The Patricians

[Lord Milton, son of the Earl of Valleys, and grandson of Lady Casterley of ‘Ravensham,’ is in the thick of a political campaign. By birth, training, and education he represents the old order, and is opposed by Humphrey Chilcox, with whom is associated a socialistic leader, Courtier, who is an enthusiast in the cause of Peace.

Milton, dreamy and ascetic, meets by chance a Mrs. Noel, discreetly referred to by the family as ’Anonyma.’ They are mutually attracted. Little is known of her antecedents, and Lady Casterley determines to keep them apart. During one of his daring speeches against Milton’s candidacy, a mob attacks Courtier, and Milton, happening, by chance, to be at Mrs. Noel’s house at a late hour in the evening, goes to his rescue. In the resulting fray Courtier is slightly injured, and is removed to ‘Monkland.’ While there, he meets Barbara, the young and beautiful daughter of Lady Valleys. Courtier hears that Lord Milton’s opponents are making political capital out of his acquaintance with Mrs. Noel and withdraws from the canvass. Upon seeing the scandalous attacks upon him flaunted in the opposition press, Lord Milton, determined to marry Mrs. Noel, if she consents, hurries to London, where he visits his father, Lord Valleys, and tells him of his intention.]

XI

LADY CASTERLEY was that inconvenient thing, an early riser. No woman in the kingdom was a better judge of a dew carpet. Nature had in her time displayed before her thousands of those pretty fabrics, where all the stars of the past night, dropped to the dark earth, were waiting to glide up to heaven again on the rays of the sun. At Ravensham she walked regularly in her gardens between half-past seven and eight, and when she paid a visit, was careful to subordinate whatever might be the local custom to this habit.

When therefore her maid, Randle, went to Barbara’s maid at seven o’clock, and said, ‘My old lady wants Lady Babs to get up,’ there was no particular pain in the breast of Lady Barbara’s maid, who was lacing up her corsets. She merely answered, ‘I’ll see to it. Lady Babs won’t be too pleased!’ And ten minutes later she entered that white-walled room which smelled of pinks — a temple of drowsy sweetness, where the summer light was vaguely stealing through flowered chintz curtains.

Barbara was sleeping with her cheek on her hand, and her tawny hair, gathered back, streaming over the pillow. Her lips were parted, and the maid thought, ‘I’d like to have hair and a mouth like that!’ She could not help smiling to herself with pleasure; Lady Babs looked so pretty — prettier asleep even than awake! And at sight of that beautiful creature, sleeping and smiling in her sleep, the fungusy, hothouse fumes steeping the mind of one perpetually serving in an atmosphere unsuited to her natural growth dispersed. Beauty, with its queer, touching power of freeing the spirit from all barriers and thoughts of self, sweetened the maid’s eyes, and kept her standing, holding her breath. For Barbara asleep was a symbol of that Golden Age in which she so desperately believed.

She opened her eyes, and seeing the maid, said, ‘ Is it eight o’clock, Stacey? ’

‘No, Lady Barbara, but Lady Casterley wants you to walk with her.’

‘Oh! bother! I was having such a jolly dream.’

‘Yes; you were smiling.’

‘I was dreaming that I could fly.’

‘Fancy!’

‘I could see everything spread out below me, as close as I see you; I was hovering like a buzzard hawk. I felt that I could come down exactly where I wanted. It was fascinating. I had perfect power, Stacey.’

She threw her head back and closed her eyes. The sunlight streamed in on her between the half-drawn curtains. The queerest impulse to put out a hand and stroke that full white throat shot through the maid’s mind; she turned abruptly.

‘These flying machines are stupid,’ murmured Barbara; ‘the pleasure’s in one’s body — wings!’

‘I can see Lady Casterley in the garden.’

Barbara sprang out of bed. Close by the statue of Diana, Lady Casterley was standing, gazing up at the great house, a tiny, gray figure. Barbara sighed. With her, in her dream, had been another buzzard hawk, and she was filled with a sort of surprise and queer pleasure that ran down her in little shivers while she bathed and dressed.

In her haste she took no hat; and still busy with the fastening of her linen frock, hurried down the stairs and Georgian corridor, toward the garden. At the end of it she almost ran into the arms of Courtier.

Awakening early this morning, he had begun thinking first of Mrs. Noel, threatened by scandal; then of his yesterday’s companion, that glorious young creature, whose image had so gripped and taken possession of him. In the pleasure of this memory he had steeped himself. She was youth itself! That perfect thing, a young girl without callowness.

And his words, when she nearly ran into him, were, ‘The Winged Victory!’

Barbara’s answer was equally symbolic: ‘A buzzard hawk! I dreamed you were flying with me, Mr. Courtier.’

Courtier gravely answered, ‘If the gods give me that dream, Lady Barbara — ’

From the garden door Barbara turned her head, smiled, and passed through.

On seeing her grand-daughter coming toward her, Lady Casterley, who had been scrutinizing some newly founded colonies of a flower with which she was not familiar, said, ‘What is this thing?’

‘Nemesia.’

‘Never heard of it.'

‘It’s rather new,’ said Barbara.

‘Nemesia ?’ repeated Lady Casterley. ‘What has Nemesis to do with flowers? I have no patience with gardeners, and these idiotic names. Where is your hat? I like that duck’s-egg color in your frock. There’s a button undone.’ And reaching up her little spidery hand, wonderfully steady considering its age, she buttoned the top button but one of Barbara’s bodice. ‘You look very blooming, my dear,’she said. ‘ How far is it to this woman’s cottage? We’ll go there now.’

‘She would n’t be up.’

Lady Casterley’s eyes gleamed maliciously. ‘ You all tell me she’s so nice,’she said. ‘No nice unencumbered woman lies in bed after half-past seven. Which is the very shortest way?’

So saying, she led on at her brisk pace toward the avenue.

All the way down the drive she discoursed on woodcraft, glancing sharply at the great trees. Forestry — she said — like building, and all other pursuits which required faith and patient industry, was a lost art in this secondhand age. She had made Barbara’s grandfather practice it, so that at Catton (her country place), and even at Ravensham, the trees were worth looking at. Here, at Monkland, they were shamefully neglected. To have the finest Italian cypress in the country, for example, and not take more care of it, was a crime!

Barbara listened, smiling lazily. Granny was so amusing in her energy and precision! Haunted still by the feeling that she could fly, almost drunk on the sweetness of the air that summer morning, it seemed funny to her that any one should be like that. Then for a second she saw her grandmother’s face in repose, off guard, grim with anxious purpose, as if questioning its hold on life; and in one of those flashes of intuition which come to women — even when young and conquering like Barbara — she felt suddenly sorry, as though she had caught sight of the pale spectre never yet seen by her. ‘Poor old darling!’ she thought; ‘what a pity to be old!’

But they had entered the footpath crossing the three meadows which climbed up toward Mrs. Noel’s. It was so golden-sweet here amongst, the million tiny saffron cups frosted wit h the lingering dewshine; there was such flying glory in the limes and ash trees; so delicate a scent from the late whins and mayflower; and on every tree a gray bird calling — to be sorry was not possible!

In the far corner of the first field a chestnut mare was standing with ears pricked at some distant sound whose charm she alone perceived. On viewing the intruders, she laid those ears back, and a little vicious star gleamed out at the corner of her eye. They passed her and entered the second field. Halfway across, Barbara said quietly, ‘Granny, that’s a bull!’

It was indeed an enormous bull, who had been standing behind a clump of bushes. He was moving slowly toward them, still distant about two hundred yards; a great red beast, with the huge development of neck and front which makes the bull, of all living creatures, the symbol of brute force.

Lady Casterley envisaged him severely. ‘I dislike bulls,’ she said. ‘I think I must walk backward.’

‘You can’t, dear; it’s too uphill.’

‘I am not going to turn back,’ said Lady Casterley. ‘The bull ought not to be here. Whose fault is it? I shall speak to some one. Stand still and look at him. We must prevent his coming nearer.’

They stood still and looked at the bull, who continued to approach.

‘It does n’t stop him,’ said Lady Casterley. ‘We must take no notice. Give me your arm, my dear; my legs feel rather funny.’

Barbara put her arm round the little figure. They walked on.

‘I have not been used to bulls lately,’ said Lady Casterley.

The bull came nearer.

‘Granny,’ said Barbara, ‘you must go quietly on to the stile while I talk to him. When you ’re over I’ll come too.’

‘Certainly not,’ said Lady Casterley, ‘we will go together. Take no notice of him; I have great faith in that.’

‘Granny darling, you must do as I say, please; I remember this bull, he is one of ours.’

At those rather ominous words Lady Casterley gave her a sharp glance.

‘I shall not go,’ she said. ‘My legs feel quite strong now. We can run, if necessary.’

‘So can the bull,’ said Barbara,

‘I’m not going to leave you to him,’ muttered Lady Casterley. ‘ If he turns vicious I shall talk to him. He won’t touch me. You can run faster than I; that’s settled.’

‘Don’t be absurd, dear,’ answered Barbara; ‘I am not afraid of bulls.’

Lady Casterley flashed a look at her which had a gleam of amusement.

‘I can feel you,’she said. ‘You’re just as trembly as I am.’

The bull was now distant some eighty yards, and they were still quite a hundred from the stile.

‘Granny,’ said Barbara, ‘if you don’t go on as I tell you, I shall just leave you, and go and meet him! You must n’t be obstinate!’

Lady Casterley’s answer was to grip her grand-daughter round the waist; the nervous force of that spidery arm was surprising. ‘You will do nothing of the sort,’ she said. ‘I refuse to have anything more to do with this bull; I shall simply pay no attention.’

The bull now began very slowly ambling towards them.

‘Take no notice,’ said Lady Casterley, who was walking faster than she had ever walked before.

‘The ground is level now,’ said Barbara; ‘can you run, dear?’

‘I think so,’ gasped Lady Casterley; and suddenly she found herself halflifted from the ground, and, as it were, flying towards the stile. She heard a noise behind; then Barbara’s voice,— ‘We must stop. He’s on us. Get behind me.’

She felt herself caught and pinioned by two arms that seemed set on the wrong way. Instinct and a general softness told her that she was back to back with her grand-daughter.

‘Let me go! ’ she gasped; ‘let me go! ’

And suddenly she felt herself being propelled by that softness forward towards the stile.

‘Shoo!’ she said; ‘shoo!’

‘Granny,’ Barbara’s voice came, calm and breathless, ‘don’t! You only excite him! Are we near the stile?’

‘Ten yards,’ panted Lady Casterley.

‘Look out, then!’ There was a sort of warm flurry round her, a rush, a heave, a scramble; she was beyond the stile. The bull and Barbara, a yard or two apart, were just the other side. Lady Casterley raised her handkerchief and fluttered it. The bull looked up; Barbara, all legs and arms, came slipping down beside her.

Without wasting a moment Lady Casterley leaned forward and addressed the bull. ‘You awful brute!’ she said; ‘I will have you well flogged.’

Gently pawing the ground, the bull snuffled.

‘Are you any the worse, child?’

‘Not a scrap,’ said Barbara’s serene, still breathless voice.

Lady Casterley put up her hands and took the girl’s face between them.

‘What legs you have!’ she said. ‘Give me a kiss!’

Having received a hot, rather quivering kiss, she walked on, holding somewhat firmly to Barbara’s arm.

‘As for that bull,’ she murmured, ‘the brute — to attack women!’

Barbara looked down at her. ‘Darling,’ she said, ‘are you sure you’re not shaken?’

Lady Casterley, whose lips were quivering, pressed them together very hard. ‘Not a b-b-bit.’

‘Don’t you think,’ said Barbara, ‘that we had better go back, at once — the other way?’

‘Certainly not. There are no more bulls, I suppose, between us and this woman ? ’

‘But are you fit to see her?’

Lady Casterley passed her handkerchief over her lips, to remove their quivering. ‘Perfectly,’ she answered grimly.

‘Then, dear,’ said Barbara, ‘stand still a minute, while I dust you behind.’

This having been accomplished, they proceeded in the direction of Mrs. Noel’s cottage.

At sight of it Lady Casterley said, ‘I shall put my foot down. It would be fatal for a man of Milton’s prospects. I look forward to the time when he will be Prime Minister.’ Hearing Barbara’s voice murmuring above her, she paused: ‘What’s that you say?’

‘I said, what is the use of our being what we are, if we can’t love whom we like?’

‘Love!’ said Lady Casterley; ‘I was talking of marriage.'

‘I am glad you admit the distinction, Granny dear.’

‘You are pleased to be sarcastic,’ said Lady Casterley. ‘Listen to me! It’s the greatest nonsense to suppose that people in our caste are free to do as they please. The sooner you realize that, the better, Babs. I am talking to you seriously. The preservation of our position as a class depends on our observing certain decencies. What do you imagine would happen to the Royal Family if they were allowed to marry whom they pleased? All this marrying with Gayety girls, and Americans, and people with pasts, and writers, and so forth, is most damaging. There’s not much of it, thank goodness, but it ought to be stopped. It may be tolerated for a few cranks, or silly young men, and these new women; but for Milton —’ Lady Casterley paused again, and her fingers pinched Barbara’s arm,— ‘or for you,—oh! yes, I ’ve very good eyes, — there’s only one sort of marriage possible. As for Eustace, I shall speak to this good lady, and see that he does n’t get entangled further.’

Absorbed in the intensity of her purpose, she did not observe a peculiar little smile playing round Barbara’s lips.

‘You had better speak to Nature, too, Granny!’

Lady Casterley stopped short, and looked up in her grand-daughter’s face.

‘Now what do you mean by that?’ she said. ‘Tell me!’

But noticing that Barbara’s lips had closed tightly, she gave her arm a hard — if unintentional — pinch, and walked on.

XII

Lady Casterley’s rather malicious diagnosis of ‘Anonyma’ was correct. She was already in her garden when Barbara and her grandmother appeared at the wicket-gate; but being near the lime tree at the far end, she did not hear the rapid colloquy passing between them.

‘You have promised to be good, Granny.’

‘Good indeed! What do you mean, child?’

‘You know!’

‘H’mph!'

Lady Casterley could not possibly have provided herself with a better introduction than Barbara, whom Mrs. Noel never met without the sheer pleasure felt by a sympathetic woman when she sees embodied that ‘joy in life’ which Fate has not permitted to herself.

She came forward with her head a little on one side, a trick of hers not at all affected, and stood waiting.

The unembarrassed Barbara began at once. ‘We’ve just had an encounter with a bull. This is my grandmother, Lady Casterley.’

The little great lady’s demeanor, confronted with this very pretty face and figure, was a thought less autocratic and abrupt than usual. Her shrewd eyes saw at once that she had no common adventuress to deal with. She was woman of the world enough, too, to know that ‘birth’ was not what it had been in her young days, that even money was rather rococo, and that good looks, manners, and a knowledge of literature, art, and music (and this woman looked like one of that sort), were often considered socially more valuable. She was therefore both wary and affable.

‘How do you do?’ she said. ‘I have heard of you. May we sit down for a minute in your garden? The bull was a wretch!’

But even in speaking, she was uneasily conscious that this woman’s clear eyes saw very well what she had come for. The look in them indeed was almost cynical, and in spite of her sympathetic murmurs, she did not somehow seem to believe in the bull. This was disconcerting. Why had Barbara condescended to mention the wretched brute? And she decided to take him by the horns.

‘Babs,’ she said, ‘go to the inn and order me a fly. I shall drive back, I feel very shaky’; and, as Mrs. Noel offered to send her maid, she added, ‘No, no, my grand-daughter will go.’

Barbara having departed with a quizzical look, Lady Casterley patted the rustic seat, and said, ‘Do come and sit down, I want to talk to you.’

Mrs. Noel obeyed. And suddenly Lady Casterley perceived that she had a most difficult task before her. She had not expected a woman with whom one could take no liberties. Those clear dark eyes, and that soft, perfectly graceful manner — to a person so ‘sympathetic’ one should be able to say anything, and — one could n’t! It was awkward. And suddenly she noticed that this woman was sitting perfectly upright, as upright — more upright—than herself. A bad sign — a very bad sign! Taking out her handkerchief, she put it to her lips.

‘I suppose you think,’ she said, ‘that we were not chased by a bull.’

‘I am sure you were.’

‘H’m! I’ve something else to talk to you about.’

Mrs. Noel’s face quivered back, as a flower might that one was going to pluck; and again Lady Casterley put her handkerchief to her lips. This time she rubbed them hard. There was nothing to come off; to do so, therefore, was a satisfaction.

‘I am an old woman,’ she said, ‘and you must n’t mind what I say.’

Mrs. Noel did not answer, but looked straight at Lady Casterley, to whom it seemed suddenly as if this was another woman. What was it about that face, staring at her! In a weird way it reminded her of a child that one had hurt — with those great eyes and that soft hair, and the mouth thin, in a line.

All of a sudden, and as if it had been jerked out of her, she said, ‘I don’t want to hurt you, my dear. It’s about my grandson, of course.’

But Anonyma made no sign or motion; and that feeling of irritation which so rapidly attacks the old when confronted with the unexpected, came to Lady Casterley’s aid.

‘His name,’ she said, ‘is being coupled with yours in a way that’s doing him a great deal of harm. You don’t wish to injure him, I’m sure.’

Mrs. Noel shook her head, and Lady Casterley went on: —

‘I don’t know what they’re not saying since the evening that man Mr. Courtier hurt his knee. Milton has been most unwise. You had not perhaps realized that.'

Mrs. Noel’s answer was bitterly distinct. ‘I did n’t know any one was sufficiently interested in me.’

Lady Casterley made a gesture of exasperation.

‘Good Heavens!’ she said; ‘every common person is interested in a woman whose position is anomalous. Living alone as you do, and not a widow, you’re fair game for everybody, especially in the country.’

Mrs. Noel’s sidelong glance, very clear, and cynical, seemed to say, ‘Even for you!’

‘I am not entitled to ask your story,’ Lady Casterley went on, ‘but if you make mysteries you must expect the worst interpretation put on them. My grandson is a man of the highest principle; he does not see things with the eyes of the world, and that should have made you doubly careful not to compromise him, especially at a time like this.’

Mrs. Noel smiled. This smile startled Lady Casterley; it seemed, by concealing everything, to reveal depths of strength and subtlety. Would the woman never show her hand? And she said abruptly, ‘Anything serious, of course, is out of the question.'

‘Quite.’

That word, which of all others seemed the right one, was spoken so that Lady Casterley did not know in the least what it meant. Though occasionally employing irony, she detested it in others. No woman should be allowed to use it as a weapon! But in these days, when they were so foolish as to want votes, one never knew what they would be at. This woman, however, did not look like one of that sort. She was feminine, — very feminine, — the sort of creature that spoiled men by being too nice to them. And though she had come determined to find out all about everything and put air end to it, she saw Barbara reëntering the wicket gate with considerable relief.

‘I am ready to walk home now,’ she said. And getting up from the rustic seat, she made Mrs. Noel a stiff little bow. ‘You understand, don’t you? Give me your arm, child.’

Barbara gave her arm, and over her shoulder threw a swift smile like a sudden gleam of sunshine. But Mrs. Noel did not answer it. She stood looking quietly after them; and her eyes seemed immensely dark and large.

Out in the lane Lady Casterley walked on, very silent, digesting her emotions.

‘What about the fly, Granny?’

‘What fly?’

‘The one you told me to order.’

‘You don’t mean to say that you took me seriously, child?’

‘No,’ said Barbara.

‘H’mph!’

They proceeded some little way further before Lady Casterley said suddenly,— ‘She is deep.’

‘And dark,’ said Barbara. ‘I am afraid you were not good!’

Lady Casterley glanced upwards. ‘I detest this habit,’ she said, ‘amongst you young people, of taking nothing seriously. Not even bulls,’ she added, with a grim smile.

Barbara threw back her head and sighed. ‘Who could be serious on a day like this!’

Lady Casterley saw that she had closed her eyes and opened her lips, as if inviting the kisses of the sun. And she thought, ‘She’s a very beautiful girl. I had no idea she was so beautiful— but too big!’ And she added aloud, — ‘Shut your mouth! You will get a fly down!’

Instead of shutting her mouth, Barbara bent down and kissed her three times, as it seemed simply for the pleasure of kissing.

‘That will do,’ said Lady Casterley.

‘I am not a man!’ Something in those kisses had disturbed her.

They spoke no more till they had entered the avenue; then Lady Casterley said sharply, ‘Who is this coming down the drive?’

‘Mr. Courtier, I think.’

‘What does he mean by it, with that leg?’

‘He is coming to talk to you, Granny.’

Lady Casterley stopped short.

‘You are a cat!’ she said; ‘a sly cat. Now mind, Babs, I won’t have it!’

‘No, darling,’ murmured Barbara; ‘you shan’t have it — I’ll take him off your hands.’

‘What does your mother mean,’ stammered Lady Casterley, ‘letting you grow up like this! You’re as bad as she was at your age!’

‘Worse!’ said Barbara. ‘I dreamed last night that I could fly!’

‘If you try that,’ said Lady Casterley grimly, ‘you ’ll soon come to grief. Good-morning, sir; you ought to be in bed!’

Courtier raised his hat.

‘Surely it is not for me to be where you are not!’ He added gloomily, ‘The war scare’s dead!’

‘Ha!’ said Lady Casterley; ‘your occupation’s gone, then. You ’ll go back to London now, I suppose?’

And looking at Barbara she saw that the girl’s eyes were half-closed, and she was smiling; it seemed to Lady Casterley too — or was it fancy? — that she shook her head.

XIII

That evening, in the billiard-room, Barbara said to Courtier, — ‘ I wonder if you will answer me a question?’

‘If I may, and can, Lady Barbara.’ Her low-cut dress was of yew-green, with little threads of flame-color, matching her hair, so that there was about her a splendor of darkness and whiteness and gold, almost dazzling; and she stood very still, leaning back against the lighter green of the billiardtable, grasping its edge. The smooth, strong backs of her hands quivered with that grip.

‘We have just heard that Milton is going to ask Mrs. Noel to marry him. People are never mysterious, are they, without good reason ? I wanted you to tell me — is it a very bad thing for him ? ’

‘I don’t think I quite grasp the situation,’ murmured Courtier. ‘You said

— to marry him?’

Barbara put out her hand ever so little, begging for the truth.

‘But how can your brother marry her — she’s married!’

‘Oh!’

‘I’d no idea you did n’t know.’

‘The story about her here is that she’s divorced.’

Courtier’s eyes kindled. ‘Hoist with their own petard! The usual thing. Let a pretty woman live alone — the tongues of men will do the rest.’

‘And of women,’ murmured Barbara. ‘Tell me all about it, please. We’d better know.’

‘Her father was a country parson, a friend of my father’s; I’ve known her from a child. Noel was his curate. It was what you call a “snap” marriage

— girl of twenty who ’d never met any men to speak of, continually thrown with him, encouraged by her father. She simply found out, like a good many other people, that she ’d made an utter mistake.’

‘What was he like?’ Barbara interrupted.

‘Not a bad fellow in his way, but one of those narrow, conscientious men who make the most trying kind of husband — born egoistic. A parson of that sort has no chance at all. Every mortal thing he has to do or say helps him to develop his worst points. The wife of a man like that’s no better than a slave. She began to show the strain at last, though she’s one of the sort who goes on until she snaps. It took him four years to realize. Then the question was, what were they to do? He’s a very High Churchman, with all their feeling about marriage; but luckily his pride was mortally wounded, and he got the notion that it would be sin to go on living a married life with her under the circumstances. Anyway, they separated two years ago, and there she is, left high and dry. Her people are dead. She has money enough to live on quietly; and he runs a parish somewhere in a Midland town. They never see each other; and, so far as I know, they don’t correspond. That, Lady Barbara, is the simple history.’

Barbara said impulsively, ‘Oh! poor thing!’

Courtier went to his rest that night with a new and revised version of that young book bound in green and flame. She was a fuller, more complete work than he had thought. This was the first glimpse he had caught of her under the softening glow of the emotions. What a woman she would make if the drying curse of high-caste life were not allowed to stereotype and shrivel her! If enthusiasm were suffered to penetrate and fertilize her soul! He had a vision of her, as a flower, floating, freed of roots and the mould of its cultivated soil, in the liberty of the impartial air. What a passionate and noble thing she might become! What radiance and perfume she would exhale! A spirit fleur-de-lys! Sister to all the noble flowers of light that inhabited the wind!

Leaning in the deep embrasure of his window, he looked at anonymous night. He could hear the owls hoot, and feel a heart beating out there somewhere in the darkness, but there came no answer to his wondering. Would she — this great tawny lily of a girl — ever become unconscious of her environment, not in manner, but in the very soul, so that she might be just a woman, breathing, suffering, loving, and rejoicing with the poet-soul of all mankind? Would she ever be capable of riding out with the little company of big hearts, naked of advantage?

Courtier had not been inside a church for twenty years, being the son of a clergyman, and having long felt that he must not enter the mosques of his country without putting off the shoes of freedom; but he read the Bible, considering it the greatest of all poems; and the old words came haunting him: ‘Verily I say unto you, it is harder for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of Heaven.’ And now, looking into the night, whose darkness seemed to hold the answer to all secrets, he tried to read the riddle of this girl’s future, with which there seemed so interwoven that large enigma, how far the spirit can free itself in this life from the matter that encompasseth.

XIV

A copy of the Bucklandbury News, containing an account of his evening adventure, did not reach Milton till he was just starting on his return journey. It came marked with blue pencil, together with a note.

MY DEAR EUSTACE,—
The inclosed — however unwarranted and impudent — requires attention. But we shall do nothing till you come back. Yours ever,
WILLIAM SHROPTON.

The effect on Milton might perhaps have been different had he not been so conscious of his intention to ask Mrs. Noel to marry him; but in any circumstances it is doubtful whether he would have done more than smile, and tear the paper up. Truly that sort of thing had so little power to hurt or disturb him personally, that he was incapable of seeing how it could hurt or disturb any one. If those who read it were affected by it, so much the worse for them. He had a real, if unobtrusive, contempt for groundlings, of whatever class; it never would enter his head to step an inch out of his course in deference to their vagaries. Nor did it come home to him that Mrs. Noel, wrapped in the glamour which he cast about her, could possibly suffer from the meanness of vulgar minds. This incapacity for thinking meanly made his strength; this incapacity for understanding how others could think meanly, his weakness. Shropton’s note, indeed, caused him the more annoyance of those two documents. It was like his brother-inlaw to make much of little!

He hardly dozed at all during his swift journey through the sleeping country; nor when he reached his room at Monkland did he go to bed. He had the wonderful, upborne feeling of man on the verge of achievement. His spirit and senses were both on fire — for that was the quality of this woman, she suffered no part of him to sleep, and he was glad of her exactions.

He drank some tea, went out, and took a path up to the moor. It was not yet eight o’clock when he reached the top of the nearest tor. And there, below him, around, and above, was a land and sky transcending even his exaltation. It was like a symphony of great music, or the nobility of a stupendous mind laid bare; it was God up there, in His many moods. Serenity was spread in the middle heavens, blue, illimitable; and along to the east, three great clouds, like thoughts brooding over the destinies below, moved slowly toward the sea, so that great shadows filled those valleys. And the land that lay under all the other sky was gleaming and quivering with every color, as it were, clothed with the divine smile.

The wind, from the north, whereon floated the white birds of the smaller clouds, had no voice; for it was above all barriers, utterly free. Before Milton, turning his face to this wind, lay the maze of the lower lands, with the misty greens, rose-pinks, and browns of the fields, and the white and gray dots and strokes of cottages and church towers, fading into the blue veil of distance, confined by a far range of hills. When he turned his back to the wind there was nothing but the restless surface of the moor, colored purplishbrown. On that untamed sea of graven wildness could be seen no ship of man, save one, on the far horizon — the grim hulk, Dartmoor prison. There was no sound, no scent, and it seemed to Milton as if his spirit had left his body, and become part of the solemnity of God. Yet, as he stood there, with his head bared to the wind, that strange smile which haunted him in moments of deep feeling showed that he had not surrendered to the Universal, that his own spirit was but being fortified, and that this was the true and secret source of his delight.

He lay down in a scoop of the stones. The sun entered there, but no wind, so that a dry, sweet scent exuded from the young shoots of heather. That warmth and perfume crept through the shield of his spirit, and stole into his blood; ardent images rose before him, the vision of an unending embrace. Out of an embrace sprang Life, out of that the World was made, this wonderful World, with its innumerable forms and natures — no two alike! And from him and her would spring forms to take their place in the great pattern! This seemed wonderful, and right—for they would be worthy forms, who would hand on great traditions! Then there broke on him one of those delirious waves of natural desire, against which he had so often fought, so often with great pain conquered. Thank God! An end to that was coming! He got up, and ran down hill, leaping over the stones, and the thicker clumps of heather.

Anonyma, too, had been early astir, though she had gone late enough to bed. She dressed languidly, but very carefully, being one of those women who put on armor against Fate, because they are proud and dislike the thought that their sufferings should make others suffer, because their bodies are something rather sacred, having been given them in trust, to cause delight. When she had finished, she looked at herself in the glass rather more distrustfully than usual. She knew that her sort of woman was rather at a discount in these days, and being very sensitive, she was never content with her appearance, or her habits; yet she went on instinctively behaving in unsatisfactory ways. She incorrigibly loved to look as charming as she could, even if no one were going to see her; she never felt that she looked charming enough. She was, too, as Lady Casterley had guessed, the sort of woman who spoils men by being too nice to them; of no use to those who wish women to assert themselves, yet having a certain passive stoicism, very disconcerting. She was one of those women who have little power of initiative, yet will do what they are set to do with a thoroughness that would shame an initiator; who are temperamentally unable to beg anything of anybody, but require love as a plant requires water; who will give themselves completely, yet remain oddly incorruptible; one of those women who are, in a word, hopeless, and usually beloved of those who think them so. With all this, however, she was not quite what is called a ‘sweet woman,’ — a phrase she detested, — for there was in her a queer vein of gentle cynicism. She ‘saw’ with extraordinary clearness, as if she had been born in Italy and still carried that clear, dry atmosphere about her soul. There was no mysticism in her, and little aspiration; sufficient to her were things as they showed themselves to be.

This morning, when she had made herself smell of geraniums, and fastened all the small contrivances that hold even the best of women together, she went downstairs to her little dining-room, set the spirit-lamp going, and taking up her newspaper, stood waiting to make tea.

It was the hour of the day most dear to her. If the dew had been brushed off her life, it was still there every morning on the face of nature, and on the faces of her flowers; there was before her all the pleasure of seeing how each of the little creatures in the garden had slept; how many children had been born since the dawn; who was ailing, and needed attention. There was also the feeling, which renews itself each morning in people who live lonely lives, that they are not lonely, until the day, wearing on, assures them that they are. Not that she was idle, for she had obtained through Courtier the work of reviewing music in a woman’s paper, for which she was intuitively fitted. This, her flowers, her own music, and the affairs of certain families of cottagers, filled nearly all her time. And she asked no better fate than to have every minute occupied, having the passion for work that demanded no initiative natural to those with lazy minds.

Suddenly she dropped her newspaper, went to the bowl of flowers on the breakfast-table, and plucked forth two stalks of lavender; holding them away from her, she went out into the garden and flung them over the wall.

This strange immolation of those two poor sprigs, born so early, and gathered and placed there with such kind intention by her maid, seemed of all acts the least to be expected of one who hated to hurt people’s feelings, and whose eyes always shone at the sight of flowers. But in truth the smell of lavender — that scent carried on her husband’s handkerchief and clothes — still affected her so strongly that she could not bear to be in a room with it. As nothing else did, it brought before her one to live with whom it had slowly become torture. And, freed by that scent, the whole flood of memory broke in on her. The memory of three long years when her teeth had been set doggedly on her discovery that she was chained to unhappiness for life; the memory of the abrupt end, and of her creeping away to let her scorched nerves recover. Of how, during the first year of this release, that was not freedom, she had twice changed her abode, to get away from her own story — not because she was ashamed of it, but because it reminded her of wretchedness. Of how she had then come to Monkland, where the quiet life had slowly given her back elasticity. And then of her meeting with Milton; the unexpected delight of that companionship; the frank enjoyment of the first four months. And she remembered all her secret rejoicing, her silent identification of another life with her own, before she acknowledged or even suspected love. And then, three weeks ago, helping to tie up her roses, he had touched her, and she had known! Even now, until the night of Courtier’s accident, she had not dared to realize. More concerned for him than for herself, she asked herself a thousand times if she had been to blame. She had let him grow fond of her, a woman out of court, a dead woman! Was it not an unpardonable sin? But surely that depended on what she was prepared to give! And she was ready to give everything, to ask for nothing. He knew her position, he had told her that he knew. In her love for him she gloried, would continue to glory; and suffer without regret.

Milton was right in believing that the newspaper gossip was incapable of hurting her, though her reasons for being so impervious were not what he supposed. She was not, like him, secured from pain because the insinuation was mean or vulgar; it did not even occur to her that it was; it simply did not hurt her, because she would have gloried had it been true. In fact she was already so deeply Milton’s property in spirit, that she was almost glad that they should assign him all the rest of her. But, for Milton’s sake, she was disturbed to the soul. Had she not tarnished his shield in the eyes of men; and (for she was oddly practical) perhaps put back his career, who knew how many years! She sat down to drink her tea. Not being a crying woman, she suffered very quietly. She knew somehow that Milton would be coming to her, having that power of divining things before they happen, common to passive natures. She did not know at all what she should say to him when he did come. He could not care for her so much as she cared for him! He was a man; men soon forget! But he was not like most men. One could not look at his eyes without feeling that he could suffer terribly! Her own reputation concerned her not at all.

Life, and her clear way of looking at things, had brought her the conviction that to a woman the preciousness of her reputation was a fiction invented by men entirely for man’s benefit; a second-hand fetish insidiously, inevitably set up by men for worship, in novels, plays, and law courts. Her instinct told her that men could not feel secure in the possession of their women unless they could believe that women set tremendous store by sexual reputation. What they wanted to believe, that they did believe. But she knew otherwise. Such great-minded women as she had met or read of, had always left on her the impression that reputation for them was a matter of the spirit, having little to do with sex. From her own feelings she knew that reputation, for a simple woman, meant to stand well in the eyes of him or her whom she loved best. For worldly women she had always noted that its value was not intrinsic, but commercial; not a crown of dignity, but just a marketable asset. And so she did not dread in the least what people might say of her friendship with Milton; nor did she feel at all that her indissoluble marriage forbade her loving him. She had secretly felt free as soon as she had discovered that she did not love her husband, but had gone on dutifully until the separation, from sheer passivity, and because it was against her nature to cause pain to any one. The man who was still her husband was now as dead to her as if he had never been born. She could not marry again, it was true; but she could and did love. If that love was to be starved and die away, it would not be because of any moral scruples.

She opened her paper languidly; and almost the first words she read, under the heading of ‘Election News,’ were these: —

‘Apropos of the outrage on Mr. Courtier, we are requested to state that the lady who accompanied Lord Milton to the rescue of that gentleman was Mrs. Noel, wife of the Rev. Stephen Noel, the vicar of a parish in a Midland town.’

This dubious little daub of whitewash only brought a rather sad smile to her lips. She left her tea, and went out into the air. There at the gate was Milton, coming in. Her heart leaped, and all her soul rushed into her eyes. But she went forward quietly, and greeted him, as if nothing were out of the ordinary.

(To be continued.)