bottle. Put them on the table here.”

Dr. Lytton, his previous indignation vanished, slipped from the room. A
vague and exciting understanding had come to him. De Medici cleared the
table hastily and lighted the candlesticks. As he did, his fingers
snapped the electric switch and the room dropped into a yellow shadowed
darkness. Dr. Lytton returned with his arms loaded.

                     [Illustration: {uncaptioned}]

“Set the table as if for a meal,” murmured De Medici, his eyes holding
the stare of the woman, “and bring a knife. A long knife.”

The woman, oblivious to these maneuvers, had begun to talk once more.

“Name your price, then, Baron,” she intoned.

“Hurry,” De Medici whispered to the scientist, “and leave the rest to
me. I’ll take the part. I know it well.”

He turned to the woman, his figure become polite, leering, his hand
extended.

“Ah, Lady Floria,” he smiled at her, “venal my enemies call me. But
remember, I do not sell myself for money. If I must betray my honor”—he
paused to laugh—“I insist upon choosing my payment.”

He advanced toward the woman, his manner becoming unctuous and
caressing.

“You have scorned and braved me, Lady Floria,” he spoke, “yet your
beauty has kept me enslaved. I’ve watched you clinging to your lover
like an amorous tigress and I vowed that you would be mine some day.”

He paused and waited. The woman’s eyes had taken fire. Her head flung
itself back in a superb gesture. Her voice came throatily and
distinctly.

“No. I would rather kill myself.”

For an instant De Medici beamed with delight. Then again the unctuous,
leering manner returned.

“You forget,” he cried, “you forget I hold your Mario’s life in pawn for
yours, Tosca.”

She nodded regally.

“And do you think, Baron Scarpia, that I would contract so hideous a
payment with you?”

De Medici, in search of his lines for a moment, hesitated and then cried
out:

“How you detest me!”

The Tosca facing him laughed.

“I do,” she answered, “with my soul and body I loathe you.”

“Ah, ’tis thus I love you most,” he spoke.

Dr. Lytton, eyeing the incredible make-believe for a moment, had become
busy. The drift of the strange scene had penetrated his thought. His
hands had cleared the table and arranged the plates and bottles brought
from the kitchen. Carefully he laid the knife on the edge nearest the
woman. De Medici, seizing the swing of the lines he had evidently once
known, fired the antiquated Sardou speech at the woman, remembering and
improvising as he went.

“Spolletta, pay attention.” He was addressing imaginary actors. “I have
changed my mind. The lovely Floria and I have made a bargain. Let
Cavaradossi be shot. Here is the order.”

Turning to the table he scribbled with a pencil on a piece of paper.

“Here, Floria,” he said, “the passport. I have fulfilled my promise.”

“Not entirely,” came the voice behind him. “I must have a safe conduct
enabling me, too, to quit the country. For I go with him.”

“After tonight?” De Medici murmured, “you will leave me?”

The voice behind him answered:

“Yes, forever.”

Dr. Lytton was watching narrowly. He saw the metamorphosed housekeeper
stealthily approaching the apparently unconscious De Medici. With
infinite caution her fingers reached for the knife on the table edge.
She held it behind her as De Medici raised a wineglass in his hand.

“Ah, my lovely one, my beautiful Tosca, at last thou art mine.”

As he spoke the woman appeared to become transfigured. The terror of her
eyes gave way to an exultant light. She stood poised for a moment,
gazing at the man straightening with the wineglass in his hand. Then
with a cry she raised the knife and plunged it toward De Medici.

He had been waiting, his body tensed for the moment. His hand caught the
descending arm and frustrated the attack. But immediately he sank to the
floor, crying hoarsely:

“Help me, help me, I am dying.”

Dr. Lytton, who had followed the grewsome pantomime, stood motionless
against the curtains. The woman approached the figure spread on the
floor and remained looking down into the face of the man she had slain.
Then, without removing her eyes from him, she went through the motions
of washing her fingers in one of the water glasses. She stopped, and her
gaze centered on the two lighted candles. A shudder passed through her.

De Medici, warily alert, watched her lift the two candlesticks from the
table and lean over him. For a moment the face of the madwoman breathed
against him as the candlesticks were placed one at each side of his
head. She had kneeled. Tearing the crucifix that hung from her neck, she
laid it upon his chest and then arose.

Actress and murderess had become merged in her eyes. She glanced wildly
about the darkened and shadow-dancing room and then, with a last look at
the figure on the floor, moved toward the door. She walked like one in a
dreadful dream, her body moving as if impelled by a force.

De Medici, still motionless, waited till she had retreated several
steps. Raising himself, he whispered quickly:

“Don’t let her get away, Hugo.”

But the woman had paused before Dr. Lytton could move. Her figure grew
larger in the shadows. Her gaze had torn itself from the one on the
floor. She was staring straight ahead of her. Standing in the doorway
blocking her path was Florence Ballau.

The girl’s hair was down and a drowsy look was over her eyes. She stood
regarding the woman in the trailing gown and then, raising her arms,
stumbled forward with the cry:

“Mother ... mother.... Oh, my God!”

                               CHAPTER XV
                           HEARTS AND FLOWERS

  In which Florence takes up the drama—A taxicab, as in the beginning—In
  which what is left of the reader’s suspense and curiosity is carefully
  removed.

The cab bowled slowly along through the circuitous park roads.

“I’ll tell him to take his time,” De Medici whispered. “The air will do
you good.”

He looked at the girl beside him. Tenderness lighted his face.

“There’s really nothing to worry about any more, Florence. Your mother
will have excellent care where she is. Dr. Lytton wrote me that he’s
taken personal charge of the case and that she’s as happy as anyone
could expect.”

Florence nodded. Her hand took his.

“You’ve been wonderful,” she said. “And more than anything else, I
admire your reticence. It’s a week—and you haven’t asked me any
questions yet.”

“I’ve been waiting,” he said. “And rejoicing in my own way. There’s no
hurry for the epilogue. And anyway ... I prefer this.”

He raised her hand and kissed it.

“I’d like to go somewhere and talk,” she said at length. “The cab’s a
bit inconvenient. And I’m tired.”

De Medici yielded the point with a minor protest.

“I have an obsession in favor of cabs,” he smiled. “I’ve always done
most of my thinking in cabs, and most of my business has been transacted
in them. I fancy it’s because rooms always used to depress and frighten
me.”

He gave directions to the chauffeur.

“We’ll go to my place,” he resumed. “And on the way I’ll tell you about
my end of the mystery.”

As the cab turned back De Medici began his story, confessing for the
first time aloud the strange suspicions that had seized him as he bent
over the body of his friend Ballau.

“I was convinced at the moment,” he explained, “that, in a fit of mental
aberration during which I took on some of the characteristics of my
ancestors, I killed poor Victor. And the more I thought of that, the
more guilty I seemed to feel.”

He continued relating the fears that had haunted him, the hallucinations
that had accused him during the ensuing weeks. Florence listened
quietly, her large eyes regarding him with emotion.

“I love you so,” she murmured, “and I knew there was something like
this. And I tried to utilize it to save her. It was never clear in my
mind just what I was doing ... or just how it {could work. I must have
been acting on} impulse, determined that whatever happened, she would be
spared. But it’s better this way, I’m sure.”

They left the cab and entered De Medici’s apartment.

“I’ll like living here,” she smiled as they sat down in the room of the
curtains. “Providing, of course, the ghost of Francesca is forever
laid.”

“Forever,” he answered.

She studied him in silence.

“Yes”—at length—“there is a change. Something seems absent from your
face. A nervousness. As if....”

“As if,” he supplied, “the phantoms of De Medici had said good-bye.”

“As if you loved me in a simpler way,” she corrected. “But I’ll tell you
what’s left now. If you wish to hear.”

“Some tea?” he asked.

He gave instructions to his man. Ten minutes later they were sitting
happily over their emptied cups.

“Well,” Florence began, “it goes back to long ago. I remember none of
it. But the story is familiar. Poor father—I still must call him
father—told it to me at least a dozen times. It was in London before I
was born. There was a man named Bandoux, a Frenchman. He and Victor
Ballau were rivals for my mother’s love. Does it sound stilted?”

She smiled sadly.

“A rather old-fashioned melodrama,” she continued. “Bandoux was a
dashing, unscrupulous sort. And she eloped with him. They were gone
about a year and they came back to London with me. Bandoux had refused
to marry her, even after I came. In fact, he mistreated, abused and
reviled her every hour of the day. And poor Victor still loved her.
Mother was young and temperamental and proud, of course. But finally
Victor’s love reached her heart. They were married and lived together
happily for a year.”

“Old Fanny was a little mixed in her dates,” De Medici smiled as she
paused, “but otherwise the story is the same—to that point.”

He told her briefly of his adventure with the wardrobe mistress and the
candlestick.

“I don’t remember her,” Florence went on. “Well, father, that is, Victor
Ballau, was in charge of the Goldsmith Theater at that time and mother
was playing the leads in the repertoire bills they put on. Things were
going nicely, and apparently poor mother had forgotten the hell she’d
been through with Bandoux.

“Then one day father had to leave London on business, and in his absence
the leading man fell ill. I forget his name. The manager in charge
dashed around frantically in search of some experienced repertoire man
to take his place, and found—Bandoux. He’d had a hard time of it and was
willing to join the company for anything he could get. Mother objected
violently at first. But it was either Bandoux or shutting down for the
week, there being no actor available at the price they could pay for a
mid-season employment. And so mother finally agreed. Bandoux played in
the cast that night. Oh, he was a scoundrel! Everything that has
happened, all the tragedy that haunted poor Victor Ballau’s life, came
from him and his rottenness. The play that night was Sardou’s ‘Tosca.’

“Father has told me all these details. I was about three years old at
the time. But I seem to remember the creature, a flamboyant type of
cheap actor. With a grand manner and a nasty temper. Terribly vain of
his looks. An unscrupulous rogue who devoted himself to boasting and to
women.

“Anyway, Bandoux took the part of Baron Scarpia. Mother played Floria La
Tosca. It had always been one of her favorite rôles. The play went
through the first act with nothing unusual happening. Mother was nervous
and excited but managed to restrain herself. Her loathing of this man
Bandoux was almost too much for her. And in the second act the thing
happened. The grief he had caused her, the hatred his perfidy had left
in her heart, flamed out. And when the murder scene arrived, poor mother
went out of her head. She raised the dagger to kill Baron Scarpia as she
had so often done in other performances. But this time she screamed and
hurled herself at Bandoux. He was almost taken by surprise but managed
to defend himself and escaped with a slight wound. Mother fainted. There
was pandemonium and the curtain was rung down.

“Father came back the next morning and found her still raving. She had
been taken to a hospital and was completely out of her mind. She was
Floria La Tosca, screaming the idiotic lines of the play and going
through the pantomime of the stage murder. For a month she lay
completely insane. Her mildest moments were spent in weeping. The rest
of the time she lay crying out that she wanted to kill Scarpia, who had
betrayed her. Poor father was beside himself with grief. Nothing, of
course, could be done with Bandoux. They got rid of him and hushed up
the scandal. The theater was closed and father devoted himself to her.
He was a wonderful man, the finest man that ever lived.”

She paused in her story, her eyes glistening with tears.

“An impression I always had,” whispered De Medici, “a man smiling
courteously at grief.”

“He did his best,” Florence continued. “And gradually the active mania
left her. She became what we grew to regard as normal. But she was no
longer Florence Ballau. When she got over her violence she had forgotten
who she was, she’d forgotten even that she was father’s wife. All memory
of the past had been wiped out. She left the bed in the hospital one
day, quiet once more and unaware of her name, unaware even that she was
my mother.

“Father took us both away to a place in the north of England and we
lived there for some time. He did everything that could be done to
restore her. But it was futile. Apparently she had recovered from her
mania. But she was unable to return to herself. She developed during the
year in England into a docile, simple-minded woman—the woman you knew as
Jane. Father’s friends insisted that he put her into an insane asylum.
But he refused indignantly. He tried for a time to convince her she was
his wife. This fact, however, struck her as preposterous. She refused to
believe it or to have anything to do with father. And he was afraid of
talking too much to her about it, afraid of bringing on her insanity
again—I mean the active part of it. The result was that he finally hit
on the plan of convincing her that she was his housekeeper. This was
successful. She seemed willing to accept the part as his housekeeper,
and he brought us both to America, giving her another name. And our
strange life with Jane started.

“Nobody ever suspected. During the twenty years we lived in New York
father was constantly devoted to her. She was in his mind his wife, and
despite everything she remained so to the end. He never ceased to suffer
because of the position she insisted upon occupying, and he frequently
made love to her, trying to persuade her to marry him instead of her
remaining his housekeeper. But it was odd about poor mother. She would
grow puzzled when he became tender, and then her excitement would begin.
He was frightened of bringing on the violence—we called them spells—and
he would drop the subject. She would go around for several days
murmuring to herself and looking reproachfully at father, whom she had
grown to regard as a friend and protector. And if he pressed the matter
she would break out with the words: ‘I can’t marry you. Don’t you
understand?’ And she would stand and look at him with terror in her
eyes.

“As I grew up I became aware of all this and of what was going on.
Father made no secret of it. She was my mother. Somehow his quixotic
devotion inspired a similar affection in me. She was more than a
mother—an unfortunate to be protected and watched over. Through all the
years of his success and his rise to fame he remained absolutely
faithful to this self-imposed trust of his. There was never another
woman in his life than the memory of the beautiful actress that was
buried in the simple-minded housekeeper.”

She paused and looked sadly at De Medici.

“So much for the past,” she sighed. “Perhaps you can’t understand how a
man could be faithful and as kind as poor father.”

“I can,” De Medici answered. “It is sometimes easier to love a memory
than a woman ... and easier to be faithful to one.”

“Well,” Florence continued, “what I’ve told you is only part of it.
There were other things that happened. I’ll have to speak of them too
because ... well, because they form the story. I can hardly talk of them
even now. Oh, it was terrible! There were times when Floria returned,
the same Floria who had screamed for months in the London hospital. I
remember the first time I saw her. It was about twelve years ago. I came
home from school and found mother, that is Jane, dressed in a ball gown
and talking to father in a voice I had never heard before. She was
playing the part of La Tosca. When I arrived father was in tears. We
both managed somehow to quiet her and after an hour she fell asleep.
When she woke up she was Jane again. And there was no memory in her mind
of the scene she’d been through. She worked around for days, looking
dully at us and only half alive. But after this Floria returned a number
of times and each time more and more violently. We never knew when one
of the spells would come to her and we spent all our time watching her,
trying to anticipate her and soothe her. But despite all our efforts we
could do nothing. Floria would come and father would at once begin to
act. It was the only way to humor her. Several times I sat by crying my
eyes out and watching him play Baron Scarpia for her.

“We tried everything—remedies, travel, and even several specialists. But
the only thing we found able to bring her out of her spells, to end
quickly the delusion which would sweep her, was to let her have her own
way for a while. Father discovered that if he indulged her for a few
minutes and played the part of the Baron, if he let her dress herself as
Tosca, the Floria obsession would collapse of itself. And particularly
if I were present and watching. Otherwise the delusion would last for
hours—even days. And all this kept on through years. Oh, it was awful!
But he would never consider for a moment sending her away. She was his
wife to the last. I’ll tell you about the night ... about the night he
was killed,” she concluded for a space with a sigh.

De Medici sat waiting, his hand on hers and his eyes staring miserably
at her saddened face.

“On the night he was killed,” she resumed, “the same thing happened that
had happened frequently before. Floria returned. Father, worried and
frightened by the fact that my engagement party was to take place in a
few hours, telephoned me. He told me briefly over the phone that she was
in one of her spells. I understood. There was a chance, if he humored
her and if I were present, that we might rid her of the mania in a short
while. I rushed out of the theater beside myself. To have this thing
happen on this night seemed to me almost too much to bear. I was beside
myself with fear and grief. You know, when one has guarded a secret so
carefully all one’s life, one becomes almost like the secret itself. I
was not ashamed of having it known that Jane was my mother. But under
poor father’s influence, I had all my life worked with him to keep the
secret of her insanity hidden from our world. And it was as if something
beautiful would be soiled for him more than for me if it were
discovered.

“I got home in a few minutes. I had a key and let myself in. Father had
set the little scene as he frequently had done before. He had even put
on the black beard that he wore when he played Scarpia for her. He had
found that these details served to convince mother of the reality of the
scene and to shorten the awful thing. I ... I opened the door. He was
sitting in a chair with his back to me as I entered. I saw mother raise
the dagger and strike him, screaming at the same time. I stood still. I
thought for the moment it was another one of the awful make-believes I’d
witnessed so often. And I waited for father to stand up. He did. He
stood up slowly and turned and saw me and nodded with a smile. The
dagger was in his heart and he stood smiling at me. The act was over for
him, the terrible scene that he had so often played. It was over forever
this time. And as he fell he snatched at the thing on his chin and tore
it off.

“I still failed to realize what had happened. He had smiled so kindly, I
could hardly believe it was anything but a minor accident. But gradually
it came to me. I stood horrified and watched mother approach the body on
the floor and place the candle at his head and the crucifix on his body.
Then she turned and saw me. I thought of one thing only. That I must
save her. I knew he would wish it that way. I remembered how he had
looked when he stood before me with the dagger killing him.

“She walked to me and collapsed in my arms. I dragged her to the bedroom
and removed the costume. She lay in a heavy sleep for a few minutes. I
washed the rouge from my face. My mind, as you can imagine, was not
entirely clear. I didn’t know what to do with things. I was obsessed
only by the desire to protect her, to save her. And I must have thrust
the ball gown out of the window on the fire escape. But I didn’t
remember doing it when you came. She lay sleeping and I knew she would
sleep for at least ten minutes. I went into the library and then I must
have lost my head. I had an idea fixed in my mind of misleading the
police with false evidence. All I could think of was to make it look as
if a terrible fight had taken place. I pulled a lot of books down, cut a
few pictures, and turned over some chairs. I remember blowing out the
candle and seeing the beard in father’s hand. I was going to remove it
but thought it would be better to leave it there because it would
increase the mystery and baffle the police. I thought, too, that the
police would figure out he’d been attacked by a man and had torn the
false beard from his assailant’s face. I didn’t think of the gum
mucilage that might show on his own chin.

“You see now, Julien, why I couldn’t tell you anything, why I had to
keep still and lie and muddle things up. It was for his sake. I kept
feeling how he would feel if anything happened to her—if exposure
overtook her. I was desperate and the thought that it was you who seemed
intent upon unmasking the thing that we had kept so hidden for so long
drove me wild.”

“I understand,” De Medici nodded.

“After I’d fixed up the library,” Florence continued, “mother awoke. I
told her that she’d fainted and she said yes, she knew she was subject
to dizzy spells. She got dressed and went out to the kitchen to go on
with her work and I went into the library and screamed. She came running
to me and I told her father had been murdered. She remembered nothing,
of course, of what had happened. I impressed upon her that I had just
come in and found her fainting, but that she should not tell that to the
police because it would look bad for her; that she should just tell them
I had come in and screamed. You recall the first story she told. And the
time Lieutenant Norton asked her whether she had seen anybody else in
the apartment and she said yes, she had seen a man with a black beard, I
was standing just outside the door. For a moment I thought it was all
over and that the lieutenant had hypnotized poor mother or something and
was going to learn the secret from her. But she evidently recovered
herself and the Floria that almost spoke in the library that time
remained hidden.

“After the inquest I began to see what was worrying you, poor Julien. I
couldn’t understand at first, but from the way you spoke and acted I saw
that you didn’t believe it was I who had done it and that somehow you
accused yourself. Oh, it was terrible! I didn’t know what you might do,
and yet I figured blindly that if I kept still, your self-suspicions
would lead you off the track. Then I took mother to Rollo. We had been
there once before during a summer. There’s a sanitarium on the outskirts
of the village. They knew her there and the thing she was suffering
from. And I entrusted her to their keeping and hurried back to New York.
I remembered that during several of her seizures she had written letters
to father and signed them ‘Floria.’ They were letters threatening to
kill him and addressing him sometimes by name and sometimes as Baron
Scarpia. Some of them had the picture of a dagger underneath the name
Floria. I meant to destroy them and I recalled that it was one thing I
had forgotten to do. So I came back and they caught me.

“I had tried right along to make out I was convinced father had
committed suicide, and I was hoping the police would believe it. And
from the way they acted at the inquest I felt almost desperately certain
that they did. I knew you had learned about the telephone call, but I
was positive you would say nothing. Oh, you were so good, Julien! But
when they arrested me and began their questioning I saw that they hadn’t
been fooled. I didn’t know what course to take, so I decided to say
nothing. I didn’t care what happened to me. I think I must have gone a
little mad myself. And that night they brought you and that terrible
doctor to the station I was completely insane. Crazed ideas kept coming
into my head. I couldn’t figure out how much you knew, and when Dr.
Lytton started hypnotizing me I pretended to be in a hypnotic sleep. I
was going to confess to being a double personality. I saw at once that
was what you and he suspected. But somehow I couldn’t. I played with the
idea until I became frantic and then fainted. That wasn’t acting—the
faint,” she smiled; “that was real. But it came in handy.

“And then this awful farce started. Lieutenant Norton decided to release
me and did. And I made for the train at once. I had a feeling that
things were wrong with her. I must have taken the same train as Dr.
Lytton did. It was quite dark when I got off at Rollo and we didn’t see
each other. I made directly for the sanitarium. They admitted me and the
doctor was glad I had come. He told me that mother had left two days ago
and he didn’t know what had become of her. She had eluded the attendants
and vanished.

“I was beside myself and didn’t know what to do. It seemed that all I’d
been through was now for nothing. Poor mother was alone, crazed and
wandering. God knew where. And I started walking distractedly in the
street not knowing what to do first or where to go, when Dr. Lytton
stopped me. When I saw him I felt that it was all over, that he knew
everything. But when he began to talk to me I noticed at once it was I
he suspected. He thought I was the insane one, the double ego and all
that. And I listened to what he said. It was easy to take him in.”

Here she smiled and De Medici found it suddenly difficult to suppress a
laugh. The vision of the didactic scientist and his arbitrary
conclusions, his subsequent discomfiture and good sportsmanship in
admitting his innumerable errors, lightened the mood between them.

“That night she came here,” smiled De Medici, “and I knew, when I saw
you beside Dr. Lytton on his return from Rollo, that he’d blundered.
That is, I suspected it. There was another suspicion, but we’ll not
discuss that any more.”

“I know.” Florence looked tenderly at him. “Dr. Lytton told me. Anyway,
after he’d talked to me in the village hotel I improvised a story that
fitted in with his theories. My chief idea was to get him out of Rollo.
I was all to pieces. All I could think of was that I had to keep him
from finding out about mother at the sanitarium. And when he wanted me
to confess, I confessed. It seemed to cheer him up a great deal.”

“Yes,” said De Medici, “he’s a terrible man to argue with. But the truth
dawned on me—about her—as we were coming up here from the train. It
struck me as if it had been something I had known from the first. Merely
that there had been only one other person in your home at the time he
was killed and that this person had been Jane. And when I thought this,
it all straightened out. I knew your mother had been an actress. I knew
you were protecting your mother. And I knew she had killed poor Victor.
And knowing all this, it cleared up suddenly when I thought of Jane.
There was only one thing. The murder ritual ... out of a play. I
surmised that in the next few minutes while Dr. Lytton was holding forth
on your guilt. I couldn’t place the play until I saw her come in the
room. And then La Tosca showed itself in my head. I had read and
witnessed the thing a score of times and was familiar with most of the
scenes.”

Florence rose and moved to a window. De Medici, beside her, placed his
arm about her shoulders.

“There is only one mystery left,” he murmured.

She turned shining eyes to him.

“You,” he said, “and this thing in my heart that makes life incomplete
without you.”

                     [Illustration: {uncaptioned}]

                                THE END

                          Transcriber’s Notes

--Copyright notice provided as in the original—this e-text is public
  domain in the country of publication.

--In the text versions, delimited italics text in _underscores_ (the
  HTML version reproduces the font form of the printed book.)

--Silently corrected palpable typos; left non-standard spellings and
  dialect unchanged.

--Conjecturally restored {within brackets} one line missing from the
  printed version.


logical processes of thought; her feelings often got her into
troublesome perplexities.

Thyrza came up again. Mrs. Grail had received her with tears and
silence at first, but soon with something of the gratitude which
Gilbert felt.

'I told them I was going to stay till to-morrow. I shall have tea with
them then. You'll spare me for an hour, Lyddy?'

There was no talk between them as yet on the main subject of their
thoughts. Something that was said caused Lydia to go to her cupboard
and bring forth an object which Thyrza at once recognised. It was Mr.
Boddy's violin.

'I shall always keep it,' she said. 'I have had offers to buy it, but I
shall have to be badly in want before it goes.'

She had redeemed it from the pawnbroker's, and no one had opposed her
claim to possess it. The expenses of the old man's burial had been
defrayed by a subscription Ackroyd got up among those who remembered
Mr. Boddy with kindness.

Thyrza touched the strings, and shrank back frightened at the sound.
The ghost of dead music, it evoked the ghost of her dead self.

They fell into solemn talk. Thyrza had resolved that she would not tell
her sister the truth of everything for a long time; some day she would
do so, when the new life had become old habit. But, as they sat by the
fire and spoke in low voices, she was impelled to make all known. Why
should there any longer be a secret between Lyddy and herself? It would
be yet another help to her if she told Lyddy; she felt at length that
she must.

So the story was whispered. Lydia could only hold her sister in her
arms, and shed tears of love and pity.

'We will never speak of it again, dearest,' Thyrza said; 'never, as
long as we live!'

'No, never as long as we live!'

'It's all very long ago, already,' Thyrza added. 'I don't suffer now,
dear one. I have borne so much, that I think I can't feel pain any
more. With you, here in our home, I am happy, and, wherever I am, I
don't think I shall ever be _un_happy. I have written to Mrs. Ormonde,
and she will let him know. He will think I came back because I had long
forgotten him, and was sorry that I ever left Gilbert. You see, that's
what I wish him to believe. Now there'll be nothing to prevent him from
marrying who he likes. No one can say that he has done harm which can
never be undone, can they? I shall rest now, and life will seem easy.
So little will be asked of me; I shall do my best so willingly.'

In the morning Thyrza said:

'I have a fancy, Lyddy. I want you to do my hair for me again.'

'Like you wear it now?'

'No, I mean in the old way. Will it make me look a child again? Never
mind, that is what I should like. I'll have it so when I go downstairs
to tea.'

And whilst Lydia was busy with the golden tresses, Thyrza laughed
suddenly. She had only just thought again of the ducks in the park. She
told all about them, and they laughed together.

'I wonder whether Mrs. Jarmey knows I'm here,' Thyrza said. 'You think
not? Won't someone be coming to see you? Won't Mary?'

'Yes. She always calls for me to go to chapel. Would you rather not see
her?'

'Not to-day, Lyddy. Not till I'm in my own home.'

'But I may tell her you're here? I'll go down in time to meet her, and
I won't go to chapel this morning. No, I'll stay with you this morning,
dear.'

So it was arranged. And they cooked their dinner as they used to; only
Thyrza declared that Lydia had been extravagant in providing.

'I see how you indulge yourself, now that I'm away! Oh yes, of course
you pretend it's only for me.'

How could she be so merry? Lydia thought. But this smile was not always
on her face.

The day passed very quickly. Lydia said she would go out whilst Thyrza
was with the Grails; she had promised to see someone. Thyrza did not
ask who it was.

When she came upstairs again the other had not yet returned. She was
yet a quarter of an hour away. Then she appeared with signs of haste.

'I was afraid you'd be here alone,' she said.

'But have you had tea, Lyddy?'

'Yes.'

This 'yes' was said rather mysteriously. And Lydia's subsequent
behaviour was also mysterious. She took her hat off and stood with it
in her hand, as if not knowing where to put it. Then she sat down,
forgetting that she still wore her jacket. Reminded of this, she stood
about the room, undecidedly.

'What are you thinking of, Lyddy?'

'Nothing.'

She sat down at last, but had so singular a countenance that Thyrza was
obliged to remark on it.

'What have you been doing? Never mind, if you'd rather not tell me.'

Two or three minutes passed before Lydia could make up her mind to
tell. She began by saying:

'You know when I went down to see Mary this morning?'

'Yes,'

'She said she'd seen--that she'd seen Mrs. Poole, and that I was to be
sure to go round to Mrs. Poole's some time in the afternoon, as she
wanted to see me, particular.'

'Yes. And that's where you went?'

Lydia seemed to have no more to say. Thyrza looked at her searchingly.

'Well, Lyddy, there's nothing in that. What else? I know there's
something else.'

'Yes, there is. I went to the house, and, when I knocked at the door,
Mr. Ackroyd opened it.'

Thyrza had begun to tremble. Her eyes watched her sister's face
eagerly; she read something in the heightened colour it showed.

'And then, Lyddy? And then?'

'He asked me to come into the sitting-room. And then he--he said he
wanted me to marry him, Thyrza.'

'Lyddy! It is true? At last?'

Thyrza could scarcely contain herself for joy. She had longed for this.
No happiness of her own would have been in truth complete until there
came like happiness to her sister. She knew how long, how patiently,
with what self-sacrifice, Lydia had been faithful to this her first
love. Again and again the love had seemed for ever hopeless; yet Lydia
gave no sign of sorrow. The sisters were unlike each other in this.
Lydia's nature, fortunately for herself, was not passionate; but its
tenderness none knew as Thyrza did, its tenderness and its steadfast
faith.

'Thyrza, any one would think you are more glad of it than I am.'

'There are no words to tell my gladness, dearest! Good Lyddy! At last,
at last!'

Her face changed from moment to moment; it was now flushed, now again
pale. Once or twice she put her hand against her side.

'How excitable you always were, little one!' Lydia said. 'Come and sit
quietly. It's bad luck when any one makes so much of a thing.'

Thyrza grew calmer. Her face showed that she was suppressing pain. In a
few minutes she said:

'I'll just lie down, Lyddy. I shall be better directly. Don't trouble,
it's nothing. Come and sit by me. How glad I am! Look pleased, just to
please me, will you?'

Both were quiet. Thyrza said it had only been a feeling of faintness;
it was gone now.

The fire was getting low. Lydia went to stir it. She had done so and
was turning to the bed again, when Thyrza half rose, crying in a
smothered voice:

'Lyddy! Come!'

Then she fell back. Her sister was bending over her in an instant, was
loosening her dress, doing all that may restore one who has fainted.
But for Thyrza there was no awaking.

Had she not herself desired it? And what gift more blessed, of all that
man may pray for?

She was at rest, the pure, the gentle, at rest in her maidenhood. The
joy that had strength to kill her was not of her own; of the two great
loves between which her soul was divided, that which was lifelong
triumphed in her life's last moment.

She who wept there through the night would have lain dead if that cold
face could in exchange have been touched by the dawn to waking. She
felt that her life was desolate; she mourned as for one on whom the
extremity of fate has fallen. Mourn she must, in the anguish of her
loss; she could not know the cruelty that was in her longing to bring
the sleeper back to consciousness. The heart that had ached so wearily
would ache no more; for the tired brain there was no more doubt. Had
existence been to her but one song of thanksgiving, even then to lie
thus had been more desirable. For to sleep is better than to wake, and
how should we who live bear the day's burden but for the promise of
death.

On Monday at noon there arrived a telegram, addressed to 'Miss Thyrza
Trent.' Gilbert received it from Mrs. Jarmey, and he took it upstairs
to Lydia, who opened it. It was from Mrs. Ormonde; she was at the
Emersons', and wished to know when Thyrza would return; she desired to
see her.

'Will you write to her, Gilbert?' Lydia asked.

'Wouldn't it be better if I went to see her?'

Yes, that was felt to be better. It was known that Thyrza had written
to Mrs. Ormonde on Saturday, so that nothing needed to be explained;
Gilbert had only to bear his simple news.

Arrived at the house, he had to wait. Mrs. Ormonde was gone out for an
hour, and neither Mr. Emerson nor his wife was at home. He sat in the
Emersons' parlour, seldom stirring, his eyes unobservant. For Gilbert
Grail there was little left in the world that he cared to look at.

Mrs. Ormonde came in. She regarded Gilbert with uncertainty, having
been told that someone waited for her, but nothing more. Gilbert rose
and made himself known to her. Then, marking his expression, she was
fearful.

'You have come from Miss Trent--from Thyrza,' she said, giving him her
hand.

'She could not come herself, Mrs. Ormonde.'

'Thyrza is ill?'

He hesitated. His face had told her the truth before he uttered:

'She is dead!'

It is seldom that we experience a simple emotion. When the words,
incredible at first, had established their meaning in her mind, Mrs.
Ormonde knew that with her human grief there blended an awe-struck
thankfulness. She stood on other ground than Lydia's, on other than
Gilbert's; her heart had been wrung by the short unaffected letter she
had received from Thyrza, and, though she could only acquiesce, the
future had looked grey and joyless. To hear it said of Thyrza, 'She is
dead!' chilled her; the world of her affections was beyond measure
poorer by the loss of that sweet and noble being. But could she by a
word have reversed the decision of fate, love would not have suffered
her to speak it.

They talked together, and at the end she said:

'If Lydia will let me come and see her, I shall be very grateful. Will
you ask her, and send word to me speedily?'

The permission was granted. Mrs. Ormonde went to Walnut Tree Walk that
evening, and Gilbert conducted her to the door of the room. The lamp
gave its ordinary stinted light. There was nothing unusual in the
appearance of the chamber. In the bed one lay asleep.

Mrs. Ormonde took Lydia's hands and without speaking kissed her. Then
Lydia raised the lamp from the table, and held it so that the light
fell on her sister's face. No remnant of pain was there, only calm,
unblemished beauty; the lips were as naturally composed as if they
might still part to give utterance to song; the brow showed its lines
of high imaginativeness even more clearly than in life. The golden
braid rested by her neck as in childhood.

'Have you any picture of her?' Mrs. Ormonde asked.

'No.'

'Will you let me have one made--drawn from her face now, but looking as
she did in life? It shall be done by a good artist; I think it can be
done successfully.'

Lydia was in doubt. The thought of introducing a stranger to this room
to sit and pore upon the dead face with cold interest was repugnant to
her. Yet if Thyrza's face really could be preserved, to look at her,
for others dear to her to look at, that would be much. She gave her
assent.

Mary Bower came frequently; her silent presence was a help to Lydia
through the miseries of the next few days.

One other there was who asked timidly to be allowed to see Thyrza once
more--her friend Totty. She sought Mary Bower, and said how much she
wished it, though she feared Lydia would not grant her wish. But it was
granted readily, Totty had her sad pleasure, and her solemn memory.

Mrs. Ormonde knew that it was better for her not to attend the funeral.
On the evening before, she left at the house a small wreath of white
flowers. Lydia, Gilbert, Mary Bower, Luke Ackroyd and his sister, these
only went to the cemetery. He whom Thyrza would have wished to follow
her, in thought at least, to the grave, was too far away to know of her
death till later.

The next day, Lydia sat for an hour with Ackroyd. They did not speak
much. But before she left him, Lydia looked into his face and said:

'Do you wish me to believe, Luke, that I shall never see my sister
again?'

He bent his face and kept silence.

'Do you think that I could live if I believed that she was gone for
ever? That I should never meet Thyrza after this, never again?'

'I shall never wish you to think in that way, Lyddy,' he answered,
kindly. 'I've often talked as if I knew things for certain, when I know
nothing. You're better in yourself than I am, and you may feel more of
the truth.'

The next morning, Lydia went to her work as usual. Gilbert had already
returned to his. The clear winter sunshine was already a thing of the
far past; in the streets was the slush of thaw, and darkness fell early
from the obscured sky.

CHAPTER XLI

THE LIVING

This winter the Newthorpes spent abroad. Mr. Newthorpe was in very
doubtful health when he went to Ullswater, just before Egremont's
return to England, and by the end of the autumn his condition was such
as to cause a renewal of Annabel's former fears. On a quick decision,
they departed for Cannes, and remained there till early in the
following April.

'There's a sort of absurdity,' Mr. Newthorpe remarked, 'in living when
you can think of nothing but how you're to save your life. Better have
done with it, I think. It strikes me as an impiety, too, to go playing
at hide-and-seek with the gods.'

They came back to Eastbourne, which, on the whole, seemed to suit the
invalid during these summer months. He did little now but muse over a
few favourite books and listen to his daughter's conversation.
Comparatively a young man, his energies were spent, his life was behind
him. To Annabel it was infinitely sorrowful to have observed this rapid
process of decay. She could not be persuaded that the failure of his
powers was anything more than temporary. But her father lost no
opportunity of warning her that she deceived herself. He had his
reasons for doing so.

His temper was perfect: his outlook on the world remained that of a
genial pessimist, a type of man common enough in our day. He seemed to
find a pleasure in urbanely mocking at his own futility.

'I am the sort of man,' he once said, 'of whom Tourgueneff would make
an admirable study. There's tragedy in me, if you have the eyes to see
it. I don't think any one can help feeling kindly towards me. I don't
think any one can altogether despise me. Yet my life is a mere
inefficacy.'

'You have had much enjoyment in your life, father,' Annabel replied,
'and enjoyment of the purest kind. In our age of the world I think that
must be a sufficient content.'

'Why, there you've hit it, Bell. 'Tis the age. There's somebody else I
know who had better take warning by me. But I think he has done.'

They were talking thus as they sat alone in one of the places of
shelter on the Parade. Other people had departed on the serious
business of dining; but the evening was beautiful, and these two were
tempted to remain and watch the sea.

'You mean Mr. Egremont,' Annabel said.

'Yes. I wonder very much what he will be at my age. He won't be
anything particular, of course.'

'No, I don't suppose he will do anything remarkable,' the girl assented
impartially.

'Yet he might have done,' recommenced her father, with some annoyance,
as if his remark had not elicited the answer he looked for. 'This
mill-work of his I consider mere discipline. I should have thought two
years of it enough; three certainly ought to be. A fourth, and he will
never do anything else.'

'What else should he do?'

Mr. Newthorpe laughed a little.

'There's only one thing for such a fellow to do nowadays. Let him write
something.'

'Write?' Annabel mused. 'Yes, I suppose there is nothing else. Yet he
happens to have sufficient means.'

'Do you mean it for an epigram? Well, it will pass. True, there's the
hardship of his position. There's nothing for him to do but to write,
yet he is handicapped by his money. I should have done something worth
the doing, if I had had to write for bread and cheese. Let him show
that he has something in him, in spite of the fact that he has never
gone without his dinner. Yes, but that would prove him an extraordinary
man, and we agree that he is nothing of the kind.'

'Haven't you ever felt a sort of uneasy shame when you have heard of
another acquaintance taking up the pen?'

'Of course I have. I've felt the same when I've heard of someone being
born.'

'Suppose I announced to you that I was writing a novel?'

'I am a philosopher, Bell.'

'Precisely. It would be disagreeable to me if I heard that Mr. Egremont
was writing a novel. If he published anything very good, it wouldn't
trouble one so much after the event. I don't see why he should write. I
think he'd better continue to give half his day to something practical,
and the other half to the pleasures of a man of culture. It will
preserve his balance.'

'Bella mia, you are greatly disillusioned for a young girl.'

'I don't feel that the term is applicable to me. I am disillusioned,
father, because I am getting reasonably old.'

'You live too much alone.'

'I prefer it.'

Mr. Newthorpe seemed to be turning over a thought.

'I suppose,' he said at length, with a glance at his daughter, 'that
what you have just said explains our friend's return to his oil-cloth.'

'Not entirely, I think.'

'H'm. You sent him about his business, however.

Annabel looked straight before her at the sea; her lips barely smiled.

'You are mistaken. He gave me no right to do so.'

'Oh? Then I have been on a wrong tack.'

'Shall we walk homewards?'

Towards the end of August, Mr. and Mrs. Dalmaine were at Eastbourne for
a few days. Paula spent one hour with her cousin in private, no more.
The two had drifted further apart than ever. But in that one hour Paula
had matter enough for talk. There had been a General Election during
the summer, and Mr. Dalmaine had victoriously retained his seat for
Vauxhall. His wife could speak of nothing else.

'What I would have given if you could have seen me canvassing, Bell!
Now I've found the one thing that I can do really well. I wish
Parliaments were annual!'

'My dear Paula, what has made you so misanthropic?'

'I don't understand. You know I never do understand your clever
remarks, Bell; please speak quite simply, will you? Oh, but the
canvassing! Of course I didn't get on with people's wives as well as
with people themselves; women never do, you know. You should have heard
me arguing questions with working men and shopkeepers! Mr. Dalmaine
once told me I'd better keep out of politics, as I only made a bungle
of it; but I've learnt a great deal since then. He admits now that I
really do understand the main questions. Of course it's all his
teaching. He puts things so clearly, you know. I suppose there's no one
in the House who makes such clear speeches as he does.'

'The result of your work was very satisfactory.'

'Wasn't it! Fifteen hundred majority! Then we drove all about the
borough, and I had to bow nicely to people who waved their hats and
shouted. It was a new sensation; I think I never enjoyed anything so
much in my life. He is enormously popular, my husband. And everybody
says he is doing an enormous lot of good. You know, Bell, it was a mere
chance that he isn't in the Ministry! His name was mentioned; we know
it for a fact. There's no doubt whatever he'll be in next time, if the
Liberal Government keeps up. It is so annoying that Parliaments
generally last so long! Think what that will be, when he is a Minister!
I shouldn't wonder if you come to see me some day in Downing Street,
Bell.'

'I should be afraid, Paula.'

'Nonsense! Your husband will bring you. Don't you think Mr. Dalmaine's
looking remarkably well? I'm so sorry I haven't got my little boy here
for you to see. We've decided that _he's_ to be Prime Minister! I hope
you read Mr. Dalmaine's speeches, Bell?'

'Frequently.'

'That's good of you! He's thinking of publishing a volume of those that
deal with factory legislation. You should have heard what they said
about him, at the election time!'

Paula was still charming, but it must be confessed a trifle vulgarised.
Formerly she had not been vulgar at all; at present one discerned
unmistakably the influence of her husband, and of the world in which
she lived. In person, she showed the matron somewhat prematurely; one
saw that in another ten years she would be portly; her round fair face
would become too round and too pinky. Mentally, she was at length
formed, and to Mr. Dalmaine was due the credit of having formed her.

This gentleman did his kinsfolk the honour of calling upon them. He had
grown a little stouter; he bore himself with conscious dignity; you saw
that he had not much time, nor much attention, to bestow upon
unpolitical people. He was suave and abrupt by turns; he used his hands
freely in conversing. Mr. Newthorpe smiled much during the interview
with him, and, a few hours later, when alone with Annabel, he suddenly
exclaimed:

'What an ignorant pretentious numskull that fellow is!'

'Of whom do you speak?'

'Why, of Dalmaine, of course.'

'My dear father!--A philanthropist! One of the forces of the time!'

Mr. Newthorpe leaned back and laughed.

'Perfectly true,' he said presently. 'Whence we may arrive at certain
conclusions with regard to mankind at large and our time in particular.
That poor pretty girl! It's too bad.'

'She is happy.'

'True again. And it would be foolish to wish her miserable. Bell, let
us join hands and go to the old ferryman's boat together.'

'It would cost me no pang, father. Still we will walk a little longer
on the sea-shore.'

And whilst this conversation was going on, Mr. and Mrs. Dalmaine sat
after dinner on the balcony of their hotel, talking occasionally.
Dalmaine smoked a cigar: his eyes betrayed the pleasures of digestion
and thought on high matters of State.

He said all at once:

'By-the-by, Lady Wigger is at the Queen's Hotel, I see. You will call
to-morrow.'

'Lady Wigger? But really I don't think I can, dear,' Paula replied,
timidly.

'Why not?'

'Why, you know she was so shockingly rude to me at the Huntleys' ball.
You said it was abominable, yourself.'

'So it was, but you'd better call.'

'I'd much rather not.'

Dalmaine looked at her with Olympian surprise.

'But, my dear,' he said with suave firmness, 'I said that you had
better call. The people must not be neglected; they will be useful. Do
you understand me?'

'Yes, love.'

Paula was quiet for a few moments, then talked as brightly as ever....

One day close upon the end of September, Mrs. Ormonde had to pay a
visit to the little village of West Dean, which is some four miles
distant from Eastbourne, inland and westward. Business of a domestic
nature took her thither; she wished to visit a cottage for the purpose
of seeing a girl whom she thought of engaging as a servant. The day was
very beautiful; she asked the Newthorpes to accompany her on the drive.
Mr. Newthorpe preferred to remain at home; Annabel accepted the
invitation.

The road was uphill, until the level of the Downs was reached; then it
went winding along, with fair stretches of scenery on either hand,
between fields fragrant of Autumn, overhead the broad soft purple sky.
First East Dean was passed, a few rustic houses nestling, as the name
implies, in its gentle hollow. After that, another gradual ascent, and
presently the carriage paused at a point of the road immediately above
the village to which they were going.

The desire to stop was simultaneous in Mrs. Ormonde and her companion;
their eyes rested on as sweet a bit of landscape as can be found in
England, one of those scenes which are typical of the Southern
countries. It was a broad valley, at the lowest point of which lay West
Dean. The hamlet consists of very few houses, all so compactly grouped
about the old church that from this distance it seemed as if the hand
could cover them. The roofs were overgrown with lichen, yellow on
slate, red on tiles. In the farmyards were haystacks with yellow
conical coverings of thatch. And around all closed dense masses of
chestnut foliage, the green just touched with gold. The little group of
houses had mellowed with age; their guarded peacefulness was soothing
to the eye and the spirit. Along the stretch of the hollow the land was
parcelled into meadows and tilth of varied hue. Here was a great patch
of warm grey soil, where horses were drawing the harrow; yonder the
same work was being done by sleek black oxen. Where there was pasture,
its chalky-brown colour told of the nature of the earth which produced
it. A vast oblong running right athwart the far side of the valley had
just been strewn with loam; it was the darkest purple. The bright
yellow of the 'kelk' spread in several directions; and here and there
rose thin wreaths of white smoke, where a pile of uprooted couch-grass
was burning; the scent was borne hither by a breeze that could be
scarcely felt.

The clock of the old church struck four.

'A kindness, Mrs. Ormonde!' said Annabel. 'Let me stay here whilst you
drive down into the village. I don't wish to see the people there just
now. To sit here and look down on that picture will do me good.'

'By all means. But I dare say I shall be half an hour. It will take ten
minutes to drive down.'

'Never mind. I shall sit here on the bank, and enjoy myself.'

Now it happened that on this same September day a young man left
Brighton and started to walk eastward along the coast. He had come into
Brighton from London the evening before, having to pay a visit to the
family of an acquaintance of his who had recently died in Pennsylvania,
and who, when dying, had asked him to perform this office on his return
to England. He was no stranger to Brighton; he knew that, if one is
obliged to visit the place, it is well to be there under cover of the
night and to depart as speedily as possible from amid its vulgar
hideousness. So, not later than eight on the following morning, he had
left the abomination behind him, and was approaching Rottingdean.

His destination was Eastbourne; the thought of going thither on foot
came to him as he glanced at a map of the coast whilst at breakfast.
The weather was perfect, and the walk would be full of interest.

One would have said that he had a mind very free from care. For the
most part he stepped on at a good round pace, observing well; sometimes
he paused, as if merely to enjoy the air. He was in excellent health;
he smiled readily.

At Rottingdean he lingered for awhile. A soft mist hung all around; sky
and sea were of a delicate blurred blue-grey, the former mottled in
places. The sun was not visible, but its light lay in one long gleaming
line out on the level water; beyond, all was vapour-veiled. There were
no breakers; now and then a larger ripple than usual splashed on the
beach, and that was the only sound the sea gave. It was full tide; the
water at the foot of the cliffs was of a wonderful green, pellucid,
delicate, through which the chalk was visible, with dark masses of weed
here and there. Swallows in great numbers flew about the edge, and
thistle-down floated everywhere. From the fields came a tinkle of
sheep-bells.

The pedestrian sighed when he rose to continue his progress. It was
noticeable that, as he went on, he lost something of his cheerfulness
of manner; probably the early rising and the first taste of exercise
had had their effect upon him, and now he was returning to his more
wonted self. The autumn air, the sun-stained mist, the silent sea,
would naturally incline to pensiveness one who knew that mood.

The air was unimaginably calm; the thistle-down gave proof that only
the faintest breath was stirring. On the Downs beyond Rottingdean lay
two or three bird-catchers, prone as they watched the semicircle of
call-birds in cages, and held their hand on the string which closed the
nets. The young man spoke a few words with one of these, curious about
his craft.

He came down upon Newhaven, and halted in the town for refreshment;
then, having loitered a little to look at the shipping, he climbed the
opposite side of the valley, and made his way as far as Seaford. Thence
another climb, and a bend inland, for the next indentation of the coast
was Cuckmere Haven, and the water could only be crossed at some
distance from the sea. The country through which the Cuckmere flowed
had a melancholy picturesqueness. It was a great reach of level
meadows, very marshy, with red-brown rushes growing in every ditch, and
low trees in places, their trunks wrapped in bright yellow lichen; nor
only their trunks, but the very smallest of their twigs was so clad.
All over the flats were cows pasturing, black cows, contrasting with
flocks of white sheep, which were gathered together, bleating. The
coarse grass was sun-scorched; the slope of the Downs on either side
showed the customary chalky green. The mist had now all but dispersed,
yet there was still only blurred sunshine. Rooks hovered beneath the
sky, heavily, lazily, and uttered their long caws.

The Cuckmere was crossed, and another ascent began. The sea was now
hidden; the road would run inland, cutting off the great angle made by
Beachy Head. The pedestrian had made notes of his track; he knew that
he was now approaching a village called West Dean. He had lingered by
the Cuckmere; now he braced himself. And he came in sight of West Dean
as the church clock struck four.

He wished now to make speed to Eastbourne, but the loveliness of the
hollow above which the road ran perforce checked him; he paced forward
very slowly, his eyes bent upon the hamlet. Something moved, near to
him. He looked round. A lady was standing in the road, and, of all
strange things, a lady of whom at that moment he was thinking.

'By what inconceivable chance does this happen, Miss Newthorpe?' he
said, taking her offered hand.

'Surely the question would come with even more force from me,' Annabel
made answer. 'You might have presumed me to be in England, Mr.
Egremont; I, on the other hand, certainly imagined that you were beyond
the Atlantic.'

'I have been in England a day or two.'

'But here? Looking down upon West Dean?'

'I have walked from Brighton--one of the most delightful walks I ever
took.'

'A long one, surely. I am waiting for Mrs. Ormonde. She is with the
carriage below. I chose to wait here, to feast my eyes.'

Both turned again to the picture. The two did not sort ill together.
Annabel was very womanly, of fair, thoughtful countenance, and she
stood with no less grace, though maturer, than by the ripples of
Ullswater, four years ago. She had the visage of a woman whose
intellect is highly trained, a face sensitive to every note of the
soul's music, yet impressed with the sober consciousness which comes of
self-study and experience. A woman, one would have said, who could act
as nobly as she could speak, yet who would prefer both to live and to
express herself in a minor key. And Egremont was not unlike her in some
essential points. The turn for irony was more pronounced on his
features, yet he had the eyes of an idealist. He, too, would choose
restraint in preference to outbreak of emotion: he too could be
forcible if occasion of sufficient pressure lay upon him. And the
probability remained, that both one and the other would choose a path
of life where there was small risk of their stronger faculties being
demanded.

They talked of the landscape, of that exclusively, until Mrs. Ormonde's
carriage was seen reascending the hill. Then they became silent, and
stood so as their common friend drew near. Her astonishment was not
slight, but she gave it only momentary expression, then passed on to
general talk.

'I always regard you as reasonably emancipated, Annabel,' she said,
'but none the less I felt a certain surprise in noticing you intimately
conversing with a chance wayfarer. Mr. Egremont, be good enough to seat
yourself opposite to us.'

They drove back to Eastbourne. All conversed on the way with as much
ease as if they had this afternoon set forth in company from The
Chestnuts.

'This is what, at school, we used to call a 'lift,'' said Egremont.

'A welcome one, too, I should think,' Mrs. Ormonde replied. 'But you
always calculated distances by 'walks,' I remember, when others measure
by the carriage or the railway. Annabel, you too are an excellent
walker; you have often brought me to extremities in the lakes, though I
wouldn't confess it. And pray, Mr. Egremont, for whom was your visit
intended? Shall I put you down at Mr. Newthorpe's door, or had you my
humble house in view?'

'It is natural to me to count upon The Chestnuts as a place of rest, at
all events,' Walter replied. 'I should not have ventured to disturb Mr.
Newthorpe this evening.'

'We will wait at the door, Mrs. Ormonde,' put in Annabel. 'Father will
come out as he always does.'

Accordingly the carriage was stopped at the Newthorpes' house, and, as
Annabel had predicted, her father sauntered forth.

'Ah, how do you do, Egremont?' he said, after a scarcely appreciable
hesitation, giving his hand with perfect self-possession. 'Turned up on
the road, have you?'

The ladies laughed. Annabel left the carriage, and the other two drove
on to The Chestnuts.

Egremont dined and spent the evening with Mrs. Ormonde. Their
conversation was long and intimate, yet it was some time before
reference was made to the subject both had most distinctly in mind.

'I went to see Grail as soon as I got to London,' Egremont said at
length.

'I am glad of that. But how did you know where to find him?'

'They gave me his address at the old house. He seems comfortably lodged
with his friend Ackroyd. Mrs. Ackroyd opened the door to me; of course
I didn't know her, and she wouldn't know me; Grail told me who it was
afterwards. I could recall no likeness to her sister.'

'There is very little. The poor girl is in calm water at last, I hope.
She was to have been married on Midsummer Day, and, the night before,
Mrs. Grail died; so they put it off. And what of Mr. Grail?'

'He behaved admirably to me; he did not let me feel for a moment that I
excited any trouble in his memory.'

'But does his life seem bitter to him--his employment, I mean?'

'I can't think he finds it so. He spoke very frankly, and assured me
that he has all the leisure time he cared to use. He says he is not so
eager after knowledge as formerly; it is enough for him to read the
books he likes. I went with the intention of asking him to let me be of
some use, if I could. But it was a delicate matter, in any case, and I
found that he understood me without plain speech: he conveyed his
answer distinctly enough. No, I sincerely think that he has reached
that point of resignation at which a man dreads to be disturbed. He
spoke with emotion of Mrs. Ackroyd; she is invaluable to him, I saw.'

'She is a true-hearted woman.'

Egremont let a minute pass, then said:

'You will show me the portrait?'

'Certainly. It hangs in my bedroom; I will fetch it.'

She went and returned quickly, carrying a red crayon drawing framed in
plain oak. In the corner was a well-known signature, that of one of the
few living artists to whom one would appeal with confidence for the
execution of a task such as this, a man whom success has not
vulgarised, and who is still of opinion that the true artist will
oftener find his inspiration in a London garret than amid the banality
of the plutocrat's drawing-room. The work was of course masterly in
execution; it was no less admirable as a portrait. In those few lines
of chalk, Thyrza lived. He had divined the secret of the girl's soul,
that gift of passionate imagination which in her early years sunk her
in hour-long reverie, and later burned her life away. The mood embodied
was one so characteristic of Thyrza that one marvelled at the insight
which had evoked it from a dead face; she was not happy, she was net
downcast; her eyes _saw_ something, something which stirred her being,
something for which she yearned, passionately, yet with knowledge that
it was for ever forbidden to her. A face of infinite pathos, which drew
tears to the eyes, yet was unutterably sweet to gaze upon.

Holding the picture, Egremont turned to his companion, and said in a
subdued voice,

'This was Thyrza?'

'Her very self.'

'He knew her story?'

'The bare facts, of course without names, without details. He would
take nothing for the original drawing--Lydia has it--and nothing for
this copy which he made me. He said I had done him a great kindness.'

'Oh, if one could be a man like that!'

The words answered to his thoughts, yet implied something more than
their plain meaning. They uttered more than one regret, more than one
aspiration.

'Let me take it, Walter.'

'One moment!--This was Thyrza?'

'Let me take it.'

'Tell me--has Miss Newthorpe seen it?'

'Yes.'

Mrs. Ormonde bore the picture away. In a few minutes Egremont took his
leave, and went to the hotel to which he had sent his travelling-bag
from Brighton. It was long before he slept. He was thinking of a night
a little more than a year ago, when he had walked by the shore and held
debate with himself....

On the following evening, shortly before sunset, Annabel and he walked
on the short dry grass of the Down that rises to Beachy Head. There had
been another day of supreme tranquillity, of blurred sunshine, of
soothing autumnal warmth. And this was the crowning hour. The mist had
drifted from the land and the sea; as the two continued their ascent,
the view became lovelier. They regarded it, but spoke of other things.

'I have no wish to go back to America,' Egremont was saying, 'but, if I
do, I shall very likely settle there for good. I don't think I am
ideally adapted to a pursuit of that kind, but habit makes it quite
tolerable.'

'What should you do if you remained in England?' Annabel asked, her
voice implying no more than friendly interest.

'I might say that I don't know, but it wouldn't be true. I know well
enough I should live the life of a student, and of a man who looks on
contemporary things with an artistic interest, though he lacks the
artistic power to use his observations. In time I should marry. I
should have pleasure in my house, should make it as beautiful as might
be, should gather a very few friends about me. I should not become
morbid; the danger of that is over. Every opportunity I saw of helping
those less fortunate than myself I should gladly seize; it is not
impossible that I might seek opportunities, that I might found some
institution--of quite commonplace aims, be assured. For instance, I
should like to see other Homes like Mrs. Ormonde's; many women could
conduct them, if the means were supplied. And so on.'

'Yes, that is all very reasonable. It lies with yourself to decide
whether you might not have a breezier existence in America.'

'True. But not with myself to decide whether I remain here or go back
again. I ask you to help me in determining that.'

Annabel stood as one who reflects gravely yet collectedly. Egremont
fixed his eyes upon her, until she looked at him then his gaze
questioned silently.

'Let us understand each other,' said Annabel. 'Do you say this because
of anything that has been in the past?'

'Not _because_ of it; in continuance of it.'

'Yet we are both very different from what we were when that happened.'

'Both, I think. I do not speak now as I did then, yet the wish I have
is far more real.'

They were more than half-way up the ascent; it was after sunset, and
the mood of the season was changing.

The plain of Pevensey lay like a vision of fairyland, the colouring
indescribably delicate, unreal; bands of dark green alternated with the
palest and most translucent emeralds. The long stretch of the coast was
a faint outline, yet so clear that every tongue of sand, every smallest
headland was distinguishable. The sky that rested on the eastern
semicircle of horizon was rather neutral tint than blue, and in it hung
long clouds of the colour of faded daffodils. A glance overhead gave
the reason of this wondrous effect of light; there, and away to the
west, brooded a vast black storm-cloud, ragged at the edge, yet seeming
motionless; the western sea was very night, its gloom intensified by
one slip of silver shimmer, wherein a sail was revealed. The hillside
immediately in front of those who stood here was so deeply shadowed
that its contrast threw the vision of unearthly light into distance
immeasurable. A wind was rising, but, though its low whistling sound
was very audible, it seemed to be in the upper air; here scarcely a
breath was felt.

Annabel said:

'Have you seen Thyrza's portrait?

'Yes.'

She raised her eyes; they were sad, compassionate, yet smiled.

'She could not have lived. But you are conscious now of what that face
means?'

'I know nothing of her history from the day when I last saw her, except
the mere outward circumstances.'

'Nor do I. But I saw her once, here, and I have seen her portrait. The
crisis of your life was there. There was your one great opportunity,
and you let it pass. She could not have lived; but that is no matter.
You were tried, Mr. Egremont, and found Wanting.'

'Her love for me did not continue. It was already too late at the end
of those two years.

'Was it?'

'What secret knowledge have you?'

'None whatever, as you mean it. But it was not too late.'

They were silent. And as they stood thus the sky was again transformed.
A steady yet soft wind from the northwest was propelling the great
black cloud seaward, over to France; it moved in a solid mass, its
ragged edges little by little broken off, its bulk detached from the
night which lay behind it. And in the sky which it disclosed rose as it
were a pale dawn, the restored twilight. Thereamid glimmered the
pole-star.

Eastward on the coast, at the far end of Pevensey Bay, the lights of
Hastings began to twinkle; out at sea was visible a single gleam,
appearing and disappearing, the lightship on the Sovereign Shoals.

Annabel continued speaking:

'We have both missed something, something that will never again he
offered us. When you asked me to be your wife, four years ago at
Ullswater, I did not love you. I admired you; I liked you; it would
have been very possible to me to marry you. But I had my ideal of love,
and I hoped to give my husband something more than I felt for you at
that time. A year after, I loved you. I suffered when you were
suffering. I was envious of the love you gave to another woman, and I
said to myself that the moment I hoped for had come only in vain. Since
then I have changed more than I changed in those twelve months. I am
not in love with you now; I can talk of these things without a flutter
of the pulse. Is it not true?'

She held her hand to him, baring the wrist. Egremont retained the hand
in both his own.

'I can tell you, you see,' she went on, 'what I know to be the truth,
that you missed the great opportunity of your life when you abandoned
Thyrza. Her love would have made of you what mine never could, even
though she herself had been taken from you very soon. I can tell you
the mere truth, you see. Dare you still ask for me?'

'I don't ask, Annabel. I have your hand and I keep it.'

'You may. I don't think I should ever give it to any other man.'

The night was thickening about them.

'Shall we go up to the Head?' Egremont asked.

'No higher.'

She said it with a significant look, and he understood her.