"I see. And when you look at your—your aunt's face, you naturally do not look for what she was forty years ago."

"That is it, your ladyship. Because I have had mother to go by, all the time. She has always been the same she was last week—last month—last year—any time. What must it be to her, to see me what I am!"

"I don't believe it is harder for her to think about than it is for you. She is feverish now, and that makes her wander. People are always worse in the morning. Dr. Nash says so. I thought yesterday she seemed so clear—almost understood it all." Thus Gwen, not over-sure of her facts.

"She was worse," said Ruth, thinking back into the recent events, "that evening I showed her the mill. That was her bad time. Who knows but that has made it easier for her now? I shouldn't wonder.... And to think that I thought her mad, and never guessed who I was, myself, all that time."

"Was that the model?" said Gwen, thinking that anything the mind could rest on might make the thing more real for Ruth. "Do you know I have only half seen it? I should so like to see it again. Why have you covered it up?" A few words explained this, and the mill was again put on the table. If the little dolly figures had only possessed faculties, they would have wondered why, after all these years, they were awakening such an interest among the big movable creatures outside the glass. How they would have wondered at Gwen's next words:—"And those two have lived to be eighty years old and are in the next room!"

Then she was not sure she had not made matters worse. "Oh dear!" said Widow Thrale, "it is all impossible—impossible! This was old when I was a child."

Gwen was not prepared to submit to Time's tyranny. "What does it matter?" said she intrepidly. "There is no need for possibility, that I can see. She is here, and the thing to think of now is—how can we keep her? It will all seem natural in three weeks. See now, how they know one another, and talk of old times already. She may live another five—ten—fifteen years. Who can say?"

"She is talking to mother now, I think," said Widow Thrale, listening. For the voices of the twins came from the bedroom. "Suppose we go back!"

"Yes—and you look at the two faces together, this time."

"I will look," was the reply, with a shade of doubt in it that added:—"I may not see the resemblance."

Gwen went first. The two old faces were close together as they entered, and she could see, more plainly than she had ever seen it yet, their amazing similarity. She could see how much thinner old Maisie was of the two. It was very visible in the hand that touched her sister's, which was strong and substantial by comparison.

The monotonous bells at Chorlton Church had said all they could to convince its congregation that the time had come for praise and prayer; and had broken into impatient thrills and jerks that seemed to say:—"If you don't come for this, nothing will fetch you!" The wicked man who had been waiting to go for a brisk walk as soon as the others had turned away from their wickedness, and were safe in their pews making the responses, was getting on his thickest overcoat and choosing which stick he would have, or had already decided that the coast was clear, and had started. Old Maisie's face on the pillow was attentive to the bells. She looked less feverish, and they were giving her pleasure.

What was that she was saying, about some bells? "Old Keturah's husband the sexton used to ring them. You remember him, Phoebe darling?—him and his wart. We thought it would slice off with a knife, like the topnoddy on a new loaf if one was greedy.... And you remember how we went up his ladder into the belfry, and I was frightened because it jumped?"

Old Phoebe remembered. "Yes, indeed! And old Jacob saying if he could clamber up at ninety-four, we could at fourteen. Then we pulled the bells. After that he would let us ring the curfew."

Just at that moment the last jerk cut off the last thrill of the chimes at Chorlton, and the big bell started thoughtfully to say it was eleven o'clock. Old Maisie seemed suddenly disquieted. "Phoebe darling!" she said. And then, touching her sister's hand, with a frightened voice:—"This is Phoebe, is it not?... No, it is not my eyes—it is my head goes!" For Gwen had said:—"Yes, this is your sister. Do you not see her?" She then went on:—"My dear—my dear!—I am keeping you from church. I want not to. I want not to."

"Never mind church for one day, dear," said Granny Marrable. "Parson he won't blame me, stopping away this once. More by token, if he does miss seeing me, he'll just think I'm at Denby's."

"But, Phoebe—Phoebe!—think of long ago, how I would try to persuade you to stop away just once, to please me—just only once! And now ..." She seemed to have set her heart on her sister's going; a sort of not very explicable tribute to "auld lang syne."

Gwen caught what seemed a clue to her meaning. "I see," said she. "You want to make up for it now. Isn't that it?"

"Yes—yes—yes! And Ruth must go with her to take care of her.... Oh, Phoebe, why should you be so much stronger than me?" She meant perhaps, why should her sister's strength be taken for granted?

Gwen looked at Granny Marrable, who was hesitating. Her look meant:—"Yes—go! Why not?" A nod thrown in meant:—"Better go!" She looked round for Ruth, to get her sanction or support, but Ruth was no longer in the room. "What has become of Mrs. Thrale?" said Gwen.

Ruth had vanished into the front-room, and there Gwen found her, looking white. "I saw it," said she. "And it frightened me. I am a fool—why have I not seen it before?"

Gwen said:—"Oh, I see! You mean the likeness? Yes—it's—it's startling!" Then she told of old Maisie's sudden whim about the service at Chorlton Church. "As your ladyship thinks best!" said Ruth. Her ladyship did think it best, on the whole. It would be best to comply with every whim—could only have a sedative effect. She herself would remain beside "your mother" while the two were away. Would they not be very late? Oh, that didn't matter! Besides, everyone was late. Granny Marrable and Ruth were soon in trim for a hasty departure. But as they went away Ruth slipped into Lady Gwen's hand the accursed letter, as promised. She had brought it out into the daylight again, unwillingly enough.

That was how it came about that Gwen found herself alone with old Maisie that morning.

"My dear—my dear!" said the old lady, as soon as Gwen was settled down beside her, "if it had not been for you, I should have died and never seen them—my sister and my Ruth.... I think I am sure that it is they, come back.... It is—oh, it is—my Phoebe and my little girl.... Oh, say it is. I like you to say it." She caught Gwen by the arm, speaking low and quickly, almost whispering.

"Of course it is. And they have gone to church. They will be back to dinner at one. Perhaps you will be strong enough to sit up at table.... Oh no!—that certainly is not them back again. I think it is Elizabeth—from next door; I don't know her name—putting the meat down to roast.... Yes—she has her own Sunday dinner to attend to, but she says she can be in both houses at once. I heard her say so to your sister." Gwen felt it desirable to dwell on the relationship, when chances occurred.

"Elizabeth-next-door. I remember her when Ruth was Widow Thrale—it seems so long ago now!... Yes—I wished Phoebe to go to church, because she always wished to go. Besides, it made it like then."

"'Made it like then?'" Gwen was not sure she followed this.

"Yes—like then, when the mill was, and our father. Only before I married and went away he made us go with him, always. He was very strict. It was after that I would persuade Phoebe to leave me behind when she went on Sunday. It was when she was married to Uncle Nicholas who was drowned. We always called him Uncle Nicholas, because of my little Ruth."

Gwen thought a moment whether anything would be gained by clearing up this confusion. Old Maisie's belief in "Uncle Nicholas's" death by drowning, fifty years ago, clung to her mind, as a portion of a chaotic past no visible surrounding challenged. It was quite negligible—that was Gwen's decision. She held her tongue.

But nothing of the Chaos was negligible. Every memory was entangled with another. A sort of affright seemed to seize upon old Maisie, making her hand tighten suddenly on Gwen's arm. "Oh, how was that—how was that?" she cried. "They were together—all together!"

"It was only what the letter said," answered Gwen. "It was all a made-up story. Uncle Nicholas was not drowned, any more than your sister, or your child."

"Oh dear!" Old Maisie's hand went to her forehead, as though it stunned her to think.

"They will tell you when he died, soon, when you have got more settled. I don't know."

"He must be dead, because Phoebe is a widow."

"She is the widow of the husband she married after his death. That is why her name is Marrable, not ... Cropworthy—was it?"

"Not Cropworthy—Cropredy. Such a funny name we thought it.... But then—Phoebe must think...."

"Think what?"

"Must think I married again. Because I am Mrs. Prichard."

"Perhaps she does think so. Why are you Mrs. Prichard? Don't tell me now if it tires you to talk."

"It does not tire me. It is easier to talk than to think. I took the name of Prichard because I wanted it all forgotten."

"About your husband having been—in prison?"

"Oh no, no! I was not ashamed about that. He was wrong, but it was only money. It was my son.... Oh yes—he was transported too—but that was after.... It was only a theft. I cannot talk about my son." Gwen felt that she shuddered, and that danger lay that way. The fever might return. She cast about for anything that would divert the conversation from that terrible son. Dave and Dolly, naturally.

"Stop a minute," said she. "You have never seen Dave's letter that he wrote to say he knew all about it." And she went away to the front room to get it.

A peaceful joint was turning both ways at the right speed by itself. The cat, uninterested, was consulting her own comfort, and the cricket was persevering for ever in his original statement. Saucepans were simmering in conformity, with perfect faith in the reappearance of the human disposer of their events, in due course. Dave's letter lay where Gwen had left it, between the flower-pots on the window-shelf. She picked it up and went back with it to the bedside.

"You must have your spectacles and read it yourself. Can you? Where shall I find them?"

"I think my Ruth has put them in the watch-pocket with my watch, over my head here." She could make no effort to reach them, but Gwen drew out both watch and glasses. "What a pretty old watch!" said she.

It pleased the old lady to hear her watch admired. "I had it when I went out to my husband." She added inexplicably:—"The man brought it back to me for the reward. He had not sold it." Then she told, clearly enough, the tale you may remember her telling to Aunt M'riar; about the convict at Chatham, who brought her a letter from her husband on the river hulk. "Over fifty years ago now, and it still goes. Only it loses—and gains.... But show me my boy's letter." She got her glasses on, with Gwen's help, and read. The word "cistern" was obscure. She quite understood what followed, saying:—"Oh, yes—so much longer ago than Dolly's birthday! And we did—we did—think we were dead and buried. The darling boy!"

"He means each thought the other was. I told him." Gwen saw that the old face looked happy, and was pleased. She began to think she would be easy in her mind at Pensham, to-morrow, about old Mrs. Picture, and able to tell the story to her blind lover with a light heart.

Old Maisie had come to the postscript. "What is this at the end?" said she. "'The tea is stood ready' for me. And for Granny Marrowbone too." Gwen saw the old face looking happier than she had seen it yet, and was glad to answer:—"Yes—I saw the tea 'stood ready' by your chair. All but the real sugar and milk. Dolly sits beside it on the floor—all her leisure time I believe—and dreams of bliss to come. Dave sympathizes at heart, but affects superiority. It's his manhood." Old Maisie said again:—"The darling children!" and kept on looking at the letter.

Gwen's satisfaction at this was to be dashed slightly. For she found herself asked, to her surprise, "Who is Granny Marrowbone?" She replied:—"Of course Dave wants his other Granny, from the country." She waited for an assent, but none came.

Instead, old Maisie said reflectively, as though recalling an incident of some interest:—"Oh yes!—Granny Marrowbone was his other Granny in the country, where he went to stay, and saw Jones's Bull. I think she must be a nice old lady." Gwen said nothing. Better pass this by; it would be forgotten.

But the strong individuality of that Bull came in the way. Had not they visited him together only the other day? He struck confusion into memory and oblivion alike. The face Gwen saw, when the letter that hid it fell on the coverlid, was almost terrified. "Oh, see the things I say!" cried old Maisie, in great distress of mind. "How am I ever to know it right?" She clung to Gwen's hand in a sort of panic. In a few moments she said, in an awed sort of voice:—"Was that Phoebe, then, that I saw when we stopped at the Cottage, in the carriage, after the Bull?"

"Yes, dear! And you are in the Cottage now. And Phoebe is coming back soon. And Ruth."



CHAPTER XXIII

CATHERINE WHEELS. CENTIPEDES. CENTENARIANS. BACKGAMMON. IT. HEREAFTER CORNER. LADY KATHERINE STUARTLAVEROCK. BISHOP BERKELEY. THE COUNTESS'S VISIT REVIEWED. A CODEX OF HUMAN WEAKNESS. AN EXPOSITION OF SELFISHNESS. HOW ADRIAN WOULD HOLD ON LIKE GRIM DEATH. A BELDAM, CRONE, HAG, OR DOWDY. SUICIDE. THE LITTLE BOTTLE OF INDIAN POISON. MORE SEPTIMIUS SEVERUS. GWEN'S DAILY BULLETINS. ONESIMUS. TURTLE SOUP AND CHAMPAGNE. FOXBOURNE. HOW THEY WENT TO CHORLTON, AND ANOTHER DOG SMELT ACHILLES

As he who has godfathered a Catherine Wheel stands at a respectful distance while it spits and fizzes, so may the story that reunites lovers who have been more than a week apart. The parallel, however, does not hold good throughout, for the Catherine Wheel usually gets stuck after ignition, and has to be stimulated judiciously, while lovers—if worth the name—go off at sight. In many cases—oh, so many!—the behaviour of the Catherine Wheel is painfully true to life. Its fire-spin flags and dies and perishes, and nothing is left of it but a pitiful black core that gives a last spasmodic jump and is for ever still!

Fireworks are only referred to here in connection with the former property. When Gwen reappeared at Pensham, Miss Torrens—this is her own expression—"cleared out" until her brother and her visitor "came to their senses." The Catherine Wheel, in their case, had by that time settled down from a tempest of flame-spray to a steady lamplight, endurable by bystanders. The story need not wait quite so long, but may avail itself of the first return of sanity.

"Dearest—are you really going to stop till Saturday?"

"If you think we shan't quarrel. Four whole days and a bit at each end! I think it's tempting Providence."

"Why not stop over Sunday, and make an honourable week of it and no stinting?"

"Because I have a papa coming back to his ancestral home, on Saturday evening, and he will come back boiled and low from Bath waters, inside and out, and he'll want a daughter to give him tone. He gets rid of the gout, but ..."

"But. Exactly! It's the insoluble residuum that comes back. However, you will be here till Friday night."

"Can't even promise that! I may be sent for."

"Why?... Oh, I know—the old lady. How is she? Tell me more about her. Tell me lots about her."

Whereupon Gwen, who had been looking forward to doing so, started on an exhaustive narrative of her visit to Strides Cottage. She had not got far when Irene thought it safe to return—hearing probably the narrative tone of voice—and then she had to tell it all over again.

"When I left the Cottage yesterday at about three o'clock," said Gwen, in conclusion, "she was so much better that I felt quite hopeful about her."

"Quite hopeful about her?" Irene repeated. "But if she has nothing the matter with her, except old age, why be anything but hopeful?"

"You would see if you saw her. She looks as if a puff of wind would blow her away like thistledown."

"That," Adrian said, "is a good sign. There is no guarantee of a long life like attenuation. Bloated people die shortly after you make their acquaintance. No, no—for true vitality, give me your skeleton! A healthy old age really sets in as soon as one is spoken of as still living."

"Oh dear, yes!" said Irene. "I'm sure Gwen's description sounds exactly like this old lady becoming a ... There!—I've forgotten the word! Something between a centipede and a Unitarian...."

"Centenarian?"

"Exactly. See what a good thing it is to have a brother that knows things. A person a hundred years old. I tell you, Gwen dear, my own belief is these two old ladies mean to be centenarians, and if we live long enough we shall read about them in the newspapers. And they will have a letter from Royalty!"

In the evening Gwen got Adrian, whose sanguine expressions were not serious, on a more sane and responsible line of thought. His lady-mother, with whom this story is destined never to become acquainted, retired early, after shedding a lurid radiance of symptoms on the family circle; and it, as a dutiful circle, had given her its blessing and dropped a tear by implication over her early departure from it. Sir Hamilton had involved his daughter in a vortex of backgammon, a game draught-players detest, and vice versa, because the two games are even as Box and Cox, in homes possessing only one board. So Gwen and Adrian had themselves to themselves, and wanted nothing more. Her eyes rested now and then with a new curiosity on the Baronet, deep in his game at the far end of the room. She was looking at him by the light of his handsome daughter's saucy speculation about that romantic passage in the lives of himself and her mamma. Suppose—she was saying to herself, with monstrous logic—he had been my papa, and I had had to play backgammon with him!

She was recalled from one such excursion of fancy by Adrian saying:—"Are you sure it would not have been better for the old twins—or one of them—to die and the other never be any the wiser?"

Said Gwen:—"I am not sure. How can I be? But it was absolutely impossible to leave them there, knowing it, unconscious of each other's existence."

Adrian replied:—"It was impossible. I see that. But suppose they had remained in ignorance—in the natural order of events I mean—and the London one had died unknown to her sister, would it not have been better than this reunion, with all its tempest of pain and raking up of old memories, and quite possibly an early separation by death?"

"I think not, on the whole. Because, suppose one had died, and the other had come to know of her death afterwards!"

"I am supposing the contrary. Suppose both had continued in ignorance! How then?"

It was not a question to answer off-hand. Gwen pondered; then said abruptly:—"It depends on whether we go on or stop. Now doesn't it?"

"As bogys? That question always crops up. If we stop I don't see how there can be any doubt on the matter. Much better they should have died in ignorance. The old Australian goody was quite contented, as I understand, at Scraps Court, with her little boy and girl to make tea for her. And the old body at Chorlton and her daughter would have gone on quite happily. They didn't want to be excoriated by a discovery."

"Yes—that is what it has been. Excoriation by a discovery. I'm not at all sure you're right—but I'll make you a present of it. Let's consider it settled that death in ignorance would have been the best thing for them."

"Very well!—what next?"

"What next? Why, of course, suppose we don't stop, but go on! You often say it is ten to one against it."

"So it is. I can't say I'm sorry, on the whole."

"That's neither here nor there. Ten to one against is one to ten for. Any man on the turf will tell you that."

"And any Senior Wrangler will confirm it."

"Very well, then! There we are. Suppose my dear old Mrs. Picture and Granny Marrable had turned up as ghosts, on the other side...."

"I see. You've got me in Hereafter Corner, and you don't intend to let me out."

"Not till you tell me whether they would have been happy or miserable about it, those two ghosts. In your opinion, of course! Don't run away with the idea that I think you infallible."

"There are occasions on which I do not think myself infallible. For instance, when I have to decide an apparently insoluble problem without data of any sort. Your expression 'turned up as ghosts, on the other side,' immediately suggests one."

"You can say whether you think they would have been happy or miserable about having been in England together over twenty years, and never known it. That's simple enough!"

"Don't be in a hurry! There are complications. If they knew they were ghosts, they might become interested in the novelty of their position, and be inclined to accept accomplished facts. Recrimination would be waste of time. If they didn't know ..."

"Goose!—they would be sure to know."

"The only information I have goes to prove the contrary. When Voltaire's ghost came and spirit-rapped, or whatever you call it ..."

"I know. One turns tables, and it's very silly."

"... they said triumphantly that they supposed, now he was dead, he was convinced of another existence. And he—or it—rapped out:—'There is only one existence. I am not dead.' So he didn't know he was a ghost."

Gwen seemed tolerant of Voltaire, as a pourparler. "Perhaps," she said thoughtfully, "he found he jammed up against the other ghosts instead of coinciding with them.... You know Lady Katherine Stuartlaverock tried to kiss her lover's ghost, and he gave, and she went through."

"A very interesting incident," said Adrian. "If she had been a ghost, too, she would, as you say, have jammed. If Dr. Johnson had known that story, he would have been more reasonable about Bishop Berkeley.... What did he say about him? Why, he kicked a cask, and said if the Bishop could do that, and not be convinced of the reality of matter, he would be a fool, Sir. I wonder if one said 'Sir,' as often as Dr. Johnson, one would be allowed to talk as much nonsense."

"Boswell must have made that story."

"Very likely. But Boswell made Sam Johnson. Just as we only know of the existence of Matter through our senses, so we only know of Sam's existence through Bozzy. I am conscious that I am becoming prosy. Let's get back to the old ladies."

"Well—it was you that doddered away from them, to talk about Voltaire's bogy. If they didn't know they were ghosts, what then?"

"If they didn't know they were ghosts, the discovery would have been just as excoriating as it has been here. Possibly worse, because—what does one know? Now your full-blown disembodied spirit ... Mind you, this is only my idea, and may be quite groundless!..."

"Now you've apologized, go on! 'Your full-blown disembodied spirit' ..."

"... may be so absorbed in the sudden and strange surprise of the change—Browning—as to be quite unable to partake of excruciation, even with a twin sister.... It is very disagreeable to think of, I admit. But so is nearly every concrete form in which one clothes an imaginary other-worldliness."

"Why is it disagreeable to think of being able to shake off one's troubles, and forget all about them. I like it."

"Well, I admit that I was beginning to say that I thought these two venerable ladies, meeting as ghosts—not spectres you know, in which case each would frighten t'other and both would run away—would probably be as superior to painful memories on this side as the emancipated butterfly is to its forgotten wiggles as a chrysalis. But it has dawned upon me that Perfect Beings won't wash, and that the Blessed have drawbacks, and that their Choir would pall. I am inclined to back out, and decide that the two of them would have been more miserable if the discovery had come upon them post mortem than they will be now—in a little time at least. At first of course it must be maddening to think of the twenty odd years they have been cheated out of. Really the Divine Disposer of Events might have had a little consideration for the Dramatis Personae." He jumped to another topic. "You know your mamma paid our papa a visit last—last Thursday, wasn't it?—yes, Thursday!"

"Oh yes—I heard all about it. She had a short chat with him, and he gave her a very good cup of tea. He told her about some very old acquaintances whom she hadn't heard of for years who live in Tavistock Square."

"Was that all?"

"No. The lady very-old acquaintance had been a Miss Tyrawley, and had married her riding-master."

"Was that all?"

"No. She called you and 'Re 'the son and daughter.' Then she talked of our 'engagement as your father persists in calling it.' My blood boiled for quite five minutes."

"All that sounds—very usual! Was there nothing else? That was very little for such a long visit."

"How long was the visit?"

"Much too long for what you've told me. Think of something else!"

Now Gwen had been keeping something back. Under pressure she let it out. "Well—mamma thought fit to say that your father entirely shared her views! Was that true?"

"Which of her views?... I suppose I know, though! I should say it was half-true—truish, suppose we call it!" Then Adrian began to feel he had been rash. How was he to explain to Gwen that his father thought she was perhaps—to borrow his own phrase—"sacrificing herself on his shrine"? It would be like calling on her to attest her passion for him. Now a young lady is at liberty to make any quantity of ardent protestations off her own bat, as the cricketers say; but a lover cannot solicit testimonials, to be produced if called for by parents or guardians. However, Gwen had no intention of leaving explanation to him. She continued:—

"When my mother said that your father entirely shared her views, I know which she meant, perfectly well. She has got a foolish idea into her head—and so has my dear old papa, so she's not alone—that I am marrying you to make up to you for ... for the accident." She found it harder and harder to speak of the nature of the accident. This once, she must do it, coute que coute. She went on, speaking low that nothing should reach the backgammon-players. "They say it was our fault that old Stephen shot you.... Well!—it was...."

"My darling, I have frequently pointed out the large share the Primum Mobile had in the matter, to say nothing of the undoubted influence of Destiny...."

"Silly man—I am talking seriously. I don't know that it really matters whether it was or wasn't—wasn't our fault, I mean—so long as they think I think it was. That's the point. Now, the question is, did or did not my superior mamma descend on your comme-il-faut parent to drum this idea into him, and get him on her side?"

"Am I supposed to know?"

"Yes."

"Then I will be frank with you. Always be frank with mad bulls who butt you into corners and won't let you out. Your mamma's communications with my papa had the effect you indicate, and he took me into his confidence the same evening. He too questions the purity of your motives in marrying me, alleging that they are vitiated by a spirit of self-sacrifice, tainted by the baneful influence of unselfishness. He is alive to the possibility that you hate me cordially, but are pretending."

"Oh, my dearest, I wish I did hate you.... Why?—why of course then it would really be a sacrifice, and something to boast of. As it is.... Well—I'm consulting my own convenience, and I ... I am the best judge of my own affairs. It suits me to ... to lead you to the altar, and I shall do it. As for what other people think, all I can say is, I will thank Europe to mind its own business."

Then Adrian said:—"I am conscious of the purity of my own motives. I believe it would be impossible to discover a case of a Selfishness more unalloyed than mine, if all the records of Human Weakness were carefully re-read by experts at the British Museum. I am assuming the existence of some Digest or Codex of the rather extensive material...."

"Don't go off to that. I always have such difficulty in keeping you to the point. How selfish are you, and why?"

"I doubt if I can succeed in telling you how selfish I am, but there's no harm in trying." Speech hung fire for a moment, to seek for words; then found them. "I am a thing in the dark, with an object, and I call it Gwen. I am an atom adrift in a huge black silence, and it crushes my soul, and I am misery itself. Then I hear the voice that I call Gwen's, and forthwith I am happy beyond the wildest dreams of the Poets—though really that isn't saying much, because their wildest dreams are usually unintelligible, and frequently ungrammatical...."

"Never mind them! Go on with how selfish you are."

"Can't you let a poor beggar get to the end of his parenthesis? I was endeavouring to sketch the situation, as a preliminary to going on with how selfish I am. I was remarking that however dissatisfied I feel with the Most High, however sulky I am with the want of foresight in the Primum Mobile—or his indifference to my interests; it comes to the same thing—however inclined to cry out against the darkness, the darkness that once was light, I no sooner hear that voice that I call Gwen's than I am at least in the seven-hundredth heaven of happiness. When I hear that voice, I am all Christian forgiveness towards my Maker. When it goes, my heart is dumb and the darkness gains upon me. That I beg to state, is a simple prosaic statement of an everyday fact. When I have added that the powers that I ascribe to the voice that I know to be Gwen's are also inherent in the hand that I believe to be Gwen's.... Don't pull it away!"

"I only wanted to look at it. Just to see why you shouldn't know it was mine, as well as the voice."

"I know I couldn't be mistaken about the voice. I don't think I could be wrong about the hand, but I don't know that I couldn't."

"Well—now you've got it again! Now go on. Go on to how selfish you are—that's what I want!"

"I will endeavour to do so. I hope my imperfect indication of my view of my own position...."

"Don't be prosy. It is not fair to expect any girl to keep a popular lecturer's head in her lap...."

"I agree—I agree. It was my desire to be strictly practical. I will come to the point. I want to make it perfectly clear that you are my life...."

"Don't get too loud!"

"All right!... that you are my life—my life—my glorious life! I want you to see and know that but for you I am nothing—a wisp of straw blown about by all the winds of Heaven—a mere unit of consciousness in a blank, black void. See what comes of it! Here was I, before this unfortunate result of what is from my point of view a lamentable miscarriage of Destiny, a tolerably well-informed ... English male!... Well—what else am I?... Sonneteer, suppose we say...."

"Goose—suppose we say—or gander!"

"All right! Here was I, before this mishap, not a scrap more brutally self-indulgent and inconsiderate of everybody else than the ruck of my fellow-ganders, and now look at me!"

"Well—I'm looking at you!"

"Am I showing the slightest consideration for you? Am I not showing the most cynical disregard of your welfare in life?"

"How?"

"By allowing you to throw yourself away upon me."

"It is no concern of yours what I do with myself. I do not intend you to have any voice in the matter. Besides—just be good enough to tell me, please!—suppose you made up your mind not to allow me, how would you set about it?"

This was a poser, and the gentleman was practically obliged to acknowledge it. "I couldn't say off-hand," said he. "I should have to consult materfamiliases in Good Society, and look up precedents. Several will occur at once to the student of Lempriere, some of which might be more to the point than anything Holy Writ offers in illustration. But all the cases I can recall at a moment's notice are vitiated by the motives of their male actors. These motives were pure—they were pure self-indulgence. In fact, their attitude towards their would-be charmers had the character of a sauve-qui-peut. It was founded on strong personal dislike, and has lent itself to Composition in the hands of the Old Masters...."

"Now I don't know what you are talking about. Answer my question and don't prevaricate. How would you set about it?"

"How indeed?" There was a note of seriousness in Adrian's voice, and Gwen welcomed it, saying:—"That's right!—stop talking nonsense and tell me." It became more audible as he continued:—"You are only asking me because you know I cannot answer. Was ever a case known of a man who cried off because the lady's relatives thought she didn't care about him? What did he do? Did he write her a letter, asking her to consider everything at an end between them until she could produce satisfactory evidence of an unequivocal sehnsucht of the exactly right quality—premier cru—when her restatement of the case would receive careful consideration? Rubbish!"

"Not rubbish at all! He wrote her that letter and she wrote back requesting him to look out for another young woman at his earliest convenience, because she wasn't his sort. She did, indeed! But she certainly was rather an unfortunate young woman, to be trothplight to such a very good and conscientious young man."

"Rem tetigisti acu," said Adrian. "Never mind what that means. It's Latin.... Well then!—it means you've hit it. The whole gist of the matter lies in my being neither good nor conscientious. I am a mass of double-dyed selfishness. I would not give you up—it's very sad, but it's true!—even for your own sake. I would not lose a word from your lips, a touch of your hand, an hour of your presence, to have back my eyesight and with it all else the world has to give, all else than this dear self that I may never see...."

"I'm glad you said may."

"Yes, of course it's may. We mustn't forget that. But, dearest, I tell you this, that if I were to get my sight again, and your august mammy's impression were to turn out true after all, and you come to be aware that, pity apart, your humble servant was not such a very...."

"What should you do if I did?"

"Shall I tell you? I should show the cloven foot. I should betray the unreasoning greed of my soul. I should never let you go, even if I had to resort to the brutality of keeping you to your word. I should simply hold on like grim death. Would you hate me for it?"

"N-no! I'm not sure that I should. We should see." Certainly the beautiful face that looked down at the eyes that could not see it showed no visible displeasure—quite the reverse. "But suppose I did! Suppose is a game that two can play at."

"Very proper, and shows you understand the nature of an hypothesis. What should I do?... What should I do?"

Gwen offered help to his perplexity. "And suppose that when you came to see your bargain you had found out your mistake! Suppose that Arthur's Bridge turned out all an Arabian Night! Suppose that the ... well—satisfactory personnel your imagination has concocted turned out to be that of a beldam, crone, hag, or dowdy! How then?"

Instead of replying, Adrian drew his hands gently over the face above him, caressingly over the glorious mass of golden hair and round the columnar throat Bronzino would have left reluctantly alone. Said Irene, from the other end of the room:—"Are you trying Mesmeric experiments, you two?"

"He's only doing it to make sure I'm not a beldam," said Gwen innocently. But to Adrian she added under her breath:—"It's only Irene, so it doesn't matter. Only it shows how cautious one has to be." The Baronet, attracted for one moment from his fascinating dice, contributed a fragment to the conversation, and died away into backgammon. "Hey—eh!—what's that?" said he. "Mesmerism—Mesmerism—why, you don't mean to say you believe in that nonsense!" After which Gwen and Adrian were free to go on wherever they left off, if they could find the place.

She found it first. "Yes—I know. 'Beldam, crone, hag, or dowdy!' Of course. What I mean is—if it dawned on you that you were mistaken about my identity ... I want you to be serious, because the thing is possible ... what would you do?"

"There are so many supposes. Suppose you hated me and I thought you a beldam! Practice would seem to suggest fresh fields and pastures new.... But oh, the muddy, damp fields and the desolate, barren pastures.... I know one thing I should do. I should wish myself back here in the dark, with my feet spoiling the sofa cushion, and my head in the lap of my dear delusion—my heavenly delusion. God avert my disillusionment! I would not have my eyesight back at the price."

"Don't get excited! Remember we are only pretending."

"Not at all! I am being serious, because the thing is possible. Do you know I can imagine nothing worse than waking from a dream such as I have dreamt. It would be really the worst—worse than if you were to die, or change...."

"I can't see that."

"Clearly. I should not have the one great resource."

"What resource?... Oh, I see!—you are working round to suicide. I thought we should come to that."

"Naturally, one who is not alive to the purely imaginary evil of non-existence turns to his felo de se as his sheet-anchor. Persons who conceive that the large number of non-existent persons have a legitimate grievance, on the score of never having been created at all, will think otherwise. We must agree to differ."

"But how very unreasonable of you not to kill yourself!—I mean in the case of my not—not visualising well...."

"Quite the reverse. Most reasonable. We are supposing three courses open to Destiny. One, to kill you, lawlessly—Destiny being notoriously lawless. Another to make you change your mind. A third to make me change mine. The reasonableness of suicide in the first case is obvious, if Death is not annihilation. I should catch you up. In the second, all the Hereafters in the Universe would be no worse for me than Life in the dark, without you, here and now. In the third case I should have no one but myself to thank for a weak concession to Destiny, and it would be most unfair to kill myself without your consent, freely given. And I am by no means sure that by giving that consent you would not be legally an accomplice in my felo de se. Themis is a colossal Meddlesome Matty with her fingers in every pie."

"Bother Themis! What a lot of nonsense! However, there was one gleam of reason. You are alive to the fact that I should not consent to your suicide. Or anyone else's. I think it's wrong to kill oneself."

"So do I. But it might be a luxury I should not deny myself under some circumstances. I don't know that Hamlet would influence me. A certain amount of nervousness about Eternity is inseparable from our want of authentic information. I should hope for a healthy and effectual extinction. Failing that, I should disclaim all responsibility. I should point out that it lay, not with me, but my Maker. I should dwell on the fact that Creators that make Hereafters are alone answerable for the consequences; that I had never been consulted as to my own wishes about birth and parentage; and that I should be equally contented to be annulled, and, as Mrs. Bailey would have said, ill-convenience nobody...."

"Do you know why I am letting you go on?"

"Because of my Religious Tone? Because of my Good Taste? Or why?"

"Because I sometimes suspect you of being in earnest about suicide."

"I am quite in earnest."

"Very well, then. Now attend to me. I'm going to insist on your making me a promise."

"Then I shall have to make it. But I don't know till I hear it whether I shall promise to keep it."

"That's included."

"But no promise to keep my promise to keep it's included."

"Yes it is. If you keep on, I shall keep on. So you had better stop. What you've got to promise is not to commit suicide under any circumstances whatever."

"Not under any circumstances whatever? That seems to me rather harsh and arbitrary."

"Not at all. Give me your promise."

"H'm—well!—I'm an amiable, tractable sort of cove.... But I think I am entitled to one little reservation."

"It must be a very little one."

"Anything one gives one's fiancee is returned when she breaks one off. When you break me off I shall consider the promise given back—cancelled."

"Ye-es! Perhaps that is fair, on the whole. Only I think I deserve a small consideration for allowing it."

"I can't refuse to hear what it is."

"Give me that little bottle of Indian poison. To take care of for you, you know. I'll give it back if I break you off. Honour bright!"

"I shouldn't want it till then, probably. And if I did, I could afford sixpence for Prussic acid. Fancy being able to kill oneself, or one's friends, for sixpence! It must have come to a lot more than that in the Middle Ages. We have every reason to be thankful we are Modern...."

"Don't go from the point. Will you give up the little bottle of Indian poison, or not?"

"Not. At least, not now! If I hand it to you at the altar, when you have led me there won't that do?"

Gwen considered, judicially, and appeared to be in favour of accepting the compromise. "Only remember!" said she, "if you don't produce that bottle at the altar—with the poison in it still; no cheating!—I shall cry off, in the very jaws of matrimony." She paused a moment, lest she should have left a flaw in the contract, then added:—"Whether I have led you there or not, you know! Very likely you will walk up the aisle by yourself."

If Adrian had really determined to conceal the Miss Scatcherd incident from Gwen, so as not to foster false hopes, he should have worded his reply differently. For no sooner had he said:—"Well—we are all hoping so," than Gwen exclaimed:—"Then there has been more Septimius Severus." Adrian accepted this without protest, as ordinary human speech; and the story feels confident that if its reader will be on the watch, he will very soon chance across something quite as unlike book-talk in Nature. Adrian merely said:—"How on earth did you guess that?" Gwen replied:—"Because you said, 'We are all hoping so'—not 'We hope so.' Can't you see the difference?"

Anyway, Gwen's guess was an accomplished fact, and it was no use pretending it was wrong. Said Adrian therefore:—"Yes—there was a little more Septimius Severus. I had rather made up my mind not to talk about it, in case you should think too much of it." He then narrated the Miss Scatcherd incident, checked and corrected by Irene from afar. The narrator minimised the points in favour of his flash of vision, while his commentator's corrections showed an opposite bias.

Gwen was, strange to say, really uneasy about that little bottle of Indian poison. Whether there was anything prophetic in this uneasiness, it is difficult to determine. The decision of common sense will probably be that she knew that Poets were not to be trusted, and she wished to be on the safe side. By "common sense" we mean the faculty which instinctively selects the common prejudices of its age as oriflammes to follow on Life's battlefield. Hopkins the witch-finder's common sense suggested pricking all over to find an insensible flesh-patch, in which case the prickee was a witch. We prefer to keep an open mind about Lady Gwendolen Rivers' foreboding anent that little bottle of Indian poison, until vivisection has shown us, more plainly than at present, how brain secretes Man's soul. We are aware that this language is Browning's.

* * * * *

Gwen remained at Pensham until the end of the week. Events occurred, no doubt, but, with one exception, they are outside the story. That exception was a visit to Chorlton, in order that Adrian should not remain a stranger to the interesting old twins. His interest would have been stronger no doubt could he have really seen them. Even as it was he was keenly alive to the way in which old Mrs. Prichard seemed to have fascinated Gwen, and was eager to make as much acquaintance with her as his limitations left possible to him.

Gwen contrived to arrange that she should receive every day from Chorlton not only a line from Ruth Thrale, but an official bulletin from Dr. Nash.

The first of these despatches arrived on the Tuesday afternoon, she having told her correspondents that that would be soon enough. It disappointed her. She had left the old lady so much revived by the small quantity of provisions that did duty for a Sunday dinner, that she had jumped to the conclusion that another day would see her sitting up before the fire as she had seen her in the celebrated chair with cushions at Sapps Court. It was therefore rather a damper to be told by Dr. Nash that he had felt that absolute rest continued necessary, and that he had not been able to sanction any attempt to get Mrs. Prichard up for any length of time.

Gwen turned for consolation to Widow Thrale's letter. It was a model of reserve—would not say too much. "My mother" had talked a good deal with herself and "mother" till late, but had slept fairly well, and if she was tired this morning it was no more than Dr. Nash said we were to expect. She had had a "peaceful day" yesterday, talking constantly with "mother" of their childhood, but never referring to "my father" nor Australia. Dr. Nash had said the improvement would be slow. No reference was made to any possibility of getting her into her clothes and a return to normal life.

Gwen recognised the bearer of the letters, a young native of Chorlton, when she gave him the reply she had written, with a special letter she had ready for "dear old Mrs. Picture." "I know you," said she. "How's your Bull? I hope he won't kill Farmer Jones or anyone while you're not there to whistle to him." To which the youth answered:—"Who-ap not! Sarve they roi-ut, if they dwoan't let un bid in a's stall. A penned un in afower a coomed away." Gwen thought to herself that life at Jones's farm must be painfully volcanic, and despatched the Bull's guardian genius on his cob with the largest sum of money in his pocket that he had ever possessed in his life, after learning his name, which was Onesimus.

When Onesimus reappeared with a second despatch on the afternoon of the next day, Wednesday, Gwen opened it with a beating heart in a hurry for its contents. She did as one does with letters containing news, reading persistently through to the end and taking no notice at all of Irene's interrogatory "Well?" which of course was uttered long before the quickest reader could master the shortest letter's contents. When the end came, she said with evident relief:—"Oh yes, that's all right! Now if we drive over to-morrow, she will probably be up."

"Is that what the letter says?" Adrian spoke, and Gwen, saying "He won't believe my report, you see! You read it!"—threw the letter over to Irene, who read it aloud to her brother, while Gwen looked at the other letter, from Widow Thrale.

What Irene read did not seem so very conclusive. Mrs. Prichard had had a better night, having slept six hours without a break. But the great weakness continued. If she could take a very little stimulant it would be an assistance, as it might enable her to eat more. But she had an unconquerable aversion to wine and spirits in any form, and Dr. Nash was very reluctant to force her against her will.

So said Adrian:—"What she wants is real turtle soup and champagne. I know." Whereupon his father, who was behind the Times—meaning, not the Age, but the "Jupiter" of our boyhood, looked over its title, and said:—"Champagne—champagne? There's plenty in the bin—end of the cellar—Tweedie knows. You'll find my keys on the desk there"—and went back to an absorbing leader, denouncing the defective Commissariat in the Crimea. A moment later, he remembered a thing he had forgotten—his son's blindness. "Stop a minute," he said. "I have to go, myself, later, and I may as well go now." And presently was heard discussing cellar-economics, afar, with Tweedie the butler.

The lady of the house wanted the carriage and pair next day to drive over to Foxbourne in the afternoon and wait to bring her back after the meeting. The story merely gives the bold wording used to notify the fact: it does not know what Foxbourne was, nor why there was a meeting. Its only reason for referring to them is that the party for Chorlton had to change its plans and go by the up-train from St. Everall's to Grantley Thorpe, and make it stop there specially. St. Everall's, you may remember, is the horrible new place about two miles from Pensham. The carriage could take them there and be back in plenty of time, and there was always a groggy old concern to be had at the Crown at Grantley that would run them over to Strides Cottage in half an hour. If it had been favourable weather, no doubt the long drive would have been much pleasanter; but with the chance of a heavy downfall of snow making the roads difficult, the short drives and short railway journey had advantages.

Therefore when the groggy old concern, which had seen better days—early Georgian days, probably—pulled up at Strides Cottage in the afternoon, with a black pall of cloud, whose white heralds were already coming thick and fast ahead of it, hanging over Chorlton Down, two at least of the travellers who alighted from it had misgivings that if their visit was a prolonged one, its grogginess and antiquity might stand in its way on a thick-snowed track in the dark, and might end in their being late for the down-train at six. The third of their number saw nothing, and only said:—"Hullo—snowing!" when on getting free of the concern one of the heralds aforesaid perished to convince him of its veracity; gave up the ghost between his shirt-collar and his epidermis. "Yes," he continued, addressing the first inhabitant of the cottage who greeted him. "You are quite right. I am the owner of a dog, and you do perfectly right to inquire about him. His nose is singularly unlike yours. He will detect your flavour when I return, and I shall have to allay his jealousy. It is his fault. We are none of us perfect." The dog gave a short bark which might have meant that Adrian had better hold his tongue, as anything he said might be used against him.

"Now you are in the kitchen and sitting-room I've told you of, because it's both," said Gwen. "And here is Granny Marrable herself."

"Give me hold of your hand, Granny. Because I can't see you, more's the pity! I shall hope to see you some day—like people when they want you not to call. At present my looks don't flatter me. People think I'm humbugging when I say I can't see them. I can't!"

"'Tis a small wonder, sir," said Granny Marrable, "people should be hard of belief. I would not have thought you could not, myself. But being your eyes are spared, by God's mercy, they be ready for the sight to return, when His will is."

"That's all, Granny. It's only the sight that's wanting. The eyes are as good as any in the kingdom, in themselves." This made Gwen feel dreadfully afraid Granny Marrable would think the gentleman was laughing at her. But Adrian had taken a better measure of the Granny's childlike simplicity and directness than hers. He ran on, as though it was all quite right. "Anyhow, don't run away from us to Kingdom Come just yet a while, Granny, and see if I don't come to see you and your sister—real eyesight, you know; not this make-believe! I hope she's picking up."

"She's better—because Dr. Nash says she's better. Only I wish it would come out so we might see it. But it may be I'm a bit impatient. 'Tis the time of life does it, no doubt."

Ruth Thrale returned from the inner room. "She would like her ladyship to go to her," said she. Gwen could not help noticing that somehow—Heaven knows how, but quite perceptibly—the next room seemed to claim for itself the status of an invalid chamber. She accompanied Widow Thrale, who closed the room-door behind her, apparently to secure unheard speech in the passage. "She isn't any worse, you know," said Ruth, in a reassuring manner, which made her hearer look scared, and start. "Only when she gets away to thinking of beyond the seas—that place where she was—that is bad for her, say how we may! Not that she minds talking of my father, nor my brother that died, nor any tale of the land and the people; but 'tis the coming back to make it all fit."

Gwen quite understood this, and re-worded it, for elucidation. "Of course everything clashes, and the poor old dear can't make head or tail of it! Has there been any particular thing, lately?" The reply was:—"Yes—early this morning. She woke up talking about Mrs. Skillick, the name sounded like, and how kind she was to bring her the fresh lettuces. And then she found me by her and knew I was Ruth, but was all in a maze why! Then it all seemed to come on her again, and she was in a bad upset for a while. But I did not tell mother of that. I am glad you have come, my lady. It will make her better."

"Skillick wasn't Australia," said Gwen. "It was some person she lived with here in England—not so long ago. Somewhere near London. What did you do to quiet her?"

"I talked to her about Dave and Dolly. That is always good for her—it seems to steady her. Shall we go in, my lady? I think she heard you." Again Gwen had an impression that concession had been made to the inexorable, and that whereas four days ago it was taken for granted that old Mrs. Picture's collapse was only to be temporary, a permanency of invalidism was now accepted as a working hypothesis. Only a temporary permanency, of course, to last till further notice!



CHAPTER XXIV

HOW GWEN INTRODUCED MR. TORRENS, AND MRS. PICTURE TOOK HOLD OF HIS HAND. OF MR. TORREN'S FIRM FAITH IN DEVILS, AND OLD MAISIE'S HAPPINESS THEREAT. THE DOCTOR'S MEMORY OF ADRIAN'S FIRST APPEARANCE AS A CORPSE. THE LAXITY OF GENERAL PRACTIOTIONERS. HIS WISH TO INTOXICATE MRS. PRICHARD. HOW GWEN SANG GLUCK TO ADRIAN, AND ONESIMUS BROUGHT HER A LETTER. QUITE A GOOD REPORT. HOW GWEN WASN'T ANXIOUS. OF ADRIAN'S INVISIBLE MOTHER. HER SELECTNESS, AND HIGH BREEDING. ADRIAN'S VIEWS ABOUT SUICIDES. SURVIVORS' SELFISHNESS TOWARDS THEM, HOW HE TALKED ABOUT THAT DEVIL, AND LET OUT THAT THE OLD LADY HAD FLASHED ACROSS HIS RETINA. HOW HE HAD CLOTHED EACH TWIN'S HEAD WITH THE OTHER'S HAIR

Has it not been the experience of all of us, many a time, that a few days' clear absence from an invalid has been needed, to distinguish a slow change, invisible to the watchers by the bedside? And all the while, have not the daily bulletins made out a case for indefinable slight improvements, negligible gains scarcely worth naming, whose total some mysterious flaw of calculation persistently calls loss?

There may have been very little actual change; there was room for so little. But Gwen had been building up hopes of an improvement. And now she had to see her house of cards tremble and portend collapse. She saved the structure—as one has done in real card-life—by gingerly removing a top storey, in terror of a cataclysm. She would not hope so much—indeed, indeed!—if Fate would only leave some of her structure standing. But she was at fault for a greeting, all but a disjointed word or two, when Ruth, falling back, left her to enter the bedroom alone.

It was a consolation to hear the old lady's voice. "My dear—my dear—I knew you would come. I woke in the night, and thought to myself—she will come, my lady. Then I rang, and my Ruth came. She comes so quick."

"And then that was just as good as me," said Gwen. "Wasn't it?"

"She is my child—my Ruth. And Phoebe is my Phoebe—years ago! But I have to think so much, to make it all fit. You are not like that.'

"What am I like?"

"You are the same all through. You came upstairs to me in my room—did you not?—where my little Dave and Dolly were...."

"Yes—I fetched Dolly."

"And then you put Dolly down? And I said for shame!—what a big girl to be carried!"

"Yes—and Dolly was carrying little dolly, with her eyes wide open. And when I put her down on the floor, she repeated what you said all over again, to little dolly:—'For same, what a bid dirl to be tallied!'"

A gleam came on old Maisie's face as she lay there letting the idea of Dolly soak into her heart. Presently she said, without opening her eyes:—"I wonder, if Dolly lives to be eighty, will she remember old Mrs. Picture. I should like her to. Only she is small."

"Dear Mrs. Picture, you are talking as if you were not to have Dolly again. Don't you remember what I told you on Sunday? I'm going to get both the children down here, and Aunt M'riar. Unless, when you are better, you like to go back to Sapps Court. You shall, you know!"

Another memory attacked old Maisie. "Oh dear," said she, "I thought our Court was all tumbled down. Was it not?"

"Yes—the day I came. And then I carried you off to Cavendish Square. Don't you remember?—where Miss Grahame was—Sister Nora." She went on to tell of the promptitude and efficiency with which the repairs had been carried out. For, strange to say, the power Mr. Bartlett possessed of impressing Europe with his integrity and professional ability had extended itself to Gwen, a perfect stranger, during that short visit to the Court, and she was mysteriously ready to vouch for his sobriety and good faith. Presently old Maisie grew curious about the voices in the next room.

"Is that a gentleman's voice, through the door, talking? It isn't Dr. Nash. Dr. Nash doesn't laugh like that."

"No—that is my blind man I have brought to see you. I told you about him, you know. But he must not tire you too much."

"But can he see me?"

"I didn't mean see, that way. I meant see to talk to. Some day he will really see you—with his eyes. We are sure of it, now. He shall come and sit by you, and talk."

"Yes—and I may hold his hand. And may I speak to him about ... about ..."

"About his blindness and the accident? Oh dear yes! You won't see that he's blind, you know."

"His eyes look like eyes?"

"Like beautiful eyes. I shall go and fetch him." She knew she was straining facts in her prediction of their recovery of sight, but she liked the sound of her own voice as she said it, though she knew she would not have gone so far except to give her hearer pleasure.

* * * * *

Said old Maisie to Adrian, whom Gwen brought back to sit by her, giving him the chair she had occupied beside the bed:—"You, sir, are very happy! But oh, how I grieve for your eyes!"

"Is Lady Gwendolen here in the room still?" said Adrian.

"She has just gone away, to the other room," said old Maisie. For Gwen had withdrawn. One at a time was the rule.

"Very well, dear Mrs. Picture. Then I'll tell you. There never was a better bargain driven than mine. I would not have my eyesight back, to lose what I have got. No—not for fifty pairs of eyes." And he evidently meant it.

"May I hold your hand?"

"Do. Here it is. I am sure you are a dear old lady, and can see what she is. When I had eyes, I never saw anything worth looking at, till I saw Gwen."

"But is it a rule?"

Adrian was perplexed for a moment. "Oh, I see what you mean," said he. "No—of course not! I may have my eyesight back." Then he seemed to speak more to himself than to her. "Men have been as fortunate, even as that, before now."

"But tell me—is that what the doctor says? Or only guessing?"

"It's what the doctor says, and guessing too. Doctors only guess. He's guessing."

"But don't they guess right, oftener than people?"

"A little oftener. If they didn't, what use would they be?"

"But you have seen her?"

"Yes—once! Only once. And now I know she is there, as I saw her.... But I want to know about you, Mrs. Picture dear. Because I'm so sorry for you."

"There is no need for sorrow for me, I am so happy to know my sister was not drowned. And my little girl I left behind when I went away over the great sea, and the wind blew, and I saw the stars change each night, till they were all new. And then I found my dear husband, and lived with him many, many happy years. God has been good to me, for I have had much happiness." There was nothing but contentment and rest in her voice; but then some of the tranquillity may have been due to exhaustion.

Adrian made the mistake of saying:—"And all the while you thought your sister dead."

He felt a thrill in her hand as it tightened on his, and heard it in her voice. "Oh, could it have been?" she said. "But I was told so—in a letter."

It was useless for Adrian to affect ignorance of the story; and, indeed, that would have made matters worse, for it would have put it on her to attempt the retelling of it.

Perhaps he did his best to say:—"Lady Gwendolen has told me the whole story. So I know. Don't think about it!... Well—that's nonsense! One can't help thinking. I mean—think as little as possible!" It did not mend matters much.

Her mind had got back to the letter, and could not leave it. "I have to think of it," she said, "because it was my husband that wrote that letter. I know why he wrote it. It was not himself. It was a devil. It came out of Roomoro the black witch-doctor and got a place inside my husband. He did not write that letter to Phoebe. It wrote it. For see how it had learned all the story when Roomoro sucked the little scorpion's poison out of Mary Ann Stennis's arm!"

To Adrian all this was half-feverish wandering; the limited delirium of extreme weakness. No doubt these were real persons—Roomoro and Mary Ann Stennis. It was their drama that was fictitious. He saw one thing plainly. It was to be humoured, not reasoned with. So whatever was the cause of a slight start and disconcertment of his manner when she stopped to ask suddenly:—"But you do not believe in devils, perhaps?"—it was not the one she had ascribed it to. In fact he was quite ready with a semi-conscientious affirmative. "Indeed I do. Tell me exactly how you suppose it happened, again. Roomoro was a native conjurer or medicine-man, I suppose?"

Then old Maisie recapitulated the tale her imagination had constructed to whitewash the husband who had ruined her whole life, adding some details, not without an interest for students of folklore, about the devil that had come from Roomoro. She connected it with the fact that Roomoro had eaten the flesh of the little black Dasyurus, christened the "Native Devil" by the first Tasmanian colonists, from the excessive shortness of its temper. The soul of this devil had been driven from the witch-doctor by the poison of the scorpion, and had made for the nearest human organisation. Adrian listened with as courteous a gravity as either of us would show to a Reincarnationist's extremest doctrines.

It was an immense consolation to old Maisie, evidently, to be taken in such good faith. Having made up his mind that his conscience should not stand between him and any fiction that would benefit this dear old lady, Adrian was not going to do the thing by halves. He launched out into reminiscences of his own experiences on the Essequibo and elsewhere, and was able without straining points to dwell on the remarkable similarities of the Magians of all primitive races. As he afterwards told Gwen, he was surprised at the way in which the actual facts smoothed the way for misrepresentation. He stuck at nothing in professions of belief in unseen agencies, good and bad; apologizing afterwards to Gwen for doing so by representing the ease of believing in them just for a short time, to square matters. Optional belief was no invention of his own, he said, but an ancient and honourable resource of priesthoods all the world over.

It was the only little contribution he was able to make towards the peace of mind without which it seemed almost impossible so old a constitution could rally against such a shock. And it was of real value, for old Maisie sorely needed help against her most awful discovery of all, the hideous guilt of the man whom she had loved ungrudgingly throughout. Nor was it only this. It palliated her son's crimes. But then there was a difference between the son and the father. The latter had apparently done nothing to arouse his wife's detestation. Forgery is a delinquency—not a diabolism!

They talked more—talked a good deal in fact—but only of what we know. Then Gwen came back, bringing Irene to make acquaintance. This young lady behaved very nicely, but admitted afterwards that she had once or twice been a little at a loss what to say.

As when for instance the old lady, with her tender, sad, grey eyes fixed on Miss Torrens, said:—"Come near, my dear, that I may see you close." And drew her old hand, tremulously, over the mass of rich black hair which the almost nominal bonnet of that day left uncovered, with the reticular arrangement that confined it, and went on speaking, dreamily:—"It is very beautiful, but my lady's hair is golden, and shines like the sun." Thereon Gwen to lubricate matters:—"Yes—look here! But I know which I like best." She managed to collate a handful of her own glory of gold and her friend's rich black, in one hand. "I know which I like best," said Irene. And Gwen laughed her musical laugh that filled the place. "No head of hair is a prophet in its own country," said she.

Old Maisie was trying to speak, but her voice had gone low with fatigue. "Phoebe and I," she was saying, "long ago, when we were girls.... It was a trick, you know, a game ... we would mix our hair like that, and make little Jacky Wetherall guess whose hair he had hold of. When he guessed right he had sugar. He was three. His mother used to lend him to us when she went out to scrub, and he never cried...." She went on like this, dwelling on scraps of her girlhood, for some time; then her voice went very faint to say:—"Phoebe was there then. Phoebe is back now—somehow—how is it?" Gwen saw she had talked enough, and took Irene away; and then Ruth Thrale went to sit with her mother.

* * * * *

Dr. Nash, who arrived during their absence, had been greeted by Adrian after his "first appearance as a corpse," last summer. He would have known the doctor's voice anywhere. "You never were a corpse," said that gentleman. To which Mr. Torrens replied:—"You thought I was a corpse, doctor, you know you did!"

Dr. Nash, being unable to deny it, shifted the responsibility. "Well," said he, "Sir Coupland thought so too. The fact is, we had quite given you up. When he came out and said to me:—'Come back. I want you to see something,' I said to him:—'Is that why the dog barked?' Because your dog had given a sudden queer sort of a bark. And he said to me:—'It isn't only the dog. It's Lady Gwen Rivers.'"

"What did he mean by that?" said Gwen.

"He meant that your ladyship's strong impression that the body.... Excuse my referring to you, Mr. Torrens, as...."

"As 'the body'? Not at all! I mean, don't apologize."

"The—a—subject, say, still retained vitality. No doubt we might have found out—probably should...."

"Stuff and nonsense!" said Gwen remorselessly. "You would have buried him alive if it hadn't been for me. You doctors are the most careless, casual creatures. It was me and the dog—so now Mr. Torrens knows what he has to be thankful for!"

"Well—as a matter of fact, it was the strong impression of your ladyship that did the job. We doctors are, as your ladyship says, an incautious, irresponsible lot. I hope you found Mrs. Prichard going on well."

Gwen hesitated. "I wish she looked a little—thicker," said she.

Dr. Nash looked serious. "We mustn't be in too great a hurry. Remember her age, and the fact that she is eating almost nothing. She won't take regular meals again—or what she calls regular meals—till the tension of this excitement subsides...."

Said Adrian:—"It's perfectly extraordinary to me, not seeing her, to hear her talk as she does. Because it doesn't give the impression of such weakness as that. Her hands feel very thin, of course."

Said the doctor:—"I wish I could get her to take some stimulant; then she would begin eating again. If she could only be slightly intoxicated! But she's very obdurate on that point—I told you?—and refuses even Sir Cropton Fuller's old tawny port. I talked about her to him, and he sent me half a dozen the same evening. A good-natured old chap!—wants to make everyone else as dyspeptic as himself...."

"That reminds me!" said Gwen. "We forgot the champagne."

"No, we didn't," said Irene. "It was put in the carriage, I know. In a basket. Two bottles lying down. And it was taken out, because I saw it."

"But was it put in the railway carriage?"

"I meant the railway carriage."

"I believe it's in the old Noah's Ark we came here in, all the while."

Granny Marrable said:—"I am sure there has nothing been brought into the Cottage. Because we should have seen. There is only the door through, to go in and out."

"You see, Dr. Nash," said Gwen, "when you said that in your letter, about her wanting stimulant, champagne immediately occurred to Sir Hamilton. So we brought a couple of bottles of the King of Prussia's favourite Clicquot, and a little screwy thing to milk the bottles with, like a cow, a glass at a time. Miss Torrens and I are quite agreed that very often one can get quite pleasantly and healthily drunk on champagne when other intoxicants only give one a headache and make one ill. Isn't it so, 'Re?" Miss Torrens and her brother both testified that this was their experience, and Dr. Nash assented, saying that there would at least be no harm in trying the experiment.

As for dear old Granny Marrable, her opinion was simply that whatever her ladyship from the Towers, and the young lady from Pensham and her brother, were agreed upon, was beyond question right; and even if medical sanction had not been forthcoming she would have supported them. "I am sure," said she, "my dear sister will drink some when she knows your ladyship brought it for her."

The reappearance of the Noah's Ark, when due, confirmed Gwen's view as to the whereabouts of the basket, and was followed by a hasty departure of the gentlefolks to catch the downtrain from London. As Granny Marrable watched it lurching away into the fast-increasing snow, it looked, she thought, as if it could not catch anything. But if old Pirbright, who had been on the road since last century, did not know, nobody did.

* * * * *

The day after this visit, when Gwen was singing to Adrian airs from Gluck's "Alceste," Irene and her father being both absent on Christmas business, social or charitable, the butler brought in a letter from Ruth Thrale in the very middle of a sostenuto note,—for when did any servant, however intelligent, allow music to stop before proceeding to extremities?—and said, respectfully but firmly, that it was the same boy, and he would wait. He seemed to imply that the boy's quality of identity was a sort of guarantee of his waiting—a good previous character for permanency. Gwen left "Alceste" in C minor, and opened her letter, thanking Mr. Tweedie cordially, but not able to say he might go, because he was another family's butler. Adrian said:—"Is that from the old lady?" And when Gwen said:—"Yes—it's Onesimus. I wonder he was able to get there, over the snow,"—he dismissed Mr. Tweedie with the instruction that he should see that Onesimus got plenty to eat. The butler ignored this instruction as superfluous, and died away.

Then Gwen spun round on the music-stool to read aloud. "'Honoured lady';—Oh dear, I wish she could say 'dear Gwen'; but I suppose it wouldn't do.—'I am thankful to be able to write a really good report of my mother'.... You'll see in a minute she'll have to speak of Granny Marrable and she'll call her 'mother' without the 'my.' See if she doesn't!... 'Dr. Nash said she might have some champagne, and we said she really must when you so kindly brought it. So she said indeed yes, and we gave it her up to the cuts.' That means," said Gwen, "the cuts of the wineglass." She glanced on in the letter, and when Adrian said:—"Well—that's not all!"—apologized with:—"I was looking on ahead, to see that she got some more later. It's all right. '... up to the cuts, and presently', as Dr. Nash said, was minded to eat something. So I got her the sweetbread she would not have for dinner, which warmed up well. Then we persuaded her to take a little more champagne, but Dr. Nash said be careful for fear of reaction. Then she was very chatty and cheerful, and would go back a great deal on old times with mother....' I told you she would," said Gwen, breaking off abruptly.

"Of course she will always go back on old times," said Adrian.

"I didn't mean that. I meant call her aunt 'mother' without the 'my.' Let me go on. Don't interrupt! '... old times with mother, and one thing in particular, their hair. Mother pleased her, because she could remember a little child Jacky they would puzzle to tell which hair was which, saying if she held them like that Jacky could tell, and have sugar. For their hair now is quite strong white and grey instead of both the same....' She was telling us about Jacky—me and Irene—yesterday, and I suppose that was what set her off.... 'She slept very sound and talked, and then slept well at night. So we are in good spirits about her, and thank God she may be better and get stronger. That is all I have to tell now and remain dutifully yours....' Isn't that delightful? Quite a good report!" Instructions followed to Onesimus not to bring any further news to Pensham, but to take his next instalment to the Towers.

These things occurred on the Friday, the day after the visit to Chorlton. Certainly that letter of Widow Thrale's justified Lady Gwendolen in feeling at ease about Mrs. Picture during the remainder of her visit to Pensham, and the blame she apportioned to herself for an imagined neglect afterwards was quite undeserved.

Adrian Torrens ought to have been in the seventh heaven during the remainder of an almost uninterrupted afternoon. Not that it was absolutely uninterrupted, because evidences of a chaperon in abeyance were not wanting. A mysterious voice, of unparalleled selectness, or bon-ton, or gentility, emanated from a neighbouring retreat with an accidentally open door, where the lady of the house was corresponding with philanthropists in spite of interruptions. It said:—"What is that? I know it so well," or, "That air is very familiar to me," or, "I cannot help thinking Catalani would have taken that slower." To all of which Gwen returned suitable replies, tending to encourage a belief in her questioner's mind that its early youth had been passed in a German principality with Kapellmeisters and Conservatoriums and a Court Opera Company. This excellent lady was in the habit of implying that she had been fostered in various anciens regimes, and that the parentage of anything so outlandish and radical as her son and daughter was quite out of her line, and a freak of Fate at the suggestion of her husband.

Intermittent emanations from Superiority-in-the-Bush were small drawbacks to what might perhaps prove the last unalloyed interview of these two lovers before their six months' separation—that terrible Self-Denying Ordinance—to which they had assented with a true prevision of how very unwelcome it would be when the time came. It was impossible to go back on their consent now. Gwen might have hoisted a standard of revolt against her mother. But she could not look her father in the face and cry off from the fulfilment of a condition-precedent of his consent to the perfect freedom of association of which she and Adrian had availed themselves to the uttermost, always under the plea that the terms of the contract were going to be honourably observed. As for Adrian, he was even more strongly bound. That appeal from the Countess that his father had repeated and confirmed was made direct to his honour; and while he could say unanswerably:—"What would you have me do?" nothing in the world could justify his rebelling against so reasonable a condition as that their sentiments should continue reciprocal after six months of separation.

His own mind was made up. For his views about suicide, however much he spoke of them with levity, were perfectly serious. If he lost Gwen, he would be virtually non-existent already. The end would have come, and the thing left to put an end to would no longer be a Life. It would only be a sensibility to pain, with an ample supply of it. A bare bodkin would do the business, but did not recommend itself. The right proportion of Prussic Acid had much to say on its own behalf. It was cheap, clean, certain, and the taste of ratafia was far from unpleasant. But he had a lingering favourable impression of the Warroo medicine-man, whose faith in the efficacy and painlessness of his nostrum was evident, however much was uncertain in his version of its provenance.

As to any misgivings about awakening in another world, if any occurred to Adrian he had but one answer—he had been dead, and had found death unattended with any sort of inconvenience. Resuscitation had certainly been painful, but he did not propose to leave any possibility of it, this time. His death, that time, had been a sudden shock, followed instantly by the voice of Gwen herself, which he had recognised as the last his ears had heard. If Death could be so easily negotiated, why fuss? The only serious objection to suicide was its unpopularity with survivors. But were they not sometimes a little selfish? Was this selfishness not shown to demonstration by the gratitude—felt, beyond a doubt—to the suicide who weights his pockets when he jumps into mid-ocean, contrasted with the dissatisfaction, to say the least of it, which the proprietor of a respectable first-class hotel feels when a visitor poisons himself with the door locked, and engages the attention of the Coroner. There was Irene certainly—and others—but after all it would be a great gain to them, when the first grief was over, to have got rid of a terrible encumbrance.

Therefore Adrian was quite at his ease about the Self-Denying Ordinance; at least, if a clear resolve and a mind made up can give ease. He said not a word of his views and intentions beyond what the story has already recorded. What right had he to say anything to Gwen that would put pressure on her inclinations? Had he not really said too much already? At any rate, no more!

Nevertheless, the foregoing made up the background of his reflections as he listened to more "Alceste," resumed after a short note had been written for Onesimus to carry back over the frost-bound roads to Chorlton. And he was able to trace the revival in his mind of suicide by poison to Mrs. Picture's narration of the Dasyurus and the witch-doctor who had cooked and eaten its body. This fiction of her fever-ridden thoughts had set him a-thinking again of the Warroo conjurer. He had not repeated any of it to Gwen, lest she should be alarmed on old Maisie's behalf. For it had a very insane sound.

But after such a prosperous report of her condition, above all, of the magical effect of that champagne, it seemed overnice to be making a to-do about what was probably a mere effect of overheated fancy, such as the circumstances might have produced in many a younger and stronger person. So when Alceste had provided her last soprano song, and the singer was looking for "Ifigenia in Aulide," Adrian felt at liberty to say that old Mrs. Picture's ideas about possession were very funny and interesting.

"Isn't it curious?" said Gwen. "She really believes it all, you know, like Gospel. All that about the devil that had possession of her husband! And how when he died, he passed his devil on to his son, who was worse than himself."

"That's good, though," said Adrian. "Only she never told me about the son. I had it all about the witch-doctor whose devil came out because he couldn't fancy the little scorpion's flavour. And all about the original devil—a sort of opossum they call a devil...."

"She didn't tell me about him."

"They've got one at the Zoological Gardens. He's an ugly customer. The keeper said he was a limb, if ever there was one. The old lady evidently thought her idea that the doctor's devil was this little beggar's soul, eaten up with his flesh, was indisputable. I told her I thought it had every intrinsic possibility, and I'm sure she was pleased. But the horror of her face when she spoke of him was really...."

"Adrian!"

"What, dearest? Anything the matter?"

"Only the way you put it. It was so odd. 'The horror of her face'! Just as if you had seen it!" Indeed, Gwen was looking quite disconcerted and taken aback.

"There now!" said Adrian. "See what a fool I am! I never meant to tell of that. Because I thought it threw a doubt on Scatcherd. I've been wanting to make the most of Scatcherd. I never thought much of Septimius Severus. Anyone might have said in my hearing that the bust was moved, and it was just as I was waking. But I'll swear no one said anything about Scatcherd. Why—there was only Irene!"

Gwen went and sat by him on the sofa. "Listen, darling!" said she. "I want to know what you are talking about. What was it happened, and why did it throw a doubt on Miss Scatcherd?"

"It wasn't anything, either way, you know."

"I know. But what was it, that wasn't anything, either way?"

"It was only an impression. You mustn't attach any weight to it."

"Are you going to tell what it was, or not?"

"Going to. Plenty of time! It was when the old lady began telling me about the devil. Her tone of conviction gave me a strong impression what she was looking like, and made an image of her flash across my retina. By which I mean, flash across the hole I used to see through when I had a retina. It was almost as strong and life-like as real seeing. But I knew it wasn't."

"But how—how—how?" cried Gwen, excited. "How did you know that it wasn't?"

"Because of the very white hair. It was snow-white—the image's. I suppose I had forgotten which was which, of the two old ladies—had put the saddle on the wrong horse."

Gwen looked for a moment completely bewildered. "What on, earth, can, he, mean?" said she, addressing Space very slowly. Then, speaking as one who has to show patience with a stiff problem:—"Dearest man—dearest incoherency!—do try and explain. Which of the old ladies do you suppose has white hair, and which grey?"

"Old Granny Marrable, I thought."

"Yes—but which hair? Which? Which? Which?"

"White, I thought, not grey." Whereupon Gwen, seeing how much hung upon the impression her lover had been under hitherto about these two tints of hair, kept down a growing excitement to ask him quietly for an exact, undisjointed statement, and got this for answer:—"I have always thought of Granny Marrable's as snow-white, and the old Australian's as grey. Was that wrong?"

"Quite wrong! It's the other way round. The Granny's is grey and old Mrs. Picture's is silvery white."

Adrian gave a long whistle, for astonishment, and was silent. So was Gwen. For this was the third incident of the sort, and what might not happen? Presently he broke the silence, to say:—"At any rate, that leaves Scatcherd a chance. I thought if this was a make-up of my own, it smashed her."

"Foolish man! There is more in it than that. You saw old Mrs. Picture. It was no make-up.... Well?" She paused for his reply.

It came after a studied silence, a dumbness of set purpose. "Oh why—why—is it always Mrs. Picture, or Scatcherd, or Septimius Severus? Why can it never be Gwen—Gwen—Gwen?"

The attenuated chaperonage of the lady of the house may have been moved by a certain demonstrativeness of her son's at this point, to say from afar:—"I hope we are going to have some 'Ifigenia in Aulide.' Because I should have enjoyed that." Which carried an implication that the musical world had been palming off an inferior article on a public deeply impressible by the higher aspects of Opera.



CHAPTER XXV

HOW THE EARL ASKED AFTER THE OLD TWINS. MERENESS. RECUPERATIVE POWER. HOW THE HOUSEHOLD HAD ITS ANNUAL DANCE. HOW THE COUNTESS HAD A CRACKED LIP. HOW WAS DR. TUXFORD SOMERS? SIR SPENCER DERRICK. GENERAL RAWNSLEY. HE AND GWEN'S INTENDED GREAT GRANDMOTHER-IN-LAW. GWEN HAD NEVER HAD TWINS BEFORE THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. THE GENERAL'S BROTHER PHILIP. SUPERANNUATED COCKS AND HENS. HOW GWEN HAD DREAMED SHE WAS TO MARRY A KETTLE-HOLDER. HOW MRS. LAMPREY HAD A LETTER FOR GWEN, WHICH TOOK GWEN OFF TO CHORLTON AT MIDNIGHT

When the Earl of Ancester came back to the Towers next day he certainly did look a little boiled down; otherwise, cheerful and collected. "I am quite prepared to endure another Christmas," said he resignedly to Gwen. "But a little seclusion and meditation is good to prepare one for the ordeal, and Bath certainly deserves the character everybody gives it, that you never meet anybody else there. I suppose Coventry and Jericho have something in common with Bath. I wonder if outcasts can be identified in either. Nothing distinguishes them in Bath from the favourites of Fortune. How are the old ladies?"

This was in the study, where the Earl and his daughter got a quiet ten minutes to recapitulate the story of each during the other's absence. It was late in the afternoon, two hours after his arrival from London. He had been there a day or two to make a show of fulfilling his obligations towards politics; had sat through a debate or two, and had taken part in a division or two, much to the satisfaction of his conscience. "But," said he to Gwen, "if you ask me which I have felt most interest in, your old ladies or the Foreign Enlistment Act, I should certainly say the old ladies." So it was no wonder his inquiry about them came early in this recapitulation.

Gwen found herself, to her surprise, committed to an apologetic tone about old Mrs. Picture's health, and maintaining that she was really better intrinsically, although evidently some person or persons unnamed must have said she was worse. She started on her report with every good-will to make it a prosperous one, and got entangled in some trivialities that told against her purpose. Perhaps her last letter to her father, written from Pensham on the night of her arrival there, had given too rose-coloured an account of her visit to Chorlton, and had caused the rather serious headshake which greeted her admission that old Maisie was still a quasi-invalid, on her back from the merest—quite the merest—weakness. The Earl admitted that, as a general rule, weakness might be mere enough to be negligible; but then it should be the weakness of young and strong people, possessed of that delightful property "recuperative power," which does such wonders when it comes to the scratch. Never be without it, if you can help.

The episode of the champagne was reassuring, and gave Hope a helping hand. Moreover, Gwen had just got another letter from Ruth Thrale, brought by Onesimus the bull-cajoler, which gave a very good account on the whole, though one phrase had a damping effect. We were not "to rely on the champagne," as it was "not nourishment, but stimulus." She must be got to take food regularly, said Dr. Nash, however small the quantity. This seemed to suggest that she had fallen back on that vicious practice of starvation. But "my mother" was constantly talking with "mother" about old times, and it was giving "mother" pleasure.

"I wish," said Gwen, as her father went back to "Honoured Lady" for second reading, and possibly second impressions, "I wish that Dr. Nash had written separately. I want to know what he thinks, and I want to know what Ruth thinks. I can mix them up for myself."

The Earl read to the end, and suspended judgment, visibly. "Eighty-one!" said he. "And how did Granny Marrable take it? You never said in your letters."

"Because I did not see her. Dr. Nash told—at least, he tried to. But I told you about the little boy's letter. She knew it from that."

"I remember.... Well!—we must hope." And then they spoke of matters nearer home; the impending journey to Vienna; a perplexity created by a promise rashly given to Aunt Constance that she should be married from the Ancester town-residence—two things which clashed, for how could this wedding wait till the Countess's return?—and ultimately of Gwen's own prospects. Then she told her father the incident of Adrian's apparent vision of old Mrs. Picture, and both pretended that it was too slight to build upon; but both used it for a superstructure of private imaginings. Neither encouraged the other.

Adrian and his sister were to have returned with Gwen to the Towers to stay till Monday, which was Christmas Day, when their own plum-pudding and mistletoe would claim them at Pensham. This arrangement was not carried out, possibly in deference to the Countess, who was anxious to reduce to a minimum everything that tended to focus the public gaze on the lovers. Gwen was under a social obligation, inherited perhaps from Feudalism, to be present at the Servants' Ball, which would have been on Christmas Eve had that day not fallen on a Sunday. Hence the necessity for her return on the Saturday, and the interview with her father just recorded. The quiet ten minutes filled the half-hour between tea and dressing for a dinner which might prove a scratch meal in itself, but was distinguished by its sequel. A general adjournment was to follow to the great ball-room, which was given over without reserve on this occasion to the revellers and their friends from the environs; for at the Towers nothing was done by halves in those days. There the august heads of the household were expected to walk solemnly through a quadrille with the housekeeper and head butler. Mrs. Masham's and Mr. Norbury's sense of responsibility on these occasions can neither be imagined nor described. This great event made conscientious dressing for dinner more than usually necessary, however defective the excitement of the household might make the preparation and service thereof.

These exigencies were what limited Gwen's quiet ten minutes with her father within the narrow bounds of half an hour, leaving no margin at all for more than three words with her mother on her way to her own interview with Miss Lutwyche. She exceeded her estimate almost before her ladyship's dressing-room door had swung to behind her.

"Well, mamma dear, I hope you're satisfied."

"I am, my dear. At least, I am not dissatisfied.... Don't kiss me in front, please, because I have a little crack on the corner of my lip." The Countess accepted her daughter's accolade on an unsympathetic cheek-bone. "What are you referring to?"

"Why—Adrian not coming till to-morrow, of course. What did you suppose I meant?"

"I did not suppose. Some day you will live to acknowledge—I am convinced of it—that what your father and I thought best was dictated by simple common sense and prudence. I am sure Sir Hamilton will not misinterpret our motives. Nor Lady Torrens."

"He's a nice old Bart, the Bart. We are great friends. He likes it. He gets all the kissing for nothing.... What?"

The Countess may have contemplated some protest against the pronounced ratification implied of fatherdom-in-law. She gave it up, and said:—"I was not going to say anything. Go on!"