She put her doubts and fears away from her, she answered to his call. He had awaked the woman's heart in her, and she gave freely, impulsively, not measuring her gift. If she could not offer him a girl's first rapture, she could bestow that which was infinitely greater—the deep, strong love of a woman who had suffered and knew how to endure.

They sat in the dewy garden till in the distant woods the nightingales began their passion-steeped music, and then—because the ecstasy of the night was almost more than she could bear—Avery softly freed herself from her husband's arm and rose.

"Going?" he asked quickly.

He remained seated holding her hand fast locked in his. She looked down into his upraised face, conscious that her own was in shadow and that she need not try to hide the tears that had risen inexplicably to her eyes.

"Yes, dear," she answered, with an effort at lightness. "You haven't had a smoke since dinner. I am going to leave you to have one now."

But he still held her, as if he could not let her go.

She bent to him after a moment with that sweet impulsiveness of hers that so greatly charmed all who loved her. "What is it, Piers? Don't you want me to go?"

He caught her other hand in his and held them both against his lips.

"Want you to go!" he muttered almost inarticulately; and then suddenly he raised his face again to hers. "Avery—Avery, promise me—swear to me—that, whatever happens, you will never leave me!"

"But, my dearest, haven't I already sworn—only today?" she said, surprised by his vehemence and his request. "Of course I shall never leave you. My place is by your side."

"I know! I know!" he said. "But it isn't enough. I want you to promise me personally, so that—I shall always feel—quite sure of you. You see, Avery," his words came with difficulty, his upturned face seemed to beseech her, "I'm not—the sort of impossible, chivalrous knight that Jeanie thinks me. I'm horribly bad. I sometimes think I've got a devil inside me. And I've done things—I've done things—" His voice shook suddenly; he ended abruptly, with heaving breath. "Before I ever met you, I—wronged you."

He would have let her go then, but it was her hands that held. She stooped lower to him, divinely tender, her love seeming to spread all about him like wings, folding him in.

"My dear," she said softly, "whatever there is of bad in you,—remember, the best is mine!"

He caught at the words. "The best—the best! You shall always have that, Avery. But, my darling,—you understand—you do understand—how utterly unworthy that best is of you? You must understand that before—before—"

Again his voice went into silence; but she saw his eyes glow suddenly, hotly, in the gloom, and her heart gave a quick hard throb that caught her breath and held it for the moment suspended, waiting.

He went on after a second, mastering himself with obvious effort. "What I am trying to say is this. It's easier—or at least not impossible—to forfeit what you've never had. But afterwards—afterwards—" His hands closed tightly upon hers again; his voice sounded half-choked. "Avery, I—couldn't let you go—afterwards," he said.

"But, my own Piers," she whispered, "haven't you said that there is no reason—no earthly reason—"

He broke in upon her almost fiercely. "There is no reason—none whatever—I swear it! You said yourself that the past was nothing to you. You meant it, Avery. Say you meant it!"

"But of course I meant it!" she told him. "Only, Piers, there is no secret chamber in my life that you may not enter. Perhaps some day, dear, when you come to realize that I am older than Jeanie, you will open all your doors to me!"

There was pleading in her voice, notwithstanding its note of banter; but she did not stay to plead. With the whispered words she stooped and softly kissed him. Then ere he could detain her longer she gently released herself and was gone.

He saw her light figure flit ghost-like across the dim stretch of grass and vanish into the shadows. And he started to his feet as if he would follow or call her back. But he did neither. Be only stood swaying on his feet with a face of straining impotence—as of a prisoner wrestling vainly with his iron bars—until she had gone wholly from his sight. And then with a stifled groan he dropped down again into his chair and covered his face.

He had paid a heavy price to enter the garden of his desire; but already he had begun to realize that the fruit he gathered there was Dead Sea Fruit.



CHAPTER II

THAT WHICH IS HOLY

No bells had rung at the young Squire's wedding. It had been conducted with a privacy which Miss Whalley described as "almost indecent." But there was no privacy about his return, and Miss Whalley was shocked afresh at the brazen heartlessness of it after his recent bereavement. For Sir Piers and his wife motored home at the end of July through a village decked with flags and bunting and under a triumphant arch that made Piers' little two-seater seem absurdly insignificant; while the bells in the church-tower clanged the noisiest welcome they could compass, and Gracie—home for the holidays—mustered the school-children to cheer their hardest as the happy couple passed the schoolhouse gate.

Avery would fain have stopped to greet the child, but Piers would not be persuaded.

"No, no! To-morrow!" he said. "The honeymoon isn't over till after to-night."

So they waved and were gone, at a speed which made Miss Whalley wonder what the local police could be about.

Once past the lodge-gates and Marshall's half-grudging, half-pleased smile of welcome, the speed was doubled. Piers went like the wind, till Avery breathlessly cried to him to stop.

"You'll kill us both before we get there!" she protested. In answer to which Piers moderated the pace, remarking as he did so, "But you would like to die by my side, what?"

Victor was on the steps to receive them, Victor dancing with impatience and delight. For his young master's prolonged honeymoon had represented ten weeks of desolation to him.

Old David was also present, inconspicuous and dignified, waiting to pour out tea for the travellers.

And Caesar the Dalmatian who had mourned with Victor for his absent deity now leapt upon him in one great rush of ecstatic welcome that nearly bore him backwards.

It was a riotous home-coming, for Piers was in boisterous spirits. They had travelled far that day, but he was in a mood of such restless energy that he seemed incapable of feeling fatigue.

Avery on her part was thoroughly weary, but she would not tell him so, and they spent the whole evening in wandering about house and gardens, discussing the advisability of various alterations and improvements. In the end Piers awoke suddenly to the fact that she was looking utterly exhausted, and with swift compunction piloted her to her room.

"What a fool I am!" he declared. "You must be dead beat. Why didn't you say you wanted to rest?"

"I didn't, dear," she answered simply. "I wanted to be with you."

He caught her hand to his lips. "You are happy with me then?"

She uttered a little laugh that said more than words. "My own boy, you give me all that the most exacting woman could possibly desire and then ask me that!"

He laughed too, his arm close about her. "I would give you the world if I had it. Avery, I hate to think we've come home—that the honeymoon is over—and the old beastly burdens waiting to be shouldered—" He laid his forehead against her neck with a gesture that made her fancy he did not wish her to see his face for the moment. "P'r'aps I'm a heartless brute, but I never missed the old chap all the time I was away," he whispered. "It's like being dragged under the scourge again—just when the old scars were beginning to heal—to come back to this empty barrack."

She slid a quick arm round his neck, all the woman's heart in her responding to the cry from his.

"The place is full of him," Piers went on; "I meet him at every corner. I see him in his old place on the settle in the hall, where he used to wait for me, and—and row me every night for being late." He gave a broken laugh. "Avery, if it weren't for you, I—I believe I should shoot myself."

"Come and sit down!" said Avery gently. She drew him to a couch, and they sat down locked together.

During all the ten weeks of their absence he had scarcely even mentioned his grandfather. He had been gay and inconsequent, or fiercely passionate in his devotion to her. But of his loss he had never spoken, and vaguely she had known that he had shut it out of his life with that other grim shadow that dwelt behind the locked door she might not open. She had not deemed him heartless, but she had regretted that deliberate shirking of his grief. She had known that sooner or later he would have to endure the scourging of which he spoke and that it would not grow the lighter with postponement.

And now as she held him against her heart, she was in a sense relieved that it had come at last, thankful to be there with him while he stripped himself of all subterfuge and faced his sorrow.

He could not speak much as he sat there clasped in her arms. One or two attempts he made, and then broke down against her breast. But no words were needed. Her arms were all he desired for consolation, and if they waked in him the old wild remorse, he stifled it ere it could take full possession.

Finally, when the first bitterness had passed, they sat and talked together, and he found relief in telling her of the life he had lived in close companionship with the old man.

"We quarrelled a dozen times," he said. "But somehow we could neither of us keep it up. I don't know why. We were violent enough at times. There's an Evesham devil somewhere in our ancestry, and he has a trick of cropping up still in moments of excitement. You've met him more than once. He's a formidable monster, what?"

"I am not afraid of him," said Avery, with her cheek against his black head.

He gave a shaky laugh. "You'd fling a bucket of water over Satan himself! I love you for not being afraid. But I don't know how you manage it, and that's a fact. Darling, I'm a selfish brute to wear you out like this. Send me away when you can't stand any more of me!"

"Would you go?" she said, softly stroking his cheek.

He caught her hand again and kissed it hotly, devouringly, in answer. "But I mustn't wear you out," he said, a moment later, with an odd wistfulness. "You mustn't let me, Avery."

She drew her hand gently away from the clinging of his lips. "No, I won't let you," she said, in a tone he did not understand.

He clasped her to him. "It's because I worship you so," he whispered passionately. "There is no one else in the world but you. I adore you! I adore you!"

She closed her eyes from the fiery worship that looked forth from his. "Piers," she said, "wait, dear, wait!"

"Why should I wait?" he demanded almost fiercely.

"Because I ask you. Because—just now—to be loved like that is more than I can bear. Will you—can you—kiss me only, once, and go?"

He held her in his arms. He gazed long and burningly upon her. In the end he stopped and with reverence he kissed her. "I am going, Avery," he said.

She opened her eyes to him. "God bless you, my own Piers!" she murmured softly, and laid her cheek for a moment against his sleeve ere he took his arm away.

As for Piers, he went from her as if he feared to trespass, and her heart smote her a little as she watched him go. But she would not call him back. She went instead to one of the great bay windows and leaned against the framework, gazing out. He was very good to her in all things, but there were times when she felt solitude to be an absolute necessity. His vitality, his fevered desire for her, wore upon her nerves. His attitude towards her was not wholly natural. It held something of a menace to her peace which disquieted her vaguely. She had a feeling that though she knew herself to be all he wanted in the world, yet she did not succeed in fully satisfying him. He seemed to be perpetually craving for something further, as though somewhere deep within him there burned a fiery thirst that nothing could ever slake. Her lightest touch seemed to awake it, and there were moments when his unfettered passion made her afraid.

Not for worlds would she have had him know it. Her love for him was too deep to let her shrink; and she knew that only by that love did she maintain her ascendancy, appealing to his higher nature as only true love can appeal. But the perpetual strain of it told upon her, and that night she felt tired in body and soul.

The great bedroom behind her with its dark hangings and oak furniture seemed dreary and unhome-like. She viewed the ancient and immense four-poster with misgiving and wondered if Queen Elizabeth had ever slept in it.

After a time she investigated Piers' room beyond, and found it less imposing though curiously stiff and wholly lacking in ordinary cheery comfort. Later she discovered the reason for this grim severity of arrangement. No woman's touch had softened it for close upon half a century.

She went back to her own room and dressed. Piers had wanted her to have a maid, but she had refused until other changes should be made in the establishment. There seemed so much to alter that she felt bewildered. A household of elderly menservants presented a problem with which she knew she would find it difficult to deal.

She put the matter gently before Piers that night, but he dismissed it as trivial.

"You can't turn 'em off of course," he said. "But you can have a dozen women to adjust the balance if you want 'em."

Avery did not, but she was too tired to argue the point. She let the subject slide.

They dined together in the oak-panelled dining-room where Piers had so often sat with his grandfather. The table seemed to stretch away inimitably into shadows, and Avery felt like a Lilliputian. From the wall directly facing her the last Lady Evesham smiled upon her—her baffling, mirthless smile that seemed to cover naught but heartache. She found herself looking up again and again to meet those eyes of mocking comprehension; and the memory of what Lennox Tudor had once told her recurred to her. This was Piers' Italian grandmother whose patrician beauty had descended to him through her scapegrace son.

"Are you looking at that woman with the smile?" said Piers abruptly.

She turned to him. "You are so like her, Piers. But I wouldn't like you to have a smile like that. There is something tragic behind it."

"We are a tragic family," said Piers sombrely. "As for her, she ruined her own life and my grandfather's too. She might have been happy enough with him if she had tried."

"Oh, Piers, I wonder!" Avery said, with a feeling that that smile revealed more to her than to him.

"I say she might," Piers reiterated, with a touch of impatience. "He thought the world of her, just as—just as—" he smiled at her suddenly—"I do of you. He never knew that she wasn't satisfied until one fine day she left him. She married again—afterwards, and then died. He never got over it."

But still Avery had a vagrant feeling of pity for the woman who had been Sir Beverley's bride. "I expect they never really understood each other," she said.

Piers' dark eyes gleamed. "Do you know what I would have done if I had been in his place?" he said. "I would have gone after her and brought her back—even if I'd killed her afterwards."

His voice vibrated on a deep note of savagery. He poured out a glass of wine with a hand that shook.

Avery said nothing, but through the silence she was conscious of the hard throbbing of her heart. There was something implacable, something almost cruel, about Piers at that moment. She felt as if he had bruised her without knowing it.

And then in his sudden, bewildering way he left his chair and came to her, stooped boyishly over her. "My darling, you're so awfully pale to-night. Have some wine—to please me!"

She leaned her head back against his shoulder and closed her eyes. "I am a little tired, dear; but I don't want any wine. I shall be all right in the morning."

He laid his cheek against her forehead. "I want you to drink a toast with me. Won't you?"

"We won't drink to each other," she protested, faintly smiling. "It's too like drinking to ourselves."

"That's the sweetest thing you've ever said to me," he declared. "But we won't toast ourselves. We'll drink to the future, Avery, and—" he lowered his voice—"and all it contains. What?"

Her eyes opened quickly, but she did not move. "Why do you say that?"

"What?" he said again very softly.

She was silent.

He reached a hand for his own glass. "Drink with me, sweetheart!" he said persuasively.

She suffered him to put it to her lips and drank submissively. But in a moment she put up a restraining hand. "You finish it!" she said, and pushed it gently towards him.

He took it and held it high. The light gleamed crimson in the wine; it glowed like liquid fire. A moment he held it so, then without a word he carried it to his lips and drained it.

A second later there came the sound of splintering glass, and Avery, turning in her chair, discovered that he had flung it over his shoulder.

She gazed at him in amazement astonished by his action. "Piers!"

But something in his face checked her. "No one will ever drink out of that glass again," he said. "Are you ready? Shall we go in the garden for a breath of air?"

She went with him, but on the terrace outside he stopped impulsively. "Avery darling, I don't mean to be a selfish beast; but I've got to prowl for a bit. Would you rather go to bed?"

His arm was round her; she leaned against him half-laughing. "Do you know, dear, that bedroom frightens me with its magnificence! Don't prowl too long!"

He bent to her swiftly. "Avery! Do you want me?"

"Just to scare away the bogies," she made answer, with a lightness that scarcely veiled a deeper feeling. "And when you've done that—quite thoroughly—perhaps—" She stopped.

"Perhaps—" whispered Piers.

"Perhaps I'll tell you a secret," she said still lightly. "By the way, dear, I found a letter from Mr. Crowther waiting for me. I put it in your room for you to read. He writes so kindly. Wouldn't you like him to be our first visitor?"

There was a moment's silence before Piers made answer.

"To be sure," he said then. "We mustn't forget Crowther. You wrote and told him everything, I suppose?"

"Yes, everything. He seems very fond of you, Piers. But you must read his letter. It concerns you quite as much as it does me. There! I am going. Good-bye! Come up soon!"

She patted his shoulder and turned away. Somehow it had not been easy to speak of Crowther. She had known that in doing so she had introduced an unwelcome subject. But Crowther was too great a friend to ignore. She felt that she had treated him somewhat casually already; for it was only the previous week that she had written to tell him of her marriage.

Crowther was in town, studying hard for an examination, and she felt convinced that he would be willing to pay them a visit. She also knew that for some reason Piers was reluctant to ask him, but she felt that that fact ought not to influence her. For she owed a debt of gratitude to Crowther which she could never forget.

But all thought of Crowther faded from her mind when she found herself once more in that eerie, tapestry-hung bedroom. The place had been lighted with candles, but they only seemed to emphasize the gloom. She wondered how often the last Lady Evesham—the warm-blooded, passionate Italian woman with her love of the sun and all things beautiful—had stood as she stood now and shuddered at the dreary splendour of her surroundings. How homesick she must have been, Avery thought to herself, as she undressed in the flickering candle-light! How her soul must have yearned for the glittering Southern life she had left!

She thought of Sir Beverley. He must have been very like Piers in his youth, less fierce, less intense, but in many ways practically the same, giving much and demanding even more, restless and exacting, but withal so lovable, so hard to resist, so infinitely dear. All her love for Piers throbbed suddenly up to the surface. How good he was to her! What would life be without him? She reproached herself for ingratitude and discontent. Life was a beautiful thing if only she would have it so.

She knelt down at length by the deep cushioned window-seat and began to pray. The night was dim and quiet, and as she prayed she gradually forgot the shadows behind her and seemed to lose herself in the immensity of its peace. She realized as never before that by her love she must prevail. It was the one weapon, unfailing and invincible, that alone would serve her, when she could rely upon no other. She knew that he had felt its influence, that there were times when he did instinctive reverence to it, as to that which is holy. She knew moreover that there was that within him that answered to it as it were involuntarily—a fiery essence in which his passion had no part which dwelt deep down in his turbulent heart—a germ of greatness which she knew might blossom into Love Immortal.

He was young, he was young. He wanted life, all he could get of it. And he left the higher things because as yet he was undeveloped. He had not felt that hunger of the spirit which only that which is spiritual can satisfy. It would come. She was sure it would come. She was watching for it day by day. His wings were still untried. He did not want to soar. But by-and-bye the heights would begin to draw him. And then—then they would soar together. But till that day dawned, her love must be the guardian of them both.

There came a slight sound in the room behind her. She turned swiftly. "Piers!"

He was close to her. As she started to her feet his arms enclosed her. He looked down into her eyes, holding her fast pressed to him.

"I didn't mean to disturb you," he said. "But—when I saw you were praying—I had to come in. I wanted so awfully to know—if you would get an answer."

"But, Piers!" she protested.

He kissed her lips. "Don't be angry, Avery! I'm not scoffing. I don't know enough about God to scoff at Him. Tell me! Do you ever get an answer, or are you content to go jogging on like the rest of the world without?"

She made an effort to free herself. "Do you know, Piers, I can't talk to you about—holy things—when you are holding me like this."

He looked stubborn. "I don't know what you mean by holy things. I'm not a believer. At least I don't believe in prayer. I can get all I want without it."

"I wonder!" Avery said.

She was still trying to disengage herself, but as he held her with evident determination she desisted.

There followed a silence during which her grey eyes met his black ones steadily, fearlessly, resolutely. Then in a whisper Piers spoke, his lips still close to hers. "Tell me what you were praying for, sweetheart!"

She smiled a little. "No, dear, not now! It's nothing that's in your power to give me. Shall we sit on the window-seat and talk?"

But Piers was loath to let her go from his arms. He knelt beside her as she sat, still holding her.

She put her arm round his neck. "Do you remember your Star of Hope?" she asked him softly.

"I remember," said Piers, but he did not turn his eyes to the night sky; they still dwelt upon her.

Avery's face was toward the window. The drapery fell loosely away from her throat. He stooped forward suddenly and pressed his hot lips upon her soft white flesh.

A little tremor went through her at his touch; she kept her face turned from him.

"Have you really got all you want?" she asked after a moment. "Is there nothing at all left to hope for?"

"Didn't we drink to the future only to-night?" he said.

His arms were drawing her, but still she kept her face turned away. "Did you mean anything by that?" she asked. "Were you—were you thinking of anything special?"

He did not at once answer her. He waited till with an odd reluctance she turned her face towards him. Then, "I was thinking of you," he said.

Her heart gave a quick throb. "Of me?" she questioned below her breath.

"Of you," he said again. "For myself, I have got all I can ever hope for. But you—you would be awfully happy, wouldn't you, if—"

"If—" murmured Avery.

He stooped again to kiss her white bosom. "And it would be a bond between us," he said, as if continuing some remark he had not uttered.

She turned more fully to him. "Do we need that?" she said.

"We might—some day," he answered, in a tone that somehow made it impossible for her to protest. "Anyhow, my darling, I knew,—I guessed. And I'm awfully glad—for your sake."

She bent towards him. "Not for your own?" she whispered pleadingly.

He laid his head suddenly down upon her knees with a sound that was almost a groan.

"Piers!" she said in distress.

He was silent for a space, then slowly raised himself. She had a sense of shock at sight of his face. It looked haggard and grey, as if a withering hand had touched him and shorn away his youth.

"Avery,—oh, Avery," he said, "I wish I were a better man!"

It was a cry wrung from his soul—the hungry cry which she had longed to hear, and it sent a great joy through her even though it wrung her own soul also.

She bent to him swiftly. "Dearest, we all feel that sometimes. And I think it is the Hand of God upon us, opening our eyes."

He did not answer or make any response to her words. Only as he clasped her to him, she heard him sigh. And she knew that, strive as he might to silence that soul-craving with earthly things, it would beat on unsatisfied through all. She came nearer to understanding him that night that ever before.



CHAPTER III

THE FIRST GUEST

"I am greatly honoured to be your first guest," said Crowther.

"The honour is ours to get you," Avery declared. She sat on the terrace whither she had conducted him, and smiled at him across the tea-table with eyes of shining friendship.

Crowther smiled back, thinking to himself how pleasant a picture she made. She was dressed in white, and her face was flushed and happy, even girlish in its animation. There was a ring of laughter in her voice when she talked that was very good to hear. She had herself just brought him from the station in Piers' little two-seater, and her obvious pleasure at meeting him still hung about her, making her very fair to see.

"Piers is so busy just now," she told him. "He sent all sorts of messages. He had to go over to Wardenhurst to see Colonel Rose. The M.P. for this division retired at the end of the Session, and Piers is to stand for the constituency. They talk of having the election in October."

"Will he get in?" asked Crowther, still watching her with friendly appreciation in his eyes.

"Oh, I don't know. I expect so. He gets most things that he sets his heart on. His grandfather—you knew Sir Beverley?—was so anxious that he should enter Parliament."

"Yes, I knew Sir Beverley," said Crowther. "He thought the world of Piers."

"And Piers of him," said Avery.

"Ah! Was it a great blow to him when the old man died?"

"A very great blow," she answered soberly. "That was the main reason for our marrying so suddenly. The poor boy was so lonely I couldn't bear to think of him by himself in this great house."

"He was very lucky to get you," said Crowther gravely.

She smiled. "I was lucky too. Don't you think so? I never in my wildest dreams pictured such a home as this for myself."

A great magnolia climbed the house behind her with creamy flowers that shed their lemon fragrance all about them. Crowther compared her in his own mind to the wonderful blossoms. She was so sweet, so pure, yet also in a fashion so splendid.

"I think it is a very suitable setting for you, Lady Evesham!" he said.

She made a quick, impulsive movement towards him. "Do call me Avery!" she said.

"Thank you," he answered, with a smile. "It certainly seems more natural. How long have you been in this home of yours, may I ask?"

"Only a fortnight," she said, laughing. "Our honeymoon took ten weeks. Piers wanted to make it ten years; but the harvest was coming on, and I knew he ought to come back and see what was happening. And then Mr. Ferrars resigned his seat, and it became imperative. But isn't it a beautiful place?" she ended. "I felt overwhelmed by the magnificence of it at first, but I am getting used to it now."

"A glorious place," agreed Crowther. "Piers must be very proud of it. Have you begun to have many visitors yet?"

She shook her head. "No, not many. Nearly all the big people have gone to Scotland. Piers says they will come later, but I shall not mind them so much then. I shall feel less like an interloper by that time."

"I don't know why you should feel like that," said Crowther. Avery smiled. "Well, all the little people think that I set out to catch Piers for his money and his title."

"Does what the little people think have any weight with you?" asked Crowther.

She flushed faintly under the kindly directness of his gaze. "Not really, I suppose. But one can't quite shake off the feeling of it. There is the Vicar for instance. He has never liked me. He congratulates me almost every time we meet."

"Evidently a cad," commented Crowther in his quiet way.

Avery laughed a little. She had always liked this man's plain speech. "He is not the only one," she said.

"But you have friends—real friends—also?" he questioned.

"Oh yes; indeed! The Vicarage children and their mother are the greatest friends I have." Avery spoke with warmth. "The children are having tea down in one of the cornfields now. We must go and see them presently. You are fond of children, I know."

"I sort of love them," said Crowther with his slow, kind smile. "Ah, Piers, my lad, are you trying to steal a march on us? Did you think I didn't know?"

He spoke without raising his voice. Avery turned sharply to see her husband standing on the steps of a room above them. One glimpse she had of Piers' face ere he descended and joined them, and an odd feeling of dismay smote her. For that one fleeting moment there seemed, to be something of the cornered beast in his aspect.

But as he came straight down to Crowther and wrung his hand, his dark face was smiling a welcome. He was in riding-dress, and looked very handsome and young.

"How did you know it was I? Awfully pleased to see you! Sorry I couldn't get back sooner. I've been riding like the devil. Avery explained, did she?" He threw himself into a chair, and tossed an envelope into her lap. "An invitation to Ina Rose's wedding on the twenty-third. That's the week after next. They are sorry they can't manage to call before, hope you'll understand and go. I said you should do both."

"Thank you, Piers." Avery laid the envelope aside unopened. She did not feel that he was being very cordial to Crowther. "I am not sure that I shall go."

"Oh yes, you will," he rejoined quickly. "You must. It's an order, see?" His dark eyes laughed at her, but there was more than a tinge of imperiousness in his manner. "Well, Crowther, how are you? Getting ready to scatter the Philistines? Don't give me milk, Avery! You know I hate it at this time of day."

She looked at him in surprise. He had never used that impatient tone to her before. "I didn't know," she observed simply, as she handed him his cup.

"Well, you know now," he rejoined with an irritable frown. "Hurry up, Crowther! I want you to come and see the crops."

Avery was literally amazed by his manner. He had never been so frankly and unjustifiably rude to her before. She came to the conclusion that something had happened at the Roses' to annoy him; but that he should visit his annoyance upon her was a wholly new experience.

He drank his tea, talking hard to Crowther the while, and finally sprang to his feet as if in a ferment to be gone.

"Won't Lady Evesham come too?" asked Crowther, as he rose.

Avery rose also. "Yes, I have promised the children to join them in the cornfield," she said.

Piers said nothing; but she had a very distinct impression that he would have preferred her to remain behind. The wonder crossed her mind if he were jealous because he could no longer have her exclusively to himself.

They walked down through the park to the farm. It was a splendid August evening. The reaping was still in progress, and the whirr of the machine rose slumbrous through the stillness. But of the Vicarage children there was at first no sign.

Avery searched for them in surprise. She had sent a picnic basket down to the farm earlier in the afternoon, and she had expected to find them enjoying the contents thereof in a shady corner. But for a time she searched in vain.

"They must have gone home," said Piers.

But she did not believe they would have left without seeing her, and she went to the farm to make enquiries.

Here she heard that the picnic-party had taken place and that the basket had been brought back by one of the men, but for some reason the children had evidently gone home early, for they had not been seen since.

Avery wanted to run to the Vicarage and ascertain if all were well, but Piers vetoed this.

"It's too hot," he said. "And you'll only come in for some row with the Reverend Stephen. I won't have you go, Avery. Stay with us!"

His tone was peremptory, and Avery realized that his assumption of authority was intentional. A rebellious spirit awoke within her, but she checked it. Something had gone wrong, she was sure. He would tell her presently what it was.

She yielded therefore to his desire and remained with them. They spent a considerable time in the neighbourhood of the farm, in all of which Crowther took a keen interest. Avery tried to be interested too, but Piers' behaviour troubled and perplexed her. He seemed to be all on edge, and more than once his manner to Crowther also verged upon abruptness.

They were leaving the farm to turn homeward when there came to Avery the sound of flying feet along the lane outside. She went to the gate, and beheld Gracie, her face crimson with heat, racing towards her.

Avery moved to meet her, surprised by her sudden appearance. She was still more surprised when Gracie reached her, flung tempestuous arms about her, and broke into stormy crying on her breast.

"My dear! My dear! What has happened?" Avery asked in distress.

But Gracie was for the moment quite beyond speech. She hung upon Avery, crying as if her heart would break.

Piers came swiftly down the path. "Why, Pixie, what's the matter?" he said.

He put his hand on her shoulder, drawing her gently to lean against himself, for in her paroxysm of weeping she had thrown herself upon Avery with childish unrestraint.

"Who's been bullying you, Pixie?" he said.

"Nobody! Nobody!" sobbed Gracie. She transferred herself to his arms almost mechanically, so overwhelming was her woe. "Oh, it's dreadful! It's dreadful!" she cried.

He patted her soothingly, his cheek against her fair hair. "Well, what is it, kiddie? Let's hear! One of the youngsters in trouble, what? Not Jeanie, I say?"

"No, no, no! It's—Mike." The name came out with a great burst of tears.

"Mike!" Piers looked at Avery, mystified for the moment. "Ah, to be sure! The dog! Well, what's happened to him? He isn't dead, what?"

"He is! He is!" sobbed Gracie. "He—he has been killed—by—by his own chain!"

"What!" said Piers again.

Gaspingly she told him the tragic tale. "Father always will have him kept on the chain, and—and—"

"An infernally cruel thing to do!" broke indignantly from Piers.

"Yes, we—we all said so. And we tried to give him little outings sometimes to—to make up. But to-day—somehow—we forgot him, and—and he must have seen us go, and jumped the wall after us. Pat and I went back afterwards to fetch him, and found him—found him—oh, Piers!" She cried out in sudden agony and said no more.

"Choked?" said Piers. "Choked with his own chain, poor devil!" He looked up again at Avery with something unfathomable in his eyes. "Oh, don't cry so, child!" he said. "A chained creature is happier dead—a thousand times happier!"

He spoke passionately, so passionately that Gracie's wild grief was stayed. She lifted her face, all streaming with tears. "Do you think so really?"

"Of course I think so," he said. "Life on a chain is misery unspeakable. No one with any heart could condemn a dog to that! It's the refinement of cruelty. Don't wish the poor beast back again! Be thankful he's gone!"

The vehemence of his speech was such that it carried conviction even to Gracie's torn heart. She looked up at him with something of wonder and of awe. "If only—he hadn't suffered so!" she whispered.

He put his hand on her forehead and smoothed back the clustering hair. "You poor kid!" he said pityingly. "You've suffered much more than he did at the end. But it's over. Don't fret! Don't fret!"

Gracie lifted trembling lips to be kissed. He was drying her eyes with his own handkerchief as tenderly as any woman. He stooped and kissed her. "Look here! I'll walk home with you," he said. "Avery, you go back with Crowther! I shan't be late."

Avery turned at once. The sight of Piers soothing the little girl's distress had comforted her subtly. She felt that his mood had softened.

"Won't you go too?" said Crowther, as she joined him. "Please don't stay on my account! I am used to being alone, and I can find my own way back."

"Oh no!" she said. "I had better come with you. I shan't be wanted now."

They started to walk back among the shocks of corn; but they had not gone many yards when Gracie came running after them, reached them, flung her arms about Avery.

"Good-bye, darling Avery!" she said.

Avery held her close. She was sobbing still, but the first wild anguish of her grief was past.

"Good-bye, darling!" Avery whispered, after a moment.

Grade's arms tightened. "You think like Piers does?" she murmured. "You think poor Mikey is happier now?"

Avery paused an instant. The memory of Piers' look as he had uttered the words: "Choked with his own chain, poor devil!" seemed to grip her heart. Then: "Yes, dearie," she said softly. "I think as Piers does. I am glad—for poor Mikey's sake—that his troubles are over."

"Then I'll try and be glad too," sobbed poor Gracie. "But it's very, very difficult. Pat and I loved him so, and he—he loved us."

"My dear, that love won't die," Avery said gently.

"The gift immortal," said Crowther. "The only thing that counts."

She looked round at him quickly, but his eyes were gazing straight into the sunset—steadfast eyes that saw to the very heart of things.

"And Life in Death," he added quietly.



CHAPTER IV

THE PRISONER IN THE DUNGEON

Avery was already dressed when she heard Piers enter his room and say a word to Victor. She stood by her window waiting. It was growing late, but she felt sure he would come to her.

She heard Victor bustling about in his resilient fashion, and again Piers' voice, somewhat curt and peremptory, reached her through the closed door. He was evidently dressing at full speed. She was conscious of a sense of disappointment, though she kept it at bay, reminding herself that they must not keep their guest waiting.

But presently, close upon the dinner-hour, she went herself to the door of her husband's room and knocked.

His voice answered her immediately, but it still held that unwonted quality of irritation in it. "Oh, Avery, I can't let you in. I'm sorry. Victor's here."

Something—a small, indignant spirit—sprang up within her in response. "Send Victor away!" she said. "I want to come in."

"I shall be late if I do," he made answer. "I'm horribly late as it is."

But for once Avery's habitual docility was in abeyance. "Send Victor away!" she reiterated.

She heard Piers utter an impatient word, and then in a moment or two he raised his voice again. "Come in then! What is it?"

She opened the door with an odd unaccustomed feeling of trepidation.

He was standing in his shirt-sleeves brushing his hair vigorously at the table. His back was towards her, but the glass reflected his face, and she saw that his brows were drawn into a single hard black line. His lips were tightly compressed. He looked undeniably formidable.

"Don't you want me, Piers?" she asked, pausing in the doorway.

His eyes flashed up to hers in the glass, glowing with the smouldering fire, oddly fitful, oddly persistent. "Come in!" he said, without turning. "What is it?"

She went forward to him. "Did you go to the Vicarage?" she asked. "Are they in great trouble?"

She thought she saw relief in his face at her words. "Oh yes," he said. "Mrs. Lorimer crying as usual, Jeanie trying to comfort her. I did my best to hearten them up but you know what they are. I say, sit down!"

"No, I am going," she answered gently. "Did you get on all right this afternoon?"

"Oh yes," he said again. "By the way, we must get a wedding-present for Ina Rose and another for Guyes. You'll come to the wedding, Avery?"

"If you wish it, dear," she said quietly.

He threw down his brushes and turned fully to her. "Avery darling, I'm sorry I was bearish this afternoon. You won't punish me for it?"

"Punish you, my own Piers!" she said.

"Because I can't stand it," he said recklessly. "There are certain forms of torture that drive a man crazy. Bear with me—all you can!"

His quick pleading touched her, went straight to her heart. She put her hands on his shoulders, lifting her face for his kiss. "It's all right, dear," she said.

"Is it?" he said. "Is it?" He took her face between his hands, gazing down at her with eyes of passionate craving. "Say you love me!" he urged her suddenly. "Say it!"

Her heart sank within her. She made a movement as if to withdraw herself; but he caught her fiercely to him, his hot lips sought and held her own. She felt as if a flame encompassed her, scorching her, consuming her.

"Say you love me!" he whispered again between those fiery kisses. "Avery, I must have your soul as well. Do more than bear with me! Want me—want me!"

There was more than passion in the words. They came to her like a cry of torment. She braced herself to meet his need, realizing it to be greater than she knew.

"Piers! Piers!" she said. "I am altogether yours. I love you. Don't you know it?"

He drew a deep, quivering breath. "Yes—yes, I do know it," he said. "But—but—Avery, I would go through hell for you. You are my religion, my life, my all. I am not that to you. If—if I were dragged down, you wouldn't follow me in."

His intensity shocked her, but she would not have him know it. She sought to calm his agitation though she possessed no key thereto. "My dear," she said, "you are talking wildly. You don't know what you are to me, and I can't even begin to tell you. But surely—by now—you can take me on trust."

He made a curious sound that was half-laugh, half-groan. "You don't know yourself, Avery," he said.

"But you don't doubt my love, Piers," she protested very earnestly. "You know that it would never fail you."

"Your love is like the moonlight, Avery," he answered. "It is all whiteness and purity. But mine—mine is red like the fire that is under the earth. And though sometimes it scorches you, it never quite reaches you. You stoop to me, but you can't lift me. You are too far above. And the moonlight doesn't always reach to the prisoner in the dungeon either."

"All the same dear, don't be afraid that it will ever fail you!" she said.

He kissed her again, hotly, lingeringly, and let her go. "Perhaps I shall remind you of that one day," he said.

All through dinner his spirits were recklessly high. He talked incessantly, playing the host with a brilliant ease that betrayed no sign of strain. He did not seem to have a care in the world, and Avery marvelled at his versatility.

She herself felt weary and strangely sick at heart. Those few words of his had been a bitter revelation to her. She knew now what was wanting between them. He desired passion from her rather than love. He had no use for spiritual things. And she,—she knew that she shrank inwardly whenever she encountered that fierce, untamed desire of his. It fettered her spirit, it hung upon her like an overpowering weight. She could not satisfy his wild Southern nature. He crushed her love with the very fierceness of his possession and ever cried to her for more. He seemed insatiable. Even though she gave him all she had, he still hungered, still strove feverishly to possess himself of something further.

She felt worn out, body and soul, and she could not hide it. She was unspeakably glad when at length the meal was over and she was able to leave the table.

Crowther opened the door for her, looking at her with eyes of kindly criticism.

"You look tired," he said. "I hope you don't sit up late."

She smiled at him. "Oh no! We will make Piers play to us presently, and then I will say good-night."

"Then we mustn't keep you waiting long," he said. "So Piers is a musician, is he? I didn't know."

"You had better go to bed, Avery; it's late," said Piers abruptly. "I can't play to-night. The spirit doesn't move me." He rose from the table with a careless laugh. "Say good-night to her, Crowther, and let her go! We will smoke in the garden."

There was finality in his tone, its lightness notwithstanding. Again there came to Avery the impulse to rebel, and again instinctively she caught it back. She held out her hand to Crowther.

"I am dismissed then," she said. "Good-night!"

His smile answered hers. He looked regretful, but very kindly. "I am glad to see Piers takes care of you," he said.

She laughed a little drearily as she went away, making no other response.

Crowther turned back to the table with its shaded candles and gleaming wine. He saw that Piers' glass was practically untouched.

Piers himself was searching a cabinet for cigars. He found what he sought, and turned round with the box in his hand.

"I don't know what you generally smoke," he said. "Will you try one of these? It's a hot night. We may as well have coffee in the garden."

He seemed possessed with a spirit of restlessness, just as he had been on that night at the Casino in the spring. Crowther, massive and self-contained, observed him silently.

They went out on to the terrace, and drank their coffee in the dewy stillness. But even there Piers could not sit still. He prowled to and fro eternally, till Crowther set down his cup and joined him, pushing a quiet hand through his arm.

"It's a lovely place you've got here, sonny," he said; "a regular garden of Paradise. I almost envy you."

"Oh, you needn't do that. There's a serpent in every Eden," said Piers, with a mirthless laugh.

He did not seek to keep Crowther at arm's length, but neither did he seem inclined for any closer intimacy. His attitude neither invited nor repelled confidence. Yet Crowther knew intuitively that his very indifference was in itself a barrier that might well prove insurmountable.

He walked in silence while Piers talked intermittently of various impersonal matters, drifting at length into silence himself.

In the western wing of the house a light burned at an upper window, and Crowther, still quietly observant, noted how at each turn Piers' eyes went to that light as though drawn by some magnetic force.

Gently at length he spoke. "She doesn't look altogether robust, sonny."

Piers started sharply as if something had pricked him. "What? Avery do you mean? No, she isn't over and above strong—just now."

He uttered the last two words as if reluctantly, yet as if some measure of pride impelled him.

Crowther's hand pressed his arm, in mute sympathy. "You are right to take care of her," he said simply. "And Piers, my lad, I want to tell you how glad I was to know that you were able to win her after all. I somehow felt you would."

It was his first attempt to pass that intangible barrier, and it failed. Piers disregarded the words as if they had not reached him.

"I don't know if I shall let her stay here through the winter," he said. "I am not sure that the place suits her. It's damp, you know; good hunting and so on, but a bit depressing in bad weather. Besides I'd rather have her under a town doctor. The new heir arrives in March," he said, with a slight laugh that struck Crowther as unconsciously pathetic.

"I'm very pleased to hear it, sonny," said Crowther. "May he be the first of many! What does Avery think about it? I'll warrant she's pleased?"

"Oh yes, she's pleased enough."

"And you, lad?"

"Oh yes, I'm pleased too," said Piers, but his tone lacked complete satisfaction and he added after a moment, "I'd rather have had her to myself a bit longer. I'm a selfish brute, you know, Crowther. I want all I can get—and even that's hardly enough to keep me from starvation."

There was a note of banter in his voice, but there was something else as well that touched Crowther's kindly heart.

"I don't think Avery is the sort of woman to sacrifice her husband to her children," he said. "You will always come first, sonny,—if I know her."

"I couldn't endure anything else," said Piers, with sudden fire. "She is the mainspring of my life."

"And you of hers," said Crowther.

Piers stopped dead in his walk and faced him. "No,—no, I'm not!" he said, speaking quickly, unrestrainedly. "I'm a good deal to her, but I'm not that. She gives, but she never offers. If I went off on a journey round the world to-morrow, she'd see me go quite cheerfully, and she'd wait serenely till I came back again. She'd never fret. Above all, she'd never dream of coming to look for me."

The passionate utterance went into a sound that resembled a laugh, but it was a sound of such bitterness that Crowther was strongly moved.

He put his hand on Piers' shoulder and gave it an admonitory shake. "My dear lad, don't be a fool!" he said, with slow force. "You're consuming your own happiness—and hers too. You can't measure a woman's feelings like that. They are immeasurable. You can't even begin to fathom a woman's restraint—a woman's reserve. How can she offer when you are always demanding? As to her love, it is probably as infinitely great, as infinitely deep, as infinitely selfless, as yours is passionate, and fierce and insatiable. There are big possibilities in you, Piers; but you're not letting 'em grow. It would have done you good to have been kept waiting ten years or more. You're spoilt; that's what's the matter with you. You got your heart's desire too easily. You think this world is your own damn playground. And it isn't. Understand? You're put here to work, not play; to develop yourself, not batten on other people. You won her like a man in the face of desperate odds. You paid a heavy price for her. But even so, you don't deserve to keep her if you forget that she has paid too. By Heaven, Piers, she must have loved you a mighty lot to have done it!"

He paused, for Piers had made a sharp, involuntary movement as of a man in intolerable pain. He almost wrenched himself from Crowther's hand, and walked to the low wall of the terrace. Here he stood for many seconds quite motionless, gazing down over the quiet garden.

Finally he swung round, and looked at Crowther. "Yes," he said, in an odd tone as of one repeating something learned by heart. "I've got to remember that, haven't I? Thanks for—reminding me!" He stopped, seemed to collect himself, moved slowly forward. "You're a good chap, Crowther," he said. "I wonder you've never got married yourself, what?"

Crowther waited for him quietly, in his eyes that look of the man who has gazed for long over the wide spaces of the earth.

"I never married, sonny," he said, "because I had nothing to offer to the woman I cared for, and so—she never knew."

"By gad, old chap, I'm sorry," said Piers impulsively.

Crowther held out a steady hand. "I'm happy enough," he said simply. "I've got—all I want."

"All?" echoed Piers incredulously.

Crowther was smiling. He lifted his face to the night sky. "Yes,—thank God,—all!" he said.



CHAPTER V

THE SWORD FALLS

As Miss Whalley had predicted, Ina Rose's wedding was a very grand affair indeed. Everyone who was anyone attended it, and a good many besides. It took place in the midst of a spell of sultry weather, during which the sun shone day after day with brazen strength and the heat was intense.

It was the sort of weather Piers revelled in. It suited his tropical nature. But it affected Avery very differently. All her customary energy wilted before it, and yet she was strangely restless also. A great reluctance to attend the wedding possessed her, wherefore she could not have said. But for some reason Piers was determined that she should go. He was even somewhat tyrannical on the subject, and rather than have a discussion Avery had yielded the point. For Piers was oddly difficult in those days. Crowther's visit, which had barely run into forty-eight hours, seemed to have had a disquieting effect upon him. There had developed a curious, new-born mastery in his attitude towards her, which she sometimes found it hard to endure. She missed the chivalry of the early days. She missed the sweetness of his boyish adoration.

She did not understand him, but she knew that he was not happy. He never took her into his confidence, never alluded by word or sign to the change which he must have realized that she could not fail to notice. And Avery on her part made no further effort to open the door that was so strenuously locked against her. With an aching heart she gave herself to the weary task of waiting, convinced that sooner or later the nature of the barrier which he so stubbornly ignored would be revealed to her. But it was impossible to extend her full confidence to him. Moreover, he seemed to shrink from all intimate subjects. Instinctively and wholly involuntarily she withdrew into herself, meeting reserve with reserve. Since he had become master rather than lover, she yielded him obedience, and she hid away her love, not deliberately or intentionally, but rather with the impulse to protect from outrage that which was holy. He was not asking love of her just then.

She saw but little of him during the day. He was busy on the estate, busy with the coming election, busy with a hundred and one matters that evidently occupied his thoughts very fully. The heat seemed to imbue him with inexhaustible energy. He never seemed tired after the most strenuous exertion. He never slacked for a moment or seemed to have a moment to spare till the day was done. He was generally late for meals, and always raced through them at a speed that Avery was powerless to emulate.

He was late on the day of Ina Rose's wedding, so late that Avery, who had dressed in good time and was lying on the sofa in her room, began to wonder if he had after all abandoned the idea of going. But she presently heard him race into his own room, and immediately there came the active patter of Victor's feet as he waited upon him.

She lay still, listening, wishing that the wedding were over, morbidly dreading the heat and crush and excitement which she knew awaited her and to which she felt utterly unequal.

A quarter of an hour passed, then impetuously, without preliminary, her door opened and Piers stood on the threshold. He had the light behind him, for Avery had lowered the blinds, and so seeing him she was conscious of a sudden thrill of admiration. For he stood before her like a prince. She had never seen him look more handsome, more patrician, more tragically like that woman in the picture-frame downstairs who smiled so perpetually upon them both.

He came to her with his light, athletic tread, stooped, and lifted her bodily in his arms. He held her a moment before he set her on her feet, and then in his hot, fierce way he kissed her.

"You beautiful ghost!" he said.

She leaned against him, breathing rather hard. "I wish—I wish we needn't go," she said.

"Why?" said Piers.

He held her to him, gazing down at her with his eyes of fiery possession that always made her close her own.

"Because—because it's so hot," she said quiveringly. "There will be no one I know there. And I—and I—"

"That's just why you are going," he broke in. "Don't you know it will be your introduction to the County? You've got to find your footing, Avery. I'm not going to have my wife overlooked by anyone."

"Oh, my dear," she said, with a faint laugh, "I don't care two straws about the County. They've seen me once already, most of them,—in a ditch and covered with mud. If they want to renew the acquaintance they can come and call."

He kissed her again with lips that crushed her own. "We won't stay longer than we can help," he said. "You ought to go out more, you know. It isn't good for you to stay in this gloomy old vault all day. We will really get to work and make it more habitable presently. But I've got such a lot on hand just now."

"I know," she said quietly. "Please don't bother about me! Lunch is waiting for us. Shall we go?"

He gave her a quick, keen look, as if he suspected her of trying to elude him; but he let her go without a word.

They descended to lunch, and later went forth into the blazing sunshine where the car awaited them. Avery sank back into the corner and closed her eyes. Her head was aching violently. The sense of reluctance that had possessed her for so long amounted almost to a premonition of evil.

"Avery!" Her husband's voice, curt, imperious, with just a tinge of anxiety broke in upon her. "Are you feeling faint or anything?"

She looked at him. He was watching her with a frown between his eyes.

"No, I am not faint," she said. "The heat makes my head ache, that's all."

"You ought to see a doctor," he said restlessly. "But not that ass, Tudor. We'll go up to town to-morrow. Avery," his voice softened suddenly, "I'm sorry I dragged you here if you didn't want to come."

She put out her hand to him instantly. It was the old Piers who had spoken, Piers the boy-lover who had won her heart so irresistibly, so completely.

He held the hand tightly, and she thought his face quivered a little as he said: "I don't mean to be a tyrant, dear. But somehow—somehow, you know—I can't always help it. A man with a raging thirst will take—anything he can get."

His eyes were still upon her, and her heart quickened to compassion at their look. They seemed to cry to her for mercy out of a depth of suffering that she could not bear to contemplate.

She leaned swiftly towards him. "Piers,—my dear—what is it? What is it?" she said, under her breath.

But in that instant the look vanished. The old fierce flare of passion blazed forth upon her, held her burningly, till finally she drew back before it in mute protest. "So you will forgive me," he said, in a tone that seemed to contain something of a jeering quality. "We are all human, what? You're looking better now. Egad, Avery, you're splendid!"

Her heart died within her. She turned her face away, as one ashamed.

The church at Wardenhurst was thronged with a chattering crowd of guests. Piers and Avery arrived late, so late that they had some difficulty in finding seats. Tudor, who was present and looking grimly disgusted with himself, spied them at length, and gave up his place to Avery.

The bride entered almost immediately afterwards, young, lovely, with the air of a queen passing through her subjects. Dick Guyes at the altar was shaking with nervousness, but Ina was supremely self-possessed. She even sent a smile of casual greeting to Piers as she went.

She maintained her attitude of complete sang-froid throughout the service, and Piers watched her critically with that secret smile at the corners of his lips which was not good to see.

He did not seem aware of anyone else in the church till the service was over, and the strains of the Wedding March were crashing through the building. Then very suddenly he turned and looked at his wife—with that in his dark eyes that thrilled her to the soul.

A man's voice accosted him somewhat abruptly. "Are you Sir Piers Evesham? I'm the best man. They want you to sign the register."

Piers started as one rudely awakened from an entrancing dream. An impatient exclamation rose to his lips which he suppressed rather badly. He surveyed the man who addressed him with a touch of hauteur.

Avery surveyed him also, and as not very favourably impressed. He was a small man with thick sandy eyebrows and shifty uncertain eyes. He looked hard at Piers in answer to the latter's haughty regard, and Avery became aware of a sudden sharp change in his demeanour as he did so. He opened his eyes and stared in blank astonishment.

"Hullo!" he ejaculated softly. "You!"

"What do you mean?" demanded Piers.

It was a challenge, albeit spoken in an undertone. He stood like a man transfixed as he uttered it. There came to Avery a quick hot impulse to intervene, to protect him from some hidden danger, she knew not what, that had risen like a serpent in his path. But before she could take any action, the critical moment was passed. Piers had recovered himself.

He stepped forward. "All right. I will come," he said.

She watched him move away in the direction of the vestry with that free, proud gait of his, and a great coldness came down upon her, wrapping her round, penetrating to her very soul. Who was that man with the shifty eyes? Why had he stared at Piers so? Above all, why had Piers stood with that stiff immobility of shock as though he had been stabbed in the back?

A voice spoke close to her. "Lady Evesham, come and wait by the door! There is more air there."

She turned her head mechanically, and looked at Lennox Tudor with eyes that saw not. There was a singing in her ears that made the crashing chords of the organ sound confused and jumbled.

His hand closed firmly, sustainingly, upon her elbow.

"Come with me!" he said.

She went with him blindly, unconscious of the curious eyes that watched her go.

He led her quietly down the church and into the porch. The air from outside, albeit hot and sultry, was less oppressive than within. She drew great breaths of relief as it reached her. The icy grip at her heart seemed to relax.

Tudor watched her narrowly. "What madness brought you here?" he said presently, as she turned at last and mustered a smile of thanks.

She countered the question. "I might ask you the same," she said.

His eyes contracted behind the shielding glasses. "So you might," he said briefly. "Well,—I came on the chance of meeting you."

"Of meeting me!" She looked at him in surprise.

He nodded. "Just so. I want a word with you; but it can't be said here. Give me an opportunity later if you can!"

His hand fell away from her elbow, he drew back. The bridal procession was coming down the church.

Ina was flushed and laughing. Dick Guyes still obviously nervous, but, also obviously, supremely happy. They went by Avery into a perfect storm of rose-leaves that awaited them from the crowd outside. Yet for one moment the eyes of the bride rested upon Avery, meeting hers almost as if they would ask her a question. And behind her—immediately behind her—came Piers.

His eyes also found Avery, and in an instant with a haughty disregard of Tudor, he had swept her forward with him, his arm thrust imperially through hers. They also weathered the storm of rose-leaves, and as they went Avery heard him laugh,—the laugh of the man who fights with his back to the wall.

They were among the first to offer congratulations to the bride and bridegroom, and again Avery was aware of the girl's eyes searching hers.

"I haven't forgotten you," she said, as they shook hands. "I knew you would be Lady Evesham sooner or later after that day when you kept the whole Hunt at bay."

Avery felt herself flush. There seemed to her to be a covert insinuation in the remark. "I was very grateful to you for taking my part," she said.

"It was rather generous certainly," agreed the bride coolly. "Dick, do get off my train! You're horribly clumsy to-day."

The bridegroom hastened to remove himself to a respectful distance, while Ina turned her pretty cheek to Piers. "You may salute the bride," she said graciously. "It's the only opportunity you will ever have."

Piers kissed the cheek as airily as it was proffered, his dark eyes openly mocking. "Good luck to you, Ina!" he said lightly. "I wish you the first and best of all that's most worth having."

Her red lips curled in answer. "You are superlatively kind," she said.

Other guests came crowding round with congratulations, and they moved on.

Piers knew everyone there, and presented one after another to his wife till she felt absolutely bewildered. He did not present the best man, who to her relief seemed disposed to keep out of their way. She wondered greatly if anything had passed between him and Piers, though by the latter at least the incident seemed to be wholly forgotten. He was in his gayest, most sparkling mood, and she could not fail to see that he was very popular whichever way he turned. People kept claiming his attention, and though he tried to remain near her he was drawn away at last by the bridegroom himself.

Avery looked round her then for a quiet corner where Tudor might find her if he so desired, but while she was searching she came upon Tudor himself.

He joined her immediately, with evident relief. "For Heaven's sake, let us get away from this gibbering crowd!" he said. "They are like a horde of painted monkeys. Come alone to the library! I don't think there are many people there."

Avery accompanied him, equally thankful to escape. They found the library deserted, and Tudor made her sit down by the window in the most comfortable chair the room contained.

"You look about as fit for this sort of show as Mrs. Lorimer," he observed drily. "She had the sense to stay away."

"I couldn't," Avery said.

"For goodness' sake," he exclaimed roughly, "don't let that young ruffian tyrannize over you! You will never know any peace if you do."

Avery smiled a little and was silent.

"Why are you so painfully thin?" he pursued relentlessly. "What's the matter with you? When I saw you in church just now I had a positive shock."

She put out her hand to him. "I am quite all right," she assured him, still faintly smiling. "I should have sent for you if I hadn't been."

"It's high time you sent for me now," said Tudor.

He looked at her searchingly through his glasses, holding her hand firmly clasped in his.

"Are you happy?" he asked her suddenly.

She started at the question, started and flushed. "Why—why do you ask me that?" she said in confusion.

"Because you don't look it," he said plainly. "No, don't be vexed with me! I speak as a friend—a friend who desires your happiness more than anything else on earth. And do you know, I think I should see a doctor pretty soon if I were you. If you don't, you will probably regret it. Get Piers to take you up to town! Maxwell Wyndham is about the best man I know. Go to him!"

"Thank you," Avery said. "Perhaps I will."

It was at this point that a sudden uproarious laugh sounded from below the window near which they sat, Avery looked round startled, and Tudor frowned.

"It's that little brute of a best man—drunk as a lord. He's some sort of cousin of Guyes', just home from Australia; and the sooner he goes back the better for the community at large, I should say."

"Piers knows him!" broke almost involuntarily from Avery.

And with that swiftly she turned her head to listen, for the man outside had evidently gathered to himself an audience at the entrance of a tent that had been erected for refreshments, and was declaiming at the top of his voice.

"Eric Denys was the name of the man. He was a chum of mine. Samson we used to call him. This Evesham fellow killed him in the first round. I've never forgotten it. I recognized him the minute I set eyes on him, though it's years ago now. And he recognized me! I wish you'd seen his face." Again came the uncontrolled, ribald laughter. "A bully sort of squire, eh? I suppose he's a justice of the peace now, a law-giver, eh? Damn funny, I call it!"

Tudor was on his feet. He looked at Avery, but she sat like a statue, making no sign.

Another man was speaking in a lower tone, as though he were trying to restrain the first; but his efforts were plainly useless, for the best man had more to say.

"Oh, I can tell you a Queensland crowd is no joke. He'd have been manhandled if he hadn't bolted. Mistaken? Not I! Could anyone mistake a face like that? Go and ask the man himself, if you don't believe me! You'll find he won't deny it!"

"Shall we go?" suggested Tudor brusquely.

Avery made a slight movement, wholly mechanical; but she did not turn her head. Her whole attitude was one of tense listening.

"I think I'll go in any case," said Tudor, after a moment. "That fellow will make an exhibition of himself if someone doesn't interfere."

He went to the door, but before he reached it Avery turned in her chair and spoke.

"He has gone inside for another drink. You had better let him have it."

There was that in her voice that he had never heard before. He stopped short, looking back at her.

"Let him have it!" she reiterated. "Let him soak himself with it! You won't quiet him any other way."

Even as she spoke, that horrible, half-intoxicated laugh came to them, insulting the beauty of the summer afternoon. Avery shivered from head to foot.

"Don't go!" she said. "Please!"

She rose as Tudor came back, rose and faced him, her face like death.

"I think I must go home," she said. "Will you find the car? No, I am not ill. I—" She paused, seemed to grope for words, stopped, and suddenly a bewildered look came into her face. Her eyes dilated. She gave a sharp gasp. Tudor caught her as she fell.



CHAPTER VI

THE MASK

The bride and bridegroom departed amid a storm of rice and good wishes, Ina's face still wearing that slightly contemptuous smile to the last. Piers, in the foremost of the crowd, threw a handful straight into her lap as the car started, but only he and Dick Guyes saw her gather it up with sudden energy and fling it back in his face.

Piers dropped off the step laughing. "Ye gods! What fun for Dick Guyes!" he said.

A hand grasped his shoulder, and he turned and saw Lennox Tudor.

"Hullo!" he said, sharply freeing himself.

"I want a word with you," said Tudor briefly.

A wary look came into Piers' face on the instant. He looked at Tudor with the measuring eye of a fencer.

"What about?" he asked.

"I can't tell you here. Will you walk back with me? Lady Evesham has already gone in the car."

Piers' black brows went up, "Why was that? Wasn't she well?"

"No," said Tudor curtly.

"But she will send the car back," said Piers, stubbornly refusing to betray himself.

"No, she won't. I told her we would walk."

"The devil you did!" said Piers.

He turned his back on Tudor, and went into the house.

But Tudor was undaunted. In a battle of wills, he was fully a match for Piers. He kept close behind.

Eventually, Piers turned upon him. "Look here! I'll give you five minutes in the library. I'm not going to walk three miles with you in this blazing heat. It would be damned unhealthy for us both. Moreover, I've promised to spend the evening with Colonel Rose."

It was the utmost he could hope for, and Tudor had the sense to accept what he could get. He followed him to the library in silence.

They found it empty, and Tudor quietly turned the key.

"What's that for?" demanded Piers sharply.

"Because I don't want to be disturbed," returned Tudor.

He moved forward into the middle of the room and faced Piers.

"I have an unpleasant piece of news for you," he said, in a grim, emotionless voice. "That cousin of Guyes'—you have met him before, I think? He claims to know something of your past, and he has been talking—somewhat freely."

"What has he been saying?" said Piers.

He stood up before Tudor with the arrogance of a man who mocks defeat, but there was a gleam of desperation in his eyes—something of the cornered animal in his very nonchalance.

A queer touch of pity moved Tudor from his attitude of cold informer. There was an undercurrent of something that was almost sympathy in his voice as he made reply.

"The fellow was more or less drunk, but I am afraid he was rather circumstantial. He recognized in you a man who had killed some chum of his years ago, in Queensland."

"Well?" said Piers.

Just the one word, uttered like a command! Tudor's softer impulse passed.

"He was bawling it out at the top of his voice. A good many people must have heard him. I was in this room with Lady Evesham. We heard also."

"Well?" Piers said again.

He spoke without stirring an eyelid, and again, involuntarily, Tudor was moved, this time with a species of unwilling admiration. The fellow was no coward at least.

He went on steadily. "It was impossible not to hear what the beast said. He mentioned names also,—your name and the name of the man whom he alleged you had killed. Lady Evesham heard it. We both heard it."

He paused. Piers had not moved. His face was like a mask in its composure, but it was a dreadful mask. Tudor had a feeling that it hid unutterable things.

"What was the man's name?" Piers asked, after a moment.

"Denys—Eric Denys."

Piers nodded, as one verifying a piece of information. His next question came with hauteur and studied indifference.

"Lady Evesham heard, you say? Did she pay any attention to these maudlin revelations?"

"She fainted," said Tudor shortly.

"Oh? And what happened then?"

It was maddeningly cold-blooded; but it was the mask that spoke. Tudor recognized that.

"I brought her round," he made answer. "No one else was present. She begged me to let her go home alone. I did so."

"She also asked you to make full explanation to me?" came in measured tones from Piers.

"She did." Tudor paused a moment as though he found some difficulty in forming his next words. But he went on almost at once with resolution. "She said to me at parting: 'I must be alone. I must think. Beg Piers to understand! Beg him not to see me again to-day! I will talk to him in the morning!' I promised to deliver the message exactly as she gave it."

"Thank you," said Piers. He turned with the words, moved away to the window, and looked forth at the now deserted marquee.

Tudor stood mutely waiting; he felt as if it had been laid upon him to wait.

Suddenly Piers jerked his head round and glanced at the chair in which Avery had been sitting, then abruptly turned himself and looked at Tudor.

"What were you—and my wife—doing in here?" he said.

Tudor frowned impatiently at the question. "Oh, don't be a fool, Evesham!" he said with vehemence.

"I'm not a fool." Piers left the window with the gait of a prowling animal; he stood again face to face with the other man. But though his features were still mask-like, his eyes shone through the mask; and they were eyes of leaping flame. "Oh, I am no fool, I assure you," he said, and in his voice there sounded a deep vibration that was almost like a snarl. "I know you too well by this time to be hoodwinked. You would come between us if you could."

"You lie!" said Tudor.

He did not raise his voice or speak in haste. His vehemence had departed. He simply made the statement as if it had been a wholly impersonal one.

Piers' hands clenched, but they remained at his sides. He looked at Tudor hard, as if he did not understand him.

After a moment Tudor spoke again. "I am no friend of yours, and I never shall be. But I am the friend of your wife, and—whether you like it or not—I shall remain so. For that reason, whatever I do will be in your interests as well as hers. I have not the smallest intention or desire to come between you. And if you use your wits you will see that I couldn't if I tried. Your marriage with her tied my hands."

"What proof have I of that?" said Piers, his voice low and fierce.

Tudor made a slight gesture of disgust. "I am dealing with facts, not proofs," he said. "You know as well as I do that though you obtained her love on false pretences, still you obtained it. Whether you will keep it or not remains to be seen, but she is not the sort of woman to solace herself with anyone else. If you lose it, it will be because you failed to guard your own property—not because anyone deprived you of it."

"Damnation!" exclaimed Piers furiously, and with the word the storm of his anger broke like a fiery torrent, sweeping all before it, "are you taking me to task, you—you—for this accursed trick of Fate? How was I to know that this infernal little sot would turn up here? Why, I don't so much as know the fellow's name! I had forgotten his very existence! Where the devil is he? Let me find him, and break every bone in his body!" He whirled round to the door, but in a moment was back again. "Tudor! Damn you! Where's the key?"

"In my pocket," said Tudor quietly. "And, Piers, before you go—since I am your ally in spite of myself—let me warn you to keep your head! There's no sense in murdering another man. It won't improve your case. There's no sense in running amok. Sit down for Heaven's sake, and review the situation quietly!"

The calm words took effect. Piers stopped, arrested in spite of himself by the other's steady insistence. He looked at Tudor with half-sullen respect dawning behind his ungoverned fury.

"Listen!" Tudor said. "The fellow has gone. I packed him off myself. It was a piece of sheer ill-luck that brought him home in time for this show. He starts for America en route for Australia in less than a week, and it is utterly unlikely that either you or any of your friends will see or hear anything more of him. Guyes himself is by no means keen on him and only had him as best man because a friend failed him at the last minute. If you behave rationally the whole affair will probably pass off of itself. Everyone knows the fellow was intoxicated, and no one is likely to pay any lasting attention to what he said. Treat the matter as unworthy of notice, and you will very possibly hear no more of it! But if you kick up a row, you will simply court disaster. I am an older man than you are. Take my word for it,—I know what I am talking about."

Piers listened in silence. The heat had gone from his face, but his eyes still gleamed with a restless fire.

Tudor watched him keenly. Not by his own choice would he have ranged himself on Piers' side, but circumstances having placed him there he was oddly anxious to effect his deliverance. He was fighting heavy odds, and he knew it, but there was a fighting strain in his nature also. He relished the odds.

"For Heaven's sake don't be a fool and give the whole show away!" he urged. "You have no enemies. No one will want to take the matter up if you will only let it lie. No one wants to believe evil of you. Possibly no one will."

"Except yourself!" said Piers, with a smile that showed his set teeth.

"Quite so." Tudor also smiled, a grim brief smile. "But then I happen to know you better than most. You gave yourself away so far as I am concerned that night in the winter. I knew then that once upon a time in your career—you had—killed a man."

"And you didn't tell Avery!" The words shot out unexpectedly. Piers was plainly astonished.

"I'm not a woman!" said Tudor contemptuously. "That affair was between us two."

"Great Scott!" said Piers.

"At the same time," Tudor continued sternly, "if I had known what I know now, I would have told her everything sooner than let her ruin her happiness by marrying you."

Piers made a sharp gesture that passed unexplained. He had made no attempt at self-defence; he made none then. Perhaps his pride kicked at the idea; perhaps in the face of Tudor's shrewd grip of the situation it did not seem worth while.

He held out his hand. "May I have that key?"

Tudor gave it to him. He was still watching narrowly, but Piers' face told him nothing. The mask had been replaced, and the man behind it was securely hidden from scrutiny. Tudor would have given much to have rent it aside, and have read the thoughts and intentions it covered. But he knew that he was powerless. He knew that he was deliberately barred out.

Piers went to the door and fitted the key into the lock. His actions were all grimly deliberate. The volcanic fires which Tudor had seen raging but a few seconds before had sunk very far below the surface. Whatever was happening in the torture-chamber where his soul agonized, it was certain that no human being—save possibly one—would ever witness it. What he suffered he would suffer in proud aloofness and silence. It was only the effect of that suffering that could ever be made apparent, when the soul came forth again, blackened and shrivelled from the furnace.

Yet ere he left Tudor, some impulse moved him to look back.

He met Tudor's gaze with brooding eyes which nevertheless held a faint warmth like the dim reflection of a light below the horizon.

"I am obliged to you," he said, and was gone before Tudor could speak again.



CHAPTER VII

THE GATES OF HELL

Up and down, up and down, in a fever of restlessness, Avery walked. She felt trapped. The gloomy, tapestried room seemed to close her in like a prison. The whole world seemed to have turned into a monstrous place of punishment. One thing only was needed to complete the anguish of her spirit, and that was the presence of her husband.

She could not picture the meeting with him. Body and soul recoiled from the thought. It would not be till the morning; that was her sole comfort. By the morning this fiery suffering would have somewhat abated. She would be calmer, more able to face him and hear his defence—if defence there could be. Somehow she never questioned the truth of the story. She knew that Tudor had not questioned it either. She knew moreover that had it been untrue, Piers would have been with her long ago in vehement indignation and wrath.

No, the thing was true. He was the man who had wrecked her life at its beginning, and now—now he had wrecked it again. He was the man whose hands were stained with her husband's blood. He had done the deed in one of those wild tempests of anger with which she was so familiar. He had done the deed, possibly unintentionally, but certainly with murderous impulse; and then deliberately cynically, he had covered it up, and gone his arrogant way.

He had met her, he had desired her; with a few, quickly-stifled qualms he had won her, trusting to luck that his sin would never find him out. And so he had made her his own, his property, his prisoner, the slave of his pleasure. She was bound for ever to her husband's murderer.

Again body and soul shrank in quivering horror from the thought, and a wild revolt awoke within her. She could not bear it. She must break free. The bare memory of his passion sickened her. For the first time in her life hatred, fiery, intense, kindled within her. The thought of his touch filled her with a loathing unutterable. He had become horrible to her, a thing unclean, abominable, whose very proximity was pollution. She felt as if the blood on his hands had stained her also—the blood of the man she had once loved. For a space she became like a woman demented. The thing was too abhorrent to be endured.

And then by slow degrees her brain began to clear again. She grew a little calmer. Monstrous though he was, he was still human. He was, in a fashion, at her mercy. He had sinned, but it was in her hands that his punishment lay.

She was stronger than he. She had always known it. But she must keep her strength. She must not waste it in futile resentment. She would need it all. He had entered her kingdom by subtlety; but she would drive him forth in the strength of a righteous indignation. To suffer him to remain was unthinkable. It would be to share his guilt.

Her thoughts tried to wander into the future, but she called them resolutely back. The future would provide for itself. Her immediate duty was all she now needed to face. When that dreaded interview was over, when she had shut him out finally and completely then it would be time enough to consider that. Probably some arrangement would have to be made by which they would meet occasionally, but as husband and wife—never, never more.

It was growing late. The dinner-gong had sounded, but she would not go down. She rang for Victor, and told him to bring her something on a tray. It did not matter what.

He looked at her with keen little eyes of solicitude, and swiftly obeyed her desire. He then asked her if the dinner were to be kept for Monsieur Pierre, who had not yet returned. She did not know what to say, but lest he should wonder at her ignorance of Piers' doings, she answered in the negative, and Victor withdrew.

Then, again lest comment should be made, she forced herself to eat and drink, though the food nauseated her. A feeling of sick suspense was growing upon her, a strange, foreboding fear that hung leaden about her heart. What was Piers doing all this time? What effect had that message, delivered by Tudor, had upon him? Why had he not returned?

Time passed. The evening waned and became night. A full moon rose red and wonderful out of a bank of inky cloud, lighting the darkness with an oddly tropical effect. The night was tropical, breathless, terribly still. It seemed as if a storm must be upon its way.

She began to undress at last there in the moonlight. The heat was too intense to veil the windows, and she would not light the candles lest bats or moths should be attracted. At another time the eerieness of the shadowy room would have played upon her nerves, but to-night she was not even aware of it. The shadows within were too dark, too sinister.

A great weariness had come upon her. She ached for rest. Her body felt leaden, and her brain like a burnt-out furnace. The very capacity for thought seemed to have left her. Only the horror of the day loomed gigantic whichever way she turned, blotting out all beside. Prayer was an impossibility to her. She felt lost in a wilderness of doubt, forsaken and wandering, and terribly alone.

If she could rest, if she could sleep, she thought that strength might return to her—the strength to grapple with and overthrow the evil that had entered into and tainted her whole life. But till sleep should come to her, she was impotent. She was heavy and numb with fatigue.

She lay down at length with a vague sense of physical relief beneath her crushing weight of trouble. How unutterably weary she was! How tired—how tired of life!

Time passed. The moon rose higher, filling the room with its weird cold light. Avery lay asleep.

Exhaustion had done for her what no effort of will could have accomplished, closing her eyes, drawing a soft veil of oblivion across her misery.

But it was only a temporary lull. The senses were too alert, too fevered, for true repose. That blessed interval of unconsciousness was all too short. After a brief, brief respite she began to dream.

And in her dream she saw a man being tortured in a burning, fiery furnace, imprisoned behind bars of iron, writhing, wrestling, agonizing, to be free. She saw the flames leaping all around him, and in the flames were demon-faces that laughed and gibed and jested. She saw his hands all blistered in the heat, reaching out to her, straining through those cruel bars, beseeching her vainly for deliverance. And presently, gazing with a sick horror that compelled, she saw his face....

With a gasping cry she awoke, started up with every nerve stretched and quivering, her heart pounding as if it would choke her. It was a dream—it was a dream! She whispered it to herself over and over again, striving to control those awful palpitations. Surely it was all a dream!

Stay! What was that? A sound in the room beyond—a movement—a step! She sprang up, obeying blind impulse, sped softly to the intervening door, with hands that trembled shot the bolt. Then, like a hunted creature, almost distracted by the panic of her dream, she slipped back to the gloomy four-poster, and cowered down again.

Lying there, crouched and quivering, she began to count those hammering heart-beats, and wondered wildly if the man on the other side of the door could hear them also. She was sure that he had been there, sure that he had been on the point of entering when she had shot the bolt.

He would not enter now, she whispered to her quaking heart. She would not have to meet him before the morning. And by then she would be strong. It was only her weariness that made her so weak to-night!

She grew calmer. She began to chide herself for her senseless panic—she the bearer of other people's burdens, who prided herself upon her steady nerve and calmness of purpose. She had never been hysterical in her life before. Surely she could muster self-control now, when her need of it was so urgent, so imperative.

And then, just as a certain measure of composure had returned to her, something happened. Someone passed down the passage outside her room and paused at the outer door. Her heart stood still, but again desperately she steadied herself. That door was bolted also.

Yes, it was bolted, but there was a hand upon it,—a hand that felt softly for the lock, found the key outside, softly turned it.

Then indeed panic came upon Avery. Lying there, tense and listening, she heard the quiet step return along the passage and enter her husband's room, heard that door also close and lock, and knew herself a prisoner.

"Avery!"

Every pulse leapt, every nerve shrank. She started up, wide-eyed, desperate.

"I will talk to you in the morning, Piers," she said, steadying her voice with difficulty. "Not now! Not now!"

"Open this door!" he said.

There was dear command in his voice, and with it the old magnetic force reached her, quick, insistent, vital. She threw a wild look round, but only the dazzling moonlight met her eyes. There was no escape for her—no escape.

She turned her face to the door behind which he stood. "Piers, please, not to-night!" she said beseechingly.

"Open the door!" he repeated inexorably.

Again that force reached her. It was like an electric current suddenly injected into her veins. Her whole body quivered in response. Almost before she knew it, she had started to obey.

And then horror seized her—a dread unutterable. She stopped.

"Piers, will you promise—"

"I promise nothing," he said, in the same clear, imperious voice, "except to force this door unless you open it within five seconds."

She stood in the moonlight, trembling, unnerved. He did not sound like a man bereft of reason. And yet—and yet—something in his voice appalled her. Her strength was utterly gone. She was just a weak, terrified woman.

"Avery," his voice came to her again, short and stern, "I don't wish to threaten you; but it will be better for us both if I don't have to force the door."

She forced herself to speak though her tongue felt stiff and dry. "I can't let you in now," she said. "I will hear what you have to say in the morning."

He made no reply. There was an instant of dead silence. Then there came a sudden, hideous shock against the panel of the door. The socket of the bolt gave with the strain, but did not wholly yield. Avery shrank back trembling against the shadowy four-poster. She felt as if a raging animal were trying to force an entrance.

Again came that awful shock. The wood splintered and rent, socket and bolt were torn free; the door burst inwards.

There came a brief, fiendish laugh, and Piers broke in upon her.

He recovered himself with a sharp effort, and stood breathing heavily, looking at her. The moonlight was full upon him, showing him deadly pale, and in his eyes there shone the red glare of hell.

"Did you really think—a locked door—would keep me out?" he said, speaking with an odd jerkiness, with lips that twitched.

She drew herself together with an instinctive effort at self-control. "I thought you would respect my wish," she said, her voice very low.

"Did you?" said Piers. "Then why did you lock the door?"

He swung it closed behind him and came to her.

"Listen to me, Avery!" he said. "You are not your own any longer—to give or to take away. You are mine."

She faced him with all the strength she could muster, but she could not meet those awful eyes that mocked her, that devoured her.

"Piers," she said, almost under her breath, "remember,—what happens to-night we shall neither of us ever forget. Don't make me hate you!"

"Haven't you begun to hate me then?" he demanded. "Would you have locked that door against me if you hadn't?"

She heard the rising passion in his voice, and her heart fainted within her. Yet still desperately she strove for strength.

"I don't want to do anything violent or unconsidered. I must have time to think. Piers, you have me at your mercy. Be merciful!"

He made a sharp movement. "Are you going to be merciful to me?" he said.

She hesitated. There was something brutal in the question, yet it pierced her. She knew that he had divined all that had been passing within her during that evening of misery. She did not answer him, for she could not.

"Listen!" he said again. "What has happened has happened by sheer ill-luck. The past is nothing to you. You have said so yourself. The future shall not be sacrificed to it. If you will give me your solemn promise to put this thing behind you, to behave as if it had never been, I will respect your wishes, I will do my utmost to help you to forget. But if you refuse—" He stopped.

"If I refuse—" she repeated faintly.

He made again that curious gesture that was almost one of helplessness. "Don't ask for mercy!" he said.

In the silence that followed there came to her the certain knowledge that he was suffering, that he was in an inferno of torment that goaded him into fierce savagery against her, like a mad animal that will wreak its madness first upon the being most beloved. It was out of his torment that he did this thing. She saw him again agonizing in the flames.

If he had had patience then, that divine pity of hers might have come to help them both; but he read into her silence the abhorrence which a little earlier had possessed her soul; and the maddening pain of it drove him beyond all bounds.

He seized her suddenly and savagely between his hands. "Are you any the less my wife," he said, speaking between his teeth, "because you have found out what manner of man I am?"

She resisted him, swiftly, instinctively, her hands against his breast, pressing him back. "I may be your wife," she said gaspingly. "I am not—your slave."

He laughed a fiendish laugh. Her resistance fired him. He caught her fiercely to him. He covered her face, her throat, her arms, her hands, with kisses that burned her through and through, seeming to sear her very soul.

He crushed her in a grip that bruised her, that suffocated her. He pressed his lips, hot with passion, to hers.

"And now!" he said. "And now!"

She lay in his arms spent and quivering and helpless. The cruel triumph of his voice silenced all appeal.

He went on deeply, speaking with his lips so close that she felt his breath scorch through her like the breath of a fiery furnace.

"You are bound to me for better—for worse, and nothing will ever set you free. Do you understand? If you will not be my wife, you shall be—my slave."

Quiveringly, through lips that would scarcely move she spoke at last. "I shall never forgive you."

"I shall never ask your forgiveness," he said.

So the gates of hell closed upon Avery also. She went down into the unknown depths. And in an agony of shame she learned the bitterest lesson of her life.



CHAPTER VIII

A FRIEND IN NEED

"Why, Avery dear, is it you? Come in!" Mrs. Lorimer looked up with a smile of eager welcome on her little pinched face and went forward almost at a run to greet her.

The brown holland smock upon which she had been at work fell to the ground. It was Avery who, after a close embrace, stooped to pick it up.

"Who is this for? Baby Phil? You must let me lend a hand," she said.

"Ah, my dear, I do miss you," said Mrs. Lorimer wistfully. "The village girl who comes in to help is no good at all at needlework, and you know how busy Nurse always is. Jeanie does her best, and is a great help in many ways. But she is but a child. However," she caught herself up, "I mustn't start grumbling the moment you enter the house. Tell me about yourself, dear! You are looking very pale. Does the heat try you?"

"A little," Avery admitted.

She was spreading out the small garment on her knee, looking at it critically, with eyes downcast. She certainly was pale that morning. The only colour in her face seemed concentrated in her lips.

Mrs. Lorimer looked at her uneasily. There was something not quite normal about her, she felt. She had never seen Avery look so statuesque. She missed the quick sweetness of her smile, the brightness and animation of her glance.

"It is very dear of you to come and see me," she said gently, after a moment. "Did you walk all the way? I hope it hasn't been too much for you."