"I'd like it better than anything in the world," asserted Patricia, fervently and truthfully.

"I wonder if people ever grow up at all here," Constantia said, smiling, "you are all so preposterously young, you know."

"You were brought up here yourself."

Constantia laughed outright. "But I have been educated since I married: that is when most people's education does begin. We are only preparing for it before."

"And if one never marries, one remains uneducated, I suppose."

Constantia kissed her. "Your education is not likely to be neglected, my dear. Go to bed now, we will settle with Renata to-morrow."



CHAPTER XXVII

It is one thing to produce, and another to launch the production on an unwilling world. Christopher soon found he had but exchanged an arduous engrossing task for a sordid uphill struggle. Yet if his mind sometimes flew back to Peter Masters' offer, it was never with any desire to open negotiations with him, nor did he ever remind Aymer of the possibility. They fought together against the difficulties that beset the great venture and their comradeship reduced the irritating trivialities of the first start to bearable limits.

Since the day when he received Peter Masters' curt acknowledgment of satisfaction with the selected car, neither Christopher nor the Astons had heard one word from the millionaire. His restored interest in the family appeared to have evaporated as rapidly as it had risen, and peace fell on Aymer's troubled mind. He flung himself heart and soul into the business of launching Christopher's discovery, and verified his cousin's old opinion of his business qualities. The initial difficulties of obtaining the patent being overcome and a small, private company formed, they started a factory for the manufacture of Patrimondi within five miles of Marden, and a decently capable staff was secured to meet the slow, but steadily increasing, demands for the new material.

After some months of uphill work they suddenly received an order for laying the roadways and a special motor track at an International Exhibition. From this plane Patrimondi leapt into fame. Within three months of the opening of the Exhibition the little factory had doubled its staff and even then could not produce enough to meet the demand. With the mounting strain Christopher began to prove of what metal he was made. He stuck to the work with steady persistence, meeting success as he had met difficulties, counting each but expected incidents in a life's work. This level-headedness enabled him to bear a physical strain that would have broken down the nerve of any man more subject to outward conditions. A large proportion of extra work was entailed on him by the starting point of Patrimondi being so distant from London, but he resisted all suggestions to move it nearer town, or make his own headquarters there, or take any step that would serve to separate Aymer from easy contact with the work that made so great a difference in his monotonous life.

Since the last appearance of Peter Masters, Aymer had seemed to lose something of his old independent spirit of resistance. The mine of strength within himself, which his father had developed, was nearing exhaustion, and he lived more and more by force of his interest in outward things, and the active part he played in Christopher's life. But this diminution of his inward strength made the question of any move too serious to be contemplated, although they still vaguely spoke of a time when they would return to London. Mr. Aston knew that he himself could not face the old strenuous life again.

He had dropped out of the line of workers too early, and though seventy years found him still a man of active habits and vigour of mind, he was too conscious of his divorce from the past to endure meeting it daily face to face.

The fortunes of Patrimondi continued to leap forward by untraceable impulses. They were able to choose their work now, and Christopher gave the preference first to roads whose construction was under his own direction from the very foundation, and secondly to such work as least separated him from Caesar, but this last fact he was careful to conceal even from Mr. Aston's watchful eyes.

In the world of workers he became known as the "Roadmaker," and fabulous stories of his origin and fortune were circulated. Unknown to himself or to those nearest to him, men high up in the financial world kept their eye on the young man—made no prophecies—said nothing—but were careful for reasons best known to themselves to help rather than oppose him when he happened to cross their path. But the greatest of all their race, Peter Masters himself, made no sign at all. No fabulous fortune was, however, gathered in. "Patrimondi" paid well, but the working expenses were great. Christopher made big returns to the men, not in wages only, but in every condition of their work. Those in power under him soon learnt it was better to forget the momentary interests of the company than the living interests of the workmen, but in return for his care Christopher did insist on, and get from his men, an amount of work that made other employers open their eyes with envious wonder.

All this time Patricia held her place in his life. It would have been hard to trace her actual influence on his daily actions, but it was there, preserving his finer instincts under the load of material cares, linking him indissolubly to that world of high Realities which is every man's true inheritance. Yet he made no attempt to claim her and at times wondered at his own procrastination. The idea implanted by Peter Masters bore strange fruit, for even an unconsciously harboured lie must needs hamper the life behind which it finds shelter. He could make no advance towards Patricia while that invidious doubt of his parentage existed, and he lacked the remorseless courage of Mr. Aston to inflict pain for however justifiable a cause on Caesar. Also perhaps his pride had a word to say. If there was a secret, it was theirs, and they had not chosen to divulge it to him. Again, he had fathomed something of the depth of the jealous love bestowed on him, and his own affection and gratitude would have their say. All and each of these reasons arrayed themselves against his love. When he tried to face it first one and then the other weighed heaviest, till at length he called time to his side and flung himself into his work the harder to leave that ally free scope. All of which meant that he was yet but a worshipper at Love's throne, and failed to recognise that his place was on it.

Christopher was in France when he saw the notice of Peter Masters' death in the papers, and he was more staggered by it than he cared to admit to himself. The millionaire had been knocked down at a busy crossing with no more ceremony than would have served for his poorest workman. He had been carried to the nearest hospital and died there almost directly, alone, as he had lived. There was the usual hasty account of his life, but by some magic that had perhaps root in Peter's own will, no mention was made of his marriage.

Christopher wrote home on the subject this-wise:

"It seems to me the more terrible since I think he was a man who never believed any such mischance could dare to happen to him. He always gave me the impression of one who read his own mortality for immortality, and was prepared to rule Time as arbitrarily as he ruled men. It does not look to an outsider as if he had gained any particular happiness from his fortune, but happiness is a word everyone spells in their own way.... I shall be back at the end of the week, for I find Marcel quite capable of finishing this piece of work...."

Such was the epitaph pronounced over Peter Masters by his own son, and Aymer, reading, sank beneath the dead weight of responsibility that was his. The outcome of neutrality can be as great a force as that of action, and to assume the right to stand aside is to play as decisive a part as the fiercest champion. Nevertheless he held to that neutral attitude through the pangs of self-reproach.

There was no will, Mr. Aston told him, when he returned from the plain business-like affair of the funeral.

The news, incredible as it was, was yet a respite to Aymer.

He did not trouble to conceal it.

"But I am certain Saunderson knows something. Do not count on it, Aymer."

"I count every chance in my favour," returned Aymer deliberately. "I discount even your belief that Peter knew, since he said nothing."

Mr. Aston looked at him sadly. He had no such hope, nor was he even certain he was justified in seconding Caesar's wish that the fortune should pass Christopher by. The nearer the great thing came to them the more difficult was it to ignore the vastness of the interests involved, and the greater the responsibility of those who stood motionless between Christopher and it. Yet Mr. Aston knew as well as Aymer that neither of them would move from their position, and if they had acted wrongly in following the wishes of the dead woman in preference to the material instincts of the living man, they must accept the result, and Christopher must accept it, too.

But he felt keenly Aymer's failure to present an unbiassed face to the turn of circumstances.

"How long will it be before Saunderson acts if he has any clue to go on?" Aymer asked wearily after a long silence.

"He would act immediately, but whether that would land him on the right line would depend on the strength of the clue. Aymer, my dear fellow, try and put the matter from you. You are not going to act yourself."

"No, but I'm no hand at waiting."

That was true, and as usual the days of suspense told heavily on Aymer. Christopher's return was an immense relief. He had had a heavy spell of work and travelling, and allowed himself a few days' holiday. It happened that Patricia was also at Marden. She spent so large a percentage of her time with Constantia now that her presence in the house that had been her home more resembled a visit than Christopher's comings and goings. No one had mentioned the fact that she was there to him, and he found her in the drawing-room before dinner kneeling by the fire and coaxing it into a cheery blaze.

"You are a regular truant, Patricia," he complained after their greeting.

"Constantia maintains I am at school with her and calls me truant when I run down here for a few days."

"Are you at school? What does she teach you?"

"Subjects too deep for mere man," she retorted lightly. She continued to kneel with her back to him and the light touched her wonderful hair, that still seemed too heavy a crown for the proud little head. It was like molten gold. Christopher felt a new heartache for the days when he could touch it without fear in the blind bravery of boyhood. He wanted to see her face which she so persistently turned from him.

"I am not sure it is a suitable school for you."

"Since when have you become responsible for my education, sir? Would you prefer my going to school with Charlotte? You are confounding me with Patrimondi. You will end by rolling me out flat on a high-road one day."

She was talking arrant nonsense in self-defence, for every fibre of her being was quivering at his presence. The old hushed cry awoke in her heart "Christopher and Love—Love and Christopher." If she looked at him he must see it, her eyes must needs betray the pitiful whisper but for the clamour of foolish words. Where was Renata? Why were they all so late to-night of all nights? Yet she had hurried her dressing—chosen her gown even, on the chance of this interview that outmatched her schooled frivolity. The need to see her face and her eyes again pressed on the man—became imperative—as something of great moment, strangely difficult to achieve.

At last he abruptly spoke her name.

"Patricia."

She involuntarily turned to him and found what had appeared so hard was quite easy, for she discerned some unusual trouble in his mind, and was woman enough for the mothering instinct to sweep up over the personal love.

"What is it, Christopher?"

He had wit enough to keep his advantage, for there was something to read on the upturned face that must not be deciphered in haste.

"I am seriously worried, Patricia. You might assist instead of hindering me."

"Well, what is it?"

"What is Constantia teaching you?"

"Me again," she returned with a show of indignation, "why on earth should that worry you?"

"I don't like new facets to familiar diamonds," he grumbled obscurely, "you are getting too old. Patricia."

"You are losing your manners." But even under the banter the colour died from her face and her hand fell listlessly to her side.

"I won't allow you to be older than I am."

She was saved further embarrassment by Renata's entrance, but all dinner time she was conscious of his silent "awareness" of her and was troubled by it, and it was a new and unpleasing sensation to be troubled by any attitude of Christopher's. Then his scrutiny stopped abruptly as if she were suddenly placed outside his range of vision, and that attitude suited her mind as poorly as the other.

She hardly knew if it were by her own will or Christopher's that she sat with him and Aymer that evening. She was quite powerless to resist the request that might have been a command, and there is some pain in life that we cling to, dreading its loss more acutely than its presence.

Mr. Aston was away, a rare occurrence now, and the three sat talking before the fire, till the dear familiar intercourse and the peace put to sleep the dull ache in Patricia's heart. They talked—or rather the men talked—of Christopher's latest experiences abroad. He had been to the scene of a vast tunnelling operation in which his part was to come later.

"They suggest we should take over their men's shanties as they stand."

"Will you?" demanded Caesar. These things were in Christopher's hands.

"They might serve as material," he answered drily. "Two of their overseers and twenty men asked for berths with me. They are mostly Italians. If we keep them to make our encampment, I shall have to go myself. It is rather odd how these men pick things up. I heard——" he broke off abruptly.

"We didn't," remarked Caesar suggestively after a minute.

"It was not much, but it is funny how a nick-name travels. There were about five hundred men there still, and I heard one say as I passed, 'Ecco il 'Roadmaker.''"

He was evidently boyishly pleased at the recognition, though he did not conclude the sentence. The man had saluted him as he added to his comrade, "C'e un maestro d'uomini, non di brutti."

Patricia gave Caesar a quick look and caught his answer. It was as if some sudden bond of sympathy were tied between them.

Caesar continued skilfully to ply Christopher with questions and extracted the information that the Patrimondi Company was much disliked by the big manufacturing powers.

"They say we spoil our men, and their own grumble. They sent me a deputation to ask us to cancel the Sunday holiday, which they never grant on contract work, and they feared the result of our example."

"And you politely agreed?" suggested Caesar, watching Patricia.

"I told them to——" again he stopped and laughed; "well, Patricia, I told them such was the time-honoured custom of my country and regretted my inability to consider their request."

"I expect they only get into mischief on Sunday."

Caesar flung out this with assumed contempt, but it brought no quick retort. Christopher answered slowly, with his eyes on the fire.

"We plan excursions for them when there is anything to see or amusements of some kind. They are like children. If they are not amused they must needs make mischief."

His voice was rather grave and Aymer knew there must have been difficulties here of which he did not mean to speak openly.

"It is deplorable if our Roadmaker is going about destroying other people's comfortable paths. Don't you agree with me, Patricia?"

She flushed up quickly, grasping his meaning at once.

"Not if their paths encroach on weaker people's rights. I think it's just what is wanted." Then because Caesar laughed, she realised he was only drawing her, and flung him an appealing glance.

"But we mustn't encourage him openly, Patricia, or he'll leave us no old tracks at all."

"I'm only the humble instrument of a company," protested Christopher. "I merely carry out the regulations of my superiors."

"Who are entirely at your mercy, you should add."

Christopher disdained to reply to so obvious a fallacy. Presently, when he had gone to fetch some drawings to show them, Caesar said quizzically.

"Has he obliterated any of your pet footpaths, Patricia?"

She shook her head.

"The Company has great confidence in him," he announced gravely.

She looked straight at him. There was a kind intelligence in his eyes, and he held out his hand to her. "Present company not excepted. But we must not spoil him, Patricia."

And she understood that her secret was Aymer's and it lent her a sense of security and rest to know it, so that when she went to bed she reproached herself for her former childish moods. "I should be glad his strength of purpose and commonsense are so great," she told herself, forgetting love and commonsense were ever ill neighbours. "I am never going to marry, and it would be difficult to say no to him. To-night was just one of the best of times that can be for us."

That unwise thought aroused the dull throbbing ache in her heart again and the reasonable salve she offered it had no effect. She slept with it, woke with it, and knew it for the close companion of many days.

But Christopher's last thought was, "I am not going to do without her any longer, if I am to meet her any more in this way. I should have read her soul again to-night if I had not remembered in time."

Aymer Aston lay awake wondering what was the matter between the two that they did not guess their palpable secret. He was the richer for another day's respite and every day was a tide carrying him to the shore of safety.



CHAPTER XXVIII

A chilly, rainy mist shrouded the country and blotted out the familiar beauty. Not a day for walking, but Christopher had chosen to tramp to a far-off corner of the estate on some pretence of business and had come back through the wet, dripping woods, burr-covered and muddy. He was met in the hall by a message that Mr. Aymer wanted him at once, so without waiting to change he strode away, whistling, to the West Room and came to a standstill on the threshold, finding Aymer had visitors with him.

There were two gentlemen, one was Mr. Shakleton, the son and successor of the old solicitor who had played his part in the finding of Christopher, the other was a stout, complacent man with gold-rimmed glasses and scanty sandy hair, and all three of the occupants of the room looked towards the door as if waiting for and expecting him. A glance at Caesar's face brought Christopher swiftly to his side and established instantly a sense of antagonism with the visitors.

"You want me, Caesar?"

"Yes. We want you. Mr. Shakleton you know. This is Mr. Saunderson."

Both men stood up and to Christopher's amazement bowed profoundly.

"I am very honoured to meet you," said Mr. Saunderson suavely. "I hope it will be the commencement of a long and fruitful acquaintance."

Christopher felt rather at a loss to know if the man meant to be impertinent or was merely being silly. He looked at Caesar with the hostile impatience he felt only too apparent. The hostility but not the impatience deepened as he noticed the drawn beaten look on Aymer's face. Also he was uncomfortably conscious of the three pairs of eyes watching him with rapt attention. The mild Mr. Shakleton, however, seemed entirely obscured by the expansive personality of the bigger man.

"Confound him," thought Christopher, "has he never seen burrs on a wet coat before or is my tie up?"

"Christopher," said Aymer, at last, "come and sit by me, will you. I think I should like to tell you myself." He looked at Mr. Saunderson as if waiting permission.

"Of course, of course, Mr. Aston. I quite understand. It is not the sort of news we tell people every day."

Christopher sat on the edge of the sofa with his eyes fixed on Caesar.

"Are you sure it won't keep," he asked abruptly, "you look rather tired for business, Caesar."

"It won't keep. It concerns Peter Masters. Mr. Saunderson says public rumour has underestimated his fortune rather than exaggerated it. He was worth nearly three millions."

"Three millions six hundred and forty-one thousand." Mr. Saunderson rolled it out in sonorous tones after a little smack of his lips that set Christopher's teeth on edge.

"It seems, Christopher," Aymer went on, with an abruptness that did not accord with his opening words, "that it's yours. You are his heir."

He made not the smallest movement or sign by which the two strangers could gather one passing glimpse of the agony it cost him to say it, for their attention was fixed on the younger man. But Christopher saw nothing else and had thought for nothing but how soonest to quench that fierce pain.

The preposterous catastrophe was evidently true, but surely his own will and wishes were of some account. He put his hand on Aymer, searching for words which would not form into sense.

"Take your time, take your time, young man," broke in Mr. Saunderson's resonant voice. "It's not the sort of event a man can be hurried over. You will grasp it more clearly in a few minutes."

Christopher turned and looked at him.

"I believe I quite grasp the matter," he said coolly. "Mr. Masters has, with no doubt the kindest meaning in the world, left his fortune to me. It's unfortunate that I don't happen to want all this money. I couldn't possibly do with it."

Mr. Saunderson leant back in his chair with a tolerant smile as if this were just what he would expect to hear after the shock, but Aymer bit his lip as if face to face with some inevitable ill.

Christopher leant towards him.

"You are worrying about it, Caesar. There can't be any need to say any more now. Of course it's out of the question my accepting it. They can't make me a millionaire against my wishes, I suppose. Anyhow it's a preposterous will."

"There is no will," began Caesar and then looked at the big lawyer, "tell him," he added shortly. Mr. Saunderson cleared his throat.

"That is so. There is no will and the fortune naturally goes to the next of kin."

"Very well, then," returned Christopher, with blunt relief. "I believe he told me once he had a son somewhere. You had better find him. I don't want to deprive him of his luck."

Again the embarrassing silence. Then the big lawyer got up and bowed solemnly to Christopher.

"We have found him. Allow me to be the first to congratulate you, Mr. Masters."

Christopher wheeled round on him like a man struck.

"No!" he cried with passionate emphasis. "Caesar, it's not true. Tell them so."

But Caesar lay very still and looked past them all, staring blankly at the opposite wall. It seemed to Christopher the watching eyes of the others imprisoned him, held him in subjection. He got up.

"Let me out," he muttered between his teeth, though none impeded him. He walked across the room to the fireplace and stood with his back to them, his hand mechanically altering the order of a procession of black elephants that stood there.

Aymer broke the silence, speaking with clear evenness.

"Shakleton, will you take Mr. Saunderson into the library. You will find my brother there, probably."

"Certainly, Mr. Aston. Shall I leave these?" He indicate the papers on the table before him.

"Yes. Leave them where they are."

Mr. Saunderson rose. "You must not be alarmed, my dear sir," he said in a forced whisper, with a glance towards Christopher, "such news often takes a man off his feet for a while. He'll soon appreciate it."

"No doubt. Order anything you like, Shakleton."

They were alone at last, yet Christopher did not move.

"Christopher, come to me," called Aymer quietly.

At that he turned and walked mechanically to the sofa, seating himself, again with his elbows on his knees, and his eyes absently fixed on the carpet.

"Did you know this before, Caesar?"

Aymer's face twitched. "Yes, always."

"Did—he—know?"

"Yes, apparently."

"You did not tell him?"

"No."

Christopher looked up sharply and met his eyes, and again he forgot his own intimate trouble before the greater one.

"Thanks, Caesar," he said, dragging up a smile, "it would have been far harder at your hand."

Then suddenly he sunk on his knees by Aymer's side, and hid his head against the arm that had sheltered him as a child.

"They can't make me take it," he whispered, "even if I am his son. But Caesar, Caesar, why didn't you tell me before?"

"I hoped you would never know. Did you never have any suspicion yourself?"

"Never. It was the last thing I should have imagined."

"You have never asked me anything. You must sometimes have wondered about yourself."

"I was quite content." Christopher spoke with shut teeth. Under no provocation must Caesar know the falsehood that had lain so long in his mind. He saw it in its full proportion now, and hated himself for his blindness in harbouring so ugly a thought.

"We were never certain how much Peter knew and I've never known for the past three years whether he meant to claim you or not."

"If you'd only told me, Caesar!"

"It was my one hope you should not know."

"I don't think I've earned that," he said reproachfully.

"It was myself, not you, I thought of. You've got to know the whole thing now. Go and sit there in your old place and don't look at me till I've finished."

So Aymer at last reached the moment when he must break the seals of silence—that expected moment that had hung over him like some shadowy fate as a foretaste of judgment, when he must retrace the painful footsteps of his life across the black gulf from which he had climbed. But as he turned his face to the darkness, there was light also on the other side, and he forgot he had feared.

"Peter and I were friends, as you know. He was five years my senior, but it did not make much difference. He was a worker, just as I was a player. He had tremendous capabilities and he put all his big brain into his work and when he wanted change he came to me. I represented to him the reverse side of his strenuous life and he was oddly fond of me. Before he was thirty he had well started his fortune as he raced to wealth. I raced to ruin and found every inch of the road made easy for me. Peter came into conflict with the socialistic party. There was a certain James Hibbault, who was a great power, and Peter, who was not so heavy a power in those days, employed the wisdom of the serpent to crush him. He came up to London and offered me a chance of new amusement in abetting his plans. The Hibbaults were middle class people without middle class virtues. They lived a scrambling, noisy life propagating their crude ideas and sowing broadcast the seeds of a greater power than they knew. They were, however, a real force to be reckoned with, they and their party, because of certain truths hidden in their wildest creeds—truths which did not suit Peter's creed in the least. He made their acquaintance, and he introduced me to them. They were sufficiently new to amuse me, but I should have probably have tired of them soon had it not been for your mother."

He paused a moment. "Do you remember her, Christopher?"

Christopher nodded.

"Elizabeth Hibbault," went on Aymer slowly, "was extraordinarily beautiful, with the beauty of grace rather than of feature. She was as distinct from the rest of her clamorous family as a pearl from pebbles. She was an enthusiast, a dreamer, passionately sincere, passionately pitiful. She recognised truth as a water diviner finds water. She was brought up in a labyrinth of theories, creeds of equality, in hatred for the rich, and out of all the jargon she gathered some eternal truths which she made her own. She did not live with her people: she had rooms of her own and she was a black-and-white artist. But she was often at the Hibbaults. Peter probably knew her accustomed days. She used to speak of her faiths. It was like one note of gold in the discordant babble. Men came and listened to her and she never knew it was not for her words but for her magnetic wonderful unknown self that they came. She might, and probably did, impress men who were dreamers or fanatics already, but those to whom all her beliefs were childish nonsense went just the same, Peter and I with them."

He stopped a moment and shot a glance at Christopher, who never moved.

"I lost my interest in Peter's schemes and he ceased to explain them to me, but I still visited Elizabeth at her own rooms when I was allowed. She was very anxious to convert Peter and myself, more especially Peter. I was not in love with her, Christopher, yet, but she fascinated me. I speculated as to how it would be with her if all the fire and devotion she brought to a mere Cause were turned into a more personal direction. She paid more attention to Peter than to myself, and she evidently considered him a more desirable convert. One evening we went together to call on her and they fell into the usual line of discussion, he answering her in a tolerant amused way as if she were a precocious child. I stayed behind when he left and she walked up and down in restless agitation, half forgetful of me. 'The personality of the man!' she cried fiercely, 'he is too strong, he is ruthless! One cannot escape him. I cannot get him out of my head.' I told her she had much better tackle me. She told me plainly that I was a negative force in the world and my cousin an active. That was enough for me. I thought she despised me and I vowed she should recognise my possibilities as well as Peter's. If any man were to turn the passionate stream of her nature back on herself, or to love—to see the woman rise above the fanatic—it should be I, not Peter. But I said nothing of this to him. I do not think he ever knew it at all. It began in pique on my side, then jealousy, lastly passion. Christopher, if I had loved her from the first beginning of things I should not be ashamed to meet your eyes now. Don't look round yet. I laid deliberate siege to her heart and found she possessed my mind night and day. Soon it was not Peter who was my rival, but her own soul. I was confident I should win, though Peter, it was clear, was also wooing her persistently. He at least meant her well, Christopher. He loved her in his uncomprehending way, wanting her for the woman she was not—except in his mind. And I—I wanted her for the outward woman she was."

He paused long enough for his listener to face clearly the portrait of the worn, broken woman he remembered, the outward woman that bore no likeness to the clear knowledge of the inner soul.

Aymer continued:

"At last I felt it was time to end it. Peter had been in town some time then. I knew the senior Hibbault and he were coming to some understanding, but I guessed nothing of the nature of it. She never mentioned him to me at this time. She stood, poor girl, between the two of us like a trapped creature, and because she feared herself and neither of us, she overstepped one snare to fall into the other. Christopher, I don't know what was in my mind when I went to her that last evening: I had not seen her for some days, but when I stood before her I knew suddenly I loved her, and then, like a flash, I saw it was neither Peter nor her that stood between us, but my own evil self. I told her all—that she was the victor and I the conquered. I was proud of my new humbleness. For once I recognised myself and my true place in the order of the world. But she knew me better than I guessed, and she was afraid to tell me the truth. She put me off with gentle words, terrified lest I should guess before I left her—Don't turn away, Christopher—At last she owned she had written me a letter and I should find it when I got back. Her attitude maddened me. The better self, if it ever existed, got stamped out. I told her nothing should come between us, that nothing short of death should keep me from her, while I could move hand or foot."

The white scar on Aymer's forehead was very plain and his face had grown thin and sharp. Christopher for the first time looked up at him and away again.

"I went home at last, Christopher, wild to get this mysterious letter to which she would refer me. I went back and took seven devils with me—my passion and love fighting for possession. Nevil and I had a room of our own on the ground floor. I think they use it for storing papers in now."

Christopher gave a slight movement: he knew that well.

"I went straight in, knowing any letter for me would be taken there. Nevil was going upstairs as I crossed the hall and he called to me across the banisters that Wayband had sent back my revolver and he had opened it. Revolver shooting was a passion just then and I was accounted a crack shot. I answered him savagely and went on. The letter lay on the table. She had been married to Peter two days before at a Registrar's office. I felt I must have known it from eternity, but it caught me on the crest of my fury, it overwhelmed me in a torrent of mad shame and wild jealousy. I had failed—had been beaten at my own game—beaten and fooled by some God who had used my passion for his own ends. Those short minutes of purer love burnt my soul like fire till I raged at my folly. Christopher, I'd give all I have left to say I was mad. I wasn't. I knew what I was doing. The revolver lay there on the table and an open box of cartridges by it. It was the coward's way out of the agony, and I took it. I shot myself—the crack shot of Waybands Club missed his own life by a hair's-breadth."

Even then, after the long years, Christopher caught an echo of bitterness in the voice. He dully wondered at his own inability to move or speak or send out a thought of consolation to the man who had suffered so fiercely.

Aymer gave a little gasp and was still a moment Then he went on:

"That's all my story, Christopher. Now comes your mother's part of it. The first result of her marriage was that the Hibbaults' name ceased to be a power for the Socialist party—became less than a power. James Hibbault severed his connection with them entirely. I think Peter gave him a place at one of his big affairs. He had bought them out, and for a time the party fell into disrepute. But Elizabeth, whom he had married, he had not bought. I think she believed she had and could influence him, that she could sway him without loss of her own being. I know she clung to her true personality with passionate strength. I had failed to break it down, but I think Peter failed here also. When she heard of her father's and brother's betrayal of their party—it was nothing else—she was nearly crazy with grief. It was some time before Peter could get her to acknowledge their marriage at all, and she never, I believe, spoke of her people again. But at last he got her to Stormly. I know very little of what happened there. I believe he was willing she should play Lady Bountiful to his people if it pleased her—even made her a big allowance for the purpose. But she went amongst them and she would have none of it. She would make no compromise with what she regarded as wholly evil. She found Peter had only played with her regarding her creed—that he never had the least intention of altering his plan of life to suit it. She hated it all a hundredfold more than you did, Christopher, and the thought of bringing a child into an atmosphere that was rank poison to her, became a nightmare. Perhaps she was not wholly accountable then—there was no woman to stand by her or counsel patience. Anyhow, about six weeks before you were born, we believe she just disappeared. No one knows how Peter really felt about it. In the face of the world he shrugged his shoulders and went on with his life as if wife and expected child had never been. We suppose he tried to find her at first, but he always declared there was no need—she would come back when she had had enough of the world. Eventually a letter reached him saying you had come into the world and that, rather than put you under the power of your father and all he stood for, she would bring you up among the people she loved and pitied. My father tried all he could to make Peter seriously seek for his wife. We know now he had some false clue and that he believed she and you were living in Liverpool. But either from pride or indifference he would never see for himself these two whose fortunes he watched so closely. Saunderson tells me it was the younger Hibbault who supplied him with the false clue and found it to his advantage to keep up the fraud. They can't trace either Hibbault now. They seem to have emigrated. My father once visited Peter, before Elizabeth left him. There was some dispute at the works and a certain foreman named Felton protested against his orders. My father heard the interview between them, and the man made a strong appeal to him. He did his best as go-between and failed. Peter did not quarrel about it. He was just immovable in his heavy way, but your mother was greatly troubled over the whole business and was generously good to Felton and his wife in the face of Peter's direct commands. Ten years afterwards this man, tramping from Portsmouth to London in search of work, met your mother again. He was evidently a man of strong memory, and he knew her."

Christopher nodded. He remembered the little narrow paths in the tiny garden, the smell of the box edging, a pink cabbage rose that fell when the man's sleeve brushed against it. The man and his mother had talked long and the old woman had asked him if he knew the man. The next day they were on the road again and he had felt a resentment towards this man as the cause. All these recollections crowded themselves into his mind.

"Felton seems to have been a man with some strength of character. He had easily promised your mother not to betray her existence to her husband, but the memory of her face and some uneasy sense of unfitness troubled him, I suppose. He remembered Mr. Aston, who had spoken for him, and that he was something to do with these people. He turned up here one day and Nevil had the sense to send him direct to us in London. It was just at the time when I was wanting to adopt a child. I had stopped cursing fate and myself, and I wanted something of my own almost as fiercely as I wanted my freedom."

There was another long pause. This time Christopher put out his hand and laid it on Aymer's.

"There isn't any more. We followed up the clue and found you. My father made another appeal to Peter on behalf of his unknown son, and Peter declared the subject was not discussable: so I kept you. I vowed I'd never stand between your own father and you, but also that I'd never put out a hand to bring you together. That visit you paid him, Christopher, was the blackest time I've had since the day I realised what I'd done. I thought I had got over my jealousy, and I had not."

Christopher leant over him and gripped his hands.

"Caesar," he said in a breathless low voice, looking him straight in the eyes. "Caesar, there was no need of that then—there never has been, nor could be. I have no father at all if it be not you."



CHAPTER XXIX

"It does not seem to me a very great thing to ask in the face of things."

Mr. Saunderson dangled his eyeglasses and regarded Christopher with a dubious air.

"I want three days to consider the matter," continued Christopher impatiently. "Where is the difficulty? You don't seem to remember you are asking me to give up my chosen life and work and take on a job that I loathe."

If Mr. Saunderson's face had been capable of expressing more than displeasure, it would have done so, but he was of no plastic build, mind or body, and "displeasure" was the nearest he could get to active anger.

"You have a singular way of regarding what most men would think overpowering good luck, Mr. Masters."

Christopher turned sharply.

"You at least cannot compel me to take that name. It has never been mine and never will be."

"Gently, gently, young man. I am willing to make every allowance for your perturbation, but really, in speaking of my late client ..." he stopped with a shake of the head.

"I was speaking of a name, not of him, Mr. Saunderson. However, I apologise. Once more, will you let the whole matter stand still for three days. I don't mean to accept the thing, you know, but I can't argue it out now. I will meet you in town on Wednesday."

"If you insist, there is nothing more to be said of course," returned Mr. Saunderson, huffily. "As to your refusing your own rights, that will be less simple than you imagine, but I shall hope you will soon view the matter in another light."

"There was no provision made in case the inheritor should refuse or not be available?"

Christopher confronted him suddenly with the question, and the poor man, who was as completely off his balance by Christopher's incomprehensible reception of his tidings, as that young man himself, was evidently confused.

"There were no instructions at all beyond the memorandum stating his wife and child were last heard of in Whitmansworth Union."

"But in the former will, which you say was destroyed?"

"I am not at liberty to divulge anything that might be contained in that document."

"There is nothing to prevent your acting on such instructions at your own prompting," Christopher insisted bluntly.

Mr. Saunderson looked at him critically. "That is an ingenious suggestion Mr. ..." he paused.

"Aston," said Christopher. "It's the name those who have treated me as a son gave me, and I see no obligation to change it."

The lawyer rose.

"Then we are to defer further discussion till Wednesday?"

"Until Wednesday. In town, not here."

He left with Mr. Shakleton in his wake, and Christopher was at last alone and free to weigh if he would the weight of this stupendous burden, which he resolutely decided was not his to bear. He stood looking out of the window at the still driving mist and had to drag his thoughts back from the external aspect of things to the inner matters he must face. But there was no lucidity in his mind, nothing was clear to him but his fierce resentment against the dead man, and a passionate pity for a faded woman.

"It was the beauty of grace rather than feature...." He was stung with intolerable shame for the manhood he must share with one who had wrought such havoc in the woman he was most bound to protect from herself, as well as from the world. The risks and chances of those early days flickered before him. He had been abandoned to such for some vague ultimate good to the colossal idea of fortune which neither he nor its late possessor could spend. Was he more bound to take it and its cares to himself than its author was bound to care for his own flesh and blood? Anger clouded his reason and he knew it. Yet if he could not think coherently on the matter, of what use were the three days of grace he had claimed? He could not endure company at present, and the four walls of his room were as a prison. At last he sent a hasty message to the motor house, tossed a few necessaries into a bag and wrote a note to Caesar. "Dear Caesar, I've got to make up my mind about this and I must do it alone, so to come to some decision I'm going off in the car. I'll be back when I've got the thing straight in my mind. Tell St. Michael and Nevil about it, but if you can help it don't let anyone else know.—Christopher Aston."

He drove slowly down the drive, out into the highroad and, turning westward, sped away into the misty distance.

A great stillness fell on Aymer when Christopher left him. He had lived so long under the shadowy fear of the thing that had now happened, that it was hard to credit the fear had passed in fulfilment. He had been forced back to face the past, and, behold, the terror of it was gone. He could only measure the full value of the effort he had made by the languor and listlessness that now wrapped him round, as a child who had overtaxed his strength and must needs rest. A hazy doubt crept into his mind as to what it was he had so dreaded—the resuscitation of the past, or Christopher's reception of it. In either case the fear had faded as some phantom form that melted in daylight.

He stumbled on one thought with vague wonder. No barrier had been raised between him and his adopted son: instead he found the only barrier had been erected by his own lack of strength to face that truth until the inexorable hand of God forced him to the issue.

As to the future he recognised that might be left to Christopher, whose whole life, since Aymer took him, had been a preparation for this situation. His long struggle to keep a grip on life was ebbing fast, it was good to leave decisions in another's hands, to rest, and accept.

When Mr. Aston returned Caesar gave him Christopher's note with a brief remark.

"Saunderson has been."

The note, short as it was, told the rest. Mr. Aston looked anxiously at his son, but Aymer met his eyes with a quiet smile.

"I'm glad you were away, St. Michael. You've had enough to contend with, and there was no need. There is nothing for either of us to do. It's Christopher's affair."

Mr. Aston looked at the note again and reread the signature, then he gave it back, satisfied.

"What will happen if he won't accept it?" he questioned thoughtfully.

"It is for him to decide." Aymer's tone was earnestly emphatic. "Father, we've done our part. We can't alter it if we would. Leave him free."

"It is the crown of your success that you can do so, my dear old fellow."

"The coronation has not taken place yet," returned Caesar, with a touch of dry humour that reassured his father more than any words that all was well with his son.

* * * * *

Meanwhile, hour after hour, Christopher's car raced over the white roads. The twinkling lights in the villages through which he sped grew fewer and at last ceased. A more solid blackness was the only inkling of dwellings on either hand. Once the low, vibrating hum of the car seemed to bring a light to a high window, but it fell back into the dark before he had caught more than a faint glimmer on the blind.

He met nothing: the road for all he knew was utterly empty of life. In the silent, motionless darkness it was like a path into illimitable space. He knew every mile of it, yet in the night the miles stretched out and raced with him.

It was far from village or town when at last Christopher wrenched his mind from the mechanical power that held it prisoner, and realised that town or no town, bed or no bed, he must stop. He brought the car to a standstill under the lea of a low ridge of downs, at a point where an old chalk pit reared its white face, glimmering faintly in the darkness. He hazarded a fair guess as to his whereabouts. Whitmansworth must be fifteen or twenty miles ahead. It was nearly midnight now. He would get no lodging even if he went on. He backed the car off the road into the circle of the chalk pit, made as comfortable a resting place as he could with rugs and cushions between the motor and the white wall, and extinguished the lamps. The cool, still night had him to herself, and cradled him to sleep as a mother her child, under the folds of her dark mantle.

He woke when the first fingers of dawn busied themselves with the hem of that dusky cloak, and sound as faint and tremulous as the light itself whispered across the earth. He watched a while to see the dim shapes reform under the glowing light, and the clouds that still curtained the sky, take on themselves a sombre grey uniform. But directly the line of white road took distinctness Christopher struck camp, and boldly raced to meet the full day. An early shepherd paused to watch him pass, returning impassively to work as he disappeared. Two or three labouring men also stared; one even commented to a fellow worker that "these yere motors take no more heed o' decent hours than o' natural distances. Five in the mornin' weren't part o' the gentry's day when I were a boy," he grumbled, "and five miles were five miles, no more nor less. 'Tisn't more nor a mile now."

At wayside farms life was in full swing. Dumbly impatient cows listened for the clatter of milk-pails, and solemn cart horses trudged to the upland fields. Presently he passed through a town where his own Patrimondi made pleasant, easy going. The town servants were cleaning the smooth, elastic surface with big jets of water. Christopher went slowly by with an eye on his handiwork. He fancied he saw a small defect at a turn and stopped to examine it. An indignant worker told him brusquely he needn't try to pick holes in their roads because there weren't any, and Christopher returned meekly he thought they looked good, but fancied the mark he examined was a flaw.

"It ain't any business of yours, anyway," was the angry retort, "the men who laid this knew what they was a-doin'."

Another man had joined him who had worked on the new road when Christopher was to and fro there, and recognised him. He plucked the other by the sleeve.

"Shut up, you fool," he growled, though not so low but Christopher heard him. "It's the Roadmaker himself. Mornin', sir."

Christopher gave him a few words of recognition and went on.

The slate roofs of Whitmansworth came into sight as the church clock struck six. He could see the white Union House high on the hill to the left, but he had no mind to halt there. He stopped the car at the gate of the town cemetery. It was not a beautiful place. Just a little square field with an avenue of young trees and an orderly row of green mounds and haphazard monuments, but in one corner amongst a row of unmarked graves was a white cross. "In remembrance of my mother," was the sole inscription it bore. Christopher stood and looked at it gravely. The thought of another grave amongst the family tombs in the trim churchyard at Stormly crossed his mind. It was better here in the little, plain unpretentious cemetery amongst the very poor whose sorrows she had made her own. She would sleep more quietly so.

But he found no message from her here, nor had he expected it. Her actual presence had not consecrated the spot for him, and he was impatient to gain the road made sacred by reason of the tired, failing footsteps that made their last effort there: the Via Dolorosa of his mother's life.

He passed the milestone where he had waited for his fortune fifteen years ago, and saw it in his mind's eye hastening towards him from the east in the person of Charles Aston. That was the true Fortune,—this spurious thing they were trying to harness to his back was evil to the core. Had not that been the very meaning of those painful steps that had struggled away from it along this very road—the meaning of the lonely grave amongst the broken-down poor of Whitmansworth Union?

He stopped the car near a little bridge where a thin brooklet made a noisy chatter, and sat still, his chin on his hand, thinking deeply.

This was the spot for which he had raced all these hours, for here he and she had rested that terrible night to gather strength for the last mile that lay between the woman and rest.

* * * * *

"It's better to be tired and hungry oneself, Jim, than to make other people so. Don't forget that."

"I am not really tired," the child maintained stoutly, "but it's going to rain again. Can't you come on?"

"Presently."

"You think it is the right road?"

"I don't know, Jim. I was sure of it at first, but I'm sure of nothing now."

* * * * *

The words and scene were as clear to him as the day they happened. He saw in it now a deeper significance, a possible meaning that was the last note of tragedy to his mother's story. For that note is reached only when the faith in which we have lived, acted and endured, fails us. That is the bitterness and foretaste of death. Then only can the shadow of it fall on us, and in great mercy gather us into its shade.

The Right Road! There was no doubt or shadow for Christopher yet. He had taken the first step on the Road he had chosen, and he would not look back. He would not stultify his mother's sacrifice. Such faint echoes as he heard calling him back were temptations to which he must turn a deaf ear. He would go forward on his chosen path, and Peter Masters' millions must look after themselves.

That was the final decision. Yet he sat there, still figuring the persons of the woman and the child trudging down the road towards him, and as he gazed, without conscious effort, the forms changed. The boy grew to manhood: the woman took to herself youth, youth with a crown of golden hair and the form of Patricia.

A throb of exultation leapt through him. Here were the real riches and fulness of life within his grasp and he, in blunt stupidity, had not chosen to see, had set material good and vague uncertainties before his own incomparable gain and happiness. Whatever had held him back before, the clouded life or personal ambition, or Caesar's need, it was swept away now like some low-lying mist before the wind, and left the clear vision, the man and the woman together on the long, smooth Road he would lay for her tender feet.

There should be no more delay than the needed time to race from here to her. Twenty-five miles of country that his car was eager to devour. He slipped away swiftly from the past as he had done before on this very road—to a new future.



CHAPTER XXX

Patricia sat by the fire in her little sitting-room seeking for a plausible excuse to return to Constantia as soon as might be. The grey weather, the strange sense of impending events weighed on her, she knew. She was in the mood when the old evil might flash up again, and for this reason she kept away from her sister a while, hoping to nurse herself into a better mind before evening. Christopher had gone again in his usual abrupt way. Presumably Caesar understood, but she found herself wishing she also held his confidence. She was hungry for a repetition of that first evening as a starved child is hungry for a crust, when the better things seem as far away as heaven. She must go back to Constantia when she could frame a suitable reason for her capricious movements. She was much safer there, beside the considerate friend, who kept the surface of life in a pleasant ripple, and never seemed to look into the depths or ask her what she found there to trouble her, as dear little sympathetic Renata did occasionally. Yet how could she go if Christopher were really coming back to-day, as St. Michael said, and the future held any possibility of another golden hour? The force of her deep love turned back on herself, broke through spirit and heart and let loose in her mind strange imaginings, alternate glimpses of a heaven or hell that had no relationship with tradition. She put her hands over her face and kept quite still in the grip of a sudden agony that made her physically cold and faint and exhausted. It would pass as it had passed before, yet was she forever to be at the mercy of this torturing realisation of empty years and eternal loss? Did Christopher love her or not? The assured "yes" and the positive "no" were as two shuttlecocks tossed over her strained mind by the breath of circumstance. Her own erroneous idea that her still unconquered passion kept them apart was breeding morbid misery for her, as all false beliefs must do. She had kept herself under control to-day by dint of isolation, and the inadequacy of that course filled her with self-contempt. In her solitary fight against the life forces within and without, she was getting worsted. She knew she resisted the invasion of their hours of depression with less courage than of old. It did not seem to matter so greatly if there were nothing to be won from life, and she was very tired. It had been a mistake to come to Marden at all, there was too much time to think there. She returned to that fact eventually. The afternoon wore on and she fell into a lethargy with no desire to escape it, and did not hear Christopher's motor arrive.

Christopher for once paused in the hall, instead of going straight to Aymer's room, as was the invariable rule, after even a day's absence.

"Where is Mrs. Aston?" he asked the footman, who replied vaguely, when Renata herself appeared. But it was not Renata that Christopher wanted.

"Where is Patricia?" he questioned with more truth.

"Upstairs in her room, I think. She seems rather worried and tired, Christopher. Do you want her?"

There was a note of anxiety in Renata's gentle voice. She was always nervous and anxious if she fancied Patricia was worried, struggling to stand between her and the petty annoyances which were supposed to be so irresistibly maddening to a true Connell.

"Yes, I want her." He smiled as he said it. "But I'll go to her. Don't trouble."

He went upstairs two steps at a time, and along the familiar corridor, and outside the door paused for the first moment since he had seen his vision on the highroad.

The corridor was already dark, but when he entered in obedience to her languid "Come in," the fire light made a rosy glow and filled the quiet space with tremulous light.

Patricia sat facing the fire, with her back to the door. He could see her golden head over the back of the chair, and his heart beat quickly.

"May I come and talk to you, Patricia?"

For the moment she did not answer or move. She was almost in doubt if she could accept his presence just now, until he was actually standing on the rug before her, looking down at her with keen, searching eyes, before which all her wild thoughts sunk back into oblivion, and a sense of quiet content and security stole over her.

"What have you been doing?" he demanded. "You look very tired."

"The result of laziness," she rejoined, and then was angry with herself for allowing an opening for mere trivialities.

"No, that's not true, Christopher. It's a bad day with me. I'm afraid to face anyone, even my own maid."

With no one else in the world could she have owned so much, and the keen pleasure of exercising her right to open dealing with him, outweighed the humiliation of her avowal.

Christopher seemed intent on his own affairs, however, for he asked her abruptly if St. Michael or Caesar had told her the news.

"What news?"

"Something rather disconcerting has happened to me," he said slowly, "but I'll tell you that presently. The most important thing now is that I want to get married."

All the cold waters of the world closed over her head for a moment. It was as if he had wrenched a plank from one drowning. She answered him, however, in a low, mechanical voice:

"Soon, Christopher?"

"That will be for her to say, if she will have me at all."

"You have not asked her yet?"

"I am asking her."

She looked up at him, puzzled and incredulous of the apparent meaning. Then suddenly he was on his knees by her side, with his strong arms round her.

"My dear, my dear, surely you must know. Is there need for any words between us? I've known so long all you must mean to me. Listen, Patricia, you will have to forgive me a great thing. I've let outside considerations, absurd ambitions, and the shadow of a lie, stand between us. I've waited when I should have spoken. You will forgive me that, my dear one, will you not? I'm not humble a bit in asking. I am so proud of the one great thing, that I can give you, Love,—can hold you and wrap you in it, so that nothing can hurt you any more. You understand, you recognise my right, Patricia?"

She could say nothing, understand nothing, but the great peace of perfect security. She let him hold her still, with her head against his shoulder and his dear face near, so near she seemed to lose sense of her own identity. All the answer to her life's riddle lay there, behind the love that emptied her soul of need. Out of the blissful unspeakable light some words vibrated into new meaning.

"There shall be no more sea."

It meant this then, this experience that was theirs. For him and her there was no more tempest, no more restless craving or peril, all had passed with the old incompleteness.

Still, she had not spoken audibly to him nor had he pressed her to do so. Words were too imperfect a medium. But presently, when all had been said in the silence that could be said, he touched her hair with caressing hand and reminded her:

"You have never answered me, sweet."

She put her hand on his as it held her and whispered, "Have I not, Christopher?"

And then he kissed her.

Afterwards as they sat watching the red fire, it seemed to her there was no problem in all the world he could not solve, no struggle in which he would not prove victor, nor any knowledge too deep to reach. In the illumination of their great love the gates of life became visible and open, never to be quite closed again.

She spoke at last slowly and quietly.

"Christopher, I am not going to ask you if you are afraid or have counted the risk you run, I being what I am. I know what you would say and I love you so well that now at this moment I have no fear either. But it will come nevertheless. Others will point out to you that it is a mad thing to do, and I shall say it too. It is then you must hold me, Christopher, against my will and against myself. For this is my clear sane hour, when I really know, and I know it means my salvation. Only when that certainty slips from me you must keep and save me yourself, dearest."

He held her hands against him and looked down into her eyes. "As I would keep and save myself, beloved."

She smiled a little, understanding to the finest shade his meaning, and then a quiver of weakness touched her.

"I should die if you let me slip, Christopher."

"You are going to live," he said firmly, and kissed her again.



CHAPTER XXXI

Christopher entirely forgot to tell Patricia of his fortune or parentage. He remembered that little omission as he went down to dinner and looked back to see if she were visible, but she was not in sight, and as he was already late he had to go in without her.

She came down still later, looking so beautiful with such a touch of warm colour in her face, and so sweet a light of wonder in her eyes that even Nevil regarded her with speculative interest.

Aymer had long given up dining with them, and no one spoke of the lawyers' visit or of Christopher's rapid flittings, or indeed of any of the subjects on which their minds were really intent. But there seemed a tacit understanding amongst them that dinner must not be a long affair and was a prelude to something yet to happen.

They went out together and Christopher delayed Patricia in the hall.

"I must see Nevil and Caesar and tell them at once," he said hurriedly, "then I want you, my dearest. I've news for you, which I forgot just now. You must know it, though it makes no difference to us."

Nevil came out at that moment and she slipped away after Renata with curiosity wide awake.

"Am I to congratulate you as a millionaire or commiserate with you as a bearer of burdens, old fellow?" asked Nevil, flinging himself into a big chair.

"You will congratulate me, I hope, but not about that confounded money though. Nevil, you are Patricia's guardian. Will you and Renata give her to me?"

He spoke abruptly and without any preamble, gripping the back of a chair in his hands. A sudden doubt as to the family acceptance of what was an unquestionable matter in his eyes suddenly assailed him.

"You want to marry Patricia?"

Christopher nodded. "You can hardly urge we have not had time to know our own minds," he said, smiling a little.

"No," Nevil admitted, and then added rather distractedly, "What ought I to urge, though, Christopher? Of course it's the greatest possible thing that could happen to Patricia, but for you?"

"I'm appealing to Patricia's guardian, who has only her interests to consider. I'll look after my own. However," he went on hastily, "it's only fair to tell you, Nevil, I don't mean to take either the fortune or the name. So long as you'll lend me your own I'll stick to it. Failing that, my mother's will serve me."

Nevil made no comment beyond a nod. The younger man waited with what patience he could command.

"Does it seriously affect the matter?" he asked at last, "my refusing the beastly money?"

Nevil got up slowly and shook himself.

"It affects Patricia's guardians not one bit. It's not as if it were that, or nothing."

"No, I've enough. Of course if I hadn't I might feel differently about it. I can keep her in comfort, Nevil."

Nevil got up deliberately and altered the position of a bronze on the high mantelshelf.

"It's not Patricia I'm thinking about," he said in his slow way, "but hang it all, you belong to us, Christopher. We must think of you! Have you counted the risks?"

"I probably understand them better than anyone."

"Then I dismiss further responsibility. I'm really more pleased than I can say, Christopher. Poor little Patricia! What fortune for her!"

"You clearly understand there won't be any fortune?" persisted the other bluntly.

"Oh, Peter's fortune? Of course not. Where's the obligation? I'll go and tell Renata."

He strolled off and Christopher hurried to the West Room, where he found Aymer and Mr. Aston waiting expectantly. Christopher came to a standstill by the fireplace and to his amazement found his hands shaking. He had never imagined there would be any difficulty in this interview, yet he found himself unaccountably at a loss before these two men. The absurdly inadequate idea that they might consider it unjustifiable greed in him to grasp so great a prize as Patricia Connell when they had already given him so much assailed him.

Both men were aware of his unusual embarrassment and neither of them made the slightest attempt to help him out, for Mr. Aston had a very fair idea of what had happened, and had conveyed his suspicions to Aymer. They both found a certain amusing fascination in seeing how he would deal with the situation, and it was a situation so pleasing to them both that they failed to realise it might present real difficulties to him.

He faced them suddenly, and plunged into the matter in his usual direct way.

"Caesar and St. Michael, I've something to tell you both. I am not sure if it will be news to you or not, but Patricia has said she will marry me."

He came to an abrupt stop, and turned away again towards the fire.

"It's very good news," said Mr. Aston quietly, "if in no way surprising."

"You don't think I'm asking too much when I've had so much given me? I feel abominably greedy."

"You might think of me in the matter," protested Aymer, plaintively. "What on earth does it matter if you are greedy so long as you provide me with a real interest in life. I began to think you meant to defraud me of my clear rights."

A very grateful Christopher crossed the room and took his usual seat on the sofa.

"I've been a blind idiot," he admitted, "or rather an idle one. I've known for years it must be Patricia, and left it at that."

"Why?" demanded Aymer.

But that he could not or would not tell them.

Mr. Aston then suggested Christopher should explain what he meant to do concerning his inheritance.

"Which you have treated so far with scandalous disrespect," put in Aymer.

"I can't touch it. It would be treason to—to my mother. And I don't want it. I hate it, the way it's done, the caring for it."

There was something so foreign to Christopher's usual finality of statement in this, that the two older men looked at each other with sudden apprehension and then avoided the other's eye. For in their secret hearts they both knew that Christopher must presently arrive at the unconfessed certainty that had come to them, that this was not a matter in which he was free to act as he would. The call had come for him to take up a burden he disliked and sooner or later he would hear the voice and recognise the authority to which he had been taught to bow his own will. Yet both of them, without consultation or any word, knew it was not for them to interpret the call for him. Their work was over now. If they had taught him to set no value on the prizes of the world and to regard the means as of equal importance to the end, they had also taught him that duty may come in many disguises, but once recognised, her sway must be absolute. Christopher would discover her in time, but they must hold their peace lest conflicting motives should hamper his surrender to her call.

"I'm going to meet Mr. Saunderson in town to-morrow," Christopher went on, "I am not quite clear yet how it's to be worked. I am only clear I won't touch money of that sort. It costs too much. I feel pretty certain Mr. Saunderson has instructions what to do, if I refuse it."

He looked at Mr. Aston with an unusual desire for confirmation of his hope and his decision. A strong inclination to appeal for such support pressed him sorely. But he knew it was only confirmation of his own determination he sought, and his ingrained independence of mind shrank from such a proceeding.

"If you know what you want to do and what you ought to do, why appeal to me?" Caesar had repeatedly told the small boy he was fitting out for life: yet who so kind or patient when the decision still hung in the balance and uncertainty held the scales? There was no uncertainty now, Christopher told himself, and allowed none either to himself or to them. One concession only did he permit himself. He turned to Mr. Aston a little shyly.

"Would you go with me, St. Michael? I am afraid of Mr. Saunderson's wrath if I am unprotected."

Mr. Aston gravely expressed his willingness to hold his hand and see him through. After which Christopher went out to fetch Patricia. He found her sitting on the floor at Renata's feet, the latter fussing over her with matronly joy and sisterly love, and talking inconsequently between times of Charlotte, with what would appear to an outsider irrelevance of the first order.

"Charlotte will be a most desirable bridesmaid," Christopher remarked after he had listened a moment, whereupon Renata became greatly confused and Patricia laughed without any embarrassment whatever.

"Charlotte has not yet had time to signify her approval," she said. "I rely on her judgment to a great extent, you know. If she offers any objection we shall have to reconsider it."

"I'm not afraid. Charlotte has always approved of me," asserted Christopher cheerfully.

"Of course Charlotte will be pleased," put in that young lady's mother, quite seriously. "What nonsense you are talking, Patricia."

She got up and offered a transparent excuse to slip away and leave the lovers alone.

Patricia, still kneeling by the fire, leant her head against Christopher.

"I used to try and make up my mind you would marry Charlotte when she grew up," she said dreamily.

"How ingenious of you. Unfortunately, it was my mind, not yours, that was concerned, and that had been made up when Charlotte was in pinafores. Now come and talk business, dear."

So at last he told her the news he had been so tardy in delivering, told her the whole story very simply and as impersonally as he could, but Patricia's heart brimmed over with pity for him. She divined more clearly than the men the strength of his hatred for the burden with which he was threatened, and the burden of past memories in which that hatred had its root. In the fulness of her love she set herself the future task of rooting out the resentment for another's sorrows, which she knew must be as poison to his generous soul. At length Christopher, having read in her love the confirmation for which he so childishly longed, took her away to be introduced to Caesar in her new character as his promised wife. She waited for no such introduction whatever, but seated herself on the big hassock by the sofa that was still Christopher's privileged seat and leant her head against the edge of Caesar's cushions, but she failed to find anything to say and Christopher was so occupied in watching her as to forget to speak.

"It's taken him a long time to recognise his own privilege, hasn't it, Patricia?" said Caesar, gently putting his hand on hers. "I was getting impatient with him. It was time he grew up."

"You aren't disappointed then?" she asked with a little flush of confusion. "Mrs. Sartin will be. She always expects him to marry a duchess at least. She is so insufferably proud of him."

"She does not know him so well as we do, that's why."

"I'll not stay here to be discussed," remarked Christopher decidedly, "you can pull my character to pieces when I'm away. When did you last see Mrs. Sartin, Patricia?"

"Last Thursday. She comes to tea every week with Maria."

Maria was Mrs. Sartin's second daughter, midway between Sam and Jim, and was just installed as second lady's-maid to Mrs. Wyatt.

"Is Sam more reconciled to her going out?"

"Not a bit. You know he wanted to send her to a Young Ladies' Academy in Battersea. I know he'd have done it but for Martha, who has more sense in her fingers than he has in his whole head."

"Hadn't Maria anything to say in the matter?" This from Caesar.

"No one has much to say when Sam and his mother dispute," said Christopher, shaking his head. "Sam would be a tyrant, Caesar, if he could. He always wants to push people on in his own way."

"Sam is not singular," put in Mr. Aston, in his meditative way, "character is all more or less a question of degree. There are the same fundamental instincts in all of us. Some get developed at the expense of others, that's all."

"There but for the grace of God goes ..." said Patricia, laughing.

Christopher felt in his pocket and produced a coin.

"Apropos of which, Caesar," he said with a flicker of a smile, "I found this, the other day rummaging in an old box."

He tossed it dexterously to Caesar. It was a sovereign with a hole in it and the broken link of a chain therein. Caesar looked at it and then slipped it in his own pocket.

"It's mine, at all events," he said shortly, "and we are all talking nonsense, especially Christopher."

But Christopher shook his head.

"Mayn't I understand all this?" demanded Patricia.

"No," returned Caesar, before Christopher could speak. "It's not worth it. John Bunyan was a fool."

"Not at all, but the other man might have retorted, 'there with the grace of God goes I.'"

This was from Mr. Aston, and Christopher gave him a quick look of comprehension.

"The Court is with you, sir," said Aymer languidly. "Let us discuss wedding presents."



CHAPTER XXXII

At eleven o'clock on Wednesday, Mr. Aston and Christopher were ushered into Mr. Saunderson's office by a discreetly interested clerk. The bland and smiling lawyer advanced to meet them with that respect and courtesy he felt due to the vast fortune they represented. His table was covered with orderly rows of papers, and the door of the safe, labeled P. Masters, Esq., stood open.

"Punctuality is the essence of good business," said Mr. Saunderson, with effusive approval as he indicated two lordly armchairs placed ready for his visitors. Mr. Aston and Christopher had both a dim, unreasonable consciousness of dental trouble and exchanged glances of mutual encouragement.

Mr. Saunderson blinked at them genially behind his gold-rimmed glasses and spoke of the weather, which was bad, dilated on the state of the streets, lamented the slowness of the L. C. C. to enforce the use of Patrimondi beyond the limits of Westminster, and as the futile little remarks trickled on they carried with them his complacent smile, for in every quiet response he read Christopher Masters' fatal determination, and prepared himself for battle. It was Christopher, however, who flung down the gauntlet. He answered the question anent the use of Patrimondi in the metropolis, and then said directly:

"Mr. Saunderson, I've considered the matter of this fortune you tell me I've inherited, and I do not feel under any obligation to accept it or its responsibilities. It's only fair to let you know this at once."

Mr. Saunderson leant back in his chair and rubbed his chin, and his eyes wandered from one to the other of his visitors thoughtfully.

"The matter is far too complicated to be disposed of so lightly, I fear," he remarked, shaking his head. "Let me place the details of the thing before you and as a business man you can then judge for yourself."

He had at least no fault to find with the grave attention they paid him, indeed, the entirely unemotional attitude of the younger man was to the lawyer's mind the most alarming symptom he had noted. Still he could not allow to himself that his task presented more than surmountable difficulties, for Mr. Saunderson had no real knowledge of the forces at work against him, of the silent, desperate woman who had given her life for her faith, who had once been beautiful, and whose worn body slept in the little dull cemetery at Whitmansworth.

"I believe you are acquainted with the great premises known as Princes Buildings," began Mr. Saunderson, "that simplifies my task. For the whole affair is so amazingly managed that I can offer you no precedent with which to compare it. There are seven floors in that building, and on each floor the affairs of the six great concerns in which Mr. Masters was interested, are conducted. Such an arrangement was only carried out at enormous expense and trouble. I may tell you, however, that the condition of Mr. Masters' interesting himself in either of the companies, was their domicile beneath this one roof. Now in five of these big concerns he occupied merely the place of a director, with no more official power than any other director might have. Yet in every case, I think I may say, no decision of any importance would have been taken by the company in opposition to his advice, and he was the financial backbone of each. On the two top floors of these great premises we have a rather different state of things. For here are the offices of the three smaller companies which were directly under the control of Mr. Masters, and which are the original source of his fortune. I allude to the Steel Axle Company, the Stormly Mine and the Stormly Foundry Companies. These affairs he continued to keep under his own eye, never relaxing his attention, or the excellent system he had established, under which the whole great affair worked with such marvellous smoothness and success. I beg your pardon, did you say anything?"

Christopher shook his head. Mr. Saunderson resumed.

"You will understand Mr. Masters' wealth was directly drawn from these companies, bringing him an income of roughly L130,000 a year. The administration of this income, of which he spent about one-fourth on himself, was the occupation of the offices on the top floor of Princes Buildings. A certain proportion of income was regularly reinvested in concerns in which Mr. Masters took no active part, and was accumulative. It is this reserve fund which has brought the actual fortune to such high figures as I have quoted you, nearly L4,000,000. A great deal of money also has been devoted to the purchase of freehold property. You would be surprised how great an area of Birmingham itself belongs to Mr. Masters."

Christopher gave an involuntary movement of dissent, and the lawyer hurried on.

"Not perhaps districts that it would be interesting to visit now, but which will undoubtedly be of vast interest to your heirs. They represent enormous capital and of course will eventually be a source of colossal wealth.

"Now, so perfect is the machinery and system under which all these giant concerns are worked, that they will run without difficulty on their present lines until you have mastered the working thoroughly, and are able, if you should wish it, to make your own plans for future greatness. I say this, because it seems to me you are inclined to overrate the difficulties of your position. I do not say, mind you, matters could go on indefinitely as they are, but you are a young man of intellect and capacity, you have only to step into the place of one who has set everything in order for you, and before two years are up you will have the details of the system by heart, and will, I am convinced, be recognised as an able successor to your father."

Christopher's mouth straightened ominously. It was an unlucky slip on Mr. Saunderson's part, but he was oblivious to it. He was indeed incapable of appreciating the sentiment towards his late client, which was playing so large a part against him in this tussle of wills.

Christopher heard in every word that was spoken the imperious Will that would force him to compass its ends, even from the land of Death. It was not wholly the unsought responsibility, the burden of the wealth, the memory of his mother that buttressed his determination to refuse this stupendous thing, it was also his fierce, vehement desire to escape the enforced compliance with that still living Will-power. Peter Masters' unwritten and unspoken word was, that he, Christopher, should succeed him. He had left him no directions, no choice, no request, he had relied on the Greatness of the Thing which Christopher loathed with his whole soul, he had claimed him for this bondage with an unuttered surety that was maddening. Minute by minute Christopher felt his former quiet determination rise to passionate resistance and denial of the right of that Dominant Will to drag his life into the vortex it had made.

Quite suddenly Mr. Saunderson was aware of the strength of the antagonism that confronted him. Unable to trace the reason of it, he blundered on hopelessly.

"Mr. Masters was, I should say, quite aware of your natural ability. He has had more regard for your fortunes than you probably suspect. I have letters of his to various men concerning the starting of this ingenious invention of yours, Patrimondi." He bustled over some papers on the table as if searching, and did not see Christopher's sudden backward movement: but Mr. Aston bent forward and put his hand as if accidentally on Christopher's shoulder as he spoke:

"Never mind them, now, Mr. Saunderson. Mr. Masters was, we know, naturally interested in that affair, but to continue your account, what will happen if Mr. Aston refuses to accept his position? Let us suppose for a moment there had been no clue left. What would you have done?"

Mr. Saunderson brought the tips of his red, podgy fingers together with great exactness.

"That is a supposition I should be sorry to entertain, sir," he said deliberately.

"I am afraid you must entertain it," put in Christopher, suddenly, his resolution to escape urging him to curt methods.

The light eyes of the lawyer rested on him with something very like apprehension in them.

"In the case of there being no direct heir the money would go to the nearest of kin."

"We will pass that over," Mr. Aston said quietly. "I am the nearest relative Peter had, after Christopher, and I decline it at all costs."

"Unclaimed and unowned money would fall to the Crown, I suppose. It is impossible to imagine it."

"The Crown would see no difficulty in that, I expect," put in Christopher. "How could you stop the Thing going on, that's what I want to know?"

"You could give the money to Charities and shut down the works and leave thousands to starve."

Christopher moved impatiently.

"The money invested in each company could be divided amongst the shareholders, I suppose, or in the case of the Stormly Mines amongst the work-people."

"If you want to ruin them."

"Mr. Saunderson, I am not going to accept this fortune. I don't like the way it was made, I don't want it, I won't work for it."

"Why should you work for it, after all? You can go on with your own life and delegate your powers to another or others, and let all continue as it is. The income would be at your disposal to save or spend. You need never enter Princes Buildings if that is what troubles you. You can spend the money in philanthropy, or gamble it away at Monte Carlo, or leave it to accumulate for your heirs. If you'll do that I'll undertake to find suitable men to carry on the affairs."

Christopher's face flushed angrily, but he made an effort to control himself, however, and answered quietly.

"I cannot take money I've not earned, Mr. Saunderson."

Mr. Saunderson made a gesture of despair.

"All you have to do," went on Christopher, watching him closely, "is to act as if that clue had never fallen into your hands or as if when you followed it up you found I was dead. Do you mean to say Mr. Masters did not provide for that contingency?"

"As I have told you before, Mr. Masters provided for no such contingency," snapped the lawyer; "he never entertained such a preposterous idea as your refusing."

"To conform to his will," concluded Christopher drily.

The three men were silent a while, each struggling to see some way out of the impasse into which they had arrived.

"You say the various companies are entirely distinct from each other?" queried Mr. Aston thoughtfully, more for the sake of starting a line of inquiry than because he saw any open door of escape.

"Entirely unconnected, but Mr. Masters, or his successor, holds the ends of the various threads, so to speak. Apart from him each affair has a multitude of masters and no head. If the money left in each company were divided as a bonus—a preposterous suggestion to my mind—they would each be free and would presumably find a head for themselves."

"Then you had better work out some such scheme, and once free of the source of the money we can deal with what's left at leisure. The Crown will make no difficulties over its share and we can set the London hospitals on their feet or establish a Home for Lost Cats." He got up and walked across the big room to the window, looking moodily into the street.

Mr. Saunderson looked genuinely pained and cast appealing glances at Mr. Aston, who only shook his head.

"It is a matter for Christopher to decide for himself, Mr. Saunderson. I cannot and may not influence him either way."

"There is not the smallest doubt of his parentage," said the lawyer in a low voice, "one can hear his father in every sentence."

"It is unwise to remind him of it."

The other looked astonished. "Indeed, you surprise me. Yet he is really deeply indebted to his father for the success of his own invention."

"Still more unwise to insist on that. You must remember he had a mother as well as a father."

Mr. Saunderson opened his mouth to say something and closed it again. Presently he opened a folded paper and, having perused it, laid it back in a drawer. Christopher rejoined them.

"Mr. Saunderson," he said frankly, "I fear I've spoken in an unseemly manner, and I beg your pardon. I can quite understand I must seem little short of a madman to you, but I've perhaps better reasons for my refusal than you think. Put it, if you will, that I feel too young, too inexperienced to deal with this fortune as Mr. Masters meant it to be dealt with, and on those grounds I ask you to devise some scheme for breaking it up without letting the workers suffer. I'll subscribe to any feasible plan you suggest. Will you undertake this for me?"

"It will take time." Mr. Saunderson regarded him watchfully, as he spoke, "a great deal of time."

"How long do you ask?"

"Two years."

"Then in two years' time, Mr. Saunderson, send me your scheme, and I'll be your debtor for life."

Mr. Saunderson smiled faintly.

But on that understanding they ultimately parted.

"My own belief is," said Mr. Aston when he was giving an account of the interview to Aymer, "that Mr. Saunderson means to do nothing at all and is only giving Christopher time. Also, though he persistently denies it, I believe he has instructions behind him. We know Peter had an immense belief in Time and never hurried his schemes."

Aymer moved restlessly.

"And you share his belief?"

"I believe in the long run Christopher will do the thing he is meant to do and neither you nor I, old fellow, can say what that is. You have taught him to follow the highest Road he can, see, and I tell you again, as I have before, you must leave it at that."



CHAPTER XXXIII

Thus by tacit consent did the whole question of Peter Masters' Fortune and the Refusal slip into the background of the lives of those mostly concerned, and only for Christopher did that background colour all the present and alter the perspective of his outlook.

He told Aymer plainly that it was a bitter thought to him to be indebted to Peter Masters for even a share of the Patrimondi success.

"According to Saunderson he must have subsidised the Exhibition people," he said moodily.

"It was a very excellent advertisement."

"It meant he had his own way and left me indebted to him when I had refused his help."

"Good heavens, what a mercy you two were not flung together earlier in life!"

Christopher faced him abruptly.

"Am I so like him then?"

"Absurdly so. Your own way and no one else to interfere."

Christopher was silent for a while, but presently he said in a low voice, "That's not quite true, Caesar, is it? You can interfere as much as you like."

"I'd be sorry to try."

Again Christopher was silent, but his face softened. He thought of how the personality and jealous love of this man to whom he owed so much had stood between him and Patricia and how he felt no shadow of resentment at it.

"I think I shall adopt Max when he leaves school," remarked Caesar languidly, "he'll let me manage him in my own way till he is an octogenarian."

"Caesar, you have no discrimination at all. Once you wanted to adopt Sam, now Max. Both as pliable as elastic, and as unmalleable."

"I've a great affection for Max."

"So have I. Is Nevil going to give him to Patrimondi?"

"No, to me."

"Honestly?"

Aymer nodded. "He'll have to manage the estate some day, not so far off, either."

Christopher patted the sofa rug absently.

"When he's at Cambridge he'll have to spend the Long Vacation learning from his ancient uncle."

Christopher gave an involuntary sigh.

"Jealous again?" demanded Aymer quizzically, but he put his hand on Christopher's and they both smiled.

Patricia and Christopher were married at Christmas, Charlotte having given her consent with the remark, it was better than having a horrid stranger in the family anyway.

They established themselves in a house on the verge of the sea, within easy motor or train distance of Marden and the Patrimondi works. It was a relief to all to find how easily Caesar appeared to take the new separation, but the quiet peace and unspoken happiness of the united lives seemed to include him in its all-embracing results. There could be no room for jealousy in a love that usurped no rights, but only filled its own place.

The days of doubt which Patricia had feared came and passed in the autumn weeks preceding the marriage, and Christopher had kept his word and held her firmly against the weak terrors that assailed her. Once they were married, however, she seemed to pass out of the shadow of the fear, and to break from the bondage of her race. In some wonderful way her husband's clear, perpetual vision of her as separate from the tyranny of heredity, did actually free her. She too saw herself free, and in so seeing, the fetters were loosed. If it were a miracle, as little Renata sometimes thought, it was only one in so far as the Love which can inspire such faith and vision is yet but a strange unknown power with us, to which nature seldom rises, and can rarely hold when grasped.

But these two held it, rising with each other's efforts, sinking with each other's daily failures; their lives so intricately woven together that they needed no outward semblance of interests or visible companionship to bring the knowledge of their Love to their hearts.

Christopher continued his work, journeying far and wide. Sometimes she accompanied him actually, sometimes she remained in their home on the cliff edge, alone but not solitary, looking with joy for his return, but free from aching need. Quite slowly the Woman learnt to recognise her unseen, unreckoned sway over the Man, to discover how he could only rise to the full height of his manhood by strength of the inspiring love she brought him. She was pressed by an uncomprehending world to fill her leisure hours with many occupations, useful and useless, but she resisted steadily. She took life as it came to her, day by day, wasting no strength, but refusing no task, shirking no responsibility, drinking in every joy, and holding always faithfully in her heart his true image as he had held hers, knowing that when perchance the outward man blurred that image for a moment it was but the outward casing; the inner soul remained true to the likeness in which it was created.

As the months slipped by Christopher saw that his work continued to grow, that the good roads of which he had dreamed stretched far and wide across the country, and he knew he had won for himself a place in the history of men. Moreover, he loved his work.

It was a never-ceasing pleasure, and when it ended came the greater, deeper joy of his undivided love. If the aim of man is happiness, he had achieved that end as far as any human being might do so.

Yet all the while a black thread wove itself into the warp of his existence. He tried not to see it, for recognition of it would cancel that white web of life that grew daily beneath his hand. Still it was there, and the white web became uneven and knotted. He was restless, even irritable, the white turned to grey, yet still he resisted the unknown forces that pressed him onward to the dissolution of this present beautiful life. And Patricia herself, with her unbroken faith in his readiness to follow the highest when he saw it, fought with the silent Powers till at length that silence was broken by a cry so imperious that even his dogged will could refuse sight and hearing no longer.