or, perhaps, expecting too much." + +Warrisden made no other answer than to lean forward in his chair, with +his eyes upon Pamela's face. She was going to explain that isolation +of hers which had so baffled him. He would not for worlds have +interrupted her lest he should check the utterance on her lips. He saw +clearly enough that she was taking a great step for her, a step, too, +which meant much to him. The actual explanation was not the important +thing. That she should confide it of her own accord--there was the +real and valuable sign. As she began to speak again, diffidence was +even audible in her voice. She almost awaited his judgment. + +"I must tell you something which I thought never to tell to any one," +she said. "I meant to carry it as my secret out with me at the end of +my life. I have been looking on all these last years. You noticed +that; you thought perhaps I was just obeying my nature. But I wasn't. +I did not begin life looking on. I began it as eager, as expectant of +what life could give me as any girl that was ever born. And I had just +my first season, that was all." She smiled rather wistfully as her +thoughts went back to it. "I enjoyed my first season. I had hardly +ever been in London before. I was eighteen; and everybody was very +nice to me. At the end of July I went to stay for a month with some +friends of mine on the coast of Devonshire, and--some one else stayed +there, too. His name does not matter. I had met him during the season +a good deal, but until he came down to Devonshire I had not thought of +him more than as a friend. He was a little older than myself, not very +much, and just as poor. He had no prospects, and his profession was +diplomacy.... So that there was no possibility from the first. He +meant never to say anything; but there came an hour, and the truth was +out between us." + +She stopped and gazed into the fire. The waters of the Channel ran in +sunlit ripples before her eyes; the red rocks of Bigbury Bay curved +warmly out on her right and her left; further away the towering +headlands loomed misty in the hot, still August air. A white yacht, +her sails hardly drawing, moved slowly westwards; the black smoke of a +steamer stained the sky far out; and on the beach there were just two +figures visible--herself and the man who had not meant to speak. + +"We parted at once," she went on. "He was appointed a consul in West +Africa. I think--indeed I know--that he hoped to rise more quickly +that way. But trouble came and he was killed. Because of that one +hour, you see, when he spoke what he did not mean to speak, he was +killed." It seemed that there was the whole story told. But Pamela had +not told it all, and never did; for her mother had played a part in +its unfolding. It was Mrs. Mardale's ambition that her daughter should +make a great marriage; it was her daughter's misfortune that she knew +little of her daughter's character. Mrs. Mardale had remarked the +growing friendship between Pamela and the man, she had realised +that marriage was quite impossible, and she had thought, with her +short-sighted ingenuity, that if Pamela fell in love and found love +to be a thing of fruitless trouble, she would come the sooner to take +a sensible view of the world and marry where marriage was to her +worldly advantage. She thus had encouraged the couple to a greater +friendliness, throwing them together when she could have hindered +their companionship; she had even urged Pamela to accept that +invitation to Devonshire, knowing who would be the other guests. She +was disappointed afterwards when Pamela did not take the sensible +view; but she did not blame herself at all. For she knew nothing of +the suffering which her plan had brought about. Pamela had kept her +secret. Even the months of ill-health which followed upon that first +season had not opened the mother's eyes, and certainly she never +suspected the weary nights of sleeplessness and aching misery which +Pamela endured. Some hint of the pain of that bad past time, however, +Pamela now gave to Warrisden. + +"I stayed as much at home in Leicestershire as possible," she said. +"You see there were my horses there; but even with them I was very +lonely. The time was long in passing, and it wasn't pleasant to think +that there would be so much of it yet, before it passed altogether. I +went up to London for the season each year, and I went out a great +deal. It helped me to keep from thinking." + +The very simplicity with which she spoke gave an intensity to her +words. There was no affectation in Pamela Mardale. Warrisden was able +to fill out her hints, to understand her distress. + +"All this is a great surprise to me," he said. "I have thought of you +always as one who had never known either great troubles or great joys. +I have hoped that some day you would wake, that I should find you +looking out on the world with the eagerness of youth. But I believed +eagerness would be a new thing to you." + +He looked at her as she sat. The firelight was bright upon her face, +and touched her hair with light; her dark eyes shone; and his thought +was that which the schoolmaster at Roquebrune had once sadly pondered. +It seemed needlessly cruel, needlessly wanton that a girl so equipped +for happiness should, in her very first season, when the world was +opening like a fairyland, have been blindly struck down. There were so +many others who would have felt the blow less poignantly. She might +surely have been spared. + +"You can guess, now," said Pamela, "why I have so persistently looked +on. I determined that I would never go through such distress again. I +felt that I would not dare to face it again." She suddenly covered her +face with her hands. "I don't think I could," she cried in a low, +piteous voice. "I don't know what I would do," as though once more the +misery of that time were closing upon her, so vivid were her +recollections. + +And once more Warrisden felt, as he watched her, the shock of a +surprise. He had thought her too sedate, too womanly for her years, +and here she sat shrinking in a positive terror, like any child, from +the imagined recurrence of her years of trouble. Warrisden was moved +as he had seldom been. But he sat quite still, saying no word; and in +a little while she took her hands from her face and went on-- + +"My life was over, you see, at the very beginning, and I was resolved +it should be over. For the future I would get interested only in +trifling, unimportant things; no one should ever be more to me than a +friend whom I could relinquish; I would merely look on. I should grow +narrow, no doubt, and selfish." And, as Warrisden started, a smile +came on to her face. "Yes, you have been thinking that, too, and you +were right. But I didn't mind. I meant to take no risks. Nothing +serious should ever come near me. If I saw it coming, I would push it +away; and I have pushed it away." + +"Until to-day, when you need my help?" Warrisden interrupted. + +"Yes, until to-day," Pamela repeated softly. + +Warrisden walked over to the window and stood with his back towards +her. The three tall poplars stood leafless up in front of him; the sky +was heavy with grey clouds; the wind was roaring about the chimneys; +and the roads ran with water. It was as cheerless a day as February +can produce, but to Warrisden it had something of a summer brightness. +The change for which he had hoped so long in vain had actually come to +pass. + +"What do you want me to do?" he asked, turning again to the room. + +"I want you to find Millie Stretton's husband," she replied; "and, at +all costs, to bring him home again." + +"Millie Stretton's husband?" he repeated, in perplexity. + +"Yes. Don't you remember the couple who stepped out of the dark house +in Berkeley Square and dared not whistle for a hansom--the truants?" + +Warrisden was startled. "Those two!" he exclaimed. "Well, that's +strange. On the very night when we saw them, you were saying that +there was no road for you, no new road from Quetta to Seistan. I was +puzzling my brains, too, as to how in the world you were to be roused +out of your detachment; and there were the means visible all the time, +perhaps--who knows?--ordained." He sat down again in his chair. + +"Where shall I look for Mr. Stretton?" he asked. + +"I don't know. He went away to New York, six months ago, to make a +home for Millie and himself. He did not succeed, and he has +disappeared." + +"Disappeared?" cried Warrisden. + +"Oh, but of his own accord," said Pamela. "I can't tell you why; it +wouldn't be fair. I have no right to tell you. But he must be found, +and he must be brought back. Again I can't tell you why; but it is +most urgent." + +"Is there any clue to help us?" Warrisden asked. "Had he friends in +New York?" + +"No; but he has a friend in England," said Pamela, "and I think it's +just possible that the friend may know where he is to be found, for it +was upon his advice that Mr. Stretton went to New York." + +"Tell me his name." + +"Mr. Chase," Pamela replied. "He is head of a mission in Stepney +Green. Tony Stretton told me of him one morning in Hyde Park just +before he went away. He seemed to rely very much upon his judgment." + +Warrisden wrote the name down in his pocket-book. + +"Will he tell me, do you think, where Stretton is, even if he knows? +You say Stretton has disappeared of his own accord." + +"I have thought of that difficulty," Pamela answered. "There is an +argument which you can use. Sir John Stretton, Tony's father, is ill, +and in all probability dying." + +"I see. I can use the same argument to Stretton himself, I suppose, +when I find him?" + +"I can give you no other," said Pamela; "but you can add to it. Mr. +Stretton will tell you that his father does not care whether he comes +back in time or not. He is sure to say that. But you can answer that +every night since he went away the candles have been lit in his +dressing-room and his clothes laid out by his father's orders, on the +chance that some evening he might walk in at the door." + +That Sir John Stretton's illness was merely the pretext for Tony's +return both understood. The real reason why he must come home Pamela +did not tell. To her thinking Millie was not yet so deeply entangled +with Lionel Callon but that Tony's home-coming might set the tangle +right. A few weeks of companionship, and surely he would resume his +due place in his wife's thoughts. Pamela, besides, was loyal to her +sex. She had promised to safeguard Millicent; she was in no mind to +betray her. + +"But bring him back," she cried, with a real passion. "So much depends +on his return, for Millie, for him, and for me, too. Yes, for me! If +you fail, it is I who fail; and I don't want failure. Save me from +it!" + +"I'll try," Warrisden answered simply; and Pamela was satisfied. + +Much depended, for Warrisden too, upon the success of his adventure. +If he failed, Pamela would retire again behind her barrier; she would +again resume the passive, indifferent attitude of the very old; she +would merely look on as before and wait for things to cease. If, +however, he succeeded, she would be encouraged to move forward still; +the common sympathies would have her in their grasp again; she might +even pass that turnpike gate of friendship and go boldly down the +appointed road of life. Thus success meant much for him. The fortunes +of the four people--Millicent, Tony, Pamela, and Warrisden--were +knotted together at this one point. + +"Indeed, I'll try," he repeated, + +Pamela's horse was brought round to the inn door. The dusk was coming +on. + +"Which way do you go?" asked Warrisden. + +"Down the hill." + +"I will walk to the bottom with you. The road will be dangerous." + +They went slowly down between the high elder hedges, Pamela seated on +her horse, Warrisden walking by her side. The wide level lowlands +opened out beneath them--fields of brown and green, black woods with +swinging boughs, and the broad high road with its white wood rails. A +thin mist swirled across the face of the country in the wind, so that +its every feature was softened and magnified. It loomed dim and +strangely distant, with a glamour upon it like a place of old romance. +To Pamela and Warrisden, as the mists wove and unwove about it, it had +a look of dreamland. + +They reached the end of the incline, and Pamela stopped her horse. + +"This is my way," said she, pointing along the highway with her whip. + +"Yes," answered Warrisden. The road ran straight for some distance, +then crossed a wooden bridge and curved out of sight round the edge of +a clump of trees. "The new road," he said softly. "The new road from +Quetta to Seistan!" + +Pamela smiled. + +"This is Quetta," said she. + +Warrisden laid his hand upon her horse's neck, and looked suddenly up +into her face. + +"Where will be Seistan?" he asked in a low voice. + +Pamela returned the look frankly. There came a softness into her dark +eyes. For a moment she let her hand rest lightly upon his sleeve, and +did not speak. She herself was wondering how far she was to travel +upon this new road. + +"I cannot tell," she said very gently. "Nor, my friend, can you. +Only"--and her voice took on a lighter and a whimsical tone-"only I +start alone on my new road." + +And she went forward into the level country. Warrisden climbed the +hill again, and turned when he had reached the top; but Pamela was out +of sight. The dusk and the mists had enclosed her. + + + + + CHAPTER X + + MR. CHASE + + +The night had come when Warrisden stepped from the platform of the +station into the train. Pamela was by this time back at Whitewebs--he +himself was travelling to London; their day was over. He looked out of +the window. Somewhere three miles away the village of the three +poplars crowned the hill, but a thick wall of darkness and fog hid it +from his eyes. It seemed almost as if Pamela and he had met that day +only in thought at some village which existed only in a dream. The +train, however, rattled upon its way. Gradually he became conscious of +a familiar exhilaration. The day had been real. Not merely had it +signalled the change in Pamela, for which for so long he had wished; +not merely had it borne a blossom of promise for himself, but +something was to be done immediately, and the thing to be done was of +all things that which most chimed with his own desires. He was to take +the road again, and the craving for the road was seldom stilled for +long within his heart. He heard its call sung like a song to the +rhythm of the wheels. The very uncertainty of its direction tantalised +his thoughts. + +Warrisden lodged upon the Embankment, and his rooms overlooked the +Thames. The mist lay heavy upon London, mid all that night the +steamboats hooted as they passed from bridge to bridge. Warrisden lay +long awake listening to them; each blast had its message for him, each +was like the greeting of a friend; each one summoned him, and to each +he answered with a rising joy, "I shall follow, I shall follow." The +boats passed down to the sea through the night mist. Many a time he +had heard them before, picturing the dark deck and the side lights, +red and green, and the yellow light upon the mast, and the man silent +at the wheel with the light from the binnacle striking up upon the +lines of his face. They were little river or coasting boats for the +most part, but he had never failed to be stirred by the long-drawn +melancholy of their whistles. They talked of distant lands and an +alien foliage. + +He spent the following morning and the afternoon in the arrangement of +his affairs, and in the evening drove down to the mission house. It +stood in a dull by-street close to Stepney Green, a rambling building +with five rooms upon the ground floor panelled with varnished deal and +furnished with forms and rough tables, and on the floor above, a big +billiard-room, a bagatelle-room, and a carpenter's workshop. Mr. Chase +was superintending a boxing class in one of the lower rooms, and +Warrisden, when he was led up to him, received a shock of surprise. He +had never seen a man to the outward eye so unfitted for his work. He +had expected a strong burly person, cheery of manner and confident of +voice; he saw, however, a tall young man with a long pale face and a +fragile body. Mr. Chase was clothed in a clerical frock-coat of +unusual length, he wore linen of an irreproachable whiteness, and his +hands were fine and delicate as a woman's. He seemed indeed the +typical High Church curate fresh that very instant from the tea-cups +of a drawing-room. + +"A gentleman to see you, sir," said the ex-army sergeant who had +brought forward Warrisden. He handed Warrisden's card to Chase, who +turned about and showed Warrisden his full face. Surprise had been +Warrisden's first sentiment, but it gave place in an instant to +distaste. The face which he saw was not ugly, but he disliked it. It +almost repelled him. There was no light in the eyes at all; they were +veiled and sunken; and the features repelled by reason of a queer +antagonism. Mr. Chase had the high narrow forehead of an ascetic, the +loose mouth of a sensualist, and a thin crop of pale and almost +colourless hair. Warrisden wondered why any one should come to this +man for advice, most of all a Tony Stretton. What could they have in +common--the simple, good-humoured, unintellectual subaltern of the +Coldstream, and this clerical exquisite? The problem was perplexing. + +"You wish to see me?" asked Chase. + +"If you please." + +"Now? As you see, I am busy." + +"I can wait." + +"Thank you. The mission closes at eleven. If you can wait till then +you might come home with me, and we could talk in comfort." + +It was nine o'clock. For two hours Warrisden followed Chase about the +mission, and with each half-hour his interest increased. However +irreconcilable with his surroundings Chase might appear to be, neither +he nor any of the members of the mission were aware of it. He was at +ease alike with the boys and the men; and the boys and the men were at +ease with him. Moreover, he was absolute master, although there were +rough men enough among his subjects. The fiercest boxing contest was +stopped in a second by a motion of that delicate hand. + +"I used to have a little trouble," he said to Warrisden, "before I had +those wire frames fixed over the gas-jets. You see they cover the gas +taps. Before that was done, if there was any trouble, the first thing +which happened was that the room was in darkness. It took some time to +restore order;" and he passed on to the swimming-bath. + +Mr. Chase was certainly indefatigable. Now he was giving a lesson in +wood-carving to a boy; now he was arranging an apprenticeship for +another in the carpenter's shop. Finally he led the way into the great +billiard-room, where only the older men were allowed. + +"It is here that Stretton used to keep order?" said Warrisden; and +Chase at once turned quickly towards him. + +"Oh," he said slowly, in a voice of comprehension, "I was wondering +what brought you here. Yes; this was the room." + +Chase moved carelessly away, and spoke to some of the men about the +tables. But for the rest of the evening he was on his guard. More than +once his eyes turned curiously and furtively towards Warrisden. His +face was stubborn, and wore a look of wariness. Warrisden began to +fear lest he should get no answer to the question he had to put. No +appeal would be of any use--of that he felt sure. His argument must +serve--and would it serve? + +Chase, at all events, made no attempt to avoid the interview. As the +hands of the clock marked eleven, and the rooms emptied, he came at +once to Warrisden. + +"We can go now," he said; and unlocking a drawer, to Warrisden's +perplexity he filled his pockets with racket-balls. The motive for +that proceeding became apparent as they walked to the house where +Chase lodged. Their way lay through alleys, and as they walked the +children clustered about them, and Chase's pockets were emptied. + +"We keep this house because men from the Universities come down and +put in a week now and then at the mission. My rooms are upstairs." + +Chase's sitting-room was in the strangest contrast to the bareness of +the mission and the squalor of the streets. It was furnished with +luxury, but the luxury was that of a man of taste and knowledge. There +was hardly a piece of furniture which had not an interesting history; +the engravings and the brass ornaments upon the walls had been picked +up here and there in Italy. A bright fire blazed upon the hearth. + +"What will you drink?" Chase asked, and brought from a cupboard bottle +after bottle of liqueurs. It seemed to Warrisden that the procession +of bottles would never end--some held liqueurs of which he had never +even heard the name; but concerning all of them Mr. Chase discoursed +with great knowledge and infinite appreciation. + +"I can recommend this," he said tentatively, as he took up one fat +round bottle and held it up to the light. "It is difficult perhaps to +say definitely which is the best, but--yes, I can recommend this." + +"Can't I have a whiskey and soda?" asked Warrisden, plaintively. + +Mr. Chase looked at his companion with a stare. + +"Of course you can," he replied. But his voice was one of +disappointment, and with an almost imperceptible shrug of the +shoulders he fetched a Tantalus and a siphon of seltzer. + +"Help yourself," he said; and lighting a gold-tipped cigarette he drew +up a chair and began to talk. And so Warrisden came at last to +understand how Tony Stretton had gained his great faith in Mr. Chase. +Chase was a talker of a rare quality. He sat stooping over the fire +with his thin hands outspread to the blaze, and for half an hour +Warrisden was enchained. All that had repelled him in the man, all +that had aroused his curiosity, was soon lost to sight. He yielded +himself up as if to some magician. Chase talked not at all of his work +or of the many strange incidents which he must needs have witnessed in +its discharge. He spoke of other climates and bright towns with a +scholarship which had nothing of pedantry, and an observation human as +it was keen. Chase, with the help of his Livy, had traced Hannibal's +road across the Alps and had followed it on foot; he spoke of another +march across snow mountains of which Warrisden had never till this +moment heard--the hundred days of a dead Sultan of Morocco on the +Passes of the Atlas, during which he led his forces back from Tafilet +to Rabat. Chase knew nothing of this retreat but what he had read. Yet +he made it real to Warrisden, so vividly did his imagination fill up +the outlines of the written history. He knew his Paris, his +Constantinople. He had bathed from the Lido and dreamed on the Grand +Canal. He spoke of the peeling frescoes in the Villa of Countess +Guiccioli above Leghorn, of the outlook from the terrace over the +vines and the olive trees to the sea where Shelley was drowned; and +where Byron's brig used to round into the wind and with its sails +flapping drop anchor under the hill. For half an hour Warrisden +wandered through Europe in the pleasantest companionship, and then +Chase stopped abruptly and leaned back in his chair. + +"I was forgetting," he said, "that you had come upon a particular +errand. It sometimes happens that I see no one outside the mission +people for a good while, and during those periods when I get an +occasion I am apt to talk too much. What can I do for you?" + +The spirit had gone from his voice, his face. He leaned back in his +chair, a man tired out. Warrisden looked at the liqueur bottles +crowded on the table, with Chase's conversation still fresh in his +mind. Was Chase a man at war with himself, he wondered, who was living +a life for which he had no taste that he might the more completely +escape a life which his conscience disapproved? Or was he deliberately +both hedonist and Puritan, giving to each side of his strange nature, +in turn, its outlet and gratification? + +"You have something to say to me," Chase continued. "I know quite well +what it is about." + +"Stretton," said Warrisden. + +"Yes; you mentioned him in the billiard-room. Well?" + +Chase was not looking at Warrisden. He sat with his eyes half-closed, +his elbows on the arms of his chair, his finger-tips joined under his +chain, and his head thrown back. There was no expression upon his face +but one of weariness. Would he answer? Could he answer? Warrisden was +in doubt, indeed in fear. He led to his question warily. + +"It was you who recommended Stretton to try horse-breeding in +Kentucky." + +"Yes," said Chase; and he added, "after he had decided of his own +accord to go away." + +"He failed." + +"Yes." + +"And he has disappeared." + +Chase opened his eyes, but did not turn them to his companion. + +"I did not advise his disappearance," he said. "That, like his +departure, was his own doing." + +"No doubt," Warrisden agreed. "But it is thought that you might have +heard from him since his disappearance." + +Chase nodded his head. + +"I have." + +"It is thought that you might know where he is now." + +"I do," said Mr. Chase. Warrisden was sensibly relieved. One-half of +his fear was taken from him. Chase knew, at all events, where Stretton +was to be found. Now he must disclose his knowledge. But before he +could put a question, Chase said languidly-- + +"You say 'it is thought,' Mr. Warrisden. By whom is it thought? By his +wife?" + +"No. But by a great friend of hers and his." + +"Oh," said Chase, "by Miss Pamela Mardale, then." + +Warrisden started forward. + +"You know her?" he asked. + +"No. But Stretton mentioned her to me in a letter. She has sent you to +me in fulfilment of a promise. I understand." + +The words were not very intelligible to Warrisden. He knew nothing of +Pamela's promise to Tony Stretton. But, on the other hand, he saw that +Mr. Chase was giving a more attentive ear to what he said. He betrayed +no ignorance of the promise. + +"I am sent to fetch Stretton home," he said. "I want you to tell me +where he is." + +Chase shook his head. + +"No," he said gently. + +"It is absolutely necessary that Stretton should come back," Warrisden +declared with great deliberation. And with no less deliberation Chase +replied-- + +"In Stretton's view it is absolutely necessary that he should stay +away!" + +"His father is dying." + +Chase started forward in his chair, and stared at Warrisden for a long +time. + +"Is that an excuse?" he said at length. + +It was, as Warrisden was aware. He did not answer the question. + +"It is the truth," he replied; and he replied truthfully. + +Chase rose from his chair and walked once or twice across the room. He +came back to the fire, and leaning an elbow on the mantelpiece stared +into the coals. Warrisden sat very still. He had used his one +argument--he could add nothing to it; he could only wait for the +answer in a great anxiety. So much hung upon that answer for Stretton +and his wife, for Pamela, for himself! The fortunes of all four were +knotted together. At last the answer came. + +"I promised Tony that I would keep his secret," said Chase. "But when +he asked for the promise, and when I gave it, the possibility of his +father dying was not either in his mind or mine. We considered--in +letters, of course--other possibilities; but not this one. I don't +think I have the right to remain silent. Even in the face of this +possibility I should have kept my promise, I think, if you had come +from his wife--for I know why he disappeared. But as things are, I +will tell you. Tony Stretton is in the North Sea on a trawler." + +"In the North Sea?" exclaimed Warrisden. And he smiled. After all, the +steamboats on the river had last night called to him with a particular +summons. + +"Yes," continued Chase, and he fetched from his writing-desk a letter +in Tony's hand. "He came back to England two months ago. He drifted +across the country. He found himself at Yarmouth with a few shillings +in his pocket. He knew something of the sea. He had sailed his own +yacht in happier times. He was in great trouble. He needed time to +think out a new course of life. He hung about on Gorleston pier for a +day or two, and then was taken on by a skipper who was starting out +short of hands, he signed for eight weeks, and he wrote to me the day +before he started. That's four weeks ago." + +"Can I reach him?" Warrisden asked. + +"Yes. The boat is the _Perseverance_, and it belongs to the Blue +Fleet. A steam cutter goes out every day from Billingsgate to fetch +the fish. I know one of the owners. His son comes down to the mission. +I can get you a passage. When can you start?" + +"At any time," replied Warrisden. "The sooner the better." + +"To-morrow, then," said Chase. "Meet me at the entrance to +Billingsgate Market at half-past eleven. It will take you forty-eight +hours with ordinary luck to reach the Dogger Bank. Of course, if +there's a fog in the Thames the time will be longer. And I warn you, +living is rough on a fish-carrier." + +"I don't mind that," said Warrisden, with a smile. He went away with a +light heart, and that night wrote a letter to Pamela, telling her of +his interview with Mr. Chase. The new road seemed after all likely to +prove a smooth one. As he wrote, every now and then a steamboat hooted +from the river, and the rain pattered upon his window. He flung it up +and looked out. There was no fog to-night, only the rain fell, and +fell gently. He prayed that there might be no fog upon the Thames +to-morrow. + +Mr. Chase, too, heard the rain that night. He sat in his armchair +listening to it with a decanter at his elbow half filled with a liquid +like brown sherry. At times he poured a little into his glass and +drank it slowly, crouching over his fire. Somewhere in the darkness of +the North Sea Tony Stretton was hidden. Very likely at this moment he +was standing upon the deck of his trawler with his hands upon the +spokes of the wheel, and his eyes peering forward through the rain, +keeping his long night-watch while the light from the binnacle struck +upwards upon the lines of his face. Mr. Chase sat late in a muse. But +before he went to bed he locked the decanter and the glass away in a +private cupboard, and took the key with him into his bedroom. + + + + + CHAPTER XI + + ON THE DOGGER BANK + + +The _City of Bristol_ swung out of the huddle of boats off +Billingsgate Wharf at one o'clock on the next afternoon. Mr. Chase, +who stood upon the quay amongst the porters and white-jacketed +salesmen, turned away with an episcopal wave of the hand. Warrisden +leaned over the rail of the steamer's bridge, between the captain and +the pilot, and shouted a reply. The _City of Bristol_, fish-cutter of +300 tons, was a boat built for speed, long and narrow, sitting low on +the water, with an upstanding forecastle forward, a small saloon in +the stern, and a tiny cabin for the captain under the bridge on deck. +She sidled out into the fair way and went forward upon her slow, +intricate journey to the sea. Below the Tower she took her place in +the long, single file of ships winding between the mud banks, and +changed it as occasion served; now she edged up by a string of barges, +now in a clear broad space she made a spurt and took the lead of a +barquantine, which swam in indolence, with bare masts, behind a tug; +and at times she stopped altogether, like a carriage blocked in +Piccadilly. The screw thrashed the water, ceased, and struck again +with a suggestion of petulance at the obstacles which barred the +boat's way. Warrisden, too, chafed upon the bridge. A question pressed +continually upon his mind--"Would Stretton return?" He had discovered +where Stretton was to be found. The tall grey spire of Stepney Church +rose from behind an inlet thick with masts, upon the left; he was +already on his way to find him. But the critical moment was yet to +come. He had still to use his arguments; and as he stood watching the +shipping with indifferent eyes the arguments appeared most weak and +unpersuasive. Stretton's father was dying, it was true. The son's +return was no doubt a natural obligation. But would the natural +obligation hold when the father was unnatural? Those months in New +York had revealed one quality in Tony Stretton, at all events; he +could persist. The very name of the trawler in which he was at work +seemed to Warrisden of a bad augury for his success--the +_Perseverance!_ + +Greenwich, with its hill of grass, slipped behind on the right; at the +Albert Docks a huge Peninsular and Oriental steamer, deck towering +above deck, swung into the line; the high chimneys of the cement works +on the Essex flats began to stand out against the pale grey sky, each +one crowned with white smoke like a tuft of wool; the barges, under +their big brown sprit-sails, now tacked this way and that across a +wider stream; the village of Greenhithe and the white portholes of the +_Worcester_ showed upon the right. + +"Would Stretton return?" The question revolved in Warrisden's mind as +the propeller revolved in the thick brown water. The fortunes of four +people hung upon the answer, and no answer could be given until a +night, and a day, and another night had passed, until he saw the Blue +Fleet tossing far away upon the Dogger Bank. Suppose that the answer +were "No!" He imagined Pamela sinking back into lassitude, narrowing +to that selfishness which she, no less than he, foresaw; looking on +again at the world's show with the lack-lustre indifference of the +very old. + +At Gravesend the _City of Bristol_ dropped her pilot, a little, +white-bearded, wizened man, who all the way down the river, balancing +himself upon the top-rail of the bridge, like some nautical Blondin, +had run from side to side the while he exchanged greetings with the +anchored ships; and just opposite to Tilbury Fort, with its scanty +fringe of trees, she ran alongside of a hulk and took in a load of +coal. + +"We'll go down and have tea while they are loading her," said the +captain. + +The dusk was falling when Warrisden came again on deck, and a cold +wind was blowing from the north-west. The sharp stem of the boat was +cutting swiftly through the quiet water; the lift of the sea under her +forefoot gave to her a buoyancy of motion--she seemed to have become a +thing alive. The propeller cleft the surface regularly; there was no +longer any sound of petulance in its revolutions, rather there was a +throb of joy as it did its work unhindered. Throughout the ship a +steady hum, a steady vibration ran. The _City of Bristol_ was not +merely a thing alive; it was a thing satisfied. + +Upon Warrisden, too, there descended a sense of peace. He was _en +rapport_ with the ship. The fever of his questioning left him. On +either side the arms of the shore melted into the gathering night. Far +away upon his right the lights of Margate shone brightly, like a chain +of gold stretched out upon the sea; in front of him there lay a wide +and misty bay, into which the boat drove steadily. All the unknown +seemed hidden there; all the secret unrevealed Beyond. There came +whispers out of that illimitable bay to Warrisden's ears; whispers +breathed upon the north wind, and all the whispers were whispers of +promise, bidding him take heart. Warrisden listened and believed, +uplifted by the grave quiet of the sea and its mysterious width. + +The _City of Bristol_ turned northward into the great channel of the +Swin, keeping close to the lightships on the left, so close that +Warrisden from the bridge could look straight down upon their decks. +The night had altogether come--a night of stars. Clusters of lights, +low down upon the left, showed where the towns of Essex stood; upon +the light hand the homeward-bound ships loomed up ghost-like and +passed by; on the right, too, shone out the great green globes of the +Mouse light like Neptune's reading-lamps. Sheltered behind the canvas +screen at the corner of the bridge Warrisden looked along the rake of +the unlighted deck below. He thought of Pamela waiting for his return +at Whitewebs, but without impatience. The great peace and silence of +the night were the most impressive things he had ever known. The +captain's voice complaining of the sea jarred upon him. + +"It's no Bobby's job," said the captain in a low voice. "It's home +once in three weeks from Saturday to Monday, if you are in luck, and +the rest of your time you're in carpet slippers on the bridge. You'll +sleep in my chatoo, to-night. I sha'n't turn in until we have passed +the Outer Gabbard and come to the open sea. That won't be till four in +the morning." + +Warrisden understood that he was being offered the captain's cabin. + +"No, thanks," said he. "The bench of the saloon will do very well for +me." + +The captain did not press his offer. + +"Yes; there's more company in the saloon," he said. "I often sleep +there myself. You are bound for the Mission ship, I suppose?" + +"No; I want to find a man on the trawler _Perseverance_." + +The captain turned. Warrisden could not see his face, but he knew from +his attitude that he was staring at him in amazement. + +"Then you must want to see him pretty badly," he commented. "The No'th +Sea in February and March is not a Bobby's job." + +"Bad weather is to be expected?" asked Warrisden. + +"It has been known," said the captain dryly; and before the lights of +the Outer Gabbard winked good-bye on the starboard quarter at four +o'clock in the morning, the _City of Bristol_ was taking the water +over her deck. + +Warrisden rolled on the floor of the saloon--for he could not keep his +balance on the narrow bench--and tried in vain to sleep. But the +strong light of a lamp, swinging from the roof, glared upon his eyes, +the snores of his companions trumpeted in his ears. Moreover, the heat +was intolerable. Five men slept in the bunks--Warrisden made a sixth. +At four in the morning the captain joined the party through his love +of company. The skylight and the door were both tightly closed, a big +fire burned in the stove, and a boiling kettle of tea perpetually +puffed from its spout a column of warm, moist steam. Warrisden felt +his skin prickly beneath his clothes; he gasped for fresh air. + +Living would be rough upon the fish-carrier, Chase had told him; and +rough Warrisden found it. In the morning the steward rose, and made +tea by the simple process of dropping a handful of tea into the kettle +and filling it up with water. A few minutes later he brought a dish of +ham and eggs from the galley, and slapped it down on the table. + +"Breakfast," he cried; and the five men opened their eyes, rubbed +them, and without any other preparation sat down and ate. Warrisden +slipped up the companion, unscrewed the skylight and opened it for the +space of an inch. Then he returned. + +The _City of Bristol_ was rolling heavily, and Warrisden noticed with +surprise that all of the five men gave signs of discomfort. Surely, he +thought, they must be used to heavy weather. But, nevertheless, +something was wrong; they did not talk. Finally, the captain looked +upwards, and brought his hand down upon the table. + +"I felt something was wrong," said he; "the skylight's open." + +All stared up to the roof. + +"So it is." + +"I did that," Warrisden said humbly. + +At once all the faces were turned on him in great curiosity. + +"Now why?" asked the captain. "Don't you like it nice and snug?" + +"Yes; oh yes," Warrisden said hurriedly. + +"Well, then!" said the captain; and the steward went on deck and +screwed the skylight down. + +"After all, it's only for thirty-six hours," thought Warrisden, as he +subsequently bathed in a pail on deck. But he was wrong; for the Blue +Fleet had gone a hundred miles north to the Fisher Bank, and thither +the _City of Bristol_ followed it. + +The _City of Bristol_ sailed on to the Fisher Bank, and found an empty +sea. It hunted the Blue Fleet for half-a-dozen hours, and, as night +fell, it came upon a single trawler with a great flare light suspended +from its yard. + +"They're getting in their trawl," said the captain; and he edged up +within earshot. + +"Where's the Blue Fleet?" he cried. + +"Gone back to the Dogger," came the answer. + +The captain swore, and turned southwards. For four days and nights +Warrisden pitched about on the fish-carrier and learned many things, +such as the real meaning of tannin in tea, and the innumerable medical +uses to which "Friar's Balsam" can be put. On the morning of the fifth +day the _City of Bristol_ steamed into the middle of the fleet, and +her engines stopped. + +These were the days before the steam-trawler. The sailing-ships were +not as yet laid up, two by two, alongside Gorleston quay, and knocked +down for a song to any purchaser. Warrisden looked over a grey, savage +sea. The air was thick with spindrift. The waves leaped exultingly up +from windward and roared away to leeward from under the cutter's keel +in a steep, uprising hill of foam. All about him the sailing-boats +headed to the wind, sinking and rising in the furrows, so that +Warrisden would just see a brown topsail over the edge of a steep +roller like a shark's fin, and the next instant the dripping hull of +the boat flung out upon a breaking crest. + +"You will have to look slippy when the punt from the _Perseverance_ +comes alongside with her fish," the captain shouted. "The punt will +give you a passage back to the _Perseverance_, but I don't think you +will be able to return. There's a no'th-westerly gale blowing up, and +the sea is increasing every moment. However, there will be another +cutter up to-morrow, and if it's not too rough you could be put on +board of her." + +It took Warrisden a full minute to realise the meaning of the +captain's words. He looked at the tumbling, breaking waves, he +listened to the roar of the wind through the rigging. + +"The boats won't come alongside to-day," he cried. + +"Won't they?" the skipper replied. "Look!" + +Certainly some man[oe]uvre was in progress. The trawlers were all +forming to windward in a rough semicircle about the cutter. Warrisden +could see boat tackle being rigged to the main yards and men standing +about the boats capsized on deck. They were actually intending to put +their fish on board in the face of the storm. + +"You see, with the gale blowing up, they mayn't get a chance to put +their fish on board for three or four days after this," the captain +explained. "Oh, you can take it from me. The No'th Sea is not a +Bobby's job." + +As Warrisden watched, one by one the trawlers dropped their boats, and +loaded them with fish-boxes. The boats pushed off, three men to each, +with their life-belts about their oil-skins, and came down with the +wind towards the fish-carrier. The trawlers bore away, circled round +the _City of Bristol_, and took up their formation to leeward, so +that, having discharged their fish, the boats might drop down again +with the wind to their respective ships. Warrisden watched the boats, +piled up with fish-boxes, coming through the welter of the sea. It +seemed some desperate race was being rowed. + +"Can you tell me which is the boat from the _Perseverance?_" he asked. + +"I think it's the fifth," said the captain. + +The boats came down, each one the kernel of a globe of spray. +Warrisden watched, admiring how cleverly they chose the little gaps +and valleys in the crests of the waves. Each moment he looked to see a +boat tossed upwards and overturned; each moment he dreaded that boat +would be the fifth. But no boat was overturned. One by one they passed +under the stern of the City of Bristol, and came alongside under the +shelter of its wall. + +The fifth boat ranged up. A man stood up in the stern. + +"The _Perseverance_," he cried. "Nine boxes." And as he spoke a great +sea leapt up against the windward bow of the cutter. The cutter rolled +from it suddenly, her low bulwarks dipped under water on the leeward +side, close by the _Perseverance_ boat. + +"Shove off!" the man cried, who was standing up; and as he shouted he +lurched and fell into the bottom of the boat. The two men in the bows +pushed off with their oars; but they were too late. The cutter's +bulwark caught the boat under the keel; it seemed she must be upset, +and men and boxes whelmed in the sea, unless a miracle happened. But +the miracle did happen. As the fish-cutter righted she scooped on to +her deck the boat, with its boxes and its crew. The incident all +seemed to happen within the fraction of a second. Not a man upon the +fish-cutter had time to throw out a rope. Warrisden saw the cutter's +bulwarks dip, the sailor falling in the boat, and the boat upon the +deck of the cutter in so swift a succession that he had not yet +realised disaster was inevitable before disaster was avoided. + +The sailor rose from the bottom of the boat and stepped on deck, a +stalwart, dripping figure. + +"From the _Perseverance_, sir. Nine boxes," he said, looking up to the +captain on the bridge; and Warrisden, leaning by the captain's side +upon the rail, knew the sailor to be Tony Stretton. The accent of the +voice would have been enough to assure him; but Warrisden knew the +face too. + +"This is the man I want," he said to the captain. + +"You must be quick, then," the captain replied. "Speak to him while +the boat is being unloaded." + +Warrisden descended on to the deck. + +"Mr. Stretton," said he. + +The sailor swung round quickly. There was a look of annoyance upon his +face. + +"You are surely making a mistake," said he, abruptly. "We are not +acquainted," and he turned back to the fish-boxes. + +"I'm not making a mistake," replied Warrisden. "I have come out to the +North Sea in order to find you." + +Stretton ceased from his work and stood up. He led the way to the +stern of the cutter, where the two men were out of earshot. + +"Now," he said. He stood in front of Warrisden, in his sea-boots and +his oilskins, firmly planted, yet swaying to the motion of the ship. +There was not merely annoyance in his face, but he had the stubborn +and resolute look of a man not lightly to be persuaded. Standing there +on the cutter's deck, backed by the swinging seas, there was even an +air of mastery about him which Warrisden had not expected. His +attitude seemed, somehow, not quite consistent with his record of +failure. + +"Now," said Stretton, "we must be quick. The sea is getting worse each +minute, and I have to get back to the _Perseverance_. You are----?" + +"Alan Warrisden, a stranger to you." + +"Yes," Stretton interrupted; "how did you find me out?" + +"Chase told me." + +Stretton's face flushed angrily. + +"He had no right to tell you. I wished for these few weeks to be +alone. He gave me his word he would tell no one." + +"He had to break his word," said Warrisden, firmly. "It is necessary +that you should come home at once." + +Stretton laughed. Warrisden was clinging to a wire stay from the +cutter's mizzen-mast, and even so could hardly keep his feet. He had a +sense of coming failure from the very ease with which Stretton stood +resting his hands upon his hips, unsupported on the unsteady deck. + +"I cannot come," said Stretton abruptly; and he turned away. As he +turned Warrisden shouted--for in that high wind words carried in no +other way--"Your father, Sir John Stretton, is dying." + +Stretton stopped. He looked for a time thoughtfully into Warrisden's +face; but there was no change in his expression by which Warrisden +could gather whether the argument would prevail or no. And when at +last he spoke, it was to say-- + +"But he has not sent for me." + +It was the weak point in Warrisden's argument, and Stretton had, in +his direct way, come to it at once. Warrisden was silent. + +"Well?" asked Stretton. "He has not sent for me?" + +"No," Warrisden admitted; "that is true." + +"Then I will not come." + +"But though he has not sent for you, it is very certain that he wishes +for your return," Warrisden urged. "Every night since you have been +away the candles have been lighted in your dressing-room and your +clothes laid out, in the hope that on one evening you will walk in at +the door. On the very first night, the night of the day on which you +went, that was done. It was done by Sir John Stretton's orders, and by +his orders it has always since been done." + +Just for a moment Warrisden thought that his argument would prevail. +Stretton's face softened; then came a smile which was almost wistful +about his lips, his eyes had a kindlier look. And the kindlier look +remained. Kindliness, too, was the first tone audible in his voice as +he replied; but the reply itself yielded nothing. + +"He has not sent for me." + +He looked curiously at Warrisden, as if for the first time he became +aware of him as a man acting from motives, not a mere instrument of +persuasion. + +"After all, who did send you?" he asked. "My wife?" + +"No." + +"Who then?" + +"Miss Pamela Mardale." + +Stretton was startled by the name. It was really the strongest +argument Warrisden had in his armoury. Only he was not aware of its +strength. + +"Oh," said Stretton, doubtfully; "so Miss Mardale sent you!" + +He thought of that morning in the Row; of Pamela's words--"I still +give the same advice. Do not leave your wife." He recalled the promise +she had given, although it was seldom long absent from his thoughts. +It might be that she sent this message in fulfilment of that promise. +It might be that, for some unknown reason, he was now needed at his +wife's side. But he had no thought of distrust; he had great faith in +Millicent. She despised him, yes; but he did not distrust her. And, +again, it might be that Pamela was merely sending him this news +thinking he would wish to hear of it in time. After all, Pamela was +his friend. He looked out on the wild sea. Already the boats were +heading back through the foam, each to its trawler. + +"One must take one's risks," he said. "So much I have learnt here in +the North Sea. Look!" and he pointed to the boats. "Those boats are +taking theirs. Yes; whether it's lacing your topsail or taking in a +reef, one must take one's risks. I will not come." + +He went back to the middle of the ship. The punt of the _Perseverance_ +was already launched, the two fishermen waiting in it. As it rose on a +swell, Stretton climbed over the bulwarks and dropped into the stern. + +"Good-bye," he said. "I have signed on for eight weeks, and only four +have passed. I cannot run away and leave the ship short-handed. Thank +you for coming; but one must take one's risks." + +The boat was pushed off and headed towards the _Perseverance_. The +waves had increased, the crests toppled down the green slopes in foam. +Slowly the boat was rowed down to the trawler, the men now stopping +and backing water, now dashing on. Warrisden saw them reach the ship's +side and climb on board, and he saw the boat slung upwards and brought +in on to the deck. Then the screw of the _City of Bristol_ struck the +water again. Lurching through the heavy seas, she steamed southwards. +In a few minutes the Blue Fleet was lost to sight. + + + + + CHAPTER XII + + TONY'S INSPIRATION + + +Warrisden had failed. This was the account of his mission which he had +to give to Pamela Mardale; and he gave it without excuses. He landed +at Billingsgate Wharf at eleven o'clock on the second day after the +sails of the Blue Fleet had dropped out of sight behind the screen of +breaking waves. That afternoon he travelled down to the village of the +three poplars. It was night when he stepped out of the train on to the +platform of the little station. One can imagine what bitter and +humiliating thoughts occupied his mind. Away on the crest of the hill +the lights of the village shone brightly through the clear night air, +just as the lights of Margate had shone across the bay when the +steam-cutter had sprung like a thing alive to the lift of the sea +beneath her bows. Then all the breeze had whispered promises; now the +high hopes were fallen. "Do not fail!" Pamela had cried, with a +veritable passion, hating failure as an indignity, he could hear the +words in the very accent of her voice. Once she had suffered failure, +but it was not to be endured again. That was what she had meant; and +he had failed. He drove along that straight road which he had +traversed with Pamela at his side; he slept under the roof of the inn +where Pamela had claimed his help. The help had been fruitless, and +the next morning he rode down the hill and along the load with the +white wood rails--"the new road"--to tell her so. The sun was bright; +there was a sparkle of spring in the air; on the black leafless boughs +birds sang. He looked back to the three poplars pointing to the sky +from the tiny garden on the crest of the hill. Quetta--yes! But it +seemed there was to be no Seistan. + +He had started early, fearing that there might be a meet that day; and +he had acted wisely, for in the hall there were one or two men +lounging by the fire in scarlet, and Pamela was wearing her +riding-habit when she received him. He was shown into a little room +which opened on to the garden behind the house, and thither Pamela +came. + +"You are alone!" she said. + +"Yes; Stretton would not come." + +"None the less, I am very grateful." + +She smiled as she spoke, and sat down, with her eyes upon him, waiting +for his story. The disappointment was visible upon his face, but not +upon hers. Pamela's indeed, was to him at this moment rather +inscrutable. It was not indifferent, however. He recognised that, and +was, in a way, consoled. It had been his fear that at the first word +she would dismiss the subject, and turn her back on it for good. On +the contrary, she was interested, attentive. + +"You found him, then?" she asked. + +"Yes. You would like to hear what passed?" + +"Of course." + +"Even though I failed?" + +She looked at him with some surprise at his insistence. + +"Yes, yes," she said, a little impatiently. + +"We were nearly three days longer in reaching the Blue Fleet than we +anticipated," he began. "Stretton came on board the fish-cutter----" +And Pamela interrupted him-- + +"Why were you nearly three days longer? Tell me about your own journey +out to the fleet from the beginning." + +She was, in fact, as much interested in her messenger as in the errand +upon which she had sent him. Warrisden began to see that his journey +after all was not entirely a defeat. The alliance to which they had +set their hands up there in the village on the hill was bearing its +fruit. It had set them in a new relationship to each other, and in a +closer intimacy. + +He told the story of his voyage, making light of his hardships on the +steam-cutter. She, on the other hand, made much of them. + +"To quote your captain," she remarked, with a smile, "it was not a +Bobby's job." + +Warrisden laughed, and told her of Stretton's arrival in the punt of +the _Perseverance_. He described the way in which he had come on +board; he related the conversation which had passed between them at +the stern of the cutter. + +"He hadn't the look of a man who had failed," Warrisden continued. "He +stood there on the swinging deck with his legs firmly planted apart, +as easily as if he were standing on a stone pavement. I, on the other +hand, was clinging desperately to a stay. He stood there, with the +seas swinging up behind him, and stubbornly refused to come." + +"You told him of his father's illness?" asked Pamela. + +"He replied that his father had not sent for him." + +"You spoke of the candles lit every night?" + +"His answer was the same. His father had not sent for him. Besides, he +had his time to serve. He had signed on for eight weeks. There was +only one moment when I thought that there was a chance I might +persuade him; and, indeed, my persuasions had really nothing to do +with it at all. It was just the mention of your name." + +"My name?" asked Pamela, in surprise. + +"Yes. In answer to a question of his I told him that I had been sent +out by you, and for a moment he faltered." + +Pamela nodded her head in comprehension. + +"I understand; but he refused in the end?" + +"Yes. He said, 'One must take one's risks.'" + +Pamela repeated the sentence softly to herself; and Warrisden crossed +over to her side. His voice took a gentler note, and one still more +serious than that which he had used. + +"Do you know what I think?" he asked. "You sent me out with a message +to Stretton. I think that he has sent me back with a message for +you--'One must take one's risks.' He said that he had learned that in +the North Sea. He pointed to the little boats carrying the fish-boxes +to the steamer through the heavy, breaking seas. Each man in each of +the boats was taking his risks. 'Whether it's lacing your topsail or +taking in a reef,' he said, 'one must take one's risks.'" + +Pamela was silent for awhile after he had spoken. She sat with her +hands folded in her lap, and her face most serious. Then she looked up +at her companion with a very friendly smile; but she did not answer +him at all. And when she spoke, she spoke words which utterly +surprised him. All the time since the ketches had disappeared behind +the waves he had been plagued with the thought of the distress which +defeat would cause her; and here she was saying-- + +"I am very glad that you went out to the North Sea for me, even though +the journey proved fruitless. It makes us so much the better friends, +doesn't it? And that is a gain for me. Think of it that way, and you +will not mind the hardships and the waste of time." + +She held out her hand--rather a rare act with her--and Warrisden took +it. Then came the explanation why defeat meant so little just at this +time. + +"I need not have sent you at all," she continued, "could I have +foreseen. Sir John Stretton died yesterday afternoon, suddenly. I +received a telegram last night from Millie. So Tony will naturally +come home when his four weeks are up. I wrote last night to Millie, +telling her where Tony was." Then she added, "But I am glad that I did +not foresee." + +She rose from her chair, and they walked out through the hall to the +front of the house. A groom was holding Pamela's horse. The others who +were hunting that day had already ridden off. Warrisden helped her +into the saddle, and she rode away. + +Sir John had died, and Stretton would now naturally come home. That +explained to Warrisden how it was that Pamela made so little of the +defeat. But it was not the whole explanation. Pamela was waking from +her long sleep, like the princess in the fairy tale, and the mere act +of waking was a pleasure. In the stir of emotions, hitherto rigorously +suppressed, in the exercise of sympathies, she found a delight such as +one may find in the mere stretching of one's muscles after a deep +rest. The consciousness of life as a thing enjoyable began to tingle +in her. She was learning again lessons which she remembered once to +have learned before. The joy of being needed by those one needs--there +was one of them. She had learned a new one to-day--"One must take +one's risks." She repeated the sentence over to herself as she rode +between the hedgerows on this morning which had the sparkle of spring. +A few days ago she would have put that view of life away from her. +Now, old as it was, simple as it was, she pondered upon it as though +it were a view quite novel. She found it, moreover, pleasant. She had +travelled, indeed, further along the new road than she was aware. The +truth is that she had rather hugged to herself the great trouble which +had overshadowed her life. She had done so unwittingly. She had +allowed it to dominate her after it had lost its power to dominate, +and from force of habit. She began to be aware of it now that she had +stepped out from her isolation, and was gathering again the strings of +her life into her hands. + + + * * * * * + + +But Pamela was wrong in her supposition that since Sir John's death +the danger for Millicent was at an end. Tony Stretton would now return +home, she thought; and nothing was further from Tony's thoughts. At +the time when Pamela was riding through the lanes of Leicestershire on +that morning of early spring, Tony was lying in his bunk in the cabin +of the _Perseverance_ reading over, for the thousandth time, certain +letters which he kept beneath his pillow. This week he kept the long +night watch from midnight until eight of the morning; it was now +eleven, and he had the cabin to himself. The great gale had blown +itself out. The trawl, which for three days had remained safely stowed +under the lee bulwarks, was now dragging behind the boat; with her +topsails set the ketch was sailing full and by the wind; and down the +open companion the sunlight streamed into the cabin and played like +water upon the floor. The letters Tony Stretton was reading were those +which Millie had sent him. Disappointment was plain in every line; +they were sown with galling expressions of pity; here and there +contempt peeped out. Yet he was glad to have them; they were his +monitors, and he found a stimulus in their very cruelty. Though he +knew them by heart, he continually read them on mornings like this, +when the sun shone down the companion, and the voices of his fellow +sailors called cheerily overhead; at night, leaning upon his elbow, +and spelling them out by the dim light of the swinging lamp, while the +crew slept about him in their bunks. + +To his companions he was rather a mystery. To some of them he was just +down on his luck; to others he was a man "who had done something." + +"I suppose you have come out here to lie doggo," said the skipper to +him, shouting out the words in the height of the gale, when both were +standing by the lashed wheel one night. "I ask no questions. All I say +is, you do your work. I have had no call to slap a haddick across your +face. I say that fair and square. Water!" + +He concluded his speech with a yell. Stretton saw a ragged line of +white suddenly flash out in the darkness, high up by the weather bow, +and descend with a roar. It was a wave breaking down upon the deck. +Both men flung themselves down the companion, and the water sluiced +after them and washed them struggling about the floor of the cabin. +The wave saved Stretton from the need to reply, and the skipper did +not refer to the subject again. + +Stretton had signed on for this cruise on the _Perseverance_ because +he wanted a time during which he could be quite sure of his +livelihood. So far he had failed. He must map out a new course for +himself upon his life's chart. But for that work he needed time for +thought, and that time, up till now, he had not enjoyed. The +precarious existence which he had led since he had lost the half of +Millie's small fortune--now a clerk in a store, and a failure; now a +commercial traveller, and again a failure--had left him little +breathing space wherein to gather up his slow thoughts and originate a +new plan. That breathing space, however, the _Perseverance_ had +afforded him. During the long watches on fine nights, when the dark +sails, swinging up and down to the motion of the boat, revealed and +obscured the stars, he wrestled with the difficult problem of his +life. + +He could go back when his cruise was over if he chose. His father was +dying; he faced the fact quite frankly. The object with which he set +out would be, after all, accomplished, though not accomplished by +himself. There would be a house for Millie and himself independent of +the old man's caprice; their life would be freed from the shadow of +his tyranny; their seclusion would come to an end; they could let the +sunlight in upon their lives. Yes! But there were the letters down in +the cabin there, underneath his pillow. Did not they alter the +position? He had gone away to keep his wife, just, in a word, to +prevent that very contempt of which the letters gave him proof. Must +he not now stay away in order to regain her? His wife was at the +bottom of all his thoughts. He had no blame for her, however much her +written words might hurt. He looked back upon their life together, its +pleasant beginnings, when they were not merely lovers, but very good +friends into the bargain. For it is possible to be the one and yet not +the other. They were good days, the days in the little house in +Deanery Street, days full of fun and good temper and amusement. He +recalled their two seasons in London--London bright with summer--and +making of each long day a too short holiday. Then had come the change, +sudden, dark, and complete. In the place of freedom, subjection; in +the place of company, isolation; in the place of friends, a sour old +man, querulous and exacting. Then had come the great hope of another +home; and swiftly upon that hope its failure through his incapacity. +He could not blame her for the letters underneath his pillow. He was +no less set upon regaining her than he had been before on keeping her. +His love for her had been the chief motive of his life when he left +the house in Berkeley Square. It remained so still. Could he go back, +he asked himself? + +There was one inducement persuading him always to answer "Yes"--the +sentence which Pamela had spoken, and which she had refused to +explain. He should be at his wife's side. He had never understood that +saying; it remained fixed in his memory, plaguing him. He should be at +his wife's side. So Pamela Mardale had said, and for what Pamela said +he had the greatest respect. Well, he could be in a few weeks at his +wife's side. But would it not be at too great a cost unless he had +first redeemed himself from her contempt? + +Thus he turned and turned, and saw no issue anywhere. The days slipped +by, and one morning the fish-cutter brought to him a letter, which +told him that four days ago his father had died. He could not reach +home in time for the funeral, even if he started at once. And he could +not start at once; he had signed on for eight weeks. + +But the letter left him face to face with the old problem. Should he +go back or should he stay away? And if he stayed away, what should he +do? + +He came on deck one morning, and his skipper said-- + +"There's a fog on land, Stretton," + +"How do you know that?" asked Stretton. + +The captain pointed to some birds hovering over the masts of the +ketch. + +"Those are land birds," said he. "Look, there's a thrush and there's a +blackbird. You won't find them so far from land without a reason. +There has been a fog, and very likely a storm. They have lost their +bearings in the fog." + +The birds hovered about the ships of the fleet, calling +plaintively--here, at all events, were men recognisably belonging to +the land they vainly sought. Stretton, watching them, felt very much +like one of those birds. He, too, had lost his way in a fog, and +though he made no outcry, his need of guidance was no less great than +theirs. + +Then came a morning at last when the trawl was hauled in for the last +time, and the boat's head pointed towards Yarmouth. + +"When shall we reach harbour?" Stretton asked anxiously. + +"If this breeze holds, in twenty-four hours," replied the skipper. + +Twenty-four hours! Just a day and a night, and Stretton would step +from the deck on to Gorleston Quay; and he was no nearer to the +solution of his problem than when he had stepped from the quay on to +the deck eight weeks ago. Those eight weeks were to have resolved all +his perplexities, and lo! the eight weeks had passed. + +He was in a fever of restlessness. He paced the deck all the day when +he was not standing at the wheel; at night he could not sleep, but +stood leaning over the bulwarks, watching the stars trembling in the +quiet water. At one o'clock in the morning the _Perseverance_ passed a +lightship. Already the boat was so near home! And in the hour which +followed, his eight weeks of solitary communing, forced, as it were, +by immediate necessity, bore their fruit. His inspiration--he counted +the idea no less than an inspiration-came to him suddenly. He saw all +at once his course marked out for him upon the chart of life. He would +not suffer a doubt of it to enter his mind; he welcomed it with +passion, and the great load was lifted from his mind. The idea had +come. It was water in a dry land. + +A fisherman leaning over the bulwark by Stretton's side heard him +suddenly begin to sing over to himself a verse or two of a song-- + + + "Oh, come out, mah love! I'm a-waiting foh you heah! + Doan' you keep yuh window closed to-night." + + +It was a coon song which Stretton was humming over to himself. His +voice dropped to a murmur, He stopped and laughed softly to himself, +as though the song had very dear associations in his thoughts. Then +his voice rose again, and there was now a kind of triumph in the lilt +of the song, which had nothing to do with the words-- + + + "De stars all a-gwine put dey little ones to bed + Wid dey 'hush now, sing a lullaby,' + De man in de moon nod his sleepy, sleepy head, + And do sandman put a little in his eye." + + +The words went lilting out over the quiet sea. It seemed to Stretton +that they came from a lighted window just behind him, and were sung in +a woman's voice. He was standing on a lawn surrounded by high dark +trees in the warmth of a summer night. He was looking out past the +islets over eight miles of quiet water to the clustered lights of the +yachts in Oban Bay. The coon song was that which his wife had sung to +him on one evening he was never to forget; and this night he had +recovered its associations. It was no longer "a mere song sung by +somebody." It seemed to him, so quickly did his anticipations for once +outrun his judgment, that he had already recovered his wife. + +The _Perseverance_ was moored alongside of the quay at eight o'clock +in the morning, and just at that time Millie was reading a letter of +condolence from Lionel Callon. + + + + + CHAPTER XIII + + TONY STRETTON RETURNS TO STEPNEY + + +Mr. Chase left the mission quite early in the evening and walked +towards his lodging. That side of his nature which clamoured for +enjoyments and a life of luxury was urgent with him to-night. As he +turned into his street he began to debate with himself whether he +should go in search of a cab and drive westwards out of the squalor. A +church clock had just struck nine; he would find his club open and his +friends about the fire. Thus debating he came to his own door, and had +unconsciously taken his latch-key from his pocket before he had +decided upon his course. The latch-key decided him. He opened the door +and went quickly up to his sitting-room. The gas was low, and what +light there was came from the fire. Chase shut the door gently, and +his face underwent a change. There came a glitter into his eyes, a +smile to his lips. He crossed to the little cupboard in the corner and +unlocked it, stealthily, even though he was alone. As he put his hand +into it and grasped the decanter, something stirred in his armchair. +The back of the chair was towards him. He remained for a second or two +motionless, listening. But the sound was not repeated. Chase +noiselessly locked the cupboard again and came back to the fire. A man +was sitting asleep in the chair. + +Chase laid a hand upon his shoulder and shook him. + +"Stretton," he said; and Tony Stretton opened his eyes. + +"I fell asleep waiting for you," he said. + +"When did you get back?" asked Chase. + +"I landed at Yarmouth this morning. I came up to London this +afternoon." + +Chase turned up the gas and lit a cigarette. + +"You have not been home, then?" he said. "There is news waiting for +you there. Your father is dead!" + +"I know," Stretton replied. "He died a month ago." + +Mr. Chase was perplexed. He drew up a chair to the fire and sat down. + +"You know that?" he asked slowly; "and yet you have not gone home?" + +"No," replied Stretton. "And I do not mean to go." + +Stretton was speaking in the quietest and most natural way. There was +no trace in his manner of that anxiety which during the last few days +had kept him restless and uneasy. He had come to his decision. Chase +was aware of the stubborn persistence of his friend; and it was rather +to acquire knowledge than to persuade that he put his questions. + +"But why? You went away to make an independent home, free from the +restrictions under which you and your wife were living. Well, you have +got that home now. The reason for your absence has gone." + +Stretton shook his head. + +"The reason remains. Indeed it is stronger now than it was when I +first left England," he answered. He leaned forward with his elbows +upon his knees, gazing into the fire. The light played upon his face, +and Chase could not but notice the change which these few months had +brought to him. He had grown thin, and rather worn; he had lost the +comfortable look of prosperity; his face was tanned. But there was +more. It might have been expected that the rough surroundings amidst +which Stretton had lived would leave their marks. He might have become +rather coarse, rather gross to the eye. On the contrary, there was a +look of refinement. It was the long battle with his own thoughts which +had left the marks. The mind was showing through the flesh. The face +had become spiritualised. + +"Yes, the reason remains," said Stretton. "I left home to keep my +wife. We lived a life of quarrels. All the little memories, the +associations, the thousand and one small private things--ideas, +thoughts, words, jokes even, which two people who care very much for +one another have in common--we were losing, and so quickly; so very +quickly. I can't express half what I mean. But haven't you seen a man +and a woman at a dinner-table, when some chance sentence is spoken, +suddenly look at one another just for a second, smile perhaps, at all +events speak, though no word is spoken? Well, that kind of intimacy +was going. I saw indifference coming, perhaps dislike, perhaps +contempt; yes, contempt, just because I sat there and looked on. So I +went away. But the contempt has come. Oh, don't think I believe that I +made a mistake in going away. It would have come none the less had I +stayed. But I have to reckon with the fact that it has come." + +Mr. Chase sat following Stretton's words with a very close attention. +Never had Stretton spoken to him with so much frankness before. + +"Go on," said Chase. "What you are saying is--much of it--news to me." + +"Well, suppose that I were to go back now," Stretton resumed, "at +once--do you see?--that contempt is doubled." + +"No," cried Chase. + +"Yes, yes," Stretton insisted. "Look at it from Millie's point of +view, not from yours, not even from mine. Look at the history of the +incident from the beginning! Work it out as she would; nay," he +corrected himself, remembering the letters, "as she has. I leave her +when things are at their worst. That's not all. I take half Millie's +fortune, and am fool enough to lose it right away. And that's not all. +I stay away in the endeavour to recover the lost ground, and I +continually fail. Meanwhile Millie has the dreary, irksome, exacting, +unrequited life, which I left behind, to get through as best she can +alone; without pleasure, and she likes pleasure----" He suddenly +looked at Chase, with a challenge in his eyes. "Why shouldn't she?" he +asked abruptly. Chase agreed. + +"Why shouldn't she?" he said, with a smile. "I am not disapproving." + +Stretton resumed his former attitude, his former tone. + +"Without friends, and she is fond of having friends about her; without +any chance of gratifying her spirits or her youth! To make her life +still more disheartening, every mail which reaches her from New York +brings her only another instalment of my disastrous record. Work it +out from her point of view, Chase; then add this to crown it all." He +leaned forward towards Chase and emphasized his words with a gesture +of his hand. "The first moment when her life suddenly becomes easy, +and does so through no help of mine, I--the failure--come scurrying +back to share it. No, Chase, no!" + +He uttered his refusal to accept that position with a positive +violence, and flung himself back in his chair. Chase answered +quietly-- + +"Surely you are forgetting that it is your father's wealth which makes +her life easy." + +"I am not forgetting it at all." + +"It's your father's wealth," Chase repeated. "You have a right to +share in it." + +"Yes," Stretton admitted; "but what have rights to do with the +question at all? If my wife thinks me no good, will my rights save me +from her contempt?" + +And before that blunt question Mr. Chase was silent. It was too +direct, too unanswerable. Stretton rose from his chair, and stood +looking down at his companion. + +"Just consider the story I should have to tell Millie tonight--by +George!" he exclaimed suddenly--"if I went back to-night. I start out +with fifteen hundred pounds of hers to make a home and a competence; +and within a few months I am working as a hand on a North Sea trawler +at nineteen shillings a week." + +"A story of hardships undergone for her sake," said Chase; "for that's +the truth of your story, Stretton. And don't you think the hardships +would count for ever so much more than any success you could have +won?" + +"Hardships!" exclaimed Stretton, with a laugh. "I think I would find +it difficult to make a moving tale out of my hardships. And I wouldn't +if I could--no!" + +As a fact, although it was unknown to Tony, Chase was wrong. Had +Stretton told his story never so vividly, it would have made no +difference. Millie Stretton had not the imagination to realise what +those hardships had been. Tony's story would have been to her just a +story, calling, no doubt, for exclamations of tenderness and pity. But +she could not have understood what he had felt, what he had thought, +what he had endured. Deeper feelings and a wider sympathy than Millie +Stretton was dowered with would have been needed for comprehension. + +Stretton walked across the room and came back to the fire. He looked +down at Chase with a smile. "Very likely you think I am a great fool," +he said, in a gentler voice than he had used till now. "No doubt nine +men out of ten would say, 'Take the gifts the gods send you, and let +the rest slide. What if you and your wife drift apart? You won't be +the only couple.' But, frankly, Chase, that is not good enough. I have +seen a good deal of it--the boredom, the gradual ossification. Oh no; +I'm not content with that! You see, Chase," he stopped for a moment +and gazed steadily into the fire; then he went on quite simply, "you +see, I care for Millie very much." + +Chase knew well what weight to give to that short sentence. Had it +been more elaborate it would have meant less. It needed no other +commentary than the quiet sincerity with which it was uttered. + +"Yes, I understand," he said. + +Stretton seated himself again in his chair and took out a briar pipe +from his pocket. The pipe had an open metal covering over the bowl. + +"I need that no longer," Stretton said, with a laugh, as he removed +it. Then he took out a pouch, filled his pipe, and lighted it. + +"Have a whisky and soda?" said Chase. + +"No, thanks." + +Chase lighted a cigarette and looked at his friend with curiosity. The +change which he had noticed in Stretton's looks had been just as +noticeable in his words. This man sitting opposite to him was no +longer the Tony Stretton who had once come to him for advice. That man +had been slow of thought, halting of speech, good-humoured, friendly; +but a man with whom it was difficult to get at close quarters. Talk +with him a hundred times, and you seemed to know him no better than +you did at the moment when first you were introduced to him. Here, +however, was a man who had thought out his problem--was, moreover, +able lucidly to express it. + +"Well," said Chase, "you are determined not to go back?" + +"Not yet," Stretton corrected. + +"What do you propose to do?" + +The question showed how great the change had been, begun by the hard +times in New York, completed by the eight weeks in the North Sea. For +Chase put the question. He no longer offered advice, understanding +that Stretton had not come to ask for it. + +"I propose to enlist in the French Foreign Legion." + +Stretton spoke with the most matter-of-fact air imaginable; he might +have been naming the house at which he was to dine the next night. +Nevertheless, Chase started out of his chair; he stared at his +companion in a stupefaction. + +"No," said Stretton, calmly; "I am not off my head, and I have not +been drinking. Sit down again, and think it over." + +Chase obeyed, and Stretton proceeded to expound that inspiration which +had come to him the night before. + +"What else should I do? You know my object now. I have to re-establish +myself in my wife's thoughts. How else can I do it? What professions +are open to me in which I could gain, I don't say distinction, but +mere recognition? I am not a money-maker; that, at all events, is +evident. I have had experience enough during the last months to know +that if I lived to a thousand I should never make money." + +"I think that's true," Chase agreed, thoughtfully. + +"Luckily there's no longer any need that I should try. What then? Run +through the professions, Chase, and find one, if you can, in which a +man at my age--twenty-nine--with my ignorance, my want of intellect, +has a single chance of success. The bar? It's laughable. The sea? I am +too old. The army? I resigned my commission years ago. So what then?" + +He waited for Chase to speak, and Chase was silent. He waited with a +smile, knowing that Chase could not speak. + +"There must be an alternative," Chase said, doubtfully, at last. + +"Name it, then." + +That was just what Chase could not do. He turned in his mind from this +calling to that. There was not one which did not need a particular +education; there was not one in which Stretton was likely to succeed. +Soldiering or the sea. These were the two callings for which he was +fitted. From the sea his age debarred him; from soldiering too, except +in this one way. No, certainly, Stretton was not off his head. + +"How in the world did you think of the Foreign Legion?" he asked. + +Stretton shrugged his shoulders. + +"I thought of most other courses first, and, one by one, rejected them +as impossible. This plan came to me last of all, and only last night. +We were passing a light-ship. In a way, you see, we were within sight +of home. I was in despair; and suddenly the idea flashed upon me, like +the revolving blaze from the light-ship. It is a sound one, I think. +At all events, it is the only one." + +"Yes," answered Chase, slowly; "I suppose there will be chances, for +there's always something stirring on the Algerian frontier." + +"There, or in Siam," said Stretton. + +"What arrangements are you making here?" + +"I have written to my lawyers. Millie can do as she pleases with the +income. She has power, too, to sell the house in Berkeley Square. I +made my will, you know, before I left England." + +Chase nodded, and for a while there fell a silence upon the two +friends. A look of envy crept into the face of the clergyman as he +looked at Stretton. He could appreciate a motive which set a man +aiming high. He admired the persistence with which Stretton nursed it. +The plan it had prompted might be quixotic and quite fruitless, but, +at all events, it was definite; and a definite scheme of life, based +upon a simple and definite motive, was not so common but that it was +enviable. Stretton was so sure of its wisdom, too. He had no doubts. +He sat in his chair not asking for approval, not caring for censure; +he had made up his mind. The image of Stretton, indeed, as he sat in +that chair on that evening, with the firelight playing upon his face, +was often to come to Chase's thoughts. + +"There will be great risks," he said. "Risks of death, of trouble in +the battalion." + +"I have counted them," Stretton replied; and he leaned forward again, +with his hands upon his knees. "Oh yes; there will be great risks! But +there's a prize, too, proportionate to the risks. Risks! Every one +speaks of them," he went on, with a laugh of impatience. "But I have +been eight weeks on the Dogger Bank, Chase, and I know--yes, I +know--how to estimate risks. Out there men risk their lives daily to +put a few boxes of fish on board a fish-cutter. Take the risk +half-heartedly and your boat's swamped for a sure thing; but take it +with all your heart and there are the fish-boxes to your credit. Well, +Millie is my fish-boxes." + +He ended with a laugh, and, rising, took his hat. + +"Shall I put you up for the night?" Chase asked. + +"No, thanks," said Stretton. "I have got a bed at an hotel. I have +something else to do to-night;" and a smile, rather wistful and +tender, played about his lips. "Goodbye!" He held out his hand, and as +Chase took it he went on, "I am looking forward to the day when I come +back. My word, how I am looking forward to it; and I will look forward +each day until it actually, at the long last, comes. It will have been +worth waiting for, Chase, well worth waiting for, both to Millie and +to me." + +With that he went away. Chase heard him close the street door behind +him, and his footsteps sound for a moment or two on the pavement. +After all, he thought, a life under those Algerian skies, a life in +the open air, of activity--there were many worse things, even though +it should prove a second failure. + +Chase stood for a little before the fire. He crossed slowly over to +that cupboard in the corner at which Stretton's movement in the chair +had stayed his hand. Chase looked back to the armchair, as though he +half expected still to see Stretton sitting there. Then he slowly +walked back to the fire, and left the cupboard locked. Stretton had +gone, but he had left behind him memories which were not to be +effaced--the memory of a great motive and of a sturdy determination to +fulfil it. The two men were never to meet again; but, in the after +time, more than once, of an evening, Chase's hand was stayed upon that +cupboard door. More than once he looked back towards the chair as if +he expected that again his friend was waiting for him by the fire. + + + + + CHAPTER XIV + + TONY STRETTON PAYS A VISIT TO BERKELEY SQUARE + + +While Tony Stretton was thus stating the problem of his life to Mr. +Chase in Stepney Green, Lady Millingham was entertaining her friends +in Berkeley Square. She began the evening with a dinner-party, at +which Pamela Mardale and John Mudge were present, and she held a +reception afterwards. Many people came, for Frances Millingham was +popular. By half-past ten the rooms were already over-hot and +overcrowded, and Lady Millingham was enjoying herself to her heart's +content. Mr. Mudge, who stood by himself at the end of a big +drawing-room, close to one of the windows, saw the tall figure of +Warrisden come in at the door and steadily push towards Pamela. A few +moments later M. de Marnay, a youthful _attaché_ of the French +Embassy, approached Mr. Mudge. M. de Marnay wiped his forehead and +looked round the crowded room. + +"A little is a good thing," said he, "but too much is enough." And he +unlatched and pushed open the window. As he spoke, Mr. Mudge saw +Callon appear in the doorway. + +"Yes," he answered, with a laugh; "too much is enough." + +Mudge watched Callon's movements with his usual interest. He saw him +pass, a supple creature of smiles and small talk, from woman to woman. +How long would he last in his ignoble career? Mudge wondered. Would he +marry in the end some rich and elderly widow? Or would the crash come, +and parties know Mr. Lionel Callon no more? Mudge never saw the man +but he had a wish that he might get a glimpse of him alone in his own +rooms, with the smile dropped from his face, and the unpaid bills +piled upon his mantel-shelf, and his landlord very likely clamouring +for the rent. He imagined the face grown all at once haggard and tired +and afraid--afraid with a great fear of what must happen in a few +years at the latest, when, with middle-age heavy upon his shoulders, +he should see his coevals prospering and himself bankrupt of his +stock-in-trade of good looks, and without one penny to rub against +another. No presage of mind weighed upon Callon to-night, however, +during his short stay in Frances Millingham's house. For his stay was +short. + +As the clock upon the mantelpiece struck eleven, his eyes were at once +lifted to the clock-face, and almost at once he moved from the lady to +whom he was talking and made his way to the door. + +Mr. Mudge turned back to the window and pushed it still more open. It +was a clear night of April, and April had brought with it the warmth +of summer. Mr. Mudge stood at the open window facing the coolness and +the quiet of the square; and thus by the accident of an overcrowded +room he became the witness of a little episode which might almost have +figured in some bygone comedy of intrigue. + +Callon passed through the line of carriages in the roadway beneath, +and crossed the corner of the square to the pavement on the right-hand +side. When he reached the pavement he walked for twenty yards or so in +the direction of Piccadilly, until he came to a large and gloomy +house. There a few shallow steps led from the pavement to the front +door. Callon mounted the steps, rang the bell, and was admitted. + +There were a few lights in the upper windows and on the ground floor; +but it was evident that there was no party at the house. Callon had +run in to pay a visit. Mr. Mudge, who had watched this, as it were, +the first scene in the comedy, distinctly heard the door close, and +the sound somehow suggested to him that the time had come for him to +go home to bed. He looked at his watch. It was exactly a quarter past +eleven--exactly, in a word, three-quarters of an hour since Tony +Stretton, who "had something else to do," had taken his leave of his +friend Chase in Stepney. + +Mr. Mudge turned from the window to make his way to the door, and came +face to face with Pamela and Alan Warrisden. Pamela spoke to him. He +had never yet met Warrisden, and he was now introduced. All three +stood and talked together for a few minutes by the open window. Then +Mudge, in that spirit of curiosity which Callon always provoked in +him, asked abruptly-- + +"By the way, Miss Mardale, do you happen to know who lives in that +house?" and he pointed across the corner of the square to the house +into which Callon had disappeared. + +Pamela and Warrisden looked quickly at one another. Then Pamela turned +with great interest to Mr. Mudge. + +"Yes, we both know," she answered. "Why do you ask?" + +"Well, I don't know," said Mudge; "I think that I should like to +know." + +The glance which his two companions had exchanged, and Pamela's rather +eager question, had quickened his curiosity. But he got no answer for +a few moments. Both Pamela and Warrisden were looking out towards the +house. They were standing side by side. Mr. Mudge had an intuition +that the same thought was passing through both their minds. + +"That is where the truants lived last July," said Warrisden, in a low +voice. He spoke to Pamela, not to Mr. Mudge at all, whose existence +seemed for the moment to have been clean forgotten. + +"Yes," Pamela replied softly. "The dark house, where the truants lived +and where"--she looked at Warrisden and smiled with a great +friendliness--"where the new road began. For it was there really. It's +from the steps of the dark house, not from the three poplars that the +new road runs out." + +"Yes, that is true," said Warrisden. + +And again both were silent. + +Mr. Mudge broke in upon the silence. "I have no doubt that the truants +lived there, and that the new road begins at the foot of the steps," +he said plaintively; "but neither statement adds materially to my +knowledge." + +Pamela and Warrisden turned to him and laughed. It was true that they +had for a moment forgotten Mr. Mudge. The memory of the star-lit +night, in last July, when from this balcony they had watched the +truants slip down the steps and furtively call a cab, was busy in +their thoughts. From that night their alliance had dated, although no +suspicion of it had crossed their minds. It seemed strange to them now +that there had been no premonition. + +"Well, who lives there?" asked Mudge. + +But even now he received no answer; for Warrisden suddenly exclaimed +in a low, startled voice-- + +"Look!" and with an instinctive movement he drew back into the room. + +A man was standing in the road looking up at the windows of the dark +house. His face could not be seen under the shadow of his hat. Pamela +peered forward. + +"Do you think it's he?" she asked in a whisper. + +"I am not sure," replied Warrisden. + +"Oh, I hope so! I hope so!" + +"I am not sure. Wait! Wait and look!" said Warrisden. + +In a few moments the man moved. He crossed the road and stepped on to +the pavement. Again he stopped, again he looked up to the house; then +he walked slowly on. But he walked northwards, that is, towards the +watchers at the window. + +"There's a lamp-post," said Warrisden; "he will come within the light +of it. We shall know." + +And the next moment the light fell white and clear upon Tony +Stretton's face. + +"He has come back," exclaimed Pamela, joyfully. + +"Who?" asked Mr. Mudge; "who has come back?" + +This time he was answered. + +"Why, Tony Stretton, of course," said Pamela, impatiently. She was +hardly aware of Mr. Mudge, even while she answered him; she was too +intent upon Tony Stretton in the square below. She did not therefore +notice that Mudge was startled by her reply. She did not remark the +anxiety in his voice as he went on-- + +"And that is Stretton's house?" + +"Yes." + +"And his wife, Lady Stretton, is she in London? Is she there--now?" + +Mr. Mudge spoke with an excitement of manner which at any other time +must have caused surprise. It passed now unremarked; for Warrisden, +too, had his preoccupation. He was neither overjoyed, like Pamela, nor +troubled, like Mr. Mudge; but as he looked down into the square he was +perplexed. + +"Yes," replied Pamela, "Millie Stretton is at home. Could anything be +more fortunate?" + +To Mudge's way of thinking, nothing could be more unfortunate. Pamela +had come late to the play; Mr. Mudge, on the other hand, had seen the +curtain rise, and had a clearer knowledge of the plot's development. +The husband outside the house, quite unexpected, quite unsuspicious, +and about to enter; the wife and the interloper within: here were the +formulas of a comedy of intrigue. Only, Mr. Mudge doubtfully wondered, +after the husband had entered, and when the great scene took place, +would the decorous accent of the comedy be maintained? Nature was +after all a violent dramatist, with little care for the rules and +methods. Of one thing, at all events, he was quite sure, as he looked +at Pamela: she would find no amusement in the climax. There was, +however, to be an element of novelty, which Mr. Mudge had not +foreseen. + +"What puzzles me," said Warrisden, "is that Stretton does not go in." + +Stretton walked up to the corner of the square, turned, and retraced +his steps. Again he approached the steps of the house. "Now," thought +Mr. Mudge, with a good deal of suspense, "now he will ascend them." +Pamela had the same conviction, but in her case hope inspired it. +Tony, however, merely cast a glance upwards and walked on. They heard +his footsteps for a little while upon the pavement; then that sound +ceased. + +"He has gone," cried Pamela, blankly; "he has gone away again." + +Mr. Mudge turned to her very seriously. + +"Believe me," said he, "nothing better could have happened." + +Tony, in fact, had never had a thought of entering the house. Having +this one night in London, he had yielded to a natural impulse to +revisit again the spot where he and Millie had lived--where she still +lived. The bad days of the quarrels and the indifference and the +weariness were forgotten by him to-night. His thoughts went back to +the early days when they played truant, and truancy was good fun. The +escapes from the house, the little suppers at the Savoy, the stealthy +home-comings, the stumbling up the stairs in the dark, laughing and +hushing their laughter--upon these incidents his mind dwelt, +wistfully, yet with a great pleasure and a great hopefulness. Those +days were gone, but in others to come all that was good in them might +be repeated. The good humour, the intimacy, the sufficiency of the +two, each to the other, might be recovered if only he persisted. To +return now, to go in at the door and say, "I have come home," that +would be the mistake which there would be no retrieving. He was at the +cross-ways, and if he took the wrong road life would not give him the +time to retrace his steps. He walked away, dreaming of the good days +to come. + +Meanwhile, Lionel Callon was talking to Millie in that little +sitting-room which had once been hers and Tony's. + +Millie was surprised at the lateness of his visit, and when he was +shown into the room she rose at once. + +"Something has happened?" she said. + +"No," Callon replied. "I was at Lady Millingham's party. I suddenly +thought of you sitting here alone. I am tired besides, and overworked. +I knew it would be a rest for me if I could see you and talk to you +for a few minutes. You see, I am selfish." + +Millie smiled at him. + +"No, kind," said she. + +She asked him to sit down. + +"You look tired," she added. "How does your election work go on?" + +Callon related the progress of his campaign, and with an air of making +particular confidences. He could speak without any reserve to her, he +said. He conveyed the impression that he was making headway against +almost insuperable obstacles. He flattered her, moreover, by a +suggestion that she herself was a great factor in his successes. The +mere knowledge that she wished him well, that perhaps, once or twice +in the day, she gave him a spare thought, helped him much more than +she could imagine. Millie was induced to believe that, although she +sat quietly in London, she was thus exercising power through Callon in +his constituency. + +"Of course, I am a poor man," said Callon. "Poverty hampers one." + +"Oh, but you will win," cried Millie Stretton, with a delighted +conviction; "yes, you will win." + +She felt strong, confident--just, in a word, as she had felt when she +had agreed with Tony that he must go away. + +"With your help, yes," he answered; and the sound of his voice +violated her like a caress. Millie rose from her chair. + +At once Callon rose too, and altered his tone. + +"You have heard from Sir Anthony Stretton?" he said. "Tell me of +yourself." + +"Yes, I have heard. He will not return yet." + +There came a light into Callon's eyes. He raised his hand to his mouth +to hide a smile. + +"Few men," he said, with the utmost sympathy, "would have left you to +bear these last weeks alone." + +He was standing just behind her, speaking over her shoulder. He was +very still, the house was very silent. Millie was suddenly aware of +danger. + +"You must not say that, Mr. Callon," she said rather sharply. + +And immediately he answered, "I beg your pardon. I had no idea my +sympathy would have seemed to you an insult." + +He spoke with a sudden bitterness. Millicent turned round in surprise. +She saw that his face was stern and cold. + +"An insult?" she said, and her voice was troubled. "No, you and I are +friends." + +But Callon would have none of these excuses. He had come to the house +deliberately to quarrel. He had a great faith in the efficacy of +quarrels, given the right type of woman. As Mudge had told Pamela, he +knew the tactics of the particular kind of warfare which he waged. To +cause a woman some pain, to make her think with regret that in him she +had lost a friend; that would fix him in her thoughts. So Callon +quarrelled. Millie Stretton could not say a word but he misinterpreted +it. Every sentence he cleverly twisted into an offence. + +"I will say good-bye," he said, at length, as though he had reached +the limits of endurance. + +Millie Stretton looked at him with troubled eyes. + +"I am so sorry it should end like this," she said piteously. "I don't +know why it has." + +Callon went out of the room, and closed the door behind him. Then he +let himself into the street. Millie Stretton would miss him, he felt +sure. Her looks, her last words assured him of that. He would wait now +without a movement towards a reconciliation. That must come from her, +it would give him in her eyes a reputation for strength. He knew the +value of that reputation. He had no doubt, besides, that she would +suggest a reconciliation. Other women might not, but Millie--yes. On +the whole, Mr. Callon was very well content with his night's work. He +had taken, in his way of thinking, a long step. The square was empty, +except for the carriages outside Lady Millingham's door. Lionel Callon +walked briskly home. + + + + + CHAPTER XV + + MR. MUDGE COMES TO THE RESCUE + + +Lionel Callon's visit to Millie Stretton bore, however, consequences +which had not at all entered into his calculations. He was unaware of +the watchers at Lady Millingham's window; he had no knowledge of +Pamela's promise to Tony Stretton; no suspicion, therefore, that she +was now passionately resolved to keep it in the spirit and the letter. +He was even without a thought that his advances towards Millie had at +all been remarked upon or their motive discovered. Ignorance lulled +him into security. But within a short while a counter-plot was set in +train. + +The occasion was the first summer meeting on Newmarket Heath. Pamela +Mardale seldom missed a race meeting at Newmarket dining the spring +and summer. There were the horses, in the first place; she met her +friends besides; the heath itself, with its broad expanse and its +downs, had for her eyes a beauty of its own; and in addition the +private enclosure was separated by the width of the course from the +crowd and clamour of the ring. She attended this particular meeting, +and after the second race was over she happened to be standing amidst +a group of friends within the grove of trees at the back of the +paddock. Outside, upon the heath, the air was clear and bright; a +light wind blew pleasantly. Here the trees were in bud, and the +sunlight, split by the boughs, dappled with light and shadow the +glossy coats of the horses as they were led in and out amongst the +boles. A mare was led past Pamela, and one of her friends said-- + +"Semiramis. I think she will win this race." + +Pamela looked towards the mare, and saw, just beyond her, Mr. Mudge. +He was alone, as he usually was; and though he stopped in his walk, +now here, now there, to exchange a word with some acquaintance, he +moved on again, invariably alone. Gradually he drew nearer to the +group in which Pamela was standing, and his face brightened. He +quickened his step; Pamela, on her side, advanced rather quickly +towards him. + +"You are here?" she said, with a smile. "I am glad, though I did not +think to meet you." + +Mr. Mudge, to tell the truth, though he carried a race-card in his +hand, and glasses slung across his shoulder, had the disconsolate air +of a man conscious that he was out of place. He answered Pamela, +indeed, almost apologetically. + +"It is better after all to be here than in London on a day of summer," +he said, and he added, with a shrewd glance at her, "You have +something to say to me--a question to ask." + +Pamela looked up at him in surprise. + +"Yes, I have. Let us go out." + +They walked into the paddock, and thence through the gate into the +enclosure. The enclosure was at this moment rather empty. Pamela led +the way to the rails alongside the course, and chose a place where +they were out of the hearing of any bystander. + +"You remember the evening at Frances Millingham's?" she asked. She had +not seen Mr. Mudge since that date. + +Mr. Mudge replied immediately. + +"Yes; Sir Anthony Stretton"--and the name struck so oddly upon +Pamela's ears that, serious as at this moment she was, she laughed. +"Sir Anthony Stretton turned away from the steps of his house. You +were distressed, Miss Mardale: I, on the contrary, said that nothing +better could have happened. You wish to ask me why I said that?" + +"Yes," said Pamela; "I am very anxious to know. Millie is my friend. I +am, in a sort of way, too, responsible for her;" and as Mr. Mudge +looked surprised, she repeated the word--"Yes, responsible. And I am +rather troubled." She spoke with a little hesitation. There was a +frown upon her forehead, a look of perplexity in her dark eyes. She +was reluctant to admit that her friend was in any danger or needed any +protection from her own weakness. The freemasonry of her sex impelled +her to silence. On the other hand, she was at her wits' end what to +do. And she had confidence in her companion's discretion; she +determined to speak frankly. + +"It is not only your remark which troubles me," she said, "but I +called on Millie the next afternoon." + +"Oh, you did?" exclaimed Mr. Mudge. + +"Yes; I asked after Tony. Millie had not seen him, and did not expect +him. She showed me letters from his solicitors empowering her to do +what she liked with the house and income, and a short letter from Tony +himself, written on the _Perseverance_, to the same effect." + +She did not explain to Mr. Mudge what the _Perseverance_ was, and he +asked no questions. + +"I told Millie," she continued, "that Tony had returned, but she +refused to believe it. I told her when and where I had seen him." + +"You did that?" said Mr. Mudge. "Wait a moment." He saw and understood +Pamela's reluctance to speak. He determined to help her out. "Let me +describe to you what followed. She stared blankly at you and asked you +to repeat what you had said?" + +"Yes," replied Pamela, in surprise; "that is just what she did." + +"And when you had repeated it, she turned a little pale, perhaps was +disconcerted, perhaps a little--afraid." + +"Yes, it is that which troubles me," Pamela cried, in a low voice. +"She was afraid. I would have given much to have doubted it. I could +not; her eyes betrayed it, her face, her whole attitude. She was +afraid." + +Mr. Mudge nodded his head, and went quietly on-- + +"And when she had recovered a little from her fear she questioned you +closely as to the time when you first saw Stretton outside the house, +and the time when he went away." + +He spoke with so much certitude that he might have been present at the +interview. + +"I told her that it was some little time after eleven when he came, +and that he only stayed a few minutes," answered Pamela. + +"And at that," rejoined Mr. Mudge, "Lady Stretton's anxiety +diminished." + +"Yes, that is true, too," Pamela admitted; and she turned her face to +him with its troubled appeal. "Why was she afraid? For, since you have +guessed that she was, you must know the reason which she had for fear. +Why was it so fortunate that Tony Stretton did not mount the steps of +the house and ring the bell?" + +Mr. Mudge answered her immediately, and very quietly. + +"Because Lionel Callon was inside the house." + +A great sympathy made his voice gentle--sympathy for Pamela. None the +less the words hurt her cruelly. She turned away from him so that he +might not see her face, and stood gazing down the course through a +mist. Bitter disappointment was hers at that moment. She was by nature +a partisan. The thing which she did crept closer to her heart by the +mere act of doing it. She knew it, and it was just her knowledge which +had so long kept her to inaction. Now her thoughts were passionately +set on saving Millie, and here came news to her which brought her to +the brink of despair. She blamed Tony. "Why did he ever go away?" she +cried. "Why, when he had come back, did he not stay?" And at once she +saw the futility of her outcry. Tony, Millie, Lionel Callon--what was +the use of blaming them? They acted as their characters impelled them. +She had to do her best to remedy the evil which the clash of these +three characters had produced. "What can be done?" she asked of +herself. There was one course open certainly. She could summon +Warrisden again, send him out a second time in search of Tony +Stretton, and make him the bearer, not of an excuse, but of the whole +truth. Only she dreaded the outcome; she shrank from telling Tony the +truth, fearing that he would exaggerate it. "Can nothing be done?" she +asked, again in despair, and this time she asked the question aloud, +and turned to Mr. Mudge. + +Mudge had been quietly waiting for it. + +"Yes," he answered, "something can be done. I should not have told +you, Miss Mardale, what I knew unless I had already hit upon a means +to avert the peril; for I am aware how much my news must grieve you." + +Pamela looked at Mr. Mudge in surprise. It had not occurred to her at +all that he could have solved the problem. + +"What can I do?" she asked. + +"You can leave the whole trouble in my hands for a few days." + +Pamela was silent for a little while; then she answered doubtfully-- + +"It is most kind of you to offer me your help." + +Mr. Mudge shook his head at Pamela with a certain sadness. + +"There's no kindness in it at all," he said; "but I quite understand +your hesitation, Miss Mardale. You were surprised that I should offer +you help, just as you were surprised to see me here. Although I move +in your world I am not of it. Its traditions, its instincts, even its +methods of thought--to all of these I am a stranger. I am just a +passing visitor who, for the time of his stay, is made an honorary +member of your club. He meets with every civility, every kindness; but +he is not inside, so that when he suddenly comes forward and offers +you help in a matter where other members of your club are concerned, +you naturally pause." + +Pamela made a gesture of dissent; but Mr. Mudge gently insisted-- + +"Let me finish. I want you to understand equally well why I offer you +help which may very likely seem to you an impertinence." + +"No, indeed," said Pamela; "on the contrary, I am very grateful." + +Others were approaching the spot where they stood. They turned and +walked slowly over the grass away from the paddock. + +"There is no need that you should be," Mudge continued; "you will +see that, if you listen." And in a few words he told her at last +something of his own career. "I sprang from a Deptford gutter, with +one thought--to get on, and get on, and get on. I moved from Deptford +to Peckham. There I married. I moved from Peckham to a residential +suburb in the south-west. There my wife died. Looking back now, I am +afraid that in my haste to get on I rather neglected my wife's +happiness. You see I am frank with you. From the residential suburb I +moved into the Cromwell Road, from the Cromwell Road to Grosvenor +Square. I do not think that I was just a snob; but I wanted to have +the very best of what was going. There is a difference. A few years +ago I found myself at the point which I had aimed to reach, and, as I +have told you, it is a position of many acquaintances and much +loneliness. You might say that I could give it up and retire into the +country. But I have too many undertakings on my hands; besides, I am +too tired to start again, so I remain. But I think you will understand +that it will be a real pleasure to me to help you. I have not so many +friends that I can afford to lose the opportunity of doing one of them +a service." + +Pamela heard him to the end without any interruption; but when he had +finished she said, with a smile-- + +"You are quite wrong about the reason for my hesitation. I asked a +friend of mine a few weeks ago to help me, and he gave me the best of +help at once. Even the best of help fails at times, and my friend did. +I was wondering merely whether it would not be a little disloyal to +him if I now accepted yours, for I know he would be grieved if I went +to any one but him." + +"I see," said Mr. Mudge; "but I think that I can give you help which +no one else can." + +It was clear from his quiet persistence that he had a definite plan. +Pamela stopped and faced him. + +"Very well," she said. "I leave the whole matter for a little while in +your hands." + +"Thank you," said Mr. Mudge; and he looked up towards the course. +"There are the horses going down." + +A sudden thought occurred to Pamela. She opened the purse she carried +on her wrist, and took out a couple of pounds. + +"Put this on Semiramis for me, please," she said, with a laugh. "Be +quick, if you will, and come back." + +Though she laughed she was still most urgent he should go. Mr. Mudge +hurried across the course, made the bet, and returned. Pamela watched +the race with an eagerness which astonished Mr. Mudge, so completely +did she seem to have forgotten all that had troubled her a minute ago. +But he did not understand Pamela. She was, after her custom, seeking +for a sign, and when Semiramis galloped in a winner by a neck, she +turned with a hopeful smile to her companion-- + +"We shall win too." + +"I think so," Mudge replied, and he laughed. "Do you know what I think +of Lionel Callon, Miss Mardale? The words are not mine, but the +sentiment is unexceptionable. A little may be a good thing, but too +much is enough." + + + + + CHAPTER XVI + + THE FOREIGN LEGION + + +It was midday at Sidi Bel-Abbès in Algeria. Two French officers were +sitting in front of a café at the wide cross-roads in the centre of +the town. One of them was Captain Tavernay, a man of forty-seven, +tall, thin, with a brown face worn and tired by the campaigns of +thirty years, the other a young lieutenant, M. Laurent, fresh and +pink, who seemed to hare been passed out but yesterday from the school +of St. Cyr. Captain Tavernay picked up his cap from the iron table in +front of him and settled it upon his grizzled head. Outside the town +trees clustered thickly, farms were half-hidden amongst groves of +fig-trees and hedges of aloes. Here there was no foliage. The streets +were very quiet, the sunlight lay in dazzling pools of gold upon the +sand of the roads, the white houses glittered under a blue, cloudless +sky. In front of the two officers, some miles away, the bare cone of +Jebel Tessalah sprang upwards from a range of hills dominating the +town, and a speck of white upon its shoulder showed where a village +perched. Captain Tavernay sat looking out towards the mountain with +the lids half-closed upon his eyes. Then he rose deliberately from his +chair. + +"If we walk to the station," he said, "we shall just meet the train +from Oran. A batch of thirty recruits is coming in by it. Let us walk +to the station, Laurent." + +Lieutenant Laurent dropped the end of his cigarette on to the ground +and stood up reluctantly. + +"As you will, Captain," he answered. "But we should see the animals +soon enough at the barracks." + +The words were spoken in a voice which was almost, and with a shrug of +the shoulders which was quite, contemptuous. The day was hot, and +Lieutenant Laurent unwilling to move from his coffee and the shade +into that burning sunlight. Captain Tavernay gazed mildly at his +youthful junior. Long experience had taught him to leave much to time +and little to argument. For himself he loved his legionaries. He had a +smile of indulgence for their faults even while he punished them; and +though his face seldom showed the smile, and his punishments were not +unjustly light, the culprits none the less knew it was there, hidden +somewhere close to his heart. But then he had seen his men in action, +and Lieutenant Laurent had not. That made all the difference. The +Foreign Legion certainly did not show at its best in a cantonment. +Amongst that motley assemblage--twelve thousand men, distinct in +nationality as in character, flung together pell-mell, negroes and +whites, criminals, adventurers, silent unknown men, haunted by +memories of other days or tortured by remorse--a garrison town with +its monotony and its absinthe played havoc. An Abyssinian rubbed +shoulders in the ranks with a scholar who spoke nine languages; a +tenor from the Théâtre de la Monnaie at Brussels with an unfrocked +priest. Often enough Captain Tavernay had seen one of his legionaries +sitting alone hour after hour at his little table outside a café, +steadily drinking glass after glass of absinthe, rising mechanically +to salute his officer, and sinking back among his impenetrable +secrets. Was he dreaming of the other days, the laughter and the +flowers, the white shoulders of women? Was he again placing that last +stake upon the red which had sent him straight from the table to the +nearest French depôt? Was he living again some tragic crisis of love +in which all at once he had learned that he had been befooled and +derided? Captain Tavernay never passed such a man but he longed to sit +down by his side and say, "My friend, share your secret with me; so +will it be easier to bear." But the etiquette of the Foreign Legion +forbade. Captain Tavernay merely returned the salute and passed on, +knowing that very likely his legionary would pass the night in the +guard-room and the next week in the cells. No; the town of Sidi +Bel-Abbès was not the place wherein to learn the mettle of the +legionary. Away to the south there, beyond the forest of trees on the +horizon's line, things were different. Let Lieutenant Laurent see the +men in their bivouacs at night under the stars, and witness their +prowess under arms, _ces animaux_ would soon become _mes enfants_. + +Therefore he answered Lieutenant Laurent in the mildest voice. + +"We shall see them at the barracks, it is true. But you are wrong when +you say that it will be soon enough. At the barracks they will be +prepared for us, they will have their little stories ready for us, +they will be armed with discretion. But let us see them descend from +the train, let us watch their first look round at their new home, +their new fatherland. We may learn a little, and if it is ever so +little it will help us to know them the better afterwards. And at the +worst it will be an amusing exercise in psychology." + +They walked away from the café, and strolled down the Rue de Mascara +under the shady avenue of trees, Tavernay moving with a long, indolent +stride, which covered a deal of ground with a surprising rapidity, +Laurent fidgeting along discontentedly at his side. M. Laurent was +beginning, in fact, to regret the hurry with which he had sought a +commission in the Foreign Legion. M. Laurent had, a few months ago, in +Paris, imagined himself to be irrevocably in love with the wife of one +of his friends, a lady at once beautiful and mature; M. Laurent had +declared his passion upon a suitable occasion; M. Laurent had been +snubbed for his pains; M. Laurent in a fit of pique had sought the +consolation of another climate and foreign service; and M. Laurent was +now quickly realising that he was not nearly so heartbroken as he had +fancied himself to be. Already while he walked to the station he was +thinking that, after all, Paris was endurable, even though one +particular woman could not refrain from a little smile of amusement +when he crossed her path. + +Captain Tavernay had timed their walk accurately. For as they reached +the station the train was signalled. + +"Let us stand here, behind these cases," said Tavernay. "We shall see +and not be seen." + +In a few moments the train moved slowly in and stopped. From the +furthermost carriage the detachment descended, and, following a +_sous-officier_ in the uniform of the Legion, walked towards the cases +behind which Tavernay and his companion were concealed. In front came +two youths, fair of complexion and of hair, dressed neatly, well shod, +who walked with a timidity of manner as though they expected to be +questioned and sent packing. + +"Who can they be?" asked Laurent. "They are boys." + +"Yet they will give their age as eighteen," replied Tavernay, and his +voice trembled ever so slightly; "and we shall ask no questions." + +"But they bear no marks of misery. They are not poor. Whence can they +come?" Laurent repeated. + +"I can tell you that," said Tavernay. He was much moved. He spoke with +a deep note of reverence. "They come from Alsace or Lorraine. We get +many such. They will not serve Germany. At all costs they _will_ serve +France." + +Lieutenant Laurent was humbled. Here was a higher motive than pique, +here was a devotion which would not so quickly tire of discipline and +service. He gazed with a momentary feeling of envy at these two youths +who insisted, at so high a price, on being his compatriots. + +"You see," said Tavernay, with a smile, "it was worth while to come to +the station and see the recruits arrive, even on so hot a day as +this." + +"Yes," replied Laurent; and then "look!" + +Following the two youths walked a man tall and powerful, with the +long, loose stride of one well versed in sports. He held his head +erect, and walked defiantly, daring you to question him. His hands +were long and slender, well-kept, unused to labour, his face aquiline +and refined. He looked about thirty-five years old. He wore a light +overcoat of a fine material, which hung open, and underneath the +overcoat he was attired in evening dress. It was his dress which had +riveted Laurent's attention; and certainly nothing could have seemed +more bizarre, more strangely out of place. The hot African sun poured +down out of a cloudless sky; and a new recruit for the Foreign Legion +stepped out of a railway carriage as though he had come straight from +a ball-room. What sudden disaster could have overtaken him? In what +tragedy had he borne a part? Even Laurent's imagination was stimulated +into speculation. As the man passed him, Laurent saw that his tie was +creased and dusty, his shirt-front rumpled and soiled. That must needs +have been. At some early hour on a spring morning, some four or +five days ago, this man must have rushed into the guard-room of a +barrack-square in some town of France. Laurent turned to Tavernay +eagerly-- + +"What do you make of him?" + +Tavernay shrugged his shoulders. + +"A man of fashion, who has made a fool of himself. They make good +soldiers as a rule." + +"But he will repent!" + +"He has already had the time, and he has not. There is no escort for +recruits until they reach Marseilles. Suppose that he enlisted in +Paris. He is given the fare. At any station between Paris and +Marseilles he could have got out and returned." + +The man in evening-dress walked on. There were dark shadows under his +eyes, the eyes themselves were sombre and alert. + +"We shall know something of him soon," said Tavernay. He watched his +recruit with so composed an air that Laurent cried out-- + +"Can nothing astonish you?" + +"Very little," answered Tavernay, phlegmatically. "Listen, my friend. +One day, some years ago, a captain of Hussars landed at Oran. He came +to Bel-Abbès with a letter of introduction to me. He stayed with me. +He expressed a wish to see my men on parade. I turned them out. He +came to the parade-ground and inspected them. As he passed along the +ranks he suddenly stopped in front of an old soldier with fifteen +years' service in the Legion, much of which fifteen years had been +passed in the cells. The old soldier was a drunkard--oh, but a +confirmed drunkard. Well, in front of this man my young Captain with +the curled moustaches stopped--stopped and turned very pale. But he +did not speak. My soldier looked at him respectfully, and the Captain +continued his inspection. Well, they were father and son--that is all. +Why should anything astonish me?" and Captain Tavernay struck a match +and lighted a cigarette. + +The match, however, attracted attention to the presence of the +officers. Four men who marched, keeping time with their feet and +holding their hands stiffly at their sides, saw the flame and remarked +the uniforms. Their hands rose at once to the salute. + +"Ah! German deserters," said Tavernay. "They fight well." + +Others followed, men in rags and out of shoe-leather, outcasts and +fugitives; and behind them came one who was different. He was tall and +well-knit, with a frank open face, not particularly intellectual, +on the other hand not irretrievably stupid. He was dressed in a +double-breasted, blue-serge suit, and as he walked he now and then +gave a twist to his fair moustache, as though he were uneasy and +embarrassed. Captain Tavernay ran his eyes over him with the look of a +connoisseur. + +"Aha!" said he, with a chuckle of satisfaction. "The true legionary! +Hard, finely trained, he has done work too. Yes! You see, Laurent, he +is a little ashamed, a little self-conscious. He feels that he is +looking a fool. I wonder what nationality he will claim." + +"He comes from the North," said Lament. "Possibly from Normandy." + +"Oh, I know what he is," returned Tavernay. "I am wondering only what +he will claim to be. Let us go outside and see." + +Tavernay led the way to the platform. Outside, in front of the +station, the _sous-officier_ marshalled his men in a line. They looked +a strange body of men as they stood there, blinking in the strong +sunlight. The man in the ruffled silk hat and the dress-suit toed the +line beside a bundle of rags; the German deserters rubbed elbows with +the "true legionary" in the blue serge. Those thirty men represented +types of almost all the social grades, and to a man they were seeking +the shelter of anonymity in that monastery of action, the Foreign +Legion. + +"Answer to your names," said the _sous-officier_, and from a paper in +his hand he began to read. The answers came back, ludicrous in their +untruth. A French name would be called. + +"Montaubon." + +And a German voice replied-- + +"Present." + +"Ohlsen," cried the _sous-officier_, and no answer was given. +"Ohlsen," he repeated sharply. "Is not Ohlsen here?" + +And suddenly the face of the man in the serge suit flashed, and he +answered hurriedly-- + +"Present." + +Even the _sous-officier_ burst into a laugh. The reason for the pause +was too obvious; "Ohlsen" had forgotten that Ohlsen was now his name. + +"My lad, you must keep your ears open," said the _sous-officier_. +"Now, attention. Fours right. March!" + +And the detachment marched off towards the barracks. + +"Ohlsen," said Tavernay, and he shrugged his shoulders. "Well, what +does it matter? Come!" + +"Ohlsen" was Tony Stretton, and all the way along the Rue Daya to the +barracks he was longing for the moment when he would put on the +uniform and cease to figure ridiculously in this grotesque procession. +None the less he had to wait with the others, drawn up in the +barrack-square until Captain Tavernay returned. The Captain went to +his office, and thither the recruits were marched. One by one they +entered in at the door, answered his questions, and were sent off to +the regimental tailor. Tony Stretton was the last. + +"Name?" asked Tavernay. + +"Hans Ohlsen." + +"Town of enlistment?" + +"Marseilles." + +Tavernay compared the answers with some writing on a sheet of paper. + +"Yes, Marseilles. Passed by the doctor Paul as sound of body. Yes," +and he resumed his questions. + +"Nationality?" + +"Swede." + +Captain Tavernay had a smattering of most languages, and he was +greatly inclined to try his new recruit with a few questions in the +Swedish tongue. But the etiquette of the Legion forbade. He went on +without a smile-- + +"Age?" + +"Thirty." + +"Vocation?" + +"Fisherman." + +Captain Tavernay looked up. This time he could not help smiling. + +"Well, it is as good as any other," said he; and suddenly there was a +sound of cries, and three soldiers burst out of a narrow entrance on +the further side of the parade-ground and came running across the +square to the Captain's quarters. Both Tavernay and Stretton looked +through the door. There was not a tree in that great square; the +sunlight poured down upon the bare brown space with a blinding +fierceness. All the recruits but Stretton had marched off; a second +ago it had been quite empty and very silent. Now these three men were +hurrying across it, shouting, gesticulating with their hands. Stretton +looked at them with surprise. Then he noticed that one of them, the +man running in the middle and a little ahead of the others, carried a +revolver in his hand and brandished it. Moreover, from the look of his +inflamed face, he was shouting threats; the others were undoubtedly +shouting warnings. Scraps of their warnings came to Stretton's ears. +"Mon Capitaine!" "Il veut vous tuer!" "Rentrez!" They were straining +every muscle to catch the threatening soldier up. + +Stretton strode to the door, and a voice behind him cried-- + +"Halt!" + +It was Tavernay who was speaking. + +"But he is already halfway across the square." + +"Halt!" + +And there was no disobeying the command. Captain Tavernay walked to +the door. + +"A Spanish corporal whom yesterday I degraded to the ranks," said he. +"Half a pint of _aguardiente_, and here's the result." + +Captain Tavernay stepped out of the door and leisurely advanced +towards the running men. He gave an order, he raised his hand, and the +two soldiers who warned him fell back and halted. Certainly Captain +Tavernay was accustomed to obedience. The Spanish ex-corporal ran on +alone, straight towards Tavernay, but as he ran, as he saw the officer +standing there alone, quietly waiting his onslaught, his threats +weakened, his pace slackened. He came to a stop in front of Tavernay. + +"I must kill yon!" he cried, waving his revolver. + +"Yon shall kill me from behind, then," said Tavernay, calmly. "Follow +me!" And he turned round, and with the same leisurely deliberation +walked back to his room. The ex-corporal hesitated and--obeyed. He +followed Captain Tavernay into the room where Stretton stood. + +"Place your revolver on the table." + +The Spaniard again obeyed. Tavernay pushed open the door of an inner +room. + +"You are drunk," he said. "You must not be seen in this condition by +your fellow-soldiers. Go in and lie down!" + +The Spaniard stared at his officer stupidly, tottering upon his limbs. +Then he staggered into the Captain's room. Tavernay turned back to +Stretton and a ghost of a smile crept into his face. + +"_C'est du theater_," he said, with a little shrug of the shoulders. +"But what would you have, monsieur?" And he spoke to Stretton as to +an equal. "You are astonished. It is very likely not your way in +your-fishing-boats," he continued, with a chuckle. Stretton knew very +well that he meant "army." "But there is no Foreign Legion amongst +your--fishermen." He laughed again; and gathering up his papers +dismissed Stretton to the tailor's. But after Stretton had taken a few +steps across the parade, Tavernay called him back again. He looked at +him with a very friendly smile. + +"I, too, enlisted at Marseilles," he said. "One can rise in the +Foreign Legion by means of these"--and he touched lightly the medals +upon his breast. This was Tony Stretton's introduction to the Foreign +Legion. + + + + + CHAPTER XVII + + CALLON LEAVES ENGLAND + + +Spring that year drew summer quickly after it. The lilac had been +early in flower, the days bright and hot. At nine o'clock on a July +morning Callon's servant drew up the blinds in his master's room and +let the sunlight in. Lionel Callon stretched himself in bed and asked +for his letters and his tea. As he drank the tea he picked up the +letters one by one, and the first at which he looked brought a smile +of satisfaction to his face. The superscription told him that it was +from Millie Stretton. That little device of a quarrel had proved +successful, then. He tore open the envelope and read the letter. +Millie wrote at no great length, but what was written satisfied +Callon. She could not understand how the quarrel had arisen. She had +been thinking over it many times since it happened, and she was still +baffled. She had not had a thought of hurting him. How could she, +since they were friends? She had been hoping to hear from him, but +since some time had passed and no word had reached her, she must write +and say that she thought it sad their friendship should have ended as +it had. + +It was a wistful little letter, and as Callon laid it down he said to +himself, "Poor little girl"; but he said the words with a smile rather +than with any contrition. She had been the first to write--that was +the main point. Had he given in, had he been the one to make the +advance, to save her the troubled speculations, the sorrow at this +abrupt close to their friendship. Millie Stretton would have been +glad, no doubt, but she would have thought him weak. Now he was the +strong man. He had caused her suffering and abased her to seek a +reconciliation. Therefore he was the strong man. Well, women would +have it so, he thought, with a chuckle, and why should he complain? + +He wrote a note to Millie Stretton, announcing that he would call that +afternoon, and despatched the note by a messenger. Then he turned to +his other letters, and amongst them he found one which drove all the +satisfaction from his thoughts. It came from a firm of solicitors, and +was couched in a style with which he was not altogether unfamiliar. + + +Sir,--Messrs. Deacon & Sons (Livery Stables, Montgomery Street) having +placed their books in our hands for the collection of their +outstanding debts, we must ask you to send us a cheque in settlement +of your account by return of post, and thus save further proceedings. + + We are, yours, &c., + + Humphreys & Neill. + + +Callon allowed the letter to slip from his fingers, and lay for a +while very still, feeling rather helpless, rather afraid. It was not +merely the amount of the bill which troubled him, although that was +inconveniently large. But there were other reasons. His eyes wandered +to a drawer in his dressing-table. He got out of bed and unlocked it. +At the bottom of that drawer lay the other reasons, piled one upon the +other--letters couched in just the same words as that which he had +received this morning, and--still worse!---signed by this same firm of +Humphreys and Neill. Moreover, every one of those letters had reached +him within the last ten days. It seemed that all his tradesmen had +suddenly placed their books in the hands of Messrs. Humphreys and +Neill. + +Callon took the letters back to his bed. There were quite an +astonishing number of them. Callon himself was surprised to see how +deep he was in debt. They littered the bed--tailors' bills; bills for +expensive little presents of jewellery; bills run up at restaurants +for dinners and suppers; bills for the hire of horses and carriages; +bills of all kinds--and there were just Mr. Callon's election expenses +in Mr. Callon's exchequer that morning. Even if he parted with them, +they would not pay a third part of the sum claimed. Fear invaded him; +he saw no way out of his troubles. Given time, he could borrow enough, +no doubt, scrape enough money together one way or another to tide +himself over the difficulty. His hand searched for Millie Stretton's +letter and found it, and rejected it. He needed time there; he must +walk warily or he would spoil all. And looking at the letters he knew +that he had not the time. + +It was improbable, nay more than improbable, that all these bills were +in the hands of one firm by mere chance. No; somewhere he had an +enemy. A man--or it might be a woman--was striking at him out of the +dark, striking with knowledge too. For the blow fell where he could +least parry it. Mr. Mudge would have been quite satisfied could he +have seen Callon as he lay that morning with the summer sunlight +pouring into his bedroom. He looked more than his age, and his face +was haggard. He felt that a hand was at his throat, a hand which +gripped and gripped with an ever-increasing pressure. + +He tried to guess who his enemy might be. But there were so many who +might be glad to do him an ill-turn. Name after name occurred to him, +but amongst those names was not the name of Mr. Mudge. That shy and +inoffensive man was the last whom he would have suspected to be +meddling with his life. + +Callon sprang out of bed. He must go down to Lincoln's Inn Fields and +interview Messrs. Humphreys and Neill. Summonses would never do with a +general election so near. He dressed quickly, and soon after ten was +in the office of that firm. He was received by a bald and smiling +gentleman in spectacles. + +"Mr. Callon?" said the smiling gentleman, who announced himself as +Humphreys. "Oh yes. You have come in reference to the letters which +our clients have desired us to send you?" + +"Yes," replied Callon. "There are a good number of letters." + +The smiling gentleman laughed genially. + +"A man of fashion, Mr. Callon, has of course many expenses which we +humdrum business people are spared. Let me see. The total amount due +is----" And Mr. Humphreys made a calculation with his pen. + +"I came to ask for an extension of time," Callon blurted out; and the +smiling gentleman ceased to smile. He gazed through his spectacles +with a look of the utmost astonishment. "You see, Mr. Humphreys, all +these bills, each one accompanied with a peremptory demand for +payment, have been presented together, almost as it were by the same +post." + +"They are all, however, to account rendered," said Mr. Humphreys, as +he removed and breathed upon his spectacles. + +"It would, I frankly confess, seriously embarrass me to settle them +all at once." + +"Dear, dear!" said Mr. Humphreys, in a voice of regret. "I am very +sorry. These duties are very painful to me, Mr. Callon. But I have the +strictest instructions." And he rose from his chair to conclude the +interview. + +"One moment," said Callon. "I want to ask you how it is that all my +bills have come into your hands? Who is it who has brought them up?" + +"Really, really, Mr. Callon," the lawyer protested. "I cannot listen +to such suggestions." And then the smile came back to his face. "Why +not pay them in full?" His eyes beamed through his spectacles. He had +an air of making a perfectly original and delightful suggestion. "Sit +down in this comfortable chair now, and write me out a little cheque +for--let me see----" And he went back to his table. + +"I must have some time," said Callon. + +Mr. Humphreys was gradually persuaded that the concession of a little +time was reasonable. + +"A day, then," he said. "We will say a day, Mr. Callon. This is +Wednesday. Some time to-morrow we shall hear from you." And he bowed +Callon from his office. Then he wrote a little note and despatched it +by a messenger into the City. The message was received by Mr. Mudge, +who read it, took up his hat, and jumping into a hansom cab, drove +westward with all speed. + +Lionel Callon, on the contrary, walked back to his rooms. He had been +in tight places before, but never in one quite so tight. Before, it +was really the money which had been needed. Now, what was needed was +his ruin. To make matters worse, he had no idea of the particular +person who wished to ruin him. He walked gloomily back to his club and +lunched in solitude. A day remained to him, but what could he do in a +day, unless----? There was a certain letter in the breast-pocket of +Callon's coat to which, more than once as he lunched, his fingers +strayed. He took it out and read it again. It was too soon to borrow +in that quarter, but his back was against the wall. He saw no other +chance of escape. He drove to Millie Stretton's house in Berkeley +Square at the appointed time that afternoon. + +But Mr. Mudge had foreseen. When he jumped into his hansom cab he had +driven straight to the house in Audley Square, where Pamela Mardale +was staying with some friends. + +"Are you lunching anywhere?" he asked. "No? Then lunch with Lady +Stretton, please! And don't go away too soon! See as much as you can +of her during the next two days." + +As a consequence, when Lionel Callon was shown into the drawing-room, +he found Pamela Mardale in her most talkative mood, and Millie +Stretton sitting before the tea-table silent and helpless. Callon +stayed late; Pamela stayed later. Callon returned to his club, having +said not a single word upon the momentous subject of his debts. + +He ordered a stiff brandy and soda. Somehow he must manage to see +Millie Stretton alone. He thought, for a moment, of writing; he indeed +actually began to write. But the proposal looked too crude when +written down. Callon knew the tactics of his game. There must, in a +word, be an offer from Millie, not a request from him. He tore up +his letter, and while he was tearing it up, Mr. Mudge entered the +smoking-room. Mudge nodded carelessly to Callon, and then seemed to be +struck by an idea. He came across to the writing-table and said-- + +"Do I interrupt you? I wonder whether you could help me. You know so +many people that you might be able to lay your finger at once on the +kind of man I want." + +Callon looked up carelessly at Mudge. + +"No. You are not interrupting me. What kind of man do you want?" + +"I want a man to superintend an important undertaking which I have in +hand." + +Callon swung round in his chair. All his carelessness had gone. He +looked at Mr. Mudge, who stood drumming with his fingers on the +writing-table. + +"Oh," said Callon. "Tell me about it." + +He walked over to a corner of the room which was unoccupied and sat +down. Mudge sat beside him and lighted a cigar. + +"I want a man to supervise, you understand. I don't want an expert. +For I have engineers and technical men enough on the spot. And I don't +want any one out of my office. I need some one, on whom I can rely, to +keep me in touch with what is going on--some one quite outside my +business and its associations." + +"I see," said Callon. "The appointment would be--for how long?" + +"Two years." + +"And the salary would be good?" + +Callon leaned back on the lounge as he put the question and he put it +without any show of eagerness. Two years would be all the time he +needed wherein to set himself straight; and it seemed the work would +not be arduous. + +"I think so," replied Mudge. "You shall judge for yourself. It would +be two thousand a year." + +Callon did not answer for a little while, simply because he could not +trust himself to speak. His heart was beating fast. Two thousand a +year for two years, plus the sum for his election expenses! He would +be able to laugh at that unknown enemy who was striking at him from +the dark. + +"Should I do?" he asked at length, and even then his voice shook. Mr. +Mudge appeared, however, not to notice his agitation. He was looking +down at the carpet, and tracing the pattern with the ferrule of his +walking-stick. + +"Of course," he said, with a smile, as though Callon had been merely +uttering a joke. He did not even lift his eyes to Callon's face. "Of +course. I only wish you were serious." + +"But I am," cried Callon. + +Mr. Mudge looked at his companion now, and with surprise. + +"Are you? But you wouldn't have the time to spare. You are standing +for a constituency." + +Callon shrugged his shoulders. + +"Oh, I am not so very keen about Parliament. And there are reasons why +I would welcome the work." + +Mr. Mudge answered with alacrity. + +"Then we will consider it settled. Dine with me tonight at my house, +and we will talk the details over." + +Callon accepted the invitation, and Mudge rose from his seat. Callon, +however, detained him. + +"There's one difficulty in the way," and Mr. Mudge's face became +clouded with anxiety. "The truth is, I am rather embarrassed at the +present moment. I owe a good deal of money, and I am threatened with +proceedings unless it is immediately paid." + +Mudge's face cleared at once. + +"Oh, is that all?" he exclaimed cheerily. "How much do you owe?" + +"More than my first year's salary." + +"Well, I will advance you half at once. Offer them a thousand on +account, and they will stay proceedings." + +"I don't know that they will," replied Callon. + +"You can try them, at all events. If they won't accept half, send them +to me, and we will make some other arrangement. But they are sure to. +They are pressing for immediate payment because they are afraid they +will get nothing at all by any other way. But offer them a thousand +down, and see the pleasant faces with which they will greet you." Mr. +Mudge was quite gay now that he understood how small was the obstacle +which hindered him from gaining Lionel Callon's invaluable help. "I +will write you a cheque," he said; and sitting down at a writing-table +he filled out a cheque and brought it back. He stood in front of +Callon with the cheque in his hand. He did not give it to Callon at +once. He had not blotted it, and he held it by a corner and gently +waved it to and fro, so that the ink might dry. It followed that those +tantalising "noughts," three of them, one behind the other, and +preceded by a one, like a file of soldiers with a sergeant at the +head, and that excellent signature "John Mudge" were constantly before +Callon's eyes, now approaching him like some shy maiden in a flutter +of agitation, now coyly receding. But to no shy maiden had Lionel +Callon ever said "I love you," with so glowing an ardour as he felt +for that most tantalising cheque. + +"I ought to have told yon," said Mr. Mudge, "that the undertaking is a +railway abroad." + +Callon had been so blinded by the dazzle of the cheque that he had not +dreamed of that possibility. Two years abroad, even at two thousand a +year, did not at all fit in with his scheme of life. + +"Abroad?" he repeated doubtfully. "Where?" + +"Chili," said Mr. Mudge; and he looked at the cheque to see that the +ink was quite dry. Perhaps Mr. Mudge's voice was a trifle too +unconcerned. Perhaps there was something a little too suggestive in +his examination of his cheque. Perhaps he kept his eyes too +deliberately from Callon's face. At all events, Callon became suddenly +suspicious. There flashed into his mind by some trick of memory a +picture--a picture of Mr. Mudge and Pamela Mardale talking earnestly +together upon a couch in a drawing-room, and of himself sitting at a +card-table, fixed there till the game was over, though he knew well +that the earnest conversation was aimed against himself. He started, +he looked at Mudge in perplexity. + +"Well?" said Mudge. + +"Wait a moment!" + +Pamela Mardale was Millie Stretton's friend. There was that incident +in the hall--Millie Stretton coming down the stairs and Pamela in +front of the mirror over the mantelpiece. Finally there was Pamela's +persistent presence at Millie Stretton's house this afternoon. One by +one the incidents gathered in his recollections and fitted themselves +together and explained each other. Was this offer a pretext to get him +out of the way? Callon, after all, was not a fool, and he asked +himself why in the world Mr. Mudge should, just at this moment when he +was in desperate straits, offer him 2000_l_. a year to superintend a +railway in Chili? + +"Well?" said Mudge again. + +"I must have time to think over the proposition," replied Callon. He +meant that he must have time to obtain an interview with Millie +Stretton. But Mudge was ready for him. + +"Certainly," said he. "That is only reasonable. It is seven o'clock +now. You dine with me at eight. Give me your answer then." + +"I should like till to-morrow morning," said Callon. + +Mr. Mudge shook his head. + +"That, I am afraid, is impossible. We shall need all tomorrow to make +the necessary arrangements and to talk over your duties. For if you +undertake the work you must leave England on the day after." + +Callon started up in protest. "On the day after!" he exclaimed. + +"It gives very little time, I know," said Mudge. Then he looked Callon +quietly and deliberately in the eyes. "But, you see, I want to get you +out of the country at once." + +Callon no longer doubted. He had thought, through Mr. Mudge's help, to +laugh at his enemy; and lo! the enemy was Mudge himself. It was Mudge +who had bought up his debts, who now held him in so secure a grip that +he did not think it worth while to practise any concealment. Callon +was humiliated to the verge of endurance. Two years in Chili, +pretending to supervise a railway! He understood the position which he +would occupy; he was within an ace of flinging the offer back. But he +dared not. + +"Very well," he said. "I will give you my answer at eight." + +"Thanks. Be punctual." Mr. Mudge sauntered away. There could only be +the one answer. Mr. Lionel Callon might twist and turn as he pleased, +he would spend two years in Chili. It was five minutes past seven, +besides. Callon could hardly call at the house in Berkeley Square with +any chance of seeing Lady Stretton between now and eight. Mudge was +contented with his afternoon. + +At eight o'clock Callon gave in his submission and pocketed the +cheque. At eleven he proposed to go, but Mudge, mindful of an evening +visit which he had witnessed from a balcony, could not part from his +new manager so soon. There was so little time for discussion even with +every minute of Callon's stay in England. He kept Callon with him +until two o'clock in the morning; he made an appointment with him at +ten, and there was a note of warning in his voice which bade Callon +punctually keep it. By one shift and another he kept him busy all the +next day, and in the evening Callon had to pack, to write his letters, +and to make his arrangements for his departure. Moreover, Pamela +Mardale dined quietly with Millie Stretton and stayed late. It thus +happened that Callon left England without seeing Millie Stretton +again. He could write, of course; but he could do no more. + + + + + CHAPTER XVIII + + SOUTH OF OUARGLA + + +"Halt!" cried Captain Tavernay. + +The bugler at his side raised his bugle to his lips and blew. The +dozen chasseurs d'Afrique and the ten native scouts who formed the +advance guard stopped upon the signal. A couple of hundred yards +behind them the two companies of the Foreign Legion came to a +standstill. The convoy of baggage mules upon the right flank, the +hospital equipment, the artillery section, the herd of oxen which was +driven along in the rear, in a word, the whole expedition, halted in a +wood of dwarf-oaks and junipers at three o'clock in the afternoon. + +The order was given to gather wood for the night's camp fires, and the +companies were dismissed. Each soldier made his little bundle and +fixed it upon his shoulders. Again the bugle rang out, sounding the +"Fall in." And the tiny force marched out from the trees of the high +plateaux into the open desert. It was extraordinary with what +abruptness that transition was made. One minute the companies were +treading upon turf under rustling leaves, the next they were +descending a slope carpeted with halfa-grass, which stretched away to +the horizon's rim, with hardly a bush to break its bare monotony. At +the limit of vision, a great arc like a mirror of silver glittered out +of the plain. + +"Water," said a tall, bearded soldier, who marched in the front rank +of the first company. It was he who had stepped from the train at +Bel-Abbès with a light dust-coat over his evening dress suit. He +passed now as Fusilier Barbier, an ex-engineer of Lyons. + +"No," replied Sergeant Ohlsen, who marched at his side: "the crystals +of a dry salt lake." + +In the autumn of last year Ohlsen--or, rather, to give him his right +name, Tony Stretton--had marched upon an expedition from Mesheria to +the Chott Tigri, and knew, therefore, the look of those tantalising +salt lakes. That expedition, which had conducted a surrey for a road +to the Figuig oasis, had brought him his promotion. + +"But we camp by the lake to-night," he added. "The wells of +El-Guethifa are close." + +The companies went forward, and above that salt lake they saw the +mirages begin to shimmer, citadels and hanging gardens, tall towers +and waving woods and majestic galleons, topsail over topsail, floating +upon summer seas. At the wells the sheikh of the district was waiting +upon a mule. + +"I want fifty camels with their saddles and their drivers at five +o'clock to-morrow morning," said Tavernay; and although as far as the +eye could reach there was no moving thing upon that vast plain except +the small group of Arabs and soldiers about the well, by five o'clock +the camels were squatting upon the sand with their drivers beside +them. The mules were sent back from El-Guethifa that morning, the +baggage was packed upon the camels, and the little force, insufficient +in numbers and supplies, went forward on its long and untoward march. + +It passed through the oases of El-Maia and Methlili to Ouargla, at +that time the last outpost of French authority. At Ouargla it rested +for a week; and there, renewing its supplies, penetrated southwards to +survey the desert country of the Touaregs for the construction of the +oft-mooted trans-Saharan railway. South of Ouargla all the +difficulties of the advance were doubled. The companies went down +through the archipelago of oases in the dangerous Touat country +amongst a sullen people, who had little food to supply, and would +hardly supply it. Tavernay led his men with care, neither practising a +discipline needlessly strict, nor relaxing into carelessness. But he +was under-officered, and his officers even so were inexperienced. +Lieutenant Laurent, a man irritable and unjust, was his second in +command, and there were but two _sous-lieutenants_ besides. In spite +of all Tavernay's care the convoy diminished. One day a camel would +stumble on the slippery bottom of a salt marsh, fall, and break its +limbs; the next another would fail, and die through a long-untended +wound, caused by the rough saddle upon its back. In the ranks of the +soldiers, too, there was trouble, and Laurent was not the man to deal +with it. There was hardly a company of the Legion, recruited, as it so +largely was, from the outcasts and the men of sorrows, in which there +were not some of disordered minds, some whom absinthe had brought to +the edge of insanity. Upon these the severity of the expedition bore +heavily. Tents had been perforce discarded. The men slept under the +stars. They woke from freezing nights to the bitter winds of dawn, and +two hours after dawn they were parched by a burning sun, and all the +day they suffered under its pitiless and blinding glare. Storms +whelmed them in lofty spirals of whirling, choking sand. For a week +they would toil over high red mountainous ground of loose stones; then +would follow the monotony of bare round plains, piled here and there +with black rocks, quivering and glittering in the heat; the sun rose +day after day upon their left hand in scarlet, and set in scarlet upon +their right, and they themselves were still the tiny centre of the +same empty inhospitable space; so that only the difference of the +ground they trod, the feel of soft sand beneath their feet, where a +minute before they had marched on gravel, told them that they +progressed at all. The worst of the men became prone to disobedience, +eager for change; and every now and then a soldier would rise upon his +elbow in the night time, gaze furtively about over his sleeping +comrades, watch the sentries until their backs were turned, and then +crawl past them into the darkness. Of these men none ever returned. Or +some mania would seize upon them and fix a strange idea in their +brains, such as that which besieged Barbier, the fusilier, who had +once stepped out of the railway carriage in his evening dress. He +leaned over towards Stretton one evening, and said in a hoarse, +trembling voice-- + +"I can stand it no longer." + +Both men were sitting by a tiny fire, which Barbier was feeding with +handfuls of halfa-grass and sticks. He was kneeling up in front of it, +and by the red waving light Stretton saw that his face was quivering +with excitement. + +"What can't you stand?" he asked. + +"It is Captain Tavernay," replied Barbier. He suddenly laughed in a +pitiful fashion, and cast a glance over his shoulder. "There is a man +put on to watch me. Night and day I am watched by Captain Tavernay's +orders. He wants to fix a crime on me! I know. He wants to trap me. +But let him take care!" + +Stretton fetched the doctor, who listened for a while to Barbier's +rambling, minatory talk, and then shrugged his shoulders. + +"Hallucinations," said he. "Ideas of persecution. The commonest form," +and having fixed Barbier into his proper category, he walked away. +There was nothing to be done for Barbier upon this expedition. He had +to be watched; that was all. Thus for seven hundred miles the force +pushed southwards from Ouargla, and thus from within it disintegrated +as it went. Tavernay could not but notice the change, but he said +nothing to any subordinate. The men would fight well if fighting +happened. That he knew, and meanwhile he marched on. + +It was just when the seven hundred miles had been completed that +Tavernay realised fighting was likely to happen. He went the round of +the camp as the sun was setting, when the rifles were piled and the +fires crackling. Stretton was at his side, and saw his commander stop +and shade his eyes. Tavernay was looking westwards. Far away against +the glowing ball of the sun, which was just dipping down behind the +plain, the figure of an Arab mounted upon a camel stood motionless and +black. Tavernay swung round and looked behind him. On the crest of a +sandhill to the north a second rider stood distinct against the sky. + +Tavernay watched the men for a long time through his glasses. + +"Touaregs," said he, gravely. "Masked Touaregs," and that night the +sentinels were doubled; and in the morning the bugle did not sound the +_réveillé_. + +Moreover, when the force advanced, it advanced in the formation of a +square, with the baggage camels in the centre, one gun in the front +line, and the other in the rear. They had marched into the country +where the Senoussa sect prevailed. The monasteries of that body sent +out their missionaries eastward to Khordofan, westwards to Tafilet, +preaching the purification of the Mohammedan religion and the +enlargement of Mohammedan countries now subject to the infidels. But +nowhere had the missionaries raised their standard with more success +than in this Touat country of the Sahara. The companies marched that +day alert and cheerful. They were consolidated by the knowledge of +danger. Captain Tavernay led them with pride. + +"An insufficient force, ill-found, inadequately officered," he +thought. "But the men are of the Legion." They were _mes enfants_ to +him all that day. + +But the attack was not yet to be delivered. During the night the two +scouts had ridden on their swift Meharis northwestwards, to the town +of Insalah. They knocked upon the gates of the great mud fortress of +Abd-el-Kader, the sheikh, and were instantly admitted to the dark room +where he sat upon a pile of rugs. When the eyes of the scouts became +accustomed to the gloom, they saw there was yet another in the room, a +tall man robed in black, with a black mask of cotton wound about his +face so that only his eyes were visible. This was the chieftain of the +Hoggar Touaregs. + +"Well?" said Abd-el-Kader. And the scouts told him roughly the number +of the force and the direction of the journey. + +Then Abd-el-Kader turned to the Touareg chieftain. + +"We will let them go further south, since southwards they are +marching," he said, in his suave gentle voice. "A hundred miles more, +and they will be amongst the sand dunes. Since they have cannon, the +attack must be sudden. Let it be at the wells of Bir-el-Gharamo." + +The Touareg chieftain rode out that day towards his hills; and, +unmolested, Captain Tavernay's expedition went down to the dunes. +Great waves of yellow sand, sometimes three hundred feet from crest to +base, intersected the face of the desert; the winds had given to their +summits the overhang of a breaking sea; they ran this way and that, as +though the currents of an ocean had directed their course; they had +the very look of motion; so that Stretton could not but remember the +roaring combers of the cold North Sea as he gazed upon these silent +and arrested copies. They made of that country a maze of intricate +valleys. Led by a local guide commandeered from the last oasis, the +companies of the Legion marched into the maze, and on the second day +saw, as they came over a hill, just below them in a narrow hollow, a +mud parapet built about the mouth of a well. This was Bir-el-Gharamo, +and here they camped. Sentries were posted on the neighbouring crests; +suddenly the darkness came, and overhead the stars rushed down towards +the earth. There was no moon that night, nor was there any sound of +danger heard. Three times Tavernay went the round of the sentries, at +eight and at ten and at twelve. But at three o'clock, just as the dawn +was breaking, a shot was heard. Tavernay sprang up from the ground, +the alarm rang out clear from the bugle over the infinite waste, the +companies of the Legion seized their piled rifles and fell into battle +order with an incredible neatness and expedition. There was no +confusion, no noise. The square was formed about the well--the camels +were knee-haltered in the middle, the guns placed at the corners. But +it was still dark. A few shots were fired on the dunes, and the +sentries came running back. + +"Steady," cried Captain Tavernay. "They are coming. Fire low!" + +The first volley rang out, and immediately afterwards on every side of +that doomed square the impact of the Touaregs' charge fell like the +blow of some monstrous hammer. All night they had been gathering +noiselessly in the surrounding valleys. Now they had charged with +lance and sword from the surrounding crests. Three sides of the square +held their ground. The fourth wavered, crumpled in like a piece of +broken cardboard, and the Arabs were within the square, stabbing at +the backs of the soldiers, loosing and stampeding the camels. And at +once, where deep silence had reigned a minute ago, the air was torn +with shrill cries and oaths and the clamour of weapons. The square was +broken; but here a group of men stood back to back, and with cartridge +and bayonet held its ground; there another formed; and about each gun +the men fought desperately. Meanwhile the morning came, a grey, clear +light spread over the desert. Tavernay himself was with one of the +machine-guns. It was dragged clear of the _mêlée_ and up a slope of +sand. The soldiers parted in front of it, and its charge began to +sweep the Touaregs down like swathes, and to pit the sand hills like a +fall of rain. About the other gun the fight still raged. + +"Come, my children," said Tavernay, "fight well; the Touaregs give no +quarter." + +Followed by Stretton, he led the charge. The Touaregs gave way before +their furious onslaught. The soldiers reached the gun, faced about, +and firing steadily kept off the enemy while the gun was run back. As +soon as that was saved the battle was over. All over the hollow, +wherever the Touaregs were massed, the two guns rattled out their +canister. No Arab could approach them. The sun rose over the earth, +and while it was rising the Touaregs broke and fled. When it shone out +in its full round, there was no one left of them in that hollow except +the wounded and the dead. But the victory had been dearly bought. All +about the well, lying pell-mell among the Arabs and the dead camels, +were the French Legionaries, some quite still, and others writhing in +pain and crying for water. Stretton drew his hand across his forehead. +He was stunned and dazed. It seemed to him that years had passed, that +he had grown very old. Yet there was the sun new-risen. There was a +dull pain in his head. He raised his hand and drew it away wet with +blood. How or when he had received the blow he was quite unaware. He +stood staring stupidly about him. So very little while ago men were +lying here sleeping in their cloaks, quite strong, living people; now +they were lying dead or in pain; it was all incomprehensible. + +"Why?" he asked aloud of no one. "Now, why?" + +Gradually, however, custom resumed its power. There was a man hanging +limp over the parapet of the well. He looked as though he had knelt +down and stooped over to drink, and in that attitude had fallen +asleep. But he might so easily be pushed into the well, and custom +had made the preservation of wells from impurity an instinct. He +removed the body and went in search of Tavernay. Tavernay was sitting +propped up against a camel's saddle; the doctor was by his side, a +blood-stained bandage was about his thigh. He spoke in a weak voice. + +"Lieutenant Laurent?" + +Stretton went in search. He came across an old grey-headed soldier +rolling methodically a cigarette. + +"He is dead--over there," said the soldier. "Have you a light?" + +Laurent had died game. He was lying clasped in the arms of a gigantic +Touareg, and while thus held he had been stabbed by another through +the back. To that end the contemptuous smile of a lady far away in +Paris had brought him. He lay with his face to the sky, his wounded +vanity now quite healed. He had earned Tavernay's praise, at all +events, that day. For he had fought well. Of the _sous-lieutenants_ +one was killed, the other dangerously wounded. A sergeant-major lay +with a broken shoulder beside one of the guns. Stretton went back to +Tavernay. + +"You must take command, then," said Tavernay. "I think you have learnt +something about it on your fishing-boats." And in spite of his pain he +smiled. + +Stretton mustered the men and called over the names. Almost the first +name which he called was the name of "Barbier," and Barbier, with a +blood-stained rag about his head, answered. Of the two hundred and +thirty men who had made up the two companies of the Legion, only +forty-seven could stand in the ranks and answer to their names. For +those forty-seven there was herculean work to do. Officers were +appointed, the dead bodies were roughly buried, the camels collected, +litters improvised for the wounded, the goat-skins filled with water. +Late in the afternoon Stretton came again to Tavernay. + +"We are ready, sir." Tavernay nodded and asked for a sheet of paper, +an envelope, and ink. They were fetched from his portfolio and very +slowly and laboriously he wrote a letter and handed it to Stretton. + +"Seal it," he said, "now, in front of me." + +Stretton obeyed. + +"Keep that letter. If you get back to Ouargla without me, give it to +the Commandant there." + +Tavernay was lifted in a litter on to the back of a camel, and the +remnant of the geographical expedition began its terrible homeward +march. Eight hundred miles lay between Bir-el-Ghiramo and the safety +of Ouargla. The Touaregs hung upon the rear of the force, but they did +not attack again. They preferred another way. One evening a solitary +Arab drove a laden camel into the bivouac. He was conducted to +Stretton, and said, "The Touaregs ask pardon and pray for peace. They +will molest you no more. Indeed, they will help you, and as an earnest +of their true desire for your welfare they send you a camel-load of +dates." + +Stretton accepted the present, and carried the message to Tavernay, +who cried at once, "Let no one eat those dates." But two soldiers had +already eaten of them, and died of poison before the morning. Short of +food, short of sentinels, the broken force crept back across the +stretches of soft sand, the greyish-green plains of halfa-grass, the +ridges of red hill. One by one the injured succumbed; their wounds +gangrened, they were tortured by the burning sun and the motion of the +camels. A halt would be made, a camel made to kneel, and a rough grave +dug. + +"Pelissier," cried Stretton, and a soldier stepped out from the ranks +who had once conducted mass in the church of the Madeleine in Paris. +Pelissier would recite such prayers as he remembered, and the force +would move on again, leaving one more soldier's grave behind it in the +desert to protest unnoticed against the economy of governments. Then +came a morning when Stretton was summoned to Captain Tavernay's side. + +For two days Tavernay had tossed in a delirium. He now lay beneath a +rough shelter of cloaks, in his right senses, but so weak that he +could not lift a hand, and with a face so pinched and drawn that his +years seemed to have been doubled. His eyes shone out from big black +circles. Stretton knelt down beside him. + +"You have the letter?" + +"Yes." + +"Do not forget." + +He lay for a while in a sort of contentment, then he said--"Do not +think this expedition has been waste. A small force first and disaster +... the big force afterwards to retrieve the disaster, and with it +victory, and government and peace, and a new country won for France. +That is the law of the Legion.... _My_ Legion." He smiled, and +Stretton muttered a few insincere words. + +"You will recover, my captain. You will lead your companies again." + +"No," said Tavernay, in a whisper. "I do not want to. I am very happy. +Yes, I say that, who joined the Legion twenty years ago. And the +Legion, my friend, is the nation of the unhappy. For twenty years I +have been a citizen of that nation.... I pity women who have no such +nation to welcome them and find them work.... For us there is no need +of pity." + +And in a few moments he fell asleep, and, two hours later, sleeping, +died. A pile of stones was built above his grave, and the force +marched on. Gaunt, starved, and ragged, the men marched northwards, +leaving the Touat country upon their left hand. It struck the caravan +route from Tidikelt to Ouargla; it stumbled at last through the gates +of the town. Silently it marched through the streets to the French +fortress. On no survivor's face was there any sign of joy that at last +their hardships were over, their safety assured. All were too tired, +too dispirited. The very people who crowded to see them pass seemed +part of an uninteresting show. Stretton went at once to the Commandant +and told the story of their disaster. Then he handed him the letter of +Captain Tavernay. The Commandant broke the seal and read it through. +He looked up at Stretton, a thin spent figure of a man overwrought +with sleeplessness and anxiety. + +"Tell me how and when this was written," said the Commandant. + +Stretton obeyed, and after he had heard, the Commandant sat with his +hand shading his eyes. When he spoke, his voice showed that he was +deeply moved. + +"You know what the letter contains, Sergeant Ohlsen?" + +"No, my Commandant." + +"Read, then, for yourself;" and he passed the letter across his office +table. Stretton took it and read. There were a few lines written--only +a few; but those few lines recommended Sergeant Ohlsen for promotion +to the rank of officer. The Commandant held out his hand. + +"That is like our Tavernay," he said. "He thought always of his +soldiers. He wrote it at once, you see, after the battle was over, +lest he should die and justice not be done. Have no fear, my friend. +It is you who have brought back to Ouargla the survivors of the +Legion. But you must give your real name. There is a scrutiny before a +soldier is promoted to the rank of office. Sergeant Ohlsen. That is +all very well. But Lieutenant----. Come, Lieutenant who?" + +He took up his pen. + +"Lieutenant Sir Anthony Stretton," replied Tony; and the Commandant +wrote down the name. + + + + + CHAPTER XIX + + THE TURNPIKE GATE + + +It was not, however, only Millie Stretton whose fortunes were touched +by Tony's absence. Warrisden, whom Stretton had met but the once on +board the _City of Bristol_, was no less affected. On a day of that +summer, during which Tony camped far away on the edge of the Sahara, +Warrisden rode down the steep hill from the village of the three +poplars on his way to Whitewebs. Once Pamela had ridden along this +road between the white wood rails and the black bare stems of trees on +a winter's evening of mist. That was more than fifteen months ago. The +brown furrows in the fields were now acres of waving yellow; each +black clump was now an ambuscade of green, noisy with birds. The +branches creaked in a light wind and rippled and shook the sunlight +from their leaves, the road glistened like chalk. It was ten o'clock +on an August morning, very clear and light. Voices from far away +amongst the corn sounded tiny and distinct, like voices heard through +a telephone. Round this bend at the thicket corner Pamela had +disappeared on that dim, grey evening. How far had she since travelled +on the new road, Warrisden wondered. She was at Whitewebs now. He was +riding thither to find out. + +When he inquired for her at the door, he was at once led through the +house into the big garden at the back. Pamela was sitting in a chair +at the edge of the lawn under the shade of the great avenue of elms +which ran straight from the back of the house to the shallow stream at +the garden's boundary. She saw him at once as he came out from the +glass-door on to the gravel, and she rose from her chair. She did not +advance to him, but just stood where she was, watching him approach; +and in her eyes there was a great perplexity. Warrisden came straight +to her over the lawn. There was no hesitation in his manner, at all +events. On the other hand, there was no air of assurance. He came with +a definite object; so much was evident, but no more. He stopped in +front of her and raised his hat. Pamela looked at him and said +nothing. She did not even give him her hand. She stood and waited +almost submissively, with her troubled eyes resting quietly on his. + +"You expected me?" he said. + +"Yes. I received your letter this morning." + +"You have guessed why I have come?" + +"Yes." + +"And you are troubled," said Warrisden. + +They turned and walked under the branches into the avenue. Overhead +there was a bustle of blackbirds and thrushes; a gardener sharpening +his scythe in the rose garden made a little rasping sound. Over all +the lawn the August sunlight lay warm and golden like a benediction. + +"I have come to ask you the old question," said Warrisden. "Will you +marry me?" + +Pamela gazed steadily ahead as she walked, and she walked very slowly. +She was prepared for the question, yet she took her time to answer it. +And the answer when at last she gave it was no answer at all. + +"I do not know," she said, in a low clear voice. + +Warrisden looked at her. The profile of her face was towards him. He +wondered for the thousandth time at its beauty and its gentleness. The +broad, white forehead under the sweep of her dark hair, the big, dark +eyes shining beneath her brows, the delicate colour upon her cheeks, +the curve of the lips. He wondered and longed. But he spoke simply and +without extravagance, knowing that he would be understood. + +"I have done nothing for you of the things men often do when a woman +comes into their lives. I have tried to make no career. I think there +are enough people making careers. They make the world very noisy, and +they raise a deal of dust. I have just gone on living quietly as I did +before, believing you would need no such proof." + +"I do not," said Pamela. + +"There might be much happiness for both of us," he continued. And +again she answered, without looking at him-- + +"I do not know." + +She was not evading him. Evasions, indeed, were never to her liking; +and here, she was aware, were very serious issues. + +"I have been thinking about you a great deal," she said. "I will tell +you this. There is no one else. But that is not all. I can say too, I +think, quite certainly, that there will be no one else. Only that is +not enough, is it? Not enough, at all events, for you and me." + +Warrisden nodded his head. + +"No, that is not enough," he said gravely. + +They walked on side by side in silence for a little while. + +"It is only fair that I should be very frank with you," she went on. +"I have been thinking so much about you in order that when you came +again with this old question, as I knew you would, I might be quite +clear and frank. Do you remember that you once spoke to me about the +turnpike gate--the gate which I was to open and through which I was to +go, like other men and women down the appointed road?" + +"Yes, I remember." + +"You meant, as I understand it, the gate between friendship and the +ever so much more which lies beyond?" + +"Yes." + +And Pamela repeated his word. "Yes," she said. "But one cannot open +that gate at will. It opens of itself at a touch, or it stays shut." + +"And it stays shut now?" + +Pamela answered him at once-- + +"Say, rather, that I have raised a hand towards the gate, but that I +am afraid to try." And she turned her face to him at last. Her eyes +were very wistful. + +They stopped upon the grass bank of the stream at the end of the +avenue. Pamela looked down into the dark, swiftly running water, and +went on choosing each word, testing it, as it were, before she uttered +it. + +"You see that new road beyond the gate is no new road to me. I have +trodden it before, and crept back--broken. Therefore, I am afraid." +She paused. Warrisden was aware from her attitude that she had not +finished. He did not stir lest he should check what more remained to +say, and that remnant never be spoken at all. And it was well for him +that he did not stir; for she said, in the same clear, low voice which +she had hitherto used, and just as steadily-- + +"I am the more afraid because I think that if I did touch that gate it +might open of itself." + +She had begun, in a word, to feel premonitions of that suspense and of +that glowing life in which for a few brief months she had once been +steeped. Did she expect a letter from Warrisden, there was an +eagerness in her anticipation with which she was well familiar. Was +the letter delayed, there was a keenness in her disappointment which +was like the pang of an old wound. And this recognition that the good +days might come again, as in a cycle, brought to her very vividly the +memory of the bad black days which had followed. Fear of those latter +days, and the contrast of their number with the number of those which +had gone before, drove her back. For those latter days in their turn +might come round again. + +Warrisden looked at her and his heart filled with pity for the great +trouble which had overwhelmed her. She stood by his side with the +sunlight playing upon her face and her hair--a girl brilliant with +life, ripe to turn its possibilities into facts; and she shrank from +the ordeal, so hardly had she been hit! She was by nature fearless, +yet was she desperately afraid. + +"Will nothing make you touch the gate and try?" he asked gently. And +then, quietly as he spoke, the greatness of his longing made itself +heard. "My dear, my dear," he said, "will nothing make you take your +risks?" + +The words struck sharply upon her memories. She turned her eyes to +him. + +"It is strange that you should use those words," she said. "For there +is one thing which might make me take my risks. The return of the man +who used them to you in the North Sea." + +"Tony Stretton?" exclaimed Warrisden. + +"Yes. He is still away. It is said that he is on a long shooting +expedition somewhere in Central Africa, and out of reach. But that is +not the truth. We do not know where he is, or when he will come +back." + +"Shall I try to find him again?" said Warrisden. "This time I might +succeed in bringing him home." + +Pamela shook her head. + +"No," she answered. "I think I know why he stays away. And there would +be only one way of persuading him to return. Well--that means I must +not use, unless things have come to an extremity." + +The one means of persuasion was the truth. If she sent for Tony +Stretton again she must explain what that saying of hers spoken so +long ago had meant. She must write why he should not have left his +wife. She must relate the sordid story, which rendered his return +imperative, That she was prepared to do, if all else failed, in the +last resort, but not till then. + +"But the extremity has not been reached," she continued, "and I hope +it never will. I hope Tony Stretton will come back soon of his own +accord. That would be the best thing which could happen, ever so much +the best." She did not blame Tony for his absence, for she understood +the motive which caused it. In a way, she was inclined to approve of +it in itself, just as a motive, that is to say. It was the character +of Millie Stretton and his ignorance of it which made his experiment +so hazardous. Complete confidence in his wife's honour, indeed, was to +her thinking, and rightly, an essential part of his motive. She wished +him to return of his own accord and keep that confidence. + +"There is not the same necessity," she continued, choosing her words, +"that he should return immediately, as there was when I sent you out +to the North Sea; but it is possible that the necessity might recur." +For she knew that, though Callon was far away in Chili, letters came +from him to Millie. Only lately a careless remark of Millie's with +reference to that State had assured her of this. And if the letters +still came, though Callon had been away a year, it followed that they +were answered. + +"In that case you would send for me?" said Warrisden. + +"Yes. I should rely on you." + +And Warrisden answered quietly, "Thank you." + +He asked no questions. He seemed to understand that Pamela must use +him, and, while using him, not fail of loyalty to her sex. A feeling +of self-reproach suddenly troubled Pamela. She had never told him that +she had used another's help and not his. She wondered whether it was +quite fair not to tell him. But she kept silent. After all, she +thought, the news would only hurt him; and Mr. Mudge's help had been +help which he could not have given. She went back to the matter of +their relationship to one another. + +"So you understand what I think," she said. "I am afraid. I look for +signs. I cannot help doing that. I have set my heart on keeping a +promise which I made to Tony Stretton. If he returns, whether of his +own accord or by my persuasion, and things go well--why, then"--and +she turned her face from him and said, looking steadily in front of +her--"why, then, perhaps." + +As she spoke her face changed wonderfully. The mere utterance of the +word aloud conjured up dreams. A wistful smile made her lips +beautiful, her eyes grew dim. Just for a moment she gave those dreams +their way. She looked across the garden through a mist, seeing nothing +of the trees or the coloured flowers, but gazing into a vision of +other and golden days--of days perhaps to come. Warrisden stood at her +side, and did not speak. But something of those dreams he guessed, her +face had grown so young. + +She shook her dreams from her in a few moments. + +"So you see, at present," she resumed, "marriage is impossible. It +will always be impossible to me unless I can bring--everything, not +merely companionship, not merely liking; out the ever so much more +which there is. I cannot contemplate it at all under any other +conditions"--and now she looked at her companion--"and I believe it is +the same with you." + +"Yes," Warrisden replied, "I ask for everything." + +He had his convictions, and since there was complete confidence +between these two, he spoke them now. + +"It is unsafe, of course, to generalise on the subject of women. But I +do think this: If a man asks little from a woman, she will give him +even less than he asks, and she will give it grudgingly, sparingly; +counting what she gives. And that little, to my mind, is worth rather +less than nothing. Better have no ties than weak ones. If, on the +other hand, a man asks a great deal, and continually asks it, why, the +woman may get bored, and he may get nothing. In which case he is no +worse off than he was before. But if, on the other hand, the woman +does give in return----" + +"Well?" asked Pamela. + +"Well, then, she gives ever so much more than he asks, and gives it +willingly with open hands." + +Pamela thought the theory over. + +"Yes, I think that is generally true," she said. "But, after all, I am +giving you very little." + +Warrisden laughed. + +"That's true," he replied. "But then you are not bored, and I have not +done asking." + +Pamela laughed too, and their talk thus ended in a lighter note. They +walked towards the house, and as they did so a woman came out on to +the lawn. + +"This is Millie Stretton," said Pamela. + +"She is staying here?" cried Warrisden. + +"Yes," replied Pamela, "Before she comes I want to ask you to do +something for me. Oh, it is quite a small thing. But I should like you +very much to do it. Where do you go to from here?" + +"To London," said Warrisden, "I have business there." + +The business which called him to town had, indeed, only occurred to +him during the last half-hour. It had arisen from their conversation. +It seemed to Warrisden immediate and imperative. + +"Will you be in London to-morrow?" asked Pamela. + +"Yes." + +"Then I want you to write to me. Just a little letter--nothing much, a +line or two. And I want you to post it, not by the country post, but +afterwards, so that it will reach me in the evening. Don't write here, +for I am going home. And please don't forget." + +Millie Stretton joined them a moment afterwards, and Warrisden was +introduced to her. + +"I have had an offer for the house in Berkeley Square," she said to +Pamela. "I think I will take it. I shall be glad to be rid of it." + +They went back into the house. Warrisden wondered at Pamela's request +for a letter, and at her urgency that it should arrive at a particular +time. He was not discontented with the walk which they had taken under +the avenue of elms. It seemed to him that Pamela was coming slowly +towards him. There was a great difference between her "No" of last +year and her "I do not know" of to-day. Even that "I do not know" +while they talked had become "perhaps." Had she not owned even more, +since she was afraid the gate would open of itself did she but touch +and try? His hopes, therefore, rode high that day, and would have +ridden yet higher, could he have guessed why she so desired a few +lines in his handwriting in the evening of the day after to-morrow. + +The reason was this. Repairs, long needed, had at last been undertaken +in the house of Pamela's father, a few miles away; and those repairs +involved the rooms reserved for Pamela. There were certain drawers in +that room which had not been unlocked for years, and of which Pamela +sedulously guarded the keys. They held letters, a few small presents, +one or two photographs, and some insignificant trifles which could not +be valued, since their value depended only on their associations. +There were, for instance, some cheap red beads, and the history of +those beads tells all that need be said of the contents of those +locked drawers. + +Two hundred years before, a great full-rigged ship, bound with a +general cargo for the Guinea Coast, sailed down the Channel out of +Portsmouth. Amongst the cargo was a great store of these red beads. +The beads were to buy slaves for the plantations. But the great ship +got no further on her voyage than Bigbury Bay in Devonshire. She +damaged her rudder in a storm, and the storm swept her on to the bleak +rocks of Bolt Tail, dragged her back again into the welter of the sea, +drove her into Bigbury Bay, and flung her up there against the low red +cliffs, where all her crew perished. The cargo was spilt amongst the +breakers, and the shores of that bay were littered with red beads. You +may pick them up to this day amongst the pebbles. There Pamela had +picked them upon a hot August morning, very like to that which now +dreamed over this green, quiet garden of Leicestershire; and when she +had picked them up she had not been alone. The locked cabinets held +all the relics which remained to her from those few bright weeks in +Devon; and the mere touch of any one, however trifling, would have +magic to quicken her memories. Yet now the cabinets must be unlocked, +and all that was in them removed. There was a bad hour waiting for +Pamela, when she would remove these relics one by one--the faded +letters in the handwriting which she would never see again on any +envelope; the photograph of the face which could exchange no look with +her; the little presents from the hand which could touch hers no more. +It would be a relief, she thought, to come downstairs when that +necessary work was done, that bad hour over, and find a letter from +Warrisden upon the table. Just a few lines. She needed nothing more. + + + + + CHAPTER XX + + MR. CHASE DOES NOT ANSWER + + +Both Pamela and Millie Stretton walked with Warrisden through the hall +to the front door. Upon the hall-table letters were lying. Pamela +glanced at them as she passed, and caught one up rather suddenly. Then +she looked at Warrisden, and there was something of appeal in her +look. It was as though she turned to a confederate on whom she could +surely rely. But she said nothing, since Millie Stretton was at her +side. For the letter was in the handwriting of Mr. Mudge, who wrote +but rarely, and never without a reason. She read the letter in the +garden as soon as Warrisden had ridden off, and the news which it +contained was bad news. Callon had lived frugally in South America--by +Christmas he would have discharged his debts; and he had announced to +Mudge that he intended at that date to resign his appointment. There +were still four months, Pamela reflected--nay, counting the journey +home, five months; and within that time Tony Stretton might reappear. +If he did not, why, she could summon Warrisden to her aid. She looked +at Millie, who was reading a book in a garden-chair close by. Did she +know, Pamela wondered? But Millie gave no sign. + +Meanwhile, Warrisden travelled to London upon that particular business +which made a visit there in August so imperative. It had come upon him +while he had been talking with Pamela that it would be as well for him +to know the whereabouts of Tony Stretton at once; so that if the need +came he should be ready to set out upon the instant. On the following +evening, accordingly, he drove down to Stepney. It was very likely +that Chase would be away upon a holiday. But there was a chance that +he might find him clinging to his work through this hot August, a +chance worth the trouble of his journey. He drove to the house where +Chase lodged, thinking to catch him before he set out for his +evening's work at the mission. The door of the house stood open to the +street. Warrisden dismissed his cab, and walked up the steps into the +narrow hall. A door upon his right hand was opened, and a young man +politely asked Warrisden to step in. He was a fair-haired youth, with +glasses upon his nose, and he carried a napkin in his hand. He had +evidently been interrupted at his dinner by Warrisden's arrival. He +was not dining alone, for a youth of the same standing, but of a more +athletic mould, sat at the table. There was a third place laid, but +not occupied. + +Warrisden looked at the third chair. + +"I came to see Mr. Chase," he said. "I suppose that he has gone early +to the mission?" + +"No," said the youth who had opened the door. "He has not been well of +late. The hot weather in these close streets is trying. But he +certainly should have something to eat by now, even if he does not +intend to get up." + +He spoke in a pedantic, self-satisfied voice, and introduced himself +as Mr. Raphael Princkley, and his companion as Mr. Jonas Stiles, both +undergraduates of Queen's College, Oxford. + +"We are helping Chase in his work," continued Mr. Princkley. "It is +little we can do, but you are no doubt acquainted with the poetry of +Robert Browning: 'The little more, and how much it is'? In that line +we find our justification." + +The fair-haired youth rang the bell for the housekeeper. She was an +old woman, fat and slow, and she took her time in answering the +summons. + +"Mrs. Wither, have you called Mr. Chase?" he asked when the old lady +appeared at the door. + +"No, Mr. Princkley, sir," she replied. "You told me yesterday evening +not to disturb him on any account until he rang." + +Mr. Princkley turned to Warrisden. + +"Mr. Chase was unwell all yesterday," he said, "and at dinner-time he +told us that he felt unequal to his duties. He was sitting in that +empty place, and we both advised him not to overtax his strength." + +He appealed with a look to Mr. Stiles for corroboration. + +"Yes; we both advised him," said Stiles, between two mouthfuls; "and, +very wisely, he took our advice." + +"He rose from his chair," continued Princkley. "There was some fruit +upon the table. He took an apple from the dish. I think, Stiles, that +it was an apple which he took?" + +Mr. Stiles agreed, and went on with his dinner. + +"It was certainly an apple which he took. He took it in his hand." + +"You hardly expected him to take it with his foot!" rejoined +Warrisden, politely. Warrisden was growing a little restive under this +detailed account of Chase's indisposition. + +"No," replied Princkley, with gravity. "He took it in quite a natural +way, and went upstairs to his sitting-room. I gave orders to Mrs. +Wither that he must not be disturbed until he rang. That is so, Mrs. +Wither, is it not? Yes. I thank you." + +"That was yesterday evening!" cried Warrisden. + +"Yesterday evening," replied Mr. Princkley. + +"And no one has been near him since?" + +Then Mrs. Wither intervened. + +"Oh yes. I went into Mr. Chase's room an hour afterwards. He was +sitting in his armchair before the grate----" + +"Holding the apple in his hand. I think. Mrs. Wither, you said?" +continued Stiles. + +"Yes, sir," said Mrs. Wither. "He had his arm out resting on the arm +of the chair, and the apple was in his hand." + +"Well, well!" exclaimed Warrisden. + +"I told him that I would not call him in the morning until he rang, as +he wanted a good rest." + +"What did he say?" asked Warrisden. + +"Nothing, sir. As often as not he does not answer when he is spoken +to." + +A sudden fear seized upon Warrisden. He ran out of the room and up the +stairs to Chase's sitting-room. He knocked on the door; there was no +answer. He turned the handle and entered. Chase had not gone to bed +last night. He was still sitting in his armchair before the grate. One +arm was extended along the arm of the chair, with the palm turned +upwards, and in the palm lay an apple. Chase was sitting huddled up, +with his head fallen forward upon his breast like a man asleep. +Warrisden crossed the room and touched the hand which held the apple. +It was quite cold. The apple rolled on to the floor. Warrisden turned +to the housekeeper. She was standing in the doorway, and staring over +her shoulder were the two undergraduates. + +"He was dead," said Warrisden, "when you looked into the room an hour +afterwards!" + +The three people in the doorway stood stupidly aghast. Warrisden +pushed them out, locked the door on the outside, and removed the key. + +"Mr. Princkley, will you run for a doctor?" he asked. + +Princkley nodded his head, and went off upon his errand. + +Warrisden and Stiles descended the stairs into the dining-room. + +"I think you had better take the news to the mission," said Warrisden; +and Stiles in his turn went off without a word. Mrs. Wither for her +part had run out of the house as quickly as she could. She hardly knew +what she was doing. She had served as housekeeper to Mr. Chase ever +since he had come to Stepney, and she was dazed by the sudden +calamity. She was aware of a need to talk, to find the neighbours and +talk. + +Warrisden was thus left alone in the house. It had come about without +any premeditation upon his part. He was the oldest man of the three +who had been present, and the only one who had kept his wits clear. +Both Princkley and Stiles had looked to him to decide what must be +done. They regarded him as Chase's friend, whereas they were mere +acquaintances. It did not even occur to Warrisden at first that he was +alone in the house, that he held in his hand the key to Chase's room. +He was thinking of the strange perplexing life which had now so +strangely ended. He thought of his first meeting with Chase in the +mission, and of the distaste which he had felt; he remembered the +array of liqueur bottles on the table, and the half-hour during which +Chase had talked. A man of morbid pleasures, that had been Warrisden's +impression. Yet there were the years of work, here, amongst these +squalid streets. Even August had seen him clinging to--nay, dying +at--his work. As Warrisden looked out of the window he saw a group of +men and women and children gather outside the house. There was not a +face but wore a look of consternation. If they spoke, they spoke in +whispers, like people overawed. A very strange life! Warrisden knew +many--as who does not?--who saw the high-road distinctly, and could +not for the life of them but walk upon the low one. But to use both +deliberately, as it seemed Chase had done; to dip from the high-road +on to the low, and then painfully to scramble up again, and again +willingly to drop, as though the air of those stern heights were too +rigorous for continuous walking; to live the double life because he +could not entirely live the one, and would not entirely live the +other. Thus Warrisden solved the problem of the _dilettante_ curate +and his devotion to his work, and his solution was correct. + +But he held the key of Chase's room in his hand; and there was no one +but himself in the house. His thoughts came back to Pamela and the +object of his journey up to town. He was sorely tempted to use the +key, since now the means by which he had hoped to discover in what +quarter of the world Stretton wandered and was hid were tragically +closed to him. Chase could no longer speak, even if he would. Very +likely there were letters upstairs lying on the table. There might be +one from Tony Stretton. Warrisden did not want to read it--a mere +glance at the postmark, and at the foreign stamp upon the envelope. +Was that so great a crime? Warrisden was sorely tempted. If only he +could be sure that Chase would a second time have revealed what he was +bidden to keep hid, why, then, would it not be just the same thing as +if Chase were actually speaking with his lips? Warrisden played with +the key. He went to the door and listened. There was not a sound in +the house except the ticking of a clock. The front door still stood +open. He must be quick if he meant to act. Warrisden turned to the +stairs. The thought of the dead man huddled in the chair, a silent +guardian of the secret, weighted his steps. Slowly he mounted. Such +serious issues hung upon his gaining this one piece of knowledge. The +fortunes of four people--Pamela and himself, Tony Stretton and his +wife--might all be straightened out if he only did this one thing, +which he had no right to do. He would not pry amongst Chase's papers; +he would merely glance at the table, that was all. He heard voices in +the hall while he was still upon the stairs. He turned back with a +feeling of relief. + +At the foot of the stairs stood Mr. Princkley and the doctor. +Warrisden handed the key of the room to the latter, and the three men +went up. The doctor opened the door and crossed to the armchair. Then +he looked about the room. + +"Nothing has been touched, of course?" + +"Nothing," replied Warrisden. + +The doctor looked again at the dead man. Then he turned to Warrisden, +mistaking him, as the others had done, for some relation or near +friend. + +"I can give no certificate," said he. + +"There must be an inquest?" + +"Yes." + +Then the doctor moved suddenly to the table, which stood a few feet +from the armchair. There was a decanter upon it half filled with a +liquid like brown sherry, only a little darker. The doctor removed the +stopper and raised the decanter to his nose. + +"Ah!" said he, in a voice of comprehension. He turned again to +Warrisden. + +"Did you know?" he asked. + +"No." + +The doctor held the decanter towards Warrisden. Warrisden took it, +moistened the tip of a finger with the liquid, and tasted it. It had a +bitter flavour. + +"What is it?" he asked. + +"Laudanum," said the doctor. "An overdose of it." + +"Where is the glass, then, in which it was taken?" + +A tumbler stood upon the table close to the decanter-stopper. The +doctor took it up. + +"Yes, I noticed that," said Warrisden; "I noticed that it is clean." + +The doctor took the glass to the window, turned it upside down, and +held it to the light. It was quite dry, quite clean. + +"Surely it's evident what happened," said Warrisden. "Chase came into +the room, opened that cupboard door in the corner there. His keys are +still dangling in the lock, he took the decanter and the tumbler out, +placed them on the table at his side, sat down in his chair with the +apple in his hand, leaned back and quietly died." + +"Yes, no doubt," said the doctor. "But I think here will be found the +reason why he leaned back and quietly died," and he touched the +decanter. "Opium poisoning. It may not have been an overdose, but a +regular practice." He went to the door and called for Mrs. Wither. +Mrs. Wither had now returned to the house. When she came upstairs into +the room, he pointed to the decanter. + +"Did you ever see this before?" + +"No, sir," she answered. + +"Or that cupboard open?" + +"No, it was always locked." + +"Quite so," said the doctor. "You had better get some women to help +you here," he went on; and, with Warrisden's assistance, he lifted +Chase from the chair and carried him into his bedroom. + +"I must give notice to the police," he went on, and again he appealed +to Warrisden. "Do you mind staying in the house till I come back?" + +"Not at all." + +The doctor locked the door of the room and took the key away with him. +Warrisden waited with Princkley in the dining-room. The doctor had +taken away the key. It seemed that his chance of discovering the +secret which was of so much importance to Pamela and Millie Stretton +and himself had vanished. If only he had come yesterday, or the day +before! He sat down by the window and gazed out upon the street. A +group of men and women were gathered in the roadway, looking up at the +windows and talking quietly together. Then Princkley from behind +said-- + +"Some letters came for Chase this morning. They were not taken up to +his room. You had better look at them." + +Every one took him for a close friend. Princkley brought him the +letters, and he glanced at the superscriptions lest any one should +wear a look of immediate importance. He held the letters in his hand +and turned them over one by one, and half-way through the file he +stopped. He had come to a letter written upon thin paper, in a man's +handwriting, with a foreign stamp upon the envelope. The stamp was a +French one, and there was printed upon it: "Poste d'Algérie." + +Warrisden examined the post-mark. The letter came from Ain-Sefra. +Warrisden went on with his examination without a word. But his heart +quickened. He wondered whether he had found the clue. Ain-Sefra in +Algeria. Warrisden had never heard of the place before. It might be a +health resort, a wintering place. But this was the month of August. +There would be no visitors at this time to a health resort in Algeria. +He handed the letters back to Princkley. + +"I cannot tell whether they are important or not," he said. "I knew +Chase very slightly. His relations must be informed. I suppose Mrs. +Wither knows where they live." + +He took his departure as soon as the doctor had returned with the +police, and drove back to his rooms. A search through the Encyclopædia +told him nothing of Ain-Sefra; but, on the other hand, he could not +look at the article on Algeria without the Foreign Legion leaping to +his eyes at once--so great and magnificent a part it played in the +modern history of that colony. The Foreign Legion! Warrisden jumped to +the conviction that there was the secret of Tony Stretton's +disappearance. Every reason he could imagine came to his aid. Let a +man wish to disappear, as, from whatsoever reason, Tony Stretton did, +where else could he so completely bury himself and yet live? +Hardships? Dangers? Yes. But Tony Stretton had braved hardships and +dangers in the North Sea, and had made light of them. A detachment of +the Foreign Legion might well be stationed at this oasis of Ain-Sefra, +of which his Encyclopædia knew nothing. He had no doubt there was a +trooper there, serving under some false name, who would start if the +name of "Stretton" were suddenly shouted to him behind his back. + +Warrisden wrote no word of his conjecture to Pamela; he wished to +raise no hopes which he could not fulfil. Convinced as he was, he +wished for certain proof. But in fulfilment of his promise he wrote to +Pamela that night. Just a few lines--nothing more, as she had asked. +But in those few lines he wrote that he would like her to procure for +him a scrap of Tony Stretton's handwriting. Could she do it? In a week +the scrap of handwriting arrived. Warrisden, looking at it, knew that +the same hand had addressed the envelope at Ain-Sefra to Mr. Chase. + +Warrisden was ready now, if the summons to service should come once +more from Pamela. + + + + + CHAPTER XXI + + CALLON REDIVIVUS + + +All through that autumn Pamela watched for Tony's return, and watched +in vain. Winter came, and with the winter a letter from Mr. Mudge. +Lionel Callon had booked his passage home on a steamer which sailed on +Christmas Eve from the port of Valparaiso. Pamela received the news +one morning of December. She hunted that day with the Quorn, and for +once her thoughts were set on other matters than this immediate +business. The long grass meadows slipped away under her horse's feet +the while she pondered how once more the danger of Callon's presence +was to be averted. At times she hoped it would not need averting. +Callon had been eighteen months away, and Millie was quick to forget. +But she was no less quick to respond to a show of affection. Let +Callon lay siege again persistently, and the danger at once was close. +Besides, there were the letters. That he should have continued to +write during the months of his absence was a sign that he had not +forgone his plan of conquest. + +Pamela returned home with a scheme floating in her mind. Some words +which her mother had spoken at the breakfast-table had recurred to +her, and at tea Pamela revived the subject. + +"Did you say that you would not go to Roquebrune this winter, mother?" +she asked. + +"Yes," Mrs. Mardale replied; "I have been for so many winters now. I +shall stay in England, for a change. We can let the Villa Pontignard, +no doubt." + +"Oh, there is no hurry," said Pamela. She added, "I shall be going to +London to-morrow, but I shall be back in the evening." + +She thought over her plan that evening. Its execution would cost her +something, she realised. For many years she had not been out of +England during the winter. She must leave her horses behind, and that +was no small sacrifice for Pamela. She had one horse in particular, a +big Irish horse, which had carried her in the days when her troubles +were at their worst. He would follow her about the paddock or the yard +nuzzling against her arm; a horse of blood and courage, yet gentle +with her, thoughtful and kind for her as only a horse amongst the +animals can be. She must leave him. On the other hand, her thoughts of +late had been turning to Roquebrune for a particular reason. She had a +feeling that she would rather like to tread again those hill-paths, to +see once more those capes and headlands of which every one was a +landmark of past pain--just as an experiment. She travelled to London +the next day and drove from St. Pancras into Regent's Park. + +Millie Stretton had taken a house on the west side of the park. It +looked east across the water and through the glades of trees, and in +front of it were the open spaces of which Tony and she had dreamed; +and the sunlight streamed through the windows and lay in golden +splashes on the floors when there was sunlight in London anywhere at +all. When she looked from her window on the first morning, she could +not but remember the plans which Tony and she had debated long ago. +They had been so certain of realising them. Well, they were realised +now, for her, at all events. There was the sunlight piercing through +every cranny; there were the wide expanses of green, and trees. Only +the windows looked on Regent's Park, and on no wide prairie; and of +the two who, with so much enthusiasm, had marked out their imaginary +site and built their house, there was only one to enjoy the +fulfilment. Millie Stretton thought of Tony that morning, but with an +effort. What Pamela had foreseen had come to pass. He had grown +elusive to her thoughts, she could hardly visualise his person to +herself; he was almost unreal. Had he walked in at that moment he +would have been irksome to her as a stranger. + +It was, however, Pamela Mardale who walked in. She was shown over the +house, and until that ceremony was over she did not broach the reason +for her visit. Then, however, Millie said with delight-- + +"It is what I have always wanted--sunlight." + +"I came to suggest more sunlight," said Pamela. "There is our villa at +Roquebrune in the south of France. It will be empty this winter. And I +thought that perhaps you and I might go out there together as soon as +Christmas is past." + +Millie was standing at the window with her back to Pamela. She turned +round quickly. + +"But you hate the place," she said. + +Pamela answered with sincerity-- + +"None the less I want to go this winter. I want to go very much. I +won't tell you why. But I do want to go. And I should like you to come +with me." + +Pamela was anxious to discover whether that villa and its grounds, and +the view from its windows, had still the power to revive the grief +with which they had been so completely associated in her mind. +Hitherto she had shrunk from the very idea of ever revisiting +Roquebrune; of late, however, since Warrisden, in a word, had occupied +so large a place in her thoughts, she had wished to put herself to the +test, to understand whether her distress was really and truly dead, or +whether it merely slumbered and could wake again. It was necessary, +for Warrisden's sake as much as her own, that she should come to a +true knowledge. And nowhere else could she so certainly acquire it. If +the sight of Roquebrune, the familiar look of the villa's rooms, the +familiar paths whereon she had carried so overcharged a heart, had no +longer power to hurt and pain her, then she would be sure that she +could start her life afresh. It was only fair--so she phrased it in +her thoughts--that she should make the experiment. + +Millie turned back to the window. + +"I do not think that I shall leave London this winter," she said. "You +see, I have only just got into the house." + +"It might spare you some annoyance," Pamela suggested. + +"I don't understand," said Millie. + +"The annoyance of having to explain Tony's absence. He will very +likely have returned by the spring." + +Millie shrugged her shoulders. + +"I have borne that annoyance for two years," she replied. "I do not +think I shall go away this winter." + +Was Millie thinking of Callon's return? Pamela wondered. Was it on +his account that she decided to remain? Pamela could not ask the +question. Her plan had come to naught, and she returned that afternoon +to Leicestershire. + +Christmas passed, and half-way through the month of January Callon +called, on a dark afternoon, at Millie Stretton's house. Millie was +alone; she was indeed expecting him. When Callon entered the room he +found her standing with her back to the window, her face to the door, +and so she stood, without speaking, for a few moments. + +"You have been a long time away," she said, and she looked at him with +curiosity, but with yet more anxiety to mark any changes which had +come in his face. + +"Yes," said he, "a long time." + +Millie rang the bell and ordered tea to be brought. + +"You have not changed," said she. + +"Nor you." + +Millie had spoken with a noticeable distance in her manner; and she +had not given him her hand. With her back towards the light she had +allowed very little of her expression to be visible to her visitor. +When tea was brought in, however, she sat between the fireplace and +the window, and the light fell upon her. Callon sat opposite to her. + +"At last I know that I am at home again," he said, with a smile. Then +he leaned forward and lowered his voice, although there was no third +person in the room. He knew the value of such tricks. "I have looked +forward during these eighteen months so very much to seeing you +again." + +Millie's face coloured, but it was with anger rather than pleasure. +There was a hard look upon her face; her eyes blamed him. + +"Yet you went away without a word to me," she said. "You did not come +to see me before you went, you never hinted you were going." + +"You thought it unkind?" + +"It was unkind," said Millie. + +"But I wrote to you. I have written often." + +"In no letter have you told me why you went away," said Millie. + +"You missed me when I went, then?" + +Millie shrugged her shoulders. + +"Well, I had seen a good deal of you. I missed--I missed--something," +she said. Callon drank his tea and set down his cup. + +"I have come to tell you why I went away without a word. I never +mentioned the reason in my letters; I meant to tell you it with my +lips. I did not _go_ away, I was _sent_ away." + +Millie was perplexed. "Sent away?" she repeated. "I understood, from +what you wrote, that you accepted a post from Mr. Mudge?" + +"I had to accept it," said Callon. "It was forced on me. Mudge was +only the instrument to get me out of the way." + +"Who sent you away, then?" asked Millie. + +"A friend of yours--Miss Pamela Mardale." + +Millie Stretton leaned back in her chair. "Pamela!" she cried +incredulously. "Pamela sent you away! Why?" + +"Because she thought that I was seeing too much of you." + +Callon watched for the effect which his words would produce. He saw +the change come in Millie's face. There was a new light in her eyes, +her face flushed, she was angry; and anger was just the feeling he had +meant to arouse, anger against Pamela, anger which would drive Millie +towards him. He had kept his explanation back deliberately until he +could speak it himself. From the moment when he had started from +England he had nursed his determination to tell it to Millie Stretton. +He had been hoodwinked, outwitted by Pamela and her friend; he had +been banished to Chili for two years. Very well. But the game was not +over yet. His vanity was hurt as nothing had ever hurt it before. He +was stung to a thirst for revenge. He would live frugally, clear off +his debts, return to England, and prove to his enemies the futility of +their plan. He thought of Pamela Mardale; he imagined her hearing of +his departure and dismissing him straightway contemptuously from her +thoughts. For eighteen months he nursed his anger, and waited for the +moment when he could return. There should be a surprise for Pamela +Mardale. She should understand that he was a dangerous fellow to +attack. Already, within a day of his landing, he had begun to +retaliate. The anger in Millie Stretton's face was of good augury for +him. + +"Pamela!" cried Millie, clenching her hands together suddenly. "Yes, +it was Pamela." + +She bethought her of that pressing invitation to the south of France, +an invitation from Pamela who looked on the shires as the only +wintering-place. That was explained now. Mr. Mudge had informed +Pamela, no doubt, that Lionel Callon was returning. Millie was +furious. She looked on this interference as a gross impertinence. + +Callon rose from his chair. + +"You can imagine it, was humiliating to me to be tricked and sent +away. But I was helpless. I am a poor man; I was in debt. Miss Mardale +had an old rich man devoted to her in Mr. Mudge. He bought up my +debts, his lawyer demanded an immediate settlement of them all, and I +could not immediately settle them. I was threatened with proceedings, +with bankruptcy." + +"You should have come to me," cried Millie. + +Callon raised a protesting hand. + +"Oh, Lady Stretton, how could I?" he exclaimed in reproach. "Think for +a moment! Oh, you would have offered help at a hint. I know you. You +are most kind, most generous. But think, you are a woman. I am a man. +Oh no!" + +Callon did not mention that Mr. Mudge had compelled him to accept or +refuse the post in Chili with only an hour's deliberation, and that +hour between seven and eight in the evening. He had thought of calling +upon Millie to suggest in her mind the offer which she had now made, +but he had not had the time. He was glad now. His position was thereby +so much the stronger. + +"I had to accept Mudge's offer. Even the acceptance was made as +humiliating as it possibly could be. For Mudge deliberately let me see +that his only motive was to get me out of the country. He did not care +whether I knew his motive or not. I did not count," he cried, +bitterly. "I was a mere pawn upon a chess-board. I had to withdraw +from my candidature. My career was spoilt. What did they care--Mr. +Mudge and your friend? I was got out of your way." + +"Oh, oh!" cried Millie; and Callon stepped quickly to her side. + +"Imagine what these months have been to me," he went on. "I was out +there in Chili, without friends. I had nothing to do. Every one else +upon the railway had his work, his definite work, his definite +position. I was nothing at, all, a mere prisoner, in everybody's way, +a man utterly befooled. But that was not the worst of it. Shall I be +frank?" He made a pretence of hesitation. "I will. I will take the +risk of frankness. I was sent away just when I had begun to think a +great deal about you." Millie Stretton, who had been gazing into her +companion's face with the utmost sympathy, lowered her eyes to the +floor. But she was silent. + +"That was the worst," he continued softly. "I was angry, of course. I +knew that I was losing the better part of two years----" + +And Millie interrupted him: "How did she know?" she exclaimed. + +"Who? Oh, Miss Mardale. Do you remember the evening she came to +Whitewebs? I was waiting for you in the hall. You came down the stairs +and ran up again. There was a mirror on the mantelpiece. She guessed +then. Afterwards she and Mudge discussed us in the drawing-room. I saw +them." + +Millie got up from her chair and moved to the fireplace. + +"It was on my account that you have lost two years, that your career +has been injured," she said, in a low voice. She was really hurt, +really troubled. "I am so very sorry. What return can I ever make to +you? I will never speak to Pamela again." + +Callon crossed and stood beside her. + +"No, don't do that," he said. "It would be--unwise." + +Her eyes flashed up to his quickly, and as quickly fell. The colour +slowly deepened in her cheeks. + +"What does it matter about my career?" he continued, with a smile. "I +see you again. If you wish to make me a return, let me see you very +often!" + +He spoke with tenderness, and he was not pretending. What space did +Millie Stretton fill in his thoughts? She was pretty, she was +sympathetic, she was ready to catch the mood of her companion. It was +not merely an act of retaliation which Callon projected. Such love as +he had to give was hers. It was not durable, it was intertwined with +meanness, it knew no high aims; yet, such as it was, it was hers. It +gained, too, a fictitious strength from the mere fact that he had been +deliberately kept from her. The eighteen months of bondage had given +her an importance in his eyes, had made her more desirable through the +very difficulty of attaining her. Millie allowed him to come again and +again. She had a natural taste for secrecies, and practised them now, +as he bade her do, without any perception of the humiliation which +they involved. If he called at her house, it was after the dusk had +fallen, and when she was at home to no other visitors. They dined +together in the restaurants of unfashionable hotels, and if she drove +to them in her brougham, she sent it away, and was escorted to her +door in a cab. Callon was a past-master in concealment; he knew the +public places where the public never is, and rumour did not couple +their names. But secrecy is not for the secret when the secret ones +are a man and a woman. It needs too much calculation in making +appointments, too much punctuality in keeping them, too close a +dependence upon the probable thing happening at the probable time. +Sooner or later an accident, which could not be foreseen, occurs. It +may be no more than the collision of a cab and the summons of the +driver. Or some one takes, one morning, a walk in an unaccustomed +spot. Or the intriguers fall in quite unexpectedly with another, who +has a secret too, of which they were not aware. Sooner or later some +one knows. + +It was the last of these contingencies which brought about the +disclosure in the case of Callon and Millie Stretton. Six weeks had +passed since Callon's return. It was just a month from Easter. Millie +dined with some friends, and went with them afterwards to a theatre in +the Haymarket. At the door she sent her carriage home, and when the +performance was over she took a hansom cab. She declined any escort, +and was driven up Regent Street towards her home. At the corner of +Devonshire Street, in Portland Place, a man loitered upon the pavement +with a white scarf showing above his coat-collar. Millie opened the +trap and spoke to the driver. The cab stopped by the loiterer at the +street corner, who opened the doors and stepped in. The loiterer was +Lionel Callon. + +"Drive round Regent's Park," he said. + +The cab drove northwards through Park Place and along the broad road +towards Alexandra Gate. The air was warm, the stars bright overhead, +the dark trees lined the roadway on the left, the road under the +wheels was very white. There was a great peace in the park. It was +quite deserted. In a second it seemed they had come out of the glare, +and the roar of streets, into a land of quiet and cool gloom. Millie +leaned back while Callon talked, and this was the burden of his talk. + +"Let us go to the south of France. I will go first. Do you follow! You +go for Easter. It will be quite natural. You stay at Eze, I at the +little Reserve by the sea a mile away. There is a suite of rooms +there. No one need know." Three times the cab drove round the park +while Callon urged, and Millie more and more faintly declined. The +driver sat perched upon his box, certain of a good fare, indifferent. +Inside his cab, on this quiet night, the great issues of life and +honour were debated. Millie had just her life in her hands. One way or +the other, by a 'Yes' or a 'No,' she must decide what she would do +with it, and, to whatever decision she came, it must reach out +momentous with consequences and touch other lives beyond hers and +beyond those others, others still. Her husband, her relations, her +friends--not one of them but was concerned in this midnight drive. It +seemed to Millie almost that she heard them hurrying about the cab, +calling to her, reaching out their hands. So vivid was her thought, +that she could count them, and could recognise their faces. She looked +amongst them for her husband. But Tony was not there. She could not +see him, she could not hear his voice. Round and round past the trees, +on the white road, the cab went jingling on, the driver, indifferent, +upon his perch, the tempter and the tempted within. + +"Your husband does not care," said Callon. "If he did, would he stay +so long away?" + +"No, he does not care," said Millie. If he cared, would he not be +among that suppliant throng which ran about the cab? And all at once +it seemed that the hurrying footsteps lagged behind. The voices called +more faintly; she could not see the outreaching hands. + +"No one need know," said Callon. + +"_Someone always knows_," replied Millie. + +"What then?" cried Callon. "If you love, you will not mind. If you +love, you will abandon everything--everyone. If you love!" + +He had taken the right way to persuade her. Call upon Millie for a +great sacrifice, she would make it, she would glory in making it, just +for the moment. Disenchantment would come later; but nothing of it +would she foresee. As she had matched herself with Tony, when first he +had proposed to leave her behind in 'his father's house, so now she +matched herself with Callon, she felt strong. + +"Very well," she said. "I will follow." + +Callon stopped the cab and got out. As he closed the doors and told +the cabman where to drive, a man, wretchedly clad, slouched past and +turned into the Marylebone Road. That was all. Sooner or later some +one was sure to discover their secret. It happened that the some one +passed them by to-night. + + + + + CHAPTER XXII + + MR. MUDGE'S CONFESSION + + +On the following morning a telegram was brought to Pamela at her +father's house in Leicestershire. It came from Mr. Mudge, and +contained these words: "Important that I should see you. Coming down. +Please be at home at two." Punctually Mr. Mudge arrived. Pamela +received him in her own sitting-room. She was waiting with a restless +anxiety, and hardly waited for the door to be closed. + +"You have bad news for me," she said. "Oh, I know! You are a busy man. +You would not have come down to me had you not bad news. I am very +grateful for your coming, but you have bad news." + +"Yes," said Mr. Mudge, gravely; "news so bad that you must ask your +other friend to help you. I can do nothing here." + +It cost Mr. Mudge a little to acknowledge that he was of no avail in +this particular instance. He would rather have served Pamela himself, +had it been possible. He was fully aware of his age, and his looks, +and his limitations. He was quite willing to stand aside for the other +friend; indeed, he wished, with all his heart, that she should be +happy with some mate of her own people. But at the same time he wished +her to owe as much as possible of her happiness to him. He was her +friend, but there was just that element of jealousy in his friendship +which springs up when the friends are man and woman. Pamela understood +that it meant some abnegation on his part to bid her call upon another +than himself. She was still more impressed, in consequence, with the +gravity of the news he had to convey. + +"Is it Mr. Callon?" she asked. + +"Yes," he replied. "It is imperative that Sir Anthony Stretton should +return, and return at once. Of that I am very sure." + +"You have seen Mr. Callon?" asked Pamela. + +"And Lady Stretton. They were together." + +"When?" + +"Last night. In Regent's Park." + +Pamela hesitated. She was doubtful how to put her questions. She +said-- + +"And you are sure the trouble is urgent?" + +Mr. Mudge nodded his head. + +"Very sure. I saw them together. I saw the look on Lady Stretton's +face. It was a clear night. There was a lamp too, in the cab. I passed +them as Callon got out and said 'Good-night.'" + +Pamela sat down in a chair, and fixed her troubled eyes on her +companion. + +"Did they see you?" + +Mr. Mudge smiled. + +"No." + +"Let me have the whole truth," cried Pamela, "Tell me the story from +the beginning. How you came to see them--everything." + +Mr. Mudge sat down in his turn. He presented to her a side of his +character which she had not hitherto suspected. She listened, and was +moved to sympathy, as no complaint could ever have moved her; and Mr. +Mudge was the last man to complain. Yet the truth came out clearly. +Outwardly prosperous and enviable, he had yet inwardly missed all. A +man of so wide a business, so many undertakings, so occupied a life, +it was natural to dissociate him from the ordinary human sympathies +and desires. It seemed that he could have neither time nor inclination +to indulge them. But here he was, as he had once done before, not +merely admitting their existence within him, but confessing that they +were far the greater part of him, and that because they had been +thwarted, the prosperous external life of business to which he seemed +so ardently enchained was really of little account, He spoke very +simply. Pamela lost sight of the business machine altogether. Here was +a man, like another, telling her that through his vain ambitions his +life had gone astray. She found a pathos in the dull and unimpressive +look of him--his bald, uncomely head, his ungraceful figure. There was +a strange contrast between his appearance and the fanciful antidote +for disappointment which had brought him into Regent's Park when +Callon and Lady Stretton were discussing their future course. + +"I told you something of my history at Newmarket," he said. "You must +remember what I told you, or you will not understand." + +"I remember very well," said Pamela, gently. "I think that I shall +understand." + +Pamela of late, indeed, had gained much understanding. Two years ago +the other point of view was to her always without interest. As often +as not she was unaware that it existed; when she was aware, she +dismissed it without consideration. But of late her eyes had learned +to soften at the troubles of others, her mind to be perplexed with +their perplexities. + +"Yes," said Mudge, nodding his head, with a smile towards her. "You +will understand now." + +And he laid so much emphasis upon the word that Pamela looked up in +surprise. + +"Why now?" she asked. + +"Because, recently, imagination has come to you. I have seen, I have +noticed. Imagination, the power to see clearly, the power to +understand--perhaps the greatest gift which love has in all his big +box of gifts." + +Pamela coloured at his words. She neither admitted nor denied the +suggestion they contained. + +"I have therefore ho fear that you will misunderstand," Mr. Mudge +insisted. "I told you that my career, such as it is, has left me a +very lonely man amongst a crowd of acquaintances, who are no more in +sympathy with me than I myself am in sympathy with them. I did not +tell you that I had found a way of alleviation." + +"No," said Pamela. She was at a loss to understand how this statement +of her companion was connected with his detection of Callon and Lady +Stretton; but she had no doubt there was a connection. Mudge was not +of those who take a pride in disclosing the details of their life and +character in and out of season. If he spoke of himself, he did so with +a definite reason, which bore upon the business in hand. "No; on the +contrary, you said that you could not go back and start afresh. You +had too much upon your hands. You were fixed in your isolation." + +"I did not even then tell you all the truth. I could not go back +half-way, that is true. I do not think I would find any comfort in +that course even if I could; but I can and I do go back all the way at +times. I reconstruct the days when I was very, very poor, and yet full +of hope, full of confidence. I do not mean that I sit in front of my +fire and tell myself the story. I do much more. I actually live them +over again, so far as I can. That puzzles you," he said, with a laugh. + +Pamela, indeed, was looking at him with a frown of perplexity upon her +forehead. + +"How do you live them again?" she asked. "I don't understand." + +"In this way," said Mudge. "I keep an old, worn-out suit of clothes +locked up in a cupboard. Well, when I find the house too lonely, and +my servants, with their noiseless tread, get on to my nerves, I just +put on that suit of clothes and revisit the old haunts where I used to +live forty and fifty years ago. Often I have come back from a dinner +party, let myself in at my front door, and slipped out of a side +entrance half an hour later on one of my pilgrimages. You would never +know me; you might toss me a shilling, that's all. Of course, I have +to be careful. I am always expecting to be taken up as a thief as I +slink away from the house. I would look rather a fool if that +happened, wouldn't I?" and he laughed. "But it never has yet." He +suddenly turned to her. "I enjoy myself upon those jaunts, you know; I +really enjoy myself. I like the secrecy. To slip out of the great, +silent house, to get clear away from the pictures, and the furniture, +and the obedience, and to tramp down into the glare and the noise of +the big streets, and to turn into some pothouse where once, years ago, +I used to take my supper and dream of the future. It's a sort of +hide-and-seek in itself." He laughed again, and then suddenly became +serious. "But it's much more than that--ever so much more." + +"Where do you go?" asked Pamela. + +"It depends upon the time I have. If it's early I go down to Deptford, +very often. I get into a tram and ride down a street where I once +wandered all night because I hadn't the price of a lodging. I look at +the old cookshop where I used to flatten my nose against the glass and +dream that I had the run of my teeth. I get down and go into a +public-house, say, with a sanded floor, and have a sausage and mash +and a pot of beer, just as I was doing forty years ago, when this or +that scheme, which turned out well, first came into my head. But don't +misunderstand," Mudge exclaimed. "I don't set off upon these visits +for the satisfaction of comparing what I was then with what I have +become. It is to get back to what I was then, as nearly as I can; to +recapture, just for a moment, some of the high hopes, some of the +anticipations of happiness to be won which I felt in those days; to +forget that the happiness has never been won, that the high hopes were +for things not worth the trouble spent in acquiring them. I was wet, +very often hungry, always ill-clothed; but I was happy in those days, +Miss Mardale, though very likely I didn't know it. I was young, the +future was mine, a solid reality; and the present--why, that was a +time of work and dreams. There's nothing much better than that +combination, Miss Mardale--work and dreams!" + +He repeated the words wistfully, and was silent for a moment. No doubt +those early struggles had not been so pleasant as they appeared in the +retrospect; but time had stripped them of their bitterness and left to +Mr. Mudge just that part of them which was worth remembering. + +"I had friends in those days," he went on. "I wonder what has become +of them all? In all my jaunts I have never seen one." + +"And where else do you go?" asked Pamela. + +"Oh, many places. There's a little narrow market between Shaftesbury +Avenue and Oxford Street, where the gas-jets flare over the barrows on +a Saturday night, and all the poor people go marketing. That's a haunt +of mine. I was some time, too, when I was young, at work near the +Marylebone Road. There's a tavern near Madame Tussaud's where I used +to go and have supper at the counter in the public bar. Do you +remember the night of Lady Millingham's reception, when we looked out +of the window and saw Sir Anthony Stretton? Well, I supped at that +tavern in the Marylebone Road on that particular night. I was hard put +to it, too, when I used to work in Marylebone. I slept for three +nights in Regent's Park. There's a coffee-stall close to the bridge, +just outside the park, on the north side." + +Pamela started, and Mudge nodded his head. + +"Yes; that is how I came to see Lady Stretton and Mr. Callon. A hansom +cab drove past me just as I crossed the road to go out of the gate to +the coffee-stall. I noticed it enough to see that it held a man and a +woman in evening dress, but no more. I stayed at the coffee-stall for +a little while talking with the cabmen and the others who were about +it, and drinking my coffee. As I returned into the park the cab drove +past me again. I thought it was the same cab, from the casual glance I +gave, and with the same people inside it. They had driven round, were +still driving round. It was a fine night, a night of spring, fresh, +and cool, and very pleasant. I did not wonder; I rather sympathised +with them," he said, with a smile. "You see, I have never driven round +Regent's Park at night with a woman I cared for beside me;" and again +the wistful note was very audible in his voice; and he added, in a low +voice, "That was not for me." + +He shook the wistfulness from him and resumed-- + +"Well, as I reached the south side of the park, and was close by Park +Place, the cab came towards me again, and pulled up. Callon got out. I +saw him clearly. I saw quite clearly, too, who was within the cab. So +you see there is danger. Mere friends do not drive round and round +Regent's Park at night." + +Mr. Mudge rose, and held out his hand. + +"I must get back to town. I have a fly waiting to take me to the +station," he said. + +Pamela walked with him to the door of the house. As they stood in the +hall she said-- + +"I thanked you, before you spoke at all, for putting your business +aside for my sake, and coming down to me. I thank you still more now, +and for another reason. I thank you for telling me what you have told +me about yourself. Such confessions," and she smiled upon the word, +"cannot be made without great confidence in the one they are made to." + +"I have that confidence," said Mudge. + +"I know. I am glad," replied Pamela; and she resumed: "They cannot be +made, either, without creating a difference. We no longer stand where +we did before they were made. I always looked upon you as my friend; +but we are far greater friends now, is not that so?" + +She spoke with great simplicity and feeling, her eyes glistened a +little, and she added, "You are not living now with merely +acquaintances around you." + +Mr. Mudge took her hand. + +"I am very glad that I came," he said; and, mounting into the fly, he +drove away. + +Pamela went back to the house and wrote out a telegram to Warrisden. +She asked him to come at once to--and then she paused. Should he come +here? No; there was another place, with associations for her which had +now grown very pleasant and sweet to her thoughts. She asked him to +meet her at the place where they had once kept tryst before--the +parlour of the inn upon the hill in the village of the Three Poplars. +Thither she had ridden before from Lady Millingham's house of +Whitewebs. Her own house stood, as it were, at one end of the base of +an obtuse triangle, of which Whitewebs made the other end, and the +three poplars the apex. + + + + + CHAPTER XXIII + + ROQUEBRUNE REVISITED + + +There, accordingly, they met on the following afternoon. Pamela rode +across the level country between the Croft Hill which overhung her +house, and the village. In front of her the three poplars pointed +skywards from the ridge. She was anxious and troubled. It seemed to +her that Millie Stretton was slipping beyond her reach; but the sight +of those trees lightened her of some portion of her distress. She was +turning more and more in her thoughts towards Warrisden whenever +trouble knocked upon her door. In the moment of greatest perplexity +his companionship, or even the thought of it, rested her like sleep. +As she came round the bend of the road at the foot of the hill, she +saw him coming down the slope towards her. She quickened her horse, +and trotted up to him. + +"You are here already?" she said. "I am very glad. I was not sure that +I had allowed you time enough." + +"Oh yes," said Warrisden. "I came at once. I guessed why you wanted me +from the choice of our meeting-place. We meet at Quetta, on the same +business which brought us together at Quetta before. Is not that so?" + +"Yes," said Pamela. + +They walked to the door of the inn at the top of the hill. An ostler +took charge of Pamela's horse, and they went within to the parlour. + +"You want me to find Stretton again?" said Warrisden. + +Pamela looked at him remorsefully. + +"Well, I do," she answered; and there was compunction in the tone of +her voice. "I would not ask you unless the matter was very urgent. I +have used you for my needs, I know, with too little consideration for +you, and you very generously and willingly have allowed me to use you. +So I am a little ashamed to come to you again." + +Here were strange words from Pamela. They were spoken with hesitation, +too, and the colour burned in her cheeks. Warrisden was surprised to +hear them. He laid his hand upon her arm and gave it a little +affectionate shake. + +"My dear, I am serving myself," he said, "just as much as I am serving +you. Don't you understand that? Have you forgotten our walk under the +elms in Lady Millingham's garden? If Tony returned, and returned in +time, why, then you might lay your finger on the turnpike gate and let +it swing open of its own accord. I remember what you said. Tony's +return helps me, so I help myself in securing his return." + +Pamela's face softened into a smile. + +"Then you really do not mind going?" she went on. "I am remorseful, in +a way, because I asked you to go once before in this very room, and +nothing came of all your trouble. I want you to believe now that I +could not ask you again to undergo the same trouble, or even more, as +it may prove, were not the need ever so much more urgent than it was +then." + +"I am sorry to hear that the need is more urgent," Warrisden replied; +"but, on the other hand, the trouble I shall have to bear is much +less, for I know where Stretton is." + +Pamela felt that half of the load of anxiety was taken from her +shoulders. + +"You do?" she exclaimed. + +Warrisden nodded. + +"And what he is doing. He is serving with the Foreign Legion in +Algeria. I thought you might want to lay your hands on him again, and +I wished to be ready. Chance gave me a clue--an envelope with a +postmark. I followed up the clue by securing an example of Stretton's +handwriting. It was the same handwriting as that which directed the +envelope, so I was sure." + +"Thank you," said Pamela. "Indeed, you do not fail me;" and her voice +was musical with gratitude. + +"He was at Ain-Sefra, a little town on the frontier of Algeria," +Warrisden resumed. And Pamela interrupted him-- + +"Then I need not make so heavy a demand upon you after all," she said. +"It was only a letter which I was going to ask you to carry to Tony. +Now there is no necessity that yon should go at all, for I can post +it." + +She produced the letter from a pocket of her coat as she spoke. + +"Ah, but will it reach Stretton if you do?" said Warrisden. + +Pamela had already seated herself at the table, and was drawing the +inkstand towards her. She paused at Warrisden's question, and looked +up. + +"Surely Ain-Sefra, Algeria, will find him?" + +"Will it?" Warrisden repeated. He sat down at the table opposite to +her. "Even if it does, will it reach him in time? You say the need is +urgent. Well, it was last summer when I saw the postmark on the +envelope, two days after we talked together in Lady Millingham's +garden. I had business in London." + +"I remember," said Pamela. + +"My business was just to find out where Stretton was hiding himself. +He was at Ain-Sefra then; he may be at Ain-Sefra now. But it is a +small post, and he may not. The headquarters of the Legion are at Sidi +Bel-Abbès, in the north. He may be there, or he may be altogether out +of reach on some Saharan expedition." + +There was yet another possibility which occurred to both their minds +at this moment. It was possible that no letter would ever reach +Stretton again; that Warrisden, searched he never so thoroughly, would +not be able to find the man he searched for. There are so many graves +in the Sahara. But neither of them spoke of this possibility, though a +quick look they interchanged revealed to each its presence in the +other's thoughts. + +"Besides, he wanted to lie hidden. So much I know, who know nothing of +his story. Would he have enlisted under his own name, do you think? +Or even under his own nationality? It is not the common practice in +the Foreign Legion. And that's not all. Even were he soldiering openly +under his own name, how will you address your letter with any +likelihood that it will reach him? Just 'La Legion Etrangère'? We want +to know to what section of la Legion Etrangère he belongs. Is he +chasseur, artilleryman, sapper? Perhaps he serves in the cavalry. Then +which is his squadron? Is he a plain foot soldier? Then in what +battalion, and what rank does he occupy? We cannot answer any of these +questions, and, unanswered, they certainly delay your letter; they may +prevent it ever reaching him at all." + +Pamela laid down her pen and stared blankly at "Warrisden. He piled up +the objections one by one in front of her until it seemed she would +lose Tony once more from her sight after she had got him for a moment +within her vision. + +"So you had better entrust your letter to me," he concluded. "Address +it to Stretton under his own name. I will find him, if he is to be +found, never fear. I will find him very quickly." + +Pamela addressed the letter. Yet she held it for a little time in her +hand after it was addressed. All the while Warrisden had been speaking +she had felt an impulse strong within her to keep him back; and it was +because of that impulse, rather than with any thought of Millie +Stretton and the danger in which she stood, that Pamela asked +doubtfully-- + +"How long will you be?" + +"I should find him within ten days." + +Pamela smiled suddenly. + +"It is not so very long," said she; and she handed the letter across +to Warrisden. "Well, go!" she cried, with a certain effort. "Telegraph +to me when you have found Tony. Bring him back, and come back +yourself." She added, in a voice which was very low and wistful, +"Please come back soon!" Then she rose from the table, and Warrisden +put the letter in his pocket and rose too. + +"You will be at home, I suppose, in ten days?" he said. And Pamela +said quickly, as though some new idea had just been suggested to her +mind-- + +"Oh, wait a moment!" + +She stood quite still and thoughtful. There was a certain test by +which she had meant to find the soundings of heart. Here was a good +opportunity to apply the test. Warrisden would be away upon his +journey; she could not help Millie Stretton now by remaining in +England. She determined to apply the test. + +"No," she said slowly. "Telegraph to me at the Villa Pontignard, +Roquebrune, Alpes Maritimes, France. I shall be travelling thither +immediately." + +Her decision was taken upon an instant. It was the logical outcome of +her thoughts and of Warrisden's departure; and since Warrisden went +because of Millie Stretton, Pamela's journey to the South of France +was due, in a measure, to that lady, too. Yet no one would have been +more astonished than Millie Stretton had she learned of Pamela's visit +at this time. She would have been quick to change her own plans; but +she had no knowledge of whither Pamela's thoughts were leading her. +When Callon in the hansom cab had said to her, "Come South," her first +swift reflection had been, "Pamela will be safe in England." She +herself had refused to go south with Pamela. Pamela's desire to go was +to her mind a mere false pretext to get her away from her one friend. +If she did not go south, she was very sure that Pamela would not. +There had seemed to her no safer place than the Riviera. But she was +wrong. Here, in the village of the Three Poplars, Pamela had made her +decision. + +"I shall go to Roquebrune as soon as I can make arrangements for a +servant or two," she said. + +"Roquebrune," said Warrisden, as he wrote down the address. "I once +walked up a long flight of steps to that village many years ago. +Perhaps you were at the villa then. I wonder. You must have been a +little girl. It was one February. I came over from Monte Carlo, and we +walked up from the station. We met the schoolmaster." + +"M. Giraud!" exclaimed Pamela. + +"Was that his name? He had written a little history of the village and +the Corniche road. He took me under his wing. We went into a wine shop +on the first floor of a house in the middle of the village, and we sat +there quite a long time. He asked us about Paris and London with an +eagerness which was quite pathetic. He came down with us to the +station, and his questions never ceased. I suppose he was lonely +there." + +Pamela nodded her head. + +"Very. He did not sleep all night for thinking of what you had told +him." + +"You were there, then?" cried Warrisden. + +"Yes; M. Giraud used to read French with me. He came to me one +afternoon quite feverish. Two Englishmen had come up to Roquebrune, +and had talked to him about the great towns and the lighted streets. +He was always dreaming of them. Poor man, he is at Roquebrune still, +no doubt." + +She spoke with a great tenderness and pity, looking out of the window, +and for the moment altogether lost to her surroundings. Warrisden +roused her from her reverie. + +"I must be going away." + +Pamela's horse was brought to the door, and she mounted. + +"Walk down the hill beside my horse," she said; "just as you did +on that other day, when the hill was slippery, your hand upon his +neck--so." + +Very slowly they walked down the hill. There were no driving mists +to-day, the evening was coming with a great peace, the fields and +woods lay spread beneath them toned to a tranquil grey. The white road +glimmered. At the bottom of the hill Pamela stopped. + +"Good-bye," she said; and there was more tenderness in her voice and +in her face than he had ever known. She laid her hand upon his arm and +bent down to him. + +"Come back to me," she said wistfully. "I do not like letting you go; +and yet I am rather proud to know that you are doing something for me +which I could not do for myself, and that you do it so very +willingly." + +She did not wait to hear any answer, but took her hand from his arm +and rode quickly away. That turnpike gate of friendship had already +swung open of its own accord. As she rode from Quetta that evening, +she passed beyond it, and went gratefully and hopefully, with the +other men and women, down the appointed road. + +She knew it while she was riding homewards to the Croft Hill. She knew +it, and was very glad. She rode home very slowly through the tranquil +evening, and gave herself up to joy. It was warm, and there was a +freshness in the air as though the world renewed itself. Darkness +came; only the road glimmered ahead of her--the new road, which was +the old road. Even that glimmer of white had almost vanished when at +last she saw the lighted windows of her father's house. The footman +told her that dinner was already served, but she ran past him very +quickly up the stairs, and coming to her own room, locked the door and +sat for a long while in the darkness, her blood throbbing in her +veins, her whole heart uplifted, not thinking at all, but just living, +and living most joyfully. She sat so still that she might have been in +a swoon; but it was the stillness of perfect happiness. She knew the +truth that night. + +But, none the less, she travelled south towards the end of the week, +since there a telegram would come to her. She persuaded a convenient +aunt to keep her company, who has nothing whatever to do with this +story; and reaching Villa Pontignard one afternoon, walked through the +familiar rooms which she had so dreaded ever to revisit. She went out +to the narrow point of the garden where so often she had dreamed with +M. Giraud of the outside world, its roaring cities and its jostle of +people. She sat down upon the parapet. Below her the cliff fell sheer, +and far below, in the darkness at the bottom of the gorge, the water +tumbled in foam with a distant hum. On the opposite hill the cypresses +stood out black from the brown and green. Here she had suffered +greatly, but the wounds were healed. These dreaded places had no +longer power to hurt. She knew that very surely. She was emancipated +from sorrow, and as she sat there in the still, golden afternoon, the +sense of freedom ran riot in her blood. She looked back over the years +to the dragging days of misery, the sleepless nights. She felt a pity +for the young girl who had then looked down from this parapet and +prayed for death; who had counted the many years of life in front of +her; who had bewailed her very strength and health. But ever her eyes +turned towards the Mediterranean and searched the horizon. For beyond +that blue, calm sea stretched the coasts of Algeria. + +There was but one cloud to darken Pamela's happiness during these days +while she waited for Warrisden's telegram. On the morning after she +had arrived, the old curé climbed from the village to visit her. +Almost Pamela's first question was of M. Giraud. + +"He is still here?" + +"Yes, he is still here," replied the curé; but he pursed up his lips +and shook his head. + +"I must send for him," said Pamela. + +The curé said nothing. He was standing by the window, and almost +imperceptibly he shrugged his shoulders as though he doubted her +wisdom. In a moment Pamela was at his side. + +"What is it?" she asked gently. "Tell me." + +"Oh, mademoiselle, there is little to tell! He is not the schoolmaster +you once knew. That is all. The wine shop has made the difference--the +wine shop and discontent. He was always dissatisfied, you know. It is +a pity." + +"I am so sorry," said Pamela, gravely, "so very sorry." + +She was silent for a while, and greatly troubled by the curé's news. + +"Has he married?" she asked. + +"No." + +"It would have been better if he had." + +"No doubt, mademoiselle," said the curé, "but he has not, and I think +it is now too late." + +Pamela did not send for M. Giraud. It seemed to her that she could do +no good even if at her request he came to her. She would be going away +in a few days. She would only hurt him and put him to shame before +her. She took no step towards a renewal of their friendship, and +though she did not avoid him, she never came across him in her walks. + +For ten days she walked the old hill paths, and dreams came to her +with the sunlight. They gave her company in the evenings, too, when +she looked from her garden upon the quiet sea and saw, away upon the +right, the lights, like great jewels, burning on the terrace of Monte +Carlo. She went down one morning on to that terrace, and, while seated +upon a bench, suddenly saw, at a little distance, the back of a man +which was familiar to her. + +She was not sure, but she was chilled with apprehension. She watched +from behind her newspaper, and in a little while she was sure, for the +man turned and showed his face. It was Lionel Callon. What was he +doing here, she asked herself? And another question trod fast upon the +heels of the first. "Was he alone?" + +Callon was alone on this morning, at all events. Pamela saw him speak +to one or two people, and then mount the terrace steps towards the +town. She gave him a little time, and then, walking through the +gardens, bought a visitors' list at the kiosk in front of the Rooms. +She found Callon's name. He was the only visitor at a Reserve, on the +Corniche road, which was rather a restaurant than a hotel. She +searched through the list, fearing to find the name of Millie Stretton +under the heading of some other hotel. To her relief it was not there. +It was possible, of course, that Callon was merely taking a holiday by +himself. She wished to believe that, and yet there was a fear speaking +loudly at her heart. "Suppose that Tony should return too late just by +a few days!" She was still holding the paper in her hands when she +heard her name called, and, turning about, saw some friends. She +lunched with them at Ciro's, and asked carelessly during luncheon-- + +"You have not seen Millie Stretton, I suppose?" + +"No," they all replied. And one asked, "Is she expected?" + +"I don't know whether she will come or not," Pamela replied. "I asked +her to come with me, but she could not do that, and she was not sure +that she would come at all." + +This she said, thinking that if Millie did arrive it might seem that +she came because Pamela herself was there. Pamela went back to +Roquebrune that afternoon, and after she had walked through the +village and had come out on the slope of hill above, she met the +postman coming down from the Villa Pontignard. + +"You have a telegram for me?" she said anxiously. + +"Mademoiselle," he replied, "I have just left it at the house." + +Pamela hurried on, and found the telegram in the _salon_. She tore it +open. It was from Warrisden. It told her that Tony Stretton was found, +and would return. It gave the news in vague and guarded language, +mentioning no names. But Pamela understood the message. Tony Stretton +was actually coming back. "Would he come too late?" she asked, gazing +out in fear across the sea. Of any trouble, out there in Algeria, +which might delay his return, she did not think at all. If it was true +that he had enlisted in the Legion, there might be obstacles to a +quick return. But such matters were not in her thoughts. She thought +only of Callon upon the terrace of Monte Carlo. "Would Tony come too +late?" she asked; and she prayed that he might come in time. + + + + + CHAPTER XXIV + + THE END OF THE EXPERIMENT + + +The village of Ain-Sefra stands upon a high and fertile oasis on the +very borders of Morocco. The oasis is well watered, and the date-palm +grows thickly there. It lies far to the south. The railway, in the +days when Tony Stretton served in the Foreign Legion, did not reach to +it; the barracks were newly built, the parade ground newly enclosed; +and if one looked southwards from any open space, one saw a tawny belt +of sand in the extreme distance streak across the horizon from east to +west. That is the beginning of the great Sahara. Tony Stretton could +never see that belt of sand, but his thoughts went back to the +terrible homeward march from Bir-el-Ghiramo to Ouargla. From east to +west the Sahara stretched across Africa, breaking the soldiers who +dared to violate its privacy, thrusting them back maimed and +famine-stricken, jealously guarding its secrets and speaking by its +very silence, its terrible "thus far and no farther," no less audibly, +and a thousand times more truthfully than ever did the waves of the +sea. + +On one noonday Stretton mounted the steps on to the verandah of the +hospital. He looked across open country to the great yellow line. He +thought of the Touaregs hanging persistently upon the flanks of his +tiny force, the long laborious days of thirst and hunger, the +lengthening trail of graves which he left behind--those milestones of +invasion. He felt as though the desert gripped him again and would not +loose its hold, clinging to his feet with each step he took in the +soft, yielding sand. He had brought back his handful of men, it was +true; they had stumbled into Ouargla at the last; but there were few +of them who were men as good as they had been when they had set out. +Even the best, it almost seemed to him, had lost something of vitality +which they would never recover; had a look fixed in their eyes which +set them apart from their fellows--the look of those who have endured +too much, who gazed for too long a time upon horrors; while the others +were for the most part only fit to squat in the shade and to wait for +things to cease. There was one whom Stretton had passed only a minute +before sitting on the ground under the shadow of the barrack wall. +Stretton was haunted by the picture of that man, for he was the only +white man he had ever seen who did not trouble to raise a hand to +brush away the flies from his face, but allowed them to settle and +cluster about the corners of his mouth. + +There was another in the hospital behind him. Him the Sahara +definitely claimed. Stretton turned and walked into the building. + +He passed down the line of beds, and stopped where a man lay tossing +in a fever. Stretton leaned over the bed. + +"Barbier," he said. + +Fusilier Barbier had grown very gaunt and thin during these latter +weeks. He turned his eyes upon Stretton, and muttered incoherently. +But there was recognition neither in his eyes nor in his voice. An +orderly approached the bed as Stretton stood beside it; and, in a low +voice, lest, haply, Barbier should hear and understand, Tony asked-- + +"What did the doctor say?" + +"Nothing good, my sergeant," the orderly replied, with an expressive +shrug of the shoulders. + +"I am very sorry," said Stretton, gravely. + +Certainly Barbier looked to be lying at death's door. One hand and +arm, emaciated and the colour of wax, lay outside upon the coverlet of +the bed. His eyes, unnaturally lustrous, unnaturally large, shone +deep-sunken in dark purple rings. His eyelids were red, as though with +much weeping, and, below the eyes, his face was drawn with fever and +very white. Stretton laid his hand gently upon Barbier's forehead. It +was burning hot. Stretton dismissed the orderly with a nod. There was +a haggard nobility in Barbier's appearance--his long, finely shaped +hands, his lithe, well-knit figure, all betrayed the man of race. Yet +he had once sunk to babbling about persecution at a fire in the +desert, like any morbid child. + +A heavy step sounded in the ward, and Stretton's colonel stood beside +him, a stoutly built man, with a white moustache and imperial, and a +stern yet not unkindly face. It expressed a deal of solicitude at this +moment. + +"I have seen the doctor this morning," said the colonel, "and he has +given up hope. Barbier will hardly live out the night. They should +never have sent him to us here. They should not have discharged him +from the asylum as cured." + +The idea of persecution had become fixed in Barbier's brain. It had +never left him since the evening when he first gave utterance to it in +the desert. The homeward march, indeed, had aggravated his mania. On +his return he had been sent to the asylum at Bel-Abbès, but there he +had developed cunning enough to conceal his hallucination. He had +ceased to complain that his officers were in a conspiracy to entrap +and ruin him, no more threats were heard, no more dangerous stealthy +glances detected. He was sent back to his battalion at Ain-Sefra. A +few weeks and again his malady was manifest, and on the top of that +had come fever. + +"I am very sorry," Stretton said again; and then, after looking about +him and perceiving that the orderly was out of earshot, he bent down +towards Barbier, lower than he had bent before, and he called upon him +in a still lower voice. + +But Barbier was no longer the name he used. + +"Monsieur le Comte," he said, first of all, and then "Monsieur de----" +He uttered a name which the generation before had made illustrious in +French diplomacy. + +At the sound of the name Barbier's face contracted. He started up in +his bed upon one arm. + +"Hush!" he cried. A most extraordinary change had come over him in a +second. His eyes protruded, his mouth hung half open, his face was +frozen into immobility by horror. "There is some one on the stairs," +he whispered, "coming up--some one treading very lightly--but coming +up--coming up." He inclined his head in the strained attitude of one +listening with a great concentration and intentness, an image of +terror and suspense. "Yes, coming up--coming up! Don't lock the door! +That betrays all. Turn out the lights! Quickly! So. Oh, will this +night ever pass!" + +He ended with a groan of despair. Very gently Stretton laid him down +again in the bed and covered him over with the clothes. The sweat +rolled in drops from Barbier's forehead. + +"He never tells us more, my colonel," said Stretton. "His real +name-yes!--he betrayed that once to me. But of this night nothing more +than the dread that it will never pass. Always he ends with those +words. Yet it was that night, no doubt, which tossed him beyond the +circle of his friends and dropped him down here, a man without a name, +amongst the soldiers of the Legion." + +Often Stretton's imagination had sought to pierce the mystery. What +thing of horror had been done upon that night? In what town of France? +Had the some one on the stairs turned the handle and entered the room +when all the lights were out? Had he heard Barbier's breathing in the +silent darkness of the room? Stretton could only reconstruct the +scene. The stealthy footsteps on the stairs, the cautious turning of +the door handle, the opening of the door, and the impenetrable +blackness with one man, perhaps more than one, holding his breath +somewhere, and crouching by the wall. But no hint escaped the sick +man's lips of what there was which must needs be hidden, nor whether +the thing which must needs be hidden was discovered by the one who +trod so lightly on the stairs. Was it a dead man? Was it a dead woman? +Or a woman alive? There was no answer. There was no knowledge to be +gained, it seemed, but this--that because of that night a man in +evening dress, who bore an illustrious name, had fled at daybreak on a +summer morning to the nearest barracks, and had buried his name and +all of his past life in the Foreign Legion. + +As it happened, there was just a little more knowledge to be gained by +Stretton. He learned it that morning from his colonel. + +"When you told me who 'Barbier' really was, sergeant," said the +colonel, "I made inquiries. Barbier's father died two years ago; but +an uncle and a sister lived. I wrote to both, offering to send their +relation back to them. Well, the mail has this morning come in from +France." + +"There is an answer, sir?" asked Stretton. + +"From the uncle," replied the colonel. "Not a word from the sister; +she does not mean to write. The uncle's letter makes that clear, I +think. Read!" He handed the letter to Stretton. A cheque was enclosed, +and a few words were added. + +"See, if you please, that Barbier wants for nothing which can minister +to body and soul." + +That was all. There was no word of kindliness or affection. Barbier +was dying. Let him, therefore, have medicine and prayers. Love, wishes +for recovery, a desire that he should return to his friends, +forgiveness for the thing which he had done, pity for the sufferings +which had fallen to him--these things Fusilier Barbier must not +expect. Stretton, reading the letter by the sick man's bed, thought it +heartless and callous as no letter written by a human hand had ever +been. Yet--yet, after all, who knew what had happened on that night? +The uncle, evidently. It might be something which dishonoured the +family beyond all reparation, which, if known, would have disgraced a +great name, so that those who bore it in pride must now change it for +very shame. Perhaps the father had died because of it, perhaps the +sister had been stricken down. Stretton handed the letter back to his +colonel. + +"It is very sad, sir," he said. + +"Yes, it is very sad," returned the colonel. "But for us this letter +means nothing at all. Never speak of it, obliterate it from your +memories." He tore the paper into the tiniest shreds. "We have no +reproaches, no accusations for what Barbier did before Barbier got out +of the train at Sidi Bel-Abbès. That is not our affair. For us the +soldier of the Legion is only born on the day when he enlists." + +Thus, in one sentence, the colonel epitomised the character of the +Foreign Legion. It was a fine saying, Stretton thought. He knew it to +be a true one. + +"I will say nothing," said Stretton, "and I will forget." + +"That is well. Come with me, for there is another letter which +concerns you." + +He turned upon his heel and left the hospital. Stretton followed him +to his quarters. + +"There is a letter from the War Office which concerns you, Sergeant +Ohlsen," said the colonel, with a smile. "You will be gazetted, under +your own name, to the first lieutenancy which falls vacant. There is +the notification." + +He handed the paper over to Stretton, and shook hands with him. +Stretton was not a demonstrative man. He took the notification with no +more show of emotion than if it had been some unimportant order of the +day. + +"Thank you, sir," he said, quietly; and for a moment his eyes rested +on the paper. + +But, none the less, the announcement, so abruptly made, caused him a +shock. The words danced before his eyes so that he could not read +them. He saluted his colonel and went out on to the great open parade +ground, and stood there in the middle of that space, alone, under the +hot noonday sun. + +The thing for which he had striven had come to pass, then. He held the +assurance of it in his hand. Hoped for and half-expected as that proof +had been ever since he had led the survivors of the geographical +expedition under the gate of Ouargla, its actual coming was to him +most wonderful. He looked southwards to where the streak of yellow +shone far away. The long marches, the harassing anxiety, the haunting +figures of the Touaregs, with their faces veiled in their black masks +and their eyes shining between the upper and the lower strip--yes, +even those figures which appalled the imagination in the retrospect by +a suggestion of inhuman ferocity--what were they all but +contributaries to this event? His ordeal was over. He had done enough. +He could go home. + +Stretton did not want for modesty. He had won a commission from the +ranks, it is true; but he realised that others had done this before, +and under harder conditions. He himself had started with an +advantage-the advantage of previous service in the English army. His +knowledge of the manual exercise, of company and battalion drill had +been of the greatest use at the first. He had had luck, too--the luck +to be sent on the expedition to the Figuig oasis, the luck to find +himself sergeant with Colonel Tavernay's force. His heart went out in +gratitude to that fine friend who lay in his bed of sand so far away. +Undoubtedly, he realised, his luck had been exceptional. + +He turned away from the parade ground and walked through the village, +and out of it towards a grove of palm trees. Under the shade of those +trees he laid himself down on the ground and made out his plans. He +would obtain his commission, secure his release, and so go home. A few +months and he would be home! It seemed hardly credible; yet it was +true, miraculously true. He would write home that very day. It was not +any great success which he had achieved, but, at all events, he was no +longer the man who was no good. He could write with confidence; he +could write to Millie. + +He lay under the shadow of the palms looking across to the village. +There rose a little mosque with a white dome. The hovels were thatched +for the most part, but here and there a square white-washed house, +with a flat roof, overtopped the rest. Hedges of cactus and prickly +pears walled in the narrow lanes, and now and then a white robe +appeared and vanished. Very soon Stretton would turn his back upon +Algeria. In the after time he would remember this afternoon, remember +the village as he saw it now, and the yellow streak of desert sand in +the distance. + +Stretton lay on his back and put together the sentences which he +would write that day to Millie. She would get the letter within ten +days--easily. He began to hum over to himself the words of the coon +song which had once been sung on a summer night in an island of +Scotland-- + + + "Oh, come out, mah love. I'm a-waitin' fo' you heah! + Doan' you keep yuh window shut to-night. + De tree-tops above am a-whisp'rin' to you, deah----" + + +And then he stopped suddenly. At last he began to wonder how Millie +would receive the letter he was to write. + +Yes, there was her point of view to be considered. Stretton was +stubborn by nature as few men are. He had convinced himself that the +course he had taken was the only course which promised happiness for +Millie and himself, and impelled by that conviction he had gone on his +way undisturbed by doubts and questions. Now, however, his object was +achieved. He could claim exemption from his wife's contempt. His mind +had room for other thoughts, and they came that afternoon. + +He had left his wife alone, with no explanation of his absence to +offer to her friends, without even any knowledge of his whereabouts. +There had been no other way, he still believed. But it was hard on +Millie--undoubtedly it was hard. + +Stretton rose from the ground and set off towards the camp that he +might write his letter. But he never wrote it, for as he walked along +the lane towards the barracks a man tapped him on the shoulder from +behind. He was still humming his song, and he stopped in the middle of +it-- + + + "Jus' look out an' see all de longin' in mah eyes, + An' mah arms is jus' a-pinin' foh to hug you," + + +he said, and turned about on his heel. He saw a stranger in European +dress, who at once spoke his name. + +"Sir Anthony Stretton?" + +Stretton was no longer seeking to evade discovery. + +"Yes?" he said. The stranger's face became vaguely familiar to him. "I +have seen you before, I think." + +"Once," replied the other. "My name is Warrisden. You saw me for a few +minutes on the deck of a fish-carrier in the North Sea." + +"To be sure," he said slowly. "Yes, to be sure, I did. You were sent +to find me by Miss Pamela Mardale." + +"She sends me again," replied Warrisden. + +Stretton's heart sank in fear. He had disobeyed the summons before. He +remembered Pamela's promise to befriend his wife. He remembered her +warning that he should not leave his wife. + +"She sent you then with an urgent message that I should return home," +he said. + +"I carry the same message again, only it is a thousand times more +urgent." + +He drew a letter from his pocket as he spoke, and handed it to +Stretton. "I was to give you this," he said. + +Stretton looked at the handwriting and nodded. + +"Thank you," he said gravely. + +He tore open the envelope and read. + + + + + CHAPTER XXV + + TONY STRETTON BIDS FAREWELL TO THE LEGION + + +It was a long letter. Tony read it through slowly, standing in the +narrow lane between the high walls of prickly pear. A look of +incredulity came upon his face. + +"Is all this true?" he asked, not considering at all of whom he asked +the question. + +"I know nothing, of course, of what is written there," replied +Warrisden; "but I do not doubt its truth. The signature is, I think, +sufficient guarantee." + +"No doubt, no doubt," said Stretton, absently. Then he asked-- + +"When did you reach Ain-Sefra?" + +"This morning." + +"And you came quickly?" + +"Yes; I travelled night and day, I came first of all to Ain-Sefra in +search of you." + +"Thank you," said Stretton. + +He did not ask how it was that Warrisden had come first of all to +Ain-Sefra; such details held no place in his thoughts. Warrisden _had_ +found him, _had_ brought the letter which Pamela Mardale had written. +That letter, with its perplexities and its consequences, obliterated +all other speculations. + +"You have a camp here?" Stretton asked. + +"Yes." + +"Let us go to it. The news you have brought has rather stunned me. I +should like to sit down and think what I must do." + +The incredulity had vanished from his face. Distress had replaced it. + +"It is all true, no doubt," he went on, "but for the moment I don't +understand it. Will you tell me where your camp is?" + +"I will show you the way," said Warrisden. + +"I think not. It will be better that we should not be seen together," +Stretton said thoughtfully. "Will you give me the direction and go +first? I will follow." + +Warrisden's camp was pitched amongst trees a hundred yards from the +western borders of the village. It stood in a garden of grass, +enclosed with hedges. Thither Stretton found his way by a roundabout +road, approaching the camp from the side opposite to Ain-Sefra. There +was no one, at the moment, loitering about the spot. He walked into +the garden. There were three tents pitched. Half a dozen mules stood +picketed in a line, a little Barbary horse lay on the grass, some +Algerian muleteers were taking their ease, and outside the chief tent +a couple of camp chairs were placed. Warrisden came forward as +Stretton entered the garden. + +"Sit down," he said. + +"Inside the tent, I think," replied Stretton. + +There he read the letter through again. He understood at last what +Pamela had meant by the warning which had baffled him. Pamela revealed +its meaning now. "Millie is not of those women," she wrote, "who have +a vivid remembrance. To hold her, you must be near her. Go away, she +will cry her eyes out; stay away for a little while, she will long for +your return; make that little while a longer time, she will grow +indifferent whether you return or not; prolong that longer time, she +will regard your return as an awkwardness, a disturbance; add yet a +little more to that longer time, and you will find another occupying +your place in her thoughts." Then followed an account of the growth of +that dangerous friendship between Millie and Lionel Callon. A summary +of Callon's character rounded the description off. "So come home," she +concluded, "at once, for no real harm has been done yet." + +Stretton understood what the last sentence meant, and he believed it. +Yet his mind revolted against the phrase. Of course, it was Pamela's +phrase. Pamela, though frank, was explaining the position in words +which could best spare Millie. But it was an unfortunate sentence. It +provoked a momentary wave of scorn, which swept over Stretton. There +was a postscript: "You yourself are really a good deal to blame." Thus +it ran; but Stretton was in no mood to weigh its justice or injustice +at the moment. Only this afternoon he had been lying under the palm +trees putting together in his mind the sentences which were to tell +Millie of his success, to re-establish him in her esteem, and to +prepare her for his return. And now this letter had come. He sat for a +time frowning at the letter, turning its pages over, glancing now at +one phrase, now at another. Then he folded it up. "Callon," he said, +softly; and then again, "Lionel Callon. I will talk with Mr. Callon." +For all its softness, his voice sounded to Warrisden the voice of a +dangerous man. And after he had spoken in this way he sat in thought, +saying nothing, making no movement, and his face gave Warrisden no +clue as to what he thought. At the last he stirred in his chair. + +"Well?" said Warrisden. + +"I shall return at once to England." + +"You can?" + +"Yes; I shall start to-night," said Stretton. + +"We can go back together, then." + +"No; that's impossible." + +"Why?" asked Warrisden. + +"Because I should be arrested if we did," Stretton replied calmly. + +"Arrested?" Warrisden exclaimed. + +"Yes; you see I shall have to desert to-night." + +Warrisden started from his chair. + +"Surely there is an alternative?" + +"None," replied Stretton; and Warrisden slowly resumed his seat. He +was astounded; he had never contemplated this possibility. He looked +at Stretton in wonder. He could not understand how a man could speak +so calmly of such a plan. Why in the world had Stretton ever joined +the Legion if he was so ready, at the first summons, to desert? There +seemed an inconsistency. But he did not know Tony Stretton. + +"You are surprised," said Tony. "More than surprised--you are rather +shocked; but there is no choice for me. I wish with all my heart and +soul there were," he suddenly exclaimed, with a sort of passion. "I +have foreseen this necessity ever since you tapped me on the shoulder +in the lane. Because I foresaw it, I would not walk with you to your +camp. Were we seen together to-day, the reason of my absence might be +the sooner suspected. As it is, I shall get a day's start, for I have +a good name in the regiment, and a day's start is all I need." + +He spoke sadly and wistfully. He was caught by an inexorable fate, and +knew it. He just had to accept the one course open to him. + +"You see," he explained, "I am a soldier of the Legion--that is to +say, I enlisted for five years' service in the French colonies. I +could not get leave." + +"Five years!" cried Warrisden. "You meant to stay five years away?" + +"No," replied Stretton. "If things went well with me here, as up till +to-day they have done, if, in a word, I did what I enlisted to do, I +should have gone to work to buy myself out and get free. That can be +done with a little influence and time-only time is the one thing I +have not now. I must go home at once, since no harm has yet been done. +Therefore I must desert. I am very sorry"--and again the wistfulness +became very audible--"for, as I say, I have a good name; amongst both +officers and men I have a good name. I should have liked very much to +have left a good name behind me. Sergeant Ohlsen"--and as he uttered +the name he smiled. "They speak well of Sergeant Ohlsen in the Legion, +Warrisden; and to-morrow they will not. I am very sorry. I have good +friends amongst both officers and men. I shall have lost them all +to-morrow. I am sorry. There is only one thing of which I am glad +to-day. I am glad that Captain Tavernay is dead." + +Warrisden knew nothing at all of Captain Tavernay. Until this moment +he had never heard his name. But Stretton was speaking with a +simplicity so sincere, and so genuine a sorrow, that Warrisden could +not but be deeply moved. He forgot the urgency of his summons; he +ceased to think how greatly Stretton's immediate return would help his +own fortunes. He cried out upon the impulse-- + +"Stay, then, until you can get free without----" And he stopped, +keeping unspoken the word upon his lips. + +"Without disgrace." + +Stretton finished the sentence with a smile. + +"Say it! Without disgrace. That was the word upon your tongue. I can't +avoid disgrace. I have come to such a pass in my life's history that, +one way or another, I can't avoid it. I thought just at the first +moment that I could let things slide and stay. But there's dishonour +in that course, too. Dishonour for myself, dishonour for my +name, dishonour for others, too, whom it is my business--yes, my +business--to keep from dishonour. That's the position--disgrace if I +stay, disgrace if I go. It seems to me there's no rule of conduct +which applies. I must judge for myself." + +Stretton spoke with some anger in his voice, anger with those who had +placed him in so cruel a position, anger, perhaps, in some measure, +with himself. For in a little while he said-- + +"It is quite true that I am myself to blame, too. I want to be just. I +was a fool not to have gone into the house the evening I was in +London, after I had come back from the North Sea. Yes, I should have +gone in then; and yet--I don't know. I had thought my course all out. +I don't know." + +He had thought his course out, it is true; but he had thought it out +in ignorance of his wife's character. That was the trouble, as he +clearly saw now. + +"Anyhow, I must go to-night," he said, rising from his chair. In an +instant he had become the practical man, arranging the means to an end +already resolved upon. + +"I can borrow money of you?" + +"Yes." + +"And a mule?" + +"Yes." + +"Let me choose my mule." + +They walked from the tent to where the mules stood picketed. Warrisden +pointed to one in the middle of the line. + +"That is the strongest." + +"I don't want one too strong, too obviously well-fed," said Stretton; +and he selected another. "Can I borrow a muleteer for an hour or two?" + +"Of course," said Warrisden. + +Stretton called a muleteer towards him and gave him orders. + +"There is a market to-day," he said. "Go to it and buy." He enumerated +the articles he wanted, ticking them off upon his fingers--a few pairs +of scissors and knives, a few gaudy silk handkerchiefs, one or two +cheap clocks, some pieces of linen, needles and thread--in fact, a +small pedlar's pack of wares. In addition, a black jellaba and cap, +such as the Jews must wear in Morocco, and a native's underclothes and +slippers. + +"Bring these things back to the camp at once and speak to no one!" +said Stretton. + +The muleteer loosed a mule to carry the packages, and went off upon +his errand. Stretton and Warrisden went back to the tent. Stretton sat +down again in his chair, took a black cigarette from a bright-blue +packet which he had in his pocket and lighted it, as though all the +arrangements for his journey were now concluded. + +"I want you to pack the mule I chose with the things which your +muleteer brings back. Add some barley for the mule and some food for +me, and bring it with the clothes to the south-west corner of the +barrack wall at eight. It will be dark then. Don't come before it is +dark, and wait for me at the corner. Will you?" + +"Yes," replied Warrisden. "You are going to tramp to the coast? Surely +you can come as one of my men as far as the rail-head. Then I will go +on and wait for you at Algiers." + +"No," said Stretton; "our ways lie altogether apart. It would be too +dangerous for me to tramp through Algeria. I should certainly be +stopped. That's my way." + +He raised his arm and pointed through the tent door. + +The tent door faced the west, and in front there rose a range of +mountains, dark and lofty, ridge overtopping ridge, and wonderfully +distinct. In that clear air the peaks and gaps, and jagged _arêtes_ +were all sharply defined. The sun was still bright, and the dark +cliffs had a purple bloom of extraordinary softness and beauty, like +the bloom upon a ripe plum. Here and there the mountains were capped +with snow, and the snow glistened like silver. + +"Those mountains are in Morocco," said Stretton. "That's my way--over +them. My only way. We are on the very edge of Morocco here." + +"But, once over the border," Warrisden objected, "are you safe in +Morocco?" + +"Safe from recapture." + +"But safe in no other sense?" + +Stretton shrugged his shoulders. + +"It is a bad road, I know--dangerous and difficult. The ordinary +traveller cannot pass along it. But it has been traversed. Prisoners +have escaped that way to Fez--Escoffier, for instance. Deserters have +reached their homes by following it--some of them, at all events. One +must take one's risks." + +It was the old lesson learned upon the ketch _Perseverance_ which +Stretton now repeated; and not vainly learned. Far away to the south, +in the afternoon sunlight, there shone that yellow streak of sand, +beyond which its value had been surely proved. Warrisden's thoughts +were carried back on a sudden to that morning of storm and foam and +roaring waves, when Stretton had stood easily upon the deck of the +fish-cutter, with the great seas swinging up behind him, and had, for +the first time, uttered it in Warrisden's hearing. Much the same +feeling came over Warrisden as that which had then affected him--a +feeling almost of inferiority. Stretton was a man of no more than +average ability, neither a deep thinker, nor a person of ingenuity and +resource; but the mere stubbornness of his character gave to him at +times a certain grandeur. In Warrisden's eyes he had that grandeur +now. He had come quickly to his determination to desert, but he had +come calmly to it. There had been no excitement in his manner, no +suggestion of hysteria. He had counted up the cost, he had read his +letter, he had held the balance between his sacrifice and Millie's +necessity; and he had decided. He had decided, knowing not merely the +disgrace, but the difficulties of his journey, and the danger of his +road amongst the wild, lawless tribes in that unsettled quarter of +Morocco. Again Warrisden was carried away. He forgot even Pamela at +Roquebrune waiting for the telegram he was to send from Oran on his +return. He cried-- + +"I will send back my outfit and come with you. If we travel together +there will be more safety." + +Stretton shook his head. + +"Less," said he. "You cannot speak Mogrhebbin. I have a few +sentences--not many, but enough. I know something of these tribes, +too. For I once marched to the Figuig oasis. Your company would be no +protection; rather it would be an extra danger." + +Warrisden did not press his proposal. Stretton had so clearly made up +his mind. + +"Very well," he said. "You have a revolver, I suppose. Or shall I lend +you one?" + +And, to Warrisden's astonishment, Stretton replied-- + +"I shall carry no weapons." + +Warrisden was already placing his arms of defence upon the table so +that Stretton might make his choice. + +"No weapons!" he exclaimed. + +"No. My best chance to get through to Fez is to travel as a Jew +pedlar. That is why I am borrowing your mule and have sent your +muleteer to the market. A Jew can go in Morocco where no Moor can, for +he is not suspected; he is merely despised. Besides, he brings things +for sale which are needed. He may be robbed and beaten, but he has +more chance of reaching his journey's end in some plight or other than +any one else." + +Thereafter he sat for awhile silent, gazing towards the mountains in +the west. The snow glittering upon the peaks brought back to his mind +the flashing crystals in the great salt lakes. It was at just such a +time, on just such an afternoon, when the two companies of the Legion +had marched out from the trees of the high plateaux into the open +desert, with its grey-green carpet of halfa-grass. Far away the lake +had flashed like an arc of silver set in the ground. Stretton could +not but remember that expedition and compare it with the one upon +which he was now to start; and the comparison was full of bitterness. +Then high hopes had reigned. The companies were marching out upon the +Legion's special work; even if disaster overtook them, disaster would +not be without its glory. Stretton heard the clear inspiriting music +of the bugles, he listened to the steady tramp of feet. Now he was +deserting. + +"I shall miss the Legion," he said regretfully. "I had no idea how +much I should miss it until this moment." + +Its proud past history had grown dear to him. The recklessness of its +soldiers, the endless perplexing variety of their characters, the +secrets of their lives, of which every now and then, in a rare moment +of carelessness, a glimpse was revealed, as though a curtain were +raised and lowered--all these particular qualities of the force had +given to it a grip upon his affections of which he felt the full +strength now. + +"Any other life," he said, "cannot but be a little dull, a little +uninteresting afterwards. I shall miss the Legion very much." + +Suddenly he put his hand into his pocket and took out of it that +letter from the French War Office which his colonel had handed to him. +"Look!" and he handed it over to Warrisden. "That is what I joined the +Legion to win--a commission; and I have just not won it. In a month or +two, perhaps in a week, perhaps even to-morrow, it might have been +mine. Very soon I should have been back at home, the life I have +dreamed of and worked for ever since I left London, might have been +mine to live. It was to have been a good life of great happiness"--he +had forgotten, it seemed, that he would regret the Legion--"a life +without a flaw. Now that life's impossible, and I am a deserter. It's +hard lines, isn't it?" + +He rose from his chair, and looked for a moment at Warrisden in +silence. + +"I am feeling sorry that I ever came," said Warrisden. + +"Oh no," Stretton answered, with a smile. "It would have been still +worse if I had stayed here, ignorant of the news you have brought +me, and had come home in my own time. Things would have been much +worse--beyond all remedy. Do you know a man named Callon--Lionel +Callon?" he asked abruptly. And before Warrisden could answer, the +blood rushed into his face, and he exclaimed, "Never mind; don't +answer! Be at the corner of the barracks with the mule at eight." And +he went from the tent, cautiously made his way out of the garden, and +returned to his quarters. + +A few minutes before eight Warrisden drove the mule, packed with +Stretton's purchases, to the south-western corner of the barracks. The +night was dark, no one was abroad, the place without habitations. He +remained under the shadow of the high wall, watching this way and that +for Stretton's approach; and in a few minutes he was almost startled +out of his wits by a heavy body falling from the top of the wall upon +the ground at his side. Warrisden, indeed, was so taken by surprise +that he uttered a low cry. + +"Hush!" said a voice close to the ground. "It's only me." + +"And Stretton rose to his feet. He had dropped from the summit of the +wall. + +"Are you hurt?" whispered Warrisden. + +"No. Have you the clothes? Thanks!" + +Stretton stripped off his uniform, and put on the Jewish dress. He had +shaved off his moustache and blacked his hair. As he dressed he gave +two or three small packages to Warrisden. + +"Place them in the pack; hide them, if possible. That package contains +my medals. I shall need them. The other's lamp-black. I shall want +that for my hair. Glossy raven locks," he said, with a low laugh, "are +not so easily procured in Ain-Sefra as in Bond Street. I have been +thinking. You can help me if you will; you can shorten the time of my +journey." + +"How?" asked Warrisden. + +"Go back to Oran as quickly as possible. Take the first boat to +Tangier. Hire an outfit there, mules and horses--but good ones, +mind!--and travel up at once to Fez. If you are quick you can do it +within a fortnight. I shall take a fortnight at the least to reach +Fez. I may be three weeks. But if I find you there, ready to start the +moment I come to the town, we shall save much time." + +"Very well; I will be there." + +"If I get through sooner than I expect, I shall go straight on to +Tangier, and we will meet on the road. Now let me climb on to your +shoulders." Stretton made a bundle of his uniform, climbed on to +Warrisden's shoulders, and threw it over the wall into the barrack +yard. + +"But that will betray you!" cried Warrisden, in a whisper. "They will +find your clothes in the morning--clothes with a sergeant's stripes." + +"I cannot help that," replied Stretton, as he jumped to the ground. "I +do not intend to be shot as a thief, for that is what may happen when +a man deserts and takes his uniform with him. Don't fail me in Fez. +Good-bye." + +He held out his hand, and, as Warrisden grasped it, he said-- + +"I have not said much to you in the way of thanks; but I am very +grateful, however much I may have seemed to have been made unhappy by +your coming. Since things are as they are, I am glad you came. I thank +you, too, for that other visit to the North Sea. I will give you +better thanks when we meet in Fez." + +He cast a glance back to the wall of the barracks, and, in a voice +which trembled, so deeply was he moved, he whispered to himself, +rather than to Warrisden-- + +"Oh, but I am glad Tavernay is dead!" + +All else that he had said since he dropped from the wall had been said +hurriedly and without emotion. These last words were whispered from a +heart overcharged with sorrow. They were his farewell to the Legion. +He turned away, and, driving the mule before him, vanished into the +darkness. + + + + + CHAPTER XXVI + + BAD NEWS FOR PAMELA + + +Warrisden struck his camp early the next morning, and set out for the +rail-head. Thence he travelled to Oran. At Oran he was fortunate +enough to find a steamer of the Lambert Line in the harbour, which was +preparing to sail that afternoon for Tangier. Warrisden had three +hours to pass in Oran. He went at once to the post-office and +despatched his telegram to Pamela Mardale at the Villa Pontignard. The +telegram informed her that Tony Stretton was returning, though his +journey might take longer than she would naturally expect; and, +secondly, that he himself was sailing that day for Tangier, whither +any message should be sent at once to await his arrival at the English +post-office. The telegram was couched in vague phrases. Tony Stretton, +for instance, was called "The Truant." Pamela became more and more +disquieted by the vagueness of its wording. She pondered, and in vain, +why in the world Warrisden must be sailing to Tangier. It seemed +certain that there were difficulties in the way of Tony's home-coming +which she had not foreseen, and at the nature of which she could not +conjecture. She sent off a reply to Tangier-- + +"Bring truant to Roquebrune as soon as possible." + +For, on thinking over the new aspect which her problem presented, now +that Lionel Callon had come to the Riviera, she had come to the +conclusion that this was the safest plan. + +If Millie Stretton did not come to the south of France, no harm would +have been done; whereas, if she did, and Tony went straight home to +England, the last chance of saving her would be lost. + +This message, however, did little to reassure Pamela. For the more she +thought of Warrisden's telegram, the more she was troubled. Tony was +returning. Yes, that was something--that was a great thing. But he was +going to take a long time in returning, and, to Pamela's apprehension, +there was no long time to spare. And the day after she had received +the telegram she came upon still stronger reasons for disquietude. + +She went down to Monte Carlo in the morning, and again saw Lionel +Callon upon the terrace, and again noticed that he was alone. Yet on +the whole she was not surprised. Millie Stretton's name figured as yet +in no visitors' list, and Pamela was quite sure that if Millie +Stretton had come south the name would have been inserted. It was +impossible that Millie Stretton could come to Monte Carlo, or to, +indeed, any hotel upon the Riviera, under a false name. She could not +but meet acquaintances and friends at every step, during this season +of the year. To assume a name which was not hers would be an act of +stupidity too gross. None the less Pamela was relieved. She avoided +Callon's notice, and acting upon a sudden impulse, went out from the +garden, hired a carriage, and ordered the coachman to drive along the +lower Corniche Road in the direction of Beaulieu. + +Pamela was growing harassed and anxious. The days were passing, and no +message had yet come from Alan Warrisden. She suspected the presence +of Lionel Callon on the Riviera more and more. More and more she +dreaded the arrival of Millie Stretton. There was nothing now which +she could do. She had that hard lot which falls to women, the lot of +waiting. But she could not wait with folded hands. She must be doing +something; even though that something were altogether trivial and +useless, it still helped her through the hours. In this spirit she +drove out from Monte Carlo at twelve o'clock, without a thought that +her drive was to assist her toward the end on which she had set her +heart. + +She drove past the back of the big hotel at Eze. Just beyond, a deep +gorge runs from the hills straight down to the sea. The road carves +round the head of the gorge and bends again to the shore. Pamela drove +round the gorge, and coming again to the shore, went forward by the +side of the sea. After a few minutes she bade the driver stop. In +front of her the road rose a little, and then on the other side of the +crest dipped down a steep hill. On her left a pair of iron gates stood +open. From those gates a carriage-drive ran in two zigzags between +borders of flowers down to an open gravel space in front of a long +one-storied building. The building faced upon the road, but at a lower +level, so that even the flat roof was below Pamela. The building was +prettily built, and roses and magnolias climbed against the walls, +making it gay. The door in the middle stood open, but there was no +sign of life about the house. Pamela sat gazing down into the garden, +with its bushes and brightly-coloured flowers. + +Pamela spoke to the driver. + +"What place is this?" she asked. + +"It was only built last year," the man replied, and he told her enough +for her to know that this was the _Réserve_ at which Lionel Callon was +staying. + +"Few people come here?" said Pamela. + +"It is not known yet," replied the driver. "It is such a little while +since it has been opened." + +The sun was bright. Beyond the _Réserve_ the Mediterranean rippled and +sparkled--here the deepest blue, there breaking into points of golden +light. The _Réserve_ itself had the look of a country house in a rich +garden of flowers tended with love. In the noonday the spot was very +quiet and still. Yet to Pamela it had the most sinister aspect. It +stood in a solitary position, just beneath the road. In its very +quietude there was to her harassed thoughts something clandestine. + +She knew that Callon was in Monte Carlo. She told her driver to drive +down to the door, and at the door she stepped down and walked into the +building. A large dining-room opened out before her in which two +waiters lounged. There were no visitors. The waiters came forward. +"Would Madame take luncheon in the room, or on the terrace at the back +over the sea?" + +"On the terrace," Pamela replied. + +She lunched quite alone on a broad, flagged terrace, with the sea +gently breaking at its foot. The greater portion of the building was +occupied by the restaurant, but at one end Pamela noticed a couple of +French windows. She remarked to the waiter who served her upon the +absence of any visitors but herself. + +"It is only this season, Madame, that the restaurant is open," he +replied. + +"Can people stay here?" she asked. + +"Yes. There are two suites of rooms. One is occupied; but the other is +vacant, if Madame would care to see it." + +Pamela rose and followed him. He opened one of the French windows. A +dining-room furnished with elegance, and lightly decorated; a +sitting-room, and a bedroom comprised the suite. Pamela came back to +the terrace. She was disquieted. It was impossible, of course, that +Millie Stretton should stay at the _Réserve_; but the whole look of +the place troubled her. + +She mounted into her carriage and drove back. In front of her the +great hotel of Eze stood high upon a promontory above the railway. A +thought came to Pamela. She drove back round the head of the gorge, +and when she came to the hotel she bade the coachman drive in. In the +open space in front of the hotel she took tea. She could not see the +restaurant itself, but she could see the road rising to the little +hill-crest beside it. It was very near, she thought. She went into the +hotel, and asked boldly at the office-- + +"When do you expect Lady Stretton?" + +"Lady Stretton?" The clerk in the office looked up his books. "In +three weeks, Madame," he said. "She has engaged her rooms from the +31st." + +"Thank you," said Pamela. + +She mounted into her carriage and drove back to Monte Carlo. So Millie +Stretton was coming to the Riviera after all. She had refused to come +with Pamela, yet she was coming by herself. She had declared she would +not leave England this spring. But she had made that declaration +before Lionel Callon had returned from Chili. Now Callon was here, and +she was following. Pamela could not doubt that her coming was part of +a concerted plan. The very choice of the hotel helped to convince her. +It was so near to that at which Callon was staying. Twenty minutes' +walk at the most would separate them. Moreover, why should Callon +choose that lonely restaurant without some particular, nay, some +secret object? No one, it seemed, visited it in the day; no one but he +slept there at night. Callon was not the man to fall in love with +solitude. And if he had wished for solitude he would not have come to +the Riviera at all. Besides, he spent his days in Monte Carlo, as +Pamela well knew. No, it was not loneliness at which he aimed, but +secrecy. That was it--secrecy. Pamela's heart sank within her. She had +a momentary thought that she would disclose her presence to Lionel +Callon, and dismissed it. The disclosure would alter Callon's plan, +that was all; it would not hinder the fulfilment. It would drive +Millie and him from the Riviera--it would not prevent them from +meeting somewhere else. It would be better, indeed, that, if meet they +must, they should meet under her eyes. For some accident might happen, +some unforeseen opportunity occur of which she could take advantage to +separate them. It was not known to Callon that she was on the spot. +After all, that was an advantage. She must meet secrecy with secrecy. +She urged her coachman to quicken his pace. She drove straight to the +post-office at Monte Carlo. Thence she despatched a second telegram to +Alan Warrisden at Tangier. + +"Do not fail to arrive by the 31st," she telegraphed; and upon that +took the train back to Roquebrune. She could do no more now; but the +knowledge that she could do no more only aggravated her fears. +Questions which could not be answered thronged upon her mind. "Would +the telegram reach Tangier in time? What was Alan Warrisden doing at +Tangier at all? What hindered them coming straight from Algeria to +France?" Well, there were three weeks still. She sent up her prayer +that those three weeks might bring Tony Stretton back, that Millie +might be saved for him. She walked up the steps from Roquebrune +station very slowly. She did not look up as she climbed. Had she done +so she might, perhaps, have seen a head above the parapet in the +little square where the school-house stood; and she would certainly +have seen that head suddenly withdrawn as her head was raised. M. +Giraud was watching her furtively, as he had done many a time since +she had come to Roquebrune, taking care that she should not see him. +He watched her now, noticing that she walked with the same lagging, +weary step as when he had last seen her on that path so many years +ago. But as he watched she stopped, and, turning about, looked +southwards across the sea, and stood there for an appreciable time. +When she turned again and once more mounted the steps, it seemed to +him that the weariness had gone. She walked buoyantly, like one full +of faith, full of hope; and he caught a glimpse of her face. It seemed +to him that it had become transfigured, and that the eyes were looking +at some vision which was visible to her eyes alone. Pamela had come +back. Indeed, at the end of all her perplexities and conjectures, to +the belief born of her new love, that somehow the world would right +itself, that somehow in a short while she would hear whispered upon +the wind, answered by the ripples of the sea, and confirmed by the one +voice she longed to hear, the sentinel's cry, "All's well." + +The messages which Pamela had sent to Warrisden reached him at +Tangier. He found them both waiting for him the day after they had +been sent. He had twenty days in front of him. If Tony kept to his +time, twenty days would serve. He hired a camp outfit, and the best +mules to be obtained in Tangier on that day. The same evening he +bought a couple of barbs, well recommended to him for speed and +endurance. + +"They will amble at six miles an hour for ten hours a day," said one +whose advice he sought. Warrisden discounted the statement, but bought +the barbs. Early the nest morning he set out for Fez. + + + + + CHAPTER XXVII + + "BALAK!" + + +There are two cities of Fez. One is the city of the narrow, crowded +streets, where the cry, "Balak! Balak!"[1] resounds all day. Streets, +one terms them, since they are the main thoroughfares through which +all the merchandise of Morocco passes out to the four quarters of the +compass; but they are no wider than the alley-ways of an English +village, and in many places a man may stand in the centre and touch +the wall on either side. These streets are paved with big +cobblestones, but the stones are broken and displaced by the tramp of +centuries. If mended at all, they are mended with a millstone or any +chance slab of rock; but for the most part they are left unmended +altogether. For that is the fashion in Morocco. There they build and +make, and they do both things beautifully and well. But they seldom +finish; in a house, dainty with fountains and arabesques and coloured +tiles, you will still find a corner uncompleted, a pillar which lacks +the delicate fluting of the other pillars, an embrasure for a clock +half ornamented with gold filagree, and half left plain. And if they +seldom finish, they never by any chance repair. The mansion is built +and decorated within; artists fit the tiles together in a mosaic of +cool colours, and carve, and gild, and paint the little pieces of +cedar-wood, and glue them into the light and pointed arches; the rich +curtains are hung, and the master enters into his possession. There +follows the procession of the generations. The tiles crack, the +woodwork of the arches splits and falls, and the walls break and +crumble. The householder sits indifferent, and the whole house +corrodes. So, in the narrow streets, holes gape, and the water wears a +channel where it wills, and the mud lies thick and slippery on the +rounded stones; the streets ran steeply up and down the hills, wind +abruptly round corners, dive into tunnels. Yet men gallop about them +on their sure-footed horses, stumbling, slipping, but seldom falling. +"Balak!" they cry. "Balak!" and the man on foot is flung against the +wall or jostled out of the way. No one protests or resents. + + +--------------------- +[Footnote 1: "Take care!"] +--------------------- + + +A file of donkeys, laden with wood or with grain, so fixed upon their +backs that the load grazes each street wall, blocks the way. "Balak!" +shouts the donkey-driver. And perhaps some nobleman of Fez, soft and +fat and indolent, in his blue cloak, who comes pacing on a mule no +less fat, preceded by his servants, must turn or huddle himself into +an embrasure. There are no social distinctions in the alley-ways of +Fez. It may be that one of those donkeys will fall then and there +beneath his load, and refuse to rise. His load will be taken from his +back, and if he still refuse, he will be left just where he fell, to +die. His owner walks on. It is no one's business to remove the animal. +There he lies in the middle of the street, and to him "Balak" will be +called in vain. + +A mounted troop of wild Berbers from the hills, with their long, +brass-bound guns slung across their backs, and gaudy handkerchiefs +about their heads, will ride through the bazaars, ragged of dress and +no less ragged in the harness of their horses. "Balak!" Very swiftly +way is made for them. Balak, indeed, is the word most often heard in +the streets of Fez. + +Those streets wind at times between the walls of gardens, and if the +walls are broken, as surely at some point they will be, a plot of +grass, a grove of orange trees hung with ruddy fruit, and a clump of +asphodel will shine upon the eyes in that brown and windowless city +like a rare jewel. At times, too, they pass beneath some spacious arch +into a place of width, or cross a bridge where one of the many streams +of the river Fez boils for a moment into the open, and then swirls +away again beneath the houses. But, chiefly, they run deep beneath the +towering walls of houses, and little of the sunlight visits them; so +that you may know a man of Fez, even though he be absent from his +town, by the pallor of his face. A householder, moreover, may build +over the street, if he can come to an agreement with his neighbour on +the opposite side, and then the alleys suddenly become tunnels, and +turn upon themselves in the dark. Or the walls so lean together at the +top that barely a finger's breadth of sky is visible as from the +bottom of a well. + +Into this city of dark streets Warrisden came upon an evening of +gloom. The night before he had camped on the slope of a hill by the +village of Segota. Never had he seen a spot more beautiful. He had +looked across the deep valley at his feet to the great buttress of +Jebel Zarhon, on a dark shoulder of which mountain one small, round, +white town was perched. A long, high range of grey hills--the last +barrier between him and Fez--cleft at one point by the road, rose on +the far side of the valley; and those hills and the fields beneath, +and the solitary crumbling castle which stood in the bottom amongst +the fields, were all magnified and made beautiful by the mists of +evening. The stars had come out overhead, behind him the lights shone +in his tent, and a cheerful fire crackled in the open near the door. +He had come up quickly from Tangier, and without hindrance, in spite +of warnings that the road was not safe. The next morning he would be +in Fez. It had seemed to him, then, that fortune was on his side. He +drew an augury of success from the clean briskness of the air. And +that confidence had remained with him in the morning. He had crossed +the valley early, and riding over the long pass on the other side, had +seen at last the snow-crowned spur of the Atlas on the further side of +the plain of Fez. He had descended into the plain, which perpetually +rose and fell like the billows of an ocean; and in the afternoon, from +the summit of one of these billows, he had suddenly seen, not an +hour's journey off, the great city of Fez, with its crenelated walls +and high minarets, a mass of grey and brown, with here and there a +splash of white, and here and there a single palm-tree, straggling +formlessly across the green plain. The sky had clouded over; the track +was now thronged with caravans of camels, and mules, and donkeys, and +wayfarers on foot going to and coming from the town; and before the +Bab Sagma, the great gate looking towards Mikkes, was reached, the +rain was falling. + +Warrisden had sent on the soldier who had ridden with him from +Tangier, to deliver a note to the Consul, and he waited with his +animals and his men for the soldier's return. The man came towards +dusk with word that a house had been secured in the town, and +Warrisden passed through the gate and down between the high +battlements of the Bugilud into the old town. And as he passed through +the covered bazaars and the narrow streets, in the gloom of the +evening, while the rain fell drearily from a sullen sky, his +confidence of the morning departed from him, and a great depression +chilled him to the heart. The high, cracked, bulging walls of the +houses, towering up without a window, the shrouded figures of the +passers-by, the falling light, the neglect as of a city of immemorial +age crumbling in decay, made of Fez to him that night a place of gloom +and forbidding mystery. He was in a mood to doubt whether ever he +would look on Tony Stretton's face again. + +In the narrowest of the alleys, where each of his stirrups touched a +wall, his guide stopped. It was almost pitch-dark here. By throwing +back his head, Warrisden could just see, far above him, a little slit +of light. His guide groped his way down a passage on the right, and at +the end opened with a key a ponderous black door. Warrisden stepped +over the sill, and found himself in a tiled court of which the roof +was open to the sky. On the first floor there was a gallery, and on +each of the four sides a long, narrow room, lofty, and closed with +great folding doors, opened on to the gallery. In one of these rooms +Warrisden had his bed set up. He sat there trying to read by the light +of a single candle, and listening to the drip of the rain. + +When he left Tangier, he had twenty-one days before he need be at +Roquebrune in answer to Pamela's summons. He had looked up the +steamers before he started. Four of those days would be needed to +carry them from Tangier to Roquebrune. He had reached Fez in five, and +he thus had twelve days left. In other words, if Stretton came to Fez +within a week, there should still be time, provided, of course, the +road to the coast was not for the moment cut by rebellious tribes. +That was the danger, as Warrisden's journey had told him. He +discounted the timorous statements of his dragoman, Ibrahim, but one +who knew had warned him at El Ksar. There was a risk. + +The night was cold. Warrisden wrapped himself in a Moorish jellaba of +fine, white wool, but he could not put on with it the Moorish patience +and indifference. The rain dripped upon the tiles of the court. Where +was Stretton, he wondered? + +He went to bed, and waked up in the middle of the night. He had left +the great doors of his bedroom open; the rain had stopped; and in the +stillness of the night he heard one loud voice, of an exquisite +beauty, vibrating over the roofs of the sleeping city, as though it +spoke from heaven itself. Warrisden lay listening to it, and +interpreting the words from the modulation of the voice which uttered +them. Now it rang out imperious as a summons, dropping down through +the open roofs to wake the sleepers in their beds. Now it rose, +lyrical and glorious, in a high chant of praise. Now it became +wistful, and trembled away pleading, yet with a passion of longing in +the plea. Warrisden could look upwards from his bed through the open +roof. The sky was clear again. Overhead were the bright stars, and +this solitary voice, most musical and strange, ringing out through the +silence. + +It was the mueddhin on the tower of the Karueein Mosque. For five +hours before the dawn the praises of Allah are sung from the summit of +the mosque's minaret. There are ten mueddhins to whom the service is +entrusted, and each sends out his chant above the sleeping city for +half an hour. But in the voice of this, one of the ten whom Warrisden +heard on the first night when he slept in Fez, there was a particular +quality. He listened for it during the nights which followed; expected +it, and welcomed its first note as one welcomes the coming of a +friend. It seemed to him that all the East was in that cry. + +It brought back to him sunsets when his camp was pitched by some +little village of tents or thatched mud-houses surrounded by hedges of +aloes and prickly pears--at Karia Ben Ouder, at Djouma--villages where +there was no mosque at all, but whence none the less the voice of a +priest dispersed its plaintive cry across the empty country of +marigolds and asphodels, startling the white cow-birds and the storks. + +Warrisden fell to thinking of Tony Stretton. He struck a match, and +looked at his watch. It was close upon the hour of dawn. Perhaps, just +at this moment, by some village in that wild, dark, mountain country +to the south-east, Stretton stirred in his sleep, and waked to hear +some such summons chanted about the village. Perhaps he was even now +loading his mule, and setting forth by the glimmer of the starlight +upon his dangerous road. Warrisden fell asleep again with that picture +in his mind, and woke to find the sunlight pouring through the square +opening of the roof. He drank his coffee, and mounting a little +winding stairway of broken steps, came out into that other city of +Fez, the city of the roof-tops. + +Fez is built upon the slope of a hill, and upon some of the flat roofs +Warrisden looked down and through the dark square holes of the +openings; to the parapets of others he looked up. Upon some there were +gardens planted--so, he thought, must have looked the hanging gardens +of Babylon; on others, linen was strung out to dry as in some backyard +of England; the minarets, here inlaid with white and green tiles, +there built simply of bricks and brown plaster, rose high into the +limpid air. And on the towers were the great nests of storks. + +Warrisden looked abroad, and in the sunlight his hopes revived. It +seemed that it must have been into another town that he had entered +last night. Nowhere could he see the gash of a street in that plateau +of roof-tops--so narrow they were; and no noise rose at all, they were +so deep. Here the only sound audible was the chattering of women's +voices--for the roofs are the playgrounds of the women, and Warrisden +could see them in their coloured handkerchiefs and robes clustered +together, climbing from one house to another with the help of ladders, +visiting their friends. But of all the clamour which must needs be +resounding in those crowded streets, not even one stray cry of +"Balak!" reached to this upper air. Lower down the hill to the east, +Warrisden could see the city wall and the gate through which Stretton +must pass when he came. And he might come to-day! + +That was Warrisden's thought. He went down the stairs, had his horse +brought into the dark street before the door, and, accompanied by his +_mehazni_, that old soldier who had ridden with him from Tangier, went +out of the city over the plain towards Sefru. For through that small +town of gardens and fruit at the base of the Atlas spur, Stretton +would come. But he did not come on that day, nor on the next. But, on +the other hand, Ibrahim, Warrisden's guide, brought bad news. + +He mounted to the roof in the morning, while Warrisden sat there after +his breakfast, and crouched down behind the parapet so that he might +not be seen. For the men leave the roof-tops to their women-folk, and +do not trespass there themselves. + +"Sir," said he, "the road between Djebel Silfat and Djebel Zarbon is +cut. Word has come into Fez this morning. The Z'mur have come down +from the hills, and sit across the road, stopping and robbing every +one." + +Warrisden sat up. + +"Are you sure?" he asked. He was, as he knew, in a country of liars. +Ibrahim, in addition, was a coward in the country districts, though +the best of braggarts at Tangier. He had ridden on his mule slung +about with weapons--a Spanish rifle on his back, a revolver in his +belt, and a Winchester in his hands; while between the fingers of his +left hand he carried ready four cartridges--but he was none the less +afraid. However, Warrisden remembered that mountain pass which led +from the plain of the Sebou up to Segota. It was very lonely, it was +narrow, the road looped perpetually round the bases of the round +buttresses of Djebel Silfat. It would certainly be an awkward place +wherein to be entrapped. + +"Yes, yes, I am sure," replied Ibrahim, "the Z'mur are bad men. They +might capture you and hold you to ransom." + +Warrisden was inclined to discount Ibrahim's terror of the Z'mur. The +lawless deeds of that wild and fanatical tribe had been dinned into +his ears ever since he had crossed the Sebou; until he had come to +make light of them. But there was no doubt they terrorised the people; +in the villages where Warrisden had camped, they were spoken of with a +dread hardly less than that which Ibrahim betrayed. It would certainly +never do to be taken by the Z'mur. They would be released, no doubt; +but time would be wasted. They might be kept for weeks in the forest +of Marmura. They would reach Roquebrune too late. + +Warrisden had brought with him, as a servant, one of the men who had +been with him to Ain-Sefra, and descending the stairs he called him, +and spoke, bidding Ibrahim interpret. + +"Do you remember the mule which I gave away at Ain-Sefra?" he asked. +And the man answered, "Yes!" + +"You would know it again?" + +The man was sure upon that point. He described the marks by which he +would recognise the beast. + +"Very well," said Warrisden. "Go out to the west of Fez, and watch the +road to Sefru. If you see a Jew come towards Fez driving the mule, +lead him at once to this house. Watch all day until the gate is +closed." + +The man went off upon his errand, and Warrisden betook himself to the +vice-consulate. On his return he summoned Ibrahim, and said-- + +We must travel by Mequinez and Mediyah. A letter will be given to us, +passing us on from governor to governor. We can reach Larache, +travelling hard, in five days. We may find a steamer there for +Gibraltar. If not, we must go on, in one more day, to Tangier. + +Ibrahim bowed his head and made no further protest. In the evening +Warrisden's servant came back from the gate; his watch had been +fruitless. Thus three days had passed. Warrisden became anxious again, +and restless. The seven days which Tony Stretton could take, and still +reach Roquebrune by the date on which Pamela insisted, were now +curtailed. Six days formed the limit, and even that limit implied that +the journey should be of the swiftest. Of those six days, three had +gone. + +The fourth came, and passed. Warrisden rode out upon the track to +Sefru in vain. Even the promised letter did not come. Warrisden made +inquiries. It would come, he was told. There was no doubt upon that +score. But a Government letter takes a long time in the writing in +Morocco. It was not until the fifth evening that a messenger from the +Palace knocked upon the door. These were the days when Mulai-el-Hassan +ruled in Morocco, and was on the march against his rebellious tribes +for nine months out of the twelve. Mulai-el-Hassan, at this particular +time, was far away to the south in the Sus country, and therefore the +mountain pass to the north was dangerous. + +Warrisden had his letter, however, sealed with the Viceroy's seal. But +he gazed out over the city as it lay, warm and ruddy in the sunset, +and wondered whether it would avail at all. His servant had come back +from the gate with his familiar answer. No Jew had driven the mule +down the road into Fez that day. And there was only one more day. + +Warrisden descended the stairs to the gallery on the first floor, and +as he came out upon it, he heard voices in the courtyard below. He +looked over the balustrade and saw a man standing amongst his +muleteers and servants. Warrisden could not see his face. He was +dressed in rags, but the rags were the remnants of a black gabardine, +and he wore a black skull-cap upon his head. + +It is likely that Warrisden would have taken no further notice of the +man, but that he cringed a little in his manner as though he was +afraid. Then he spoke in Arabic, and the voice was timorous and +apologetic. Warrisden, however, knew it none the less. He leaned over +the balustrade-- + +"Stretton!" he cried out in a burst of joy. + +The man in the courtyard looked up. Warrisden would never have known +him but for his voice. A ragged beard stubbled his cheeks and chin; he +was disfigured with dirt and bruises; he was lean with hunger; his +face was drawn and hollow from lack of sleep. But there was something +more, a wider difference between this ragged Stretton in the courtyard +and the Stretton Warrisden had known than mere looks explained. The +man who had looked up when he heard his voice loudly and suddenly +pronounced had been startled--nay, more than startled. He had raised +an arm as though to ward off a blow. He had shrunk back. He had been +afraid. Even now, when he looked at Warrisden, and knew that he was +here in a house of safety, he stood drawing deep breaths, and +trembling like one who has received a shock. His appearance told +Warrisden much of the dangers of the journey from Ain-Sefra through +the hills to Fez. + +"Yes," said Tony, "I am here. Am I in time?" + +"Just in time," cried Warrisden. "Oh, but I thought you never would +come!" + +He ran down the steps into the courtyard. + +"Balak!" cried Stretton, with a laugh. "Wait till I have had a bath, +and got these clothes burnt." + +In such guise, Tony Stretton came to Fez. He had gone straight to the +vice-consulate, and thence had been directed to Warrisden's house. +When, an hour later, he came up on to the gallery and sat down to +dinner, he was wearing the clothes of a European, and the look of fear +had gone from his face, the servility from his manner. But Warrisden +could not forget either the one or the other. Tony Stretton had come +through the mountains--yes. But the way had not been smooth. + + + + + CHAPTER XXVIII + + HOMEWARDS + + +The two men smoked together upon the roof-top afterwards. + +"I left a man at the gate all day," said Warrisden, "to watch the +track from Sefru. I had brought him from Algiers. I do not know how he +came to miss you." + +"He could not know me," said Tony, "and I spoke to no one." + +"But he knew the mule!" + +Tony was silent for a little while. Then he said, in a low, grave +voice, like a man speaking upon matters which he has no liking to +remember-- + +"The mule was taken from me some days ago in the Ait Yussi country." +And Warrisden upon that said-- + +"You had trouble, then, upon the way--great trouble." + +Again Tony was slow in the reply. He looked out across the city. It +was a night of moonlight, so bright that the stars were pale and +small, as though they were withdrawn; there was no cloud anywhere +about the sky; and on such a night, in that clear, translucent air, +the city, with its upstanding minarets, had a grace and beauty denied +to it by day. There was something of enchantment in its aspect, Tony +smoked his pipe in silence for a little while. Then he said-- + +"Let us not talk about it! I never thought that I would be sitting +here in Fez to-night. Tell me rather when we start!" + +"Early to-morrow," replied Warrisden. "We must reach Roquebrune in the +South of France by the thirty-first." + +Stretton suddenly sat back in his chair. + +"Roquebrune! France!" he exclaimed. "We must go there? Why?" + +"I do not know," Warrisden answered. "A telegram reached me at +Tangier. I kept it." + +He took the telegram from his pocket and handed it to Stretton, who +read it and sat thinking. + +"We have time," said Warrisden, "just time enough, I think, if we +travel fast." + +"Good," said Stretton, as he returned the telegram. "But I was not +thinking of the time." + +He did not explain what had caused him to start at the mention of +Roquebrune; but after sitting for a little while longer in silence, he +betook himself to bed. + +Early the next morning they rode out of the Bab Sagma upon the +thronged highway over the plain to Mequinez. + +The caravans diminished, striking off into this or that track. Very +soon there remained with them only one party of five Jews mounted on +small donkeys. They began to ride through high shrubs and bushes of +fennel over rolling ground. Stretton talked very little, and as the +track twisted and circled across the plain he was constantly standing +up in his stirrups and searching the horizon. + +"There does not seem to be one straight path in Morocco," he exclaimed +impatiently. "Look at this one. There's no reason why it should not +run straight. Yet it never does." + +Indeed, the track lay across that open plain like some brown, +monstrous serpent of a legend. + +"I do not believe," replied Warrisden, "that there is a straight path +anywhere in the world, unless it is one which has been surveyed and +made, or else it runs from gate to gate, and both gates are visible. +One might think the animals made this track, turning and twisting to +avoid the bushes. Only the tracks are no straighter in the desert, +where there are no bushes at all." + +They halted for half an hour at eleven, beside a bridge which crossed +a stream, broken and ruinous, but still serviceable. And while they +sat on the ground under the shadow they suddenly heard a great clatter +of hoofs upon the broken cobbles; and looking up saw a body of men +ride across the bridge. There were about forty of them, young and old; +all were mounted, and in appearance as wild and ragged a set of +bandits as could be imagined. As they rode over the bridge they saw +Warrisden and Stretton seated on the ground beneath them; and without +a word or a shout they halted as one man. Their very silence was an +intimidating thing. + +"Z'mur," whispered Ibrahim. He was shaking with fear. Warrisden +noticed that the two soldiers who accompanied them on this journey to +Mequinez quietly mounted their horses. Stretton and Warrisden rose to +do likewise. And as they rose a dozen of the mounted Z'mur quietly +rode round from the end of the bridge and stood between them and the +stream. Then the leader, a big man with a black beard turning grey, +began to talk in a quiet and pleasant voice to the soldiers. + +"You are bringing Europeans into our country. Now, why are you doing +that? We do not like Europeans." + +The soldiers no less pleasantly replied-- + +"Your country? The Europeans are travelling with a letter from your +master and mine, my Lord the Sultan, to the Governor of Mequinez." + +"You will show us then the letter?" + +"I will do nothing of the kind," the soldier replied, with a smile. +The Z'mur did not move; the two soldiers sat upon their horses +smiling--it seemed that matters had come to a deadlock. Meanwhile +Warrisden and Stretton got into their saddles. Then the leader of the +Z'mur spoke again-- + +"We passed five Jews riding on donkeys a little while ago. They were +kind enough when we stopped them to give us a peseta apiece. We are +going to Fez to offer our help to the Sultan, if only he will give us +rifles and ammunition. But we shall go home again when we have got +them. Perhaps the Europeans would like to give us a peseta apiece as +well." + +"I do not think they would like it at all," said the soldier. "Peace +go with you!" and he turned his horse and, followed, by Warrisden and +Stretton, the terrified Ibrahim and the train of mules, he rode right +through the forty Z'mur and over the bridge. + +It was an awkward moment, but the men of Warrisden's party assumed, +with what skill they could, an air of unconcern. Trouble was very near +to them. It needed only that one of those wild tribesmen should reach +out his hand and seize the bridle of a horse. But no hand was reached +out. The Z'mur were caught in a moment of indecision. They sat upon +their horses motionless. They let the Europeans pass. + +Ibrahim, however, drew no comfort from their attitude. + +"It is because they wish rifles and ammunition from the Government," +he said. "Therefore they will avoid trouble until they have got them. +But with the next party it will not be so." + +There are three waterfalls in Morocco, and of those three one falls in +a great cascade between red cliffs into a dark pool thirty feet below, +close by the village of Medhuma. By this waterfall they lunched, the +while Ibrahim bared his right arm to the shoulder, stretched himself +full length upon the ground, and, to the infinite danger of the +bystanders, practised shooting with his revolver. They lunched quickly +and rode on. Towards evening, above a group of trees on a hill, they +saw here and there a minaret. + +"Mequinez," exclaimed Ibrahim. "Schoof! Mequinez!" + +In a little while fragments of thick wall began to show, scattered +here and there about the plain. Brown walls, high and crumbling to +rain, walls that never had been walls of houses, but which began and +ended for no reason. They were all that was left of the work of Mulai +Ismail, who, in the seventeenth century, had built and planned +buildings about this town until death put an end to all his +architecture. There was to be a wall across the country, from Fez to +Morocco city far away in the south, so that the blind, of which this +kingdom still has many, and then was full, might pass from one town to +another without a guide. Part of that wall was built, and fragments of +it rise amongst the oleanders and the bushes to this day. + +The travellers entered now upon a park. A green mossy turf spread out +soft beneath the feet of their horses, dwarf oaks made everywhere a +pleasant shade; Stretton had lost sight now of the minarets, and no +sign of Mequinez was visible at all. The ground sloped downwards, the +track curved round a hill, and suddenly, on the opposite side of a +valley, they saw the royal city, with its high walls and gates, its +white houses, and its green-tiled mosques, and its old grey massive +palaces stretch along the hillside before their eyes. + +One of the soldiers rode forward into the town to find the Basha and +present his letters. A troop of men came out in a little time and led +the travellers up the cobbled stones through a gateway into the wide +space before the Renegade's Gate, that wonderful monument of Moorish +art which neither the wear of the centuries nor the neglect of its +possessors has availed to destroy. Its tiles are broken. The rains +have discoloured it, stones have fallen from their places. Yet the +gate rises, majestic yet most delicate, beautiful in colour, exquisite +in shape, flanked with massive pillars, and surmounted by its soaring +arch, a piece of embroidery in stone, fine as though the stone were +lace. By the side of this arch the camp was pitched just about the +time when the horses and mules are brought down to roll in the dust of +the square and to drink at the two great fountains beyond the gate. + +Later in that evening there came a messenger from the Basha with +servants bearing bowls of kouss-kouss. + +"Fourteen soldiers will ride with you to-morrow," he said, "for the +country is not safe. It will be well if you start early, for you have +a long way to go." + +"The earlier the better," said Stretton. + +"It will do if you breakfast at five--half-past five," said Ibrahim, +to whom punctuality was a thing unknown. "And start at six--half-past +six." + +"No," said Warrisden. "We will start at five--half-past five." + +That night a company of soldiers kept guard about the tents, and +passed the hours of darkness in calling to one another and chanting +one endless plaintive melody. Little sleep was possible to the two +Englishmen, and to one of them sleep did not come at all. Now and then +Warrisden dropped off and waked again; and once or twice he struck a +match and lit his candle. Each time that he did this he saw Stretton +lying quite motionless in his bed on the other side of the tent. Tony +lay with the bed-clothes up to his chin, and his arms straight down at +his sides, in some uncanny resemblance to a dead man. But Warrisden +saw that all the while his eyes were open. Tony was awake with his +troubles and perplexities, keeping them to himself as was his wont, +and slowly searching for an issue. That he would hit upon the issue he +did not doubt. He had these few days for thought, and it was not the +first time that he had had to map out a line of conduct. His course +might be revealed to him at the very last moment, as it had been on +the trawler in the North Sea. Or it might flash upon him in a second, +as the necessity to desert had flashed upon him amidst the aloes of +Ain-Sefra. Meanwhile he lay awake and thought. + +They started early that morning, and crossing a valley, mounted on to +that high, wide plain Djebel Zarhon and Djebel Gerowaun. They left the +town of Mequinez behind them; its minarets dropped out of sight. They +had come into a most empty world. Not a tent-village stood anywhere +beside the track. Far away to the right, in a deep recess, the white +sacred town of Mulai Idris fell down the dark side of Zarhon like a +cascade. A little further an arch of stone and a few pillars rising +from the plain showed where once the Romans had built their town of +Volubilis. But when that was passed there was no sign of life anywhere +at all. For hours they rode in a desolate, beautiful world. Bushes of +asphodel, white with their starry flowers, brushed against them; +plants of iris, purple and yellow, stood stirrup-high upon their path; +and at times the bushes would cease, and they would ride over a red +carpet of marigolds, which would pale away into the gold of the +mustard flower. Flowers were about them all that day, the red anemone, +the blue lupin, periwinkles, the yellow flower of the cytisus, but no +living things. Even the air above their heads was still. The country +seemed too empty even for the birds. + +At eleven o'clock they stopped beside a stream which ran prettily +between trees across their path. + +"We shall find no more water until evening," said Ibrahim. "We will +stop here." + +Stretton dismounted, and said-- + +"We can send the mules on and catch them up. It will save time." + +The soldiers shook their heads. + +"We are in the Berber country," they said. "We must not separate." + +Stretton looked around impatiently. + +"But there is no one within miles," he exclaimed; and, as if to +contradict him, a man walked out from the bushes by the stream and +came towards them. He had been robbed on this very track not two hours +before by eleven mounted Berbers. He had been driving three mules +laden with eggs and food to Mulai Idris, and his mules and their loads +had been taken from him. He was walking home, absolutely penniless, +His whole fortune had been lost that day; and when once again the +travellers started upon their journey he ran at a trot beside their +horses for safety's sake. + +The road mounted now on to stony and mountainous country. It wound +continually, ascending in and out amongst low, round peaks towards the +summit of a great line of hills which ran from east to west opposite +to them against the sky. + +"Beyond the hills," cried Ibrahim, "is the plain of the Sebou." + +A big village crowned the hill just where the track ascended. It had +been placed there to protect the road. In a little while they came to +the brow of the hill, and suddenly they saw, far below them, the great +plain of the Sebou, green and level, dotted with villages and the +white tombs of saints and clumps of trees, stretching away as far as +the eye could reach. It was afternoon, not a cloud was in the sky, and +the sun shone through the clear, golden air beneficently bright. The +hillside fell away to the plain with a descent so sheer, the plain +broke so abruptly upon the eyes, that the very beauty of the scene +caught the breath away. Both Warrisden and Stretton reined in their +horses, and sat looking across the plain as a man might who suddenly +from the crest of some white cliff sees for the first time the sea. +And then Warrisden heard his companion begin to hum a song. He caught +some of the words, but not many. + +"Oh, come out, mah love, I'm awaitin' foh you heah!" Tony began, and +suddenly checked himself with an expression of anger, as though the +words had associations which it hurt him to recall. + +"Let us ride on," he said, and led the way down the steep, winding +track towards the plain. + +They pressed on that evening, and camped late in the Beni Hassan +country. Stretton slept that night, but he slept fitfully. He had not +yet come to the end of his perplexities, and as he rode away from +their camping-ground in the morning he said, impulsively-- + +"It is quite true. I have thought of it. I am to blame. I should have +gone into the house that night." + +He was endeavouring to be just, and to this criticism of himself he +continually recurred. He should have entered his house in Berkeley +Square on the night when he contented himself with looking up to the +lighted windows. He should have gone in and declared what was in his +mind to do. Very likely he would only have made matters worse. +Contempt for a visionary would very likely have been added to the +contempt for a ne'er-do-weel. Certainly no faith would have been felt +by Millie in the success of his plan. He would have been asked, in a +lukewarm way, to abandon it and stay at home. Still, he ought to have +gone in. He had made a mistake that night. + +All that day they rode through the Beni Hassan country westwards. The +plain was level and monotonous; they passed village after village, +each one built in a circle round a great space of open turf, into +which the cattle were driven at night. For upon the hills, and in the +forest of Mamura to the south, close by, the Z'mur lived, and between +the Beni Hassan and the Z'mur there is always war. In the afternoon +they came to the borders of that forest, and skirting its edge, +towards evening reached the caravanserai of El Kantra. + +The travellers saw it some while before they came to it--four high, +smooth, castellated walls crowning a low hill. It stands upon the road +from Fez to Rabat, and close to the road from Rabat to Larache, and a +garrison guards it. For you could almost throw a stone from its walls +into the trees of Mamura. Stretton and Warrisden rode round the walls +to the gate, and as they passed beneath the arch both halted and +looked back. + +Outside was a quiet country of grey colours; the sun was near to its +setting; far away the broken walls of the old Portuguese town of +Mediyah stood upon a point of vantage on a hillside, like some ruined +castle of the Tyrol. Inside the caravanserai all was noise and +shouting and confusion. In the thickness of the walls there were +little rooms or cells, and in these the merchants were making their +homes for the night, while about them their servants and muleteers +buzzed like a hive of bees. And the whole great square within the +walls was one lake of filthy mud, wherein camels, and mules, and +donkeys, and horses rolled and stamped and fought. A deafening clamour +rose to the skies. Every discordant sound that the created world could +produce seemed to be brayed from that jostling throng of animals as +from some infernal orchestra. And the smell of the place was fetid. + +"Let us pitch our camp outside!" said Warrisden. But the captain of +the garrison came hurrying up. + +"No," he cried excitedly. "The Z'mur! The Z'mur!" + +Stretton shrugged his shoulders. + +"I am getting a little bored with the Z'mur," said he. + +"They have sent in word to us," the captain continued, "that they mean +to attack us to-night." + +Stretton looked perplexed. + +"But why send in word?" he asked. + +The captain of the garrison looked astonished at the question. + +"So that we may be ready for them, of course," he replied, quite +seriously; for life in Morocco has some of the qualities of +_opera-bouffe_. "So you must come inside. You have a letter from my +lord the Basha of Fez, it is true. If the letter said you were to +sleep outside the walls of El Kantra, then I would kiss the seal and +place it against my forehead, and bring out my five hundred men to +guard you, and we should all get killed. But it does not say so." + +His five hundred men were really short of fifty. Stretton and +Warrisden laughed; but they had to go inside the caravanserai. This +was the last day on which they ran any risk. To-morrow they would +cross the Sebou at Mediyah, and beyond the Sebou the road was safe. + +They rode inside the caravanserai, and were allotted a cell which +obtained some privacy from a hurdle fixed in the ground in front of +it. The gates of the caravanserai were closed, the sunset flushed the +blue sky with a hue of rose; the mueddhin came out upon the minaret +which rose from the southern wall, and chanted in a monotone his call +to prayer; and then a drummer and a bugler advanced into the crowded +square. Suddenly there fell upon Stretton's ears, competing with the +mueddhin and the uproar of the animals, the "Last Post." + +Stretton started up, amazed, and most deeply moved. An English officer +instructed the Moorish troops. What more natural than that he should +introduce the English calls and signals? But to Stretton it seemed +most wonderful that here, in this Eastern country, while the +Mohammedan priest was chanting from his minaret, he should hear again, +after so many years, that familiar tattoo sounded by an Eastern bugle +and an Eastern drum. In how many barracks of England, he wondered, +would that same "Last Post" ring out to-night? And at once the years +slipped away, the hard years of the North Sea and the Sahara. He was +carried back among the days when he served in the Coldstream. Then +arose in his heart a great longing that something of the happiness of +those days might be recaptured still. + +Warrisden and Stretton crossed the Sebou the next morning, and rode +with the boom of the Atlantic in their ears. Hills upon their left +hand hid the sea from their eyes, and it was not until the next day, +when they mounted on to a high tableland four hours from Larache, that +they saw it rolling lazily towards the shore. They caught a steamer at +Larache that night. + + + + + CHAPTER XXIX + + PAMELA MEETS A STRANGER + + +Meanwhile Pamela waited at the Villa Pontignard, swinging from hope to +fear, and from fear again to hope. The days chased one another. She +watched the arrival of each train from Marseilles at the little +station below, with an expectant heart; and long after it had departed +towards Italy, she kept within her vision the pathway up the hillside +to the villa. But the travellers did not return. Expectation and +disappointment walked alternately at her elbow all the day, and each +day seemed endless. Yet, when the next day came, it had come all too +quickly. Every morning it seemed to her, as she turned her calendar, +that the days chased one another, racing to the month's end; every +evening, tired out with her vigil, she wondered how they could pass so +slowly. The thirty-first of the month dawned at last. At some time on +this day Millie Stretton would arrive at Eze. She thought of it, as +she rose, with a sinking heart; and then thrust thought aside. She +dared not confront the possibility that the trains might stop at +Roquebrune, and move on to Italy and discharge no passengers upon the +platform. She dared not recognise her dread that this day might close +and the darkness come as fruitlessly as all the rest. It was her last +day of hope. Lionel Callon was waiting. Millie Stretton was arriving. +To-morrow, Tony might come, but he would come too late. Pamela lived +in suspense. Somehow the morning passed. The afternoon _Rapide_ swept +through towards Mentone. Pamela saw the smoke of the engine from her +terrace, and knew that upon that train had come the passenger from +England. Half an hour ago Millie had most likely stepped from her +carriage on to the platform at Eze. And still Tony Stretton and +Warrisden lingered. + +Towards dusk she began to despair. In a little while another train was +due. She heard its whistle, saw it stop at the station, and waited +with her eyes fixed upon the hillside path. No one appeared upon it. +She turned and went into the house. She thought for a moment of going +herself to Eze, thrusting herself upon Millie at the cost of any snub; +and while she debated whether the plan could at all avail, the door +was opened, a servant spoke some words about a visitor, and a man +entered the room. Pamela started to her feet. The man stood in the +twilight of the room: his back was against the light of the window. +Pamela could not see his face. But it was not Warrisden, so much she +knew at once. It could only be Tony Stretton. + +"So you have come," she cried. "At last! I had given up hope." + +She advanced and held out her hand. And some reserve in Tony's +attitude, something of coldness in the manner with which he took her +hand, checked and chilled her. + +"It is you?" she asked. "I watched the path. The train has gone some +while." + +"Yes, it is I," he replied. "I had to inquire my way at the village. +This is the first time I ever came to Roquebrune." + +Still more than the touch of his hand and the reserve of his manner, +the cold reticence of his voice chilled her. She turned to the servant +abruptly-- + +"Bring lamps," she said. She felt the need to see Tony Stretton's +face. She had looked forward so eagerly to his coming; she had hoped +for it, and despaired of it with so full a heart; and now he had come, +and with him there had come, most unexpectedly, disappointment. She +had expected ardour, and there was only, as it seemed, indifference +and stolidity. She was prepared for a host of questions to be tumbled +out upon her in so swift a succession that no time was given to her +for an answer to any one of them; and he stood before her, seemingly +cold as stone. Had he ceased to care for Millie, she wondered? + +"You have come as quickly as you could?" she asked, trying to read his +features in the obscurity. + +"I have not lost a moment since I received your letter," he answered. + +She caught at the words, "your letter." Perhaps there lay the reason +for his reserve. She had written frankly, perhaps too frankly she +feared at this moment. Had the letter suddenly killed his love for +Millie? Such things, no doubt, could happen--had happened. Disillusion +might have withered it like a swift shaft of lightning. + +"My letter," she said. "You must not exaggerate its meaning. You read +it carefully?" + +"Very carefully." + +"And I wrote it carefully," she went on, pleading with his +indifference; "very carefully." + +"It contains the truth," said Tony; "I did not doubt that." + +"Yes; but it contains all the truth," she urged. "You must not doubt +that either. Remember, you yourself are to blame. I wrote that, didn't +I? I meant it." + +"Yes, you wrote that," answered Tony. "I am not denying that you are +right. It may well be that I am to blame. It may well be that you, +too, are not quite free from blame. Had you told me that morning, when +we rode together in the Row, what you had really meant when you said +that I ought never to leave my wife----" And at that Pamela +interrupted him-- + +"Would you have stayed if I had explained?" she cried. And Tony for a +moment was silent. Then he answered slowly-- + +"No; for I should not have believed you." And then he moved for the +first time since he had entered the room. "However, it can do neither +of us any good to discuss what we might have done had we known then +what we know now." + +He stopped as the door opened. The lamps were brought in and set upon +the tables. Tony waited until the servant had gone out, and the door +was closed again; then he said-- + +"You sent a telegram. I am here in answer to it. I was to be at +Roquebrune on the thirty-first. This is the thirty-first. Am I in +time?" + +"Yes," said Pamela. + +She could now see Tony clearly; and of one thing she at once was sure. +She had been misled by the twilight of the room. Tony, at all events, +was not indifferent. He stood before her travel-stained and worn. His +face was haggard and thin; his eyes very tired, like the eyes of an +old man; there were flecks of grey in his hair, and lines about his +eyes. These changes she noticed, and took them at their true value. +They were signs of the hard life he had lived during these years, and +of the quick, arduous journey which he had made. But there was more. +If Tony had spoken with a measured voice, it was in order that he +might control himself the better. If he had stood without gesture or +motion, it was because he felt the need to keep himself in hand. So +much Pamela clearly saw. Tony was labouring under a strong emotion. + +"Yes you are in time," she cried; and now her heart was glad. "I was +so set on saving both your lives, in keeping you and Millie for each +other. Of late, since you did not come, my faith faltered a little. +But it should not have faltered. You are here! You are here!" + +"My wife is here, too?" asked Tony, coldly; and Pamela's enthusiasm +again was checked. "Where is she?" + +"She arrives in the south of France to-day. She stops at Eze. She +should be there now." + +She had hoped to see the blood pulse into his face, and some look of +gladness dawn suddenly in his eyes, some smile of forgiveness alter +the stern set of his lips. But again she was disappointed. + +Tony seemed to put his wife out of his thoughts. + +"And since your message was so urgent," he continued deliberately, "it +follows that Callon comes to-day as well," and he repeated the name in +a singularly soft, slow, and almost caressing voice. "Lionel Callon," +he said. + +And at once Pamela was desperately afraid. It needed just that name +uttered in just that way to explain to her completely the emotion +which Tony so resolutely controlled. She looked at him aghast. She had +planned to bring back Tony to Millie and his home. The Tony Stretton +whom she had known of old, the good-natured, kindly man who loved his +wife, whom all men liked and none feared. And lo! she had brought back +a stranger. And the stranger was dangerous. He was thrilling with +anger, he was anticipating his meeting with Lionel Callon with a +relish which, to Pamela, was dreadful. + +"No," she exclaimed eagerly. "Mr. Callon has been here all this while, +and Millie only comes to-day." + +"Callon has been waiting for her, then?" he asked implacably. + +"Oh, I don't know," Pamela exclaimed in despair. "I have not spoken to +him. How should I know?" + +"Yet you have no doubts." + +"Well, then, no," she said, "I have no doubt that he is waiting here +for Millie. But she only arrives to-day. They have not met until +to-day. That is why I sent the telegram." + +Tony nodded his head. + +"So that I might be present at the meeting?" + +And Pamela could have cried out aloud. She had not thought, she had +not foreseen. She had fixed all her hopes on saving Millie. Set upon +that, she had not understood that other and dreadful consequences +might ensue. These consequences were vivid enough before her eyes now. +All three would meet--Tony, Millie, and Lionel Callon. What would +follow? What might not follow? Pamela closed her eyes. Her heart sank; +she felt faint at the thought of what she had so blindly brought +about. + +"Tony!" she exclaimed. She wrung her hands together, pleading with him +in short and broken sentences. "Don't think of him!... Think of +Millie. You can gain her back!... I am very sure.... I wrote that to +you, didn't I?... Mr. Callon.... It is not worth while.... He is of no +account.... Millie was lonely, that was all.... There would be a +scandal, at the best...." And Tony laughed harshly. + +"Oh, it is not worth while," she cried again piteously, and yet again, +"it is not worth while." + +"Yet I am anxious to meet him," said Tony. + +Suddenly Pamela looked over his shoulder to the door, and, for a +moment, hope brightened on her face. But Stretton understood the look, +and replied to it. + +"No, Warrisden is not here. I left him behind with our luggage at +Monte Carlo." + +"Why did he stay?" cried Pamela, as again her hopes fell. + +"He could hardly refuse. This is my affair, not his. I claimed +to-night. He will come to you, no doubt, tomorrow." + +"You meant him to stay behind, then?" + +"I meant to see you alone," said Tony; and Pamela dared question him +no more, though the questions thronged in her mind and tortured her. +Was it only because he wished to see her alone that he left Warrisden +behind? Was it not also so that he might not be hampered afterwards? +Was it only so that another might not know of the trouble between +himself and Millie? Or was it not so that another might not be on hand +to hinder him from exacting retribution? Pamela was appalled. Tony was +angry--yes, that was natural enough. She would not have felt half her +present distress if he had shown his passion in tempestuous words, if +he had threatened, if he had raved. But there was so much deliberation +in his anger, he had it so completely in control; it was an instrument +which he meant to use, not a fever which might master him for a moment +and let him go. + +"You are so changed," she cried. "I did not think of that when I wrote +to you. But, of course, these years and the Foreign Legion could not +but change you." + +She moved away, and sat down holding her head between her hands. +Stretton did not answer her words in any way. He moved towards her, +and asked-- + +"Is Callon, too, at Eze?" + +"No, no," she cried, raising her head, thankful, at last, that here +was some small point on which she could attenuate his suspicions. "You +are making too much of the trouble." + +"Yet you wrote the letter to me. You also sent the telegram. You sent +me neither the one nor the other without good reason." And Pamela +dropped her eyes again from his face. + +"If Callon is not at Eze," he insisted, "he is close by!" + +Pamela did not answer. She sat trying to compose her thoughts. Suppose +that she refused to answer, Tony would go to Eze. He might find Millie +and Callon there. On the other hand, it was unlikely that he would. +Pamela had seen that quiet, solitary restaurant by the sea where +Callon lodged. It was there that they would be, she had no doubt. + +"Where is Callon?" asked Tony. "Where does he stay?" + +Pamela closed her ears to the question, working still at the stern +problem of her answer. If she refused to tell him what he asked, +Millie and Callon might escape for to-night. That was possible. But, +then, to-morrow would come. Tony must meet them to-morrow in any case, +and to-morrow might be too late. + +"I will tell you," she answered, and she described the place. And in +another minute she was alone. She heard the front door close, she +heard Tony's step upon the gravel of the garden path, and then all was +silent. She sat holding her throbbing temples in her hands. Visions +rose before her eyes, and her fear made them extraordinarily luminous +and vivid. She saw that broad, quiet terrace over the sea where she +had lunched, the lonely restaurant, the windows of that suite of rooms +open on to the terrace. A broad column of light streamed out from the +window in her vision. She could almost hear voices and the sound of +laughter, she imagined the laughter all struck dumb, and thereafter a +cry of horror stabbing the night. The very silence of the villa became +a torture to her. She rose and walked restlessly about the room. If +she could only have reached Warrisden! But she did not even know to +which hotel in all the hotels of Monte Carlo he had gone. Tony might +have told her that, had she kept her wits about her and put the +question with discretion. But she had not. She had no doubt that +Stretton had purposely left him behind. Tony wished for no restraining +hand, when at last he came face to face with Lionel Callon. She sat +down, and tried to reason out what would happen. Tony would go first +to Eze. Would he find Millie there? Perhaps. Most likely he would not. +He would go on then to the restaurant on the Corniche road. But he +would have wasted some time. It might be only a little time, still, +however short it was, what was waste of time to Tony might be gain of +time to her--if only she could find a messenger. + +Suddenly she stood up. There was a messenger, under her very hand. She +scribbled a note to Lionel Callon, hardly knowing what she wrote. She +bade him go the instant when he received it, go at all costs without a +moment's delay. Then, taking the note in her hand, she ran from the +villa down the road to Roquebrune. + + + + + CHAPTER XXX + + M. GIRAUD AGAIN + + +The dusk was deepening quickly into darkness. As she ran down the open +stretch of hillside between her villa and the little town, she saw the +lights blaze out upon the terrace of Monte Carlo. Far below her, upon +her right, they shone like great opals, each with a heart of fire. +Pamela stopped for a second to regain her breath before she reached +Roquebrune. The sudden brightness of those lights carried her thoughts +backwards to the years when the height of trouble for her had been the +sickness of a favourite horse, and all her life was an eager +expectation. On so many evenings she had seen those lights flash out +through the gathering night while she had sat talking in her garden +with the little schoolmaster whom she was now to revisit. To both of +them those lights had been a parable. They had glowed in friendliness +and promise--thus she had read the parable--out of a great, bright, +gay world of men and women, upon a cool, twilit garden of youth and +ignorance. She thought of what had come in place of all that imagined +gaiety. To the schoolmaster, disappointment and degradation; while, as +for herself, she felt very lonely upon this evening. "The world is a +place of great sadness." Thus had M. Giraud spoken when Pamela had +returned to Roquebrune from her first season in London, and the words +now came back to her again. + +She ran on through the narrow streets of Roquebrune, her white frock +showing in the light from the shops and windows. She wore no hat upon +her head, and more than one of the people in the street called to her +as she passed and asked her whether she needed help. Help, indeed, she +did need, but not from them. She came to the tiny square whence the +steps led down to the station. On the west side of the square stood +the school-house, and, close by, the little house of the schoolmaster. +A light burned in a window of the ground floor. Pamela knocked loudly +upon the door. She heard a chair grate upon the floor-boards. She +knocked again, and the door was opened. It was the schoolmaster +himself who opened it. + +"M. Giraud!" she exclaimed, drawing her breath quickly. The +schoolmaster leaned forward and stared at the white figure which stood +in the darkness just outside his porch; but he made no reply. + +"Let me in!" cried Pamela; and he made a movement as though to bar the +way. But she slipped quickly past him into the room. He closed the +door slowly and followed her. + +The room was bare. A deal table, a chair or two, and a few tattered +books on a hanging bookshelf made up all its furniture. Pamela leaned +against the wall with a hand to her heart. M. Giraud saw her clearly +now. She stood only a few feet from him, in the light of the room. She +was in distress; yet he spoke harshly. + +"Why have you come?" he cried; and she answered, piteously, "I want +your help." + +At that a flame of anger kindled within him. He saw her again, after +all this long time of her absence--her whose equal he had never spoken +with. Her dark hair, her eyes, the pure outline of her face, her tall, +slim figure, the broad forehead--all the delicacy and beauty of +her--was a torture to him. The sound of her voice, with its remembered +accents, hurt him as he had thought nothing could ever hurt him again. + +"Really!" he cried, in exasperation. "You want help; so you come to +me. Without that need would you have come? No, indeed. You are a +woman. Get your fine friends to help you!" + +There were other follies upon his tongue, but he never spoke them. He +looked at Pamela, and came to a stop. + +Pamela had entered the cottage bent with a single mind upon her +purpose--to avert a catastrophe at the little restaurant on the +Corniche road. But M. Giraud was before her, face to face with her, as +she was face to face with him. She saw him clearly in the light as he +saw her; and she was shocked. The curé had prepared her for a change +in her old comrade, but not for so complete a disfigurement. The +wineshop had written its sordid story too legibly upon his features. +His face was bloated and red, the veins stood out upon the cheeks, and +the nose like threads of purple; his eyes were yellow and unwholesome. +M. Giraud had grown stout in body, too; and his dress was slovenly and +in disrepair. He was an image of degradation and neglect. Pamela was +shocked, and betrayed the shock. She almost shrank from him at the +first; there was almost upon her face an expression of aversion and +disgust. But sorrow drove the aversion away, and immediately her eyes +were full of pity; and these swift changes M. Giraud saw and +understood. + +She was still his only window on the outside world. That was the +trouble. By her expression he read his own decline more surely than in +his mirror. Through her he saw the world; through her, too, he saw +what manner of figure he presented to the world. Never had he realised +how far he had sunk until this moment. He saw, as in a picture, the +young schoolmaster of the other days who had read French with the +pupil, who was more his teacher than his pupil, upon the garden +terrace of the Villa Pontignard--a youth full of dreams, which were +vain, no doubt, but not ignoble. There was a trifle of achievement, +too. For even now one of the tattered books upon his shelf was a copy +of his brochure on Roquebrune and the Upper Corniche road. With +perseverance, with faith--he understood it in a flash--he might have +found, here, at Roquebrune, a satisfaction for those ambitions which +had so tortured him. There was a field here for the historian, had he +chosen to seize on it. Fame might have come to him, though he never +visited the great cities and the crowded streets. So he thought, and +then he realised what he had become. It was true he had suffered great +unhappiness. Yet so had she--Pamela Mardale; and she had not fallen +from her pedestal. Here shame seized upon him. He lowered his eyes +from her face. + +"Help!" he stammered. "You ask me to help you? Look at me! I can give +you no help!" + +He suddenly broke off. He sat down at the table, buried his face in +his hands, and burst into tears. Pamela crossed to him and laid her +hand very gently upon his shoulder. She spoke very gently, too. + +"Oh yes, you can," she said. + +He drew away from her, but she would not be repulsed. + +"You should never have come to me at all," he sobbed. "Oh, how I hate +that you should see me like this! Why did you come? I did not mean you +to see me. You must have known that! You must have known, too, why. It +was not kind of you, mademoiselle. No, it was not kind!" + +"Yet I am glad that I came," said Pamela. "I came, thinking of myself, +it is true--my need is so very great; but now I see your need is as +great as mine. I ask you to rise up and help me." + +"No, leave me alone!" he cried. And she answered, gently, "I will +not." + +M. Giraud grew quiet. He pressed his handkerchief to his eyes, and +stood up. + +"Forgive me!" he said. "I have behaved like a child; but you would +forgive me if you knew how I have waited and waited for you to come +back. But you never did. Each summer I said, 'She will return in the +winter!' And the winter came, and I said, 'She will come in the +spring.' But neither in winter nor in the spring did you return to +Roquebrune. I have needed you so badly all these years." + +"I am sorry," replied Pamela; "I am very sorry." + +She did not reproach herself at all. She could not see, indeed, that +she was to blame. But she was none the less distressed. Giraud's +exhibition of grief was so utterly unfamiliar to her that she felt +awkward and helpless in face of it. He was yet further disfigured now +by the traces of weeping; his eyes were swollen and red. There was +something grotesque in the aspect of this drink-swollen face, all +convulsed with sorrow. Nothing could well lie less in sympathy with +Pamela's nature than Giraud's outburst and display of tears; for she +was herself reticent and proud. She held her head high as she walked +through the world, mistress alike of her sorrows and her joys. But Mr. +Mudge had spoken the truth when he had called upon her in +Leicestershire. Imagination had come to her of late. She was able to +understand the other point of view--to appreciate that there were +other characters than hers which must needs fulfil themselves in ways +which were not hers. She put herself now in M. Giraud's place. She +imagined him waiting and waiting at Roquebrune, with his one window on +the outside world closed and shuttered--a man in a darkened room who +most passionately desired the air without. She said, with a trace of +hesitation-- + +"You say you have needed me very much?" + +"Oh, have I not?" exclaimed Giraud; and the very weariness of his +voice would have convinced her, had she needed conviction. It seemed +to express the dilatory passage of the years during which he had +looked for her coming, and had looked in vain. + +"Well, then, listen to me," she went on. "I was once told that +to be needed by those whom one needs is a great comfort. I thought +of the saying at the time, and I thought that it was a true one. +Afterwards"--she began to speak slowly, carefully selecting her +words--"it happened that in my own experience I proved it to be +true--at all events, for me. Is it true for you also? Think well. If +it is not true I will go away as you bade me at the beginning; but if +it is true--why, then I may be of some little help to you, and you +will be certainly a great help to me; for I need you very surely." + +M. Giraud looked at her in silence for a little while. Then he +answered her with simplicity, and so, for the first time during this +interview, wore the proper dignity of a man. + +"Yes, I will help you," he said. "What can I do?" + +She held out the letter which she had written to Lionel Callon. She +bade him carry it with the best speed he could to its destination. + +"Lose no time!" she implored. "I am not sure, but it may be that one +man's life, and the happiness of a man and a woman besides, all hang +upon its quick receipt." + +M. Giraud took his hat from the wall and went to the door. At the door +he paused, and standing thus, with an averted face, he said in a +whisper, recalling the words she had lately spoken-- + +"There is one, then, whom you need? You are no longer lonely in your +thoughts? I should like to know." + +"Yes," Pamela answered gently: "I am no longer lonely in my thoughts." + +"And you are happy?" he continued. "You were not happy when you were +at Roquebrune last. I should like to know that you, at all events, are +happy now." + +"Yes," said Pamela. In the presence of his distress she rather shrank +from acknowledging the change which had come over her. It seemed +cruel; yet he clearly wished to know. He clearly would be the happier +for knowing. "Yes," she said; "I am happy." + +"I am very glad," said M. Giraud, in a low voice; "I am very glad." +And he went rather quickly out by the door. + + + + + CHAPTER XXXI + + AT THE RESÉRVE + + +Tony Stretton walked quickly down from the Villa Pontignard to the +station. There he learned that an hour must elapse before a train to +Eze was due. Inaction was at this moment intolerable to him. Even +though he should get to Eze not a minute the sooner, he must hurry +upon his way. He could not wait upon this platform for an hour, +suspense so tortured him. He went out upon the road and began to run. +He ran very quickly. The road turned sharply round the shoulder of a +hill, and Stretton saw in front of him the lights of Monte Carlo. They +were bunched in great white clusters, they were strung in festoons in +the square and the streets. They made a golden crescent about the +dark, quiet waters of the bay. Looking down from this shoulder of the +hill upon the town at such an hour one seems to be looking upon a town +of fairyland; one expects a sweet and delicate music to float upwards +from its houses and charm the ears. Tony's one thought was that beyond +that place of lights lay Eze. He came to an electric tram which was on +point of starting. He entered it and it rattled him quickly down the +hill. + +At Monte Carlo he sprang into the first carriage which he saw waiting +for a fare, and bade the coachman drive him quickly out to Eze. The +night had come; above his head the stars shone very brightly from a +dark sky of velvet. The carriage passed out of the town; the villas +grew more scarce; the open road glimmered ahead of him a riband of +white; the sea murmured languorously upon the shore. + +At this moment, in the lonely restaurant towards which Tony was +driving in such haste, Lionel Callon and Millie Stretton were sitting +down to dinner. The table was laid in the small, daintily furnished +room which opened on to the terrace. The windows stood wide, and the +lazy murmur of the waves entered in. The white cloth shone with +silver, a great bowl of roses stood in the centre and delicately +perfumed the air. Thither Millie had come in fulfilment of that +promise made on a midnight of early spring in Regent's Park. The +colour burned prettily on her cheeks, she had dressed herself in a +pink gown of lace, jewels shone on her arms and at her neck. She was, +perhaps, a little feverish in her gaiety, her laughter was perhaps a +little over loud. Indeed, every now and then her heart sank in fear +within her, and she wished herself far away. But here Lionel Callon +was at his ease. He knew the methods by which victory was to be won. +There was no suggestion of triumph in his manner. He was considerate +and most deferential, and with no more than a hint of passion in the +deference. + +"You have come," he said. His eyes rested upon hers, and he left them +to express his gratitude. He raised her hand to his lips and gently +took the cloak from her shoulders. "You have had a long journey. But +you are not tired." He placed her chair for her at the table and sat +opposite. He saw that she was uneasy. He spoke no word which might +alarm her. + +Meanwhile Tony was drawing nearer. He reached the hotel at Eze, and +drove through its garden to the door. + +"Is Lady Stretton in the hotel?" he asked. + +"No, sir. Her ladyship went out to dinner nearly an hour ago." + +"Thank you," said Tony. "She arrived this afternoon, I think?" + +"Yes, sir. What name shall I give when she returns?" + +"No name," said Tony. And he ordered his coachman to drive back to the +road. + +When he had reached it he directed the man again. + +"Towards Beaulieu," he said; and in a little while, on his left hand, +below the level of the road, he saw the lights of the _Réserve_. He +stopped at the gate, dismissed his carriage, and walked down the +winding drive to the door. He walked into the restaurant. It was +empty. A waiter came forward to him. + +"I wish you to take me at once to Mr. Callon," he said. He spoke in a +calm, matter-of-fact voice. But the waiter nevertheless hesitated. +Tony wore the clothes in which he had travelled to Roquebrune. He was +covered with dust, his face was haggard and stern. He had nothing in +common with the dainty little room of lights and flowers and shining +silver, and the smartly dressed couple who were dining there. The +waiter guessed that his irruption would be altogether inconvenient. + +"Mr. Callon!" he stammered. "He has gone out." + +Tony heard the rattle of a metal cover upon a dish. He looked in the +direction whence the sound came--he looked to the right-hand side of +the restaurant. A door stood open there, and in the passage beyond the +door he saw a waiter pass carrying the dish. Moreover, the man who had +spoken to him made yet another mistake. He noticed the direction of +Tony's glance, and he made a quick movement as though to bar that +passage. + +"He is here," said Tony; and he thrust the waiter aside. He crossed +the restaurant quickly and entered the passage. The passage ran +parallel to the restaurant; and, at the end towards the terrace, there +was another door upon the opposite side. The waiter with the dish had +his hand upon the door-handle, but he turned at the sound of +Stretton's step. He, too, noticed the disorder of Tony's dress. At the +same moment the man in the restaurant shouted in a warning voice-- + +"Jules!" + +Jules stood in front of the door. + +"Monsieur, this room is private," said he. + +"Yet I will take the liberty to intrude," said Tony, quietly. + +From behind the door there came the sound of a man's voice which Tony +did not know. He had, indeed, never heard it before. Then a woman's +laugh rang out; and the sound of it angered Tony beyond endurance. He +recognised it beyond the possibility of mistake. It was his wife who +was laughing so gaily there behind the closed door. He thought of the +years he had spent in the determination to regain his wife's esteem, +to free himself from her contempt. For the moment he could have +laughed bitterly at his persistence as at some egregious folly. It +seemed all waste--waste of time, waste of endeavour, waste of +suffering. She was laughing! And with Lionel Callon for her companion! +The cold, black nights of the North Sea and its gales; the arid sands +of the Sahara; all his long service for her ending in that crowning +act of desertion--the story was clear in his mind from beginning to +end, detailed and complete. And she was laughing in there with Lionel +Callon! Her laughter was to him as some biting epigram which +epitomised the way in which she had spent the years of his absence. +His anger got the better of his self-control. + +"Stand away," he cried, in a low, savage voice, to the waiter. And +since the man did not instantly move, he seized him by the shoulders +and dragged him from the door. + +"Monsieur!" the man cried aloud, in a frightened voice, and the dish +which he was carrying fell with a clatter on to the floor. Inside the +room the laughter suddenly ceased. Tony listened for a second. He +could not hear even a whisper. There was complete silence. He smiled +rather grimly to himself; he was thinking that this was not, at all +events, the silence of contempt. + +Could he have seen through the door into the room he would have been +yet more convinced. All the gaiety vanished in an instant from +Millie's face. She was sitting opposite the door; she sat and stared +at it in terror. The blood ebbed from the cheeks, leaving them as +white as paper. + +"Monsieur!" she repeated, in so low a whisper that even Callon, on the +other side of the small table, hardly heard the word. Her lips were +dry, and she moistened them. "Monsieur!" she whispered again, and the +whisper was a question. She had no definite suspicion who "Monsieur" +was; she did not define him as her husband. She only understood that +somehow she was trapped. The sudden clatter of the dish upon the +floor, the loudness of the waiter's cry, which was not a mere protest, +but also a cry of fear, terrified her; they implied violence. She was +trapped. She sat paralysed upon her chair, staring across the table +over Callon's shoulder at the door. Callon meanwhile said not a word. +He had been sitting with his back to the door, and he twisted round in +his chair. To both of them it seemed ages before the handle was +turned. Yet so short was the interval of time that they could hardly +have reached the terrace through the open window had they sprung up at +the first sound of disturbance. + +Thus they were sitting, silent and motionless, when the door was +pushed open, and Tony stood in the doorway. At the sight of him Millie +uttered one loud scream, and clapped her hands over her face. Callon, +on the other hand, started up on to his feet. As he did so he upset +his wine-glass over the table-cloth; it fell and splintered on the +polished floor. He turned towards the intruder who so roughly forced +his way into the room. The eyes of that intruder took no account of +him; they were fixed upon Millie Stretton, as she sat cowering at the +table with her hands before her face. + +"What do you want?" cried Callon. "You have no right here!" + +"I have every right here," said Tony. "That is my wife!" + +It was still his wife at whom he looked, not at all towards Callon. +Callon was startled out of his wits. Detection he had always feared; +he had sought to guard against it by the use of every precaution known +to his devious strategy. But it was detection by Pamela Mardale and +her friends, who had once already laid him by the heels; the husband +had never entered into his calculations. He had accepted without +question Millie's version of the husband--he was the man who did not +care. In some part of the world he wandered, but where no one knew; +cut off from all his friends--indifferent, neglectful, and a fool. +Even now he could not believe. This might be some new trick of Pamela +Mardale's. + +"Your wife!" he exclaimed. "That is not true." + +"Not true?" cried Tony, in a terrible voice. He stretched out his arm +and pointed towards Millie. "Look!" + +Millie flinched as though she feared a blow. She dropped her head yet +lower. She held her fingers over her eyelids, closing them tightly. +She had looked once at Tony's face, she dared not look again. She sat +in darkness, trembling. One question was in her mind. "Would he kill +her?" Callon looked at her as he was bidden. Millie was wont to speak +of her husband with indifference, and a suggestion of scorn. Yet it +was her manifest terror which now convinced Callon that the husband +was indeed before him. Here the man was, sprung suddenly out of the +dark upon him, not neglectful, for he had the look of one who has +travelled from afar very quickly, and slept but little on the way; not +indifferent, for he was white with anger and his eyes were aflame. +Callon cursed the luck which had for a second time brought him into +such ill straits. He measured himself with Tony, and knew in the +instant that he was no match for him. There was a man, tired, no +doubt, and worn, but hard as iron, supple of muscle and limb, and +finely trained to the last superfluous ounce of flesh; while he +himself was soft with luxury and good living. He sought to temporise. + +"That is no proof," said he. "Any woman might be startled----" And +Tony broke fiercely in upon his stammered argument-- + +"Go out," he cried, "and wait for me!" + +The door was still open. Outside it in the passage the waiters were +clustered, listening. Inside the room Millie was listening. The order, +roughly given, was just one which Callon for very shame could not +obey. He would have liked to obey it, for confronting husbands was +never to his liking; all his art lay in eluding them. + +"Go out!" Tony repeated, and took a step forward. Callon could not cut +so poor a figure as to slink from the room like a whipped schoolboy. +Yet it would have gone better with him had he eaten his leek and gone. + +"It would not be safe to leave you," he babbled. And suddenly Tony +caught him by the throat, struck him upon the face, and then flung him +violently away. + +Callon reeled back through the open windows, slipped and fell at his +full length upon the terrace. His head struck the stone flags with a +horrible sound. He lay quite still in the strong light which poured +from the room; his eyes were closed, his face quite bloodless. It was +his business, as Mudge had said, to light amongst the teacups. + +Tony made no further movement towards him. The waiters went out on to +the terrace and lifted him up and carried him away. Then Tony turned +towards his wife. She had risen up from her chair and overturned it +when Tony had flung the interloper from the room. She now crouched +shuddering against the wall, with her eyes fixed in terror upon her +husband. As he turned towards her she uttered a sob and dropped upon +her knees before him. That was the end of all her scorn. She kneeled +in deadly fear, admiring him in the very frenzy of her fear. She had +no memory for the contemptuous letters which she had written and Tony +had carried under his pillow on the North Sea. Her little deceits and +plots and trickeries to hoodwink her friends, her little pretence of +passion for Lionel Callon--she knew at this moment that it never had +been more than a pretence--these were the matters which now she +remembered, and for which she dreaded punishment. She was wearing +jewels that night--jewels which Tony had given her in the good past +days when they lived together in the house in Deanery Street. They +shook and glittered upon her hair, about her neck, upon her bosom and +her arms. She kneeled in her delicate finery of lace and satin in this +room of luxury and bright flowers. There was no need for Tony now to +work to re-establish himself in her thoughts. She reached out her +hands to him in supplication. + +"I am not guilty," she moaned. "Tony! Tony!" + + + + + CHAPTER XXXII + + HUSBAND AND WIFE + + +The man who was no good had his triumph then. Only triumph was not at +all in his thoughts. + +"Oh, please!" he said very quietly, "get up from your knees. I don't +like to see you there. It hurts me." + +Millie raised her eyes to him in wonder. He did not mean to kill her, +then. All his violence, it seemed, was reserved for that poor warrior +of the drawing-rooms who had just been carried away stunned and +bleeding from the terrace. When Tony spoke to her his voice was rather +that of a man very dispirited and sad. He had indeed travelled through +the mountains of Morocco hot with anger against Callon the interloper; +but now that he had come face to face again with Millie, now that he +had heard her voice with its remembered accents, the interloper seemed +of little account, a creature to punish and be done with. The sadness +of his voice penetrated to Millie's heart. She rose and stood +submissively before him. + +In the passage outside the door the waiters were clustered whispering +together. Tony closed the door and shut the whispers out. Upon the +terrace, outside the window, a man was hesitating whether to enter or +no. Tony went to the window. + +"Who are you?" he asked. "What do you want?" + +"I am Giraud, the schoolmaster of Roquebrune," said the man, timidly. +"I bring a letter from Mademoiselle Mardale." + +"Let me see it!" said Tony; and he held out his hand for the letter. +He glanced at the superscription and gave it back. "It is not for me," +he said, and M. Giraud went away from the terrace. Tony turned back to +his wife. His mind was full of a comparison between the ways in which +he and she had each spent the years of absence. For him they had been +years of endeavour, persisted in through failure and perplexity until +success, but for her, was reached. And how had Millie spent them? He +looked at her sternly, and she said again in a faltering voice-- + +"I am innocent, Tony." + +And he replied-- + +"Could you have said as much to-morrow had I not come back to-night?" + +Millie had no answer to that question--she attempted none; and it was +even at that moment counted to her credit by her husband. She stood +silent for a while, and only the murmur of the sea breaking upon the +beach filled the room. A light wind breathed through the open window, +cool and fragrant, and made the shaded candles flicker upon the table. +Millie had her one poor excuse to offer, and she pleaded it humbly. + +"I thought that you had ceased to care what became of me," she said. + +Tony looked sharply at her. She was sincere--surely she was sincere. + +"You thought that?" he exclaimed; and he replaced her chair at the +table. "Sit down here! Let me understand! You thought that I had +ceased to care for you? When I ceased to write, I suppose?" + +Millie shook her head. + +"Before that?" + +Tony dropped into the chair on which Callon had been sitting. + +"Before that?" he exclaimed in perplexity. "When? Tell me!" + +Millie sat over against him at the table. + +"Do you remember the evening when you first told me that you had made +up your mind to go away and make a home for both of us? It was on that +evening. You gave your reason for going away. We had begun to +quarrel--we were drifting apart." + +"I remember," said Tony; "but we had not ceased to care then, neither +you nor I. It was just because I feared that at some time we might +cease to care that I was resolved to go away." + +"Ah," said Millie; "but already the change had begun. Yes, yes! Things +winch you thought you never could remember without a thrill you +remembered already with indifference--you remembered them without +being any longer moved or touched by the associations which they once +had had. I recollect the very words you used. I sat as still as could +be while you spoke them; but I never forgot them, Tony. There was a +particular instance which you mentioned--a song----" And suddenly Tony +laughed; but he laughed harshly, and there was no look of amusement on +his face. Millie stared at him in surprise, but he did not explain, +and she went on with her argument. + +"So when you ceased to write I was: still more convinced that you had +reaped to care. When you remained away after your father had died I +was yet more sure." + +Tony leaned across the white table-cloth with its glittering silver, +and fixed his eyes on her. + +"I will tell you why I ceased to write. Every letter which you wrote +to me when I was in New York was more contemptuous than the letter +which had preceded it. I had failed, and you despised me for my +failure. I had allowed myself to be tricked out of your money----" And +upon that Millie interrupted him-- + +"Oh no!" she cried; "you must not say that I despised you for that. +No! That is not fair. I never thought of the money. I offered you what +was left." + +Tony had put himself in the wrong here. He recognised his mistake, he +accepted Millie's correction. + +"Yes, that is true," he said; "you offered me all that was left--but +you offered it contemptuously; you had no shadow of belief that I +would use it to advantage--you had no faith in me at all. In your eyes +I was no good. Mind, I don't blame you. You were justified, no doubt. +I had set out to make a home for you, as many a man has done for his +wife. Only where they had succeeded I had failed. If I thought anything +at all----" he said, with an air of hesitation. + +"Well?" asked Millie. + +"I thought you might have expressed your contempt with a little less +of unkindness, or perhaps have hidden it altogether. You see, I was +not having an easy time in New York, and your letters made it very +much harder." + +"Oh, Tony," she said, in a low voice of self-reproach. She was sitting +with her hands clenched in front of her upon the table-cloth, her +forehead puckered, and in her eyes a look of great pain. + +"Never mind that," he replied; and he resumed his story. "I saw then +quite clearly that with each letter which you received from me, each +new instalment of my record of failure--for each letter was just that, +wasn't it?--your contempt grew. I was determined that if I could help +it your contempt should not embitter all our two lives. So I ceased to +write. For the same reason I stayed away, even after my father had +died. Had I come back then I should have come back a failure, proved +and self-confessed. And your scorn would have stayed with you. My +business henceforth was to destroy it, to prove to you that after all +I was some good--if not at money-making, at something else. I resolved +that we should not live together again until I could come to you and +say, 'You have no right to despise me. Here's the proof.'" + +Millie was learning now, even as Tony had learnt a minute ago. All +that he said to her was utterly surprising and strange. He had been +thinking of her, then, all the time while he was away! Indifference +was in no way the reason of his absence. + +"Oh, why did you not write this to me?" she cried. "It need not have +been a long letter, since you were unwilling to write. But just this +you might have written. It would have been better, kinder"--and she +paused upon the word, uttering it with hesitation and a shy +deprecating smile, as though aware that she had no claim upon his +kindness. "It would have been kinder than just to leave me here, not +knowing where you were, and thinking what I did." + +"It is true," said Tony, "I might have written. But would you have +believed me if I had? No." + +"Then you might have come to me," she urged. "Once--just for five +minutes--to tell me what you meant to do." + +"I might," Tony agreed; "in fact, I very nearly did. I was under the +windows of the house in Berkeley Square one night." And Millie +started. + +"Yes, you were," she said slowly. + +"You knew that?" + +"Yes; I knew it the next day." And she added, "I wish now, I think, +that you had come in that night." + +"Suppose that I had," said Tony; "suppose that I had told you of my +fine plan, you would have had no faith in it. You would merely have +thought, 'Here's another folly to be added to the rest.' Your contempt +would have been increased, that's all." + +It was quite strange to Millie Stretton that there ever could have +been a time when she had despised him. She saw him sitting now in +front of her, quiet and stern; she remembered her own terror when he +burst into the room, when he flung Callon headlong through the +windows, when he turned at last towards her. + +"We have been strangers to one another." + +"Yes," he replied; "I did not know you. I should never have left +you--now I understand that. I trusted you very blindly, but I did not +know you." + +Millie lowered her eyes from his face. + +"Nor I you," she answered. "What did you do when you went away that +night from Berkeley Square?" + +"I enlisted in the Foreign Legion in Algeria." + +Millie raised her head again with a start of surprise. + +"Soldiering was my trade, you see. It was the one profession where I +had just a little of that expert knowledge which is necessary nowadays +if you are to make your living." + +Something of his life in the Foreign Legion Tony now told her. He +spoke deliberately, since a light was beginning dimly to shine through +the darkness of his perplexities. Of a set purpose he described to her +the arduous perils of active service and the monotony of the +cantonments. He was resolved that she should understand in the spirit +and in the letter the life which for her sake he had led. He related +his expedition to the Figuig oasis, his march into the Sahara under +Tavernay. He took from his pocket the medals which he had won, and +laid them upon the tablecloth before her. + +"Look at them," he said; "I earned them. These are mine. I earned them +for you; and while I was earning them what were you doing?" + +Millie listened and looked. Wonder grew upon her. It was for her that +he had laboured and endured and succeeded! His story was a revelation +to her. Never had she dreamed that a man would so strive for any +woman. She had lived so long among the little things of the world--the +little emotions, the little passions, the little jealousies and +rivalries, the little aims, the little methods of attaining them, that +only with great difficulty could she realise a simpler and a wider +life. She was overwhelmed now. Pride and humiliation fought within +her--pride that Tony had so striven for her in silence and obscurity, +humiliation because she had fallen so short of his example. It was her +way to feel in superlatives at any crisis of her destiny, but surely +she had a justification now. + +"I never knew--I never thought! Oh, Tony!" she exclaimed, twisting her +hands together as she sat before him. + +"I became a sergeant," he said. "Then I brought back the remnants of +the geographical expedition to Ouargla." He taxed his memory for the +vivid details of that terrible retreat. He compelled her to realise +something of the dumb, implacable hostility of the Sahara, to see, in +the evening against the setting sun, the mounted figures of the +Touaregs, and to understand that the day's march had not shaken them +off. She seemed to be on the march herself, wondering whether she +would live out the day, or, if she survived that, whether she would +live out the night. + +"But you succeeded!" she cried, clinging to the fact that they were +both here in France, with the murmur of the Mediterranean in their +ears. "You came back." + +"Yes, I came back. One morning I marched my men through the gate of +Ouargla--and what were you doing upon that day?" + +Talking, perhaps, with Lionel Callon, in one of those unfrequented +public places with which London abounds! Millie could not tell. She +sat there and compared Lionel Callon with the man who was before her. +Memories of the kind of talk she was wont to hold with Lionel Callon +recurred to her, filling her with shame. She was glad to think that +when Tony led his broken, weary force through the gate of Ouargla +Lionel Callon had not been with her--had indeed been far away in +Chili. She suddenly placed her hands before her face and burst into +tears. + +"Oh, Tony," she whispered, in an abasement of humiliation. "Oh, Tony." + +"By that homeward march," he went on, "I gained my commission. That +was what I aimed at all the while, and I had earned it at the last. +Look!" + +He took from his pocket the letter which his colonel had handed to him +at Ain-Sefra. He had carefully treasured it all this while. He held it +out to her and made her read. + +"You see?" he said. "A commission won from the ranks in the hardest +service known to soldiers, won without advantage of name, or friends, +or money. Won just by myself. That is what I strove for. If I could +win that I could come back to you with a great pride. I should be no +longer the man who was no good. You yourself might even be proud of +me. I used to dream of that--to dream of something else." + +His voice softened a little, and a smile for a moment relaxed the +severity of his face. + +"Of what?" she asked. + +"Out there among the sand hills, under the stars at night, I used to +dream that we might perhaps get hold again of the little house in +Deanery Street, where we were so happy together once. We might pretend +almost that we had lived there all the time." + +He spoke in a voice of great longing, and Millie was touched to the +heart. She looked at Tony through her tears. There was a great longing +astir within her at this moment. Was that little house in Deanery +Street still a possibility? She did not presume to hope so much; but +she wished that she could have hoped. She pressed the letter which she +held against her breast; she would have loved to have held it to her +lips, but that again she did not dare to do. + +"At all events, you did succeed." she said; "I shall be glad to know +that. I shall always be glad--whatever happens now." + +"But I did not succeed," Tony replied. "I earned the commission, +yes!--I never held it. That letter was given to me one Monday by my +colonel at Ain-Sefra. You mentioned a song a minute ago, do you +remember?... I had lost the associations of that song. I laughed when +you mentioned it, and you were surprised. I laughed because when I +received that letter I took it away with me, and that song, with all +that it had ever meant, came back to my mind. I lay beneath the palm +trees, and I looked across the water past the islands, and I saw the +lights of the yachts in Oban Bay. I was on the dark lawn again, high +above the sea, the lighted windows of the house were behind me. I +heard your voice. Oh, I had got you altogether back that day," he +exclaimed, with a cry. "It was as though I held your hands and looked +into your eyes. I went back towards the barracks to write to you, and +as I went some one tapped me on the shoulder and brought me news of +you to wake me out of my dreams." + +Just for a moment Millie wondered who it was who had brought the news; +but the next words which Tony spoke drove the question from her mind. + +"A few more weeks and I should have held that commission. I might have +left the Legion, leaving behind me many friends and an honoured name. +As it was, I had to desert--I deserted that night." + +He spoke quite simply; but, nevertheless, the words fell with a shock +upon Millie. She uttered a low cry: "Oh, Tony!" she said. + +"Yes," he said, with a nod of the head, "I incurred that disgrace. I +shall be ashamed of it all my life. Had I been caught, it might have +meant an ignoble death; in any case, it would have meant years of +prison--and I should have deserved those years of prison." + +Millie shut her eyes in horror. Everything else that he had told her, +every other incident--his sufferings, his perils--all seemed of little +account beside this crowning risk, this crowning act of sacrifice. It +was not merely that he had risked a shameful death or a shameful +imprisonment. Millie was well aware that his whole nature and +character must be in revolt against the act itself. Desertion! It +implied disloyalty, untruth, deceit, cowardice--just those qualities, +indeed, which she knew Tony most to hate, which perhaps she had rather +despised him for hating. No man would have been more severe in the +punishment of a deserter than Tony himself. Yet he had deserted, and +upon her account. And he sat there telling her of it quietly, as +though it were the most insignificant action in the world. He might +have escaped the consequences--he would certainly not have escaped the +shame. + +But Millie's cup of remorse was not yet full. + +"Yet I cannot see that I could do anything else. To-night proves to me +that I was right, I think. I have come very quickly, yet I am only +just in time." There was a long stain of wine upon the table-cloth +beneath his eyes. There Callon had upset his glass upon Tony's +entrance. + +"Yes, it was time that I returned," he continued. "One way or another +a burden of disgrace had to be borne--if I stayed, just as certainly +as if I came away; I saw that quite clearly. So I came away." He +forbore to say that now the disgrace fell only upon his shoulders, +that she was saved from it. But Millie understood, and in her heart +she thanked him for his forbearance. "But it was hard on me, I think," +he said. "You see, even now I am on French soil, and subject to French +laws." + +And Millie, upon that, started up in alarm. + +"What do you mean?" she asked breathlessly. + +"There has been a disturbance here to-night, has there not? Suppose +that the manager of this restaurant has sent for a gendarme!" + +With a swift movement Millie gathered up the medals and held them +close in her clenched hands. + +"Oh, it does not need those to convict me; my name would be enough. +Let my name appear and there's a deserter from the Foreign Legion laid +by the heels in France. All the time we have been talking here I have +sat expecting that door to open behind me." + +Millie caught up a lace wrap which lay upon a sofa. She had the look +of a hunted creature. She spoke quickly and feverishly, in a whisper. + +"Oh, why did not you say this at once? Let us go!" + +Tony sat stubbornly in his chair. + +"No," said he, with his eyes fixed upon her. "I have given you an +account of how I have spent the years during which we have been apart. +Can you do the same?" + +He waited for her answer in suspense. To this question all his words +had been steadily leading; for this reason he had dwelt upon his own +career. Would she, stung by her remorse, lay before him truthfully and +without reserve the story of her years? If she did, why, that dim +light which shone amidst the darkness of his perplexities might +perhaps shine a little brighter. He uttered his question. Millie bowed +her head, and answered-- + +"I will." + +"Sit down, then, and tell me now." + +"Oh no," she exclaimed; "not here! It is not safe. As we go back to +Eze I will tell you everything." + +A look of relief came upon Tony's face. He rose and touched the bell. + +A waiter appeared. + +"I will pay the bill," he said. + +The waiter brought the bill and Tony discharged it. + +"The gentleman--M. Callon," the waiter said. "A doctor has been. He +has a concussion. It will be a little time before he is able to be +moved." + +"Indeed?" said Tony, with indifference. He walked with his wife out of +the little gaily-lighted room into the big, silent restaurant. A +single light faintly illuminated it. They crossed it to the door, and +went up the winding drive on to the road. The night was dry and clear +and warm. There was no moon. They walked in the pure twilight of the +stars round the gorge towards Eze. + + + + + CHAPTER XXXIII + + MILLIE'S STORY + + +They walked for a while in silence, side by side, yet not so close but +that there was an interval between them. Millie every now and then +glanced at Tony's face, but she saw only his profile, and with only +the glimmer of the starlight to serve her for a reading-lamp, she +could guess nothing of his expression. But he walked like a man +utterly dispirited and tired. The hopes, so stoutly cherished during +the last few years, had all crumbled away to-night. Perpetually +his thoughts recurred to that question, which now never could be +answered--if he had gone into the house in Berkeley Square on that +distant evening when he had been contented to pace for a little while +beneath the windows, would he have averted the trouble which had +reached its crisis to-night at the _Réserve?_ He thought not--he was +not sure; only he was certain that he should have gone in. He stopped +and turned back, looking towards the _Réserve_. A semicircle of lights +over the doorway was visible, and as he looked those lights were +suddenly extinguished. He heard Millie's voice at his side. + +"I will tell you now how the time has passed with me." And he saw that +she was looking steadfastly into his eyes. "The story will sound very +trivial, very contemptible, after what you have told me. It fills me +utterly with shame. But I should have told you it none the less had +you not asked for it--I rather wish that you had not asked for it; for +I think I must have told you of my own accord." + +She spoke in a quick, troubled voice, but it did not waver; nor did +her eyes once fall from his. The change in her was swift, no doubt. +But down there in the _Réserve_, where the lights were out, and the +sea echoed through empty rooms, she had had stern and savage teachers. +Terror, humiliation, and the spectacle of violence had torn away a +veil from before her eyes. She saw her own life in its true +perspective. And, that she might see it the more clearly and +understand, she had the story of another life wherewith to compare it. +It is a quality of big performances, whether in art or life, that +while they surprise when first apprehended, they appear upon thought +to be so simple that it is astonishing surprise was ever felt. +Something of that quality Tony's career possessed. It had come upon +Millie as a revelation, yet, now she was thinking: "Yes, that is what +Tony would do. How is it I never guessed?" She put him side by side +with that other man, the warrior of the drawing-rooms, and she was +filled with shame that ever she could have preferred the latter even +for a moment of madness. + +They walked slowly on again. Millie drew her lace wrap more closely +about her throat. + +"Are you cold?" asked Tony. "You are lightly clothed to be talking +here. We had better perhaps walk on, and keep what you have to tell me +until to-morrow." + +"No," she answered quickly, "I am not cold. And I must tell you what I +have to tell you to-night. I want all this bad, foolish part of my +life to end to-night, to be extinguished just as those lights were +extinguished a minute since. Only there is something I should like to +say to you first." Millie's voice wavered now and broke. "If we do not +walk along the road together any more," she went on timidly, "I will +still be glad that you came back to-night. I do not know that you will +believe that--I do not, indeed, see why you should; but I should very +much like you to believe it; for it is the truth. I have learned a +good deal, I think, during the last three hours. I would rather go on +alone--if it is to be so--in this dim, clean starlight, than ever be +back again in the little room with its lights and flowers. Do you +understand me?" + +"I think so," said Tony. + +"At all events, the road is visible ahead," she went on. "One sees it +glimmering, one can keep between the banks; while, in the little +lighted room it is easy to get lost." + +And thus to Millie now, as to Pamela when she rode back from her last +interview with Warrisden at the village of the three poplars, the +riband of white road stretching away in the dusk became a parable. + +"Yes," said Tony, "perhaps my path was really the easier one to +follow. It was direct and plain." + +"Ah," said Millie, "it only seems so because you have traversed it, +and are looking back. I do not think it was so simple and direct while +you walked upon it." And Tony, remembering the doubts and perplexities +which had besieged him, could not but assent. + +"I do not think, too, that it was so easy to discover at the +beginning." + +There rose before Tony's eyes the picture of a ketch-rigged boat +sailing at night over a calm sea. A man leaned over the bulwarks, and +the bright glare from a lightship ran across the waves and flashed +upon his face. Tony remembered the moment very clearly when he had +first hit upon his plan; he remembered the weeks of anxiety of which +it was the outcome. No, the road had not been easy to find at the +beginning. He was silent for a minute, and then he said gently-- + +"I am sorry that I asked you to tell your story--I am sorry that I +did not leave the decision to you. But it shall be as though you told +it of your own accord." + +The sentence was a concession, no less in the manner of its utterance +than in the words themselves. Millie took heart, and told him the +whole story of her dealings with Lionel Callon, without excuses and +without concealments. + +"I seemed to mean so much to him, so little to you," she said. "You +see, I did not understand you at all. You were away, too, and he was +near. I do not defend myself." + +She did not spare herself, she taxed her memory for the details of her +days; and as she spoke the story seemed more utterly contemptible and +small than even she in her abasement had imagined it would be. But she +struggled through with it to the end. + +"That night when you stood beneath the windows in Berkeley Square," +she said, "he was with me. He ran in from Lady Millingham's party and +talked with me for half an hour. Yes, at the very time when you were +standing on the pavement he was within the house. I know, for you were +seen, and on the next day I was told of your presence. I was afraid +then. The news was a shock to me. I thought, 'Suppose you had come +in!'" + +"But, back there, in the room," Tony interrupted, "you told me that +you wished I had come in." + +"Yes," she answered. "And it is quite true; I wish now that you had +come in." + +She told him of the drive round Regent's Park, and of the consent she +gave that night to Lionel Callon. + +"I think you know everything now," she said. "I have tried to forget +nothing. I want you, whatever you decide to do, to decide knowing +everything." + +"Thank you," said Tony, simply. And she added-- + +"I am not the first woman I know who has thrown away the substance for +the shadow." + +Upon the rest of that walk little was said. They went forward beneath +the stars. A great peace lay upon sea and land. The hills rose dark +and high upon their left hand, the sea murmured and whispered to them +upon the right. Millie walked even more slowly as they neared the +hotel at Eze, and Tony turned to her with a question-- + +"You are tired?" + +"No," she answered. + +She was thinking that very likely she would never walk again on any +road with Tony at her side, and she was minded to prolong this last +walk to the last possible moment. For in this one night Tony had +reconquered her. It was not merely that his story had filled her with +amazement and pride, but she had seen him that night strong and +dominant, as she had never dreamed of seeing him. She loved his very +sternness towards herself. Not once had he spoken her name and called +her "Millie." She had watched for that and longed for it, and yet +because he had not used it she was the nearer to worship. Once she +said to him with a start of anxiety-- + +"You are not staying here under your own name?" + +"No," he replied. "A friend has taken rooms in Monte Carlo for both of +us. Only his name has been given." + +"And you will leave France to-morrow?" + +"Yes." + +"Promise!" she cried. + +Tony promised, with a look of curiosity at his wife. Why should she be +so eager for his safety? He did not understand. He was wondering what +he must do in this crisis of their lives. Was he to come, in spite of +all his efforts, to that ordinary compromise which it had been his +object to avoid? + +They reached the door of the hotel, and there Tony halted. + +"Good night!" he said; he did not hold out his hand. He stood +confronting Millie with the light from the hall lamp falling full upon +his face. Millie hoped that he would say something more--just a little +word of kindness or forgiveness--if only she waited long enough +without answering him; and she was willing to wait until the morning +came, he did indeed speak again, and then Millie was sorry that she +had waited. For he said the one really cruel thing amongst all the +words he had said that night. He was not aware of its cruelty, he was +only conscious of its truth. + +"Do you know." he said--and upon his tired face there came a momentary +smile--"to-night I miss the Legion very much." Again he said "Good +night." + +This time Millie answered him; and in an instant he was gone. She +could have cried out; she could hardly restrain her voice from calling +him back to her. "Was this the end?" she asked of herself. "That one +cruel sentence, and then the commonplace Good night, without so much +as a touch of the hands. Was this the very end?" A sharp fear stabbed +her. For a few moments she heard Tony's footsteps upon the flags in +front of the hotel, and then for a few moments upon the gravel of the +garden path; and after that she heard only the murmur of the sea. And +all at once for her the world was empty. "Was this the end?" she asked +herself again most piteously; "this, which might have been the +beginning." Slowly she went up to her rooms. Sleep did not visit her +that night. + + + + + CHAPTER XXXIV + + THE NEXT MORNING + + +There was another who kept a vigil all the night In the Villa +Pontignard Pamela Mardale saw from her window the morning break, and +wondered in dread what had happened upon that broad terrace by the +sea. She dressed and went down into the garden. As yet the world was +grey and cool, and something of its quietude entered into her and gave +her peace. A light mist hung over the sea, birds sang sweetly in the +trees, and from the chimneys of Roquebrune the blue smoke began to +coil. In the homely suggestions of that blue smoke Pamela found a +comfort. She watched it for a while, and then there came a flush of +rose upon the crests of the hills. The mist was swept away from the +floor of the sea, shadows and light suddenly ran down the hillsides, +and the waves danced with a sparkle of gold. The sun had risen. Pamela +saw a man coming up the open slope from Roquebrune to the villa. It +was M. Giraud. She ran to the gate and met him there. + +"Well?" she asked. And he answered sadly-- + +"I arrived too late." + +The colour went from Pamela's cheeks. She set a hand upon the gate to +steady herself. There was an expression of utter consternation on her +face. + +"Too late, I mean," the schoolmaster explained hurriedly, "to help +you, to be of any real service to you. But the harm done is perhaps +not so great as you fear." + +He described to her what he had seen--Lionel Callon lying outstretched +and insensible upon the pavement, Tony and Millie Stretton within the +room. + +"We removed M. Callon to his bedroom," he said. "Then I fetched a +doctor. M. Callon will recover--it is a concussion of the brain. He +will be ill for a little time, but he will get well." + +"And the man and the woman?" Pamela asked eagerly. "The two within the +room? What of them?" + +"They were standing opposite to one another." The schoolmaster had not +seen Millie on her knees. "A chair was overturned, the chair on which +she had sat. She was in great distress, and, I think, afraid; but he +spoke quietly." He described how he had offered Tony the letter, and +how Tony had closed the door of the room upon the waiters. + +"The manager did not know what to do, whether to send for help or not. +But I did not think that there was any danger to the woman in the +room, and I urged him to do nothing." + +"Thank you," said Pamela, gratefully. "Indeed, you were in time to +help me." + +But even then she did not know how much she was indebted to the +schoolmaster's advice. She was thinking of the scandal which must have +arisen had the police been called in, of the publication of Millie's +folly to the world of her acquaintances. That was prevented now. If +Tony took back his wife--as with all her heart she hoped he would--he +would not, at all events, take back one of whom gossip would be +speaking with a slighting tongue. She was not aware that Tony had +deserted from the Legion to keep his tryst upon the thirty-first of +the month. Afterwards, when she did learn this, she was glad that she +had not lacked warmth when she had expressed her gratitude to M. +Giraud. A look of pleasure came into the schoolmaster's face. + +"I am very glad," he said. "When I brought the doctor back the two +within the room were talking quietly together; we could hear their +voices through the door. So I came away. I walked up to the villa +here. But it was already late, and the lights were out--except in one +room on an upper floor looking over the sea--that room," and he +pointed to a window. + +"Yes, that is my room," said Pamela. + +"I thought it was likely to be yours, and I hesitated whether I should +fling up a stone; but I was not sure that it was your room. So I +determined to wait until the morning. I am sorry, for you have been +very anxious and have not slept--I can see that. I could have saved +you some hours of anxiety." + +Pamela laughed in friendliness, and the laugh told him surely that her +distress had gone from her. + +"That does not matter," she said. "You have brought me very good news. +I could well afford to wait for it." + +The schoolmaster remained in an awkward hesitation at the gate; it was +clear that he had something more to say. It was no less clear that he +found the utterance of it very difficult. Pamela guessed what was in +his mind, and, after her own fashion, she helped him to speak it. She +opened the gate, which up till now had stood closed between them. + +"Come in for a little while, won't you?" she said; and she led the way +through the garden to that narrow corner on the bluff of the hill +which had so many associations for them both. If M. Giraud meant to +say what she thought he did, here was the one place where utterance +would be easy. Here they had interchanged, in other times, their +innermost thoughts, their most sacred confidences. The stone parapet, +the bench, the plot of grass, the cedar in the angle of the +corner--among these familiar things memories must throb for him even +as they did for her. Pamela sat down upon the parapet and, leaning +over, gazed into the torrent far below. She wished him to take his +time. She had a thought that even if he had not in his mind that +utterance which she hoped to hear, the recollection of those other +days, vividly renewed, might suggest it. And in a moment or two he +spoke. + +"It is true, mademoiselle, that I was of service to you last night?" + +"Yes," replied Pamela, gently; "that is quite true." + +"I am glad," he continued. "I shall have that to remember. I do not +suppose that I shall see you often any more. Very likely you will not +come back to Roquebrune--very likely I shall never see you again. And +if I do not, I should like you to know that last night will make a +difference to me." + +He was now speaking with a simple directness. Pamela raised her face +towards his. He could see that his words greatly rejoiced her; a very +tender smile was upon her lips, and her eyes shone. There were tears +in them. + +"I am so glad," she said. + +"I resented your coming to me at first," he went on--"I was a fool; I +am now most grateful that you did come. I learnt that you had at last +found the happiness which I think you have always deserved. You know I +have always thought that it is a bad thing when such a one as you is +wasted upon loneliness and misery--the world is not so rich that it +can afford such waste. And if only because you told me that a change +had come for you, I should be grateful for the visit which you paid +me. But there is more. You spoke a very true word last night when you +told me it was a help to be needed by those one needs." + +"You think that too?" said Pamela. + +"Yes, now I do," he answered. "It will always be a great pride to me +that you needed me. I shall never forget that you knocked upon my door +one dark night in great distress. I shall never forget your face, as I +saw it framed in the light when I came out into the porch. I shall +never forget that you stood within my room, and called upon me, in the +name of our old comradeship, to rise up and help you. I think my room +will be hallowed by that recollection." And he lowered his voice +suddenly and said, "I think I shall see you as I saw you when I opened +the door, between myself and the threshold of the wineshop; that is +what I meant to say." + +He held out his hand, and, as Pamela took it, he raised her hand to +his lips and kissed it. + +"Good-bye," he said; and turning away quickly he left her up in the +place where she had known the best of him, and went down to his +schoolroom in the square of Roquebrune. Very soon the sing-song of the +children's voices was droning from the open windows. + +Pamela remained upon the terrace. The breaking of old ties is always a +melancholy business, and here was one broken to-day. It was very +unlikely, she thought, that she would ever see her friend the little +schoolmaster again. She would be returning to England immediately, and +she would not come back to the Villa Pontignard. + +She was still in that corner of the garden when another visitor called +upon her. She heard his footsteps on the gravel of the path, and, +looking up, saw Warrisden approaching her. She rose from the parapet +and went forward to meet him. She understood that he had come with his +old question, and she spoke first. The question could wait just for a +little while. + +"You have seen Tony?" she asked. + +"Yes; late last night," he replied. "I waited at the hotel for him. He +said nothing more than 'Good night,' and went at once to his room." + +"And this morning?" + +"This morning," said Warrisden, "he has gone. I did not see him. He +went away with his luggage before I was up, and he left no message." + +Pamela stood thoughtful and silent. + +"It is the best thing he could have done," Warrisden continued; "for +he is not safe in France." + +"Not safe?" + +"No. Did he not tell you? He deserted from the French Legion. It was +the only way in which he could reach Roquebrune by the date you +named." + +Pamela was startled, but she was startled into activity. + +"Will you wait for me here?" she said. "I will get my hat." + +She ran into the villa, and coming out again said, "Let us go down to +the station." + +They hurried down the steep flight of steps. At the station Warrisden +asked, "Shall I book to Monte Carlo?" + +"No; to Eze," she replied. + +She hardly spoke at all during the journey; and Warrisden kept his +question in reserve--this was plainly no time to utter it. Pamela +walked at once to the hotel. + +"Is Lady Stretton in?" she asked; and the porter replied-- + +"No, Madame. She left for England an hour ago." + +"Alone?" asked Pamela. + +"No. A gentleman came and took her away." + +Pamela turned towards Warrisden with a look of great joy upon her +face. + +"They have gone together," she cried. "He has taken his risks. He has +not forgotten that lesson learnt on the North Sea. I had a fear this +morning that he had." + +"And you?" said Warrisden, putting his question at last. + +Pamela moved away from the door until they were out of earshot. Then +she said-- + +"I will take my risks too." Her eyes dwelt quietly upon her companion, +and she added, "And I think the risks are very small." + + + + + CHAPTER XXXV + + THE LITTLE HOUSE IN DEANERY STREET + + +Pamela construed the departure of Tony and his wife together according +to her hopes. They were united again. She was content with that fact, +and looked no further, since her own affairs had become of an +engrossing interest. But the last word has not been said about the +Truants. It was not, indeed, until the greater part of a year had +passed that the section of their history which is related in this book +reached any point of finality. + +In the early days of January the Truants arrived in London at the +close of a long visit to Scotland. They got out upon Euston platform, +and entering their brougham, drove off. They had not driven far before +Millie looked out of the window and started forward with her hand upon +the check-string. It was dusk, and the evening was not clear. But she +saw, nevertheless, that the coachman had turned down to the left +amongst the squares of Bloomsbury, and that is not the way from Euston +to Regent's Park. She did not pull the check-string, however. She +looked curiously at Tony, who was sitting beside her, and then leaned +back in the carriage. With her quick adaptability she had fallen into +a habit of not questioning her husband. Since the night in the South +of France she had given herself into his hands with a devotion which, +to tell the truth, had something of slavishness. It was his wish, +apparently, that the recollection of that night should still be a +barrier between them, hindering them from anything but an exchange of +courtesies. She bowed to the wish without complaint. Tonight, however, +as they drove through the unaccustomed streets, there rose within her +mind a hope. She would have stifled it, dreading disappointment; but +it was stronger than her will. Moreover, it received each minute fresh +encouragement. The brougham crossed Oxford Street, turned down South +Audley Street, and traversed thence into Park Street. Millie now sat +forward in her seat. She glanced at her husband. Tony, with a face of +indifference, was looking out of the window. Yet the wonderful thing, +it seemed, was coming to pass, nay, had come to pass. For already the +brougham had stopped, and the door at which it stopped was the door of +the little house in Deanery Street. + +Tony turned to his wife with a smile. + +"Home!" he said. + +She sat there incredulous, even though the look of the house, the +windows, the very pavement were speaking to her memories. There was +the blank wall on the north side which her drawing-room window +overlooked, there was the sharp curve of the street into Park Lane, +there was the end of Dorchester House. Here the happiest years of her +life, yes, and of Tony's, too, had been passed. She had known that to +be truth for a long while now. She had come of late to think that they +were the only really happy years which had fallen to her lot. The +memories of them throbbed about her now with a vividness which was +poignant. + +"Is it true?" she asked, with a catch of her breath. "Is it really +true, Tony?" + +"Yes, this is our home." + +Millie descended from the carriage. Tony looked at her curiously. This +sudden arrival at the new home, which was the old, had proved a +greater shock to her than he had expected. For a little while after +their return to England Millie had dwelt upon the words which Tony had +spoken to her in the _Réserve_ by the sea. He had dreamed of buying +the house in Deanery Street, of resuming there the life which they had +led together there, in the days when they had been good friends as +well as good lovers. That dream for a time she had made her own. She +had come to long for its fulfilment, as she had never longed for +anything else in the world; she had believed that sooner or later Tony +would relent, and that it would be fulfilled. But the months had +passed, and now, when she had given up hope, unexpectedly it had been +fulfilled. She stood upon the pavement, almost dazed. + +"You never said a word of what you meant to do," she said with a +smile, as though excusing herself for her unresponsive manner. The +door was open. She went into the house and Tony followed her. They +mounted the stairs into the drawing-room. + +"As far as I could," Tony said, "I had the house furnished just as it +used to be. I could not get all the pictures which we once had, but +you see I have done my best." + +Millie looked round the room. There was the piano standing just as it +used to do, the carpet, the wall-paper were all of the old pattern. It +seemed to her that she had never left the house; that the years in +Berkeley Square and Regent's Park were a mere nightmare from which she +had just awaked. And then she looked at Tony. No, these latter years +had been quite real--he bore the marks of them upon his face. The +boyishness had gone. No doubt, she thought, it was the same with her. + +Tony stood and looked at her with an eagerness which she did not +understand. + +"Are you glad?" he asked earnestly. "Millie, are you pleased?" + +She stood in front of him with a very serious face. Once a smile +brightened it; but it was a smile of doubt, of question. + +"I am not sure," she said. "I know that you have been very kind. You +have done this to please me. But----" And her voice wavered a little. + +"Well?" said Tony. + +"But," she went on with difficulty, "I am not sure that I can endure +it, unless things are different from what they have been lately. I +shall be reminded every minute of other times, and the comparison +between those times and the present will be very painful. I think that +I shall be very unhappy, much more unhappy than I have ever been, even +lately." + +Her voice sank to a whisper at the end. The little house in Deanery +Street, even in her dreams, had been no more than a symbol. She had +longed for it as the outward and visible sign of the complete +reconciliation on which her heart was set. But to have the sign and to +know that it signified nothing--she dreaded that possibility now. Only +for a very few moments she dreaded it. + +"I don't think I can endure it, Tony," she said sadly. And the next +moment his arms were about her, and her head was resting against his +breast. + +"Millie!" he cried in a low voice; and again "Millie!" + +Her face was white, her eyelids closed over her eyes. Tony thought +that she had swooned. But when he moved her hands held him close to +her, held him tightly, as though she dreaded to lose him. + +"Millie," he said, "do you remember the lights in Oban Bay? And the +gulls calling at night above the islands?" + +"I am forgiven, then?" she whispered; and he answered only-- + +"Hush!" + +But the one word was enough. + + + + + CHAPTER XXXVI + + THE END + + +Tony wished for no mention of the word. He had not brought her to that +house that he might forgive her, but because he wanted her there. If +forgiveness was in question, there was much to be said upon her side +too. He was to blame, as Pamela had written. He had during the last +few months begun to realise the justice of that sentence more clearly +than he had done even when the letter was fresh within his thoughts. + +"I have learnt something," he said to Millie, "which I might have +known before, but never did. It is this. Although a man may be content +to know that love exists, that is not the case with women. They want +the love expressed, continually expressed, not necessarily in words, +but in a hundred little ways. I did not think of that. There was the +mistake I made: I left you alone to think just what you chose. Well, +that's all over now. I bought this house not merely to please you, but +as much to please myself; for as soon as I understood that after all +the compromise which I dreaded need not be our lot--that after all the +life together of which I used to dream was possible, was within arm's +reach if only one would put out an arm and grasp it, I wanted you +here. As soon as I was sure, quite sure that I had recaptured you, I +wanted you here." + +He spoke with passion, holding her in his arms. Millie remained quite +still for a while, and then she asked-- + +"Do you miss the Legion? As much as you thought you would--as much as +you did that night at Eze?" + +He answered, "No"; and spoke the truth. On that night at Eze he had +not foreseen the outcome of his swift return, of his irruption into +the gaily lighted room murmurous with the sea. On that night he had +revealed himself to Millie, and the revelation had been the beginning +of love in her rather than its resumption. This he had come to +understand, and, understanding, could reply with truth that he did not +miss the Legion as he had thought he would. There were moments, no +doubt, when the sound of a bugle on a still morning would stir him to +a sense of loss, and he would fall to dreaming of Tavernay and +Barbier, and his old comrades, and the menacing silence of the Sahara. +At times, too, the yapping of dogs in the street would call up vividly +before his mind the picture of some tent village in Morocco where he +had camped. Or the wind roaring amongst trees on a night of storm +would set his mind wondering whether the ketch _Perseverance_ was +heading to the white-crested rollers, close-reefed between the Dogger +and the Fisher Banks; and for a little while he would feel the savour +of the brine sharp upon his lips, and longing would be busy at his +heart--for the Ishmaelite cannot easily become a stay-at-home. These, +however, were but the passing moods. + +Of one other character who took an important if an unobtrusive part in +shaping the fortunes of the Truants a final word may be said. A +glimpse of that man, of the real man in him, was vouchsafed to +Warrisden two summers later. It happened that Warrisden attended a +public dinner which was held in a restaurant in Oxford Street. He left +the company before the dinner was over, since he intended to fetch his +wife Pamela, who was on that June evening witnessing a performance of +"Rigoletto" at the Opera House in Covent Garden. Warrisden rose from +the table and slipped out, as he thought at eleven o'clock, but on +descending into the hall he found that he had miscalculated the time. +It was as yet only a quarter to the hour, and having fifteen minutes +to spare, he determined to walk. The night was hot; he threw his +overcoat across his arm, and turning southwards out of Oxford Street, +passed down a narrow road in the neighbourhood of Drury Lane. In those +days, which were not, after all, so very distant from our own, the +great blocks of model dwellings had not been as yet erected; squalid +courts and rookeries opened on to ill-lighted passages; the houses had +a ruinous and a miserable look. There were few people abroad as +Warrisden passed through the quarter, and his breast-plate of white +shirt-front made him a conspicuous figure. He had come about half the +way from Oxford Street when he saw two men suddenly emerge from the +mouth of a narrow court a few yards in front of him. The two men were +speaking, or rather shouting, at one another; and from the violence of +their gestures no less than from the abusive nature of the language +which they used, it was plain that they were quarrelling. Words and +gestures led to blows. Warrisden saw one man strike the other and fell +him to the ground. + +In an instant a little group of people was gathered about the +combatants, people intensely silent and interested--the sightseers of +the London streets who spring from nowhere with inconceivable +rapidity, as though they had been waiting in some secret spot hard by +for just this particular spectacle in this particular place. +Warrisden, indeed, was wondering carelessly at the speed with which +the small crowd had gathered when he came abreast of it. He stopped +and peered over the shoulders of the men and women in front of him +that he might see the better. The two disputants had relapsed +apparently into mere vituperation. Warrisden pressed forward, and +those in front parted and made way for him. He did not, however, take +advantage of the deference shown to his attire; for at that moment a +voice whispered in his ear-- + +"You had better slip out. This row is got up for you." + +Warrisden turned upon his heel. He saw a short, stout, meanly dressed +man of an elderly appearance moving away from his side; no doubt it +was he who had warned him. Warrisden took the advice, all the more +readily because he perceived that the group was, as it were, beginning +to reform itself, with him as the new centre. He was, however, still +upon the outskirts. He pushed quickly out into the open street, +crossed the road, and continued on his way. In front of him he saw the +stout, elderly man, and, quickening his pace, he caught him up. + +"I have to thank you," he said, "for saving me from an awkward +moment." + +"Yes," replied the stout man; and Warrisden, as he heard his voice, +glanced at him with a sudden curiosity. But his hat was low upon his +brows, and the street was dark. "It is an old trick, but the old +tricks are the tricks which succeed. There was no real quarrel at all. +Those two men were merely pretending to quarrel in order to attract +your attention. You were seen approaching--that white shirt-front +naturally inspired hope. In another minute you would have been hustled +down the court and into one of the houses at the end. You would have +been lucky if, half an hour later, you were turned out into the street +stripped of everything of value you possess, half naked and half dead +into the bargain. Good night!" + +The little man crossed the road abruptly. It was plain that he needed +neither thanks nor any further conversation. It occurred, indeed, to +Warrisden that he was deliberately avoiding conversation. Warrisden +accordingly walked on to the Opera House, and, meeting his wife in the +vestibule, told her this story while they waited for their brougham. + +As they drove together homewards, he added-- + +"That is not all, Pamela. I can't help thinking--it is absurd, of +course--and yet, I don't know; but the little stout man reminded me +very much of some one we both know." + +Pamela turned suddenly towards her husband-- + +"Mr. Mudge?" she said. + +"Yes," replied Warrisden, with some astonishment at the accuracy of +her guess. "He reminded me of Mudge." + +"It was Mr. Mudge," she said. For a moment or two she was silent; then +she let her hand fall upon her husband's: "He was a very good friend +to us," she said gently--"to all of us." + + + + + THE END + + + + + * * * * * + PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, LONDON AND BECCLES. + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Truants, by +A. E. W. 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E. W. Mason"> + +<meta name="Publisher" content="Smith, Elder & Co."> +<meta name="Date" content="1904"> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1"> +<style type="text/css"> +body {margin-left:10%; + margin-right:10%; background-color:#FFFFFF;} + + + +p.normal {text-indent:.25in; text-align: justify;} +.center {margin: auto; text-align:center; margin-top:24pt; margin-bottom:24pt} +.stage {margin-left:10%} + + +p.right {text-align:right; margin-right:20%;} + +p.continue {text-indent: 0in; margin-top:9pt;} +.text10 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:10%; margin-right:0px; font-size:90%;} +.text20 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:20%; margin-right:0px; font-size:90%;} + + +.poem0 { + margin-top: 24pt; margin-left: 0%; + margin-right: 0%; text-align: left; + margin-bottom: 24pt; font-size:90%} + +.poem1 { + margin-top: 24pt; margin-left: 2em; + margin-right: 10%; text-align: left; + margin-bottom: 24pt; font-size:90%} + +.poem2 { + margin-top: 24pt; margin-left: 20%; + margin-right: 20%; text-align: left; + margin-bottom: 24pt; font-size:90%} + +.poem3 { + margin-top: 24pt; margin-left: 30%; + margin-right: 30%; text-align: left; + margin-bottom: 24pt; font-size:90%} + + + + + +figcenter {margin:auto; text-align:center; margin-top:9pt;} + +.t0 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:0em; margin-right:0px;} +.t1 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:1em; margin-right:0px;} +.t2 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:2em; margin-right:0px;} +.t3 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:3em; margin-right:0px;} +.t4 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:4em; margin-right:0px;} +.t5 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:5em; margin-right:0px;} +.t6 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:6em; margin-right:0px;} +.t7 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:7em; margin-right:0px;} +.t8 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:8em; margin-right:0px;} +.t9 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:9em; margin-right:0px;} +.t10 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:10em; margin-right:0px;} +.t11 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:11em; margin-right:0px;} +.t12 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:12em; margin-right:0px;} +.t13 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:13em; margin-right:0px;} +.t14 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:14em; margin-right:0px;} +.t15 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:15em; margin-right:0px;} +.t16 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:16em; margin-right:0px;} + + +.quote {text-indent:.25in; text-align: justify; font-size:90%; margin-top:36pt; margin-bottom:36pt} +.ctrquote {text-align: center; font-size:90%; margin-top:36pt; margin-bottom:36pt} + +.dateline {text-align:right; font-size:90%; margin-right:10%; margin-top:24pt; margin-bottom:24pt} + +h1,h2,h3,h4,h5 {text-align: center;} + +span.sc {font-variant: small-caps; font-size:110%;} +span.sc2 {font-variant: small-caps; font-size:90%;} + +hr.W10 {width:10%; color:black; margin-top:24pt; margin-bottom:24pt} + +hr.W20 {width:20%; color:black; margin-top:12pt; margin-bottom:12pt} + +hr.W50 {width:50%; color:black;} +hr.W90 {width:90%; color:black;} + +p.hang1 {margin-left:3em; text-indent:-3em;} +p.hang2 {margin-left:3em; text-indent:0em;} + + +</style> + +</head> + +<body> + + +<pre> + +Project Gutenberg's The Truants, by A. E. W. (Alfred Edward Woodley) Mason + +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: The Truants + +Author: A. E. W. (Alfred Edward Woodley) Mason + +Release Date: January 27, 2012 [EBook #38685] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE TRUANTS *** + + + + +Produced by Charles Bowen, from page scans provided by the Web Archive + + + + + +</pre> + +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<p class="hang1">Transcriber's Notes:<br> + +1. Page scan source:<br> +http://www.archive.org/details/truantsnovel00maso</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>THE TRUANTS</h2> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<table cellpadding="30" style="width:60%; margin-left:20%; border: 4px solid black; font-weight:bold"> +<tr> +<td> +<h4>BY THE SAME AUTHOR</h4> +<hr class="W10"> + +<p class="continue">THE FOUR FEATHERS.<br> +CLEMENTINA.<br> +MIRANDA OF THE BALCONY.<br> +THE WATCHERS.<br> +THE COURTSHIP OF MORRICE BUCKLER.<br> +THE PHILANDERERS.<br> +LAWRENCE CLAVERING.<br> +ENSIGN KNIGHTLEY, AND OTHER STORIES.</p> + +</td></tr></table> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h1>THE TRUANTS</h1> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h5>BY</h5> + +<h3>A. E. W. MASON</h3> + +<h5>AUTHOR OF</h5> + +<h5>"THE FOUR FEATHERS," "MIRANDA OF THE BALCONY,"<br> + +ETC., ETC.</h5> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h3>LONDON<br> + +SMITH, ELDER & CO., 15, WATERLOO PLACE<br> + +1904</h3> + +<p class="center">(<i>All rights reserved</i>)</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h5>PRINTED BY<br> + +WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED,<br> + +LONDON AND BECCLES.</h5> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> + +<table cellpadding="10" style="width:90%; margin-left:5%; font-weight:bold"> +<colgroup><col style="width:10%; text-align:right; vertical-align:top"><col style="width:90%"></colgroup> +<tr> +<td><span class="sc2">Chapter</span></td> +<td> </td> +</tr><tr> +<td>I.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_01" href="#div1_01">Pamela Mardale learns a very little History.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>II.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_02" href="#div1_02">Pamela looks on.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>III.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_03" href="#div1_03">The Truants.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>IV.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_04" href="#div1_04">Tony Stretton makes a Proposal.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>V.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_05" href="#div1_05">Pamela makes a Promise.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>VI.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_06" href="#div1_06">News of Tony.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>VII.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_07" href="#div1_07">The Lady on the Stairs.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>VIII.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_08" href="#div1_08">Gideon's Fleece.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>IX.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_09" href="#div1_09">The New Road.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>X.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_10" href="#div1_10">Mr. Chase.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XI.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_11" href="#div1_11">On the Dogger Bank.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XII.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_12" href="#div1_12">Tony's Inspiration.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XIII.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_13" href="#div1_13">Tony Stretton returns to Stepney.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XIV.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_14" href="#div1_14">Tony Stretton pays a Visit to Berkeley Square.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XV.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_15" href="#div1_15">Mr. Mudge comes to the Rescue.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XVI.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_16" href="#div1_16">The Foreign Legion.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XVII.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_17" href="#div1_17">Callon leaves England.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XVIII.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_18" href="#div1_18">South of Ouargla.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XIX.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_19" href="#div1_19">The Turnpike Gate.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XX.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_20" href="#div1_20">Mr. Chase does not answer.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XXI.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_21" href="#div1_21">Callon redivivus.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XXII.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_22" href="#div1_22">Mr. Mudge's Confession.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XXIII.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_23" href="#div1_23">Roquebrune Revisited.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XXIV.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_24" href="#div1_24">The End of the Experiment.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XXV.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_25" href="#div1_25">Tony Stretton bids Farewell to the Legion.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XXVI.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_26" href="#div1_26">Bad News for Pamela.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XXVII.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_27" href="#div1_27">"Balak!"</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XXVIII.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_28" href="#div1_28">Homewards.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XXIX.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_29" href="#div1_29">Pamela meets a Stranger.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XXX.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_30" href="#div1_30">M. Giraud again.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XXXI.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_31" href="#div1_31">At the Réserve.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XXXII.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_32" href="#div1_32">Husband and Wife.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XXXIII.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_33" href="#div1_33">Millie's Story.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XXXIV.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_34" href="#div1_34">The Next Morning.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XXXV.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_35" href="#div1_35">The Little House in Deanery Street.</a></span></p></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XXXVI.</td> +<td><p class="hang1"><span class="sc"><a name="div1Ref_36" href="#div1_36">The End.</a></span></p></td> +</tr></table> + +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h1>THE TRUANTS</h1> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER I</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_01" href="#div1Ref_01">PAMELA MARDALE LEARNS A VERY LITTLE HISTORY</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">There were only two amongst all Pamela Mardale's friends who guessed +that anything was wrong with her; and those two included neither her +father nor her mother. Her mother, indeed, might have guessed, had she +been a different woman. But she was a woman of schemes and little +plots, who watched with concentration their immediate developments, +but had no eyes for any lasting consequence. And it was no doubt as +well for her peace of mind that she never guessed. But of the others +it was unlikely that any one would suspect the truth. For Pamela made +no outward sign. She hunted through the winter from her home under the +Croft Hill in Leicestershire; she went everywhere, as the saying is, +during the season in London; she held her own in her own world, +lacking neither good spirits nor the look of health. There were, +perhaps, two small peculiarities which marked her off from her +companions. She was interested in things rather than in persons, and +she preferred to talk to old men rather than to youths. But such +points, taken by themselves, were not of an importance to attract +attention.</p> + +<p class="normal">Yet there were two amongst her friends who suspected: Alan Warrisden +and the schoolmaster of Roquebrune, the little village carved out of +the hillside to the east of Monte Carlo. The schoolmaster was the +nearer to the truth, for he not only knew that something was amiss, he +suspected what the something was. But then he had a certain advantage, +since he had known Pamela Mardale when she was a child. Their +acquaintance came about in the following way--</p> + +<p class="normal">He was leaning one evening of December over the parapet of the tiny +square beside the schoolhouse, when a servant from the Villa +Pontignard approached him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Could M. Giraud make it convenient to call at the villa at noon +to-morrow?" the servant asked. "Madame Mardale was anxious to speak to +him."</p> + +<p class="normal">M. Giraud turned about with a glow of pleasure upon his face.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Certainly," he replied. "But nothing could be more simple. I will be +at the Villa Pontignard as the clock strikes."</p> + +<p class="normal">The servant bowed, and without another word paced away across the +square and up the narrow winding street of Roquebrune, leaving the +schoolmaster a little abashed at his display of eagerness. M. Giraud +recognised that in one man's mind, at all events, he was now set down +for a snob, for a lackey disguised as a schoolmaster. But the moment +of shame passed. He had no doubt as to the reason of the summons, and +he tingled with pride from head to foot. It was his little brochure +upon the history of the village--written with what timidity, and +printed at what cost to his meagre purse!--which had brought him +recognition from the lady of the villa upon the spur of the hill. +Looking upwards he could just see the white walls of the villa +glimmering through the dusk, he could imagine its garden of trim lawns +and dark cypresses falling from bank to bank in ordered tiers down the +hillside.</p> + +<p class="normal">"To-morrow at noon," he repeated to himself; and now he was seized +with a shiver of fear at the thought of the mistakes in behaviour +which he was likely to make. What if Madame Mardale asked him to +breakfast? There would be unfamiliar dishes to be eaten with +particular forks. Sometimes a knife should be used and sometimes not. +He turned back to the parapet with the thought that he had better, +perhaps, send up a note in the morning pleading his duties at the +school as a reason for breaking his engagement. But he was young, and +as he looked down the steep slope of rock on which the village is +perched, anticipation again got the better of fear. He began to build +up his life like a fairy palace from the foundation of this brief +message.</p> + +<p class="normal">A long lane of steps led winding down from the square, and his eyes +followed it, as his feet had often done, to the little railway station +by the sea through which people journeyed to and fro between the great +cities, westwards to France and Paris, eastwards to Rome and Italy. +His eyes followed the signal lights towards another station of many +lamps far away to the right, and as he looked there blazed out +suddenly other lights of a great size and a glowing brilliancy, lights +which had the look of amazing jewels discovered in an eastern cave. +These were the lights upon the terrace of Monte Carlo. The +schoolmaster had walked that terrace on his mornings of leisure, had +sat unnoticed on the benches, all worship of the women and their +daintiness, all envy of the men and the composure of their manner. He +knew none of them, and yet one of them had actually sent for him, and +had heard of his work. He was to speak with her at noon to-morrow.</p> + +<p class="normal">Let it be said at once that there was nothing of the lackey under the +schoolmaster's shabby coat. The visit which he was bidden to pay was +to him not so much a step upwards as outwards. Living always in this +remote high village, where the rock cropped out between the houses, +and the streets climbed through tunnels of rock, he was always +tormented with visions of great cities and thoroughfares ablaze; he +longed for the jostle of men, he craved for other companionship than +he could get in the village wineshop on the first floor, as a fainting +man craves for air. The stars came out above his head; it was a clear +night, and they had never shone brighter. The Mediterranean, dark and +noiseless, swept out at his feet beyond the woods of Cap Martin. But +he saw neither the Mediterranean nor any star. His eyes turned to the +glowing terrace upon his right, and to the red signal-lamps below the +terrace.</p> + +<p class="normal">M. Giraud kept his engagement punctually. The clock chimed upon the +mantelpiece a few seconds after he was standing in the drawing-room of +the Villa Pontignard, and before the clock had stopped chiming Mrs. +Mardale came in to him. She was a tall woman, who, in spite of her +years, still retained the elegance of her youth, but her face was hard +and a trifle querulous, and M. Giraud was utterly intimidated. On the +other hand, she had good manners, and the friendly simplicity with +which she greeted him began to set him at his ease.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are a native of Roquebrune, Monsieur?" said she.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, Madame, my father was a peasant at Aigues-Mortes. I was born +there," he replied frankly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yet you write, if I may say so, with the love of a native for his +village," she went on. M. Giraud was on the point of explaining. Mrs. +Mardale, however, was not in the least interested in his explanation, +and she asked him to sit down.</p> + +<p class="normal">"My daughter, Monsieur, has an English governess," she explained, "but +it seems a pity that she should spend her winters here and lose the +chance of becoming really proficient in French. The curé recommended +me to apply to you, and I sent for you to see whether we could arrange +that you should read history with her in French during your spare +hours."</p> + +<p class="normal">M. Giraud felt his head turning. Here was his opportunity so long +dreamed of come at last. It might be the beginning of a career--it was +at all events that first difficult step outwards. He was to be the +teacher in appearance; at the bottom of his heart he knew that he was +to be the pupil, he accepted the offer with enthusiasm, and the +arrangements were made. Three afternoons a week he was to spend an +hour at the Villa Pontignard.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, I hope the plan will succeed, said Mrs. Mardale, but she spoke +in a voice which showed that she had no great hopes of success. And as +M. Giraud replied that he would at all events do his best, she +rejoined plaintively--</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is not of you, Monsieur, that I have any doubts. But you do not +know my daughter. She will learn nothing which she does not want to +learn, she will not endure any governess who is not entirely her +slave, and she is fifteen and she really must learn something."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela Mardale, indeed, was at this time the despair of her mother. +Mrs. Mardale had mapped out for her daughter an ideal career. She was +to be a model of decorum in the Early Victorian style, at once an +ornament for a drawing-room and an excellent housekeeper, and she was +subsequently to make a brilliant marriage. The weak point of the +scheme was that it left Pamela out of the reckoning. There was her +passion for horses for one thing, and her distinct refusal, besides, +to sit quietly in any drawing-room. When she was a child, horses had +been persons to Pamela rather than animals, and, as her conduct +showed, persons preferable by far to human beings. Visitors to the +house under Croft Hill were at times promised a sight of Pamela, and +indeed they sometimes did see a girl in a white frock, with long black +legs, and her hair tumbled all over her forehead, neighing and +prancing at them from behind the gate of the stable yard. But they did +not see her at closer quarters than that, and it was certain that if +by any chance her lessons were properly learnt, they had been learnt +upon the corn-bin in the stables. Portraits of Pamela at the age of +nine remain, and they show a girl who was very pretty, but who might +quite well have been a boy, with a mass of unruly dark hair, a pair of +active dark eyes, and a good-humoured face alertly watching for any +mischief which might come its way.</p> + +<p class="normal">Something of the troubles which M. Giraud was likely to find ahead of +him Mrs. Mardale disclosed that morning, and the schoolmaster returned +to his house filled with apprehensions. The apprehensions, however, +were not justified. The little schoolmaster was so shy, so timid, that +Pamela was disarmed. She could be gentle when she chose, and she chose +now. She saw, too, M. Giraud's anxiety to justify her mother's choice +of him, and she determined with a sense of extreme virtue to be a +credit to his teaching. They became friends, and thus one afternoon, +when they had taken their books out into the garden of the villa, M. +Giraud confided to her the history of the brochure which had made them +acquainted.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It was not love for Roquebrune which led me to write it," he said. +"It was, on the contrary, my discontent. I was tortured with longings, +I was not content with the children's lessons for my working hours, +and the wineshop for my leisure. I took long walks over Cap Martin to +Mentone, along the Corniche road to La Turbie, and up Mont Agel. But +still I had my longings as my constant companions, and since +everywhere I saw traces of antiquity, I wrote this little history as a +relief. It kept my thoughts away from the great world."</p> + +<p class="normal">The garden ran here to a point at the extreme end of that outcropping +spur of rock on which the villa was built. They were facing westwards, +and the sun was setting behind the hills. It lay red upon the +Mediterranean on their left, but the ravine and front was already +dark, and down the hillside the shadows of the trees were lengthening. +At their feet, a long way below, a stream tumbled and roared amongst +the oleanders in the depths of the ravine. Pamela sat gazing +downwards, her lips parted in a smile.</p> + +<p class="normal">"The great world," she said in a low voice of eagerness. "I wonder +what it's like."</p> + +<p class="normal">That afternoon marked a distinct step in their friendship, and +thereafter in the intervals of their reading they talked continually +upon this one point they had in common, their curiosity as to the life +of the world beyond their village. But it happened that Pamela did the +greater part of the talking, and one afternoon that fact occurred to +her.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You always listen now, Monsieur," she said. "Why have you grown so +silent?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"You know more than I do, Mademoiselle."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I?" she exclaimed in surprise. "I only know about horses." Then she +laughed. "Really, we both know nothing. We can only guess and guess."</p> + +<p class="normal">And that was the truth. Pamela's ideas of the world were as visionary, +as dreamlike as his, but they were not his, as he was quick to +recognise. The instincts of her class, her traditions, the influence +of her friends, were all audible in her voice as well as in her words. +To her the world was a great flower garden of pleasure with plenty of +room for horses. To him it was a crowded place of ennobling strife.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But it's pleasant work guessing," she continued, "isn't it? Then why +have you stopped?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will tell you, Mademoiselle. I am beginning to guess through your +eyes."</p> + +<p class="normal">The whistle of a train, the train from Paris, mounted through the +still air to their ears.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well," said Pamela, with a shrug of impatience, "we shall both know +the truth some time."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You will, Mademoiselle," said the schoolmaster, suddenly falling out +of his dream.</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela looked quickly at him. The idea that he would be left behind, +that he would stay here all his life listening to the sing-song drone +of the children in the schoolroom, teaching over and over again with +an infinite weariness the same elementary lessons, until he became +shabby and worn as the lesson-books he handled, had never struck her +till this moment. The trouble which clouded his face was reflected by +sympathy upon hers.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But you won't stay here," she said gently. "Oh no! Let me think!" and +she thought with a child's oblivion of obstacles and a child's +confidence. She imparted the wise result of her reflections to M. +Giraud the next afternoon.</p> + +<p class="normal">He came to the garden with his eyes fevered and his face drawn.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are ill?" said Pamela. "We will not work to-day."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It's nothing," he replied.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Tell me," said she.</p> + +<p class="normal">M. Giraud looked out across the valley.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Two travellers came up to Roquebrune yesterday. I met them as I +walked home from here. I spoke to them and showed them the village, +and took them by the short cut of the steps down to the railway +station. They were from London. They talked of London and of Paris. +It's as well visitors come up to Roquebrune rarely. I have not slept +all night," and he clasped and unclasped his hands.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Hannibal crossed the Alps," said Pamela. "I read it in your book," +and then she shook a finger at him, just as the schoolmaster might +have done to one of his refractory pupils.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Listen," said she. "I have thought it all out."</p> + +<p class="normal">The schoolmaster composed himself into the attentive attitude of a +pupil.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are to become a Deputy."</p> + +<p class="normal">That was the solution of the problem. Pamela saw no difficulties. He +would need a dress-suit of course for official occasions, which she +understood were numerous. A horse, too, would be of use, but that +didn't matter so much. The horse was regretfully given up. It might +come later, he must get elected first, never mind how. In a word, he +was as good as a Deputy already. And from a Deputy to the President of +the French Republic, the step after all was not so very long. "Though +I am not quite sure that I approve of Republics," said Pamela, very +seriously.</p> + +<p class="normal">However, that was the best she could do in the way of mapping out his +future, and the schoolmaster listened, seeing the world through her +eyes. Thus three winters passed and Pamela learned a very little +history.</p> + +<p class="normal">Towards the end of the third winter the history books were put away. +Pamela was now eighteen and looking eagerly forward to her first +season in London. And no doubt frocks and hats occupied more of her +thoughts than did the fortunes of the schoolmaster. Some remorse for +her forgetfulness seized her the day before she went away. It was a +morning of spring, and the schoolmaster saw her coming down the dark +narrow streets towards him. She was tall beyond the average, but +without ungainliness, long of limb and lightly built, and she walked +with the very step of youth. Her dark hair swept in two heavy waves +above her forehead, and was coiled down behind on the back of her +neck. Her throat rose straight and slim from the firm shoulders, and +her eyes glowed with anticipation. Though her hair was dark, she was +not sallow. Her face was no less fresh and clear than were her eyes, +and a soft colour like the bloom of a fruit brightened her cheeks. In +that old brown street she shone like a brilliant flower, and Giraud, +as he watched her, felt all at once that he could have no place in her +life, and in his humility he turned aside. But she ran after him and +caught him up.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am going to-morrow," she said, and she tried to keep the look of +happiness out of her eyes, the thrill out of her voice. And she +failed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is good-bye, then," said he.</p> + +<p class="normal">"For a little while. I shall come back to Roquebrune in December."</p> + +<p class="normal">The schoolmaster smiled.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I shall look forward from to-day until that month comes. You will +have much to tell me."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, shan't I?" she cried; and then, lest her eagerness should hurt +her friend, she added, "But I shall not forget our quiet afternoons on +the garden terrace."</p> + +<p class="normal">The recollection of them, however, was not strong enough to check +either her thoughts or their utterance. Later on perhaps, in after +years, she might in her musings return to that terrace and the +speculations they indulged in, and the fairy palaces they built, with +an envy of the ignorance and the high thoughts of youth. To-day she +was all alert to grasp the future in her hands. One can imagine her +looking much as she looked in those portraits of her childhood.</p> + +<p class="normal">"News of the great world," she cried. "I shall bring it back. We will +talk it over in Roquebrune and correct our guesses. For I shall know."</p> + +<p class="normal">As a fact, they never did talk over her news, but that she could not +foresee. She went on her way with a smile upon her face: all +confidence and courage, and expectation, a brilliant image of youth. +Giraud, as he watched her the proud poise of her head, the light +springing step, the thing of beauty and gentleness which she was, +breathed a prayer that no harm might come to her, and no grief ever +sadden her face.</p> + +<p class="normal">The next morning she went away, and the schoolmaster lost his one +glimpse of the outer world. But he lived upon the recollections of it, +and took again to his long walks on the Corniche road. The time hung +heavily upon his hands. He hungered for news, and no news came, and +when in the month of December he noticed that the shutters were opened +in the Villa Pontignard, and that there was a stir of servants about +the house, he felt that the shutters were being opened after a long +dark time from his one window on the outside world. He frequented the +little station from that moment. No "Rapide" passed from France on its +way to Italy during his leisure hours but he was there to watch its +passengers. Mrs. Mardale came first, and a fortnight afterwards Pamela +descended from a carriage with her maid.</p> + +<p class="normal">Giraud watched her with a thrill of longing. It was not merely his +friend who had returned, but his instructor, with new and wonderful +knowledge added to the old.</p> + +<p class="normal">Then came his first chilling moment of disillusion. It was quite +evident that she saw him as she was stepping on to the platform. Her +eyes went straight to his--and yet she turned away without the +slightest sign of recognition and busied herself about her luggage. +The world had spoilt her. That was his first thought, but he came to a +truer understanding afterwards. And indeed that thought had barely +become definite in his mind, when she turned again, and, holding out +her hand, came to him with a smile.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are well?" she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," said he.</p> + +<p class="normal">And they walked up the long flight of steps to Roquebrune, talking +banalities. She gave him none of the news for which he longed, and +they spoke not at all of the career which together they had mapped out +for him. All their long talks upon the terrace, their plans and their +speculations seemed in an instant to Giraud to have become part of a +pleasant, very foolish, and very distant past. He was aware of the +vast gulf between them. With a girl's inimitable quickness to adapt +herself to new surroundings, she had acquired in the few months of her +absence the ease, the polish, and the armour of a woman of the world. +He was still the village schoolmaster, the peasant tortured with vain +aspirations, feeding upon vain dreams; and in this moment he saw +himself very clearly. Her silence upon their plan helped him to see +himself thus. Had she still believed in that imagined career, surely +she would have spoken of it. In a word, he was still looking at the +world through her eyes.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You must come up to the villa," she said. "I shall look forward to +your coming."</p> + +<p class="normal">They were in the little square by the schoolhouse and he took the +words for his dismissal. She went up the hill alone and slowly, like +one that is tired. Giraud, watching her, could not but compare her +with the girl who had come lightly down that street a few months ago. +It dawned upon him that, though knowledge had been acquired, something +had gone, something perhaps more valuable, the elasticity from her +step, the eagerness from her eyes.</p> + +<p class="normal">Giraud did not go up to the villa of his own accord, but he was asked +to lunch in a week's time, and after lunch Pamela and he went out into +the garden. Instinctively they walked down to that corner on the point +of the bluff which overhung the ravine and the white torrent amongst +the oleanders in its depths. They had come indeed to the bench on +which they used to sit before Pamela was quite aware of the direction +their steps had taken. She drew back suddenly as she raised her head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh no, not here," she cried, and she moved away quickly with a look +of pain. Giraud suddenly understood why she had turned away at the +railway station. Here they had dreamed, and the reality had shown the +dreams to be bitterly false, so false that the very place where they +had dreamed had become by its associations a place of pain. She had +needed for herself that first moment when she had stepped down from +the carriage.</p> + +<p class="normal">"The world must be the home of great troubles,' said Giraud, sadly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And how do you know that?" Pamela asked with a smile.</p> + +<p class="normal">"From you," he replied simply.</p> + +<p class="normal">The answer was unexpected. Pamela stopped and looked at him with +startled eyes.</p> + +<p class="normal">"From me? I have said nothing--nothing at all."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yet I know. How else should I know except from you, since through you +alone I see the world?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"A home of great troubles?" she repeated, speaking lightly. "Not for +all. You are serious, my friend, this afternoon, and you should not +be, for have I not come back?"</p> + +<p class="normal">The schoolmaster was not deceived by her evasion. There had come a +gravity into her manner, and a womanliness into her face, in a degree +more than natural at her years.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Let us talk of you for a change," said she.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, and what shall we say?" asked Giraud, and a constraint fell +upon them both.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We must forget those fine plans," he continued at length. "Is it not +so? I think I have learnt that too from you."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I hare said nothing," she interrupted quickly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Precisely," said he, with a smile. "The school at Roquebrune will +send no Deputy to Paris."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh! why not?" said Pamela, but there was no conviction in her voice. +Giraud was not of the stern stuff</p> + + +<p class="center">"To break his birth's invidious bar."</p> + + +<p class="normal">He had longings, but there was the end.</p> + +<p class="normal">"At all events," she said, turning to him with a great earnestness, +"we shall be friends always, whatever happens."</p> + +<p class="normal">The words were the death-knell to the schoolmaster's aspirations. They +conveyed so much more than was actually said. He took them bravely +enough.</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is a good thing," he said in all sincerity. "If I stay here all +my life, I shall still have the memory of the years when I taught you +history. I shall know, though I do not see you, that we are friends. +It is a great thing for me."</p> + +<p class="normal">"For me, too," said Pamela, looking straight into his eyes, and she +meant her words no less than he had meant his. Yet to both they had +the sound of a farewell. And in a way they were. They were the +farewell to the afternoons upon the terrace, they closed the door upon +their house of dreams.</p> + +<p class="normal">Giraud leaned that evening over the parapet in the little square of +Roquebrune. The Mediterranean lay dark and quiet far below, the +terrace of Monte Carlo glowed, and the red signal-lamps pointed out +the way to Paris. But he was no longer thinking of his fallen plans. +He was thinking of the girl up there in the villa who had been struck +by some blind blow of Destiny, who had grown a woman before her time. +It was a pity, it was a loss in the general sum of things which make +for joy.</p> + +<p class="normal">He had of course only his suspicions to go upon. But they were soon +strengthened. For Pamela fell into ill-health, and the period of +ill-health lasted all that winter. After those two years had passed, +she disappeared for a while altogether out of Giraud's sight. She came +no more to the Villa Pontignard, but stayed with her father and her +horses at her home in Leicestershire. Her mother came alone to +Roquebrune.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER II</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_02" href="#div1Ref_02">PAMELA LOOKS ON</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Alan Warrisden was one of the two men who had walked up to Roquebrune +on that afternoon of which M. Giraud spoke. But it was not until +Pamela had reached the age of twenty that he made her acquaintance at +Lady Millingham's house in Berkeley Square. He took her down to +dinner, and, to tell the truth, paid no particular attention either to +her looks or her conversation. His neighbour upon the other side +happened to be a friend whom he had not seen for some while, and for a +good part of the dinner he talked to her. A few days afterwards, +however, he called upon Lady Millingham, and she asked at once quite +eagerly--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, what did you think of Pamela Mardale?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden was rather at a loss. He was evidently expected to answer +with enthusiasm, and he had not any very definite recollections on +which enthusiasm could be based. He did his best, however; but he was +unconvincing. Lady Millingham shrugged her shoulders and frowned. She +had been married precisely a year, and was engaged in plans for +marrying off all her friends with the greatest possible despatch.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I shall send you in with somebody quite old the next time you dine +here," she said severely, and she discoursed at some length upon +Pamela's charms. "She loves horses, and yet she's not a bit horsey," +she said in conclusion, "and there's really nothing better than that. +And just heaps of men have wanted to marry her." She leaned back +against her sofa and contemplated Warrisden with silent scorn. She had +set her heart upon this marriage more than upon any other. Of all the +possible marriages in London, there was not one, to her mind, so +suitable as this. Pamela Mardale came of one of the oldest families of +commoners in Leicestershire. The family was not well off, the estate +had shrunk year by year, and what was left was mortgaged, owing in +some degree to that villa at Roquebrune upon which Mrs. Mardale +insisted. Warrisden, on the other hand, was more than well off, his +family was known, and at the age of twenty-eight he was still dividing +his life between the season in London and shooting expeditions about +the world. And he had the look of a man who might do something more.</p> + +<p class="normal">That visit had its results. Warrisden met Pamela Mardale again and +realised that Lady Millingham's indignation had been justified. At the +end of that season he proposed, and was gently refused. But if he was +slow to move, he was also firm to persevere. He hunted with the Quorn +that winter, and during the following season he was persistently but +unobtrusively at her elbow; so that Pamela came, at all events, to +count upon him as a most reliable friend. Having duly achieved that +place in her thoughts, he disappeared for ten months and returned to +town one afternoon in the last week of June. There were letters +waiting for him in his rooms, and amongst them a card from Lady +Millingham inviting him to a dance upon that night. At eleven o'clock +his <i>coupé</i> turned out of Piccadilly and entered Berkeley Square. At +the bottom of the square the lighted windows of the house blazed out +upon the night, the balconies were banked with flowers, and behind the +flowers, silhouetted against the light, were visible the thronged +faces of men and women. Warrisden leaned forward, scrutinising the +shapes of the heads, the contours of the faces. His sight, sharpened +by long practice over wide horizons, was of the keenest; he could see, +even at that distance, the flash of jewels on neck and shoulder. But +the face he looked for was not there.</p> + +<p class="normal">Lady Millingham, however, set his mind at case.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are back, then?" she cried.</p> + +<p class="normal">"This afternoon."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You will find friends here."</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden passed on into the reception rooms. It seemed to him indeed +that all the friends he had ever made were gathered to this one house +on this particular evening. He was a tall man, and his height made him +noticeable upon most occasions. He was the more noticeable now by +reason of his sunburn and a certain look of exhilaration upon his +face. The season was drawing to its end, and brown faces were not so +usual but that the eyes turned to them. He spoke, however, the fewest +possible words to the men who greeted him, and he did not meet the +eyes of any woman. Yet he saw the women, and was in definite quest of +one of them. That might have been noticed by a careful observer, for +whenever he saw a man older than the rest talking to a girl he +quickened his pace that he might the sooner see that girl's face. He +barely looked into the ball-room at all, but kept to the corridors, +and, at last, in a doorway, came face to face with Pamela Mardale. He +saw her face light up, and the hand held out to him was even eagerly +extended.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Have you a dance to spare?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela looked quickly round upon her neighbours.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, this one," she answered. She bowed to her companion, a man, as +Warrisden expected, much older than herself, and led the way at once +towards the balcony. Warrisden saw a youth emerge from the throng and +come towards them. Pamela was tall, and she used her height at this +moment. She looked him in the face with so serene an indifference that +the youth drew back disconcerted. Pamela was deliberately cutting her +partners.</p> + +<p class="normal">Another man might have built upon the act, but Warrisden was shrewd, +and shrewdness had taught him long since to go warily in thought where +Pamela Mardale was concerned. She might merely be angry. He walked by +her side and said nothing. Even when they were seated on the balcony, +he left for her to speak first. She was sitting upon the outside +against the railing, so that the light from the windows streamed full +upon her face. He watched it, looking for the change which he desired. +But it had still the one fault he found with it. It was still too +sedate, too womanly for her years. It happened that they had found a +corner where flowers made a sort of screen, and they could talk in low +voices without being overheard.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I heard of you," she said. "You were shooting woodcock in Dalmatia."</p> + +<p class="normal">"That was at Christmas."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes. You were hurt there."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Not seriously," he replied. "A sheep-dog attacked me. They are savage +brutes, and indeed they have to be, there are so many wolves. The +worst of it is, if you are attacked, you mustn't kill the dog, or +there's trouble."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I heard of you again. You were at Quetta, getting together a +caravan."</p> + +<p class="normal">"That was in February. I crossed by the new trade route from Quetta to +Seistan."</p> + +<p class="normal">She had spoken in an indefinite tone, which left him with no clue to +her thoughts. Now, however she turned her eyes upon him, and said in a +lower voice, which was very gentle--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Don't you think yon might have told me that you were going away for a +year?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden had gone away deliberately, and as deliberately he had +abstained from telling her of his intention. He had no answer to make +to her question, and he did not attempt to invent one. He sat still +and looked at her. She followed the question with another. +"Don't you think it would have been kinder if you had written to me +once or twice, instead of letting me hear about you from any chance +acquaintance?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Again he made no answer. For he had deliberately abstained from +writing. The gentleness with which she spoke was the most hopeful sign +for him which she had made that evening. He had expected a harsher +accusation. For Pamela made her claims upon her friends. They must put +her first or there was likely to be a deal of trouble.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well," she said, with a shrug of her shoulders, "I hope you enjoyed +it."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes. I wish I could have thought you would have enjoyed it too. But +you wouldn't have."</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," she answered listlessly.</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden was silent. He had expected the answer, but he was none the +less disappointed to receive it. To him there was no century in the +history of the world comparable to that in which he lived. It had its +faults, of course. It was ugly and a trifle feverish, but to men of +his stamp, the men with means and energy, a new world with countless +opportunities had been opened up. Asia and Africa were theirs, and the +farthest islands of the sea. Pamela, however, turned her back on it. +The new trade route to Seistan had no message for her. She looked with +envy upon an earlier century.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Of course," he resumed, "it's pleasant to come back, if only as a +preparation for going away again."</p> + +<p class="normal">And then Pamela turned on him with her eyes wide open and a look of +actual trouble upon her face.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," she said with emphasis. She leaned forward and lowered her +voice. "You have no right to work upon people and make them your +friends, if you mean, when you have made them your friends, to go away +without a word for ever so long. I have missed you very much."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I wanted you to miss me," he replied.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, I thought so. But it wasn't fair," she said gently. "You see, I +have been quite fair with you. If you had gone away at once, if you +had left me alone when I said 'No' to you two years ago, then I should +have no right to complain. I should have no right to call you back. +But it's different now, and you willed that it should be different. +You stayed by me. Whenever I turned, there were you at my side. You +taught me to count on you, as I count on no one else. Yes, that's +true. Well, then, you have lost the right to turn your back now just +when it pleases you."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It wasn't because it pleased me."</p> + +<p class="normal">"No. I admit that," she agreed. "It was to make an experiment on me, +but the experiment was made at my expense. For after all you enjoyed +yourself," she added, with a laugh.</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden joined in the laugh.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It's quite true," he said. "I did." Then his voice dropped to the +same serious tone in which she had spoken. "Why not say the experiment +succeeded? Couldn't you say that?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela shook her head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No. I can give you no more now than I gave you a year ago, two years +ago, and that is not enough. Oh, I know," she continued hurriedly as +she saw that he was about to interrupt. "Lots of women are content to +begin with friendship. How they can, puzzles me. But I know they do +begin with nothing more than that, and very often it works out very +well. The friendship becomes more than friendship. But I can't begin +that way. I would if I could. But I can't."</p> + +<p class="normal">She leaned back in her chair, and sat for a while with her hands upon +her knees in an attitude extraordinarily still. The jingle of harness +in the square rose to Warrisden's ears, the clamour of the town came +muffled from the noisy streets. He looked upwards to the tender blue +of a summer sky where the stars shone like silver; and he leaned back +disheartened. He had returned to London, and nothing was changed. +There was the same busy life vociferous in its streets, and this girl +still sat in the midst of it with the same lassitude and quiescence. +She seemed to be waiting, not at all for something new to happen, but +for the things, which were happening, to cease, waiting with the +indifference of the very old. And she was quite young. She sat with +the delicate profile of her face outlined against the darkness; the +colour of youth was in her cheeks; the slender column of her throat, +the ripple of her dark hair, the grace of her attitude claimed her for +youth; she was fragrant with it from head to foot. And yet it seemed +that there was no youth in her blood.</p> + +<p class="normal">"So nothing has changed for you during these months," he said, deeply +disappointed.</p> + +<p class="normal">She turned her face quietly to him and smiled. "No," she answered, +"there has been no new road for me from Quetta to Seistan. I still +look on."</p> + +<p class="normal">There was the trouble. She just looked on, and to his thinking it was +not right that at her age she should do no more. A girl nowadays had +so many privileges, so many opportunities denied to her grandmother, +she could do so much more, she had so much more freedom, and yet +Pamela insisted upon looking on. If she had shown distress, it would +have been better. But no. She lived without deep feeling of any kind +in a determined isolation. She had built up a fence about herself, and +within it she sat untouched and alone.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was likely that no one else in the wide circle of her acquaintances +had noticed her detachment, and certainly to no one but Warrisden had +she admitted it. And it was only acknowledged to him after he had +found it out for himself. For she did not sit at home. On the +contrary, hardly a night passed during the season but she went to some +party. Only, wherever she went, she looked on.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And you still prefer old men to young ones?" he cried in a real +exasperation.</p> + +<p class="normal">"They talk more of things and less of persons," she explained.</p> + +<p class="normal">That was not right either. She ought to be interested in persons. +Warrisden rose abruptly from his chair. He was completely baffled. +Pamela was like the sleeping princess in the fairy tale, she lay girt +about with an impassable thicket of thorns. She was in a worse case, +indeed, for the princess in the story might have slept on till the end +of time, a thing of beauty. But was it possible for Pamela, so to +sleep to the end of life, he asked himself. Let her go on in her +indifference, and she might dwindle and grow narrow, her soul would be +starved and all the good of her be lost. Somehow a way must be forced +through the thicket, somehow she must be wakened. But he seemed no +nearer to finding that way than he had been two years ago, and she was +no nearer to her wakening.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, there has been no change," he said, and as he spoke his eye was +caught by a bright light which suddenly flamed up in the window of a +dark house upon his right. The house had perplexed him more than once. +It took so little part in the life of the square, it so consistently +effaced itself from the gaieties of the people who lived about. Its +balconies were never banked with flowers, no visitors mounted its +steps; and even in the daytime it had a look of mystery. It may have +been that some dim analogy between that house and the question which +so baffled him arrested Warrisden's attention. It may have been merely +that he was by nature curious and observant. But he leaned forward +upon the balcony-rail.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do you see that light?" he asked. "In the window on the second +floor?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes."</p> + +<p class="normal">He took out his watch and noticed the time. It was just a quarter to +twelve. He laughed softly to himself and said--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Wait a moment!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He watched the house for a few minutes without saying a word. Pamela +with a smile at his eagerness watched too. In a little while they saw +the door open and a man and a woman, both in evening dress, appear +upon the steps. Warrisden laughed again.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Wait," he said, as if he expected Pamela to interrupt. "You'll see +they won't whistle up a cab. They'll walk beyond the house and take +one quietly. Very likely they'll look up at the lighted window on the +second floor as though they were schoolboys who had escaped from their +dormitories, and were afraid of being caught by the master before they +had had their fun. There, do you see?"</p> + +<p class="normal">For as he spoke the man and the woman stopped and looked up. Had they +heard Warrisden's voice and obeyed his directions they could not have +more completely fulfilled his prediction. They had the very air of +truants. Apparently they were reassured. They walked along the +pavement until they were well past the house. Then they signalled to a +passing hansom. The cab-driver did not see them, yet they did not call +out, nor did the man whistle. They waited until another approached and +they beckoned to that. Warrisden watched the whole scene with the +keenest interest. As the two people got into the cab he laughed again +and turned back to Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well?" she said, with a laugh of amusement, and the quiet +monosyllable, falling as it were with a cold splash upon his enjoyment +of the little scene, suddenly brought him back to the question which +was always latent in his mind. How was Pamela to be awakened?</p> + +<p class="normal">"It's a strange place, London," he said. "No doubt it seems stranger +to me, and more full of interesting people and interesting things just +because I have come back from very silent and very empty places. But +that house always puzzled me. I used to have rooms overlooking this +square, high up, over there," and he pointed to the eastern side of +the square towards Berkeley Street, "and what we have seen to-night +used to take place every night, and at the same hour. The light went +up in the room on the second floor, and the truants crept out. Guess +where they go to! The Savoy. They go and sit there amongst the lights +and the music for half an hour, then they come back to the dark house. +They live in the most curious isolation with the most curious +regularity. There are three of them altogether: an old man--it is his +light, I suppose, which went up on the second floor--and those two. I +know who they are. The old man is Sir John Stretton."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh!" said Pamela, with interest.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And the two people we saw are his son and his son's wife. I have +never met them. In fact, no one meets them. I don't know any one who +knows them."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, you do," said Pamela, "I know them." And in her knowledge, +although Warrisden did not know it, lay the answer to the problem +which so perplexed him.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER III</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_03" href="#div1Ref_03">THE TRUANTS</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden turned quickly to Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You never mentioned them."</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," she replied with a smile. "But there's no mystery in my silence. +I simply haven't mentioned them because for two years I have lost +sight of them altogether. I used to meet them about, and I have been +to their house."</p> + +<p class="normal">"There?" asked Warrisden, with a nod towards the lighted window.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No; but to the house Millie and Mr. Stretton had in Deanery Street. +They gave that up two years ago when old Lady Stretton died. I thought +they had gone to live in the country."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And all the while they have been living here," exclaimed Warrisden. +He had spoken truthfully of himself. The events, and the people with +whom he came, however slightly, into contact always had interested and +amused him. It was his pleasure to fit his observations together until +he had constructed a little biography in his mind of each person with +whom he was acquainted. And there was never an incident of any +interest within his notice, but he sought the reason for it and kept +an eye open for its consequence.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Don't you see how strange the story is?" he went on. "They give up +their house upon Lady Stretton's death, and they come to live here +with Sir John. That's natural enough. Sir John's an old man. But they +live in such seclusion that even their friends think they have retired +into the country."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, it is strange," Pamela admitted. And she added, "I was Millie +Stretton's bridesmaid."</p> + +<p class="normal">Upon Warrisden's request she told him what she knew of the couple who +lived in the dark house and played truant. Millie Stretton was the +daughter of a Judge in Ceylon who when Millie had reached the age of +seventeen had married a second time. The step-mother had lacked +discretion; from the very first she had claimed to exercise a complete +and undisputed authority; she had been at no pains to secure the +affections of her step-daughter. And very little trouble would have +been needed, for Millie was naturally affectionate. A girl without any +great depth of feeling, she responded easily to a show of kindness. +She found it neither difficult to make intimate friends, nor hard to +lose them. She was of the imitative type besides. She took her +thoughts and even her language from those who at the moment were by +her side. Thus her step-mother had the easiest of tasks but she did +not possess the necessary tact. She demanded obedience, and in return +offered tolerance. The household at Colombo, therefore, became for +Millie a roofstead rather than a home, and a year after this marriage +she betook herself and the few thousands of pounds which her mother +had bequeathed her to London. The ostensible reason for departure was +the invitation of Mrs. Charles Rawson, a friend of her mother's. But +Millie had made up her mind that a return to Ceylon was not to be +endured. Somehow she would manage to make a home or herself in +England.</p> + +<p class="normal">She found her path at once made easy. She was pretty, with the +prettiness of a child, she gave no trouble, she was fresh, she dressed +a drawing-room gracefully, he fitted neatly into her surroundings, she +picked up immediately the ways of thought and the jargon of her new +companions. In a word, with the remarkable receptivity which was hers, +she was very quickly at home in Mrs. Rawson's house. She became a +favourite no less for her modest friendliness than on account of her +looks. Mrs. Rawson, who was nearing middle age, but whose love of +amusements was not assuaged, rejoiced to have so attractive a +companion to take about with her. Millie, for her part, was very glad +to be so taken about. She had fallen from the obscure clouds into a +bright and wonderful world.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was at this time that Pamela Mardale first met Millicent Stretton, +or rather, one should say, Millicent Rundell, since Rundell was at +that time her name. They became friends, although so far as character +was concerned they had little in common. It may have been that the +difference between them was the actual cause of their friendship. +Certainly Millie came rather to lean upon her friend, admired her +strength, made her the repository of her confidences, and if she +received no confidences in return, she was content to believe that +there were none to make. It was at this time too that Millie fell in +with Lady Stretton.</p> + +<p class="normal">Lady Stretton, a tall old woman with the head of a Grenadier, had +the characteristic of Sir Anthony Absolute. There was no one so +good-tempered so long as she had her own way; and she generally had +it.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Lady Stretton saw that Millie was easily led," Pamela continued. "She +thought, for that reason, she would be a suitable wife for Tony, her +son, who was then a subaltern in the Coldstream. So she did all she +could to throw them together. She invited Millie up to her house in +Scotland, the house Lady Millingham now has, and Mr. Stretton fell in +love. He was evidently very fond of Millie, and Millie on her side +liked him quite as much as any one else. They were married. Lady +Stretton hired them the house I told you of, close to Park Lane, and +took a great deal of trouble to see that they were comfortable. You +see, they were toys for her. There, that's all I know. Are you +satisfied?"</p> + +<p class="normal">She leaned back in her chair, smiling at Warrisden's serious face.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And what about the old man, Sir John Stretton?" he asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I never met him," replied Pamela. "He never went out to parties, and +I never went to that house."</p> + +<p class="normal">As she concluded the sentence, a man looked on to the balcony and, +seeing them, withdrew. Pamela rose at once from her chair, and, with a +sudden movement of jealousy, Warrisden swung round and looked into the +room. The man was well past the middle age, stout of build, and with a +heavy careworn face with no pleasure in it at all. He was the man who +had been with Pamela when Warrisden had arrived. Warrisden turned back +to the girl with a smile of relief.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are engaged?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, for this dance to Mr. Mudge," and she indicated the man who was +retiring. "But we shall meet again--at Newmarket, at all events. +Perhaps in Scotland too."</p> + +<p class="normal">She held out her hand to Warrisden, and, as he took it, her voice +dropped to a plea.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Please don't go away again without telling me first, without talking +it over, so that I may know where you are from month to month. Please +promise!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden promised, and went away from the house with her prayer +echoing in his ears. The very sound of her voice was audible to him, +and he never doubted the sincerity of its appeal. But if she set such +store on what she had, why was she content with just that and nothing +more, he asked himself. Why did she not claim a little more and give a +little more in return? Why did she come to a halt at friendship, a +mere turnpike on the great road, instead of passing through the gate +and going on down the appointed way. He did not know that she passed +the turnpike once, and that if she refused to venture on that path +again, it was because, knowing herself, she dared not.</p> + +<p class="normal">In the narrows of Berkeley Street Warrisden was shaken out of these +reflections. A hansom jingled past him, and by the light of the lamp +which hung at the back within it he caught a glimpse of the truants. +They were driving home to the dark house in the Square, and they sat +side by side silent and with troubled faces. Warrisden's thoughts went +back to what Pamela had told him that night. She had told him the +half, but not the perplexing, interesting half of their history. That +indeed Pamela could not tell, for she did not know Sir John Stretton, +and the old man's warped and churlish character alone explained it.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was by his doing that the truants gave up their cheery little house +in Deanery Street and came to live in Berkeley Square. The old man was +a miser, who during his wife's existence had not been allowed to +gratify his instincts. He made all the more ample amends after she had +died. The fine allowance on which the young couple had managed to keep +a pair of horses and a little brougham was stripped from them.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Why should I live alone?" said the old man. "I am old, Tony, and I +need some attention. The house is big, much too big for me, and the +servants are eating their heads off for the want of something to do." +There were indeed more servants than were needed. Servants were the +single luxury Sir John allowed himself. Their liveries were faded, +they themselves were insolent and untidy, but they were there, in the +great bare dining-room at dinner-time, in the hall when Sir John came +home of an afternoon. For the old man went out each day as the clock +struck three; he came back each evening at half-past six. He went out +alone, he returned alone, and he never went to his club. He took an +omnibus from the corner of Berkeley Street and journeyed eastwards as +far as Ludgate Hill. There he took a drink in the refreshment bar, +and, coming out, struck northwards into Holborn, where he turned +westwards, and walking as far as the inn at the corner of the +Tottenham Court Road, stepped for an hour into the private bar. Thence +he took another omnibus, and finally reached home, where his footmen +received him solemnly in the hall. To this home he brought Tony and +his wife.</p> + +<p class="normal">"There choose your own rooms, Tony," he said magnanimously. "What's +that? Money? But what for? You'll have it soon enough."</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony Stretton suggested that it was hardly possible for any man, +however careful, to retain a commission in the Coldstream without an +allowance. Sir John, a tall thin man, with high bald forehead, and a +prim puritanical face, looked at his son with a righteous severity.</p> + +<p class="normal">"A very expensive regiment. Leave it, Tony! And live quietly at home. +Look after your father, my boy, and you won't need money," and he +stalked upstairs leaving Tony aghast in the hall. Tony had to sit down +and think it over before he could quite realise the fate which had +over-taken him. Here he was, twenty-six years old brought up to spend +what he wanted and to ask for more when that was ended, and he was to +live quietly on nothing at all. He had no longer any profession, he +was not clever enough to enter upon a new one without some sort of +start and in addition he had a wife. His wife, it was true, had a few +thousands; they had remained untouched ever since the marriage and +Tony shrank from touching them now. He sat on one of the hall-chairs, +twisting his moustache and staring with his blank blue eyes at the +opposite wall. What in the world was he to do? Old Sir John was quite +aware of those few thousands. They might just as well be used now he +thought, and save him expense. Tony could pay them back after his +father was dead. Such was Sir John's plan and Tony had to fall in with +it. The horses and the brougham and all the furniture, the prints, the +pictures and the mirrors which had decked out so gaily the little +house in Deanery Street went to the hammer. Tony paid off his debts +and found himself with a hundred pounds in hand at the end; and when +that was gone he was forced to come to his wife.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Of course," said she, "we'll share what I have, Tony."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, but we must go carefully," he replied. "Heaven knows how long we +will have to drag on like this."</p> + +<p class="normal">So the money question was settled, but that was in reality the least +of their troubles. Sir John, for the first time in his life, was +master in fact as well as in name. He had been no match for his wife, +but he was more than a match for his son. He was the fifth baronet of +his name, and yet there was no landed property. He was rich, and all +the money was safely tucked away in the public funds, and he could +bequeath it as he willed. He was in a position to put the screw on +Tony and his wife, and he did not let the opportunity slip. The love +of authority grew upon him. He became exacting and portentously +severe. In his black, shabby coat, with his long thin figure, and his +narrow face, he had the look of a cold self-righteous fanatic. You +would have believed that he was mortifying his son for the sake of his +son's soul, unless perchance you had peeped into that private bar in +the Tottenham Court Road and had seen him drinking gloomily alone.</p> + +<p class="normal">He laid down rules to which the unfortunate couple must needs conform. +They had to dine with him every night and to sit with him every +evening until he went to bed. It followed that they lost sight of +their friends, and every month isolated them more completely. The mere +humiliation of the position in which they stood caused them to shrink +more and more into their privacy. When they walked out in the +afternoon they kept away from the Park; when they played truant in the +evening, at the Savoy, they chose a little table in an obscure corner. +This was the real history of the truants with whose fortunes those of +Warrisden and Pamela were to be so closely intermingled. For that life +in the dark house was not to last. Even as Warrisden passed them in +Berkeley Street, Tony Stretton was saying over and over again in his +inactive mind--</p> + +<p class="normal">"It can't go on. It can't go on!"</p> + +<p class="normal">In the after times, when the yapping of dogs in the street at night +would wake Tony from his sleep, and set him on dreaming of tent +villages in a wild country of flowers, or when the wind in the trees +would recall to him a little ship labouring on short steep seas in a +mist of spray, he always looked back to this night as that on which +the venture of his wife's fortunes and his own began.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER IV</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_04" href="#div1Ref_04">TONY STRETTON MAKES A PROPOSAL</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Regular as Warrisden had declared the lives of the truants to be, on +the night following the dance at Lady Millingham's there came a break +in the monotony of their habits. For once in a way they did not leave +the house in their search for light and colour as soon as they were +free. They stayed on in their own sitting-room. But it seemed that +they had nothing to speak about. Millie Stretton sat at the table, +staring at the wall in front of her, moody and despairing. Tony +Stretton leaned against the embrasure of the window, now and then +glancing remorsefully at his wife, now and then looking angrily up to +the ceiling where the heavy footsteps of a man treading up and down +the room above sounded measured and unceasing.</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony lifted a corner of the blind and looked out.</p> + +<p class="normal">"There's a party next door," he said, "there was another at Lady +Millingham's last night. You should have been at both, Millie, and you +were at neither. Upon my word, it's rough."</p> + +<p class="normal">He dropped the blind and came over to her side. He knew quite well +what parties and entertainments meant to her. She loved them, and it +seemed to him natural and right that she should. Light, admiration, +laughter and gaiety, and fine frocks--these things she was born to +enjoy, and he himself had in the old days taken a great pride in +watching her enjoyment. But it was not merely the feeling that she had +been stripped of what was her due through him which troubled him +to-night. Other and deeper thoughts were vaguely stirring in his mind.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We have quarrelled again to-night, Millie," he continued +remorsefully. "Here we are cooped up together with just ourselves to +rely upon to pull through these bad years, and we have quarrelled +again."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie shrugged her shoulders.</p> + +<p class="normal">"How did it begin?" he asked. "Upon my word I don't remember. Oh yes, +I----" and Millie interrupted him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What does it matter, Tony, how the quarrel began? It did begin, and +another will begin to-morrow. We can't help ourselves, and you have +given the reason. Here we are cooped up by ourselves with nothing else +to do."</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony pulled thoughtfully at his moustache.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And we swore off quarrelling, too. When was that?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yesterday."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yesterday!" exclaimed Tony, with a start of surprise. "By George, so +it was. Only yesterday."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie looked up at him, and the trouble upon his face brought a smile +to hers. She laid a hand upon his arm.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It's no use swearing off, Tony," she said. "We are both of us living +all the time in a state of exasperation. I just--tingle with it, +there's no other word. And the least, smallest thing which goes wrong +sets us quarrelling. I don't think either of us is to blame. The house +alone gets on our nerves, doesn't it? These great empty, silent, dingy +rooms, with their tarnished furniture. Oh! they are horrible! I wander +through them sometimes and it always seems to me that, a long time +ago, people lived here who suddenly felt one morning that they +couldn't stand it for a single moment longer, and ran out and locked +the street door behind them; and I have almost done it myself. The +very sunlight comes through the windows timidly, as if it knew it had +no right here at all."</p> + +<p class="normal">She leaned back in her chair, looking at Tony with eyes that were +hopeless and almost haggard. As Tony listened to her outburst the +remorse deepened on his face.</p> + +<p class="normal">"If I could have foreseen all this, I would have spared you it, +Millie," he said. "I would, upon my word." He drew up a chair to the +table, and, sitting down, said in a more cheerful voice, "Let's talk +it over, and see if we can't find a remedy."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie shook her head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We talked it over yesterday."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, so we did."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And quarrelled an hour after we had talked it over."</p> + +<p class="normal">"We did that too," Tony agreed, despondently. His little spark of +hopefulness was put out and he sat in silence. His wife, too, did not +speak, and in a short while it occurred to him that the silence was +more complete than it had been a few minutes ago. It seemed that a +noise had ceased, and a noise which, unnoticed before, had become +noticeable by its cessation. He looked up to the ceiling. The heavy +footsteps no longer dragged upon the floor overhead. Tony sprang up.</p> + +<p class="normal">"There! He is in bed," he exclaimed. "Shall we go out?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Not to-night," replied Millie.</p> + +<p class="normal">He could make no proposal that night which was welcomed, and as he +walked over to the mantelshelf and filled his pipe, there was +something in his attitude and bearing which showed to Millie that the +quick rebuff had hurt.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I can't pretend to-night, Tony, and that's the truth," she added in a +kinder voice. "For, after all, I do only pretend nowadays that I find +the Savoy amusing."</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony turned slowly round with the lighted match in his hand and stared +at his wife. He was a man slow in thought, and when his thoughts +compelled expression, laborious in words. The deeper thoughts which +had begun of late to take shape in his mind stirred again at her +words.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have owned it," he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It had been pretence with you too, then?" she asked, looking up in +surprise.</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony puffed at his pipe.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Of late, yes," he replied. "Perhaps chiefly since I saw that you were +pretending."</p> + +<p class="normal">He came back to her side and looked for a long time steadily at her +while he thought. It was a surprise to Millie that he had noticed her +pretence, as much of a surprise as that he had been pretending too. +For she knew him to be at once slow to notice any change in others and +quick to betray it in himself. But she was not aware how wide a place +she filled in all his thoughts, partly because her own nature with its +facile emotions made her unable to conceive a devotion which was +engrossing, and partly because Tony himself had no aptitude for +expressing such a devotion, and indeed would have shrunk from its +expression had the aptitude been his. But she did fill that wide +place. Very slowly he had begun to watch her, very slowly and dimly +certain convictions were taking shape, very gradually he was drawing +nearer and nearer to a knowledge that a great risk must be taken and a +great sacrifice made partly by him, partly too by her. Some part of +his trouble he now spoke to her.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It wasn't pretence a year ago, Millie," he said wistfully. "That's +what bothers me. We enjoyed slipping away quietly when the house was +quiet, and snatching some of the light, some of the laughter the +others have any time they want it. It made up for the days, it was fun +then, Millie, wasn't it? Upon my word, I believe we enjoyed our life, +yes, even this life, a year ago. Do you remember how we used to drive +home, laughing over what we had seen, talking about the few people we +had spoken to? It wasn't until we had turned the latch-key in the +door, and crept into the hall----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"And passed the library door," Millie interrupted, with a little +shiver.</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony Stretton stopped for a moment. Then he resumed in a lower voice, +"Yes, it wasn't until we had passed the library door that the gloom +settled down again. But now the fun's all over, at the latest when the +lights go down in the supper room, and often before we have got to +them at all. We were happy last year"--and he shook her affectionately +by the arm--"that's what bothers me."</p> + +<p class="normal">His wife responded to the gentleness of his voice and action.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Never mind, Tony," she said. "Some day we shall look back on all of +it--this house and the empty rooms and the quarrels"--she hesitated +for a second--"Yes, and the library door; we shall look back on it all +and laugh."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Shall we?" said Tony, suddenly. His face was most serious, his voice +most doubtful.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Why, what do you mean?" asked Millie. Then she added reassuringly, +"It must end some time. Oh yes, it can't last for ever."</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," replied Tony; "but it can last just long enough."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Long enough for what?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Long enough to spoil both our lives altogether."</p> + +<p class="normal">He was speaking with a manner which was quite strange to her. There +was a certainty in his voice, there was a gravity too. He had ceased +to leave the remedy of their plight to time and chance, since, through +two years, time and chance had failed them. He had been seriously +thinking, and as the result of thought he had come to definite +conclusions. Millie understood that there was much more behind the +words he had spoken and that he meant to say that much more to her +to-night. She was suddenly aware that she was face to face with issues +momentous to both of them. She began to be a little afraid. She looked +at Tony almost as if he were a stranger.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Tony," she said faintly, in deprecation.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We must face it, Millie," he went on steadily. "This life of ours +here in this house will come to an end, of course, but how will it +leave us, you and me? Soured, embittered, quarrelsome, or no longer +quarrelsome, but just indifferent to each other, bored by each other?" +He was speaking very slowly, choosing each word with difficulty.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh no," Millie protested.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It may be even worse than that. Suppose we passed beyond indifference +to dislike--yes, active dislike. We are both of us young, we can both +reasonably look forward to long lives, long lives of active dislike. +There might too be contempt on your side."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie stared at her husband.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Contempt?" she said, echoing his words in surprise.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes. Here are you, most unhappy, and I take it sitting down. Contempt +might come from that."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But what else can you do?" she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ah," said Tony, as though he had been waiting for that question, +couched in just those words. "Ask yourself that question often enough, +and contempt will come."</p> + +<p class="normal">This idea of contempt was a new one to Millie, and very likely her +husband was indiscreet in suggesting its possibility. But he was not +thinking at all of the unwisdom of his words. His thoughts were set on +saving the cherished intimacy of their life from the ruin which he saw +was likely to overtake it. He spoke out frankly, not counting the +risk. Millie, for her part, was not in the mood to estimate the truth +of what he said, although it remained in her memory. She was rather +confused by the new aspect which her husband wore. She foresaw that he +was working towards the disclosure of a plan; and the plan would +involve changes, great changes, very likely a step altogether into the +dark. And she hesitated.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We sha'n't alter, Tony," she said. "You can be sure of me, can't +you?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"But we are altering," he replied. "Already the alteration has begun. +Did we quarrel a year ago as we do now? We enjoyed those evenings when +we played truant, a year ago"; and then he indulged in a yet greater +indiscretion than any which he had yet allowed himself to utter. But +he was by nature simple and completely honest. Whatever occurred to +him, that he spoke without reserve, and the larger it loomed in his +thoughts the more strenuous was its utterance upon his lips. He took a +seat at the table by her side.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I know we are changing. I take myself, and I expect it is the same +with you. I am--it is difficult to express it--I am deadening. I am +getting insensible to the things which not very long ago moved me very +much. I once had a friend who fell ill of a slow paralysis, which +crept up his limbs little by little and he hardly noticed its advance. +I think that's happening with me. I am losing the associations--that's +the word I want--the associations which made one's recollections +valuable, and gave a colour to one's life. For instance, you sang a +song last night, Millie, one of those coon songs of yours--do you +remember? You sang it once in Scotland on a summer's night. I was +outside on the lawn, and past the islands across the water, which was +dark and still, I saw the lights in Oban bay. I thought I would never +hear that song again without seeing those lights in my mind far away +across the water, clustered together like the lights of a distant +town. Well, last night all those associations were somehow dead. I +remembered all right, but without any sort of feeling, that that song +was a landmark in one's life. It was merely you singing a song, or +rather it was merely some one singing a song."</p> + +<p class="normal">It was a laboured speech, and Tony was very glad to have got it over.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am very sorry," replied Millie in a low voice. She did not show him +her face, and he had no notion whatever that his words could hardly +have failed to hurt. He was too intent upon convincing her, and too +anxious to put his belief before her with unmistakable clearness to +reflect in what spirit she might receive the words. That her first +thought would be "He no longer cares" never occurred to him at all, +and cheerfully misunderstanding her acquiescence, he went on--</p> + +<p class="normal">"You see that's bad. It mustn't go on, Millie. Let's keep what we've +got. At all costs let us keep that!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"You mean we must go away?" said Millie, and Tony Stretton did not +answer. He rose from his chair and walked back to the fireplace and +knocked the ashes from his pipe. Millie was accustomed to long +intervals between her questions and his replies, but she was on the +alert now. Something in his movements and his attitude showed her that +he was not thinking of what answer he should make. He was already sure +upon that point. Only the particular answer he found difficult to +speak. She guessed it on the instant and stood up erect, in alarm.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You mean that you must go away, and that I must remain?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony turned round to her and nodded his head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Alone! Here?" she exclaimed, looking round her with a shiver.</p> + +<p class="normal">"For a little while. Until I have made a home for you to come to. Only +till then, Millie. It needn't be so very long."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It will seem ages!" she cried, "however short it is. Tony, it's +impossible."</p> + +<p class="normal">The tedious days stretched before her in an endless and monotonous +succession. The great rooms would be yet more silent, and more empty +than they were; there would be a chill throughout all the house; the +old man's exactions would become yet more oppressive, since there +would be only one to bear them. She thought of the long dull evenings, +in the faded drawing-room. They were bad enough now, those long +evenings during which she read the evening paper aloud, and Sir John +slept, yet not so soundly but that he woke the instant her voice +stopped, and bade her continue. What would they be if Tony were gone, +if there were no hour or so at the end when they were free to play +truant if they willed? What she had said was true. She had been merely +pretending to enjoy their hour of truancy, but she would miss it none +the less. And in the midst of these thoughts she heard Tony's voice.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It sounds selfish, I know, but it isn't really. You see, I sha'n't +enjoy myself. I have not been brought up to know anything well or to +do anything well--anything, I mean, really useful--I'll have a pretty +hard time too." And then he described to her what he thought of doing. +He proposed to go out to one of the colonies, spend some months on a +farm as a hand, and when he had learned enough of the methods, and had +saved a little money, to get hold of a small farm to which he could +ask her to come. It was a pretty and a simple scheme, and it ignored +the great difficulties in the way, such as his ignorance and his lack +of capital. But he believed in it sincerely, and every word in his +short and broken sentences proved his belief. He had his way that +night with Millicent. She was capable of a quick fervour, though the +fervour might as quickly flicker out. She saw that the sacrifice was +really upon his side, for upon him would be the unaccustomed burden of +labour, and the labour would be strange and difficult. She rose to his +height since he was with her and speaking to her with all the +conviction of his soul.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, then, go," she cried. "I'll wait here, Tony, till you send for +me."</p> + +<p class="normal">And when she passed the library door that night she did not even +shrink.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER V</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_05" href="#div1Ref_05">PAMELA MAKES A PROMISE</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Millie's enthusiasm for her husband's plan increased each day. The +picture which his halting phrases evoked for her, of a little farm +very far away under Southern skies, charmed her more by reason of its +novelty than either she or Tony quite understood. In the evenings of +the following week, long after the footsteps overhead had ceased, they +sat choosing the site of their house and building it. It was to be the +exact opposite of their house of bondage. The windows should look out +over rolling country, the simple decorations should be bright of +colour, and through every cranny the sun should find its way. Millie's +hopes, indeed, easily outran her husband's. She counted the house +already built, and the door open for her coming. Colour and light +bathed it in beauty.</p> + +<p class="normal">"There's my little fortune, Tony," she said, when once or twice he +tried to check the leap of her anticipations; "that will provide the +capital."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I knew you would offer it," Tony replied simply. "Your help will +shorten our separation by a good deal. So I'll take half."</p> + +<p class="normal">"All!" cried Millie.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And what would you do when you wanted a new frock?" asked Tony, with +a smile.</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie shrugged her shoulders.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I shall join you so soon," she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">It dawned upon Tony that she was making too little of the burden which +she would be called upon to bear--the burden of dull lonely months in +that great shabby house.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It will be a little while before I can send for you, Millie," he +protested. But she paid no heed to the protest. She fetched her bank +book and added up the figures.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have three thousand pounds," she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I'll borrow half," he repeated. "Of course, I am only borrowing. +Should things go wrong with me, you are sure to get it back in the +end."</p> + +<p class="normal">They drove down to Millie's bank the next morning, and fifteen hundred +pounds were transferred to his account.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Meanwhile," said Tony, as they came out of the door into Pall Mall, +"we have not yet settled where our farm is to be. I think I will go +and see Chase."</p> + +<p class="normal">"The man in Stepney Green?" Millie asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes. He's the man to help us."</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony called a cab and drove off. It was late in the afternoon when he +returned, and he had no opportunity to tell his wife the results of +his visit before dinner was announced. Millie was in a fever to hear +his news. Never, even in this house, had an evening seemed so long. +Sir John sat upright in his high-backed chair, and, as was his custom, +bade her read aloud the evening paper. But that task was beyond her. +She pleaded a headache and escaped. It seemed to her that hours passed +before Tony rejoined her. She had come to dread with an intense fear +that some hindrance would, at any moment, stop their plan.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well?" she asked eagerly, when Tony at last came into their +sitting-room.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It's to be horses in Kentucky," answered Tony. "Farming wants more +knowledge and a long apprenticeship; but I know a little about +horses."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Splendid!" cried Millie. "You will go soon?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"In a week. A week is all I need."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie was quiet for a little while. Then she asked, with an anxious +look--</p> + +<p class="normal">"When do you mean to tell your father?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"To-morrow."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Don't," said she. She saw his face cloud, she was well aware of his +dislike of secrecies, but she was too much afraid that, somehow, at +the last moment an insuperable obstacle would bar the way. "Don't tell +him at all," she went on. "Leave a note for him. I will see that it is +given to him after you have gone. Then he can't stop you. Please do +this, I ask you."</p> + +<p class="normal">"How can he stop me?</p> + +<p class="normal">"I don't know; but I am afraid that he will. He could threaten to +disinherit you; if you disobeyed, he might carry out the threat. Give +him no opportunity to threaten."</p> + +<p class="normal">Very reluctantly Tony consented. He had all a man's objections to +concealments, she all a woman's liking for them; but she prevailed, +and since the moment of separation was very near, they began to +retrace their steps through the years of their married life, and back +beyond them to the days of their first acquaintance. Thus it happened +that Millie mentioned the name of Pamela Mardale, and suddenly Tony +drew himself upright in his chair.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Is she in town, I wonder?" he asked, rather of himself than of his +wife.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Most likely," Millie replied. "Why?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I think I must try to see her before I go," said Tony, thoughtfully; +and more than once during the evening he looked with anxiety towards +his wife; but in his look there was some perplexity too.</p> + +<p class="normal">He tried next day; for he borrowed a horse from a friend, and rode out +into the Row at eleven o'clock. As he passed through the gates of Hyde +Park, he saw Pamela turning her horse on the edge of the sand. She saw +him at the same moment and waited.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are a stranger here," she said, with a smile, as he joined her.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Here and everywhere," he replied. "I came out on purpose to find +you."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela glanced at Tony curiously. Only a few days had passed since +Warrisden had pointed out the truants from the window of Lady +Millingham's house, and had speculated upon the seclusion of their +lives. The memory of that evening was still fresh in her mind.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I want to ask you a question."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ask it and I'll answer," she replied carelessly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You were Millie's bridesmaid?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You saw a good deal of her before we were married?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes."</p> + +<p class="normal">They were riding down the Row at a walk under the trees, Pamela +wondering to what these questions were to lead, Tony slowly +formulating the point which troubled him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Before Millie and I were engaged," he went on, "before indeed there +was any likelihood of our being engaged, you once said to me something +about her."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I did?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes. I remembered it last night. And it rather worries me. I should +like you to explain what you meant. You said, 'The man who marries her +should never leave her. If he goes away shooting big game, he should +take her with him. On no account must she be left behind.'"</p> + +<p class="normal">It was a day cloudless and bright. Over towards the Serpentine the +heat filled the air with a soft screen of mist, and at the bottom of +the Row the rhododendrons glowed. As Pamela and Tony went forward at a +walk the sunlight slanting through the leaves now shone upon their +faces and now left them in shade. And when it fell bright upon Pamela +it lit up a countenance which was greatly troubled. She did not, +however, deny that she had used the words. She did not pretend that +she had forgotten their application.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You remember what I said?" she remarked. "It is a long while ago."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Before that," he explained, "I had begun to notice all that was said +of Millie."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I spoke the words generally, perhaps too carelessly."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yet not without a reason," Tony insisted. "That's not your way."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela made no reply for a moment or two. Then she patted her horse's +head, and said softly--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Not without a reason." She admitted his contention frankly. She did +more, for she turned in her saddle towards him and, looking straight +into his face, said--</p> + +<p class="normal">"I was not giving you advice at the time. But, had I been, I should +have said just those words. I say them again now."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Why?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony put his question very earnestly. He held Pamela in a great +respect, believing her clear-sighted beyond her fellows. He was indeed +a little timid in her presence as a rule, for she overawed him, though +all unconsciously. Nothing of this timidity, however, showed now. +"That was what I came out to ask you. Why?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Again Pamela attempted no evasion.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I can't tell you," she said quietly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You promised."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I break the promise."</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony looked wistfully at his companion. That the perplexing words had +been spoken with a definite meaning he had felt sure from the moment +when he had remembered them. And her refusal to explain proved to him +that the meaning was a very serious one--one indeed which he ought to +know and take into account.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I ask you to explain," he urged, "because I <i>am</i> going away, and I +<i>am</i> leaving Millie behind."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela was startled. She turned quickly towards him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Must you?" she said, and before he could answer she recovered from +her surprise. "Never mind," she continued; "shall we ride on?" and she +put her horse to a trot. It was not her business to advise or to +interfere. She had said too much already. She meant to remain the +looker-on.</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton, however, was not upon this occasion to be so easily +suppressed. He kept level with her, and as they rode he told her +something of the life which Millie and he had led in the big lonely +house in Berkeley Square; and in spite of herself Pamela was +interested. She had a sudden wish that Alan Warrisden was riding with +them too, so that he might hear his mystery resolved; she had a sudden +vision of his face, keen as a boy's, as he listened.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I saw Millie and you a few nights ago. I was at a dance close by, and +I was surprised to see you. I thought you had left London," she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No; but I am leaving," Stretton returned; and he went on to describe +that idyllic future which Millie and he had allotted to themselves. +The summer sunlight was golden in the air about them; already it +seemed that new fresh life was beginning. "I shall breed horses in +Kentucky. I was recommended to it by an East End parson called Chase, +who runs a mission on Stepney Green. I used to keep order in a +billiard room at his mission one night a week, when I was quartered at +the Tower. A queer sort of creature, Chase; but his judgment's good, +and of course he is always meeting all sorts of people."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Chase?" Pamela repeated; and she retained the name in her memory.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But he doesn't know Millie," said Stretton, "and you do. And so what +you said troubles me very much. If I go away remembering your words +and not understanding them, I shall go away uneasy. I shall remain +uneasy."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am sorry," Pamela replied. "I broke a rule of mine in saying what I +did, a rule not to interfere. And I see now that I did very wrong in +breaking it. I will not break it again. You must forget my words."</p> + +<p class="normal">There was a quiet decision in her manner which warned Tony that no +persuasions would induce her to explain. He gave up his attempt and +turned to another subject.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have something else to ask--not a question this time, but a favour. +You could be a very staunch friend, Miss Mardale, if you chose. Millie +will be lonely after I have gone. You were a great friend of hers +once--be a friend of hers again."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela hesitated. The promise which he sought on the face of it no +doubt looked easy of fulfilment. But Tony Stretton had been right in +one conjecture. She had spoken the words which troubled him from a +definite reason, and that reason assured her now that this promise +might lay upon her a burden, and a burden of a heavy kind. And she +shrank from all burdens. On the other hand, there was no doubt that +she had caused Tony much uneasiness. He would go away, on a task +which, as she saw very clearly, would be more arduous by far than even +he suspected--he would go away troubled and perplexed. That could not +be helped. But she might lighten the trouble, and make the perplexity +less insistent, if she granted the favour which he sought. It seemed +churlish to refuse.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Very well," she said reluctantly. "I promise."</p> + +<p class="normal">Already Tony's face showed his relief. She had given her promise +reluctantly, but she would keep it now. Of that he felt assured, and, +bidding her good-bye, he turned his horse and cantered back.</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela rode homewards more slowly. She had proposed to keep clear of +entanglements and responsibilities, and, behold! the meshes were about +her. She had undertaken a trust. In spite of herself she had ceased to +be the looker-on.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER VI</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_06" href="#div1Ref_06">NEWS OF TONY</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">The promise which Pamela had given was a great relief to Tony; he went +about the work of preparing for his departure with an easier mind. It +was even in his thoughts when he stood with his wife upon the platform +of Euston station, five minutes before his train started for +Liverpool.</p> + +<p class="normal">"She will be a good friend, Millie," he said. "Count on her till I +send for you. I think I am right to go, even though I don't +understand----"</p> + +<p class="normal">He checked himself abruptly. Millie, however, paid heed only to the +first clause of his sentence.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Of course you are right," she said, with a confidence which brought +an answering smile to his face.</p> + +<p class="normal">She watched the red tail-light of the train until it disappeared, and +drove home alone to the big dreary house. It seemed ten times more +dreary, ten times more silent than ever before. She was really alone +now. But her confidence in herself and in Tony was still strong. "I +can wait," she said, and the consciousness of her courage rejoiced +her. She walked from room to room and sat for a few moments in each, +realising that the coldness, the dingy look of the furniture, and the +empty silence had no longer the power to oppress her. She even +hesitated at the library door with her fingers on the key. But it was +not until the next day that she unlocked it and threw it open.</p> + +<p class="normal">For Pamela, mindful of her promise, called in the afternoon. Millicent +was still uplifted by her confidence.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I can wait quite patiently," she said; and Pamela scrutinised her +with some anxiety. For Millicent was speaking feverishly, as though +she laboured under an excitement. Was her courage the mere +effervescence of that excitement, or was it a steady, durable thing? +Pamela led her friend on to speak of the life which she and Tony had +led in the big house, sounding her the while so that she might come +upon some answer to that question. And thus it happened that, as they +came down the stairs together, Millicent again stopped before the +library door.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Look!" she said. "This room always seemed to me typical of the whole +house, typical too of the lives we led in it."</p> + +<p class="normal">She unlocked the door suddenly and flung it open. The floor of the +library was below the level of the hall, and a smooth plane of wood +sloped down to it very gradually from the threshold.</p> + +<p class="normal">"There used to be steps here once, but before my time," said +Millicent. She went down into the room. Pamela followed her, and +understood why those two steps had been removed. Although the +book-shelves rose on every wall from floor to ceiling, it was not as a +library that this room was used. Heavy black curtains draped it with a +barbaric profusion. The centre of the room was clear of furniture, and +upon the carpet in that clear space was laid a purple drugget; and on +the drugget opposite to one another stood two strong wooden crutches. +The room was a mortuary chamber--nothing less. On those two crutches +the dead were to lie awaiting burial.</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie Stretton shook her shoulders with a kind of shiver.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, how I used to hate this room, hate knowing that it was here, +prepared and ready!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela could understand how the knowledge would work upon a woman of +emotions, whose nerves were already strung to exasperation by the life +she led. For even to her there was something eerie in the disposition +of the room. It looked out upon a dull yard of stone at the back of +the house; the light was very dim and the noise of the streets hardly +the faintest whisper; there was a chill and a dampness in the air.</p> + +<p class="normal">"How I hated it," Millie repeated. "I used to lie awake and think of +it. I used to imagine it more silent than any other of the silent +rooms, and emptier--emptier because day and night it seemed to claim +an inhabitant, and to claim it as a right. That was the horrible +thing. The room was waiting--waiting for us to be carried down that +wooden bridge and laid on the crutches here, each in our turn. It +became just a symbol of the whole house. For what is the house, +Pamela? A place that should have been a place of life, and is a place +merely expecting death. Look at the books reaching up to the ceiling, +never taken down, never read, for the room's a room for coffins. It +wasn't merely a symbol of the house--that wasn't the worst of it. It +was a sort of image of our lives, the old man's upstairs, Tony's and +mine down here. We were all doing nothing, neither suffering nor +enjoying, but just waiting--waiting for death. Nothing you see could +happen in this house but death. Until it came there would only be +silence and emptiness."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie Stretton finished her outburst, and stood dismayed as though +the shadow of those past days were still about her. The words she had +spoken must have seemed exaggerated and even theatrical, but for the +aspect of her as she spoke them. Her whole frame shuddered, her face +had the shrinking look of fear. She recovered herself, however, in a +moment.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But that time's past," she said. "Tony's gone and I--I am waiting for +life now. I am only a lodger, you see. A month or two, and I pack my +boxes."</p> + +<p class="normal">She turned towards the door and stopped. The hall door had just at +that moment opened. Pamela heard a man's footsteps sound heavily upon +the floor of the hall and then upon the stairs.</p> + +<p class="normal">"My father-in-law," said Millie.</p> + +<p class="normal">"This was his doing?" asked Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," replied Millie. "It's strange, isn't it? But there's something +stranger still."</p> + +<p class="normal">The footsteps had now ceased. Millie led the way back to her room.</p> + +<p class="normal">"When I got home yesterday," she related, "I had Tony's letter +announcing his departure taken up to Sir John. I waited for him to +send for me. He did not. I am not sure that I expected he would. You +see, he has never shown the least interest in us. However, when I went +up to my room to dress for dinner, I saw that the candles were all +lighted in Tony's room next door, and his clothes laid out upon the +bed. I went in and put the candles out--rather quickly." Her voice +shook a little upon those last two words. Pamela nodded her head as +though she understood, and Millicent went on, after a short pause--</p> + +<p class="normal">"It troubled me to see them burning; it troubled me very much. And +when I came downstairs I told the footman the candles were not to be +lit again, since Tony had gone away. He answered that they had been +lit by Sir John's orders. At first I thought that Sir John had not +troubled to read the letter at all. I thought that all the more +because he never once, either during dinner or afterwards, mentioned +Tony's name or seemed to remark his absence. But it was not so. He has +given orders that every night the room is to be ready and the candles +lit as though Tony were here still, or might walk in at the door at +any moment. I suppose that after all in a queer way he cares."</p> + +<p class="normal">Again her voice faltered; and again a question rose up insistent in +Pamela's mind. She knew her friend, and it was out of her knowledge +that she had spoken long ago in Tony's presence when she had said, +"her husband should never leave her." It was evident that Tony's +departure had caused his wife great suffering.</p> + +<p class="normal">Millicent had let that fact escape in spite of her exaltation. Pamela +welcomed it, but she asked, "Was that regret a steady and durable +thing?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela left London the next day with her question unanswered, and for +two months there was no opportunity for her of discovering an answer. +Often during that August and September, on the moors in Scotland, or +at her own home in Leicestershire, she would think of Millie Stretton, +in the hot and dusty town amongst the houses where the blinds were +drawn. She imagined her sitting over against the old stern impassive +man at dinner, or wearily reading to him his newspaper at night. Had +the regret dwindled to irritation, and the loneliness begotten +petulance?</p> + +<p class="normal">Indeed, those months were dull and wearisome enough for Millicent. No +change of significance came in the routine of that monotonous +household. Sir John went to his room perhaps a little earlier than had +been his wont, his footsteps dragged along the floor for a while +longer, and his light burned in the window after the dawn had come. +Finally he ceased to leave his room at all. But that was all. For +Millicent, however, the weeks passed easily. Each day brought her a +day nearer to the sunlit farm fronting the open plain. She marked the +weeks off in her diary with a growing relief; for news kept coming +from America, and the news was good.</p> + +<p class="normal">Early in October, Pamela passed through London on her way to Sussex, +and broke her journey that she might see her friend.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Frances Millingham is writing to you," she said. "She wants you to +stay with her in Leicestershire. I shall be there too. I hope you will +come."</p> + +<p class="normal">"When?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"At the beginning of the New Year."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millicent laughed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I shall have left England before then. Tony will have made his way," +she said, with a joyous conviction.</p> + +<p class="normal">"There might be delays," Pamela suggested, in a very gentle voice. For +suddenly there had risen before her mind the picture of a terrace high +above a gorge dark with cypresses. She saw again the Mediterranean, +breaking in gold along the curving shore, and the gardens of the +Casino at Monte Carlo. She heard a young girl prophesying success upon +that terrace with no less certainty than Millicent had used. Her face +softened and her eyes shone with a very wistful look. She took out her +watch and glanced at it. It was five o'clock. The school children had +gone home by now from the little school-house in the square of +Roquebrune. Was the schoolmaster leaning over the parapet looking +downwards to the station or to the deserted walk in front of the +Casino? Was a train passing along the sea's edge towards France and +Paris?</p> + +<p class="normal">"One must expect delays, Millie," she insisted; and again Millie +laughed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have had letters. I am expecting another. It should have come a +fortnight since." And she told Pamela what the letters had contained.</p> + +<p class="normal">At first Tony had been a little bewildered by the activity of New +York, after his quiescent years. But he had soon made an acquaintance, +and the acquaintance had become a friend. The two men had determined +to go into partnership; a farm in Kentucky was purchased, each man +depositing an equal share of the purchase money.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Six weeks ago they left New York. Tony said I would not hear from him +at once."</p> + +<p class="normal">And while they were sitting together there came a knock upon the door, +and two letters were brought in for Millicent. One she tossed upon the +table. With the other in her hand she turned triumphantly to Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do you mind?" she asked. "I have been waiting so long."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Read it, of course," said Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie tore the letter open, and at once the light died out of her +eyes, and the smile vanished from her lips.</p> + +<p class="normal">"From New York," she said, halfway between perplexity and fear. "He +writes from New York." And with trembling fingers she turned over the +sheets and read the letter through.</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela watched her, saw the blood ebb from her cheeks, and dejection +overspread her face. A great pity welled up in Pamela's heart, not +merely for the wife who read, but for the man who had penned that +letter--with what difficulty, she wondered, with how much pain! +Failure was the message which it carried. Millicent's trembling lips +told her that. And again the village of Roquebrune rose up before her +eyes as she gazed out of the window on the London square. What were +the words the schoolmaster had spoken when, stripped of his dreams, he +had confessed success was not for him? "We must forget these fine +plans. The school at Roquebrune will send no deputy to Paris." +Pamela's eyes grew dim.</p> + +<p class="normal">She stood looking out of the window for some while, but hearing no +movement she at length turned back again. The sheets of the letter had +fallen upon the floor, they lay scattered, written over in a round, +sprawling, schoolboy's hand. Millicent sat very still, her face most +weary and despairing.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It's all over," she said. "The friend was a swindler. He left the +train at a station on the way and disappeared. Tony went on, but there +was no farm. He is back in New York."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But the man can be found?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"He belongs to a gang. There is little chance, and Tony has no money. +He will take no more of mine."</p> + +<p class="normal">"He is coming home, then?" said Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No; he means to stay and retrieve his failures."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela said nothing, and Millicent appealed to her. "He will do that, +don't you think? Men have started badly before, and have succeeded, +and have not taken so very long to succeed."</p> + +<p class="normal">"No doubt," said Pamela; and she spoke with what hopefulness she +could. But she remembered Tony Stretton. Simplicity and good-humour +were amongst his chief qualities; he was a loyal friend, and he had +pluck. Was that enough? On the other hand, he had little knowledge and +little experience. The schoolmaster of Roquebrune and Tony Stretton +stood side by side in her thoughts. She was not, however, to be put to +the task of inventing encouragements. For before she could open her +lips again, Millicent said gently--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Will you mind if I ask to be left alone? Come again as soon as you +can. But this afternoon----" Her voice broke so that she could not +finish her sentence, and she turned hastily away. However, she +recovered her self-control and went down the stairs with Pamela, and +as they came into the hall their eyes turned to the library door, and +then they looked at one another. Both remembered the conversation they +had had within that room.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What if you told Sir John?" said Pamela. "It seems that he does after +all care."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It would be of no use," said Millicent, shaking her head. "He would +only say, 'Let him come home,' and Tony will not. Besides, I never see +him now."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Never?" exclaimed Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No; he does not leave his room." She lowered her voice. "I do not +believe he ever will leave it again. It's not that he's really ill, +his doctor tells me, but he's slowly letting himself go."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela answered absently. Sir John Stretton and his ailments played a +small part in her thoughts. It seemed that the library was again to +become typical of the house, typical of the life its inhabitants led. +Nothing was to happen, then. There was to be a mere waiting for things +to cease.</p> + +<p class="normal">But a second letter was lying upstairs unopened on the table, and that +letter, harmless as it appeared, was strangely to influence Millicent +Stretton's life. It was many hours afterwards when Millicent opened +it, and, compared with the heavy tidings she had by the same post +received, it seemed utterly trifling and unimportant. It was no more +indeed than the invitation from Frances Millingham of which Pamela had +spoken. Pamela forgot it altogether when she heard the news which Tony +had sent, but she was to be affected by it too. For she had made a +promise to Tony Stretton, and, as he had foreseen, she would at any +cost fulfil it.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER VII</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_07" href="#div1Ref_07">THE LADY ON THE STAIRS</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Whitewebs, Frances Millingham's house in Leicestershire, was a long +white building with many level windows. The square main block of the +building rose in the centre two storeys high, and on each side a wing +of one storey projected. Behind the house a broad lawn sloped to the +bank of a clear and shallow trout stream, with an avenue of old elms +upon its left, and a rose garden upon its right. In front of the house +a paddock made a ring of green, and round this ring the carriage drive +circled from a white five-barred gate. Whitewebs stood in a flat grass +country. From the upper windows you looked over a wide plain of +meadows and old trees, so level that you had on a misty day almost an +illusion of a smooth sea and the masts of ships; from the lower, you +saw just as far as the nearest hedgerow, except in one quarter of the +compass. For to the south-west the ground rose very far away, and at +the limit of view three tall poplars, set in a tiny garden on the +hill's crest, stood clearly out against the sky like sentinels upon a +frontier. These three landmarks were visible for many miles around. +Pamela, however, saw nothing of them as she was driven over the three +miles from the station to Whitewebs.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was late on a February evening, and already dark. The snow had +fallen heavily during the last week, and as Pamela looked out through +the carriage windows she saw that the ground glimmered white on every +side; above the ground a mist thickened the night air, and the cold +was piercing. When she reached the house she found that Frances +Millingham was waiting for her alone in the big inner hall, with tea +ready; and the first question which she asked of her hostess was--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Is Millie Stretton here?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," replied Frances Millingham. "She has been here a week."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I couldn't come before," said Pamela, rather remorsefully. "My father +was at home alone. How is Millie? I have not seen her for a long time. +Is she enjoying herself?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela's conscience had been reproaching her all that afternoon. She +could plead in her own behalf that after the arrival of Tony's letter +with its message of failure, she had deferred her visit into the +country and had stayed in London for a week. But she had not returned +to London since, and consequently she had not seen her friend. She had +heard regularly from her, it is true; she also knew that there was yet +no likelihood of the hoped-for change in the life of that isolated +household in Berkeley Square. But there had been certain omissions of +late in Millicent's letters which began to make Pamela anxious.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," Frances Millingham replied; "she seems to be happy enough."</p> + +<p class="normal">Lady Millingham related the names of her guests. There were twelve in +all, but the first ten may be omitted, for they are in no way +concerned with Pamela's history. The eleventh name, however, was that +of a friend.</p> + +<p class="normal">"John Mudge is here, too," said Frances Millingham; and Pamela said, +with a smile--</p> + +<p class="normal">"I like him."</p> + +<p class="normal">John Mudge was that elderly man whom Allan Warrisden had seen with +Pamela at Lady Millingham's dance, the man with no pleasure in his +face. "And Mr. Lionel Callon," said Frances; "you know him."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do I?" asked Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"At all events, he knows you."</p> + +<p class="normal">It was no doubt a consequence of Pamela's deliberate plan never to be +more than an onlooker, that people who did not arouse her active +interest passed in and out of her acquaintanceship like shadows upon a +mirror. It might be that she had met Lionel Callon. She could not +remember.</p> + +<p class="normal">"A quarter past seven," said Frances Millingham, glancing at the +clock. "We dine at eight."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela dressed quickly in the hope that she might gain a few minutes +before dinner wherein to talk to Millicent. She came down the stairs +with this object a good quarter of an hour before eight, but she was +to be disappointed. The stairs descended into the big inner hall of +the house, and just below the roof of the hall they took a bend. As +Pamela came round this bend the hall was exposed to her eyes, and she +saw, below her, not Millicent at all, but the figure of a man. He was +standing by the fireplace, on her left hand as she descended, looking +into the fire indeed, so that his back was towards her. But at the +rustle of her frock he swung round quickly and looked up. He now moved +a few steps towards the foot of the stairs with a particular +eagerness. Pamela at that moment had just come round the bend, and was +on the small platform from which the final flight of steps began. The +staircase was dimly lit, and the panelling of the wall against which +it rested dark. Pamela took a step or two downwards, and the light of +the hall struck upon her face. The man came instantly to a dead stop, +and a passing disappointment was visible upon his upturned face. It +was evident that he was expecting some one else. Pamela on her side +was disappointed, too, for she had hoped to find Millicent. She went +down the stairs and stopped on the third step from the bottom.</p> + +<p class="normal">"How do you do, Miss Mardale?" said the man. "You have arrived at +last."</p> + +<p class="normal">The man was Lionel Callon. Pamela recognised him now that they stood +face to face; she <i>had</i> met him, but she had retained no impression of +him in her memory. For the future, however, she would retain a very +distinct impression. For her instincts told her at once and clearly +that she thoroughly disliked the man. He was thirty-three in years, +and looked a trifle younger, although his hair was turning grey. He +was clean shaven, handsome beyond most men, and while his features +were of a classical regularity and of an almost feminine delicacy, +they were still not without character. There was determination in his +face, and his eyes were naturally watchful. It was his manner which +prompted Pamela's instinct of dislike. Assurance gave to it a hint of +arrogance; familiarity made it distasteful. He might have been her +host from the warmth of his welcome. Pamela put on her sedatest air.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am quite well," she said, with just sufficient surprise to suggest +the question, "What in the world has my health to do with you?" She +came down the three steps, and added, "We are the first, I suppose."</p> + +<p class="normal">"There may be others in the drawing-room," said Callon, with a glance +towards the open door. But Pamela did not take the hint. For one thing +no sound of any voice was audible in that room; for another Mr. Callon +was plainly anxious to be rid of her. Even as he was speaking his +glance strayed past her up the staircase. Pamela disliked him; she +was, besides, disappointed by him of that private talk with Millicent +which she desired. She was in a mood for mischief. She changed her +manner at once, and, crossing over to the fireplace, engaged Mr. +Callon in conversation with the utmost cordiality, and as she talked +she began to be amused. Callon became positively uneasy; he could not +keep still, he answered her at random. For instance, she put to him a +question about the number of guests in the house. He did not answer at +all for a moment or two, and when he did speak, it was to say, "Will +the frost hold, do you think?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"There's no sign of a thaw to-night," replied Pamela; and the sounds +for which both were listening became audible--the shutting of a door +on the landing above, and then the rustle of a frock upon the stairs. +Mr. Callon was evidently at his wits' end what to do; and Pamela, +taking her elbow from the mantelpiece, said, with great sympathy--</p> + +<p class="normal">"One feels a little in the way----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, not at all, Miss Mardale," Callon answered hurriedly, with a +flustered air.</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela looked at her companion with the blankest stare of surprise.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I was going to say, when you interrupted me," she went on, "that one +feels a little in the way when one has brought a couple of horses, as +I have, and the frost holds."</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon grew red. He had fallen into a trap; his very hurry to +interrupt what appeared to be almost an apology betrayed that the lady +upon the stairs and Mr. Lionel Callon had arranged to come down early. +He had protested overmuch. However, he looked Pamela steadily in the +face, and said--</p> + +<p class="normal">"I beg your pardon, Miss Mardale."</p> + +<p class="normal">He spoke loudly, rather too loudly for the ears of any one so near to +him as Pamela. The sentence, too, was uttered with a note of warning. +There was even a suggestion of command. The command was obeyed by the +lady on the stairs, for all at once the frock ceased to rustle, and +there was silence. Lionel Callon kept his eyes fixed upon Pamela's +face, but she did not look towards the stairs, and in a little while +again the sound was heard. But it diminished. The lady upon the stairs +was ascending, and a few minutes afterwards a door closed overhead. +She had beaten a retreat.</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon could not quite keep the relief which he felt out of his eyes +or the smile from his lips. Pamela noticed the change with amusement. +She was not in the mind to spare him uneasiness, and she said, looking +at the wall above the mantelpiece--</p> + +<p class="normal">"This is an old mirror, don't you think? From what period would you +date it?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon's thoughts had been so intent upon the stairs that he had paid +no heed to the ornaments above the mantelshelf. Now, however, he took +note of them with a face grown at once anxious. The mirror was of an +oval shape and framed in gold. Under the pretence of admiring it, he +moved and stood behind Pamela, looking into the mirror over her +shoulder, seeing what she could see, and wondering how much she had +seen. He was to some extent relieved. The stairs were ill-lighted, the +panelling of the wall dark mahogany; moreover, the stairs bent round +into the hall just below the level of the roof, and at the bend the +lady on the stairs had stopped. Pamela could not have seen her face. +Pamela, indeed, had seen nothing more than a black satin slipper +arrested in the act of taking a step, and a black gown with some +touches of red at the waist. She had, however, noticed the attitude of +the wearer of the dress when the warning voice had brought her to a +stop. The lady had stooped down and had cautiously peered into the +hall. In this attitude she had been able to see, and yet had avoided +being seen.</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela, however, did not relieve Mr. Callon of his suspense. She +walked into the drawing-room and waited, with an amused curiosity, for +the appearance of the black dress. It was long in coming, however. +Pamela had no doubt that it would come last, and in a hurry, as though +its wearer had been late in dressing. But Pamela was wrong. Millicent +Stretton came into the room dressed in a frock of white lace, and at +once dinner was announced. Pamela turned to Frances Millingham with a +startled face--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Are we all here?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Frances Millingham looked round.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes;" and Lord Millingham at that moment offered his arm to Pamela. +As she took it, she looked at Millicent, who was just rising from her +chair. Millicent was wearing with her white dress black shoes and +stockings. She might be wearing them deliberately, of course; on the +other hand, she might be wearing them because she had not had time to +change them. It was Millicent, certainly, who had come down last. "I +beg your pardon, Miss Mardale," Callon had said, and it was upon the +"Miss Mardale" that his voice had risen. The emphasis of his warning +had been laid upon the name.</p> + +<p class="normal">As she placed her hand on her host's arm, Pamela said--</p> + +<p class="normal">"It was very kind of Frances to ask Millie Stretton here."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh no," Lord Millingham replied. "You see, Frances knew her. We all +knew, besides, that she is a great friend of yours."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," said Pamela; "I suppose everybody here knows that?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Mrs. Stretton has talked of it," he answered, with a smile.</p> + +<p class="normal">The "Miss Mardale" might be a warning, then, to Millicent that her +friend had arrived--was actually then in the hall. There was certainly +no one but Millicent in that house who could have been conscious of +any need to shrink back at the warning, who would have changed her +dress to prevent a recognition; and Millicent herself need not have +feared the warning had there not been something to conceal--something +to conceal especially from Pamela, who had said, "I have promised your +husband I would be your friend." There was the heart of Pamela's +trouble.</p> + +<p class="normal">She gazed down the two lines of people at the dinner-table, hoping +against hope that she had overlooked some one. There was no one +wearing a black gown. All Pamela's amusement in outwitting Callon had +long since vanished. If Tony had only taken her advice without +question, she thought. "Millie's husband should never leave her. If he +goes away he should take her with him." The words rang in her mind all +through dinner like the refrain of a song of which one cannot get rid. +And at the back of her thoughts there steadily grew and grew a great +regret that she had ever promised Tony to befriend his wife.</p> + +<p class="normal">That Millicent was the lady on the stairs she no longer dared to +doubt. Had she doubted, her suspicions would have been confirmed +immediately dinner was over. In the drawing-room Millicent avoided any +chance of a private conversation, and since they had not met for so +long such avoidance was unnatural. Pamela, however, made no effort to +separate her friend from the other women. She had a plan in her mind, +and in pursuit of it she occupied a sofa, upon which there was just +room for two. She sat in the middle of the sofa, so that no one else +could sit on it, and just waited until the men came in. Some of them +crossed at once to Pamela, but she did not budge an inch. They were +compelled to stand. Finally, Mr. Mudge approached her, and immediately +she moved into one corner and bade him take the other. Mr. Mudge +accepted the position with alacrity. The others began to move away; a +couple of card-tables were made up. Pamela and John Mudge were left +alone.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You know every one here?" she asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, very few."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Mr. Callon, at all events?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Mudge glanced shrewdly at his questioner.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, I know him slightly," he answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Tell me what you know."</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Mudge sat for a moment or two with his hands upon his knees and +his eyes staring in front of him. Pamela knew his history, and +esteemed his judgment. He had built up a great contracting business +from the poorest beginnings, and he remained without bombast or +arrogance. He was to be met nowadays in many houses, and, while he had +acquired manners, he had lost nothing of his simplicity. The journey +from the Seven Dials to Belgrave Square is a test of furnace heat, and +John Mudge had betrayed no flaws. There was a certain forlornness, +too, in his manner which appealed particularly to Pamela. She guessed +that the apples, for which through a lifetime he had grasped, had +crumbled into ashes between his fingers. Sympathy taught her that the +man was lonely. He wandered through the world amidst a throng of +acquaintances; but how many friends had he, she wondered? She did not +interrupt his reflections, and he turned to her at last, with an air +of decision.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am on strange ground here," he said, "as you know. I am the +outsider; and when I am on strange ground I go warily. If I am asked +what I think of this man or that I make it a rule to praise."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes; but not to me," said Pamela, with a smile. "I want to know the +truth to-night."</p> + +<p class="normal">Mudge looked at her deliberately, and no less deliberately he spoke--</p> + +<p class="normal">"And I think you ought to know the truth to-night."</p> + +<p class="normal">Mudge, then, like the rest, knew that she was Millicent's friend. Was +it for that reason that she ought to know the truth?</p> + +<p class="normal">"I know Callon a little," he went on, "but I know a good deal about +him. Like most of the men who know him I dislike him heartily. Women, +on the other hand, like him, Miss Mardale--like him too well. Women +make extraordinary mistakes over men just as men do over women. They +can be very blind--like your friend----"</p> + +<p class="normal">Mudge paused for an appreciable time. Then he went on steadily--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Like your friend Lady Millingham, who invites him here."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela was grateful for the delicacy with which the warning was +conveyed, but she did not misunderstand it. She had been told +indirectly, but no less definitely on that account, that Millie was +entangled.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Callon has good looks, of course," continued Mudge; and Pamela +uttered a little exclamation of contempt. Mudge smiled, but rather +sadly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, it's something. All people have not your haughty indifference to +good looks. He is tall, he has a face which is a face and not a +pudding. It's a good deal, Miss Mardale."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela looked in surprise at the stout, heavily-built bald man who +spoke. That he should ever have given a thought to how he looked was a +new idea to her. It struck her as pathetic.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But he is not merely good-looking. He is clever, persistent besides, +and, so far as I can judge, untroubled by a single scruple in the +management of his life. Altogether, Miss Mardale, a dangerous man. How +does he live?" he asked suddenly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I neither know nor care," said Pamela. "Ah, but you should care," +replied Mudge. "The answer is instructive. He has a small income--two +hundred a year, perhaps; a mere nothing compared with what he +spends--and he never does an hour's work, as we understand work. Yet +he pays his card debts at his club, and they are sometimes heavy, and +he wants for nothing. How is it done? He has no prospect of an +inheritance, so post-obits are not the explanation."</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Mudge leaned back in his chair and waited. Pamela turned the +question over in her mind. "I can't guess how it's done," she said. +"And I can do no more than hint the answer," he replied. "He rides one +woman's horses, he drives another woman's phaeton, he is always on +hand to take a third to a theatre, or to make up a luncheon party with +a fourth. Shall we say he borrows money from a fifth? Shall we be +wrong in saying it?" And suddenly Mr. Mudge exclaimed, with a heat and +scorn which Pamela had never heard from him before, "A very +contemptible existence, anyway, Miss Mardale. But the man's not to be +despised, mind. No, that's the worst of it. Some day, perhaps, a +strong man will rise up and set his foot on him. Till that time he is +to be feared." And when Pamela by a gesture rejected the word, Mudge +repeated it. "Yes, feared. He makes his plans, Miss Mardale. Take a +purely imaginary case," and somehow, although he laid no ironic stress +on the word imaginary, and accompanied it with no look, but sat gazing +straight in front of him, Pamela was aware that it was a real case he +was going to cite. "Imagine a young and pretty woman coming to a house +where most of the guests were strangers to her; imagine her to be of a +friendly, unsuspecting temperament, rather lonely, perhaps, and either +unmarried or separated for a time from her husband. Add that she will +one day be very rich, or that her husband will be. Such a woman might +be his prey, unless----"</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela looked up inquiringly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Unless she had good friends to help her."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela's face, distressed before, grew yet more troubled now. The +burden of her promise was being forced upon her back. It seemed she +was not for one moment to be allowed to forget it.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I'll tell you my philosophy, Miss Mardale," Mudge continued, "and I +have inferred it from what I have seen. I do not believe that any man +really comes to good unless he has started in life with the ambition +to make a career for himself, with no help other than his hands and +his brains afford. Later on he will learn that women can be most +helpful; later on, as he gets towards middle life, as the years +shorten and shorten, he will see that he must use whatever extraneous +assistance comes his way. But he will begin with a fearless ambition +to suffice with his own hands and head." Mr. Mudge dropped from the +high level of his earnestness. He looked towards Lionel Callon, who +was seated at a card-table, and the contempt again crept into his +voice. "Now that man began life meaning to use all people he met, and +especially women. Women were to be his implements." Mr. Mudge smiled +suddenly. "He's listening," he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But he is too far away to hear," replied Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No doubt; but he knows we are speaking of him. Look, his attitude +shows it. This, you see, is his battleground, and he knows the arts of +his particular warfare. A drawing-room! Mr. Lionel Callon fights among +the teacups. Cajolery first, and God knows by what means afterwards. +But he wins, Miss Mardale; don't close your eyes to that! Look, I told +you he was listening. The rubber's over, and he's coming towards us. +Oh, he's alert upon his battle-ground! He knows what men think of him. +He's afraid lest I should tell what men think to you. But he comes too +late."</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon crossed to the sofa, and stood talking there until Frances +Millingham rose. Pamela turned to Mr. Mudge as she got up.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I thank you very much," she said gratefully.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Mudge smiled.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No need for thanks," said he. "I am very glad you came to-night, for +I go away to-morrow."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela went to her room and sat down before the fire. What was to be +done, she wondered? She could not get Lionel Callon sent away from the +house. It would be no use even if she could, since Millie had an +address in town. She could not say a word openly.</p> + +<p class="normal">She raised her head and spoke to her maid.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Which is Mrs. Stretton's room?" And when she had the answer she rose +from her chair and stood, a figure of indecision. She did not plead +that John Mudge had exaggerated the danger; for she had herself +foreseen it long-ago, before Millie's marriage--even before Millie's +engagement. It was just because she had foreseen it that she had used +the words which had so rankled in Tony's memory. Bitterly she +regretted that she had ever used them; greatly she wished that she +could doubt their wisdom. But she could not. Let Millie's husband +leave her, she would grieve with all the strength of her nature; let +him come back soon, she would welcome him with a joy as great. Yes; +but he must come back <i>soon</i>. Otherwise she would grow used to his +absence; she would find his return an embarrassment, for it would be +the return of a stranger with the prerogative of a husband; she might +even have given to another the place he once held in her thoughts. And +the other might be a Lionel Callon. For this was Millicent's +character. She yielded too easily to affection, and she did not +readily distinguish between affection and the show of it. She paddled +in the shallows of passion, and flattered herself that she was +swimming in the depths. Grief she was capable of--yes; but a torrent +of tears obliterated it. Joy she knew; but it was a thrill with her +lasting an hour.</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela walked along the passage and knocked at Millicent's door, +saying who she was. Millicent opened the door, and received her friend +with some constraint.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Can I come in?" said Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Of course," said Millie.</p> + +<p class="normal">They sat opposite to one another on each side of the fire.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I wanted to see you before I went to bed," said Pamela. "You have not +told me lately in your letters how Tony is getting on."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie raised her hand to shield her face from the blaze of the fire. +She happened to shade it also from the eyes of Pamela; and she made no +reply.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Is he still in New York?" Pamela asked; and then Millie replied.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do not know," she answered slowly. She let her hand fall, and +looked straight and defiantly at her friend.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have not heard from him for a long while," she added; and as she +spoke there crept into her face a look of disdain.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER VIII</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_08" href="#div1Ref_08">GIDEON'S FLEECE</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Millicent was reluctant to add any word of explanation. She sat with +her eyes upon the fire, waiting, it seemed, until Pamela should see +fit to go. But Pamela remained, and of the two women she was the +stronger in will and character. She sat, with her eyes quietly resting +upon Millicent's face; and in a little while Millicent began +reluctantly to speak. As she spoke the disdainful droop of her lips +became more pronounced, and her words were uttered in a note of +petulance.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He <i>would</i> stay to retrieve his failure. You remember?" she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," replied Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I wrote to him again and again to come home, but he would not. I +couldn't make him see that he wasn't really a match for the people he +must compete with."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela nodded her head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You wrote that to him?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Millicent lifted her face to Pamela's.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I put it, of course, with less frankness. I offered him, besides, the +rest of my money, so that he might try again; but he refused to take a +farthing more. It was unreasonable, don't you think? I could have got +on without it, but he couldn't. I was very sorry for him."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And you expressed your pity, too?" asked Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, indeed," said Millicent, eagerly. "But he never would accept it. +He replied cheerfully that something was sure to happen soon, that he +would be sure to find an opening soon. But, of course, he never did. +It was not likely that with his inexperience he ever would."</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony's own words had recoiled upon him. On the evening when he had +first broached his plan to Millicent in Berkeley Square, he had laid +before her, amongst others, this very obstacle, thinking that she +ought to be aware of it, and never doubting but that he would surmount +it. The honesty of his nature had bidden him speak all that he had +thought, and he had spoken without a suspicion that his very frankness +might put in her mind an argument to belittle him. He had seemed +strong then, because he knew the difficulties, and counted them up +when she omitted them. His image was all the more pale and ineffectual +now because, foreknowing them well, he had not mastered them.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I wrote to him at last that it wasn't any use for him to go on with +the struggle. He would not tell me how he lived, or even where. I had +to send my letters to a post-office, and he called for them. He must +be living in want, in misery. I wrote to him that I had guessed as +much from his very reticence, and I said how sorry I was. Yet, in +spite of what I wrote," and here her voice hardened a little; she +showed herself as a woman really aggrieved, "in spite of what I wrote, +he answered me in a quite short letter, saying that I must not expect +to hear from him again until he had recovered from his defeat and was +re-established in my eyes. I can't understand that, can you?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I think so," Pamela answered. She spoke gently. For there was +something to be said upon Millicent's side. The sudden collapse of her +exaggerated hopes, the dreary life she led, and her natural +disappointment at the failure of the man whom she had married, when +once he stepped down into the arena to combat with his fellow-men. +These things could not fail to provoke, in a nature so easily swayed +from extreme to extreme as Millicent's, impatience, anger, and a sense +of grievance. Pamela could hold the balance fairly enough to +understand that. But chiefly she was thinking of Tony--Tony hidden +away in some lodging in New York, a lodging so squalid that he would +not give the address, and vainly seeking for an opportunity whereby he +would make a rapid fortune; very likely going short of food, and +returning home at night to read over a letter from his wife of which +every line cried out to him, with a contemptuous pity, "You are a +failure. You are a failure. Come home." Pamela's heart went out in +pity, too. But there was no contempt in her pity. She could not but +admire the perseverance with which, on this, the first time that he +had ever walked hand in hand with misery, he endured its +companionship.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I think I understand," she said. "You say he answered you in that +short way in spite of what you wrote. I think it was not in spite of, +but because----"</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie Stretton shook her head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, that's not the reason," she replied. She gave one herself, and it +fairly startled Pamela. "Tony no longer cares for me. He means to go +out of my life altogether."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela remembered what store Tony had always set upon his wife, how he +had spoken of her that July morning in the park, and how he had looked +at the moment when he spoke. It was just because he cared so much that +he had taken his wild leap into the dark. That, at all events, she +believed, and in such a strain she replied. But Millicent would not be +persuaded.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Before Tony went away," she said stubbornly, "he let me see that he +no longer cared. He was losing the associations which used to be vivid +in his memory. Our marriage had just become a dull, ordinary thing. He +had lost the spirit in which he entered into it."</p> + +<p class="normal">Again Tony's indiscreet frankness had done him wrong. The coon song, +which was always to be associated in his mind with the summer night, +and the islets in the sea, and the broad stretch of water trembling +away in the moonlight across to the lights of the yachts in Oban Bay, +had become a mere coon song "sung by some one." Millicent had often +remembered and reflected upon that unfortunate sentence, and as her +disappointment in Tony increased and the pitying contempt gradually +crept into her mind, she read into it more and more of what Tony had +not meant.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am sure you are wrong," said Pamela, very earnestly. "He went away +because he cared. He went away to keep your married life and his from +fading away into the colourless, dull, ordinary thing it so frequently +becomes. He has lost ground by his failure. No doubt your own letters +have shown that; and he is silent now in order to keep what he has. +You have said it yourself. He will not write until he is able to +re-establish himself in your thoughts."</p> + +<p class="normal">But would Tony succeed? <i>Could</i> he succeed? The questions forced +themselves into her mind even while she was speaking, and she carried +them back to her room. The chances were all against him. Even if he +retrieved his failure, it would be a long time before that result was +reached--too long, perhaps, when his wife was Millicent, and such +creatures as Lionel Callon walked about the world. And he might never +succeed at all, he was so badly handicapped.</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela was sorely tempted to leave the entanglement alone to unravel +itself. There was something which she could do. She was too honest to +close her eyes to that. But her own history rose up against her and +shook a warning finger. It had a message to her ears never so loudly +repeated as on this night. "Don't move a step. Look on! Look on!" She +knew herself well. She was by nature a partisan. Let her take this +trouble in hand and strive to set it right, her whole heart would soon +be set upon success. She was fond of Millicent already; she would +become fonder still in the effort to save her. She liked Tony very +much. The thought of him stoutly persevering, clinging to his one +ambition to keep his married life a bright and real thing in spite of +want and poverty--and even his wife's contempt, appealed to her with a +poignant strength. But she might fail. She had eaten of failure once, +and, after all these years, the taste of it was still most bitter in +her mouth.</p> + +<p class="normal">She fought her battle out over her dying fire, and at the end two +thoughts stood out clearly in her mind. She had given her promise to +Tony to be a good friend to his wife, and there was one thing which +she could do in fulfilment of her promise.</p> + +<p class="normal">She walked over to her window and flung it open. She was of the women +who look for signs; no story quite appealed to her like the story of +Gideon's Fleece. She looked for a sign now quite seriously. If a thaw +had set in, why, the world was going a little better with her, and +perhaps she might succeed. But the earth was iron-bound, and in the +still night she could hear a dry twig here and there snapping in the +frost. No, the world was not going well. She decided to wait until +things improved.</p> + +<p class="normal">But next day matters were worse. For one thing John Mudge went away, +and he was the only person in the house who interested her at all. +Furthermore, Lionel Callon stayed, and he announced some news.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have been chosen to stand for Parliament at the next election," he +said; and he named an important constituency. Pamela noticed the look +of gratification, almost of pride, which shone at once on Millie's +face, and her heart sank. She interpreted Millie's thought, and +accurately. Here was a successful man, a man who had got on without +opportunities or means, simply by his own abilities; and there, far +away in New York, was her failure of a husband. Moreover, Callon and +Millicent were much together; they had even small secrets, to which in +conversation they referred. The world was not going well with Pamela, +and she waited for the fleece to be wet with dew.</p> + +<p class="normal">After four days, however, the frost showed signs of breaking. A thaw +actually set in that evening, and on the next morning two pieces of +good news arrived. In the first place, Pamela received a letter from +Alan Warrisden. There was nothing of importance in it, but it gave her +his actual address. In the second, Millie told Frances Millingham that +she had received news that Sir John Stretton was really failing, and +although there was no immediate danger, she must hold herself in +readiness to return to town. This to Pamela was really the best news +of all. This morning, at all events, Gideon's Fleece was wet. She +looked out some trains in the railway guide, and then sent a telegram +to Warrisden to come by a morning train. She would meet him at the +railway station. The one step in her power she was thus resolved to +take.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER IX</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_09" href="#div1Ref_09">THE NEW ROAD</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">On the crest of that hill which was visible from the upper windows of +Whitewebs, a village straggled for a mile; and all day in the cottages +the looms were heard. The sound of looms, indeed, was always +associated with that village in the minds of Pamela Mardale and Alan +Warrisden, though they drove along its broad street but once, and a +few hours included all their visit. Those few hours, however, were +rich with consequence. For Pamela asked for help that day, and, in the +mere asking, gave, as women must; and she neither asked nor gave in +ignorance of what she did. The request might be small, the gift small, +too; but it set her and her friend in a new relation each to each, it +linked them in a common effort, it brought a new and a sweet intimacy +into both their lives. So that the noise of a loom was never heard by +them in the after times but there rose before their eyes, visible as a +picture, that grey chill day of February, the red-brick houses +crowding on the broad street in a picturesque irregularity, and the +three tall poplars tossing in the wind. The recollection brought +always a smile of tenderness to their faces; and in their thoughts +they had for the village a strange and fanciful name. It was just a +little Leicestershire village perched upon a hill, the village of +looms, the village of the three poplars. But they called it Quetta.</p> + +<p class="normal">At the very end of the street, and exactly opposite to the small house +from whose garden the poplars rose, there stood an inn. It was on the +edge of the hill, for just beyond the road dipped steeply down between +high hedges of brambles and elder trees, and, turning at the bottom of +the incline, wound thence through woods and level meadows towards +Leicester. It was the old coach road, and the great paved yard of the +inn and the long line of disused stables had once been noisy with the +shouts of ostlers and the crack of whips. Now only the carrier's cart +drove twice a week down the steep road to Leicester, and a faint +whistle from the low-lying land and a trail of smoke showed where now +the traffic ran. On the platform of the little roadside station, three +miles from the village, Pamela met Alan Warrisden on the morning after +she had sent off her telegram. She had a trap waiting at the door, and +as they mounted into it she said--</p> + +<p class="normal">"I rode over to the village this morning and hired this dog-cart at +the inn. I am not expected to be back at Whitewebs until the +afternoon; so I thought we might lunch at the inn, and then a man can +drive you back to the station, while I ride home again."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It was bad going for a horse, wasn't it?" said Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">The thaw had fairly set in; the roads, still hard as cement, ran with +water, and were most slippery. On each side patches of snow hung upon +the banks half melted, and the air was raw.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, it was bad going," Pamela admitted. "But I could not wait. It +was necessary that I should see you to-day."</p> + +<p class="normal">She said no more at the moment, and Warrisden was content to sit by +her side as she drove, and wait. The road ran in a broad straight line +over the sloping ground. There was no vehicle, not even another +person, moving along it. Warrisden could see the line of houses ahead, +huddled against the sky, the spire of a church, and on his right the +three sentinel poplars. He was to see them all that afternoon.</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela drove straight to the inn, where she had already ordered +luncheon; and it was not until luncheon was over that she drew up her +chair to the fire and spoke.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Won't you smoke?" she said first of all. "I want you to listen to +me."</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden lit a pipe and listened.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is right that I should be very frank with you," she went on, "for +I am going to ask you to help me."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You need me, then?" said Warrisden. There was a leap in his voice +which brought the colour to her cheeks.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Very much," she said; and, with a smile, she asked, "Are you glad?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," he answered simply.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yet the help may be difficult for you to give. It may occupy a long +time besides. I am not asking you for a mere hour or a day."</p> + +<p class="normal">The warning only brought a smile to Warrisden's face.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I don't think you understand," he said, "how much one wants to be +needed by those one needs."</p> + +<p class="normal">Indeed, even when that simple truth was spoken to her, it took Pamela +a little while to weigh it in her thoughts and give it credence. She +had travelled a long distance during these last years down her +solitary road. She began to understand that now. To need--actually to +need people, to feel a joy in being needed--here were emotions, +familiar to most, and no doubt at one time familiar to her, which +were, nevertheless, now very new and strange. At present she only +needed. Would a time come when she would go further still? When she +would feel a joy in being needed? The question flashed across her +mind.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," she admitted, "no doubt that is true. But none the less there +must be no misunderstanding between you and me. I speak of myself, +although it is not for myself that I need your help; but I am not +blind. I know it will be for my sake that you give it, and I do not +want you to give it in any ignorance of me, or, perhaps"--and she +glanced at him almost shyly--"or, perhaps, expecting too much."</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden made no other answer than to lean forward in his chair, with +his eyes upon Pamela's face. She was going to explain that isolation +of hers which had so baffled him. He would not for worlds have +interrupted her lest he should check the utterance on her lips. He saw +clearly enough that she was taking a great step for her, a step, too, +which meant much to him. The actual explanation was not the important +thing. That she should confide it of her own accord--there was the +real and valuable sign. As she began to speak again, diffidence was +even audible in her voice. She almost awaited his judgment.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I must tell you something which I thought never to tell to any one," +she said. "I meant to carry it as my secret out with me at the end of +my life. I have been looking on all these last years. You noticed +that; you thought perhaps I was just obeying my nature. But I wasn't. +I did not begin life looking on. I began it as eager, as expectant of +what life could give me as any girl that was ever born. And I had just +my first season, that was all." She smiled rather wistfully as her +thoughts went back to it. "I enjoyed my first season. I had hardly +ever been in London before. I was eighteen; and everybody was very +nice to me. At the end of July I went to stay for a month with some +friends of mine on the coast of Devonshire, and--some one else stayed +there, too. His name does not matter. I had met him during the season +a good deal, but until he came down to Devonshire I had not thought of +him more than as a friend. He was a little older than myself, not very +much, and just as poor. He had no prospects, and his profession was +diplomacy.... So that there was no possibility from the first. He +meant never to say anything; but there came an hour, and the truth was +out between us."</p> + +<p class="normal">She stopped and gazed into the fire. The waters of the Channel ran in +sunlit ripples before her eyes; the red rocks of Bigbury Bay curved +warmly out on her right and her left; further away the towering +headlands loomed misty in the hot, still August air. A white yacht, +her sails hardly drawing, moved slowly westwards; the black smoke of a +steamer stained the sky far out; and on the beach there were just two +figures visible--herself and the man who had not meant to speak.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We parted at once," she went on. "He was appointed a consul in West +Africa. I think--indeed I know--that he hoped to rise more quickly +that way. But trouble came and he was killed. Because of that one +hour, you see, when he spoke what he did not mean to speak, he was +killed." It seemed that there was the whole story told. But Pamela had +not told it all, and never did; for her mother had played a part in +its unfolding. It was Mrs. Mardale's ambition that her daughter should +make a great marriage; it was her daughter's misfortune that she knew +little of her daughter's character. Mrs. Mardale had remarked the +growing friendship between Pamela and the man, she had realised +that marriage was quite impossible, and she had thought, with her +short-sighted ingenuity, that if Pamela fell in love and found love +to be a thing of fruitless trouble, she would come the sooner to take +a sensible view of the world and marry where marriage was to her +worldly advantage. She thus had encouraged the couple to a greater +friendliness, throwing them together when she could have hindered +their companionship; she had even urged Pamela to accept that +invitation to Devonshire, knowing who would be the other guests. She +was disappointed afterwards when Pamela did not take the sensible +view; but she did not blame herself at all. For she knew nothing of +the suffering which her plan had brought about. Pamela had kept her +secret. Even the months of ill-health which followed upon that first +season had not opened the mother's eyes, and certainly she never +suspected the weary nights of sleeplessness and aching misery which +Pamela endured. Some hint of the pain of that bad past time, however, +Pamela now gave to Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I stayed as much at home in Leicestershire as possible," she said. +"You see there were my horses there; but even with them I was very +lonely. The time was long in passing, and it wasn't pleasant to think +that there would be so much of it yet, before it passed altogether. I +went up to London for the season each year, and I went out a great +deal. It helped me to keep from thinking."</p> + +<p class="normal">The very simplicity with which she spoke gave an intensity to her +words. There was no affectation in Pamela Mardale. Warrisden was able +to fill out her hints, to understand her distress.</p> + +<p class="normal">"All this is a great surprise to me," he said. "I have thought of you +always as one who had never known either great troubles or great joys. +I have hoped that some day you would wake, that I should find you +looking out on the world with the eagerness of youth. But I believed +eagerness would be a new thing to you."</p> + +<p class="normal">He looked at her as she sat. The firelight was bright upon her face, +and touched her hair with light; her dark eyes shone; and his thought +was that which the schoolmaster at Roquebrune had once sadly pondered. +It seemed needlessly cruel, needlessly wanton that a girl so equipped +for happiness should, in her very first season, when the world was +opening like a fairyland, have been blindly struck down. There were so +many others who would have felt the blow less poignantly. She might +surely have been spared.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You can guess, now," said Pamela, "why I have so persistently looked +on. I determined that I would never go through such distress again. I +felt that I would not dare to face it again." She suddenly covered her +face with her hands. "I don't think I could," she cried in a low, +piteous voice. "I don't know what I would do," as though once more the +misery of that time were closing upon her, so vivid were her +recollections.</p> + +<p class="normal">And once more Warrisden felt, as he watched her, the shock of a +surprise. He had thought her too sedate, too womanly for her years, +and here she sat shrinking in a positive terror, like any child, from +the imagined recurrence of her years of trouble. Warrisden was moved +as he had seldom been. But he sat quite still, saying no word; and in +a little while she took her hands from her face and went on--</p> + +<p class="normal">"My life was over, you see, at the very beginning, and I was resolved +it should be over. For the future I would get interested only in +trifling, unimportant things; no one should ever be more to me than a +friend whom I could relinquish; I would merely look on. I should grow +narrow, no doubt, and selfish." And, as Warrisden started, a smile +came on to her face. "Yes, you have been thinking that, too, and you +were right. But I didn't mind. I meant to take no risks. Nothing +serious should ever come near me. If I saw it coming, I would push it +away; and I have pushed it away."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Until to-day, when you need my help?" Warrisden interrupted.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, until to-day," Pamela repeated softly.</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden walked over to the window and stood with his back towards +her. The three tall poplars stood leafless up in front of him; the sky +was heavy with grey clouds; the wind was roaring about the chimneys; +and the roads ran with water. It was as cheerless a day as February +can produce, but to Warrisden it had something of a summer brightness. +The change for which he had hoped so long in vain had actually come to +pass.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What do you want me to do?" he asked, turning again to the room.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I want you to find Millie Stretton's husband," she replied; "and, at +all costs, to bring him home again."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Millie Stretton's husband?" he repeated, in perplexity.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes. Don't you remember the couple who stepped out of the dark house +in Berkeley Square and dared not whistle for a hansom--the truants?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden was startled. "Those two!" he exclaimed. "Well, that's +strange. On the very night when we saw them, you were saying that +there was no road for you, no new road from Quetta to Seistan. I was +puzzling my brains, too, as to how in the world you were to be roused +out of your detachment; and there were the means visible all the time, +perhaps--who knows?--ordained." He sat down again in his chair.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Where shall I look for Mr. Stretton?" he asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I don't know. He went away to New York, six months ago, to make a +home for Millie and himself. He did not succeed, and he has +disappeared."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Disappeared?" cried Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, but of his own accord," said Pamela. "I can't tell you why; it +wouldn't be fair. I have no right to tell you. But he must be found, +and he must be brought back. Again I can't tell you why; but it is +most urgent."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Is there any clue to help us?" Warrisden asked. "Had he friends in +New York?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No; but he has a friend in England," said Pamela, "and I think it's +just possible that the friend may know where he is to be found, for it +was upon his advice that Mr. Stretton went to New York."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Tell me his name."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Mr. Chase," Pamela replied. "He is head of a mission in Stepney +Green. Tony Stretton told me of him one morning in Hyde Park just +before he went away. He seemed to rely very much upon his judgment."</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden wrote the name down in his pocket-book.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Will he tell me, do you think, where Stretton is, even if he knows? +You say Stretton has disappeared of his own accord."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have thought of that difficulty," Pamela answered. "There is an +argument which you can use. Sir John Stretton, Tony's father, is ill, +and in all probability dying."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I see. I can use the same argument to Stretton himself, I suppose, +when I find him?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I can give you no other," said Pamela; "but you can add to it. Mr. +Stretton will tell you that his father does not care whether he comes +back in time or not. He is sure to say that. But you can answer that +every night since he went away the candles have been lit in his +dressing-room and his clothes laid out by his father's orders, on the +chance that some evening he might walk in at the door."</p> + +<p class="normal">That Sir John Stretton's illness was merely the pretext for Tony's +return both understood. The real reason why he must come home Pamela +did not tell. To her thinking Millie was not yet so deeply entangled +with Lionel Callon but that Tony's home-coming might set the tangle +right. A few weeks of companionship, and surely he would resume his +due place in his wife's thoughts. Pamela, besides, was loyal to her +sex. She had promised to safeguard Millicent; she was in no mind to +betray her.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But bring him back," she cried, with a real passion. "So much depends +on his return, for Millie, for him, and for me, too. Yes, for me! If +you fail, it is I who fail; and I don't want failure. Save me from +it!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I'll try," Warrisden answered simply; and Pamela was satisfied.</p> + +<p class="normal">Much depended, for Warrisden too, upon the success of his adventure. +If he failed, Pamela would retire again behind her barrier; she would +again resume the passive, indifferent attitude of the very old; she +would merely look on as before and wait for things to cease. If, +however, he succeeded, she would be encouraged to move forward still; +the common sympathies would have her in their grasp again; she might +even pass that turnpike gate of friendship and go boldly down the +appointed road of life. Thus success meant much for him. The fortunes +of the four people--Millicent, Tony, Pamela, and Warrisden--were +knotted together at this one point.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Indeed, I'll try," he repeated,</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela's horse was brought round to the inn door. The dusk was coming +on.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Which way do you go?" asked Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Down the hill."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will walk to the bottom with you. The road will be dangerous."</p> + +<p class="normal">They went slowly down between the high elder hedges, Pamela seated on +her horse, Warrisden walking by her side. The wide level lowlands +opened out beneath them--fields of brown and green, black woods with +swinging boughs, and the broad high road with its white wood rails. A +thin mist swirled across the face of the country in the wind, so that +its every feature was softened and magnified. It loomed dim and +strangely distant, with a glamour upon it like a place of old romance. +To Pamela and Warrisden, as the mists wove and unwove about it, it had +a look of dreamland.</p> + +<p class="normal">They reached the end of the incline, and Pamela stopped her horse.</p> + +<p class="normal">"This is my way," said she, pointing along the highway with her whip.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," answered Warrisden. The road ran straight for some distance, +then crossed a wooden bridge and curved out of sight round the edge of +a clump of trees. "The new road," he said softly. "The new road from +Quetta to Seistan!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela smiled.</p> + +<p class="normal">"This is Quetta," said she.</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden laid his hand upon her horse's neck, and looked suddenly up +into her face.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Where will be Seistan?" he asked in a low voice.</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela returned the look frankly. There came a softness into her dark +eyes. For a moment she let her hand rest lightly upon his sleeve, and +did not speak. She herself was wondering how far she was to travel +upon this new road.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I cannot tell," she said very gently. "Nor, my friend, can you. +Only"--and her voice took on a lighter and a whimsical tone-"only I +start alone on my new road."</p> + +<p class="normal">And she went forward into the level country. Warrisden climbed the +hill again, and turned when he had reached the top; but Pamela was out +of sight. The dusk and the mists had enclosed her.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER X</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_10" href="#div1Ref_10">MR. CHASE</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">The night had come when Warrisden stepped from the platform of the +station into the train. Pamela was by this time back at Whitewebs--he +himself was travelling to London; their day was over. He looked out of +the window. Somewhere three miles away the village of the three +poplars crowned the hill, but a thick wall of darkness and fog hid it +from his eyes. It seemed almost as if Pamela and he had met that day +only in thought at some village which existed only in a dream. The +train, however, rattled upon its way. Gradually he became conscious of +a familiar exhilaration. The day had been real. Not merely had it +signalled the change in Pamela, for which for so long he had wished; +not merely had it borne a blossom of promise for himself, but +something was to be done immediately, and the thing to be done was of +all things that which most chimed with his own desires. He was to take +the road again, and the craving for the road was seldom stilled for +long within his heart. He heard its call sung like a song to the +rhythm of the wheels. The very uncertainty of its direction tantalised +his thoughts.</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden lodged upon the Embankment, and his rooms overlooked the +Thames. The mist lay heavy upon London, mid all that night the +steamboats hooted as they passed from bridge to bridge. Warrisden lay +long awake listening to them; each blast had its message for him, each +was like the greeting of a friend; each one summoned him, and to each +he answered with a rising joy, "I shall follow, I shall follow." The +boats passed down to the sea through the night mist. Many a time he +had heard them before, picturing the dark deck and the side lights, +red and green, and the yellow light upon the mast, and the man silent +at the wheel with the light from the binnacle striking up upon the +lines of his face. They were little river or coasting boats for the +most part, but he had never failed to be stirred by the long-drawn +melancholy of their whistles. They talked of distant lands and an +alien foliage.</p> + +<p class="normal">He spent the following morning and the afternoon in the arrangement of +his affairs, and in the evening drove down to the mission house. It +stood in a dull by-street close to Stepney Green, a rambling building +with five rooms upon the ground floor panelled with varnished deal and +furnished with forms and rough tables, and on the floor above, a big +billiard-room, a bagatelle-room, and a carpenter's workshop. Mr. Chase +was superintending a boxing class in one of the lower rooms, and +Warrisden, when he was led up to him, received a shock of surprise. He +had never seen a man to the outward eye so unfitted for his work. He +had expected a strong burly person, cheery of manner and confident of +voice; he saw, however, a tall young man with a long pale face and a +fragile body. Mr. Chase was clothed in a clerical frock-coat of +unusual length, he wore linen of an irreproachable whiteness, and his +hands were fine and delicate as a woman's. He seemed indeed the +typical High Church curate fresh that very instant from the tea-cups +of a drawing-room.</p> + +<p class="normal">"A gentleman to see you, sir," said the ex-army sergeant who had +brought forward Warrisden. He handed Warrisden's card to Chase, who +turned about and showed Warrisden his full face. Surprise had been +Warrisden's first sentiment, but it gave place in an instant to +distaste. The face which he saw was not ugly, but he disliked it. It +almost repelled him. There was no light in the eyes at all; they were +veiled and sunken; and the features repelled by reason of a queer +antagonism. Mr. Chase had the high narrow forehead of an ascetic, the +loose mouth of a sensualist, and a thin crop of pale and almost +colourless hair. Warrisden wondered why any one should come to this +man for advice, most of all a Tony Stretton. What could they have in +common--the simple, good-humoured, unintellectual subaltern of the +Coldstream, and this clerical exquisite? The problem was perplexing.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You wish to see me?" asked Chase.</p> + +<p class="normal">"If you please."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Now? As you see, I am busy."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I can wait."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Thank you. The mission closes at eleven. If you can wait till then +you might come home with me, and we could talk in comfort."</p> + +<p class="normal">It was nine o'clock. For two hours Warrisden followed Chase about the +mission, and with each half-hour his interest increased. However +irreconcilable with his surroundings Chase might appear to be, neither +he nor any of the members of the mission were aware of it. He was at +ease alike with the boys and the men; and the boys and the men were at +ease with him. Moreover, he was absolute master, although there were +rough men enough among his subjects. The fiercest boxing contest was +stopped in a second by a motion of that delicate hand.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I used to have a little trouble," he said to Warrisden, "before I had +those wire frames fixed over the gas-jets. You see they cover the gas +taps. Before that was done, if there was any trouble, the first thing +which happened was that the room was in darkness. It took some time to +restore order;" and he passed on to the swimming-bath.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Chase was certainly indefatigable. Now he was giving a lesson in +wood-carving to a boy; now he was arranging an apprenticeship for +another in the carpenter's shop. Finally he led the way into the great +billiard-room, where only the older men were allowed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is here that Stretton used to keep order?" said Warrisden; and +Chase at once turned quickly towards him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh," he said slowly, in a voice of comprehension, "I was wondering +what brought you here. Yes; this was the room."</p> + +<p class="normal">Chase moved carelessly away, and spoke to some of the men about the +tables. But for the rest of the evening he was on his guard. More than +once his eyes turned curiously and furtively towards Warrisden. His +face was stubborn, and wore a look of wariness. Warrisden began to +fear lest he should get no answer to the question he had to put. No +appeal would be of any use--of that he felt sure. His argument must +serve--and would it serve?</p> + +<p class="normal">Chase, at all events, made no attempt to avoid the interview. As the +hands of the clock marked eleven, and the rooms emptied, he came at +once to Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We can go now," he said; and unlocking a drawer, to Warrisden's +perplexity he filled his pockets with racket-balls. The motive for +that proceeding became apparent as they walked to the house where +Chase lodged. Their way lay through alleys, and as they walked the +children clustered about them, and Chase's pockets were emptied.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We keep this house because men from the Universities come down and +put in a week now and then at the mission. My rooms are upstairs."</p> + +<p class="normal">Chase's sitting-room was in the strangest contrast to the bareness of +the mission and the squalor of the streets. It was furnished with +luxury, but the luxury was that of a man of taste and knowledge. There +was hardly a piece of furniture which had not an interesting history; +the engravings and the brass ornaments upon the walls had been picked +up here and there in Italy. A bright fire blazed upon the hearth.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What will you drink?" Chase asked, and brought from a cupboard bottle +after bottle of liqueurs. It seemed to Warrisden that the procession +of bottles would never end--some held liqueurs of which he had never +even heard the name; but concerning all of them Mr. Chase discoursed +with great knowledge and infinite appreciation.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I can recommend this," he said tentatively, as he took up one fat +round bottle and held it up to the light. "It is difficult perhaps to +say definitely which is the best, but--yes, I can recommend this."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Can't I have a whiskey and soda?" asked Warrisden, plaintively.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Chase looked at his companion with a stare.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Of course you can," he replied. But his voice was one of +disappointment, and with an almost imperceptible shrug of the +shoulders he fetched a Tantalus and a siphon of seltzer.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Help yourself," he said; and lighting a gold-tipped cigarette he drew +up a chair and began to talk. And so Warrisden came at last to +understand how Tony Stretton had gained his great faith in Mr. Chase. +Chase was a talker of a rare quality. He sat stooping over the fire +with his thin hands outspread to the blaze, and for half an hour +Warrisden was enchained. All that had repelled him in the man, all +that had aroused his curiosity, was soon lost to sight. He yielded +himself up as if to some magician. Chase talked not at all of his work +or of the many strange incidents which he must needs have witnessed in +its discharge. He spoke of other climates and bright towns with a +scholarship which had nothing of pedantry, and an observation human as +it was keen. Chase, with the help of his Livy, had traced Hannibal's +road across the Alps and had followed it on foot; he spoke of another +march across snow mountains of which Warrisden had never till this +moment heard--the hundred days of a dead Sultan of Morocco on the +Passes of the Atlas, during which he led his forces back from Tafilet +to Rabat. Chase knew nothing of this retreat but what he had read. Yet +he made it real to Warrisden, so vividly did his imagination fill up +the outlines of the written history. He knew his Paris, his +Constantinople. He had bathed from the Lido and dreamed on the Grand +Canal. He spoke of the peeling frescoes in the Villa of Countess +Guiccioli above Leghorn, of the outlook from the terrace over the +vines and the olive trees to the sea where Shelley was drowned; and +where Byron's brig used to round into the wind and with its sails +flapping drop anchor under the hill. For half an hour Warrisden +wandered through Europe in the pleasantest companionship, and then +Chase stopped abruptly and leaned back in his chair.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I was forgetting," he said, "that you had come upon a particular +errand. It sometimes happens that I see no one outside the mission +people for a good while, and during those periods when I get an +occasion I am apt to talk too much. What can I do for you?"</p> + +<p class="normal">The spirit had gone from his voice, his face. He leaned back in his +chair, a man tired out. Warrisden looked at the liqueur bottles +crowded on the table, with Chase's conversation still fresh in his +mind. Was Chase a man at war with himself, he wondered, who was living +a life for which he had no taste that he might the more completely +escape a life which his conscience disapproved? Or was he deliberately +both hedonist and Puritan, giving to each side of his strange nature, +in turn, its outlet and gratification?</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have something to say to me," Chase continued. "I know quite well +what it is about."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Stretton," said Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes; you mentioned him in the billiard-room. Well?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Chase was not looking at Warrisden. He sat with his eyes half-closed, +his elbows on the arms of his chair, his finger-tips joined under his +chain, and his head thrown back. There was no expression upon his face +but one of weariness. Would he answer? Could he answer? Warrisden was +in doubt, indeed in fear. He led to his question warily.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It was you who recommended Stretton to try horse-breeding in +Kentucky."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," said Chase; and he added, "after he had decided of his own +accord to go away."</p> + +<p class="normal">"He failed."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And he has disappeared."</p> + +<p class="normal">Chase opened his eyes, but did not turn them to his companion.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I did not advise his disappearance," he said. "That, like his +departure, was his own doing."</p> + +<p class="normal">"No doubt," Warrisden agreed. "But it is thought that you might have +heard from him since his disappearance."</p> + +<p class="normal">Chase nodded his head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is thought that you might know where he is now."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do," said Mr. Chase. Warrisden was sensibly relieved. One-half of +his fear was taken from him. Chase knew, at all events, where Stretton +was to be found. Now he must disclose his knowledge. But before he +could put a question, Chase said languidly--</p> + +<p class="normal">"You say 'it is thought,' Mr. Warrisden. By whom is it thought? By his +wife?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No. But by a great friend of hers and his."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh," said Chase, "by Miss Pamela Mardale, then."</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden started forward.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You know her?" he asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No. But Stretton mentioned her to me in a letter. She has sent you to +me in fulfilment of a promise. I understand."</p> + +<p class="normal">The words were not very intelligible to Warrisden. He knew nothing of +Pamela's promise to Tony Stretton. But, on the other hand, he saw that +Mr. Chase was giving a more attentive ear to what he said. He betrayed +no ignorance of the promise.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am sent to fetch Stretton home," he said. "I want you to tell me +where he is."</p> + +<p class="normal">Chase shook his head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," he said gently.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is absolutely necessary that Stretton should come back," Warrisden +declared with great deliberation. And with no less deliberation Chase +replied--</p> + +<p class="normal">"In Stretton's view it is absolutely necessary that he should stay +away!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"His father is dying."</p> + +<p class="normal">Chase started forward in his chair, and stared at Warrisden for a long +time.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Is that an excuse?" he said at length.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was, as Warrisden was aware. He did not answer the question.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is the truth," he replied; and he replied truthfully.</p> + +<p class="normal">Chase rose from his chair and walked once or twice across the room. He +came back to the fire, and leaning an elbow on the mantelpiece stared +into the coals. Warrisden sat very still. He had used his one +argument--he could add nothing to it; he could only wait for the +answer in a great anxiety. So much hung upon that answer for Stretton +and his wife, for Pamela, for himself! The fortunes of all four were +knotted together. At last the answer came.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I promised Tony that I would keep his secret," said Chase. "But when +he asked for the promise, and when I gave it, the possibility of his +father dying was not either in his mind or mine. We considered--in +letters, of course--other possibilities; but not this one. I don't +think I have the right to remain silent. Even in the face of this +possibility I should have kept my promise, I think, if you had come +from his wife--for I know why he disappeared. But as things are, I +will tell you. Tony Stretton is in the North Sea on a trawler."</p> + +<p class="normal">"In the North Sea?" exclaimed Warrisden. And he smiled. After all, the +steamboats on the river had last night called to him with a particular +summons.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," continued Chase, and he fetched from his writing-desk a letter +in Tony's hand. "He came back to England two months ago. He drifted +across the country. He found himself at Yarmouth with a few shillings +in his pocket. He knew something of the sea. He had sailed his own +yacht in happier times. He was in great trouble. He needed time to +think out a new course of life. He hung about on Gorleston pier for a +day or two, and then was taken on by a skipper who was starting out +short of hands, he signed for eight weeks, and he wrote to me the day +before he started. That's four weeks ago."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Can I reach him?" Warrisden asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes. The boat is the <i>Perseverance</i>, and it belongs to the Blue +Fleet. A steam cutter goes out every day from Billingsgate to fetch +the fish. I know one of the owners. His son comes down to the mission. +I can get you a passage. When can you start?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"At any time," replied Warrisden. "The sooner the better."</p> + +<p class="normal">"To-morrow, then," said Chase. "Meet me at the entrance to +Billingsgate Market at half-past eleven. It will take you forty-eight +hours with ordinary luck to reach the Dogger Bank. Of course, if +there's a fog in the Thames the time will be longer. And I warn you, +living is rough on a fish-carrier."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I don't mind that," said Warrisden, with a smile. He went away with a +light heart, and that night wrote a letter to Pamela, telling her of +his interview with Mr. Chase. The new road seemed after all likely to +prove a smooth one. As he wrote, every now and then a steamboat hooted +from the river, and the rain pattered upon his window. He flung it up +and looked out. There was no fog to-night, only the rain fell, and +fell gently. He prayed that there might be no fog upon the Thames +to-morrow.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Chase, too, heard the rain that night. He sat in his armchair +listening to it with a decanter at his elbow half filled with a liquid +like brown sherry. At times he poured a little into his glass and +drank it slowly, crouching over his fire. Somewhere in the darkness of +the North Sea Tony Stretton was hidden. Very likely at this moment he +was standing upon the deck of his trawler with his hands upon the +spokes of the wheel, and his eyes peering forward through the rain, +keeping his long night-watch while the light from the binnacle struck +upwards upon the lines of his face. Mr. Chase sat late in a muse. But +before he went to bed he locked the decanter and the glass away in a +private cupboard, and took the key with him into his bedroom.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XI</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_11" href="#div1Ref_11">ON THE DOGGER BANK</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">The <i>City of Bristol</i> swung out of the huddle of boats off +Billingsgate Wharf at one o'clock on the next afternoon. Mr. Chase, +who stood upon the quay amongst the porters and white-jacketed +salesmen, turned away with an episcopal wave of the hand. Warrisden +leaned over the rail of the steamer's bridge, between the captain and +the pilot, and shouted a reply. The <i>City of Bristol</i>, fish-cutter of +300 tons, was a boat built for speed, long and narrow, sitting low on +the water, with an upstanding forecastle forward, a small saloon in +the stern, and a tiny cabin for the captain under the bridge on deck. +She sidled out into the fair way and went forward upon her slow, +intricate journey to the sea. Below the Tower she took her place in +the long, single file of ships winding between the mud banks, and +changed it as occasion served; now she edged up by a string of barges, +now in a clear broad space she made a spurt and took the lead of a +barquantine, which swam in indolence, with bare masts, behind a tug; +and at times she stopped altogether, like a carriage blocked in +Piccadilly. The screw thrashed the water, ceased, and struck again +with a suggestion of petulance at the obstacles which barred the +boat's way. Warrisden, too, chafed upon the bridge. A question pressed +continually upon his mind--"Would Stretton return?" He had discovered +where Stretton was to be found. The tall grey spire of Stepney Church +rose from behind an inlet thick with masts, upon the left; he was +already on his way to find him. But the critical moment was yet to +come. He had still to use his arguments; and as he stood watching the +shipping with indifferent eyes the arguments appeared most weak and +unpersuasive. Stretton's father was dying, it was true. The son's +return was no doubt a natural obligation. But would the natural +obligation hold when the father was unnatural? Those months in New +York had revealed one quality in Tony Stretton, at all events; he +could persist. The very name of the trawler in which he was at work +seemed to Warrisden of a bad augury for his success--the +<i>Perseverance!</i></p> + +<p class="normal">Greenwich, with its hill of grass, slipped behind on the right; at the +Albert Docks a huge Peninsular and Oriental steamer, deck towering +above deck, swung into the line; the high chimneys of the cement works +on the Essex flats began to stand out against the pale grey sky, each +one crowned with white smoke like a tuft of wool; the barges, under +their big brown sprit-sails, now tacked this way and that across a +wider stream; the village of Greenhithe and the white portholes of the +<i>Worcester</i> showed upon the right.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Would Stretton return?" The question revolved in Warrisden's mind as +the propeller revolved in the thick brown water. The fortunes of four +people hung upon the answer, and no answer could be given until a +night, and a day, and another night had passed, until he saw the Blue +Fleet tossing far away upon the Dogger Bank. Suppose that the answer +were "No!" He imagined Pamela sinking back into lassitude, narrowing +to that selfishness which she, no less than he, foresaw; looking on +again at the world's show with the lack-lustre indifference of the +very old.</p> + +<p class="normal">At Gravesend the <i>City of Bristol</i> dropped her pilot, a little, +white-bearded, wizened man, who all the way down the river, balancing +himself upon the top-rail of the bridge, like some nautical Blondin, +had run from side to side the while he exchanged greetings with the +anchored ships; and just opposite to Tilbury Fort, with its scanty +fringe of trees, she ran alongside of a hulk and took in a load of +coal.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We'll go down and have tea while they are loading her," said the +captain.</p> + +<p class="normal">The dusk was falling when Warrisden came again on deck, and a cold +wind was blowing from the north-west. The sharp stem of the boat was +cutting swiftly through the quiet water; the lift of the sea under her +forefoot gave to her a buoyancy of motion--she seemed to have become a +thing alive. The propeller cleft the surface regularly; there was no +longer any sound of petulance in its revolutions, rather there was a +throb of joy as it did its work unhindered. Throughout the ship a +steady hum, a steady vibration ran. The <i>City of Bristol</i> was not +merely a thing alive; it was a thing satisfied.</p> + +<p class="normal">Upon Warrisden, too, there descended a sense of peace. He was <i>en +rapport</i> with the ship. The fever of his questioning left him. On +either side the arms of the shore melted into the gathering night. Far +away upon his right the lights of Margate shone brightly, like a chain +of gold stretched out upon the sea; in front of him there lay a wide +and misty bay, into which the boat drove steadily. All the unknown +seemed hidden there; all the secret unrevealed Beyond. There came +whispers out of that illimitable bay to Warrisden's ears; whispers +breathed upon the north wind, and all the whispers were whispers of +promise, bidding him take heart. Warrisden listened and believed, +uplifted by the grave quiet of the sea and its mysterious width.</p> + +<p class="normal">The <i>City of Bristol</i> turned northward into the great channel of the +Swin, keeping close to the lightships on the left, so close that +Warrisden from the bridge could look straight down upon their decks. +The night had altogether come--a night of stars. Clusters of lights, +low down upon the left, showed where the towns of Essex stood; upon +the light hand the homeward-bound ships loomed up ghost-like and +passed by; on the right, too, shone out the great green globes of the +Mouse light like Neptune's reading-lamps. Sheltered behind the canvas +screen at the corner of the bridge Warrisden looked along the rake of +the unlighted deck below. He thought of Pamela waiting for his return +at Whitewebs, but without impatience. The great peace and silence of +the night were the most impressive things he had ever known. The +captain's voice complaining of the sea jarred upon him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It's no Bobby's job," said the captain in a low voice. "It's home +once in three weeks from Saturday to Monday, if you are in luck, and +the rest of your time you're in carpet slippers on the bridge. You'll +sleep in my chatoo, to-night. I sha'n't turn in until we have passed +the Outer Gabbard and come to the open sea. That won't be till four in +the morning."</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden understood that he was being offered the captain's cabin.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, thanks," said he. "The bench of the saloon will do very well for +me."</p> + +<p class="normal">The captain did not press his offer.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes; there's more company in the saloon," he said. "I often sleep +there myself. You are bound for the Mission ship, I suppose?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No; I want to find a man on the trawler <i>Perseverance</i>."</p> + +<p class="normal">The captain turned. Warrisden could not see his face, but he knew from +his attitude that he was staring at him in amazement.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then you must want to see him pretty badly," he commented. "The No'th +Sea in February and March is not a Bobby's job."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Bad weather is to be expected?" asked Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It has been known," said the captain dryly; and before the lights of +the Outer Gabbard winked good-bye on the starboard quarter at four +o'clock in the morning, the <i>City of Bristol</i> was taking the water +over her deck.</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden rolled on the floor of the saloon--for he could not keep his +balance on the narrow bench--and tried in vain to sleep. But the +strong light of a lamp, swinging from the roof, glared upon his eyes, +the snores of his companions trumpeted in his ears. Moreover, the heat +was intolerable. Five men slept in the bunks--Warrisden made a sixth. +At four in the morning the captain joined the party through his love +of company. The skylight and the door were both tightly closed, a big +fire burned in the stove, and a boiling kettle of tea perpetually +puffed from its spout a column of warm, moist steam. Warrisden felt +his skin prickly beneath his clothes; he gasped for fresh air.</p> + +<p class="normal">Living would be rough upon the fish-carrier, Chase had told him; and +rough Warrisden found it. In the morning the steward rose, and made +tea by the simple process of dropping a handful of tea into the kettle +and filling it up with water. A few minutes later he brought a dish of +ham and eggs from the galley, and slapped it down on the table.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Breakfast," he cried; and the five men opened their eyes, rubbed +them, and without any other preparation sat down and ate. Warrisden +slipped up the companion, unscrewed the skylight and opened it for the +space of an inch. Then he returned.</p> + +<p class="normal">The <i>City of Bristol</i> was rolling heavily, and Warrisden noticed with +surprise that all of the five men gave signs of discomfort. Surely, he +thought, they must be used to heavy weather. But, nevertheless, +something was wrong; they did not talk. Finally, the captain looked +upwards, and brought his hand down upon the table.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I felt something was wrong," said he; "the skylight's open."</p> + +<p class="normal">All stared up to the roof.</p> + +<p class="normal">"So it is."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I did that," Warrisden said humbly.</p> + +<p class="normal">At once all the faces were turned on him in great curiosity.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Now why?" asked the captain. "Don't you like it nice and snug?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes; oh yes," Warrisden said hurriedly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, then!" said the captain; and the steward went on deck and +screwed the skylight down.</p> + +<p class="normal">"After all, it's only for thirty-six hours," thought Warrisden, as he +subsequently bathed in a pail on deck. But he was wrong; for the Blue +Fleet had gone a hundred miles north to the Fisher Bank, and thither +the <i>City of Bristol</i> followed it.</p> + +<p class="normal">The <i>City of Bristol</i> sailed on to the Fisher Bank, and found an empty +sea. It hunted the Blue Fleet for half-a-dozen hours, and, as night +fell, it came upon a single trawler with a great flare light suspended +from its yard.</p> + +<p class="normal">"They're getting in their trawl," said the captain; and he edged up +within earshot.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Where's the Blue Fleet?" he cried.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Gone back to the Dogger," came the answer.</p> + +<p class="normal">The captain swore, and turned southwards. For four days and nights +Warrisden pitched about on the fish-carrier and learned many things, +such as the real meaning of tannin in tea, and the innumerable medical +uses to which "Friar's Balsam" can be put. On the morning of the fifth +day the <i>City of Bristol</i> steamed into the middle of the fleet, and +her engines stopped.</p> + +<p class="normal">These were the days before the steam-trawler. The sailing-ships were +not as yet laid up, two by two, alongside Gorleston quay, and knocked +down for a song to any purchaser. Warrisden looked over a grey, savage +sea. The air was thick with spindrift. The waves leaped exultingly up +from windward and roared away to leeward from under the cutter's keel +in a steep, uprising hill of foam. All about him the sailing-boats +headed to the wind, sinking and rising in the furrows, so that +Warrisden would just see a brown topsail over the edge of a steep +roller like a shark's fin, and the next instant the dripping hull of +the boat flung out upon a breaking crest.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You will have to look slippy when the punt from the <i>Perseverance</i> +comes alongside with her fish," the captain shouted. "The punt will +give you a passage back to the <i>Perseverance</i>, but I don't think you +will be able to return. There's a no'th-westerly gale blowing up, and +the sea is increasing every moment. However, there will be another +cutter up to-morrow, and if it's not too rough you could be put on +board of her."</p> + +<p class="normal">It took Warrisden a full minute to realise the meaning of the +captain's words. He looked at the tumbling, breaking waves, he +listened to the roar of the wind through the rigging.</p> + +<p class="normal">"The boats won't come alongside to-day," he cried.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Won't they?" the skipper replied. "Look!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Certainly some manœuvre was in progress. The trawlers were all +forming to windward in a rough semicircle about the cutter. Warrisden +could see boat tackle being rigged to the main yards and men standing +about the boats capsized on deck. They were actually intending to put +their fish on board in the face of the storm.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You see, with the gale blowing up, they mayn't get a chance to put +their fish on board for three or four days after this," the captain +explained. "Oh, you can take it from me. The No'th Sea is not a +Bobby's job."</p> + +<p class="normal">As Warrisden watched, one by one the trawlers dropped their boats, and +loaded them with fish-boxes. The boats pushed off, three men to each, +with their life-belts about their oil-skins, and came down with the +wind towards the fish-carrier. The trawlers bore away, circled round +the <i>City of Bristol</i>, and took up their formation to leeward, so +that, having discharged their fish, the boats might drop down again +with the wind to their respective ships. Warrisden watched the boats, +piled up with fish-boxes, coming through the welter of the sea. It +seemed some desperate race was being rowed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Can you tell me which is the boat from the <i>Perseverance?</i>" he asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I think it's the fifth," said the captain.</p> + +<p class="normal">The boats came down, each one the kernel of a globe of spray. +Warrisden watched, admiring how cleverly they chose the little gaps +and valleys in the crests of the waves. Each moment he looked to see a +boat tossed upwards and overturned; each moment he dreaded that boat +would be the fifth. But no boat was overturned. One by one they passed +under the stern of the City of Bristol, and came alongside under the +shelter of its wall.</p> + +<p class="normal">The fifth boat ranged up. A man stood up in the stern.</p> + +<p class="normal">"The <i>Perseverance</i>," he cried. "Nine boxes." And as he spoke a great +sea leapt up against the windward bow of the cutter. The cutter rolled +from it suddenly, her low bulwarks dipped under water on the leeward +side, close by the <i>Perseverance</i> boat.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Shove off!" the man cried, who was standing up; and as he shouted he +lurched and fell into the bottom of the boat. The two men in the bows +pushed off with their oars; but they were too late. The cutter's +bulwark caught the boat under the keel; it seemed she must be upset, +and men and boxes whelmed in the sea, unless a miracle happened. But +the miracle did happen. As the fish-cutter righted she scooped on to +her deck the boat, with its boxes and its crew. The incident all +seemed to happen within the fraction of a second. Not a man upon the +fish-cutter had time to throw out a rope. Warrisden saw the cutter's +bulwarks dip, the sailor falling in the boat, and the boat upon the +deck of the cutter in so swift a succession that he had not yet +realised disaster was inevitable before disaster was avoided.</p> + +<p class="normal">The sailor rose from the bottom of the boat and stepped on deck, a +stalwart, dripping figure.</p> + +<p class="normal">"From the <i>Perseverance</i>, sir. Nine boxes," he said, looking up to the +captain on the bridge; and Warrisden, leaning by the captain's side +upon the rail, knew the sailor to be Tony Stretton. The accent of the +voice would have been enough to assure him; but Warrisden knew the +face too.</p> + +<p class="normal">"This is the man I want," he said to the captain.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You must be quick, then," the captain replied. "Speak to him while +the boat is being unloaded."</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden descended on to the deck.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Mr. Stretton," said he.</p> + +<p class="normal">The sailor swung round quickly. There was a look of annoyance upon his +face.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are surely making a mistake," said he, abruptly. "We are not +acquainted," and he turned back to the fish-boxes.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I'm not making a mistake," replied Warrisden. "I have come out to the +North Sea in order to find you."</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton ceased from his work and stood up. He led the way to the +stern of the cutter, where the two men were out of earshot.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Now," he said. He stood in front of Warrisden, in his sea-boots and +his oilskins, firmly planted, yet swaying to the motion of the ship. +There was not merely annoyance in his face, but he had the stubborn +and resolute look of a man not lightly to be persuaded. Standing there +on the cutter's deck, backed by the swinging seas, there was even an +air of mastery about him which Warrisden had not expected. His +attitude seemed, somehow, not quite consistent with his record of +failure.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Now," said Stretton, "we must be quick. The sea is getting worse each +minute, and I have to get back to the <i>Perseverance</i>. You are----?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Alan Warrisden, a stranger to you."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," Stretton interrupted; "how did you find me out?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Chase told me."</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton's face flushed angrily.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He had no right to tell you. I wished for these few weeks to be +alone. He gave me his word he would tell no one."</p> + +<p class="normal">"He had to break his word," said Warrisden, firmly. "It is necessary +that you should come home at once."</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton laughed. Warrisden was clinging to a wire stay from the +cutter's mizzen-mast, and even so could hardly keep his feet. He had a +sense of coming failure from the very ease with which Stretton stood +resting his hands upon his hips, unsupported on the unsteady deck.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I cannot come," said Stretton abruptly; and he turned away. As he +turned Warrisden shouted--for in that high wind words carried in no +other way--"Your father, Sir John Stretton, is dying."</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton stopped. He looked for a time thoughtfully into Warrisden's +face; but there was no change in his expression by which Warrisden +could gather whether the argument would prevail or no. And when at +last he spoke, it was to say--</p> + +<p class="normal">"But he has not sent for me."</p> + +<p class="normal">It was the weak point in Warrisden's argument, and Stretton had, in +his direct way, come to it at once. Warrisden was silent.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well?" asked Stretton. "He has not sent for me?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," Warrisden admitted; "that is true."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then I will not come."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But though he has not sent for you, it is very certain that he wishes +for your return," Warrisden urged. "Every night since you have been +away the candles have been lighted in your dressing-room and your +clothes laid out, in the hope that on one evening you will walk in at +the door. On the very first night, the night of the day on which you +went, that was done. It was done by Sir John Stretton's orders, and by +his orders it has always since been done."</p> + +<p class="normal">Just for a moment Warrisden thought that his argument would prevail. +Stretton's face softened; then came a smile which was almost wistful +about his lips, his eyes had a kindlier look. And the kindlier look +remained. Kindliness, too, was the first tone audible in his voice as +he replied; but the reply itself yielded nothing.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He has not sent for me."</p> + +<p class="normal">He looked curiously at Warrisden, as if for the first time he became +aware of him as a man acting from motives, not a mere instrument of +persuasion.</p> + +<p class="normal">"After all, who did send you?" he asked. "My wife?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Who then?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Miss Pamela Mardale."</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton was startled by the name. It was really the strongest +argument Warrisden had in his armoury. Only he was not aware of its +strength.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh," said Stretton, doubtfully; "so Miss Mardale sent you!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He thought of that morning in the Row; of Pamela's words--"I still +give the same advice. Do not leave your wife." He recalled the promise +she had given, although it was seldom long absent from his thoughts. +It might be that she sent this message in fulfilment of that promise. +It might be that, for some unknown reason, he was now needed at his +wife's side. But he had no thought of distrust; he had great faith in +Millicent. She despised him, yes; but he did not distrust her. And, +again, it might be that Pamela was merely sending him this news +thinking he would wish to hear of it in time. After all, Pamela was +his friend. He looked out on the wild sea. Already the boats were +heading back through the foam, each to its trawler.</p> + +<p class="normal">"One must take one's risks," he said. "So much I have learnt here in +the North Sea. Look!" and he pointed to the boats. "Those boats are +taking theirs. Yes; whether it's lacing your topsail or taking in a +reef, one must take one's risks. I will not come."</p> + +<p class="normal">He went back to the middle of the ship. The punt of the <i>Perseverance</i> +was already launched, the two fishermen waiting in it. As it rose on a +swell, Stretton climbed over the bulwarks and dropped into the stern.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Good-bye," he said. "I have signed on for eight weeks, and only four +have passed. I cannot run away and leave the ship short-handed. Thank +you for coming; but one must take one's risks."</p> + +<p class="normal">The boat was pushed off and headed towards the <i>Perseverance</i>. The +waves had increased, the crests toppled down the green slopes in foam. +Slowly the boat was rowed down to the trawler, the men now stopping +and backing water, now dashing on. Warrisden saw them reach the ship's +side and climb on board, and he saw the boat slung upwards and brought +in on to the deck. Then the screw of the <i>City of Bristol</i> struck the +water again. Lurching through the heavy seas, she steamed southwards. +In a few minutes the Blue Fleet was lost to sight.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XII</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_12" href="#div1Ref_12">TONY'S INSPIRATION</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden had failed. This was the account of his mission which he had +to give to Pamela Mardale; and he gave it without excuses. He landed +at Billingsgate Wharf at eleven o'clock on the second day after the +sails of the Blue Fleet had dropped out of sight behind the screen of +breaking waves. That afternoon he travelled down to the village of the +three poplars. It was night when he stepped out of the train on to the +platform of the little station. One can imagine what bitter and +humiliating thoughts occupied his mind. Away on the crest of the hill +the lights of the village shone brightly through the clear night air, +just as the lights of Margate had shone across the bay when the +steam-cutter had sprung like a thing alive to the lift of the sea +beneath her bows. Then all the breeze had whispered promises; now the +high hopes were fallen. "Do not fail!" Pamela had cried, with a +veritable passion, hating failure as an indignity, he could hear the +words in the very accent of her voice. Once she had suffered failure, +but it was not to be endured again. That was what she had meant; and +he had failed. He drove along that straight road which he had +traversed with Pamela at his side; he slept under the roof of the inn +where Pamela had claimed his help. The help had been fruitless, and +the next morning he rode down the hill and along the load with the +white wood rails--"the new road"--to tell her so. The sun was bright; +there was a sparkle of spring in the air; on the black leafless boughs +birds sang. He looked back to the three poplars pointing to the sky +from the tiny garden on the crest of the hill. Quetta--yes! But it +seemed there was to be no Seistan.</p> + +<p class="normal">He had started early, fearing that there might be a meet that day; and +he had acted wisely, for in the hall there were one or two men +lounging by the fire in scarlet, and Pamela was wearing her +riding-habit when she received him. He was shown into a little room +which opened on to the garden behind the house, and thither Pamela +came.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are alone!" she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes; Stretton would not come."</p> + +<p class="normal">"None the less, I am very grateful."</p> + +<p class="normal">She smiled as she spoke, and sat down, with her eyes upon him, waiting +for his story. The disappointment was visible upon his face, but not +upon hers. Pamela's indeed, was to him at this moment rather +inscrutable. It was not indifferent, however. He recognised that, and +was, in a way, consoled. It had been his fear that at the first word +she would dismiss the subject, and turn her back on it for good. On +the contrary, she was interested, attentive.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You found him, then?" she asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes. You would like to hear what passed?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Of course."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Even though I failed?"</p> + +<p class="normal">She looked at him with some surprise at his insistence.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, yes," she said, a little impatiently.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We were nearly three days longer in reaching the Blue Fleet than we +anticipated," he began. "Stretton came on board the fish-cutter----" +And Pamela interrupted him--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Why were you nearly three days longer? Tell me about your own journey +out to the fleet from the beginning."</p> + +<p class="normal">She was, in fact, as much interested in her messenger as in the errand +upon which she had sent him. Warrisden began to see that his journey +after all was not entirely a defeat. The alliance to which they had +set their hands up there in the village on the hill was bearing its +fruit. It had set them in a new relationship to each other, and in a +closer intimacy.</p> + +<p class="normal">He told the story of his voyage, making light of his hardships on the +steam-cutter. She, on the other hand, made much of them.</p> + +<p class="normal">"To quote your captain," she remarked, with a smile, "it was not a +Bobby's job."</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden laughed, and told her of Stretton's arrival in the punt of +the <i>Perseverance</i>. He described the way in which he had come on +board; he related the conversation which had passed between them at +the stern of the cutter.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He hadn't the look of a man who had failed," Warrisden continued. "He +stood there on the swinging deck with his legs firmly planted apart, +as easily as if he were standing on a stone pavement. I, on the other +hand, was clinging desperately to a stay. He stood there, with the +seas swinging up behind him, and stubbornly refused to come."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You told him of his father's illness?" asked Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He replied that his father had not sent for him."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You spoke of the candles lit every night?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"His answer was the same. His father had not sent for him. Besides, he +had his time to serve. He had signed on for eight weeks. There was +only one moment when I thought that there was a chance I might +persuade him; and, indeed, my persuasions had really nothing to do +with it at all. It was just the mention of your name."</p> + +<p class="normal">"My name?" asked Pamela, in surprise.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes. In answer to a question of his I told him that I had been sent +out by you, and for a moment he faltered."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela nodded her head in comprehension.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I understand; but he refused in the end?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes. He said, 'One must take one's risks.'"</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela repeated the sentence softly to herself; and Warrisden crossed +over to her side. His voice took a gentler note, and one still more +serious than that which he had used.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do you know what I think?" he asked. "You sent me out with a message +to Stretton. I think that he has sent me back with a message for +you--'One must take one's risks.' He said that he had learned that in +the North Sea. He pointed to the little boats carrying the fish-boxes +to the steamer through the heavy, breaking seas. Each man in each of +the boats was taking his risks. 'Whether it's lacing your topsail or +taking in a reef,' he said, 'one must take one's risks.'"</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela was silent for awhile after he had spoken. She sat with her +hands folded in her lap, and her face most serious. Then she looked up +at her companion with a very friendly smile; but she did not answer +him at all. And when she spoke, she spoke words which utterly +surprised him. All the time since the ketches had disappeared behind +the waves he had been plagued with the thought of the distress which +defeat would cause her; and here she was saying--</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am very glad that you went out to the North Sea for me, even though +the journey proved fruitless. It makes us so much the better friends, +doesn't it? And that is a gain for me. Think of it that way, and you +will not mind the hardships and the waste of time."</p> + +<p class="normal">She held out her hand--rather a rare act with her--and Warrisden took +it. Then came the explanation why defeat meant so little just at this +time.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I need not have sent you at all," she continued, "could I have +foreseen. Sir John Stretton died yesterday afternoon, suddenly. I +received a telegram last night from Millie. So Tony will naturally +come home when his four weeks are up. I wrote last night to Millie, +telling her where Tony was." Then she added, "But I am glad that I did +not foresee."</p> + +<p class="normal">She rose from her chair, and they walked out through the hall to the +front of the house. A groom was holding Pamela's horse. The others who +were hunting that day had already ridden off. Warrisden helped her +into the saddle, and she rode away.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sir John had died, and Stretton would now naturally come home. That +explained to Warrisden how it was that Pamela made so little of the +defeat. But it was not the whole explanation. Pamela was waking from +her long sleep, like the princess in the fairy tale, and the mere act +of waking was a pleasure. In the stir of emotions, hitherto rigorously +suppressed, in the exercise of sympathies, she found a delight such as +one may find in the mere stretching of one's muscles after a deep +rest. The consciousness of life as a thing enjoyable began to tingle +in her. She was learning again lessons which she remembered once to +have learned before. The joy of being needed by those one needs--there +was one of them. She had learned a new one to-day--"One must take +one's risks." She repeated the sentence over to herself as she rode +between the hedgerows on this morning which had the sparkle of spring. +A few days ago she would have put that view of life away from her. +Now, old as it was, simple as it was, she pondered upon it as though +it were a view quite novel. She found it, moreover, pleasant. She had +travelled, indeed, further along the new road than she was aware. The +truth is that she had rather hugged to herself the great trouble which +had overshadowed her life. She had done so unwittingly. She had +allowed it to dominate her after it had lost its power to dominate, +and from force of habit. She began to be aware of it now that she had +stepped out from her isolation, and was gathering again the strings of +her life into her hands.</p> + +<p class="center" style="letter-spacing:20pt">* * * * *</p> + +<p class="normal">But Pamela was wrong in her supposition that since Sir John's death +the danger for Millicent was at an end. Tony Stretton would now return +home, she thought; and nothing was further from Tony's thoughts. At +the time when Pamela was riding through the lanes of Leicestershire on +that morning of early spring, Tony was lying in his bunk in the cabin +of the <i>Perseverance</i> reading over, for the thousandth time, certain +letters which he kept beneath his pillow. This week he kept the long +night watch from midnight until eight of the morning; it was now +eleven, and he had the cabin to himself. The great gale had blown +itself out. The trawl, which for three days had remained safely stowed +under the lee bulwarks, was now dragging behind the boat; with her +topsails set the ketch was sailing full and by the wind; and down the +open companion the sunlight streamed into the cabin and played like +water upon the floor. The letters Tony Stretton was reading were those +which Millie had sent him. Disappointment was plain in every line; +they were sown with galling expressions of pity; here and there +contempt peeped out. Yet he was glad to have them; they were his +monitors, and he found a stimulus in their very cruelty. Though he +knew them by heart, he continually read them on mornings like this, +when the sun shone down the companion, and the voices of his fellow +sailors called cheerily overhead; at night, leaning upon his elbow, +and spelling them out by the dim light of the swinging lamp, while the +crew slept about him in their bunks.</p> + +<p class="normal">To his companions he was rather a mystery. To some of them he was just +down on his luck; to others he was a man "who had done something."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I suppose you have come out here to lie doggo," said the skipper to +him, shouting out the words in the height of the gale, when both were +standing by the lashed wheel one night. "I ask no questions. All I say +is, you do your work. I have had no call to slap a haddick across your +face. I say that fair and square. Water!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He concluded his speech with a yell. Stretton saw a ragged line of +white suddenly flash out in the darkness, high up by the weather bow, +and descend with a roar. It was a wave breaking down upon the deck. +Both men flung themselves down the companion, and the water sluiced +after them and washed them struggling about the floor of the cabin. +The wave saved Stretton from the need to reply, and the skipper did +not refer to the subject again.</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton had signed on for this cruise on the <i>Perseverance</i> because +he wanted a time during which he could be quite sure of his +livelihood. So far he had failed. He must map out a new course for +himself upon his life's chart. But for that work he needed time for +thought, and that time, up till now, he had not enjoyed. The +precarious existence which he had led since he had lost the half of +Millie's small fortune--now a clerk in a store, and a failure; now a +commercial traveller, and again a failure--had left him little +breathing space wherein to gather up his slow thoughts and originate a +new plan. That breathing space, however, the <i>Perseverance</i> had +afforded him. During the long watches on fine nights, when the dark +sails, swinging up and down to the motion of the boat, revealed and +obscured the stars, he wrestled with the difficult problem of his +life.</p> + +<p class="normal">He could go back when his cruise was over if he chose. His father was +dying; he faced the fact quite frankly. The object with which he set +out would be, after all, accomplished, though not accomplished by +himself. There would be a house for Millie and himself independent of +the old man's caprice; their life would be freed from the shadow of +his tyranny; their seclusion would come to an end; they could let the +sunlight in upon their lives. Yes! But there were the letters down in +the cabin there, underneath his pillow. Did not they alter the +position? He had gone away to keep his wife, just, in a word, to +prevent that very contempt of which the letters gave him proof. Must +he not now stay away in order to regain her? His wife was at the +bottom of all his thoughts. He had no blame for her, however much her +written words might hurt. He looked back upon their life together, its +pleasant beginnings, when they were not merely lovers, but very good +friends into the bargain. For it is possible to be the one and yet not +the other. They were good days, the days in the little house in +Deanery Street, days full of fun and good temper and amusement. He +recalled their two seasons in London--London bright with summer--and +making of each long day a too short holiday. Then had come the change, +sudden, dark, and complete. In the place of freedom, subjection; in +the place of company, isolation; in the place of friends, a sour old +man, querulous and exacting. Then had come the great hope of another +home; and swiftly upon that hope its failure through his incapacity. +He could not blame her for the letters underneath his pillow. He was +no less set upon regaining her than he had been before on keeping her. +His love for her had been the chief motive of his life when he left +the house in Berkeley Square. It remained so still. Could he go back, +he asked himself?</p> + +<p class="normal">There was one inducement persuading him always to answer "Yes"--the +sentence which Pamela had spoken, and which she had refused to +explain. He should be at his wife's side. He had never understood that +saying; it remained fixed in his memory, plaguing him. He should be at +his wife's side. So Pamela Mardale had said, and for what Pamela said +he had the greatest respect. Well, he could be in a few weeks at his +wife's side. But would it not be at too great a cost unless he had +first redeemed himself from her contempt?</p> + +<p class="normal">Thus he turned and turned, and saw no issue anywhere. The days slipped +by, and one morning the fish-cutter brought to him a letter, which +told him that four days ago his father had died. He could not reach +home in time for the funeral, even if he started at once. And he could +not start at once; he had signed on for eight weeks.</p> + +<p class="normal">But the letter left him face to face with the old problem. Should he +go back or should he stay away? And if he stayed away, what should he +do?</p> + +<p class="normal">He came on deck one morning, and his skipper said--</p> + +<p class="normal">"There's a fog on land, Stretton,"</p> + +<p class="normal">"How do you know that?" asked Stretton.</p> + +<p class="normal">The captain pointed to some birds hovering over the masts of the +ketch.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Those are land birds," said he. "Look, there's a thrush and there's a +blackbird. You won't find them so far from land without a reason. +There has been a fog, and very likely a storm. They have lost their +bearings in the fog."</p> + +<p class="normal">The birds hovered about the ships of the fleet, calling +plaintively--here, at all events, were men recognisably belonging to +the land they vainly sought. Stretton, watching them, felt very much +like one of those birds. He, too, had lost his way in a fog, and +though he made no outcry, his need of guidance was no less great than +theirs.</p> + +<p class="normal">Then came a morning at last when the trawl was hauled in for the last +time, and the boat's head pointed towards Yarmouth.</p> + +<p class="normal">"When shall we reach harbour?" Stretton asked anxiously.</p> + +<p class="normal">"If this breeze holds, in twenty-four hours," replied the skipper.</p> + +<p class="normal">Twenty-four hours! Just a day and a night, and Stretton would step +from the deck on to Gorleston Quay; and he was no nearer to the +solution of his problem than when he had stepped from the quay on to +the deck eight weeks ago. Those eight weeks were to have resolved all +his perplexities, and lo! the eight weeks had passed.</p> + +<p class="normal">He was in a fever of restlessness. He paced the deck all the day when +he was not standing at the wheel; at night he could not sleep, but +stood leaning over the bulwarks, watching the stars trembling in the +quiet water. At one o'clock in the morning the <i>Perseverance</i> passed a +lightship. Already the boat was so near home! And in the hour which +followed, his eight weeks of solitary communing, forced, as it were, +by immediate necessity, bore their fruit. His inspiration--he counted +the idea no less than an inspiration-came to him suddenly. He saw all +at once his course marked out for him upon the chart of life. He would +not suffer a doubt of it to enter his mind; he welcomed it with +passion, and the great load was lifted from his mind. The idea had +come. It was water in a dry land.</p> + +<p class="normal">A fisherman leaning over the bulwark by Stretton's side heard him +suddenly begin to sing over to himself a verse or two of a song--</p> +<div class="poem1"> +<p class="t0" style="text-indent:-8pt"> +"Oh, come out, mah love! I'm a-waiting foh you heah!<br> +Doan' you keep yuh window closed to-night."</p> +</div> + +<p class="normal">It was a coon song which Stretton was humming over to himself. His +voice dropped to a murmur, He stopped and laughed softly to himself, +as though the song had very dear associations in his thoughts. Then +his voice rose again, and there was now a kind of triumph in the lilt +of the song, which had nothing to do with the words--</p> +<div class="poem1"> +<p class="t0" style="text-indent:-8pt">"De stars all a-gwine put dey little ones to bed</p> +<p class="t1">Wid dey 'hush now, sing a lullaby,'</p> +<p class="t0">De man in de moon nod his sleepy, sleepy head,</p> +<p class="t1">And do sandman put a little in his eye."</p> +</div> + +<p class="normal">The words went lilting out over the quiet sea. It seemed to Stretton +that they came from a lighted window just behind him, and were sung in +a woman's voice. He was standing on a lawn surrounded by high dark +trees in the warmth of a summer night. He was looking out past the +islets over eight miles of quiet water to the clustered lights of the +yachts in Oban Bay. The coon song was that which his wife had sung to +him on one evening he was never to forget; and this night he had +recovered its associations. It was no longer "a mere song sung by +somebody." It seemed to him, so quickly did his anticipations for once +outrun his judgment, that he had already recovered his wife.</p> + +<p class="normal">The <i>Perseverance</i> was moored alongside of the quay at eight o'clock +in the morning, and just at that time Millie was reading a letter of +condolence from Lionel Callon.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XIII</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_13" href="#div1Ref_13">TONY STRETTON RETURNS TO STEPNEY</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Chase left the mission quite early in the evening and walked +towards his lodging. That side of his nature which clamoured for +enjoyments and a life of luxury was urgent with him to-night. As he +turned into his street he began to debate with himself whether he +should go in search of a cab and drive westwards out of the squalor. A +church clock had just struck nine; he would find his club open and his +friends about the fire. Thus debating he came to his own door, and had +unconsciously taken his latch-key from his pocket before he had +decided upon his course. The latch-key decided him. He opened the door +and went quickly up to his sitting-room. The gas was low, and what +light there was came from the fire. Chase shut the door gently, and +his face underwent a change. There came a glitter into his eyes, a +smile to his lips. He crossed to the little cupboard in the corner and +unlocked it, stealthily, even though he was alone. As he put his hand +into it and grasped the decanter, something stirred in his armchair. +The back of the chair was towards him. He remained for a second or two +motionless, listening. But the sound was not repeated. Chase +noiselessly locked the cupboard again and came back to the fire. A man +was sitting asleep in the chair.</p> + +<p class="normal">Chase laid a hand upon his shoulder and shook him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Stretton," he said; and Tony Stretton opened his eyes.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I fell asleep waiting for you," he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"When did you get back?" asked Chase.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I landed at Yarmouth this morning. I came up to London this +afternoon."</p> + +<p class="normal">Chase turned up the gas and lit a cigarette.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have not been home, then?" he said. "There is news waiting for +you there. Your father is dead!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I know," Stretton replied. "He died a month ago."</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Chase was perplexed. He drew up a chair to the fire and sat down.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You know that?" he asked slowly; "and yet you have not gone home?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," replied Stretton. "And I do not mean to go."</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton was speaking in the quietest and most natural way. There was +no trace in his manner of that anxiety which during the last few days +had kept him restless and uneasy. He had come to his decision. Chase +was aware of the stubborn persistence of his friend; and it was rather +to acquire knowledge than to persuade that he put his questions.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But why? You went away to make an independent home, free from the +restrictions under which you and your wife were living. Well, you have +got that home now. The reason for your absence has gone."</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton shook his head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"The reason remains. Indeed it is stronger now than it was when I +first left England," he answered. He leaned forward with his elbows +upon his knees, gazing into the fire. The light played upon his face, +and Chase could not but notice the change which these few months had +brought to him. He had grown thin, and rather worn; he had lost the +comfortable look of prosperity; his face was tanned. But there was +more. It might have been expected that the rough surroundings amidst +which Stretton had lived would leave their marks. He might have become +rather coarse, rather gross to the eye. On the contrary, there was a +look of refinement. It was the long battle with his own thoughts which +had left the marks. The mind was showing through the flesh. The face +had become spiritualised.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, the reason remains," said Stretton. "I left home to keep my +wife. We lived a life of quarrels. All the little memories, the +associations, the thousand and one small private things--ideas, +thoughts, words, jokes even, which two people who care very much for +one another have in common--we were losing, and so quickly; so very +quickly. I can't express half what I mean. But haven't you seen a man +and a woman at a dinner-table, when some chance sentence is spoken, +suddenly look at one another just for a second, smile perhaps, at all +events speak, though no word is spoken? Well, that kind of intimacy +was going. I saw indifference coming, perhaps dislike, perhaps +contempt; yes, contempt, just because I sat there and looked on. So I +went away. But the contempt has come. Oh, don't think I believe that I +made a mistake in going away. It would have come none the less had I +stayed. But I have to reckon with the fact that it has come."</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Chase sat following Stretton's words with a very close attention. +Never had Stretton spoken to him with so much frankness before.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Go on," said Chase. "What you are saying is--much of it--news to me."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, suppose that I were to go back now," Stretton resumed, "at +once--do you see?--that contempt is doubled."</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," cried Chase.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, yes," Stretton insisted. "Look at it from Millie's point of +view, not from yours, not even from mine. Look at the history of the +incident from the beginning! Work it out as she would; nay," he +corrected himself, remembering the letters, "as she has. I leave her +when things are at their worst. That's not all. I take half Millie's +fortune, and am fool enough to lose it right away. And that's not all. +I stay away in the endeavour to recover the lost ground, and I +continually fail. Meanwhile Millie has the dreary, irksome, exacting, +unrequited life, which I left behind, to get through as best she can +alone; without pleasure, and she likes pleasure----" He suddenly +looked at Chase, with a challenge in his eyes. "Why shouldn't she?" he +asked abruptly. Chase agreed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Why shouldn't she?" he said, with a smile. "I am not disapproving."</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton resumed his former attitude, his former tone.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Without friends, and she is fond of having friends about her; without +any chance of gratifying her spirits or her youth! To make her life +still more disheartening, every mail which reaches her from New York +brings her only another instalment of my disastrous record. Work it +out from her point of view, Chase; then add this to crown it all." He +leaned forward towards Chase and emphasized his words with a gesture +of his hand. "The first moment when her life suddenly becomes easy, +and does so through no help of mine, I--the failure--come scurrying +back to share it. No, Chase, no!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He uttered his refusal to accept that position with a positive +violence, and flung himself back in his chair. Chase answered +quietly--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Surely you are forgetting that it is your father's wealth which makes +her life easy."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am not forgetting it at all."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It's your father's wealth," Chase repeated. "You have a right to +share in it."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," Stretton admitted; "but what have rights to do with the +question at all? If my wife thinks me no good, will my rights save me +from her contempt?"</p> + +<p class="normal">And before that blunt question Mr. Chase was silent. It was too +direct, too unanswerable. Stretton rose from his chair, and stood +looking down at his companion.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Just consider the story I should have to tell Millie tonight--by +George!" he exclaimed suddenly--"if I went back to-night. I start out +with fifteen hundred pounds of hers to make a home and a competence; +and within a few months I am working as a hand on a North Sea trawler +at nineteen shillings a week."</p> + +<p class="normal">"A story of hardships undergone for her sake," said Chase; "for that's +the truth of your story, Stretton. And don't you think the hardships +would count for ever so much more than any success you could have +won?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Hardships!" exclaimed Stretton, with a laugh. "I think I would find +it difficult to make a moving tale out of my hardships. And I wouldn't +if I could--no!"</p> + +<p class="normal">As a fact, although it was unknown to Tony, Chase was wrong. Had +Stretton told his story never so vividly, it would have made no +difference. Millie Stretton had not the imagination to realise what +those hardships had been. Tony's story would have been to her just a +story, calling, no doubt, for exclamations of tenderness and pity. But +she could not have understood what he had felt, what he had thought, +what he had endured. Deeper feelings and a wider sympathy than Millie +Stretton was dowered with would have been needed for comprehension.</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton walked across the room and came back to the fire. He looked +down at Chase with a smile. "Very likely you think I am a great fool," +he said, in a gentler voice than he had used till now. "No doubt nine +men out of ten would say, 'Take the gifts the gods send you, and let +the rest slide. What if you and your wife drift apart? You won't be +the only couple.' But, frankly, Chase, that is not good enough. I have +seen a good deal of it--the boredom, the gradual ossification. Oh no; +I'm not content with that! You see, Chase," he stopped for a moment +and gazed steadily into the fire; then he went on quite simply, "you +see, I care for Millie very much."</p> + +<p class="normal">Chase knew well what weight to give to that short sentence. Had it +been more elaborate it would have meant less. It needed no other +commentary than the quiet sincerity with which it was uttered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, I understand," he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton seated himself again in his chair and took out a briar pipe +from his pocket. The pipe had an open metal covering over the bowl.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I need that no longer," Stretton said, with a laugh, as he removed +it. Then he took out a pouch, filled his pipe, and lighted it.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Have a whisky and soda?" said Chase.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, thanks."</p> + +<p class="normal">Chase lighted a cigarette and looked at his friend with curiosity. The +change which he had noticed in Stretton's looks had been just as +noticeable in his words. This man sitting opposite to him was no +longer the Tony Stretton who had once come to him for advice. That man +had been slow of thought, halting of speech, good-humoured, friendly; +but a man with whom it was difficult to get at close quarters. Talk +with him a hundred times, and you seemed to know him no better than +you did at the moment when first you were introduced to him. Here, +however, was a man who had thought out his problem--was, moreover, +able lucidly to express it.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well," said Chase, "you are determined not to go back?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Not yet," Stretton corrected.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What do you propose to do?"</p> + +<p class="normal">The question showed how great the change had been, begun by the hard +times in New York, completed by the eight weeks in the North Sea. For +Chase put the question. He no longer offered advice, understanding +that Stretton had not come to ask for it.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I propose to enlist in the French Foreign Legion."</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton spoke with the most matter-of-fact air imaginable; he might +have been naming the house at which he was to dine the next night. +Nevertheless, Chase started out of his chair; he stared at his +companion in a stupefaction.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," said Stretton, calmly; "I am not off my head, and I have not +been drinking. Sit down again, and think it over."</p> + +<p class="normal">Chase obeyed, and Stretton proceeded to expound that inspiration which +had come to him the night before.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What else should I do? You know my object now. I have to re-establish +myself in my wife's thoughts. How else can I do it? What professions +are open to me in which I could gain, I don't say distinction, but +mere recognition? I am not a money-maker; that, at all events, is +evident. I have had experience enough during the last months to know +that if I lived to a thousand I should never make money."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I think that's true," Chase agreed, thoughtfully.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Luckily there's no longer any need that I should try. What then? Run +through the professions, Chase, and find one, if you can, in which a +man at my age--twenty-nine--with my ignorance, my want of intellect, +has a single chance of success. The bar? It's laughable. The sea? I am +too old. The army? I resigned my commission years ago. So what then?"</p> + +<p class="normal">He waited for Chase to speak, and Chase was silent. He waited with a +smile, knowing that Chase could not speak.</p> + +<p class="normal">"There must be an alternative," Chase said, doubtfully, at last.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Name it, then."</p> + +<p class="normal">That was just what Chase could not do. He turned in his mind from this +calling to that. There was not one which did not need a particular +education; there was not one in which Stretton was likely to succeed. +Soldiering or the sea. These were the two callings for which he was +fitted. From the sea his age debarred him; from soldiering too, except +in this one way. No, certainly, Stretton was not off his head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"How in the world did you think of the Foreign Legion?" he asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton shrugged his shoulders.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I thought of most other courses first, and, one by one, rejected them +as impossible. This plan came to me last of all, and only last night. +We were passing a light-ship. In a way, you see, we were within sight +of home. I was in despair; and suddenly the idea flashed upon me, like +the revolving blaze from the light-ship. It is a sound one, I think. +At all events, it is the only one."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," answered Chase, slowly; "I suppose there will be chances, for +there's always something stirring on the Algerian frontier."</p> + +<p class="normal">"There, or in Siam," said Stretton.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What arrangements are you making here?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have written to my lawyers. Millie can do as she pleases with the +income. She has power, too, to sell the house in Berkeley Square. I +made my will, you know, before I left England."</p> + +<p class="normal">Chase nodded, and for a while there fell a silence upon the two +friends. A look of envy crept into the face of the clergyman as he +looked at Stretton. He could appreciate a motive which set a man +aiming high. He admired the persistence with which Stretton nursed it. +The plan it had prompted might be quixotic and quite fruitless, but, +at all events, it was definite; and a definite scheme of life, based +upon a simple and definite motive, was not so common but that it was +enviable. Stretton was so sure of its wisdom, too. He had no doubts. +He sat in his chair not asking for approval, not caring for censure; +he had made up his mind. The image of Stretton, indeed, as he sat in +that chair on that evening, with the firelight playing upon his face, +was often to come to Chase's thoughts.</p> + +<p class="normal">"There will be great risks," he said. "Risks of death, of trouble in +the battalion."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have counted them," Stretton replied; and he leaned forward again, +with his hands upon his knees. "Oh yes; there will be great risks! But +there's a prize, too, proportionate to the risks. Risks! Every one +speaks of them," he went on, with a laugh of impatience. "But I have +been eight weeks on the Dogger Bank, Chase, and I know--yes, I +know--how to estimate risks. Out there men risk their lives daily to +put a few boxes of fish on board a fish-cutter. Take the risk +half-heartedly and your boat's swamped for a sure thing; but take it +with all your heart and there are the fish-boxes to your credit. Well, +Millie is my fish-boxes."</p> + +<p class="normal">He ended with a laugh, and, rising, took his hat.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Shall I put you up for the night?" Chase asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, thanks," said Stretton. "I have got a bed at an hotel. I have +something else to do to-night;" and a smile, rather wistful and +tender, played about his lips. "Goodbye!" He held out his hand, and as +Chase took it he went on, "I am looking forward to the day when I come +back. My word, how I am looking forward to it; and I will look forward +each day until it actually, at the long last, comes. It will have been +worth waiting for, Chase, well worth waiting for, both to Millie and +to me."</p> + +<p class="normal">With that he went away. Chase heard him close the street door behind +him, and his footsteps sound for a moment or two on the pavement. +After all, he thought, a life under those Algerian skies, a life in +the open air, of activity--there were many worse things, even though +it should prove a second failure.</p> + +<p class="normal">Chase stood for a little before the fire. He crossed slowly over to +that cupboard in the corner at which Stretton's movement in the chair +had stayed his hand. Chase looked back to the armchair, as though he +half expected still to see Stretton sitting there. Then he slowly +walked back to the fire, and left the cupboard locked. Stretton had +gone, but he had left behind him memories which were not to be +effaced--the memory of a great motive and of a sturdy determination to +fulfil it. The two men were never to meet again; but, in the after +time, more than once, of an evening, Chase's hand was stayed upon that +cupboard door. More than once he looked back towards the chair as if +he expected that again his friend was waiting for him by the fire.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XIV</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_14" href="#div1Ref_14">TONY STRETTON PAYS A VISIT TO BERKELEY SQUARE</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">While Tony Stretton was thus stating the problem of his life to Mr. +Chase in Stepney Green, Lady Millingham was entertaining her friends +in Berkeley Square. She began the evening with a dinner-party, at +which Pamela Mardale and John Mudge were present, and she held a +reception afterwards. Many people came, for Frances Millingham was +popular. By half-past ten the rooms were already over-hot and +overcrowded, and Lady Millingham was enjoying herself to her heart's +content. Mr. Mudge, who stood by himself at the end of a big +drawing-room, close to one of the windows, saw the tall figure of +Warrisden come in at the door and steadily push towards Pamela. A few +moments later M. de Marnay, a youthful <i>attaché</i> of the French +Embassy, approached Mr. Mudge. M. de Marnay wiped his forehead and +looked round the crowded room.</p> + +<p class="normal">"A little is a good thing," said he, "but too much is enough." And he +unlatched and pushed open the window. As he spoke, Mr. Mudge saw +Callon appear in the doorway.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," he answered, with a laugh; "too much is enough."</p> + +<p class="normal">Mudge watched Callon's movements with his usual interest. He saw him +pass, a supple creature of smiles and small talk, from woman to woman. +How long would he last in his ignoble career? Mudge wondered. Would he +marry in the end some rich and elderly widow? Or would the crash come, +and parties know Mr. Lionel Callon no more? Mudge never saw the man +but he had a wish that he might get a glimpse of him alone in his own +rooms, with the smile dropped from his face, and the unpaid bills +piled upon his mantel-shelf, and his landlord very likely clamouring +for the rent. He imagined the face grown all at once haggard and tired +and afraid--afraid with a great fear of what must happen in a few +years at the latest, when, with middle-age heavy upon his shoulders, +he should see his coevals prospering and himself bankrupt of his +stock-in-trade of good looks, and without one penny to rub against +another. No presage of mind weighed upon Callon to-night, however, +during his short stay in Frances Millingham's house. For his stay was +short.</p> + +<p class="normal">As the clock upon the mantelpiece struck eleven, his eyes were at once +lifted to the clock-face, and almost at once he moved from the lady to +whom he was talking and made his way to the door.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Mudge turned back to the window and pushed it still more open. It +was a clear night of April, and April had brought with it the warmth +of summer. Mr. Mudge stood at the open window facing the coolness and +the quiet of the square; and thus by the accident of an overcrowded +room he became the witness of a little episode which might almost have +figured in some bygone comedy of intrigue.</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon passed through the line of carriages in the roadway beneath, +and crossed the corner of the square to the pavement on the right-hand +side. When he reached the pavement he walked for twenty yards or so in +the direction of Piccadilly, until he came to a large and gloomy +house. There a few shallow steps led from the pavement to the front +door. Callon mounted the steps, rang the bell, and was admitted.</p> + +<p class="normal">There were a few lights in the upper windows and on the ground floor; +but it was evident that there was no party at the house. Callon had +run in to pay a visit. Mr. Mudge, who had watched this, as it were, +the first scene in the comedy, distinctly heard the door close, and +the sound somehow suggested to him that the time had come for him to +go home to bed. He looked at his watch. It was exactly a quarter past +eleven--exactly, in a word, three-quarters of an hour since Tony +Stretton, who "had something else to do," had taken his leave of his +friend Chase in Stepney.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Mudge turned from the window to make his way to the door, and came +face to face with Pamela and Alan Warrisden. Pamela spoke to him. He +had never yet met Warrisden, and he was now introduced. All three +stood and talked together for a few minutes by the open window. Then +Mudge, in that spirit of curiosity which Callon always provoked in +him, asked abruptly--</p> + +<p class="normal">"By the way, Miss Mardale, do you happen to know who lives in that +house?" and he pointed across the corner of the square to the house +into which Callon had disappeared.</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela and Warrisden looked quickly at one another. Then Pamela turned +with great interest to Mr. Mudge.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, we both know," she answered. "Why do you ask?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, I don't know," said Mudge; "I think that I should like to +know."</p> + +<p class="normal">The glance which his two companions had exchanged, and Pamela's rather +eager question, had quickened his curiosity. But he got no answer for +a few moments. Both Pamela and Warrisden were looking out towards the +house. They were standing side by side. Mr. Mudge had an intuition +that the same thought was passing through both their minds.</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is where the truants lived last July," said Warrisden, in a low +voice. He spoke to Pamela, not to Mr. Mudge at all, whose existence +seemed for the moment to have been clean forgotten.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," Pamela replied softly. "The dark house, where the truants lived +and where"--she looked at Warrisden and smiled with a great +friendliness--"where the new road began. For it was there really. It's +from the steps of the dark house, not from the three poplars that the +new road runs out."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, that is true," said Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">And again both were silent.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Mudge broke in upon the silence. "I have no doubt that the truants +lived there, and that the new road begins at the foot of the steps," +he said plaintively; "but neither statement adds materially to my +knowledge."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela and Warrisden turned to him and laughed. It was true that they +had for a moment forgotten Mr. Mudge. The memory of the star-lit +night, in last July, when from this balcony they had watched the +truants slip down the steps and furtively call a cab, was busy in +their thoughts. From that night their alliance had dated, although no +suspicion of it had crossed their minds. It seemed strange to them now +that there had been no premonition.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, who lives there?" asked Mudge.</p> + +<p class="normal">But even now he received no answer; for Warrisden suddenly exclaimed +in a low, startled voice--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Look!" and with an instinctive movement he drew back into the room.</p> + +<p class="normal">A man was standing in the road looking up at the windows of the dark +house. His face could not be seen under the shadow of his hat. Pamela +peered forward.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do you think it's he?" she asked in a whisper.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am not sure," replied Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, I hope so! I hope so!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am not sure. Wait! Wait and look!" said Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">In a few moments the man moved. He crossed the road and stepped on to +the pavement. Again he stopped, again he looked up to the house; then +he walked slowly on. But he walked northwards, that is, towards the +watchers at the window.</p> + +<p class="normal">"There's a lamp-post," said Warrisden; "he will come within the light +of it. We shall know."</p> + +<p class="normal">And the next moment the light fell white and clear upon Tony +Stretton's face.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He has come back," exclaimed Pamela, joyfully.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Who?" asked Mr. Mudge; "who has come back?"</p> + +<p class="normal">This time he was answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Why, Tony Stretton, of course," said Pamela, impatiently. She was +hardly aware of Mr. Mudge, even while she answered him; she was too +intent upon Tony Stretton in the square below. She did not therefore +notice that Mudge was startled by her reply. She did not remark the +anxiety in his voice as he went on--</p> + +<p class="normal">"And that is Stretton's house?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And his wife, Lady Stretton, is she in London? Is she there--now?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Mudge spoke with an excitement of manner which at any other time +must have caused surprise. It passed now unremarked; for Warrisden, +too, had his preoccupation. He was neither overjoyed, like Pamela, nor +troubled, like Mr. Mudge; but as he looked down into the square he was +perplexed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," replied Pamela, "Millie Stretton is at home. Could anything be +more fortunate?"</p> + +<p class="normal">To Mudge's way of thinking, nothing could be more unfortunate. Pamela +had come late to the play; Mr. Mudge, on the other hand, had seen the +curtain rise, and had a clearer knowledge of the plot's development. +The husband outside the house, quite unexpected, quite unsuspicious, +and about to enter; the wife and the interloper within: here were the +formulas of a comedy of intrigue. Only, Mr. Mudge doubtfully wondered, +after the husband had entered, and when the great scene took place, +would the decorous accent of the comedy be maintained? Nature was +after all a violent dramatist, with little care for the rules and +methods. Of one thing, at all events, he was quite sure, as he looked +at Pamela: she would find no amusement in the climax. There was, +however, to be an element of novelty, which Mr. Mudge had not +foreseen.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What puzzles me," said Warrisden, "is that Stretton does not go in."</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton walked up to the corner of the square, turned, and retraced +his steps. Again he approached the steps of the house. "Now," thought +Mr. Mudge, with a good deal of suspense, "now he will ascend them." +Pamela had the same conviction, but in her case hope inspired it. +Tony, however, merely cast a glance upwards and walked on. They heard +his footsteps for a little while upon the pavement; then that sound +ceased.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He has gone," cried Pamela, blankly; "he has gone away again."</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Mudge turned to her very seriously.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Believe me," said he, "nothing better could have happened."</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony, in fact, had never had a thought of entering the house. Having +this one night in London, he had yielded to a natural impulse to +revisit again the spot where he and Millie had lived--where she still +lived. The bad days of the quarrels and the indifference and the +weariness were forgotten by him to-night. His thoughts went back to +the early days when they played truant, and truancy was good fun. The +escapes from the house, the little suppers at the Savoy, the stealthy +home-comings, the stumbling up the stairs in the dark, laughing and +hushing their laughter--upon these incidents his mind dwelt, +wistfully, yet with a great pleasure and a great hopefulness. Those +days were gone, but in others to come all that was good in them might +be repeated. The good humour, the intimacy, the sufficiency of the +two, each to the other, might be recovered if only he persisted. To +return now, to go in at the door and say, "I have come home," that +would be the mistake which there would be no retrieving. He was at the +cross-ways, and if he took the wrong road life would not give him the +time to retrace his steps. He walked away, dreaming of the good days +to come.</p> + +<p class="normal">Meanwhile, Lionel Callon was talking to Millie in that little +sitting-room which had once been hers and Tony's.</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie was surprised at the lateness of his visit, and when he was +shown into the room she rose at once.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Something has happened?" she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," Callon replied. "I was at Lady Millingham's party. I suddenly +thought of you sitting here alone. I am tired besides, and overworked. +I knew it would be a rest for me if I could see you and talk to you +for a few minutes. You see, I am selfish."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie smiled at him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, kind," said she.</p> + +<p class="normal">She asked him to sit down.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You look tired," she added. "How does your election work go on?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon related the progress of his campaign, and with an air of making +particular confidences. He could speak without any reserve to her, he +said. He conveyed the impression that he was making headway against +almost insuperable obstacles. He flattered her, moreover, by a +suggestion that she herself was a great factor in his successes. The +mere knowledge that she wished him well, that perhaps, once or twice +in the day, she gave him a spare thought, helped him much more than +she could imagine. Millie was induced to believe that, although she +sat quietly in London, she was thus exercising power through Callon in +his constituency.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Of course, I am a poor man," said Callon. "Poverty hampers one."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, but you will win," cried Millie Stretton, with a delighted +conviction; "yes, you will win."</p> + +<p class="normal">She felt strong, confident--just, in a word, as she had felt when she +had agreed with Tony that he must go away.</p> + +<p class="normal">"With your help, yes," he answered; and the sound of his voice +violated her like a caress. Millie rose from her chair.</p> + +<p class="normal">At once Callon rose too, and altered his tone.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have heard from Sir Anthony Stretton?" he said. "Tell me of +yourself."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, I have heard. He will not return yet."</p> + +<p class="normal">There came a light into Callon's eyes. He raised his hand to his mouth +to hide a smile.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Few men," he said, with the utmost sympathy, "would have left you to +bear these last weeks alone."</p> + +<p class="normal">He was standing just behind her, speaking over her shoulder. He was +very still, the house was very silent. Millie was suddenly aware of +danger.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You must not say that, Mr. Callon," she said rather sharply.</p> + +<p class="normal">And immediately he answered, "I beg your pardon. I had no idea my +sympathy would have seemed to you an insult."</p> + +<p class="normal">He spoke with a sudden bitterness. Millicent turned round in surprise. +She saw that his face was stern and cold.</p> + +<p class="normal">"An insult?" she said, and her voice was troubled. "No, you and I are +friends."</p> + +<p class="normal">But Callon would have none of these excuses. He had come to the house +deliberately to quarrel. He had a great faith in the efficacy of +quarrels, given the right type of woman. As Mudge had told Pamela, he +knew the tactics of the particular kind of warfare which he waged. To +cause a woman some pain, to make her think with regret that in him she +had lost a friend; that would fix him in her thoughts. So Callon +quarrelled. Millie Stretton could not say a word but he misinterpreted +it. Every sentence he cleverly twisted into an offence.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will say good-bye," he said, at length, as though he had reached +the limits of endurance.</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie Stretton looked at him with troubled eyes.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am so sorry it should end like this," she said piteously. "I don't +know why it has."</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon went out of the room, and closed the door behind him. Then he +let himself into the street. Millie Stretton would miss him, he felt +sure. Her looks, her last words assured him of that. He would wait now +without a movement towards a reconciliation. That must come from her, +it would give him in her eyes a reputation for strength. He knew the +value of that reputation. He had no doubt, besides, that she would +suggest a reconciliation. Other women might not, but Millie--yes. On +the whole, Mr. Callon was very well content with his night's work. He +had taken, in his way of thinking, a long step. The square was empty, +except for the carriages outside Lady Millingham's door. Lionel Callon +walked briskly home.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XV</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_15" href="#div1Ref_15">MR. MUDGE COMES TO THE RESCUE</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Lionel Callon's visit to Millie Stretton bore, however, consequences +which had not at all entered into his calculations. He was unaware of +the watchers at Lady Millingham's window; he had no knowledge of +Pamela's promise to Tony Stretton; no suspicion, therefore, that she +was now passionately resolved to keep it in the spirit and the letter. +He was even without a thought that his advances towards Millie had at +all been remarked upon or their motive discovered. Ignorance lulled +him into security. But within a short while a counter-plot was set in +train.</p> + +<p class="normal">The occasion was the first summer meeting on Newmarket Heath. Pamela +Mardale seldom missed a race meeting at Newmarket dining the spring +and summer. There were the horses, in the first place; she met her +friends besides; the heath itself, with its broad expanse and its +downs, had for her eyes a beauty of its own; and in addition the +private enclosure was separated by the width of the course from the +crowd and clamour of the ring. She attended this particular meeting, +and after the second race was over she happened to be standing amidst +a group of friends within the grove of trees at the back of the +paddock. Outside, upon the heath, the air was clear and bright; a +light wind blew pleasantly. Here the trees were in bud, and the +sunlight, split by the boughs, dappled with light and shadow the +glossy coats of the horses as they were led in and out amongst the +boles. A mare was led past Pamela, and one of her friends said--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Semiramis. I think she will win this race."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela looked towards the mare, and saw, just beyond her, Mr. Mudge. +He was alone, as he usually was; and though he stopped in his walk, +now here, now there, to exchange a word with some acquaintance, he +moved on again, invariably alone. Gradually he drew nearer to the +group in which Pamela was standing, and his face brightened. He +quickened his step; Pamela, on her side, advanced rather quickly +towards him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are here?" she said, with a smile. "I am glad, though I did not +think to meet you."</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Mudge, to tell the truth, though he carried a race-card in his +hand, and glasses slung across his shoulder, had the disconsolate air +of a man conscious that he was out of place. He answered Pamela, +indeed, almost apologetically.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is better after all to be here than in London on a day of summer," +he said, and he added, with a shrewd glance at her, "You have +something to say to me--a question to ask."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela looked up at him in surprise.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, I have. Let us go out."</p> + +<p class="normal">They walked into the paddock, and thence through the gate into the +enclosure. The enclosure was at this moment rather empty. Pamela led +the way to the rails alongside the course, and chose a place where +they were out of the hearing of any bystander.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You remember the evening at Frances Millingham's?" she asked. She had +not seen Mr. Mudge since that date.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Mudge replied immediately.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes; Sir Anthony Stretton"--and the name struck so oddly upon +Pamela's ears that, serious as at this moment she was, she laughed. +"Sir Anthony Stretton turned away from the steps of his house. You +were distressed, Miss Mardale: I, on the contrary, said that nothing +better could have happened. You wish to ask me why I said that?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," said Pamela; "I am very anxious to know. Millie is my friend. I +am, in a sort of way, too, responsible for her;" and as Mr. Mudge +looked surprised, she repeated the word--"Yes, responsible. And I am +rather troubled." She spoke with a little hesitation. There was a +frown upon her forehead, a look of perplexity in her dark eyes. She +was reluctant to admit that her friend was in any danger or needed any +protection from her own weakness. The freemasonry of her sex impelled +her to silence. On the other hand, she was at her wits' end what to +do. And she had confidence in her companion's discretion; she +determined to speak frankly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is not only your remark which troubles me," she said, "but I +called on Millie the next afternoon."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, you did?" exclaimed Mr. Mudge.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes; I asked after Tony. Millie had not seen him, and did not expect +him. She showed me letters from his solicitors empowering her to do +what she liked with the house and income, and a short letter from Tony +himself, written on the <i>Perseverance</i>, to the same effect."</p> + +<p class="normal">She did not explain to Mr. Mudge what the <i>Perseverance</i> was, and he +asked no questions.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I told Millie," she continued, "that Tony had returned, but she +refused to believe it. I told her when and where I had seen him."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You did that?" said Mr. Mudge. "Wait a moment." He saw and understood +Pamela's reluctance to speak. He determined to help her out. "Let me +describe to you what followed. She stared blankly at you and asked you +to repeat what you had said?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," replied Pamela, in surprise; "that is just what she did."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And when you had repeated it, she turned a little pale, perhaps was +disconcerted, perhaps a little--afraid."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, it is that which troubles me," Pamela cried, in a low voice. +"She was afraid. I would have given much to have doubted it. I could +not; her eyes betrayed it, her face, her whole attitude. She was +afraid."</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Mudge nodded his head, and went quietly on--</p> + +<p class="normal">"And when she had recovered a little from her fear she questioned you +closely as to the time when you first saw Stretton outside the house, +and the time when he went away."</p> + +<p class="normal">He spoke with so much certitude that he might have been present at the +interview.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I told her that it was some little time after eleven when he came, +and that he only stayed a few minutes," answered Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And at that," rejoined Mr. Mudge, "Lady Stretton's anxiety +diminished."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, that is true, too," Pamela admitted; and she turned her face to +him with its troubled appeal. "Why was she afraid? For, since you have +guessed that she was, you must know the reason which she had for fear. +Why was it so fortunate that Tony Stretton did not mount the steps of +the house and ring the bell?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Mudge answered her immediately, and very quietly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Because Lionel Callon was inside the house."</p> + +<p class="normal">A great sympathy made his voice gentle--sympathy for Pamela. None the +less the words hurt her cruelly. She turned away from him so that he +might not see her face, and stood gazing down the course through a +mist. Bitter disappointment was hers at that moment. She was by nature +a partisan. The thing which she did crept closer to her heart by the +mere act of doing it. She knew it, and it was just her knowledge which +had so long kept her to inaction. Now her thoughts were passionately +set on saving Millie, and here came news to her which brought her to +the brink of despair. She blamed Tony. "Why did he ever go away?" she +cried. "Why, when he had come back, did he not stay?" And at once she +saw the futility of her outcry. Tony, Millie, Lionel Callon--what was +the use of blaming them? They acted as their characters impelled them. +She had to do her best to remedy the evil which the clash of these +three characters had produced. "What can be done?" she asked of +herself. There was one course open certainly. She could summon +Warrisden again, send him out a second time in search of Tony +Stretton, and make him the bearer, not of an excuse, but of the whole +truth. Only she dreaded the outcome; she shrank from telling Tony the +truth, fearing that he would exaggerate it. "Can nothing be done?" she +asked, again in despair, and this time she asked the question aloud, +and turned to Mr. Mudge.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mudge had been quietly waiting for it.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," he answered, "something can be done. I should not have told +you, Miss Mardale, what I knew unless I had already hit upon a means +to avert the peril; for I am aware how much my news must grieve you."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela looked at Mr. Mudge in surprise. It had not occurred to her at +all that he could have solved the problem.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What can I do?" she asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You can leave the whole trouble in my hands for a few days."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela was silent for a little while; then she answered doubtfully--</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is most kind of you to offer me your help."</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Mudge shook his head at Pamela with a certain sadness.</p> + +<p class="normal">"There's no kindness in it at all," he said; "but I quite understand +your hesitation, Miss Mardale. You were surprised that I should offer +you help, just as you were surprised to see me here. Although I move +in your world I am not of it. Its traditions, its instincts, even its +methods of thought--to all of these I am a stranger. I am just a +passing visitor who, for the time of his stay, is made an honorary +member of your club. He meets with every civility, every kindness; but +he is not inside, so that when he suddenly comes forward and offers +you help in a matter where other members of your club are concerned, +you naturally pause."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela made a gesture of dissent; but Mr. Mudge gently insisted--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Let me finish. I want you to understand equally well why I offer you +help which may very likely seem to you an impertinence."</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, indeed," said Pamela; "on the contrary, I am very grateful."</p> + +<p class="normal">Others were approaching the spot where they stood. They turned and +walked slowly over the grass away from the paddock.</p> + +<p class="normal">"There is no need that you should be," Mudge continued; "you will +see that, if you listen." And in a few words he told her at last +something of his own career. "I sprang from a Deptford gutter, with +one thought--to get on, and get on, and get on. I moved from Deptford +to Peckham. There I married. I moved from Peckham to a residential +suburb in the south-west. There my wife died. Looking back now, I am +afraid that in my haste to get on I rather neglected my wife's +happiness. You see I am frank with you. From the residential suburb I +moved into the Cromwell Road, from the Cromwell Road to Grosvenor +Square. I do not think that I was just a snob; but I wanted to have +the very best of what was going. There is a difference. A few years +ago I found myself at the point which I had aimed to reach, and, as I +have told you, it is a position of many acquaintances and much +loneliness. You might say that I could give it up and retire into the +country. But I have too many undertakings on my hands; besides, I am +too tired to start again, so I remain. But I think you will understand +that it will be a real pleasure to me to help you. I have not so many +friends that I can afford to lose the opportunity of doing one of them +a service."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela heard him to the end without any interruption; but when he had +finished she said, with a smile--</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are quite wrong about the reason for my hesitation. I asked a +friend of mine a few weeks ago to help me, and he gave me the best of +help at once. Even the best of help fails at times, and my friend did. +I was wondering merely whether it would not be a little disloyal to +him if I now accepted yours, for I know he would be grieved if I went +to any one but him."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I see," said Mr. Mudge; "but I think that I can give you help which +no one else can."</p> + +<p class="normal">It was clear from his quiet persistence that he had a definite plan. +Pamela stopped and faced him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Very well," she said. "I leave the whole matter for a little while in +your hands."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Thank you," said Mr. Mudge; and he looked up towards the course. +"There are the horses going down."</p> + +<p class="normal">A sudden thought occurred to Pamela. She opened the purse she carried +on her wrist, and took out a couple of pounds.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Put this on Semiramis for me, please," she said, with a laugh. "Be +quick, if you will, and come back."</p> + +<p class="normal">Though she laughed she was still most urgent he should go. Mr. Mudge +hurried across the course, made the bet, and returned. Pamela watched +the race with an eagerness which astonished Mr. Mudge, so completely +did she seem to have forgotten all that had troubled her a minute ago. +But he did not understand Pamela. She was, after her custom, seeking +for a sign, and when Semiramis galloped in a winner by a neck, she +turned with a hopeful smile to her companion--</p> + +<p class="normal">"We shall win too."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I think so," Mudge replied, and he laughed. "Do you know what I think +of Lionel Callon, Miss Mardale? The words are not mine, but the +sentiment is unexceptionable. A little may be a good thing, but too +much is enough."</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XVI</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_16" href="#div1Ref_16">THE FOREIGN LEGION</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">It was midday at Sidi Bel-Abbès in Algeria. Two French officers were +sitting in front of a café at the wide cross-roads in the centre of +the town. One of them was Captain Tavernay, a man of forty-seven, +tall, thin, with a brown face worn and tired by the campaigns of +thirty years, the other a young lieutenant, M. Laurent, fresh and +pink, who seemed to hare been passed out but yesterday from the school +of St. Cyr. Captain Tavernay picked up his cap from the iron table in +front of him and settled it upon his grizzled head. Outside the town +trees clustered thickly, farms were half-hidden amongst groves of +fig-trees and hedges of aloes. Here there was no foliage. The streets +were very quiet, the sunlight lay in dazzling pools of gold upon the +sand of the roads, the white houses glittered under a blue, cloudless +sky. In front of the two officers, some miles away, the bare cone of +Jebel Tessalah sprang upwards from a range of hills dominating the +town, and a speck of white upon its shoulder showed where a village +perched. Captain Tavernay sat looking out towards the mountain with +the lids half-closed upon his eyes. Then he rose deliberately from his +chair.</p> + +<p class="normal">"If we walk to the station," he said, "we shall just meet the train +from Oran. A batch of thirty recruits is coming in by it. Let us walk +to the station, Laurent."</p> + +<p class="normal">Lieutenant Laurent dropped the end of his cigarette on to the ground +and stood up reluctantly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"As you will, Captain," he answered. "But we should see the animals +soon enough at the barracks."</p> + +<p class="normal">The words were spoken in a voice which was almost, and with a shrug of +the shoulders which was quite, contemptuous. The day was hot, and +Lieutenant Laurent unwilling to move from his coffee and the shade +into that burning sunlight. Captain Tavernay gazed mildly at his +youthful junior. Long experience had taught him to leave much to time +and little to argument. For himself he loved his legionaries. He had a +smile of indulgence for their faults even while he punished them; and +though his face seldom showed the smile, and his punishments were not +unjustly light, the culprits none the less knew it was there, hidden +somewhere close to his heart. But then he had seen his men in action, +and Lieutenant Laurent had not. That made all the difference. The +Foreign Legion certainly did not show at its best in a cantonment. +Amongst that motley assemblage--twelve thousand men, distinct in +nationality as in character, flung together pell-mell, negroes and +whites, criminals, adventurers, silent unknown men, haunted by +memories of other days or tortured by remorse--a garrison town with +its monotony and its absinthe played havoc. An Abyssinian rubbed +shoulders in the ranks with a scholar who spoke nine languages; a +tenor from the Théâtre de la Monnaie at Brussels with an unfrocked +priest. Often enough Captain Tavernay had seen one of his legionaries +sitting alone hour after hour at his little table outside a café, +steadily drinking glass after glass of absinthe, rising mechanically +to salute his officer, and sinking back among his impenetrable +secrets. Was he dreaming of the other days, the laughter and the +flowers, the white shoulders of women? Was he again placing that last +stake upon the red which had sent him straight from the table to the +nearest French depôt? Was he living again some tragic crisis of love +in which all at once he had learned that he had been befooled and +derided? Captain Tavernay never passed such a man but he longed to sit +down by his side and say, "My friend, share your secret with me; so +will it be easier to bear." But the etiquette of the Foreign Legion +forbade. Captain Tavernay merely returned the salute and passed on, +knowing that very likely his legionary would pass the night in the +guard-room and the next week in the cells. No; the town of Sidi +Bel-Abbès was not the place wherein to learn the mettle of the +legionary. Away to the south there, beyond the forest of trees on the +horizon's line, things were different. Let Lieutenant Laurent see the +men in their bivouacs at night under the stars, and witness their +prowess under arms, <i>ces animaux</i> would soon become <i>mes enfants</i>.</p> + +<p class="normal">Therefore he answered Lieutenant Laurent in the mildest voice.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We shall see them at the barracks, it is true. But you are wrong when +you say that it will be soon enough. At the barracks they will be +prepared for us, they will have their little stories ready for us, +they will be armed with discretion. But let us see them descend from +the train, let us watch their first look round at their new home, +their new fatherland. We may learn a little, and if it is ever so +little it will help us to know them the better afterwards. And at the +worst it will be an amusing exercise in psychology."</p> + +<p class="normal">They walked away from the café, and strolled down the Rue de Mascara +under the shady avenue of trees, Tavernay moving with a long, indolent +stride, which covered a deal of ground with a surprising rapidity, +Laurent fidgeting along discontentedly at his side. M. Laurent was +beginning, in fact, to regret the hurry with which he had sought a +commission in the Foreign Legion. M. Laurent had, a few months ago, in +Paris, imagined himself to be irrevocably in love with the wife of one +of his friends, a lady at once beautiful and mature; M. Laurent had +declared his passion upon a suitable occasion; M. Laurent had been +snubbed for his pains; M. Laurent in a fit of pique had sought the +consolation of another climate and foreign service; and M. Laurent was +now quickly realising that he was not nearly so heartbroken as he had +fancied himself to be. Already while he walked to the station he was +thinking that, after all, Paris was endurable, even though one +particular woman could not refrain from a little smile of amusement +when he crossed her path.</p> + +<p class="normal">Captain Tavernay had timed their walk accurately. For as they reached +the station the train was signalled.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Let us stand here, behind these cases," said Tavernay. "We shall see +and not be seen."</p> + +<p class="normal">In a few moments the train moved slowly in and stopped. From the +furthermost carriage the detachment descended, and, following a +<i>sous-officier</i> in the uniform of the Legion, walked towards the cases +behind which Tavernay and his companion were concealed. In front came +two youths, fair of complexion and of hair, dressed neatly, well shod, +who walked with a timidity of manner as though they expected to be +questioned and sent packing.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Who can they be?" asked Laurent. "They are boys."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yet they will give their age as eighteen," replied Tavernay, and his +voice trembled ever so slightly; "and we shall ask no questions."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But they bear no marks of misery. They are not poor. Whence can they +come?" Laurent repeated.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I can tell you that," said Tavernay. He was much moved. He spoke with +a deep note of reverence. "They come from Alsace or Lorraine. We get +many such. They will not serve Germany. At all costs they <i>will</i> serve +France."</p> + +<p class="normal">Lieutenant Laurent was humbled. Here was a higher motive than pique, +here was a devotion which would not so quickly tire of discipline and +service. He gazed with a momentary feeling of envy at these two youths +who insisted, at so high a price, on being his compatriots.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You see," said Tavernay, with a smile, "it was worth while to come to +the station and see the recruits arrive, even on so hot a day as +this."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," replied Laurent; and then "look!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Following the two youths walked a man tall and powerful, with the +long, loose stride of one well versed in sports. He held his head +erect, and walked defiantly, daring you to question him. His hands +were long and slender, well-kept, unused to labour, his face aquiline +and refined. He looked about thirty-five years old. He wore a light +overcoat of a fine material, which hung open, and underneath the +overcoat he was attired in evening dress. It was his dress which had +riveted Laurent's attention; and certainly nothing could have seemed +more bizarre, more strangely out of place. The hot African sun poured +down out of a cloudless sky; and a new recruit for the Foreign Legion +stepped out of a railway carriage as though he had come straight from +a ball-room. What sudden disaster could have overtaken him? In what +tragedy had he borne a part? Even Laurent's imagination was stimulated +into speculation. As the man passed him, Laurent saw that his tie was +creased and dusty, his shirt-front rumpled and soiled. That must needs +have been. At some early hour on a spring morning, some four or +five days ago, this man must have rushed into the guard-room of a +barrack-square in some town of France. Laurent turned to Tavernay +eagerly--</p> + +<p class="normal">"What do you make of him?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Tavernay shrugged his shoulders.</p> + +<p class="normal">"A man of fashion, who has made a fool of himself. They make good +soldiers as a rule."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But he will repent!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"He has already had the time, and he has not. There is no escort for +recruits until they reach Marseilles. Suppose that he enlisted in +Paris. He is given the fare. At any station between Paris and +Marseilles he could have got out and returned."</p> + +<p class="normal">The man in evening-dress walked on. There were dark shadows under his +eyes, the eyes themselves were sombre and alert.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We shall know something of him soon," said Tavernay. He watched his +recruit with so composed an air that Laurent cried out--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Can nothing astonish you?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Very little," answered Tavernay, phlegmatically. "Listen, my friend. +One day, some years ago, a captain of Hussars landed at Oran. He came +to Bel-Abbès with a letter of introduction to me. He stayed with me. +He expressed a wish to see my men on parade. I turned them out. He +came to the parade-ground and inspected them. As he passed along the +ranks he suddenly stopped in front of an old soldier with fifteen +years' service in the Legion, much of which fifteen years had been +passed in the cells. The old soldier was a drunkard--oh, but a +confirmed drunkard. Well, in front of this man my young Captain with +the curled moustaches stopped--stopped and turned very pale. But he +did not speak. My soldier looked at him respectfully, and the Captain +continued his inspection. Well, they were father and son--that is all. +Why should anything astonish me?" and Captain Tavernay struck a match +and lighted a cigarette.</p> + +<p class="normal">The match, however, attracted attention to the presence of the +officers. Four men who marched, keeping time with their feet and +holding their hands stiffly at their sides, saw the flame and remarked +the uniforms. Their hands rose at once to the salute.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ah! German deserters," said Tavernay. "They fight well."</p> + +<p class="normal">Others followed, men in rags and out of shoe-leather, outcasts and +fugitives; and behind them came one who was different. He was tall and +well-knit, with a frank open face, not particularly intellectual, +on the other hand not irretrievably stupid. He was dressed in a +double-breasted, blue-serge suit, and as he walked he now and then +gave a twist to his fair moustache, as though he were uneasy and +embarrassed. Captain Tavernay ran his eyes over him with the look of a +connoisseur.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Aha!" said he, with a chuckle of satisfaction. "The true legionary! +Hard, finely trained, he has done work too. Yes! You see, Laurent, he +is a little ashamed, a little self-conscious. He feels that he is +looking a fool. I wonder what nationality he will claim."</p> + +<p class="normal">"He comes from the North," said Lament. "Possibly from Normandy."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, I know what he is," returned Tavernay. "I am wondering only what +he will claim to be. Let us go outside and see."</p> + +<p class="normal">Tavernay led the way to the platform. Outside, in front of the +station, the <i>sous-officier</i> marshalled his men in a line. They looked +a strange body of men as they stood there, blinking in the strong +sunlight. The man in the ruffled silk hat and the dress-suit toed the +line beside a bundle of rags; the German deserters rubbed elbows with +the "true legionary" in the blue serge. Those thirty men represented +types of almost all the social grades, and to a man they were seeking +the shelter of anonymity in that monastery of action, the Foreign +Legion.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Answer to your names," said the <i>sous-officier</i>, and from a paper in +his hand he began to read. The answers came back, ludicrous in their +untruth. A French name would be called.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Montaubon."</p> + +<p class="normal">And a German voice replied--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Present."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ohlsen," cried the <i>sous-officier</i>, and no answer was given. +"Ohlsen," he repeated sharply. "Is not Ohlsen here?"</p> + +<p class="normal">And suddenly the face of the man in the serge suit flashed, and he +answered hurriedly--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Present."</p> + +<p class="normal">Even the <i>sous-officier</i> burst into a laugh. The reason for the pause +was too obvious; "Ohlsen" had forgotten that Ohlsen was now his name.</p> + +<p class="normal">"My lad, you must keep your ears open," said the <i>sous-officier</i>. +"Now, attention. Fours right. March!"</p> + +<p class="normal">And the detachment marched off towards the barracks.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ohlsen," said Tavernay, and he shrugged his shoulders. "Well, what +does it matter? Come!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ohlsen" was Tony Stretton, and all the way along the Rue Daya to the +barracks he was longing for the moment when he would put on the +uniform and cease to figure ridiculously in this grotesque procession. +None the less he had to wait with the others, drawn up in the +barrack-square until Captain Tavernay returned. The Captain went to +his office, and thither the recruits were marched. One by one they +entered in at the door, answered his questions, and were sent off to +the regimental tailor. Tony Stretton was the last.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Name?" asked Tavernay.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Hans Ohlsen."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Town of enlistment?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Marseilles."</p> + +<p class="normal">Tavernay compared the answers with some writing on a sheet of paper.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, Marseilles. Passed by the doctor Paul as sound of body. Yes," +and he resumed his questions.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Nationality?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Swede."</p> + +<p class="normal">Captain Tavernay had a smattering of most languages, and he was +greatly inclined to try his new recruit with a few questions in the +Swedish tongue. But the etiquette of the Legion forbade. He went on +without a smile--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Age?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Thirty."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Vocation?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Fisherman."</p> + +<p class="normal">Captain Tavernay looked up. This time he could not help smiling.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, it is as good as any other," said he; and suddenly there was a +sound of cries, and three soldiers burst out of a narrow entrance on +the further side of the parade-ground and came running across the +square to the Captain's quarters. Both Tavernay and Stretton looked +through the door. There was not a tree in that great square; the +sunlight poured down upon the bare brown space with a blinding +fierceness. All the recruits but Stretton had marched off; a second +ago it had been quite empty and very silent. Now these three men were +hurrying across it, shouting, gesticulating with their hands. Stretton +looked at them with surprise. Then he noticed that one of them, the +man running in the middle and a little ahead of the others, carried a +revolver in his hand and brandished it. Moreover, from the look of his +inflamed face, he was shouting threats; the others were undoubtedly +shouting warnings. Scraps of their warnings came to Stretton's ears. +"Mon Capitaine!" "Il veut vous tuer!" "Rentrez!" They were straining +every muscle to catch the threatening soldier up.</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton strode to the door, and a voice behind him cried--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Halt!"</p> + +<p class="normal">It was Tavernay who was speaking.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But he is already halfway across the square."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Halt!"</p> + +<p class="normal">And there was no disobeying the command. Captain Tavernay walked to +the door.</p> + +<p class="normal">"A Spanish corporal whom yesterday I degraded to the ranks," said he. +"Half a pint of <i>aguardiente</i>, and here's the result."</p> + +<p class="normal">Captain Tavernay stepped out of the door and leisurely advanced +towards the running men. He gave an order, he raised his hand, and the +two soldiers who warned him fell back and halted. Certainly Captain +Tavernay was accustomed to obedience. The Spanish ex-corporal ran on +alone, straight towards Tavernay, but as he ran, as he saw the officer +standing there alone, quietly waiting his onslaught, his threats +weakened, his pace slackened. He came to a stop in front of Tavernay.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I must kill yon!" he cried, waving his revolver.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yon shall kill me from behind, then," said Tavernay, calmly. "Follow +me!" And he turned round, and with the same leisurely deliberation +walked back to his room. The ex-corporal hesitated and--obeyed. He +followed Captain Tavernay into the room where Stretton stood.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Place your revolver on the table."</p> + +<p class="normal">The Spaniard again obeyed. Tavernay pushed open the door of an inner +room.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are drunk," he said. "You must not be seen in this condition by +your fellow-soldiers. Go in and lie down!"</p> + +<p class="normal">The Spaniard stared at his officer stupidly, tottering upon his limbs. +Then he staggered into the Captain's room. Tavernay turned back to +Stretton and a ghost of a smile crept into his face.</p> + +<p class="normal">"<i>C'est du theater</i>," he said, with a little shrug of the shoulders. +"But what would you have, monsieur?" And he spoke to Stretton as to +an equal. "You are astonished. It is very likely not your way in +your-fishing-boats," he continued, with a chuckle. Stretton knew very +well that he meant "army." "But there is no Foreign Legion amongst +your--fishermen." He laughed again; and gathering up his papers +dismissed Stretton to the tailor's. But after Stretton had taken a few +steps across the parade, Tavernay called him back again. He looked at +him with a very friendly smile.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I, too, enlisted at Marseilles," he said. "One can rise in the +Foreign Legion by means of these"--and he touched lightly the medals +upon his breast. This was Tony Stretton's introduction to the Foreign +Legion.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XVII</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_17" href="#div1Ref_17">CALLON LEAVES ENGLAND</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Spring that year drew summer quickly after it. The lilac had been +early in flower, the days bright and hot. At nine o'clock on a July +morning Callon's servant drew up the blinds in his master's room and +let the sunlight in. Lionel Callon stretched himself in bed and asked +for his letters and his tea. As he drank the tea he picked up the +letters one by one, and the first at which he looked brought a smile +of satisfaction to his face. The superscription told him that it was +from Millie Stretton. That little device of a quarrel had proved +successful, then. He tore open the envelope and read the letter. +Millie wrote at no great length, but what was written satisfied +Callon. She could not understand how the quarrel had arisen. She had +been thinking over it many times since it happened, and she was still +baffled. She had not had a thought of hurting him. How could she, +since they were friends? She had been hoping to hear from him, but +since some time had passed and no word had reached her, she must write +and say that she thought it sad their friendship should have ended as +it had.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was a wistful little letter, and as Callon laid it down he said to +himself, "Poor little girl"; but he said the words with a smile rather +than with any contrition. She had been the first to write--that was +the main point. Had he given in, had he been the one to make the +advance, to save her the troubled speculations, the sorrow at this +abrupt close to their friendship. Millie Stretton would have been +glad, no doubt, but she would have thought him weak. Now he was the +strong man. He had caused her suffering and abased her to seek a +reconciliation. Therefore he was the strong man. Well, women would +have it so, he thought, with a chuckle, and why should he complain?</p> + +<p class="normal">He wrote a note to Millie Stretton, announcing that he would call that +afternoon, and despatched the note by a messenger. Then he turned to +his other letters, and amongst them he found one which drove all the +satisfaction from his thoughts. It came from a firm of solicitors, and +was couched in a style with which he was not altogether unfamiliar.</p> +<div style="font-size:90%; margin-top:12pt; margin-bottom:12pt;"> + +<p class="normal">Sir,--Messrs. Deacon & Sons (Livery Stables, Montgomery Street) having +placed their books in our hands for the collection of their +outstanding debts, we must ask you to send us a cheque in settlement +of your account by return of post, and thus save further proceedings.</p> + +<p style="text-indent:50%">We are, yours, &c.,</p> + +<p style="text-indent:55%"><span class="sc">Humphreys & Neill</span>.</p> +</div> + +<p class="normal">Callon allowed the letter to slip from his fingers, and lay for a +while very still, feeling rather helpless, rather afraid. It was not +merely the amount of the bill which troubled him, although that was +inconveniently large. But there were other reasons. His eyes wandered +to a drawer in his dressing-table. He got out of bed and unlocked it. +At the bottom of that drawer lay the other reasons, piled one upon the +other--letters couched in just the same words as that which he had +received this morning, and--still worse!---signed by this same firm of +Humphreys and Neill. Moreover, every one of those letters had reached +him within the last ten days. It seemed that all his tradesmen had +suddenly placed their books in the hands of Messrs. Humphreys and +Neill.</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon took the letters back to his bed. There were quite an +astonishing number of them. Callon himself was surprised to see how +deep he was in debt. They littered the bed--tailors' bills; bills for +expensive little presents of jewellery; bills run up at restaurants +for dinners and suppers; bills for the hire of horses and carriages; +bills of all kinds--and there were just Mr. Callon's election expenses +in Mr. Callon's exchequer that morning. Even if he parted with them, +they would not pay a third part of the sum claimed. Fear invaded him; +he saw no way out of his troubles. Given time, he could borrow enough, +no doubt, scrape enough money together one way or another to tide +himself over the difficulty. His hand searched for Millie Stretton's +letter and found it, and rejected it. He needed time there; he must +walk warily or he would spoil all. And looking at the letters he knew +that he had not the time.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was improbable, nay more than improbable, that all these bills were +in the hands of one firm by mere chance. No; somewhere he had an +enemy. A man--or it might be a woman--was striking at him out of the +dark, striking with knowledge too. For the blow fell where he could +least parry it. Mr. Mudge would have been quite satisfied could he +have seen Callon as he lay that morning with the summer sunlight +pouring into his bedroom. He looked more than his age, and his face +was haggard. He felt that a hand was at his throat, a hand which +gripped and gripped with an ever-increasing pressure.</p> + +<p class="normal">He tried to guess who his enemy might be. But there were so many who +might be glad to do him an ill-turn. Name after name occurred to him, +but amongst those names was not the name of Mr. Mudge. That shy and +inoffensive man was the last whom he would have suspected to be +meddling with his life.</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon sprang out of bed. He must go down to Lincoln's Inn Fields and +interview Messrs. Humphreys and Neill. Summonses would never do with a +general election so near. He dressed quickly, and soon after ten was +in the office of that firm. He was received by a bald and smiling +gentleman in spectacles.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Mr. Callon?" said the smiling gentleman, who announced himself as +Humphreys. "Oh yes. You have come in reference to the letters which +our clients have desired us to send you?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," replied Callon. "There are a good number of letters."</p> + +<p class="normal">The smiling gentleman laughed genially.</p> + +<p class="normal">"A man of fashion, Mr. Callon, has of course many expenses which we +humdrum business people are spared. Let me see. The total amount due +is----" And Mr. Humphreys made a calculation with his pen.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I came to ask for an extension of time," Callon blurted out; and the +smiling gentleman ceased to smile. He gazed through his spectacles +with a look of the utmost astonishment. "You see, Mr. Humphreys, all +these bills, each one accompanied with a peremptory demand for +payment, have been presented together, almost as it were by the same +post."</p> + +<p class="normal">"They are all, however, to account rendered," said Mr. Humphreys, as +he removed and breathed upon his spectacles.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It would, I frankly confess, seriously embarrass me to settle them +all at once."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Dear, dear!" said Mr. Humphreys, in a voice of regret. "I am very +sorry. These duties are very painful to me, Mr. Callon. But I have the +strictest instructions." And he rose from his chair to conclude the +interview.</p> + +<p class="normal">"One moment," said Callon. "I want to ask you how it is that all my +bills have come into your hands? Who is it who has brought them up?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Really, really, Mr. Callon," the lawyer protested. "I cannot listen +to such suggestions." And then the smile came back to his face. "Why +not pay them in full?" His eyes beamed through his spectacles. He had +an air of making a perfectly original and delightful suggestion. "Sit +down in this comfortable chair now, and write me out a little cheque +for--let me see----" And he went back to his table.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I must have some time," said Callon.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Humphreys was gradually persuaded that the concession of a little +time was reasonable.</p> + +<p class="normal">"A day, then," he said. "We will say a day, Mr. Callon. This is +Wednesday. Some time to-morrow we shall hear from you." And he bowed +Callon from his office. Then he wrote a little note and despatched it +by a messenger into the City. The message was received by Mr. Mudge, +who read it, took up his hat, and jumping into a hansom cab, drove +westward with all speed.</p> + +<p class="normal">Lionel Callon, on the contrary, walked back to his rooms. He had been +in tight places before, but never in one quite so tight. Before, it +was really the money which had been needed. Now, what was needed was +his ruin. To make matters worse, he had no idea of the particular +person who wished to ruin him. He walked gloomily back to his club and +lunched in solitude. A day remained to him, but what could he do in a +day, unless----? There was a certain letter in the breast-pocket of +Callon's coat to which, more than once as he lunched, his fingers +strayed. He took it out and read it again. It was too soon to borrow +in that quarter, but his back was against the wall. He saw no other +chance of escape. He drove to Millie Stretton's house in Berkeley +Square at the appointed time that afternoon.</p> + +<p class="normal">But Mr. Mudge had foreseen. When he jumped into his hansom cab he had +driven straight to the house in Audley Square, where Pamela Mardale +was staying with some friends.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Are you lunching anywhere?" he asked. "No? Then lunch with Lady +Stretton, please! And don't go away too soon! See as much as you can +of her during the next two days."</p> + +<p class="normal">As a consequence, when Lionel Callon was shown into the drawing-room, +he found Pamela Mardale in her most talkative mood, and Millie +Stretton sitting before the tea-table silent and helpless. Callon +stayed late; Pamela stayed later. Callon returned to his club, having +said not a single word upon the momentous subject of his debts.</p> + +<p class="normal">He ordered a stiff brandy and soda. Somehow he must manage to see +Millie Stretton alone. He thought, for a moment, of writing; he indeed +actually began to write. But the proposal looked too crude when +written down. Callon knew the tactics of his game. There must, in a +word, be an offer from Millie, not a request from him. He tore up +his letter, and while he was tearing it up, Mr. Mudge entered the +smoking-room. Mudge nodded carelessly to Callon, and then seemed to be +struck by an idea. He came across to the writing-table and said--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do I interrupt you? I wonder whether you could help me. You know so +many people that you might be able to lay your finger at once on the +kind of man I want."</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon looked up carelessly at Mudge.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No. You are not interrupting me. What kind of man do you want?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I want a man to superintend an important undertaking which I have in +hand."</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon swung round in his chair. All his carelessness had gone. He +looked at Mr. Mudge, who stood drumming with his fingers on the +writing-table.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh," said Callon. "Tell me about it."</p> + +<p class="normal">He walked over to a corner of the room which was unoccupied and sat +down. Mudge sat beside him and lighted a cigar.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I want a man to supervise, you understand. I don't want an expert. +For I have engineers and technical men enough on the spot. And I don't +want any one out of my office. I need some one, on whom I can rely, to +keep me in touch with what is going on--some one quite outside my +business and its associations."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I see," said Callon. "The appointment would be--for how long?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Two years."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And the salary would be good?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon leaned back on the lounge as he put the question and he put it +without any show of eagerness. Two years would be all the time he +needed wherein to set himself straight; and it seemed the work would +not be arduous.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I think so," replied Mudge. "You shall judge for yourself. It would +be two thousand a year."</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon did not answer for a little while, simply because he could not +trust himself to speak. His heart was beating fast. Two thousand a +year for two years, plus the sum for his election expenses! He would +be able to laugh at that unknown enemy who was striking at him from +the dark.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Should I do?" he asked at length, and even then his voice shook. Mr. +Mudge appeared, however, not to notice his agitation. He was looking +down at the carpet, and tracing the pattern with the ferrule of his +walking-stick.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Of course," he said, with a smile, as though Callon had been merely +uttering a joke. He did not even lift his eyes to Callon's face. "Of +course. I only wish you were serious."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But I am," cried Callon.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Mudge looked at his companion now, and with surprise.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Are you? But you wouldn't have the time to spare. You are standing +for a constituency."</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon shrugged his shoulders.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, I am not so very keen about Parliament. And there are reasons why +I would welcome the work."</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Mudge answered with alacrity.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then we will consider it settled. Dine with me tonight at my house, +and we will talk the details over."</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon accepted the invitation, and Mudge rose from his seat. Callon, +however, detained him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"There's one difficulty in the way," and Mr. Mudge's face became +clouded with anxiety. "The truth is, I am rather embarrassed at the +present moment. I owe a good deal of money, and I am threatened with +proceedings unless it is immediately paid."</p> + +<p class="normal">Mudge's face cleared at once.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, is that all?" he exclaimed cheerily. "How much do you owe?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"More than my first year's salary."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, I will advance you half at once. Offer them a thousand on +account, and they will stay proceedings."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I don't know that they will," replied Callon.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You can try them, at all events. If they won't accept half, send them +to me, and we will make some other arrangement. But they are sure to. +They are pressing for immediate payment because they are afraid they +will get nothing at all by any other way. But offer them a thousand +down, and see the pleasant faces with which they will greet you." Mr. +Mudge was quite gay now that he understood how small was the obstacle +which hindered him from gaining Lionel Callon's invaluable help. "I +will write you a cheque," he said; and sitting down at a writing-table +he filled out a cheque and brought it back. He stood in front of +Callon with the cheque in his hand. He did not give it to Callon at +once. He had not blotted it, and he held it by a corner and gently +waved it to and fro, so that the ink might dry. It followed that those +tantalising "noughts," three of them, one behind the other, and +preceded by a one, like a file of soldiers with a sergeant at the +head, and that excellent signature "John Mudge" were constantly before +Callon's eyes, now approaching him like some shy maiden in a flutter +of agitation, now coyly receding. But to no shy maiden had Lionel +Callon ever said "I love you," with so glowing an ardour as he felt +for that most tantalising cheque.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I ought to have told yon," said Mr. Mudge, "that the undertaking is a +railway abroad."</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon had been so blinded by the dazzle of the cheque that he had not +dreamed of that possibility. Two years abroad, even at two thousand a +year, did not at all fit in with his scheme of life.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Abroad?" he repeated doubtfully. "Where?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Chili," said Mr. Mudge; and he looked at the cheque to see that the +ink was quite dry. Perhaps Mr. Mudge's voice was a trifle too +unconcerned. Perhaps there was something a little too suggestive in +his examination of his cheque. Perhaps he kept his eyes too +deliberately from Callon's face. At all events, Callon became suddenly +suspicious. There flashed into his mind by some trick of memory a +picture--a picture of Mr. Mudge and Pamela Mardale talking earnestly +together upon a couch in a drawing-room, and of himself sitting at a +card-table, fixed there till the game was over, though he knew well +that the earnest conversation was aimed against himself. He started, +he looked at Mudge in perplexity.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well?" said Mudge.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Wait a moment!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela Mardale was Millie Stretton's friend. There was that incident +in the hall--Millie Stretton coming down the stairs and Pamela in +front of the mirror over the mantelpiece. Finally there was Pamela's +persistent presence at Millie Stretton's house this afternoon. One by +one the incidents gathered in his recollections and fitted themselves +together and explained each other. Was this offer a pretext to get him +out of the way? Callon, after all, was not a fool, and he asked +himself why in the world Mr. Mudge should, just at this moment when he +was in desperate straits, offer him 2000<i>l</i>. a year to superintend a +railway in Chili?</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well?" said Mudge again.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I must have time to think over the proposition," replied Callon. He +meant that he must have time to obtain an interview with Millie +Stretton. But Mudge was ready for him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Certainly," said he. "That is only reasonable. It is seven o'clock +now. You dine with me at eight. Give me your answer then."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I should like till to-morrow morning," said Callon.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Mudge shook his head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"That, I am afraid, is impossible. We shall need all tomorrow to make +the necessary arrangements and to talk over your duties. For if you +undertake the work you must leave England on the day after."</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon started up in protest. "On the day after!" he exclaimed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It gives very little time, I know," said Mudge. Then he looked Callon +quietly and deliberately in the eyes. "But, you see, I want to get you +out of the country at once."</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon no longer doubted. He had thought, through Mr. Mudge's help, to +laugh at his enemy; and lo! the enemy was Mudge himself. It was Mudge +who had bought up his debts, who now held him in so secure a grip that +he did not think it worth while to practise any concealment. Callon +was humiliated to the verge of endurance. Two years in Chili, +pretending to supervise a railway! He understood the position which he +would occupy; he was within an ace of flinging the offer back. But he +dared not.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Very well," he said. "I will give you my answer at eight."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Thanks. Be punctual." Mr. Mudge sauntered away. There could only be +the one answer. Mr. Lionel Callon might twist and turn as he pleased, +he would spend two years in Chili. It was five minutes past seven, +besides. Callon could hardly call at the house in Berkeley Square with +any chance of seeing Lady Stretton between now and eight. Mudge was +contented with his afternoon.</p> + +<p class="normal">At eight o'clock Callon gave in his submission and pocketed the +cheque. At eleven he proposed to go, but Mudge, mindful of an evening +visit which he had witnessed from a balcony, could not part from his +new manager so soon. There was so little time for discussion even with +every minute of Callon's stay in England. He kept Callon with him +until two o'clock in the morning; he made an appointment with him at +ten, and there was a note of warning in his voice which bade Callon +punctually keep it. By one shift and another he kept him busy all the +next day, and in the evening Callon had to pack, to write his letters, +and to make his arrangements for his departure. Moreover, Pamela +Mardale dined quietly with Millie Stretton and stayed late. It thus +happened that Callon left England without seeing Millie Stretton +again. He could write, of course; but he could do no more.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XVIII</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_18" href="#div1Ref_18">SOUTH OF OUARGLA</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">"Halt!" cried Captain Tavernay.</p> + +<p class="normal">The bugler at his side raised his bugle to his lips and blew. The +dozen chasseurs d'Afrique and the ten native scouts who formed the +advance guard stopped upon the signal. A couple of hundred yards +behind them the two companies of the Foreign Legion came to a +standstill. The convoy of baggage mules upon the right flank, the +hospital equipment, the artillery section, the herd of oxen which was +driven along in the rear, in a word, the whole expedition, halted in a +wood of dwarf-oaks and junipers at three o'clock in the afternoon.</p> + +<p class="normal">The order was given to gather wood for the night's camp fires, and the +companies were dismissed. Each soldier made his little bundle and +fixed it upon his shoulders. Again the bugle rang out, sounding the +"Fall in." And the tiny force marched out from the trees of the high +plateaux into the open desert. It was extraordinary with what +abruptness that transition was made. One minute the companies were +treading upon turf under rustling leaves, the next they were +descending a slope carpeted with halfa-grass, which stretched away to +the horizon's rim, with hardly a bush to break its bare monotony. At +the limit of vision, a great arc like a mirror of silver glittered out +of the plain.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Water," said a tall, bearded soldier, who marched in the front rank +of the first company. It was he who had stepped from the train at +Bel-Abbès with a light dust-coat over his evening dress suit. He +passed now as Fusilier Barbier, an ex-engineer of Lyons.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," replied Sergeant Ohlsen, who marched at his side: "the crystals +of a dry salt lake."</p> + +<p class="normal">In the autumn of last year Ohlsen--or, rather, to give him his right +name, Tony Stretton--had marched upon an expedition from Mesheria to +the Chott Tigri, and knew, therefore, the look of those tantalising +salt lakes. That expedition, which had conducted a surrey for a road +to the Figuig oasis, had brought him his promotion.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But we camp by the lake to-night," he added. "The wells of +El-Guethifa are close."</p> + +<p class="normal">The companies went forward, and above that salt lake they saw the +mirages begin to shimmer, citadels and hanging gardens, tall towers +and waving woods and majestic galleons, topsail over topsail, floating +upon summer seas. At the wells the sheikh of the district was waiting +upon a mule.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I want fifty camels with their saddles and their drivers at five +o'clock to-morrow morning," said Tavernay; and although as far as the +eye could reach there was no moving thing upon that vast plain except +the small group of Arabs and soldiers about the well, by five o'clock +the camels were squatting upon the sand with their drivers beside +them. The mules were sent back from El-Guethifa that morning, the +baggage was packed upon the camels, and the little force, insufficient +in numbers and supplies, went forward on its long and untoward march.</p> + +<p class="normal">It passed through the oases of El-Maia and Methlili to Ouargla, at +that time the last outpost of French authority. At Ouargla it rested +for a week; and there, renewing its supplies, penetrated southwards to +survey the desert country of the Touaregs for the construction of the +oft-mooted trans-Saharan railway. South of Ouargla all the +difficulties of the advance were doubled. The companies went down +through the archipelago of oases in the dangerous Touat country +amongst a sullen people, who had little food to supply, and would +hardly supply it. Tavernay led his men with care, neither practising a +discipline needlessly strict, nor relaxing into carelessness. But he +was under-officered, and his officers even so were inexperienced. +Lieutenant Laurent, a man irritable and unjust, was his second in +command, and there were but two <i>sous-lieutenants</i> besides. In spite +of all Tavernay's care the convoy diminished. One day a camel would +stumble on the slippery bottom of a salt marsh, fall, and break its +limbs; the next another would fail, and die through a long-untended +wound, caused by the rough saddle upon its back. In the ranks of the +soldiers, too, there was trouble, and Laurent was not the man to deal +with it. There was hardly a company of the Legion, recruited, as it so +largely was, from the outcasts and the men of sorrows, in which there +were not some of disordered minds, some whom absinthe had brought to +the edge of insanity. Upon these the severity of the expedition bore +heavily. Tents had been perforce discarded. The men slept under the +stars. They woke from freezing nights to the bitter winds of dawn, and +two hours after dawn they were parched by a burning sun, and all the +day they suffered under its pitiless and blinding glare. Storms +whelmed them in lofty spirals of whirling, choking sand. For a week +they would toil over high red mountainous ground of loose stones; then +would follow the monotony of bare round plains, piled here and there +with black rocks, quivering and glittering in the heat; the sun rose +day after day upon their left hand in scarlet, and set in scarlet upon +their right, and they themselves were still the tiny centre of the +same empty inhospitable space; so that only the difference of the +ground they trod, the feel of soft sand beneath their feet, where a +minute before they had marched on gravel, told them that they +progressed at all. The worst of the men became prone to disobedience, +eager for change; and every now and then a soldier would rise upon his +elbow in the night time, gaze furtively about over his sleeping +comrades, watch the sentries until their backs were turned, and then +crawl past them into the darkness. Of these men none ever returned. Or +some mania would seize upon them and fix a strange idea in their +brains, such as that which besieged Barbier, the fusilier, who had +once stepped out of the railway carriage in his evening dress. He +leaned over towards Stretton one evening, and said in a hoarse, +trembling voice--</p> + +<p class="normal">"I can stand it no longer."</p> + +<p class="normal">Both men were sitting by a tiny fire, which Barbier was feeding with +handfuls of halfa-grass and sticks. He was kneeling up in front of it, +and by the red waving light Stretton saw that his face was quivering +with excitement.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What can't you stand?" he asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is Captain Tavernay," replied Barbier. He suddenly laughed in a +pitiful fashion, and cast a glance over his shoulder. "There is a man +put on to watch me. Night and day I am watched by Captain Tavernay's +orders. He wants to fix a crime on me! I know. He wants to trap me. +But let him take care!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton fetched the doctor, who listened for a while to Barbier's +rambling, minatory talk, and then shrugged his shoulders.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Hallucinations," said he. "Ideas of persecution. The commonest form," +and having fixed Barbier into his proper category, he walked away. +There was nothing to be done for Barbier upon this expedition. He had +to be watched; that was all. Thus for seven hundred miles the force +pushed southwards from Ouargla, and thus from within it disintegrated +as it went. Tavernay could not but notice the change, but he said +nothing to any subordinate. The men would fight well if fighting +happened. That he knew, and meanwhile he marched on.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was just when the seven hundred miles had been completed that +Tavernay realised fighting was likely to happen. He went the round of +the camp as the sun was setting, when the rifles were piled and the +fires crackling. Stretton was at his side, and saw his commander stop +and shade his eyes. Tavernay was looking westwards. Far away against +the glowing ball of the sun, which was just dipping down behind the +plain, the figure of an Arab mounted upon a camel stood motionless and +black. Tavernay swung round and looked behind him. On the crest of a +sandhill to the north a second rider stood distinct against the sky.</p> + +<p class="normal">Tavernay watched the men for a long time through his glasses.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Touaregs," said he, gravely. "Masked Touaregs," and that night the +sentinels were doubled; and in the morning the bugle did not sound the +<i>réveillé</i>.</p> + +<p class="normal">Moreover, when the force advanced, it advanced in the formation of a +square, with the baggage camels in the centre, one gun in the front +line, and the other in the rear. They had marched into the country +where the Senoussa sect prevailed. The monasteries of that body sent +out their missionaries eastward to Khordofan, westwards to Tafilet, +preaching the purification of the Mohammedan religion and the +enlargement of Mohammedan countries now subject to the infidels. But +nowhere had the missionaries raised their standard with more success +than in this Touat country of the Sahara. The companies marched that +day alert and cheerful. They were consolidated by the knowledge of +danger. Captain Tavernay led them with pride.</p> + +<p class="normal">"An insufficient force, ill-found, inadequately officered," he +thought. "But the men are of the Legion." They were <i>mes enfants</i> to +him all that day.</p> + +<p class="normal">But the attack was not yet to be delivered. During the night the two +scouts had ridden on their swift Meharis northwestwards, to the town +of Insalah. They knocked upon the gates of the great mud fortress of +Abd-el-Kader, the sheikh, and were instantly admitted to the dark room +where he sat upon a pile of rugs. When the eyes of the scouts became +accustomed to the gloom, they saw there was yet another in the room, a +tall man robed in black, with a black mask of cotton wound about his +face so that only his eyes were visible. This was the chieftain of the +Hoggar Touaregs.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well?" said Abd-el-Kader. And the scouts told him roughly the number +of the force and the direction of the journey.</p> + +<p class="normal">Then Abd-el-Kader turned to the Touareg chieftain.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We will let them go further south, since southwards they are +marching," he said, in his suave gentle voice. "A hundred miles more, +and they will be amongst the sand dunes. Since they have cannon, the +attack must be sudden. Let it be at the wells of Bir-el-Gharamo."</p> + +<p class="normal">The Touareg chieftain rode out that day towards his hills; and, +unmolested, Captain Tavernay's expedition went down to the dunes. +Great waves of yellow sand, sometimes three hundred feet from crest to +base, intersected the face of the desert; the winds had given to their +summits the overhang of a breaking sea; they ran this way and that, as +though the currents of an ocean had directed their course; they had +the very look of motion; so that Stretton could not but remember the +roaring combers of the cold North Sea as he gazed upon these silent +and arrested copies. They made of that country a maze of intricate +valleys. Led by a local guide commandeered from the last oasis, the +companies of the Legion marched into the maze, and on the second day +saw, as they came over a hill, just below them in a narrow hollow, a +mud parapet built about the mouth of a well. This was Bir-el-Gharamo, +and here they camped. Sentries were posted on the neighbouring crests; +suddenly the darkness came, and overhead the stars rushed down towards +the earth. There was no moon that night, nor was there any sound of +danger heard. Three times Tavernay went the round of the sentries, at +eight and at ten and at twelve. But at three o'clock, just as the dawn +was breaking, a shot was heard. Tavernay sprang up from the ground, +the alarm rang out clear from the bugle over the infinite waste, the +companies of the Legion seized their piled rifles and fell into battle +order with an incredible neatness and expedition. There was no +confusion, no noise. The square was formed about the well--the camels +were knee-haltered in the middle, the guns placed at the corners. But +it was still dark. A few shots were fired on the dunes, and the +sentries came running back.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Steady," cried Captain Tavernay. "They are coming. Fire low!"</p> + +<p class="normal">The first volley rang out, and immediately afterwards on every side of +that doomed square the impact of the Touaregs' charge fell like the +blow of some monstrous hammer. All night they had been gathering +noiselessly in the surrounding valleys. Now they had charged with +lance and sword from the surrounding crests. Three sides of the square +held their ground. The fourth wavered, crumpled in like a piece of +broken cardboard, and the Arabs were within the square, stabbing at +the backs of the soldiers, loosing and stampeding the camels. And at +once, where deep silence had reigned a minute ago, the air was torn +with shrill cries and oaths and the clamour of weapons. The square was +broken; but here a group of men stood back to back, and with cartridge +and bayonet held its ground; there another formed; and about each gun +the men fought desperately. Meanwhile the morning came, a grey, clear +light spread over the desert. Tavernay himself was with one of the +machine-guns. It was dragged clear of the <i>mêlée</i> and up a slope of +sand. The soldiers parted in front of it, and its charge began to +sweep the Touaregs down like swathes, and to pit the sand hills like a +fall of rain. About the other gun the fight still raged.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Come, my children," said Tavernay, "fight well; the Touaregs give no +quarter."</p> + +<p class="normal">Followed by Stretton, he led the charge. The Touaregs gave way before +their furious onslaught. The soldiers reached the gun, faced about, +and firing steadily kept off the enemy while the gun was run back. As +soon as that was saved the battle was over. All over the hollow, +wherever the Touaregs were massed, the two guns rattled out their +canister. No Arab could approach them. The sun rose over the earth, +and while it was rising the Touaregs broke and fled. When it shone out +in its full round, there was no one left of them in that hollow except +the wounded and the dead. But the victory had been dearly bought. All +about the well, lying pell-mell among the Arabs and the dead camels, +were the French Legionaries, some quite still, and others writhing in +pain and crying for water. Stretton drew his hand across his forehead. +He was stunned and dazed. It seemed to him that years had passed, that +he had grown very old. Yet there was the sun new-risen. There was a +dull pain in his head. He raised his hand and drew it away wet with +blood. How or when he had received the blow he was quite unaware. He +stood staring stupidly about him. So very little while ago men were +lying here sleeping in their cloaks, quite strong, living people; now +they were lying dead or in pain; it was all incomprehensible.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Why?" he asked aloud of no one. "Now, why?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Gradually, however, custom resumed its power. There was a man hanging +limp over the parapet of the well. He looked as though he had knelt +down and stooped over to drink, and in that attitude had fallen +asleep. But he might so easily be pushed into the well, and custom +had made the preservation of wells from impurity an instinct. He +removed the body and went in search of Tavernay. Tavernay was sitting +propped up against a camel's saddle; the doctor was by his side, a +blood-stained bandage was about his thigh. He spoke in a weak voice.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Lieutenant Laurent?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton went in search. He came across an old grey-headed soldier +rolling methodically a cigarette.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He is dead--over there," said the soldier. "Have you a light?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Laurent had died game. He was lying clasped in the arms of a gigantic +Touareg, and while thus held he had been stabbed by another through +the back. To that end the contemptuous smile of a lady far away in +Paris had brought him. He lay with his face to the sky, his wounded +vanity now quite healed. He had earned Tavernay's praise, at all +events, that day. For he had fought well. Of the <i>sous-lieutenants</i> +one was killed, the other dangerously wounded. A sergeant-major lay +with a broken shoulder beside one of the guns. Stretton went back to +Tavernay.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You must take command, then," said Tavernay. "I think you have learnt +something about it on your fishing-boats." And in spite of his pain he +smiled.</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton mustered the men and called over the names. Almost the first +name which he called was the name of "Barbier," and Barbier, with a +blood-stained rag about his head, answered. Of the two hundred and +thirty men who had made up the two companies of the Legion, only +forty-seven could stand in the ranks and answer to their names. For +those forty-seven there was herculean work to do. Officers were +appointed, the dead bodies were roughly buried, the camels collected, +litters improvised for the wounded, the goat-skins filled with water. +Late in the afternoon Stretton came again to Tavernay.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We are ready, sir." Tavernay nodded and asked for a sheet of paper, +an envelope, and ink. They were fetched from his portfolio and very +slowly and laboriously he wrote a letter and handed it to Stretton.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Seal it," he said, "now, in front of me."</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton obeyed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Keep that letter. If you get back to Ouargla without me, give it to +the Commandant there."</p> + +<p class="normal">Tavernay was lifted in a litter on to the back of a camel, and the +remnant of the geographical expedition began its terrible homeward +march. Eight hundred miles lay between Bir-el-Ghiramo and the safety +of Ouargla. The Touaregs hung upon the rear of the force, but they did +not attack again. They preferred another way. One evening a solitary +Arab drove a laden camel into the bivouac. He was conducted to +Stretton, and said, "The Touaregs ask pardon and pray for peace. They +will molest you no more. Indeed, they will help you, and as an earnest +of their true desire for your welfare they send you a camel-load of +dates."</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton accepted the present, and carried the message to Tavernay, +who cried at once, "Let no one eat those dates." But two soldiers had +already eaten of them, and died of poison before the morning. Short of +food, short of sentinels, the broken force crept back across the +stretches of soft sand, the greyish-green plains of halfa-grass, the +ridges of red hill. One by one the injured succumbed; their wounds +gangrened, they were tortured by the burning sun and the motion of the +camels. A halt would be made, a camel made to kneel, and a rough grave +dug.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Pelissier," cried Stretton, and a soldier stepped out from the ranks +who had once conducted mass in the church of the Madeleine in Paris. +Pelissier would recite such prayers as he remembered, and the force +would move on again, leaving one more soldier's grave behind it in the +desert to protest unnoticed against the economy of governments. Then +came a morning when Stretton was summoned to Captain Tavernay's side.</p> + +<p class="normal">For two days Tavernay had tossed in a delirium. He now lay beneath a +rough shelter of cloaks, in his right senses, but so weak that he +could not lift a hand, and with a face so pinched and drawn that his +years seemed to have been doubled. His eyes shone out from big black +circles. Stretton knelt down beside him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have the letter?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do not forget."</p> + +<p class="normal">He lay for a while in a sort of contentment, then he said--"Do not +think this expedition has been waste. A small force first and disaster +... the big force afterwards to retrieve the disaster, and with it +victory, and government and peace, and a new country won for France. +That is the law of the Legion.... <i>My</i> Legion." He smiled, and +Stretton muttered a few insincere words.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You will recover, my captain. You will lead your companies again."</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," said Tavernay, in a whisper. "I do not want to. I am very happy. +Yes, I say that, who joined the Legion twenty years ago. And the +Legion, my friend, is the nation of the unhappy. For twenty years I +have been a citizen of that nation.... I pity women who have no such +nation to welcome them and find them work.... For us there is no need +of pity."</p> + +<p class="normal">And in a few moments he fell asleep, and, two hours later, sleeping, +died. A pile of stones was built above his grave, and the force +marched on. Gaunt, starved, and ragged, the men marched northwards, +leaving the Touat country upon their left hand. It struck the caravan +route from Tidikelt to Ouargla; it stumbled at last through the gates +of the town. Silently it marched through the streets to the French +fortress. On no survivor's face was there any sign of joy that at last +their hardships were over, their safety assured. All were too tired, +too dispirited. The very people who crowded to see them pass seemed +part of an uninteresting show. Stretton went at once to the Commandant +and told the story of their disaster. Then he handed him the letter of +Captain Tavernay. The Commandant broke the seal and read it through. +He looked up at Stretton, a thin spent figure of a man overwrought +with sleeplessness and anxiety.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Tell me how and when this was written," said the Commandant.</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton obeyed, and after he had heard, the Commandant sat with his +hand shading his eyes. When he spoke, his voice showed that he was +deeply moved.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You know what the letter contains, Sergeant Ohlsen?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, my Commandant."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Read, then, for yourself;" and he passed the letter across his office +table. Stretton took it and read. There were a few lines written--only +a few; but those few lines recommended Sergeant Ohlsen for promotion +to the rank of officer. The Commandant held out his hand.</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is like our Tavernay," he said. "He thought always of his +soldiers. He wrote it at once, you see, after the battle was over, +lest he should die and justice not be done. Have no fear, my friend. +It is you who have brought back to Ouargla the survivors of the +Legion. But you must give your real name. There is a scrutiny before a +soldier is promoted to the rank of office. Sergeant Ohlsen. That is +all very well. But Lieutenant----. Come, Lieutenant who?"</p> + +<p class="normal">He took up his pen.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Lieutenant Sir Anthony Stretton," replied Tony; and the Commandant +wrote down the name.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XIX</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_19" href="#div1Ref_19">THE TURNPIKE GATE</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">It was not, however, only Millie Stretton whose fortunes were touched +by Tony's absence. Warrisden, whom Stretton had met but the once on +board the <i>City of Bristol</i>, was no less affected. On a day of that +summer, during which Tony camped far away on the edge of the Sahara, +Warrisden rode down the steep hill from the village of the three +poplars on his way to Whitewebs. Once Pamela had ridden along this +road between the white wood rails and the black bare stems of trees on +a winter's evening of mist. That was more than fifteen months ago. The +brown furrows in the fields were now acres of waving yellow; each +black clump was now an ambuscade of green, noisy with birds. The +branches creaked in a light wind and rippled and shook the sunlight +from their leaves, the road glistened like chalk. It was ten o'clock +on an August morning, very clear and light. Voices from far away +amongst the corn sounded tiny and distinct, like voices heard through +a telephone. Round this bend at the thicket corner Pamela had +disappeared on that dim, grey evening. How far had she since travelled +on the new road, Warrisden wondered. She was at Whitewebs now. He was +riding thither to find out.</p> + +<p class="normal">When he inquired for her at the door, he was at once led through the +house into the big garden at the back. Pamela was sitting in a chair +at the edge of the lawn under the shade of the great avenue of elms +which ran straight from the back of the house to the shallow stream at +the garden's boundary. She saw him at once as he came out from the +glass-door on to the gravel, and she rose from her chair. She did not +advance to him, but just stood where she was, watching him approach; +and in her eyes there was a great perplexity. Warrisden came straight +to her over the lawn. There was no hesitation in his manner, at all +events. On the other hand, there was no air of assurance. He came with +a definite object; so much was evident, but no more. He stopped in +front of her and raised his hat. Pamela looked at him and said +nothing. She did not even give him her hand. She stood and waited +almost submissively, with her troubled eyes resting quietly on his.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You expected me?" he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes. I received your letter this morning."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have guessed why I have come?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And you are troubled," said Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">They turned and walked under the branches into the avenue. Overhead +there was a bustle of blackbirds and thrushes; a gardener sharpening +his scythe in the rose garden made a little rasping sound. Over all +the lawn the August sunlight lay warm and golden like a benediction.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have come to ask you the old question," said Warrisden. "Will you +marry me?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela gazed steadily ahead as she walked, and she walked very slowly. +She was prepared for the question, yet she took her time to answer it. +And the answer when at last she gave it was no answer at all.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do not know," she said, in a low clear voice.</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden looked at her. The profile of her face was towards him. He +wondered for the thousandth time at its beauty and its gentleness. The +broad, white forehead under the sweep of her dark hair, the big, dark +eyes shining beneath her brows, the delicate colour upon her cheeks, +the curve of the lips. He wondered and longed. But he spoke simply and +without extravagance, knowing that he would be understood.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have done nothing for you of the things men often do when a woman +comes into their lives. I have tried to make no career. I think there +are enough people making careers. They make the world very noisy, and +they raise a deal of dust. I have just gone on living quietly as I did +before, believing you would need no such proof."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do not," said Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"There might be much happiness for both of us," he continued. And +again she answered, without looking at him--</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do not know."</p> + +<p class="normal">She was not evading him. Evasions, indeed, were never to her liking; +and here, she was aware, were very serious issues.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have been thinking about you a great deal," she said. "I will tell +you this. There is no one else. But that is not all. I can say too, I +think, quite certainly, that there will be no one else. Only that is +not enough, is it? Not enough, at all events, for you and me."</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden nodded his head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, that is not enough," he said gravely.</p> + +<p class="normal">They walked on side by side in silence for a little while.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is only fair that I should be very frank with you," she went on. +"I have been thinking so much about you in order that when you came +again with this old question, as I knew you would, I might be quite +clear and frank. Do you remember that you once spoke to me about the +turnpike gate--the gate which I was to open and through which I was to +go, like other men and women down the appointed road?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, I remember."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You meant, as I understand it, the gate between friendship and the +ever so much more which lies beyond?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes."</p> + +<p class="normal">And Pamela repeated his word. "Yes," she said. "But one cannot open +that gate at will. It opens of itself at a touch, or it stays shut."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And it stays shut now?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela answered him at once--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Say, rather, that I have raised a hand towards the gate, but that I +am afraid to try." And she turned her face to him at last. Her eyes +were very wistful.</p> + +<p class="normal">They stopped upon the grass bank of the stream at the end of the +avenue. Pamela looked down into the dark, swiftly running water, and +went on choosing each word, testing it, as it were, before she uttered +it.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You see that new road beyond the gate is no new road to me. I have +trodden it before, and crept back--broken. Therefore, I am afraid." +She paused. Warrisden was aware from her attitude that she had not +finished. He did not stir lest he should check what more remained to +say, and that remnant never be spoken at all. And it was well for him +that he did not stir; for she said, in the same clear, low voice which +she had hitherto used, and just as steadily--</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am the more afraid because I think that if I did touch that gate it +might open of itself."</p> + +<p class="normal">She had begun, in a word, to feel premonitions of that suspense and of +that glowing life in which for a few brief months she had once been +steeped. Did she expect a letter from Warrisden, there was an +eagerness in her anticipation with which she was well familiar. Was +the letter delayed, there was a keenness in her disappointment which +was like the pang of an old wound. And this recognition that the good +days might come again, as in a cycle, brought to her very vividly the +memory of the bad black days which had followed. Fear of those latter +days, and the contrast of their number with the number of those which +had gone before, drove her back. For those latter days in their turn +might come round again.</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden looked at her and his heart filled with pity for the great +trouble which had overwhelmed her. She stood by his side with the +sunlight playing upon her face and her hair--a girl brilliant with +life, ripe to turn its possibilities into facts; and she shrank from +the ordeal, so hardly had she been hit! She was by nature fearless, +yet was she desperately afraid.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Will nothing make you touch the gate and try?" he asked gently. And +then, quietly as he spoke, the greatness of his longing made itself +heard. "My dear, my dear," he said, "will nothing make you take your +risks?"</p> + +<p class="normal">The words struck sharply upon her memories. She turned her eyes to +him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is strange that you should use those words," she said. "For there +is one thing which might make me take my risks. The return of the man +who used them to you in the North Sea."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Tony Stretton?" exclaimed Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes. He is still away. It is said that he is on a long shooting +expedition somewhere in Central Africa, and out of reach. But that is +not the truth. We do not know where he is, or when he will come +back."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Shall I try to find him again?" said Warrisden. "This time I might +succeed in bringing him home."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela shook her head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," she answered. "I think I know why he stays away. And there would +be only one way of persuading him to return. Well--that means I must +not use, unless things have come to an extremity."</p> + +<p class="normal">The one means of persuasion was the truth. If she sent for Tony +Stretton again she must explain what that saying of hers spoken so +long ago had meant. She must write why he should not have left his +wife. She must relate the sordid story, which rendered his return +imperative, That she was prepared to do, if all else failed, in the +last resort, but not till then.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But the extremity has not been reached," she continued, "and I hope +it never will. I hope Tony Stretton will come back soon of his own +accord. That would be the best thing which could happen, ever so much +the best." She did not blame Tony for his absence, for she understood +the motive which caused it. In a way, she was inclined to approve of +it in itself, just as a motive, that is to say. It was the character +of Millie Stretton and his ignorance of it which made his experiment +so hazardous. Complete confidence in his wife's honour, indeed, was to +her thinking, and rightly, an essential part of his motive. She wished +him to return of his own accord and keep that confidence.</p> + +<p class="normal">"There is not the same necessity," she continued, choosing her words, +"that he should return immediately, as there was when I sent you out +to the North Sea; but it is possible that the necessity might recur." +For she knew that, though Callon was far away in Chili, letters came +from him to Millie. Only lately a careless remark of Millie's with +reference to that State had assured her of this. And if the letters +still came, though Callon had been away a year, it followed that they +were answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"In that case you would send for me?" said Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes. I should rely on you."</p> + +<p class="normal">And Warrisden answered quietly, "Thank you."</p> + +<p class="normal">He asked no questions. He seemed to understand that Pamela must use +him, and, while using him, not fail of loyalty to her sex. A feeling +of self-reproach suddenly troubled Pamela. She had never told him that +she had used another's help and not his. She wondered whether it was +quite fair not to tell him. But she kept silent. After all, she +thought, the news would only hurt him; and Mr. Mudge's help had been +help which he could not have given. She went back to the matter of +their relationship to one another.</p> + +<p class="normal">"So you understand what I think," she said. "I am afraid. I look for +signs. I cannot help doing that. I have set my heart on keeping a +promise which I made to Tony Stretton. If he returns, whether of his +own accord or by my persuasion, and things go well--why, then"--and +she turned her face from him and said, looking steadily in front of +her--"why, then, perhaps."</p> + +<p class="normal">As she spoke her face changed wonderfully. The mere utterance of the +word aloud conjured up dreams. A wistful smile made her lips +beautiful, her eyes grew dim. Just for a moment she gave those dreams +their way. She looked across the garden through a mist, seeing nothing +of the trees or the coloured flowers, but gazing into a vision of +other and golden days--of days perhaps to come. Warrisden stood at her +side, and did not speak. But something of those dreams he guessed, her +face had grown so young.</p> + +<p class="normal">She shook her dreams from her in a few moments.</p> + +<p class="normal">"So you see, at present," she resumed, "marriage is impossible. It +will always be impossible to me unless I can bring--everything, not +merely companionship, not merely liking; out the ever so much more +which there is. I cannot contemplate it at all under any other +conditions"--and now she looked at her companion--"and I believe it is +the same with you."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," Warrisden replied, "I ask for everything."</p> + +<p class="normal">He had his convictions, and since there was complete confidence +between these two, he spoke them now.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is unsafe, of course, to generalise on the subject of women. But I +do think this: If a man asks little from a woman, she will give him +even less than he asks, and she will give it grudgingly, sparingly; +counting what she gives. And that little, to my mind, is worth rather +less than nothing. Better have no ties than weak ones. If, on the +other hand, a man asks a great deal, and continually asks it, why, the +woman may get bored, and he may get nothing. In which case he is no +worse off than he was before. But if, on the other hand, the woman +does give in return----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well?" asked Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, then, she gives ever so much more than he asks, and gives it +willingly with open hands."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela thought the theory over.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, I think that is generally true," she said. "But, after all, I am +giving you very little."</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden laughed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"That's true," he replied. "But then you are not bored, and I have not +done asking."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela laughed too, and their talk thus ended in a lighter note. They +walked towards the house, and as they did so a woman came out on to +the lawn.</p> + +<p class="normal">"This is Millie Stretton," said Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"She is staying here?" cried Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," replied Pamela, "Before she comes I want to ask you to do +something for me. Oh, it is quite a small thing. But I should like you +very much to do it. Where do you go to from here?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"To London," said Warrisden, "I have business there."</p> + +<p class="normal">The business which called him to town had, indeed, only occurred to +him during the last half-hour. It had arisen from their conversation. +It seemed to Warrisden immediate and imperative.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Will you be in London to-morrow?" asked Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then I want you to write to me. Just a little letter--nothing much, a +line or two. And I want you to post it, not by the country post, but +afterwards, so that it will reach me in the evening. Don't write here, +for I am going home. And please don't forget."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie Stretton joined them a moment afterwards, and Warrisden was +introduced to her.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have had an offer for the house in Berkeley Square," she said to +Pamela. "I think I will take it. I shall be glad to be rid of it."</p> + +<p class="normal">They went back into the house. Warrisden wondered at Pamela's request +for a letter, and at her urgency that it should arrive at a particular +time. He was not discontented with the walk which they had taken under +the avenue of elms. It seemed to him that Pamela was coming slowly +towards him. There was a great difference between her "No" of last +year and her "I do not know" of to-day. Even that "I do not know" +while they talked had become "perhaps." Had she not owned even more, +since she was afraid the gate would open of itself did she but touch +and try? His hopes, therefore, rode high that day, and would have +ridden yet higher, could he have guessed why she so desired a few +lines in his handwriting in the evening of the day after to-morrow.</p> + +<p class="normal">The reason was this. Repairs, long needed, had at last been undertaken +in the house of Pamela's father, a few miles away; and those repairs +involved the rooms reserved for Pamela. There were certain drawers in +that room which had not been unlocked for years, and of which Pamela +sedulously guarded the keys. They held letters, a few small presents, +one or two photographs, and some insignificant trifles which could not +be valued, since their value depended only on their associations. +There were, for instance, some cheap red beads, and the history of +those beads tells all that need be said of the contents of those +locked drawers.</p> + +<p class="normal">Two hundred years before, a great full-rigged ship, bound with a +general cargo for the Guinea Coast, sailed down the Channel out of +Portsmouth. Amongst the cargo was a great store of these red beads. +The beads were to buy slaves for the plantations. But the great ship +got no further on her voyage than Bigbury Bay in Devonshire. She +damaged her rudder in a storm, and the storm swept her on to the bleak +rocks of Bolt Tail, dragged her back again into the welter of the sea, +drove her into Bigbury Bay, and flung her up there against the low red +cliffs, where all her crew perished. The cargo was spilt amongst the +breakers, and the shores of that bay were littered with red beads. You +may pick them up to this day amongst the pebbles. There Pamela had +picked them upon a hot August morning, very like to that which now +dreamed over this green, quiet garden of Leicestershire; and when she +had picked them up she had not been alone. The locked cabinets held +all the relics which remained to her from those few bright weeks in +Devon; and the mere touch of any one, however trifling, would have +magic to quicken her memories. Yet now the cabinets must be unlocked, +and all that was in them removed. There was a bad hour waiting for +Pamela, when she would remove these relics one by one--the faded +letters in the handwriting which she would never see again on any +envelope; the photograph of the face which could exchange no look with +her; the little presents from the hand which could touch hers no more. +It would be a relief, she thought, to come downstairs when that +necessary work was done, that bad hour over, and find a letter from +Warrisden upon the table. Just a few lines. She needed nothing more.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XX</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_20" href="#div1Ref_20">MR. CHASE DOES NOT ANSWER</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Both Pamela and Millie Stretton walked with Warrisden through the hall +to the front door. Upon the hall-table letters were lying. Pamela +glanced at them as she passed, and caught one up rather suddenly. Then +she looked at Warrisden, and there was something of appeal in her +look. It was as though she turned to a confederate on whom she could +surely rely. But she said nothing, since Millie Stretton was at her +side. For the letter was in the handwriting of Mr. Mudge, who wrote +but rarely, and never without a reason. She read the letter in the +garden as soon as Warrisden had ridden off, and the news which it +contained was bad news. Callon had lived frugally in South America--by +Christmas he would have discharged his debts; and he had announced to +Mudge that he intended at that date to resign his appointment. There +were still four months, Pamela reflected--nay, counting the journey +home, five months; and within that time Tony Stretton might reappear. +If he did not, why, she could summon Warrisden to her aid. She looked +at Millie, who was reading a book in a garden-chair close by. Did she +know, Pamela wondered? But Millie gave no sign.</p> + +<p class="normal">Meanwhile, Warrisden travelled to London upon that particular business +which made a visit there in August so imperative. It had come upon him +while he had been talking with Pamela that it would be as well for him +to know the whereabouts of Tony Stretton at once; so that if the need +came he should be ready to set out upon the instant. On the following +evening, accordingly, he drove down to Stepney. It was very likely +that Chase would be away upon a holiday. But there was a chance that +he might find him clinging to his work through this hot August, a +chance worth the trouble of his journey. He drove to the house where +Chase lodged, thinking to catch him before he set out for his +evening's work at the mission. The door of the house stood open to the +street. Warrisden dismissed his cab, and walked up the steps into the +narrow hall. A door upon his right hand was opened, and a young man +politely asked Warrisden to step in. He was a fair-haired youth, with +glasses upon his nose, and he carried a napkin in his hand. He had +evidently been interrupted at his dinner by Warrisden's arrival. He +was not dining alone, for a youth of the same standing, but of a more +athletic mould, sat at the table. There was a third place laid, but +not occupied.</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden looked at the third chair.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I came to see Mr. Chase," he said. "I suppose that he has gone early +to the mission?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," said the youth who had opened the door. "He has not been well of +late. The hot weather in these close streets is trying. But he +certainly should have something to eat by now, even if he does not +intend to get up."</p> + +<p class="normal">He spoke in a pedantic, self-satisfied voice, and introduced himself +as Mr. Raphael Princkley, and his companion as Mr. Jonas Stiles, both +undergraduates of Queen's College, Oxford.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We are helping Chase in his work," continued Mr. Princkley. "It is +little we can do, but you are no doubt acquainted with the poetry of +Robert Browning: 'The little more, and how much it is'? In that line +we find our justification."</p> + +<p class="normal">The fair-haired youth rang the bell for the housekeeper. She was an +old woman, fat and slow, and she took her time in answering the +summons.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Mrs. Wither, have you called Mr. Chase?" he asked when the old lady +appeared at the door.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, Mr. Princkley, sir," she replied. "You told me yesterday evening +not to disturb him on any account until he rang."</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Princkley turned to Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Mr. Chase was unwell all yesterday," he said, "and at dinner-time he +told us that he felt unequal to his duties. He was sitting in that +empty place, and we both advised him not to overtax his strength."</p> + +<p class="normal">He appealed with a look to Mr. Stiles for corroboration.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes; we both advised him," said Stiles, between two mouthfuls; "and, +very wisely, he took our advice."</p> + +<p class="normal">"He rose from his chair," continued Princkley. "There was some fruit +upon the table. He took an apple from the dish. I think, Stiles, that +it was an apple which he took?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Stiles agreed, and went on with his dinner.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It was certainly an apple which he took. He took it in his hand."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You hardly expected him to take it with his foot!" rejoined +Warrisden, politely. Warrisden was growing a little restive under this +detailed account of Chase's indisposition.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," replied Princkley, with gravity. "He took it in quite a natural +way, and went upstairs to his sitting-room. I gave orders to Mrs. +Wither that he must not be disturbed until he rang. That is so, Mrs. +Wither, is it not? Yes. I thank you."</p> + +<p class="normal">"That was yesterday evening!" cried Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yesterday evening," replied Mr. Princkley.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And no one has been near him since?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Then Mrs. Wither intervened.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh yes. I went into Mr. Chase's room an hour afterwards. He was +sitting in his armchair before the grate----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Holding the apple in his hand. I think. Mrs. Wither, you said?" +continued Stiles.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, sir," said Mrs. Wither. "He had his arm out resting on the arm +of the chair, and the apple was in his hand."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, well!" exclaimed Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I told him that I would not call him in the morning until he rang, as +he wanted a good rest."</p> + +<p class="normal">"What did he say?" asked Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Nothing, sir. As often as not he does not answer when he is spoken +to."</p> + +<p class="normal">A sudden fear seized upon Warrisden. He ran out of the room and up the +stairs to Chase's sitting-room. He knocked on the door; there was no +answer. He turned the handle and entered. Chase had not gone to bed +last night. He was still sitting in his armchair before the grate. One +arm was extended along the arm of the chair, with the palm turned +upwards, and in the palm lay an apple. Chase was sitting huddled up, +with his head fallen forward upon his breast like a man asleep. +Warrisden crossed the room and touched the hand which held the apple. +It was quite cold. The apple rolled on to the floor. Warrisden turned +to the housekeeper. She was standing in the doorway, and staring over +her shoulder were the two undergraduates.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He was dead," said Warrisden, "when you looked into the room an hour +afterwards!"</p> + +<p class="normal">The three people in the doorway stood stupidly aghast. Warrisden +pushed them out, locked the door on the outside, and removed the key.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Mr. Princkley, will you run for a doctor?" he asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">Princkley nodded his head, and went off upon his errand.</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden and Stiles descended the stairs into the dining-room.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I think you had better take the news to the mission," said Warrisden; +and Stiles in his turn went off without a word. Mrs. Wither for her +part had run out of the house as quickly as she could. She hardly knew +what she was doing. She had served as housekeeper to Mr. Chase ever +since he had come to Stepney, and she was dazed by the sudden +calamity. She was aware of a need to talk, to find the neighbours and +talk.</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden was thus left alone in the house. It had come about without +any premeditation upon his part. He was the oldest man of the three +who had been present, and the only one who had kept his wits clear. +Both Princkley and Stiles had looked to him to decide what must be +done. They regarded him as Chase's friend, whereas they were mere +acquaintances. It did not even occur to Warrisden at first that he was +alone in the house, that he held in his hand the key to Chase's room. +He was thinking of the strange perplexing life which had now so +strangely ended. He thought of his first meeting with Chase in the +mission, and of the distaste which he had felt; he remembered the +array of liqueur bottles on the table, and the half-hour during which +Chase had talked. A man of morbid pleasures, that had been Warrisden's +impression. Yet there were the years of work, here, amongst these +squalid streets. Even August had seen him clinging to--nay, dying +at--his work. As Warrisden looked out of the window he saw a group of +men and women and children gather outside the house. There was not a +face but wore a look of consternation. If they spoke, they spoke in +whispers, like people overawed. A very strange life! Warrisden knew +many--as who does not?--who saw the high-road distinctly, and could +not for the life of them but walk upon the low one. But to use both +deliberately, as it seemed Chase had done; to dip from the high-road +on to the low, and then painfully to scramble up again, and again +willingly to drop, as though the air of those stern heights were too +rigorous for continuous walking; to live the double life because he +could not entirely live the one, and would not entirely live the +other. Thus Warrisden solved the problem of the <i>dilettante</i> curate +and his devotion to his work, and his solution was correct.</p> + +<p class="normal">But he held the key of Chase's room in his hand; and there was no one +but himself in the house. His thoughts came back to Pamela and the +object of his journey up to town. He was sorely tempted to use the +key, since now the means by which he had hoped to discover in what +quarter of the world Stretton wandered and was hid were tragically +closed to him. Chase could no longer speak, even if he would. Very +likely there were letters upstairs lying on the table. There might be +one from Tony Stretton. Warrisden did not want to read it--a mere +glance at the postmark, and at the foreign stamp upon the envelope. +Was that so great a crime? Warrisden was sorely tempted. If only he +could be sure that Chase would a second time have revealed what he was +bidden to keep hid, why, then, would it not be just the same thing as +if Chase were actually speaking with his lips? Warrisden played with +the key. He went to the door and listened. There was not a sound in +the house except the ticking of a clock. The front door still stood +open. He must be quick if he meant to act. Warrisden turned to the +stairs. The thought of the dead man huddled in the chair, a silent +guardian of the secret, weighted his steps. Slowly he mounted. Such +serious issues hung upon his gaining this one piece of knowledge. The +fortunes of four people--Pamela and himself, Tony Stretton and his +wife--might all be straightened out if he only did this one thing, +which he had no right to do. He would not pry amongst Chase's papers; +he would merely glance at the table, that was all. He heard voices in +the hall while he was still upon the stairs. He turned back with a +feeling of relief.</p> + +<p class="normal">At the foot of the stairs stood Mr. Princkley and the doctor. +Warrisden handed the key of the room to the latter, and the three men +went up. The doctor opened the door and crossed to the armchair. Then +he looked about the room.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Nothing has been touched, of course?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Nothing," replied Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">The doctor looked again at the dead man. Then he turned to Warrisden, +mistaking him, as the others had done, for some relation or near +friend.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I can give no certificate," said he.</p> + +<p class="normal">"There must be an inquest?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes."</p> + +<p class="normal">Then the doctor moved suddenly to the table, which stood a few feet +from the armchair. There was a decanter upon it half filled with a +liquid like brown sherry, only a little darker. The doctor removed the +stopper and raised the decanter to his nose.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ah!" said he, in a voice of comprehension. He turned again to +Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Did you know?" he asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No."</p> + +<p class="normal">The doctor held the decanter towards Warrisden. Warrisden took it, +moistened the tip of a finger with the liquid, and tasted it. It had a +bitter flavour.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What is it?" he asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Laudanum," said the doctor. "An overdose of it."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Where is the glass, then, in which it was taken?"</p> + +<p class="normal">A tumbler stood upon the table close to the decanter-stopper. The +doctor took it up.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, I noticed that," said Warrisden; "I noticed that it is clean."</p> + +<p class="normal">The doctor took the glass to the window, turned it upside down, and +held it to the light. It was quite dry, quite clean.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Surely it's evident what happened," said Warrisden. "Chase came into +the room, opened that cupboard door in the corner there. His keys are +still dangling in the lock, he took the decanter and the tumbler out, +placed them on the table at his side, sat down in his chair with the +apple in his hand, leaned back and quietly died."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, no doubt," said the doctor. "But I think here will be found the +reason why he leaned back and quietly died," and he touched the +decanter. "Opium poisoning. It may not have been an overdose, but a +regular practice." He went to the door and called for Mrs. Wither. +Mrs. Wither had now returned to the house. When she came upstairs into +the room, he pointed to the decanter.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Did you ever see this before?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, sir," she answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Or that cupboard open?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, it was always locked."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Quite so," said the doctor. "You had better get some women to help +you here," he went on; and, with Warrisden's assistance, he lifted +Chase from the chair and carried him into his bedroom.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I must give notice to the police," he went on, and again he appealed +to Warrisden. "Do you mind staying in the house till I come back?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Not at all."</p> + +<p class="normal">The doctor locked the door of the room and took the key away with him. +Warrisden waited with Princkley in the dining-room. The doctor had +taken away the key. It seemed that his chance of discovering the +secret which was of so much importance to Pamela and Millie Stretton +and himself had vanished. If only he had come yesterday, or the day +before! He sat down by the window and gazed out upon the street. A +group of men and women were gathered in the roadway, looking up at the +windows and talking quietly together. Then Princkley from behind +said--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Some letters came for Chase this morning. They were not taken up to +his room. You had better look at them."</p> + +<p class="normal">Every one took him for a close friend. Princkley brought him the +letters, and he glanced at the superscriptions lest any one should +wear a look of immediate importance. He held the letters in his hand +and turned them over one by one, and half-way through the file he +stopped. He had come to a letter written upon thin paper, in a man's +handwriting, with a foreign stamp upon the envelope. The stamp was a +French one, and there was printed upon it: "Poste d'Algérie."</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden examined the post-mark. The letter came from Ain-Sefra. +Warrisden went on with his examination without a word. But his heart +quickened. He wondered whether he had found the clue. Ain-Sefra in +Algeria. Warrisden had never heard of the place before. It might be a +health resort, a wintering place. But this was the month of August. +There would be no visitors at this time to a health resort in Algeria. +He handed the letters back to Princkley.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I cannot tell whether they are important or not," he said. "I knew +Chase very slightly. His relations must be informed. I suppose Mrs. +Wither knows where they live."</p> + +<p class="normal">He took his departure as soon as the doctor had returned with the +police, and drove back to his rooms. A search through the Encyclopædia +told him nothing of Ain-Sefra; but, on the other hand, he could not +look at the article on Algeria without the Foreign Legion leaping to +his eyes at once--so great and magnificent a part it played in the +modern history of that colony. The Foreign Legion! Warrisden jumped to +the conviction that there was the secret of Tony Stretton's +disappearance. Every reason he could imagine came to his aid. Let a +man wish to disappear, as, from whatsoever reason, Tony Stretton did, +where else could he so completely bury himself and yet live? +Hardships? Dangers? Yes. But Tony Stretton had braved hardships and +dangers in the North Sea, and had made light of them. A detachment of +the Foreign Legion might well be stationed at this oasis of Ain-Sefra, +of which his Encyclopædia knew nothing. He had no doubt there was a +trooper there, serving under some false name, who would start if the +name of "Stretton" were suddenly shouted to him behind his back.</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden wrote no word of his conjecture to Pamela; he wished to +raise no hopes which he could not fulfil. Convinced as he was, he +wished for certain proof. But in fulfilment of his promise he wrote to +Pamela that night. Just a few lines--nothing more, as she had asked. +But in those few lines he wrote that he would like her to procure for +him a scrap of Tony Stretton's handwriting. Could she do it? In a week +the scrap of handwriting arrived. Warrisden, looking at it, knew that +the same hand had addressed the envelope at Ain-Sefra to Mr. Chase.</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden was ready now, if the summons to service should come once +more from Pamela.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XXI</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_21" href="#div1Ref_21">CALLON REDIVIVUS</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">All through that autumn Pamela watched for Tony's return, and watched +in vain. Winter came, and with the winter a letter from Mr. Mudge. +Lionel Callon had booked his passage home on a steamer which sailed on +Christmas Eve from the port of Valparaiso. Pamela received the news +one morning of December. She hunted that day with the Quorn, and for +once her thoughts were set on other matters than this immediate +business. The long grass meadows slipped away under her horse's feet +the while she pondered how once more the danger of Callon's presence +was to be averted. At times she hoped it would not need averting. +Callon had been eighteen months away, and Millie was quick to forget. +But she was no less quick to respond to a show of affection. Let +Callon lay siege again persistently, and the danger at once was close. +Besides, there were the letters. That he should have continued to +write during the months of his absence was a sign that he had not +forgone his plan of conquest.</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela returned home with a scheme floating in her mind. Some words +which her mother had spoken at the breakfast-table had recurred to +her, and at tea Pamela revived the subject.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Did you say that you would not go to Roquebrune this winter, mother?" +she asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," Mrs. Mardale replied; "I have been for so many winters now. I +shall stay in England, for a change. We can let the Villa Pontignard, +no doubt."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, there is no hurry," said Pamela. She added, "I shall be going to +London to-morrow, but I shall be back in the evening."</p> + +<p class="normal">She thought over her plan that evening. Its execution would cost her +something, she realised. For many years she had not been out of +England during the winter. She must leave her horses behind, and that +was no small sacrifice for Pamela. She had one horse in particular, a +big Irish horse, which had carried her in the days when her troubles +were at their worst. He would follow her about the paddock or the yard +nuzzling against her arm; a horse of blood and courage, yet gentle +with her, thoughtful and kind for her as only a horse amongst the +animals can be. She must leave him. On the other hand, her thoughts of +late had been turning to Roquebrune for a particular reason. She had a +feeling that she would rather like to tread again those hill-paths, to +see once more those capes and headlands of which every one was a +landmark of past pain--just as an experiment. She travelled to London +the next day and drove from St. Pancras into Regent's Park.</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie Stretton had taken a house on the west side of the park. It +looked east across the water and through the glades of trees, and in +front of it were the open spaces of which Tony and she had dreamed; +and the sunlight streamed through the windows and lay in golden +splashes on the floors when there was sunlight in London anywhere at +all. When she looked from her window on the first morning, she could +not but remember the plans which Tony and she had debated long ago. +They had been so certain of realising them. Well, they were realised +now, for her, at all events. There was the sunlight piercing through +every cranny; there were the wide expanses of green, and trees. Only +the windows looked on Regent's Park, and on no wide prairie; and of +the two who, with so much enthusiasm, had marked out their imaginary +site and built their house, there was only one to enjoy the +fulfilment. Millie Stretton thought of Tony that morning, but with an +effort. What Pamela had foreseen had come to pass. He had grown +elusive to her thoughts, she could hardly visualise his person to +herself; he was almost unreal. Had he walked in at that moment he +would have been irksome to her as a stranger.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was, however, Pamela Mardale who walked in. She was shown over the +house, and until that ceremony was over she did not broach the reason +for her visit. Then, however, Millie said with delight--</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is what I have always wanted--sunlight."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I came to suggest more sunlight," said Pamela. "There is our villa at +Roquebrune in the south of France. It will be empty this winter. And I +thought that perhaps you and I might go out there together as soon as +Christmas is past."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie was standing at the window with her back to Pamela. She turned +round quickly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But you hate the place," she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela answered with sincerity--</p> + +<p class="normal">"None the less I want to go this winter. I want to go very much. I +won't tell you why. But I do want to go. And I should like you to come +with me."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela was anxious to discover whether that villa and its grounds, and +the view from its windows, had still the power to revive the grief +with which they had been so completely associated in her mind. +Hitherto she had shrunk from the very idea of ever revisiting +Roquebrune; of late, however, since Warrisden, in a word, had occupied +so large a place in her thoughts, she had wished to put herself to the +test, to understand whether her distress was really and truly dead, or +whether it merely slumbered and could wake again. It was necessary, +for Warrisden's sake as much as her own, that she should come to a +true knowledge. And nowhere else could she so certainly acquire it. If +the sight of Roquebrune, the familiar look of the villa's rooms, the +familiar paths whereon she had carried so overcharged a heart, had no +longer power to hurt and pain her, then she would be sure that she +could start her life afresh. It was only fair--so she phrased it in +her thoughts--that she should make the experiment.</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie turned back to the window.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do not think that I shall leave London this winter," she said. "You +see, I have only just got into the house."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It might spare you some annoyance," Pamela suggested.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I don't understand," said Millie.</p> + +<p class="normal">"The annoyance of having to explain Tony's absence. He will very +likely have returned by the spring."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie shrugged her shoulders.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have borne that annoyance for two years," she replied. "I do not +think I shall go away this winter."</p> + +<p class="normal">Was Millie thinking of Callon's return? Pamela wondered. Was it on +his account that she decided to remain? Pamela could not ask the +question. Her plan had come to naught, and she returned that afternoon +to Leicestershire.</p> + +<p class="normal">Christmas passed, and half-way through the month of January Callon +called, on a dark afternoon, at Millie Stretton's house. Millie was +alone; she was indeed expecting him. When Callon entered the room he +found her standing with her back to the window, her face to the door, +and so she stood, without speaking, for a few moments.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have been a long time away," she said, and she looked at him with +curiosity, but with yet more anxiety to mark any changes which had +come in his face.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," said he, "a long time."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie rang the bell and ordered tea to be brought.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have not changed," said she.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Nor you."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie had spoken with a noticeable distance in her manner; and she +had not given him her hand. With her back towards the light she had +allowed very little of her expression to be visible to her visitor. +When tea was brought in, however, she sat between the fireplace and +the window, and the light fell upon her. Callon sat opposite to her.</p> + +<p class="normal">"At last I know that I am at home again," he said, with a smile. Then +he leaned forward and lowered his voice, although there was no third +person in the room. He knew the value of such tricks. "I have looked +forward during these eighteen months so very much to seeing you +again."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie's face coloured, but it was with anger rather than pleasure. +There was a hard look upon her face; her eyes blamed him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yet you went away without a word to me," she said. "You did not come +to see me before you went, you never hinted you were going."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You thought it unkind?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"It was unkind," said Millie.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But I wrote to you. I have written often."</p> + +<p class="normal">"In no letter have you told me why you went away," said Millie.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You missed me when I went, then?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie shrugged her shoulders.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, I had seen a good deal of you. I missed--I missed--something," +she said. Callon drank his tea and set down his cup.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have come to tell you why I went away without a word. I never +mentioned the reason in my letters; I meant to tell you it with my +lips. I did not <i>go</i> away, I was <i>sent</i> away."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie was perplexed. "Sent away?" she repeated. "I understood, from +what you wrote, that you accepted a post from Mr. Mudge?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I had to accept it," said Callon. "It was forced on me. Mudge was +only the instrument to get me out of the way."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Who sent you away, then?" asked Millie.</p> + +<p class="normal">"A friend of yours--Miss Pamela Mardale."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie Stretton leaned back in her chair. "Pamela!" she cried +incredulously. "Pamela sent you away! Why?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Because she thought that I was seeing too much of you."</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon watched for the effect which his words would produce. He saw +the change come in Millie's face. There was a new light in her eyes, +her face flushed, she was angry; and anger was just the feeling he had +meant to arouse, anger against Pamela, anger which would drive Millie +towards him. He had kept his explanation back deliberately until he +could speak it himself. From the moment when he had started from +England he had nursed his determination to tell it to Millie Stretton. +He had been hoodwinked, outwitted by Pamela and her friend; he had +been banished to Chili for two years. Very well. But the game was not +over yet. His vanity was hurt as nothing had ever hurt it before. He +was stung to a thirst for revenge. He would live frugally, clear off +his debts, return to England, and prove to his enemies the futility of +their plan. He thought of Pamela Mardale; he imagined her hearing of +his departure and dismissing him straightway contemptuously from her +thoughts. For eighteen months he nursed his anger, and waited for the +moment when he could return. There should be a surprise for Pamela +Mardale. She should understand that he was a dangerous fellow to +attack. Already, within a day of his landing, he had begun to +retaliate. The anger in Millie Stretton's face was of good augury for +him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Pamela!" cried Millie, clenching her hands together suddenly. "Yes, +it was Pamela."</p> + +<p class="normal">She bethought her of that pressing invitation to the south of France, +an invitation from Pamela who looked on the shires as the only +wintering-place. That was explained now. Mr. Mudge had informed +Pamela, no doubt, that Lionel Callon was returning. Millie was +furious. She looked on this interference as a gross impertinence.</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon rose from his chair.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You can imagine it, was humiliating to me to be tricked and sent +away. But I was helpless. I am a poor man; I was in debt. Miss Mardale +had an old rich man devoted to her in Mr. Mudge. He bought up my +debts, his lawyer demanded an immediate settlement of them all, and I +could not immediately settle them. I was threatened with proceedings, +with bankruptcy."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You should have come to me," cried Millie.</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon raised a protesting hand.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, Lady Stretton, how could I?" he exclaimed in reproach. "Think for +a moment! Oh, you would have offered help at a hint. I know you. You +are most kind, most generous. But think, you are a woman. I am a man. +Oh no!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon did not mention that Mr. Mudge had compelled him to accept or +refuse the post in Chili with only an hour's deliberation, and that +hour between seven and eight in the evening. He had thought of calling +upon Millie to suggest in her mind the offer which she had now made, +but he had not had the time. He was glad now. His position was thereby +so much the stronger.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I had to accept Mudge's offer. Even the acceptance was made as +humiliating as it possibly could be. For Mudge deliberately let me see +that his only motive was to get me out of the country. He did not care +whether I knew his motive or not. I did not count," he cried, +bitterly. "I was a mere pawn upon a chess-board. I had to withdraw +from my candidature. My career was spoilt. What did they care--Mr. +Mudge and your friend? I was got out of your way."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, oh!" cried Millie; and Callon stepped quickly to her side.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Imagine what these months have been to me," he went on. "I was out +there in Chili, without friends. I had nothing to do. Every one else +upon the railway had his work, his definite work, his definite +position. I was nothing at, all, a mere prisoner, in everybody's way, +a man utterly befooled. But that was not the worst of it. Shall I be +frank?" He made a pretence of hesitation. "I will. I will take the +risk of frankness. I was sent away just when I had begun to think a +great deal about you." Millie Stretton, who had been gazing into her +companion's face with the utmost sympathy, lowered her eyes to the +floor. But she was silent.</p> + +<p class="normal">"That was the worst," he continued softly. "I was angry, of course. I +knew that I was losing the better part of two years----"</p> + +<p class="normal">And Millie interrupted him: "How did she know?" she exclaimed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Who? Oh, Miss Mardale. Do you remember the evening she came to +Whitewebs? I was waiting for you in the hall. You came down the stairs +and ran up again. There was a mirror on the mantelpiece. She guessed +then. Afterwards she and Mudge discussed us in the drawing-room. I saw +them."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie got up from her chair and moved to the fireplace.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It was on my account that you have lost two years, that your career +has been injured," she said, in a low voice. She was really hurt, +really troubled. "I am so very sorry. What return can I ever make to +you? I will never speak to Pamela again."</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon crossed and stood beside her.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, don't do that," he said. "It would be--unwise."</p> + +<p class="normal">Her eyes flashed up to his quickly, and as quickly fell. The colour +slowly deepened in her cheeks.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What does it matter about my career?" he continued, with a smile. "I +see you again. If you wish to make me a return, let me see you very +often!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He spoke with tenderness, and he was not pretending. What space did +Millie Stretton fill in his thoughts? She was pretty, she was +sympathetic, she was ready to catch the mood of her companion. It was +not merely an act of retaliation which Callon projected. Such love as +he had to give was hers. It was not durable, it was intertwined with +meanness, it knew no high aims; yet, such as it was, it was hers. It +gained, too, a fictitious strength from the mere fact that he had been +deliberately kept from her. The eighteen months of bondage had given +her an importance in his eyes, had made her more desirable through the +very difficulty of attaining her. Millie allowed him to come again and +again. She had a natural taste for secrecies, and practised them now, +as he bade her do, without any perception of the humiliation which +they involved. If he called at her house, it was after the dusk had +fallen, and when she was at home to no other visitors. They dined +together in the restaurants of unfashionable hotels, and if she drove +to them in her brougham, she sent it away, and was escorted to her +door in a cab. Callon was a past-master in concealment; he knew the +public places where the public never is, and rumour did not couple +their names. But secrecy is not for the secret when the secret ones +are a man and a woman. It needs too much calculation in making +appointments, too much punctuality in keeping them, too close a +dependence upon the probable thing happening at the probable time. +Sooner or later an accident, which could not be foreseen, occurs. It +may be no more than the collision of a cab and the summons of the +driver. Or some one takes, one morning, a walk in an unaccustomed +spot. Or the intriguers fall in quite unexpectedly with another, who +has a secret too, of which they were not aware. Sooner or later some +one knows.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was the last of these contingencies which brought about the +disclosure in the case of Callon and Millie Stretton. Six weeks had +passed since Callon's return. It was just a month from Easter. Millie +dined with some friends, and went with them afterwards to a theatre in +the Haymarket. At the door she sent her carriage home, and when the +performance was over she took a hansom cab. She declined any escort, +and was driven up Regent Street towards her home. At the corner of +Devonshire Street, in Portland Place, a man loitered upon the pavement +with a white scarf showing above his coat-collar. Millie opened the +trap and spoke to the driver. The cab stopped by the loiterer at the +street corner, who opened the doors and stepped in. The loiterer was +Lionel Callon.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Drive round Regent's Park," he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">The cab drove northwards through Park Place and along the broad road +towards Alexandra Gate. The air was warm, the stars bright overhead, +the dark trees lined the roadway on the left, the road under the +wheels was very white. There was a great peace in the park. It was +quite deserted. In a second it seemed they had come out of the glare, +and the roar of streets, into a land of quiet and cool gloom. Millie +leaned back while Callon talked, and this was the burden of his talk.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Let us go to the south of France. I will go first. Do you follow! You +go for Easter. It will be quite natural. You stay at Eze, I at the +little Reserve by the sea a mile away. There is a suite of rooms +there. No one need know." Three times the cab drove round the park +while Callon urged, and Millie more and more faintly declined. The +driver sat perched upon his box, certain of a good fare, indifferent. +Inside his cab, on this quiet night, the great issues of life and +honour were debated. Millie had just her life in her hands. One way or +the other, by a 'Yes' or a 'No,' she must decide what she would do +with it, and, to whatever decision she came, it must reach out +momentous with consequences and touch other lives beyond hers and +beyond those others, others still. Her husband, her relations, her +friends--not one of them but was concerned in this midnight drive. It +seemed to Millie almost that she heard them hurrying about the cab, +calling to her, reaching out their hands. So vivid was her thought, +that she could count them, and could recognise their faces. She looked +amongst them for her husband. But Tony was not there. She could not +see him, she could not hear his voice. Round and round past the trees, +on the white road, the cab went jingling on, the driver, indifferent, +upon his perch, the tempter and the tempted within.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Your husband does not care," said Callon. "If he did, would he stay +so long away?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, he does not care," said Millie. If he cared, would he not be +among that suppliant throng which ran about the cab? And all at once +it seemed that the hurrying footsteps lagged behind. The voices called +more faintly; she could not see the outreaching hands.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No one need know," said Callon.</p> + +<p class="normal">"<i>Someone always knows</i>," replied Millie.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What then?" cried Callon. "If you love, you will not mind. If you +love, you will abandon everything--everyone. If you love!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He had taken the right way to persuade her. Call upon Millie for a +great sacrifice, she would make it, she would glory in making it, just +for the moment. Disenchantment would come later; but nothing of it +would she foresee. As she had matched herself with Tony, when first he +had proposed to leave her behind in 'his father's house, so now she +matched herself with Callon, she felt strong.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Very well," she said. "I will follow."</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon stopped the cab and got out. As he closed the doors and told +the cabman where to drive, a man, wretchedly clad, slouched past and +turned into the Marylebone Road. That was all. Sooner or later some +one was sure to discover their secret. It happened that the some one +passed them by to-night.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XXII</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_22" href="#div1Ref_22">MR. MUDGE'S CONFESSION</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">On the following morning a telegram was brought to Pamela at her +father's house in Leicestershire. It came from Mr. Mudge, and +contained these words: "Important that I should see you. Coming down. +Please be at home at two." Punctually Mr. Mudge arrived. Pamela +received him in her own sitting-room. She was waiting with a restless +anxiety, and hardly waited for the door to be closed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have bad news for me," she said. "Oh, I know! You are a busy man. +You would not have come down to me had you not bad news. I am very +grateful for your coming, but you have bad news."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," said Mr. Mudge, gravely; "news so bad that you must ask your +other friend to help you. I can do nothing here."</p> + +<p class="normal">It cost Mr. Mudge a little to acknowledge that he was of no avail in +this particular instance. He would rather have served Pamela himself, +had it been possible. He was fully aware of his age, and his looks, +and his limitations. He was quite willing to stand aside for the other +friend; indeed, he wished, with all his heart, that she should be +happy with some mate of her own people. But at the same time he wished +her to owe as much as possible of her happiness to him. He was her +friend, but there was just that element of jealousy in his friendship +which springs up when the friends are man and woman. Pamela understood +that it meant some abnegation on his part to bid her call upon another +than himself. She was still more impressed, in consequence, with the +gravity of the news he had to convey.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Is it Mr. Callon?" she asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," he replied. "It is imperative that Sir Anthony Stretton should +return, and return at once. Of that I am very sure."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have seen Mr. Callon?" asked Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And Lady Stretton. They were together."</p> + +<p class="normal">"When?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Last night. In Regent's Park."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela hesitated. She was doubtful how to put her questions. She +said--</p> + +<p class="normal">"And you are sure the trouble is urgent?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Mudge nodded his head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Very sure. I saw them together. I saw the look on Lady Stretton's +face. It was a clear night. There was a lamp too, in the cab. I passed +them as Callon got out and said 'Good-night.'"</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela sat down in a chair, and fixed her troubled eyes on her +companion.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Did they see you?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Mudge smiled.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Let me have the whole truth," cried Pamela, "Tell me the story from +the beginning. How you came to see them--everything."</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Mudge sat down in his turn. He presented to her a side of his +character which she had not hitherto suspected. She listened, and was +moved to sympathy, as no complaint could ever have moved her; and Mr. +Mudge was the last man to complain. Yet the truth came out clearly. +Outwardly prosperous and enviable, he had yet inwardly missed all. A +man of so wide a business, so many undertakings, so occupied a life, +it was natural to dissociate him from the ordinary human sympathies +and desires. It seemed that he could have neither time nor inclination +to indulge them. But here he was, as he had once done before, not +merely admitting their existence within him, but confessing that they +were far the greater part of him, and that because they had been +thwarted, the prosperous external life of business to which he seemed +so ardently enchained was really of little account, He spoke very +simply. Pamela lost sight of the business machine altogether. Here was +a man, like another, telling her that through his vain ambitions his +life had gone astray. She found a pathos in the dull and unimpressive +look of him--his bald, uncomely head, his ungraceful figure. There was +a strange contrast between his appearance and the fanciful antidote +for disappointment which had brought him into Regent's Park when +Callon and Lady Stretton were discussing their future course.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I told you something of my history at Newmarket," he said. "You must +remember what I told you, or you will not understand."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I remember very well," said Pamela, gently. "I think that I shall +understand."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela of late, indeed, had gained much understanding. Two years ago +the other point of view was to her always without interest. As often +as not she was unaware that it existed; when she was aware, she +dismissed it without consideration. But of late her eyes had learned +to soften at the troubles of others, her mind to be perplexed with +their perplexities.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," said Mudge, nodding his head, with a smile towards her. "You +will understand now."</p> + +<p class="normal">And he laid so much emphasis upon the word that Pamela looked up in +surprise.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Why now?" she asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Because, recently, imagination has come to you. I have seen, I have +noticed. Imagination, the power to see clearly, the power to +understand--perhaps the greatest gift which love has in all his big +box of gifts."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela coloured at his words. She neither admitted nor denied the +suggestion they contained.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have therefore ho fear that you will misunderstand," Mr. Mudge +insisted. "I told you that my career, such as it is, has left me a +very lonely man amongst a crowd of acquaintances, who are no more in +sympathy with me than I myself am in sympathy with them. I did not +tell you that I had found a way of alleviation."</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," said Pamela. She was at a loss to understand how this statement +of her companion was connected with his detection of Callon and Lady +Stretton; but she had no doubt there was a connection. Mudge was not +of those who take a pride in disclosing the details of their life and +character in and out of season. If he spoke of himself, he did so with +a definite reason, which bore upon the business in hand. "No; on the +contrary, you said that you could not go back and start afresh. You +had too much upon your hands. You were fixed in your isolation."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I did not even then tell you all the truth. I could not go back +half-way, that is true. I do not think I would find any comfort in +that course even if I could; but I can and I do go back all the way at +times. I reconstruct the days when I was very, very poor, and yet full +of hope, full of confidence. I do not mean that I sit in front of my +fire and tell myself the story. I do much more. I actually live them +over again, so far as I can. That puzzles you," he said, with a laugh.</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela, indeed, was looking at him with a frown of perplexity upon her +forehead.</p> + +<p class="normal">"How do you live them again?" she asked. "I don't understand."</p> + +<p class="normal">"In this way," said Mudge. "I keep an old, worn-out suit of clothes +locked up in a cupboard. Well, when I find the house too lonely, and +my servants, with their noiseless tread, get on to my nerves, I just +put on that suit of clothes and revisit the old haunts where I used to +live forty and fifty years ago. Often I have come back from a dinner +party, let myself in at my front door, and slipped out of a side +entrance half an hour later on one of my pilgrimages. You would never +know me; you might toss me a shilling, that's all. Of course, I have +to be careful. I am always expecting to be taken up as a thief as I +slink away from the house. I would look rather a fool if that +happened, wouldn't I?" and he laughed. "But it never has yet." He +suddenly turned to her. "I enjoy myself upon those jaunts, you know; I +really enjoy myself. I like the secrecy. To slip out of the great, +silent house, to get clear away from the pictures, and the furniture, +and the obedience, and to tramp down into the glare and the noise of +the big streets, and to turn into some pothouse where once, years ago, +I used to take my supper and dream of the future. It's a sort of +hide-and-seek in itself." He laughed again, and then suddenly became +serious. "But it's much more than that--ever so much more."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Where do you go?" asked Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It depends upon the time I have. If it's early I go down to Deptford, +very often. I get into a tram and ride down a street where I once +wandered all night because I hadn't the price of a lodging. I look at +the old cookshop where I used to flatten my nose against the glass and +dream that I had the run of my teeth. I get down and go into a +public-house, say, with a sanded floor, and have a sausage and mash +and a pot of beer, just as I was doing forty years ago, when this or +that scheme, which turned out well, first came into my head. But don't +misunderstand," Mudge exclaimed. "I don't set off upon these visits +for the satisfaction of comparing what I was then with what I have +become. It is to get back to what I was then, as nearly as I can; to +recapture, just for a moment, some of the high hopes, some of the +anticipations of happiness to be won which I felt in those days; to +forget that the happiness has never been won, that the high hopes were +for things not worth the trouble spent in acquiring them. I was wet, +very often hungry, always ill-clothed; but I was happy in those days, +Miss Mardale, though very likely I didn't know it. I was young, the +future was mine, a solid reality; and the present--why, that was a +time of work and dreams. There's nothing much better than that +combination, Miss Mardale--work and dreams!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He repeated the words wistfully, and was silent for a moment. No doubt +those early struggles had not been so pleasant as they appeared in the +retrospect; but time had stripped them of their bitterness and left to +Mr. Mudge just that part of them which was worth remembering.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I had friends in those days," he went on. "I wonder what has become +of them all? In all my jaunts I have never seen one."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And where else do you go?" asked Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, many places. There's a little narrow market between Shaftesbury +Avenue and Oxford Street, where the gas-jets flare over the barrows on +a Saturday night, and all the poor people go marketing. That's a haunt +of mine. I was some time, too, when I was young, at work near the +Marylebone Road. There's a tavern near Madame Tussaud's where I used +to go and have supper at the counter in the public bar. Do you +remember the night of Lady Millingham's reception, when we looked out +of the window and saw Sir Anthony Stretton? Well, I supped at that +tavern in the Marylebone Road on that particular night. I was hard put +to it, too, when I used to work in Marylebone. I slept for three +nights in Regent's Park. There's a coffee-stall close to the bridge, +just outside the park, on the north side."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela started, and Mudge nodded his head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes; that is how I came to see Lady Stretton and Mr. Callon. A hansom +cab drove past me just as I crossed the road to go out of the gate to +the coffee-stall. I noticed it enough to see that it held a man and a +woman in evening dress, but no more. I stayed at the coffee-stall for +a little while talking with the cabmen and the others who were about +it, and drinking my coffee. As I returned into the park the cab drove +past me again. I thought it was the same cab, from the casual glance I +gave, and with the same people inside it. They had driven round, were +still driving round. It was a fine night, a night of spring, fresh, +and cool, and very pleasant. I did not wonder; I rather sympathised +with them," he said, with a smile. "You see, I have never driven round +Regent's Park at night with a woman I cared for beside me;" and again +the wistful note was very audible in his voice; and he added, in a low +voice, "That was not for me."</p> + +<p class="normal">He shook the wistfulness from him and resumed--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, as I reached the south side of the park, and was close by Park +Place, the cab came towards me again, and pulled up. Callon got out. I +saw him clearly. I saw quite clearly, too, who was within the cab. So +you see there is danger. Mere friends do not drive round and round +Regent's Park at night."</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Mudge rose, and held out his hand.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I must get back to town. I have a fly waiting to take me to the +station," he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela walked with him to the door of the house. As they stood in the +hall she said--</p> + +<p class="normal">"I thanked you, before you spoke at all, for putting your business +aside for my sake, and coming down to me. I thank you still more now, +and for another reason. I thank you for telling me what you have told +me about yourself. Such confessions," and she smiled upon the word, +"cannot be made without great confidence in the one they are made to."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have that confidence," said Mudge.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I know. I am glad," replied Pamela; and she resumed: "They cannot be +made, either, without creating a difference. We no longer stand where +we did before they were made. I always looked upon you as my friend; +but we are far greater friends now, is not that so?"</p> + +<p class="normal">She spoke with great simplicity and feeling, her eyes glistened a +little, and she added, "You are not living now with merely +acquaintances around you."</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. Mudge took her hand.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am very glad that I came," he said; and, mounting into the fly, he +drove away.</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela went back to the house and wrote out a telegram to Warrisden. +She asked him to come at once to--and then she paused. Should he come +here? No; there was another place, with associations for her which had +now grown very pleasant and sweet to her thoughts. She asked him to +meet her at the place where they had once kept tryst before--the +parlour of the inn upon the hill in the village of the Three Poplars. +Thither she had ridden before from Lady Millingham's house of +Whitewebs. Her own house stood, as it were, at one end of the base of +an obtuse triangle, of which Whitewebs made the other end, and the +three poplars the apex.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XXIII</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_23" href="#div1Ref_23">ROQUEBRUNE REVISITED</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">There, accordingly, they met on the following afternoon. Pamela rode +across the level country between the Croft Hill which overhung her +house, and the village. In front of her the three poplars pointed +skywards from the ridge. She was anxious and troubled. It seemed to +her that Millie Stretton was slipping beyond her reach; but the sight +of those trees lightened her of some portion of her distress. She was +turning more and more in her thoughts towards Warrisden whenever +trouble knocked upon her door. In the moment of greatest perplexity +his companionship, or even the thought of it, rested her like sleep. +As she came round the bend of the road at the foot of the hill, she +saw him coming down the slope towards her. She quickened her horse, +and trotted up to him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are here already?" she said. "I am very glad. I was not sure that +I had allowed you time enough."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh yes," said Warrisden. "I came at once. I guessed why you wanted me +from the choice of our meeting-place. We meet at Quetta, on the same +business which brought us together at Quetta before. Is not that so?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," said Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">They walked to the door of the inn at the top of the hill. An ostler +took charge of Pamela's horse, and they went within to the parlour.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You want me to find Stretton again?" said Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela looked at him remorsefully.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, I do," she answered; and there was compunction in the tone of +her voice. "I would not ask you unless the matter was very urgent. I +have used you for my needs, I know, with too little consideration for +you, and you very generously and willingly have allowed me to use you. +So I am a little ashamed to come to you again."</p> + +<p class="normal">Here were strange words from Pamela. They were spoken with hesitation, +too, and the colour burned in her cheeks. Warrisden was surprised to +hear them. He laid his hand upon her arm and gave it a little +affectionate shake.</p> + +<p class="normal">"My dear, I am serving myself," he said, "just as much as I am serving +you. Don't you understand that? Have you forgotten our walk under the +elms in Lady Millingham's garden? If Tony returned, and returned in +time, why, then you might lay your finger on the turnpike gate and let +it swing open of its own accord. I remember what you said. Tony's +return helps me, so I help myself in securing his return."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela's face softened into a smile.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then you really do not mind going?" she went on. "I am remorseful, in +a way, because I asked you to go once before in this very room, and +nothing came of all your trouble. I want you to believe now that I +could not ask you again to undergo the same trouble, or even more, as +it may prove, were not the need ever so much more urgent than it was +then."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am sorry to hear that the need is more urgent," Warrisden replied; +"but, on the other hand, the trouble I shall have to bear is much +less, for I know where Stretton is."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela felt that half of the load of anxiety was taken from her +shoulders.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You do?" she exclaimed.</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden nodded.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And what he is doing. He is serving with the Foreign Legion in +Algeria. I thought you might want to lay your hands on him again, and +I wished to be ready. Chance gave me a clue--an envelope with a +postmark. I followed up the clue by securing an example of Stretton's +handwriting. It was the same handwriting as that which directed the +envelope, so I was sure."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Thank you," said Pamela. "Indeed, you do not fail me;" and her voice +was musical with gratitude.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He was at Ain-Sefra, a little town on the frontier of Algeria," +Warrisden resumed. And Pamela interrupted him--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then I need not make so heavy a demand upon you after all," she said. +"It was only a letter which I was going to ask you to carry to Tony. +Now there is no necessity that yon should go at all, for I can post +it."</p> + +<p class="normal">She produced the letter from a pocket of her coat as she spoke.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ah, but will it reach Stretton if you do?" said Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela had already seated herself at the table, and was drawing the +inkstand towards her. She paused at Warrisden's question, and looked +up.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Surely Ain-Sefra, Algeria, will find him?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Will it?" Warrisden repeated. He sat down at the table opposite to +her. "Even if it does, will it reach him in time? You say the need is +urgent. Well, it was last summer when I saw the postmark on the +envelope, two days after we talked together in Lady Millingham's +garden. I had business in London."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I remember," said Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"My business was just to find out where Stretton was hiding himself. +He was at Ain-Sefra then; he may be at Ain-Sefra now. But it is a +small post, and he may not. The headquarters of the Legion are at Sidi +Bel-Abbès, in the north. He may be there, or he may be altogether out +of reach on some Saharan expedition."</p> + +<p class="normal">There was yet another possibility which occurred to both their minds +at this moment. It was possible that no letter would ever reach +Stretton again; that Warrisden, searched he never so thoroughly, would +not be able to find the man he searched for. There are so many graves +in the Sahara. But neither of them spoke of this possibility, though a +quick look they interchanged revealed to each its presence in the +other's thoughts.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Besides, he wanted to lie hidden. So much I know, who know nothing of +his story. Would he have enlisted under his own name, do you think? +Or even under his own nationality? It is not the common practice in +the Foreign Legion. And that's not all. Even were he soldiering openly +under his own name, how will you address your letter with any +likelihood that it will reach him? Just 'La Legion Etrangère'? We want +to know to what section of la Legion Etrangère he belongs. Is he +chasseur, artilleryman, sapper? Perhaps he serves in the cavalry. Then +which is his squadron? Is he a plain foot soldier? Then in what +battalion, and what rank does he occupy? We cannot answer any of these +questions, and, unanswered, they certainly delay your letter; they may +prevent it ever reaching him at all."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela laid down her pen and stared blankly at "Warrisden. He piled up +the objections one by one in front of her until it seemed she would +lose Tony once more from her sight after she had got him for a moment +within her vision.</p> + +<p class="normal">"So you had better entrust your letter to me," he concluded. "Address +it to Stretton under his own name. I will find him, if he is to be +found, never fear. I will find him very quickly."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela addressed the letter. Yet she held it for a little time in her +hand after it was addressed. All the while Warrisden had been speaking +she had felt an impulse strong within her to keep him back; and it was +because of that impulse, rather than with any thought of Millie +Stretton and the danger in which she stood, that Pamela asked +doubtfully--</p> + +<p class="normal">"How long will you be?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I should find him within ten days."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela smiled suddenly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is not so very long," said she; and she handed the letter across +to Warrisden. "Well, go!" she cried, with a certain effort. "Telegraph +to me when you have found Tony. Bring him back, and come back +yourself." She added, in a voice which was very low and wistful, +"Please come back soon!" Then she rose from the table, and Warrisden +put the letter in his pocket and rose too.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You will be at home, I suppose, in ten days?" he said. And Pamela +said quickly, as though some new idea had just been suggested to her +mind--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, wait a moment!"</p> + +<p class="normal">She stood quite still and thoughtful. There was a certain test by +which she had meant to find the soundings of heart. Here was a good +opportunity to apply the test. Warrisden would be away upon his +journey; she could not help Millie Stretton now by remaining in +England. She determined to apply the test.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," she said slowly. "Telegraph to me at the Villa Pontignard, +Roquebrune, Alpes Maritimes, France. I shall be travelling thither +immediately."</p> + +<p class="normal">Her decision was taken upon an instant. It was the logical outcome of +her thoughts and of Warrisden's departure; and since Warrisden went +because of Millie Stretton, Pamela's journey to the South of France +was due, in a measure, to that lady, too. Yet no one would have been +more astonished than Millie Stretton had she learned of Pamela's visit +at this time. She would have been quick to change her own plans; but +she had no knowledge of whither Pamela's thoughts were leading her. +When Callon in the hansom cab had said to her, "Come South," her first +swift reflection had been, "Pamela will be safe in England." She +herself had refused to go south with Pamela. Pamela's desire to go was +to her mind a mere false pretext to get her away from her one friend. +If she did not go south, she was very sure that Pamela would not. +There had seemed to her no safer place than the Riviera. But she was +wrong. Here, in the village of the Three Poplars, Pamela had made her +decision.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I shall go to Roquebrune as soon as I can make arrangements for a +servant or two," she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Roquebrune," said Warrisden, as he wrote down the address. "I once +walked up a long flight of steps to that village many years ago. +Perhaps you were at the villa then. I wonder. You must have been a +little girl. It was one February. I came over from Monte Carlo, and we +walked up from the station. We met the schoolmaster."</p> + +<p class="normal">"M. Giraud!" exclaimed Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Was that his name? He had written a little history of the village and +the Corniche road. He took me under his wing. We went into a wine shop +on the first floor of a house in the middle of the village, and we sat +there quite a long time. He asked us about Paris and London with an +eagerness which was quite pathetic. He came down with us to the +station, and his questions never ceased. I suppose he was lonely +there."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela nodded her head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Very. He did not sleep all night for thinking of what you had told +him."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You were there, then?" cried Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes; M. Giraud used to read French with me. He came to me one +afternoon quite feverish. Two Englishmen had come up to Roquebrune, +and had talked to him about the great towns and the lighted streets. +He was always dreaming of them. Poor man, he is at Roquebrune still, +no doubt."</p> + +<p class="normal">She spoke with a great tenderness and pity, looking out of the window, +and for the moment altogether lost to her surroundings. Warrisden +roused her from her reverie.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I must be going away."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela's horse was brought to the door, and she mounted.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Walk down the hill beside my horse," she said; "just as you did +on that other day, when the hill was slippery, your hand upon his +neck--so."</p> + +<p class="normal">Very slowly they walked down the hill. There were no driving mists +to-day, the evening was coming with a great peace, the fields and +woods lay spread beneath them toned to a tranquil grey. The white road +glimmered. At the bottom of the hill Pamela stopped.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Good-bye," she said; and there was more tenderness in her voice and +in her face than he had ever known. She laid her hand upon his arm and +bent down to him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Come back to me," she said wistfully. "I do not like letting you go; +and yet I am rather proud to know that you are doing something for me +which I could not do for myself, and that you do it so very +willingly."</p> + +<p class="normal">She did not wait to hear any answer, but took her hand from his arm +and rode quickly away. That turnpike gate of friendship had already +swung open of its own accord. As she rode from Quetta that evening, +she passed beyond it, and went gratefully and hopefully, with the +other men and women, down the appointed road.</p> + +<p class="normal">She knew it while she was riding homewards to the Croft Hill. She knew +it, and was very glad. She rode home very slowly through the tranquil +evening, and gave herself up to joy. It was warm, and there was a +freshness in the air as though the world renewed itself. Darkness +came; only the road glimmered ahead of her--the new road, which was +the old road. Even that glimmer of white had almost vanished when at +last she saw the lighted windows of her father's house. The footman +told her that dinner was already served, but she ran past him very +quickly up the stairs, and coming to her own room, locked the door and +sat for a long while in the darkness, her blood throbbing in her +veins, her whole heart uplifted, not thinking at all, but just living, +and living most joyfully. She sat so still that she might have been in +a swoon; but it was the stillness of perfect happiness. She knew the +truth that night.</p> + +<p class="normal">But, none the less, she travelled south towards the end of the week, +since there a telegram would come to her. She persuaded a convenient +aunt to keep her company, who has nothing whatever to do with this +story; and reaching Villa Pontignard one afternoon, walked through the +familiar rooms which she had so dreaded ever to revisit. She went out +to the narrow point of the garden where so often she had dreamed with +M. Giraud of the outside world, its roaring cities and its jostle of +people. She sat down upon the parapet. Below her the cliff fell sheer, +and far below, in the darkness at the bottom of the gorge, the water +tumbled in foam with a distant hum. On the opposite hill the cypresses +stood out black from the brown and green. Here she had suffered +greatly, but the wounds were healed. These dreaded places had no +longer power to hurt. She knew that very surely. She was emancipated +from sorrow, and as she sat there in the still, golden afternoon, the +sense of freedom ran riot in her blood. She looked back over the years +to the dragging days of misery, the sleepless nights. She felt a pity +for the young girl who had then looked down from this parapet and +prayed for death; who had counted the many years of life in front of +her; who had bewailed her very strength and health. But ever her eyes +turned towards the Mediterranean and searched the horizon. For beyond +that blue, calm sea stretched the coasts of Algeria.</p> + +<p class="normal">There was but one cloud to darken Pamela's happiness during these days +while she waited for Warrisden's telegram. On the morning after she +had arrived, the old curé climbed from the village to visit her. +Almost Pamela's first question was of M. Giraud.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He is still here?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, he is still here," replied the curé; but he pursed up his lips +and shook his head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I must send for him," said Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">The curé said nothing. He was standing by the window, and almost +imperceptibly he shrugged his shoulders as though he doubted her +wisdom. In a moment Pamela was at his side.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What is it?" she asked gently. "Tell me."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, mademoiselle, there is little to tell! He is not the schoolmaster +you once knew. That is all. The wine shop has made the difference--the +wine shop and discontent. He was always dissatisfied, you know. It is +a pity."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am so sorry," said Pamela, gravely, "so very sorry."</p> + +<p class="normal">She was silent for a while, and greatly troubled by the curé's news.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Has he married?" she asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It would have been better if he had."</p> + +<p class="normal">"No doubt, mademoiselle," said the curé, "but he has not, and I think +it is now too late."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela did not send for M. Giraud. It seemed to her that she could do +no good even if at her request he came to her. She would be going away +in a few days. She would only hurt him and put him to shame before +her. She took no step towards a renewal of their friendship, and +though she did not avoid him, she never came across him in her walks.</p> + +<p class="normal">For ten days she walked the old hill paths, and dreams came to her +with the sunlight. They gave her company in the evenings, too, when +she looked from her garden upon the quiet sea and saw, away upon the +right, the lights, like great jewels, burning on the terrace of Monte +Carlo. She went down one morning on to that terrace, and, while seated +upon a bench, suddenly saw, at a little distance, the back of a man +which was familiar to her.</p> + +<p class="normal">She was not sure, but she was chilled with apprehension. She watched +from behind her newspaper, and in a little while she was sure, for the +man turned and showed his face. It was Lionel Callon. What was he +doing here, she asked herself? And another question trod fast upon the +heels of the first. "Was he alone?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon was alone on this morning, at all events. Pamela saw him speak +to one or two people, and then mount the terrace steps towards the +town. She gave him a little time, and then, walking through the +gardens, bought a visitors' list at the kiosk in front of the Rooms. +She found Callon's name. He was the only visitor at a Reserve, on the +Corniche road, which was rather a restaurant than a hotel. She +searched through the list, fearing to find the name of Millie Stretton +under the heading of some other hotel. To her relief it was not there. +It was possible, of course, that Callon was merely taking a holiday by +himself. She wished to believe that, and yet there was a fear speaking +loudly at her heart. "Suppose that Tony should return too late just by +a few days!" She was still holding the paper in her hands when she +heard her name called, and, turning about, saw some friends. She +lunched with them at Ciro's, and asked carelessly during luncheon--</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have not seen Millie Stretton, I suppose?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," they all replied. And one asked, "Is she expected?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I don't know whether she will come or not," Pamela replied. "I asked +her to come with me, but she could not do that, and she was not sure +that she would come at all."</p> + +<p class="normal">This she said, thinking that if Millie did arrive it might seem that +she came because Pamela herself was there. Pamela went back to +Roquebrune that afternoon, and after she had walked through the +village and had come out on the slope of hill above, she met the +postman coming down from the Villa Pontignard.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have a telegram for me?" she said anxiously.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Mademoiselle," he replied, "I have just left it at the house."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela hurried on, and found the telegram in the <i>salon</i>. She tore it +open. It was from Warrisden. It told her that Tony Stretton was found, +and would return. It gave the news in vague and guarded language, +mentioning no names. But Pamela understood the message. Tony Stretton +was actually coming back. "Would he come too late?" she asked, gazing +out in fear across the sea. Of any trouble, out there in Algeria, +which might delay his return, she did not think at all. If it was true +that he had enlisted in the Legion, there might be obstacles to a +quick return. But such matters were not in her thoughts. She thought +only of Callon upon the terrace of Monte Carlo. "Would Tony come too +late?" she asked; and she prayed that he might come in time.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XXIV</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_24" href="#div1Ref_24">THE END OF THE EXPERIMENT</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">The village of Ain-Sefra stands upon a high and fertile oasis on the +very borders of Morocco. The oasis is well watered, and the date-palm +grows thickly there. It lies far to the south. The railway, in the +days when Tony Stretton served in the Foreign Legion, did not reach to +it; the barracks were newly built, the parade ground newly enclosed; +and if one looked southwards from any open space, one saw a tawny belt +of sand in the extreme distance streak across the horizon from east to +west. That is the beginning of the great Sahara. Tony Stretton could +never see that belt of sand, but his thoughts went back to the +terrible homeward march from Bir-el-Ghiramo to Ouargla. From east to +west the Sahara stretched across Africa, breaking the soldiers who +dared to violate its privacy, thrusting them back maimed and +famine-stricken, jealously guarding its secrets and speaking by its +very silence, its terrible "thus far and no farther," no less audibly, +and a thousand times more truthfully than ever did the waves of the +sea.</p> + +<p class="normal">On one noonday Stretton mounted the steps on to the verandah of the +hospital. He looked across open country to the great yellow line. He +thought of the Touaregs hanging persistently upon the flanks of his +tiny force, the long laborious days of thirst and hunger, the +lengthening trail of graves which he left behind--those milestones of +invasion. He felt as though the desert gripped him again and would not +loose its hold, clinging to his feet with each step he took in the +soft, yielding sand. He had brought back his handful of men, it was +true; they had stumbled into Ouargla at the last; but there were few +of them who were men as good as they had been when they had set out. +Even the best, it almost seemed to him, had lost something of vitality +which they would never recover; had a look fixed in their eyes which +set them apart from their fellows--the look of those who have endured +too much, who gazed for too long a time upon horrors; while the others +were for the most part only fit to squat in the shade and to wait for +things to cease. There was one whom Stretton had passed only a minute +before sitting on the ground under the shadow of the barrack wall. +Stretton was haunted by the picture of that man, for he was the only +white man he had ever seen who did not trouble to raise a hand to +brush away the flies from his face, but allowed them to settle and +cluster about the corners of his mouth.</p> + +<p class="normal">There was another in the hospital behind him. Him the Sahara +definitely claimed. Stretton turned and walked into the building.</p> + +<p class="normal">He passed down the line of beds, and stopped where a man lay tossing +in a fever. Stretton leaned over the bed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Barbier," he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">Fusilier Barbier had grown very gaunt and thin during these latter +weeks. He turned his eyes upon Stretton, and muttered incoherently. +But there was recognition neither in his eyes nor in his voice. An +orderly approached the bed as Stretton stood beside it; and, in a low +voice, lest, haply, Barbier should hear and understand, Tony asked--</p> + +<p class="normal">"What did the doctor say?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Nothing good, my sergeant," the orderly replied, with an expressive +shrug of the shoulders.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am very sorry," said Stretton, gravely.</p> + +<p class="normal">Certainly Barbier looked to be lying at death's door. One hand and +arm, emaciated and the colour of wax, lay outside upon the coverlet of +the bed. His eyes, unnaturally lustrous, unnaturally large, shone +deep-sunken in dark purple rings. His eyelids were red, as though with +much weeping, and, below the eyes, his face was drawn with fever and +very white. Stretton laid his hand gently upon Barbier's forehead. It +was burning hot. Stretton dismissed the orderly with a nod. There was +a haggard nobility in Barbier's appearance--his long, finely shaped +hands, his lithe, well-knit figure, all betrayed the man of race. Yet +he had once sunk to babbling about persecution at a fire in the +desert, like any morbid child.</p> + +<p class="normal">A heavy step sounded in the ward, and Stretton's colonel stood beside +him, a stoutly built man, with a white moustache and imperial, and a +stern yet not unkindly face. It expressed a deal of solicitude at this +moment.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have seen the doctor this morning," said the colonel, "and he has +given up hope. Barbier will hardly live out the night. They should +never have sent him to us here. They should not have discharged him +from the asylum as cured."</p> + +<p class="normal">The idea of persecution had become fixed in Barbier's brain. It had +never left him since the evening when he first gave utterance to it in +the desert. The homeward march, indeed, had aggravated his mania. On +his return he had been sent to the asylum at Bel-Abbès, but there he +had developed cunning enough to conceal his hallucination. He had +ceased to complain that his officers were in a conspiracy to entrap +and ruin him, no more threats were heard, no more dangerous stealthy +glances detected. He was sent back to his battalion at Ain-Sefra. A +few weeks and again his malady was manifest, and on the top of that +had come fever.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am very sorry," Stretton said again; and then, after looking about +him and perceiving that the orderly was out of earshot, he bent down +towards Barbier, lower than he had bent before, and he called upon him +in a still lower voice.</p> + +<p class="normal">But Barbier was no longer the name he used.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Monsieur le Comte," he said, first of all, and then "Monsieur de----" +He uttered a name which the generation before had made illustrious in +French diplomacy.</p> + +<p class="normal">At the sound of the name Barbier's face contracted. He started up in +his bed upon one arm.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Hush!" he cried. A most extraordinary change had come over him in a +second. His eyes protruded, his mouth hung half open, his face was +frozen into immobility by horror. "There is some one on the stairs," +he whispered, "coming up--some one treading very lightly--but coming +up--coming up." He inclined his head in the strained attitude of one +listening with a great concentration and intentness, an image of +terror and suspense. "Yes, coming up--coming up! Don't lock the door! +That betrays all. Turn out the lights! Quickly! So. Oh, will this +night ever pass!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He ended with a groan of despair. Very gently Stretton laid him down +again in the bed and covered him over with the clothes. The sweat +rolled in drops from Barbier's forehead.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He never tells us more, my colonel," said Stretton. "His real +name-yes!--he betrayed that once to me. But of this night nothing more +than the dread that it will never pass. Always he ends with those +words. Yet it was that night, no doubt, which tossed him beyond the +circle of his friends and dropped him down here, a man without a name, +amongst the soldiers of the Legion."</p> + +<p class="normal">Often Stretton's imagination had sought to pierce the mystery. What +thing of horror had been done upon that night? In what town of France? +Had the some one on the stairs turned the handle and entered the room +when all the lights were out? Had he heard Barbier's breathing in the +silent darkness of the room? Stretton could only reconstruct the +scene. The stealthy footsteps on the stairs, the cautious turning of +the door handle, the opening of the door, and the impenetrable +blackness with one man, perhaps more than one, holding his breath +somewhere, and crouching by the wall. But no hint escaped the sick +man's lips of what there was which must needs be hidden, nor whether +the thing which must needs be hidden was discovered by the one who +trod so lightly on the stairs. Was it a dead man? Was it a dead woman? +Or a woman alive? There was no answer. There was no knowledge to be +gained, it seemed, but this--that because of that night a man in +evening dress, who bore an illustrious name, had fled at daybreak on a +summer morning to the nearest barracks, and had buried his name and +all of his past life in the Foreign Legion.</p> + +<p class="normal">As it happened, there was just a little more knowledge to be gained by +Stretton. He learned it that morning from his colonel.</p> + +<p class="normal">"When you told me who 'Barbier' really was, sergeant," said the +colonel, "I made inquiries. Barbier's father died two years ago; but +an uncle and a sister lived. I wrote to both, offering to send their +relation back to them. Well, the mail has this morning come in from +France."</p> + +<p class="normal">"There is an answer, sir?" asked Stretton.</p> + +<p class="normal">"From the uncle," replied the colonel. "Not a word from the sister; +she does not mean to write. The uncle's letter makes that clear, I +think. Read!" He handed the letter to Stretton. A cheque was enclosed, +and a few words were added.</p> + +<p class="normal">"See, if you please, that Barbier wants for nothing which can minister +to body and soul."</p> + +<p class="normal">That was all. There was no word of kindliness or affection. Barbier +was dying. Let him, therefore, have medicine and prayers. Love, wishes +for recovery, a desire that he should return to his friends, +forgiveness for the thing which he had done, pity for the sufferings +which had fallen to him--these things Fusilier Barbier must not +expect. Stretton, reading the letter by the sick man's bed, thought it +heartless and callous as no letter written by a human hand had ever +been. Yet--yet, after all, who knew what had happened on that night? +The uncle, evidently. It might be something which dishonoured the +family beyond all reparation, which, if known, would have disgraced a +great name, so that those who bore it in pride must now change it for +very shame. Perhaps the father had died because of it, perhaps the +sister had been stricken down. Stretton handed the letter back to his +colonel.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is very sad, sir," he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, it is very sad," returned the colonel. "But for us this letter +means nothing at all. Never speak of it, obliterate it from your +memories." He tore the paper into the tiniest shreds. "We have no +reproaches, no accusations for what Barbier did before Barbier got out +of the train at Sidi Bel-Abbès. That is not our affair. For us the +soldier of the Legion is only born on the day when he enlists."</p> + +<p class="normal">Thus, in one sentence, the colonel epitomised the character of the +Foreign Legion. It was a fine saying, Stretton thought. He knew it to +be a true one.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will say nothing," said Stretton, "and I will forget."</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is well. Come with me, for there is another letter which +concerns you."</p> + +<p class="normal">He turned upon his heel and left the hospital. Stretton followed him +to his quarters.</p> + +<p class="normal">"There is a letter from the War Office which concerns you, Sergeant +Ohlsen," said the colonel, with a smile. "You will be gazetted, under +your own name, to the first lieutenancy which falls vacant. There is +the notification."</p> + +<p class="normal">He handed the paper over to Stretton, and shook hands with him. +Stretton was not a demonstrative man. He took the notification with no +more show of emotion than if it had been some unimportant order of the +day.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Thank you, sir," he said, quietly; and for a moment his eyes rested +on the paper.</p> + +<p class="normal">But, none the less, the announcement, so abruptly made, caused him a +shock. The words danced before his eyes so that he could not read +them. He saluted his colonel and went out on to the great open parade +ground, and stood there in the middle of that space, alone, under the +hot noonday sun.</p> + +<p class="normal">The thing for which he had striven had come to pass, then. He held the +assurance of it in his hand. Hoped for and half-expected as that proof +had been ever since he had led the survivors of the geographical +expedition under the gate of Ouargla, its actual coming was to him +most wonderful. He looked southwards to where the streak of yellow +shone far away. The long marches, the harassing anxiety, the haunting +figures of the Touaregs, with their faces veiled in their black masks +and their eyes shining between the upper and the lower strip--yes, +even those figures which appalled the imagination in the retrospect by +a suggestion of inhuman ferocity--what were they all but +contributaries to this event? His ordeal was over. He had done enough. +He could go home.</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton did not want for modesty. He had won a commission from the +ranks, it is true; but he realised that others had done this before, +and under harder conditions. He himself had started with an +advantage-the advantage of previous service in the English army. His +knowledge of the manual exercise, of company and battalion drill had +been of the greatest use at the first. He had had luck, too--the luck +to be sent on the expedition to the Figuig oasis, the luck to find +himself sergeant with Colonel Tavernay's force. His heart went out in +gratitude to that fine friend who lay in his bed of sand so far away. +Undoubtedly, he realised, his luck had been exceptional.</p> + +<p class="normal">He turned away from the parade ground and walked through the village, +and out of it towards a grove of palm trees. Under the shade of those +trees he laid himself down on the ground and made out his plans. He +would obtain his commission, secure his release, and so go home. A few +months and he would be home! It seemed hardly credible; yet it was +true, miraculously true. He would write home that very day. It was not +any great success which he had achieved, but, at all events, he was no +longer the man who was no good. He could write with confidence; he +could write to Millie.</p> + +<p class="normal">He lay under the shadow of the palms looking across to the village. +There rose a little mosque with a white dome. The hovels were thatched +for the most part, but here and there a square white-washed house, +with a flat roof, overtopped the rest. Hedges of cactus and prickly +pears walled in the narrow lanes, and now and then a white robe +appeared and vanished. Very soon Stretton would turn his back upon +Algeria. In the after time he would remember this afternoon, remember +the village as he saw it now, and the yellow streak of desert sand in +the distance.</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton lay on his back and put together the sentences which he +would write that day to Millie. She would get the letter within ten +days--easily. He began to hum over to himself the words of the coon +song which had once been sung on a summer night in an island of +Scotland--</p> +<div class="poem1"> +<p class="t0" style="text-indent:-8pt"> +"Oh, come out, mah love. I'm a-waitin' fo' you heah!<br> +Doan' you keep yuh window shut to-night.<br> +De tree-tops above am a-whisp'rin' to you, deah----"</p> +</div> + +<p class="normal">And then he stopped suddenly. At last he began to wonder how Millie +would receive the letter he was to write.</p> + +<p class="normal">Yes, there was her point of view to be considered. Stretton was +stubborn by nature as few men are. He had convinced himself that the +course he had taken was the only course which promised happiness for +Millie and himself, and impelled by that conviction he had gone on his +way undisturbed by doubts and questions. Now, however, his object was +achieved. He could claim exemption from his wife's contempt. His mind +had room for other thoughts, and they came that afternoon.</p> + +<p class="normal">He had left his wife alone, with no explanation of his absence to +offer to her friends, without even any knowledge of his whereabouts. +There had been no other way, he still believed. But it was hard on +Millie--undoubtedly it was hard.</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton rose from the ground and set off towards the camp that he +might write his letter. But he never wrote it, for as he walked along +the lane towards the barracks a man tapped him on the shoulder from +behind. He was still humming his song, and he stopped in the middle of +it--</p> +<div class="poem1"> +<p class="t0" style="text-indent:-8pt">"Jus' look out an' see all de longin' in mah eyes,<br> +An' mah arms is jus' a-pinin' foh to hug you,"</p> +</div> + +<p class="normal">he said, and turned about on his heel. He saw a stranger in European +dress, who at once spoke his name.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Sir Anthony Stretton?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton was no longer seeking to evade discovery.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes?" he said. The stranger's face became vaguely familiar to him. "I +have seen you before, I think."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Once," replied the other. "My name is Warrisden. You saw me for a few +minutes on the deck of a fish-carrier in the North Sea."</p> + +<p class="normal">"To be sure," he said slowly. "Yes, to be sure, I did. You were sent +to find me by Miss Pamela Mardale."</p> + +<p class="normal">"She sends me again," replied Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton's heart sank in fear. He had disobeyed the summons before. He +remembered Pamela's promise to befriend his wife. He remembered her +warning that he should not leave his wife.</p> + +<p class="normal">"She sent you then with an urgent message that I should return home," +he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I carry the same message again, only it is a thousand times more +urgent."</p> + +<p class="normal">He drew a letter from his pocket as he spoke, and handed it to +Stretton. "I was to give you this," he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton looked at the handwriting and nodded.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Thank you," he said gravely.</p> + +<p class="normal">He tore open the envelope and read.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XXV</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_25" href="#div1Ref_25">TONY STRETTON BIDS FAREWELL TO THE LEGION</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">It was a long letter. Tony read it through slowly, standing in the +narrow lane between the high walls of prickly pear. A look of +incredulity came upon his face.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Is all this true?" he asked, not considering at all of whom he asked +the question.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I know nothing, of course, of what is written there," replied +Warrisden; "but I do not doubt its truth. The signature is, I think, +sufficient guarantee."</p> + +<p class="normal">"No doubt, no doubt," said Stretton, absently. Then he asked--</p> + +<p class="normal">"When did you reach Ain-Sefra?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"This morning."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And you came quickly?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes; I travelled night and day, I came first of all to Ain-Sefra in +search of you."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Thank you," said Stretton.</p> + +<p class="normal">He did not ask how it was that Warrisden had come first of all to +Ain-Sefra; such details held no place in his thoughts. Warrisden <i>had</i> +found him, <i>had</i> brought the letter which Pamela Mardale had written. +That letter, with its perplexities and its consequences, obliterated +all other speculations.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have a camp here?" Stretton asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Let us go to it. The news you have brought has rather stunned me. I +should like to sit down and think what I must do."</p> + +<p class="normal">The incredulity had vanished from his face. Distress had replaced it.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is all true, no doubt," he went on, "but for the moment I don't +understand it. Will you tell me where your camp is?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will show you the way," said Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I think not. It will be better that we should not be seen together," +Stretton said thoughtfully. "Will you give me the direction and go +first? I will follow."</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden's camp was pitched amongst trees a hundred yards from the +western borders of the village. It stood in a garden of grass, +enclosed with hedges. Thither Stretton found his way by a roundabout +road, approaching the camp from the side opposite to Ain-Sefra. There +was no one, at the moment, loitering about the spot. He walked into +the garden. There were three tents pitched. Half a dozen mules stood +picketed in a line, a little Barbary horse lay on the grass, some +Algerian muleteers were taking their ease, and outside the chief tent +a couple of camp chairs were placed. Warrisden came forward as +Stretton entered the garden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Sit down," he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Inside the tent, I think," replied Stretton.</p> + +<p class="normal">There he read the letter through again. He understood at last what +Pamela had meant by the warning which had baffled him. Pamela revealed +its meaning now. "Millie is not of those women," she wrote, "who have +a vivid remembrance. To hold her, you must be near her. Go away, she +will cry her eyes out; stay away for a little while, she will long for +your return; make that little while a longer time, she will grow +indifferent whether you return or not; prolong that longer time, she +will regard your return as an awkwardness, a disturbance; add yet a +little more to that longer time, and you will find another occupying +your place in her thoughts." Then followed an account of the growth of +that dangerous friendship between Millie and Lionel Callon. A summary +of Callon's character rounded the description off. "So come home," she +concluded, "at once, for no real harm has been done yet."</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton understood what the last sentence meant, and he believed it. +Yet his mind revolted against the phrase. Of course, it was Pamela's +phrase. Pamela, though frank, was explaining the position in words +which could best spare Millie. But it was an unfortunate sentence. It +provoked a momentary wave of scorn, which swept over Stretton. There +was a postscript: "You yourself are really a good deal to blame." Thus +it ran; but Stretton was in no mood to weigh its justice or injustice +at the moment. Only this afternoon he had been lying under the palm +trees putting together in his mind the sentences which were to tell +Millie of his success, to re-establish him in her esteem, and to +prepare her for his return. And now this letter had come. He sat for a +time frowning at the letter, turning its pages over, glancing now at +one phrase, now at another. Then he folded it up. "Callon," he said, +softly; and then again, "Lionel Callon. I will talk with Mr. Callon." +For all its softness, his voice sounded to Warrisden the voice of a +dangerous man. And after he had spoken in this way he sat in thought, +saying nothing, making no movement, and his face gave Warrisden no +clue as to what he thought. At the last he stirred in his chair.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well?" said Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I shall return at once to England."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You can?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes; I shall start to-night," said Stretton.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We can go back together, then."</p> + +<p class="normal">"No; that's impossible."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Why?" asked Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Because I should be arrested if we did," Stretton replied calmly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Arrested?" Warrisden exclaimed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes; you see I shall have to desert to-night."</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden started from his chair.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Surely there is an alternative?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"None," replied Stretton; and Warrisden slowly resumed his seat. He +was astounded; he had never contemplated this possibility. He looked +at Stretton in wonder. He could not understand how a man could speak +so calmly of such a plan. Why in the world had Stretton ever joined +the Legion if he was so ready, at the first summons, to desert? There +seemed an inconsistency. But he did not know Tony Stretton.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are surprised," said Tony. "More than surprised--you are rather +shocked; but there is no choice for me. I wish with all my heart and +soul there were," he suddenly exclaimed, with a sort of passion. "I +have foreseen this necessity ever since you tapped me on the shoulder +in the lane. Because I foresaw it, I would not walk with you to your +camp. Were we seen together to-day, the reason of my absence might be +the sooner suspected. As it is, I shall get a day's start, for I have +a good name in the regiment, and a day's start is all I need."</p> + +<p class="normal">He spoke sadly and wistfully. He was caught by an inexorable fate, and +knew it. He just had to accept the one course open to him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You see," he explained, "I am a soldier of the Legion--that is to +say, I enlisted for five years' service in the French colonies. I +could not get leave."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Five years!" cried Warrisden. "You meant to stay five years away?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," replied Stretton. "If things went well with me here, as up till +to-day they have done, if, in a word, I did what I enlisted to do, I +should have gone to work to buy myself out and get free. That can be +done with a little influence and time-only time is the one thing I +have not now. I must go home at once, since no harm has yet been done. +Therefore I must desert. I am very sorry"--and again the wistfulness +became very audible--"for, as I say, I have a good name; amongst both +officers and men I have a good name. I should have liked very much to +have left a good name behind me. Sergeant Ohlsen"--and as he uttered +the name he smiled. "They speak well of Sergeant Ohlsen in the Legion, +Warrisden; and to-morrow they will not. I am very sorry. I have good +friends amongst both officers and men. I shall have lost them all +to-morrow. I am sorry. There is only one thing of which I am glad +to-day. I am glad that Captain Tavernay is dead."</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden knew nothing at all of Captain Tavernay. Until this moment +he had never heard his name. But Stretton was speaking with a +simplicity so sincere, and so genuine a sorrow, that Warrisden could +not but be deeply moved. He forgot the urgency of his summons; he +ceased to think how greatly Stretton's immediate return would help his +own fortunes. He cried out upon the impulse--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Stay, then, until you can get free without----" And he stopped, +keeping unspoken the word upon his lips.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Without disgrace."</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton finished the sentence with a smile.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Say it! Without disgrace. That was the word upon your tongue. I can't +avoid disgrace. I have come to such a pass in my life's history that, +one way or another, I can't avoid it. I thought just at the first +moment that I could let things slide and stay. But there's dishonour +in that course, too. Dishonour for myself, dishonour for my +name, dishonour for others, too, whom it is my business--yes, my +business--to keep from dishonour. That's the position--disgrace if I +stay, disgrace if I go. It seems to me there's no rule of conduct +which applies. I must judge for myself."</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton spoke with some anger in his voice, anger with those who had +placed him in so cruel a position, anger, perhaps, in some measure, +with himself. For in a little while he said--</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is quite true that I am myself to blame, too. I want to be just. I +was a fool not to have gone into the house the evening I was in +London, after I had come back from the North Sea. Yes, I should have +gone in then; and yet--I don't know. I had thought my course all out. +I don't know."</p> + +<p class="normal">He had thought his course out, it is true; but he had thought it out +in ignorance of his wife's character. That was the trouble, as he +clearly saw now.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Anyhow, I must go to-night," he said, rising from his chair. In an +instant he had become the practical man, arranging the means to an end +already resolved upon.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I can borrow money of you?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And a mule?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Let me choose my mule."</p> + +<p class="normal">They walked from the tent to where the mules stood picketed. Warrisden +pointed to one in the middle of the line.</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is the strongest."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I don't want one too strong, too obviously well-fed," said Stretton; +and he selected another. "Can I borrow a muleteer for an hour or two?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Of course," said Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton called a muleteer towards him and gave him orders.</p> + +<p class="normal">"There is a market to-day," he said. "Go to it and buy." He enumerated +the articles he wanted, ticking them off upon his fingers--a few pairs +of scissors and knives, a few gaudy silk handkerchiefs, one or two +cheap clocks, some pieces of linen, needles and thread--in fact, a +small pedlar's pack of wares. In addition, a black jellaba and cap, +such as the Jews must wear in Morocco, and a native's underclothes and +slippers.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Bring these things back to the camp at once and speak to no one!" +said Stretton.</p> + +<p class="normal">The muleteer loosed a mule to carry the packages, and went off upon +his errand. Stretton and Warrisden went back to the tent. Stretton sat +down again in his chair, took a black cigarette from a bright-blue +packet which he had in his pocket and lighted it, as though all the +arrangements for his journey were now concluded.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I want you to pack the mule I chose with the things which your +muleteer brings back. Add some barley for the mule and some food for +me, and bring it with the clothes to the south-west corner of the +barrack wall at eight. It will be dark then. Don't come before it is +dark, and wait for me at the corner. Will you?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," replied Warrisden. "You are going to tramp to the coast? Surely +you can come as one of my men as far as the rail-head. Then I will go +on and wait for you at Algiers."</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," said Stretton; "our ways lie altogether apart. It would be too +dangerous for me to tramp through Algeria. I should certainly be +stopped. That's my way."</p> + +<p class="normal">He raised his arm and pointed through the tent door.</p> + +<p class="normal">The tent door faced the west, and in front there rose a range of +mountains, dark and lofty, ridge overtopping ridge, and wonderfully +distinct. In that clear air the peaks and gaps, and jagged <i>arêtes</i> +were all sharply defined. The sun was still bright, and the dark +cliffs had a purple bloom of extraordinary softness and beauty, like +the bloom upon a ripe plum. Here and there the mountains were capped +with snow, and the snow glistened like silver.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Those mountains are in Morocco," said Stretton. "That's my way--over +them. My only way. We are on the very edge of Morocco here."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But, once over the border," Warrisden objected, "are you safe in +Morocco?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Safe from recapture."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But safe in no other sense?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton shrugged his shoulders.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is a bad road, I know--dangerous and difficult. The ordinary +traveller cannot pass along it. But it has been traversed. Prisoners +have escaped that way to Fez--Escoffier, for instance. Deserters have +reached their homes by following it--some of them, at all events. One +must take one's risks."</p> + +<p class="normal">It was the old lesson learned upon the ketch <i>Perseverance</i> which +Stretton now repeated; and not vainly learned. Far away to the south, +in the afternoon sunlight, there shone that yellow streak of sand, +beyond which its value had been surely proved. Warrisden's thoughts +were carried back on a sudden to that morning of storm and foam and +roaring waves, when Stretton had stood easily upon the deck of the +fish-cutter, with the great seas swinging up behind him, and had, for +the first time, uttered it in Warrisden's hearing. Much the same +feeling came over Warrisden as that which had then affected him--a +feeling almost of inferiority. Stretton was a man of no more than +average ability, neither a deep thinker, nor a person of ingenuity and +resource; but the mere stubbornness of his character gave to him at +times a certain grandeur. In Warrisden's eyes he had that grandeur +now. He had come quickly to his determination to desert, but he had +come calmly to it. There had been no excitement in his manner, no +suggestion of hysteria. He had counted up the cost, he had read his +letter, he had held the balance between his sacrifice and Millie's +necessity; and he had decided. He had decided, knowing not merely the +disgrace, but the difficulties of his journey, and the danger of his +road amongst the wild, lawless tribes in that unsettled quarter of +Morocco. Again Warrisden was carried away. He forgot even Pamela at +Roquebrune waiting for the telegram he was to send from Oran on his +return. He cried--</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will send back my outfit and come with you. If we travel together +there will be more safety."</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton shook his head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Less," said he. "You cannot speak Mogrhebbin. I have a few +sentences--not many, but enough. I know something of these tribes, +too. For I once marched to the Figuig oasis. Your company would be no +protection; rather it would be an extra danger."</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden did not press his proposal. Stretton had so clearly made up +his mind.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Very well," he said. "You have a revolver, I suppose. Or shall I lend +you one?"</p> + +<p class="normal">And, to Warrisden's astonishment, Stretton replied--</p> + +<p class="normal">"I shall carry no weapons."</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden was already placing his arms of defence upon the table so +that Stretton might make his choice.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No weapons!" he exclaimed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No. My best chance to get through to Fez is to travel as a Jew +pedlar. That is why I am borrowing your mule and have sent your +muleteer to the market. A Jew can go in Morocco where no Moor can, for +he is not suspected; he is merely despised. Besides, he brings things +for sale which are needed. He may be robbed and beaten, but he has +more chance of reaching his journey's end in some plight or other than +any one else."</p> + +<p class="normal">Thereafter he sat for awhile silent, gazing towards the mountains in +the west. The snow glittering upon the peaks brought back to his mind +the flashing crystals in the great salt lakes. It was at just such a +time, on just such an afternoon, when the two companies of the Legion +had marched out from the trees of the high plateaux into the open +desert, with its grey-green carpet of halfa-grass. Far away the lake +had flashed like an arc of silver set in the ground. Stretton could +not but remember that expedition and compare it with the one upon +which he was now to start; and the comparison was full of bitterness. +Then high hopes had reigned. The companies were marching out upon the +Legion's special work; even if disaster overtook them, disaster would +not be without its glory. Stretton heard the clear inspiriting music +of the bugles, he listened to the steady tramp of feet. Now he was +deserting.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I shall miss the Legion," he said regretfully. "I had no idea how +much I should miss it until this moment."</p> + +<p class="normal">Its proud past history had grown dear to him. The recklessness of its +soldiers, the endless perplexing variety of their characters, the +secrets of their lives, of which every now and then, in a rare moment +of carelessness, a glimpse was revealed, as though a curtain were +raised and lowered--all these particular qualities of the force had +given to it a grip upon his affections of which he felt the full +strength now.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Any other life," he said, "cannot but be a little dull, a little +uninteresting afterwards. I shall miss the Legion very much."</p> + +<p class="normal">Suddenly he put his hand into his pocket and took out of it that +letter from the French War Office which his colonel had handed to him. +"Look!" and he handed it over to Warrisden. "That is what I joined the +Legion to win--a commission; and I have just not won it. In a month or +two, perhaps in a week, perhaps even to-morrow, it might have been +mine. Very soon I should have been back at home, the life I have +dreamed of and worked for ever since I left London, might have been +mine to live. It was to have been a good life of great happiness"--he +had forgotten, it seemed, that he would regret the Legion--"a life +without a flaw. Now that life's impossible, and I am a deserter. It's +hard lines, isn't it?"</p> + +<p class="normal">He rose from his chair, and looked for a moment at Warrisden in +silence.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am feeling sorry that I ever came," said Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh no," Stretton answered, with a smile. "It would have been still +worse if I had stayed here, ignorant of the news you have brought +me, and had come home in my own time. Things would have been much +worse--beyond all remedy. Do you know a man named Callon--Lionel +Callon?" he asked abruptly. And before Warrisden could answer, the +blood rushed into his face, and he exclaimed, "Never mind; don't +answer! Be at the corner of the barracks with the mule at eight." And +he went from the tent, cautiously made his way out of the garden, and +returned to his quarters.</p> + +<p class="normal">A few minutes before eight Warrisden drove the mule, packed with +Stretton's purchases, to the south-western corner of the barracks. The +night was dark, no one was abroad, the place without habitations. He +remained under the shadow of the high wall, watching this way and that +for Stretton's approach; and in a few minutes he was almost startled +out of his wits by a heavy body falling from the top of the wall upon +the ground at his side. Warrisden, indeed, was so taken by surprise +that he uttered a low cry.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Hush!" said a voice close to the ground. "It's only me."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And Stretton rose to his feet. He had dropped from the summit of the +wall.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Are you hurt?" whispered Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No. Have you the clothes? Thanks!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton stripped off his uniform, and put on the Jewish dress. He had +shaved off his moustache and blacked his hair. As he dressed he gave +two or three small packages to Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Place them in the pack; hide them, if possible. That package contains +my medals. I shall need them. The other's lamp-black. I shall want +that for my hair. Glossy raven locks," he said, with a low laugh, "are +not so easily procured in Ain-Sefra as in Bond Street. I have been +thinking. You can help me if you will; you can shorten the time of my +journey."</p> + +<p class="normal">"How?" asked Warrisden.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Go back to Oran as quickly as possible. Take the first boat to +Tangier. Hire an outfit there, mules and horses--but good ones, +mind!--and travel up at once to Fez. If you are quick you can do it +within a fortnight. I shall take a fortnight at the least to reach +Fez. I may be three weeks. But if I find you there, ready to start the +moment I come to the town, we shall save much time."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Very well; I will be there."</p> + +<p class="normal">"If I get through sooner than I expect, I shall go straight on to +Tangier, and we will meet on the road. Now let me climb on to your +shoulders." Stretton made a bundle of his uniform, climbed on to +Warrisden's shoulders, and threw it over the wall into the barrack +yard.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But that will betray you!" cried Warrisden, in a whisper. "They will +find your clothes in the morning--clothes with a sergeant's stripes."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I cannot help that," replied Stretton, as he jumped to the ground. "I +do not intend to be shot as a thief, for that is what may happen when +a man deserts and takes his uniform with him. Don't fail me in Fez. +Good-bye."</p> + +<p class="normal">He held out his hand, and, as Warrisden grasped it, he said--</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have not said much to you in the way of thanks; but I am very +grateful, however much I may have seemed to have been made unhappy by +your coming. Since things are as they are, I am glad you came. I thank +you, too, for that other visit to the North Sea. I will give you +better thanks when we meet in Fez."</p> + +<p class="normal">He cast a glance back to the wall of the barracks, and, in a voice +which trembled, so deeply was he moved, he whispered to himself, +rather than to Warrisden--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, but I am glad Tavernay is dead!"</p> + +<p class="normal">All else that he had said since he dropped from the wall had been said +hurriedly and without emotion. These last words were whispered from a +heart overcharged with sorrow. They were his farewell to the Legion. +He turned away, and, driving the mule before him, vanished into the +darkness.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XXVI</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_26" href="#div1Ref_26">BAD NEWS FOR PAMELA</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden struck his camp early the next morning, and set out for the +rail-head. Thence he travelled to Oran. At Oran he was fortunate +enough to find a steamer of the Lambert Line in the harbour, which was +preparing to sail that afternoon for Tangier. Warrisden had three +hours to pass in Oran. He went at once to the post-office and +despatched his telegram to Pamela Mardale at the Villa Pontignard. The +telegram informed her that Tony Stretton was returning, though his +journey might take longer than she would naturally expect; and, +secondly, that he himself was sailing that day for Tangier, whither +any message should be sent at once to await his arrival at the English +post-office. The telegram was couched in vague phrases. Tony Stretton, +for instance, was called "The Truant." Pamela became more and more +disquieted by the vagueness of its wording. She pondered, and in vain, +why in the world Warrisden must be sailing to Tangier. It seemed +certain that there were difficulties in the way of Tony's home-coming +which she had not foreseen, and at the nature of which she could not +conjecture. She sent off a reply to Tangier--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Bring truant to Roquebrune as soon as possible."</p> + +<p class="normal">For, on thinking over the new aspect which her problem presented, now +that Lionel Callon had come to the Riviera, she had come to the +conclusion that this was the safest plan.</p> + +<p class="normal">If Millie Stretton did not come to the south of France, no harm would +have been done; whereas, if she did, and Tony went straight home to +England, the last chance of saving her would be lost.</p> + +<p class="normal">This message, however, did little to reassure Pamela. For the more she +thought of Warrisden's telegram, the more she was troubled. Tony was +returning. Yes, that was something--that was a great thing. But he was +going to take a long time in returning, and, to Pamela's apprehension, +there was no long time to spare. And the day after she had received +the telegram she came upon still stronger reasons for disquietude.</p> + +<p class="normal">She went down to Monte Carlo in the morning, and again saw Lionel +Callon upon the terrace, and again noticed that he was alone. Yet on +the whole she was not surprised. Millie Stretton's name figured as yet +in no visitors' list, and Pamela was quite sure that if Millie +Stretton had come south the name would have been inserted. It was +impossible that Millie Stretton could come to Monte Carlo, or to, +indeed, any hotel upon the Riviera, under a false name. She could not +but meet acquaintances and friends at every step, during this season +of the year. To assume a name which was not hers would be an act of +stupidity too gross. None the less Pamela was relieved. She avoided +Callon's notice, and acting upon a sudden impulse, went out from the +garden, hired a carriage, and ordered the coachman to drive along the +lower Corniche Road in the direction of Beaulieu.</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela was growing harassed and anxious. The days were passing, and no +message had yet come from Alan Warrisden. She suspected the presence +of Lionel Callon on the Riviera more and more. More and more she +dreaded the arrival of Millie Stretton. There was nothing now which +she could do. She had that hard lot which falls to women, the lot of +waiting. But she could not wait with folded hands. She must be doing +something; even though that something were altogether trivial and +useless, it still helped her through the hours. In this spirit she +drove out from Monte Carlo at twelve o'clock, without a thought that +her drive was to assist her toward the end on which she had set her +heart.</p> + +<p class="normal">She drove past the back of the big hotel at Eze. Just beyond, a deep +gorge runs from the hills straight down to the sea. The road carves +round the head of the gorge and bends again to the shore. Pamela drove +round the gorge, and coming again to the shore, went forward by the +side of the sea. After a few minutes she bade the driver stop. In +front of her the road rose a little, and then on the other side of the +crest dipped down a steep hill. On her left a pair of iron gates stood +open. From those gates a carriage-drive ran in two zigzags between +borders of flowers down to an open gravel space in front of a long +one-storied building. The building faced upon the road, but at a lower +level, so that even the flat roof was below Pamela. The building was +prettily built, and roses and magnolias climbed against the walls, +making it gay. The door in the middle stood open, but there was no +sign of life about the house. Pamela sat gazing down into the garden, +with its bushes and brightly-coloured flowers.</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela spoke to the driver.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What place is this?" she asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It was only built last year," the man replied, and he told her enough +for her to know that this was the <i>Réserve</i> at which Lionel Callon was +staying.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Few people come here?" said Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is not known yet," replied the driver. "It is such a little while +since it has been opened."</p> + +<p class="normal">The sun was bright. Beyond the <i>Réserve</i> the Mediterranean rippled and +sparkled--here the deepest blue, there breaking into points of golden +light. The <i>Réserve</i> itself had the look of a country house in a rich +garden of flowers tended with love. In the noonday the spot was very +quiet and still. Yet to Pamela it had the most sinister aspect. It +stood in a solitary position, just beneath the road. In its very +quietude there was to her harassed thoughts something clandestine.</p> + +<p class="normal">She knew that Callon was in Monte Carlo. She told her driver to drive +down to the door, and at the door she stepped down and walked into the +building. A large dining-room opened out before her in which two +waiters lounged. There were no visitors. The waiters came forward. +"Would Madame take luncheon in the room, or on the terrace at the back +over the sea?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"On the terrace," Pamela replied.</p> + +<p class="normal">She lunched quite alone on a broad, flagged terrace, with the sea +gently breaking at its foot. The greater portion of the building was +occupied by the restaurant, but at one end Pamela noticed a couple of +French windows. She remarked to the waiter who served her upon the +absence of any visitors but herself.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is only this season, Madame, that the restaurant is open," he +replied.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Can people stay here?" she asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes. There are two suites of rooms. One is occupied; but the other is +vacant, if Madame would care to see it."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela rose and followed him. He opened one of the French windows. A +dining-room furnished with elegance, and lightly decorated; a +sitting-room, and a bedroom comprised the suite. Pamela came back to +the terrace. She was disquieted. It was impossible, of course, that +Millie Stretton should stay at the <i>Réserve</i>; but the whole look of +the place troubled her.</p> + +<p class="normal">She mounted into her carriage and drove back. In front of her the +great hotel of Eze stood high upon a promontory above the railway. A +thought came to Pamela. She drove back round the head of the gorge, +and when she came to the hotel she bade the coachman drive in. In the +open space in front of the hotel she took tea. She could not see the +restaurant itself, but she could see the road rising to the little +hill-crest beside it. It was very near, she thought. She went into the +hotel, and asked boldly at the office--</p> + +<p class="normal">"When do you expect Lady Stretton?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Lady Stretton?" The clerk in the office looked up his books. "In +three weeks, Madame," he said. "She has engaged her rooms from the +31st."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Thank you," said Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">She mounted into her carriage and drove back to Monte Carlo. So Millie +Stretton was coming to the Riviera after all. She had refused to come +with Pamela, yet she was coming by herself. She had declared she would +not leave England this spring. But she had made that declaration +before Lionel Callon had returned from Chili. Now Callon was here, and +she was following. Pamela could not doubt that her coming was part of +a concerted plan. The very choice of the hotel helped to convince her. +It was so near to that at which Callon was staying. Twenty minutes' +walk at the most would separate them. Moreover, why should Callon +choose that lonely restaurant without some particular, nay, some +secret object? No one, it seemed, visited it in the day; no one but he +slept there at night. Callon was not the man to fall in love with +solitude. And if he had wished for solitude he would not have come to +the Riviera at all. Besides, he spent his days in Monte Carlo, as +Pamela well knew. No, it was not loneliness at which he aimed, but +secrecy. That was it--secrecy. Pamela's heart sank within her. She had +a momentary thought that she would disclose her presence to Lionel +Callon, and dismissed it. The disclosure would alter Callon's plan, +that was all; it would not hinder the fulfilment. It would drive +Millie and him from the Riviera--it would not prevent them from +meeting somewhere else. It would be better, indeed, that, if meet they +must, they should meet under her eyes. For some accident might happen, +some unforeseen opportunity occur of which she could take advantage to +separate them. It was not known to Callon that she was on the spot. +After all, that was an advantage. She must meet secrecy with secrecy. +She urged her coachman to quicken his pace. She drove straight to the +post-office at Monte Carlo. Thence she despatched a second telegram to +Alan Warrisden at Tangier.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do not fail to arrive by the 31st," she telegraphed; and upon that +took the train back to Roquebrune. She could do no more now; but the +knowledge that she could do no more only aggravated her fears. +Questions which could not be answered thronged upon her mind. "Would +the telegram reach Tangier in time? What was Alan Warrisden doing at +Tangier at all? What hindered them coming straight from Algeria to +France?" Well, there were three weeks still. She sent up her prayer +that those three weeks might bring Tony Stretton back, that Millie +might be saved for him. She walked up the steps from Roquebrune +station very slowly. She did not look up as she climbed. Had she done +so she might, perhaps, have seen a head above the parapet in the +little square where the school-house stood; and she would certainly +have seen that head suddenly withdrawn as her head was raised. M. +Giraud was watching her furtively, as he had done many a time since +she had come to Roquebrune, taking care that she should not see him. +He watched her now, noticing that she walked with the same lagging, +weary step as when he had last seen her on that path so many years +ago. But as he watched she stopped, and, turning about, looked +southwards across the sea, and stood there for an appreciable time. +When she turned again and once more mounted the steps, it seemed to +him that the weariness had gone. She walked buoyantly, like one full +of faith, full of hope; and he caught a glimpse of her face. It seemed +to him that it had become transfigured, and that the eyes were looking +at some vision which was visible to her eyes alone. Pamela had come +back. Indeed, at the end of all her perplexities and conjectures, to +the belief born of her new love, that somehow the world would right +itself, that somehow in a short while she would hear whispered upon +the wind, answered by the ripples of the sea, and confirmed by the one +voice she longed to hear, the sentinel's cry, "All's well."</p> + +<p class="normal">The messages which Pamela had sent to Warrisden reached him at +Tangier. He found them both waiting for him the day after they had +been sent. He had twenty days in front of him. If Tony kept to his +time, twenty days would serve. He hired a camp outfit, and the best +mules to be obtained in Tangier on that day. The same evening he +bought a couple of barbs, well recommended to him for speed and +endurance.</p> + +<p class="normal">"They will amble at six miles an hour for ten hours a day," said one +whose advice he sought. Warrisden discounted the statement, but bought +the barbs. Early the nest morning he set out for Fez.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XXVII</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_27" href="#div1Ref_27">"BALAK!"</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">There are two cities of Fez. One is the city of the narrow, crowded +streets, where the cry, "Balak! Balak!"<a name="div2_01" href="#div2Ref_01"><sup>[1]</sup></a> resounds all day. Streets, +one terms them, since they are the main thoroughfares through which +all the merchandise of Morocco passes out to the four quarters of the +compass; but they are no wider than the alley-ways of an English +village, and in many places a man may stand in the centre and touch +the wall on either side. These streets are paved with big +cobblestones, but the stones are broken and displaced by the tramp of +centuries. If mended at all, they are mended with a millstone or any +chance slab of rock; but for the most part they are left unmended +altogether. For that is the fashion in Morocco. There they build and +make, and they do both things beautifully and well. But they seldom +finish; in a house, dainty with fountains and arabesques and coloured +tiles, you will still find a corner uncompleted, a pillar which lacks +the delicate fluting of the other pillars, an embrasure for a clock +half ornamented with gold filagree, and half left plain. And if they +seldom finish, they never by any chance repair. The mansion is built +and decorated within; artists fit the tiles together in a mosaic of +cool colours, and carve, and gild, and paint the little pieces of +cedar-wood, and glue them into the light and pointed arches; the rich +curtains are hung, and the master enters into his possession. There +follows the procession of the generations. The tiles crack, the +woodwork of the arches splits and falls, and the walls break and +crumble. The householder sits indifferent, and the whole house +corrodes. So, in the narrow streets, holes gape, and the water wears a +channel where it wills, and the mud lies thick and slippery on the +rounded stones; the streets ran steeply up and down the hills, wind +abruptly round corners, dive into tunnels. Yet men gallop about them +on their sure-footed horses, stumbling, slipping, but seldom falling. +"Balak!" they cry. "Balak!" and the man on foot is flung against the +wall or jostled out of the way. No one protests or resents.</p> + +<p class="normal">A file of donkeys, laden with wood or with grain, so fixed upon their +backs that the load grazes each street wall, blocks the way. "Balak!" +shouts the donkey-driver. And perhaps some nobleman of Fez, soft and +fat and indolent, in his blue cloak, who comes pacing on a mule no +less fat, preceded by his servants, must turn or huddle himself into +an embrasure. There are no social distinctions in the alley-ways of +Fez. It may be that one of those donkeys will fall then and there +beneath his load, and refuse to rise. His load will be taken from his +back, and if he still refuse, he will be left just where he fell, to +die. His owner walks on. It is no one's business to remove the animal. +There he lies in the middle of the street, and to him "Balak" will be +called in vain.</p> + +<p class="normal">A mounted troop of wild Berbers from the hills, with their long, +brass-bound guns slung across their backs, and gaudy handkerchiefs +about their heads, will ride through the bazaars, ragged of dress and +no less ragged in the harness of their horses. "Balak!" Very swiftly +way is made for them. Balak, indeed, is the word most often heard in +the streets of Fez.</p> + +<p class="normal">Those streets wind at times between the walls of gardens, and if the +walls are broken, as surely at some point they will be, a plot of +grass, a grove of orange trees hung with ruddy fruit, and a clump of +asphodel will shine upon the eyes in that brown and windowless city +like a rare jewel. At times, too, they pass beneath some spacious arch +into a place of width, or cross a bridge where one of the many streams +of the river Fez boils for a moment into the open, and then swirls +away again beneath the houses. But, chiefly, they run deep beneath the +towering walls of houses, and little of the sunlight visits them; so +that you may know a man of Fez, even though he be absent from his +town, by the pallor of his face. A householder, moreover, may build +over the street, if he can come to an agreement with his neighbour on +the opposite side, and then the alleys suddenly become tunnels, and +turn upon themselves in the dark. Or the walls so lean together at the +top that barely a finger's breadth of sky is visible as from the +bottom of a well.</p> + +<p class="normal">Into this city of dark streets Warrisden came upon an evening of +gloom. The night before he had camped on the slope of a hill by the +village of Segota. Never had he seen a spot more beautiful. He had +looked across the deep valley at his feet to the great buttress of +Jebel Zarhon, on a dark shoulder of which mountain one small, round, +white town was perched. A long, high range of grey hills--the last +barrier between him and Fez--cleft at one point by the road, rose on +the far side of the valley; and those hills and the fields beneath, +and the solitary crumbling castle which stood in the bottom amongst +the fields, were all magnified and made beautiful by the mists of +evening. The stars had come out overhead, behind him the lights shone +in his tent, and a cheerful fire crackled in the open near the door. +He had come up quickly from Tangier, and without hindrance, in spite +of warnings that the road was not safe. The next morning he would be +in Fez. It had seemed to him, then, that fortune was on his side. He +drew an augury of success from the clean briskness of the air. And +that confidence had remained with him in the morning. He had crossed +the valley early, and riding over the long pass on the other side, had +seen at last the snow-crowned spur of the Atlas on the further side of +the plain of Fez. He had descended into the plain, which perpetually +rose and fell like the billows of an ocean; and in the afternoon, from +the summit of one of these billows, he had suddenly seen, not an +hour's journey off, the great city of Fez, with its crenelated walls +and high minarets, a mass of grey and brown, with here and there a +splash of white, and here and there a single palm-tree, straggling +formlessly across the green plain. The sky had clouded over; the track +was now thronged with caravans of camels, and mules, and donkeys, and +wayfarers on foot going to and coming from the town; and before the +Bab Sagma, the great gate looking towards Mikkes, was reached, the +rain was falling.</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden had sent on the soldier who had ridden with him from +Tangier, to deliver a note to the Consul, and he waited with his +animals and his men for the soldier's return. The man came towards +dusk with word that a house had been secured in the town, and +Warrisden passed through the gate and down between the high +battlements of the Bugilud into the old town. And as he passed through +the covered bazaars and the narrow streets, in the gloom of the +evening, while the rain fell drearily from a sullen sky, his +confidence of the morning departed from him, and a great depression +chilled him to the heart. The high, cracked, bulging walls of the +houses, towering up without a window, the shrouded figures of the +passers-by, the falling light, the neglect as of a city of immemorial +age crumbling in decay, made of Fez to him that night a place of gloom +and forbidding mystery. He was in a mood to doubt whether ever he +would look on Tony Stretton's face again.</p> + +<p class="normal">In the narrowest of the alleys, where each of his stirrups touched a +wall, his guide stopped. It was almost pitch-dark here. By throwing +back his head, Warrisden could just see, far above him, a little slit +of light. His guide groped his way down a passage on the right, and at +the end opened with a key a ponderous black door. Warrisden stepped +over the sill, and found himself in a tiled court of which the roof +was open to the sky. On the first floor there was a gallery, and on +each of the four sides a long, narrow room, lofty, and closed with +great folding doors, opened on to the gallery. In one of these rooms +Warrisden had his bed set up. He sat there trying to read by the light +of a single candle, and listening to the drip of the rain.</p> + +<p class="normal">When he left Tangier, he had twenty-one days before he need be at +Roquebrune in answer to Pamela's summons. He had looked up the +steamers before he started. Four of those days would be needed to +carry them from Tangier to Roquebrune. He had reached Fez in five, and +he thus had twelve days left. In other words, if Stretton came to Fez +within a week, there should still be time, provided, of course, the +road to the coast was not for the moment cut by rebellious tribes. +That was the danger, as Warrisden's journey had told him. He +discounted the timorous statements of his dragoman, Ibrahim, but one +who knew had warned him at El Ksar. There was a risk.</p> + +<p class="normal">The night was cold. Warrisden wrapped himself in a Moorish jellaba of +fine, white wool, but he could not put on with it the Moorish patience +and indifference. The rain dripped upon the tiles of the court. Where +was Stretton, he wondered?</p> + +<p class="normal">He went to bed, and waked up in the middle of the night. He had left +the great doors of his bedroom open; the rain had stopped; and in the +stillness of the night he heard one loud voice, of an exquisite +beauty, vibrating over the roofs of the sleeping city, as though it +spoke from heaven itself. Warrisden lay listening to it, and +interpreting the words from the modulation of the voice which uttered +them. Now it rang out imperious as a summons, dropping down through +the open roofs to wake the sleepers in their beds. Now it rose, +lyrical and glorious, in a high chant of praise. Now it became +wistful, and trembled away pleading, yet with a passion of longing in +the plea. Warrisden could look upwards from his bed through the open +roof. The sky was clear again. Overhead were the bright stars, and +this solitary voice, most musical and strange, ringing out through the +silence.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was the mueddhin on the tower of the Karueein Mosque. For five +hours before the dawn the praises of Allah are sung from the summit of +the mosque's minaret. There are ten mueddhins to whom the service is +entrusted, and each sends out his chant above the sleeping city for +half an hour. But in the voice of this, one of the ten whom Warrisden +heard on the first night when he slept in Fez, there was a particular +quality. He listened for it during the nights which followed; expected +it, and welcomed its first note as one welcomes the coming of a +friend. It seemed to him that all the East was in that cry.</p> + +<p class="normal">It brought back to him sunsets when his camp was pitched by some +little village of tents or thatched mud-houses surrounded by hedges of +aloes and prickly pears--at Karia Ben Ouder, at Djouma--villages where +there was no mosque at all, but whence none the less the voice of a +priest dispersed its plaintive cry across the empty country of +marigolds and asphodels, startling the white cow-birds and the storks.</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden fell to thinking of Tony Stretton. He struck a match, and +looked at his watch. It was close upon the hour of dawn. Perhaps, just +at this moment, by some village in that wild, dark, mountain country +to the south-east, Stretton stirred in his sleep, and waked to hear +some such summons chanted about the village. Perhaps he was even now +loading his mule, and setting forth by the glimmer of the starlight +upon his dangerous road. Warrisden fell asleep again with that picture +in his mind, and woke to find the sunlight pouring through the square +opening of the roof. He drank his coffee, and mounting a little +winding stairway of broken steps, came out into that other city of +Fez, the city of the roof-tops.</p> + +<p class="normal">Fez is built upon the slope of a hill, and upon some of the flat roofs +Warrisden looked down and through the dark square holes of the +openings; to the parapets of others he looked up. Upon some there were +gardens planted--so, he thought, must have looked the hanging gardens +of Babylon; on others, linen was strung out to dry as in some backyard +of England; the minarets, here inlaid with white and green tiles, +there built simply of bricks and brown plaster, rose high into the +limpid air. And on the towers were the great nests of storks.</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden looked abroad, and in the sunlight his hopes revived. It +seemed that it must have been into another town that he had entered +last night. Nowhere could he see the gash of a street in that plateau +of roof-tops--so narrow they were; and no noise rose at all, they were +so deep. Here the only sound audible was the chattering of women's +voices--for the roofs are the playgrounds of the women, and Warrisden +could see them in their coloured handkerchiefs and robes clustered +together, climbing from one house to another with the help of ladders, +visiting their friends. But of all the clamour which must needs be +resounding in those crowded streets, not even one stray cry of +"Balak!" reached to this upper air. Lower down the hill to the east, +Warrisden could see the city wall and the gate through which Stretton +must pass when he came. And he might come to-day!</p> + +<p class="normal">That was Warrisden's thought. He went down the stairs, had his horse +brought into the dark street before the door, and, accompanied by his +<i>mehazni</i>, that old soldier who had ridden with him from Tangier, went +out of the city over the plain towards Sefru. For through that small +town of gardens and fruit at the base of the Atlas spur, Stretton +would come. But he did not come on that day, nor on the next. But, on +the other hand, Ibrahim, Warrisden's guide, brought bad news.</p> + +<p class="normal">He mounted to the roof in the morning, while Warrisden sat there after +his breakfast, and crouched down behind the parapet so that he might +not be seen. For the men leave the roof-tops to their women-folk, and +do not trespass there themselves.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Sir," said he, "the road between Djebel Silfat and Djebel Zarbon is +cut. Word has come into Fez this morning. The Z'mur have come down +from the hills, and sit across the road, stopping and robbing every +one."</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden sat up.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Are you sure?" he asked. He was, as he knew, in a country of liars. +Ibrahim, in addition, was a coward in the country districts, though +the best of braggarts at Tangier. He had ridden on his mule slung +about with weapons--a Spanish rifle on his back, a revolver in his +belt, and a Winchester in his hands; while between the fingers of his +left hand he carried ready four cartridges--but he was none the less +afraid. However, Warrisden remembered that mountain pass which led +from the plain of the Sebou up to Segota. It was very lonely, it was +narrow, the road looped perpetually round the bases of the round +buttresses of Djebel Silfat. It would certainly be an awkward place +wherein to be entrapped.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, yes, I am sure," replied Ibrahim, "the Z'mur are bad men. They +might capture you and hold you to ransom."</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden was inclined to discount Ibrahim's terror of the Z'mur. The +lawless deeds of that wild and fanatical tribe had been dinned into +his ears ever since he had crossed the Sebou; until he had come to +make light of them. But there was no doubt they terrorised the people; +in the villages where Warrisden had camped, they were spoken of with a +dread hardly less than that which Ibrahim betrayed. It would certainly +never do to be taken by the Z'mur. They would be released, no doubt; +but time would be wasted. They might be kept for weeks in the forest +of Marmura. They would reach Roquebrune too late.</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden had brought with him, as a servant, one of the men who had +been with him to Ain-Sefra, and descending the stairs he called him, +and spoke, bidding Ibrahim interpret.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do you remember the mule which I gave away at Ain-Sefra?" he asked. +And the man answered, "Yes!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"You would know it again?"</p> + +<p class="normal">The man was sure upon that point. He described the marks by which he +would recognise the beast.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Very well," said Warrisden. "Go out to the west of Fez, and watch the +road to Sefru. If you see a Jew come towards Fez driving the mule, +lead him at once to this house. Watch all day until the gate is +closed."</p> + +<p class="normal">The man went off upon his errand, and Warrisden betook himself to the +vice-consulate. On his return he summoned Ibrahim, and said--</p> + +<p class="normal">We must travel by Mequinez and Mediyah. A letter will be given to us, +passing us on from governor to governor. We can reach Larache, +travelling hard, in five days. We may find a steamer there for +Gibraltar. If not, we must go on, in one more day, to Tangier.</p> + +<p class="normal">Ibrahim bowed his head and made no further protest. In the evening +Warrisden's servant came back from the gate; his watch had been +fruitless. Thus three days had passed. Warrisden became anxious again, +and restless. The seven days which Tony Stretton could take, and still +reach Roquebrune by the date on which Pamela insisted, were now +curtailed. Six days formed the limit, and even that limit implied that +the journey should be of the swiftest. Of those six days, three had +gone.</p> + +<p class="normal">The fourth came, and passed. Warrisden rode out upon the track to +Sefru in vain. Even the promised letter did not come. Warrisden made +inquiries. It would come, he was told. There was no doubt upon that +score. But a Government letter takes a long time in the writing in +Morocco. It was not until the fifth evening that a messenger from the +Palace knocked upon the door. These were the days when Mulai-el-Hassan +ruled in Morocco, and was on the march against his rebellious tribes +for nine months out of the twelve. Mulai-el-Hassan, at this particular +time, was far away to the south in the Sus country, and therefore the +mountain pass to the north was dangerous.</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden had his letter, however, sealed with the Viceroy's seal. But +he gazed out over the city as it lay, warm and ruddy in the sunset, +and wondered whether it would avail at all. His servant had come back +from the gate with his familiar answer. No Jew had driven the mule +down the road into Fez that day. And there was only one more day.</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden descended the stairs to the gallery on the first floor, and +as he came out upon it, he heard voices in the courtyard below. He +looked over the balustrade and saw a man standing amongst his +muleteers and servants. Warrisden could not see his face. He was +dressed in rags, but the rags were the remnants of a black gabardine, +and he wore a black skull-cap upon his head.</p> + +<p class="normal">It is likely that Warrisden would have taken no further notice of the +man, but that he cringed a little in his manner as though he was +afraid. Then he spoke in Arabic, and the voice was timorous and +apologetic. Warrisden, however, knew it none the less. He leaned over +the balustrade--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Stretton!" he cried out in a burst of joy.</p> + +<p class="normal">The man in the courtyard looked up. Warrisden would never have known +him but for his voice. A ragged beard stubbled his cheeks and chin; he +was disfigured with dirt and bruises; he was lean with hunger; his +face was drawn and hollow from lack of sleep. But there was something +more, a wider difference between this ragged Stretton in the courtyard +and the Stretton Warrisden had known than mere looks explained. The +man who had looked up when he heard his voice loudly and suddenly +pronounced had been startled--nay, more than startled. He had raised +an arm as though to ward off a blow. He had shrunk back. He had been +afraid. Even now, when he looked at Warrisden, and knew that he was +here in a house of safety, he stood drawing deep breaths, and +trembling like one who has received a shock. His appearance told +Warrisden much of the dangers of the journey from Ain-Sefra through +the hills to Fez.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," said Tony, "I am here. Am I in time?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Just in time," cried Warrisden. "Oh, but I thought you never would +come!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He ran down the steps into the courtyard.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Balak!" cried Stretton, with a laugh. "Wait till I have had a bath, +and got these clothes burnt."</p> + +<p class="normal">In such guise, Tony Stretton came to Fez. He had gone straight to the +vice-consulate, and thence had been directed to Warrisden's house. +When, an hour later, he came up on to the gallery and sat down to +dinner, he was wearing the clothes of a European, and the look of fear +had gone from his face, the servility from his manner. But Warrisden +could not forget either the one or the other. Tony Stretton had come +through the mountains--yes. But the way had not been smooth.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XXVIII</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_28" href="#div1Ref_28">HOMEWARDS</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">The two men smoked together upon the roof-top afterwards.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I left a man at the gate all day," said Warrisden, "to watch the +track from Sefru. I had brought him from Algiers. I do not know how he +came to miss you."</p> + +<p class="normal">"He could not know me," said Tony, "and I spoke to no one."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But he knew the mule!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony was silent for a little while. Then he said, in a low, grave +voice, like a man speaking upon matters which he has no liking to +remember--</p> + +<p class="normal">"The mule was taken from me some days ago in the Ait Yussi country." +And Warrisden upon that said--</p> + +<p class="normal">"You had trouble, then, upon the way--great trouble."</p> + +<p class="normal">Again Tony was slow in the reply. He looked out across the city. It +was a night of moonlight, so bright that the stars were pale and +small, as though they were withdrawn; there was no cloud anywhere +about the sky; and on such a night, in that clear, translucent air, +the city, with its upstanding minarets, had a grace and beauty denied +to it by day. There was something of enchantment in its aspect, Tony +smoked his pipe in silence for a little while. Then he said--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Let us not talk about it! I never thought that I would be sitting +here in Fez to-night. Tell me rather when we start!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Early to-morrow," replied Warrisden. "We must reach Roquebrune in the +South of France by the thirty-first."</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton suddenly sat back in his chair.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Roquebrune! France!" he exclaimed. "We must go there? Why?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do not know," Warrisden answered. "A telegram reached me at +Tangier. I kept it."</p> + +<p class="normal">He took the telegram from his pocket and handed it to Stretton, who +read it and sat thinking.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We have time," said Warrisden, "just time enough, I think, if we +travel fast."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Good," said Stretton, as he returned the telegram. "But I was not +thinking of the time."</p> + +<p class="normal">He did not explain what had caused him to start at the mention of +Roquebrune; but after sitting for a little while longer in silence, he +betook himself to bed.</p> + +<p class="normal">Early the next morning they rode out of the Bab Sagma upon the +thronged highway over the plain to Mequinez.</p> + +<p class="normal">The caravans diminished, striking off into this or that track. Very +soon there remained with them only one party of five Jews mounted on +small donkeys. They began to ride through high shrubs and bushes of +fennel over rolling ground. Stretton talked very little, and as the +track twisted and circled across the plain he was constantly standing +up in his stirrups and searching the horizon.</p> + +<p class="normal">"There does not seem to be one straight path in Morocco," he exclaimed +impatiently. "Look at this one. There's no reason why it should not +run straight. Yet it never does."</p> + +<p class="normal">Indeed, the track lay across that open plain like some brown, +monstrous serpent of a legend.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do not believe," replied Warrisden, "that there is a straight path +anywhere in the world, unless it is one which has been surveyed and +made, or else it runs from gate to gate, and both gates are visible. +One might think the animals made this track, turning and twisting to +avoid the bushes. Only the tracks are no straighter in the desert, +where there are no bushes at all."</p> + +<p class="normal">They halted for half an hour at eleven, beside a bridge which crossed +a stream, broken and ruinous, but still serviceable. And while they +sat on the ground under the shadow they suddenly heard a great clatter +of hoofs upon the broken cobbles; and looking up saw a body of men +ride across the bridge. There were about forty of them, young and old; +all were mounted, and in appearance as wild and ragged a set of +bandits as could be imagined. As they rode over the bridge they saw +Warrisden and Stretton seated on the ground beneath them; and without +a word or a shout they halted as one man. Their very silence was an +intimidating thing.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Z'mur," whispered Ibrahim. He was shaking with fear. Warrisden +noticed that the two soldiers who accompanied them on this journey to +Mequinez quietly mounted their horses. Stretton and Warrisden rose to +do likewise. And as they rose a dozen of the mounted Z'mur quietly +rode round from the end of the bridge and stood between them and the +stream. Then the leader, a big man with a black beard turning grey, +began to talk in a quiet and pleasant voice to the soldiers.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are bringing Europeans into our country. Now, why are you doing +that? We do not like Europeans."</p> + +<p class="normal">The soldiers no less pleasantly replied--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Your country? The Europeans are travelling with a letter from your +master and mine, my Lord the Sultan, to the Governor of Mequinez."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You will show us then the letter?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will do nothing of the kind," the soldier replied, with a smile. +The Z'mur did not move; the two soldiers sat upon their horses +smiling--it seemed that matters had come to a deadlock. Meanwhile +Warrisden and Stretton got into their saddles. Then the leader of the +Z'mur spoke again--</p> + +<p class="normal">"We passed five Jews riding on donkeys a little while ago. They were +kind enough when we stopped them to give us a peseta apiece. We are +going to Fez to offer our help to the Sultan, if only he will give us +rifles and ammunition. But we shall go home again when we have got +them. Perhaps the Europeans would like to give us a peseta apiece as +well."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do not think they would like it at all," said the soldier. "Peace +go with you!" and he turned his horse and, followed, by Warrisden and +Stretton, the terrified Ibrahim and the train of mules, he rode right +through the forty Z'mur and over the bridge.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was an awkward moment, but the men of Warrisden's party assumed, +with what skill they could, an air of unconcern. Trouble was very near +to them. It needed only that one of those wild tribesmen should reach +out his hand and seize the bridle of a horse. But no hand was reached +out. The Z'mur were caught in a moment of indecision. They sat upon +their horses motionless. They let the Europeans pass.</p> + +<p class="normal">Ibrahim, however, drew no comfort from their attitude.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is because they wish rifles and ammunition from the Government," +he said. "Therefore they will avoid trouble until they have got them. +But with the next party it will not be so."</p> + +<p class="normal">There are three waterfalls in Morocco, and of those three one falls in +a great cascade between red cliffs into a dark pool thirty feet below, +close by the village of Medhuma. By this waterfall they lunched, the +while Ibrahim bared his right arm to the shoulder, stretched himself +full length upon the ground, and, to the infinite danger of the +bystanders, practised shooting with his revolver. They lunched quickly +and rode on. Towards evening, above a group of trees on a hill, they +saw here and there a minaret.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Mequinez," exclaimed Ibrahim. "Schoof! Mequinez!"</p> + +<p class="normal">In a little while fragments of thick wall began to show, scattered +here and there about the plain. Brown walls, high and crumbling to +rain, walls that never had been walls of houses, but which began and +ended for no reason. They were all that was left of the work of Mulai +Ismail, who, in the seventeenth century, had built and planned +buildings about this town until death put an end to all his +architecture. There was to be a wall across the country, from Fez to +Morocco city far away in the south, so that the blind, of which this +kingdom still has many, and then was full, might pass from one town to +another without a guide. Part of that wall was built, and fragments of +it rise amongst the oleanders and the bushes to this day.</p> + +<p class="normal">The travellers entered now upon a park. A green mossy turf spread out +soft beneath the feet of their horses, dwarf oaks made everywhere a +pleasant shade; Stretton had lost sight now of the minarets, and no +sign of Mequinez was visible at all. The ground sloped downwards, the +track curved round a hill, and suddenly, on the opposite side of a +valley, they saw the royal city, with its high walls and gates, its +white houses, and its green-tiled mosques, and its old grey massive +palaces stretch along the hillside before their eyes.</p> + +<p class="normal">One of the soldiers rode forward into the town to find the Basha and +present his letters. A troop of men came out in a little time and led +the travellers up the cobbled stones through a gateway into the wide +space before the Renegade's Gate, that wonderful monument of Moorish +art which neither the wear of the centuries nor the neglect of its +possessors has availed to destroy. Its tiles are broken. The rains +have discoloured it, stones have fallen from their places. Yet the +gate rises, majestic yet most delicate, beautiful in colour, exquisite +in shape, flanked with massive pillars, and surmounted by its soaring +arch, a piece of embroidery in stone, fine as though the stone were +lace. By the side of this arch the camp was pitched just about the +time when the horses and mules are brought down to roll in the dust of +the square and to drink at the two great fountains beyond the gate.</p> + +<p class="normal">Later in that evening there came a messenger from the Basha with +servants bearing bowls of kouss-kouss.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Fourteen soldiers will ride with you to-morrow," he said, "for the +country is not safe. It will be well if you start early, for you have +a long way to go."</p> + +<p class="normal">"The earlier the better," said Stretton.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It will do if you breakfast at five--half-past five," said Ibrahim, +to whom punctuality was a thing unknown. "And start at six--half-past +six."</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," said Warrisden. "We will start at five--half-past five."</p> + +<p class="normal">That night a company of soldiers kept guard about the tents, and +passed the hours of darkness in calling to one another and chanting +one endless plaintive melody. Little sleep was possible to the two +Englishmen, and to one of them sleep did not come at all. Now and then +Warrisden dropped off and waked again; and once or twice he struck a +match and lit his candle. Each time that he did this he saw Stretton +lying quite motionless in his bed on the other side of the tent. Tony +lay with the bed-clothes up to his chin, and his arms straight down at +his sides, in some uncanny resemblance to a dead man. But Warrisden +saw that all the while his eyes were open. Tony was awake with his +troubles and perplexities, keeping them to himself as was his wont, +and slowly searching for an issue. That he would hit upon the issue he +did not doubt. He had these few days for thought, and it was not the +first time that he had had to map out a line of conduct. His course +might be revealed to him at the very last moment, as it had been on +the trawler in the North Sea. Or it might flash upon him in a second, +as the necessity to desert had flashed upon him amidst the aloes of +Ain-Sefra. Meanwhile he lay awake and thought.</p> + +<p class="normal">They started early that morning, and crossing a valley, mounted on to +that high, wide plain Djebel Zarhon and Djebel Gerowaun. They left the +town of Mequinez behind them; its minarets dropped out of sight. They +had come into a most empty world. Not a tent-village stood anywhere +beside the track. Far away to the right, in a deep recess, the white +sacred town of Mulai Idris fell down the dark side of Zarhon like a +cascade. A little further an arch of stone and a few pillars rising +from the plain showed where once the Romans had built their town of +Volubilis. But when that was passed there was no sign of life anywhere +at all. For hours they rode in a desolate, beautiful world. Bushes of +asphodel, white with their starry flowers, brushed against them; +plants of iris, purple and yellow, stood stirrup-high upon their path; +and at times the bushes would cease, and they would ride over a red +carpet of marigolds, which would pale away into the gold of the +mustard flower. Flowers were about them all that day, the red anemone, +the blue lupin, periwinkles, the yellow flower of the cytisus, but no +living things. Even the air above their heads was still. The country +seemed too empty even for the birds.</p> + +<p class="normal">At eleven o'clock they stopped beside a stream which ran prettily +between trees across their path.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We shall find no more water until evening," said Ibrahim. "We will +stop here."</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton dismounted, and said--</p> + +<p class="normal">"We can send the mules on and catch them up. It will save time."</p> + +<p class="normal">The soldiers shook their heads.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We are in the Berber country," they said. "We must not separate."</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton looked around impatiently.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But there is no one within miles," he exclaimed; and, as if to +contradict him, a man walked out from the bushes by the stream and +came towards them. He had been robbed on this very track not two hours +before by eleven mounted Berbers. He had been driving three mules +laden with eggs and food to Mulai Idris, and his mules and their loads +had been taken from him. He was walking home, absolutely penniless, +His whole fortune had been lost that day; and when once again the +travellers started upon their journey he ran at a trot beside their +horses for safety's sake.</p> + +<p class="normal">The road mounted now on to stony and mountainous country. It wound +continually, ascending in and out amongst low, round peaks towards the +summit of a great line of hills which ran from east to west opposite +to them against the sky.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Beyond the hills," cried Ibrahim, "is the plain of the Sebou."</p> + +<p class="normal">A big village crowned the hill just where the track ascended. It had +been placed there to protect the road. In a little while they came to +the brow of the hill, and suddenly they saw, far below them, the great +plain of the Sebou, green and level, dotted with villages and the +white tombs of saints and clumps of trees, stretching away as far as +the eye could reach. It was afternoon, not a cloud was in the sky, and +the sun shone through the clear, golden air beneficently bright. The +hillside fell away to the plain with a descent so sheer, the plain +broke so abruptly upon the eyes, that the very beauty of the scene +caught the breath away. Both Warrisden and Stretton reined in their +horses, and sat looking across the plain as a man might who suddenly +from the crest of some white cliff sees for the first time the sea. +And then Warrisden heard his companion begin to hum a song. He caught +some of the words, but not many.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, come out, mah love, I'm awaitin' foh you heah!" Tony began, and +suddenly checked himself with an expression of anger, as though the +words had associations which it hurt him to recall.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Let us ride on," he said, and led the way down the steep, winding +track towards the plain.</p> + +<p class="normal">They pressed on that evening, and camped late in the Beni Hassan +country. Stretton slept that night, but he slept fitfully. He had not +yet come to the end of his perplexities, and as he rode away from +their camping-ground in the morning he said, impulsively--</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is quite true. I have thought of it. I am to blame. I should have +gone into the house that night."</p> + +<p class="normal">He was endeavouring to be just, and to this criticism of himself he +continually recurred. He should have entered his house in Berkeley +Square on the night when he contented himself with looking up to the +lighted windows. He should have gone in and declared what was in his +mind to do. Very likely he would only have made matters worse. +Contempt for a visionary would very likely have been added to the +contempt for a ne'er-do-weel. Certainly no faith would have been felt +by Millie in the success of his plan. He would have been asked, in a +lukewarm way, to abandon it and stay at home. Still, he ought to have +gone in. He had made a mistake that night.</p> + +<p class="normal">All that day they rode through the Beni Hassan country westwards. The +plain was level and monotonous; they passed village after village, +each one built in a circle round a great space of open turf, into +which the cattle were driven at night. For upon the hills, and in the +forest of Mamura to the south, close by, the Z'mur lived, and between +the Beni Hassan and the Z'mur there is always war. In the afternoon +they came to the borders of that forest, and skirting its edge, +towards evening reached the caravanserai of El Kantra.</p> + +<p class="normal">The travellers saw it some while before they came to it--four high, +smooth, castellated walls crowning a low hill. It stands upon the road +from Fez to Rabat, and close to the road from Rabat to Larache, and a +garrison guards it. For you could almost throw a stone from its walls +into the trees of Mamura. Stretton and Warrisden rode round the walls +to the gate, and as they passed beneath the arch both halted and +looked back.</p> + +<p class="normal">Outside was a quiet country of grey colours; the sun was near to its +setting; far away the broken walls of the old Portuguese town of +Mediyah stood upon a point of vantage on a hillside, like some ruined +castle of the Tyrol. Inside the caravanserai all was noise and +shouting and confusion. In the thickness of the walls there were +little rooms or cells, and in these the merchants were making their +homes for the night, while about them their servants and muleteers +buzzed like a hive of bees. And the whole great square within the +walls was one lake of filthy mud, wherein camels, and mules, and +donkeys, and horses rolled and stamped and fought. A deafening clamour +rose to the skies. Every discordant sound that the created world could +produce seemed to be brayed from that jostling throng of animals as +from some infernal orchestra. And the smell of the place was fetid.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Let us pitch our camp outside!" said Warrisden. But the captain of +the garrison came hurrying up.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," he cried excitedly. "The Z'mur! The Z'mur!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton shrugged his shoulders.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am getting a little bored with the Z'mur," said he.</p> + +<p class="normal">"They have sent in word to us," the captain continued, "that they mean +to attack us to-night."</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton looked perplexed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But why send in word?" he asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">The captain of the garrison looked astonished at the question.</p> + +<p class="normal">"So that we may be ready for them, of course," he replied, quite +seriously; for life in Morocco has some of the qualities of +<i>opera-bouffe</i>. "So you must come inside. You have a letter from my +lord the Basha of Fez, it is true. If the letter said you were to +sleep outside the walls of El Kantra, then I would kiss the seal and +place it against my forehead, and bring out my five hundred men to +guard you, and we should all get killed. But it does not say so."</p> + +<p class="normal">His five hundred men were really short of fifty. Stretton and +Warrisden laughed; but they had to go inside the caravanserai. This +was the last day on which they ran any risk. To-morrow they would +cross the Sebou at Mediyah, and beyond the Sebou the road was safe.</p> + +<p class="normal">They rode inside the caravanserai, and were allotted a cell which +obtained some privacy from a hurdle fixed in the ground in front of +it. The gates of the caravanserai were closed, the sunset flushed the +blue sky with a hue of rose; the mueddhin came out upon the minaret +which rose from the southern wall, and chanted in a monotone his call +to prayer; and then a drummer and a bugler advanced into the crowded +square. Suddenly there fell upon Stretton's ears, competing with the +mueddhin and the uproar of the animals, the "Last Post."</p> + +<p class="normal">Stretton started up, amazed, and most deeply moved. An English officer +instructed the Moorish troops. What more natural than that he should +introduce the English calls and signals? But to Stretton it seemed +most wonderful that here, in this Eastern country, while the +Mohammedan priest was chanting from his minaret, he should hear again, +after so many years, that familiar tattoo sounded by an Eastern bugle +and an Eastern drum. In how many barracks of England, he wondered, +would that same "Last Post" ring out to-night? And at once the years +slipped away, the hard years of the North Sea and the Sahara. He was +carried back among the days when he served in the Coldstream. Then +arose in his heart a great longing that something of the happiness of +those days might be recaptured still.</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden and Stretton crossed the Sebou the next morning, and rode +with the boom of the Atlantic in their ears. Hills upon their left +hand hid the sea from their eyes, and it was not until the next day, +when they mounted on to a high tableland four hours from Larache, that +they saw it rolling lazily towards the shore. They caught a steamer at +Larache that night.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XXIX</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_29" href="#div1Ref_29">PAMELA MEETS A STRANGER</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Meanwhile Pamela waited at the Villa Pontignard, swinging from hope to +fear, and from fear again to hope. The days chased one another. She +watched the arrival of each train from Marseilles at the little +station below, with an expectant heart; and long after it had departed +towards Italy, she kept within her vision the pathway up the hillside +to the villa. But the travellers did not return. Expectation and +disappointment walked alternately at her elbow all the day, and each +day seemed endless. Yet, when the next day came, it had come all too +quickly. Every morning it seemed to her, as she turned her calendar, +that the days chased one another, racing to the month's end; every +evening, tired out with her vigil, she wondered how they could pass so +slowly. The thirty-first of the month dawned at last. At some time on +this day Millie Stretton would arrive at Eze. She thought of it, as +she rose, with a sinking heart; and then thrust thought aside. She +dared not confront the possibility that the trains might stop at +Roquebrune, and move on to Italy and discharge no passengers upon the +platform. She dared not recognise her dread that this day might close +and the darkness come as fruitlessly as all the rest. It was her last +day of hope. Lionel Callon was waiting. Millie Stretton was arriving. +To-morrow, Tony might come, but he would come too late. Pamela lived +in suspense. Somehow the morning passed. The afternoon <i>Rapide</i> swept +through towards Mentone. Pamela saw the smoke of the engine from her +terrace, and knew that upon that train had come the passenger from +England. Half an hour ago Millie had most likely stepped from her +carriage on to the platform at Eze. And still Tony Stretton and +Warrisden lingered.</p> + +<p class="normal">Towards dusk she began to despair. In a little while another train was +due. She heard its whistle, saw it stop at the station, and waited +with her eyes fixed upon the hillside path. No one appeared upon it. +She turned and went into the house. She thought for a moment of going +herself to Eze, thrusting herself upon Millie at the cost of any snub; +and while she debated whether the plan could at all avail, the door +was opened, a servant spoke some words about a visitor, and a man +entered the room. Pamela started to her feet. The man stood in the +twilight of the room: his back was against the light of the window. +Pamela could not see his face. But it was not Warrisden, so much she +knew at once. It could only be Tony Stretton.</p> + +<p class="normal">"So you have come," she cried. "At last! I had given up hope."</p> + +<p class="normal">She advanced and held out her hand. And some reserve in Tony's +attitude, something of coldness in the manner with which he took her +hand, checked and chilled her.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is you?" she asked. "I watched the path. The train has gone some +while."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, it is I," he replied. "I had to inquire my way at the village. +This is the first time I ever came to Roquebrune."</p> + +<p class="normal">Still more than the touch of his hand and the reserve of his manner, +the cold reticence of his voice chilled her. She turned to the servant +abruptly--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Bring lamps," she said. She felt the need to see Tony Stretton's +face. She had looked forward so eagerly to his coming; she had hoped +for it, and despaired of it with so full a heart; and now he had come, +and with him there had come, most unexpectedly, disappointment. She +had expected ardour, and there was only, as it seemed, indifference +and stolidity. She was prepared for a host of questions to be tumbled +out upon her in so swift a succession that no time was given to her +for an answer to any one of them; and he stood before her, seemingly +cold as stone. Had he ceased to care for Millie, she wondered?</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have come as quickly as you could?" she asked, trying to read his +features in the obscurity.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have not lost a moment since I received your letter," he answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">She caught at the words, "your letter." Perhaps there lay the reason +for his reserve. She had written frankly, perhaps too frankly she +feared at this moment. Had the letter suddenly killed his love for +Millie? Such things, no doubt, could happen--had happened. Disillusion +might have withered it like a swift shaft of lightning.</p> + +<p class="normal">"My letter," she said. "You must not exaggerate its meaning. You read +it carefully?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Very carefully."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And I wrote it carefully," she went on, pleading with his +indifference; "very carefully."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It contains the truth," said Tony; "I did not doubt that."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes; but it contains all the truth," she urged. "You must not doubt +that either. Remember, you yourself are to blame. I wrote that, didn't +I? I meant it."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, you wrote that," answered Tony. "I am not denying that you are +right. It may well be that I am to blame. It may well be that you, +too, are not quite free from blame. Had you told me that morning, when +we rode together in the Row, what you had really meant when you said +that I ought never to leave my wife----" And at that Pamela +interrupted him--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Would you have stayed if I had explained?" she cried. And Tony for a +moment was silent. Then he answered slowly--</p> + +<p class="normal">"No; for I should not have believed you." And then he moved for the +first time since he had entered the room. "However, it can do neither +of us any good to discuss what we might have done had we known then +what we know now."</p> + +<p class="normal">He stopped as the door opened. The lamps were brought in and set upon +the tables. Tony waited until the servant had gone out, and the door +was closed again; then he said--</p> + +<p class="normal">"You sent a telegram. I am here in answer to it. I was to be at +Roquebrune on the thirty-first. This is the thirty-first. Am I in +time?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," said Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">She could now see Tony clearly; and of one thing she at once was sure. +She had been misled by the twilight of the room. Tony, at all events, +was not indifferent. He stood before her travel-stained and worn. His +face was haggard and thin; his eyes very tired, like the eyes of an +old man; there were flecks of grey in his hair, and lines about his +eyes. These changes she noticed, and took them at their true value. +They were signs of the hard life he had lived during these years, and +of the quick, arduous journey which he had made. But there was more. +If Tony had spoken with a measured voice, it was in order that he +might control himself the better. If he had stood without gesture or +motion, it was because he felt the need to keep himself in hand. So +much Pamela clearly saw. Tony was labouring under a strong emotion.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes you are in time," she cried; and now her heart was glad. "I was +so set on saving both your lives, in keeping you and Millie for each +other. Of late, since you did not come, my faith faltered a little. +But it should not have faltered. You are here! You are here!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"My wife is here, too?" asked Tony, coldly; and Pamela's enthusiasm +again was checked. "Where is she?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"She arrives in the south of France to-day. She stops at Eze. She +should be there now."</p> + +<p class="normal">She had hoped to see the blood pulse into his face, and some look of +gladness dawn suddenly in his eyes, some smile of forgiveness alter +the stern set of his lips. But again she was disappointed.</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony seemed to put his wife out of his thoughts.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And since your message was so urgent," he continued deliberately, "it +follows that Callon comes to-day as well," and he repeated the name in +a singularly soft, slow, and almost caressing voice. "Lionel Callon," +he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">And at once Pamela was desperately afraid. It needed just that name +uttered in just that way to explain to her completely the emotion +which Tony so resolutely controlled. She looked at him aghast. She had +planned to bring back Tony to Millie and his home. The Tony Stretton +whom she had known of old, the good-natured, kindly man who loved his +wife, whom all men liked and none feared. And lo! she had brought back +a stranger. And the stranger was dangerous. He was thrilling with +anger, he was anticipating his meeting with Lionel Callon with a +relish which, to Pamela, was dreadful.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," she exclaimed eagerly. "Mr. Callon has been here all this while, +and Millie only comes to-day."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Callon has been waiting for her, then?" he asked implacably.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, I don't know," Pamela exclaimed in despair. "I have not spoken to +him. How should I know?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yet you have no doubts."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, then, no," she said, "I have no doubt that he is waiting here +for Millie. But she only arrives to-day. They have not met until +to-day. That is why I sent the telegram."</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony nodded his head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"So that I might be present at the meeting?"</p> + +<p class="normal">And Pamela could have cried out aloud. She had not thought, she had +not foreseen. She had fixed all her hopes on saving Millie. Set upon +that, she had not understood that other and dreadful consequences +might ensue. These consequences were vivid enough before her eyes now. +All three would meet--Tony, Millie, and Lionel Callon. What would +follow? What might not follow? Pamela closed her eyes. Her heart sank; +she felt faint at the thought of what she had so blindly brought +about.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Tony!" she exclaimed. She wrung her hands together, pleading with him +in short and broken sentences. "Don't think of him!... Think of +Millie. You can gain her back!... I am very sure.... I wrote that to +you, didn't I?... Mr. Callon.... It is not worth while.... He is of no +account.... Millie was lonely, that was all.... There would be a +scandal, at the best...." And Tony laughed harshly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, it is not worth while," she cried again piteously, and yet again, +"it is not worth while."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yet I am anxious to meet him," said Tony.</p> + +<p class="normal">Suddenly Pamela looked over his shoulder to the door, and, for a +moment, hope brightened on her face. But Stretton understood the look, +and replied to it.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, Warrisden is not here. I left him behind with our luggage at +Monte Carlo."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Why did he stay?" cried Pamela, as again her hopes fell.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He could hardly refuse. This is my affair, not his. I claimed +to-night. He will come to you, no doubt, tomorrow."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You meant him to stay behind, then?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I meant to see you alone," said Tony; and Pamela dared question him +no more, though the questions thronged in her mind and tortured her. +Was it only because he wished to see her alone that he left Warrisden +behind? Was it not also so that he might not be hampered afterwards? +Was it only so that another might not know of the trouble between +himself and Millie? Or was it not so that another might not be on hand +to hinder him from exacting retribution? Pamela was appalled. Tony was +angry--yes, that was natural enough. She would not have felt half her +present distress if he had shown his passion in tempestuous words, if +he had threatened, if he had raved. But there was so much deliberation +in his anger, he had it so completely in control; it was an instrument +which he meant to use, not a fever which might master him for a moment +and let him go.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are so changed," she cried. "I did not think of that when I wrote +to you. But, of course, these years and the Foreign Legion could not +but change you."</p> + +<p class="normal">She moved away, and sat down holding her head between her hands. +Stretton did not answer her words in any way. He moved towards her, +and asked--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Is Callon, too, at Eze?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, no," she cried, raising her head, thankful, at last, that here +was some small point on which she could attenuate his suspicions. "You +are making too much of the trouble."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yet you wrote the letter to me. You also sent the telegram. You sent +me neither the one nor the other without good reason." And Pamela +dropped her eyes again from his face.</p> + +<p class="normal">"If Callon is not at Eze," he insisted, "he is close by!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela did not answer. She sat trying to compose her thoughts. Suppose +that she refused to answer, Tony would go to Eze. He might find Millie +and Callon there. On the other hand, it was unlikely that he would. +Pamela had seen that quiet, solitary restaurant by the sea where +Callon lodged. It was there that they would be, she had no doubt.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Where is Callon?" asked Tony. "Where does he stay?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela closed her ears to the question, working still at the stern +problem of her answer. If she refused to tell him what he asked, +Millie and Callon might escape for to-night. That was possible. But, +then, to-morrow would come. Tony must meet them to-morrow in any case, +and to-morrow might be too late.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will tell you," she answered, and she described the place. And in +another minute she was alone. She heard the front door close, she +heard Tony's step upon the gravel of the garden path, and then all was +silent. She sat holding her throbbing temples in her hands. Visions +rose before her eyes, and her fear made them extraordinarily luminous +and vivid. She saw that broad, quiet terrace over the sea where she +had lunched, the lonely restaurant, the windows of that suite of rooms +open on to the terrace. A broad column of light streamed out from the +window in her vision. She could almost hear voices and the sound of +laughter, she imagined the laughter all struck dumb, and thereafter a +cry of horror stabbing the night. The very silence of the villa became +a torture to her. She rose and walked restlessly about the room. If +she could only have reached Warrisden! But she did not even know to +which hotel in all the hotels of Monte Carlo he had gone. Tony might +have told her that, had she kept her wits about her and put the +question with discretion. But she had not. She had no doubt that +Stretton had purposely left him behind. Tony wished for no restraining +hand, when at last he came face to face with Lionel Callon. She sat +down, and tried to reason out what would happen. Tony would go first +to Eze. Would he find Millie there? Perhaps. Most likely he would not. +He would go on then to the restaurant on the Corniche road. But he +would have wasted some time. It might be only a little time, still, +however short it was, what was waste of time to Tony might be gain of +time to her--if only she could find a messenger.</p> + +<p class="normal">Suddenly she stood up. There was a messenger, under her very hand. She +scribbled a note to Lionel Callon, hardly knowing what she wrote. She +bade him go the instant when he received it, go at all costs without a +moment's delay. Then, taking the note in her hand, she ran from the +villa down the road to Roquebrune.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XXX</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_30" href="#div1Ref_30">M. GIRAUD AGAIN</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">The dusk was deepening quickly into darkness. As she ran down the open +stretch of hillside between her villa and the little town, she saw the +lights blaze out upon the terrace of Monte Carlo. Far below her, upon +her right, they shone like great opals, each with a heart of fire. +Pamela stopped for a second to regain her breath before she reached +Roquebrune. The sudden brightness of those lights carried her thoughts +backwards to the years when the height of trouble for her had been the +sickness of a favourite horse, and all her life was an eager +expectation. On so many evenings she had seen those lights flash out +through the gathering night while she had sat talking in her garden +with the little schoolmaster whom she was now to revisit. To both of +them those lights had been a parable. They had glowed in friendliness +and promise--thus she had read the parable--out of a great, bright, +gay world of men and women, upon a cool, twilit garden of youth and +ignorance. She thought of what had come in place of all that imagined +gaiety. To the schoolmaster, disappointment and degradation; while, as +for herself, she felt very lonely upon this evening. "The world is a +place of great sadness." Thus had M. Giraud spoken when Pamela had +returned to Roquebrune from her first season in London, and the words +now came back to her again.</p> + +<p class="normal">She ran on through the narrow streets of Roquebrune, her white frock +showing in the light from the shops and windows. She wore no hat upon +her head, and more than one of the people in the street called to her +as she passed and asked her whether she needed help. Help, indeed, she +did need, but not from them. She came to the tiny square whence the +steps led down to the station. On the west side of the square stood +the school-house, and, close by, the little house of the schoolmaster. +A light burned in a window of the ground floor. Pamela knocked loudly +upon the door. She heard a chair grate upon the floor-boards. She +knocked again, and the door was opened. It was the schoolmaster +himself who opened it.</p> + +<p class="normal">"M. Giraud!" she exclaimed, drawing her breath quickly. The +schoolmaster leaned forward and stared at the white figure which stood +in the darkness just outside his porch; but he made no reply.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Let me in!" cried Pamela; and he made a movement as though to bar the +way. But she slipped quickly past him into the room. He closed the +door slowly and followed her.</p> + +<p class="normal">The room was bare. A deal table, a chair or two, and a few tattered +books on a hanging bookshelf made up all its furniture. Pamela leaned +against the wall with a hand to her heart. M. Giraud saw her clearly +now. She stood only a few feet from him, in the light of the room. She +was in distress; yet he spoke harshly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Why have you come?" he cried; and she answered, piteously, "I want +your help."</p> + +<p class="normal">At that a flame of anger kindled within him. He saw her again, after +all this long time of her absence--her whose equal he had never spoken +with. Her dark hair, her eyes, the pure outline of her face, her tall, +slim figure, the broad forehead--all the delicacy and beauty of +her--was a torture to him. The sound of her voice, with its remembered +accents, hurt him as he had thought nothing could ever hurt him again.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Really!" he cried, in exasperation. "You want help; so you come to +me. Without that need would you have come? No, indeed. You are a +woman. Get your fine friends to help you!"</p> + +<p class="normal">There were other follies upon his tongue, but he never spoke them. He +looked at Pamela, and came to a stop.</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela had entered the cottage bent with a single mind upon her +purpose--to avert a catastrophe at the little restaurant on the +Corniche road. But M. Giraud was before her, face to face with her, as +she was face to face with him. She saw him clearly in the light as he +saw her; and she was shocked. The curé had prepared her for a change +in her old comrade, but not for so complete a disfigurement. The +wineshop had written its sordid story too legibly upon his features. +His face was bloated and red, the veins stood out upon the cheeks, and +the nose like threads of purple; his eyes were yellow and unwholesome. +M. Giraud had grown stout in body, too; and his dress was slovenly and +in disrepair. He was an image of degradation and neglect. Pamela was +shocked, and betrayed the shock. She almost shrank from him at the +first; there was almost upon her face an expression of aversion and +disgust. But sorrow drove the aversion away, and immediately her eyes +were full of pity; and these swift changes M. Giraud saw and +understood.</p> + +<p class="normal">She was still his only window on the outside world. That was the +trouble. By her expression he read his own decline more surely than in +his mirror. Through her he saw the world; through her, too, he saw +what manner of figure he presented to the world. Never had he realised +how far he had sunk until this moment. He saw, as in a picture, the +young schoolmaster of the other days who had read French with the +pupil, who was more his teacher than his pupil, upon the garden +terrace of the Villa Pontignard--a youth full of dreams, which were +vain, no doubt, but not ignoble. There was a trifle of achievement, +too. For even now one of the tattered books upon his shelf was a copy +of his brochure on Roquebrune and the Upper Corniche road. With +perseverance, with faith--he understood it in a flash--he might have +found, here, at Roquebrune, a satisfaction for those ambitions which +had so tortured him. There was a field here for the historian, had he +chosen to seize on it. Fame might have come to him, though he never +visited the great cities and the crowded streets. So he thought, and +then he realised what he had become. It was true he had suffered great +unhappiness. Yet so had she--Pamela Mardale; and she had not fallen +from her pedestal. Here shame seized upon him. He lowered his eyes +from her face.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Help!" he stammered. "You ask me to help you? Look at me! I can give +you no help!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He suddenly broke off. He sat down at the table, buried his face in +his hands, and burst into tears. Pamela crossed to him and laid her +hand very gently upon his shoulder. She spoke very gently, too.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh yes, you can," she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">He drew away from her, but she would not be repulsed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You should never have come to me at all," he sobbed. "Oh, how I hate +that you should see me like this! Why did you come? I did not mean you +to see me. You must have known that! You must have known, too, why. It +was not kind of you, mademoiselle. No, it was not kind!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yet I am glad that I came," said Pamela. "I came, thinking of myself, +it is true--my need is so very great; but now I see your need is as +great as mine. I ask you to rise up and help me."</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, leave me alone!" he cried. And she answered, gently, "I will +not."</p> + +<p class="normal">M. Giraud grew quiet. He pressed his handkerchief to his eyes, and +stood up.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Forgive me!" he said. "I have behaved like a child; but you would +forgive me if you knew how I have waited and waited for you to come +back. But you never did. Each summer I said, 'She will return in the +winter!' And the winter came, and I said, 'She will come in the +spring.' But neither in winter nor in the spring did you return to +Roquebrune. I have needed you so badly all these years."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am sorry," replied Pamela; "I am very sorry."</p> + +<p class="normal">She did not reproach herself at all. She could not see, indeed, that +she was to blame. But she was none the less distressed. Giraud's +exhibition of grief was so utterly unfamiliar to her that she felt +awkward and helpless in face of it. He was yet further disfigured now +by the traces of weeping; his eyes were swollen and red. There was +something grotesque in the aspect of this drink-swollen face, all +convulsed with sorrow. Nothing could well lie less in sympathy with +Pamela's nature than Giraud's outburst and display of tears; for she +was herself reticent and proud. She held her head high as she walked +through the world, mistress alike of her sorrows and her joys. But Mr. +Mudge had spoken the truth when he had called upon her in +Leicestershire. Imagination had come to her of late. She was able to +understand the other point of view--to appreciate that there were +other characters than hers which must needs fulfil themselves in ways +which were not hers. She put herself now in M. Giraud's place. She +imagined him waiting and waiting at Roquebrune, with his one window on +the outside world closed and shuttered--a man in a darkened room who +most passionately desired the air without. She said, with a trace of +hesitation--</p> + +<p class="normal">"You say you have needed me very much?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, have I not?" exclaimed Giraud; and the very weariness of his +voice would have convinced her, had she needed conviction. It seemed +to express the dilatory passage of the years during which he had +looked for her coming, and had looked in vain.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, then, listen to me," she went on. "I was once told that +to be needed by those whom one needs is a great comfort. I thought +of the saying at the time, and I thought that it was a true one. +Afterwards"--she began to speak slowly, carefully selecting her +words--"it happened that in my own experience I proved it to be +true--at all events, for me. Is it true for you also? Think well. If +it is not true I will go away as you bade me at the beginning; but if +it is true--why, then I may be of some little help to you, and you +will be certainly a great help to me; for I need you very surely."</p> + +<p class="normal">M. Giraud looked at her in silence for a little while. Then he +answered her with simplicity, and so, for the first time during this +interview, wore the proper dignity of a man.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, I will help you," he said. "What can I do?"</p> + +<p class="normal">She held out the letter which she had written to Lionel Callon. She +bade him carry it with the best speed he could to its destination.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Lose no time!" she implored. "I am not sure, but it may be that one +man's life, and the happiness of a man and a woman besides, all hang +upon its quick receipt."</p> + +<p class="normal">M. Giraud took his hat from the wall and went to the door. At the door +he paused, and standing thus, with an averted face, he said in a +whisper, recalling the words she had lately spoken--</p> + +<p class="normal">"There is one, then, whom you need? You are no longer lonely in your +thoughts? I should like to know."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," Pamela answered gently: "I am no longer lonely in my thoughts."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And you are happy?" he continued. "You were not happy when you were +at Roquebrune last. I should like to know that you, at all events, are +happy now."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," said Pamela. In the presence of his distress she rather shrank +from acknowledging the change which had come over her. It seemed +cruel; yet he clearly wished to know. He clearly would be the happier +for knowing. "Yes," she said; "I am happy."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am very glad," said M. Giraud, in a low voice; "I am very glad." +And he went rather quickly out by the door.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XXXI</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_31" href="#div1Ref_31">AT THE RESÉRVE</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Tony Stretton walked quickly down from the Villa Pontignard to the +station. There he learned that an hour must elapse before a train to +Eze was due. Inaction was at this moment intolerable to him. Even +though he should get to Eze not a minute the sooner, he must hurry +upon his way. He could not wait upon this platform for an hour, +suspense so tortured him. He went out upon the road and began to run. +He ran very quickly. The road turned sharply round the shoulder of a +hill, and Stretton saw in front of him the lights of Monte Carlo. They +were bunched in great white clusters, they were strung in festoons in +the square and the streets. They made a golden crescent about the +dark, quiet waters of the bay. Looking down from this shoulder of the +hill upon the town at such an hour one seems to be looking upon a town +of fairyland; one expects a sweet and delicate music to float upwards +from its houses and charm the ears. Tony's one thought was that beyond +that place of lights lay Eze. He came to an electric tram which was on +point of starting. He entered it and it rattled him quickly down the +hill.</p> + +<p class="normal">At Monte Carlo he sprang into the first carriage which he saw waiting +for a fare, and bade the coachman drive him quickly out to Eze. The +night had come; above his head the stars shone very brightly from a +dark sky of velvet. The carriage passed out of the town; the villas +grew more scarce; the open road glimmered ahead of him a riband of +white; the sea murmured languorously upon the shore.</p> + +<p class="normal">At this moment, in the lonely restaurant towards which Tony was +driving in such haste, Lionel Callon and Millie Stretton were sitting +down to dinner. The table was laid in the small, daintily furnished +room which opened on to the terrace. The windows stood wide, and the +lazy murmur of the waves entered in. The white cloth shone with +silver, a great bowl of roses stood in the centre and delicately +perfumed the air. Thither Millie had come in fulfilment of that +promise made on a midnight of early spring in Regent's Park. The +colour burned prettily on her cheeks, she had dressed herself in a +pink gown of lace, jewels shone on her arms and at her neck. She was, +perhaps, a little feverish in her gaiety, her laughter was perhaps a +little over loud. Indeed, every now and then her heart sank in fear +within her, and she wished herself far away. But here Lionel Callon +was at his ease. He knew the methods by which victory was to be won. +There was no suggestion of triumph in his manner. He was considerate +and most deferential, and with no more than a hint of passion in the +deference.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have come," he said. His eyes rested upon hers, and he left them +to express his gratitude. He raised her hand to his lips and gently +took the cloak from her shoulders. "You have had a long journey. But +you are not tired." He placed her chair for her at the table and sat +opposite. He saw that she was uneasy. He spoke no word which might +alarm her.</p> + +<p class="normal">Meanwhile Tony was drawing nearer. He reached the hotel at Eze, and +drove through its garden to the door.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Is Lady Stretton in the hotel?" he asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, sir. Her ladyship went out to dinner nearly an hour ago."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Thank you," said Tony. "She arrived this afternoon, I think?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, sir. What name shall I give when she returns?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No name," said Tony. And he ordered his coachman to drive back to the +road.</p> + +<p class="normal">When he had reached it he directed the man again.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Towards Beaulieu," he said; and in a little while, on his left hand, +below the level of the road, he saw the lights of the <i>Réserve</i>. He +stopped at the gate, dismissed his carriage, and walked down the +winding drive to the door. He walked into the restaurant. It was +empty. A waiter came forward to him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I wish you to take me at once to Mr. Callon," he said. He spoke in a +calm, matter-of-fact voice. But the waiter nevertheless hesitated. +Tony wore the clothes in which he had travelled to Roquebrune. He was +covered with dust, his face was haggard and stern. He had nothing in +common with the dainty little room of lights and flowers and shining +silver, and the smartly dressed couple who were dining there. The +waiter guessed that his irruption would be altogether inconvenient.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Mr. Callon!" he stammered. "He has gone out."</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony heard the rattle of a metal cover upon a dish. He looked in the +direction whence the sound came--he looked to the right-hand side of +the restaurant. A door stood open there, and in the passage beyond the +door he saw a waiter pass carrying the dish. Moreover, the man who had +spoken to him made yet another mistake. He noticed the direction of +Tony's glance, and he made a quick movement as though to bar that +passage.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He is here," said Tony; and he thrust the waiter aside. He crossed +the restaurant quickly and entered the passage. The passage ran +parallel to the restaurant; and, at the end towards the terrace, there +was another door upon the opposite side. The waiter with the dish had +his hand upon the door-handle, but he turned at the sound of +Stretton's step. He, too, noticed the disorder of Tony's dress. At the +same moment the man in the restaurant shouted in a warning voice--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Jules!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Jules stood in front of the door.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Monsieur, this room is private," said he.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yet I will take the liberty to intrude," said Tony, quietly.</p> + +<p class="normal">From behind the door there came the sound of a man's voice which Tony +did not know. He had, indeed, never heard it before. Then a woman's +laugh rang out; and the sound of it angered Tony beyond endurance. He +recognised it beyond the possibility of mistake. It was his wife who +was laughing so gaily there behind the closed door. He thought of the +years he had spent in the determination to regain his wife's esteem, +to free himself from her contempt. For the moment he could have +laughed bitterly at his persistence as at some egregious folly. It +seemed all waste--waste of time, waste of endeavour, waste of +suffering. She was laughing! And with Lionel Callon for her companion! +The cold, black nights of the North Sea and its gales; the arid sands +of the Sahara; all his long service for her ending in that crowning +act of desertion--the story was clear in his mind from beginning to +end, detailed and complete. And she was laughing in there with Lionel +Callon! Her laughter was to him as some biting epigram which +epitomised the way in which she had spent the years of his absence. +His anger got the better of his self-control.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Stand away," he cried, in a low, savage voice, to the waiter. And +since the man did not instantly move, he seized him by the shoulders +and dragged him from the door.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Monsieur!" the man cried aloud, in a frightened voice, and the dish +which he was carrying fell with a clatter on to the floor. Inside the +room the laughter suddenly ceased. Tony listened for a second. He +could not hear even a whisper. There was complete silence. He smiled +rather grimly to himself; he was thinking that this was not, at all +events, the silence of contempt.</p> + +<p class="normal">Could he have seen through the door into the room he would have been +yet more convinced. All the gaiety vanished in an instant from +Millie's face. She was sitting opposite the door; she sat and stared +at it in terror. The blood ebbed from the cheeks, leaving them as +white as paper.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Monsieur!" she repeated, in so low a whisper that even Callon, on the +other side of the small table, hardly heard the word. Her lips were +dry, and she moistened them. "Monsieur!" she whispered again, and the +whisper was a question. She had no definite suspicion who "Monsieur" +was; she did not define him as her husband. She only understood that +somehow she was trapped. The sudden clatter of the dish upon the +floor, the loudness of the waiter's cry, which was not a mere protest, +but also a cry of fear, terrified her; they implied violence. She was +trapped. She sat paralysed upon her chair, staring across the table +over Callon's shoulder at the door. Callon meanwhile said not a word. +He had been sitting with his back to the door, and he twisted round in +his chair. To both of them it seemed ages before the handle was +turned. Yet so short was the interval of time that they could hardly +have reached the terrace through the open window had they sprung up at +the first sound of disturbance.</p> + +<p class="normal">Thus they were sitting, silent and motionless, when the door was +pushed open, and Tony stood in the doorway. At the sight of him Millie +uttered one loud scream, and clapped her hands over her face. Callon, +on the other hand, started up on to his feet. As he did so he upset +his wine-glass over the table-cloth; it fell and splintered on the +polished floor. He turned towards the intruder who so roughly forced +his way into the room. The eyes of that intruder took no account of +him; they were fixed upon Millie Stretton, as she sat cowering at the +table with her hands before her face.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What do you want?" cried Callon. "You have no right here!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have every right here," said Tony. "That is my wife!"</p> + +<p class="normal">It was still his wife at whom he looked, not at all towards Callon. +Callon was startled out of his wits. Detection he had always feared; +he had sought to guard against it by the use of every precaution known +to his devious strategy. But it was detection by Pamela Mardale and +her friends, who had once already laid him by the heels; the husband +had never entered into his calculations. He had accepted without +question Millie's version of the husband--he was the man who did not +care. In some part of the world he wandered, but where no one knew; +cut off from all his friends--indifferent, neglectful, and a fool. +Even now he could not believe. This might be some new trick of Pamela +Mardale's.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Your wife!" he exclaimed. "That is not true."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Not true?" cried Tony, in a terrible voice. He stretched out his arm +and pointed towards Millie. "Look!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie flinched as though she feared a blow. She dropped her head yet +lower. She held her fingers over her eyelids, closing them tightly. +She had looked once at Tony's face, she dared not look again. She sat +in darkness, trembling. One question was in her mind. "Would he kill +her?" Callon looked at her as he was bidden. Millie was wont to speak +of her husband with indifference, and a suggestion of scorn. Yet it +was her manifest terror which now convinced Callon that the husband +was indeed before him. Here the man was, sprung suddenly out of the +dark upon him, not neglectful, for he had the look of one who has +travelled from afar very quickly, and slept but little on the way; not +indifferent, for he was white with anger and his eyes were aflame. +Callon cursed the luck which had for a second time brought him into +such ill straits. He measured himself with Tony, and knew in the +instant that he was no match for him. There was a man, tired, no +doubt, and worn, but hard as iron, supple of muscle and limb, and +finely trained to the last superfluous ounce of flesh; while he +himself was soft with luxury and good living. He sought to temporise.</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is no proof," said he. "Any woman might be startled----" And +Tony broke fiercely in upon his stammered argument--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Go out," he cried, "and wait for me!"</p> + +<p class="normal">The door was still open. Outside it in the passage the waiters were +clustered, listening. Inside the room Millie was listening. The order, +roughly given, was just one which Callon for very shame could not +obey. He would have liked to obey it, for confronting husbands was +never to his liking; all his art lay in eluding them.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Go out!" Tony repeated, and took a step forward. Callon could not cut +so poor a figure as to slink from the room like a whipped schoolboy. +Yet it would have gone better with him had he eaten his leek and gone.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It would not be safe to leave you," he babbled. And suddenly Tony +caught him by the throat, struck him upon the face, and then flung him +violently away.</p> + +<p class="normal">Callon reeled back through the open windows, slipped and fell at his +full length upon the terrace. His head struck the stone flags with a +horrible sound. He lay quite still in the strong light which poured +from the room; his eyes were closed, his face quite bloodless. It was +his business, as Mudge had said, to light amongst the teacups.</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony made no further movement towards him. The waiters went out on to +the terrace and lifted him up and carried him away. Then Tony turned +towards his wife. She had risen up from her chair and overturned it +when Tony had flung the interloper from the room. She now crouched +shuddering against the wall, with her eyes fixed in terror upon her +husband. As he turned towards her she uttered a sob and dropped upon +her knees before him. That was the end of all her scorn. She kneeled +in deadly fear, admiring him in the very frenzy of her fear. She had +no memory for the contemptuous letters which she had written and Tony +had carried under his pillow on the North Sea. Her little deceits and +plots and trickeries to hoodwink her friends, her little pretence of +passion for Lionel Callon--she knew at this moment that it never had +been more than a pretence--these were the matters which now she +remembered, and for which she dreaded punishment. She was wearing +jewels that night--jewels which Tony had given her in the good past +days when they lived together in the house in Deanery Street. They +shook and glittered upon her hair, about her neck, upon her bosom and +her arms. She kneeled in her delicate finery of lace and satin in this +room of luxury and bright flowers. There was no need for Tony now to +work to re-establish himself in her thoughts. She reached out her +hands to him in supplication.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am not guilty," she moaned. "Tony! Tony!"</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XXXII</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_32" href="#div1Ref_32">HUSBAND AND WIFE</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">The man who was no good had his triumph then. Only triumph was not at +all in his thoughts.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, please!" he said very quietly, "get up from your knees. I don't +like to see you there. It hurts me."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie raised her eyes to him in wonder. He did not mean to kill her, +then. All his violence, it seemed, was reserved for that poor warrior +of the drawing-rooms who had just been carried away stunned and +bleeding from the terrace. When Tony spoke to her his voice was rather +that of a man very dispirited and sad. He had indeed travelled through +the mountains of Morocco hot with anger against Callon the interloper; +but now that he had come face to face again with Millie, now that he +had heard her voice with its remembered accents, the interloper seemed +of little account, a creature to punish and be done with. The sadness +of his voice penetrated to Millie's heart. She rose and stood +submissively before him.</p> + +<p class="normal">In the passage outside the door the waiters were clustered whispering +together. Tony closed the door and shut the whispers out. Upon the +terrace, outside the window, a man was hesitating whether to enter or +no. Tony went to the window.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Who are you?" he asked. "What do you want?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am Giraud, the schoolmaster of Roquebrune," said the man, timidly. +"I bring a letter from Mademoiselle Mardale."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Let me see it!" said Tony; and he held out his hand for the letter. +He glanced at the superscription and gave it back. "It is not for me," +he said, and M. Giraud went away from the terrace. Tony turned back to +his wife. His mind was full of a comparison between the ways in which +he and she had each spent the years of absence. For him they had been +years of endeavour, persisted in through failure and perplexity until +success, but for her, was reached. And how had Millie spent them? He +looked at her sternly, and she said again in a faltering voice--</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am innocent, Tony."</p> + +<p class="normal">And he replied--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Could you have said as much to-morrow had I not come back to-night?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie had no answer to that question--she attempted none; and it was +even at that moment counted to her credit by her husband. She stood +silent for a while, and only the murmur of the sea breaking upon the +beach filled the room. A light wind breathed through the open window, +cool and fragrant, and made the shaded candles flicker upon the table. +Millie had her one poor excuse to offer, and she pleaded it humbly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I thought that you had ceased to care what became of me," she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony looked sharply at her. She was sincere--surely she was sincere.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You thought that?" he exclaimed; and he replaced her chair at the +table. "Sit down here! Let me understand! You thought that I had +ceased to care for you? When I ceased to write, I suppose?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie shook her head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Before that?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony dropped into the chair on which Callon had been sitting.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Before that?" he exclaimed in perplexity. "When? Tell me!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie sat over against him at the table.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do you remember the evening when you first told me that you had made +up your mind to go away and make a home for both of us? It was on that +evening. You gave your reason for going away. We had begun to +quarrel--we were drifting apart."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I remember," said Tony; "but we had not ceased to care then, neither +you nor I. It was just because I feared that at some time we might +cease to care that I was resolved to go away."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ah," said Millie; "but already the change had begun. Yes, yes! Things +winch you thought you never could remember without a thrill you +remembered already with indifference--you remembered them without +being any longer moved or touched by the associations which they once +had had. I recollect the very words you used. I sat as still as could +be while you spoke them; but I never forgot them, Tony. There was a +particular instance which you mentioned--a song----" And suddenly Tony +laughed; but he laughed harshly, and there was no look of amusement on +his face. Millie stared at him in surprise, but he did not explain, +and she went on with her argument.</p> + +<p class="normal">"So when you ceased to write I was: still more convinced that you had +reaped to care. When you remained away after your father had died I +was yet more sure."</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony leaned across the white table-cloth with its glittering silver, +and fixed his eyes on her.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will tell you why I ceased to write. Every letter which you wrote +to me when I was in New York was more contemptuous than the letter +which had preceded it. I had failed, and you despised me for my +failure. I had allowed myself to be tricked out of your money----" And +upon that Millie interrupted him--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh no!" she cried; "you must not say that I despised you for that. +No! That is not fair. I never thought of the money. I offered you what +was left."</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony had put himself in the wrong here. He recognised his mistake, he +accepted Millie's correction.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, that is true," he said; "you offered me all that was left--but +you offered it contemptuously; you had no shadow of belief that I +would use it to advantage--you had no faith in me at all. In your eyes +I was no good. Mind, I don't blame you. You were justified, no doubt. +I had set out to make a home for you, as many a man has done for his +wife. Only where they had succeeded I had failed. If I thought anything +at all----" he said, with an air of hesitation.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well?" asked Millie.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I thought you might have expressed your contempt with a little less +of unkindness, or perhaps have hidden it altogether. You see, I was +not having an easy time in New York, and your letters made it very +much harder."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, Tony," she said, in a low voice of self-reproach. She was sitting +with her hands clenched in front of her upon the table-cloth, her +forehead puckered, and in her eyes a look of great pain.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Never mind that," he replied; and he resumed his story. "I saw then +quite clearly that with each letter which you received from me, each +new instalment of my record of failure--for each letter was just that, +wasn't it?--your contempt grew. I was determined that if I could help +it your contempt should not embitter all our two lives. So I ceased to +write. For the same reason I stayed away, even after my father had +died. Had I come back then I should have come back a failure, proved +and self-confessed. And your scorn would have stayed with you. My +business henceforth was to destroy it, to prove to you that after all +I was some good--if not at money-making, at something else. I resolved +that we should not live together again until I could come to you and +say, 'You have no right to despise me. Here's the proof.'"</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie was learning now, even as Tony had learnt a minute ago. All +that he said to her was utterly surprising and strange. He had been +thinking of her, then, all the time while he was away! Indifference +was in no way the reason of his absence.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, why did you not write this to me?" she cried. "It need not have +been a long letter, since you were unwilling to write. But just this +you might have written. It would have been better, kinder"--and she +paused upon the word, uttering it with hesitation and a shy +deprecating smile, as though aware that she had no claim upon his +kindness. "It would have been kinder than just to leave me here, not +knowing where you were, and thinking what I did."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is true," said Tony, "I might have written. But would you have +believed me if I had? No."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then you might have come to me," she urged. "Once--just for five +minutes--to tell me what you meant to do."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I might," Tony agreed; "in fact, I very nearly did. I was under the +windows of the house in Berkeley Square one night." And Millie +started.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, you were," she said slowly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You knew that?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes; I knew it the next day." And she added, "I wish now, I think, +that you had come in that night."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Suppose that I had," said Tony; "suppose that I had told you of my +fine plan, you would have had no faith in it. You would merely have +thought, 'Here's another folly to be added to the rest.' Your contempt +would have been increased, that's all."</p> + +<p class="normal">It was quite strange to Millie Stretton that there ever could have +been a time when she had despised him. She saw him sitting now in +front of her, quiet and stern; she remembered her own terror when he +burst into the room, when he flung Callon headlong through the +windows, when he turned at last towards her.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We have been strangers to one another."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," he replied; "I did not know you. I should never have left +you--now I understand that. I trusted you very blindly, but I did not +know you."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie lowered her eyes from his face.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Nor I you," she answered. "What did you do when you went away that +night from Berkeley Square?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I enlisted in the Foreign Legion in Algeria."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie raised her head again with a start of surprise.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Soldiering was my trade, you see. It was the one profession where I +had just a little of that expert knowledge which is necessary nowadays +if you are to make your living."</p> + +<p class="normal">Something of his life in the Foreign Legion Tony now told her. He +spoke deliberately, since a light was beginning dimly to shine through +the darkness of his perplexities. Of a set purpose he described to her +the arduous perils of active service and the monotony of the +cantonments. He was resolved that she should understand in the spirit +and in the letter the life which for her sake he had led. He related +his expedition to the Figuig oasis, his march into the Sahara under +Tavernay. He took from his pocket the medals which he had won, and +laid them upon the tablecloth before her.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Look at them," he said; "I earned them. These are mine. I earned them +for you; and while I was earning them what were you doing?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie listened and looked. Wonder grew upon her. It was for her that +he had laboured and endured and succeeded! His story was a revelation +to her. Never had she dreamed that a man would so strive for any +woman. She had lived so long among the little things of the world--the +little emotions, the little passions, the little jealousies and +rivalries, the little aims, the little methods of attaining them, that +only with great difficulty could she realise a simpler and a wider +life. She was overwhelmed now. Pride and humiliation fought within +her--pride that Tony had so striven for her in silence and obscurity, +humiliation because she had fallen so short of his example. It was her +way to feel in superlatives at any crisis of her destiny, but surely +she had a justification now.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I never knew--I never thought! Oh, Tony!" she exclaimed, twisting her +hands together as she sat before him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I became a sergeant," he said. "Then I brought back the remnants of +the geographical expedition to Ouargla." He taxed his memory for the +vivid details of that terrible retreat. He compelled her to realise +something of the dumb, implacable hostility of the Sahara, to see, in +the evening against the setting sun, the mounted figures of the +Touaregs, and to understand that the day's march had not shaken them +off. She seemed to be on the march herself, wondering whether she +would live out the day, or, if she survived that, whether she would +live out the night.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But you succeeded!" she cried, clinging to the fact that they were +both here in France, with the murmur of the Mediterranean in their +ears. "You came back."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, I came back. One morning I marched my men through the gate of +Ouargla--and what were you doing upon that day?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Talking, perhaps, with Lionel Callon, in one of those unfrequented +public places with which London abounds! Millie could not tell. She +sat there and compared Lionel Callon with the man who was before her. +Memories of the kind of talk she was wont to hold with Lionel Callon +recurred to her, filling her with shame. She was glad to think that +when Tony led his broken, weary force through the gate of Ouargla +Lionel Callon had not been with her--had indeed been far away in +Chili. She suddenly placed her hands before her face and burst into +tears.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, Tony," she whispered, in an abasement of humiliation. "Oh, Tony."</p> + +<p class="normal">"By that homeward march," he went on, "I gained my commission. That +was what I aimed at all the while, and I had earned it at the last. +Look!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He took from his pocket the letter which his colonel had handed to him +at Ain-Sefra. He had carefully treasured it all this while. He held it +out to her and made her read.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You see?" he said. "A commission won from the ranks in the hardest +service known to soldiers, won without advantage of name, or friends, +or money. Won just by myself. That is what I strove for. If I could +win that I could come back to you with a great pride. I should be no +longer the man who was no good. You yourself might even be proud of +me. I used to dream of that--to dream of something else."</p> + +<p class="normal">His voice softened a little, and a smile for a moment relaxed the +severity of his face.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Of what?" she asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Out there among the sand hills, under the stars at night, I used to +dream that we might perhaps get hold again of the little house in +Deanery Street, where we were so happy together once. We might pretend +almost that we had lived there all the time."</p> + +<p class="normal">He spoke in a voice of great longing, and Millie was touched to the +heart. She looked at Tony through her tears. There was a great longing +astir within her at this moment. Was that little house in Deanery +Street still a possibility? She did not presume to hope so much; but +she wished that she could have hoped. She pressed the letter which she +held against her breast; she would have loved to have held it to her +lips, but that again she did not dare to do.</p> + +<p class="normal">"At all events, you did succeed." she said; "I shall be glad to know +that. I shall always be glad--whatever happens now."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But I did not succeed," Tony replied. "I earned the commission, +yes!--I never held it. That letter was given to me one Monday by my +colonel at Ain-Sefra. You mentioned a song a minute ago, do you +remember?... I had lost the associations of that song. I laughed when +you mentioned it, and you were surprised. I laughed because when I +received that letter I took it away with me, and that song, with all +that it had ever meant, came back to my mind. I lay beneath the palm +trees, and I looked across the water past the islands, and I saw the +lights of the yachts in Oban Bay. I was on the dark lawn again, high +above the sea, the lighted windows of the house were behind me. I +heard your voice. Oh, I had got you altogether back that day," he +exclaimed, with a cry. "It was as though I held your hands and looked +into your eyes. I went back towards the barracks to write to you, and +as I went some one tapped me on the shoulder and brought me news of +you to wake me out of my dreams."</p> + +<p class="normal">Just for a moment Millie wondered who it was who had brought the news; +but the next words which Tony spoke drove the question from her mind.</p> + +<p class="normal">"A few more weeks and I should have held that commission. I might have +left the Legion, leaving behind me many friends and an honoured name. +As it was, I had to desert--I deserted that night."</p> + +<p class="normal">He spoke quite simply; but, nevertheless, the words fell with a shock +upon Millie. She uttered a low cry: "Oh, Tony!" she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," he said, with a nod of the head, "I incurred that disgrace. I +shall be ashamed of it all my life. Had I been caught, it might have +meant an ignoble death; in any case, it would have meant years of +prison--and I should have deserved those years of prison."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie shut her eyes in horror. Everything else that he had told her, +every other incident--his sufferings, his perils--all seemed of little +account beside this crowning risk, this crowning act of sacrifice. It +was not merely that he had risked a shameful death or a shameful +imprisonment. Millie was well aware that his whole nature and +character must be in revolt against the act itself. Desertion! It +implied disloyalty, untruth, deceit, cowardice--just those qualities, +indeed, which she knew Tony most to hate, which perhaps she had rather +despised him for hating. No man would have been more severe in the +punishment of a deserter than Tony himself. Yet he had deserted, and +upon her account. And he sat there telling her of it quietly, as +though it were the most insignificant action in the world. He might +have escaped the consequences--he would certainly not have escaped the +shame.</p> + +<p class="normal">But Millie's cup of remorse was not yet full.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yet I cannot see that I could do anything else. To-night proves to me +that I was right, I think. I have come very quickly, yet I am only +just in time." There was a long stain of wine upon the table-cloth +beneath his eyes. There Callon had upset his glass upon Tony's +entrance.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, it was time that I returned," he continued. "One way or another +a burden of disgrace had to be borne--if I stayed, just as certainly +as if I came away; I saw that quite clearly. So I came away." He +forbore to say that now the disgrace fell only upon his shoulders, +that she was saved from it. But Millie understood, and in her heart +she thanked him for his forbearance. "But it was hard on me, I think," +he said. "You see, even now I am on French soil, and subject to French +laws."</p> + +<p class="normal">And Millie, upon that, started up in alarm.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What do you mean?" she asked breathlessly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"There has been a disturbance here to-night, has there not? Suppose +that the manager of this restaurant has sent for a gendarme!"</p> + +<p class="normal">With a swift movement Millie gathered up the medals and held them +close in her clenched hands.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, it does not need those to convict me; my name would be enough. +Let my name appear and there's a deserter from the Foreign Legion laid +by the heels in France. All the time we have been talking here I have +sat expecting that door to open behind me."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie caught up a lace wrap which lay upon a sofa. She had the look +of a hunted creature. She spoke quickly and feverishly, in a whisper.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, why did not you say this at once? Let us go!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony sat stubbornly in his chair.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," said he, with his eyes fixed upon her. "I have given you an +account of how I have spent the years during which we have been apart. +Can you do the same?"</p> + +<p class="normal">He waited for her answer in suspense. To this question all his words +had been steadily leading; for this reason he had dwelt upon his own +career. Would she, stung by her remorse, lay before him truthfully and +without reserve the story of her years? If she did, why, that dim +light which shone amidst the darkness of his perplexities might +perhaps shine a little brighter. He uttered his question. Millie bowed +her head, and answered--</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Sit down, then, and tell me now."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh no," she exclaimed; "not here! It is not safe. As we go back to +Eze I will tell you everything."</p> + +<p class="normal">A look of relief came upon Tony's face. He rose and touched the bell.</p> + +<p class="normal">A waiter appeared.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will pay the bill," he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">The waiter brought the bill and Tony discharged it.</p> + +<p class="normal">"The gentleman--M. Callon," the waiter said. "A doctor has been. He +has a concussion. It will be a little time before he is able to be +moved."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Indeed?" said Tony, with indifference. He walked with his wife out of +the little gaily-lighted room into the big, silent restaurant. A +single light faintly illuminated it. They crossed it to the door, and +went up the winding drive on to the road. The night was dry and clear +and warm. There was no moon. They walked in the pure twilight of the +stars round the gorge towards Eze.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XXXIII</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_33" href="#div1Ref_33">MILLIE'S STORY</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">They walked for a while in silence, side by side, yet not so close but +that there was an interval between them. Millie every now and then +glanced at Tony's face, but she saw only his profile, and with only +the glimmer of the starlight to serve her for a reading-lamp, she +could guess nothing of his expression. But he walked like a man +utterly dispirited and tired. The hopes, so stoutly cherished during +the last few years, had all crumbled away to-night. Perpetually +his thoughts recurred to that question, which now never could be +answered--if he had gone into the house in Berkeley Square on that +distant evening when he had been contented to pace for a little while +beneath the windows, would he have averted the trouble which had +reached its crisis to-night at the <i>Réserve?</i> He thought not--he was +not sure; only he was certain that he should have gone in. He stopped +and turned back, looking towards the <i>Réserve</i>. A semicircle of lights +over the doorway was visible, and as he looked those lights were +suddenly extinguished. He heard Millie's voice at his side.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will tell you now how the time has passed with me." And he saw that +she was looking steadfastly into his eyes. "The story will sound very +trivial, very contemptible, after what you have told me. It fills me +utterly with shame. But I should have told you it none the less had +you not asked for it--I rather wish that you had not asked for it; for +I think I must have told you of my own accord."</p> + +<p class="normal">She spoke in a quick, troubled voice, but it did not waver; nor did +her eyes once fall from his. The change in her was swift, no doubt. +But down there in the <i>Réserve</i>, where the lights were out, and the +sea echoed through empty rooms, she had had stern and savage teachers. +Terror, humiliation, and the spectacle of violence had torn away a +veil from before her eyes. She saw her own life in its true +perspective. And, that she might see it the more clearly and +understand, she had the story of another life wherewith to compare it. +It is a quality of big performances, whether in art or life, that +while they surprise when first apprehended, they appear upon thought +to be so simple that it is astonishing surprise was ever felt. +Something of that quality Tony's career possessed. It had come upon +Millie as a revelation, yet, now she was thinking: "Yes, that is what +Tony would do. How is it I never guessed?" She put him side by side +with that other man, the warrior of the drawing-rooms, and she was +filled with shame that ever she could have preferred the latter even +for a moment of madness.</p> + +<p class="normal">They walked slowly on again. Millie drew her lace wrap more closely +about her throat.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Are you cold?" asked Tony. "You are lightly clothed to be talking +here. We had better perhaps walk on, and keep what you have to tell me +until to-morrow."</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," she answered quickly, "I am not cold. And I must tell you what I +have to tell you to-night. I want all this bad, foolish part of my +life to end to-night, to be extinguished just as those lights were +extinguished a minute since. Only there is something I should like to +say to you first." Millie's voice wavered now and broke. "If we do not +walk along the road together any more," she went on timidly, "I will +still be glad that you came back to-night. I do not know that you will +believe that--I do not, indeed, see why you should; but I should very +much like you to believe it; for it is the truth. I have learned a +good deal, I think, during the last three hours. I would rather go on +alone--if it is to be so--in this dim, clean starlight, than ever be +back again in the little room with its lights and flowers. Do you +understand me?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I think so," said Tony.</p> + +<p class="normal">"At all events, the road is visible ahead," she went on. "One sees it +glimmering, one can keep between the banks; while, in the little +lighted room it is easy to get lost."</p> + +<p class="normal">And thus to Millie now, as to Pamela when she rode back from her last +interview with Warrisden at the village of the three poplars, the +riband of white road stretching away in the dusk became a parable.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," said Tony, "perhaps my path was really the easier one to +follow. It was direct and plain."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ah," said Millie, "it only seems so because you have traversed it, +and are looking back. I do not think it was so simple and direct while +you walked upon it." And Tony, remembering the doubts and perplexities +which had besieged him, could not but assent.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do not think, too, that it was so easy to discover at the +beginning."</p> + +<p class="normal">There rose before Tony's eyes the picture of a ketch-rigged boat +sailing at night over a calm sea. A man leaned over the bulwarks, and +the bright glare from a lightship ran across the waves and flashed +upon his face. Tony remembered the moment very clearly when he had +first hit upon his plan; he remembered the weeks of anxiety of which +it was the outcome. No, the road had not been easy to find at the +beginning. He was silent for a minute, and then he said gently--</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am sorry that I asked you to tell your story--I am sorry that I +did not leave the decision to you. But it shall be as though you told +it of your own accord."</p> + +<p class="normal">The sentence was a concession, no less in the manner of its utterance +than in the words themselves. Millie took heart, and told him the +whole story of her dealings with Lionel Callon, without excuses and +without concealments.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I seemed to mean so much to him, so little to you," she said. "You +see, I did not understand you at all. You were away, too, and he was +near. I do not defend myself."</p> + +<p class="normal">She did not spare herself, she taxed her memory for the details of her +days; and as she spoke the story seemed more utterly contemptible and +small than even she in her abasement had imagined it would be. But she +struggled through with it to the end.</p> + +<p class="normal">"That night when you stood beneath the windows in Berkeley Square," +she said, "he was with me. He ran in from Lady Millingham's party and +talked with me for half an hour. Yes, at the very time when you were +standing on the pavement he was within the house. I know, for you were +seen, and on the next day I was told of your presence. I was afraid +then. The news was a shock to me. I thought, 'Suppose you had come +in!'"</p> + +<p class="normal">"But, back there, in the room," Tony interrupted, "you told me that +you wished I had come in."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," she answered. "And it is quite true; I wish now that you had +come in."</p> + +<p class="normal">She told him of the drive round Regent's Park, and of the consent she +gave that night to Lionel Callon.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I think you know everything now," she said. "I have tried to forget +nothing. I want you, whatever you decide to do, to decide knowing +everything."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Thank you," said Tony, simply. And she added--</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am not the first woman I know who has thrown away the substance for +the shadow."</p> + +<p class="normal">Upon the rest of that walk little was said. They went forward beneath +the stars. A great peace lay upon sea and land. The hills rose dark +and high upon their left hand, the sea murmured and whispered to them +upon the right. Millie walked even more slowly as they neared the +hotel at Eze, and Tony turned to her with a question--</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are tired?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," she answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">She was thinking that very likely she would never walk again on any +road with Tony at her side, and she was minded to prolong this last +walk to the last possible moment. For in this one night Tony had +reconquered her. It was not merely that his story had filled her with +amazement and pride, but she had seen him that night strong and +dominant, as she had never dreamed of seeing him. She loved his very +sternness towards herself. Not once had he spoken her name and called +her "Millie." She had watched for that and longed for it, and yet +because he had not used it she was the nearer to worship. Once she +said to him with a start of anxiety--</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are not staying here under your own name?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," he replied. "A friend has taken rooms in Monte Carlo for both of +us. Only his name has been given."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And you will leave France to-morrow?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Promise!" she cried.</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony promised, with a look of curiosity at his wife. Why should she be +so eager for his safety? He did not understand. He was wondering what +he must do in this crisis of their lives. Was he to come, in spite of +all his efforts, to that ordinary compromise which it had been his +object to avoid?</p> + +<p class="normal">They reached the door of the hotel, and there Tony halted.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Good night!" he said; he did not hold out his hand. He stood +confronting Millie with the light from the hall lamp falling full upon +his face. Millie hoped that he would say something more--just a little +word of kindness or forgiveness--if only she waited long enough +without answering him; and she was willing to wait until the morning +came, he did indeed speak again, and then Millie was sorry that she +had waited. For he said the one really cruel thing amongst all the +words he had said that night. He was not aware of its cruelty, he was +only conscious of its truth.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do you know." he said--and upon his tired face there came a momentary +smile--"to-night I miss the Legion very much." Again he said "Good +night."</p> + +<p class="normal">This time Millie answered him; and in an instant he was gone. She +could have cried out; she could hardly restrain her voice from calling +him back to her. "Was this the end?" she asked of herself. "That one +cruel sentence, and then the commonplace Good night, without so much +as a touch of the hands. Was this the very end?" A sharp fear stabbed +her. For a few moments she heard Tony's footsteps upon the flags in +front of the hotel, and then for a few moments upon the gravel of the +garden path; and after that she heard only the murmur of the sea. And +all at once for her the world was empty. "Was this the end?" she asked +herself again most piteously; "this, which might have been the +beginning." Slowly she went up to her rooms. Sleep did not visit her +that night.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XXXIV</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_34" href="#div1Ref_34">THE NEXT MORNING</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">There was another who kept a vigil all the night In the Villa +Pontignard Pamela Mardale saw from her window the morning break, and +wondered in dread what had happened upon that broad terrace by the +sea. She dressed and went down into the garden. As yet the world was +grey and cool, and something of its quietude entered into her and gave +her peace. A light mist hung over the sea, birds sang sweetly in the +trees, and from the chimneys of Roquebrune the blue smoke began to +coil. In the homely suggestions of that blue smoke Pamela found a +comfort. She watched it for a while, and then there came a flush of +rose upon the crests of the hills. The mist was swept away from the +floor of the sea, shadows and light suddenly ran down the hillsides, +and the waves danced with a sparkle of gold. The sun had risen. Pamela +saw a man coming up the open slope from Roquebrune to the villa. It +was M. Giraud. She ran to the gate and met him there.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well?" she asked. And he answered sadly--</p> + +<p class="normal">"I arrived too late."</p> + +<p class="normal">The colour went from Pamela's cheeks. She set a hand upon the gate to +steady herself. There was an expression of utter consternation on her +face.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Too late, I mean," the schoolmaster explained hurriedly, "to help +you, to be of any real service to you. But the harm done is perhaps +not so great as you fear."</p> + +<p class="normal">He described to her what he had seen--Lionel Callon lying outstretched +and insensible upon the pavement, Tony and Millie Stretton within the +room.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We removed M. Callon to his bedroom," he said. "Then I fetched a +doctor. M. Callon will recover--it is a concussion of the brain. He +will be ill for a little time, but he will get well."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And the man and the woman?" Pamela asked eagerly. "The two within the +room? What of them?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"They were standing opposite to one another." The schoolmaster had not +seen Millie on her knees. "A chair was overturned, the chair on which +she had sat. She was in great distress, and, I think, afraid; but he +spoke quietly." He described how he had offered Tony the letter, and +how Tony had closed the door of the room upon the waiters.</p> + +<p class="normal">"The manager did not know what to do, whether to send for help or not. +But I did not think that there was any danger to the woman in the +room, and I urged him to do nothing."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Thank you," said Pamela, gratefully. "Indeed, you were in time to +help me."</p> + +<p class="normal">But even then she did not know how much she was indebted to the +schoolmaster's advice. She was thinking of the scandal which must have +arisen had the police been called in, of the publication of Millie's +folly to the world of her acquaintances. That was prevented now. If +Tony took back his wife--as with all her heart she hoped he would--he +would not, at all events, take back one of whom gossip would be +speaking with a slighting tongue. She was not aware that Tony had +deserted from the Legion to keep his tryst upon the thirty-first of +the month. Afterwards, when she did learn this, she was glad that she +had not lacked warmth when she had expressed her gratitude to M. +Giraud. A look of pleasure came into the schoolmaster's face.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am very glad," he said. "When I brought the doctor back the two +within the room were talking quietly together; we could hear their +voices through the door. So I came away. I walked up to the villa +here. But it was already late, and the lights were out--except in one +room on an upper floor looking over the sea--that room," and he +pointed to a window.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, that is my room," said Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I thought it was likely to be yours, and I hesitated whether I should +fling up a stone; but I was not sure that it was your room. So I +determined to wait until the morning. I am sorry, for you have been +very anxious and have not slept--I can see that. I could have saved +you some hours of anxiety."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela laughed in friendliness, and the laugh told him surely that her +distress had gone from her.</p> + +<p class="normal">"That does not matter," she said. "You have brought me very good news. +I could well afford to wait for it."</p> + +<p class="normal">The schoolmaster remained in an awkward hesitation at the gate; it was +clear that he had something more to say. It was no less clear that he +found the utterance of it very difficult. Pamela guessed what was in +his mind, and, after her own fashion, she helped him to speak it. She +opened the gate, which up till now had stood closed between them.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Come in for a little while, won't you?" she said; and she led the way +through the garden to that narrow corner on the bluff of the hill +which had so many associations for them both. If M. Giraud meant to +say what she thought he did, here was the one place where utterance +would be easy. Here they had interchanged, in other times, their +innermost thoughts, their most sacred confidences. The stone parapet, +the bench, the plot of grass, the cedar in the angle of the +corner--among these familiar things memories must throb for him even +as they did for her. Pamela sat down upon the parapet and, leaning +over, gazed into the torrent far below. She wished him to take his +time. She had a thought that even if he had not in his mind that +utterance which she hoped to hear, the recollection of those other +days, vividly renewed, might suggest it. And in a moment or two he +spoke.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is true, mademoiselle, that I was of service to you last night?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," replied Pamela, gently; "that is quite true."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am glad," he continued. "I shall have that to remember. I do not +suppose that I shall see you often any more. Very likely you will not +come back to Roquebrune--very likely I shall never see you again. And +if I do not, I should like you to know that last night will make a +difference to me."</p> + +<p class="normal">He was now speaking with a simple directness. Pamela raised her face +towards his. He could see that his words greatly rejoiced her; a very +tender smile was upon her lips, and her eyes shone. There were tears +in them.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am so glad," she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I resented your coming to me at first," he went on--"I was a fool; I +am now most grateful that you did come. I learnt that you had at last +found the happiness which I think you have always deserved. You know I +have always thought that it is a bad thing when such a one as you is +wasted upon loneliness and misery--the world is not so rich that it +can afford such waste. And if only because you told me that a change +had come for you, I should be grateful for the visit which you paid +me. But there is more. You spoke a very true word last night when you +told me it was a help to be needed by those one needs."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You think that too?" said Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, now I do," he answered. "It will always be a great pride to me +that you needed me. I shall never forget that you knocked upon my door +one dark night in great distress. I shall never forget your face, as I +saw it framed in the light when I came out into the porch. I shall +never forget that you stood within my room, and called upon me, in the +name of our old comradeship, to rise up and help you. I think my room +will be hallowed by that recollection." And he lowered his voice +suddenly and said, "I think I shall see you as I saw you when I opened +the door, between myself and the threshold of the wineshop; that is +what I meant to say."</p> + +<p class="normal">He held out his hand, and, as Pamela took it, he raised her hand to +his lips and kissed it.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Good-bye," he said; and turning away quickly he left her up in the +place where she had known the best of him, and went down to his +schoolroom in the square of Roquebrune. Very soon the sing-song of the +children's voices was droning from the open windows.</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela remained upon the terrace. The breaking of old ties is always a +melancholy business, and here was one broken to-day. It was very +unlikely, she thought, that she would ever see her friend the little +schoolmaster again. She would be returning to England immediately, and +she would not come back to the Villa Pontignard.</p> + +<p class="normal">She was still in that corner of the garden when another visitor called +upon her. She heard his footsteps on the gravel of the path, and, +looking up, saw Warrisden approaching her. She rose from the parapet +and went forward to meet him. She understood that he had come with his +old question, and she spoke first. The question could wait just for a +little while.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have seen Tony?" she asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes; late last night," he replied. "I waited at the hotel for him. He +said nothing more than 'Good night,' and went at once to his room."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And this morning?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"This morning," said Warrisden, "he has gone. I did not see him. He +went away with his luggage before I was up, and he left no message."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela stood thoughtful and silent.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is the best thing he could have done," Warrisden continued; "for +he is not safe in France."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Not safe?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No. Did he not tell you? He deserted from the French Legion. It was +the only way in which he could reach Roquebrune by the date you +named."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela was startled, but she was startled into activity.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Will you wait for me here?" she said. "I will get my hat."</p> + +<p class="normal">She ran into the villa, and coming out again said, "Let us go down to +the station."</p> + +<p class="normal">They hurried down the steep flight of steps. At the station Warrisden +asked, "Shall I book to Monte Carlo?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No; to Eze," she replied.</p> + +<p class="normal">She hardly spoke at all during the journey; and Warrisden kept his +question in reserve--this was plainly no time to utter it. Pamela +walked at once to the hotel.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Is Lady Stretton in?" she asked; and the porter replied--</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, Madame. She left for England an hour ago."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Alone?" asked Pamela.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No. A gentleman came and took her away."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela turned towards Warrisden with a look of great joy upon her +face.</p> + +<p class="normal">"They have gone together," she cried. "He has taken his risks. He has +not forgotten that lesson learnt on the North Sea. I had a fear this +morning that he had."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And you?" said Warrisden, putting his question at last.</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela moved away from the door until they were out of earshot. Then +she said--</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will take my risks too." Her eyes dwelt quietly upon her companion, +and she added, "And I think the risks are very small."</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XXXV</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_35" href="#div1Ref_35">THE LITTLE HOUSE IN DEANERY STREET</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Pamela construed the departure of Tony and his wife together according +to her hopes. They were united again. She was content with that fact, +and looked no further, since her own affairs had become of an +engrossing interest. But the last word has not been said about the +Truants. It was not, indeed, until the greater part of a year had +passed that the section of their history which is related in this book +reached any point of finality.</p> + +<p class="normal">In the early days of January the Truants arrived in London at the +close of a long visit to Scotland. They got out upon Euston platform, +and entering their brougham, drove off. They had not driven far before +Millie looked out of the window and started forward with her hand upon +the check-string. It was dusk, and the evening was not clear. But she +saw, nevertheless, that the coachman had turned down to the left +amongst the squares of Bloomsbury, and that is not the way from Euston +to Regent's Park. She did not pull the check-string, however. She +looked curiously at Tony, who was sitting beside her, and then leaned +back in the carriage. With her quick adaptability she had fallen into +a habit of not questioning her husband. Since the night in the South +of France she had given herself into his hands with a devotion which, +to tell the truth, had something of slavishness. It was his wish, +apparently, that the recollection of that night should still be a +barrier between them, hindering them from anything but an exchange of +courtesies. She bowed to the wish without complaint. Tonight, however, +as they drove through the unaccustomed streets, there rose within her +mind a hope. She would have stifled it, dreading disappointment; but +it was stronger than her will. Moreover, it received each minute fresh +encouragement. The brougham crossed Oxford Street, turned down South +Audley Street, and traversed thence into Park Street. Millie now sat +forward in her seat. She glanced at her husband. Tony, with a face of +indifference, was looking out of the window. Yet the wonderful thing, +it seemed, was coming to pass, nay, had come to pass. For already the +brougham had stopped, and the door at which it stopped was the door of +the little house in Deanery Street.</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony turned to his wife with a smile.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Home!" he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">She sat there incredulous, even though the look of the house, the +windows, the very pavement were speaking to her memories. There was +the blank wall on the north side which her drawing-room window +overlooked, there was the sharp curve of the street into Park Lane, +there was the end of Dorchester House. Here the happiest years of her +life, yes, and of Tony's, too, had been passed. She had known that to +be truth for a long while now. She had come of late to think that they +were the only really happy years which had fallen to her lot. The +memories of them throbbed about her now with a vividness which was +poignant.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Is it true?" she asked, with a catch of her breath. "Is it really +true, Tony?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, this is our home."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie descended from the carriage. Tony looked at her curiously. This +sudden arrival at the new home, which was the old, had proved a +greater shock to her than he had expected. For a little while after +their return to England Millie had dwelt upon the words which Tony had +spoken to her in the <i>Réserve</i> by the sea. He had dreamed of buying +the house in Deanery Street, of resuming there the life which they had +led together there, in the days when they had been good friends as +well as good lovers. That dream for a time she had made her own. She +had come to long for its fulfilment, as she had never longed for +anything else in the world; she had believed that sooner or later Tony +would relent, and that it would be fulfilled. But the months had +passed, and now, when she had given up hope, unexpectedly it had been +fulfilled. She stood upon the pavement, almost dazed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You never said a word of what you meant to do," she said with a +smile, as though excusing herself for her unresponsive manner. The +door was open. She went into the house and Tony followed her. They +mounted the stairs into the drawing-room.</p> + +<p class="normal">"As far as I could," Tony said, "I had the house furnished just as it +used to be. I could not get all the pictures which we once had, but +you see I have done my best."</p> + +<p class="normal">Millie looked round the room. There was the piano standing just as it +used to do, the carpet, the wall-paper were all of the old pattern. It +seemed to her that she had never left the house; that the years in +Berkeley Square and Regent's Park were a mere nightmare from which she +had just awaked. And then she looked at Tony. No, these latter years +had been quite real--he bore the marks of them upon his face. The +boyishness had gone. No doubt, she thought, it was the same with her.</p> + +<p class="normal">Tony stood and looked at her with an eagerness which she did not +understand.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Are you glad?" he asked earnestly. "Millie, are you pleased?"</p> + +<p class="normal">She stood in front of him with a very serious face. Once a smile +brightened it; but it was a smile of doubt, of question.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am not sure," she said. "I know that you have been very kind. You +have done this to please me. But----" And her voice wavered a little.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well?" said Tony.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But," she went on with difficulty, "I am not sure that I can endure +it, unless things are different from what they have been lately. I +shall be reminded every minute of other times, and the comparison +between those times and the present will be very painful. I think that +I shall be very unhappy, much more unhappy than I have ever been, even +lately."</p> + +<p class="normal">Her voice sank to a whisper at the end. The little house in Deanery +Street, even in her dreams, had been no more than a symbol. She had +longed for it as the outward and visible sign of the complete +reconciliation on which her heart was set. But to have the sign and to +know that it signified nothing--she dreaded that possibility now. Only +for a very few moments she dreaded it.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I don't think I can endure it, Tony," she said sadly. And the next +moment his arms were about her, and her head was resting against his +breast.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Millie!" he cried in a low voice; and again "Millie!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Her face was white, her eyelids closed over her eyes. Tony thought +that she had swooned. But when he moved her hands held him close to +her, held him tightly, as though she dreaded to lose him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Millie," he said, "do you remember the lights in Oban Bay? And the +gulls calling at night above the islands?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am forgiven, then?" she whispered; and he answered only--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Hush!"</p> + +<p class="normal">But the one word was enough.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XXXVI</h2> + +<h3><span class="sc"><a name="div1_36" href="#div1Ref_36">THE END</a></span></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Tony wished for no mention of the word. He had not brought her to that +house that he might forgive her, but because he wanted her there. If +forgiveness was in question, there was much to be said upon her side +too. He was to blame, as Pamela had written. He had during the last +few months begun to realise the justice of that sentence more clearly +than he had done even when the letter was fresh within his thoughts.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have learnt something," he said to Millie, "which I might have +known before, but never did. It is this. Although a man may be content +to know that love exists, that is not the case with women. They want +the love expressed, continually expressed, not necessarily in words, +but in a hundred little ways. I did not think of that. There was the +mistake I made: I left you alone to think just what you chose. Well, +that's all over now. I bought this house not merely to please you, but +as much to please myself; for as soon as I understood that after all +the compromise which I dreaded need not be our lot--that after all the +life together of which I used to dream was possible, was within arm's +reach if only one would put out an arm and grasp it, I wanted you +here. As soon as I was sure, quite sure that I had recaptured you, I +wanted you here."</p> + +<p class="normal">He spoke with passion, holding her in his arms. Millie remained quite +still for a while, and then she asked--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do you miss the Legion? As much as you thought you would--as much as +you did that night at Eze?"</p> + +<p class="normal">He answered, "No"; and spoke the truth. On that night at Eze he had +not foreseen the outcome of his swift return, of his irruption into +the gaily lighted room murmurous with the sea. On that night he had +revealed himself to Millie, and the revelation had been the beginning +of love in her rather than its resumption. This he had come to +understand, and, understanding, could reply with truth that he did not +miss the Legion as he had thought he would. There were moments, no +doubt, when the sound of a bugle on a still morning would stir him to +a sense of loss, and he would fall to dreaming of Tavernay and +Barbier, and his old comrades, and the menacing silence of the Sahara. +At times, too, the yapping of dogs in the street would call up vividly +before his mind the picture of some tent village in Morocco where he +had camped. Or the wind roaring amongst trees on a night of storm +would set his mind wondering whether the ketch <i>Perseverance</i> was +heading to the white-crested rollers, close-reefed between the Dogger +and the Fisher Banks; and for a little while he would feel the savour +of the brine sharp upon his lips, and longing would be busy at his +heart--for the Ishmaelite cannot easily become a stay-at-home. These, +however, were but the passing moods.</p> + +<p class="normal">Of one other character who took an important if an unobtrusive part in +shaping the fortunes of the Truants a final word may be said. A +glimpse of that man, of the real man in him, was vouchsafed to +Warrisden two summers later. It happened that Warrisden attended a +public dinner which was held in a restaurant in Oxford Street. He left +the company before the dinner was over, since he intended to fetch his +wife Pamela, who was on that June evening witnessing a performance of +"Rigoletto" at the Opera House in Covent Garden. Warrisden rose from +the table and slipped out, as he thought at eleven o'clock, but on +descending into the hall he found that he had miscalculated the time. +It was as yet only a quarter to the hour, and having fifteen minutes +to spare, he determined to walk. The night was hot; he threw his +overcoat across his arm, and turning southwards out of Oxford Street, +passed down a narrow road in the neighbourhood of Drury Lane. In those +days, which were not, after all, so very distant from our own, the +great blocks of model dwellings had not been as yet erected; squalid +courts and rookeries opened on to ill-lighted passages; the houses had +a ruinous and a miserable look. There were few people abroad as +Warrisden passed through the quarter, and his breast-plate of white +shirt-front made him a conspicuous figure. He had come about half the +way from Oxford Street when he saw two men suddenly emerge from the +mouth of a narrow court a few yards in front of him. The two men were +speaking, or rather shouting, at one another; and from the violence of +their gestures no less than from the abusive nature of the language +which they used, it was plain that they were quarrelling. Words and +gestures led to blows. Warrisden saw one man strike the other and fell +him to the ground.</p> + +<p class="normal">In an instant a little group of people was gathered about the +combatants, people intensely silent and interested--the sightseers of +the London streets who spring from nowhere with inconceivable +rapidity, as though they had been waiting in some secret spot hard by +for just this particular spectacle in this particular place. +Warrisden, indeed, was wondering carelessly at the speed with which +the small crowd had gathered when he came abreast of it. He stopped +and peered over the shoulders of the men and women in front of him +that he might see the better. The two disputants had relapsed +apparently into mere vituperation. Warrisden pressed forward, and +those in front parted and made way for him. He did not, however, take +advantage of the deference shown to his attire; for at that moment a +voice whispered in his ear--</p> + +<p class="normal">"You had better slip out. This row is got up for you."</p> + +<p class="normal">Warrisden turned upon his heel. He saw a short, stout, meanly dressed +man of an elderly appearance moving away from his side; no doubt it +was he who had warned him. Warrisden took the advice, all the more +readily because he perceived that the group was, as it were, beginning +to reform itself, with him as the new centre. He was, however, still +upon the outskirts. He pushed quickly out into the open street, +crossed the road, and continued on his way. In front of him he saw the +stout, elderly man, and, quickening his pace, he caught him up.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have to thank you," he said, "for saving me from an awkward +moment."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," replied the stout man; and Warrisden, as he heard his voice, +glanced at him with a sudden curiosity. But his hat was low upon his +brows, and the street was dark. "It is an old trick, but the old +tricks are the tricks which succeed. There was no real quarrel at all. +Those two men were merely pretending to quarrel in order to attract +your attention. You were seen approaching--that white shirt-front +naturally inspired hope. In another minute you would have been hustled +down the court and into one of the houses at the end. You would have +been lucky if, half an hour later, you were turned out into the street +stripped of everything of value you possess, half naked and half dead +into the bargain. Good night!"</p> + +<p class="normal">The little man crossed the road abruptly. It was plain that he needed +neither thanks nor any further conversation. It occurred, indeed, to +Warrisden that he was deliberately avoiding conversation. Warrisden +accordingly walked on to the Opera House, and, meeting his wife in the +vestibule, told her this story while they waited for their brougham.</p> + +<p class="normal">As they drove together homewards, he added--</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is not all, Pamela. I can't help thinking--it is absurd, of +course--and yet, I don't know; but the little stout man reminded me +very much of some one we both know."</p> + +<p class="normal">Pamela turned suddenly towards her husband--</p> + +<p class="normal">"Mr. Mudge?" she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," replied Warrisden, with some astonishment at the accuracy of +her guess. "He reminded me of Mudge."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It was Mr. Mudge," she said. For a moment or two she was silent; then +she let her hand fall upon her husband's: "He was a very good friend +to us," she said gently--"to all of us."</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> + + + +<h3>FOOTNOTE:</h3> + +<p class="hang1"><a name="div2Ref_01" href="#div2_01">Footnote 1</a>: "Take care!"</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h3>THE END</h3> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<hr class="W90"> +<h5>PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, LONDON AND BECCLES.</h5> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Truants, by +A. E. W. 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(Alfred Edward Woodley) Mason + +Release Date: January 27, 2012 [EBook #38685] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE TRUANTS *** + + + + +Produced by Charles Bowen, from page scans provided by the Web Archive + + + + + + + + +Transcriber's Notes: + + 1. Page scan source: + http://www.archive.org/details/truantsnovel00maso + + 2. The diphthong oe is represented by [oe]. + + + + + + THE TRUANTS + + + + + + + BY THE SAME AUTHOR + + + THE FOUR FEATHERS. + CLEMENTINA. + MIRANDA OF THE BALCONY. + THE WATCHERS. + THE COURTSHIP OF MORRICE BUCKLER. + THE PHILANDERERS. + LAWRENCE CLAVERING. + ENSIGN KNIGHTLEY, AND OTHER STORIES. + + + + + + + THE TRUANTS + + + + + BY + + A. E. W. MASON + + AUTHOR OF + + "THE FOUR FEATHERS," "MIRANDA OF THE BALCONY," + + ETC., ETC. + + + + + LONDON + + SMITH, ELDER & CO., 15, WATERLOO PLACE + + 1904 + + (_All rights reserved_) + + + + + + + PRINTED BY + + WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, + + LONDON AND BECCLES. + + + + + CONTENTS + + + CHAPTER + + I. Pamela Mardale learns a very little History. + + II. Pamela looks on. + + III. The Truants. + + IV. Tony Stretton makes a Proposal. + + V. Pamela makes a Promise. + + VI. News of Tony. + + VII. The Lady on the Stairs. + + VIII. Gideon's Fleece. + + IX. The New Road. + + X. Mr. Chase. + + XI. On the Dogger Bank. + + XII. Tony's Inspiration. + + XIII. Tony Stretton returns to Stepney. + + XIV. Tony Stretton pays a Visit to Berkeley Square. + + XV. Mr. Mudge comes to the Rescue. + + XVI. The Foreign Legion. + + XVII. Callon leaves England. + + XVIII. South of Ouargla. + + XIX. The Turnpike Gate. + + XX. Mr. Chase does not answer. + + XXI. Callon redivivus. + + XXII. Mr. Mudge's Confession. + + XXIII. Roquebrune Revisited. + + XXIV. The End of the Experiment. + + XXV. Tony Stretton bids Farewell to the Legion. + + XXVI. Bad News for Pamela. + + XXVII. "Balak!" + + XXVIII. Homewards. + + XXIX. Pamela meets a Stranger. + + XXX. M. Giraud again. + + XXXI. At the Reserve. + + XXXII. Husband and Wife. + + XXXIII. Millie's Story. + + XXXIV. The Next Morning. + + XXXV. The Little House in Deanery Street. + + XXXVI. The End. + + + + + + THE TRUANTS + + + + + CHAPTER I + + PAMELA MARDALE LEARNS A VERY LITTLE HISTORY + + +There were only two amongst all Pamela Mardale's friends who guessed +that anything was wrong with her; and those two included neither her +father nor her mother. Her mother, indeed, might have guessed, had she +been a different woman. But she was a woman of schemes and little +plots, who watched with concentration their immediate developments, +but had no eyes for any lasting consequence. And it was no doubt as +well for her peace of mind that she never guessed. But of the others +it was unlikely that any one would suspect the truth. For Pamela made +no outward sign. She hunted through the winter from her home under the +Croft Hill in Leicestershire; she went everywhere, as the saying is, +during the season in London; she held her own in her own world, +lacking neither good spirits nor the look of health. There were, +perhaps, two small peculiarities which marked her off from her +companions. She was interested in things rather than in persons, and +she preferred to talk to old men rather than to youths. But such +points, taken by themselves, were not of an importance to attract +attention. + +Yet there were two amongst her friends who suspected: Alan Warrisden +and the schoolmaster of Roquebrune, the little village carved out of +the hillside to the east of Monte Carlo. The schoolmaster was the +nearer to the truth, for he not only knew that something was amiss, he +suspected what the something was. But then he had a certain advantage, +since he had known Pamela Mardale when she was a child. Their +acquaintance came about in the following way-- + +He was leaning one evening of December over the parapet of the tiny +square beside the schoolhouse, when a servant from the Villa +Pontignard approached him. + +"Could M. Giraud make it convenient to call at the villa at noon +to-morrow?" the servant asked. "Madame Mardale was anxious to speak to +him." + +M. Giraud turned about with a glow of pleasure upon his face. + +"Certainly," he replied. "But nothing could be more simple. I will be +at the Villa Pontignard as the clock strikes." + +The servant bowed, and without another word paced away across the +square and up the narrow winding street of Roquebrune, leaving the +schoolmaster a little abashed at his display of eagerness. M. Giraud +recognised that in one man's mind, at all events, he was now set down +for a snob, for a lackey disguised as a schoolmaster. But the moment +of shame passed. He had no doubt as to the reason of the summons, and +he tingled with pride from head to foot. It was his little brochure +upon the history of the village--written with what timidity, and +printed at what cost to his meagre purse!--which had brought him +recognition from the lady of the villa upon the spur of the hill. +Looking upwards he could just see the white walls of the villa +glimmering through the dusk, he could imagine its garden of trim lawns +and dark cypresses falling from bank to bank in ordered tiers down the +hillside. + +"To-morrow at noon," he repeated to himself; and now he was seized +with a shiver of fear at the thought of the mistakes in behaviour +which he was likely to make. What if Madame Mardale asked him to +breakfast? There would be unfamiliar dishes to be eaten with +particular forks. Sometimes a knife should be used and sometimes not. +He turned back to the parapet with the thought that he had better, +perhaps, send up a note in the morning pleading his duties at the +school as a reason for breaking his engagement. But he was young, and +as he looked down the steep slope of rock on which the village is +perched, anticipation again got the better of fear. He began to build +up his life like a fairy palace from the foundation of this brief +message. + +A long lane of steps led winding down from the square, and his eyes +followed it, as his feet had often done, to the little railway station +by the sea through which people journeyed to and fro between the great +cities, westwards to France and Paris, eastwards to Rome and Italy. +His eyes followed the signal lights towards another station of many +lamps far away to the right, and as he looked there blazed out +suddenly other lights of a great size and a glowing brilliancy, lights +which had the look of amazing jewels discovered in an eastern cave. +These were the lights upon the terrace of Monte Carlo. The +schoolmaster had walked that terrace on his mornings of leisure, had +sat unnoticed on the benches, all worship of the women and their +daintiness, all envy of the men and the composure of their manner. He +knew none of them, and yet one of them had actually sent for him, and +had heard of his work. He was to speak with her at noon to-morrow. + +Let it be said at once that there was nothing of the lackey under the +schoolmaster's shabby coat. The visit which he was bidden to pay was +to him not so much a step upwards as outwards. Living always in this +remote high village, where the rock cropped out between the houses, +and the streets climbed through tunnels of rock, he was always +tormented with visions of great cities and thoroughfares ablaze; he +longed for the jostle of men, he craved for other companionship than +he could get in the village wineshop on the first floor, as a fainting +man craves for air. The stars came out above his head; it was a clear +night, and they had never shone brighter. The Mediterranean, dark and +noiseless, swept out at his feet beyond the woods of Cap Martin. But +he saw neither the Mediterranean nor any star. His eyes turned to the +glowing terrace upon his right, and to the red signal-lamps below the +terrace. + +M. Giraud kept his engagement punctually. The clock chimed upon the +mantelpiece a few seconds after he was standing in the drawing-room of +the Villa Pontignard, and before the clock had stopped chiming Mrs. +Mardale came in to him. She was a tall woman, who, in spite of her +years, still retained the elegance of her youth, but her face was hard +and a trifle querulous, and M. Giraud was utterly intimidated. On the +other hand, she had good manners, and the friendly simplicity with +which she greeted him began to set him at his ease. + +"You are a native of Roquebrune, Monsieur?" said she. + +"No, Madame, my father was a peasant at Aigues-Mortes. I was born +there," he replied frankly. + +"Yet you write, if I may say so, with the love of a native for his +village," she went on. M. Giraud was on the point of explaining. Mrs. +Mardale, however, was not in the least interested in his explanation, +and she asked him to sit down. + +"My daughter, Monsieur, has an English governess," she explained, "but +it seems a pity that she should spend her winters here and lose the +chance of becoming really proficient in French. The cure recommended +me to apply to you, and I sent for you to see whether we could arrange +that you should read history with her in French during your spare +hours." + +M. Giraud felt his head turning. Here was his opportunity so long +dreamed of come at last. It might be the beginning of a career--it was +at all events that first difficult step outwards. He was to be the +teacher in appearance; at the bottom of his heart he knew that he was +to be the pupil, he accepted the offer with enthusiasm, and the +arrangements were made. Three afternoons a week he was to spend an +hour at the Villa Pontignard. + +"Well, I hope the plan will succeed, said Mrs. Mardale, but she spoke +in a voice which showed that she had no great hopes of success. And as +M. Giraud replied that he would at all events do his best, she +rejoined plaintively-- + +"It is not of you, Monsieur, that I have any doubts. But you do not +know my daughter. She will learn nothing which she does not want to +learn, she will not endure any governess who is not entirely her +slave, and she is fifteen and she really must learn something." + +Pamela Mardale, indeed, was at this time the despair of her mother. +Mrs. Mardale had mapped out for her daughter an ideal career. She was +to be a model of decorum in the Early Victorian style, at once an +ornament for a drawing-room and an excellent housekeeper, and she was +subsequently to make a brilliant marriage. The weak point of the +scheme was that it left Pamela out of the reckoning. There was her +passion for horses for one thing, and her distinct refusal, besides, +to sit quietly in any drawing-room. When she was a child, horses had +been persons to Pamela rather than animals, and, as her conduct +showed, persons preferable by far to human beings. Visitors to the +house under Croft Hill were at times promised a sight of Pamela, and +indeed they sometimes did see a girl in a white frock, with long black +legs, and her hair tumbled all over her forehead, neighing and +prancing at them from behind the gate of the stable yard. But they did +not see her at closer quarters than that, and it was certain that if +by any chance her lessons were properly learnt, they had been learnt +upon the corn-bin in the stables. Portraits of Pamela at the age of +nine remain, and they show a girl who was very pretty, but who might +quite well have been a boy, with a mass of unruly dark hair, a pair of +active dark eyes, and a good-humoured face alertly watching for any +mischief which might come its way. + +Something of the troubles which M. Giraud was likely to find ahead of +him Mrs. Mardale disclosed that morning, and the schoolmaster returned +to his house filled with apprehensions. The apprehensions, however, +were not justified. The little schoolmaster was so shy, so timid, that +Pamela was disarmed. She could be gentle when she chose, and she chose +now. She saw, too, M. Giraud's anxiety to justify her mother's choice +of him, and she determined with a sense of extreme virtue to be a +credit to his teaching. They became friends, and thus one afternoon, +when they had taken their books out into the garden of the villa, M. +Giraud confided to her the history of the brochure which had made them +acquainted. + +"It was not love for Roquebrune which led me to write it," he said. +"It was, on the contrary, my discontent. I was tortured with longings, +I was not content with the children's lessons for my working hours, +and the wineshop for my leisure. I took long walks over Cap Martin to +Mentone, along the Corniche road to La Turbie, and up Mont Agel. But +still I had my longings as my constant companions, and since +everywhere I saw traces of antiquity, I wrote this little history as a +relief. It kept my thoughts away from the great world." + +The garden ran here to a point at the extreme end of that outcropping +spur of rock on which the villa was built. They were facing westwards, +and the sun was setting behind the hills. It lay red upon the +Mediterranean on their left, but the ravine and front was already +dark, and down the hillside the shadows of the trees were lengthening. +At their feet, a long way below, a stream tumbled and roared amongst +the oleanders in the depths of the ravine. Pamela sat gazing +downwards, her lips parted in a smile. + +"The great world," she said in a low voice of eagerness. "I wonder +what it's like." + +That afternoon marked a distinct step in their friendship, and +thereafter in the intervals of their reading they talked continually +upon this one point they had in common, their curiosity as to the life +of the world beyond their village. But it happened that Pamela did the +greater part of the talking, and one afternoon that fact occurred to +her. + +"You always listen now, Monsieur," she said. "Why have you grown so +silent?" + +"You know more than I do, Mademoiselle." + +"I?" she exclaimed in surprise. "I only know about horses." Then she +laughed. "Really, we both know nothing. We can only guess and guess." + +And that was the truth. Pamela's ideas of the world were as visionary, +as dreamlike as his, but they were not his, as he was quick to +recognise. The instincts of her class, her traditions, the influence +of her friends, were all audible in her voice as well as in her words. +To her the world was a great flower garden of pleasure with plenty of +room for horses. To him it was a crowded place of ennobling strife. + +"But it's pleasant work guessing," she continued, "isn't it? Then why +have you stopped?" + +"I will tell you, Mademoiselle. I am beginning to guess through your +eyes." + +The whistle of a train, the train from Paris, mounted through the +still air to their ears. + +"Well," said Pamela, with a shrug of impatience, "we shall both know +the truth some time." + +"You will, Mademoiselle," said the schoolmaster, suddenly falling out +of his dream. + +Pamela looked quickly at him. The idea that he would be left behind, +that he would stay here all his life listening to the sing-song drone +of the children in the schoolroom, teaching over and over again with +an infinite weariness the same elementary lessons, until he became +shabby and worn as the lesson-books he handled, had never struck her +till this moment. The trouble which clouded his face was reflected by +sympathy upon hers. + +"But you won't stay here," she said gently. "Oh no! Let me think!" and +she thought with a child's oblivion of obstacles and a child's +confidence. She imparted the wise result of her reflections to M. +Giraud the next afternoon. + +He came to the garden with his eyes fevered and his face drawn. + +"You are ill?" said Pamela. "We will not work to-day." + +"It's nothing," he replied. + +"Tell me," said she. + +M. Giraud looked out across the valley. + +"Two travellers came up to Roquebrune yesterday. I met them as I +walked home from here. I spoke to them and showed them the village, +and took them by the short cut of the steps down to the railway +station. They were from London. They talked of London and of Paris. +It's as well visitors come up to Roquebrune rarely. I have not slept +all night," and he clasped and unclasped his hands. + +"Hannibal crossed the Alps," said Pamela. "I read it in your book," +and then she shook a finger at him, just as the schoolmaster might +have done to one of his refractory pupils. + +"Listen," said she. "I have thought it all out." + +The schoolmaster composed himself into the attentive attitude of a +pupil. + +"You are to become a Deputy." + +That was the solution of the problem. Pamela saw no difficulties. He +would need a dress-suit of course for official occasions, which she +understood were numerous. A horse, too, would be of use, but that +didn't matter so much. The horse was regretfully given up. It might +come later, he must get elected first, never mind how. In a word, he +was as good as a Deputy already. And from a Deputy to the President of +the French Republic, the step after all was not so very long. "Though +I am not quite sure that I approve of Republics," said Pamela, very +seriously. + +However, that was the best she could do in the way of mapping out his +future, and the schoolmaster listened, seeing the world through her +eyes. Thus three winters passed and Pamela learned a very little +history. + +Towards the end of the third winter the history books were put away. +Pamela was now eighteen and looking eagerly forward to her first +season in London. And no doubt frocks and hats occupied more of her +thoughts than did the fortunes of the schoolmaster. Some remorse for +her forgetfulness seized her the day before she went away. It was a +morning of spring, and the schoolmaster saw her coming down the dark +narrow streets towards him. She was tall beyond the average, but +without ungainliness, long of limb and lightly built, and she walked +with the very step of youth. Her dark hair swept in two heavy waves +above her forehead, and was coiled down behind on the back of her +neck. Her throat rose straight and slim from the firm shoulders, and +her eyes glowed with anticipation. Though her hair was dark, she was +not sallow. Her face was no less fresh and clear than were her eyes, +and a soft colour like the bloom of a fruit brightened her cheeks. In +that old brown street she shone like a brilliant flower, and Giraud, +as he watched her, felt all at once that he could have no place in her +life, and in his humility he turned aside. But she ran after him and +caught him up. + +"I am going to-morrow," she said, and she tried to keep the look of +happiness out of her eyes, the thrill out of her voice. And she +failed. + +"It is good-bye, then," said he. + +"For a little while. I shall come back to Roquebrune in December." + +The schoolmaster smiled. + +"I shall look forward from to-day until that month comes. You will +have much to tell me." + +"Yes, shan't I?" she cried; and then, lest her eagerness should hurt +her friend, she added, "But I shall not forget our quiet afternoons on +the garden terrace." + +The recollection of them, however, was not strong enough to check +either her thoughts or their utterance. Later on perhaps, in after +years, she might in her musings return to that terrace and the +speculations they indulged in, and the fairy palaces they built, with +an envy of the ignorance and the high thoughts of youth. To-day she +was all alert to grasp the future in her hands. One can imagine her +looking much as she looked in those portraits of her childhood. + +"News of the great world," she cried. "I shall bring it back. We will +talk it over in Roquebrune and correct our guesses. For I shall know." + +As a fact, they never did talk over her news, but that she could not +foresee. She went on her way with a smile upon her face: all +confidence and courage, and expectation, a brilliant image of youth. +Giraud, as he watched her the proud poise of her head, the light +springing step, the thing of beauty and gentleness which she was, +breathed a prayer that no harm might come to her, and no grief ever +sadden her face. + +The next morning she went away, and the schoolmaster lost his one +glimpse of the outer world. But he lived upon the recollections of it, +and took again to his long walks on the Corniche road. The time hung +heavily upon his hands. He hungered for news, and no news came, and +when in the month of December he noticed that the shutters were opened +in the Villa Pontignard, and that there was a stir of servants about +the house, he felt that the shutters were being opened after a long +dark time from his one window on the outside world. He frequented the +little station from that moment. No "Rapide" passed from France on its +way to Italy during his leisure hours but he was there to watch its +passengers. Mrs. Mardale came first, and a fortnight afterwards Pamela +descended from a carriage with her maid. + +Giraud watched her with a thrill of longing. It was not merely his +friend who had returned, but his instructor, with new and wonderful +knowledge added to the old. + +Then came his first chilling moment of disillusion. It was quite +evident that she saw him as she was stepping on to the platform. Her +eyes went straight to his--and yet she turned away without the +slightest sign of recognition and busied herself about her luggage. +The world had spoilt her. That was his first thought, but he came to a +truer understanding afterwards. And indeed that thought had barely +become definite in his mind, when she turned again, and, holding out +her hand, came to him with a smile. + +"You are well?" she said. + +"Yes," said he. + +And they walked up the long flight of steps to Roquebrune, talking +banalities. She gave him none of the news for which he longed, and +they spoke not at all of the career which together they had mapped out +for him. All their long talks upon the terrace, their plans and their +speculations seemed in an instant to Giraud to have become part of a +pleasant, very foolish, and very distant past. He was aware of the +vast gulf between them. With a girl's inimitable quickness to adapt +herself to new surroundings, she had acquired in the few months of her +absence the ease, the polish, and the armour of a woman of the world. +He was still the village schoolmaster, the peasant tortured with vain +aspirations, feeding upon vain dreams; and in this moment he saw +himself very clearly. Her silence upon their plan helped him to see +himself thus. Had she still believed in that imagined career, surely +she would have spoken of it. In a word, he was still looking at the +world through her eyes. + +"You must come up to the villa," she said. "I shall look forward to +your coming." + +They were in the little square by the schoolhouse and he took the +words for his dismissal. She went up the hill alone and slowly, like +one that is tired. Giraud, watching her, could not but compare her +with the girl who had come lightly down that street a few months ago. +It dawned upon him that, though knowledge had been acquired, something +had gone, something perhaps more valuable, the elasticity from her +step, the eagerness from her eyes. + +Giraud did not go up to the villa of his own accord, but he was asked +to lunch in a week's time, and after lunch Pamela and he went out into +the garden. Instinctively they walked down to that corner on the point +of the bluff which overhung the ravine and the white torrent amongst +the oleanders in its depths. They had come indeed to the bench on +which they used to sit before Pamela was quite aware of the direction +their steps had taken. She drew back suddenly as she raised her head. + +"Oh no, not here," she cried, and she moved away quickly with a look +of pain. Giraud suddenly understood why she had turned away at the +railway station. Here they had dreamed, and the reality had shown the +dreams to be bitterly false, so false that the very place where they +had dreamed had become by its associations a place of pain. She had +needed for herself that first moment when she had stepped down from +the carriage. + +"The world must be the home of great troubles,' said Giraud, sadly. + +"And how do you know that?" Pamela asked with a smile. + +"From you," he replied simply. + +The answer was unexpected. Pamela stopped and looked at him with +startled eyes. + +"From me? I have said nothing--nothing at all." + +"Yet I know. How else should I know except from you, since through you +alone I see the world?" + +"A home of great troubles?" she repeated, speaking lightly. "Not for +all. You are serious, my friend, this afternoon, and you should not +be, for have I not come back?" + +The schoolmaster was not deceived by her evasion. There had come a +gravity into her manner, and a womanliness into her face, in a degree +more than natural at her years. + +"Let us talk of you for a change," said she. + +"Well, and what shall we say?" asked Giraud, and a constraint fell +upon them both. + +"We must forget those fine plans," he continued at length. "Is it not +so? I think I have learnt that too from you." + +"I hare said nothing," she interrupted quickly. + +"Precisely," said he, with a smile. "The school at Roquebrune will +send no Deputy to Paris." + +"Oh! why not?" said Pamela, but there was no conviction in her voice. +Giraud was not of the stern stuff + + + "To break his birth's invidious bar." + + +He had longings, but there was the end. + +"At all events," she said, turning to him with a great earnestness, +"we shall be friends always, whatever happens." + +The words were the death-knell to the schoolmaster's aspirations. They +conveyed so much more than was actually said. He took them bravely +enough. + +"That is a good thing," he said in all sincerity. "If I stay here all +my life, I shall still have the memory of the years when I taught you +history. I shall know, though I do not see you, that we are friends. +It is a great thing for me." + +"For me, too," said Pamela, looking straight into his eyes, and she +meant her words no less than he had meant his. Yet to both they had +the sound of a farewell. And in a way they were. They were the +farewell to the afternoons upon the terrace, they closed the door upon +their house of dreams. + +Giraud leaned that evening over the parapet in the little square of +Roquebrune. The Mediterranean lay dark and quiet far below, the +terrace of Monte Carlo glowed, and the red signal-lamps pointed out +the way to Paris. But he was no longer thinking of his fallen plans. +He was thinking of the girl up there in the villa who had been struck +by some blind blow of Destiny, who had grown a woman before her time. +It was a pity, it was a loss in the general sum of things which make +for joy. + +He had of course only his suspicions to go upon. But they were soon +strengthened. For Pamela fell into ill-health, and the period of +ill-health lasted all that winter. After those two years had passed, +she disappeared for a while altogether out of Giraud's sight. She came +no more to the Villa Pontignard, but stayed with her father and her +horses at her home in Leicestershire. Her mother came alone to +Roquebrune. + + + + + CHAPTER II + + PAMELA LOOKS ON + + +Alan Warrisden was one of the two men who had walked up to Roquebrune +on that afternoon of which M. Giraud spoke. But it was not until +Pamela had reached the age of twenty that he made her acquaintance at +Lady Millingham's house in Berkeley Square. He took her down to +dinner, and, to tell the truth, paid no particular attention either to +her looks or her conversation. His neighbour upon the other side +happened to be a friend whom he had not seen for some while, and for a +good part of the dinner he talked to her. A few days afterwards, +however, he called upon Lady Millingham, and she asked at once quite +eagerly-- + +"Well, what did you think of Pamela Mardale?" + +Warrisden was rather at a loss. He was evidently expected to answer +with enthusiasm, and he had not any very definite recollections on +which enthusiasm could be based. He did his best, however; but he was +unconvincing. Lady Millingham shrugged her shoulders and frowned. She +had been married precisely a year, and was engaged in plans for +marrying off all her friends with the greatest possible despatch. + +"I shall send you in with somebody quite old the next time you dine +here," she said severely, and she discoursed at some length upon +Pamela's charms. "She loves horses, and yet she's not a bit horsey," +she said in conclusion, "and there's really nothing better than that. +And just heaps of men have wanted to marry her." She leaned back +against her sofa and contemplated Warrisden with silent scorn. She had +set her heart upon this marriage more than upon any other. Of all the +possible marriages in London, there was not one, to her mind, so +suitable as this. Pamela Mardale came of one of the oldest families of +commoners in Leicestershire. The family was not well off, the estate +had shrunk year by year, and what was left was mortgaged, owing in +some degree to that villa at Roquebrune upon which Mrs. Mardale +insisted. Warrisden, on the other hand, was more than well off, his +family was known, and at the age of twenty-eight he was still dividing +his life between the season in London and shooting expeditions about +the world. And he had the look of a man who might do something more. + +That visit had its results. Warrisden met Pamela Mardale again and +realised that Lady Millingham's indignation had been justified. At the +end of that season he proposed, and was gently refused. But if he was +slow to move, he was also firm to persevere. He hunted with the Quorn +that winter, and during the following season he was persistently but +unobtrusively at her elbow; so that Pamela came, at all events, to +count upon him as a most reliable friend. Having duly achieved that +place in her thoughts, he disappeared for ten months and returned to +town one afternoon in the last week of June. There were letters +waiting for him in his rooms, and amongst them a card from Lady +Millingham inviting him to a dance upon that night. At eleven o'clock +his _coupe_ turned out of Piccadilly and entered Berkeley Square. At +the bottom of the square the lighted windows of the house blazed out +upon the night, the balconies were banked with flowers, and behind the +flowers, silhouetted against the light, were visible the thronged +faces of men and women. Warrisden leaned forward, scrutinising the +shapes of the heads, the contours of the faces. His sight, sharpened +by long practice over wide horizons, was of the keenest; he could see, +even at that distance, the flash of jewels on neck and shoulder. But +the face he looked for was not there. + +Lady Millingham, however, set his mind at case. + +"You are back, then?" she cried. + +"This afternoon." + +"You will find friends here." + +Warrisden passed on into the reception rooms. It seemed to him indeed +that all the friends he had ever made were gathered to this one house +on this particular evening. He was a tall man, and his height made him +noticeable upon most occasions. He was the more noticeable now by +reason of his sunburn and a certain look of exhilaration upon his +face. The season was drawing to its end, and brown faces were not so +usual but that the eyes turned to them. He spoke, however, the fewest +possible words to the men who greeted him, and he did not meet the +eyes of any woman. Yet he saw the women, and was in definite quest of +one of them. That might have been noticed by a careful observer, for +whenever he saw a man older than the rest talking to a girl he +quickened his pace that he might the sooner see that girl's face. He +barely looked into the ball-room at all, but kept to the corridors, +and, at last, in a doorway, came face to face with Pamela Mardale. He +saw her face light up, and the hand held out to him was even eagerly +extended. + +"Have you a dance to spare?" + +Pamela looked quickly round upon her neighbours. + +"Yes, this one," she answered. She bowed to her companion, a man, as +Warrisden expected, much older than herself, and led the way at once +towards the balcony. Warrisden saw a youth emerge from the throng and +come towards them. Pamela was tall, and she used her height at this +moment. She looked him in the face with so serene an indifference that +the youth drew back disconcerted. Pamela was deliberately cutting her +partners. + +Another man might have built upon the act, but Warrisden was shrewd, +and shrewdness had taught him long since to go warily in thought where +Pamela Mardale was concerned. She might merely be angry. He walked by +her side and said nothing. Even when they were seated on the balcony, +he left for her to speak first. She was sitting upon the outside +against the railing, so that the light from the windows streamed full +upon her face. He watched it, looking for the change which he desired. +But it had still the one fault he found with it. It was still too +sedate, too womanly for her years. It happened that they had found a +corner where flowers made a sort of screen, and they could talk in low +voices without being overheard. + +"I heard of you," she said. "You were shooting woodcock in Dalmatia." + +"That was at Christmas." + +"Yes. You were hurt there." + +"Not seriously," he replied. "A sheep-dog attacked me. They are savage +brutes, and indeed they have to be, there are so many wolves. The +worst of it is, if you are attacked, you mustn't kill the dog, or +there's trouble." + +"I heard of you again. You were at Quetta, getting together a +caravan." + +"That was in February. I crossed by the new trade route from Quetta to +Seistan." + +She had spoken in an indefinite tone, which left him with no clue to +her thoughts. Now, however she turned her eyes upon him, and said in a +lower voice, which was very gentle-- + +"Don't you think yon might have told me that you were going away for a +year?" + +Warrisden had gone away deliberately, and as deliberately he had +abstained from telling her of his intention. He had no answer to make +to her question, and he did not attempt to invent one. He sat still +and looked at her. She followed the question with another. +"Don't you think it would have been kinder if you had written to me +once or twice, instead of letting me hear about you from any chance +acquaintance?" + +Again he made no answer. For he had deliberately abstained from +writing. The gentleness with which she spoke was the most hopeful sign +for him which she had made that evening. He had expected a harsher +accusation. For Pamela made her claims upon her friends. They must put +her first or there was likely to be a deal of trouble. + +"Well," she said, with a shrug of her shoulders, "I hope you enjoyed +it." + +"Yes. I wish I could have thought you would have enjoyed it too. But +you wouldn't have." + +"No," she answered listlessly. + +Warrisden was silent. He had expected the answer, but he was none the +less disappointed to receive it. To him there was no century in the +history of the world comparable to that in which he lived. It had its +faults, of course. It was ugly and a trifle feverish, but to men of +his stamp, the men with means and energy, a new world with countless +opportunities had been opened up. Asia and Africa were theirs, and the +farthest islands of the sea. Pamela, however, turned her back on it. +The new trade route to Seistan had no message for her. She looked with +envy upon an earlier century. + +"Of course," he resumed, "it's pleasant to come back, if only as a +preparation for going away again." + +And then Pamela turned on him with her eyes wide open and a look of +actual trouble upon her face. + +"No," she said with emphasis. She leaned forward and lowered her +voice. "You have no right to work upon people and make them your +friends, if you mean, when you have made them your friends, to go away +without a word for ever so long. I have missed you very much." + +"I wanted you to miss me," he replied. + +"Yes, I thought so. But it wasn't fair," she said gently. "You see, I +have been quite fair with you. If you had gone away at once, if you +had left me alone when I said 'No' to you two years ago, then I should +have no right to complain. I should have no right to call you back. +But it's different now, and you willed that it should be different. +You stayed by me. Whenever I turned, there were you at my side. You +taught me to count on you, as I count on no one else. Yes, that's +true. Well, then, you have lost the right to turn your back now just +when it pleases you." + +"It wasn't because it pleased me." + +"No. I admit that," she agreed. "It was to make an experiment on me, +but the experiment was made at my expense. For after all you enjoyed +yourself," she added, with a laugh. + +Warrisden joined in the laugh. + +"It's quite true," he said. "I did." Then his voice dropped to the +same serious tone in which she had spoken. "Why not say the experiment +succeeded? Couldn't you say that?" + +Pamela shook her head. + +"No. I can give you no more now than I gave you a year ago, two years +ago, and that is not enough. Oh, I know," she continued hurriedly as +she saw that he was about to interrupt. "Lots of women are content to +begin with friendship. How they can, puzzles me. But I know they do +begin with nothing more than that, and very often it works out very +well. The friendship becomes more than friendship. But I can't begin +that way. I would if I could. But I can't." + +She leaned back in her chair, and sat for a while with her hands upon +her knees in an attitude extraordinarily still. The jingle of harness +in the square rose to Warrisden's ears, the clamour of the town came +muffled from the noisy streets. He looked upwards to the tender blue +of a summer sky where the stars shone like silver; and he leaned back +disheartened. He had returned to London, and nothing was changed. +There was the same busy life vociferous in its streets, and this girl +still sat in the midst of it with the same lassitude and quiescence. +She seemed to be waiting, not at all for something new to happen, but +for the things, which were happening, to cease, waiting with the +indifference of the very old. And she was quite young. She sat with +the delicate profile of her face outlined against the darkness; the +colour of youth was in her cheeks; the slender column of her throat, +the ripple of her dark hair, the grace of her attitude claimed her for +youth; she was fragrant with it from head to foot. And yet it seemed +that there was no youth in her blood. + +"So nothing has changed for you during these months," he said, deeply +disappointed. + +She turned her face quietly to him and smiled. "No," she answered, +"there has been no new road for me from Quetta to Seistan. I still +look on." + +There was the trouble. She just looked on, and to his thinking it was +not right that at her age she should do no more. A girl nowadays had +so many privileges, so many opportunities denied to her grandmother, +she could do so much more, she had so much more freedom, and yet +Pamela insisted upon looking on. If she had shown distress, it would +have been better. But no. She lived without deep feeling of any kind +in a determined isolation. She had built up a fence about herself, and +within it she sat untouched and alone. + +It was likely that no one else in the wide circle of her acquaintances +had noticed her detachment, and certainly to no one but Warrisden had +she admitted it. And it was only acknowledged to him after he had +found it out for himself. For she did not sit at home. On the +contrary, hardly a night passed during the season but she went to some +party. Only, wherever she went, she looked on. + +"And you still prefer old men to young ones?" he cried in a real +exasperation. + +"They talk more of things and less of persons," she explained. + +That was not right either. She ought to be interested in persons. +Warrisden rose abruptly from his chair. He was completely baffled. +Pamela was like the sleeping princess in the fairy tale, she lay girt +about with an impassable thicket of thorns. She was in a worse case, +indeed, for the princess in the story might have slept on till the end +of time, a thing of beauty. But was it possible for Pamela, so to +sleep to the end of life, he asked himself. Let her go on in her +indifference, and she might dwindle and grow narrow, her soul would be +starved and all the good of her be lost. Somehow a way must be forced +through the thicket, somehow she must be wakened. But he seemed no +nearer to finding that way than he had been two years ago, and she was +no nearer to her wakening. + +"No, there has been no change," he said, and as he spoke his eye was +caught by a bright light which suddenly flamed up in the window of a +dark house upon his right. The house had perplexed him more than once. +It took so little part in the life of the square, it so consistently +effaced itself from the gaieties of the people who lived about. Its +balconies were never banked with flowers, no visitors mounted its +steps; and even in the daytime it had a look of mystery. It may have +been that some dim analogy between that house and the question which +so baffled him arrested Warrisden's attention. It may have been merely +that he was by nature curious and observant. But he leaned forward +upon the balcony-rail. + +"Do you see that light?" he asked. "In the window on the second +floor?" + +"Yes." + +He took out his watch and noticed the time. It was just a quarter to +twelve. He laughed softly to himself and said-- + +"Wait a moment!" + +He watched the house for a few minutes without saying a word. Pamela +with a smile at his eagerness watched too. In a little while they saw +the door open and a man and a woman, both in evening dress, appear +upon the steps. Warrisden laughed again. + +"Wait," he said, as if he expected Pamela to interrupt. "You'll see +they won't whistle up a cab. They'll walk beyond the house and take +one quietly. Very likely they'll look up at the lighted window on the +second floor as though they were schoolboys who had escaped from their +dormitories, and were afraid of being caught by the master before they +had had their fun. There, do you see?" + +For as he spoke the man and the woman stopped and looked up. Had they +heard Warrisden's voice and obeyed his directions they could not have +more completely fulfilled his prediction. They had the very air of +truants. Apparently they were reassured. They walked along the +pavement until they were well past the house. Then they signalled to a +passing hansom. The cab-driver did not see them, yet they did not call +out, nor did the man whistle. They waited until another approached and +they beckoned to that. Warrisden watched the whole scene with the +keenest interest. As the two people got into the cab he laughed again +and turned back to Pamela. + +"Well?" she said, with a laugh of amusement, and the quiet +monosyllable, falling as it were with a cold splash upon his enjoyment +of the little scene, suddenly brought him back to the question which +was always latent in his mind. How was Pamela to be awakened? + +"It's a strange place, London," he said. "No doubt it seems stranger +to me, and more full of interesting people and interesting things just +because I have come back from very silent and very empty places. But +that house always puzzled me. I used to have rooms overlooking this +square, high up, over there," and he pointed to the eastern side of +the square towards Berkeley Street, "and what we have seen to-night +used to take place every night, and at the same hour. The light went +up in the room on the second floor, and the truants crept out. Guess +where they go to! The Savoy. They go and sit there amongst the lights +and the music for half an hour, then they come back to the dark house. +They live in the most curious isolation with the most curious +regularity. There are three of them altogether: an old man--it is his +light, I suppose, which went up on the second floor--and those two. I +know who they are. The old man is Sir John Stretton." + +"Oh!" said Pamela, with interest. + +"And the two people we saw are his son and his son's wife. I have +never met them. In fact, no one meets them. I don't know any one who +knows them." + +"Yes, you do," said Pamela, "I know them." And in her knowledge, +although Warrisden did not know it, lay the answer to the problem +which so perplexed him. + + + + + CHAPTER III + + THE TRUANTS + + +Warrisden turned quickly to Pamela. + +"You never mentioned them." + +"No," she replied with a smile. "But there's no mystery in my silence. +I simply haven't mentioned them because for two years I have lost +sight of them altogether. I used to meet them about, and I have been +to their house." + +"There?" asked Warrisden, with a nod towards the lighted window. + +"No; but to the house Millie and Mr. Stretton had in Deanery Street. +They gave that up two years ago when old Lady Stretton died. I thought +they had gone to live in the country." + +"And all the while they have been living here," exclaimed Warrisden. +He had spoken truthfully of himself. The events, and the people with +whom he came, however slightly, into contact always had interested and +amused him. It was his pleasure to fit his observations together until +he had constructed a little biography in his mind of each person with +whom he was acquainted. And there was never an incident of any +interest within his notice, but he sought the reason for it and kept +an eye open for its consequence. + +"Don't you see how strange the story is?" he went on. "They give up +their house upon Lady Stretton's death, and they come to live here +with Sir John. That's natural enough. Sir John's an old man. But they +live in such seclusion that even their friends think they have retired +into the country." + +"Yes, it is strange," Pamela admitted. And she added, "I was Millie +Stretton's bridesmaid." + +Upon Warrisden's request she told him what she knew of the couple who +lived in the dark house and played truant. Millie Stretton was the +daughter of a Judge in Ceylon who when Millie had reached the age of +seventeen had married a second time. The step-mother had lacked +discretion; from the very first she had claimed to exercise a complete +and undisputed authority; she had been at no pains to secure the +affections of her step-daughter. And very little trouble would have +been needed, for Millie was naturally affectionate. A girl without any +great depth of feeling, she responded easily to a show of kindness. +She found it neither difficult to make intimate friends, nor hard to +lose them. She was of the imitative type besides. She took her +thoughts and even her language from those who at the moment were by +her side. Thus her step-mother had the easiest of tasks but she did +not possess the necessary tact. She demanded obedience, and in return +offered tolerance. The household at Colombo, therefore, became for +Millie a roofstead rather than a home, and a year after this marriage +she betook herself and the few thousands of pounds which her mother +had bequeathed her to London. The ostensible reason for departure was +the invitation of Mrs. Charles Rawson, a friend of her mother's. But +Millie had made up her mind that a return to Ceylon was not to be +endured. Somehow she would manage to make a home or herself in +England. + +She found her path at once made easy. She was pretty, with the +prettiness of a child, she gave no trouble, she was fresh, she dressed +a drawing-room gracefully, he fitted neatly into her surroundings, she +picked up immediately the ways of thought and the jargon of her new +companions. In a word, with the remarkable receptivity which was hers, +she was very quickly at home in Mrs. Rawson's house. She became a +favourite no less for her modest friendliness than on account of her +looks. Mrs. Rawson, who was nearing middle age, but whose love of +amusements was not assuaged, rejoiced to have so attractive a +companion to take about with her. Millie, for her part, was very glad +to be so taken about. She had fallen from the obscure clouds into a +bright and wonderful world. + +It was at this time that Pamela Mardale first met Millicent Stretton, +or rather, one should say, Millicent Rundell, since Rundell was at +that time her name. They became friends, although so far as character +was concerned they had little in common. It may have been that the +difference between them was the actual cause of their friendship. +Certainly Millie came rather to lean upon her friend, admired her +strength, made her the repository of her confidences, and if she +received no confidences in return, she was content to believe that +there were none to make. It was at this time too that Millie fell in +with Lady Stretton. + +Lady Stretton, a tall old woman with the head of a Grenadier, had +the characteristic of Sir Anthony Absolute. There was no one so +good-tempered so long as she had her own way; and she generally had +it. + +"Lady Stretton saw that Millie was easily led," Pamela continued. "She +thought, for that reason, she would be a suitable wife for Tony, her +son, who was then a subaltern in the Coldstream. So she did all she +could to throw them together. She invited Millie up to her house in +Scotland, the house Lady Millingham now has, and Mr. Stretton fell in +love. He was evidently very fond of Millie, and Millie on her side +liked him quite as much as any one else. They were married. Lady +Stretton hired them the house I told you of, close to Park Lane, and +took a great deal of trouble to see that they were comfortable. You +see, they were toys for her. There, that's all I know. Are you +satisfied?" + +She leaned back in her chair, smiling at Warrisden's serious face. + +"And what about the old man, Sir John Stretton?" he asked. + +"I never met him," replied Pamela. "He never went out to parties, and +I never went to that house." + +As she concluded the sentence, a man looked on to the balcony and, +seeing them, withdrew. Pamela rose at once from her chair, and, with a +sudden movement of jealousy, Warrisden swung round and looked into the +room. The man was well past the middle age, stout of build, and with a +heavy careworn face with no pleasure in it at all. He was the man who +had been with Pamela when Warrisden had arrived. Warrisden turned back +to the girl with a smile of relief. + +"You are engaged?" + +"Yes, for this dance to Mr. Mudge," and she indicated the man who was +retiring. "But we shall meet again--at Newmarket, at all events. +Perhaps in Scotland too." + +She held out her hand to Warrisden, and, as he took it, her voice +dropped to a plea. + +"Please don't go away again without telling me first, without talking +it over, so that I may know where you are from month to month. Please +promise!" + +Warrisden promised, and went away from the house with her prayer +echoing in his ears. The very sound of her voice was audible to him, +and he never doubted the sincerity of its appeal. But if she set such +store on what she had, why was she content with just that and nothing +more, he asked himself. Why did she not claim a little more and give a +little more in return? Why did she come to a halt at friendship, a +mere turnpike on the great road, instead of passing through the gate +and going on down the appointed way. He did not know that she passed +the turnpike once, and that if she refused to venture on that path +again, it was because, knowing herself, she dared not. + +In the narrows of Berkeley Street Warrisden was shaken out of these +reflections. A hansom jingled past him, and by the light of the lamp +which hung at the back within it he caught a glimpse of the truants. +They were driving home to the dark house in the Square, and they sat +side by side silent and with troubled faces. Warrisden's thoughts went +back to what Pamela had told him that night. She had told him the +half, but not the perplexing, interesting half of their history. That +indeed Pamela could not tell, for she did not know Sir John Stretton, +and the old man's warped and churlish character alone explained it. + +It was by his doing that the truants gave up their cheery little house +in Deanery Street and came to live in Berkeley Square. The old man was +a miser, who during his wife's existence had not been allowed to +gratify his instincts. He made all the more ample amends after she had +died. The fine allowance on which the young couple had managed to keep +a pair of horses and a little brougham was stripped from them. + +"Why should I live alone?" said the old man. "I am old, Tony, and I +need some attention. The house is big, much too big for me, and the +servants are eating their heads off for the want of something to do." +There were indeed more servants than were needed. Servants were the +single luxury Sir John allowed himself. Their liveries were faded, +they themselves were insolent and untidy, but they were there, in the +great bare dining-room at dinner-time, in the hall when Sir John came +home of an afternoon. For the old man went out each day as the clock +struck three; he came back each evening at half-past six. He went out +alone, he returned alone, and he never went to his club. He took an +omnibus from the corner of Berkeley Street and journeyed eastwards as +far as Ludgate Hill. There he took a drink in the refreshment bar, +and, coming out, struck northwards into Holborn, where he turned +westwards, and walking as far as the inn at the corner of the +Tottenham Court Road, stepped for an hour into the private bar. Thence +he took another omnibus, and finally reached home, where his footmen +received him solemnly in the hall. To this home he brought Tony and +his wife. + +"There choose your own rooms, Tony," he said magnanimously. "What's +that? Money? But what for? You'll have it soon enough." + +Tony Stretton suggested that it was hardly possible for any man, +however careful, to retain a commission in the Coldstream without an +allowance. Sir John, a tall thin man, with high bald forehead, and a +prim puritanical face, looked at his son with a righteous severity. + +"A very expensive regiment. Leave it, Tony! And live quietly at home. +Look after your father, my boy, and you won't need money," and he +stalked upstairs leaving Tony aghast in the hall. Tony had to sit down +and think it over before he could quite realise the fate which had +over-taken him. Here he was, twenty-six years old brought up to spend +what he wanted and to ask for more when that was ended, and he was to +live quietly on nothing at all. He had no longer any profession, he +was not clever enough to enter upon a new one without some sort of +start and in addition he had a wife. His wife, it was true, had a few +thousands; they had remained untouched ever since the marriage and +Tony shrank from touching them now. He sat on one of the hall-chairs, +twisting his moustache and staring with his blank blue eyes at the +opposite wall. What in the world was he to do? Old Sir John was quite +aware of those few thousands. They might just as well be used now he +thought, and save him expense. Tony could pay them back after his +father was dead. Such was Sir John's plan and Tony had to fall in with +it. The horses and the brougham and all the furniture, the prints, the +pictures and the mirrors which had decked out so gaily the little +house in Deanery Street went to the hammer. Tony paid off his debts +and found himself with a hundred pounds in hand at the end; and when +that was gone he was forced to come to his wife. + +"Of course," said she, "we'll share what I have, Tony." + +"Yes, but we must go carefully," he replied. "Heaven knows how long we +will have to drag on like this." + +So the money question was settled, but that was in reality the least +of their troubles. Sir John, for the first time in his life, was +master in fact as well as in name. He had been no match for his wife, +but he was more than a match for his son. He was the fifth baronet of +his name, and yet there was no landed property. He was rich, and all +the money was safely tucked away in the public funds, and he could +bequeath it as he willed. He was in a position to put the screw on +Tony and his wife, and he did not let the opportunity slip. The love +of authority grew upon him. He became exacting and portentously +severe. In his black, shabby coat, with his long thin figure, and his +narrow face, he had the look of a cold self-righteous fanatic. You +would have believed that he was mortifying his son for the sake of his +son's soul, unless perchance you had peeped into that private bar in +the Tottenham Court Road and had seen him drinking gloomily alone. + +He laid down rules to which the unfortunate couple must needs conform. +They had to dine with him every night and to sit with him every +evening until he went to bed. It followed that they lost sight of +their friends, and every month isolated them more completely. The mere +humiliation of the position in which they stood caused them to shrink +more and more into their privacy. When they walked out in the +afternoon they kept away from the Park; when they played truant in the +evening, at the Savoy, they chose a little table in an obscure corner. +This was the real history of the truants with whose fortunes those of +Warrisden and Pamela were to be so closely intermingled. For that life +in the dark house was not to last. Even as Warrisden passed them in +Berkeley Street, Tony Stretton was saying over and over again in his +inactive mind-- + +"It can't go on. It can't go on!" + +In the after times, when the yapping of dogs in the street at night +would wake Tony from his sleep, and set him on dreaming of tent +villages in a wild country of flowers, or when the wind in the trees +would recall to him a little ship labouring on short steep seas in a +mist of spray, he always looked back to this night as that on which +the venture of his wife's fortunes and his own began. + + + + + CHAPTER IV + + TONY STRETTON MAKES A PROPOSAL + + +Regular as Warrisden had declared the lives of the truants to be, on +the night following the dance at Lady Millingham's there came a break +in the monotony of their habits. For once in a way they did not leave +the house in their search for light and colour as soon as they were +free. They stayed on in their own sitting-room. But it seemed that +they had nothing to speak about. Millie Stretton sat at the table, +staring at the wall in front of her, moody and despairing. Tony +Stretton leaned against the embrasure of the window, now and then +glancing remorsefully at his wife, now and then looking angrily up to +the ceiling where the heavy footsteps of a man treading up and down +the room above sounded measured and unceasing. + +Tony lifted a corner of the blind and looked out. + +"There's a party next door," he said, "there was another at Lady +Millingham's last night. You should have been at both, Millie, and you +were at neither. Upon my word, it's rough." + +He dropped the blind and came over to her side. He knew quite well +what parties and entertainments meant to her. She loved them, and it +seemed to him natural and right that she should. Light, admiration, +laughter and gaiety, and fine frocks--these things she was born to +enjoy, and he himself had in the old days taken a great pride in +watching her enjoyment. But it was not merely the feeling that she had +been stripped of what was her due through him which troubled him +to-night. Other and deeper thoughts were vaguely stirring in his mind. + +"We have quarrelled again to-night, Millie," he continued +remorsefully. "Here we are cooped up together with just ourselves to +rely upon to pull through these bad years, and we have quarrelled +again." + +Millie shrugged her shoulders. + +"How did it begin?" he asked. "Upon my word I don't remember. Oh yes, +I----" and Millie interrupted him. + +"What does it matter, Tony, how the quarrel began? It did begin, and +another will begin to-morrow. We can't help ourselves, and you have +given the reason. Here we are cooped up by ourselves with nothing else +to do." + +Tony pulled thoughtfully at his moustache. + +"And we swore off quarrelling, too. When was that?" + +"Yesterday." + +"Yesterday!" exclaimed Tony, with a start of surprise. "By George, so +it was. Only yesterday." + +Millie looked up at him, and the trouble upon his face brought a smile +to hers. She laid a hand upon his arm. + +"It's no use swearing off, Tony," she said. "We are both of us living +all the time in a state of exasperation. I just--tingle with it, +there's no other word. And the least, smallest thing which goes wrong +sets us quarrelling. I don't think either of us is to blame. The house +alone gets on our nerves, doesn't it? These great empty, silent, dingy +rooms, with their tarnished furniture. Oh! they are horrible! I wander +through them sometimes and it always seems to me that, a long time +ago, people lived here who suddenly felt one morning that they +couldn't stand it for a single moment longer, and ran out and locked +the street door behind them; and I have almost done it myself. The +very sunlight comes through the windows timidly, as if it knew it had +no right here at all." + +She leaned back in her chair, looking at Tony with eyes that were +hopeless and almost haggard. As Tony listened to her outburst the +remorse deepened on his face. + +"If I could have foreseen all this, I would have spared you it, +Millie," he said. "I would, upon my word." He drew up a chair to the +table, and, sitting down, said in a more cheerful voice, "Let's talk +it over, and see if we can't find a remedy." + +Millie shook her head. + +"We talked it over yesterday." + +"Yes, so we did." + +"And quarrelled an hour after we had talked it over." + +"We did that too," Tony agreed, despondently. His little spark of +hopefulness was put out and he sat in silence. His wife, too, did not +speak, and in a short while it occurred to him that the silence was +more complete than it had been a few minutes ago. It seemed that a +noise had ceased, and a noise which, unnoticed before, had become +noticeable by its cessation. He looked up to the ceiling. The heavy +footsteps no longer dragged upon the floor overhead. Tony sprang up. + +"There! He is in bed," he exclaimed. "Shall we go out?" + +"Not to-night," replied Millie. + +He could make no proposal that night which was welcomed, and as he +walked over to the mantelshelf and filled his pipe, there was +something in his attitude and bearing which showed to Millie that the +quick rebuff had hurt. + +"I can't pretend to-night, Tony, and that's the truth," she added in a +kinder voice. "For, after all, I do only pretend nowadays that I find +the Savoy amusing." + +Tony turned slowly round with the lighted match in his hand and stared +at his wife. He was a man slow in thought, and when his thoughts +compelled expression, laborious in words. The deeper thoughts which +had begun of late to take shape in his mind stirred again at her +words. + +"You have owned it," he said. + +"It had been pretence with you too, then?" she asked, looking up in +surprise. + +Tony puffed at his pipe. + +"Of late, yes," he replied. "Perhaps chiefly since I saw that you were +pretending." + +He came back to her side and looked for a long time steadily at her +while he thought. It was a surprise to Millie that he had noticed her +pretence, as much of a surprise as that he had been pretending too. +For she knew him to be at once slow to notice any change in others and +quick to betray it in himself. But she was not aware how wide a place +she filled in all his thoughts, partly because her own nature with its +facile emotions made her unable to conceive a devotion which was +engrossing, and partly because Tony himself had no aptitude for +expressing such a devotion, and indeed would have shrunk from its +expression had the aptitude been his. But she did fill that wide +place. Very slowly he had begun to watch her, very slowly and dimly +certain convictions were taking shape, very gradually he was drawing +nearer and nearer to a knowledge that a great risk must be taken and a +great sacrifice made partly by him, partly too by her. Some part of +his trouble he now spoke to her. + +"It wasn't pretence a year ago, Millie," he said wistfully. "That's +what bothers me. We enjoyed slipping away quietly when the house was +quiet, and snatching some of the light, some of the laughter the +others have any time they want it. It made up for the days, it was fun +then, Millie, wasn't it? Upon my word, I believe we enjoyed our life, +yes, even this life, a year ago. Do you remember how we used to drive +home, laughing over what we had seen, talking about the few people we +had spoken to? It wasn't until we had turned the latch-key in the +door, and crept into the hall----" + +"And passed the library door," Millie interrupted, with a little +shiver. + +Tony Stretton stopped for a moment. Then he resumed in a lower voice, +"Yes, it wasn't until we had passed the library door that the gloom +settled down again. But now the fun's all over, at the latest when the +lights go down in the supper room, and often before we have got to +them at all. We were happy last year"--and he shook her affectionately +by the arm--"that's what bothers me." + +His wife responded to the gentleness of his voice and action. + +"Never mind, Tony," she said. "Some day we shall look back on all of +it--this house and the empty rooms and the quarrels"--she hesitated +for a second--"Yes, and the library door; we shall look back on it all +and laugh." + +"Shall we?" said Tony, suddenly. His face was most serious, his voice +most doubtful. + +"Why, what do you mean?" asked Millie. Then she added reassuringly, +"It must end some time. Oh yes, it can't last for ever." + +"No," replied Tony; "but it can last just long enough." + +"Long enough for what?" + +"Long enough to spoil both our lives altogether." + +He was speaking with a manner which was quite strange to her. There +was a certainty in his voice, there was a gravity too. He had ceased +to leave the remedy of their plight to time and chance, since, through +two years, time and chance had failed them. He had been seriously +thinking, and as the result of thought he had come to definite +conclusions. Millie understood that there was much more behind the +words he had spoken and that he meant to say that much more to her +to-night. She was suddenly aware that she was face to face with issues +momentous to both of them. She began to be a little afraid. She looked +at Tony almost as if he were a stranger. + +"Tony," she said faintly, in deprecation. + +"We must face it, Millie," he went on steadily. "This life of ours +here in this house will come to an end, of course, but how will it +leave us, you and me? Soured, embittered, quarrelsome, or no longer +quarrelsome, but just indifferent to each other, bored by each other?" +He was speaking very slowly, choosing each word with difficulty. + +"Oh no," Millie protested. + +"It may be even worse than that. Suppose we passed beyond indifference +to dislike--yes, active dislike. We are both of us young, we can both +reasonably look forward to long lives, long lives of active dislike. +There might too be contempt on your side." + +Millie stared at her husband. + +"Contempt?" she said, echoing his words in surprise. + +"Yes. Here are you, most unhappy, and I take it sitting down. Contempt +might come from that." + +"But what else can you do?" she said. + +"Ah," said Tony, as though he had been waiting for that question, +couched in just those words. "Ask yourself that question often enough, +and contempt will come." + +This idea of contempt was a new one to Millie, and very likely her +husband was indiscreet in suggesting its possibility. But he was not +thinking at all of the unwisdom of his words. His thoughts were set on +saving the cherished intimacy of their life from the ruin which he saw +was likely to overtake it. He spoke out frankly, not counting the +risk. Millie, for her part, was not in the mood to estimate the truth +of what he said, although it remained in her memory. She was rather +confused by the new aspect which her husband wore. She foresaw that he +was working towards the disclosure of a plan; and the plan would +involve changes, great changes, very likely a step altogether into the +dark. And she hesitated. + +"We sha'n't alter, Tony," she said. "You can be sure of me, can't +you?" + +"But we are altering," he replied. "Already the alteration has begun. +Did we quarrel a year ago as we do now? We enjoyed those evenings when +we played truant, a year ago"; and then he indulged in a yet greater +indiscretion than any which he had yet allowed himself to utter. But +he was by nature simple and completely honest. Whatever occurred to +him, that he spoke without reserve, and the larger it loomed in his +thoughts the more strenuous was its utterance upon his lips. He took a +seat at the table by her side. + +"I know we are changing. I take myself, and I expect it is the same +with you. I am--it is difficult to express it--I am deadening. I am +getting insensible to the things which not very long ago moved me very +much. I once had a friend who fell ill of a slow paralysis, which +crept up his limbs little by little and he hardly noticed its advance. +I think that's happening with me. I am losing the associations--that's +the word I want--the associations which made one's recollections +valuable, and gave a colour to one's life. For instance, you sang a +song last night, Millie, one of those coon songs of yours--do you +remember? You sang it once in Scotland on a summer's night. I was +outside on the lawn, and past the islands across the water, which was +dark and still, I saw the lights in Oban bay. I thought I would never +hear that song again without seeing those lights in my mind far away +across the water, clustered together like the lights of a distant +town. Well, last night all those associations were somehow dead. I +remembered all right, but without any sort of feeling, that that song +was a landmark in one's life. It was merely you singing a song, or +rather it was merely some one singing a song." + +It was a laboured speech, and Tony was very glad to have got it over. + +"I am very sorry," replied Millie in a low voice. She did not show him +her face, and he had no notion whatever that his words could hardly +have failed to hurt. He was too intent upon convincing her, and too +anxious to put his belief before her with unmistakable clearness to +reflect in what spirit she might receive the words. That her first +thought would be "He no longer cares" never occurred to him at all, +and cheerfully misunderstanding her acquiescence, he went on-- + +"You see that's bad. It mustn't go on, Millie. Let's keep what we've +got. At all costs let us keep that!" + +"You mean we must go away?" said Millie, and Tony Stretton did not +answer. He rose from his chair and walked back to the fireplace and +knocked the ashes from his pipe. Millie was accustomed to long +intervals between her questions and his replies, but she was on the +alert now. Something in his movements and his attitude showed her that +he was not thinking of what answer he should make. He was already sure +upon that point. Only the particular answer he found difficult to +speak. She guessed it on the instant and stood up erect, in alarm. + +"You mean that you must go away, and that I must remain?" + +Tony turned round to her and nodded his head. + +"Alone! Here?" she exclaimed, looking round her with a shiver. + +"For a little while. Until I have made a home for you to come to. Only +till then, Millie. It needn't be so very long." + +"It will seem ages!" she cried, "however short it is. Tony, it's +impossible." + +The tedious days stretched before her in an endless and monotonous +succession. The great rooms would be yet more silent, and more empty +than they were; there would be a chill throughout all the house; the +old man's exactions would become yet more oppressive, since there +would be only one to bear them. She thought of the long dull evenings, +in the faded drawing-room. They were bad enough now, those long +evenings during which she read the evening paper aloud, and Sir John +slept, yet not so soundly but that he woke the instant her voice +stopped, and bade her continue. What would they be if Tony were gone, +if there were no hour or so at the end when they were free to play +truant if they willed? What she had said was true. She had been merely +pretending to enjoy their hour of truancy, but she would miss it none +the less. And in the midst of these thoughts she heard Tony's voice. + +"It sounds selfish, I know, but it isn't really. You see, I sha'n't +enjoy myself. I have not been brought up to know anything well or to +do anything well--anything, I mean, really useful--I'll have a pretty +hard time too." And then he described to her what he thought of doing. +He proposed to go out to one of the colonies, spend some months on a +farm as a hand, and when he had learned enough of the methods, and had +saved a little money, to get hold of a small farm to which he could +ask her to come. It was a pretty and a simple scheme, and it ignored +the great difficulties in the way, such as his ignorance and his lack +of capital. But he believed in it sincerely, and every word in his +short and broken sentences proved his belief. He had his way that +night with Millicent. She was capable of a quick fervour, though the +fervour might as quickly flicker out. She saw that the sacrifice was +really upon his side, for upon him would be the unaccustomed burden of +labour, and the labour would be strange and difficult. She rose to his +height since he was with her and speaking to her with all the +conviction of his soul. + +"Well, then, go," she cried. "I'll wait here, Tony, till you send for +me." + +And when she passed the library door that night she did not even +shrink. + + + + + CHAPTER V + + PAMELA MAKES A PROMISE + + +Millie's enthusiasm for her husband's plan increased each day. The +picture which his halting phrases evoked for her, of a little farm +very far away under Southern skies, charmed her more by reason of its +novelty than either she or Tony quite understood. In the evenings of +the following week, long after the footsteps overhead had ceased, they +sat choosing the site of their house and building it. It was to be the +exact opposite of their house of bondage. The windows should look out +over rolling country, the simple decorations should be bright of +colour, and through every cranny the sun should find its way. Millie's +hopes, indeed, easily outran her husband's. She counted the house +already built, and the door open for her coming. Colour and light +bathed it in beauty. + +"There's my little fortune, Tony," she said, when once or twice he +tried to check the leap of her anticipations; "that will provide the +capital." + +"I knew you would offer it," Tony replied simply. "Your help will +shorten our separation by a good deal. So I'll take half." + +"All!" cried Millie. + +"And what would you do when you wanted a new frock?" asked Tony, with +a smile. + +Millie shrugged her shoulders. + +"I shall join you so soon," she said. + +It dawned upon Tony that she was making too little of the burden which +she would be called upon to bear--the burden of dull lonely months in +that great shabby house. + +"It will be a little while before I can send for you, Millie," he +protested. But she paid no heed to the protest. She fetched her bank +book and added up the figures. + +"I have three thousand pounds," she said. + +"I'll borrow half," he repeated. "Of course, I am only borrowing. +Should things go wrong with me, you are sure to get it back in the +end." + +They drove down to Millie's bank the next morning, and fifteen hundred +pounds were transferred to his account. + +"Meanwhile," said Tony, as they came out of the door into Pall Mall, +"we have not yet settled where our farm is to be. I think I will go +and see Chase." + +"The man in Stepney Green?" Millie asked. + +"Yes. He's the man to help us." + +Tony called a cab and drove off. It was late in the afternoon when he +returned, and he had no opportunity to tell his wife the results of +his visit before dinner was announced. Millie was in a fever to hear +his news. Never, even in this house, had an evening seemed so long. +Sir John sat upright in his high-backed chair, and, as was his custom, +bade her read aloud the evening paper. But that task was beyond her. +She pleaded a headache and escaped. It seemed to her that hours passed +before Tony rejoined her. She had come to dread with an intense fear +that some hindrance would, at any moment, stop their plan. + +"Well?" she asked eagerly, when Tony at last came into their +sitting-room. + +"It's to be horses in Kentucky," answered Tony. "Farming wants more +knowledge and a long apprenticeship; but I know a little about +horses." + +"Splendid!" cried Millie. "You will go soon?" + +"In a week. A week is all I need." + +Millie was quiet for a little while. Then she asked, with an anxious +look-- + +"When do you mean to tell your father?" + +"To-morrow." + +"Don't," said she. She saw his face cloud, she was well aware of his +dislike of secrecies, but she was too much afraid that, somehow, at +the last moment an insuperable obstacle would bar the way. "Don't tell +him at all," she went on. "Leave a note for him. I will see that it is +given to him after you have gone. Then he can't stop you. Please do +this, I ask you." + +"How can he stop me? + +"I don't know; but I am afraid that he will. He could threaten to +disinherit you; if you disobeyed, he might carry out the threat. Give +him no opportunity to threaten." + +Very reluctantly Tony consented. He had all a man's objections to +concealments, she all a woman's liking for them; but she prevailed, +and since the moment of separation was very near, they began to +retrace their steps through the years of their married life, and back +beyond them to the days of their first acquaintance. Thus it happened +that Millie mentioned the name of Pamela Mardale, and suddenly Tony +drew himself upright in his chair. + +"Is she in town, I wonder?" he asked, rather of himself than of his +wife. + +"Most likely," Millie replied. "Why?" + +"I think I must try to see her before I go," said Tony, thoughtfully; +and more than once during the evening he looked with anxiety towards +his wife; but in his look there was some perplexity too. + +He tried next day; for he borrowed a horse from a friend, and rode out +into the Row at eleven o'clock. As he passed through the gates of Hyde +Park, he saw Pamela turning her horse on the edge of the sand. She saw +him at the same moment and waited. + +"You are a stranger here," she said, with a smile, as he joined her. + +"Here and everywhere," he replied. "I came out on purpose to find +you." + +Pamela glanced at Tony curiously. Only a few days had passed since +Warrisden had pointed out the truants from the window of Lady +Millingham's house, and had speculated upon the seclusion of their +lives. The memory of that evening was still fresh in her mind. + +"I want to ask you a question." + +"Ask it and I'll answer," she replied carelessly. + +"You were Millie's bridesmaid?" + +"Yes." + +"You saw a good deal of her before we were married?" + +"Yes." + +They were riding down the Row at a walk under the trees, Pamela +wondering to what these questions were to lead, Tony slowly +formulating the point which troubled him. + +"Before Millie and I were engaged," he went on, "before indeed there +was any likelihood of our being engaged, you once said to me something +about her." + +"I did?" + +"Yes. I remembered it last night. And it rather worries me. I should +like you to explain what you meant. You said, 'The man who marries her +should never leave her. If he goes away shooting big game, he should +take her with him. On no account must she be left behind.'" + +It was a day cloudless and bright. Over towards the Serpentine the +heat filled the air with a soft screen of mist, and at the bottom of +the Row the rhododendrons glowed. As Pamela and Tony went forward at a +walk the sunlight slanting through the leaves now shone upon their +faces and now left them in shade. And when it fell bright upon Pamela +it lit up a countenance which was greatly troubled. She did not, +however, deny that she had used the words. She did not pretend that +she had forgotten their application. + +"You remember what I said?" she remarked. "It is a long while ago." + +"Before that," he explained, "I had begun to notice all that was said +of Millie." + +"I spoke the words generally, perhaps too carelessly." + +"Yet not without a reason," Tony insisted. "That's not your way." + +Pamela made no reply for a moment or two. Then she patted her horse's +head, and said softly-- + +"Not without a reason." She admitted his contention frankly. She did +more, for she turned in her saddle towards him and, looking straight +into his face, said-- + +"I was not giving you advice at the time. But, had I been, I should +have said just those words. I say them again now." + +"Why?" + +Tony put his question very earnestly. He held Pamela in a great +respect, believing her clear-sighted beyond her fellows. He was indeed +a little timid in her presence as a rule, for she overawed him, though +all unconsciously. Nothing of this timidity, however, showed now. +"That was what I came out to ask you. Why?" + +Again Pamela attempted no evasion. + +"I can't tell you," she said quietly. + +"You promised." + +"I break the promise." + +Tony looked wistfully at his companion. That the perplexing words had +been spoken with a definite meaning he had felt sure from the moment +when he had remembered them. And her refusal to explain proved to him +that the meaning was a very serious one--one indeed which he ought to +know and take into account. + +"I ask you to explain," he urged, "because I _am_ going away, and I +_am_ leaving Millie behind." + +Pamela was startled. She turned quickly towards him. + +"Must you?" she said, and before he could answer she recovered from +her surprise. "Never mind," she continued; "shall we ride on?" and she +put her horse to a trot. It was not her business to advise or to +interfere. She had said too much already. She meant to remain the +looker-on. + +Stretton, however, was not upon this occasion to be so easily +suppressed. He kept level with her, and as they rode he told her +something of the life which Millie and he had led in the big lonely +house in Berkeley Square; and in spite of herself Pamela was +interested. She had a sudden wish that Alan Warrisden was riding with +them too, so that he might hear his mystery resolved; she had a sudden +vision of his face, keen as a boy's, as he listened. + +"I saw Millie and you a few nights ago. I was at a dance close by, and +I was surprised to see you. I thought you had left London," she said. + +"No; but I am leaving," Stretton returned; and he went on to describe +that idyllic future which Millie and he had allotted to themselves. +The summer sunlight was golden in the air about them; already it +seemed that new fresh life was beginning. "I shall breed horses in +Kentucky. I was recommended to it by an East End parson called Chase, +who runs a mission on Stepney Green. I used to keep order in a +billiard room at his mission one night a week, when I was quartered at +the Tower. A queer sort of creature, Chase; but his judgment's good, +and of course he is always meeting all sorts of people." + +"Chase?" Pamela repeated; and she retained the name in her memory. + +"But he doesn't know Millie," said Stretton, "and you do. And so what +you said troubles me very much. If I go away remembering your words +and not understanding them, I shall go away uneasy. I shall remain +uneasy." + +"I am sorry," Pamela replied. "I broke a rule of mine in saying what I +did, a rule not to interfere. And I see now that I did very wrong in +breaking it. I will not break it again. You must forget my words." + +There was a quiet decision in her manner which warned Tony that no +persuasions would induce her to explain. He gave up his attempt and +turned to another subject. + +"I have something else to ask--not a question this time, but a favour. +You could be a very staunch friend, Miss Mardale, if you chose. Millie +will be lonely after I have gone. You were a great friend of hers +once--be a friend of hers again." + +Pamela hesitated. The promise which he sought on the face of it no +doubt looked easy of fulfilment. But Tony Stretton had been right in +one conjecture. She had spoken the words which troubled him from a +definite reason, and that reason assured her now that this promise +might lay upon her a burden, and a burden of a heavy kind. And she +shrank from all burdens. On the other hand, there was no doubt that +she had caused Tony much uneasiness. He would go away, on a task +which, as she saw very clearly, would be more arduous by far than even +he suspected--he would go away troubled and perplexed. That could not +be helped. But she might lighten the trouble, and make the perplexity +less insistent, if she granted the favour which he sought. It seemed +churlish to refuse. + +"Very well," she said reluctantly. "I promise." + +Already Tony's face showed his relief. She had given her promise +reluctantly, but she would keep it now. Of that he felt assured, and, +bidding her good-bye, he turned his horse and cantered back. + +Pamela rode homewards more slowly. She had proposed to keep clear of +entanglements and responsibilities, and, behold! the meshes were about +her. She had undertaken a trust. In spite of herself she had ceased to +be the looker-on. + + + + + CHAPTER VI + + NEWS OF TONY + + +The promise which Pamela had given was a great relief to Tony; he went +about the work of preparing for his departure with an easier mind. It +was even in his thoughts when he stood with his wife upon the platform +of Euston station, five minutes before his train started for +Liverpool. + +"She will be a good friend, Millie," he said. "Count on her till I +send for you. I think I am right to go, even though I don't +understand----" + +He checked himself abruptly. Millie, however, paid heed only to the +first clause of his sentence. + +"Of course you are right," she said, with a confidence which brought +an answering smile to his face. + +She watched the red tail-light of the train until it disappeared, and +drove home alone to the big dreary house. It seemed ten times more +dreary, ten times more silent than ever before. She was really alone +now. But her confidence in herself and in Tony was still strong. "I +can wait," she said, and the consciousness of her courage rejoiced +her. She walked from room to room and sat for a few moments in each, +realising that the coldness, the dingy look of the furniture, and the +empty silence had no longer the power to oppress her. She even +hesitated at the library door with her fingers on the key. But it was +not until the next day that she unlocked it and threw it open. + +For Pamela, mindful of her promise, called in the afternoon. Millicent +was still uplifted by her confidence. + +"I can wait quite patiently," she said; and Pamela scrutinised her +with some anxiety. For Millicent was speaking feverishly, as though +she laboured under an excitement. Was her courage the mere +effervescence of that excitement, or was it a steady, durable thing? +Pamela led her friend on to speak of the life which she and Tony had +led in the big house, sounding her the while so that she might come +upon some answer to that question. And thus it happened that, as they +came down the stairs together, Millicent again stopped before the +library door. + +"Look!" she said. "This room always seemed to me typical of the whole +house, typical too of the lives we led in it." + +She unlocked the door suddenly and flung it open. The floor of the +library was below the level of the hall, and a smooth plane of wood +sloped down to it very gradually from the threshold. + +"There used to be steps here once, but before my time," said +Millicent. She went down into the room. Pamela followed her, and +understood why those two steps had been removed. Although the +book-shelves rose on every wall from floor to ceiling, it was not as a +library that this room was used. Heavy black curtains draped it with a +barbaric profusion. The centre of the room was clear of furniture, and +upon the carpet in that clear space was laid a purple drugget; and on +the drugget opposite to one another stood two strong wooden crutches. +The room was a mortuary chamber--nothing less. On those two crutches +the dead were to lie awaiting burial. + +Millie Stretton shook her shoulders with a kind of shiver. + +"Oh, how I used to hate this room, hate knowing that it was here, +prepared and ready!" + +Pamela could understand how the knowledge would work upon a woman of +emotions, whose nerves were already strung to exasperation by the life +she led. For even to her there was something eerie in the disposition +of the room. It looked out upon a dull yard of stone at the back of +the house; the light was very dim and the noise of the streets hardly +the faintest whisper; there was a chill and a dampness in the air. + +"How I hated it," Millie repeated. "I used to lie awake and think of +it. I used to imagine it more silent than any other of the silent +rooms, and emptier--emptier because day and night it seemed to claim +an inhabitant, and to claim it as a right. That was the horrible +thing. The room was waiting--waiting for us to be carried down that +wooden bridge and laid on the crutches here, each in our turn. It +became just a symbol of the whole house. For what is the house, +Pamela? A place that should have been a place of life, and is a place +merely expecting death. Look at the books reaching up to the ceiling, +never taken down, never read, for the room's a room for coffins. It +wasn't merely a symbol of the house--that wasn't the worst of it. It +was a sort of image of our lives, the old man's upstairs, Tony's and +mine down here. We were all doing nothing, neither suffering nor +enjoying, but just waiting--waiting for death. Nothing you see could +happen in this house but death. Until it came there would only be +silence and emptiness." + +Millie Stretton finished her outburst, and stood dismayed as though +the shadow of those past days were still about her. The words she had +spoken must have seemed exaggerated and even theatrical, but for the +aspect of her as she spoke them. Her whole frame shuddered, her face +had the shrinking look of fear. She recovered herself, however, in a +moment. + +"But that time's past," she said. "Tony's gone and I--I am waiting for +life now. I am only a lodger, you see. A month or two, and I pack my +boxes." + +She turned towards the door and stopped. The hall door had just at +that moment opened. Pamela heard a man's footsteps sound heavily upon +the floor of the hall and then upon the stairs. + +"My father-in-law," said Millie. + +"This was his doing?" asked Pamela. + +"Yes," replied Millie. "It's strange, isn't it? But there's something +stranger still." + +The footsteps had now ceased. Millie led the way back to her room. + +"When I got home yesterday," she related, "I had Tony's letter +announcing his departure taken up to Sir John. I waited for him to +send for me. He did not. I am not sure that I expected he would. You +see, he has never shown the least interest in us. However, when I went +up to my room to dress for dinner, I saw that the candles were all +lighted in Tony's room next door, and his clothes laid out upon the +bed. I went in and put the candles out--rather quickly." Her voice +shook a little upon those last two words. Pamela nodded her head as +though she understood, and Millicent went on, after a short pause-- + +"It troubled me to see them burning; it troubled me very much. And +when I came downstairs I told the footman the candles were not to be +lit again, since Tony had gone away. He answered that they had been +lit by Sir John's orders. At first I thought that Sir John had not +troubled to read the letter at all. I thought that all the more +because he never once, either during dinner or afterwards, mentioned +Tony's name or seemed to remark his absence. But it was not so. He has +given orders that every night the room is to be ready and the candles +lit as though Tony were here still, or might walk in at the door at +any moment. I suppose that after all in a queer way he cares." + +Again her voice faltered; and again a question rose up insistent in +Pamela's mind. She knew her friend, and it was out of her knowledge +that she had spoken long ago in Tony's presence when she had said, +"her husband should never leave her." It was evident that Tony's +departure had caused his wife great suffering. + +Millicent had let that fact escape in spite of her exaltation. Pamela +welcomed it, but she asked, "Was that regret a steady and durable +thing?" + +Pamela left London the next day with her question unanswered, and for +two months there was no opportunity for her of discovering an answer. +Often during that August and September, on the moors in Scotland, or +at her own home in Leicestershire, she would think of Millie Stretton, +in the hot and dusty town amongst the houses where the blinds were +drawn. She imagined her sitting over against the old stern impassive +man at dinner, or wearily reading to him his newspaper at night. Had +the regret dwindled to irritation, and the loneliness begotten +petulance? + +Indeed, those months were dull and wearisome enough for Millicent. No +change of significance came in the routine of that monotonous +household. Sir John went to his room perhaps a little earlier than had +been his wont, his footsteps dragged along the floor for a while +longer, and his light burned in the window after the dawn had come. +Finally he ceased to leave his room at all. But that was all. For +Millicent, however, the weeks passed easily. Each day brought her a +day nearer to the sunlit farm fronting the open plain. She marked the +weeks off in her diary with a growing relief; for news kept coming +from America, and the news was good. + +Early in October, Pamela passed through London on her way to Sussex, +and broke her journey that she might see her friend. + +"Frances Millingham is writing to you," she said. "She wants you to +stay with her in Leicestershire. I shall be there too. I hope you will +come." + +"When?" + +"At the beginning of the New Year." + +Millicent laughed. + +"I shall have left England before then. Tony will have made his way," +she said, with a joyous conviction. + +"There might be delays," Pamela suggested, in a very gentle voice. For +suddenly there had risen before her mind the picture of a terrace high +above a gorge dark with cypresses. She saw again the Mediterranean, +breaking in gold along the curving shore, and the gardens of the +Casino at Monte Carlo. She heard a young girl prophesying success upon +that terrace with no less certainty than Millicent had used. Her face +softened and her eyes shone with a very wistful look. She took out her +watch and glanced at it. It was five o'clock. The school children had +gone home by now from the little school-house in the square of +Roquebrune. Was the schoolmaster leaning over the parapet looking +downwards to the station or to the deserted walk in front of the +Casino? Was a train passing along the sea's edge towards France and +Paris? + +"One must expect delays, Millie," she insisted; and again Millie +laughed. + +"I have had letters. I am expecting another. It should have come a +fortnight since." And she told Pamela what the letters had contained. + +At first Tony had been a little bewildered by the activity of New +York, after his quiescent years. But he had soon made an acquaintance, +and the acquaintance had become a friend. The two men had determined +to go into partnership; a farm in Kentucky was purchased, each man +depositing an equal share of the purchase money. + +"Six weeks ago they left New York. Tony said I would not hear from him +at once." + +And while they were sitting together there came a knock upon the door, +and two letters were brought in for Millicent. One she tossed upon the +table. With the other in her hand she turned triumphantly to Pamela. + +"Do you mind?" she asked. "I have been waiting so long." + +"Read it, of course," said Pamela. + +Millie tore the letter open, and at once the light died out of her +eyes, and the smile vanished from her lips. + +"From New York," she said, halfway between perplexity and fear. "He +writes from New York." And with trembling fingers she turned over the +sheets and read the letter through. + +Pamela watched her, saw the blood ebb from her cheeks, and dejection +overspread her face. A great pity welled up in Pamela's heart, not +merely for the wife who read, but for the man who had penned that +letter--with what difficulty, she wondered, with how much pain! +Failure was the message which it carried. Millicent's trembling lips +told her that. And again the village of Roquebrune rose up before her +eyes as she gazed out of the window on the London square. What were +the words the schoolmaster had spoken when, stripped of his dreams, he +had confessed success was not for him? "We must forget these fine +plans. The school at Roquebrune will send no deputy to Paris." +Pamela's eyes grew dim. + +She stood looking out of the window for some while, but hearing no +movement she at length turned back again. The sheets of the letter had +fallen upon the floor, they lay scattered, written over in a round, +sprawling, schoolboy's hand. Millicent sat very still, her face most +weary and despairing. + +"It's all over," she said. "The friend was a swindler. He left the +train at a station on the way and disappeared. Tony went on, but there +was no farm. He is back in New York." + +"But the man can be found?" + +"He belongs to a gang. There is little chance, and Tony has no money. +He will take no more of mine." + +"He is coming home, then?" said Pamela. + +"No; he means to stay and retrieve his failures." + +Pamela said nothing, and Millicent appealed to her. "He will do that, +don't you think? Men have started badly before, and have succeeded, +and have not taken so very long to succeed." + +"No doubt," said Pamela; and she spoke with what hopefulness she +could. But she remembered Tony Stretton. Simplicity and good-humour +were amongst his chief qualities; he was a loyal friend, and he had +pluck. Was that enough? On the other hand, he had little knowledge and +little experience. The schoolmaster of Roquebrune and Tony Stretton +stood side by side in her thoughts. She was not, however, to be put to +the task of inventing encouragements. For before she could open her +lips again, Millicent said gently-- + +"Will you mind if I ask to be left alone? Come again as soon as you +can. But this afternoon----" Her voice broke so that she could not +finish her sentence, and she turned hastily away. However, she +recovered her self-control and went down the stairs with Pamela, and +as they came into the hall their eyes turned to the library door, and +then they looked at one another. Both remembered the conversation they +had had within that room. + +"What if you told Sir John?" said Pamela. "It seems that he does after +all care." + +"It would be of no use," said Millicent, shaking her head. "He would +only say, 'Let him come home,' and Tony will not. Besides, I never see +him now." + +"Never?" exclaimed Pamela. + +"No; he does not leave his room." She lowered her voice. "I do not +believe he ever will leave it again. It's not that he's really ill, +his doctor tells me, but he's slowly letting himself go." + +Pamela answered absently. Sir John Stretton and his ailments played a +small part in her thoughts. It seemed that the library was again to +become typical of the house, typical of the life its inhabitants led. +Nothing was to happen, then. There was to be a mere waiting for things +to cease. + +But a second letter was lying upstairs unopened on the table, and that +letter, harmless as it appeared, was strangely to influence Millicent +Stretton's life. It was many hours afterwards when Millicent opened +it, and, compared with the heavy tidings she had by the same post +received, it seemed utterly trifling and unimportant. It was no more +indeed than the invitation from Frances Millingham of which Pamela had +spoken. Pamela forgot it altogether when she heard the news which Tony +had sent, but she was to be affected by it too. For she had made a +promise to Tony Stretton, and, as he had foreseen, she would at any +cost fulfil it. + + + + + CHAPTER VII + + THE LADY ON THE STAIRS + + +Whitewebs, Frances Millingham's house in Leicestershire, was a long +white building with many level windows. The square main block of the +building rose in the centre two storeys high, and on each side a wing +of one storey projected. Behind the house a broad lawn sloped to the +bank of a clear and shallow trout stream, with an avenue of old elms +upon its left, and a rose garden upon its right. In front of the house +a paddock made a ring of green, and round this ring the carriage drive +circled from a white five-barred gate. Whitewebs stood in a flat grass +country. From the upper windows you looked over a wide plain of +meadows and old trees, so level that you had on a misty day almost an +illusion of a smooth sea and the masts of ships; from the lower, you +saw just as far as the nearest hedgerow, except in one quarter of the +compass. For to the south-west the ground rose very far away, and at +the limit of view three tall poplars, set in a tiny garden on the +hill's crest, stood clearly out against the sky like sentinels upon a +frontier. These three landmarks were visible for many miles around. +Pamela, however, saw nothing of them as she was driven over the three +miles from the station to Whitewebs. + +It was late on a February evening, and already dark. The snow had +fallen heavily during the last week, and as Pamela looked out through +the carriage windows she saw that the ground glimmered white on every +side; above the ground a mist thickened the night air, and the cold +was piercing. When she reached the house she found that Frances +Millingham was waiting for her alone in the big inner hall, with tea +ready; and the first question which she asked of her hostess was-- + +"Is Millie Stretton here?" + +"Yes," replied Frances Millingham. "She has been here a week." + +"I couldn't come before," said Pamela, rather remorsefully. "My father +was at home alone. How is Millie? I have not seen her for a long time. +Is she enjoying herself?" + +Pamela's conscience had been reproaching her all that afternoon. She +could plead in her own behalf that after the arrival of Tony's letter +with its message of failure, she had deferred her visit into the +country and had stayed in London for a week. But she had not returned +to London since, and consequently she had not seen her friend. She had +heard regularly from her, it is true; she also knew that there was yet +no likelihood of the hoped-for change in the life of that isolated +household in Berkeley Square. But there had been certain omissions of +late in Millicent's letters which began to make Pamela anxious. + +"Yes," Frances Millingham replied; "she seems to be happy enough." + +Lady Millingham related the names of her guests. There were twelve in +all, but the first ten may be omitted, for they are in no way +concerned with Pamela's history. The eleventh name, however, was that +of a friend. + +"John Mudge is here, too," said Frances Millingham; and Pamela said, +with a smile-- + +"I like him." + +John Mudge was that elderly man whom Allan Warrisden had seen with +Pamela at Lady Millingham's dance, the man with no pleasure in his +face. "And Mr. Lionel Callon," said Frances; "you know him." + +"Do I?" asked Pamela. + +"At all events, he knows you." + +It was no doubt a consequence of Pamela's deliberate plan never to be +more than an onlooker, that people who did not arouse her active +interest passed in and out of her acquaintanceship like shadows upon a +mirror. It might be that she had met Lionel Callon. She could not +remember. + +"A quarter past seven," said Frances Millingham, glancing at the +clock. "We dine at eight." + +Pamela dressed quickly in the hope that she might gain a few minutes +before dinner wherein to talk to Millicent. She came down the stairs +with this object a good quarter of an hour before eight, but she was +to be disappointed. The stairs descended into the big inner hall of +the house, and just below the roof of the hall they took a bend. As +Pamela came round this bend the hall was exposed to her eyes, and she +saw, below her, not Millicent at all, but the figure of a man. He was +standing by the fireplace, on her left hand as she descended, looking +into the fire indeed, so that his back was towards her. But at the +rustle of her frock he swung round quickly and looked up. He now moved +a few steps towards the foot of the stairs with a particular +eagerness. Pamela at that moment had just come round the bend, and was +on the small platform from which the final flight of steps began. The +staircase was dimly lit, and the panelling of the wall against which +it rested dark. Pamela took a step or two downwards, and the light of +the hall struck upon her face. The man came instantly to a dead stop, +and a passing disappointment was visible upon his upturned face. It +was evident that he was expecting some one else. Pamela on her side +was disappointed, too, for she had hoped to find Millicent. She went +down the stairs and stopped on the third step from the bottom. + +"How do you do, Miss Mardale?" said the man. "You have arrived at +last." + +The man was Lionel Callon. Pamela recognised him now that they stood +face to face; she _had_ met him, but she had retained no impression of +him in her memory. For the future, however, she would retain a very +distinct impression. For her instincts told her at once and clearly +that she thoroughly disliked the man. He was thirty-three in years, +and looked a trifle younger, although his hair was turning grey. He +was clean shaven, handsome beyond most men, and while his features +were of a classical regularity and of an almost feminine delicacy, +they were still not without character. There was determination in his +face, and his eyes were naturally watchful. It was his manner which +prompted Pamela's instinct of dislike. Assurance gave to it a hint of +arrogance; familiarity made it distasteful. He might have been her +host from the warmth of his welcome. Pamela put on her sedatest air. + +"I am quite well," she said, with just sufficient surprise to suggest +the question, "What in the world has my health to do with you?" She +came down the three steps, and added, "We are the first, I suppose." + +"There may be others in the drawing-room," said Callon, with a glance +towards the open door. But Pamela did not take the hint. For one thing +no sound of any voice was audible in that room; for another Mr. Callon +was plainly anxious to be rid of her. Even as he was speaking his +glance strayed past her up the staircase. Pamela disliked him; she +was, besides, disappointed by him of that private talk with Millicent +which she desired. She was in a mood for mischief. She changed her +manner at once, and, crossing over to the fireplace, engaged Mr. +Callon in conversation with the utmost cordiality, and as she talked +she began to be amused. Callon became positively uneasy; he could not +keep still, he answered her at random. For instance, she put to him a +question about the number of guests in the house. He did not answer at +all for a moment or two, and when he did speak, it was to say, "Will +the frost hold, do you think?" + +"There's no sign of a thaw to-night," replied Pamela; and the sounds +for which both were listening became audible--the shutting of a door +on the landing above, and then the rustle of a frock upon the stairs. +Mr. Callon was evidently at his wits' end what to do; and Pamela, +taking her elbow from the mantelpiece, said, with great sympathy-- + +"One feels a little in the way----" + +"Oh, not at all, Miss Mardale," Callon answered hurriedly, with a +flustered air. + +Pamela looked at her companion with the blankest stare of surprise. + +"I was going to say, when you interrupted me," she went on, "that one +feels a little in the way when one has brought a couple of horses, as +I have, and the frost holds." + +Callon grew red. He had fallen into a trap; his very hurry to +interrupt what appeared to be almost an apology betrayed that the lady +upon the stairs and Mr. Lionel Callon had arranged to come down early. +He had protested overmuch. However, he looked Pamela steadily in the +face, and said-- + +"I beg your pardon, Miss Mardale." + +He spoke loudly, rather too loudly for the ears of any one so near to +him as Pamela. The sentence, too, was uttered with a note of warning. +There was even a suggestion of command. The command was obeyed by the +lady on the stairs, for all at once the frock ceased to rustle, and +there was silence. Lionel Callon kept his eyes fixed upon Pamela's +face, but she did not look towards the stairs, and in a little while +again the sound was heard. But it diminished. The lady upon the stairs +was ascending, and a few minutes afterwards a door closed overhead. +She had beaten a retreat. + +Callon could not quite keep the relief which he felt out of his eyes +or the smile from his lips. Pamela noticed the change with amusement. +She was not in the mind to spare him uneasiness, and she said, looking +at the wall above the mantelpiece-- + +"This is an old mirror, don't you think? From what period would you +date it?" + +Callon's thoughts had been so intent upon the stairs that he had paid +no heed to the ornaments above the mantelshelf. Now, however, he took +note of them with a face grown at once anxious. The mirror was of an +oval shape and framed in gold. Under the pretence of admiring it, he +moved and stood behind Pamela, looking into the mirror over her +shoulder, seeing what she could see, and wondering how much she had +seen. He was to some extent relieved. The stairs were ill-lighted, the +panelling of the wall dark mahogany; moreover, the stairs bent round +into the hall just below the level of the roof, and at the bend the +lady on the stairs had stopped. Pamela could not have seen her face. +Pamela, indeed, had seen nothing more than a black satin slipper +arrested in the act of taking a step, and a black gown with some +touches of red at the waist. She had, however, noticed the attitude of +the wearer of the dress when the warning voice had brought her to a +stop. The lady had stooped down and had cautiously peered into the +hall. In this attitude she had been able to see, and yet had avoided +being seen. + +Pamela, however, did not relieve Mr. Callon of his suspense. She +walked into the drawing-room and waited, with an amused curiosity, for +the appearance of the black dress. It was long in coming, however. +Pamela had no doubt that it would come last, and in a hurry, as though +its wearer had been late in dressing. But Pamela was wrong. Millicent +Stretton came into the room dressed in a frock of white lace, and at +once dinner was announced. Pamela turned to Frances Millingham with a +startled face-- + +"Are we all here?" + +Frances Millingham looked round. + +"Yes;" and Lord Millingham at that moment offered his arm to Pamela. +As she took it, she looked at Millicent, who was just rising from her +chair. Millicent was wearing with her white dress black shoes and +stockings. She might be wearing them deliberately, of course; on the +other hand, she might be wearing them because she had not had time to +change them. It was Millicent, certainly, who had come down last. "I +beg your pardon, Miss Mardale," Callon had said, and it was upon the +"Miss Mardale" that his voice had risen. The emphasis of his warning +had been laid upon the name. + +As she placed her hand on her host's arm, Pamela said-- + +"It was very kind of Frances to ask Millie Stretton here." + +"Oh no," Lord Millingham replied. "You see, Frances knew her. We all +knew, besides, that she is a great friend of yours." + +"Yes," said Pamela; "I suppose everybody here knows that?" + +"Mrs. Stretton has talked of it," he answered, with a smile. + +The "Miss Mardale" might be a warning, then, to Millicent that her +friend had arrived--was actually then in the hall. There was certainly +no one but Millicent in that house who could have been conscious of +any need to shrink back at the warning, who would have changed her +dress to prevent a recognition; and Millicent herself need not have +feared the warning had there not been something to conceal--something +to conceal especially from Pamela, who had said, "I have promised your +husband I would be your friend." There was the heart of Pamela's +trouble. + +She gazed down the two lines of people at the dinner-table, hoping +against hope that she had overlooked some one. There was no one +wearing a black gown. All Pamela's amusement in outwitting Callon had +long since vanished. If Tony had only taken her advice without +question, she thought. "Millie's husband should never leave her. If he +goes away he should take her with him." The words rang in her mind all +through dinner like the refrain of a song of which one cannot get rid. +And at the back of her thoughts there steadily grew and grew a great +regret that she had ever promised Tony to befriend his wife. + +That Millicent was the lady on the stairs she no longer dared to +doubt. Had she doubted, her suspicions would have been confirmed +immediately dinner was over. In the drawing-room Millicent avoided any +chance of a private conversation, and since they had not met for so +long such avoidance was unnatural. Pamela, however, made no effort to +separate her friend from the other women. She had a plan in her mind, +and in pursuit of it she occupied a sofa, upon which there was just +room for two. She sat in the middle of the sofa, so that no one else +could sit on it, and just waited until the men came in. Some of them +crossed at once to Pamela, but she did not budge an inch. They were +compelled to stand. Finally, Mr. Mudge approached her, and immediately +she moved into one corner and bade him take the other. Mr. Mudge +accepted the position with alacrity. The others began to move away; a +couple of card-tables were made up. Pamela and John Mudge were left +alone. + +"You know every one here?" she asked. + +"No, very few." + +"Mr. Callon, at all events?" + +Mr. Mudge glanced shrewdly at his questioner. + +"Yes, I know him slightly," he answered. + +"Tell me what you know." + +Mr. Mudge sat for a moment or two with his hands upon his knees and +his eyes staring in front of him. Pamela knew his history, and +esteemed his judgment. He had built up a great contracting business +from the poorest beginnings, and he remained without bombast or +arrogance. He was to be met nowadays in many houses, and, while he had +acquired manners, he had lost nothing of his simplicity. The journey +from the Seven Dials to Belgrave Square is a test of furnace heat, and +John Mudge had betrayed no flaws. There was a certain forlornness, +too, in his manner which appealed particularly to Pamela. She guessed +that the apples, for which through a lifetime he had grasped, had +crumbled into ashes between his fingers. Sympathy taught her that the +man was lonely. He wandered through the world amidst a throng of +acquaintances; but how many friends had he, she wondered? She did not +interrupt his reflections, and he turned to her at last, with an air +of decision. + +"I am on strange ground here," he said, "as you know. I am the +outsider; and when I am on strange ground I go warily. If I am asked +what I think of this man or that I make it a rule to praise." + +"Yes; but not to me," said Pamela, with a smile. "I want to know the +truth to-night." + +Mudge looked at her deliberately, and no less deliberately he spoke-- + +"And I think you ought to know the truth to-night." + +Mudge, then, like the rest, knew that she was Millicent's friend. Was +it for that reason that she ought to know the truth? + +"I know Callon a little," he went on, "but I know a good deal about +him. Like most of the men who know him I dislike him heartily. Women, +on the other hand, like him, Miss Mardale--like him too well. Women +make extraordinary mistakes over men just as men do over women. They +can be very blind--like your friend----" + +Mudge paused for an appreciable time. Then he went on steadily-- + +"Like your friend Lady Millingham, who invites him here." + +Pamela was grateful for the delicacy with which the warning was +conveyed, but she did not misunderstand it. She had been told +indirectly, but no less definitely on that account, that Millie was +entangled. + +"Callon has good looks, of course," continued Mudge; and Pamela +uttered a little exclamation of contempt. Mudge smiled, but rather +sadly. + +"Oh, it's something. All people have not your haughty indifference to +good looks. He is tall, he has a face which is a face and not a +pudding. It's a good deal, Miss Mardale." + +Pamela looked in surprise at the stout, heavily-built bald man who +spoke. That he should ever have given a thought to how he looked was a +new idea to her. It struck her as pathetic. + +"But he is not merely good-looking. He is clever, persistent besides, +and, so far as I can judge, untroubled by a single scruple in the +management of his life. Altogether, Miss Mardale, a dangerous man. How +does he live?" he asked suddenly. + +"I neither know nor care," said Pamela. "Ah, but you should care," +replied Mudge. "The answer is instructive. He has a small income--two +hundred a year, perhaps; a mere nothing compared with what he +spends--and he never does an hour's work, as we understand work. Yet +he pays his card debts at his club, and they are sometimes heavy, and +he wants for nothing. How is it done? He has no prospect of an +inheritance, so post-obits are not the explanation." + +Mr. Mudge leaned back in his chair and waited. Pamela turned the +question over in her mind. "I can't guess how it's done," she said. +"And I can do no more than hint the answer," he replied. "He rides one +woman's horses, he drives another woman's phaeton, he is always on +hand to take a third to a theatre, or to make up a luncheon party with +a fourth. Shall we say he borrows money from a fifth? Shall we be +wrong in saying it?" And suddenly Mr. Mudge exclaimed, with a heat and +scorn which Pamela had never heard from him before, "A very +contemptible existence, anyway, Miss Mardale. But the man's not to be +despised, mind. No, that's the worst of it. Some day, perhaps, a +strong man will rise up and set his foot on him. Till that time he is +to be feared." And when Pamela by a gesture rejected the word, Mudge +repeated it. "Yes, feared. He makes his plans, Miss Mardale. Take a +purely imaginary case," and somehow, although he laid no ironic stress +on the word imaginary, and accompanied it with no look, but sat gazing +straight in front of him, Pamela was aware that it was a real case he +was going to cite. "Imagine a young and pretty woman coming to a house +where most of the guests were strangers to her; imagine her to be of a +friendly, unsuspecting temperament, rather lonely, perhaps, and either +unmarried or separated for a time from her husband. Add that she will +one day be very rich, or that her husband will be. Such a woman might +be his prey, unless----" + +Pamela looked up inquiringly. + +"Unless she had good friends to help her." + +Pamela's face, distressed before, grew yet more troubled now. The +burden of her promise was being forced upon her back. It seemed she +was not for one moment to be allowed to forget it. + +"I'll tell you my philosophy, Miss Mardale," Mudge continued, "and I +have inferred it from what I have seen. I do not believe that any man +really comes to good unless he has started in life with the ambition +to make a career for himself, with no help other than his hands and +his brains afford. Later on he will learn that women can be most +helpful; later on, as he gets towards middle life, as the years +shorten and shorten, he will see that he must use whatever extraneous +assistance comes his way. But he will begin with a fearless ambition +to suffice with his own hands and head." Mr. Mudge dropped from the +high level of his earnestness. He looked towards Lionel Callon, who +was seated at a card-table, and the contempt again crept into his +voice. "Now that man began life meaning to use all people he met, and +especially women. Women were to be his implements." Mr. Mudge smiled +suddenly. "He's listening," he said. + +"But he is too far away to hear," replied Pamela. + +"No doubt; but he knows we are speaking of him. Look, his attitude +shows it. This, you see, is his battleground, and he knows the arts of +his particular warfare. A drawing-room! Mr. Lionel Callon fights among +the teacups. Cajolery first, and God knows by what means afterwards. +But he wins, Miss Mardale; don't close your eyes to that! Look, I told +you he was listening. The rubber's over, and he's coming towards us. +Oh, he's alert upon his battle-ground! He knows what men think of him. +He's afraid lest I should tell what men think to you. But he comes too +late." + +Callon crossed to the sofa, and stood talking there until Frances +Millingham rose. Pamela turned to Mr. Mudge as she got up. + +"I thank you very much," she said gratefully. + +Mr. Mudge smiled. + +"No need for thanks," said he. "I am very glad you came to-night, for +I go away to-morrow." + +Pamela went to her room and sat down before the fire. What was to be +done, she wondered? She could not get Lionel Callon sent away from the +house. It would be no use even if she could, since Millie had an +address in town. She could not say a word openly. + +She raised her head and spoke to her maid. + +"Which is Mrs. Stretton's room?" And when she had the answer she rose +from her chair and stood, a figure of indecision. She did not plead +that John Mudge had exaggerated the danger; for she had herself +foreseen it long-ago, before Millie's marriage--even before Millie's +engagement. It was just because she had foreseen it that she had used +the words which had so rankled in Tony's memory. Bitterly she +regretted that she had ever used them; greatly she wished that she +could doubt their wisdom. But she could not. Let Millie's husband +leave her, she would grieve with all the strength of her nature; let +him come back soon, she would welcome him with a joy as great. Yes; +but he must come back _soon_. Otherwise she would grow used to his +absence; she would find his return an embarrassment, for it would be +the return of a stranger with the prerogative of a husband; she might +even have given to another the place he once held in her thoughts. And +the other might be a Lionel Callon. For this was Millicent's +character. She yielded too easily to affection, and she did not +readily distinguish between affection and the show of it. She paddled +in the shallows of passion, and flattered herself that she was +swimming in the depths. Grief she was capable of--yes; but a torrent +of tears obliterated it. Joy she knew; but it was a thrill with her +lasting an hour. + +Pamela walked along the passage and knocked at Millicent's door, +saying who she was. Millicent opened the door, and received her friend +with some constraint. + +"Can I come in?" said Pamela. + +"Of course," said Millie. + +They sat opposite to one another on each side of the fire. + +"I wanted to see you before I went to bed," said Pamela. "You have not +told me lately in your letters how Tony is getting on." + +Millie raised her hand to shield her face from the blaze of the fire. +She happened to shade it also from the eyes of Pamela; and she made no +reply. + +"Is he still in New York?" Pamela asked; and then Millie replied. + +"I do not know," she answered slowly. She let her hand fall, and +looked straight and defiantly at her friend. + +"I have not heard from him for a long while," she added; and as she +spoke there crept into her face a look of disdain. + + + + + CHAPTER VIII + + GIDEON'S FLEECE + + +Millicent was reluctant to add any word of explanation. She sat with +her eyes upon the fire, waiting, it seemed, until Pamela should see +fit to go. But Pamela remained, and of the two women she was the +stronger in will and character. She sat, with her eyes quietly resting +upon Millicent's face; and in a little while Millicent began +reluctantly to speak. As she spoke the disdainful droop of her lips +became more pronounced, and her words were uttered in a note of +petulance. + +"He _would_ stay to retrieve his failure. You remember?" she said. + +"Yes," replied Pamela. + +"I wrote to him again and again to come home, but he would not. I +couldn't make him see that he wasn't really a match for the people he +must compete with." + +Pamela nodded her head. + +"You wrote that to him?" + +Millicent lifted her face to Pamela's. + +"I put it, of course, with less frankness. I offered him, besides, the +rest of my money, so that he might try again; but he refused to take a +farthing more. It was unreasonable, don't you think? I could have got +on without it, but he couldn't. I was very sorry for him." + +"And you expressed your pity, too?" asked Pamela. + +"Yes, indeed," said Millicent, eagerly. "But he never would accept it. +He replied cheerfully that something was sure to happen soon, that he +would be sure to find an opening soon. But, of course, he never did. +It was not likely that with his inexperience he ever would." + +Tony's own words had recoiled upon him. On the evening when he had +first broached his plan to Millicent in Berkeley Square, he had laid +before her, amongst others, this very obstacle, thinking that she +ought to be aware of it, and never doubting but that he would surmount +it. The honesty of his nature had bidden him speak all that he had +thought, and he had spoken without a suspicion that his very frankness +might put in her mind an argument to belittle him. He had seemed +strong then, because he knew the difficulties, and counted them up +when she omitted them. His image was all the more pale and ineffectual +now because, foreknowing them well, he had not mastered them. + +"I wrote to him at last that it wasn't any use for him to go on with +the struggle. He would not tell me how he lived, or even where. I had +to send my letters to a post-office, and he called for them. He must +be living in want, in misery. I wrote to him that I had guessed as +much from his very reticence, and I said how sorry I was. Yet, in +spite of what I wrote," and here her voice hardened a little; she +showed herself as a woman really aggrieved, "in spite of what I wrote, +he answered me in a quite short letter, saying that I must not expect +to hear from him again until he had recovered from his defeat and was +re-established in my eyes. I can't understand that, can you?" + +"I think so," Pamela answered. She spoke gently. For there was +something to be said upon Millicent's side. The sudden collapse of her +exaggerated hopes, the dreary life she led, and her natural +disappointment at the failure of the man whom she had married, when +once he stepped down into the arena to combat with his fellow-men. +These things could not fail to provoke, in a nature so easily swayed +from extreme to extreme as Millicent's, impatience, anger, and a sense +of grievance. Pamela could hold the balance fairly enough to +understand that. But chiefly she was thinking of Tony--Tony hidden +away in some lodging in New York, a lodging so squalid that he would +not give the address, and vainly seeking for an opportunity whereby he +would make a rapid fortune; very likely going short of food, and +returning home at night to read over a letter from his wife of which +every line cried out to him, with a contemptuous pity, "You are a +failure. You are a failure. Come home." Pamela's heart went out in +pity, too. But there was no contempt in her pity. She could not but +admire the perseverance with which, on this, the first time that he +had ever walked hand in hand with misery, he endured its +companionship. + +"I think I understand," she said. "You say he answered you in that +short way in spite of what you wrote. I think it was not in spite of, +but because----" + +Millie Stretton shook her head. + +"No, that's not the reason," she replied. She gave one herself, and it +fairly startled Pamela. "Tony no longer cares for me. He means to go +out of my life altogether." + +Pamela remembered what store Tony had always set upon his wife, how he +had spoken of her that July morning in the park, and how he had looked +at the moment when he spoke. It was just because he cared so much that +he had taken his wild leap into the dark. That, at all events, she +believed, and in such a strain she replied. But Millicent would not be +persuaded. + +"Before Tony went away," she said stubbornly, "he let me see that he +no longer cared. He was losing the associations which used to be vivid +in his memory. Our marriage had just become a dull, ordinary thing. He +had lost the spirit in which he entered into it." + +Again Tony's indiscreet frankness had done him wrong. The coon song, +which was always to be associated in his mind with the summer night, +and the islets in the sea, and the broad stretch of water trembling +away in the moonlight across to the lights of the yachts in Oban Bay, +had become a mere coon song "sung by some one." Millicent had often +remembered and reflected upon that unfortunate sentence, and as her +disappointment in Tony increased and the pitying contempt gradually +crept into her mind, she read into it more and more of what Tony had +not meant. + +"I am sure you are wrong," said Pamela, very earnestly. "He went away +because he cared. He went away to keep your married life and his from +fading away into the colourless, dull, ordinary thing it so frequently +becomes. He has lost ground by his failure. No doubt your own letters +have shown that; and he is silent now in order to keep what he has. +You have said it yourself. He will not write until he is able to +re-establish himself in your thoughts." + +But would Tony succeed? _Could_ he succeed? The questions forced +themselves into her mind even while she was speaking, and she carried +them back to her room. The chances were all against him. Even if he +retrieved his failure, it would be a long time before that result was +reached--too long, perhaps, when his wife was Millicent, and such +creatures as Lionel Callon walked about the world. And he might never +succeed at all, he was so badly handicapped. + +Pamela was sorely tempted to leave the entanglement alone to unravel +itself. There was something which she could do. She was too honest to +close her eyes to that. But her own history rose up against her and +shook a warning finger. It had a message to her ears never so loudly +repeated as on this night. "Don't move a step. Look on! Look on!" She +knew herself well. She was by nature a partisan. Let her take this +trouble in hand and strive to set it right, her whole heart would soon +be set upon success. She was fond of Millicent already; she would +become fonder still in the effort to save her. She liked Tony very +much. The thought of him stoutly persevering, clinging to his one +ambition to keep his married life a bright and real thing in spite of +want and poverty--and even his wife's contempt, appealed to her with a +poignant strength. But she might fail. She had eaten of failure once, +and, after all these years, the taste of it was still most bitter in +her mouth. + +She fought her battle out over her dying fire, and at the end two +thoughts stood out clearly in her mind. She had given her promise to +Tony to be a good friend to his wife, and there was one thing which +she could do in fulfilment of her promise. + +She walked over to her window and flung it open. She was of the women +who look for signs; no story quite appealed to her like the story of +Gideon's Fleece. She looked for a sign now quite seriously. If a thaw +had set in, why, the world was going a little better with her, and +perhaps she might succeed. But the earth was iron-bound, and in the +still night she could hear a dry twig here and there snapping in the +frost. No, the world was not going well. She decided to wait until +things improved. + +But next day matters were worse. For one thing John Mudge went away, +and he was the only person in the house who interested her at all. +Furthermore, Lionel Callon stayed, and he announced some news. + +"I have been chosen to stand for Parliament at the next election," he +said; and he named an important constituency. Pamela noticed the look +of gratification, almost of pride, which shone at once on Millie's +face, and her heart sank. She interpreted Millie's thought, and +accurately. Here was a successful man, a man who had got on without +opportunities or means, simply by his own abilities; and there, far +away in New York, was her failure of a husband. Moreover, Callon and +Millicent were much together; they had even small secrets, to which in +conversation they referred. The world was not going well with Pamela, +and she waited for the fleece to be wet with dew. + +After four days, however, the frost showed signs of breaking. A thaw +actually set in that evening, and on the next morning two pieces of +good news arrived. In the first place, Pamela received a letter from +Alan Warrisden. There was nothing of importance in it, but it gave her +his actual address. In the second, Millie told Frances Millingham that +she had received news that Sir John Stretton was really failing, and +although there was no immediate danger, she must hold herself in +readiness to return to town. This to Pamela was really the best news +of all. This morning, at all events, Gideon's Fleece was wet. She +looked out some trains in the railway guide, and then sent a telegram +to Warrisden to come by a morning train. She would meet him at the +railway station. The one step in her power she was thus resolved to +take. + + + + + CHAPTER IX + + THE NEW ROAD + + +On the crest of that hill which was visible from the upper windows of +Whitewebs, a village straggled for a mile; and all day in the cottages +the looms were heard. The sound of looms, indeed, was always +associated with that village in the minds of Pamela Mardale and Alan +Warrisden, though they drove along its broad street but once, and a +few hours included all their visit. Those few hours, however, were +rich with consequence. For Pamela asked for help that day, and, in the +mere asking, gave, as women must; and she neither asked nor gave in +ignorance of what she did. The request might be small, the gift small, +too; but it set her and her friend in a new relation each to each, it +linked them in a common effort, it brought a new and a sweet intimacy +into both their lives. So that the noise of a loom was never heard by +them in the after times but there rose before their eyes, visible as a +picture, that grey chill day of February, the red-brick houses +crowding on the broad street in a picturesque irregularity, and the +three tall poplars tossing in the wind. The recollection brought +always a smile of tenderness to their faces; and in their thoughts +they had for the village a strange and fanciful name. It was just a +little Leicestershire village perched upon a hill, the village of +looms, the village of the three poplars. But they called it Quetta. + +At the very end of the street, and exactly opposite to the small house +from whose garden the poplars rose, there stood an inn. It was on the +edge of the hill, for just beyond the road dipped steeply down between +high hedges of brambles and elder trees, and, turning at the bottom of +the incline, wound thence through woods and level meadows towards +Leicester. It was the old coach road, and the great paved yard of the +inn and the long line of disused stables had once been noisy with the +shouts of ostlers and the crack of whips. Now only the carrier's cart +drove twice a week down the steep road to Leicester, and a faint +whistle from the low-lying land and a trail of smoke showed where now +the traffic ran. On the platform of the little roadside station, three +miles from the village, Pamela met Alan Warrisden on the morning after +she had sent off her telegram. She had a trap waiting at the door, and +as they mounted into it she said-- + +"I rode over to the village this morning and hired this dog-cart at +the inn. I am not expected to be back at Whitewebs until the +afternoon; so I thought we might lunch at the inn, and then a man can +drive you back to the station, while I ride home again." + +"It was bad going for a horse, wasn't it?" said Warrisden. + +The thaw had fairly set in; the roads, still hard as cement, ran with +water, and were most slippery. On each side patches of snow hung upon +the banks half melted, and the air was raw. + +"Yes, it was bad going," Pamela admitted. "But I could not wait. It +was necessary that I should see you to-day." + +She said no more at the moment, and Warrisden was content to sit by +her side as she drove, and wait. The road ran in a broad straight line +over the sloping ground. There was no vehicle, not even another +person, moving along it. Warrisden could see the line of houses ahead, +huddled against the sky, the spire of a church, and on his right the +three sentinel poplars. He was to see them all that afternoon. + +Pamela drove straight to the inn, where she had already ordered +luncheon; and it was not until luncheon was over that she drew up her +chair to the fire and spoke. + +"Won't you smoke?" she said first of all. "I want you to listen to +me." + +Warrisden lit a pipe and listened. + +"It is right that I should be very frank with you," she went on, "for +I am going to ask you to help me." + +"You need me, then?" said Warrisden. There was a leap in his voice +which brought the colour to her cheeks. + +"Very much," she said; and, with a smile, she asked, "Are you glad?" + +"Yes," he answered simply. + +"Yet the help may be difficult for you to give. It may occupy a long +time besides. I am not asking you for a mere hour or a day." + +The warning only brought a smile to Warrisden's face. + +"I don't think you understand," he said, "how much one wants to be +needed by those one needs." + +Indeed, even when that simple truth was spoken to her, it took Pamela +a little while to weigh it in her thoughts and give it credence. She +had travelled a long distance during these last years down her +solitary road. She began to understand that now. To need--actually to +need people, to feel a joy in being needed--here were emotions, +familiar to most, and no doubt at one time familiar to her, which +were, nevertheless, now very new and strange. At present she only +needed. Would a time come when she would go further still? When she +would feel a joy in being needed? The question flashed across her +mind. + +"Yes," she admitted, "no doubt that is true. But none the less there +must be no misunderstanding between you and me. I speak of myself, +although it is not for myself that I need your help; but I am not +blind. I know it will be for my sake that you give it, and I do not +want you to give it in any ignorance of me, or, perhaps"--and she +glanced at him almost shyly--"or, perhaps, expecting too much." + +Warrisden made no other answer than to lean forward in his chair, with +his eyes upon Pamela's face. She was going to explain that isolation +of hers which had so baffled him. He would not for worlds have +interrupted her lest he should check the utterance on her lips. He saw +clearly enough that she was taking a great step for her, a step, too, +which meant much to him. The actual explanation was not the important +thing. That she should confide it of her own accord--there was the +real and valuable sign. As she began to speak again, diffidence was +even audible in her voice. She almost awaited his judgment. + +"I must tell you something which I thought never to tell to any one," +she said. "I meant to carry it as my secret out with me at the end of +my life. I have been looking on all these last years. You noticed +that; you thought perhaps I was just obeying my nature. But I wasn't. +I did not begin life looking on. I began it as eager, as expectant of +what life could give me as any girl that was ever born. And I had just +my first season, that was all." She smiled rather wistfully as her +thoughts went back to it. "I enjoyed my first season. I had hardly +ever been in London before. I was eighteen; and everybody was very +nice to me. At the end of July I went to stay for a month with some +friends of mine on the coast of Devonshire, and--some one else stayed +there, too. His name does not matter. I had met him during the season +a good deal, but until he came down to Devonshire I had not thought of +him more than as a friend. He was a little older than myself, not very +much, and just as poor. He had no prospects, and his profession was +diplomacy.... So that there was no possibility from the first. He +meant never to say anything; but there came an hour, and the truth was +out between us." + +She stopped and gazed into the fire. The waters of the Channel ran in +sunlit ripples before her eyes; the red rocks of Bigbury Bay curved +warmly out on her right and her left; further away the towering +headlands loomed misty in the hot, still August air. A white yacht, +her sails hardly drawing, moved slowly westwards; the black smoke of a +steamer stained the sky far out; and on the beach there were just two +figures visible--herself and the man who had not meant to speak. + +"We parted at once," she went on. "He was appointed a consul in West +Africa. I think--indeed I know--that he hoped to rise more quickly +that way. But trouble came and he was killed. Because of that one +hour, you see, when he spoke what he did not mean to speak, he was +killed." It seemed that there was the whole story told. But Pamela had +not told it all, and never did; for her mother had played a part in +its unfolding. It was Mrs. Mardale's ambition that her daughter should +make a great marriage; it was her daughter's misfortune that she knew +little of her daughter's character. Mrs. Mardale had remarked the +growing friendship between Pamela and the man, she had realised +that marriage was quite impossible, and she had thought, with her +short-sighted ingenuity, that if Pamela fell in love and found love +to be a thing of fruitless trouble, she would come the sooner to take +a sensible view of the world and marry where marriage was to her +worldly advantage. She thus had encouraged the couple to a greater +friendliness, throwing them together when she could have hindered +their companionship; she had even urged Pamela to accept that +invitation to Devonshire, knowing who would be the other guests. She +was disappointed afterwards when Pamela did not take the sensible +view; but she did not blame herself at all. For she knew nothing of +the suffering which her plan had brought about. Pamela had kept her +secret. Even the months of ill-health which followed upon that first +season had not opened the mother's eyes, and certainly she never +suspected the weary nights of sleeplessness and aching misery which +Pamela endured. Some hint of the pain of that bad past time, however, +Pamela now gave to Warrisden. + +"I stayed as much at home in Leicestershire as possible," she said. +"You see there were my horses there; but even with them I was very +lonely. The time was long in passing, and it wasn't pleasant to think +that there would be so much of it yet, before it passed altogether. I +went up to London for the season each year, and I went out a great +deal. It helped me to keep from thinking." + +The very simplicity with which she spoke gave an intensity to her +words. There was no affectation in Pamela Mardale. Warrisden was able +to fill out her hints, to understand her distress. + +"All this is a great surprise to me," he said. "I have thought of you +always as one who had never known either great troubles or great joys. +I have hoped that some day you would wake, that I should find you +looking out on the world with the eagerness of youth. But I believed +eagerness would be a new thing to you." + +He looked at her as she sat. The firelight was bright upon her face, +and touched her hair with light; her dark eyes shone; and his thought +was that which the schoolmaster at Roquebrune had once sadly pondered. +It seemed needlessly cruel, needlessly wanton that a girl so equipped +for happiness should, in her very first season, when the world was +opening like a fairyland, have been blindly struck down. There were so +many others who would have felt the blow less poignantly. She might +surely have been spared. + +"You can guess, now," said Pamela, "why I have so persistently looked +on. I determined that I would never go through such distress again. I +felt that I would not dare to face it again." She suddenly covered her +face with her hands. "I don't think I could," she cried in a low, +piteous voice. "I don't know what I would do," as though once more the +misery of that time were closing upon her, so vivid were her +recollections. + +And once more Warrisden felt, as he watched her, the shock of a +surprise. He had thought her too sedate, too womanly for her years, +and here she sat shrinking in a positive terror, like any child, from +the imagined recurrence of her years of trouble. Warrisden was moved +as he had seldom been. But he sat quite still, saying no word; and in +a little while she took her hands from her face and went on-- + +"My life was over, you see, at the very beginning, and I was resolved +it should be over. For the future I would get interested only in +trifling, unimportant things; no one should ever be more to me than a +friend whom I could relinquish; I would merely look on. I should grow +narrow, no doubt, and selfish." And, as Warrisden started, a smile +came on to her face. "Yes, you have been thinking that, too, and you +were right. But I didn't mind. I meant to take no risks. Nothing +serious should ever come near me. If I saw it coming, I would push it +away; and I have pushed it away." + +"Until to-day, when you need my help?" Warrisden interrupted. + +"Yes, until to-day," Pamela repeated softly. + +Warrisden walked over to the window and stood with his back towards +her. The three tall poplars stood leafless up in front of him; the sky +was heavy with grey clouds; the wind was roaring about the chimneys; +and the roads ran with water. It was as cheerless a day as February +can produce, but to Warrisden it had something of a summer brightness. +The change for which he had hoped so long in vain had actually come to +pass. + +"What do you want me to do?" he asked, turning again to the room. + +"I want you to find Millie Stretton's husband," she replied; "and, at +all costs, to bring him home again." + +"Millie Stretton's husband?" he repeated, in perplexity. + +"Yes. Don't you remember the couple who stepped out of the dark house +in Berkeley Square and dared not whistle for a hansom--the truants?" + +Warrisden was startled. "Those two!" he exclaimed. "Well, that's +strange. On the very night when we saw them, you were saying that +there was no road for you, no new road from Quetta to Seistan. I was +puzzling my brains, too, as to how in the world you were to be roused +out of your detachment; and there were the means visible all the time, +perhaps--who knows?--ordained." He sat down again in his chair. + +"Where shall I look for Mr. Stretton?" he asked. + +"I don't know. He went away to New York, six months ago, to make a +home for Millie and himself. He did not succeed, and he has +disappeared." + +"Disappeared?" cried Warrisden. + +"Oh, but of his own accord," said Pamela. "I can't tell you why; it +wouldn't be fair. I have no right to tell you. But he must be found, +and he must be brought back. Again I can't tell you why; but it is +most urgent." + +"Is there any clue to help us?" Warrisden asked. "Had he friends in +New York?" + +"No; but he has a friend in England," said Pamela, "and I think it's +just possible that the friend may know where he is to be found, for it +was upon his advice that Mr. Stretton went to New York." + +"Tell me his name." + +"Mr. Chase," Pamela replied. "He is head of a mission in Stepney +Green. Tony Stretton told me of him one morning in Hyde Park just +before he went away. He seemed to rely very much upon his judgment." + +Warrisden wrote the name down in his pocket-book. + +"Will he tell me, do you think, where Stretton is, even if he knows? +You say Stretton has disappeared of his own accord." + +"I have thought of that difficulty," Pamela answered. "There is an +argument which you can use. Sir John Stretton, Tony's father, is ill, +and in all probability dying." + +"I see. I can use the same argument to Stretton himself, I suppose, +when I find him?" + +"I can give you no other," said Pamela; "but you can add to it. Mr. +Stretton will tell you that his father does not care whether he comes +back in time or not. He is sure to say that. But you can answer that +every night since he went away the candles have been lit in his +dressing-room and his clothes laid out by his father's orders, on the +chance that some evening he might walk in at the door." + +That Sir John Stretton's illness was merely the pretext for Tony's +return both understood. The real reason why he must come home Pamela +did not tell. To her thinking Millie was not yet so deeply entangled +with Lionel Callon but that Tony's home-coming might set the tangle +right. A few weeks of companionship, and surely he would resume his +due place in his wife's thoughts. Pamela, besides, was loyal to her +sex. She had promised to safeguard Millicent; she was in no mind to +betray her. + +"But bring him back," she cried, with a real passion. "So much depends +on his return, for Millie, for him, and for me, too. Yes, for me! If +you fail, it is I who fail; and I don't want failure. Save me from +it!" + +"I'll try," Warrisden answered simply; and Pamela was satisfied. + +Much depended, for Warrisden too, upon the success of his adventure. +If he failed, Pamela would retire again behind her barrier; she would +again resume the passive, indifferent attitude of the very old; she +would merely look on as before and wait for things to cease. If, +however, he succeeded, she would be encouraged to move forward still; +the common sympathies would have her in their grasp again; she might +even pass that turnpike gate of friendship and go boldly down the +appointed road of life. Thus success meant much for him. The fortunes +of the four people--Millicent, Tony, Pamela, and Warrisden--were +knotted together at this one point. + +"Indeed, I'll try," he repeated, + +Pamela's horse was brought round to the inn door. The dusk was coming +on. + +"Which way do you go?" asked Warrisden. + +"Down the hill." + +"I will walk to the bottom with you. The road will be dangerous." + +They went slowly down between the high elder hedges, Pamela seated on +her horse, Warrisden walking by her side. The wide level lowlands +opened out beneath them--fields of brown and green, black woods with +swinging boughs, and the broad high road with its white wood rails. A +thin mist swirled across the face of the country in the wind, so that +its every feature was softened and magnified. It loomed dim and +strangely distant, with a glamour upon it like a place of old romance. +To Pamela and Warrisden, as the mists wove and unwove about it, it had +a look of dreamland. + +They reached the end of the incline, and Pamela stopped her horse. + +"This is my way," said she, pointing along the highway with her whip. + +"Yes," answered Warrisden. The road ran straight for some distance, +then crossed a wooden bridge and curved out of sight round the edge of +a clump of trees. "The new road," he said softly. "The new road from +Quetta to Seistan!" + +Pamela smiled. + +"This is Quetta," said she. + +Warrisden laid his hand upon her horse's neck, and looked suddenly up +into her face. + +"Where will be Seistan?" he asked in a low voice. + +Pamela returned the look frankly. There came a softness into her dark +eyes. For a moment she let her hand rest lightly upon his sleeve, and +did not speak. She herself was wondering how far she was to travel +upon this new road. + +"I cannot tell," she said very gently. "Nor, my friend, can you. +Only"--and her voice took on a lighter and a whimsical tone-"only I +start alone on my new road." + +And she went forward into the level country. Warrisden climbed the +hill again, and turned when he had reached the top; but Pamela was out +of sight. The dusk and the mists had enclosed her. + + + + + CHAPTER X + + MR. CHASE + + +The night had come when Warrisden stepped from the platform of the +station into the train. Pamela was by this time back at Whitewebs--he +himself was travelling to London; their day was over. He looked out of +the window. Somewhere three miles away the village of the three +poplars crowned the hill, but a thick wall of darkness and fog hid it +from his eyes. It seemed almost as if Pamela and he had met that day +only in thought at some village which existed only in a dream. The +train, however, rattled upon its way. Gradually he became conscious of +a familiar exhilaration. The day had been real. Not merely had it +signalled the change in Pamela, for which for so long he had wished; +not merely had it borne a blossom of promise for himself, but +something was to be done immediately, and the thing to be done was of +all things that which most chimed with his own desires. He was to take +the road again, and the craving for the road was seldom stilled for +long within his heart. He heard its call sung like a song to the +rhythm of the wheels. The very uncertainty of its direction tantalised +his thoughts. + +Warrisden lodged upon the Embankment, and his rooms overlooked the +Thames. The mist lay heavy upon London, mid all that night the +steamboats hooted as they passed from bridge to bridge. Warrisden lay +long awake listening to them; each blast had its message for him, each +was like the greeting of a friend; each one summoned him, and to each +he answered with a rising joy, "I shall follow, I shall follow." The +boats passed down to the sea through the night mist. Many a time he +had heard them before, picturing the dark deck and the side lights, +red and green, and the yellow light upon the mast, and the man silent +at the wheel with the light from the binnacle striking up upon the +lines of his face. They were little river or coasting boats for the +most part, but he had never failed to be stirred by the long-drawn +melancholy of their whistles. They talked of distant lands and an +alien foliage. + +He spent the following morning and the afternoon in the arrangement of +his affairs, and in the evening drove down to the mission house. It +stood in a dull by-street close to Stepney Green, a rambling building +with five rooms upon the ground floor panelled with varnished deal and +furnished with forms and rough tables, and on the floor above, a big +billiard-room, a bagatelle-room, and a carpenter's workshop. Mr. Chase +was superintending a boxing class in one of the lower rooms, and +Warrisden, when he was led up to him, received a shock of surprise. He +had never seen a man to the outward eye so unfitted for his work. He +had expected a strong burly person, cheery of manner and confident of +voice; he saw, however, a tall young man with a long pale face and a +fragile body. Mr. Chase was clothed in a clerical frock-coat of +unusual length, he wore linen of an irreproachable whiteness, and his +hands were fine and delicate as a woman's. He seemed indeed the +typical High Church curate fresh that very instant from the tea-cups +of a drawing-room. + +"A gentleman to see you, sir," said the ex-army sergeant who had +brought forward Warrisden. He handed Warrisden's card to Chase, who +turned about and showed Warrisden his full face. Surprise had been +Warrisden's first sentiment, but it gave place in an instant to +distaste. The face which he saw was not ugly, but he disliked it. It +almost repelled him. There was no light in the eyes at all; they were +veiled and sunken; and the features repelled by reason of a queer +antagonism. Mr. Chase had the high narrow forehead of an ascetic, the +loose mouth of a sensualist, and a thin crop of pale and almost +colourless hair. Warrisden wondered why any one should come to this +man for advice, most of all a Tony Stretton. What could they have in +common--the simple, good-humoured, unintellectual subaltern of the +Coldstream, and this clerical exquisite? The problem was perplexing. + +"You wish to see me?" asked Chase. + +"If you please." + +"Now? As you see, I am busy." + +"I can wait." + +"Thank you. The mission closes at eleven. If you can wait till then +you might come home with me, and we could talk in comfort." + +It was nine o'clock. For two hours Warrisden followed Chase about the +mission, and with each half-hour his interest increased. However +irreconcilable with his surroundings Chase might appear to be, neither +he nor any of the members of the mission were aware of it. He was at +ease alike with the boys and the men; and the boys and the men were at +ease with him. Moreover, he was absolute master, although there were +rough men enough among his subjects. The fiercest boxing contest was +stopped in a second by a motion of that delicate hand. + +"I used to have a little trouble," he said to Warrisden, "before I had +those wire frames fixed over the gas-jets. You see they cover the gas +taps. Before that was done, if there was any trouble, the first thing +which happened was that the room was in darkness. It took some time to +restore order;" and he passed on to the swimming-bath. + +Mr. Chase was certainly indefatigable. Now he was giving a lesson in +wood-carving to a boy; now he was arranging an apprenticeship for +another in the carpenter's shop. Finally he led the way into the great +billiard-room, where only the older men were allowed. + +"It is here that Stretton used to keep order?" said Warrisden; and +Chase at once turned quickly towards him. + +"Oh," he said slowly, in a voice of comprehension, "I was wondering +what brought you here. Yes; this was the room." + +Chase moved carelessly away, and spoke to some of the men about the +tables. But for the rest of the evening he was on his guard. More than +once his eyes turned curiously and furtively towards Warrisden. His +face was stubborn, and wore a look of wariness. Warrisden began to +fear lest he should get no answer to the question he had to put. No +appeal would be of any use--of that he felt sure. His argument must +serve--and would it serve? + +Chase, at all events, made no attempt to avoid the interview. As the +hands of the clock marked eleven, and the rooms emptied, he came at +once to Warrisden. + +"We can go now," he said; and unlocking a drawer, to Warrisden's +perplexity he filled his pockets with racket-balls. The motive for +that proceeding became apparent as they walked to the house where +Chase lodged. Their way lay through alleys, and as they walked the +children clustered about them, and Chase's pockets were emptied. + +"We keep this house because men from the Universities come down and +put in a week now and then at the mission. My rooms are upstairs." + +Chase's sitting-room was in the strangest contrast to the bareness of +the mission and the squalor of the streets. It was furnished with +luxury, but the luxury was that of a man of taste and knowledge. There +was hardly a piece of furniture which had not an interesting history; +the engravings and the brass ornaments upon the walls had been picked +up here and there in Italy. A bright fire blazed upon the hearth. + +"What will you drink?" Chase asked, and brought from a cupboard bottle +after bottle of liqueurs. It seemed to Warrisden that the procession +of bottles would never end--some held liqueurs of which he had never +even heard the name; but concerning all of them Mr. Chase discoursed +with great knowledge and infinite appreciation. + +"I can recommend this," he said tentatively, as he took up one fat +round bottle and held it up to the light. "It is difficult perhaps to +say definitely which is the best, but--yes, I can recommend this." + +"Can't I have a whiskey and soda?" asked Warrisden, plaintively. + +Mr. Chase looked at his companion with a stare. + +"Of course you can," he replied. But his voice was one of +disappointment, and with an almost imperceptible shrug of the +shoulders he fetched a Tantalus and a siphon of seltzer. + +"Help yourself," he said; and lighting a gold-tipped cigarette he drew +up a chair and began to talk. And so Warrisden came at last to +understand how Tony Stretton had gained his great faith in Mr. Chase. +Chase was a talker of a rare quality. He sat stooping over the fire +with his thin hands outspread to the blaze, and for half an hour +Warrisden was enchained. All that had repelled him in the man, all +that had aroused his curiosity, was soon lost to sight. He yielded +himself up as if to some magician. Chase talked not at all of his work +or of the many strange incidents which he must needs have witnessed in +its discharge. He spoke of other climates and bright towns with a +scholarship which had nothing of pedantry, and an observation human as +it was keen. Chase, with the help of his Livy, had traced Hannibal's +road across the Alps and had followed it on foot; he spoke of another +march across snow mountains of which Warrisden had never till this +moment heard--the hundred days of a dead Sultan of Morocco on the +Passes of the Atlas, during which he led his forces back from Tafilet +to Rabat. Chase knew nothing of this retreat but what he had read. Yet +he made it real to Warrisden, so vividly did his imagination fill up +the outlines of the written history. He knew his Paris, his +Constantinople. He had bathed from the Lido and dreamed on the Grand +Canal. He spoke of the peeling frescoes in the Villa of Countess +Guiccioli above Leghorn, of the outlook from the terrace over the +vines and the olive trees to the sea where Shelley was drowned; and +where Byron's brig used to round into the wind and with its sails +flapping drop anchor under the hill. For half an hour Warrisden +wandered through Europe in the pleasantest companionship, and then +Chase stopped abruptly and leaned back in his chair. + +"I was forgetting," he said, "that you had come upon a particular +errand. It sometimes happens that I see no one outside the mission +people for a good while, and during those periods when I get an +occasion I am apt to talk too much. What can I do for you?" + +The spirit had gone from his voice, his face. He leaned back in his +chair, a man tired out. Warrisden looked at the liqueur bottles +crowded on the table, with Chase's conversation still fresh in his +mind. Was Chase a man at war with himself, he wondered, who was living +a life for which he had no taste that he might the more completely +escape a life which his conscience disapproved? Or was he deliberately +both hedonist and Puritan, giving to each side of his strange nature, +in turn, its outlet and gratification? + +"You have something to say to me," Chase continued. "I know quite well +what it is about." + +"Stretton," said Warrisden. + +"Yes; you mentioned him in the billiard-room. Well?" + +Chase was not looking at Warrisden. He sat with his eyes half-closed, +his elbows on the arms of his chair, his finger-tips joined under his +chain, and his head thrown back. There was no expression upon his face +but one of weariness. Would he answer? Could he answer? Warrisden was +in doubt, indeed in fear. He led to his question warily. + +"It was you who recommended Stretton to try horse-breeding in +Kentucky." + +"Yes," said Chase; and he added, "after he had decided of his own +accord to go away." + +"He failed." + +"Yes." + +"And he has disappeared." + +Chase opened his eyes, but did not turn them to his companion. + +"I did not advise his disappearance," he said. "That, like his +departure, was his own doing." + +"No doubt," Warrisden agreed. "But it is thought that you might have +heard from him since his disappearance." + +Chase nodded his head. + +"I have." + +"It is thought that you might know where he is now." + +"I do," said Mr. Chase. Warrisden was sensibly relieved. One-half of +his fear was taken from him. Chase knew, at all events, where Stretton +was to be found. Now he must disclose his knowledge. But before he +could put a question, Chase said languidly-- + +"You say 'it is thought,' Mr. Warrisden. By whom is it thought? By his +wife?" + +"No. But by a great friend of hers and his." + +"Oh," said Chase, "by Miss Pamela Mardale, then." + +Warrisden started forward. + +"You know her?" he asked. + +"No. But Stretton mentioned her to me in a letter. She has sent you to +me in fulfilment of a promise. I understand." + +The words were not very intelligible to Warrisden. He knew nothing of +Pamela's promise to Tony Stretton. But, on the other hand, he saw that +Mr. Chase was giving a more attentive ear to what he said. He betrayed +no ignorance of the promise. + +"I am sent to fetch Stretton home," he said. "I want you to tell me +where he is." + +Chase shook his head. + +"No," he said gently. + +"It is absolutely necessary that Stretton should come back," Warrisden +declared with great deliberation. And with no less deliberation Chase +replied-- + +"In Stretton's view it is absolutely necessary that he should stay +away!" + +"His father is dying." + +Chase started forward in his chair, and stared at Warrisden for a long +time. + +"Is that an excuse?" he said at length. + +It was, as Warrisden was aware. He did not answer the question. + +"It is the truth," he replied; and he replied truthfully. + +Chase rose from his chair and walked once or twice across the room. He +came back to the fire, and leaning an elbow on the mantelpiece stared +into the coals. Warrisden sat very still. He had used his one +argument--he could add nothing to it; he could only wait for the +answer in a great anxiety. So much hung upon that answer for Stretton +and his wife, for Pamela, for himself! The fortunes of all four were +knotted together. At last the answer came. + +"I promised Tony that I would keep his secret," said Chase. "But when +he asked for the promise, and when I gave it, the possibility of his +father dying was not either in his mind or mine. We considered--in +letters, of course--other possibilities; but not this one. I don't +think I have the right to remain silent. Even in the face of this +possibility I should have kept my promise, I think, if you had come +from his wife--for I know why he disappeared. But as things are, I +will tell you. Tony Stretton is in the North Sea on a trawler." + +"In the North Sea?" exclaimed Warrisden. And he smiled. After all, the +steamboats on the river had last night called to him with a particular +summons. + +"Yes," continued Chase, and he fetched from his writing-desk a letter +in Tony's hand. "He came back to England two months ago. He drifted +across the country. He found himself at Yarmouth with a few shillings +in his pocket. He knew something of the sea. He had sailed his own +yacht in happier times. He was in great trouble. He needed time to +think out a new course of life. He hung about on Gorleston pier for a +day or two, and then was taken on by a skipper who was starting out +short of hands, he signed for eight weeks, and he wrote to me the day +before he started. That's four weeks ago." + +"Can I reach him?" Warrisden asked. + +"Yes. The boat is the _Perseverance_, and it belongs to the Blue +Fleet. A steam cutter goes out every day from Billingsgate to fetch +the fish. I know one of the owners. His son comes down to the mission. +I can get you a passage. When can you start?" + +"At any time," replied Warrisden. "The sooner the better." + +"To-morrow, then," said Chase. "Meet me at the entrance to +Billingsgate Market at half-past eleven. It will take you forty-eight +hours with ordinary luck to reach the Dogger Bank. Of course, if +there's a fog in the Thames the time will be longer. And I warn you, +living is rough on a fish-carrier." + +"I don't mind that," said Warrisden, with a smile. He went away with a +light heart, and that night wrote a letter to Pamela, telling her of +his interview with Mr. Chase. The new road seemed after all likely to +prove a smooth one. As he wrote, every now and then a steamboat hooted +from the river, and the rain pattered upon his window. He flung it up +and looked out. There was no fog to-night, only the rain fell, and +fell gently. He prayed that there might be no fog upon the Thames +to-morrow. + +Mr. Chase, too, heard the rain that night. He sat in his armchair +listening to it with a decanter at his elbow half filled with a liquid +like brown sherry. At times he poured a little into his glass and +drank it slowly, crouching over his fire. Somewhere in the darkness of +the North Sea Tony Stretton was hidden. Very likely at this moment he +was standing upon the deck of his trawler with his hands upon the +spokes of the wheel, and his eyes peering forward through the rain, +keeping his long night-watch while the light from the binnacle struck +upwards upon the lines of his face. Mr. Chase sat late in a muse. But +before he went to bed he locked the decanter and the glass away in a +private cupboard, and took the key with him into his bedroom. + + + + + CHAPTER XI + + ON THE DOGGER BANK + + +The _City of Bristol_ swung out of the huddle of boats off +Billingsgate Wharf at one o'clock on the next afternoon. Mr. Chase, +who stood upon the quay amongst the porters and white-jacketed +salesmen, turned away with an episcopal wave of the hand. Warrisden +leaned over the rail of the steamer's bridge, between the captain and +the pilot, and shouted a reply. The _City of Bristol_, fish-cutter of +300 tons, was a boat built for speed, long and narrow, sitting low on +the water, with an upstanding forecastle forward, a small saloon in +the stern, and a tiny cabin for the captain under the bridge on deck. +She sidled out into the fair way and went forward upon her slow, +intricate journey to the sea. Below the Tower she took her place in +the long, single file of ships winding between the mud banks, and +changed it as occasion served; now she edged up by a string of barges, +now in a clear broad space she made a spurt and took the lead of a +barquantine, which swam in indolence, with bare masts, behind a tug; +and at times she stopped altogether, like a carriage blocked in +Piccadilly. The screw thrashed the water, ceased, and struck again +with a suggestion of petulance at the obstacles which barred the +boat's way. Warrisden, too, chafed upon the bridge. A question pressed +continually upon his mind--"Would Stretton return?" He had discovered +where Stretton was to be found. The tall grey spire of Stepney Church +rose from behind an inlet thick with masts, upon the left; he was +already on his way to find him. But the critical moment was yet to +come. He had still to use his arguments; and as he stood watching the +shipping with indifferent eyes the arguments appeared most weak and +unpersuasive. Stretton's father was dying, it was true. The son's +return was no doubt a natural obligation. But would the natural +obligation hold when the father was unnatural? Those months in New +York had revealed one quality in Tony Stretton, at all events; he +could persist. The very name of the trawler in which he was at work +seemed to Warrisden of a bad augury for his success--the +_Perseverance!_ + +Greenwich, with its hill of grass, slipped behind on the right; at the +Albert Docks a huge Peninsular and Oriental steamer, deck towering +above deck, swung into the line; the high chimneys of the cement works +on the Essex flats began to stand out against the pale grey sky, each +one crowned with white smoke like a tuft of wool; the barges, under +their big brown sprit-sails, now tacked this way and that across a +wider stream; the village of Greenhithe and the white portholes of the +_Worcester_ showed upon the right. + +"Would Stretton return?" The question revolved in Warrisden's mind as +the propeller revolved in the thick brown water. The fortunes of four +people hung upon the answer, and no answer could be given until a +night, and a day, and another night had passed, until he saw the Blue +Fleet tossing far away upon the Dogger Bank. Suppose that the answer +were "No!" He imagined Pamela sinking back into lassitude, narrowing +to that selfishness which she, no less than he, foresaw; looking on +again at the world's show with the lack-lustre indifference of the +very old. + +At Gravesend the _City of Bristol_ dropped her pilot, a little, +white-bearded, wizened man, who all the way down the river, balancing +himself upon the top-rail of the bridge, like some nautical Blondin, +had run from side to side the while he exchanged greetings with the +anchored ships; and just opposite to Tilbury Fort, with its scanty +fringe of trees, she ran alongside of a hulk and took in a load of +coal. + +"We'll go down and have tea while they are loading her," said the +captain. + +The dusk was falling when Warrisden came again on deck, and a cold +wind was blowing from the north-west. The sharp stem of the boat was +cutting swiftly through the quiet water; the lift of the sea under her +forefoot gave to her a buoyancy of motion--she seemed to have become a +thing alive. The propeller cleft the surface regularly; there was no +longer any sound of petulance in its revolutions, rather there was a +throb of joy as it did its work unhindered. Throughout the ship a +steady hum, a steady vibration ran. The _City of Bristol_ was not +merely a thing alive; it was a thing satisfied. + +Upon Warrisden, too, there descended a sense of peace. He was _en +rapport_ with the ship. The fever of his questioning left him. On +either side the arms of the shore melted into the gathering night. Far +away upon his right the lights of Margate shone brightly, like a chain +of gold stretched out upon the sea; in front of him there lay a wide +and misty bay, into which the boat drove steadily. All the unknown +seemed hidden there; all the secret unrevealed Beyond. There came +whispers out of that illimitable bay to Warrisden's ears; whispers +breathed upon the north wind, and all the whispers were whispers of +promise, bidding him take heart. Warrisden listened and believed, +uplifted by the grave quiet of the sea and its mysterious width. + +The _City of Bristol_ turned northward into the great channel of the +Swin, keeping close to the lightships on the left, so close that +Warrisden from the bridge could look straight down upon their decks. +The night had altogether come--a night of stars. Clusters of lights, +low down upon the left, showed where the towns of Essex stood; upon +the light hand the homeward-bound ships loomed up ghost-like and +passed by; on the right, too, shone out the great green globes of the +Mouse light like Neptune's reading-lamps. Sheltered behind the canvas +screen at the corner of the bridge Warrisden looked along the rake of +the unlighted deck below. He thought of Pamela waiting for his return +at Whitewebs, but without impatience. The great peace and silence of +the night were the most impressive things he had ever known. The +captain's voice complaining of the sea jarred upon him. + +"It's no Bobby's job," said the captain in a low voice. "It's home +once in three weeks from Saturday to Monday, if you are in luck, and +the rest of your time you're in carpet slippers on the bridge. You'll +sleep in my chatoo, to-night. I sha'n't turn in until we have passed +the Outer Gabbard and come to the open sea. That won't be till four in +the morning." + +Warrisden understood that he was being offered the captain's cabin. + +"No, thanks," said he. "The bench of the saloon will do very well for +me." + +The captain did not press his offer. + +"Yes; there's more company in the saloon," he said. "I often sleep +there myself. You are bound for the Mission ship, I suppose?" + +"No; I want to find a man on the trawler _Perseverance_." + +The captain turned. Warrisden could not see his face, but he knew from +his attitude that he was staring at him in amazement. + +"Then you must want to see him pretty badly," he commented. "The No'th +Sea in February and March is not a Bobby's job." + +"Bad weather is to be expected?" asked Warrisden. + +"It has been known," said the captain dryly; and before the lights of +the Outer Gabbard winked good-bye on the starboard quarter at four +o'clock in the morning, the _City of Bristol_ was taking the water +over her deck. + +Warrisden rolled on the floor of the saloon--for he could not keep his +balance on the narrow bench--and tried in vain to sleep. But the +strong light of a lamp, swinging from the roof, glared upon his eyes, +the snores of his companions trumpeted in his ears. Moreover, the heat +was intolerable. Five men slept in the bunks--Warrisden made a sixth. +At four in the morning the captain joined the party through his love +of company. The skylight and the door were both tightly closed, a big +fire burned in the stove, and a boiling kettle of tea perpetually +puffed from its spout a column of warm, moist steam. Warrisden felt +his skin prickly beneath his clothes; he gasped for fresh air. + +Living would be rough upon the fish-carrier, Chase had told him; and +rough Warrisden found it. In the morning the steward rose, and made +tea by the simple process of dropping a handful of tea into the kettle +and filling it up with water. A few minutes later he brought a dish of +ham and eggs from the galley, and slapped it down on the table. + +"Breakfast," he cried; and the five men opened their eyes, rubbed +them, and without any other preparation sat down and ate. Warrisden +slipped up the companion, unscrewed the skylight and opened it for the +space of an inch. Then he returned. + +The _City of Bristol_ was rolling heavily, and Warrisden noticed with +surprise that all of the five men gave signs of discomfort. Surely, he +thought, they must be used to heavy weather. But, nevertheless, +something was wrong; they did not talk. Finally, the captain looked +upwards, and brought his hand down upon the table. + +"I felt something was wrong," said he; "the skylight's open." + +All stared up to the roof. + +"So it is." + +"I did that," Warrisden said humbly. + +At once all the faces were turned on him in great curiosity. + +"Now why?" asked the captain. "Don't you like it nice and snug?" + +"Yes; oh yes," Warrisden said hurriedly. + +"Well, then!" said the captain; and the steward went on deck and +screwed the skylight down. + +"After all, it's only for thirty-six hours," thought Warrisden, as he +subsequently bathed in a pail on deck. But he was wrong; for the Blue +Fleet had gone a hundred miles north to the Fisher Bank, and thither +the _City of Bristol_ followed it. + +The _City of Bristol_ sailed on to the Fisher Bank, and found an empty +sea. It hunted the Blue Fleet for half-a-dozen hours, and, as night +fell, it came upon a single trawler with a great flare light suspended +from its yard. + +"They're getting in their trawl," said the captain; and he edged up +within earshot. + +"Where's the Blue Fleet?" he cried. + +"Gone back to the Dogger," came the answer. + +The captain swore, and turned southwards. For four days and nights +Warrisden pitched about on the fish-carrier and learned many things, +such as the real meaning of tannin in tea, and the innumerable medical +uses to which "Friar's Balsam" can be put. On the morning of the fifth +day the _City of Bristol_ steamed into the middle of the fleet, and +her engines stopped. + +These were the days before the steam-trawler. The sailing-ships were +not as yet laid up, two by two, alongside Gorleston quay, and knocked +down for a song to any purchaser. Warrisden looked over a grey, savage +sea. The air was thick with spindrift. The waves leaped exultingly up +from windward and roared away to leeward from under the cutter's keel +in a steep, uprising hill of foam. All about him the sailing-boats +headed to the wind, sinking and rising in the furrows, so that +Warrisden would just see a brown topsail over the edge of a steep +roller like a shark's fin, and the next instant the dripping hull of +the boat flung out upon a breaking crest. + +"You will have to look slippy when the punt from the _Perseverance_ +comes alongside with her fish," the captain shouted. "The punt will +give you a passage back to the _Perseverance_, but I don't think you +will be able to return. There's a no'th-westerly gale blowing up, and +the sea is increasing every moment. However, there will be another +cutter up to-morrow, and if it's not too rough you could be put on +board of her." + +It took Warrisden a full minute to realise the meaning of the +captain's words. He looked at the tumbling, breaking waves, he +listened to the roar of the wind through the rigging. + +"The boats won't come alongside to-day," he cried. + +"Won't they?" the skipper replied. "Look!" + +Certainly some man[oe]uvre was in progress. The trawlers were all +forming to windward in a rough semicircle about the cutter. Warrisden +could see boat tackle being rigged to the main yards and men standing +about the boats capsized on deck. They were actually intending to put +their fish on board in the face of the storm. + +"You see, with the gale blowing up, they mayn't get a chance to put +their fish on board for three or four days after this," the captain +explained. "Oh, you can take it from me. The No'th Sea is not a +Bobby's job." + +As Warrisden watched, one by one the trawlers dropped their boats, and +loaded them with fish-boxes. The boats pushed off, three men to each, +with their life-belts about their oil-skins, and came down with the +wind towards the fish-carrier. The trawlers bore away, circled round +the _City of Bristol_, and took up their formation to leeward, so +that, having discharged their fish, the boats might drop down again +with the wind to their respective ships. Warrisden watched the boats, +piled up with fish-boxes, coming through the welter of the sea. It +seemed some desperate race was being rowed. + +"Can you tell me which is the boat from the _Perseverance?_" he asked. + +"I think it's the fifth," said the captain. + +The boats came down, each one the kernel of a globe of spray. +Warrisden watched, admiring how cleverly they chose the little gaps +and valleys in the crests of the waves. Each moment he looked to see a +boat tossed upwards and overturned; each moment he dreaded that boat +would be the fifth. But no boat was overturned. One by one they passed +under the stern of the City of Bristol, and came alongside under the +shelter of its wall. + +The fifth boat ranged up. A man stood up in the stern. + +"The _Perseverance_," he cried. "Nine boxes." And as he spoke a great +sea leapt up against the windward bow of the cutter. The cutter rolled +from it suddenly, her low bulwarks dipped under water on the leeward +side, close by the _Perseverance_ boat. + +"Shove off!" the man cried, who was standing up; and as he shouted he +lurched and fell into the bottom of the boat. The two men in the bows +pushed off with their oars; but they were too late. The cutter's +bulwark caught the boat under the keel; it seemed she must be upset, +and men and boxes whelmed in the sea, unless a miracle happened. But +the miracle did happen. As the fish-cutter righted she scooped on to +her deck the boat, with its boxes and its crew. The incident all +seemed to happen within the fraction of a second. Not a man upon the +fish-cutter had time to throw out a rope. Warrisden saw the cutter's +bulwarks dip, the sailor falling in the boat, and the boat upon the +deck of the cutter in so swift a succession that he had not yet +realised disaster was inevitable before disaster was avoided. + +The sailor rose from the bottom of the boat and stepped on deck, a +stalwart, dripping figure. + +"From the _Perseverance_, sir. Nine boxes," he said, looking up to the +captain on the bridge; and Warrisden, leaning by the captain's side +upon the rail, knew the sailor to be Tony Stretton. The accent of the +voice would have been enough to assure him; but Warrisden knew the +face too. + +"This is the man I want," he said to the captain. + +"You must be quick, then," the captain replied. "Speak to him while +the boat is being unloaded." + +Warrisden descended on to the deck. + +"Mr. Stretton," said he. + +The sailor swung round quickly. There was a look of annoyance upon his +face. + +"You are surely making a mistake," said he, abruptly. "We are not +acquainted," and he turned back to the fish-boxes. + +"I'm not making a mistake," replied Warrisden. "I have come out to the +North Sea in order to find you." + +Stretton ceased from his work and stood up. He led the way to the +stern of the cutter, where the two men were out of earshot. + +"Now," he said. He stood in front of Warrisden, in his sea-boots and +his oilskins, firmly planted, yet swaying to the motion of the ship. +There was not merely annoyance in his face, but he had the stubborn +and resolute look of a man not lightly to be persuaded. Standing there +on the cutter's deck, backed by the swinging seas, there was even an +air of mastery about him which Warrisden had not expected. His +attitude seemed, somehow, not quite consistent with his record of +failure. + +"Now," said Stretton, "we must be quick. The sea is getting worse each +minute, and I have to get back to the _Perseverance_. You are----?" + +"Alan Warrisden, a stranger to you." + +"Yes," Stretton interrupted; "how did you find me out?" + +"Chase told me." + +Stretton's face flushed angrily. + +"He had no right to tell you. I wished for these few weeks to be +alone. He gave me his word he would tell no one." + +"He had to break his word," said Warrisden, firmly. "It is necessary +that you should come home at once." + +Stretton laughed. Warrisden was clinging to a wire stay from the +cutter's mizzen-mast, and even so could hardly keep his feet. He had a +sense of coming failure from the very ease with which Stretton stood +resting his hands upon his hips, unsupported on the unsteady deck. + +"I cannot come," said Stretton abruptly; and he turned away. As he +turned Warrisden shouted--for in that high wind words carried in no +other way--"Your father, Sir John Stretton, is dying." + +Stretton stopped. He looked for a time thoughtfully into Warrisden's +face; but there was no change in his expression by which Warrisden +could gather whether the argument would prevail or no. And when at +last he spoke, it was to say-- + +"But he has not sent for me." + +It was the weak point in Warrisden's argument, and Stretton had, in +his direct way, come to it at once. Warrisden was silent. + +"Well?" asked Stretton. "He has not sent for me?" + +"No," Warrisden admitted; "that is true." + +"Then I will not come." + +"But though he has not sent for you, it is very certain that he wishes +for your return," Warrisden urged. "Every night since you have been +away the candles have been lighted in your dressing-room and your +clothes laid out, in the hope that on one evening you will walk in at +the door. On the very first night, the night of the day on which you +went, that was done. It was done by Sir John Stretton's orders, and by +his orders it has always since been done." + +Just for a moment Warrisden thought that his argument would prevail. +Stretton's face softened; then came a smile which was almost wistful +about his lips, his eyes had a kindlier look. And the kindlier look +remained. Kindliness, too, was the first tone audible in his voice as +he replied; but the reply itself yielded nothing. + +"He has not sent for me." + +He looked curiously at Warrisden, as if for the first time he became +aware of him as a man acting from motives, not a mere instrument of +persuasion. + +"After all, who did send you?" he asked. "My wife?" + +"No." + +"Who then?" + +"Miss Pamela Mardale." + +Stretton was startled by the name. It was really the strongest +argument Warrisden had in his armoury. Only he was not aware of its +strength. + +"Oh," said Stretton, doubtfully; "so Miss Mardale sent you!" + +He thought of that morning in the Row; of Pamela's words--"I still +give the same advice. Do not leave your wife." He recalled the promise +she had given, although it was seldom long absent from his thoughts. +It might be that she sent this message in fulfilment of that promise. +It might be that, for some unknown reason, he was now needed at his +wife's side. But he had no thought of distrust; he had great faith in +Millicent. She despised him, yes; but he did not distrust her. And, +again, it might be that Pamela was merely sending him this news +thinking he would wish to hear of it in time. After all, Pamela was +his friend. He looked out on the wild sea. Already the boats were +heading back through the foam, each to its trawler. + +"One must take one's risks," he said. "So much I have learnt here in +the North Sea. Look!" and he pointed to the boats. "Those boats are +taking theirs. Yes; whether it's lacing your topsail or taking in a +reef, one must take one's risks. I will not come." + +He went back to the middle of the ship. The punt of the _Perseverance_ +was already launched, the two fishermen waiting in it. As it rose on a +swell, Stretton climbed over the bulwarks and dropped into the stern. + +"Good-bye," he said. "I have signed on for eight weeks, and only four +have passed. I cannot run away and leave the ship short-handed. Thank +you for coming; but one must take one's risks." + +The boat was pushed off and headed towards the _Perseverance_. The +waves had increased, the crests toppled down the green slopes in foam. +Slowly the boat was rowed down to the trawler, the men now stopping +and backing water, now dashing on. Warrisden saw them reach the ship's +side and climb on board, and he saw the boat slung upwards and brought +in on to the deck. Then the screw of the _City of Bristol_ struck the +water again. Lurching through the heavy seas, she steamed southwards. +In a few minutes the Blue Fleet was lost to sight. + + + + + CHAPTER XII + + TONY'S INSPIRATION + + +Warrisden had failed. This was the account of his mission which he had +to give to Pamela Mardale; and he gave it without excuses. He landed +at Billingsgate Wharf at eleven o'clock on the second day after the +sails of the Blue Fleet had dropped out of sight behind the screen of +breaking waves. That afternoon he travelled down to the village of the +three poplars. It was night when he stepped out of the train on to the +platform of the little station. One can imagine what bitter and +humiliating thoughts occupied his mind. Away on the crest of the hill +the lights of the village shone brightly through the clear night air, +just as the lights of Margate had shone across the bay when the +steam-cutter had sprung like a thing alive to the lift of the sea +beneath her bows. Then all the breeze had whispered promises; now the +high hopes were fallen. "Do not fail!" Pamela had cried, with a +veritable passion, hating failure as an indignity, he could hear the +words in the very accent of her voice. Once she had suffered failure, +but it was not to be endured again. That was what she had meant; and +he had failed. He drove along that straight road which he had +traversed with Pamela at his side; he slept under the roof of the inn +where Pamela had claimed his help. The help had been fruitless, and +the next morning he rode down the hill and along the load with the +white wood rails--"the new road"--to tell her so. The sun was bright; +there was a sparkle of spring in the air; on the black leafless boughs +birds sang. He looked back to the three poplars pointing to the sky +from the tiny garden on the crest of the hill. Quetta--yes! But it +seemed there was to be no Seistan. + +He had started early, fearing that there might be a meet that day; and +he had acted wisely, for in the hall there were one or two men +lounging by the fire in scarlet, and Pamela was wearing her +riding-habit when she received him. He was shown into a little room +which opened on to the garden behind the house, and thither Pamela +came. + +"You are alone!" she said. + +"Yes; Stretton would not come." + +"None the less, I am very grateful." + +She smiled as she spoke, and sat down, with her eyes upon him, waiting +for his story. The disappointment was visible upon his face, but not +upon hers. Pamela's indeed, was to him at this moment rather +inscrutable. It was not indifferent, however. He recognised that, and +was, in a way, consoled. It had been his fear that at the first word +she would dismiss the subject, and turn her back on it for good. On +the contrary, she was interested, attentive. + +"You found him, then?" she asked. + +"Yes. You would like to hear what passed?" + +"Of course." + +"Even though I failed?" + +She looked at him with some surprise at his insistence. + +"Yes, yes," she said, a little impatiently. + +"We were nearly three days longer in reaching the Blue Fleet than we +anticipated," he began. "Stretton came on board the fish-cutter----" +And Pamela interrupted him-- + +"Why were you nearly three days longer? Tell me about your own journey +out to the fleet from the beginning." + +She was, in fact, as much interested in her messenger as in the errand +upon which she had sent him. Warrisden began to see that his journey +after all was not entirely a defeat. The alliance to which they had +set their hands up there in the village on the hill was bearing its +fruit. It had set them in a new relationship to each other, and in a +closer intimacy. + +He told the story of his voyage, making light of his hardships on the +steam-cutter. She, on the other hand, made much of them. + +"To quote your captain," she remarked, with a smile, "it was not a +Bobby's job." + +Warrisden laughed, and told her of Stretton's arrival in the punt of +the _Perseverance_. He described the way in which he had come on +board; he related the conversation which had passed between them at +the stern of the cutter. + +"He hadn't the look of a man who had failed," Warrisden continued. "He +stood there on the swinging deck with his legs firmly planted apart, +as easily as if he were standing on a stone pavement. I, on the other +hand, was clinging desperately to a stay. He stood there, with the +seas swinging up behind him, and stubbornly refused to come." + +"You told him of his father's illness?" asked Pamela. + +"He replied that his father had not sent for him." + +"You spoke of the candles lit every night?" + +"His answer was the same. His father had not sent for him. Besides, he +had his time to serve. He had signed on for eight weeks. There was +only one moment when I thought that there was a chance I might +persuade him; and, indeed, my persuasions had really nothing to do +with it at all. It was just the mention of your name." + +"My name?" asked Pamela, in surprise. + +"Yes. In answer to a question of his I told him that I had been sent +out by you, and for a moment he faltered." + +Pamela nodded her head in comprehension. + +"I understand; but he refused in the end?" + +"Yes. He said, 'One must take one's risks.'" + +Pamela repeated the sentence softly to herself; and Warrisden crossed +over to her side. His voice took a gentler note, and one still more +serious than that which he had used. + +"Do you know what I think?" he asked. "You sent me out with a message +to Stretton. I think that he has sent me back with a message for +you--'One must take one's risks.' He said that he had learned that in +the North Sea. He pointed to the little boats carrying the fish-boxes +to the steamer through the heavy, breaking seas. Each man in each of +the boats was taking his risks. 'Whether it's lacing your topsail or +taking in a reef,' he said, 'one must take one's risks.'" + +Pamela was silent for awhile after he had spoken. She sat with her +hands folded in her lap, and her face most serious. Then she looked up +at her companion with a very friendly smile; but she did not answer +him at all. And when she spoke, she spoke words which utterly +surprised him. All the time since the ketches had disappeared behind +the waves he had been plagued with the thought of the distress which +defeat would cause her; and here she was saying-- + +"I am very glad that you went out to the North Sea for me, even though +the journey proved fruitless. It makes us so much the better friends, +doesn't it? And that is a gain for me. Think of it that way, and you +will not mind the hardships and the waste of time." + +She held out her hand--rather a rare act with her--and Warrisden took +it. Then came the explanation why defeat meant so little just at this +time. + +"I need not have sent you at all," she continued, "could I have +foreseen. Sir John Stretton died yesterday afternoon, suddenly. I +received a telegram last night from Millie. So Tony will naturally +come home when his four weeks are up. I wrote last night to Millie, +telling her where Tony was." Then she added, "But I am glad that I did +not foresee." + +She rose from her chair, and they walked out through the hall to the +front of the house. A groom was holding Pamela's horse. The others who +were hunting that day had already ridden off. Warrisden helped her +into the saddle, and she rode away. + +Sir John had died, and Stretton would now naturally come home. That +explained to Warrisden how it was that Pamela made so little of the +defeat. But it was not the whole explanation. Pamela was waking from +her long sleep, like the princess in the fairy tale, and the mere act +of waking was a pleasure. In the stir of emotions, hitherto rigorously +suppressed, in the exercise of sympathies, she found a delight such as +one may find in the mere stretching of one's muscles after a deep +rest. The consciousness of life as a thing enjoyable began to tingle +in her. She was learning again lessons which she remembered once to +have learned before. The joy of being needed by those one needs--there +was one of them. She had learned a new one to-day--"One must take +one's risks." She repeated the sentence over to herself as she rode +between the hedgerows on this morning which had the sparkle of spring. +A few days ago she would have put that view of life away from her. +Now, old as it was, simple as it was, she pondered upon it as though +it were a view quite novel. She found it, moreover, pleasant. She had +travelled, indeed, further along the new road than she was aware. The +truth is that she had rather hugged to herself the great trouble which +had overshadowed her life. She had done so unwittingly. She had +allowed it to dominate her after it had lost its power to dominate, +and from force of habit. She began to be aware of it now that she had +stepped out from her isolation, and was gathering again the strings of +her life into her hands. + + + * * * * * + + +But Pamela was wrong in her supposition that since Sir John's death +the danger for Millicent was at an end. Tony Stretton would now return +home, she thought; and nothing was further from Tony's thoughts. At +the time when Pamela was riding through the lanes of Leicestershire on +that morning of early spring, Tony was lying in his bunk in the cabin +of the _Perseverance_ reading over, for the thousandth time, certain +letters which he kept beneath his pillow. This week he kept the long +night watch from midnight until eight of the morning; it was now +eleven, and he had the cabin to himself. The great gale had blown +itself out. The trawl, which for three days had remained safely stowed +under the lee bulwarks, was now dragging behind the boat; with her +topsails set the ketch was sailing full and by the wind; and down the +open companion the sunlight streamed into the cabin and played like +water upon the floor. The letters Tony Stretton was reading were those +which Millie had sent him. Disappointment was plain in every line; +they were sown with galling expressions of pity; here and there +contempt peeped out. Yet he was glad to have them; they were his +monitors, and he found a stimulus in their very cruelty. Though he +knew them by heart, he continually read them on mornings like this, +when the sun shone down the companion, and the voices of his fellow +sailors called cheerily overhead; at night, leaning upon his elbow, +and spelling them out by the dim light of the swinging lamp, while the +crew slept about him in their bunks. + +To his companions he was rather a mystery. To some of them he was just +down on his luck; to others he was a man "who had done something." + +"I suppose you have come out here to lie doggo," said the skipper to +him, shouting out the words in the height of the gale, when both were +standing by the lashed wheel one night. "I ask no questions. All I say +is, you do your work. I have had no call to slap a haddick across your +face. I say that fair and square. Water!" + +He concluded his speech with a yell. Stretton saw a ragged line of +white suddenly flash out in the darkness, high up by the weather bow, +and descend with a roar. It was a wave breaking down upon the deck. +Both men flung themselves down the companion, and the water sluiced +after them and washed them struggling about the floor of the cabin. +The wave saved Stretton from the need to reply, and the skipper did +not refer to the subject again. + +Stretton had signed on for this cruise on the _Perseverance_ because +he wanted a time during which he could be quite sure of his +livelihood. So far he had failed. He must map out a new course for +himself upon his life's chart. But for that work he needed time for +thought, and that time, up till now, he had not enjoyed. The +precarious existence which he had led since he had lost the half of +Millie's small fortune--now a clerk in a store, and a failure; now a +commercial traveller, and again a failure--had left him little +breathing space wherein to gather up his slow thoughts and originate a +new plan. That breathing space, however, the _Perseverance_ had +afforded him. During the long watches on fine nights, when the dark +sails, swinging up and down to the motion of the boat, revealed and +obscured the stars, he wrestled with the difficult problem of his +life. + +He could go back when his cruise was over if he chose. His father was +dying; he faced the fact quite frankly. The object with which he set +out would be, after all, accomplished, though not accomplished by +himself. There would be a house for Millie and himself independent of +the old man's caprice; their life would be freed from the shadow of +his tyranny; their seclusion would come to an end; they could let the +sunlight in upon their lives. Yes! But there were the letters down in +the cabin there, underneath his pillow. Did not they alter the +position? He had gone away to keep his wife, just, in a word, to +prevent that very contempt of which the letters gave him proof. Must +he not now stay away in order to regain her? His wife was at the +bottom of all his thoughts. He had no blame for her, however much her +written words might hurt. He looked back upon their life together, its +pleasant beginnings, when they were not merely lovers, but very good +friends into the bargain. For it is possible to be the one and yet not +the other. They were good days, the days in the little house in +Deanery Street, days full of fun and good temper and amusement. He +recalled their two seasons in London--London bright with summer--and +making of each long day a too short holiday. Then had come the change, +sudden, dark, and complete. In the place of freedom, subjection; in +the place of company, isolation; in the place of friends, a sour old +man, querulous and exacting. Then had come the great hope of another +home; and swiftly upon that hope its failure through his incapacity. +He could not blame her for the letters underneath his pillow. He was +no less set upon regaining her than he had been before on keeping her. +His love for her had been the chief motive of his life when he left +the house in Berkeley Square. It remained so still. Could he go back, +he asked himself? + +There was one inducement persuading him always to answer "Yes"--the +sentence which Pamela had spoken, and which she had refused to +explain. He should be at his wife's side. He had never understood that +saying; it remained fixed in his memory, plaguing him. He should be at +his wife's side. So Pamela Mardale had said, and for what Pamela said +he had the greatest respect. Well, he could be in a few weeks at his +wife's side. But would it not be at too great a cost unless he had +first redeemed himself from her contempt? + +Thus he turned and turned, and saw no issue anywhere. The days slipped +by, and one morning the fish-cutter brought to him a letter, which +told him that four days ago his father had died. He could not reach +home in time for the funeral, even if he started at once. And he could +not start at once; he had signed on for eight weeks. + +But the letter left him face to face with the old problem. Should he +go back or should he stay away? And if he stayed away, what should he +do? + +He came on deck one morning, and his skipper said-- + +"There's a fog on land, Stretton," + +"How do you know that?" asked Stretton. + +The captain pointed to some birds hovering over the masts of the +ketch. + +"Those are land birds," said he. "Look, there's a thrush and there's a +blackbird. You won't find them so far from land without a reason. +There has been a fog, and very likely a storm. They have lost their +bearings in the fog." + +The birds hovered about the ships of the fleet, calling +plaintively--here, at all events, were men recognisably belonging to +the land they vainly sought. Stretton, watching them, felt very much +like one of those birds. He, too, had lost his way in a fog, and +though he made no outcry, his need of guidance was no less great than +theirs. + +Then came a morning at last when the trawl was hauled in for the last +time, and the boat's head pointed towards Yarmouth. + +"When shall we reach harbour?" Stretton asked anxiously. + +"If this breeze holds, in twenty-four hours," replied the skipper. + +Twenty-four hours! Just a day and a night, and Stretton would step +from the deck on to Gorleston Quay; and he was no nearer to the +solution of his problem than when he had stepped from the quay on to +the deck eight weeks ago. Those eight weeks were to have resolved all +his perplexities, and lo! the eight weeks had passed. + +He was in a fever of restlessness. He paced the deck all the day when +he was not standing at the wheel; at night he could not sleep, but +stood leaning over the bulwarks, watching the stars trembling in the +quiet water. At one o'clock in the morning the _Perseverance_ passed a +lightship. Already the boat was so near home! And in the hour which +followed, his eight weeks of solitary communing, forced, as it were, +by immediate necessity, bore their fruit. His inspiration--he counted +the idea no less than an inspiration-came to him suddenly. He saw all +at once his course marked out for him upon the chart of life. He would +not suffer a doubt of it to enter his mind; he welcomed it with +passion, and the great load was lifted from his mind. The idea had +come. It was water in a dry land. + +A fisherman leaning over the bulwark by Stretton's side heard him +suddenly begin to sing over to himself a verse or two of a song-- + + + "Oh, come out, mah love! I'm a-waiting foh you heah! + Doan' you keep yuh window closed to-night." + + +It was a coon song which Stretton was humming over to himself. His +voice dropped to a murmur, He stopped and laughed softly to himself, +as though the song had very dear associations in his thoughts. Then +his voice rose again, and there was now a kind of triumph in the lilt +of the song, which had nothing to do with the words-- + + + "De stars all a-gwine put dey little ones to bed + Wid dey 'hush now, sing a lullaby,' + De man in de moon nod his sleepy, sleepy head, + And do sandman put a little in his eye." + + +The words went lilting out over the quiet sea. It seemed to Stretton +that they came from a lighted window just behind him, and were sung in +a woman's voice. He was standing on a lawn surrounded by high dark +trees in the warmth of a summer night. He was looking out past the +islets over eight miles of quiet water to the clustered lights of the +yachts in Oban Bay. The coon song was that which his wife had sung to +him on one evening he was never to forget; and this night he had +recovered its associations. It was no longer "a mere song sung by +somebody." It seemed to him, so quickly did his anticipations for once +outrun his judgment, that he had already recovered his wife. + +The _Perseverance_ was moored alongside of the quay at eight o'clock +in the morning, and just at that time Millie was reading a letter of +condolence from Lionel Callon. + + + + + CHAPTER XIII + + TONY STRETTON RETURNS TO STEPNEY + + +Mr. Chase left the mission quite early in the evening and walked +towards his lodging. That side of his nature which clamoured for +enjoyments and a life of luxury was urgent with him to-night. As he +turned into his street he began to debate with himself whether he +should go in search of a cab and drive westwards out of the squalor. A +church clock had just struck nine; he would find his club open and his +friends about the fire. Thus debating he came to his own door, and had +unconsciously taken his latch-key from his pocket before he had +decided upon his course. The latch-key decided him. He opened the door +and went quickly up to his sitting-room. The gas was low, and what +light there was came from the fire. Chase shut the door gently, and +his face underwent a change. There came a glitter into his eyes, a +smile to his lips. He crossed to the little cupboard in the corner and +unlocked it, stealthily, even though he was alone. As he put his hand +into it and grasped the decanter, something stirred in his armchair. +The back of the chair was towards him. He remained for a second or two +motionless, listening. But the sound was not repeated. Chase +noiselessly locked the cupboard again and came back to the fire. A man +was sitting asleep in the chair. + +Chase laid a hand upon his shoulder and shook him. + +"Stretton," he said; and Tony Stretton opened his eyes. + +"I fell asleep waiting for you," he said. + +"When did you get back?" asked Chase. + +"I landed at Yarmouth this morning. I came up to London this +afternoon." + +Chase turned up the gas and lit a cigarette. + +"You have not been home, then?" he said. "There is news waiting for +you there. Your father is dead!" + +"I know," Stretton replied. "He died a month ago." + +Mr. Chase was perplexed. He drew up a chair to the fire and sat down. + +"You know that?" he asked slowly; "and yet you have not gone home?" + +"No," replied Stretton. "And I do not mean to go." + +Stretton was speaking in the quietest and most natural way. There was +no trace in his manner of that anxiety which during the last few days +had kept him restless and uneasy. He had come to his decision. Chase +was aware of the stubborn persistence of his friend; and it was rather +to acquire knowledge than to persuade that he put his questions. + +"But why? You went away to make an independent home, free from the +restrictions under which you and your wife were living. Well, you have +got that home now. The reason for your absence has gone." + +Stretton shook his head. + +"The reason remains. Indeed it is stronger now than it was when I +first left England," he answered. He leaned forward with his elbows +upon his knees, gazing into the fire. The light played upon his face, +and Chase could not but notice the change which these few months had +brought to him. He had grown thin, and rather worn; he had lost the +comfortable look of prosperity; his face was tanned. But there was +more. It might have been expected that the rough surroundings amidst +which Stretton had lived would leave their marks. He might have become +rather coarse, rather gross to the eye. On the contrary, there was a +look of refinement. It was the long battle with his own thoughts which +had left the marks. The mind was showing through the flesh. The face +had become spiritualised. + +"Yes, the reason remains," said Stretton. "I left home to keep my +wife. We lived a life of quarrels. All the little memories, the +associations, the thousand and one small private things--ideas, +thoughts, words, jokes even, which two people who care very much for +one another have in common--we were losing, and so quickly; so very +quickly. I can't express half what I mean. But haven't you seen a man +and a woman at a dinner-table, when some chance sentence is spoken, +suddenly look at one another just for a second, smile perhaps, at all +events speak, though no word is spoken? Well, that kind of intimacy +was going. I saw indifference coming, perhaps dislike, perhaps +contempt; yes, contempt, just because I sat there and looked on. So I +went away. But the contempt has come. Oh, don't think I believe that I +made a mistake in going away. It would have come none the less had I +stayed. But I have to reckon with the fact that it has come." + +Mr. Chase sat following Stretton's words with a very close attention. +Never had Stretton spoken to him with so much frankness before. + +"Go on," said Chase. "What you are saying is--much of it--news to me." + +"Well, suppose that I were to go back now," Stretton resumed, "at +once--do you see?--that contempt is doubled." + +"No," cried Chase. + +"Yes, yes," Stretton insisted. "Look at it from Millie's point of +view, not from yours, not even from mine. Look at the history of the +incident from the beginning! Work it out as she would; nay," he +corrected himself, remembering the letters, "as she has. I leave her +when things are at their worst. That's not all. I take half Millie's +fortune, and am fool enough to lose it right away. And that's not all. +I stay away in the endeavour to recover the lost ground, and I +continually fail. Meanwhile Millie has the dreary, irksome, exacting, +unrequited life, which I left behind, to get through as best she can +alone; without pleasure, and she likes pleasure----" He suddenly +looked at Chase, with a challenge in his eyes. "Why shouldn't she?" he +asked abruptly. Chase agreed. + +"Why shouldn't she?" he said, with a smile. "I am not disapproving." + +Stretton resumed his former attitude, his former tone. + +"Without friends, and she is fond of having friends about her; without +any chance of gratifying her spirits or her youth! To make her life +still more disheartening, every mail which reaches her from New York +brings her only another instalment of my disastrous record. Work it +out from her point of view, Chase; then add this to crown it all." He +leaned forward towards Chase and emphasized his words with a gesture +of his hand. "The first moment when her life suddenly becomes easy, +and does so through no help of mine, I--the failure--come scurrying +back to share it. No, Chase, no!" + +He uttered his refusal to accept that position with a positive +violence, and flung himself back in his chair. Chase answered +quietly-- + +"Surely you are forgetting that it is your father's wealth which makes +her life easy." + +"I am not forgetting it at all." + +"It's your father's wealth," Chase repeated. "You have a right to +share in it." + +"Yes," Stretton admitted; "but what have rights to do with the +question at all? If my wife thinks me no good, will my rights save me +from her contempt?" + +And before that blunt question Mr. Chase was silent. It was too +direct, too unanswerable. Stretton rose from his chair, and stood +looking down at his companion. + +"Just consider the story I should have to tell Millie tonight--by +George!" he exclaimed suddenly--"if I went back to-night. I start out +with fifteen hundred pounds of hers to make a home and a competence; +and within a few months I am working as a hand on a North Sea trawler +at nineteen shillings a week." + +"A story of hardships undergone for her sake," said Chase; "for that's +the truth of your story, Stretton. And don't you think the hardships +would count for ever so much more than any success you could have +won?" + +"Hardships!" exclaimed Stretton, with a laugh. "I think I would find +it difficult to make a moving tale out of my hardships. And I wouldn't +if I could--no!" + +As a fact, although it was unknown to Tony, Chase was wrong. Had +Stretton told his story never so vividly, it would have made no +difference. Millie Stretton had not the imagination to realise what +those hardships had been. Tony's story would have been to her just a +story, calling, no doubt, for exclamations of tenderness and pity. But +she could not have understood what he had felt, what he had thought, +what he had endured. Deeper feelings and a wider sympathy than Millie +Stretton was dowered with would have been needed for comprehension. + +Stretton walked across the room and came back to the fire. He looked +down at Chase with a smile. "Very likely you think I am a great fool," +he said, in a gentler voice than he had used till now. "No doubt nine +men out of ten would say, 'Take the gifts the gods send you, and let +the rest slide. What if you and your wife drift apart? You won't be +the only couple.' But, frankly, Chase, that is not good enough. I have +seen a good deal of it--the boredom, the gradual ossification. Oh no; +I'm not content with that! You see, Chase," he stopped for a moment +and gazed steadily into the fire; then he went on quite simply, "you +see, I care for Millie very much." + +Chase knew well what weight to give to that short sentence. Had it +been more elaborate it would have meant less. It needed no other +commentary than the quiet sincerity with which it was uttered. + +"Yes, I understand," he said. + +Stretton seated himself again in his chair and took out a briar pipe +from his pocket. The pipe had an open metal covering over the bowl. + +"I need that no longer," Stretton said, with a laugh, as he removed +it. Then he took out a pouch, filled his pipe, and lighted it. + +"Have a whisky and soda?" said Chase. + +"No, thanks." + +Chase lighted a cigarette and looked at his friend with curiosity. The +change which he had noticed in Stretton's looks had been just as +noticeable in his words. This man sitting opposite to him was no +longer the Tony Stretton who had once come to him for advice. That man +had been slow of thought, halting of speech, good-humoured, friendly; +but a man with whom it was difficult to get at close quarters. Talk +with him a hundred times, and you seemed to know him no better than +you did at the moment when first you were introduced to him. Here, +however, was a man who had thought out his problem--was, moreover, +able lucidly to express it. + +"Well," said Chase, "you are determined not to go back?" + +"Not yet," Stretton corrected. + +"What do you propose to do?" + +The question showed how great the change had been, begun by the hard +times in New York, completed by the eight weeks in the North Sea. For +Chase put the question. He no longer offered advice, understanding +that Stretton had not come to ask for it. + +"I propose to enlist in the French Foreign Legion." + +Stretton spoke with the most matter-of-fact air imaginable; he might +have been naming the house at which he was to dine the next night. +Nevertheless, Chase started out of his chair; he stared at his +companion in a stupefaction. + +"No," said Stretton, calmly; "I am not off my head, and I have not +been drinking. Sit down again, and think it over." + +Chase obeyed, and Stretton proceeded to expound that inspiration which +had come to him the night before. + +"What else should I do? You know my object now. I have to re-establish +myself in my wife's thoughts. How else can I do it? What professions +are open to me in which I could gain, I don't say distinction, but +mere recognition? I am not a money-maker; that, at all events, is +evident. I have had experience enough during the last months to know +that if I lived to a thousand I should never make money." + +"I think that's true," Chase agreed, thoughtfully. + +"Luckily there's no longer any need that I should try. What then? Run +through the professions, Chase, and find one, if you can, in which a +man at my age--twenty-nine--with my ignorance, my want of intellect, +has a single chance of success. The bar? It's laughable. The sea? I am +too old. The army? I resigned my commission years ago. So what then?" + +He waited for Chase to speak, and Chase was silent. He waited with a +smile, knowing that Chase could not speak. + +"There must be an alternative," Chase said, doubtfully, at last. + +"Name it, then." + +That was just what Chase could not do. He turned in his mind from this +calling to that. There was not one which did not need a particular +education; there was not one in which Stretton was likely to succeed. +Soldiering or the sea. These were the two callings for which he was +fitted. From the sea his age debarred him; from soldiering too, except +in this one way. No, certainly, Stretton was not off his head. + +"How in the world did you think of the Foreign Legion?" he asked. + +Stretton shrugged his shoulders. + +"I thought of most other courses first, and, one by one, rejected them +as impossible. This plan came to me last of all, and only last night. +We were passing a light-ship. In a way, you see, we were within sight +of home. I was in despair; and suddenly the idea flashed upon me, like +the revolving blaze from the light-ship. It is a sound one, I think. +At all events, it is the only one." + +"Yes," answered Chase, slowly; "I suppose there will be chances, for +there's always something stirring on the Algerian frontier." + +"There, or in Siam," said Stretton. + +"What arrangements are you making here?" + +"I have written to my lawyers. Millie can do as she pleases with the +income. She has power, too, to sell the house in Berkeley Square. I +made my will, you know, before I left England." + +Chase nodded, and for a while there fell a silence upon the two +friends. A look of envy crept into the face of the clergyman as he +looked at Stretton. He could appreciate a motive which set a man +aiming high. He admired the persistence with which Stretton nursed it. +The plan it had prompted might be quixotic and quite fruitless, but, +at all events, it was definite; and a definite scheme of life, based +upon a simple and definite motive, was not so common but that it was +enviable. Stretton was so sure of its wisdom, too. He had no doubts. +He sat in his chair not asking for approval, not caring for censure; +he had made up his mind. The image of Stretton, indeed, as he sat in +that chair on that evening, with the firelight playing upon his face, +was often to come to Chase's thoughts. + +"There will be great risks," he said. "Risks of death, of trouble in +the battalion." + +"I have counted them," Stretton replied; and he leaned forward again, +with his hands upon his knees. "Oh yes; there will be great risks! But +there's a prize, too, proportionate to the risks. Risks! Every one +speaks of them," he went on, with a laugh of impatience. "But I have +been eight weeks on the Dogger Bank, Chase, and I know--yes, I +know--how to estimate risks. Out there men risk their lives daily to +put a few boxes of fish on board a fish-cutter. Take the risk +half-heartedly and your boat's swamped for a sure thing; but take it +with all your heart and there are the fish-boxes to your credit. Well, +Millie is my fish-boxes." + +He ended with a laugh, and, rising, took his hat. + +"Shall I put you up for the night?" Chase asked. + +"No, thanks," said Stretton. "I have got a bed at an hotel. I have +something else to do to-night;" and a smile, rather wistful and +tender, played about his lips. "Goodbye!" He held out his hand, and as +Chase took it he went on, "I am looking forward to the day when I come +back. My word, how I am looking forward to it; and I will look forward +each day until it actually, at the long last, comes. It will have been +worth waiting for, Chase, well worth waiting for, both to Millie and +to me." + +With that he went away. Chase heard him close the street door behind +him, and his footsteps sound for a moment or two on the pavement. +After all, he thought, a life under those Algerian skies, a life in +the open air, of activity--there were many worse things, even though +it should prove a second failure. + +Chase stood for a little before the fire. He crossed slowly over to +that cupboard in the corner at which Stretton's movement in the chair +had stayed his hand. Chase looked back to the armchair, as though he +half expected still to see Stretton sitting there. Then he slowly +walked back to the fire, and left the cupboard locked. Stretton had +gone, but he had left behind him memories which were not to be +effaced--the memory of a great motive and of a sturdy determination to +fulfil it. The two men were never to meet again; but, in the after +time, more than once, of an evening, Chase's hand was stayed upon that +cupboard door. More than once he looked back towards the chair as if +he expected that again his friend was waiting for him by the fire. + + + + + CHAPTER XIV + + TONY STRETTON PAYS A VISIT TO BERKELEY SQUARE + + +While Tony Stretton was thus stating the problem of his life to Mr. +Chase in Stepney Green, Lady Millingham was entertaining her friends +in Berkeley Square. She began the evening with a dinner-party, at +which Pamela Mardale and John Mudge were present, and she held a +reception afterwards. Many people came, for Frances Millingham was +popular. By half-past ten the rooms were already over-hot and +overcrowded, and Lady Millingham was enjoying herself to her heart's +content. Mr. Mudge, who stood by himself at the end of a big +drawing-room, close to one of the windows, saw the tall figure of +Warrisden come in at the door and steadily push towards Pamela. A few +moments later M. de Marnay, a youthful _attache_ of the French +Embassy, approached Mr. Mudge. M. de Marnay wiped his forehead and +looked round the crowded room. + +"A little is a good thing," said he, "but too much is enough." And he +unlatched and pushed open the window. As he spoke, Mr. Mudge saw +Callon appear in the doorway. + +"Yes," he answered, with a laugh; "too much is enough." + +Mudge watched Callon's movements with his usual interest. He saw him +pass, a supple creature of smiles and small talk, from woman to woman. +How long would he last in his ignoble career? Mudge wondered. Would he +marry in the end some rich and elderly widow? Or would the crash come, +and parties know Mr. Lionel Callon no more? Mudge never saw the man +but he had a wish that he might get a glimpse of him alone in his own +rooms, with the smile dropped from his face, and the unpaid bills +piled upon his mantel-shelf, and his landlord very likely clamouring +for the rent. He imagined the face grown all at once haggard and tired +and afraid--afraid with a great fear of what must happen in a few +years at the latest, when, with middle-age heavy upon his shoulders, +he should see his coevals prospering and himself bankrupt of his +stock-in-trade of good looks, and without one penny to rub against +another. No presage of mind weighed upon Callon to-night, however, +during his short stay in Frances Millingham's house. For his stay was +short. + +As the clock upon the mantelpiece struck eleven, his eyes were at once +lifted to the clock-face, and almost at once he moved from the lady to +whom he was talking and made his way to the door. + +Mr. Mudge turned back to the window and pushed it still more open. It +was a clear night of April, and April had brought with it the warmth +of summer. Mr. Mudge stood at the open window facing the coolness and +the quiet of the square; and thus by the accident of an overcrowded +room he became the witness of a little episode which might almost have +figured in some bygone comedy of intrigue. + +Callon passed through the line of carriages in the roadway beneath, +and crossed the corner of the square to the pavement on the right-hand +side. When he reached the pavement he walked for twenty yards or so in +the direction of Piccadilly, until he came to a large and gloomy +house. There a few shallow steps led from the pavement to the front +door. Callon mounted the steps, rang the bell, and was admitted. + +There were a few lights in the upper windows and on the ground floor; +but it was evident that there was no party at the house. Callon had +run in to pay a visit. Mr. Mudge, who had watched this, as it were, +the first scene in the comedy, distinctly heard the door close, and +the sound somehow suggested to him that the time had come for him to +go home to bed. He looked at his watch. It was exactly a quarter past +eleven--exactly, in a word, three-quarters of an hour since Tony +Stretton, who "had something else to do," had taken his leave of his +friend Chase in Stepney. + +Mr. Mudge turned from the window to make his way to the door, and came +face to face with Pamela and Alan Warrisden. Pamela spoke to him. He +had never yet met Warrisden, and he was now introduced. All three +stood and talked together for a few minutes by the open window. Then +Mudge, in that spirit of curiosity which Callon always provoked in +him, asked abruptly-- + +"By the way, Miss Mardale, do you happen to know who lives in that +house?" and he pointed across the corner of the square to the house +into which Callon had disappeared. + +Pamela and Warrisden looked quickly at one another. Then Pamela turned +with great interest to Mr. Mudge. + +"Yes, we both know," she answered. "Why do you ask?" + +"Well, I don't know," said Mudge; "I think that I should like to +know." + +The glance which his two companions had exchanged, and Pamela's rather +eager question, had quickened his curiosity. But he got no answer for +a few moments. Both Pamela and Warrisden were looking out towards the +house. They were standing side by side. Mr. Mudge had an intuition +that the same thought was passing through both their minds. + +"That is where the truants lived last July," said Warrisden, in a low +voice. He spoke to Pamela, not to Mr. Mudge at all, whose existence +seemed for the moment to have been clean forgotten. + +"Yes," Pamela replied softly. "The dark house, where the truants lived +and where"--she looked at Warrisden and smiled with a great +friendliness--"where the new road began. For it was there really. It's +from the steps of the dark house, not from the three poplars that the +new road runs out." + +"Yes, that is true," said Warrisden. + +And again both were silent. + +Mr. Mudge broke in upon the silence. "I have no doubt that the truants +lived there, and that the new road begins at the foot of the steps," +he said plaintively; "but neither statement adds materially to my +knowledge." + +Pamela and Warrisden turned to him and laughed. It was true that they +had for a moment forgotten Mr. Mudge. The memory of the star-lit +night, in last July, when from this balcony they had watched the +truants slip down the steps and furtively call a cab, was busy in +their thoughts. From that night their alliance had dated, although no +suspicion of it had crossed their minds. It seemed strange to them now +that there had been no premonition. + +"Well, who lives there?" asked Mudge. + +But even now he received no answer; for Warrisden suddenly exclaimed +in a low, startled voice-- + +"Look!" and with an instinctive movement he drew back into the room. + +A man was standing in the road looking up at the windows of the dark +house. His face could not be seen under the shadow of his hat. Pamela +peered forward. + +"Do you think it's he?" she asked in a whisper. + +"I am not sure," replied Warrisden. + +"Oh, I hope so! I hope so!" + +"I am not sure. Wait! Wait and look!" said Warrisden. + +In a few moments the man moved. He crossed the road and stepped on to +the pavement. Again he stopped, again he looked up to the house; then +he walked slowly on. But he walked northwards, that is, towards the +watchers at the window. + +"There's a lamp-post," said Warrisden; "he will come within the light +of it. We shall know." + +And the next moment the light fell white and clear upon Tony +Stretton's face. + +"He has come back," exclaimed Pamela, joyfully. + +"Who?" asked Mr. Mudge; "who has come back?" + +This time he was answered. + +"Why, Tony Stretton, of course," said Pamela, impatiently. She was +hardly aware of Mr. Mudge, even while she answered him; she was too +intent upon Tony Stretton in the square below. She did not therefore +notice that Mudge was startled by her reply. She did not remark the +anxiety in his voice as he went on-- + +"And that is Stretton's house?" + +"Yes." + +"And his wife, Lady Stretton, is she in London? Is she there--now?" + +Mr. Mudge spoke with an excitement of manner which at any other time +must have caused surprise. It passed now unremarked; for Warrisden, +too, had his preoccupation. He was neither overjoyed, like Pamela, nor +troubled, like Mr. Mudge; but as he looked down into the square he was +perplexed. + +"Yes," replied Pamela, "Millie Stretton is at home. Could anything be +more fortunate?" + +To Mudge's way of thinking, nothing could be more unfortunate. Pamela +had come late to the play; Mr. Mudge, on the other hand, had seen the +curtain rise, and had a clearer knowledge of the plot's development. +The husband outside the house, quite unexpected, quite unsuspicious, +and about to enter; the wife and the interloper within: here were the +formulas of a comedy of intrigue. Only, Mr. Mudge doubtfully wondered, +after the husband had entered, and when the great scene took place, +would the decorous accent of the comedy be maintained? Nature was +after all a violent dramatist, with little care for the rules and +methods. Of one thing, at all events, he was quite sure, as he looked +at Pamela: she would find no amusement in the climax. There was, +however, to be an element of novelty, which Mr. Mudge had not +foreseen. + +"What puzzles me," said Warrisden, "is that Stretton does not go in." + +Stretton walked up to the corner of the square, turned, and retraced +his steps. Again he approached the steps of the house. "Now," thought +Mr. Mudge, with a good deal of suspense, "now he will ascend them." +Pamela had the same conviction, but in her case hope inspired it. +Tony, however, merely cast a glance upwards and walked on. They heard +his footsteps for a little while upon the pavement; then that sound +ceased. + +"He has gone," cried Pamela, blankly; "he has gone away again." + +Mr. Mudge turned to her very seriously. + +"Believe me," said he, "nothing better could have happened." + +Tony, in fact, had never had a thought of entering the house. Having +this one night in London, he had yielded to a natural impulse to +revisit again the spot where he and Millie had lived--where she still +lived. The bad days of the quarrels and the indifference and the +weariness were forgotten by him to-night. His thoughts went back to +the early days when they played truant, and truancy was good fun. The +escapes from the house, the little suppers at the Savoy, the stealthy +home-comings, the stumbling up the stairs in the dark, laughing and +hushing their laughter--upon these incidents his mind dwelt, +wistfully, yet with a great pleasure and a great hopefulness. Those +days were gone, but in others to come all that was good in them might +be repeated. The good humour, the intimacy, the sufficiency of the +two, each to the other, might be recovered if only he persisted. To +return now, to go in at the door and say, "I have come home," that +would be the mistake which there would be no retrieving. He was at the +cross-ways, and if he took the wrong road life would not give him the +time to retrace his steps. He walked away, dreaming of the good days +to come. + +Meanwhile, Lionel Callon was talking to Millie in that little +sitting-room which had once been hers and Tony's. + +Millie was surprised at the lateness of his visit, and when he was +shown into the room she rose at once. + +"Something has happened?" she said. + +"No," Callon replied. "I was at Lady Millingham's party. I suddenly +thought of you sitting here alone. I am tired besides, and overworked. +I knew it would be a rest for me if I could see you and talk to you +for a few minutes. You see, I am selfish." + +Millie smiled at him. + +"No, kind," said she. + +She asked him to sit down. + +"You look tired," she added. "How does your election work go on?" + +Callon related the progress of his campaign, and with an air of making +particular confidences. He could speak without any reserve to her, he +said. He conveyed the impression that he was making headway against +almost insuperable obstacles. He flattered her, moreover, by a +suggestion that she herself was a great factor in his successes. The +mere knowledge that she wished him well, that perhaps, once or twice +in the day, she gave him a spare thought, helped him much more than +she could imagine. Millie was induced to believe that, although she +sat quietly in London, she was thus exercising power through Callon in +his constituency. + +"Of course, I am a poor man," said Callon. "Poverty hampers one." + +"Oh, but you will win," cried Millie Stretton, with a delighted +conviction; "yes, you will win." + +She felt strong, confident--just, in a word, as she had felt when she +had agreed with Tony that he must go away. + +"With your help, yes," he answered; and the sound of his voice +violated her like a caress. Millie rose from her chair. + +At once Callon rose too, and altered his tone. + +"You have heard from Sir Anthony Stretton?" he said. "Tell me of +yourself." + +"Yes, I have heard. He will not return yet." + +There came a light into Callon's eyes. He raised his hand to his mouth +to hide a smile. + +"Few men," he said, with the utmost sympathy, "would have left you to +bear these last weeks alone." + +He was standing just behind her, speaking over her shoulder. He was +very still, the house was very silent. Millie was suddenly aware of +danger. + +"You must not say that, Mr. Callon," she said rather sharply. + +And immediately he answered, "I beg your pardon. I had no idea my +sympathy would have seemed to you an insult." + +He spoke with a sudden bitterness. Millicent turned round in surprise. +She saw that his face was stern and cold. + +"An insult?" she said, and her voice was troubled. "No, you and I are +friends." + +But Callon would have none of these excuses. He had come to the house +deliberately to quarrel. He had a great faith in the efficacy of +quarrels, given the right type of woman. As Mudge had told Pamela, he +knew the tactics of the particular kind of warfare which he waged. To +cause a woman some pain, to make her think with regret that in him she +had lost a friend; that would fix him in her thoughts. So Callon +quarrelled. Millie Stretton could not say a word but he misinterpreted +it. Every sentence he cleverly twisted into an offence. + +"I will say good-bye," he said, at length, as though he had reached +the limits of endurance. + +Millie Stretton looked at him with troubled eyes. + +"I am so sorry it should end like this," she said piteously. "I don't +know why it has." + +Callon went out of the room, and closed the door behind him. Then he +let himself into the street. Millie Stretton would miss him, he felt +sure. Her looks, her last words assured him of that. He would wait now +without a movement towards a reconciliation. That must come from her, +it would give him in her eyes a reputation for strength. He knew the +value of that reputation. He had no doubt, besides, that she would +suggest a reconciliation. Other women might not, but Millie--yes. On +the whole, Mr. Callon was very well content with his night's work. He +had taken, in his way of thinking, a long step. The square was empty, +except for the carriages outside Lady Millingham's door. Lionel Callon +walked briskly home. + + + + + CHAPTER XV + + MR. MUDGE COMES TO THE RESCUE + + +Lionel Callon's visit to Millie Stretton bore, however, consequences +which had not at all entered into his calculations. He was unaware of +the watchers at Lady Millingham's window; he had no knowledge of +Pamela's promise to Tony Stretton; no suspicion, therefore, that she +was now passionately resolved to keep it in the spirit and the letter. +He was even without a thought that his advances towards Millie had at +all been remarked upon or their motive discovered. Ignorance lulled +him into security. But within a short while a counter-plot was set in +train. + +The occasion was the first summer meeting on Newmarket Heath. Pamela +Mardale seldom missed a race meeting at Newmarket dining the spring +and summer. There were the horses, in the first place; she met her +friends besides; the heath itself, with its broad expanse and its +downs, had for her eyes a beauty of its own; and in addition the +private enclosure was separated by the width of the course from the +crowd and clamour of the ring. She attended this particular meeting, +and after the second race was over she happened to be standing amidst +a group of friends within the grove of trees at the back of the +paddock. Outside, upon the heath, the air was clear and bright; a +light wind blew pleasantly. Here the trees were in bud, and the +sunlight, split by the boughs, dappled with light and shadow the +glossy coats of the horses as they were led in and out amongst the +boles. A mare was led past Pamela, and one of her friends said-- + +"Semiramis. I think she will win this race." + +Pamela looked towards the mare, and saw, just beyond her, Mr. Mudge. +He was alone, as he usually was; and though he stopped in his walk, +now here, now there, to exchange a word with some acquaintance, he +moved on again, invariably alone. Gradually he drew nearer to the +group in which Pamela was standing, and his face brightened. He +quickened his step; Pamela, on her side, advanced rather quickly +towards him. + +"You are here?" she said, with a smile. "I am glad, though I did not +think to meet you." + +Mr. Mudge, to tell the truth, though he carried a race-card in his +hand, and glasses slung across his shoulder, had the disconsolate air +of a man conscious that he was out of place. He answered Pamela, +indeed, almost apologetically. + +"It is better after all to be here than in London on a day of summer," +he said, and he added, with a shrewd glance at her, "You have +something to say to me--a question to ask." + +Pamela looked up at him in surprise. + +"Yes, I have. Let us go out." + +They walked into the paddock, and thence through the gate into the +enclosure. The enclosure was at this moment rather empty. Pamela led +the way to the rails alongside the course, and chose a place where +they were out of the hearing of any bystander. + +"You remember the evening at Frances Millingham's?" she asked. She had +not seen Mr. Mudge since that date. + +Mr. Mudge replied immediately. + +"Yes; Sir Anthony Stretton"--and the name struck so oddly upon +Pamela's ears that, serious as at this moment she was, she laughed. +"Sir Anthony Stretton turned away from the steps of his house. You +were distressed, Miss Mardale: I, on the contrary, said that nothing +better could have happened. You wish to ask me why I said that?" + +"Yes," said Pamela; "I am very anxious to know. Millie is my friend. I +am, in a sort of way, too, responsible for her;" and as Mr. Mudge +looked surprised, she repeated the word--"Yes, responsible. And I am +rather troubled." She spoke with a little hesitation. There was a +frown upon her forehead, a look of perplexity in her dark eyes. She +was reluctant to admit that her friend was in any danger or needed any +protection from her own weakness. The freemasonry of her sex impelled +her to silence. On the other hand, she was at her wits' end what to +do. And she had confidence in her companion's discretion; she +determined to speak frankly. + +"It is not only your remark which troubles me," she said, "but I +called on Millie the next afternoon." + +"Oh, you did?" exclaimed Mr. Mudge. + +"Yes; I asked after Tony. Millie had not seen him, and did not expect +him. She showed me letters from his solicitors empowering her to do +what she liked with the house and income, and a short letter from Tony +himself, written on the _Perseverance_, to the same effect." + +She did not explain to Mr. Mudge what the _Perseverance_ was, and he +asked no questions. + +"I told Millie," she continued, "that Tony had returned, but she +refused to believe it. I told her when and where I had seen him." + +"You did that?" said Mr. Mudge. "Wait a moment." He saw and understood +Pamela's reluctance to speak. He determined to help her out. "Let me +describe to you what followed. She stared blankly at you and asked you +to repeat what you had said?" + +"Yes," replied Pamela, in surprise; "that is just what she did." + +"And when you had repeated it, she turned a little pale, perhaps was +disconcerted, perhaps a little--afraid." + +"Yes, it is that which troubles me," Pamela cried, in a low voice. +"She was afraid. I would have given much to have doubted it. I could +not; her eyes betrayed it, her face, her whole attitude. She was +afraid." + +Mr. Mudge nodded his head, and went quietly on-- + +"And when she had recovered a little from her fear she questioned you +closely as to the time when you first saw Stretton outside the house, +and the time when he went away." + +He spoke with so much certitude that he might have been present at the +interview. + +"I told her that it was some little time after eleven when he came, +and that he only stayed a few minutes," answered Pamela. + +"And at that," rejoined Mr. Mudge, "Lady Stretton's anxiety +diminished." + +"Yes, that is true, too," Pamela admitted; and she turned her face to +him with its troubled appeal. "Why was she afraid? For, since you have +guessed that she was, you must know the reason which she had for fear. +Why was it so fortunate that Tony Stretton did not mount the steps of +the house and ring the bell?" + +Mr. Mudge answered her immediately, and very quietly. + +"Because Lionel Callon was inside the house." + +A great sympathy made his voice gentle--sympathy for Pamela. None the +less the words hurt her cruelly. She turned away from him so that he +might not see her face, and stood gazing down the course through a +mist. Bitter disappointment was hers at that moment. She was by nature +a partisan. The thing which she did crept closer to her heart by the +mere act of doing it. She knew it, and it was just her knowledge which +had so long kept her to inaction. Now her thoughts were passionately +set on saving Millie, and here came news to her which brought her to +the brink of despair. She blamed Tony. "Why did he ever go away?" she +cried. "Why, when he had come back, did he not stay?" And at once she +saw the futility of her outcry. Tony, Millie, Lionel Callon--what was +the use of blaming them? They acted as their characters impelled them. +She had to do her best to remedy the evil which the clash of these +three characters had produced. "What can be done?" she asked of +herself. There was one course open certainly. She could summon +Warrisden again, send him out a second time in search of Tony +Stretton, and make him the bearer, not of an excuse, but of the whole +truth. Only she dreaded the outcome; she shrank from telling Tony the +truth, fearing that he would exaggerate it. "Can nothing be done?" she +asked, again in despair, and this time she asked the question aloud, +and turned to Mr. Mudge. + +Mudge had been quietly waiting for it. + +"Yes," he answered, "something can be done. I should not have told +you, Miss Mardale, what I knew unless I had already hit upon a means +to avert the peril; for I am aware how much my news must grieve you." + +Pamela looked at Mr. Mudge in surprise. It had not occurred to her at +all that he could have solved the problem. + +"What can I do?" she asked. + +"You can leave the whole trouble in my hands for a few days." + +Pamela was silent for a little while; then she answered doubtfully-- + +"It is most kind of you to offer me your help." + +Mr. Mudge shook his head at Pamela with a certain sadness. + +"There's no kindness in it at all," he said; "but I quite understand +your hesitation, Miss Mardale. You were surprised that I should offer +you help, just as you were surprised to see me here. Although I move +in your world I am not of it. Its traditions, its instincts, even its +methods of thought--to all of these I am a stranger. I am just a +passing visitor who, for the time of his stay, is made an honorary +member of your club. He meets with every civility, every kindness; but +he is not inside, so that when he suddenly comes forward and offers +you help in a matter where other members of your club are concerned, +you naturally pause." + +Pamela made a gesture of dissent; but Mr. Mudge gently insisted-- + +"Let me finish. I want you to understand equally well why I offer you +help which may very likely seem to you an impertinence." + +"No, indeed," said Pamela; "on the contrary, I am very grateful." + +Others were approaching the spot where they stood. They turned and +walked slowly over the grass away from the paddock. + +"There is no need that you should be," Mudge continued; "you will +see that, if you listen." And in a few words he told her at last +something of his own career. "I sprang from a Deptford gutter, with +one thought--to get on, and get on, and get on. I moved from Deptford +to Peckham. There I married. I moved from Peckham to a residential +suburb in the south-west. There my wife died. Looking back now, I am +afraid that in my haste to get on I rather neglected my wife's +happiness. You see I am frank with you. From the residential suburb I +moved into the Cromwell Road, from the Cromwell Road to Grosvenor +Square. I do not think that I was just a snob; but I wanted to have +the very best of what was going. There is a difference. A few years +ago I found myself at the point which I had aimed to reach, and, as I +have told you, it is a position of many acquaintances and much +loneliness. You might say that I could give it up and retire into the +country. But I have too many undertakings on my hands; besides, I am +too tired to start again, so I remain. But I think you will understand +that it will be a real pleasure to me to help you. I have not so many +friends that I can afford to lose the opportunity of doing one of them +a service." + +Pamela heard him to the end without any interruption; but when he had +finished she said, with a smile-- + +"You are quite wrong about the reason for my hesitation. I asked a +friend of mine a few weeks ago to help me, and he gave me the best of +help at once. Even the best of help fails at times, and my friend did. +I was wondering merely whether it would not be a little disloyal to +him if I now accepted yours, for I know he would be grieved if I went +to any one but him." + +"I see," said Mr. Mudge; "but I think that I can give you help which +no one else can." + +It was clear from his quiet persistence that he had a definite plan. +Pamela stopped and faced him. + +"Very well," she said. "I leave the whole matter for a little while in +your hands." + +"Thank you," said Mr. Mudge; and he looked up towards the course. +"There are the horses going down." + +A sudden thought occurred to Pamela. She opened the purse she carried +on her wrist, and took out a couple of pounds. + +"Put this on Semiramis for me, please," she said, with a laugh. "Be +quick, if you will, and come back." + +Though she laughed she was still most urgent he should go. Mr. Mudge +hurried across the course, made the bet, and returned. Pamela watched +the race with an eagerness which astonished Mr. Mudge, so completely +did she seem to have forgotten all that had troubled her a minute ago. +But he did not understand Pamela. She was, after her custom, seeking +for a sign, and when Semiramis galloped in a winner by a neck, she +turned with a hopeful smile to her companion-- + +"We shall win too." + +"I think so," Mudge replied, and he laughed. "Do you know what I think +of Lionel Callon, Miss Mardale? The words are not mine, but the +sentiment is unexceptionable. A little may be a good thing, but too +much is enough." + + + + + CHAPTER XVI + + THE FOREIGN LEGION + + +It was midday at Sidi Bel-Abbes in Algeria. Two French officers were +sitting in front of a cafe at the wide cross-roads in the centre of +the town. One of them was Captain Tavernay, a man of forty-seven, +tall, thin, with a brown face worn and tired by the campaigns of +thirty years, the other a young lieutenant, M. Laurent, fresh and +pink, who seemed to hare been passed out but yesterday from the school +of St. Cyr. Captain Tavernay picked up his cap from the iron table in +front of him and settled it upon his grizzled head. Outside the town +trees clustered thickly, farms were half-hidden amongst groves of +fig-trees and hedges of aloes. Here there was no foliage. The streets +were very quiet, the sunlight lay in dazzling pools of gold upon the +sand of the roads, the white houses glittered under a blue, cloudless +sky. In front of the two officers, some miles away, the bare cone of +Jebel Tessalah sprang upwards from a range of hills dominating the +town, and a speck of white upon its shoulder showed where a village +perched. Captain Tavernay sat looking out towards the mountain with +the lids half-closed upon his eyes. Then he rose deliberately from his +chair. + +"If we walk to the station," he said, "we shall just meet the train +from Oran. A batch of thirty recruits is coming in by it. Let us walk +to the station, Laurent." + +Lieutenant Laurent dropped the end of his cigarette on to the ground +and stood up reluctantly. + +"As you will, Captain," he answered. "But we should see the animals +soon enough at the barracks." + +The words were spoken in a voice which was almost, and with a shrug of +the shoulders which was quite, contemptuous. The day was hot, and +Lieutenant Laurent unwilling to move from his coffee and the shade +into that burning sunlight. Captain Tavernay gazed mildly at his +youthful junior. Long experience had taught him to leave much to time +and little to argument. For himself he loved his legionaries. He had a +smile of indulgence for their faults even while he punished them; and +though his face seldom showed the smile, and his punishments were not +unjustly light, the culprits none the less knew it was there, hidden +somewhere close to his heart. But then he had seen his men in action, +and Lieutenant Laurent had not. That made all the difference. The +Foreign Legion certainly did not show at its best in a cantonment. +Amongst that motley assemblage--twelve thousand men, distinct in +nationality as in character, flung together pell-mell, negroes and +whites, criminals, adventurers, silent unknown men, haunted by +memories of other days or tortured by remorse--a garrison town with +its monotony and its absinthe played havoc. An Abyssinian rubbed +shoulders in the ranks with a scholar who spoke nine languages; a +tenor from the Theatre de la Monnaie at Brussels with an unfrocked +priest. Often enough Captain Tavernay had seen one of his legionaries +sitting alone hour after hour at his little table outside a cafe, +steadily drinking glass after glass of absinthe, rising mechanically +to salute his officer, and sinking back among his impenetrable +secrets. Was he dreaming of the other days, the laughter and the +flowers, the white shoulders of women? Was he again placing that last +stake upon the red which had sent him straight from the table to the +nearest French depot? Was he living again some tragic crisis of love +in which all at once he had learned that he had been befooled and +derided? Captain Tavernay never passed such a man but he longed to sit +down by his side and say, "My friend, share your secret with me; so +will it be easier to bear." But the etiquette of the Foreign Legion +forbade. Captain Tavernay merely returned the salute and passed on, +knowing that very likely his legionary would pass the night in the +guard-room and the next week in the cells. No; the town of Sidi +Bel-Abbes was not the place wherein to learn the mettle of the +legionary. Away to the south there, beyond the forest of trees on the +horizon's line, things were different. Let Lieutenant Laurent see the +men in their bivouacs at night under the stars, and witness their +prowess under arms, _ces animaux_ would soon become _mes enfants_. + +Therefore he answered Lieutenant Laurent in the mildest voice. + +"We shall see them at the barracks, it is true. But you are wrong when +you say that it will be soon enough. At the barracks they will be +prepared for us, they will have their little stories ready for us, +they will be armed with discretion. But let us see them descend from +the train, let us watch their first look round at their new home, +their new fatherland. We may learn a little, and if it is ever so +little it will help us to know them the better afterwards. And at the +worst it will be an amusing exercise in psychology." + +They walked away from the cafe, and strolled down the Rue de Mascara +under the shady avenue of trees, Tavernay moving with a long, indolent +stride, which covered a deal of ground with a surprising rapidity, +Laurent fidgeting along discontentedly at his side. M. Laurent was +beginning, in fact, to regret the hurry with which he had sought a +commission in the Foreign Legion. M. Laurent had, a few months ago, in +Paris, imagined himself to be irrevocably in love with the wife of one +of his friends, a lady at once beautiful and mature; M. Laurent had +declared his passion upon a suitable occasion; M. Laurent had been +snubbed for his pains; M. Laurent in a fit of pique had sought the +consolation of another climate and foreign service; and M. Laurent was +now quickly realising that he was not nearly so heartbroken as he had +fancied himself to be. Already while he walked to the station he was +thinking that, after all, Paris was endurable, even though one +particular woman could not refrain from a little smile of amusement +when he crossed her path. + +Captain Tavernay had timed their walk accurately. For as they reached +the station the train was signalled. + +"Let us stand here, behind these cases," said Tavernay. "We shall see +and not be seen." + +In a few moments the train moved slowly in and stopped. From the +furthermost carriage the detachment descended, and, following a +_sous-officier_ in the uniform of the Legion, walked towards the cases +behind which Tavernay and his companion were concealed. In front came +two youths, fair of complexion and of hair, dressed neatly, well shod, +who walked with a timidity of manner as though they expected to be +questioned and sent packing. + +"Who can they be?" asked Laurent. "They are boys." + +"Yet they will give their age as eighteen," replied Tavernay, and his +voice trembled ever so slightly; "and we shall ask no questions." + +"But they bear no marks of misery. They are not poor. Whence can they +come?" Laurent repeated. + +"I can tell you that," said Tavernay. He was much moved. He spoke with +a deep note of reverence. "They come from Alsace or Lorraine. We get +many such. They will not serve Germany. At all costs they _will_ serve +France." + +Lieutenant Laurent was humbled. Here was a higher motive than pique, +here was a devotion which would not so quickly tire of discipline and +service. He gazed with a momentary feeling of envy at these two youths +who insisted, at so high a price, on being his compatriots. + +"You see," said Tavernay, with a smile, "it was worth while to come to +the station and see the recruits arrive, even on so hot a day as +this." + +"Yes," replied Laurent; and then "look!" + +Following the two youths walked a man tall and powerful, with the +long, loose stride of one well versed in sports. He held his head +erect, and walked defiantly, daring you to question him. His hands +were long and slender, well-kept, unused to labour, his face aquiline +and refined. He looked about thirty-five years old. He wore a light +overcoat of a fine material, which hung open, and underneath the +overcoat he was attired in evening dress. It was his dress which had +riveted Laurent's attention; and certainly nothing could have seemed +more bizarre, more strangely out of place. The hot African sun poured +down out of a cloudless sky; and a new recruit for the Foreign Legion +stepped out of a railway carriage as though he had come straight from +a ball-room. What sudden disaster could have overtaken him? In what +tragedy had he borne a part? Even Laurent's imagination was stimulated +into speculation. As the man passed him, Laurent saw that his tie was +creased and dusty, his shirt-front rumpled and soiled. That must needs +have been. At some early hour on a spring morning, some four or +five days ago, this man must have rushed into the guard-room of a +barrack-square in some town of France. Laurent turned to Tavernay +eagerly-- + +"What do you make of him?" + +Tavernay shrugged his shoulders. + +"A man of fashion, who has made a fool of himself. They make good +soldiers as a rule." + +"But he will repent!" + +"He has already had the time, and he has not. There is no escort for +recruits until they reach Marseilles. Suppose that he enlisted in +Paris. He is given the fare. At any station between Paris and +Marseilles he could have got out and returned." + +The man in evening-dress walked on. There were dark shadows under his +eyes, the eyes themselves were sombre and alert. + +"We shall know something of him soon," said Tavernay. He watched his +recruit with so composed an air that Laurent cried out-- + +"Can nothing astonish you?" + +"Very little," answered Tavernay, phlegmatically. "Listen, my friend. +One day, some years ago, a captain of Hussars landed at Oran. He came +to Bel-Abbes with a letter of introduction to me. He stayed with me. +He expressed a wish to see my men on parade. I turned them out. He +came to the parade-ground and inspected them. As he passed along the +ranks he suddenly stopped in front of an old soldier with fifteen +years' service in the Legion, much of which fifteen years had been +passed in the cells. The old soldier was a drunkard--oh, but a +confirmed drunkard. Well, in front of this man my young Captain with +the curled moustaches stopped--stopped and turned very pale. But he +did not speak. My soldier looked at him respectfully, and the Captain +continued his inspection. Well, they were father and son--that is all. +Why should anything astonish me?" and Captain Tavernay struck a match +and lighted a cigarette. + +The match, however, attracted attention to the presence of the +officers. Four men who marched, keeping time with their feet and +holding their hands stiffly at their sides, saw the flame and remarked +the uniforms. Their hands rose at once to the salute. + +"Ah! German deserters," said Tavernay. "They fight well." + +Others followed, men in rags and out of shoe-leather, outcasts and +fugitives; and behind them came one who was different. He was tall and +well-knit, with a frank open face, not particularly intellectual, +on the other hand not irretrievably stupid. He was dressed in a +double-breasted, blue-serge suit, and as he walked he now and then +gave a twist to his fair moustache, as though he were uneasy and +embarrassed. Captain Tavernay ran his eyes over him with the look of a +connoisseur. + +"Aha!" said he, with a chuckle of satisfaction. "The true legionary! +Hard, finely trained, he has done work too. Yes! You see, Laurent, he +is a little ashamed, a little self-conscious. He feels that he is +looking a fool. I wonder what nationality he will claim." + +"He comes from the North," said Lament. "Possibly from Normandy." + +"Oh, I know what he is," returned Tavernay. "I am wondering only what +he will claim to be. Let us go outside and see." + +Tavernay led the way to the platform. Outside, in front of the +station, the _sous-officier_ marshalled his men in a line. They looked +a strange body of men as they stood there, blinking in the strong +sunlight. The man in the ruffled silk hat and the dress-suit toed the +line beside a bundle of rags; the German deserters rubbed elbows with +the "true legionary" in the blue serge. Those thirty men represented +types of almost all the social grades, and to a man they were seeking +the shelter of anonymity in that monastery of action, the Foreign +Legion. + +"Answer to your names," said the _sous-officier_, and from a paper in +his hand he began to read. The answers came back, ludicrous in their +untruth. A French name would be called. + +"Montaubon." + +And a German voice replied-- + +"Present." + +"Ohlsen," cried the _sous-officier_, and no answer was given. +"Ohlsen," he repeated sharply. "Is not Ohlsen here?" + +And suddenly the face of the man in the serge suit flashed, and he +answered hurriedly-- + +"Present." + +Even the _sous-officier_ burst into a laugh. The reason for the pause +was too obvious; "Ohlsen" had forgotten that Ohlsen was now his name. + +"My lad, you must keep your ears open," said the _sous-officier_. +"Now, attention. Fours right. March!" + +And the detachment marched off towards the barracks. + +"Ohlsen," said Tavernay, and he shrugged his shoulders. "Well, what +does it matter? Come!" + +"Ohlsen" was Tony Stretton, and all the way along the Rue Daya to the +barracks he was longing for the moment when he would put on the +uniform and cease to figure ridiculously in this grotesque procession. +None the less he had to wait with the others, drawn up in the +barrack-square until Captain Tavernay returned. The Captain went to +his office, and thither the recruits were marched. One by one they +entered in at the door, answered his questions, and were sent off to +the regimental tailor. Tony Stretton was the last. + +"Name?" asked Tavernay. + +"Hans Ohlsen." + +"Town of enlistment?" + +"Marseilles." + +Tavernay compared the answers with some writing on a sheet of paper. + +"Yes, Marseilles. Passed by the doctor Paul as sound of body. Yes," +and he resumed his questions. + +"Nationality?" + +"Swede." + +Captain Tavernay had a smattering of most languages, and he was +greatly inclined to try his new recruit with a few questions in the +Swedish tongue. But the etiquette of the Legion forbade. He went on +without a smile-- + +"Age?" + +"Thirty." + +"Vocation?" + +"Fisherman." + +Captain Tavernay looked up. This time he could not help smiling. + +"Well, it is as good as any other," said he; and suddenly there was a +sound of cries, and three soldiers burst out of a narrow entrance on +the further side of the parade-ground and came running across the +square to the Captain's quarters. Both Tavernay and Stretton looked +through the door. There was not a tree in that great square; the +sunlight poured down upon the bare brown space with a blinding +fierceness. All the recruits but Stretton had marched off; a second +ago it had been quite empty and very silent. Now these three men were +hurrying across it, shouting, gesticulating with their hands. Stretton +looked at them with surprise. Then he noticed that one of them, the +man running in the middle and a little ahead of the others, carried a +revolver in his hand and brandished it. Moreover, from the look of his +inflamed face, he was shouting threats; the others were undoubtedly +shouting warnings. Scraps of their warnings came to Stretton's ears. +"Mon Capitaine!" "Il veut vous tuer!" "Rentrez!" They were straining +every muscle to catch the threatening soldier up. + +Stretton strode to the door, and a voice behind him cried-- + +"Halt!" + +It was Tavernay who was speaking. + +"But he is already halfway across the square." + +"Halt!" + +And there was no disobeying the command. Captain Tavernay walked to +the door. + +"A Spanish corporal whom yesterday I degraded to the ranks," said he. +"Half a pint of _aguardiente_, and here's the result." + +Captain Tavernay stepped out of the door and leisurely advanced +towards the running men. He gave an order, he raised his hand, and the +two soldiers who warned him fell back and halted. Certainly Captain +Tavernay was accustomed to obedience. The Spanish ex-corporal ran on +alone, straight towards Tavernay, but as he ran, as he saw the officer +standing there alone, quietly waiting his onslaught, his threats +weakened, his pace slackened. He came to a stop in front of Tavernay. + +"I must kill yon!" he cried, waving his revolver. + +"Yon shall kill me from behind, then," said Tavernay, calmly. "Follow +me!" And he turned round, and with the same leisurely deliberation +walked back to his room. The ex-corporal hesitated and--obeyed. He +followed Captain Tavernay into the room where Stretton stood. + +"Place your revolver on the table." + +The Spaniard again obeyed. Tavernay pushed open the door of an inner +room. + +"You are drunk," he said. "You must not be seen in this condition by +your fellow-soldiers. Go in and lie down!" + +The Spaniard stared at his officer stupidly, tottering upon his limbs. +Then he staggered into the Captain's room. Tavernay turned back to +Stretton and a ghost of a smile crept into his face. + +"_C'est du theater_," he said, with a little shrug of the shoulders. +"But what would you have, monsieur?" And he spoke to Stretton as to +an equal. "You are astonished. It is very likely not your way in +your-fishing-boats," he continued, with a chuckle. Stretton knew very +well that he meant "army." "But there is no Foreign Legion amongst +your--fishermen." He laughed again; and gathering up his papers +dismissed Stretton to the tailor's. But after Stretton had taken a few +steps across the parade, Tavernay called him back again. He looked at +him with a very friendly smile. + +"I, too, enlisted at Marseilles," he said. "One can rise in the +Foreign Legion by means of these"--and he touched lightly the medals +upon his breast. This was Tony Stretton's introduction to the Foreign +Legion. + + + + + CHAPTER XVII + + CALLON LEAVES ENGLAND + + +Spring that year drew summer quickly after it. The lilac had been +early in flower, the days bright and hot. At nine o'clock on a July +morning Callon's servant drew up the blinds in his master's room and +let the sunlight in. Lionel Callon stretched himself in bed and asked +for his letters and his tea. As he drank the tea he picked up the +letters one by one, and the first at which he looked brought a smile +of satisfaction to his face. The superscription told him that it was +from Millie Stretton. That little device of a quarrel had proved +successful, then. He tore open the envelope and read the letter. +Millie wrote at no great length, but what was written satisfied +Callon. She could not understand how the quarrel had arisen. She had +been thinking over it many times since it happened, and she was still +baffled. She had not had a thought of hurting him. How could she, +since they were friends? She had been hoping to hear from him, but +since some time had passed and no word had reached her, she must write +and say that she thought it sad their friendship should have ended as +it had. + +It was a wistful little letter, and as Callon laid it down he said to +himself, "Poor little girl"; but he said the words with a smile rather +than with any contrition. She had been the first to write--that was +the main point. Had he given in, had he been the one to make the +advance, to save her the troubled speculations, the sorrow at this +abrupt close to their friendship. Millie Stretton would have been +glad, no doubt, but she would have thought him weak. Now he was the +strong man. He had caused her suffering and abased her to seek a +reconciliation. Therefore he was the strong man. Well, women would +have it so, he thought, with a chuckle, and why should he complain? + +He wrote a note to Millie Stretton, announcing that he would call that +afternoon, and despatched the note by a messenger. Then he turned to +his other letters, and amongst them he found one which drove all the +satisfaction from his thoughts. It came from a firm of solicitors, and +was couched in a style with which he was not altogether unfamiliar. + + +Sir,--Messrs. Deacon & Sons (Livery Stables, Montgomery Street) having +placed their books in our hands for the collection of their +outstanding debts, we must ask you to send us a cheque in settlement +of your account by return of post, and thus save further proceedings. + + We are, yours, &c., + + Humphreys & Neill. + + +Callon allowed the letter to slip from his fingers, and lay for a +while very still, feeling rather helpless, rather afraid. It was not +merely the amount of the bill which troubled him, although that was +inconveniently large. But there were other reasons. His eyes wandered +to a drawer in his dressing-table. He got out of bed and unlocked it. +At the bottom of that drawer lay the other reasons, piled one upon the +other--letters couched in just the same words as that which he had +received this morning, and--still worse!---signed by this same firm of +Humphreys and Neill. Moreover, every one of those letters had reached +him within the last ten days. It seemed that all his tradesmen had +suddenly placed their books in the hands of Messrs. Humphreys and +Neill. + +Callon took the letters back to his bed. There were quite an +astonishing number of them. Callon himself was surprised to see how +deep he was in debt. They littered the bed--tailors' bills; bills for +expensive little presents of jewellery; bills run up at restaurants +for dinners and suppers; bills for the hire of horses and carriages; +bills of all kinds--and there were just Mr. Callon's election expenses +in Mr. Callon's exchequer that morning. Even if he parted with them, +they would not pay a third part of the sum claimed. Fear invaded him; +he saw no way out of his troubles. Given time, he could borrow enough, +no doubt, scrape enough money together one way or another to tide +himself over the difficulty. His hand searched for Millie Stretton's +letter and found it, and rejected it. He needed time there; he must +walk warily or he would spoil all. And looking at the letters he knew +that he had not the time. + +It was improbable, nay more than improbable, that all these bills were +in the hands of one firm by mere chance. No; somewhere he had an +enemy. A man--or it might be a woman--was striking at him out of the +dark, striking with knowledge too. For the blow fell where he could +least parry it. Mr. Mudge would have been quite satisfied could he +have seen Callon as he lay that morning with the summer sunlight +pouring into his bedroom. He looked more than his age, and his face +was haggard. He felt that a hand was at his throat, a hand which +gripped and gripped with an ever-increasing pressure. + +He tried to guess who his enemy might be. But there were so many who +might be glad to do him an ill-turn. Name after name occurred to him, +but amongst those names was not the name of Mr. Mudge. That shy and +inoffensive man was the last whom he would have suspected to be +meddling with his life. + +Callon sprang out of bed. He must go down to Lincoln's Inn Fields and +interview Messrs. Humphreys and Neill. Summonses would never do with a +general election so near. He dressed quickly, and soon after ten was +in the office of that firm. He was received by a bald and smiling +gentleman in spectacles. + +"Mr. Callon?" said the smiling gentleman, who announced himself as +Humphreys. "Oh yes. You have come in reference to the letters which +our clients have desired us to send you?" + +"Yes," replied Callon. "There are a good number of letters." + +The smiling gentleman laughed genially. + +"A man of fashion, Mr. Callon, has of course many expenses which we +humdrum business people are spared. Let me see. The total amount due +is----" And Mr. Humphreys made a calculation with his pen. + +"I came to ask for an extension of time," Callon blurted out; and the +smiling gentleman ceased to smile. He gazed through his spectacles +with a look of the utmost astonishment. "You see, Mr. Humphreys, all +these bills, each one accompanied with a peremptory demand for +payment, have been presented together, almost as it were by the same +post." + +"They are all, however, to account rendered," said Mr. Humphreys, as +he removed and breathed upon his spectacles. + +"It would, I frankly confess, seriously embarrass me to settle them +all at once." + +"Dear, dear!" said Mr. Humphreys, in a voice of regret. "I am very +sorry. These duties are very painful to me, Mr. Callon. But I have the +strictest instructions." And he rose from his chair to conclude the +interview. + +"One moment," said Callon. "I want to ask you how it is that all my +bills have come into your hands? Who is it who has brought them up?" + +"Really, really, Mr. Callon," the lawyer protested. "I cannot listen +to such suggestions." And then the smile came back to his face. "Why +not pay them in full?" His eyes beamed through his spectacles. He had +an air of making a perfectly original and delightful suggestion. "Sit +down in this comfortable chair now, and write me out a little cheque +for--let me see----" And he went back to his table. + +"I must have some time," said Callon. + +Mr. Humphreys was gradually persuaded that the concession of a little +time was reasonable. + +"A day, then," he said. "We will say a day, Mr. Callon. This is +Wednesday. Some time to-morrow we shall hear from you." And he bowed +Callon from his office. Then he wrote a little note and despatched it +by a messenger into the City. The message was received by Mr. Mudge, +who read it, took up his hat, and jumping into a hansom cab, drove +westward with all speed. + +Lionel Callon, on the contrary, walked back to his rooms. He had been +in tight places before, but never in one quite so tight. Before, it +was really the money which had been needed. Now, what was needed was +his ruin. To make matters worse, he had no idea of the particular +person who wished to ruin him. He walked gloomily back to his club and +lunched in solitude. A day remained to him, but what could he do in a +day, unless----? There was a certain letter in the breast-pocket of +Callon's coat to which, more than once as he lunched, his fingers +strayed. He took it out and read it again. It was too soon to borrow +in that quarter, but his back was against the wall. He saw no other +chance of escape. He drove to Millie Stretton's house in Berkeley +Square at the appointed time that afternoon. + +But Mr. Mudge had foreseen. When he jumped into his hansom cab he had +driven straight to the house in Audley Square, where Pamela Mardale +was staying with some friends. + +"Are you lunching anywhere?" he asked. "No? Then lunch with Lady +Stretton, please! And don't go away too soon! See as much as you can +of her during the next two days." + +As a consequence, when Lionel Callon was shown into the drawing-room, +he found Pamela Mardale in her most talkative mood, and Millie +Stretton sitting before the tea-table silent and helpless. Callon +stayed late; Pamela stayed later. Callon returned to his club, having +said not a single word upon the momentous subject of his debts. + +He ordered a stiff brandy and soda. Somehow he must manage to see +Millie Stretton alone. He thought, for a moment, of writing; he indeed +actually began to write. But the proposal looked too crude when +written down. Callon knew the tactics of his game. There must, in a +word, be an offer from Millie, not a request from him. He tore up +his letter, and while he was tearing it up, Mr. Mudge entered the +smoking-room. Mudge nodded carelessly to Callon, and then seemed to be +struck by an idea. He came across to the writing-table and said-- + +"Do I interrupt you? I wonder whether you could help me. You know so +many people that you might be able to lay your finger at once on the +kind of man I want." + +Callon looked up carelessly at Mudge. + +"No. You are not interrupting me. What kind of man do you want?" + +"I want a man to superintend an important undertaking which I have in +hand." + +Callon swung round in his chair. All his carelessness had gone. He +looked at Mr. Mudge, who stood drumming with his fingers on the +writing-table. + +"Oh," said Callon. "Tell me about it." + +He walked over to a corner of the room which was unoccupied and sat +down. Mudge sat beside him and lighted a cigar. + +"I want a man to supervise, you understand. I don't want an expert. +For I have engineers and technical men enough on the spot. And I don't +want any one out of my office. I need some one, on whom I can rely, to +keep me in touch with what is going on--some one quite outside my +business and its associations." + +"I see," said Callon. "The appointment would be--for how long?" + +"Two years." + +"And the salary would be good?" + +Callon leaned back on the lounge as he put the question and he put it +without any show of eagerness. Two years would be all the time he +needed wherein to set himself straight; and it seemed the work would +not be arduous. + +"I think so," replied Mudge. "You shall judge for yourself. It would +be two thousand a year." + +Callon did not answer for a little while, simply because he could not +trust himself to speak. His heart was beating fast. Two thousand a +year for two years, plus the sum for his election expenses! He would +be able to laugh at that unknown enemy who was striking at him from +the dark. + +"Should I do?" he asked at length, and even then his voice shook. Mr. +Mudge appeared, however, not to notice his agitation. He was looking +down at the carpet, and tracing the pattern with the ferrule of his +walking-stick. + +"Of course," he said, with a smile, as though Callon had been merely +uttering a joke. He did not even lift his eyes to Callon's face. "Of +course. I only wish you were serious." + +"But I am," cried Callon. + +Mr. Mudge looked at his companion now, and with surprise. + +"Are you? But you wouldn't have the time to spare. You are standing +for a constituency." + +Callon shrugged his shoulders. + +"Oh, I am not so very keen about Parliament. And there are reasons why +I would welcome the work." + +Mr. Mudge answered with alacrity. + +"Then we will consider it settled. Dine with me tonight at my house, +and we will talk the details over." + +Callon accepted the invitation, and Mudge rose from his seat. Callon, +however, detained him. + +"There's one difficulty in the way," and Mr. Mudge's face became +clouded with anxiety. "The truth is, I am rather embarrassed at the +present moment. I owe a good deal of money, and I am threatened with +proceedings unless it is immediately paid." + +Mudge's face cleared at once. + +"Oh, is that all?" he exclaimed cheerily. "How much do you owe?" + +"More than my first year's salary." + +"Well, I will advance you half at once. Offer them a thousand on +account, and they will stay proceedings." + +"I don't know that they will," replied Callon. + +"You can try them, at all events. If they won't accept half, send them +to me, and we will make some other arrangement. But they are sure to. +They are pressing for immediate payment because they are afraid they +will get nothing at all by any other way. But offer them a thousand +down, and see the pleasant faces with which they will greet you." Mr. +Mudge was quite gay now that he understood how small was the obstacle +which hindered him from gaining Lionel Callon's invaluable help. "I +will write you a cheque," he said; and sitting down at a writing-table +he filled out a cheque and brought it back. He stood in front of +Callon with the cheque in his hand. He did not give it to Callon at +once. He had not blotted it, and he held it by a corner and gently +waved it to and fro, so that the ink might dry. It followed that those +tantalising "noughts," three of them, one behind the other, and +preceded by a one, like a file of soldiers with a sergeant at the +head, and that excellent signature "John Mudge" were constantly before +Callon's eyes, now approaching him like some shy maiden in a flutter +of agitation, now coyly receding. But to no shy maiden had Lionel +Callon ever said "I love you," with so glowing an ardour as he felt +for that most tantalising cheque. + +"I ought to have told yon," said Mr. Mudge, "that the undertaking is a +railway abroad." + +Callon had been so blinded by the dazzle of the cheque that he had not +dreamed of that possibility. Two years abroad, even at two thousand a +year, did not at all fit in with his scheme of life. + +"Abroad?" he repeated doubtfully. "Where?" + +"Chili," said Mr. Mudge; and he looked at the cheque to see that the +ink was quite dry. Perhaps Mr. Mudge's voice was a trifle too +unconcerned. Perhaps there was something a little too suggestive in +his examination of his cheque. Perhaps he kept his eyes too +deliberately from Callon's face. At all events, Callon became suddenly +suspicious. There flashed into his mind by some trick of memory a +picture--a picture of Mr. Mudge and Pamela Mardale talking earnestly +together upon a couch in a drawing-room, and of himself sitting at a +card-table, fixed there till the game was over, though he knew well +that the earnest conversation was aimed against himself. He started, +he looked at Mudge in perplexity. + +"Well?" said Mudge. + +"Wait a moment!" + +Pamela Mardale was Millie Stretton's friend. There was that incident +in the hall--Millie Stretton coming down the stairs and Pamela in +front of the mirror over the mantelpiece. Finally there was Pamela's +persistent presence at Millie Stretton's house this afternoon. One by +one the incidents gathered in his recollections and fitted themselves +together and explained each other. Was this offer a pretext to get him +out of the way? Callon, after all, was not a fool, and he asked +himself why in the world Mr. Mudge should, just at this moment when he +was in desperate straits, offer him 2000_l_. a year to superintend a +railway in Chili? + +"Well?" said Mudge again. + +"I must have time to think over the proposition," replied Callon. He +meant that he must have time to obtain an interview with Millie +Stretton. But Mudge was ready for him. + +"Certainly," said he. "That is only reasonable. It is seven o'clock +now. You dine with me at eight. Give me your answer then." + +"I should like till to-morrow morning," said Callon. + +Mr. Mudge shook his head. + +"That, I am afraid, is impossible. We shall need all tomorrow to make +the necessary arrangements and to talk over your duties. For if you +undertake the work you must leave England on the day after." + +Callon started up in protest. "On the day after!" he exclaimed. + +"It gives very little time, I know," said Mudge. Then he looked Callon +quietly and deliberately in the eyes. "But, you see, I want to get you +out of the country at once." + +Callon no longer doubted. He had thought, through Mr. Mudge's help, to +laugh at his enemy; and lo! the enemy was Mudge himself. It was Mudge +who had bought up his debts, who now held him in so secure a grip that +he did not think it worth while to practise any concealment. Callon +was humiliated to the verge of endurance. Two years in Chili, +pretending to supervise a railway! He understood the position which he +would occupy; he was within an ace of flinging the offer back. But he +dared not. + +"Very well," he said. "I will give you my answer at eight." + +"Thanks. Be punctual." Mr. Mudge sauntered away. There could only be +the one answer. Mr. Lionel Callon might twist and turn as he pleased, +he would spend two years in Chili. It was five minutes past seven, +besides. Callon could hardly call at the house in Berkeley Square with +any chance of seeing Lady Stretton between now and eight. Mudge was +contented with his afternoon. + +At eight o'clock Callon gave in his submission and pocketed the +cheque. At eleven he proposed to go, but Mudge, mindful of an evening +visit which he had witnessed from a balcony, could not part from his +new manager so soon. There was so little time for discussion even with +every minute of Callon's stay in England. He kept Callon with him +until two o'clock in the morning; he made an appointment with him at +ten, and there was a note of warning in his voice which bade Callon +punctually keep it. By one shift and another he kept him busy all the +next day, and in the evening Callon had to pack, to write his letters, +and to make his arrangements for his departure. Moreover, Pamela +Mardale dined quietly with Millie Stretton and stayed late. It thus +happened that Callon left England without seeing Millie Stretton +again. He could write, of course; but he could do no more. + + + + + CHAPTER XVIII + + SOUTH OF OUARGLA + + +"Halt!" cried Captain Tavernay. + +The bugler at his side raised his bugle to his lips and blew. The +dozen chasseurs d'Afrique and the ten native scouts who formed the +advance guard stopped upon the signal. A couple of hundred yards +behind them the two companies of the Foreign Legion came to a +standstill. The convoy of baggage mules upon the right flank, the +hospital equipment, the artillery section, the herd of oxen which was +driven along in the rear, in a word, the whole expedition, halted in a +wood of dwarf-oaks and junipers at three o'clock in the afternoon. + +The order was given to gather wood for the night's camp fires, and the +companies were dismissed. Each soldier made his little bundle and +fixed it upon his shoulders. Again the bugle rang out, sounding the +"Fall in." And the tiny force marched out from the trees of the high +plateaux into the open desert. It was extraordinary with what +abruptness that transition was made. One minute the companies were +treading upon turf under rustling leaves, the next they were +descending a slope carpeted with halfa-grass, which stretched away to +the horizon's rim, with hardly a bush to break its bare monotony. At +the limit of vision, a great arc like a mirror of silver glittered out +of the plain. + +"Water," said a tall, bearded soldier, who marched in the front rank +of the first company. It was he who had stepped from the train at +Bel-Abbes with a light dust-coat over his evening dress suit. He +passed now as Fusilier Barbier, an ex-engineer of Lyons. + +"No," replied Sergeant Ohlsen, who marched at his side: "the crystals +of a dry salt lake." + +In the autumn of last year Ohlsen--or, rather, to give him his right +name, Tony Stretton--had marched upon an expedition from Mesheria to +the Chott Tigri, and knew, therefore, the look of those tantalising +salt lakes. That expedition, which had conducted a surrey for a road +to the Figuig oasis, had brought him his promotion. + +"But we camp by the lake to-night," he added. "The wells of +El-Guethifa are close." + +The companies went forward, and above that salt lake they saw the +mirages begin to shimmer, citadels and hanging gardens, tall towers +and waving woods and majestic galleons, topsail over topsail, floating +upon summer seas. At the wells the sheikh of the district was waiting +upon a mule. + +"I want fifty camels with their saddles and their drivers at five +o'clock to-morrow morning," said Tavernay; and although as far as the +eye could reach there was no moving thing upon that vast plain except +the small group of Arabs and soldiers about the well, by five o'clock +the camels were squatting upon the sand with their drivers beside +them. The mules were sent back from El-Guethifa that morning, the +baggage was packed upon the camels, and the little force, insufficient +in numbers and supplies, went forward on its long and untoward march. + +It passed through the oases of El-Maia and Methlili to Ouargla, at +that time the last outpost of French authority. At Ouargla it rested +for a week; and there, renewing its supplies, penetrated southwards to +survey the desert country of the Touaregs for the construction of the +oft-mooted trans-Saharan railway. South of Ouargla all the +difficulties of the advance were doubled. The companies went down +through the archipelago of oases in the dangerous Touat country +amongst a sullen people, who had little food to supply, and would +hardly supply it. Tavernay led his men with care, neither practising a +discipline needlessly strict, nor relaxing into carelessness. But he +was under-officered, and his officers even so were inexperienced. +Lieutenant Laurent, a man irritable and unjust, was his second in +command, and there were but two _sous-lieutenants_ besides. In spite +of all Tavernay's care the convoy diminished. One day a camel would +stumble on the slippery bottom of a salt marsh, fall, and break its +limbs; the next another would fail, and die through a long-untended +wound, caused by the rough saddle upon its back. In the ranks of the +soldiers, too, there was trouble, and Laurent was not the man to deal +with it. There was hardly a company of the Legion, recruited, as it so +largely was, from the outcasts and the men of sorrows, in which there +were not some of disordered minds, some whom absinthe had brought to +the edge of insanity. Upon these the severity of the expedition bore +heavily. Tents had been perforce discarded. The men slept under the +stars. They woke from freezing nights to the bitter winds of dawn, and +two hours after dawn they were parched by a burning sun, and all the +day they suffered under its pitiless and blinding glare. Storms +whelmed them in lofty spirals of whirling, choking sand. For a week +they would toil over high red mountainous ground of loose stones; then +would follow the monotony of bare round plains, piled here and there +with black rocks, quivering and glittering in the heat; the sun rose +day after day upon their left hand in scarlet, and set in scarlet upon +their right, and they themselves were still the tiny centre of the +same empty inhospitable space; so that only the difference of the +ground they trod, the feel of soft sand beneath their feet, where a +minute before they had marched on gravel, told them that they +progressed at all. The worst of the men became prone to disobedience, +eager for change; and every now and then a soldier would rise upon his +elbow in the night time, gaze furtively about over his sleeping +comrades, watch the sentries until their backs were turned, and then +crawl past them into the darkness. Of these men none ever returned. Or +some mania would seize upon them and fix a strange idea in their +brains, such as that which besieged Barbier, the fusilier, who had +once stepped out of the railway carriage in his evening dress. He +leaned over towards Stretton one evening, and said in a hoarse, +trembling voice-- + +"I can stand it no longer." + +Both men were sitting by a tiny fire, which Barbier was feeding with +handfuls of halfa-grass and sticks. He was kneeling up in front of it, +and by the red waving light Stretton saw that his face was quivering +with excitement. + +"What can't you stand?" he asked. + +"It is Captain Tavernay," replied Barbier. He suddenly laughed in a +pitiful fashion, and cast a glance over his shoulder. "There is a man +put on to watch me. Night and day I am watched by Captain Tavernay's +orders. He wants to fix a crime on me! I know. He wants to trap me. +But let him take care!" + +Stretton fetched the doctor, who listened for a while to Barbier's +rambling, minatory talk, and then shrugged his shoulders. + +"Hallucinations," said he. "Ideas of persecution. The commonest form," +and having fixed Barbier into his proper category, he walked away. +There was nothing to be done for Barbier upon this expedition. He had +to be watched; that was all. Thus for seven hundred miles the force +pushed southwards from Ouargla, and thus from within it disintegrated +as it went. Tavernay could not but notice the change, but he said +nothing to any subordinate. The men would fight well if fighting +happened. That he knew, and meanwhile he marched on. + +It was just when the seven hundred miles had been completed that +Tavernay realised fighting was likely to happen. He went the round of +the camp as the sun was setting, when the rifles were piled and the +fires crackling. Stretton was at his side, and saw his commander stop +and shade his eyes. Tavernay was looking westwards. Far away against +the glowing ball of the sun, which was just dipping down behind the +plain, the figure of an Arab mounted upon a camel stood motionless and +black. Tavernay swung round and looked behind him. On the crest of a +sandhill to the north a second rider stood distinct against the sky. + +Tavernay watched the men for a long time through his glasses. + +"Touaregs," said he, gravely. "Masked Touaregs," and that night the +sentinels were doubled; and in the morning the bugle did not sound the +_reveille_. + +Moreover, when the force advanced, it advanced in the formation of a +square, with the baggage camels in the centre, one gun in the front +line, and the other in the rear. They had marched into the country +where the Senoussa sect prevailed. The monasteries of that body sent +out their missionaries eastward to Khordofan, westwards to Tafilet, +preaching the purification of the Mohammedan religion and the +enlargement of Mohammedan countries now subject to the infidels. But +nowhere had the missionaries raised their standard with more success +than in this Touat country of the Sahara. The companies marched that +day alert and cheerful. They were consolidated by the knowledge of +danger. Captain Tavernay led them with pride. + +"An insufficient force, ill-found, inadequately officered," he +thought. "But the men are of the Legion." They were _mes enfants_ to +him all that day. + +But the attack was not yet to be delivered. During the night the two +scouts had ridden on their swift Meharis northwestwards, to the town +of Insalah. They knocked upon the gates of the great mud fortress of +Abd-el-Kader, the sheikh, and were instantly admitted to the dark room +where he sat upon a pile of rugs. When the eyes of the scouts became +accustomed to the gloom, they saw there was yet another in the room, a +tall man robed in black, with a black mask of cotton wound about his +face so that only his eyes were visible. This was the chieftain of the +Hoggar Touaregs. + +"Well?" said Abd-el-Kader. And the scouts told him roughly the number +of the force and the direction of the journey. + +Then Abd-el-Kader turned to the Touareg chieftain. + +"We will let them go further south, since southwards they are +marching," he said, in his suave gentle voice. "A hundred miles more, +and they will be amongst the sand dunes. Since they have cannon, the +attack must be sudden. Let it be at the wells of Bir-el-Gharamo." + +The Touareg chieftain rode out that day towards his hills; and, +unmolested, Captain Tavernay's expedition went down to the dunes. +Great waves of yellow sand, sometimes three hundred feet from crest to +base, intersected the face of the desert; the winds had given to their +summits the overhang of a breaking sea; they ran this way and that, as +though the currents of an ocean had directed their course; they had +the very look of motion; so that Stretton could not but remember the +roaring combers of the cold North Sea as he gazed upon these silent +and arrested copies. They made of that country a maze of intricate +valleys. Led by a local guide commandeered from the last oasis, the +companies of the Legion marched into the maze, and on the second day +saw, as they came over a hill, just below them in a narrow hollow, a +mud parapet built about the mouth of a well. This was Bir-el-Gharamo, +and here they camped. Sentries were posted on the neighbouring crests; +suddenly the darkness came, and overhead the stars rushed down towards +the earth. There was no moon that night, nor was there any sound of +danger heard. Three times Tavernay went the round of the sentries, at +eight and at ten and at twelve. But at three o'clock, just as the dawn +was breaking, a shot was heard. Tavernay sprang up from the ground, +the alarm rang out clear from the bugle over the infinite waste, the +companies of the Legion seized their piled rifles and fell into battle +order with an incredible neatness and expedition. There was no +confusion, no noise. The square was formed about the well--the camels +were knee-haltered in the middle, the guns placed at the corners. But +it was still dark. A few shots were fired on the dunes, and the +sentries came running back. + +"Steady," cried Captain Tavernay. "They are coming. Fire low!" + +The first volley rang out, and immediately afterwards on every side of +that doomed square the impact of the Touaregs' charge fell like the +blow of some monstrous hammer. All night they had been gathering +noiselessly in the surrounding valleys. Now they had charged with +lance and sword from the surrounding crests. Three sides of the square +held their ground. The fourth wavered, crumpled in like a piece of +broken cardboard, and the Arabs were within the square, stabbing at +the backs of the soldiers, loosing and stampeding the camels. And at +once, where deep silence had reigned a minute ago, the air was torn +with shrill cries and oaths and the clamour of weapons. The square was +broken; but here a group of men stood back to back, and with cartridge +and bayonet held its ground; there another formed; and about each gun +the men fought desperately. Meanwhile the morning came, a grey, clear +light spread over the desert. Tavernay himself was with one of the +machine-guns. It was dragged clear of the _melee_ and up a slope of +sand. The soldiers parted in front of it, and its charge began to +sweep the Touaregs down like swathes, and to pit the sand hills like a +fall of rain. About the other gun the fight still raged. + +"Come, my children," said Tavernay, "fight well; the Touaregs give no +quarter." + +Followed by Stretton, he led the charge. The Touaregs gave way before +their furious onslaught. The soldiers reached the gun, faced about, +and firing steadily kept off the enemy while the gun was run back. As +soon as that was saved the battle was over. All over the hollow, +wherever the Touaregs were massed, the two guns rattled out their +canister. No Arab could approach them. The sun rose over the earth, +and while it was rising the Touaregs broke and fled. When it shone out +in its full round, there was no one left of them in that hollow except +the wounded and the dead. But the victory had been dearly bought. All +about the well, lying pell-mell among the Arabs and the dead camels, +were the French Legionaries, some quite still, and others writhing in +pain and crying for water. Stretton drew his hand across his forehead. +He was stunned and dazed. It seemed to him that years had passed, that +he had grown very old. Yet there was the sun new-risen. There was a +dull pain in his head. He raised his hand and drew it away wet with +blood. How or when he had received the blow he was quite unaware. He +stood staring stupidly about him. So very little while ago men were +lying here sleeping in their cloaks, quite strong, living people; now +they were lying dead or in pain; it was all incomprehensible. + +"Why?" he asked aloud of no one. "Now, why?" + +Gradually, however, custom resumed its power. There was a man hanging +limp over the parapet of the well. He looked as though he had knelt +down and stooped over to drink, and in that attitude had fallen +asleep. But he might so easily be pushed into the well, and custom +had made the preservation of wells from impurity an instinct. He +removed the body and went in search of Tavernay. Tavernay was sitting +propped up against a camel's saddle; the doctor was by his side, a +blood-stained bandage was about his thigh. He spoke in a weak voice. + +"Lieutenant Laurent?" + +Stretton went in search. He came across an old grey-headed soldier +rolling methodically a cigarette. + +"He is dead--over there," said the soldier. "Have you a light?" + +Laurent had died game. He was lying clasped in the arms of a gigantic +Touareg, and while thus held he had been stabbed by another through +the back. To that end the contemptuous smile of a lady far away in +Paris had brought him. He lay with his face to the sky, his wounded +vanity now quite healed. He had earned Tavernay's praise, at all +events, that day. For he had fought well. Of the _sous-lieutenants_ +one was killed, the other dangerously wounded. A sergeant-major lay +with a broken shoulder beside one of the guns. Stretton went back to +Tavernay. + +"You must take command, then," said Tavernay. "I think you have learnt +something about it on your fishing-boats." And in spite of his pain he +smiled. + +Stretton mustered the men and called over the names. Almost the first +name which he called was the name of "Barbier," and Barbier, with a +blood-stained rag about his head, answered. Of the two hundred and +thirty men who had made up the two companies of the Legion, only +forty-seven could stand in the ranks and answer to their names. For +those forty-seven there was herculean work to do. Officers were +appointed, the dead bodies were roughly buried, the camels collected, +litters improvised for the wounded, the goat-skins filled with water. +Late in the afternoon Stretton came again to Tavernay. + +"We are ready, sir." Tavernay nodded and asked for a sheet of paper, +an envelope, and ink. They were fetched from his portfolio and very +slowly and laboriously he wrote a letter and handed it to Stretton. + +"Seal it," he said, "now, in front of me." + +Stretton obeyed. + +"Keep that letter. If you get back to Ouargla without me, give it to +the Commandant there." + +Tavernay was lifted in a litter on to the back of a camel, and the +remnant of the geographical expedition began its terrible homeward +march. Eight hundred miles lay between Bir-el-Ghiramo and the safety +of Ouargla. The Touaregs hung upon the rear of the force, but they did +not attack again. They preferred another way. One evening a solitary +Arab drove a laden camel into the bivouac. He was conducted to +Stretton, and said, "The Touaregs ask pardon and pray for peace. They +will molest you no more. Indeed, they will help you, and as an earnest +of their true desire for your welfare they send you a camel-load of +dates." + +Stretton accepted the present, and carried the message to Tavernay, +who cried at once, "Let no one eat those dates." But two soldiers had +already eaten of them, and died of poison before the morning. Short of +food, short of sentinels, the broken force crept back across the +stretches of soft sand, the greyish-green plains of halfa-grass, the +ridges of red hill. One by one the injured succumbed; their wounds +gangrened, they were tortured by the burning sun and the motion of the +camels. A halt would be made, a camel made to kneel, and a rough grave +dug. + +"Pelissier," cried Stretton, and a soldier stepped out from the ranks +who had once conducted mass in the church of the Madeleine in Paris. +Pelissier would recite such prayers as he remembered, and the force +would move on again, leaving one more soldier's grave behind it in the +desert to protest unnoticed against the economy of governments. Then +came a morning when Stretton was summoned to Captain Tavernay's side. + +For two days Tavernay had tossed in a delirium. He now lay beneath a +rough shelter of cloaks, in his right senses, but so weak that he +could not lift a hand, and with a face so pinched and drawn that his +years seemed to have been doubled. His eyes shone out from big black +circles. Stretton knelt down beside him. + +"You have the letter?" + +"Yes." + +"Do not forget." + +He lay for a while in a sort of contentment, then he said--"Do not +think this expedition has been waste. A small force first and disaster +... the big force afterwards to retrieve the disaster, and with it +victory, and government and peace, and a new country won for France. +That is the law of the Legion.... _My_ Legion." He smiled, and +Stretton muttered a few insincere words. + +"You will recover, my captain. You will lead your companies again." + +"No," said Tavernay, in a whisper. "I do not want to. I am very happy. +Yes, I say that, who joined the Legion twenty years ago. And the +Legion, my friend, is the nation of the unhappy. For twenty years I +have been a citizen of that nation.... I pity women who have no such +nation to welcome them and find them work.... For us there is no need +of pity." + +And in a few moments he fell asleep, and, two hours later, sleeping, +died. A pile of stones was built above his grave, and the force +marched on. Gaunt, starved, and ragged, the men marched northwards, +leaving the Touat country upon their left hand. It struck the caravan +route from Tidikelt to Ouargla; it stumbled at last through the gates +of the town. Silently it marched through the streets to the French +fortress. On no survivor's face was there any sign of joy that at last +their hardships were over, their safety assured. All were too tired, +too dispirited. The very people who crowded to see them pass seemed +part of an uninteresting show. Stretton went at once to the Commandant +and told the story of their disaster. Then he handed him the letter of +Captain Tavernay. The Commandant broke the seal and read it through. +He looked up at Stretton, a thin spent figure of a man overwrought +with sleeplessness and anxiety. + +"Tell me how and when this was written," said the Commandant. + +Stretton obeyed, and after he had heard, the Commandant sat with his +hand shading his eyes. When he spoke, his voice showed that he was +deeply moved. + +"You know what the letter contains, Sergeant Ohlsen?" + +"No, my Commandant." + +"Read, then, for yourself;" and he passed the letter across his office +table. Stretton took it and read. There were a few lines written--only +a few; but those few lines recommended Sergeant Ohlsen for promotion +to the rank of officer. The Commandant held out his hand. + +"That is like our Tavernay," he said. "He thought always of his +soldiers. He wrote it at once, you see, after the battle was over, +lest he should die and justice not be done. Have no fear, my friend. +It is you who have brought back to Ouargla the survivors of the +Legion. But you must give your real name. There is a scrutiny before a +soldier is promoted to the rank of office. Sergeant Ohlsen. That is +all very well. But Lieutenant----. Come, Lieutenant who?" + +He took up his pen. + +"Lieutenant Sir Anthony Stretton," replied Tony; and the Commandant +wrote down the name. + + + + + CHAPTER XIX + + THE TURNPIKE GATE + + +It was not, however, only Millie Stretton whose fortunes were touched +by Tony's absence. Warrisden, whom Stretton had met but the once on +board the _City of Bristol_, was no less affected. On a day of that +summer, during which Tony camped far away on the edge of the Sahara, +Warrisden rode down the steep hill from the village of the three +poplars on his way to Whitewebs. Once Pamela had ridden along this +road between the white wood rails and the black bare stems of trees on +a winter's evening of mist. That was more than fifteen months ago. The +brown furrows in the fields were now acres of waving yellow; each +black clump was now an ambuscade of green, noisy with birds. The +branches creaked in a light wind and rippled and shook the sunlight +from their leaves, the road glistened like chalk. It was ten o'clock +on an August morning, very clear and light. Voices from far away +amongst the corn sounded tiny and distinct, like voices heard through +a telephone. Round this bend at the thicket corner Pamela had +disappeared on that dim, grey evening. How far had she since travelled +on the new road, Warrisden wondered. She was at Whitewebs now. He was +riding thither to find out. + +When he inquired for her at the door, he was at once led through the +house into the big garden at the back. Pamela was sitting in a chair +at the edge of the lawn under the shade of the great avenue of elms +which ran straight from the back of the house to the shallow stream at +the garden's boundary. She saw him at once as he came out from the +glass-door on to the gravel, and she rose from her chair. She did not +advance to him, but just stood where she was, watching him approach; +and in her eyes there was a great perplexity. Warrisden came straight +to her over the lawn. There was no hesitation in his manner, at all +events. On the other hand, there was no air of assurance. He came with +a definite object; so much was evident, but no more. He stopped in +front of her and raised his hat. Pamela looked at him and said +nothing. She did not even give him her hand. She stood and waited +almost submissively, with her troubled eyes resting quietly on his. + +"You expected me?" he said. + +"Yes. I received your letter this morning." + +"You have guessed why I have come?" + +"Yes." + +"And you are troubled," said Warrisden. + +They turned and walked under the branches into the avenue. Overhead +there was a bustle of blackbirds and thrushes; a gardener sharpening +his scythe in the rose garden made a little rasping sound. Over all +the lawn the August sunlight lay warm and golden like a benediction. + +"I have come to ask you the old question," said Warrisden. "Will you +marry me?" + +Pamela gazed steadily ahead as she walked, and she walked very slowly. +She was prepared for the question, yet she took her time to answer it. +And the answer when at last she gave it was no answer at all. + +"I do not know," she said, in a low clear voice. + +Warrisden looked at her. The profile of her face was towards him. He +wondered for the thousandth time at its beauty and its gentleness. The +broad, white forehead under the sweep of her dark hair, the big, dark +eyes shining beneath her brows, the delicate colour upon her cheeks, +the curve of the lips. He wondered and longed. But he spoke simply and +without extravagance, knowing that he would be understood. + +"I have done nothing for you of the things men often do when a woman +comes into their lives. I have tried to make no career. I think there +are enough people making careers. They make the world very noisy, and +they raise a deal of dust. I have just gone on living quietly as I did +before, believing you would need no such proof." + +"I do not," said Pamela. + +"There might be much happiness for both of us," he continued. And +again she answered, without looking at him-- + +"I do not know." + +She was not evading him. Evasions, indeed, were never to her liking; +and here, she was aware, were very serious issues. + +"I have been thinking about you a great deal," she said. "I will tell +you this. There is no one else. But that is not all. I can say too, I +think, quite certainly, that there will be no one else. Only that is +not enough, is it? Not enough, at all events, for you and me." + +Warrisden nodded his head. + +"No, that is not enough," he said gravely. + +They walked on side by side in silence for a little while. + +"It is only fair that I should be very frank with you," she went on. +"I have been thinking so much about you in order that when you came +again with this old question, as I knew you would, I might be quite +clear and frank. Do you remember that you once spoke to me about the +turnpike gate--the gate which I was to open and through which I was to +go, like other men and women down the appointed road?" + +"Yes, I remember." + +"You meant, as I understand it, the gate between friendship and the +ever so much more which lies beyond?" + +"Yes." + +And Pamela repeated his word. "Yes," she said. "But one cannot open +that gate at will. It opens of itself at a touch, or it stays shut." + +"And it stays shut now?" + +Pamela answered him at once-- + +"Say, rather, that I have raised a hand towards the gate, but that I +am afraid to try." And she turned her face to him at last. Her eyes +were very wistful. + +They stopped upon the grass bank of the stream at the end of the +avenue. Pamela looked down into the dark, swiftly running water, and +went on choosing each word, testing it, as it were, before she uttered +it. + +"You see that new road beyond the gate is no new road to me. I have +trodden it before, and crept back--broken. Therefore, I am afraid." +She paused. Warrisden was aware from her attitude that she had not +finished. He did not stir lest he should check what more remained to +say, and that remnant never be spoken at all. And it was well for him +that he did not stir; for she said, in the same clear, low voice which +she had hitherto used, and just as steadily-- + +"I am the more afraid because I think that if I did touch that gate it +might open of itself." + +She had begun, in a word, to feel premonitions of that suspense and of +that glowing life in which for a few brief months she had once been +steeped. Did she expect a letter from Warrisden, there was an +eagerness in her anticipation with which she was well familiar. Was +the letter delayed, there was a keenness in her disappointment which +was like the pang of an old wound. And this recognition that the good +days might come again, as in a cycle, brought to her very vividly the +memory of the bad black days which had followed. Fear of those latter +days, and the contrast of their number with the number of those which +had gone before, drove her back. For those latter days in their turn +might come round again. + +Warrisden looked at her and his heart filled with pity for the great +trouble which had overwhelmed her. She stood by his side with the +sunlight playing upon her face and her hair--a girl brilliant with +life, ripe to turn its possibilities into facts; and she shrank from +the ordeal, so hardly had she been hit! She was by nature fearless, +yet was she desperately afraid. + +"Will nothing make you touch the gate and try?" he asked gently. And +then, quietly as he spoke, the greatness of his longing made itself +heard. "My dear, my dear," he said, "will nothing make you take your +risks?" + +The words struck sharply upon her memories. She turned her eyes to +him. + +"It is strange that you should use those words," she said. "For there +is one thing which might make me take my risks. The return of the man +who used them to you in the North Sea." + +"Tony Stretton?" exclaimed Warrisden. + +"Yes. He is still away. It is said that he is on a long shooting +expedition somewhere in Central Africa, and out of reach. But that is +not the truth. We do not know where he is, or when he will come +back." + +"Shall I try to find him again?" said Warrisden. "This time I might +succeed in bringing him home." + +Pamela shook her head. + +"No," she answered. "I think I know why he stays away. And there would +be only one way of persuading him to return. Well--that means I must +not use, unless things have come to an extremity." + +The one means of persuasion was the truth. If she sent for Tony +Stretton again she must explain what that saying of hers spoken so +long ago had meant. She must write why he should not have left his +wife. She must relate the sordid story, which rendered his return +imperative, That she was prepared to do, if all else failed, in the +last resort, but not till then. + +"But the extremity has not been reached," she continued, "and I hope +it never will. I hope Tony Stretton will come back soon of his own +accord. That would be the best thing which could happen, ever so much +the best." She did not blame Tony for his absence, for she understood +the motive which caused it. In a way, she was inclined to approve of +it in itself, just as a motive, that is to say. It was the character +of Millie Stretton and his ignorance of it which made his experiment +so hazardous. Complete confidence in his wife's honour, indeed, was to +her thinking, and rightly, an essential part of his motive. She wished +him to return of his own accord and keep that confidence. + +"There is not the same necessity," she continued, choosing her words, +"that he should return immediately, as there was when I sent you out +to the North Sea; but it is possible that the necessity might recur." +For she knew that, though Callon was far away in Chili, letters came +from him to Millie. Only lately a careless remark of Millie's with +reference to that State had assured her of this. And if the letters +still came, though Callon had been away a year, it followed that they +were answered. + +"In that case you would send for me?" said Warrisden. + +"Yes. I should rely on you." + +And Warrisden answered quietly, "Thank you." + +He asked no questions. He seemed to understand that Pamela must use +him, and, while using him, not fail of loyalty to her sex. A feeling +of self-reproach suddenly troubled Pamela. She had never told him that +she had used another's help and not his. She wondered whether it was +quite fair not to tell him. But she kept silent. After all, she +thought, the news would only hurt him; and Mr. Mudge's help had been +help which he could not have given. She went back to the matter of +their relationship to one another. + +"So you understand what I think," she said. "I am afraid. I look for +signs. I cannot help doing that. I have set my heart on keeping a +promise which I made to Tony Stretton. If he returns, whether of his +own accord or by my persuasion, and things go well--why, then"--and +she turned her face from him and said, looking steadily in front of +her--"why, then, perhaps." + +As she spoke her face changed wonderfully. The mere utterance of the +word aloud conjured up dreams. A wistful smile made her lips +beautiful, her eyes grew dim. Just for a moment she gave those dreams +their way. She looked across the garden through a mist, seeing nothing +of the trees or the coloured flowers, but gazing into a vision of +other and golden days--of days perhaps to come. Warrisden stood at her +side, and did not speak. But something of those dreams he guessed, her +face had grown so young. + +She shook her dreams from her in a few moments. + +"So you see, at present," she resumed, "marriage is impossible. It +will always be impossible to me unless I can bring--everything, not +merely companionship, not merely liking; out the ever so much more +which there is. I cannot contemplate it at all under any other +conditions"--and now she looked at her companion--"and I believe it is +the same with you." + +"Yes," Warrisden replied, "I ask for everything." + +He had his convictions, and since there was complete confidence +between these two, he spoke them now. + +"It is unsafe, of course, to generalise on the subject of women. But I +do think this: If a man asks little from a woman, she will give him +even less than he asks, and she will give it grudgingly, sparingly; +counting what she gives. And that little, to my mind, is worth rather +less than nothing. Better have no ties than weak ones. If, on the +other hand, a man asks a great deal, and continually asks it, why, the +woman may get bored, and he may get nothing. In which case he is no +worse off than he was before. But if, on the other hand, the woman +does give in return----" + +"Well?" asked Pamela. + +"Well, then, she gives ever so much more than he asks, and gives it +willingly with open hands." + +Pamela thought the theory over. + +"Yes, I think that is generally true," she said. "But, after all, I am +giving you very little." + +Warrisden laughed. + +"That's true," he replied. "But then you are not bored, and I have not +done asking." + +Pamela laughed too, and their talk thus ended in a lighter note. They +walked towards the house, and as they did so a woman came out on to +the lawn. + +"This is Millie Stretton," said Pamela. + +"She is staying here?" cried Warrisden. + +"Yes," replied Pamela, "Before she comes I want to ask you to do +something for me. Oh, it is quite a small thing. But I should like you +very much to do it. Where do you go to from here?" + +"To London," said Warrisden, "I have business there." + +The business which called him to town had, indeed, only occurred to +him during the last half-hour. It had arisen from their conversation. +It seemed to Warrisden immediate and imperative. + +"Will you be in London to-morrow?" asked Pamela. + +"Yes." + +"Then I want you to write to me. Just a little letter--nothing much, a +line or two. And I want you to post it, not by the country post, but +afterwards, so that it will reach me in the evening. Don't write here, +for I am going home. And please don't forget." + +Millie Stretton joined them a moment afterwards, and Warrisden was +introduced to her. + +"I have had an offer for the house in Berkeley Square," she said to +Pamela. "I think I will take it. I shall be glad to be rid of it." + +They went back into the house. Warrisden wondered at Pamela's request +for a letter, and at her urgency that it should arrive at a particular +time. He was not discontented with the walk which they had taken under +the avenue of elms. It seemed to him that Pamela was coming slowly +towards him. There was a great difference between her "No" of last +year and her "I do not know" of to-day. Even that "I do not know" +while they talked had become "perhaps." Had she not owned even more, +since she was afraid the gate would open of itself did she but touch +and try? His hopes, therefore, rode high that day, and would have +ridden yet higher, could he have guessed why she so desired a few +lines in his handwriting in the evening of the day after to-morrow. + +The reason was this. Repairs, long needed, had at last been undertaken +in the house of Pamela's father, a few miles away; and those repairs +involved the rooms reserved for Pamela. There were certain drawers in +that room which had not been unlocked for years, and of which Pamela +sedulously guarded the keys. They held letters, a few small presents, +one or two photographs, and some insignificant trifles which could not +be valued, since their value depended only on their associations. +There were, for instance, some cheap red beads, and the history of +those beads tells all that need be said of the contents of those +locked drawers. + +Two hundred years before, a great full-rigged ship, bound with a +general cargo for the Guinea Coast, sailed down the Channel out of +Portsmouth. Amongst the cargo was a great store of these red beads. +The beads were to buy slaves for the plantations. But the great ship +got no further on her voyage than Bigbury Bay in Devonshire. She +damaged her rudder in a storm, and the storm swept her on to the bleak +rocks of Bolt Tail, dragged her back again into the welter of the sea, +drove her into Bigbury Bay, and flung her up there against the low red +cliffs, where all her crew perished. The cargo was spilt amongst the +breakers, and the shores of that bay were littered with red beads. You +may pick them up to this day amongst the pebbles. There Pamela had +picked them upon a hot August morning, very like to that which now +dreamed over this green, quiet garden of Leicestershire; and when she +had picked them up she had not been alone. The locked cabinets held +all the relics which remained to her from those few bright weeks in +Devon; and the mere touch of any one, however trifling, would have +magic to quicken her memories. Yet now the cabinets must be unlocked, +and all that was in them removed. There was a bad hour waiting for +Pamela, when she would remove these relics one by one--the faded +letters in the handwriting which she would never see again on any +envelope; the photograph of the face which could exchange no look with +her; the little presents from the hand which could touch hers no more. +It would be a relief, she thought, to come downstairs when that +necessary work was done, that bad hour over, and find a letter from +Warrisden upon the table. Just a few lines. She needed nothing more. + + + + + CHAPTER XX + + MR. CHASE DOES NOT ANSWER + + +Both Pamela and Millie Stretton walked with Warrisden through the hall +to the front door. Upon the hall-table letters were lying. Pamela +glanced at them as she passed, and caught one up rather suddenly. Then +she looked at Warrisden, and there was something of appeal in her +look. It was as though she turned to a confederate on whom she could +surely rely. But she said nothing, since Millie Stretton was at her +side. For the letter was in the handwriting of Mr. Mudge, who wrote +but rarely, and never without a reason. She read the letter in the +garden as soon as Warrisden had ridden off, and the news which it +contained was bad news. Callon had lived frugally in South America--by +Christmas he would have discharged his debts; and he had announced to +Mudge that he intended at that date to resign his appointment. There +were still four months, Pamela reflected--nay, counting the journey +home, five months; and within that time Tony Stretton might reappear. +If he did not, why, she could summon Warrisden to her aid. She looked +at Millie, who was reading a book in a garden-chair close by. Did she +know, Pamela wondered? But Millie gave no sign. + +Meanwhile, Warrisden travelled to London upon that particular business +which made a visit there in August so imperative. It had come upon him +while he had been talking with Pamela that it would be as well for him +to know the whereabouts of Tony Stretton at once; so that if the need +came he should be ready to set out upon the instant. On the following +evening, accordingly, he drove down to Stepney. It was very likely +that Chase would be away upon a holiday. But there was a chance that +he might find him clinging to his work through this hot August, a +chance worth the trouble of his journey. He drove to the house where +Chase lodged, thinking to catch him before he set out for his +evening's work at the mission. The door of the house stood open to the +street. Warrisden dismissed his cab, and walked up the steps into the +narrow hall. A door upon his right hand was opened, and a young man +politely asked Warrisden to step in. He was a fair-haired youth, with +glasses upon his nose, and he carried a napkin in his hand. He had +evidently been interrupted at his dinner by Warrisden's arrival. He +was not dining alone, for a youth of the same standing, but of a more +athletic mould, sat at the table. There was a third place laid, but +not occupied. + +Warrisden looked at the third chair. + +"I came to see Mr. Chase," he said. "I suppose that he has gone early +to the mission?" + +"No," said the youth who had opened the door. "He has not been well of +late. The hot weather in these close streets is trying. But he +certainly should have something to eat by now, even if he does not +intend to get up." + +He spoke in a pedantic, self-satisfied voice, and introduced himself +as Mr. Raphael Princkley, and his companion as Mr. Jonas Stiles, both +undergraduates of Queen's College, Oxford. + +"We are helping Chase in his work," continued Mr. Princkley. "It is +little we can do, but you are no doubt acquainted with the poetry of +Robert Browning: 'The little more, and how much it is'? In that line +we find our justification." + +The fair-haired youth rang the bell for the housekeeper. She was an +old woman, fat and slow, and she took her time in answering the +summons. + +"Mrs. Wither, have you called Mr. Chase?" he asked when the old lady +appeared at the door. + +"No, Mr. Princkley, sir," she replied. "You told me yesterday evening +not to disturb him on any account until he rang." + +Mr. Princkley turned to Warrisden. + +"Mr. Chase was unwell all yesterday," he said, "and at dinner-time he +told us that he felt unequal to his duties. He was sitting in that +empty place, and we both advised him not to overtax his strength." + +He appealed with a look to Mr. Stiles for corroboration. + +"Yes; we both advised him," said Stiles, between two mouthfuls; "and, +very wisely, he took our advice." + +"He rose from his chair," continued Princkley. "There was some fruit +upon the table. He took an apple from the dish. I think, Stiles, that +it was an apple which he took?" + +Mr. Stiles agreed, and went on with his dinner. + +"It was certainly an apple which he took. He took it in his hand." + +"You hardly expected him to take it with his foot!" rejoined +Warrisden, politely. Warrisden was growing a little restive under this +detailed account of Chase's indisposition. + +"No," replied Princkley, with gravity. "He took it in quite a natural +way, and went upstairs to his sitting-room. I gave orders to Mrs. +Wither that he must not be disturbed until he rang. That is so, Mrs. +Wither, is it not? Yes. I thank you." + +"That was yesterday evening!" cried Warrisden. + +"Yesterday evening," replied Mr. Princkley. + +"And no one has been near him since?" + +Then Mrs. Wither intervened. + +"Oh yes. I went into Mr. Chase's room an hour afterwards. He was +sitting in his armchair before the grate----" + +"Holding the apple in his hand. I think. Mrs. Wither, you said?" +continued Stiles. + +"Yes, sir," said Mrs. Wither. "He had his arm out resting on the arm +of the chair, and the apple was in his hand." + +"Well, well!" exclaimed Warrisden. + +"I told him that I would not call him in the morning until he rang, as +he wanted a good rest." + +"What did he say?" asked Warrisden. + +"Nothing, sir. As often as not he does not answer when he is spoken +to." + +A sudden fear seized upon Warrisden. He ran out of the room and up the +stairs to Chase's sitting-room. He knocked on the door; there was no +answer. He turned the handle and entered. Chase had not gone to bed +last night. He was still sitting in his armchair before the grate. One +arm was extended along the arm of the chair, with the palm turned +upwards, and in the palm lay an apple. Chase was sitting huddled up, +with his head fallen forward upon his breast like a man asleep. +Warrisden crossed the room and touched the hand which held the apple. +It was quite cold. The apple rolled on to the floor. Warrisden turned +to the housekeeper. She was standing in the doorway, and staring over +her shoulder were the two undergraduates. + +"He was dead," said Warrisden, "when you looked into the room an hour +afterwards!" + +The three people in the doorway stood stupidly aghast. Warrisden +pushed them out, locked the door on the outside, and removed the key. + +"Mr. Princkley, will you run for a doctor?" he asked. + +Princkley nodded his head, and went off upon his errand. + +Warrisden and Stiles descended the stairs into the dining-room. + +"I think you had better take the news to the mission," said Warrisden; +and Stiles in his turn went off without a word. Mrs. Wither for her +part had run out of the house as quickly as she could. She hardly knew +what she was doing. She had served as housekeeper to Mr. Chase ever +since he had come to Stepney, and she was dazed by the sudden +calamity. She was aware of a need to talk, to find the neighbours and +talk. + +Warrisden was thus left alone in the house. It had come about without +any premeditation upon his part. He was the oldest man of the three +who had been present, and the only one who had kept his wits clear. +Both Princkley and Stiles had looked to him to decide what must be +done. They regarded him as Chase's friend, whereas they were mere +acquaintances. It did not even occur to Warrisden at first that he was +alone in the house, that he held in his hand the key to Chase's room. +He was thinking of the strange perplexing life which had now so +strangely ended. He thought of his first meeting with Chase in the +mission, and of the distaste which he had felt; he remembered the +array of liqueur bottles on the table, and the half-hour during which +Chase had talked. A man of morbid pleasures, that had been Warrisden's +impression. Yet there were the years of work, here, amongst these +squalid streets. Even August had seen him clinging to--nay, dying +at--his work. As Warrisden looked out of the window he saw a group of +men and women and children gather outside the house. There was not a +face but wore a look of consternation. If they spoke, they spoke in +whispers, like people overawed. A very strange life! Warrisden knew +many--as who does not?--who saw the high-road distinctly, and could +not for the life of them but walk upon the low one. But to use both +deliberately, as it seemed Chase had done; to dip from the high-road +on to the low, and then painfully to scramble up again, and again +willingly to drop, as though the air of those stern heights were too +rigorous for continuous walking; to live the double life because he +could not entirely live the one, and would not entirely live the +other. Thus Warrisden solved the problem of the _dilettante_ curate +and his devotion to his work, and his solution was correct. + +But he held the key of Chase's room in his hand; and there was no one +but himself in the house. His thoughts came back to Pamela and the +object of his journey up to town. He was sorely tempted to use the +key, since now the means by which he had hoped to discover in what +quarter of the world Stretton wandered and was hid were tragically +closed to him. Chase could no longer speak, even if he would. Very +likely there were letters upstairs lying on the table. There might be +one from Tony Stretton. Warrisden did not want to read it--a mere +glance at the postmark, and at the foreign stamp upon the envelope. +Was that so great a crime? Warrisden was sorely tempted. If only he +could be sure that Chase would a second time have revealed what he was +bidden to keep hid, why, then, would it not be just the same thing as +if Chase were actually speaking with his lips? Warrisden played with +the key. He went to the door and listened. There was not a sound in +the house except the ticking of a clock. The front door still stood +open. He must be quick if he meant to act. Warrisden turned to the +stairs. The thought of the dead man huddled in the chair, a silent +guardian of the secret, weighted his steps. Slowly he mounted. Such +serious issues hung upon his gaining this one piece of knowledge. The +fortunes of four people--Pamela and himself, Tony Stretton and his +wife--might all be straightened out if he only did this one thing, +which he had no right to do. He would not pry amongst Chase's papers; +he would merely glance at the table, that was all. He heard voices in +the hall while he was still upon the stairs. He turned back with a +feeling of relief. + +At the foot of the stairs stood Mr. Princkley and the doctor. +Warrisden handed the key of the room to the latter, and the three men +went up. The doctor opened the door and crossed to the armchair. Then +he looked about the room. + +"Nothing has been touched, of course?" + +"Nothing," replied Warrisden. + +The doctor looked again at the dead man. Then he turned to Warrisden, +mistaking him, as the others had done, for some relation or near +friend. + +"I can give no certificate," said he. + +"There must be an inquest?" + +"Yes." + +Then the doctor moved suddenly to the table, which stood a few feet +from the armchair. There was a decanter upon it half filled with a +liquid like brown sherry, only a little darker. The doctor removed the +stopper and raised the decanter to his nose. + +"Ah!" said he, in a voice of comprehension. He turned again to +Warrisden. + +"Did you know?" he asked. + +"No." + +The doctor held the decanter towards Warrisden. Warrisden took it, +moistened the tip of a finger with the liquid, and tasted it. It had a +bitter flavour. + +"What is it?" he asked. + +"Laudanum," said the doctor. "An overdose of it." + +"Where is the glass, then, in which it was taken?" + +A tumbler stood upon the table close to the decanter-stopper. The +doctor took it up. + +"Yes, I noticed that," said Warrisden; "I noticed that it is clean." + +The doctor took the glass to the window, turned it upside down, and +held it to the light. It was quite dry, quite clean. + +"Surely it's evident what happened," said Warrisden. "Chase came into +the room, opened that cupboard door in the corner there. His keys are +still dangling in the lock, he took the decanter and the tumbler out, +placed them on the table at his side, sat down in his chair with the +apple in his hand, leaned back and quietly died." + +"Yes, no doubt," said the doctor. "But I think here will be found the +reason why he leaned back and quietly died," and he touched the +decanter. "Opium poisoning. It may not have been an overdose, but a +regular practice." He went to the door and called for Mrs. Wither. +Mrs. Wither had now returned to the house. When she came upstairs into +the room, he pointed to the decanter. + +"Did you ever see this before?" + +"No, sir," she answered. + +"Or that cupboard open?" + +"No, it was always locked." + +"Quite so," said the doctor. "You had better get some women to help +you here," he went on; and, with Warrisden's assistance, he lifted +Chase from the chair and carried him into his bedroom. + +"I must give notice to the police," he went on, and again he appealed +to Warrisden. "Do you mind staying in the house till I come back?" + +"Not at all." + +The doctor locked the door of the room and took the key away with him. +Warrisden waited with Princkley in the dining-room. The doctor had +taken away the key. It seemed that his chance of discovering the +secret which was of so much importance to Pamela and Millie Stretton +and himself had vanished. If only he had come yesterday, or the day +before! He sat down by the window and gazed out upon the street. A +group of men and women were gathered in the roadway, looking up at the +windows and talking quietly together. Then Princkley from behind +said-- + +"Some letters came for Chase this morning. They were not taken up to +his room. You had better look at them." + +Every one took him for a close friend. Princkley brought him the +letters, and he glanced at the superscriptions lest any one should +wear a look of immediate importance. He held the letters in his hand +and turned them over one by one, and half-way through the file he +stopped. He had come to a letter written upon thin paper, in a man's +handwriting, with a foreign stamp upon the envelope. The stamp was a +French one, and there was printed upon it: "Poste d'Algerie." + +Warrisden examined the post-mark. The letter came from Ain-Sefra. +Warrisden went on with his examination without a word. But his heart +quickened. He wondered whether he had found the clue. Ain-Sefra in +Algeria. Warrisden had never heard of the place before. It might be a +health resort, a wintering place. But this was the month of August. +There would be no visitors at this time to a health resort in Algeria. +He handed the letters back to Princkley. + +"I cannot tell whether they are important or not," he said. "I knew +Chase very slightly. His relations must be informed. I suppose Mrs. +Wither knows where they live." + +He took his departure as soon as the doctor had returned with the +police, and drove back to his rooms. A search through the Encyclopaedia +told him nothing of Ain-Sefra; but, on the other hand, he could not +look at the article on Algeria without the Foreign Legion leaping to +his eyes at once--so great and magnificent a part it played in the +modern history of that colony. The Foreign Legion! Warrisden jumped to +the conviction that there was the secret of Tony Stretton's +disappearance. Every reason he could imagine came to his aid. Let a +man wish to disappear, as, from whatsoever reason, Tony Stretton did, +where else could he so completely bury himself and yet live? +Hardships? Dangers? Yes. But Tony Stretton had braved hardships and +dangers in the North Sea, and had made light of them. A detachment of +the Foreign Legion might well be stationed at this oasis of Ain-Sefra, +of which his Encyclopaedia knew nothing. He had no doubt there was a +trooper there, serving under some false name, who would start if the +name of "Stretton" were suddenly shouted to him behind his back. + +Warrisden wrote no word of his conjecture to Pamela; he wished to +raise no hopes which he could not fulfil. Convinced as he was, he +wished for certain proof. But in fulfilment of his promise he wrote to +Pamela that night. Just a few lines--nothing more, as she had asked. +But in those few lines he wrote that he would like her to procure for +him a scrap of Tony Stretton's handwriting. Could she do it? In a week +the scrap of handwriting arrived. Warrisden, looking at it, knew that +the same hand had addressed the envelope at Ain-Sefra to Mr. Chase. + +Warrisden was ready now, if the summons to service should come once +more from Pamela. + + + + + CHAPTER XXI + + CALLON REDIVIVUS + + +All through that autumn Pamela watched for Tony's return, and watched +in vain. Winter came, and with the winter a letter from Mr. Mudge. +Lionel Callon had booked his passage home on a steamer which sailed on +Christmas Eve from the port of Valparaiso. Pamela received the news +one morning of December. She hunted that day with the Quorn, and for +once her thoughts were set on other matters than this immediate +business. The long grass meadows slipped away under her horse's feet +the while she pondered how once more the danger of Callon's presence +was to be averted. At times she hoped it would not need averting. +Callon had been eighteen months away, and Millie was quick to forget. +But she was no less quick to respond to a show of affection. Let +Callon lay siege again persistently, and the danger at once was close. +Besides, there were the letters. That he should have continued to +write during the months of his absence was a sign that he had not +forgone his plan of conquest. + +Pamela returned home with a scheme floating in her mind. Some words +which her mother had spoken at the breakfast-table had recurred to +her, and at tea Pamela revived the subject. + +"Did you say that you would not go to Roquebrune this winter, mother?" +she asked. + +"Yes," Mrs. Mardale replied; "I have been for so many winters now. I +shall stay in England, for a change. We can let the Villa Pontignard, +no doubt." + +"Oh, there is no hurry," said Pamela. She added, "I shall be going to +London to-morrow, but I shall be back in the evening." + +She thought over her plan that evening. Its execution would cost her +something, she realised. For many years she had not been out of +England during the winter. She must leave her horses behind, and that +was no small sacrifice for Pamela. She had one horse in particular, a +big Irish horse, which had carried her in the days when her troubles +were at their worst. He would follow her about the paddock or the yard +nuzzling against her arm; a horse of blood and courage, yet gentle +with her, thoughtful and kind for her as only a horse amongst the +animals can be. She must leave him. On the other hand, her thoughts of +late had been turning to Roquebrune for a particular reason. She had a +feeling that she would rather like to tread again those hill-paths, to +see once more those capes and headlands of which every one was a +landmark of past pain--just as an experiment. She travelled to London +the next day and drove from St. Pancras into Regent's Park. + +Millie Stretton had taken a house on the west side of the park. It +looked east across the water and through the glades of trees, and in +front of it were the open spaces of which Tony and she had dreamed; +and the sunlight streamed through the windows and lay in golden +splashes on the floors when there was sunlight in London anywhere at +all. When she looked from her window on the first morning, she could +not but remember the plans which Tony and she had debated long ago. +They had been so certain of realising them. Well, they were realised +now, for her, at all events. There was the sunlight piercing through +every cranny; there were the wide expanses of green, and trees. Only +the windows looked on Regent's Park, and on no wide prairie; and of +the two who, with so much enthusiasm, had marked out their imaginary +site and built their house, there was only one to enjoy the +fulfilment. Millie Stretton thought of Tony that morning, but with an +effort. What Pamela had foreseen had come to pass. He had grown +elusive to her thoughts, she could hardly visualise his person to +herself; he was almost unreal. Had he walked in at that moment he +would have been irksome to her as a stranger. + +It was, however, Pamela Mardale who walked in. She was shown over the +house, and until that ceremony was over she did not broach the reason +for her visit. Then, however, Millie said with delight-- + +"It is what I have always wanted--sunlight." + +"I came to suggest more sunlight," said Pamela. "There is our villa at +Roquebrune in the south of France. It will be empty this winter. And I +thought that perhaps you and I might go out there together as soon as +Christmas is past." + +Millie was standing at the window with her back to Pamela. She turned +round quickly. + +"But you hate the place," she said. + +Pamela answered with sincerity-- + +"None the less I want to go this winter. I want to go very much. I +won't tell you why. But I do want to go. And I should like you to come +with me." + +Pamela was anxious to discover whether that villa and its grounds, and +the view from its windows, had still the power to revive the grief +with which they had been so completely associated in her mind. +Hitherto she had shrunk from the very idea of ever revisiting +Roquebrune; of late, however, since Warrisden, in a word, had occupied +so large a place in her thoughts, she had wished to put herself to the +test, to understand whether her distress was really and truly dead, or +whether it merely slumbered and could wake again. It was necessary, +for Warrisden's sake as much as her own, that she should come to a +true knowledge. And nowhere else could she so certainly acquire it. If +the sight of Roquebrune, the familiar look of the villa's rooms, the +familiar paths whereon she had carried so overcharged a heart, had no +longer power to hurt and pain her, then she would be sure that she +could start her life afresh. It was only fair--so she phrased it in +her thoughts--that she should make the experiment. + +Millie turned back to the window. + +"I do not think that I shall leave London this winter," she said. "You +see, I have only just got into the house." + +"It might spare you some annoyance," Pamela suggested. + +"I don't understand," said Millie. + +"The annoyance of having to explain Tony's absence. He will very +likely have returned by the spring." + +Millie shrugged her shoulders. + +"I have borne that annoyance for two years," she replied. "I do not +think I shall go away this winter." + +Was Millie thinking of Callon's return? Pamela wondered. Was it on +his account that she decided to remain? Pamela could not ask the +question. Her plan had come to naught, and she returned that afternoon +to Leicestershire. + +Christmas passed, and half-way through the month of January Callon +called, on a dark afternoon, at Millie Stretton's house. Millie was +alone; she was indeed expecting him. When Callon entered the room he +found her standing with her back to the window, her face to the door, +and so she stood, without speaking, for a few moments. + +"You have been a long time away," she said, and she looked at him with +curiosity, but with yet more anxiety to mark any changes which had +come in his face. + +"Yes," said he, "a long time." + +Millie rang the bell and ordered tea to be brought. + +"You have not changed," said she. + +"Nor you." + +Millie had spoken with a noticeable distance in her manner; and she +had not given him her hand. With her back towards the light she had +allowed very little of her expression to be visible to her visitor. +When tea was brought in, however, she sat between the fireplace and +the window, and the light fell upon her. Callon sat opposite to her. + +"At last I know that I am at home again," he said, with a smile. Then +he leaned forward and lowered his voice, although there was no third +person in the room. He knew the value of such tricks. "I have looked +forward during these eighteen months so very much to seeing you +again." + +Millie's face coloured, but it was with anger rather than pleasure. +There was a hard look upon her face; her eyes blamed him. + +"Yet you went away without a word to me," she said. "You did not come +to see me before you went, you never hinted you were going." + +"You thought it unkind?" + +"It was unkind," said Millie. + +"But I wrote to you. I have written often." + +"In no letter have you told me why you went away," said Millie. + +"You missed me when I went, then?" + +Millie shrugged her shoulders. + +"Well, I had seen a good deal of you. I missed--I missed--something," +she said. Callon drank his tea and set down his cup. + +"I have come to tell you why I went away without a word. I never +mentioned the reason in my letters; I meant to tell you it with my +lips. I did not _go_ away, I was _sent_ away." + +Millie was perplexed. "Sent away?" she repeated. "I understood, from +what you wrote, that you accepted a post from Mr. Mudge?" + +"I had to accept it," said Callon. "It was forced on me. Mudge was +only the instrument to get me out of the way." + +"Who sent you away, then?" asked Millie. + +"A friend of yours--Miss Pamela Mardale." + +Millie Stretton leaned back in her chair. "Pamela!" she cried +incredulously. "Pamela sent you away! Why?" + +"Because she thought that I was seeing too much of you." + +Callon watched for the effect which his words would produce. He saw +the change come in Millie's face. There was a new light in her eyes, +her face flushed, she was angry; and anger was just the feeling he had +meant to arouse, anger against Pamela, anger which would drive Millie +towards him. He had kept his explanation back deliberately until he +could speak it himself. From the moment when he had started from +England he had nursed his determination to tell it to Millie Stretton. +He had been hoodwinked, outwitted by Pamela and her friend; he had +been banished to Chili for two years. Very well. But the game was not +over yet. His vanity was hurt as nothing had ever hurt it before. He +was stung to a thirst for revenge. He would live frugally, clear off +his debts, return to England, and prove to his enemies the futility of +their plan. He thought of Pamela Mardale; he imagined her hearing of +his departure and dismissing him straightway contemptuously from her +thoughts. For eighteen months he nursed his anger, and waited for the +moment when he could return. There should be a surprise for Pamela +Mardale. She should understand that he was a dangerous fellow to +attack. Already, within a day of his landing, he had begun to +retaliate. The anger in Millie Stretton's face was of good augury for +him. + +"Pamela!" cried Millie, clenching her hands together suddenly. "Yes, +it was Pamela." + +She bethought her of that pressing invitation to the south of France, +an invitation from Pamela who looked on the shires as the only +wintering-place. That was explained now. Mr. Mudge had informed +Pamela, no doubt, that Lionel Callon was returning. Millie was +furious. She looked on this interference as a gross impertinence. + +Callon rose from his chair. + +"You can imagine it, was humiliating to me to be tricked and sent +away. But I was helpless. I am a poor man; I was in debt. Miss Mardale +had an old rich man devoted to her in Mr. Mudge. He bought up my +debts, his lawyer demanded an immediate settlement of them all, and I +could not immediately settle them. I was threatened with proceedings, +with bankruptcy." + +"You should have come to me," cried Millie. + +Callon raised a protesting hand. + +"Oh, Lady Stretton, how could I?" he exclaimed in reproach. "Think for +a moment! Oh, you would have offered help at a hint. I know you. You +are most kind, most generous. But think, you are a woman. I am a man. +Oh no!" + +Callon did not mention that Mr. Mudge had compelled him to accept or +refuse the post in Chili with only an hour's deliberation, and that +hour between seven and eight in the evening. He had thought of calling +upon Millie to suggest in her mind the offer which she had now made, +but he had not had the time. He was glad now. His position was thereby +so much the stronger. + +"I had to accept Mudge's offer. Even the acceptance was made as +humiliating as it possibly could be. For Mudge deliberately let me see +that his only motive was to get me out of the country. He did not care +whether I knew his motive or not. I did not count," he cried, +bitterly. "I was a mere pawn upon a chess-board. I had to withdraw +from my candidature. My career was spoilt. What did they care--Mr. +Mudge and your friend? I was got out of your way." + +"Oh, oh!" cried Millie; and Callon stepped quickly to her side. + +"Imagine what these months have been to me," he went on. "I was out +there in Chili, without friends. I had nothing to do. Every one else +upon the railway had his work, his definite work, his definite +position. I was nothing at, all, a mere prisoner, in everybody's way, +a man utterly befooled. But that was not the worst of it. Shall I be +frank?" He made a pretence of hesitation. "I will. I will take the +risk of frankness. I was sent away just when I had begun to think a +great deal about you." Millie Stretton, who had been gazing into her +companion's face with the utmost sympathy, lowered her eyes to the +floor. But she was silent. + +"That was the worst," he continued softly. "I was angry, of course. I +knew that I was losing the better part of two years----" + +And Millie interrupted him: "How did she know?" she exclaimed. + +"Who? Oh, Miss Mardale. Do you remember the evening she came to +Whitewebs? I was waiting for you in the hall. You came down the stairs +and ran up again. There was a mirror on the mantelpiece. She guessed +then. Afterwards she and Mudge discussed us in the drawing-room. I saw +them." + +Millie got up from her chair and moved to the fireplace. + +"It was on my account that you have lost two years, that your career +has been injured," she said, in a low voice. She was really hurt, +really troubled. "I am so very sorry. What return can I ever make to +you? I will never speak to Pamela again." + +Callon crossed and stood beside her. + +"No, don't do that," he said. "It would be--unwise." + +Her eyes flashed up to his quickly, and as quickly fell. The colour +slowly deepened in her cheeks. + +"What does it matter about my career?" he continued, with a smile. "I +see you again. If you wish to make me a return, let me see you very +often!" + +He spoke with tenderness, and he was not pretending. What space did +Millie Stretton fill in his thoughts? She was pretty, she was +sympathetic, she was ready to catch the mood of her companion. It was +not merely an act of retaliation which Callon projected. Such love as +he had to give was hers. It was not durable, it was intertwined with +meanness, it knew no high aims; yet, such as it was, it was hers. It +gained, too, a fictitious strength from the mere fact that he had been +deliberately kept from her. The eighteen months of bondage had given +her an importance in his eyes, had made her more desirable through the +very difficulty of attaining her. Millie allowed him to come again and +again. She had a natural taste for secrecies, and practised them now, +as he bade her do, without any perception of the humiliation which +they involved. If he called at her house, it was after the dusk had +fallen, and when she was at home to no other visitors. They dined +together in the restaurants of unfashionable hotels, and if she drove +to them in her brougham, she sent it away, and was escorted to her +door in a cab. Callon was a past-master in concealment; he knew the +public places where the public never is, and rumour did not couple +their names. But secrecy is not for the secret when the secret ones +are a man and a woman. It needs too much calculation in making +appointments, too much punctuality in keeping them, too close a +dependence upon the probable thing happening at the probable time. +Sooner or later an accident, which could not be foreseen, occurs. It +may be no more than the collision of a cab and the summons of the +driver. Or some one takes, one morning, a walk in an unaccustomed +spot. Or the intriguers fall in quite unexpectedly with another, who +has a secret too, of which they were not aware. Sooner or later some +one knows. + +It was the last of these contingencies which brought about the +disclosure in the case of Callon and Millie Stretton. Six weeks had +passed since Callon's return. It was just a month from Easter. Millie +dined with some friends, and went with them afterwards to a theatre in +the Haymarket. At the door she sent her carriage home, and when the +performance was over she took a hansom cab. She declined any escort, +and was driven up Regent Street towards her home. At the corner of +Devonshire Street, in Portland Place, a man loitered upon the pavement +with a white scarf showing above his coat-collar. Millie opened the +trap and spoke to the driver. The cab stopped by the loiterer at the +street corner, who opened the doors and stepped in. The loiterer was +Lionel Callon. + +"Drive round Regent's Park," he said. + +The cab drove northwards through Park Place and along the broad road +towards Alexandra Gate. The air was warm, the stars bright overhead, +the dark trees lined the roadway on the left, the road under the +wheels was very white. There was a great peace in the park. It was +quite deserted. In a second it seemed they had come out of the glare, +and the roar of streets, into a land of quiet and cool gloom. Millie +leaned back while Callon talked, and this was the burden of his talk. + +"Let us go to the south of France. I will go first. Do you follow! You +go for Easter. It will be quite natural. You stay at Eze, I at the +little Reserve by the sea a mile away. There is a suite of rooms +there. No one need know." Three times the cab drove round the park +while Callon urged, and Millie more and more faintly declined. The +driver sat perched upon his box, certain of a good fare, indifferent. +Inside his cab, on this quiet night, the great issues of life and +honour were debated. Millie had just her life in her hands. One way or +the other, by a 'Yes' or a 'No,' she must decide what she would do +with it, and, to whatever decision she came, it must reach out +momentous with consequences and touch other lives beyond hers and +beyond those others, others still. Her husband, her relations, her +friends--not one of them but was concerned in this midnight drive. It +seemed to Millie almost that she heard them hurrying about the cab, +calling to her, reaching out their hands. So vivid was her thought, +that she could count them, and could recognise their faces. She looked +amongst them for her husband. But Tony was not there. She could not +see him, she could not hear his voice. Round and round past the trees, +on the white road, the cab went jingling on, the driver, indifferent, +upon his perch, the tempter and the tempted within. + +"Your husband does not care," said Callon. "If he did, would he stay +so long away?" + +"No, he does not care," said Millie. If he cared, would he not be +among that suppliant throng which ran about the cab? And all at once +it seemed that the hurrying footsteps lagged behind. The voices called +more faintly; she could not see the outreaching hands. + +"No one need know," said Callon. + +"_Someone always knows_," replied Millie. + +"What then?" cried Callon. "If you love, you will not mind. If you +love, you will abandon everything--everyone. If you love!" + +He had taken the right way to persuade her. Call upon Millie for a +great sacrifice, she would make it, she would glory in making it, just +for the moment. Disenchantment would come later; but nothing of it +would she foresee. As she had matched herself with Tony, when first he +had proposed to leave her behind in 'his father's house, so now she +matched herself with Callon, she felt strong. + +"Very well," she said. "I will follow." + +Callon stopped the cab and got out. As he closed the doors and told +the cabman where to drive, a man, wretchedly clad, slouched past and +turned into the Marylebone Road. That was all. Sooner or later some +one was sure to discover their secret. It happened that the some one +passed them by to-night. + + + + + CHAPTER XXII + + MR. MUDGE'S CONFESSION + + +On the following morning a telegram was brought to Pamela at her +father's house in Leicestershire. It came from Mr. Mudge, and +contained these words: "Important that I should see you. Coming down. +Please be at home at two." Punctually Mr. Mudge arrived. Pamela +received him in her own sitting-room. She was waiting with a restless +anxiety, and hardly waited for the door to be closed. + +"You have bad news for me," she said. "Oh, I know! You are a busy man. +You would not have come down to me had you not bad news. I am very +grateful for your coming, but you have bad news." + +"Yes," said Mr. Mudge, gravely; "news so bad that you must ask your +other friend to help you. I can do nothing here." + +It cost Mr. Mudge a little to acknowledge that he was of no avail in +this particular instance. He would rather have served Pamela himself, +had it been possible. He was fully aware of his age, and his looks, +and his limitations. He was quite willing to stand aside for the other +friend; indeed, he wished, with all his heart, that she should be +happy with some mate of her own people. But at the same time he wished +her to owe as much as possible of her happiness to him. He was her +friend, but there was just that element of jealousy in his friendship +which springs up when the friends are man and woman. Pamela understood +that it meant some abnegation on his part to bid her call upon another +than himself. She was still more impressed, in consequence, with the +gravity of the news he had to convey. + +"Is it Mr. Callon?" she asked. + +"Yes," he replied. "It is imperative that Sir Anthony Stretton should +return, and return at once. Of that I am very sure." + +"You have seen Mr. Callon?" asked Pamela. + +"And Lady Stretton. They were together." + +"When?" + +"Last night. In Regent's Park." + +Pamela hesitated. She was doubtful how to put her questions. She +said-- + +"And you are sure the trouble is urgent?" + +Mr. Mudge nodded his head. + +"Very sure. I saw them together. I saw the look on Lady Stretton's +face. It was a clear night. There was a lamp too, in the cab. I passed +them as Callon got out and said 'Good-night.'" + +Pamela sat down in a chair, and fixed her troubled eyes on her +companion. + +"Did they see you?" + +Mr. Mudge smiled. + +"No." + +"Let me have the whole truth," cried Pamela, "Tell me the story from +the beginning. How you came to see them--everything." + +Mr. Mudge sat down in his turn. He presented to her a side of his +character which she had not hitherto suspected. She listened, and was +moved to sympathy, as no complaint could ever have moved her; and Mr. +Mudge was the last man to complain. Yet the truth came out clearly. +Outwardly prosperous and enviable, he had yet inwardly missed all. A +man of so wide a business, so many undertakings, so occupied a life, +it was natural to dissociate him from the ordinary human sympathies +and desires. It seemed that he could have neither time nor inclination +to indulge them. But here he was, as he had once done before, not +merely admitting their existence within him, but confessing that they +were far the greater part of him, and that because they had been +thwarted, the prosperous external life of business to which he seemed +so ardently enchained was really of little account, He spoke very +simply. Pamela lost sight of the business machine altogether. Here was +a man, like another, telling her that through his vain ambitions his +life had gone astray. She found a pathos in the dull and unimpressive +look of him--his bald, uncomely head, his ungraceful figure. There was +a strange contrast between his appearance and the fanciful antidote +for disappointment which had brought him into Regent's Park when +Callon and Lady Stretton were discussing their future course. + +"I told you something of my history at Newmarket," he said. "You must +remember what I told you, or you will not understand." + +"I remember very well," said Pamela, gently. "I think that I shall +understand." + +Pamela of late, indeed, had gained much understanding. Two years ago +the other point of view was to her always without interest. As often +as not she was unaware that it existed; when she was aware, she +dismissed it without consideration. But of late her eyes had learned +to soften at the troubles of others, her mind to be perplexed with +their perplexities. + +"Yes," said Mudge, nodding his head, with a smile towards her. "You +will understand now." + +And he laid so much emphasis upon the word that Pamela looked up in +surprise. + +"Why now?" she asked. + +"Because, recently, imagination has come to you. I have seen, I have +noticed. Imagination, the power to see clearly, the power to +understand--perhaps the greatest gift which love has in all his big +box of gifts." + +Pamela coloured at his words. She neither admitted nor denied the +suggestion they contained. + +"I have therefore ho fear that you will misunderstand," Mr. Mudge +insisted. "I told you that my career, such as it is, has left me a +very lonely man amongst a crowd of acquaintances, who are no more in +sympathy with me than I myself am in sympathy with them. I did not +tell you that I had found a way of alleviation." + +"No," said Pamela. She was at a loss to understand how this statement +of her companion was connected with his detection of Callon and Lady +Stretton; but she had no doubt there was a connection. Mudge was not +of those who take a pride in disclosing the details of their life and +character in and out of season. If he spoke of himself, he did so with +a definite reason, which bore upon the business in hand. "No; on the +contrary, you said that you could not go back and start afresh. You +had too much upon your hands. You were fixed in your isolation." + +"I did not even then tell you all the truth. I could not go back +half-way, that is true. I do not think I would find any comfort in +that course even if I could; but I can and I do go back all the way at +times. I reconstruct the days when I was very, very poor, and yet full +of hope, full of confidence. I do not mean that I sit in front of my +fire and tell myself the story. I do much more. I actually live them +over again, so far as I can. That puzzles you," he said, with a laugh. + +Pamela, indeed, was looking at him with a frown of perplexity upon her +forehead. + +"How do you live them again?" she asked. "I don't understand." + +"In this way," said Mudge. "I keep an old, worn-out suit of clothes +locked up in a cupboard. Well, when I find the house too lonely, and +my servants, with their noiseless tread, get on to my nerves, I just +put on that suit of clothes and revisit the old haunts where I used to +live forty and fifty years ago. Often I have come back from a dinner +party, let myself in at my front door, and slipped out of a side +entrance half an hour later on one of my pilgrimages. You would never +know me; you might toss me a shilling, that's all. Of course, I have +to be careful. I am always expecting to be taken up as a thief as I +slink away from the house. I would look rather a fool if that +happened, wouldn't I?" and he laughed. "But it never has yet." He +suddenly turned to her. "I enjoy myself upon those jaunts, you know; I +really enjoy myself. I like the secrecy. To slip out of the great, +silent house, to get clear away from the pictures, and the furniture, +and the obedience, and to tramp down into the glare and the noise of +the big streets, and to turn into some pothouse where once, years ago, +I used to take my supper and dream of the future. It's a sort of +hide-and-seek in itself." He laughed again, and then suddenly became +serious. "But it's much more than that--ever so much more." + +"Where do you go?" asked Pamela. + +"It depends upon the time I have. If it's early I go down to Deptford, +very often. I get into a tram and ride down a street where I once +wandered all night because I hadn't the price of a lodging. I look at +the old cookshop where I used to flatten my nose against the glass and +dream that I had the run of my teeth. I get down and go into a +public-house, say, with a sanded floor, and have a sausage and mash +and a pot of beer, just as I was doing forty years ago, when this or +that scheme, which turned out well, first came into my head. But don't +misunderstand," Mudge exclaimed. "I don't set off upon these visits +for the satisfaction of comparing what I was then with what I have +become. It is to get back to what I was then, as nearly as I can; to +recapture, just for a moment, some of the high hopes, some of the +anticipations of happiness to be won which I felt in those days; to +forget that the happiness has never been won, that the high hopes were +for things not worth the trouble spent in acquiring them. I was wet, +very often hungry, always ill-clothed; but I was happy in those days, +Miss Mardale, though very likely I didn't know it. I was young, the +future was mine, a solid reality; and the present--why, that was a +time of work and dreams. There's nothing much better than that +combination, Miss Mardale--work and dreams!" + +He repeated the words wistfully, and was silent for a moment. No doubt +those early struggles had not been so pleasant as they appeared in the +retrospect; but time had stripped them of their bitterness and left to +Mr. Mudge just that part of them which was worth remembering. + +"I had friends in those days," he went on. "I wonder what has become +of them all? In all my jaunts I have never seen one." + +"And where else do you go?" asked Pamela. + +"Oh, many places. There's a little narrow market between Shaftesbury +Avenue and Oxford Street, where the gas-jets flare over the barrows on +a Saturday night, and all the poor people go marketing. That's a haunt +of mine. I was some time, too, when I was young, at work near the +Marylebone Road. There's a tavern near Madame Tussaud's where I used +to go and have supper at the counter in the public bar. Do you +remember the night of Lady Millingham's reception, when we looked out +of the window and saw Sir Anthony Stretton? Well, I supped at that +tavern in the Marylebone Road on that particular night. I was hard put +to it, too, when I used to work in Marylebone. I slept for three +nights in Regent's Park. There's a coffee-stall close to the bridge, +just outside the park, on the north side." + +Pamela started, and Mudge nodded his head. + +"Yes; that is how I came to see Lady Stretton and Mr. Callon. A hansom +cab drove past me just as I crossed the road to go out of the gate to +the coffee-stall. I noticed it enough to see that it held a man and a +woman in evening dress, but no more. I stayed at the coffee-stall for +a little while talking with the cabmen and the others who were about +it, and drinking my coffee. As I returned into the park the cab drove +past me again. I thought it was the same cab, from the casual glance I +gave, and with the same people inside it. They had driven round, were +still driving round. It was a fine night, a night of spring, fresh, +and cool, and very pleasant. I did not wonder; I rather sympathised +with them," he said, with a smile. "You see, I have never driven round +Regent's Park at night with a woman I cared for beside me;" and again +the wistful note was very audible in his voice; and he added, in a low +voice, "That was not for me." + +He shook the wistfulness from him and resumed-- + +"Well, as I reached the south side of the park, and was close by Park +Place, the cab came towards me again, and pulled up. Callon got out. I +saw him clearly. I saw quite clearly, too, who was within the cab. So +you see there is danger. Mere friends do not drive round and round +Regent's Park at night." + +Mr. Mudge rose, and held out his hand. + +"I must get back to town. I have a fly waiting to take me to the +station," he said. + +Pamela walked with him to the door of the house. As they stood in the +hall she said-- + +"I thanked you, before you spoke at all, for putting your business +aside for my sake, and coming down to me. I thank you still more now, +and for another reason. I thank you for telling me what you have told +me about yourself. Such confessions," and she smiled upon the word, +"cannot be made without great confidence in the one they are made to." + +"I have that confidence," said Mudge. + +"I know. I am glad," replied Pamela; and she resumed: "They cannot be +made, either, without creating a difference. We no longer stand where +we did before they were made. I always looked upon you as my friend; +but we are far greater friends now, is not that so?" + +She spoke with great simplicity and feeling, her eyes glistened a +little, and she added, "You are not living now with merely +acquaintances around you." + +Mr. Mudge took her hand. + +"I am very glad that I came," he said; and, mounting into the fly, he +drove away. + +Pamela went back to the house and wrote out a telegram to Warrisden. +She asked him to come at once to--and then she paused. Should he come +here? No; there was another place, with associations for her which had +now grown very pleasant and sweet to her thoughts. She asked him to +meet her at the place where they had once kept tryst before--the +parlour of the inn upon the hill in the village of the Three Poplars. +Thither she had ridden before from Lady Millingham's house of +Whitewebs. Her own house stood, as it were, at one end of the base of +an obtuse triangle, of which Whitewebs made the other end, and the +three poplars the apex. + + + + + CHAPTER XXIII + + ROQUEBRUNE REVISITED + + +There, accordingly, they met on the following afternoon. Pamela rode +across the level country between the Croft Hill which overhung her +house, and the village. In front of her the three poplars pointed +skywards from the ridge. She was anxious and troubled. It seemed to +her that Millie Stretton was slipping beyond her reach; but the sight +of those trees lightened her of some portion of her distress. She was +turning more and more in her thoughts towards Warrisden whenever +trouble knocked upon her door. In the moment of greatest perplexity +his companionship, or even the thought of it, rested her like sleep. +As she came round the bend of the road at the foot of the hill, she +saw him coming down the slope towards her. She quickened her horse, +and trotted up to him. + +"You are here already?" she said. "I am very glad. I was not sure that +I had allowed you time enough." + +"Oh yes," said Warrisden. "I came at once. I guessed why you wanted me +from the choice of our meeting-place. We meet at Quetta, on the same +business which brought us together at Quetta before. Is not that so?" + +"Yes," said Pamela. + +They walked to the door of the inn at the top of the hill. An ostler +took charge of Pamela's horse, and they went within to the parlour. + +"You want me to find Stretton again?" said Warrisden. + +Pamela looked at him remorsefully. + +"Well, I do," she answered; and there was compunction in the tone of +her voice. "I would not ask you unless the matter was very urgent. I +have used you for my needs, I know, with too little consideration for +you, and you very generously and willingly have allowed me to use you. +So I am a little ashamed to come to you again." + +Here were strange words from Pamela. They were spoken with hesitation, +too, and the colour burned in her cheeks. Warrisden was surprised to +hear them. He laid his hand upon her arm and gave it a little +affectionate shake. + +"My dear, I am serving myself," he said, "just as much as I am serving +you. Don't you understand that? Have you forgotten our walk under the +elms in Lady Millingham's garden? If Tony returned, and returned in +time, why, then you might lay your finger on the turnpike gate and let +it swing open of its own accord. I remember what you said. Tony's +return helps me, so I help myself in securing his return." + +Pamela's face softened into a smile. + +"Then you really do not mind going?" she went on. "I am remorseful, in +a way, because I asked you to go once before in this very room, and +nothing came of all your trouble. I want you to believe now that I +could not ask you again to undergo the same trouble, or even more, as +it may prove, were not the need ever so much more urgent than it was +then." + +"I am sorry to hear that the need is more urgent," Warrisden replied; +"but, on the other hand, the trouble I shall have to bear is much +less, for I know where Stretton is." + +Pamela felt that half of the load of anxiety was taken from her +shoulders. + +"You do?" she exclaimed. + +Warrisden nodded. + +"And what he is doing. He is serving with the Foreign Legion in +Algeria. I thought you might want to lay your hands on him again, and +I wished to be ready. Chance gave me a clue--an envelope with a +postmark. I followed up the clue by securing an example of Stretton's +handwriting. It was the same handwriting as that which directed the +envelope, so I was sure." + +"Thank you," said Pamela. "Indeed, you do not fail me;" and her voice +was musical with gratitude. + +"He was at Ain-Sefra, a little town on the frontier of Algeria," +Warrisden resumed. And Pamela interrupted him-- + +"Then I need not make so heavy a demand upon you after all," she said. +"It was only a letter which I was going to ask you to carry to Tony. +Now there is no necessity that yon should go at all, for I can post +it." + +She produced the letter from a pocket of her coat as she spoke. + +"Ah, but will it reach Stretton if you do?" said Warrisden. + +Pamela had already seated herself at the table, and was drawing the +inkstand towards her. She paused at Warrisden's question, and looked +up. + +"Surely Ain-Sefra, Algeria, will find him?" + +"Will it?" Warrisden repeated. He sat down at the table opposite to +her. "Even if it does, will it reach him in time? You say the need is +urgent. Well, it was last summer when I saw the postmark on the +envelope, two days after we talked together in Lady Millingham's +garden. I had business in London." + +"I remember," said Pamela. + +"My business was just to find out where Stretton was hiding himself. +He was at Ain-Sefra then; he may be at Ain-Sefra now. But it is a +small post, and he may not. The headquarters of the Legion are at Sidi +Bel-Abbes, in the north. He may be there, or he may be altogether out +of reach on some Saharan expedition." + +There was yet another possibility which occurred to both their minds +at this moment. It was possible that no letter would ever reach +Stretton again; that Warrisden, searched he never so thoroughly, would +not be able to find the man he searched for. There are so many graves +in the Sahara. But neither of them spoke of this possibility, though a +quick look they interchanged revealed to each its presence in the +other's thoughts. + +"Besides, he wanted to lie hidden. So much I know, who know nothing of +his story. Would he have enlisted under his own name, do you think? +Or even under his own nationality? It is not the common practice in +the Foreign Legion. And that's not all. Even were he soldiering openly +under his own name, how will you address your letter with any +likelihood that it will reach him? Just 'La Legion Etrangere'? We want +to know to what section of la Legion Etrangere he belongs. Is he +chasseur, artilleryman, sapper? Perhaps he serves in the cavalry. Then +which is his squadron? Is he a plain foot soldier? Then in what +battalion, and what rank does he occupy? We cannot answer any of these +questions, and, unanswered, they certainly delay your letter; they may +prevent it ever reaching him at all." + +Pamela laid down her pen and stared blankly at "Warrisden. He piled up +the objections one by one in front of her until it seemed she would +lose Tony once more from her sight after she had got him for a moment +within her vision. + +"So you had better entrust your letter to me," he concluded. "Address +it to Stretton under his own name. I will find him, if he is to be +found, never fear. I will find him very quickly." + +Pamela addressed the letter. Yet she held it for a little time in her +hand after it was addressed. All the while Warrisden had been speaking +she had felt an impulse strong within her to keep him back; and it was +because of that impulse, rather than with any thought of Millie +Stretton and the danger in which she stood, that Pamela asked +doubtfully-- + +"How long will you be?" + +"I should find him within ten days." + +Pamela smiled suddenly. + +"It is not so very long," said she; and she handed the letter across +to Warrisden. "Well, go!" she cried, with a certain effort. "Telegraph +to me when you have found Tony. Bring him back, and come back +yourself." She added, in a voice which was very low and wistful, +"Please come back soon!" Then she rose from the table, and Warrisden +put the letter in his pocket and rose too. + +"You will be at home, I suppose, in ten days?" he said. And Pamela +said quickly, as though some new idea had just been suggested to her +mind-- + +"Oh, wait a moment!" + +She stood quite still and thoughtful. There was a certain test by +which she had meant to find the soundings of heart. Here was a good +opportunity to apply the test. Warrisden would be away upon his +journey; she could not help Millie Stretton now by remaining in +England. She determined to apply the test. + +"No," she said slowly. "Telegraph to me at the Villa Pontignard, +Roquebrune, Alpes Maritimes, France. I shall be travelling thither +immediately." + +Her decision was taken upon an instant. It was the logical outcome of +her thoughts and of Warrisden's departure; and since Warrisden went +because of Millie Stretton, Pamela's journey to the South of France +was due, in a measure, to that lady, too. Yet no one would have been +more astonished than Millie Stretton had she learned of Pamela's visit +at this time. She would have been quick to change her own plans; but +she had no knowledge of whither Pamela's thoughts were leading her. +When Callon in the hansom cab had said to her, "Come South," her first +swift reflection had been, "Pamela will be safe in England." She +herself had refused to go south with Pamela. Pamela's desire to go was +to her mind a mere false pretext to get her away from her one friend. +If she did not go south, she was very sure that Pamela would not. +There had seemed to her no safer place than the Riviera. But she was +wrong. Here, in the village of the Three Poplars, Pamela had made her +decision. + +"I shall go to Roquebrune as soon as I can make arrangements for a +servant or two," she said. + +"Roquebrune," said Warrisden, as he wrote down the address. "I once +walked up a long flight of steps to that village many years ago. +Perhaps you were at the villa then. I wonder. You must have been a +little girl. It was one February. I came over from Monte Carlo, and we +walked up from the station. We met the schoolmaster." + +"M. Giraud!" exclaimed Pamela. + +"Was that his name? He had written a little history of the village and +the Corniche road. He took me under his wing. We went into a wine shop +on the first floor of a house in the middle of the village, and we sat +there quite a long time. He asked us about Paris and London with an +eagerness which was quite pathetic. He came down with us to the +station, and his questions never ceased. I suppose he was lonely +there." + +Pamela nodded her head. + +"Very. He did not sleep all night for thinking of what you had told +him." + +"You were there, then?" cried Warrisden. + +"Yes; M. Giraud used to read French with me. He came to me one +afternoon quite feverish. Two Englishmen had come up to Roquebrune, +and had talked to him about the great towns and the lighted streets. +He was always dreaming of them. Poor man, he is at Roquebrune still, +no doubt." + +She spoke with a great tenderness and pity, looking out of the window, +and for the moment altogether lost to her surroundings. Warrisden +roused her from her reverie. + +"I must be going away." + +Pamela's horse was brought to the door, and she mounted. + +"Walk down the hill beside my horse," she said; "just as you did +on that other day, when the hill was slippery, your hand upon his +neck--so." + +Very slowly they walked down the hill. There were no driving mists +to-day, the evening was coming with a great peace, the fields and +woods lay spread beneath them toned to a tranquil grey. The white road +glimmered. At the bottom of the hill Pamela stopped. + +"Good-bye," she said; and there was more tenderness in her voice and +in her face than he had ever known. She laid her hand upon his arm and +bent down to him. + +"Come back to me," she said wistfully. "I do not like letting you go; +and yet I am rather proud to know that you are doing something for me +which I could not do for myself, and that you do it so very +willingly." + +She did not wait to hear any answer, but took her hand from his arm +and rode quickly away. That turnpike gate of friendship had already +swung open of its own accord. As she rode from Quetta that evening, +she passed beyond it, and went gratefully and hopefully, with the +other men and women, down the appointed road. + +She knew it while she was riding homewards to the Croft Hill. She knew +it, and was very glad. She rode home very slowly through the tranquil +evening, and gave herself up to joy. It was warm, and there was a +freshness in the air as though the world renewed itself. Darkness +came; only the road glimmered ahead of her--the new road, which was +the old road. Even that glimmer of white had almost vanished when at +last she saw the lighted windows of her father's house. The footman +told her that dinner was already served, but she ran past him very +quickly up the stairs, and coming to her own room, locked the door and +sat for a long while in the darkness, her blood throbbing in her +veins, her whole heart uplifted, not thinking at all, but just living, +and living most joyfully. She sat so still that she might have been in +a swoon; but it was the stillness of perfect happiness. She knew the +truth that night. + +But, none the less, she travelled south towards the end of the week, +since there a telegram would come to her. She persuaded a convenient +aunt to keep her company, who has nothing whatever to do with this +story; and reaching Villa Pontignard one afternoon, walked through the +familiar rooms which she had so dreaded ever to revisit. She went out +to the narrow point of the garden where so often she had dreamed with +M. Giraud of the outside world, its roaring cities and its jostle of +people. She sat down upon the parapet. Below her the cliff fell sheer, +and far below, in the darkness at the bottom of the gorge, the water +tumbled in foam with a distant hum. On the opposite hill the cypresses +stood out black from the brown and green. Here she had suffered +greatly, but the wounds were healed. These dreaded places had no +longer power to hurt. She knew that very surely. She was emancipated +from sorrow, and as she sat there in the still, golden afternoon, the +sense of freedom ran riot in her blood. She looked back over the years +to the dragging days of misery, the sleepless nights. She felt a pity +for the young girl who had then looked down from this parapet and +prayed for death; who had counted the many years of life in front of +her; who had bewailed her very strength and health. But ever her eyes +turned towards the Mediterranean and searched the horizon. For beyond +that blue, calm sea stretched the coasts of Algeria. + +There was but one cloud to darken Pamela's happiness during these days +while she waited for Warrisden's telegram. On the morning after she +had arrived, the old cure climbed from the village to visit her. +Almost Pamela's first question was of M. Giraud. + +"He is still here?" + +"Yes, he is still here," replied the cure; but he pursed up his lips +and shook his head. + +"I must send for him," said Pamela. + +The cure said nothing. He was standing by the window, and almost +imperceptibly he shrugged his shoulders as though he doubted her +wisdom. In a moment Pamela was at his side. + +"What is it?" she asked gently. "Tell me." + +"Oh, mademoiselle, there is little to tell! He is not the schoolmaster +you once knew. That is all. The wine shop has made the difference--the +wine shop and discontent. He was always dissatisfied, you know. It is +a pity." + +"I am so sorry," said Pamela, gravely, "so very sorry." + +She was silent for a while, and greatly troubled by the cure's news. + +"Has he married?" she asked. + +"No." + +"It would have been better if he had." + +"No doubt, mademoiselle," said the cure, "but he has not, and I think +it is now too late." + +Pamela did not send for M. Giraud. It seemed to her that she could do +no good even if at her request he came to her. She would be going away +in a few days. She would only hurt him and put him to shame before +her. She took no step towards a renewal of their friendship, and +though she did not avoid him, she never came across him in her walks. + +For ten days she walked the old hill paths, and dreams came to her +with the sunlight. They gave her company in the evenings, too, when +she looked from her garden upon the quiet sea and saw, away upon the +right, the lights, like great jewels, burning on the terrace of Monte +Carlo. She went down one morning on to that terrace, and, while seated +upon a bench, suddenly saw, at a little distance, the back of a man +which was familiar to her. + +She was not sure, but she was chilled with apprehension. She watched +from behind her newspaper, and in a little while she was sure, for the +man turned and showed his face. It was Lionel Callon. What was he +doing here, she asked herself? And another question trod fast upon the +heels of the first. "Was he alone?" + +Callon was alone on this morning, at all events. Pamela saw him speak +to one or two people, and then mount the terrace steps towards the +town. She gave him a little time, and then, walking through the +gardens, bought a visitors' list at the kiosk in front of the Rooms. +She found Callon's name. He was the only visitor at a Reserve, on the +Corniche road, which was rather a restaurant than a hotel. She +searched through the list, fearing to find the name of Millie Stretton +under the heading of some other hotel. To her relief it was not there. +It was possible, of course, that Callon was merely taking a holiday by +himself. She wished to believe that, and yet there was a fear speaking +loudly at her heart. "Suppose that Tony should return too late just by +a few days!" She was still holding the paper in her hands when she +heard her name called, and, turning about, saw some friends. She +lunched with them at Ciro's, and asked carelessly during luncheon-- + +"You have not seen Millie Stretton, I suppose?" + +"No," they all replied. And one asked, "Is she expected?" + +"I don't know whether she will come or not," Pamela replied. "I asked +her to come with me, but she could not do that, and she was not sure +that she would come at all." + +This she said, thinking that if Millie did arrive it might seem that +she came because Pamela herself was there. Pamela went back to +Roquebrune that afternoon, and after she had walked through the +village and had come out on the slope of hill above, she met the +postman coming down from the Villa Pontignard. + +"You have a telegram for me?" she said anxiously. + +"Mademoiselle," he replied, "I have just left it at the house." + +Pamela hurried on, and found the telegram in the _salon_. She tore it +open. It was from Warrisden. It told her that Tony Stretton was found, +and would return. It gave the news in vague and guarded language, +mentioning no names. But Pamela understood the message. Tony Stretton +was actually coming back. "Would he come too late?" she asked, gazing +out in fear across the sea. Of any trouble, out there in Algeria, +which might delay his return, she did not think at all. If it was true +that he had enlisted in the Legion, there might be obstacles to a +quick return. But such matters were not in her thoughts. She thought +only of Callon upon the terrace of Monte Carlo. "Would Tony come too +late?" she asked; and she prayed that he might come in time. + + + + + CHAPTER XXIV + + THE END OF THE EXPERIMENT + + +The village of Ain-Sefra stands upon a high and fertile oasis on the +very borders of Morocco. The oasis is well watered, and the date-palm +grows thickly there. It lies far to the south. The railway, in the +days when Tony Stretton served in the Foreign Legion, did not reach to +it; the barracks were newly built, the parade ground newly enclosed; +and if one looked southwards from any open space, one saw a tawny belt +of sand in the extreme distance streak across the horizon from east to +west. That is the beginning of the great Sahara. Tony Stretton could +never see that belt of sand, but his thoughts went back to the +terrible homeward march from Bir-el-Ghiramo to Ouargla. From east to +west the Sahara stretched across Africa, breaking the soldiers who +dared to violate its privacy, thrusting them back maimed and +famine-stricken, jealously guarding its secrets and speaking by its +very silence, its terrible "thus far and no farther," no less audibly, +and a thousand times more truthfully than ever did the waves of the +sea. + +On one noonday Stretton mounted the steps on to the verandah of the +hospital. He looked across open country to the great yellow line. He +thought of the Touaregs hanging persistently upon the flanks of his +tiny force, the long laborious days of thirst and hunger, the +lengthening trail of graves which he left behind--those milestones of +invasion. He felt as though the desert gripped him again and would not +loose its hold, clinging to his feet with each step he took in the +soft, yielding sand. He had brought back his handful of men, it was +true; they had stumbled into Ouargla at the last; but there were few +of them who were men as good as they had been when they had set out. +Even the best, it almost seemed to him, had lost something of vitality +which they would never recover; had a look fixed in their eyes which +set them apart from their fellows--the look of those who have endured +too much, who gazed for too long a time upon horrors; while the others +were for the most part only fit to squat in the shade and to wait for +things to cease. There was one whom Stretton had passed only a minute +before sitting on the ground under the shadow of the barrack wall. +Stretton was haunted by the picture of that man, for he was the only +white man he had ever seen who did not trouble to raise a hand to +brush away the flies from his face, but allowed them to settle and +cluster about the corners of his mouth. + +There was another in the hospital behind him. Him the Sahara +definitely claimed. Stretton turned and walked into the building. + +He passed down the line of beds, and stopped where a man lay tossing +in a fever. Stretton leaned over the bed. + +"Barbier," he said. + +Fusilier Barbier had grown very gaunt and thin during these latter +weeks. He turned his eyes upon Stretton, and muttered incoherently. +But there was recognition neither in his eyes nor in his voice. An +orderly approached the bed as Stretton stood beside it; and, in a low +voice, lest, haply, Barbier should hear and understand, Tony asked-- + +"What did the doctor say?" + +"Nothing good, my sergeant," the orderly replied, with an expressive +shrug of the shoulders. + +"I am very sorry," said Stretton, gravely. + +Certainly Barbier looked to be lying at death's door. One hand and +arm, emaciated and the colour of wax, lay outside upon the coverlet of +the bed. His eyes, unnaturally lustrous, unnaturally large, shone +deep-sunken in dark purple rings. His eyelids were red, as though with +much weeping, and, below the eyes, his face was drawn with fever and +very white. Stretton laid his hand gently upon Barbier's forehead. It +was burning hot. Stretton dismissed the orderly with a nod. There was +a haggard nobility in Barbier's appearance--his long, finely shaped +hands, his lithe, well-knit figure, all betrayed the man of race. Yet +he had once sunk to babbling about persecution at a fire in the +desert, like any morbid child. + +A heavy step sounded in the ward, and Stretton's colonel stood beside +him, a stoutly built man, with a white moustache and imperial, and a +stern yet not unkindly face. It expressed a deal of solicitude at this +moment. + +"I have seen the doctor this morning," said the colonel, "and he has +given up hope. Barbier will hardly live out the night. They should +never have sent him to us here. They should not have discharged him +from the asylum as cured." + +The idea of persecution had become fixed in Barbier's brain. It had +never left him since the evening when he first gave utterance to it in +the desert. The homeward march, indeed, had aggravated his mania. On +his return he had been sent to the asylum at Bel-Abbes, but there he +had developed cunning enough to conceal his hallucination. He had +ceased to complain that his officers were in a conspiracy to entrap +and ruin him, no more threats were heard, no more dangerous stealthy +glances detected. He was sent back to his battalion at Ain-Sefra. A +few weeks and again his malady was manifest, and on the top of that +had come fever. + +"I am very sorry," Stretton said again; and then, after looking about +him and perceiving that the orderly was out of earshot, he bent down +towards Barbier, lower than he had bent before, and he called upon him +in a still lower voice. + +But Barbier was no longer the name he used. + +"Monsieur le Comte," he said, first of all, and then "Monsieur de----" +He uttered a name which the generation before had made illustrious in +French diplomacy. + +At the sound of the name Barbier's face contracted. He started up in +his bed upon one arm. + +"Hush!" he cried. A most extraordinary change had come over him in a +second. His eyes protruded, his mouth hung half open, his face was +frozen into immobility by horror. "There is some one on the stairs," +he whispered, "coming up--some one treading very lightly--but coming +up--coming up." He inclined his head in the strained attitude of one +listening with a great concentration and intentness, an image of +terror and suspense. "Yes, coming up--coming up! Don't lock the door! +That betrays all. Turn out the lights! Quickly! So. Oh, will this +night ever pass!" + +He ended with a groan of despair. Very gently Stretton laid him down +again in the bed and covered him over with the clothes. The sweat +rolled in drops from Barbier's forehead. + +"He never tells us more, my colonel," said Stretton. "His real +name-yes!--he betrayed that once to me. But of this night nothing more +than the dread that it will never pass. Always he ends with those +words. Yet it was that night, no doubt, which tossed him beyond the +circle of his friends and dropped him down here, a man without a name, +amongst the soldiers of the Legion." + +Often Stretton's imagination had sought to pierce the mystery. What +thing of horror had been done upon that night? In what town of France? +Had the some one on the stairs turned the handle and entered the room +when all the lights were out? Had he heard Barbier's breathing in the +silent darkness of the room? Stretton could only reconstruct the +scene. The stealthy footsteps on the stairs, the cautious turning of +the door handle, the opening of the door, and the impenetrable +blackness with one man, perhaps more than one, holding his breath +somewhere, and crouching by the wall. But no hint escaped the sick +man's lips of what there was which must needs be hidden, nor whether +the thing which must needs be hidden was discovered by the one who +trod so lightly on the stairs. Was it a dead man? Was it a dead woman? +Or a woman alive? There was no answer. There was no knowledge to be +gained, it seemed, but this--that because of that night a man in +evening dress, who bore an illustrious name, had fled at daybreak on a +summer morning to the nearest barracks, and had buried his name and +all of his past life in the Foreign Legion. + +As it happened, there was just a little more knowledge to be gained by +Stretton. He learned it that morning from his colonel. + +"When you told me who 'Barbier' really was, sergeant," said the +colonel, "I made inquiries. Barbier's father died two years ago; but +an uncle and a sister lived. I wrote to both, offering to send their +relation back to them. Well, the mail has this morning come in from +France." + +"There is an answer, sir?" asked Stretton. + +"From the uncle," replied the colonel. "Not a word from the sister; +she does not mean to write. The uncle's letter makes that clear, I +think. Read!" He handed the letter to Stretton. A cheque was enclosed, +and a few words were added. + +"See, if you please, that Barbier wants for nothing which can minister +to body and soul." + +That was all. There was no word of kindliness or affection. Barbier +was dying. Let him, therefore, have medicine and prayers. Love, wishes +for recovery, a desire that he should return to his friends, +forgiveness for the thing which he had done, pity for the sufferings +which had fallen to him--these things Fusilier Barbier must not +expect. Stretton, reading the letter by the sick man's bed, thought it +heartless and callous as no letter written by a human hand had ever +been. Yet--yet, after all, who knew what had happened on that night? +The uncle, evidently. It might be something which dishonoured the +family beyond all reparation, which, if known, would have disgraced a +great name, so that those who bore it in pride must now change it for +very shame. Perhaps the father had died because of it, perhaps the +sister had been stricken down. Stretton handed the letter back to his +colonel. + +"It is very sad, sir," he said. + +"Yes, it is very sad," returned the colonel. "But for us this letter +means nothing at all. Never speak of it, obliterate it from your +memories." He tore the paper into the tiniest shreds. "We have no +reproaches, no accusations for what Barbier did before Barbier got out +of the train at Sidi Bel-Abbes. That is not our affair. For us the +soldier of the Legion is only born on the day when he enlists." + +Thus, in one sentence, the colonel epitomised the character of the +Foreign Legion. It was a fine saying, Stretton thought. He knew it to +be a true one. + +"I will say nothing," said Stretton, "and I will forget." + +"That is well. Come with me, for there is another letter which +concerns you." + +He turned upon his heel and left the hospital. Stretton followed him +to his quarters. + +"There is a letter from the War Office which concerns you, Sergeant +Ohlsen," said the colonel, with a smile. "You will be gazetted, under +your own name, to the first lieutenancy which falls vacant. There is +the notification." + +He handed the paper over to Stretton, and shook hands with him. +Stretton was not a demonstrative man. He took the notification with no +more show of emotion than if it had been some unimportant order of the +day. + +"Thank you, sir," he said, quietly; and for a moment his eyes rested +on the paper. + +But, none the less, the announcement, so abruptly made, caused him a +shock. The words danced before his eyes so that he could not read +them. He saluted his colonel and went out on to the great open parade +ground, and stood there in the middle of that space, alone, under the +hot noonday sun. + +The thing for which he had striven had come to pass, then. He held the +assurance of it in his hand. Hoped for and half-expected as that proof +had been ever since he had led the survivors of the geographical +expedition under the gate of Ouargla, its actual coming was to him +most wonderful. He looked southwards to where the streak of yellow +shone far away. The long marches, the harassing anxiety, the haunting +figures of the Touaregs, with their faces veiled in their black masks +and their eyes shining between the upper and the lower strip--yes, +even those figures which appalled the imagination in the retrospect by +a suggestion of inhuman ferocity--what were they all but +contributaries to this event? His ordeal was over. He had done enough. +He could go home. + +Stretton did not want for modesty. He had won a commission from the +ranks, it is true; but he realised that others had done this before, +and under harder conditions. He himself had started with an +advantage-the advantage of previous service in the English army. His +knowledge of the manual exercise, of company and battalion drill had +been of the greatest use at the first. He had had luck, too--the luck +to be sent on the expedition to the Figuig oasis, the luck to find +himself sergeant with Colonel Tavernay's force. His heart went out in +gratitude to that fine friend who lay in his bed of sand so far away. +Undoubtedly, he realised, his luck had been exceptional. + +He turned away from the parade ground and walked through the village, +and out of it towards a grove of palm trees. Under the shade of those +trees he laid himself down on the ground and made out his plans. He +would obtain his commission, secure his release, and so go home. A few +months and he would be home! It seemed hardly credible; yet it was +true, miraculously true. He would write home that very day. It was not +any great success which he had achieved, but, at all events, he was no +longer the man who was no good. He could write with confidence; he +could write to Millie. + +He lay under the shadow of the palms looking across to the village. +There rose a little mosque with a white dome. The hovels were thatched +for the most part, but here and there a square white-washed house, +with a flat roof, overtopped the rest. Hedges of cactus and prickly +pears walled in the narrow lanes, and now and then a white robe +appeared and vanished. Very soon Stretton would turn his back upon +Algeria. In the after time he would remember this afternoon, remember +the village as he saw it now, and the yellow streak of desert sand in +the distance. + +Stretton lay on his back and put together the sentences which he +would write that day to Millie. She would get the letter within ten +days--easily. He began to hum over to himself the words of the coon +song which had once been sung on a summer night in an island of +Scotland-- + + + "Oh, come out, mah love. I'm a-waitin' fo' you heah! + Doan' you keep yuh window shut to-night. + De tree-tops above am a-whisp'rin' to you, deah----" + + +And then he stopped suddenly. At last he began to wonder how Millie +would receive the letter he was to write. + +Yes, there was her point of view to be considered. Stretton was +stubborn by nature as few men are. He had convinced himself that the +course he had taken was the only course which promised happiness for +Millie and himself, and impelled by that conviction he had gone on his +way undisturbed by doubts and questions. Now, however, his object was +achieved. He could claim exemption from his wife's contempt. His mind +had room for other thoughts, and they came that afternoon. + +He had left his wife alone, with no explanation of his absence to +offer to her friends, without even any knowledge of his whereabouts. +There had been no other way, he still believed. But it was hard on +Millie--undoubtedly it was hard. + +Stretton rose from the ground and set off towards the camp that he +might write his letter. But he never wrote it, for as he walked along +the lane towards the barracks a man tapped him on the shoulder from +behind. He was still humming his song, and he stopped in the middle of +it-- + + + "Jus' look out an' see all de longin' in mah eyes, + An' mah arms is jus' a-pinin' foh to hug you," + + +he said, and turned about on his heel. He saw a stranger in European +dress, who at once spoke his name. + +"Sir Anthony Stretton?" + +Stretton was no longer seeking to evade discovery. + +"Yes?" he said. The stranger's face became vaguely familiar to him. "I +have seen you before, I think." + +"Once," replied the other. "My name is Warrisden. You saw me for a few +minutes on the deck of a fish-carrier in the North Sea." + +"To be sure," he said slowly. "Yes, to be sure, I did. You were sent +to find me by Miss Pamela Mardale." + +"She sends me again," replied Warrisden. + +Stretton's heart sank in fear. He had disobeyed the summons before. He +remembered Pamela's promise to befriend his wife. He remembered her +warning that he should not leave his wife. + +"She sent you then with an urgent message that I should return home," +he said. + +"I carry the same message again, only it is a thousand times more +urgent." + +He drew a letter from his pocket as he spoke, and handed it to +Stretton. "I was to give you this," he said. + +Stretton looked at the handwriting and nodded. + +"Thank you," he said gravely. + +He tore open the envelope and read. + + + + + CHAPTER XXV + + TONY STRETTON BIDS FAREWELL TO THE LEGION + + +It was a long letter. Tony read it through slowly, standing in the +narrow lane between the high walls of prickly pear. A look of +incredulity came upon his face. + +"Is all this true?" he asked, not considering at all of whom he asked +the question. + +"I know nothing, of course, of what is written there," replied +Warrisden; "but I do not doubt its truth. The signature is, I think, +sufficient guarantee." + +"No doubt, no doubt," said Stretton, absently. Then he asked-- + +"When did you reach Ain-Sefra?" + +"This morning." + +"And you came quickly?" + +"Yes; I travelled night and day, I came first of all to Ain-Sefra in +search of you." + +"Thank you," said Stretton. + +He did not ask how it was that Warrisden had come first of all to +Ain-Sefra; such details held no place in his thoughts. Warrisden _had_ +found him, _had_ brought the letter which Pamela Mardale had written. +That letter, with its perplexities and its consequences, obliterated +all other speculations. + +"You have a camp here?" Stretton asked. + +"Yes." + +"Let us go to it. The news you have brought has rather stunned me. I +should like to sit down and think what I must do." + +The incredulity had vanished from his face. Distress had replaced it. + +"It is all true, no doubt," he went on, "but for the moment I don't +understand it. Will you tell me where your camp is?" + +"I will show you the way," said Warrisden. + +"I think not. It will be better that we should not be seen together," +Stretton said thoughtfully. "Will you give me the direction and go +first? I will follow." + +Warrisden's camp was pitched amongst trees a hundred yards from the +western borders of the village. It stood in a garden of grass, +enclosed with hedges. Thither Stretton found his way by a roundabout +road, approaching the camp from the side opposite to Ain-Sefra. There +was no one, at the moment, loitering about the spot. He walked into +the garden. There were three tents pitched. Half a dozen mules stood +picketed in a line, a little Barbary horse lay on the grass, some +Algerian muleteers were taking their ease, and outside the chief tent +a couple of camp chairs were placed. Warrisden came forward as +Stretton entered the garden. + +"Sit down," he said. + +"Inside the tent, I think," replied Stretton. + +There he read the letter through again. He understood at last what +Pamela had meant by the warning which had baffled him. Pamela revealed +its meaning now. "Millie is not of those women," she wrote, "who have +a vivid remembrance. To hold her, you must be near her. Go away, she +will cry her eyes out; stay away for a little while, she will long for +your return; make that little while a longer time, she will grow +indifferent whether you return or not; prolong that longer time, she +will regard your return as an awkwardness, a disturbance; add yet a +little more to that longer time, and you will find another occupying +your place in her thoughts." Then followed an account of the growth of +that dangerous friendship between Millie and Lionel Callon. A summary +of Callon's character rounded the description off. "So come home," she +concluded, "at once, for no real harm has been done yet." + +Stretton understood what the last sentence meant, and he believed it. +Yet his mind revolted against the phrase. Of course, it was Pamela's +phrase. Pamela, though frank, was explaining the position in words +which could best spare Millie. But it was an unfortunate sentence. It +provoked a momentary wave of scorn, which swept over Stretton. There +was a postscript: "You yourself are really a good deal to blame." Thus +it ran; but Stretton was in no mood to weigh its justice or injustice +at the moment. Only this afternoon he had been lying under the palm +trees putting together in his mind the sentences which were to tell +Millie of his success, to re-establish him in her esteem, and to +prepare her for his return. And now this letter had come. He sat for a +time frowning at the letter, turning its pages over, glancing now at +one phrase, now at another. Then he folded it up. "Callon," he said, +softly; and then again, "Lionel Callon. I will talk with Mr. Callon." +For all its softness, his voice sounded to Warrisden the voice of a +dangerous man. And after he had spoken in this way he sat in thought, +saying nothing, making no movement, and his face gave Warrisden no +clue as to what he thought. At the last he stirred in his chair. + +"Well?" said Warrisden. + +"I shall return at once to England." + +"You can?" + +"Yes; I shall start to-night," said Stretton. + +"We can go back together, then." + +"No; that's impossible." + +"Why?" asked Warrisden. + +"Because I should be arrested if we did," Stretton replied calmly. + +"Arrested?" Warrisden exclaimed. + +"Yes; you see I shall have to desert to-night." + +Warrisden started from his chair. + +"Surely there is an alternative?" + +"None," replied Stretton; and Warrisden slowly resumed his seat. He +was astounded; he had never contemplated this possibility. He looked +at Stretton in wonder. He could not understand how a man could speak +so calmly of such a plan. Why in the world had Stretton ever joined +the Legion if he was so ready, at the first summons, to desert? There +seemed an inconsistency. But he did not know Tony Stretton. + +"You are surprised," said Tony. "More than surprised--you are rather +shocked; but there is no choice for me. I wish with all my heart and +soul there were," he suddenly exclaimed, with a sort of passion. "I +have foreseen this necessity ever since you tapped me on the shoulder +in the lane. Because I foresaw it, I would not walk with you to your +camp. Were we seen together to-day, the reason of my absence might be +the sooner suspected. As it is, I shall get a day's start, for I have +a good name in the regiment, and a day's start is all I need." + +He spoke sadly and wistfully. He was caught by an inexorable fate, and +knew it. He just had to accept the one course open to him. + +"You see," he explained, "I am a soldier of the Legion--that is to +say, I enlisted for five years' service in the French colonies. I +could not get leave." + +"Five years!" cried Warrisden. "You meant to stay five years away?" + +"No," replied Stretton. "If things went well with me here, as up till +to-day they have done, if, in a word, I did what I enlisted to do, I +should have gone to work to buy myself out and get free. That can be +done with a little influence and time-only time is the one thing I +have not now. I must go home at once, since no harm has yet been done. +Therefore I must desert. I am very sorry"--and again the wistfulness +became very audible--"for, as I say, I have a good name; amongst both +officers and men I have a good name. I should have liked very much to +have left a good name behind me. Sergeant Ohlsen"--and as he uttered +the name he smiled. "They speak well of Sergeant Ohlsen in the Legion, +Warrisden; and to-morrow they will not. I am very sorry. I have good +friends amongst both officers and men. I shall have lost them all +to-morrow. I am sorry. There is only one thing of which I am glad +to-day. I am glad that Captain Tavernay is dead." + +Warrisden knew nothing at all of Captain Tavernay. Until this moment +he had never heard his name. But Stretton was speaking with a +simplicity so sincere, and so genuine a sorrow, that Warrisden could +not but be deeply moved. He forgot the urgency of his summons; he +ceased to think how greatly Stretton's immediate return would help his +own fortunes. He cried out upon the impulse-- + +"Stay, then, until you can get free without----" And he stopped, +keeping unspoken the word upon his lips. + +"Without disgrace." + +Stretton finished the sentence with a smile. + +"Say it! Without disgrace. That was the word upon your tongue. I can't +avoid disgrace. I have come to such a pass in my life's history that, +one way or another, I can't avoid it. I thought just at the first +moment that I could let things slide and stay. But there's dishonour +in that course, too. Dishonour for myself, dishonour for my +name, dishonour for others, too, whom it is my business--yes, my +business--to keep from dishonour. That's the position--disgrace if I +stay, disgrace if I go. It seems to me there's no rule of conduct +which applies. I must judge for myself." + +Stretton spoke with some anger in his voice, anger with those who had +placed him in so cruel a position, anger, perhaps, in some measure, +with himself. For in a little while he said-- + +"It is quite true that I am myself to blame, too. I want to be just. I +was a fool not to have gone into the house the evening I was in +London, after I had come back from the North Sea. Yes, I should have +gone in then; and yet--I don't know. I had thought my course all out. +I don't know." + +He had thought his course out, it is true; but he had thought it out +in ignorance of his wife's character. That was the trouble, as he +clearly saw now. + +"Anyhow, I must go to-night," he said, rising from his chair. In an +instant he had become the practical man, arranging the means to an end +already resolved upon. + +"I can borrow money of you?" + +"Yes." + +"And a mule?" + +"Yes." + +"Let me choose my mule." + +They walked from the tent to where the mules stood picketed. Warrisden +pointed to one in the middle of the line. + +"That is the strongest." + +"I don't want one too strong, too obviously well-fed," said Stretton; +and he selected another. "Can I borrow a muleteer for an hour or two?" + +"Of course," said Warrisden. + +Stretton called a muleteer towards him and gave him orders. + +"There is a market to-day," he said. "Go to it and buy." He enumerated +the articles he wanted, ticking them off upon his fingers--a few pairs +of scissors and knives, a few gaudy silk handkerchiefs, one or two +cheap clocks, some pieces of linen, needles and thread--in fact, a +small pedlar's pack of wares. In addition, a black jellaba and cap, +such as the Jews must wear in Morocco, and a native's underclothes and +slippers. + +"Bring these things back to the camp at once and speak to no one!" +said Stretton. + +The muleteer loosed a mule to carry the packages, and went off upon +his errand. Stretton and Warrisden went back to the tent. Stretton sat +down again in his chair, took a black cigarette from a bright-blue +packet which he had in his pocket and lighted it, as though all the +arrangements for his journey were now concluded. + +"I want you to pack the mule I chose with the things which your +muleteer brings back. Add some barley for the mule and some food for +me, and bring it with the clothes to the south-west corner of the +barrack wall at eight. It will be dark then. Don't come before it is +dark, and wait for me at the corner. Will you?" + +"Yes," replied Warrisden. "You are going to tramp to the coast? Surely +you can come as one of my men as far as the rail-head. Then I will go +on and wait for you at Algiers." + +"No," said Stretton; "our ways lie altogether apart. It would be too +dangerous for me to tramp through Algeria. I should certainly be +stopped. That's my way." + +He raised his arm and pointed through the tent door. + +The tent door faced the west, and in front there rose a range of +mountains, dark and lofty, ridge overtopping ridge, and wonderfully +distinct. In that clear air the peaks and gaps, and jagged _aretes_ +were all sharply defined. The sun was still bright, and the dark +cliffs had a purple bloom of extraordinary softness and beauty, like +the bloom upon a ripe plum. Here and there the mountains were capped +with snow, and the snow glistened like silver. + +"Those mountains are in Morocco," said Stretton. "That's my way--over +them. My only way. We are on the very edge of Morocco here." + +"But, once over the border," Warrisden objected, "are you safe in +Morocco?" + +"Safe from recapture." + +"But safe in no other sense?" + +Stretton shrugged his shoulders. + +"It is a bad road, I know--dangerous and difficult. The ordinary +traveller cannot pass along it. But it has been traversed. Prisoners +have escaped that way to Fez--Escoffier, for instance. Deserters have +reached their homes by following it--some of them, at all events. One +must take one's risks." + +It was the old lesson learned upon the ketch _Perseverance_ which +Stretton now repeated; and not vainly learned. Far away to the south, +in the afternoon sunlight, there shone that yellow streak of sand, +beyond which its value had been surely proved. Warrisden's thoughts +were carried back on a sudden to that morning of storm and foam and +roaring waves, when Stretton had stood easily upon the deck of the +fish-cutter, with the great seas swinging up behind him, and had, for +the first time, uttered it in Warrisden's hearing. Much the same +feeling came over Warrisden as that which had then affected him--a +feeling almost of inferiority. Stretton was a man of no more than +average ability, neither a deep thinker, nor a person of ingenuity and +resource; but the mere stubbornness of his character gave to him at +times a certain grandeur. In Warrisden's eyes he had that grandeur +now. He had come quickly to his determination to desert, but he had +come calmly to it. There had been no excitement in his manner, no +suggestion of hysteria. He had counted up the cost, he had read his +letter, he had held the balance between his sacrifice and Millie's +necessity; and he had decided. He had decided, knowing not merely the +disgrace, but the difficulties of his journey, and the danger of his +road amongst the wild, lawless tribes in that unsettled quarter of +Morocco. Again Warrisden was carried away. He forgot even Pamela at +Roquebrune waiting for the telegram he was to send from Oran on his +return. He cried-- + +"I will send back my outfit and come with you. If we travel together +there will be more safety." + +Stretton shook his head. + +"Less," said he. "You cannot speak Mogrhebbin. I have a few +sentences--not many, but enough. I know something of these tribes, +too. For I once marched to the Figuig oasis. Your company would be no +protection; rather it would be an extra danger." + +Warrisden did not press his proposal. Stretton had so clearly made up +his mind. + +"Very well," he said. "You have a revolver, I suppose. Or shall I lend +you one?" + +And, to Warrisden's astonishment, Stretton replied-- + +"I shall carry no weapons." + +Warrisden was already placing his arms of defence upon the table so +that Stretton might make his choice. + +"No weapons!" he exclaimed. + +"No. My best chance to get through to Fez is to travel as a Jew +pedlar. That is why I am borrowing your mule and have sent your +muleteer to the market. A Jew can go in Morocco where no Moor can, for +he is not suspected; he is merely despised. Besides, he brings things +for sale which are needed. He may be robbed and beaten, but he has +more chance of reaching his journey's end in some plight or other than +any one else." + +Thereafter he sat for awhile silent, gazing towards the mountains in +the west. The snow glittering upon the peaks brought back to his mind +the flashing crystals in the great salt lakes. It was at just such a +time, on just such an afternoon, when the two companies of the Legion +had marched out from the trees of the high plateaux into the open +desert, with its grey-green carpet of halfa-grass. Far away the lake +had flashed like an arc of silver set in the ground. Stretton could +not but remember that expedition and compare it with the one upon +which he was now to start; and the comparison was full of bitterness. +Then high hopes had reigned. The companies were marching out upon the +Legion's special work; even if disaster overtook them, disaster would +not be without its glory. Stretton heard the clear inspiriting music +of the bugles, he listened to the steady tramp of feet. Now he was +deserting. + +"I shall miss the Legion," he said regretfully. "I had no idea how +much I should miss it until this moment." + +Its proud past history had grown dear to him. The recklessness of its +soldiers, the endless perplexing variety of their characters, the +secrets of their lives, of which every now and then, in a rare moment +of carelessness, a glimpse was revealed, as though a curtain were +raised and lowered--all these particular qualities of the force had +given to it a grip upon his affections of which he felt the full +strength now. + +"Any other life," he said, "cannot but be a little dull, a little +uninteresting afterwards. I shall miss the Legion very much." + +Suddenly he put his hand into his pocket and took out of it that +letter from the French War Office which his colonel had handed to him. +"Look!" and he handed it over to Warrisden. "That is what I joined the +Legion to win--a commission; and I have just not won it. In a month or +two, perhaps in a week, perhaps even to-morrow, it might have been +mine. Very soon I should have been back at home, the life I have +dreamed of and worked for ever since I left London, might have been +mine to live. It was to have been a good life of great happiness"--he +had forgotten, it seemed, that he would regret the Legion--"a life +without a flaw. Now that life's impossible, and I am a deserter. It's +hard lines, isn't it?" + +He rose from his chair, and looked for a moment at Warrisden in +silence. + +"I am feeling sorry that I ever came," said Warrisden. + +"Oh no," Stretton answered, with a smile. "It would have been still +worse if I had stayed here, ignorant of the news you have brought +me, and had come home in my own time. Things would have been much +worse--beyond all remedy. Do you know a man named Callon--Lionel +Callon?" he asked abruptly. And before Warrisden could answer, the +blood rushed into his face, and he exclaimed, "Never mind; don't +answer! Be at the corner of the barracks with the mule at eight." And +he went from the tent, cautiously made his way out of the garden, and +returned to his quarters. + +A few minutes before eight Warrisden drove the mule, packed with +Stretton's purchases, to the south-western corner of the barracks. The +night was dark, no one was abroad, the place without habitations. He +remained under the shadow of the high wall, watching this way and that +for Stretton's approach; and in a few minutes he was almost startled +out of his wits by a heavy body falling from the top of the wall upon +the ground at his side. Warrisden, indeed, was so taken by surprise +that he uttered a low cry. + +"Hush!" said a voice close to the ground. "It's only me." + +"And Stretton rose to his feet. He had dropped from the summit of the +wall. + +"Are you hurt?" whispered Warrisden. + +"No. Have you the clothes? Thanks!" + +Stretton stripped off his uniform, and put on the Jewish dress. He had +shaved off his moustache and blacked his hair. As he dressed he gave +two or three small packages to Warrisden. + +"Place them in the pack; hide them, if possible. That package contains +my medals. I shall need them. The other's lamp-black. I shall want +that for my hair. Glossy raven locks," he said, with a low laugh, "are +not so easily procured in Ain-Sefra as in Bond Street. I have been +thinking. You can help me if you will; you can shorten the time of my +journey." + +"How?" asked Warrisden. + +"Go back to Oran as quickly as possible. Take the first boat to +Tangier. Hire an outfit there, mules and horses--but good ones, +mind!--and travel up at once to Fez. If you are quick you can do it +within a fortnight. I shall take a fortnight at the least to reach +Fez. I may be three weeks. But if I find you there, ready to start the +moment I come to the town, we shall save much time." + +"Very well; I will be there." + +"If I get through sooner than I expect, I shall go straight on to +Tangier, and we will meet on the road. Now let me climb on to your +shoulders." Stretton made a bundle of his uniform, climbed on to +Warrisden's shoulders, and threw it over the wall into the barrack +yard. + +"But that will betray you!" cried Warrisden, in a whisper. "They will +find your clothes in the morning--clothes with a sergeant's stripes." + +"I cannot help that," replied Stretton, as he jumped to the ground. "I +do not intend to be shot as a thief, for that is what may happen when +a man deserts and takes his uniform with him. Don't fail me in Fez. +Good-bye." + +He held out his hand, and, as Warrisden grasped it, he said-- + +"I have not said much to you in the way of thanks; but I am very +grateful, however much I may have seemed to have been made unhappy by +your coming. Since things are as they are, I am glad you came. I thank +you, too, for that other visit to the North Sea. I will give you +better thanks when we meet in Fez." + +He cast a glance back to the wall of the barracks, and, in a voice +which trembled, so deeply was he moved, he whispered to himself, +rather than to Warrisden-- + +"Oh, but I am glad Tavernay is dead!" + +All else that he had said since he dropped from the wall had been said +hurriedly and without emotion. These last words were whispered from a +heart overcharged with sorrow. They were his farewell to the Legion. +He turned away, and, driving the mule before him, vanished into the +darkness. + + + + + CHAPTER XXVI + + BAD NEWS FOR PAMELA + + +Warrisden struck his camp early the next morning, and set out for the +rail-head. Thence he travelled to Oran. At Oran he was fortunate +enough to find a steamer of the Lambert Line in the harbour, which was +preparing to sail that afternoon for Tangier. Warrisden had three +hours to pass in Oran. He went at once to the post-office and +despatched his telegram to Pamela Mardale at the Villa Pontignard. The +telegram informed her that Tony Stretton was returning, though his +journey might take longer than she would naturally expect; and, +secondly, that he himself was sailing that day for Tangier, whither +any message should be sent at once to await his arrival at the English +post-office. The telegram was couched in vague phrases. Tony Stretton, +for instance, was called "The Truant." Pamela became more and more +disquieted by the vagueness of its wording. She pondered, and in vain, +why in the world Warrisden must be sailing to Tangier. It seemed +certain that there were difficulties in the way of Tony's home-coming +which she had not foreseen, and at the nature of which she could not +conjecture. She sent off a reply to Tangier-- + +"Bring truant to Roquebrune as soon as possible." + +For, on thinking over the new aspect which her problem presented, now +that Lionel Callon had come to the Riviera, she had come to the +conclusion that this was the safest plan. + +If Millie Stretton did not come to the south of France, no harm would +have been done; whereas, if she did, and Tony went straight home to +England, the last chance of saving her would be lost. + +This message, however, did little to reassure Pamela. For the more she +thought of Warrisden's telegram, the more she was troubled. Tony was +returning. Yes, that was something--that was a great thing. But he was +going to take a long time in returning, and, to Pamela's apprehension, +there was no long time to spare. And the day after she had received +the telegram she came upon still stronger reasons for disquietude. + +She went down to Monte Carlo in the morning, and again saw Lionel +Callon upon the terrace, and again noticed that he was alone. Yet on +the whole she was not surprised. Millie Stretton's name figured as yet +in no visitors' list, and Pamela was quite sure that if Millie +Stretton had come south the name would have been inserted. It was +impossible that Millie Stretton could come to Monte Carlo, or to, +indeed, any hotel upon the Riviera, under a false name. She could not +but meet acquaintances and friends at every step, during this season +of the year. To assume a name which was not hers would be an act of +stupidity too gross. None the less Pamela was relieved. She avoided +Callon's notice, and acting upon a sudden impulse, went out from the +garden, hired a carriage, and ordered the coachman to drive along the +lower Corniche Road in the direction of Beaulieu. + +Pamela was growing harassed and anxious. The days were passing, and no +message had yet come from Alan Warrisden. She suspected the presence +of Lionel Callon on the Riviera more and more. More and more she +dreaded the arrival of Millie Stretton. There was nothing now which +she could do. She had that hard lot which falls to women, the lot of +waiting. But she could not wait with folded hands. She must be doing +something; even though that something were altogether trivial and +useless, it still helped her through the hours. In this spirit she +drove out from Monte Carlo at twelve o'clock, without a thought that +her drive was to assist her toward the end on which she had set her +heart. + +She drove past the back of the big hotel at Eze. Just beyond, a deep +gorge runs from the hills straight down to the sea. The road carves +round the head of the gorge and bends again to the shore. Pamela drove +round the gorge, and coming again to the shore, went forward by the +side of the sea. After a few minutes she bade the driver stop. In +front of her the road rose a little, and then on the other side of the +crest dipped down a steep hill. On her left a pair of iron gates stood +open. From those gates a carriage-drive ran in two zigzags between +borders of flowers down to an open gravel space in front of a long +one-storied building. The building faced upon the road, but at a lower +level, so that even the flat roof was below Pamela. The building was +prettily built, and roses and magnolias climbed against the walls, +making it gay. The door in the middle stood open, but there was no +sign of life about the house. Pamela sat gazing down into the garden, +with its bushes and brightly-coloured flowers. + +Pamela spoke to the driver. + +"What place is this?" she asked. + +"It was only built last year," the man replied, and he told her enough +for her to know that this was the _Reserve_ at which Lionel Callon was +staying. + +"Few people come here?" said Pamela. + +"It is not known yet," replied the driver. "It is such a little while +since it has been opened." + +The sun was bright. Beyond the _Reserve_ the Mediterranean rippled and +sparkled--here the deepest blue, there breaking into points of golden +light. The _Reserve_ itself had the look of a country house in a rich +garden of flowers tended with love. In the noonday the spot was very +quiet and still. Yet to Pamela it had the most sinister aspect. It +stood in a solitary position, just beneath the road. In its very +quietude there was to her harassed thoughts something clandestine. + +She knew that Callon was in Monte Carlo. She told her driver to drive +down to the door, and at the door she stepped down and walked into the +building. A large dining-room opened out before her in which two +waiters lounged. There were no visitors. The waiters came forward. +"Would Madame take luncheon in the room, or on the terrace at the back +over the sea?" + +"On the terrace," Pamela replied. + +She lunched quite alone on a broad, flagged terrace, with the sea +gently breaking at its foot. The greater portion of the building was +occupied by the restaurant, but at one end Pamela noticed a couple of +French windows. She remarked to the waiter who served her upon the +absence of any visitors but herself. + +"It is only this season, Madame, that the restaurant is open," he +replied. + +"Can people stay here?" she asked. + +"Yes. There are two suites of rooms. One is occupied; but the other is +vacant, if Madame would care to see it." + +Pamela rose and followed him. He opened one of the French windows. A +dining-room furnished with elegance, and lightly decorated; a +sitting-room, and a bedroom comprised the suite. Pamela came back to +the terrace. She was disquieted. It was impossible, of course, that +Millie Stretton should stay at the _Reserve_; but the whole look of +the place troubled her. + +She mounted into her carriage and drove back. In front of her the +great hotel of Eze stood high upon a promontory above the railway. A +thought came to Pamela. She drove back round the head of the gorge, +and when she came to the hotel she bade the coachman drive in. In the +open space in front of the hotel she took tea. She could not see the +restaurant itself, but she could see the road rising to the little +hill-crest beside it. It was very near, she thought. She went into the +hotel, and asked boldly at the office-- + +"When do you expect Lady Stretton?" + +"Lady Stretton?" The clerk in the office looked up his books. "In +three weeks, Madame," he said. "She has engaged her rooms from the +31st." + +"Thank you," said Pamela. + +She mounted into her carriage and drove back to Monte Carlo. So Millie +Stretton was coming to the Riviera after all. She had refused to come +with Pamela, yet she was coming by herself. She had declared she would +not leave England this spring. But she had made that declaration +before Lionel Callon had returned from Chili. Now Callon was here, and +she was following. Pamela could not doubt that her coming was part of +a concerted plan. The very choice of the hotel helped to convince her. +It was so near to that at which Callon was staying. Twenty minutes' +walk at the most would separate them. Moreover, why should Callon +choose that lonely restaurant without some particular, nay, some +secret object? No one, it seemed, visited it in the day; no one but he +slept there at night. Callon was not the man to fall in love with +solitude. And if he had wished for solitude he would not have come to +the Riviera at all. Besides, he spent his days in Monte Carlo, as +Pamela well knew. No, it was not loneliness at which he aimed, but +secrecy. That was it--secrecy. Pamela's heart sank within her. She had +a momentary thought that she would disclose her presence to Lionel +Callon, and dismissed it. The disclosure would alter Callon's plan, +that was all; it would not hinder the fulfilment. It would drive +Millie and him from the Riviera--it would not prevent them from +meeting somewhere else. It would be better, indeed, that, if meet they +must, they should meet under her eyes. For some accident might happen, +some unforeseen opportunity occur of which she could take advantage to +separate them. It was not known to Callon that she was on the spot. +After all, that was an advantage. She must meet secrecy with secrecy. +She urged her coachman to quicken his pace. She drove straight to the +post-office at Monte Carlo. Thence she despatched a second telegram to +Alan Warrisden at Tangier. + +"Do not fail to arrive by the 31st," she telegraphed; and upon that +took the train back to Roquebrune. She could do no more now; but the +knowledge that she could do no more only aggravated her fears. +Questions which could not be answered thronged upon her mind. "Would +the telegram reach Tangier in time? What was Alan Warrisden doing at +Tangier at all? What hindered them coming straight from Algeria to +France?" Well, there were three weeks still. She sent up her prayer +that those three weeks might bring Tony Stretton back, that Millie +might be saved for him. She walked up the steps from Roquebrune +station very slowly. She did not look up as she climbed. Had she done +so she might, perhaps, have seen a head above the parapet in the +little square where the school-house stood; and she would certainly +have seen that head suddenly withdrawn as her head was raised. M. +Giraud was watching her furtively, as he had done many a time since +she had come to Roquebrune, taking care that she should not see him. +He watched her now, noticing that she walked with the same lagging, +weary step as when he had last seen her on that path so many years +ago. But as he watched she stopped, and, turning about, looked +southwards across the sea, and stood there for an appreciable time. +When she turned again and once more mounted the steps, it seemed to +him that the weariness had gone. She walked buoyantly, like one full +of faith, full of hope; and he caught a glimpse of her face. It seemed +to him that it had become transfigured, and that the eyes were looking +at some vision which was visible to her eyes alone. Pamela had come +back. Indeed, at the end of all her perplexities and conjectures, to +the belief born of her new love, that somehow the world would right +itself, that somehow in a short while she would hear whispered upon +the wind, answered by the ripples of the sea, and confirmed by the one +voice she longed to hear, the sentinel's cry, "All's well." + +The messages which Pamela had sent to Warrisden reached him at +Tangier. He found them both waiting for him the day after they had +been sent. He had twenty days in front of him. If Tony kept to his +time, twenty days would serve. He hired a camp outfit, and the best +mules to be obtained in Tangier on that day. The same evening he +bought a couple of barbs, well recommended to him for speed and +endurance. + +"They will amble at six miles an hour for ten hours a day," said one +whose advice he sought. Warrisden discounted the statement, but bought +the barbs. Early the nest morning he set out for Fez. + + + + + CHAPTER XXVII + + "BALAK!" + + +There are two cities of Fez. One is the city of the narrow, crowded +streets, where the cry, "Balak! Balak!"[1] resounds all day. Streets, +one terms them, since they are the main thoroughfares through which +all the merchandise of Morocco passes out to the four quarters of the +compass; but they are no wider than the alley-ways of an English +village, and in many places a man may stand in the centre and touch +the wall on either side. These streets are paved with big +cobblestones, but the stones are broken and displaced by the tramp of +centuries. If mended at all, they are mended with a millstone or any +chance slab of rock; but for the most part they are left unmended +altogether. For that is the fashion in Morocco. There they build and +make, and they do both things beautifully and well. But they seldom +finish; in a house, dainty with fountains and arabesques and coloured +tiles, you will still find a corner uncompleted, a pillar which lacks +the delicate fluting of the other pillars, an embrasure for a clock +half ornamented with gold filagree, and half left plain. And if they +seldom finish, they never by any chance repair. The mansion is built +and decorated within; artists fit the tiles together in a mosaic of +cool colours, and carve, and gild, and paint the little pieces of +cedar-wood, and glue them into the light and pointed arches; the rich +curtains are hung, and the master enters into his possession. There +follows the procession of the generations. The tiles crack, the +woodwork of the arches splits and falls, and the walls break and +crumble. The householder sits indifferent, and the whole house +corrodes. So, in the narrow streets, holes gape, and the water wears a +channel where it wills, and the mud lies thick and slippery on the +rounded stones; the streets ran steeply up and down the hills, wind +abruptly round corners, dive into tunnels. Yet men gallop about them +on their sure-footed horses, stumbling, slipping, but seldom falling. +"Balak!" they cry. "Balak!" and the man on foot is flung against the +wall or jostled out of the way. No one protests or resents. + + +--------------------- +[Footnote 1: "Take care!"] +--------------------- + + +A file of donkeys, laden with wood or with grain, so fixed upon their +backs that the load grazes each street wall, blocks the way. "Balak!" +shouts the donkey-driver. And perhaps some nobleman of Fez, soft and +fat and indolent, in his blue cloak, who comes pacing on a mule no +less fat, preceded by his servants, must turn or huddle himself into +an embrasure. There are no social distinctions in the alley-ways of +Fez. It may be that one of those donkeys will fall then and there +beneath his load, and refuse to rise. His load will be taken from his +back, and if he still refuse, he will be left just where he fell, to +die. His owner walks on. It is no one's business to remove the animal. +There he lies in the middle of the street, and to him "Balak" will be +called in vain. + +A mounted troop of wild Berbers from the hills, with their long, +brass-bound guns slung across their backs, and gaudy handkerchiefs +about their heads, will ride through the bazaars, ragged of dress and +no less ragged in the harness of their horses. "Balak!" Very swiftly +way is made for them. Balak, indeed, is the word most often heard in +the streets of Fez. + +Those streets wind at times between the walls of gardens, and if the +walls are broken, as surely at some point they will be, a plot of +grass, a grove of orange trees hung with ruddy fruit, and a clump of +asphodel will shine upon the eyes in that brown and windowless city +like a rare jewel. At times, too, they pass beneath some spacious arch +into a place of width, or cross a bridge where one of the many streams +of the river Fez boils for a moment into the open, and then swirls +away again beneath the houses. But, chiefly, they run deep beneath the +towering walls of houses, and little of the sunlight visits them; so +that you may know a man of Fez, even though he be absent from his +town, by the pallor of his face. A householder, moreover, may build +over the street, if he can come to an agreement with his neighbour on +the opposite side, and then the alleys suddenly become tunnels, and +turn upon themselves in the dark. Or the walls so lean together at the +top that barely a finger's breadth of sky is visible as from the +bottom of a well. + +Into this city of dark streets Warrisden came upon an evening of +gloom. The night before he had camped on the slope of a hill by the +village of Segota. Never had he seen a spot more beautiful. He had +looked across the deep valley at his feet to the great buttress of +Jebel Zarhon, on a dark shoulder of which mountain one small, round, +white town was perched. A long, high range of grey hills--the last +barrier between him and Fez--cleft at one point by the road, rose on +the far side of the valley; and those hills and the fields beneath, +and the solitary crumbling castle which stood in the bottom amongst +the fields, were all magnified and made beautiful by the mists of +evening. The stars had come out overhead, behind him the lights shone +in his tent, and a cheerful fire crackled in the open near the door. +He had come up quickly from Tangier, and without hindrance, in spite +of warnings that the road was not safe. The next morning he would be +in Fez. It had seemed to him, then, that fortune was on his side. He +drew an augury of success from the clean briskness of the air. And +that confidence had remained with him in the morning. He had crossed +the valley early, and riding over the long pass on the other side, had +seen at last the snow-crowned spur of the Atlas on the further side of +the plain of Fez. He had descended into the plain, which perpetually +rose and fell like the billows of an ocean; and in the afternoon, from +the summit of one of these billows, he had suddenly seen, not an +hour's journey off, the great city of Fez, with its crenelated walls +and high minarets, a mass of grey and brown, with here and there a +splash of white, and here and there a single palm-tree, straggling +formlessly across the green plain. The sky had clouded over; the track +was now thronged with caravans of camels, and mules, and donkeys, and +wayfarers on foot going to and coming from the town; and before the +Bab Sagma, the great gate looking towards Mikkes, was reached, the +rain was falling. + +Warrisden had sent on the soldier who had ridden with him from +Tangier, to deliver a note to the Consul, and he waited with his +animals and his men for the soldier's return. The man came towards +dusk with word that a house had been secured in the town, and +Warrisden passed through the gate and down between the high +battlements of the Bugilud into the old town. And as he passed through +the covered bazaars and the narrow streets, in the gloom of the +evening, while the rain fell drearily from a sullen sky, his +confidence of the morning departed from him, and a great depression +chilled him to the heart. The high, cracked, bulging walls of the +houses, towering up without a window, the shrouded figures of the +passers-by, the falling light, the neglect as of a city of immemorial +age crumbling in decay, made of Fez to him that night a place of gloom +and forbidding mystery. He was in a mood to doubt whether ever he +would look on Tony Stretton's face again. + +In the narrowest of the alleys, where each of his stirrups touched a +wall, his guide stopped. It was almost pitch-dark here. By throwing +back his head, Warrisden could just see, far above him, a little slit +of light. His guide groped his way down a passage on the right, and at +the end opened with a key a ponderous black door. Warrisden stepped +over the sill, and found himself in a tiled court of which the roof +was open to the sky. On the first floor there was a gallery, and on +each of the four sides a long, narrow room, lofty, and closed with +great folding doors, opened on to the gallery. In one of these rooms +Warrisden had his bed set up. He sat there trying to read by the light +of a single candle, and listening to the drip of the rain. + +When he left Tangier, he had twenty-one days before he need be at +Roquebrune in answer to Pamela's summons. He had looked up the +steamers before he started. Four of those days would be needed to +carry them from Tangier to Roquebrune. He had reached Fez in five, and +he thus had twelve days left. In other words, if Stretton came to Fez +within a week, there should still be time, provided, of course, the +road to the coast was not for the moment cut by rebellious tribes. +That was the danger, as Warrisden's journey had told him. He +discounted the timorous statements of his dragoman, Ibrahim, but one +who knew had warned him at El Ksar. There was a risk. + +The night was cold. Warrisden wrapped himself in a Moorish jellaba of +fine, white wool, but he could not put on with it the Moorish patience +and indifference. The rain dripped upon the tiles of the court. Where +was Stretton, he wondered? + +He went to bed, and waked up in the middle of the night. He had left +the great doors of his bedroom open; the rain had stopped; and in the +stillness of the night he heard one loud voice, of an exquisite +beauty, vibrating over the roofs of the sleeping city, as though it +spoke from heaven itself. Warrisden lay listening to it, and +interpreting the words from the modulation of the voice which uttered +them. Now it rang out imperious as a summons, dropping down through +the open roofs to wake the sleepers in their beds. Now it rose, +lyrical and glorious, in a high chant of praise. Now it became +wistful, and trembled away pleading, yet with a passion of longing in +the plea. Warrisden could look upwards from his bed through the open +roof. The sky was clear again. Overhead were the bright stars, and +this solitary voice, most musical and strange, ringing out through the +silence. + +It was the mueddhin on the tower of the Karueein Mosque. For five +hours before the dawn the praises of Allah are sung from the summit of +the mosque's minaret. There are ten mueddhins to whom the service is +entrusted, and each sends out his chant above the sleeping city for +half an hour. But in the voice of this, one of the ten whom Warrisden +heard on the first night when he slept in Fez, there was a particular +quality. He listened for it during the nights which followed; expected +it, and welcomed its first note as one welcomes the coming of a +friend. It seemed to him that all the East was in that cry. + +It brought back to him sunsets when his camp was pitched by some +little village of tents or thatched mud-houses surrounded by hedges of +aloes and prickly pears--at Karia Ben Ouder, at Djouma--villages where +there was no mosque at all, but whence none the less the voice of a +priest dispersed its plaintive cry across the empty country of +marigolds and asphodels, startling the white cow-birds and the storks. + +Warrisden fell to thinking of Tony Stretton. He struck a match, and +looked at his watch. It was close upon the hour of dawn. Perhaps, just +at this moment, by some village in that wild, dark, mountain country +to the south-east, Stretton stirred in his sleep, and waked to hear +some such summons chanted about the village. Perhaps he was even now +loading his mule, and setting forth by the glimmer of the starlight +upon his dangerous road. Warrisden fell asleep again with that picture +in his mind, and woke to find the sunlight pouring through the square +opening of the roof. He drank his coffee, and mounting a little +winding stairway of broken steps, came out into that other city of +Fez, the city of the roof-tops. + +Fez is built upon the slope of a hill, and upon some of the flat roofs +Warrisden looked down and through the dark square holes of the +openings; to the parapets of others he looked up. Upon some there were +gardens planted--so, he thought, must have looked the hanging gardens +of Babylon; on others, linen was strung out to dry as in some backyard +of England; the minarets, here inlaid with white and green tiles, +there built simply of bricks and brown plaster, rose high into the +limpid air. And on the towers were the great nests of storks. + +Warrisden looked abroad, and in the sunlight his hopes revived. It +seemed that it must have been into another town that he had entered +last night. Nowhere could he see the gash of a street in that plateau +of roof-tops--so narrow they were; and no noise rose at all, they were +so deep. Here the only sound audible was the chattering of women's +voices--for the roofs are the playgrounds of the women, and Warrisden +could see them in their coloured handkerchiefs and robes clustered +together, climbing from one house to another with the help of ladders, +visiting their friends. But of all the clamour which must needs be +resounding in those crowded streets, not even one stray cry of +"Balak!" reached to this upper air. Lower down the hill to the east, +Warrisden could see the city wall and the gate through which Stretton +must pass when he came. And he might come to-day! + +That was Warrisden's thought. He went down the stairs, had his horse +brought into the dark street before the door, and, accompanied by his +_mehazni_, that old soldier who had ridden with him from Tangier, went +out of the city over the plain towards Sefru. For through that small +town of gardens and fruit at the base of the Atlas spur, Stretton +would come. But he did not come on that day, nor on the next. But, on +the other hand, Ibrahim, Warrisden's guide, brought bad news. + +He mounted to the roof in the morning, while Warrisden sat there after +his breakfast, and crouched down behind the parapet so that he might +not be seen. For the men leave the roof-tops to their women-folk, and +do not trespass there themselves. + +"Sir," said he, "the road between Djebel Silfat and Djebel Zarbon is +cut. Word has come into Fez this morning. The Z'mur have come down +from the hills, and sit across the road, stopping and robbing every +one." + +Warrisden sat up. + +"Are you sure?" he asked. He was, as he knew, in a country of liars. +Ibrahim, in addition, was a coward in the country districts, though +the best of braggarts at Tangier. He had ridden on his mule slung +about with weapons--a Spanish rifle on his back, a revolver in his +belt, and a Winchester in his hands; while between the fingers of his +left hand he carried ready four cartridges--but he was none the less +afraid. However, Warrisden remembered that mountain pass which led +from the plain of the Sebou up to Segota. It was very lonely, it was +narrow, the road looped perpetually round the bases of the round +buttresses of Djebel Silfat. It would certainly be an awkward place +wherein to be entrapped. + +"Yes, yes, I am sure," replied Ibrahim, "the Z'mur are bad men. They +might capture you and hold you to ransom." + +Warrisden was inclined to discount Ibrahim's terror of the Z'mur. The +lawless deeds of that wild and fanatical tribe had been dinned into +his ears ever since he had crossed the Sebou; until he had come to +make light of them. But there was no doubt they terrorised the people; +in the villages where Warrisden had camped, they were spoken of with a +dread hardly less than that which Ibrahim betrayed. It would certainly +never do to be taken by the Z'mur. They would be released, no doubt; +but time would be wasted. They might be kept for weeks in the forest +of Marmura. They would reach Roquebrune too late. + +Warrisden had brought with him, as a servant, one of the men who had +been with him to Ain-Sefra, and descending the stairs he called him, +and spoke, bidding Ibrahim interpret. + +"Do you remember the mule which I gave away at Ain-Sefra?" he asked. +And the man answered, "Yes!" + +"You would know it again?" + +The man was sure upon that point. He described the marks by which he +would recognise the beast. + +"Very well," said Warrisden. "Go out to the west of Fez, and watch the +road to Sefru. If you see a Jew come towards Fez driving the mule, +lead him at once to this house. Watch all day until the gate is +closed." + +The man went off upon his errand, and Warrisden betook himself to the +vice-consulate. On his return he summoned Ibrahim, and said-- + +We must travel by Mequinez and Mediyah. A letter will be given to us, +passing us on from governor to governor. We can reach Larache, +travelling hard, in five days. We may find a steamer there for +Gibraltar. If not, we must go on, in one more day, to Tangier. + +Ibrahim bowed his head and made no further protest. In the evening +Warrisden's servant came back from the gate; his watch had been +fruitless. Thus three days had passed. Warrisden became anxious again, +and restless. The seven days which Tony Stretton could take, and still +reach Roquebrune by the date on which Pamela insisted, were now +curtailed. Six days formed the limit, and even that limit implied that +the journey should be of the swiftest. Of those six days, three had +gone. + +The fourth came, and passed. Warrisden rode out upon the track to +Sefru in vain. Even the promised letter did not come. Warrisden made +inquiries. It would come, he was told. There was no doubt upon that +score. But a Government letter takes a long time in the writing in +Morocco. It was not until the fifth evening that a messenger from the +Palace knocked upon the door. These were the days when Mulai-el-Hassan +ruled in Morocco, and was on the march against his rebellious tribes +for nine months out of the twelve. Mulai-el-Hassan, at this particular +time, was far away to the south in the Sus country, and therefore the +mountain pass to the north was dangerous. + +Warrisden had his letter, however, sealed with the Viceroy's seal. But +he gazed out over the city as it lay, warm and ruddy in the sunset, +and wondered whether it would avail at all. His servant had come back +from the gate with his familiar answer. No Jew had driven the mule +down the road into Fez that day. And there was only one more day. + +Warrisden descended the stairs to the gallery on the first floor, and +as he came out upon it, he heard voices in the courtyard below. He +looked over the balustrade and saw a man standing amongst his +muleteers and servants. Warrisden could not see his face. He was +dressed in rags, but the rags were the remnants of a black gabardine, +and he wore a black skull-cap upon his head. + +It is likely that Warrisden would have taken no further notice of the +man, but that he cringed a little in his manner as though he was +afraid. Then he spoke in Arabic, and the voice was timorous and +apologetic. Warrisden, however, knew it none the less. He leaned over +the balustrade-- + +"Stretton!" he cried out in a burst of joy. + +The man in the courtyard looked up. Warrisden would never have known +him but for his voice. A ragged beard stubbled his cheeks and chin; he +was disfigured with dirt and bruises; he was lean with hunger; his +face was drawn and hollow from lack of sleep. But there was something +more, a wider difference between this ragged Stretton in the courtyard +and the Stretton Warrisden had known than mere looks explained. The +man who had looked up when he heard his voice loudly and suddenly +pronounced had been startled--nay, more than startled. He had raised +an arm as though to ward off a blow. He had shrunk back. He had been +afraid. Even now, when he looked at Warrisden, and knew that he was +here in a house of safety, he stood drawing deep breaths, and +trembling like one who has received a shock. His appearance told +Warrisden much of the dangers of the journey from Ain-Sefra through +the hills to Fez. + +"Yes," said Tony, "I am here. Am I in time?" + +"Just in time," cried Warrisden. "Oh, but I thought you never would +come!" + +He ran down the steps into the courtyard. + +"Balak!" cried Stretton, with a laugh. "Wait till I have had a bath, +and got these clothes burnt." + +In such guise, Tony Stretton came to Fez. He had gone straight to the +vice-consulate, and thence had been directed to Warrisden's house. +When, an hour later, he came up on to the gallery and sat down to +dinner, he was wearing the clothes of a European, and the look of fear +had gone from his face, the servility from his manner. But Warrisden +could not forget either the one or the other. Tony Stretton had come +through the mountains--yes. But the way had not been smooth. + + + + + CHAPTER XXVIII + + HOMEWARDS + + +The two men smoked together upon the roof-top afterwards. + +"I left a man at the gate all day," said Warrisden, "to watch the +track from Sefru. I had brought him from Algiers. I do not know how he +came to miss you." + +"He could not know me," said Tony, "and I spoke to no one." + +"But he knew the mule!" + +Tony was silent for a little while. Then he said, in a low, grave +voice, like a man speaking upon matters which he has no liking to +remember-- + +"The mule was taken from me some days ago in the Ait Yussi country." +And Warrisden upon that said-- + +"You had trouble, then, upon the way--great trouble." + +Again Tony was slow in the reply. He looked out across the city. It +was a night of moonlight, so bright that the stars were pale and +small, as though they were withdrawn; there was no cloud anywhere +about the sky; and on such a night, in that clear, translucent air, +the city, with its upstanding minarets, had a grace and beauty denied +to it by day. There was something of enchantment in its aspect, Tony +smoked his pipe in silence for a little while. Then he said-- + +"Let us not talk about it! I never thought that I would be sitting +here in Fez to-night. Tell me rather when we start!" + +"Early to-morrow," replied Warrisden. "We must reach Roquebrune in the +South of France by the thirty-first." + +Stretton suddenly sat back in his chair. + +"Roquebrune! France!" he exclaimed. "We must go there? Why?" + +"I do not know," Warrisden answered. "A telegram reached me at +Tangier. I kept it." + +He took the telegram from his pocket and handed it to Stretton, who +read it and sat thinking. + +"We have time," said Warrisden, "just time enough, I think, if we +travel fast." + +"Good," said Stretton, as he returned the telegram. "But I was not +thinking of the time." + +He did not explain what had caused him to start at the mention of +Roquebrune; but after sitting for a little while longer in silence, he +betook himself to bed. + +Early the next morning they rode out of the Bab Sagma upon the +thronged highway over the plain to Mequinez. + +The caravans diminished, striking off into this or that track. Very +soon there remained with them only one party of five Jews mounted on +small donkeys. They began to ride through high shrubs and bushes of +fennel over rolling ground. Stretton talked very little, and as the +track twisted and circled across the plain he was constantly standing +up in his stirrups and searching the horizon. + +"There does not seem to be one straight path in Morocco," he exclaimed +impatiently. "Look at this one. There's no reason why it should not +run straight. Yet it never does." + +Indeed, the track lay across that open plain like some brown, +monstrous serpent of a legend. + +"I do not believe," replied Warrisden, "that there is a straight path +anywhere in the world, unless it is one which has been surveyed and +made, or else it runs from gate to gate, and both gates are visible. +One might think the animals made this track, turning and twisting to +avoid the bushes. Only the tracks are no straighter in the desert, +where there are no bushes at all." + +They halted for half an hour at eleven, beside a bridge which crossed +a stream, broken and ruinous, but still serviceable. And while they +sat on the ground under the shadow they suddenly heard a great clatter +of hoofs upon the broken cobbles; and looking up saw a body of men +ride across the bridge. There were about forty of them, young and old; +all were mounted, and in appearance as wild and ragged a set of +bandits as could be imagined. As they rode over the bridge they saw +Warrisden and Stretton seated on the ground beneath them; and without +a word or a shout they halted as one man. Their very silence was an +intimidating thing. + +"Z'mur," whispered Ibrahim. He was shaking with fear. Warrisden +noticed that the two soldiers who accompanied them on this journey to +Mequinez quietly mounted their horses. Stretton and Warrisden rose to +do likewise. And as they rose a dozen of the mounted Z'mur quietly +rode round from the end of the bridge and stood between them and the +stream. Then the leader, a big man with a black beard turning grey, +began to talk in a quiet and pleasant voice to the soldiers. + +"You are bringing Europeans into our country. Now, why are you doing +that? We do not like Europeans." + +The soldiers no less pleasantly replied-- + +"Your country? The Europeans are travelling with a letter from your +master and mine, my Lord the Sultan, to the Governor of Mequinez." + +"You will show us then the letter?" + +"I will do nothing of the kind," the soldier replied, with a smile. +The Z'mur did not move; the two soldiers sat upon their horses +smiling--it seemed that matters had come to a deadlock. Meanwhile +Warrisden and Stretton got into their saddles. Then the leader of the +Z'mur spoke again-- + +"We passed five Jews riding on donkeys a little while ago. They were +kind enough when we stopped them to give us a peseta apiece. We are +going to Fez to offer our help to the Sultan, if only he will give us +rifles and ammunition. But we shall go home again when we have got +them. Perhaps the Europeans would like to give us a peseta apiece as +well." + +"I do not think they would like it at all," said the soldier. "Peace +go with you!" and he turned his horse and, followed, by Warrisden and +Stretton, the terrified Ibrahim and the train of mules, he rode right +through the forty Z'mur and over the bridge. + +It was an awkward moment, but the men of Warrisden's party assumed, +with what skill they could, an air of unconcern. Trouble was very near +to them. It needed only that one of those wild tribesmen should reach +out his hand and seize the bridle of a horse. But no hand was reached +out. The Z'mur were caught in a moment of indecision. They sat upon +their horses motionless. They let the Europeans pass. + +Ibrahim, however, drew no comfort from their attitude. + +"It is because they wish rifles and ammunition from the Government," +he said. "Therefore they will avoid trouble until they have got them. +But with the next party it will not be so." + +There are three waterfalls in Morocco, and of those three one falls in +a great cascade between red cliffs into a dark pool thirty feet below, +close by the village of Medhuma. By this waterfall they lunched, the +while Ibrahim bared his right arm to the shoulder, stretched himself +full length upon the ground, and, to the infinite danger of the +bystanders, practised shooting with his revolver. They lunched quickly +and rode on. Towards evening, above a group of trees on a hill, they +saw here and there a minaret. + +"Mequinez," exclaimed Ibrahim. "Schoof! Mequinez!" + +In a little while fragments of thick wall began to show, scattered +here and there about the plain. Brown walls, high and crumbling to +rain, walls that never had been walls of houses, but which began and +ended for no reason. They were all that was left of the work of Mulai +Ismail, who, in the seventeenth century, had built and planned +buildings about this town until death put an end to all his +architecture. There was to be a wall across the country, from Fez to +Morocco city far away in the south, so that the blind, of which this +kingdom still has many, and then was full, might pass from one town to +another without a guide. Part of that wall was built, and fragments of +it rise amongst the oleanders and the bushes to this day. + +The travellers entered now upon a park. A green mossy turf spread out +soft beneath the feet of their horses, dwarf oaks made everywhere a +pleasant shade; Stretton had lost sight now of the minarets, and no +sign of Mequinez was visible at all. The ground sloped downwards, the +track curved round a hill, and suddenly, on the opposite side of a +valley, they saw the royal city, with its high walls and gates, its +white houses, and its green-tiled mosques, and its old grey massive +palaces stretch along the hillside before their eyes. + +One of the soldiers rode forward into the town to find the Basha and +present his letters. A troop of men came out in a little time and led +the travellers up the cobbled stones through a gateway into the wide +space before the Renegade's Gate, that wonderful monument of Moorish +art which neither the wear of the centuries nor the neglect of its +possessors has availed to destroy. Its tiles are broken. The rains +have discoloured it, stones have fallen from their places. Yet the +gate rises, majestic yet most delicate, beautiful in colour, exquisite +in shape, flanked with massive pillars, and surmounted by its soaring +arch, a piece of embroidery in stone, fine as though the stone were +lace. By the side of this arch the camp was pitched just about the +time when the horses and mules are brought down to roll in the dust of +the square and to drink at the two great fountains beyond the gate. + +Later in that evening there came a messenger from the Basha with +servants bearing bowls of kouss-kouss. + +"Fourteen soldiers will ride with you to-morrow," he said, "for the +country is not safe. It will be well if you start early, for you have +a long way to go." + +"The earlier the better," said Stretton. + +"It will do if you breakfast at five--half-past five," said Ibrahim, +to whom punctuality was a thing unknown. "And start at six--half-past +six." + +"No," said Warrisden. "We will start at five--half-past five." + +That night a company of soldiers kept guard about the tents, and +passed the hours of darkness in calling to one another and chanting +one endless plaintive melody. Little sleep was possible to the two +Englishmen, and to one of them sleep did not come at all. Now and then +Warrisden dropped off and waked again; and once or twice he struck a +match and lit his candle. Each time that he did this he saw Stretton +lying quite motionless in his bed on the other side of the tent. Tony +lay with the bed-clothes up to his chin, and his arms straight down at +his sides, in some uncanny resemblance to a dead man. But Warrisden +saw that all the while his eyes were open. Tony was awake with his +troubles and perplexities, keeping them to himself as was his wont, +and slowly searching for an issue. That he would hit upon the issue he +did not doubt. He had these few days for thought, and it was not the +first time that he had had to map out a line of conduct. His course +might be revealed to him at the very last moment, as it had been on +the trawler in the North Sea. Or it might flash upon him in a second, +as the necessity to desert had flashed upon him amidst the aloes of +Ain-Sefra. Meanwhile he lay awake and thought. + +They started early that morning, and crossing a valley, mounted on to +that high, wide plain Djebel Zarhon and Djebel Gerowaun. They left the +town of Mequinez behind them; its minarets dropped out of sight. They +had come into a most empty world. Not a tent-village stood anywhere +beside the track. Far away to the right, in a deep recess, the white +sacred town of Mulai Idris fell down the dark side of Zarhon like a +cascade. A little further an arch of stone and a few pillars rising +from the plain showed where once the Romans had built their town of +Volubilis. But when that was passed there was no sign of life anywhere +at all. For hours they rode in a desolate, beautiful world. Bushes of +asphodel, white with their starry flowers, brushed against them; +plants of iris, purple and yellow, stood stirrup-high upon their path; +and at times the bushes would cease, and they would ride over a red +carpet of marigolds, which would pale away into the gold of the +mustard flower. Flowers were about them all that day, the red anemone, +the blue lupin, periwinkles, the yellow flower of the cytisus, but no +living things. Even the air above their heads was still. The country +seemed too empty even for the birds. + +At eleven o'clock they stopped beside a stream which ran prettily +between trees across their path. + +"We shall find no more water until evening," said Ibrahim. "We will +stop here." + +Stretton dismounted, and said-- + +"We can send the mules on and catch them up. It will save time." + +The soldiers shook their heads. + +"We are in the Berber country," they said. "We must not separate." + +Stretton looked around impatiently. + +"But there is no one within miles," he exclaimed; and, as if to +contradict him, a man walked out from the bushes by the stream and +came towards them. He had been robbed on this very track not two hours +before by eleven mounted Berbers. He had been driving three mules +laden with eggs and food to Mulai Idris, and his mules and their loads +had been taken from him. He was walking home, absolutely penniless, +His whole fortune had been lost that day; and when once again the +travellers started upon their journey he ran at a trot beside their +horses for safety's sake. + +The road mounted now on to stony and mountainous country. It wound +continually, ascending in and out amongst low, round peaks towards the +summit of a great line of hills which ran from east to west opposite +to them against the sky. + +"Beyond the hills," cried Ibrahim, "is the plain of the Sebou." + +A big village crowned the hill just where the track ascended. It had +been placed there to protect the road. In a little while they came to +the brow of the hill, and suddenly they saw, far below them, the great +plain of the Sebou, green and level, dotted with villages and the +white tombs of saints and clumps of trees, stretching away as far as +the eye could reach. It was afternoon, not a cloud was in the sky, and +the sun shone through the clear, golden air beneficently bright. The +hillside fell away to the plain with a descent so sheer, the plain +broke so abruptly upon the eyes, that the very beauty of the scene +caught the breath away. Both Warrisden and Stretton reined in their +horses, and sat looking across the plain as a man might who suddenly +from the crest of some white cliff sees for the first time the sea. +And then Warrisden heard his companion begin to hum a song. He caught +some of the words, but not many. + +"Oh, come out, mah love, I'm awaitin' foh you heah!" Tony began, and +suddenly checked himself with an expression of anger, as though the +words had associations which it hurt him to recall. + +"Let us ride on," he said, and led the way down the steep, winding +track towards the plain. + +They pressed on that evening, and camped late in the Beni Hassan +country. Stretton slept that night, but he slept fitfully. He had not +yet come to the end of his perplexities, and as he rode away from +their camping-ground in the morning he said, impulsively-- + +"It is quite true. I have thought of it. I am to blame. I should have +gone into the house that night." + +He was endeavouring to be just, and to this criticism of himself he +continually recurred. He should have entered his house in Berkeley +Square on the night when he contented himself with looking up to the +lighted windows. He should have gone in and declared what was in his +mind to do. Very likely he would only have made matters worse. +Contempt for a visionary would very likely have been added to the +contempt for a ne'er-do-weel. Certainly no faith would have been felt +by Millie in the success of his plan. He would have been asked, in a +lukewarm way, to abandon it and stay at home. Still, he ought to have +gone in. He had made a mistake that night. + +All that day they rode through the Beni Hassan country westwards. The +plain was level and monotonous; they passed village after village, +each one built in a circle round a great space of open turf, into +which the cattle were driven at night. For upon the hills, and in the +forest of Mamura to the south, close by, the Z'mur lived, and between +the Beni Hassan and the Z'mur there is always war. In the afternoon +they came to the borders of that forest, and skirting its edge, +towards evening reached the caravanserai of El Kantra. + +The travellers saw it some while before they came to it--four high, +smooth, castellated walls crowning a low hill. It stands upon the road +from Fez to Rabat, and close to the road from Rabat to Larache, and a +garrison guards it. For you could almost throw a stone from its walls +into the trees of Mamura. Stretton and Warrisden rode round the walls +to the gate, and as they passed beneath the arch both halted and +looked back. + +Outside was a quiet country of grey colours; the sun was near to its +setting; far away the broken walls of the old Portuguese town of +Mediyah stood upon a point of vantage on a hillside, like some ruined +castle of the Tyrol. Inside the caravanserai all was noise and +shouting and confusion. In the thickness of the walls there were +little rooms or cells, and in these the merchants were making their +homes for the night, while about them their servants and muleteers +buzzed like a hive of bees. And the whole great square within the +walls was one lake of filthy mud, wherein camels, and mules, and +donkeys, and horses rolled and stamped and fought. A deafening clamour +rose to the skies. Every discordant sound that the created world could +produce seemed to be brayed from that jostling throng of animals as +from some infernal orchestra. And the smell of the place was fetid. + +"Let us pitch our camp outside!" said Warrisden. But the captain of +the garrison came hurrying up. + +"No," he cried excitedly. "The Z'mur! The Z'mur!" + +Stretton shrugged his shoulders. + +"I am getting a little bored with the Z'mur," said he. + +"They have sent in word to us," the captain continued, "that they mean +to attack us to-night." + +Stretton looked perplexed. + +"But why send in word?" he asked. + +The captain of the garrison looked astonished at the question. + +"So that we may be ready for them, of course," he replied, quite +seriously; for life in Morocco has some of the qualities of +_opera-bouffe_. "So you must come inside. You have a letter from my +lord the Basha of Fez, it is true. If the letter said you were to +sleep outside the walls of El Kantra, then I would kiss the seal and +place it against my forehead, and bring out my five hundred men to +guard you, and we should all get killed. But it does not say so." + +His five hundred men were really short of fifty. Stretton and +Warrisden laughed; but they had to go inside the caravanserai. This +was the last day on which they ran any risk. To-morrow they would +cross the Sebou at Mediyah, and beyond the Sebou the road was safe. + +They rode inside the caravanserai, and were allotted a cell which +obtained some privacy from a hurdle fixed in the ground in front of +it. The gates of the caravanserai were closed, the sunset flushed the +blue sky with a hue of rose; the mueddhin came out upon the minaret +which rose from the southern wall, and chanted in a monotone his call +to prayer; and then a drummer and a bugler advanced into the crowded +square. Suddenly there fell upon Stretton's ears, competing with the +mueddhin and the uproar of the animals, the "Last Post." + +Stretton started up, amazed, and most deeply moved. An English officer +instructed the Moorish troops. What more natural than that he should +introduce the English calls and signals? But to Stretton it seemed +most wonderful that here, in this Eastern country, while the +Mohammedan priest was chanting from his minaret, he should hear again, +after so many years, that familiar tattoo sounded by an Eastern bugle +and an Eastern drum. In how many barracks of England, he wondered, +would that same "Last Post" ring out to-night? And at once the years +slipped away, the hard years of the North Sea and the Sahara. He was +carried back among the days when he served in the Coldstream. Then +arose in his heart a great longing that something of the happiness of +those days might be recaptured still. + +Warrisden and Stretton crossed the Sebou the next morning, and rode +with the boom of the Atlantic in their ears. Hills upon their left +hand hid the sea from their eyes, and it was not until the next day, +when they mounted on to a high tableland four hours from Larache, that +they saw it rolling lazily towards the shore. They caught a steamer at +Larache that night. + + + + + CHAPTER XXIX + + PAMELA MEETS A STRANGER + + +Meanwhile Pamela waited at the Villa Pontignard, swinging from hope to +fear, and from fear again to hope. The days chased one another. She +watched the arrival of each train from Marseilles at the little +station below, with an expectant heart; and long after it had departed +towards Italy, she kept within her vision the pathway up the hillside +to the villa. But the travellers did not return. Expectation and +disappointment walked alternately at her elbow all the day, and each +day seemed endless. Yet, when the next day came, it had come all too +quickly. Every morning it seemed to her, as she turned her calendar, +that the days chased one another, racing to the month's end; every +evening, tired out with her vigil, she wondered how they could pass so +slowly. The thirty-first of the month dawned at last. At some time on +this day Millie Stretton would arrive at Eze. She thought of it, as +she rose, with a sinking heart; and then thrust thought aside. She +dared not confront the possibility that the trains might stop at +Roquebrune, and move on to Italy and discharge no passengers upon the +platform. She dared not recognise her dread that this day might close +and the darkness come as fruitlessly as all the rest. It was her last +day of hope. Lionel Callon was waiting. Millie Stretton was arriving. +To-morrow, Tony might come, but he would come too late. Pamela lived +in suspense. Somehow the morning passed. The afternoon _Rapide_ swept +through towards Mentone. Pamela saw the smoke of the engine from her +terrace, and knew that upon that train had come the passenger from +England. Half an hour ago Millie had most likely stepped from her +carriage on to the platform at Eze. And still Tony Stretton and +Warrisden lingered. + +Towards dusk she began to despair. In a little while another train was +due. She heard its whistle, saw it stop at the station, and waited +with her eyes fixed upon the hillside path. No one appeared upon it. +She turned and went into the house. She thought for a moment of going +herself to Eze, thrusting herself upon Millie at the cost of any snub; +and while she debated whether the plan could at all avail, the door +was opened, a servant spoke some words about a visitor, and a man +entered the room. Pamela started to her feet. The man stood in the +twilight of the room: his back was against the light of the window. +Pamela could not see his face. But it was not Warrisden, so much she +knew at once. It could only be Tony Stretton. + +"So you have come," she cried. "At last! I had given up hope." + +She advanced and held out her hand. And some reserve in Tony's +attitude, something of coldness in the manner with which he took her +hand, checked and chilled her. + +"It is you?" she asked. "I watched the path. The train has gone some +while." + +"Yes, it is I," he replied. "I had to inquire my way at the village. +This is the first time I ever came to Roquebrune." + +Still more than the touch of his hand and the reserve of his manner, +the cold reticence of his voice chilled her. She turned to the servant +abruptly-- + +"Bring lamps," she said. She felt the need to see Tony Stretton's +face. She had looked forward so eagerly to his coming; she had hoped +for it, and despaired of it with so full a heart; and now he had come, +and with him there had come, most unexpectedly, disappointment. She +had expected ardour, and there was only, as it seemed, indifference +and stolidity. She was prepared for a host of questions to be tumbled +out upon her in so swift a succession that no time was given to her +for an answer to any one of them; and he stood before her, seemingly +cold as stone. Had he ceased to care for Millie, she wondered? + +"You have come as quickly as you could?" she asked, trying to read his +features in the obscurity. + +"I have not lost a moment since I received your letter," he answered. + +She caught at the words, "your letter." Perhaps there lay the reason +for his reserve. She had written frankly, perhaps too frankly she +feared at this moment. Had the letter suddenly killed his love for +Millie? Such things, no doubt, could happen--had happened. Disillusion +might have withered it like a swift shaft of lightning. + +"My letter," she said. "You must not exaggerate its meaning. You read +it carefully?" + +"Very carefully." + +"And I wrote it carefully," she went on, pleading with his +indifference; "very carefully." + +"It contains the truth," said Tony; "I did not doubt that." + +"Yes; but it contains all the truth," she urged. "You must not doubt +that either. Remember, you yourself are to blame. I wrote that, didn't +I? I meant it." + +"Yes, you wrote that," answered Tony. "I am not denying that you are +right. It may well be that I am to blame. It may well be that you, +too, are not quite free from blame. Had you told me that morning, when +we rode together in the Row, what you had really meant when you said +that I ought never to leave my wife----" And at that Pamela +interrupted him-- + +"Would you have stayed if I had explained?" she cried. And Tony for a +moment was silent. Then he answered slowly-- + +"No; for I should not have believed you." And then he moved for the +first time since he had entered the room. "However, it can do neither +of us any good to discuss what we might have done had we known then +what we know now." + +He stopped as the door opened. The lamps were brought in and set upon +the tables. Tony waited until the servant had gone out, and the door +was closed again; then he said-- + +"You sent a telegram. I am here in answer to it. I was to be at +Roquebrune on the thirty-first. This is the thirty-first. Am I in +time?" + +"Yes," said Pamela. + +She could now see Tony clearly; and of one thing she at once was sure. +She had been misled by the twilight of the room. Tony, at all events, +was not indifferent. He stood before her travel-stained and worn. His +face was haggard and thin; his eyes very tired, like the eyes of an +old man; there were flecks of grey in his hair, and lines about his +eyes. These changes she noticed, and took them at their true value. +They were signs of the hard life he had lived during these years, and +of the quick, arduous journey which he had made. But there was more. +If Tony had spoken with a measured voice, it was in order that he +might control himself the better. If he had stood without gesture or +motion, it was because he felt the need to keep himself in hand. So +much Pamela clearly saw. Tony was labouring under a strong emotion. + +"Yes you are in time," she cried; and now her heart was glad. "I was +so set on saving both your lives, in keeping you and Millie for each +other. Of late, since you did not come, my faith faltered a little. +But it should not have faltered. You are here! You are here!" + +"My wife is here, too?" asked Tony, coldly; and Pamela's enthusiasm +again was checked. "Where is she?" + +"She arrives in the south of France to-day. She stops at Eze. She +should be there now." + +She had hoped to see the blood pulse into his face, and some look of +gladness dawn suddenly in his eyes, some smile of forgiveness alter +the stern set of his lips. But again she was disappointed. + +Tony seemed to put his wife out of his thoughts. + +"And since your message was so urgent," he continued deliberately, "it +follows that Callon comes to-day as well," and he repeated the name in +a singularly soft, slow, and almost caressing voice. "Lionel Callon," +he said. + +And at once Pamela was desperately afraid. It needed just that name +uttered in just that way to explain to her completely the emotion +which Tony so resolutely controlled. She looked at him aghast. She had +planned to bring back Tony to Millie and his home. The Tony Stretton +whom she had known of old, the good-natured, kindly man who loved his +wife, whom all men liked and none feared. And lo! she had brought back +a stranger. And the stranger was dangerous. He was thrilling with +anger, he was anticipating his meeting with Lionel Callon with a +relish which, to Pamela, was dreadful. + +"No," she exclaimed eagerly. "Mr. Callon has been here all this while, +and Millie only comes to-day." + +"Callon has been waiting for her, then?" he asked implacably. + +"Oh, I don't know," Pamela exclaimed in despair. "I have not spoken to +him. How should I know?" + +"Yet you have no doubts." + +"Well, then, no," she said, "I have no doubt that he is waiting here +for Millie. But she only arrives to-day. They have not met until +to-day. That is why I sent the telegram." + +Tony nodded his head. + +"So that I might be present at the meeting?" + +And Pamela could have cried out aloud. She had not thought, she had +not foreseen. She had fixed all her hopes on saving Millie. Set upon +that, she had not understood that other and dreadful consequences +might ensue. These consequences were vivid enough before her eyes now. +All three would meet--Tony, Millie, and Lionel Callon. What would +follow? What might not follow? Pamela closed her eyes. Her heart sank; +she felt faint at the thought of what she had so blindly brought +about. + +"Tony!" she exclaimed. She wrung her hands together, pleading with him +in short and broken sentences. "Don't think of him!... Think of +Millie. You can gain her back!... I am very sure.... I wrote that to +you, didn't I?... Mr. Callon.... It is not worth while.... He is of no +account.... Millie was lonely, that was all.... There would be a +scandal, at the best...." And Tony laughed harshly. + +"Oh, it is not worth while," she cried again piteously, and yet again, +"it is not worth while." + +"Yet I am anxious to meet him," said Tony. + +Suddenly Pamela looked over his shoulder to the door, and, for a +moment, hope brightened on her face. But Stretton understood the look, +and replied to it. + +"No, Warrisden is not here. I left him behind with our luggage at +Monte Carlo." + +"Why did he stay?" cried Pamela, as again her hopes fell. + +"He could hardly refuse. This is my affair, not his. I claimed +to-night. He will come to you, no doubt, tomorrow." + +"You meant him to stay behind, then?" + +"I meant to see you alone," said Tony; and Pamela dared question him +no more, though the questions thronged in her mind and tortured her. +Was it only because he wished to see her alone that he left Warrisden +behind? Was it not also so that he might not be hampered afterwards? +Was it only so that another might not know of the trouble between +himself and Millie? Or was it not so that another might not be on hand +to hinder him from exacting retribution? Pamela was appalled. Tony was +angry--yes, that was natural enough. She would not have felt half her +present distress if he had shown his passion in tempestuous words, if +he had threatened, if he had raved. But there was so much deliberation +in his anger, he had it so completely in control; it was an instrument +which he meant to use, not a fever which might master him for a moment +and let him go. + +"You are so changed," she cried. "I did not think of that when I wrote +to you. But, of course, these years and the Foreign Legion could not +but change you." + +She moved away, and sat down holding her head between her hands. +Stretton did not answer her words in any way. He moved towards her, +and asked-- + +"Is Callon, too, at Eze?" + +"No, no," she cried, raising her head, thankful, at last, that here +was some small point on which she could attenuate his suspicions. "You +are making too much of the trouble." + +"Yet you wrote the letter to me. You also sent the telegram. You sent +me neither the one nor the other without good reason." And Pamela +dropped her eyes again from his face. + +"If Callon is not at Eze," he insisted, "he is close by!" + +Pamela did not answer. She sat trying to compose her thoughts. Suppose +that she refused to answer, Tony would go to Eze. He might find Millie +and Callon there. On the other hand, it was unlikely that he would. +Pamela had seen that quiet, solitary restaurant by the sea where +Callon lodged. It was there that they would be, she had no doubt. + +"Where is Callon?" asked Tony. "Where does he stay?" + +Pamela closed her ears to the question, working still at the stern +problem of her answer. If she refused to tell him what he asked, +Millie and Callon might escape for to-night. That was possible. But, +then, to-morrow would come. Tony must meet them to-morrow in any case, +and to-morrow might be too late. + +"I will tell you," she answered, and she described the place. And in +another minute she was alone. She heard the front door close, she +heard Tony's step upon the gravel of the garden path, and then all was +silent. She sat holding her throbbing temples in her hands. Visions +rose before her eyes, and her fear made them extraordinarily luminous +and vivid. She saw that broad, quiet terrace over the sea where she +had lunched, the lonely restaurant, the windows of that suite of rooms +open on to the terrace. A broad column of light streamed out from the +window in her vision. She could almost hear voices and the sound of +laughter, she imagined the laughter all struck dumb, and thereafter a +cry of horror stabbing the night. The very silence of the villa became +a torture to her. She rose and walked restlessly about the room. If +she could only have reached Warrisden! But she did not even know to +which hotel in all the hotels of Monte Carlo he had gone. Tony might +have told her that, had she kept her wits about her and put the +question with discretion. But she had not. She had no doubt that +Stretton had purposely left him behind. Tony wished for no restraining +hand, when at last he came face to face with Lionel Callon. She sat +down, and tried to reason out what would happen. Tony would go first +to Eze. Would he find Millie there? Perhaps. Most likely he would not. +He would go on then to the restaurant on the Corniche road. But he +would have wasted some time. It might be only a little time, still, +however short it was, what was waste of time to Tony might be gain of +time to her--if only she could find a messenger. + +Suddenly she stood up. There was a messenger, under her very hand. She +scribbled a note to Lionel Callon, hardly knowing what she wrote. She +bade him go the instant when he received it, go at all costs without a +moment's delay. Then, taking the note in her hand, she ran from the +villa down the road to Roquebrune. + + + + + CHAPTER XXX + + M. GIRAUD AGAIN + + +The dusk was deepening quickly into darkness. As she ran down the open +stretch of hillside between her villa and the little town, she saw the +lights blaze out upon the terrace of Monte Carlo. Far below her, upon +her right, they shone like great opals, each with a heart of fire. +Pamela stopped for a second to regain her breath before she reached +Roquebrune. The sudden brightness of those lights carried her thoughts +backwards to the years when the height of trouble for her had been the +sickness of a favourite horse, and all her life was an eager +expectation. On so many evenings she had seen those lights flash out +through the gathering night while she had sat talking in her garden +with the little schoolmaster whom she was now to revisit. To both of +them those lights had been a parable. They had glowed in friendliness +and promise--thus she had read the parable--out of a great, bright, +gay world of men and women, upon a cool, twilit garden of youth and +ignorance. She thought of what had come in place of all that imagined +gaiety. To the schoolmaster, disappointment and degradation; while, as +for herself, she felt very lonely upon this evening. "The world is a +place of great sadness." Thus had M. Giraud spoken when Pamela had +returned to Roquebrune from her first season in London, and the words +now came back to her again. + +She ran on through the narrow streets of Roquebrune, her white frock +showing in the light from the shops and windows. She wore no hat upon +her head, and more than one of the people in the street called to her +as she passed and asked her whether she needed help. Help, indeed, she +did need, but not from them. She came to the tiny square whence the +steps led down to the station. On the west side of the square stood +the school-house, and, close by, the little house of the schoolmaster. +A light burned in a window of the ground floor. Pamela knocked loudly +upon the door. She heard a chair grate upon the floor-boards. She +knocked again, and the door was opened. It was the schoolmaster +himself who opened it. + +"M. Giraud!" she exclaimed, drawing her breath quickly. The +schoolmaster leaned forward and stared at the white figure which stood +in the darkness just outside his porch; but he made no reply. + +"Let me in!" cried Pamela; and he made a movement as though to bar the +way. But she slipped quickly past him into the room. He closed the +door slowly and followed her. + +The room was bare. A deal table, a chair or two, and a few tattered +books on a hanging bookshelf made up all its furniture. Pamela leaned +against the wall with a hand to her heart. M. Giraud saw her clearly +now. She stood only a few feet from him, in the light of the room. She +was in distress; yet he spoke harshly. + +"Why have you come?" he cried; and she answered, piteously, "I want +your help." + +At that a flame of anger kindled within him. He saw her again, after +all this long time of her absence--her whose equal he had never spoken +with. Her dark hair, her eyes, the pure outline of her face, her tall, +slim figure, the broad forehead--all the delicacy and beauty of +her--was a torture to him. The sound of her voice, with its remembered +accents, hurt him as he had thought nothing could ever hurt him again. + +"Really!" he cried, in exasperation. "You want help; so you come to +me. Without that need would you have come? No, indeed. You are a +woman. Get your fine friends to help you!" + +There were other follies upon his tongue, but he never spoke them. He +looked at Pamela, and came to a stop. + +Pamela had entered the cottage bent with a single mind upon her +purpose--to avert a catastrophe at the little restaurant on the +Corniche road. But M. Giraud was before her, face to face with her, as +she was face to face with him. She saw him clearly in the light as he +saw her; and she was shocked. The cure had prepared her for a change +in her old comrade, but not for so complete a disfigurement. The +wineshop had written its sordid story too legibly upon his features. +His face was bloated and red, the veins stood out upon the cheeks, and +the nose like threads of purple; his eyes were yellow and unwholesome. +M. Giraud had grown stout in body, too; and his dress was slovenly and +in disrepair. He was an image of degradation and neglect. Pamela was +shocked, and betrayed the shock. She almost shrank from him at the +first; there was almost upon her face an expression of aversion and +disgust. But sorrow drove the aversion away, and immediately her eyes +were full of pity; and these swift changes M. Giraud saw and +understood. + +She was still his only window on the outside world. That was the +trouble. By her expression he read his own decline more surely than in +his mirror. Through her he saw the world; through her, too, he saw +what manner of figure he presented to the world. Never had he realised +how far he had sunk until this moment. He saw, as in a picture, the +young schoolmaster of the other days who had read French with the +pupil, who was more his teacher than his pupil, upon the garden +terrace of the Villa Pontignard--a youth full of dreams, which were +vain, no doubt, but not ignoble. There was a trifle of achievement, +too. For even now one of the tattered books upon his shelf was a copy +of his brochure on Roquebrune and the Upper Corniche road. With +perseverance, with faith--he understood it in a flash--he might have +found, here, at Roquebrune, a satisfaction for those ambitions which +had so tortured him. There was a field here for the historian, had he +chosen to seize on it. Fame might have come to him, though he never +visited the great cities and the crowded streets. So he thought, and +then he realised what he had become. It was true he had suffered great +unhappiness. Yet so had she--Pamela Mardale; and she had not fallen +from her pedestal. Here shame seized upon him. He lowered his eyes +from her face. + +"Help!" he stammered. "You ask me to help you? Look at me! I can give +you no help!" + +He suddenly broke off. He sat down at the table, buried his face in +his hands, and burst into tears. Pamela crossed to him and laid her +hand very gently upon his shoulder. She spoke very gently, too. + +"Oh yes, you can," she said. + +He drew away from her, but she would not be repulsed. + +"You should never have come to me at all," he sobbed. "Oh, how I hate +that you should see me like this! Why did you come? I did not mean you +to see me. You must have known that! You must have known, too, why. It +was not kind of you, mademoiselle. No, it was not kind!" + +"Yet I am glad that I came," said Pamela. "I came, thinking of myself, +it is true--my need is so very great; but now I see your need is as +great as mine. I ask you to rise up and help me." + +"No, leave me alone!" he cried. And she answered, gently, "I will +not." + +M. Giraud grew quiet. He pressed his handkerchief to his eyes, and +stood up. + +"Forgive me!" he said. "I have behaved like a child; but you would +forgive me if you knew how I have waited and waited for you to come +back. But you never did. Each summer I said, 'She will return in the +winter!' And the winter came, and I said, 'She will come in the +spring.' But neither in winter nor in the spring did you return to +Roquebrune. I have needed you so badly all these years." + +"I am sorry," replied Pamela; "I am very sorry." + +She did not reproach herself at all. She could not see, indeed, that +she was to blame. But she was none the less distressed. Giraud's +exhibition of grief was so utterly unfamiliar to her that she felt +awkward and helpless in face of it. He was yet further disfigured now +by the traces of weeping; his eyes were swollen and red. There was +something grotesque in the aspect of this drink-swollen face, all +convulsed with sorrow. Nothing could well lie less in sympathy with +Pamela's nature than Giraud's outburst and display of tears; for she +was herself reticent and proud. She held her head high as she walked +through the world, mistress alike of her sorrows and her joys. But Mr. +Mudge had spoken the truth when he had called upon her in +Leicestershire. Imagination had come to her of late. She was able to +understand the other point of view--to appreciate that there were +other characters than hers which must needs fulfil themselves in ways +which were not hers. She put herself now in M. Giraud's place. She +imagined him waiting and waiting at Roquebrune, with his one window on +the outside world closed and shuttered--a man in a darkened room who +most passionately desired the air without. She said, with a trace of +hesitation-- + +"You say you have needed me very much?" + +"Oh, have I not?" exclaimed Giraud; and the very weariness of his +voice would have convinced her, had she needed conviction. It seemed +to express the dilatory passage of the years during which he had +looked for her coming, and had looked in vain. + +"Well, then, listen to me," she went on. "I was once told that +to be needed by those whom one needs is a great comfort. I thought +of the saying at the time, and I thought that it was a true one. +Afterwards"--she began to speak slowly, carefully selecting her +words--"it happened that in my own experience I proved it to be +true--at all events, for me. Is it true for you also? Think well. If +it is not true I will go away as you bade me at the beginning; but if +it is true--why, then I may be of some little help to you, and you +will be certainly a great help to me; for I need you very surely." + +M. Giraud looked at her in silence for a little while. Then he +answered her with simplicity, and so, for the first time during this +interview, wore the proper dignity of a man. + +"Yes, I will help you," he said. "What can I do?" + +She held out the letter which she had written to Lionel Callon. She +bade him carry it with the best speed he could to its destination. + +"Lose no time!" she implored. "I am not sure, but it may be that one +man's life, and the happiness of a man and a woman besides, all hang +upon its quick receipt." + +M. Giraud took his hat from the wall and went to the door. At the door +he paused, and standing thus, with an averted face, he said in a +whisper, recalling the words she had lately spoken-- + +"There is one, then, whom you need? You are no longer lonely in your +thoughts? I should like to know." + +"Yes," Pamela answered gently: "I am no longer lonely in my thoughts." + +"And you are happy?" he continued. "You were not happy when you were +at Roquebrune last. I should like to know that you, at all events, are +happy now." + +"Yes," said Pamela. In the presence of his distress she rather shrank +from acknowledging the change which had come over her. It seemed +cruel; yet he clearly wished to know. He clearly would be the happier +for knowing. "Yes," she said; "I am happy." + +"I am very glad," said M. Giraud, in a low voice; "I am very glad." +And he went rather quickly out by the door. + + + + + CHAPTER XXXI + + AT THE RESERVE + + +Tony Stretton walked quickly down from the Villa Pontignard to the +station. There he learned that an hour must elapse before a train to +Eze was due. Inaction was at this moment intolerable to him. Even +though he should get to Eze not a minute the sooner, he must hurry +upon his way. He could not wait upon this platform for an hour, +suspense so tortured him. He went out upon the road and began to run. +He ran very quickly. The road turned sharply round the shoulder of a +hill, and Stretton saw in front of him the lights of Monte Carlo. They +were bunched in great white clusters, they were strung in festoons in +the square and the streets. They made a golden crescent about the +dark, quiet waters of the bay. Looking down from this shoulder of the +hill upon the town at such an hour one seems to be looking upon a town +of fairyland; one expects a sweet and delicate music to float upwards +from its houses and charm the ears. Tony's one thought was that beyond +that place of lights lay Eze. He came to an electric tram which was on +point of starting. He entered it and it rattled him quickly down the +hill. + +At Monte Carlo he sprang into the first carriage which he saw waiting +for a fare, and bade the coachman drive him quickly out to Eze. The +night had come; above his head the stars shone very brightly from a +dark sky of velvet. The carriage passed out of the town; the villas +grew more scarce; the open road glimmered ahead of him a riband of +white; the sea murmured languorously upon the shore. + +At this moment, in the lonely restaurant towards which Tony was +driving in such haste, Lionel Callon and Millie Stretton were sitting +down to dinner. The table was laid in the small, daintily furnished +room which opened on to the terrace. The windows stood wide, and the +lazy murmur of the waves entered in. The white cloth shone with +silver, a great bowl of roses stood in the centre and delicately +perfumed the air. Thither Millie had come in fulfilment of that +promise made on a midnight of early spring in Regent's Park. The +colour burned prettily on her cheeks, she had dressed herself in a +pink gown of lace, jewels shone on her arms and at her neck. She was, +perhaps, a little feverish in her gaiety, her laughter was perhaps a +little over loud. Indeed, every now and then her heart sank in fear +within her, and she wished herself far away. But here Lionel Callon +was at his ease. He knew the methods by which victory was to be won. +There was no suggestion of triumph in his manner. He was considerate +and most deferential, and with no more than a hint of passion in the +deference. + +"You have come," he said. His eyes rested upon hers, and he left them +to express his gratitude. He raised her hand to his lips and gently +took the cloak from her shoulders. "You have had a long journey. But +you are not tired." He placed her chair for her at the table and sat +opposite. He saw that she was uneasy. He spoke no word which might +alarm her. + +Meanwhile Tony was drawing nearer. He reached the hotel at Eze, and +drove through its garden to the door. + +"Is Lady Stretton in the hotel?" he asked. + +"No, sir. Her ladyship went out to dinner nearly an hour ago." + +"Thank you," said Tony. "She arrived this afternoon, I think?" + +"Yes, sir. What name shall I give when she returns?" + +"No name," said Tony. And he ordered his coachman to drive back to the +road. + +When he had reached it he directed the man again. + +"Towards Beaulieu," he said; and in a little while, on his left hand, +below the level of the road, he saw the lights of the _Reserve_. He +stopped at the gate, dismissed his carriage, and walked down the +winding drive to the door. He walked into the restaurant. It was +empty. A waiter came forward to him. + +"I wish you to take me at once to Mr. Callon," he said. He spoke in a +calm, matter-of-fact voice. But the waiter nevertheless hesitated. +Tony wore the clothes in which he had travelled to Roquebrune. He was +covered with dust, his face was haggard and stern. He had nothing in +common with the dainty little room of lights and flowers and shining +silver, and the smartly dressed couple who were dining there. The +waiter guessed that his irruption would be altogether inconvenient. + +"Mr. Callon!" he stammered. "He has gone out." + +Tony heard the rattle of a metal cover upon a dish. He looked in the +direction whence the sound came--he looked to the right-hand side of +the restaurant. A door stood open there, and in the passage beyond the +door he saw a waiter pass carrying the dish. Moreover, the man who had +spoken to him made yet another mistake. He noticed the direction of +Tony's glance, and he made a quick movement as though to bar that +passage. + +"He is here," said Tony; and he thrust the waiter aside. He crossed +the restaurant quickly and entered the passage. The passage ran +parallel to the restaurant; and, at the end towards the terrace, there +was another door upon the opposite side. The waiter with the dish had +his hand upon the door-handle, but he turned at the sound of +Stretton's step. He, too, noticed the disorder of Tony's dress. At the +same moment the man in the restaurant shouted in a warning voice-- + +"Jules!" + +Jules stood in front of the door. + +"Monsieur, this room is private," said he. + +"Yet I will take the liberty to intrude," said Tony, quietly. + +From behind the door there came the sound of a man's voice which Tony +did not know. He had, indeed, never heard it before. Then a woman's +laugh rang out; and the sound of it angered Tony beyond endurance. He +recognised it beyond the possibility of mistake. It was his wife who +was laughing so gaily there behind the closed door. He thought of the +years he had spent in the determination to regain his wife's esteem, +to free himself from her contempt. For the moment he could have +laughed bitterly at his persistence as at some egregious folly. It +seemed all waste--waste of time, waste of endeavour, waste of +suffering. She was laughing! And with Lionel Callon for her companion! +The cold, black nights of the North Sea and its gales; the arid sands +of the Sahara; all his long service for her ending in that crowning +act of desertion--the story was clear in his mind from beginning to +end, detailed and complete. And she was laughing in there with Lionel +Callon! Her laughter was to him as some biting epigram which +epitomised the way in which she had spent the years of his absence. +His anger got the better of his self-control. + +"Stand away," he cried, in a low, savage voice, to the waiter. And +since the man did not instantly move, he seized him by the shoulders +and dragged him from the door. + +"Monsieur!" the man cried aloud, in a frightened voice, and the dish +which he was carrying fell with a clatter on to the floor. Inside the +room the laughter suddenly ceased. Tony listened for a second. He +could not hear even a whisper. There was complete silence. He smiled +rather grimly to himself; he was thinking that this was not, at all +events, the silence of contempt. + +Could he have seen through the door into the room he would have been +yet more convinced. All the gaiety vanished in an instant from +Millie's face. She was sitting opposite the door; she sat and stared +at it in terror. The blood ebbed from the cheeks, leaving them as +white as paper. + +"Monsieur!" she repeated, in so low a whisper that even Callon, on the +other side of the small table, hardly heard the word. Her lips were +dry, and she moistened them. "Monsieur!" she whispered again, and the +whisper was a question. She had no definite suspicion who "Monsieur" +was; she did not define him as her husband. She only understood that +somehow she was trapped. The sudden clatter of the dish upon the +floor, the loudness of the waiter's cry, which was not a mere protest, +but also a cry of fear, terrified her; they implied violence. She was +trapped. She sat paralysed upon her chair, staring across the table +over Callon's shoulder at the door. Callon meanwhile said not a word. +He had been sitting with his back to the door, and he twisted round in +his chair. To both of them it seemed ages before the handle was +turned. Yet so short was the interval of time that they could hardly +have reached the terrace through the open window had they sprung up at +the first sound of disturbance. + +Thus they were sitting, silent and motionless, when the door was +pushed open, and Tony stood in the doorway. At the sight of him Millie +uttered one loud scream, and clapped her hands over her face. Callon, +on the other hand, started up on to his feet. As he did so he upset +his wine-glass over the table-cloth; it fell and splintered on the +polished floor. He turned towards the intruder who so roughly forced +his way into the room. The eyes of that intruder took no account of +him; they were fixed upon Millie Stretton, as she sat cowering at the +table with her hands before her face. + +"What do you want?" cried Callon. "You have no right here!" + +"I have every right here," said Tony. "That is my wife!" + +It was still his wife at whom he looked, not at all towards Callon. +Callon was startled out of his wits. Detection he had always feared; +he had sought to guard against it by the use of every precaution known +to his devious strategy. But it was detection by Pamela Mardale and +her friends, who had once already laid him by the heels; the husband +had never entered into his calculations. He had accepted without +question Millie's version of the husband--he was the man who did not +care. In some part of the world he wandered, but where no one knew; +cut off from all his friends--indifferent, neglectful, and a fool. +Even now he could not believe. This might be some new trick of Pamela +Mardale's. + +"Your wife!" he exclaimed. "That is not true." + +"Not true?" cried Tony, in a terrible voice. He stretched out his arm +and pointed towards Millie. "Look!" + +Millie flinched as though she feared a blow. She dropped her head yet +lower. She held her fingers over her eyelids, closing them tightly. +She had looked once at Tony's face, she dared not look again. She sat +in darkness, trembling. One question was in her mind. "Would he kill +her?" Callon looked at her as he was bidden. Millie was wont to speak +of her husband with indifference, and a suggestion of scorn. Yet it +was her manifest terror which now convinced Callon that the husband +was indeed before him. Here the man was, sprung suddenly out of the +dark upon him, not neglectful, for he had the look of one who has +travelled from afar very quickly, and slept but little on the way; not +indifferent, for he was white with anger and his eyes were aflame. +Callon cursed the luck which had for a second time brought him into +such ill straits. He measured himself with Tony, and knew in the +instant that he was no match for him. There was a man, tired, no +doubt, and worn, but hard as iron, supple of muscle and limb, and +finely trained to the last superfluous ounce of flesh; while he +himself was soft with luxury and good living. He sought to temporise. + +"That is no proof," said he. "Any woman might be startled----" And +Tony broke fiercely in upon his stammered argument-- + +"Go out," he cried, "and wait for me!" + +The door was still open. Outside it in the passage the waiters were +clustered, listening. Inside the room Millie was listening. The order, +roughly given, was just one which Callon for very shame could not +obey. He would have liked to obey it, for confronting husbands was +never to his liking; all his art lay in eluding them. + +"Go out!" Tony repeated, and took a step forward. Callon could not cut +so poor a figure as to slink from the room like a whipped schoolboy. +Yet it would have gone better with him had he eaten his leek and gone. + +"It would not be safe to leave you," he babbled. And suddenly Tony +caught him by the throat, struck him upon the face, and then flung him +violently away. + +Callon reeled back through the open windows, slipped and fell at his +full length upon the terrace. His head struck the stone flags with a +horrible sound. He lay quite still in the strong light which poured +from the room; his eyes were closed, his face quite bloodless. It was +his business, as Mudge had said, to light amongst the teacups. + +Tony made no further movement towards him. The waiters went out on to +the terrace and lifted him up and carried him away. Then Tony turned +towards his wife. She had risen up from her chair and overturned it +when Tony had flung the interloper from the room. She now crouched +shuddering against the wall, with her eyes fixed in terror upon her +husband. As he turned towards her she uttered a sob and dropped upon +her knees before him. That was the end of all her scorn. She kneeled +in deadly fear, admiring him in the very frenzy of her fear. She had +no memory for the contemptuous letters which she had written and Tony +had carried under his pillow on the North Sea. Her little deceits and +plots and trickeries to hoodwink her friends, her little pretence of +passion for Lionel Callon--she knew at this moment that it never had +been more than a pretence--these were the matters which now she +remembered, and for which she dreaded punishment. She was wearing +jewels that night--jewels which Tony had given her in the good past +days when they lived together in the house in Deanery Street. They +shook and glittered upon her hair, about her neck, upon her bosom and +her arms. She kneeled in her delicate finery of lace and satin in this +room of luxury and bright flowers. There was no need for Tony now to +work to re-establish himself in her thoughts. She reached out her +hands to him in supplication. + +"I am not guilty," she moaned. "Tony! Tony!" + + + + + CHAPTER XXXII + + HUSBAND AND WIFE + + +The man who was no good had his triumph then. Only triumph was not at +all in his thoughts. + +"Oh, please!" he said very quietly, "get up from your knees. I don't +like to see you there. It hurts me." + +Millie raised her eyes to him in wonder. He did not mean to kill her, +then. All his violence, it seemed, was reserved for that poor warrior +of the drawing-rooms who had just been carried away stunned and +bleeding from the terrace. When Tony spoke to her his voice was rather +that of a man very dispirited and sad. He had indeed travelled through +the mountains of Morocco hot with anger against Callon the interloper; +but now that he had come face to face again with Millie, now that he +had heard her voice with its remembered accents, the interloper seemed +of little account, a creature to punish and be done with. The sadness +of his voice penetrated to Millie's heart. She rose and stood +submissively before him. + +In the passage outside the door the waiters were clustered whispering +together. Tony closed the door and shut the whispers out. Upon the +terrace, outside the window, a man was hesitating whether to enter or +no. Tony went to the window. + +"Who are you?" he asked. "What do you want?" + +"I am Giraud, the schoolmaster of Roquebrune," said the man, timidly. +"I bring a letter from Mademoiselle Mardale." + +"Let me see it!" said Tony; and he held out his hand for the letter. +He glanced at the superscription and gave it back. "It is not for me," +he said, and M. Giraud went away from the terrace. Tony turned back to +his wife. His mind was full of a comparison between the ways in which +he and she had each spent the years of absence. For him they had been +years of endeavour, persisted in through failure and perplexity until +success, but for her, was reached. And how had Millie spent them? He +looked at her sternly, and she said again in a faltering voice-- + +"I am innocent, Tony." + +And he replied-- + +"Could you have said as much to-morrow had I not come back to-night?" + +Millie had no answer to that question--she attempted none; and it was +even at that moment counted to her credit by her husband. She stood +silent for a while, and only the murmur of the sea breaking upon the +beach filled the room. A light wind breathed through the open window, +cool and fragrant, and made the shaded candles flicker upon the table. +Millie had her one poor excuse to offer, and she pleaded it humbly. + +"I thought that you had ceased to care what became of me," she said. + +Tony looked sharply at her. She was sincere--surely she was sincere. + +"You thought that?" he exclaimed; and he replaced her chair at the +table. "Sit down here! Let me understand! You thought that I had +ceased to care for you? When I ceased to write, I suppose?" + +Millie shook her head. + +"Before that?" + +Tony dropped into the chair on which Callon had been sitting. + +"Before that?" he exclaimed in perplexity. "When? Tell me!" + +Millie sat over against him at the table. + +"Do you remember the evening when you first told me that you had made +up your mind to go away and make a home for both of us? It was on that +evening. You gave your reason for going away. We had begun to +quarrel--we were drifting apart." + +"I remember," said Tony; "but we had not ceased to care then, neither +you nor I. It was just because I feared that at some time we might +cease to care that I was resolved to go away." + +"Ah," said Millie; "but already the change had begun. Yes, yes! Things +winch you thought you never could remember without a thrill you +remembered already with indifference--you remembered them without +being any longer moved or touched by the associations which they once +had had. I recollect the very words you used. I sat as still as could +be while you spoke them; but I never forgot them, Tony. There was a +particular instance which you mentioned--a song----" And suddenly Tony +laughed; but he laughed harshly, and there was no look of amusement on +his face. Millie stared at him in surprise, but he did not explain, +and she went on with her argument. + +"So when you ceased to write I was: still more convinced that you had +reaped to care. When you remained away after your father had died I +was yet more sure." + +Tony leaned across the white table-cloth with its glittering silver, +and fixed his eyes on her. + +"I will tell you why I ceased to write. Every letter which you wrote +to me when I was in New York was more contemptuous than the letter +which had preceded it. I had failed, and you despised me for my +failure. I had allowed myself to be tricked out of your money----" And +upon that Millie interrupted him-- + +"Oh no!" she cried; "you must not say that I despised you for that. +No! That is not fair. I never thought of the money. I offered you what +was left." + +Tony had put himself in the wrong here. He recognised his mistake, he +accepted Millie's correction. + +"Yes, that is true," he said; "you offered me all that was left--but +you offered it contemptuously; you had no shadow of belief that I +would use it to advantage--you had no faith in me at all. In your eyes +I was no good. Mind, I don't blame you. You were justified, no doubt. +I had set out to make a home for you, as many a man has done for his +wife. Only where they had succeeded I had failed. If I thought anything +at all----" he said, with an air of hesitation. + +"Well?" asked Millie. + +"I thought you might have expressed your contempt with a little less +of unkindness, or perhaps have hidden it altogether. You see, I was +not having an easy time in New York, and your letters made it very +much harder." + +"Oh, Tony," she said, in a low voice of self-reproach. She was sitting +with her hands clenched in front of her upon the table-cloth, her +forehead puckered, and in her eyes a look of great pain. + +"Never mind that," he replied; and he resumed his story. "I saw then +quite clearly that with each letter which you received from me, each +new instalment of my record of failure--for each letter was just that, +wasn't it?--your contempt grew. I was determined that if I could help +it your contempt should not embitter all our two lives. So I ceased to +write. For the same reason I stayed away, even after my father had +died. Had I come back then I should have come back a failure, proved +and self-confessed. And your scorn would have stayed with you. My +business henceforth was to destroy it, to prove to you that after all +I was some good--if not at money-making, at something else. I resolved +that we should not live together again until I could come to you and +say, 'You have no right to despise me. Here's the proof.'" + +Millie was learning now, even as Tony had learnt a minute ago. All +that he said to her was utterly surprising and strange. He had been +thinking of her, then, all the time while he was away! Indifference +was in no way the reason of his absence. + +"Oh, why did you not write this to me?" she cried. "It need not have +been a long letter, since you were unwilling to write. But just this +you might have written. It would have been better, kinder"--and she +paused upon the word, uttering it with hesitation and a shy +deprecating smile, as though aware that she had no claim upon his +kindness. "It would have been kinder than just to leave me here, not +knowing where you were, and thinking what I did." + +"It is true," said Tony, "I might have written. But would you have +believed me if I had? No." + +"Then you might have come to me," she urged. "Once--just for five +minutes--to tell me what you meant to do." + +"I might," Tony agreed; "in fact, I very nearly did. I was under the +windows of the house in Berkeley Square one night." And Millie +started. + +"Yes, you were," she said slowly. + +"You knew that?" + +"Yes; I knew it the next day." And she added, "I wish now, I think, +that you had come in that night." + +"Suppose that I had," said Tony; "suppose that I had told you of my +fine plan, you would have had no faith in it. You would merely have +thought, 'Here's another folly to be added to the rest.' Your contempt +would have been increased, that's all." + +It was quite strange to Millie Stretton that there ever could have +been a time when she had despised him. She saw him sitting now in +front of her, quiet and stern; she remembered her own terror when he +burst into the room, when he flung Callon headlong through the +windows, when he turned at last towards her. + +"We have been strangers to one another." + +"Yes," he replied; "I did not know you. I should never have left +you--now I understand that. I trusted you very blindly, but I did not +know you." + +Millie lowered her eyes from his face. + +"Nor I you," she answered. "What did you do when you went away that +night from Berkeley Square?" + +"I enlisted in the Foreign Legion in Algeria." + +Millie raised her head again with a start of surprise. + +"Soldiering was my trade, you see. It was the one profession where I +had just a little of that expert knowledge which is necessary nowadays +if you are to make your living." + +Something of his life in the Foreign Legion Tony now told her. He +spoke deliberately, since a light was beginning dimly to shine through +the darkness of his perplexities. Of a set purpose he described to her +the arduous perils of active service and the monotony of the +cantonments. He was resolved that she should understand in the spirit +and in the letter the life which for her sake he had led. He related +his expedition to the Figuig oasis, his march into the Sahara under +Tavernay. He took from his pocket the medals which he had won, and +laid them upon the tablecloth before her. + +"Look at them," he said; "I earned them. These are mine. I earned them +for you; and while I was earning them what were you doing?" + +Millie listened and looked. Wonder grew upon her. It was for her that +he had laboured and endured and succeeded! His story was a revelation +to her. Never had she dreamed that a man would so strive for any +woman. She had lived so long among the little things of the world--the +little emotions, the little passions, the little jealousies and +rivalries, the little aims, the little methods of attaining them, that +only with great difficulty could she realise a simpler and a wider +life. She was overwhelmed now. Pride and humiliation fought within +her--pride that Tony had so striven for her in silence and obscurity, +humiliation because she had fallen so short of his example. It was her +way to feel in superlatives at any crisis of her destiny, but surely +she had a justification now. + +"I never knew--I never thought! Oh, Tony!" she exclaimed, twisting her +hands together as she sat before him. + +"I became a sergeant," he said. "Then I brought back the remnants of +the geographical expedition to Ouargla." He taxed his memory for the +vivid details of that terrible retreat. He compelled her to realise +something of the dumb, implacable hostility of the Sahara, to see, in +the evening against the setting sun, the mounted figures of the +Touaregs, and to understand that the day's march had not shaken them +off. She seemed to be on the march herself, wondering whether she +would live out the day, or, if she survived that, whether she would +live out the night. + +"But you succeeded!" she cried, clinging to the fact that they were +both here in France, with the murmur of the Mediterranean in their +ears. "You came back." + +"Yes, I came back. One morning I marched my men through the gate of +Ouargla--and what were you doing upon that day?" + +Talking, perhaps, with Lionel Callon, in one of those unfrequented +public places with which London abounds! Millie could not tell. She +sat there and compared Lionel Callon with the man who was before her. +Memories of the kind of talk she was wont to hold with Lionel Callon +recurred to her, filling her with shame. She was glad to think that +when Tony led his broken, weary force through the gate of Ouargla +Lionel Callon had not been with her--had indeed been far away in +Chili. She suddenly placed her hands before her face and burst into +tears. + +"Oh, Tony," she whispered, in an abasement of humiliation. "Oh, Tony." + +"By that homeward march," he went on, "I gained my commission. That +was what I aimed at all the while, and I had earned it at the last. +Look!" + +He took from his pocket the letter which his colonel had handed to him +at Ain-Sefra. He had carefully treasured it all this while. He held it +out to her and made her read. + +"You see?" he said. "A commission won from the ranks in the hardest +service known to soldiers, won without advantage of name, or friends, +or money. Won just by myself. That is what I strove for. If I could +win that I could come back to you with a great pride. I should be no +longer the man who was no good. You yourself might even be proud of +me. I used to dream of that--to dream of something else." + +His voice softened a little, and a smile for a moment relaxed the +severity of his face. + +"Of what?" she asked. + +"Out there among the sand hills, under the stars at night, I used to +dream that we might perhaps get hold again of the little house in +Deanery Street, where we were so happy together once. We might pretend +almost that we had lived there all the time." + +He spoke in a voice of great longing, and Millie was touched to the +heart. She looked at Tony through her tears. There was a great longing +astir within her at this moment. Was that little house in Deanery +Street still a possibility? She did not presume to hope so much; but +she wished that she could have hoped. She pressed the letter which she +held against her breast; she would have loved to have held it to her +lips, but that again she did not dare to do. + +"At all events, you did succeed." she said; "I shall be glad to know +that. I shall always be glad--whatever happens now." + +"But I did not succeed," Tony replied. "I earned the commission, +yes!--I never held it. That letter was given to me one Monday by my +colonel at Ain-Sefra. You mentioned a song a minute ago, do you +remember?... I had lost the associations of that song. I laughed when +you mentioned it, and you were surprised. I laughed because when I +received that letter I took it away with me, and that song, with all +that it had ever meant, came back to my mind. I lay beneath the palm +trees, and I looked across the water past the islands, and I saw the +lights of the yachts in Oban Bay. I was on the dark lawn again, high +above the sea, the lighted windows of the house were behind me. I +heard your voice. Oh, I had got you altogether back that day," he +exclaimed, with a cry. "It was as though I held your hands and looked +into your eyes. I went back towards the barracks to write to you, and +as I went some one tapped me on the shoulder and brought me news of +you to wake me out of my dreams." + +Just for a moment Millie wondered who it was who had brought the news; +but the next words which Tony spoke drove the question from her mind. + +"A few more weeks and I should have held that commission. I might have +left the Legion, leaving behind me many friends and an honoured name. +As it was, I had to desert--I deserted that night." + +He spoke quite simply; but, nevertheless, the words fell with a shock +upon Millie. She uttered a low cry: "Oh, Tony!" she said. + +"Yes," he said, with a nod of the head, "I incurred that disgrace. I +shall be ashamed of it all my life. Had I been caught, it might have +meant an ignoble death; in any case, it would have meant years of +prison--and I should have deserved those years of prison." + +Millie shut her eyes in horror. Everything else that he had told her, +every other incident--his sufferings, his perils--all seemed of little +account beside this crowning risk, this crowning act of sacrifice. It +was not merely that he had risked a shameful death or a shameful +imprisonment. Millie was well aware that his whole nature and +character must be in revolt against the act itself. Desertion! It +implied disloyalty, untruth, deceit, cowardice--just those qualities, +indeed, which she knew Tony most to hate, which perhaps she had rather +despised him for hating. No man would have been more severe in the +punishment of a deserter than Tony himself. Yet he had deserted, and +upon her account. And he sat there telling her of it quietly, as +though it were the most insignificant action in the world. He might +have escaped the consequences--he would certainly not have escaped the +shame. + +But Millie's cup of remorse was not yet full. + +"Yet I cannot see that I could do anything else. To-night proves to me +that I was right, I think. I have come very quickly, yet I am only +just in time." There was a long stain of wine upon the table-cloth +beneath his eyes. There Callon had upset his glass upon Tony's +entrance. + +"Yes, it was time that I returned," he continued. "One way or another +a burden of disgrace had to be borne--if I stayed, just as certainly +as if I came away; I saw that quite clearly. So I came away." He +forbore to say that now the disgrace fell only upon his shoulders, +that she was saved from it. But Millie understood, and in her heart +she thanked him for his forbearance. "But it was hard on me, I think," +he said. "You see, even now I am on French soil, and subject to French +laws." + +And Millie, upon that, started up in alarm. + +"What do you mean?" she asked breathlessly. + +"There has been a disturbance here to-night, has there not? Suppose +that the manager of this restaurant has sent for a gendarme!" + +With a swift movement Millie gathered up the medals and held them +close in her clenched hands. + +"Oh, it does not need those to convict me; my name would be enough. +Let my name appear and there's a deserter from the Foreign Legion laid +by the heels in France. All the time we have been talking here I have +sat expecting that door to open behind me." + +Millie caught up a lace wrap which lay upon a sofa. She had the look +of a hunted creature. She spoke quickly and feverishly, in a whisper. + +"Oh, why did not you say this at once? Let us go!" + +Tony sat stubbornly in his chair. + +"No," said he, with his eyes fixed upon her. "I have given you an +account of how I have spent the years during which we have been apart. +Can you do the same?" + +He waited for her answer in suspense. To this question all his words +had been steadily leading; for this reason he had dwelt upon his own +career. Would she, stung by her remorse, lay before him truthfully and +without reserve the story of her years? If she did, why, that dim +light which shone amidst the darkness of his perplexities might +perhaps shine a little brighter. He uttered his question. Millie bowed +her head, and answered-- + +"I will." + +"Sit down, then, and tell me now." + +"Oh no," she exclaimed; "not here! It is not safe. As we go back to +Eze I will tell you everything." + +A look of relief came upon Tony's face. He rose and touched the bell. + +A waiter appeared. + +"I will pay the bill," he said. + +The waiter brought the bill and Tony discharged it. + +"The gentleman--M. Callon," the waiter said. "A doctor has been. He +has a concussion. It will be a little time before he is able to be +moved." + +"Indeed?" said Tony, with indifference. He walked with his wife out of +the little gaily-lighted room into the big, silent restaurant. A +single light faintly illuminated it. They crossed it to the door, and +went up the winding drive on to the road. The night was dry and clear +and warm. There was no moon. They walked in the pure twilight of the +stars round the gorge towards Eze. + + + + + CHAPTER XXXIII + + MILLIE'S STORY + + +They walked for a while in silence, side by side, yet not so close but +that there was an interval between them. Millie every now and then +glanced at Tony's face, but she saw only his profile, and with only +the glimmer of the starlight to serve her for a reading-lamp, she +could guess nothing of his expression. But he walked like a man +utterly dispirited and tired. The hopes, so stoutly cherished during +the last few years, had all crumbled away to-night. Perpetually +his thoughts recurred to that question, which now never could be +answered--if he had gone into the house in Berkeley Square on that +distant evening when he had been contented to pace for a little while +beneath the windows, would he have averted the trouble which had +reached its crisis to-night at the _Reserve?_ He thought not--he was +not sure; only he was certain that he should have gone in. He stopped +and turned back, looking towards the _Reserve_. A semicircle of lights +over the doorway was visible, and as he looked those lights were +suddenly extinguished. He heard Millie's voice at his side. + +"I will tell you now how the time has passed with me." And he saw that +she was looking steadfastly into his eyes. "The story will sound very +trivial, very contemptible, after what you have told me. It fills me +utterly with shame. But I should have told you it none the less had +you not asked for it--I rather wish that you had not asked for it; for +I think I must have told you of my own accord." + +She spoke in a quick, troubled voice, but it did not waver; nor did +her eyes once fall from his. The change in her was swift, no doubt. +But down there in the _Reserve_, where the lights were out, and the +sea echoed through empty rooms, she had had stern and savage teachers. +Terror, humiliation, and the spectacle of violence had torn away a +veil from before her eyes. She saw her own life in its true +perspective. And, that she might see it the more clearly and +understand, she had the story of another life wherewith to compare it. +It is a quality of big performances, whether in art or life, that +while they surprise when first apprehended, they appear upon thought +to be so simple that it is astonishing surprise was ever felt. +Something of that quality Tony's career possessed. It had come upon +Millie as a revelation, yet, now she was thinking: "Yes, that is what +Tony would do. How is it I never guessed?" She put him side by side +with that other man, the warrior of the drawing-rooms, and she was +filled with shame that ever she could have preferred the latter even +for a moment of madness. + +They walked slowly on again. Millie drew her lace wrap more closely +about her throat. + +"Are you cold?" asked Tony. "You are lightly clothed to be talking +here. We had better perhaps walk on, and keep what you have to tell me +until to-morrow." + +"No," she answered quickly, "I am not cold. And I must tell you what I +have to tell you to-night. I want all this bad, foolish part of my +life to end to-night, to be extinguished just as those lights were +extinguished a minute since. Only there is something I should like to +say to you first." Millie's voice wavered now and broke. "If we do not +walk along the road together any more," she went on timidly, "I will +still be glad that you came back to-night. I do not know that you will +believe that--I do not, indeed, see why you should; but I should very +much like you to believe it; for it is the truth. I have learned a +good deal, I think, during the last three hours. I would rather go on +alone--if it is to be so--in this dim, clean starlight, than ever be +back again in the little room with its lights and flowers. Do you +understand me?" + +"I think so," said Tony. + +"At all events, the road is visible ahead," she went on. "One sees it +glimmering, one can keep between the banks; while, in the little +lighted room it is easy to get lost." + +And thus to Millie now, as to Pamela when she rode back from her last +interview with Warrisden at the village of the three poplars, the +riband of white road stretching away in the dusk became a parable. + +"Yes," said Tony, "perhaps my path was really the easier one to +follow. It was direct and plain." + +"Ah," said Millie, "it only seems so because you have traversed it, +and are looking back. I do not think it was so simple and direct while +you walked upon it." And Tony, remembering the doubts and perplexities +which had besieged him, could not but assent. + +"I do not think, too, that it was so easy to discover at the +beginning." + +There rose before Tony's eyes the picture of a ketch-rigged boat +sailing at night over a calm sea. A man leaned over the bulwarks, and +the bright glare from a lightship ran across the waves and flashed +upon his face. Tony remembered the moment very clearly when he had +first hit upon his plan; he remembered the weeks of anxiety of which +it was the outcome. No, the road had not been easy to find at the +beginning. He was silent for a minute, and then he said gently-- + +"I am sorry that I asked you to tell your story--I am sorry that I +did not leave the decision to you. But it shall be as though you told +it of your own accord." + +The sentence was a concession, no less in the manner of its utterance +than in the words themselves. Millie took heart, and told him the +whole story of her dealings with Lionel Callon, without excuses and +without concealments. + +"I seemed to mean so much to him, so little to you," she said. "You +see, I did not understand you at all. You were away, too, and he was +near. I do not defend myself." + +She did not spare herself, she taxed her memory for the details of her +days; and as she spoke the story seemed more utterly contemptible and +small than even she in her abasement had imagined it would be. But she +struggled through with it to the end. + +"That night when you stood beneath the windows in Berkeley Square," +she said, "he was with me. He ran in from Lady Millingham's party and +talked with me for half an hour. Yes, at the very time when you were +standing on the pavement he was within the house. I know, for you were +seen, and on the next day I was told of your presence. I was afraid +then. The news was a shock to me. I thought, 'Suppose you had come +in!'" + +"But, back there, in the room," Tony interrupted, "you told me that +you wished I had come in." + +"Yes," she answered. "And it is quite true; I wish now that you had +come in." + +She told him of the drive round Regent's Park, and of the consent she +gave that night to Lionel Callon. + +"I think you know everything now," she said. "I have tried to forget +nothing. I want you, whatever you decide to do, to decide knowing +everything." + +"Thank you," said Tony, simply. And she added-- + +"I am not the first woman I know who has thrown away the substance for +the shadow." + +Upon the rest of that walk little was said. They went forward beneath +the stars. A great peace lay upon sea and land. The hills rose dark +and high upon their left hand, the sea murmured and whispered to them +upon the right. Millie walked even more slowly as they neared the +hotel at Eze, and Tony turned to her with a question-- + +"You are tired?" + +"No," she answered. + +She was thinking that very likely she would never walk again on any +road with Tony at her side, and she was minded to prolong this last +walk to the last possible moment. For in this one night Tony had +reconquered her. It was not merely that his story had filled her with +amazement and pride, but she had seen him that night strong and +dominant, as she had never dreamed of seeing him. She loved his very +sternness towards herself. Not once had he spoken her name and called +her "Millie." She had watched for that and longed for it, and yet +because he had not used it she was the nearer to worship. Once she +said to him with a start of anxiety-- + +"You are not staying here under your own name?" + +"No," he replied. "A friend has taken rooms in Monte Carlo for both of +us. Only his name has been given." + +"And you will leave France to-morrow?" + +"Yes." + +"Promise!" she cried. + +Tony promised, with a look of curiosity at his wife. Why should she be +so eager for his safety? He did not understand. He was wondering what +he must do in this crisis of their lives. Was he to come, in spite of +all his efforts, to that ordinary compromise which it had been his +object to avoid? + +They reached the door of the hotel, and there Tony halted. + +"Good night!" he said; he did not hold out his hand. He stood +confronting Millie with the light from the hall lamp falling full upon +his face. Millie hoped that he would say something more--just a little +word of kindness or forgiveness--if only she waited long enough +without answering him; and she was willing to wait until the morning +came, he did indeed speak again, and then Millie was sorry that she +had waited. For he said the one really cruel thing amongst all the +words he had said that night. He was not aware of its cruelty, he was +only conscious of its truth. + +"Do you know." he said--and upon his tired face there came a momentary +smile--"to-night I miss the Legion very much." Again he said "Good +night." + +This time Millie answered him; and in an instant he was gone. She +could have cried out; she could hardly restrain her voice from calling +him back to her. "Was this the end?" she asked of herself. "That one +cruel sentence, and then the commonplace Good night, without so much +as a touch of the hands. Was this the very end?" A sharp fear stabbed +her. For a few moments she heard Tony's footsteps upon the flags in +front of the hotel, and then for a few moments upon the gravel of the +garden path; and after that she heard only the murmur of the sea. And +all at once for her the world was empty. "Was this the end?" she asked +herself again most piteously; "this, which might have been the +beginning." Slowly she went up to her rooms. Sleep did not visit her +that night. + + + + + CHAPTER XXXIV + + THE NEXT MORNING + + +There was another who kept a vigil all the night In the Villa +Pontignard Pamela Mardale saw from her window the morning break, and +wondered in dread what had happened upon that broad terrace by the +sea. She dressed and went down into the garden. As yet the world was +grey and cool, and something of its quietude entered into her and gave +her peace. A light mist hung over the sea, birds sang sweetly in the +trees, and from the chimneys of Roquebrune the blue smoke began to +coil. In the homely suggestions of that blue smoke Pamela found a +comfort. She watched it for a while, and then there came a flush of +rose upon the crests of the hills. The mist was swept away from the +floor of the sea, shadows and light suddenly ran down the hillsides, +and the waves danced with a sparkle of gold. The sun had risen. Pamela +saw a man coming up the open slope from Roquebrune to the villa. It +was M. Giraud. She ran to the gate and met him there. + +"Well?" she asked. And he answered sadly-- + +"I arrived too late." + +The colour went from Pamela's cheeks. She set a hand upon the gate to +steady herself. There was an expression of utter consternation on her +face. + +"Too late, I mean," the schoolmaster explained hurriedly, "to help +you, to be of any real service to you. But the harm done is perhaps +not so great as you fear." + +He described to her what he had seen--Lionel Callon lying outstretched +and insensible upon the pavement, Tony and Millie Stretton within the +room. + +"We removed M. Callon to his bedroom," he said. "Then I fetched a +doctor. M. Callon will recover--it is a concussion of the brain. He +will be ill for a little time, but he will get well." + +"And the man and the woman?" Pamela asked eagerly. "The two within the +room? What of them?" + +"They were standing opposite to one another." The schoolmaster had not +seen Millie on her knees. "A chair was overturned, the chair on which +she had sat. She was in great distress, and, I think, afraid; but he +spoke quietly." He described how he had offered Tony the letter, and +how Tony had closed the door of the room upon the waiters. + +"The manager did not know what to do, whether to send for help or not. +But I did not think that there was any danger to the woman in the +room, and I urged him to do nothing." + +"Thank you," said Pamela, gratefully. "Indeed, you were in time to +help me." + +But even then she did not know how much she was indebted to the +schoolmaster's advice. She was thinking of the scandal which must have +arisen had the police been called in, of the publication of Millie's +folly to the world of her acquaintances. That was prevented now. If +Tony took back his wife--as with all her heart she hoped he would--he +would not, at all events, take back one of whom gossip would be +speaking with a slighting tongue. She was not aware that Tony had +deserted from the Legion to keep his tryst upon the thirty-first of +the month. Afterwards, when she did learn this, she was glad that she +had not lacked warmth when she had expressed her gratitude to M. +Giraud. A look of pleasure came into the schoolmaster's face. + +"I am very glad," he said. "When I brought the doctor back the two +within the room were talking quietly together; we could hear their +voices through the door. So I came away. I walked up to the villa +here. But it was already late, and the lights were out--except in one +room on an upper floor looking over the sea--that room," and he +pointed to a window. + +"Yes, that is my room," said Pamela. + +"I thought it was likely to be yours, and I hesitated whether I should +fling up a stone; but I was not sure that it was your room. So I +determined to wait until the morning. I am sorry, for you have been +very anxious and have not slept--I can see that. I could have saved +you some hours of anxiety." + +Pamela laughed in friendliness, and the laugh told him surely that her +distress had gone from her. + +"That does not matter," she said. "You have brought me very good news. +I could well afford to wait for it." + +The schoolmaster remained in an awkward hesitation at the gate; it was +clear that he had something more to say. It was no less clear that he +found the utterance of it very difficult. Pamela guessed what was in +his mind, and, after her own fashion, she helped him to speak it. She +opened the gate, which up till now had stood closed between them. + +"Come in for a little while, won't you?" she said; and she led the way +through the garden to that narrow corner on the bluff of the hill +which had so many associations for them both. If M. Giraud meant to +say what she thought he did, here was the one place where utterance +would be easy. Here they had interchanged, in other times, their +innermost thoughts, their most sacred confidences. The stone parapet, +the bench, the plot of grass, the cedar in the angle of the +corner--among these familiar things memories must throb for him even +as they did for her. Pamela sat down upon the parapet and, leaning +over, gazed into the torrent far below. She wished him to take his +time. She had a thought that even if he had not in his mind that +utterance which she hoped to hear, the recollection of those other +days, vividly renewed, might suggest it. And in a moment or two he +spoke. + +"It is true, mademoiselle, that I was of service to you last night?" + +"Yes," replied Pamela, gently; "that is quite true." + +"I am glad," he continued. "I shall have that to remember. I do not +suppose that I shall see you often any more. Very likely you will not +come back to Roquebrune--very likely I shall never see you again. And +if I do not, I should like you to know that last night will make a +difference to me." + +He was now speaking with a simple directness. Pamela raised her face +towards his. He could see that his words greatly rejoiced her; a very +tender smile was upon her lips, and her eyes shone. There were tears +in them. + +"I am so glad," she said. + +"I resented your coming to me at first," he went on--"I was a fool; I +am now most grateful that you did come. I learnt that you had at last +found the happiness which I think you have always deserved. You know I +have always thought that it is a bad thing when such a one as you is +wasted upon loneliness and misery--the world is not so rich that it +can afford such waste. And if only because you told me that a change +had come for you, I should be grateful for the visit which you paid +me. But there is more. You spoke a very true word last night when you +told me it was a help to be needed by those one needs." + +"You think that too?" said Pamela. + +"Yes, now I do," he answered. "It will always be a great pride to me +that you needed me. I shall never forget that you knocked upon my door +one dark night in great distress. I shall never forget your face, as I +saw it framed in the light when I came out into the porch. I shall +never forget that you stood within my room, and called upon me, in the +name of our old comradeship, to rise up and help you. I think my room +will be hallowed by that recollection." And he lowered his voice +suddenly and said, "I think I shall see you as I saw you when I opened +the door, between myself and the threshold of the wineshop; that is +what I meant to say." + +He held out his hand, and, as Pamela took it, he raised her hand to +his lips and kissed it. + +"Good-bye," he said; and turning away quickly he left her up in the +place where she had known the best of him, and went down to his +schoolroom in the square of Roquebrune. Very soon the sing-song of the +children's voices was droning from the open windows. + +Pamela remained upon the terrace. The breaking of old ties is always a +melancholy business, and here was one broken to-day. It was very +unlikely, she thought, that she would ever see her friend the little +schoolmaster again. She would be returning to England immediately, and +she would not come back to the Villa Pontignard. + +She was still in that corner of the garden when another visitor called +upon her. She heard his footsteps on the gravel of the path, and, +looking up, saw Warrisden approaching her. She rose from the parapet +and went forward to meet him. She understood that he had come with his +old question, and she spoke first. The question could wait just for a +little while. + +"You have seen Tony?" she asked. + +"Yes; late last night," he replied. "I waited at the hotel for him. He +said nothing more than 'Good night,' and went at once to his room." + +"And this morning?" + +"This morning," said Warrisden, "he has gone. I did not see him. He +went away with his luggage before I was up, and he left no message." + +Pamela stood thoughtful and silent. + +"It is the best thing he could have done," Warrisden continued; "for +he is not safe in France." + +"Not safe?" + +"No. Did he not tell you? He deserted from the French Legion. It was +the only way in which he could reach Roquebrune by the date you +named." + +Pamela was startled, but she was startled into activity. + +"Will you wait for me here?" she said. "I will get my hat." + +She ran into the villa, and coming out again said, "Let us go down to +the station." + +They hurried down the steep flight of steps. At the station Warrisden +asked, "Shall I book to Monte Carlo?" + +"No; to Eze," she replied. + +She hardly spoke at all during the journey; and Warrisden kept his +question in reserve--this was plainly no time to utter it. Pamela +walked at once to the hotel. + +"Is Lady Stretton in?" she asked; and the porter replied-- + +"No, Madame. She left for England an hour ago." + +"Alone?" asked Pamela. + +"No. A gentleman came and took her away." + +Pamela turned towards Warrisden with a look of great joy upon her +face. + +"They have gone together," she cried. "He has taken his risks. He has +not forgotten that lesson learnt on the North Sea. I had a fear this +morning that he had." + +"And you?" said Warrisden, putting his question at last. + +Pamela moved away from the door until they were out of earshot. Then +she said-- + +"I will take my risks too." Her eyes dwelt quietly upon her companion, +and she added, "And I think the risks are very small." + + + + + CHAPTER XXXV + + THE LITTLE HOUSE IN DEANERY STREET + + +Pamela construed the departure of Tony and his wife together according +to her hopes. They were united again. She was content with that fact, +and looked no further, since her own affairs had become of an +engrossing interest. But the last word has not been said about the +Truants. It was not, indeed, until the greater part of a year had +passed that the section of their history which is related in this book +reached any point of finality. + +In the early days of January the Truants arrived in London at the +close of a long visit to Scotland. They got out upon Euston platform, +and entering their brougham, drove off. They had not driven far before +Millie looked out of the window and started forward with her hand upon +the check-string. It was dusk, and the evening was not clear. But she +saw, nevertheless, that the coachman had turned down to the left +amongst the squares of Bloomsbury, and that is not the way from Euston +to Regent's Park. She did not pull the check-string, however. She +looked curiously at Tony, who was sitting beside her, and then leaned +back in the carriage. With her quick adaptability she had fallen into +a habit of not questioning her husband. Since the night in the South +of France she had given herself into his hands with a devotion which, +to tell the truth, had something of slavishness. It was his wish, +apparently, that the recollection of that night should still be a +barrier between them, hindering them from anything but an exchange of +courtesies. She bowed to the wish without complaint. Tonight, however, +as they drove through the unaccustomed streets, there rose within her +mind a hope. She would have stifled it, dreading disappointment; but +it was stronger than her will. Moreover, it received each minute fresh +encouragement. The brougham crossed Oxford Street, turned down South +Audley Street, and traversed thence into Park Street. Millie now sat +forward in her seat. She glanced at her husband. Tony, with a face of +indifference, was looking out of the window. Yet the wonderful thing, +it seemed, was coming to pass, nay, had come to pass. For already the +brougham had stopped, and the door at which it stopped was the door of +the little house in Deanery Street. + +Tony turned to his wife with a smile. + +"Home!" he said. + +She sat there incredulous, even though the look of the house, the +windows, the very pavement were speaking to her memories. There was +the blank wall on the north side which her drawing-room window +overlooked, there was the sharp curve of the street into Park Lane, +there was the end of Dorchester House. Here the happiest years of her +life, yes, and of Tony's, too, had been passed. She had known that to +be truth for a long while now. She had come of late to think that they +were the only really happy years which had fallen to her lot. The +memories of them throbbed about her now with a vividness which was +poignant. + +"Is it true?" she asked, with a catch of her breath. "Is it really +true, Tony?" + +"Yes, this is our home." + +Millie descended from the carriage. Tony looked at her curiously. This +sudden arrival at the new home, which was the old, had proved a +greater shock to her than he had expected. For a little while after +their return to England Millie had dwelt upon the words which Tony had +spoken to her in the _Reserve_ by the sea. He had dreamed of buying +the house in Deanery Street, of resuming there the life which they had +led together there, in the days when they had been good friends as +well as good lovers. That dream for a time she had made her own. She +had come to long for its fulfilment, as she had never longed for +anything else in the world; she had believed that sooner or later Tony +would relent, and that it would be fulfilled. But the months had +passed, and now, when she had given up hope, unexpectedly it had been +fulfilled. She stood upon the pavement, almost dazed. + +"You never said a word of what you meant to do," she said with a +smile, as though excusing herself for her unresponsive manner. The +door was open. She went into the house and Tony followed her. They +mounted the stairs into the drawing-room. + +"As far as I could," Tony said, "I had the house furnished just as it +used to be. I could not get all the pictures which we once had, but +you see I have done my best." + +Millie looked round the room. There was the piano standing just as it +used to do, the carpet, the wall-paper were all of the old pattern. It +seemed to her that she had never left the house; that the years in +Berkeley Square and Regent's Park were a mere nightmare from which she +had just awaked. And then she looked at Tony. No, these latter years +had been quite real--he bore the marks of them upon his face. The +boyishness had gone. No doubt, she thought, it was the same with her. + +Tony stood and looked at her with an eagerness which she did not +understand. + +"Are you glad?" he asked earnestly. "Millie, are you pleased?" + +She stood in front of him with a very serious face. Once a smile +brightened it; but it was a smile of doubt, of question. + +"I am not sure," she said. "I know that you have been very kind. You +have done this to please me. But----" And her voice wavered a little. + +"Well?" said Tony. + +"But," she went on with difficulty, "I am not sure that I can endure +it, unless things are different from what they have been lately. I +shall be reminded every minute of other times, and the comparison +between those times and the present will be very painful. I think that +I shall be very unhappy, much more unhappy than I have ever been, even +lately." + +Her voice sank to a whisper at the end. The little house in Deanery +Street, even in her dreams, had been no more than a symbol. She had +longed for it as the outward and visible sign of the complete +reconciliation on which her heart was set. But to have the sign and to +know that it signified nothing--she dreaded that possibility now. Only +for a very few moments she dreaded it. + +"I don't think I can endure it, Tony," she said sadly. And the next +moment his arms were about her, and her head was resting against his +breast. + +"Millie!" he cried in a low voice; and again "Millie!" + +Her face was white, her eyelids closed over her eyes. Tony thought +that she had swooned. But when he moved her hands held him close to +her, held him tightly, as though she dreaded to lose him. + +"Millie," he said, "do you remember the lights in Oban Bay? And the +gulls calling at night above the islands?" + +"I am forgiven, then?" she whispered; and he answered only-- + +"Hush!" + +But the one word was enough. + + + + + CHAPTER XXXVI + + THE END + + +Tony wished for no mention of the word. He had not brought her to that +house that he might forgive her, but because he wanted her there. If +forgiveness was in question, there was much to be said upon her side +too. He was to blame, as Pamela had written. He had during the last +few months begun to realise the justice of that sentence more clearly +than he had done even when the letter was fresh within his thoughts. + +"I have learnt something," he said to Millie, "which I might have +known before, but never did. It is this. Although a man may be content +to know that love exists, that is not the case with women. They want +the love expressed, continually expressed, not necessarily in words, +but in a hundred little ways. I did not think of that. There was the +mistake I made: I left you alone to think just what you chose. Well, +that's all over now. I bought this house not merely to please you, but +as much to please myself; for as soon as I understood that after all +the compromise which I dreaded need not be our lot--that after all the +life together of which I used to dream was possible, was within arm's +reach if only one would put out an arm and grasp it, I wanted you +here. As soon as I was sure, quite sure that I had recaptured you, I +wanted you here." + +He spoke with passion, holding her in his arms. Millie remained quite +still for a while, and then she asked-- + +"Do you miss the Legion? As much as you thought you would--as much as +you did that night at Eze?" + +He answered, "No"; and spoke the truth. On that night at Eze he had +not foreseen the outcome of his swift return, of his irruption into +the gaily lighted room murmurous with the sea. On that night he had +revealed himself to Millie, and the revelation had been the beginning +of love in her rather than its resumption. This he had come to +understand, and, understanding, could reply with truth that he did not +miss the Legion as he had thought he would. There were moments, no +doubt, when the sound of a bugle on a still morning would stir him to +a sense of loss, and he would fall to dreaming of Tavernay and +Barbier, and his old comrades, and the menacing silence of the Sahara. +At times, too, the yapping of dogs in the street would call up vividly +before his mind the picture of some tent village in Morocco where he +had camped. Or the wind roaring amongst trees on a night of storm +would set his mind wondering whether the ketch _Perseverance_ was +heading to the white-crested rollers, close-reefed between the Dogger +and the Fisher Banks; and for a little while he would feel the savour +of the brine sharp upon his lips, and longing would be busy at his +heart--for the Ishmaelite cannot easily become a stay-at-home. These, +however, were but the passing moods. + +Of one other character who took an important if an unobtrusive part in +shaping the fortunes of the Truants a final word may be said. A +glimpse of that man, of the real man in him, was vouchsafed to +Warrisden two summers later. It happened that Warrisden attended a +public dinner which was held in a restaurant in Oxford Street. He left +the company before the dinner was over, since he intended to fetch his +wife Pamela, who was on that June evening witnessing a performance of +"Rigoletto" at the Opera House in Covent Garden. Warrisden rose from +the table and slipped out, as he thought at eleven o'clock, but on +descending into the hall he found that he had miscalculated the time. +It was as yet only a quarter to the hour, and having fifteen minutes +to spare, he determined to walk. The night was hot; he threw his +overcoat across his arm, and turning southwards out of Oxford Street, +passed down a narrow road in the neighbourhood of Drury Lane. In those +days, which were not, after all, so very distant from our own, the +great blocks of model dwellings had not been as yet erected; squalid +courts and rookeries opened on to ill-lighted passages; the houses had +a ruinous and a miserable look. There were few people abroad as +Warrisden passed through the quarter, and his breast-plate of white +shirt-front made him a conspicuous figure. He had come about half the +way from Oxford Street when he saw two men suddenly emerge from the +mouth of a narrow court a few yards in front of him. The two men were +speaking, or rather shouting, at one another; and from the violence of +their gestures no less than from the abusive nature of the language +which they used, it was plain that they were quarrelling. Words and +gestures led to blows. Warrisden saw one man strike the other and fell +him to the ground. + +In an instant a little group of people was gathered about the +combatants, people intensely silent and interested--the sightseers of +the London streets who spring from nowhere with inconceivable +rapidity, as though they had been waiting in some secret spot hard by +for just this particular spectacle in this particular place. +Warrisden, indeed, was wondering carelessly at the speed with which +the small crowd had gathered when he came abreast of it. He stopped +and peered over the shoulders of the men and women in front of him +that he might see the better. The two disputants had relapsed +apparently into mere vituperation. Warrisden pressed forward, and +those in front parted and made way for him. He did not, however, take +advantage of the deference shown to his attire; for at that moment a +voice whispered in his ear-- + +"You had better slip out. This row is got up for you." + +Warrisden turned upon his heel. He saw a short, stout, meanly dressed +man of an elderly appearance moving away from his side; no doubt it +was he who had warned him. Warrisden took the advice, all the more +readily because he perceived that the group was, as it were, beginning +to reform itself, with him as the new centre. He was, however, still +upon the outskirts. He pushed quickly out into the open street, +crossed the road, and continued on his way. In front of him he saw the +stout, elderly man, and, quickening his pace, he caught him up. + +"I have to thank you," he said, "for saving me from an awkward +moment." + +"Yes," replied the stout man; and Warrisden, as he heard his voice, +glanced at him with a sudden curiosity. But his hat was low upon his +brows, and the street was dark. "It is an old trick, but the old +tricks are the tricks which succeed. There was no real quarrel at all. +Those two men were merely pretending to quarrel in order to attract +your attention. You were seen approaching--that white shirt-front +naturally inspired hope. In another minute you would have been hustled +down the court and into one of the houses at the end. You would have +been lucky if, half an hour later, you were turned out into the street +stripped of everything of value you possess, half naked and half dead +into the bargain. Good night!" + +The little man crossed the road abruptly. It was plain that he needed +neither thanks nor any further conversation. It occurred, indeed, to +Warrisden that he was deliberately avoiding conversation. Warrisden +accordingly walked on to the Opera House, and, meeting his wife in the +vestibule, told her this story while they waited for their brougham. + +As they drove together homewards, he added-- + +"That is not all, Pamela. I can't help thinking--it is absurd, of +course--and yet, I don't know; but the little stout man reminded me +very much of some one we both know." + +Pamela turned suddenly towards her husband-- + +"Mr. Mudge?" she said. + +"Yes," replied Warrisden, with some astonishment at the accuracy of +her guess. "He reminded me of Mudge." + +"It was Mr. Mudge," she said. For a moment or two she was silent; then +she let her hand fall upon her husband's: "He was a very good friend +to us," she said gently--"to all of us." + + + + + THE END + + + + + * * * * * + PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, LONDON AND BECCLES. + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Truants, by +A. E. W. 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