CHAPTER VIII.An Indiscreet Disciple.Summer wore away, and autumn came in brief, calm radiance, and passed; winter began to threaten. At Denborough one quiet day followed another, each one noticeable for little, but in the aggregate producing some not unimportant changes at Littlehill. Dale Bannister had begun to work hard and to work in solitude; the inspiration of Nellie's eyes seemed either unnecessary or ineffectual. Moreover, his leisure hours were now largely spent in visiting at houses in the neighborhood. He did not neglect his guests, but whenever their engagements occupied them, instead of wandering about alone or enjoying the humors of the High Street, as he had been prone to do in the early days of his sojourn, he would go over to Mount Pleasant, or to the Grange, or to Sir Harry Fulmer's, and he was becoming learned in country lore and less scornful of country ways. The Doctor was a rare visitor now, and, when he came, it generally fell to Philip Hume's lot to entertain him. Philip did his duty loyally, but it was dreary work, for Roberts' conversation, at their meetings, consisted, in the main,of diatribes against Dale Bannister. He would declare that Dale's conduct, in maintaining friendly relations with the gentry of the neighborhood, was in flagrant contradiction to the views he had proclaimed in his writings. Philip shrugged his shoulders, and said that some men were better than their writings, some worse, but no man the same as his writings; the prose must ever be allowed for: and at this the angry man often turned his back on the house with an imprecation on half-heartedness. For the rest, Philip's hands were not very full, and he and Nellie Fane found time for long expeditions together, which would have been more cheerful had it not been for Nellie's scrupulous determination to ignore the absence of the third member of the old trio. One day Philip's idle steps led him through the town on the search for matter of amusement. He was caught in a shower, and took refuge in the Mayor's shop, knowing that his Worship always had time for a gossip. He was not disappointed. The Mayor entertained him with a graphic account of the last assault on Mr. Delane's position as member for the Denborough division, and of his own recent re-election to his high office. Philip congratulated him on the latter event, and asked in curiosity:"And what are your politics, Mr. Mayor?""I hold as a man in my position should have no politics, not party politics, Mr. Hume, sir.""Well, there's something to be said for that.""After all, we know what they are, sir. One out and the other in—that's what they are, sir.""But you said Mrs. Hedger canvassed for the Squire.""So she did, sir. Now, my daughter is on the Liberal side; she and Miss Smith used to go a-drivin' round together.""A sad division of opinion, Mr. Mayor.""Well, we can differ without disagreein', sir. Besides," he added, with something like a wink, "customers differ too.""Most true.""Business is business, sir, especially with a growin' fam'ly. I always think of my fam'ly, Mr. Hume, and how I should leave 'em if I was took—taken.""A man's first duty, Mr. Mayor.""You wouldn't catch me goin' on like this young Roberts.""Why, what's he been up to now?" asked Philip uneasily."You aint seen theStandard, sir?" The Mayor, of course, meant theEast Denshire Standard, not the London paper of the same name."No.""Well, last week they printed the Vicar's sermon on 'The Work of Christianity in the World.' A fine sermon it was, sir. I heard it, being a Church of England man. Mrs. Hedger goes to Chapel.""'Customers differ too,'" thought Philip, smiling."Well, as I was sayin', Jones of theStandardgot the Vicar to give it 'im, and it came out, with a leadin' article of Jones' crackin' it up.""But how does the Doctor——""This week, sir," continued the Mayor, shaking an impressive forefinger, "in theChronicle—that's the Liberal paper, sir—there's a letter from the Doctor—two columns—just abusin' the Church and the parsons, and the 'ole—whole thing, fit to—well, I never did!""Hum! Rather rash, isn't it?""Rash, Mr. Hume, sir? It's madness, that's what it is, sir. He talks about 'pestilent priests,' and I don't know what all, sir, and ends with quotin' thirty or forty lines from a poem called, I think, 'The Arch Apostates'—would that be it, sir?—by Mr. Bannister.""No! does he, by Jove?" said Philip, slapping his thigh."And the po'try, sir, is worse than the Doctor's own stuff, sir, beggin' your pardon as a friend of Mr. Bannister.""I know the lines. They're some of the hottest he's ever done.""Mr. Bannister, of course, can afford it, sir,—his opinions are what he pleases,—but the Doctor, sir!""So the fat's in the fire?""Just the very worst time it could ha' come out, sir. The Guardians over at Dirkham meet to-morrow to elect their medical officer. I'm afraid as they won't re-elect Dr. Roberts, sir, and there was more than one down at the Delane Arms sayin' they'd had the last to do with him."Philip parted from his informant in much concern for Roberts, and in no small amusementat the public placarding of "The Arch Apostates." "Surtout, point de zele," he could imagine Dale saying to his infatuated disciple.On returning home, however, he found the poet saying much harder things of, if not to, Mr. Roberts. Dale had been calling at the Smiths'. The Colonel, while shaking his head over Roberts' impudence, had applauded his opinions, and was, above all, enchanted with the extract from Dale's poem, which he had never hitherto read. His pleasure was, as he told Dale, greatly increased by finding that the letter and the quotation had fallen like a bombshell on the Grange household."The Squire was furious. Mrs. Delane said she had no idea you had done anything so bad as that; and little Janet sat and looked as if someone had knocked down the Archbishop of Canterbury. It was splendid! Gad, sir, you've waked 'em up."These congratulations had the effect of reducing the poet almost to a frenzy. "What business," he demanded, "has the fellow to quote me in support of his balderdash without my leave?""My dear fellow, your works are the possession of the nation," said Philip, smiling, as he lit a cigar."It's an infernal liberty!" fumed Dale."You light the fire, and blame it for blazing," said Philip."One doesn't want to shove one's views down people's throats.""Doesn't one? One used to.""I shall write and disclaim any responsibility.""For the poem?""For its publication, of course.""That won't do you much good."The Mayor's forecast, based on a lifelong observation of his neighbors, proved only too correct. Dr. Spink entered the lists against Roberts, and was elected by every vote save one. Sir Harry Fulmer, in blind and devoted obedience to Tora Smith, voted for Roberts; the rest, headed by the Squire, installed his rival in his place; and the Squire, having sternly done his duty, sat down and wrote a long and friendly letter of remonstrance and explanation to his erring friend.As misfortune followed misfortune, the Doctor set his teeth, and dared fate to do her worst. He waited a few days, hoping to be comforted by a word of approval from his master; none came. At last he determined to seek out Dale Bannister, and was about to start when his wife came in and gave him the new issue of theChronicle. Ethel Roberts was pale and weary-looking, and she glanced anxiously at her husband."I am going up to Littlehill," he said."Have you done your round, dear?""My round doesn't take long nowadays. Maggs will give me fifteen pounds for the pony: you know we don't want him now.""No, Jim, and we do want fifteen pounds.""What's that?""TheChronicle, dear. There's—a letter from Mr. Bannister.""Is there? Good! Let's see what Bannister has to say to these bigoted idiots."He opened the paper, and in the middle of the front page read:A DISCLAIMER FROM MR. BANNISTER.Sir: I desire to state that the use made by Mr. James Roberts of my poem in your last issue was without my authority or approbation. The poem was written some years ago, and must not be assumed to represent my present view on the subject of which it treats.I am, sir, your obedient servant,Dale Bannister.The Doctor stared at the letter."Bannister—Dale Bannister wrote that!" and he flung the paper angrily on the floor. "Give me my hat.""You're not going——""Yes, I am, Ethel. I'm going to find out what this means.""Hadn't you better wait till you're less——""Less what, Ethel? What do you mean?""Till the rain stops, Jim, dear; and it's just baby's time for coming down.""Hang—no, I beg your pardon, Ethel. I'm very sorry, but I must see the end of this."He rushed out, and the baby found a dull, preoccupied, almost tearful, very unamusing mother to play with that day.The Doctor marched into Dale's room with a stern look on his face."Well, Roberts, how are you?" asked Dale, not graciously."What does this mean, Bannister?""It means, my dear fellow, that you took my name in vain, and I had to say so.""I'm not thinking of myself, though it would have been more friendly to write to me first.""Well, I was riled, and didn't think of that.""But do you mean to deny your own words?""Really, Roberts, you seem to forget that I don't enjoy setting the place by the ears, although you seem to.""You wrote that poem?""Of course I wrote the damned thing," said Dale peevishly."And now—Bannister, you're not going to—to throw us over?""Nonsense! I like to publish my views at my own time and place, that's all.""A man like you belongs to his followers as much as to himself.""More, it seems."The Doctor looked at him almost scornfully. Dale did not like scorn from anyone."I was particularly anxious," he began apologetically, "not to get into a shindy here. I wanted to drop politics and so on, and be friendly——""Do you know what you're saying, or the meanness of it?""Meanness? What do you mean?""You know very well. All I want to know is if you wrote this thing?""Of course I wrote it.""And you stand to it?""Yes. I think you ought to have asked me before you did it.""The Squire is shocked, eh?" asked the Doctor, with a sneer."The Squire's views are nothing to me," answered Dale, flushing very red.The Doctor laughed bitterly."Come, come, old fellow," said Dale, "don't let us quarrel.""Quarrel? Well, we won't. Only look here, Bannister.""Well?""If you throw us over now, you'll be——""There, don't abuse me any more.""Oh, I wasn't going to abuse you. If you leave us,—you, the leader we trusted,—where are we, where are we?""Give me another chance," said Dale, holding out his hand."You won't withdraw this?""How the deuce can I now?"The Doctor shook his hand, saying:"Don't betray us, don't betray us;" and thus the very uncomfortable interview came to a desired end.That night at dinner Dale was cross and in low spirits. His friends, perceiving it, forbore to express their views as to his last public utterance, and the repast dragged its weary length along amid intermittent conversation.When the dessert was on the table, a note was brought for Dale. It was from the Squire.Dear Bannister: I was very glad to see your letter in theChronicle. Mrs. Delane joins me in hoping you will dine with us to-morrowen famille. Excuse short notice. The man waits for an answer—don't write one.Yours truly,George Delane."Say I'll come with great pleasure," said Dale, his face growing brighter."Where will he go with great pleasure?" asked Philip of Nellie Fane."Where is it, Dale?""Oh, only to the Grange, to dinner to-morrow. I think I had better write a note, though—don't you think so, Phil? More—more attentive, you know.""Write, my son," answered Philip, and, as Dale left the room, he looked round with a smile and exclaimed, "One!""One what, my dear?" asked Mrs. Hodge."Piece of silver, ma'am," replied Philip."You're sneering again," said Nellie in a warning tone. "Why shouldn't he like to dine at the Grange?" and she looked marvelously reasonable and indifferent."I was speaking with the voice of Doctor Roberts, Nellie, that's all. For my own part, I think a dinner is one of those things one may accept even from the enemy."
An Indiscreet Disciple.
Summer wore away, and autumn came in brief, calm radiance, and passed; winter began to threaten. At Denborough one quiet day followed another, each one noticeable for little, but in the aggregate producing some not unimportant changes at Littlehill. Dale Bannister had begun to work hard and to work in solitude; the inspiration of Nellie's eyes seemed either unnecessary or ineffectual. Moreover, his leisure hours were now largely spent in visiting at houses in the neighborhood. He did not neglect his guests, but whenever their engagements occupied them, instead of wandering about alone or enjoying the humors of the High Street, as he had been prone to do in the early days of his sojourn, he would go over to Mount Pleasant, or to the Grange, or to Sir Harry Fulmer's, and he was becoming learned in country lore and less scornful of country ways. The Doctor was a rare visitor now, and, when he came, it generally fell to Philip Hume's lot to entertain him. Philip did his duty loyally, but it was dreary work, for Roberts' conversation, at their meetings, consisted, in the main,of diatribes against Dale Bannister. He would declare that Dale's conduct, in maintaining friendly relations with the gentry of the neighborhood, was in flagrant contradiction to the views he had proclaimed in his writings. Philip shrugged his shoulders, and said that some men were better than their writings, some worse, but no man the same as his writings; the prose must ever be allowed for: and at this the angry man often turned his back on the house with an imprecation on half-heartedness. For the rest, Philip's hands were not very full, and he and Nellie Fane found time for long expeditions together, which would have been more cheerful had it not been for Nellie's scrupulous determination to ignore the absence of the third member of the old trio. One day Philip's idle steps led him through the town on the search for matter of amusement. He was caught in a shower, and took refuge in the Mayor's shop, knowing that his Worship always had time for a gossip. He was not disappointed. The Mayor entertained him with a graphic account of the last assault on Mr. Delane's position as member for the Denborough division, and of his own recent re-election to his high office. Philip congratulated him on the latter event, and asked in curiosity:
"And what are your politics, Mr. Mayor?"
"I hold as a man in my position should have no politics, not party politics, Mr. Hume, sir."
"Well, there's something to be said for that."
"After all, we know what they are, sir. One out and the other in—that's what they are, sir."
"But you said Mrs. Hedger canvassed for the Squire."
"So she did, sir. Now, my daughter is on the Liberal side; she and Miss Smith used to go a-drivin' round together."
"A sad division of opinion, Mr. Mayor."
"Well, we can differ without disagreein', sir. Besides," he added, with something like a wink, "customers differ too."
"Most true."
"Business is business, sir, especially with a growin' fam'ly. I always think of my fam'ly, Mr. Hume, and how I should leave 'em if I was took—taken."
"A man's first duty, Mr. Mayor."
"You wouldn't catch me goin' on like this young Roberts."
"Why, what's he been up to now?" asked Philip uneasily.
"You aint seen theStandard, sir?" The Mayor, of course, meant theEast Denshire Standard, not the London paper of the same name.
"No."
"Well, last week they printed the Vicar's sermon on 'The Work of Christianity in the World.' A fine sermon it was, sir. I heard it, being a Church of England man. Mrs. Hedger goes to Chapel."
"'Customers differ too,'" thought Philip, smiling.
"Well, as I was sayin', Jones of theStandardgot the Vicar to give it 'im, and it came out, with a leadin' article of Jones' crackin' it up."
"But how does the Doctor——"
"This week, sir," continued the Mayor, shaking an impressive forefinger, "in theChronicle—that's the Liberal paper, sir—there's a letter from the Doctor—two columns—just abusin' the Church and the parsons, and the 'ole—whole thing, fit to—well, I never did!"
"Hum! Rather rash, isn't it?"
"Rash, Mr. Hume, sir? It's madness, that's what it is, sir. He talks about 'pestilent priests,' and I don't know what all, sir, and ends with quotin' thirty or forty lines from a poem called, I think, 'The Arch Apostates'—would that be it, sir?—by Mr. Bannister."
"No! does he, by Jove?" said Philip, slapping his thigh.
"And the po'try, sir, is worse than the Doctor's own stuff, sir, beggin' your pardon as a friend of Mr. Bannister."
"I know the lines. They're some of the hottest he's ever done."
"Mr. Bannister, of course, can afford it, sir,—his opinions are what he pleases,—but the Doctor, sir!"
"So the fat's in the fire?"
"Just the very worst time it could ha' come out, sir. The Guardians over at Dirkham meet to-morrow to elect their medical officer. I'm afraid as they won't re-elect Dr. Roberts, sir, and there was more than one down at the Delane Arms sayin' they'd had the last to do with him."
Philip parted from his informant in much concern for Roberts, and in no small amusementat the public placarding of "The Arch Apostates." "Surtout, point de zele," he could imagine Dale saying to his infatuated disciple.
On returning home, however, he found the poet saying much harder things of, if not to, Mr. Roberts. Dale had been calling at the Smiths'. The Colonel, while shaking his head over Roberts' impudence, had applauded his opinions, and was, above all, enchanted with the extract from Dale's poem, which he had never hitherto read. His pleasure was, as he told Dale, greatly increased by finding that the letter and the quotation had fallen like a bombshell on the Grange household.
"The Squire was furious. Mrs. Delane said she had no idea you had done anything so bad as that; and little Janet sat and looked as if someone had knocked down the Archbishop of Canterbury. It was splendid! Gad, sir, you've waked 'em up."
These congratulations had the effect of reducing the poet almost to a frenzy. "What business," he demanded, "has the fellow to quote me in support of his balderdash without my leave?"
"My dear fellow, your works are the possession of the nation," said Philip, smiling, as he lit a cigar.
"It's an infernal liberty!" fumed Dale.
"You light the fire, and blame it for blazing," said Philip.
"One doesn't want to shove one's views down people's throats."
"Doesn't one? One used to."
"I shall write and disclaim any responsibility."
"For the poem?"
"For its publication, of course."
"That won't do you much good."
The Mayor's forecast, based on a lifelong observation of his neighbors, proved only too correct. Dr. Spink entered the lists against Roberts, and was elected by every vote save one. Sir Harry Fulmer, in blind and devoted obedience to Tora Smith, voted for Roberts; the rest, headed by the Squire, installed his rival in his place; and the Squire, having sternly done his duty, sat down and wrote a long and friendly letter of remonstrance and explanation to his erring friend.
As misfortune followed misfortune, the Doctor set his teeth, and dared fate to do her worst. He waited a few days, hoping to be comforted by a word of approval from his master; none came. At last he determined to seek out Dale Bannister, and was about to start when his wife came in and gave him the new issue of theChronicle. Ethel Roberts was pale and weary-looking, and she glanced anxiously at her husband.
"I am going up to Littlehill," he said.
"Have you done your round, dear?"
"My round doesn't take long nowadays. Maggs will give me fifteen pounds for the pony: you know we don't want him now."
"No, Jim, and we do want fifteen pounds."
"What's that?"
"TheChronicle, dear. There's—a letter from Mr. Bannister."
"Is there? Good! Let's see what Bannister has to say to these bigoted idiots."
He opened the paper, and in the middle of the front page read:
A DISCLAIMER FROM MR. BANNISTER.
Sir: I desire to state that the use made by Mr. James Roberts of my poem in your last issue was without my authority or approbation. The poem was written some years ago, and must not be assumed to represent my present view on the subject of which it treats.
I am, sir, your obedient servant,
Dale Bannister.
The Doctor stared at the letter.
"Bannister—Dale Bannister wrote that!" and he flung the paper angrily on the floor. "Give me my hat."
"You're not going——"
"Yes, I am, Ethel. I'm going to find out what this means."
"Hadn't you better wait till you're less——"
"Less what, Ethel? What do you mean?"
"Till the rain stops, Jim, dear; and it's just baby's time for coming down."
"Hang—no, I beg your pardon, Ethel. I'm very sorry, but I must see the end of this."
He rushed out, and the baby found a dull, preoccupied, almost tearful, very unamusing mother to play with that day.
The Doctor marched into Dale's room with a stern look on his face.
"Well, Roberts, how are you?" asked Dale, not graciously.
"What does this mean, Bannister?"
"It means, my dear fellow, that you took my name in vain, and I had to say so."
"I'm not thinking of myself, though it would have been more friendly to write to me first."
"Well, I was riled, and didn't think of that."
"But do you mean to deny your own words?"
"Really, Roberts, you seem to forget that I don't enjoy setting the place by the ears, although you seem to."
"You wrote that poem?"
"Of course I wrote the damned thing," said Dale peevishly.
"And now—Bannister, you're not going to—to throw us over?"
"Nonsense! I like to publish my views at my own time and place, that's all."
"A man like you belongs to his followers as much as to himself."
"More, it seems."
The Doctor looked at him almost scornfully. Dale did not like scorn from anyone.
"I was particularly anxious," he began apologetically, "not to get into a shindy here. I wanted to drop politics and so on, and be friendly——"
"Do you know what you're saying, or the meanness of it?"
"Meanness? What do you mean?"
"You know very well. All I want to know is if you wrote this thing?"
"Of course I wrote it."
"And you stand to it?"
"Yes. I think you ought to have asked me before you did it."
"The Squire is shocked, eh?" asked the Doctor, with a sneer.
"The Squire's views are nothing to me," answered Dale, flushing very red.
The Doctor laughed bitterly.
"Come, come, old fellow," said Dale, "don't let us quarrel."
"Quarrel? Well, we won't. Only look here, Bannister."
"Well?"
"If you throw us over now, you'll be——"
"There, don't abuse me any more."
"Oh, I wasn't going to abuse you. If you leave us,—you, the leader we trusted,—where are we, where are we?"
"Give me another chance," said Dale, holding out his hand.
"You won't withdraw this?"
"How the deuce can I now?"
The Doctor shook his hand, saying:
"Don't betray us, don't betray us;" and thus the very uncomfortable interview came to a desired end.
That night at dinner Dale was cross and in low spirits. His friends, perceiving it, forbore to express their views as to his last public utterance, and the repast dragged its weary length along amid intermittent conversation.
When the dessert was on the table, a note was brought for Dale. It was from the Squire.
Dear Bannister: I was very glad to see your letter in theChronicle. Mrs. Delane joins me in hoping you will dine with us to-morrowen famille. Excuse short notice. The man waits for an answer—don't write one.
Yours truly,
George Delane.
"Say I'll come with great pleasure," said Dale, his face growing brighter.
"Where will he go with great pleasure?" asked Philip of Nellie Fane.
"Where is it, Dale?"
"Oh, only to the Grange, to dinner to-morrow. I think I had better write a note, though—don't you think so, Phil? More—more attentive, you know."
"Write, my son," answered Philip, and, as Dale left the room, he looked round with a smile and exclaimed, "One!"
"One what, my dear?" asked Mrs. Hodge.
"Piece of silver, ma'am," replied Philip.
"You're sneering again," said Nellie in a warning tone. "Why shouldn't he like to dine at the Grange?" and she looked marvelously reasonable and indifferent.
"I was speaking with the voice of Doctor Roberts, Nellie, that's all. For my own part, I think a dinner is one of those things one may accept even from the enemy."
CHAPTER IX.Dale's Own Opinion.If ever our own fortune would allow us to be perfectly happy, the consumation is prevented and spoiled by the obstinately intruding unhappiness of others. The reverend person who was of opinion that the bliss of the blessed would be increased and, so to say, vivified by the sight of the tortures of the damned, finds few supporters nowadays, perhaps because our tenderer feelings shrink from such a ruthless application of the doctrine that only by contemplating the worse can we enjoy the better; perhaps also because we are not so sure as he was that we should not be the onlooked rather than the onlookers if ever his picture came to be realized. So sensitive are we to the ills that others suffer that at times we feel almost a grudge against them for their persistence—however unwilling it be—in marring our perfect contentment; surely they could let us forget them for once in a way.This last was Dale Bannister's frame of mind as he lay, idly and yet not peacefully, on his sofa next morning. This Doctor, with his unflinching logic and unrestrained zeal, was anuisance. His devotion had not been sought, and certainly, if it entailed scenes like yesterday's, was not desired. Dale never asked him to ruin his practice, as Philip Hume said he was doing, in order to uphold Dale's principles; Dale did not want a starving family to his account, whose hungry looks should press him to a close questioning of his conscience. Any man with an ounce of common sense would understand that there was a time for everything, and a place. It was one thing to publish your views in a book, addressed to the world of thinkers and intelligent readers; it was quite another to brandish them in the face of your neighbors, and explode them, like shells, in the innocent streets of Denborough. And yet, because he recognized this obvious distinction, because he had some sense of what was suitable and reasonable, and because he refused to make enemies of people simply because they were well off, the Doctor stormed at him as if he were a traitor and a snob. And Philip Hume had taken to smiling in an aggravating way when the Grange was mentioned; and even Nellie—— But Dale, alert as he was in his present mood to discover matter of complaint, found none against Nellie, unless it might be some falling off in her old cheerfulness and buoyancy.Dale lit his pipe and set himself to consider with impartiality whether Roberts had in fact any grievance against him. He wanted to satisfy himself that there was no basis for the Doctor's indignation; his self-esteem demandedthat the accusation should be disproved. But really it was too plain. What had he done? Refused to acquiesce in being made a fool of, refused to meet civility with incivility, to play the churl, to shut his eyes to intelligence and culture and attractiveness because they happened to be found among people who did not think as he did or as Roberts was pleased to think. He knew what those sneers meant, but he would go his own way. Things had come to a pretty pass if a man might not be civil and seek to avoid wholly unnecessary causes of offense without being treated as a renegade to all his convictions. That was not his idea of breadth of mind or toleration, or of good feeling either. It was simple bigotry, as narrow as—aye, narrower than—anything he at least had found on the other side.Dale disposed of this question, but he still lay on the sofa and thought. It had been a gain to him, he said to himself, to see this new side of life; the expedition to Littlehill was well justified. It is good for a man to take a flag of truce and go talk with the enemy in the gate. He may not change his own views,—Dale was conscious of no change in his,—but he comes to see how other people may hold different ones, and the reason, or anyhow the naturalness, of theirs. A man of Roberts' fierce Puritan temper could not feel nor appreciate what appealed to him so strongly in such a life as they lived, for instance, at the Grange. It had a beauty so its own, that unquestioned superiority, not grasped as a prize or valued as anopportunity, but gravely accepted as the parent of duties—the unbroken family life, grasping through many hands the torch undimmed from reverend antiquity—the very house, which seemed to enshrine honorable traditions, at which he could not bring himself to sneer. The sweetness of it all broke back baffled from the wall of the Doctor's stern conviction and iron determination. Yet how sweet it all was! And these people welcomed into their circle any man who had a claim to welcome, freely, ungrudgingly, cordially. All they asked was a little gentleness to their—he supposed they were prejudices, a little deference to their prepossessions, a little smoothing off of the rougher edges of difference. It was not much to ask. Was he churlishly to deny the small concession, to refuse to meet them any part of the way, to intrench himself in the dogmatic intolerance of his most vehement utterances, to shut his mind off from this new source of inspiration? That was what Roberts wanted. Well, then—Roberts be hanged!The course of these reflections produced in Dale a return to his usual equanimity. It was plainly impossible to please everybody. He must act as seemed right to himself, neglecting the frowns of unreasonable grumblers. No doubt Roberts was devoted to him, and Arthur Angell too. Yet Roberts abused him, and Arthur bothered him with imploring letters, which warned him against the subtle temptations of his new life. It was a curious sort of devotion which showed itself mainly in criticismand disapproval; it was very flattering of these good friends to set him on a pedestal and require him to live up to the position; only, unfortunately, the pedestal was of their choosing, not his. All he asked was to be allowed to live a quiet life and work out his own ideas in his own way. If they could not put up with that, why—— Dale refilled his pipe and opened a story by Maupassant.It may be asserted that every man is the victim of a particular sort of follies, the follies engendered by his particular sort of surroundings; they make a fool's circle within which each of us has a foot planted; for the rest, we may be, and no doubt generally are, very sensible people. If we set aside Squire Delane's special and indigenous illusions, he was very far indeed from a fool, and after dinner that evening he treated his distinguished guest with no small tact. The young man was beyond question a force; was it outside of ingenuity to turn him in a better direction?"Everybody approves of your letter," he said. "Roberts had no business to drag your name in.""Of course one is exposed to that sort of thing.""It's a penalty of greatness. But the case is peculiar when you're actually living in the place.""That's exactly what I feel. It's making me a party in a local quarrel.""That's what he wanted to do; he wanted to fight under your shield.""I didn't come here to fight at all.""I should think not; and you haven't found us thirsting for battle, have you?""I have found a kinder welcome than I had any right to expect.""My dear fellow! Much as we differ, we're all proud of counting you as a Denshire man. And I don't suppose we shall quarrel much about Denshire affairs. Oh, I know you think the whole system of country life an iniquity. I don't go so deep myself. I say, there it is. Perhaps it might be changed, but, pending that, sensible men can work together to make the best of it. At any rate, they can avoid treading on one another's corns.""I want to avoid everybody's corns, if they'll avoid mine.""Well, we'll try. I dare say we shall pull together. At any rate, it's very pleasant dining together. Shall we go upstairs and ask Janet for a song?"Mrs. Delane had evidently caught her cue from her husband, and she treated Dale not as a sinner who repenteth,—a mode of reception which, after all, requires great tact to make it acceptable,—but as one who had never been a sinner at all. She asked Dale if he had been overwhelmed by callers. He replied that he had not suffered much in that way."I knew it," she said. "You have frightened them, Mr. Bannister; they think you came in search of studious retirement.""Oh, I hate both study and retirement, Mrs. Delane.""Well, I shall tell people that—may I? Now, when I was at the Cransfords' yesterday,—he's our Lord Lieutenant, you know,—they were wondering whether they might call.""I am delighted to see anyone.""From the Mayor upward—or, I suppose, Hedger would think I ought to say downward. We heard what fun you made of the poor man.""Mr. Bannister will be more respectful to the Lord Lieutenant," said Janet, smiling."I suppose I disapprove of Lord Lieutenants," remarked Dale, with a laugh."You'll like Lady Cransford very much, and she'll like you. She gives so many balls that a bachelor household is a godsend.""Bannister hardly depends on that for a welcome, my dear," said the Squire from the hearthrug."Now I declare, meeting him just as a friend like this, I'm always forgetting that he's a famous man.""Please go on, Mrs. Delane. It's a capital exchange. But when are you going to give me the pleasure of seeing you at Littlehill?"Mrs. Delane paused for just a second."I should like to visit your hermit's cell. But I'm so busy just now, and I dare say you are. When your guests forsake you, perhaps we will come and relieve your solitude. Janet, will you give us some music?"Dale followed Janet to the piano, with a little frown on his brow. Why wouldn't she come now? Was it—— Janet's voice dispersed the frown and the reflection.She sang a couple of songs, choosing them out of a book. As she turned over the leaves, Dale saw that some of the airs were set to words of his own writing. When Janet came to one of these, she turned the leaf hastily. The Squire had gone out, and Mrs. Delane, with the privilege of near relationship, was absorbed in a novel."Will you do me a great favor?" he said."What, Mr. Bannister?""I should like to hear you sing words of mine. See, here are two or three."She glanced through them; then she shut the book and made as though to rise."You won't do it?"Janet blushed and looked troubled."I'm so sorry, Mr. Bannister; but I can't sing those words. I—I don't like them.""I am sorry they are so bad," he answered in an offended tone."Oh, of course, so far as power and—and beauty goes, everything in the book is trash compared to them. But I can't sing them.""I won't press you.""I know you are angry. Please don't be angry, Mr. Bannister. I can't do what I think wrong, can I?""Oh, I have no right to be angry.""There, you wouldn't say that unless you were angry. People never do.""You have such a wretchedly bad opinion of me, Miss Delane.""Do you mind that?""You know I do.""Then one would think you would try to change it.""Ah, how can I?""Write something I should delight in singing.""If I do, may I dedicate it to you?""I'm afraid that wouldn't be allowed.""But if it were allowed, would you allow it?""You know how proud any girl would be of it—of course you know.""You don't do justice to my humility.""Do justice to yourself first, Mr. Bannister.""What sort of songs do you like?""Oh, anything honest, and manly, and patriotic, and—and nice in feeling.""A catholic taste—and yet none of mine satisfy it.""I will not be quarreled with," declared Janet."My only wish is to propitiate you.""Then you know now how to do it."It must be allowed that conversations of this nature have a pleasantness of their own, and Dale left the Grange with a delightful feeling of having been treated as he ought to be treated. He found Philip Hume writing and smoking in the study."Well, been stroked the right way, old man?" asked Philip, throwing down his pen.Dale helped himself to whisky and soda water, without replying."I've been having a talk with Nellie," pursued Philip."What's wrong with Nellie?""She's got some notion in her head that she and her mother ought to go."Dale was lighting a cigar."Of course I told her it was all nonsense, and that you meant them to stay as long as they liked. She's got some maggot in her head about propriety—all nonsense, when her mother's here.""I don't want them to go, if they like staying," said Dale."Well, we should be slow without Nellie, shouldn't we? You must blow her up for thinking of it. She only wants to be persuaded.""She can do as she likes.""You don't seem very enthusiastic about it, one way or the other.""Well, my dear Phil, I can't be expected to cry at the idea of little Nellie Fane leaving us.""Yet you made rather a point of her coming—but that was two months ago.""Really, you might leave Nellie and me to settle it.""What I told her was right, I suppose?""Well, you don't suppose I wanted you to tell her to pack up?""I don't know what you want, old man," said Philip; "and I doubt if you do."
Dale's Own Opinion.
If ever our own fortune would allow us to be perfectly happy, the consumation is prevented and spoiled by the obstinately intruding unhappiness of others. The reverend person who was of opinion that the bliss of the blessed would be increased and, so to say, vivified by the sight of the tortures of the damned, finds few supporters nowadays, perhaps because our tenderer feelings shrink from such a ruthless application of the doctrine that only by contemplating the worse can we enjoy the better; perhaps also because we are not so sure as he was that we should not be the onlooked rather than the onlookers if ever his picture came to be realized. So sensitive are we to the ills that others suffer that at times we feel almost a grudge against them for their persistence—however unwilling it be—in marring our perfect contentment; surely they could let us forget them for once in a way.
This last was Dale Bannister's frame of mind as he lay, idly and yet not peacefully, on his sofa next morning. This Doctor, with his unflinching logic and unrestrained zeal, was anuisance. His devotion had not been sought, and certainly, if it entailed scenes like yesterday's, was not desired. Dale never asked him to ruin his practice, as Philip Hume said he was doing, in order to uphold Dale's principles; Dale did not want a starving family to his account, whose hungry looks should press him to a close questioning of his conscience. Any man with an ounce of common sense would understand that there was a time for everything, and a place. It was one thing to publish your views in a book, addressed to the world of thinkers and intelligent readers; it was quite another to brandish them in the face of your neighbors, and explode them, like shells, in the innocent streets of Denborough. And yet, because he recognized this obvious distinction, because he had some sense of what was suitable and reasonable, and because he refused to make enemies of people simply because they were well off, the Doctor stormed at him as if he were a traitor and a snob. And Philip Hume had taken to smiling in an aggravating way when the Grange was mentioned; and even Nellie—— But Dale, alert as he was in his present mood to discover matter of complaint, found none against Nellie, unless it might be some falling off in her old cheerfulness and buoyancy.
Dale lit his pipe and set himself to consider with impartiality whether Roberts had in fact any grievance against him. He wanted to satisfy himself that there was no basis for the Doctor's indignation; his self-esteem demandedthat the accusation should be disproved. But really it was too plain. What had he done? Refused to acquiesce in being made a fool of, refused to meet civility with incivility, to play the churl, to shut his eyes to intelligence and culture and attractiveness because they happened to be found among people who did not think as he did or as Roberts was pleased to think. He knew what those sneers meant, but he would go his own way. Things had come to a pretty pass if a man might not be civil and seek to avoid wholly unnecessary causes of offense without being treated as a renegade to all his convictions. That was not his idea of breadth of mind or toleration, or of good feeling either. It was simple bigotry, as narrow as—aye, narrower than—anything he at least had found on the other side.
Dale disposed of this question, but he still lay on the sofa and thought. It had been a gain to him, he said to himself, to see this new side of life; the expedition to Littlehill was well justified. It is good for a man to take a flag of truce and go talk with the enemy in the gate. He may not change his own views,—Dale was conscious of no change in his,—but he comes to see how other people may hold different ones, and the reason, or anyhow the naturalness, of theirs. A man of Roberts' fierce Puritan temper could not feel nor appreciate what appealed to him so strongly in such a life as they lived, for instance, at the Grange. It had a beauty so its own, that unquestioned superiority, not grasped as a prize or valued as anopportunity, but gravely accepted as the parent of duties—the unbroken family life, grasping through many hands the torch undimmed from reverend antiquity—the very house, which seemed to enshrine honorable traditions, at which he could not bring himself to sneer. The sweetness of it all broke back baffled from the wall of the Doctor's stern conviction and iron determination. Yet how sweet it all was! And these people welcomed into their circle any man who had a claim to welcome, freely, ungrudgingly, cordially. All they asked was a little gentleness to their—he supposed they were prejudices, a little deference to their prepossessions, a little smoothing off of the rougher edges of difference. It was not much to ask. Was he churlishly to deny the small concession, to refuse to meet them any part of the way, to intrench himself in the dogmatic intolerance of his most vehement utterances, to shut his mind off from this new source of inspiration? That was what Roberts wanted. Well, then—Roberts be hanged!
The course of these reflections produced in Dale a return to his usual equanimity. It was plainly impossible to please everybody. He must act as seemed right to himself, neglecting the frowns of unreasonable grumblers. No doubt Roberts was devoted to him, and Arthur Angell too. Yet Roberts abused him, and Arthur bothered him with imploring letters, which warned him against the subtle temptations of his new life. It was a curious sort of devotion which showed itself mainly in criticismand disapproval; it was very flattering of these good friends to set him on a pedestal and require him to live up to the position; only, unfortunately, the pedestal was of their choosing, not his. All he asked was to be allowed to live a quiet life and work out his own ideas in his own way. If they could not put up with that, why—— Dale refilled his pipe and opened a story by Maupassant.
It may be asserted that every man is the victim of a particular sort of follies, the follies engendered by his particular sort of surroundings; they make a fool's circle within which each of us has a foot planted; for the rest, we may be, and no doubt generally are, very sensible people. If we set aside Squire Delane's special and indigenous illusions, he was very far indeed from a fool, and after dinner that evening he treated his distinguished guest with no small tact. The young man was beyond question a force; was it outside of ingenuity to turn him in a better direction?
"Everybody approves of your letter," he said. "Roberts had no business to drag your name in."
"Of course one is exposed to that sort of thing."
"It's a penalty of greatness. But the case is peculiar when you're actually living in the place."
"That's exactly what I feel. It's making me a party in a local quarrel."
"That's what he wanted to do; he wanted to fight under your shield."
"I didn't come here to fight at all."
"I should think not; and you haven't found us thirsting for battle, have you?"
"I have found a kinder welcome than I had any right to expect."
"My dear fellow! Much as we differ, we're all proud of counting you as a Denshire man. And I don't suppose we shall quarrel much about Denshire affairs. Oh, I know you think the whole system of country life an iniquity. I don't go so deep myself. I say, there it is. Perhaps it might be changed, but, pending that, sensible men can work together to make the best of it. At any rate, they can avoid treading on one another's corns."
"I want to avoid everybody's corns, if they'll avoid mine."
"Well, we'll try. I dare say we shall pull together. At any rate, it's very pleasant dining together. Shall we go upstairs and ask Janet for a song?"
Mrs. Delane had evidently caught her cue from her husband, and she treated Dale not as a sinner who repenteth,—a mode of reception which, after all, requires great tact to make it acceptable,—but as one who had never been a sinner at all. She asked Dale if he had been overwhelmed by callers. He replied that he had not suffered much in that way.
"I knew it," she said. "You have frightened them, Mr. Bannister; they think you came in search of studious retirement."
"Oh, I hate both study and retirement, Mrs. Delane."
"Well, I shall tell people that—may I? Now, when I was at the Cransfords' yesterday,—he's our Lord Lieutenant, you know,—they were wondering whether they might call."
"I am delighted to see anyone."
"From the Mayor upward—or, I suppose, Hedger would think I ought to say downward. We heard what fun you made of the poor man."
"Mr. Bannister will be more respectful to the Lord Lieutenant," said Janet, smiling.
"I suppose I disapprove of Lord Lieutenants," remarked Dale, with a laugh.
"You'll like Lady Cransford very much, and she'll like you. She gives so many balls that a bachelor household is a godsend."
"Bannister hardly depends on that for a welcome, my dear," said the Squire from the hearthrug.
"Now I declare, meeting him just as a friend like this, I'm always forgetting that he's a famous man."
"Please go on, Mrs. Delane. It's a capital exchange. But when are you going to give me the pleasure of seeing you at Littlehill?"
Mrs. Delane paused for just a second.
"I should like to visit your hermit's cell. But I'm so busy just now, and I dare say you are. When your guests forsake you, perhaps we will come and relieve your solitude. Janet, will you give us some music?"
Dale followed Janet to the piano, with a little frown on his brow. Why wouldn't she come now? Was it—— Janet's voice dispersed the frown and the reflection.
She sang a couple of songs, choosing them out of a book. As she turned over the leaves, Dale saw that some of the airs were set to words of his own writing. When Janet came to one of these, she turned the leaf hastily. The Squire had gone out, and Mrs. Delane, with the privilege of near relationship, was absorbed in a novel.
"Will you do me a great favor?" he said.
"What, Mr. Bannister?"
"I should like to hear you sing words of mine. See, here are two or three."
She glanced through them; then she shut the book and made as though to rise.
"You won't do it?"
Janet blushed and looked troubled.
"I'm so sorry, Mr. Bannister; but I can't sing those words. I—I don't like them."
"I am sorry they are so bad," he answered in an offended tone.
"Oh, of course, so far as power and—and beauty goes, everything in the book is trash compared to them. But I can't sing them."
"I won't press you."
"I know you are angry. Please don't be angry, Mr. Bannister. I can't do what I think wrong, can I?"
"Oh, I have no right to be angry."
"There, you wouldn't say that unless you were angry. People never do."
"You have such a wretchedly bad opinion of me, Miss Delane."
"Do you mind that?"
"You know I do."
"Then one would think you would try to change it."
"Ah, how can I?"
"Write something I should delight in singing."
"If I do, may I dedicate it to you?"
"I'm afraid that wouldn't be allowed."
"But if it were allowed, would you allow it?"
"You know how proud any girl would be of it—of course you know."
"You don't do justice to my humility."
"Do justice to yourself first, Mr. Bannister."
"What sort of songs do you like?"
"Oh, anything honest, and manly, and patriotic, and—and nice in feeling."
"A catholic taste—and yet none of mine satisfy it."
"I will not be quarreled with," declared Janet.
"My only wish is to propitiate you."
"Then you know now how to do it."
It must be allowed that conversations of this nature have a pleasantness of their own, and Dale left the Grange with a delightful feeling of having been treated as he ought to be treated. He found Philip Hume writing and smoking in the study.
"Well, been stroked the right way, old man?" asked Philip, throwing down his pen.
Dale helped himself to whisky and soda water, without replying.
"I've been having a talk with Nellie," pursued Philip.
"What's wrong with Nellie?"
"She's got some notion in her head that she and her mother ought to go."
Dale was lighting a cigar.
"Of course I told her it was all nonsense, and that you meant them to stay as long as they liked. She's got some maggot in her head about propriety—all nonsense, when her mother's here."
"I don't want them to go, if they like staying," said Dale.
"Well, we should be slow without Nellie, shouldn't we? You must blow her up for thinking of it. She only wants to be persuaded."
"She can do as she likes."
"You don't seem very enthusiastic about it, one way or the other."
"Well, my dear Phil, I can't be expected to cry at the idea of little Nellie Fane leaving us."
"Yet you made rather a point of her coming—but that was two months ago."
"Really, you might leave Nellie and me to settle it."
"What I told her was right, I suppose?"
"Well, you don't suppose I wanted you to tell her to pack up?"
"I don't know what you want, old man," said Philip; "and I doubt if you do."
CHAPTER X.A Prejudiced Verdict.It has been contumeliously said by insolent Englishmen—a part of our population which may sometimes seem to foreign eyes as large as the whole—that you might put any other of the world's capitals, say Paris or New York, down in London, and your cabman would not be able to find it. However this may be,—and there is no need in this place either for assertions or admissions,—it is certain that you might unload a wagonful of talents in Piccadilly, and they would speedily be absorbed and leave little obvious trace of the new ingredient. Hence the advantage, for a man who does not dislike thedigito monstrari et dicier"hic est," of dwelling in small places, and hence, a cynic might suggest, the craving for quieter quarters displayed by some of our less conspicuous celebrities. It is better, says a certain authority, to reign in hell than serve in heaven; and a man may grow weary of walking unrecognized down the Strand, when he has only, to be the beheld of all beholders, to take up his residence in—perhaps it will be more prudent to say Market Denborough, and notpoint the finger of printed scorn at any better known resort.This very ungenerous explanation was the one which Miss Victoria Smith chose to adopt as accounting for Dale Bannister's coming to Littlehill. Such an idea had never crossed her mind at first, but it became evident that a man who could leave his friend in the lurch and palter with his principles, as Dale's letter to theChronicleshowed him to be doing, could only be credited with any discoverable motive less bad and contemptible than the worst through mere hastiness and ill-considered good nature. For her part, she liked a man to stick to his colors and to his friends, and not be ashamed before the tea tables of Denshire. No, she had never read his poems, she had no time, but papa had, and agreed with every word of them."Gad! does he?" said Sir Harry Fulmer, to whom these views were expressed. "Well played the Colonel!""What do you mean?""Well, some of them made me sit up rather," remarked Sir Harry."Oh, anything would make you 'sit up,' as you call it. I don't consider you a Radical.""I voted for your friend the Doctor anyhow.""Yes, that was good of you. You were the only one with an elementary sense of justice."Sir Harry's sense of justice, elementary or other, had had very little to do with his vote, but he said with honest pride:"Somebody ought to stand by a fellow when he's down.""Especially when he's in the right.""Well, I don't quite see, Miss Smith, what business it was of Roberts' to cut up the Vicar's sermon. Naturally the Vicar don't like it.""So he takes his medicine from Dr. Spink!""Rather awkward for him to have Roberts about the place.""Oh, of course you defend him.""The Vicar's a very good fellow, though he's a Tory.""You seem to think all Tories good fellows.""So they are, most of them.""I suppose you think Mr. Bannister's right too?""I shouldn't be so down on him as you are.""You like people who lead their friends on and then forsake them?""Bannister never asked him to write the letter.""Well, it's not my idea of friendship. I wouldn't have a friend who thought that conduct right.""Then I think it deuced wrong," said Sir Harry promptly."It's no compliment to a woman to treat her like a baby," remarked Tora with dignity.Sir Harry perceived that it would be to his advantage to change the subject."Are you going skating?" he asked. "There's nothing else to do in this beastly frost.""Does the ice bear?""Yes, they're skating on the Grange lake. Imet Hume, Bannister's friend, and he told me Bannister was there.""Wasn't he going? I rather like him.""No, he was walking with Miss Fane. I believe I rather put my foot in it by asking her if she wasn't going.""Why shouldn't you?""She said she didn't know Mrs. Delane, and looked confused, don't you know.""Hasn't Mrs. Delane called?""It seems not," said Sir Harry."I wonder how long they are going to stay at Littlehill?""Forever, apparently. Shall you come to the lake?""Perhaps in the afternoon."Tora returned to the house, still wondering. She was very angry with Dale, and prepared to think no good of him. Was it possible that she and the Colonel had been hasty in stretching out the hand of welcome to Mrs. Hodge and her daughter? For all her independence, Tora liked to have Mrs. Delane'simprimaturon the women of her acquaintance. She thought she would have a word with the Colonel, and went to seek him in his study. He was not there, but it chanced that there lay on the table a copy of Dale's first published volume, "The Clarion." Three-quarters of the little book were occupied with verses on matters of a more or less public description—beliefs past and future, revolutions effected and prayed for, and so forth; the leaves bore marks of use, and evidently were often turned by the Colonel.But bound up with them was a little sheaf of verses of an amatory character: where these began, the Colonel's interest appeared to cease, for the pages were uncut; he had only got as far as the title. It was not so with his daughter. Having an idle hour and some interest in the matters and affairs of love, she took a paper-knife and sat down to read. Poets are, by ancient privilege,legibus soluti, and Dale certainly reveled in his freedom. Still, perhaps, the verses were not in reality so very, very atrocious as they unhappily appeared to the young lady who now read them. Tora was accustomed to consider herself almost a revolutionary spirit, and her neighbors, half in earnest, half in joke, encouraged the idea; but her revolutions were to be very strictly confined, and the limits of her free-thought were marked out by most unyielding metes and bounds—bounds that stopped very short at the church door and on the domestic threshold. This frame of mind is too common to excite comment, and it had been intensified in her by the social surroundings against which she was in mock revolt. Dale's freedom knew no trammels, or had known none when he wrote "The Clarion"; nothing was sacred to him except truth, everything as nothing beside reason, reason the handmaid of passion, wherein the spirit and individuality of each man found their rightful expression. This theory, embodied in a poet's fancy and enlivened by a young man's ardor, made fine verses, but verses which startled Tora Smith. She read for half an hour, and then,flinging the book down and drawing a long breath, exclaimed: "I can believe anything of him now!"And she had had this man to dinner! And that girl! Who was that girl?The Colonel came home to luncheon in very good spirits. He had just succeeded, in the interests of freedom, in stirring up a spirit of active revolt in Alderman Johnstone. The Alderman had hitherto, like his father before him, occupied his extensive premises on a weekly tenancy; he had never been threatened with molestation or eviction; but he felt that he existed on sufferance, and the consciousness of his precarious position had been irksome to him. A moment had come when the demand for houses was slack, when two or three were empty, and when the building trade itself was nearly at a standstill. The Colonel had incited Johnstone to seize the opportunity to ask from the Squire a lease, and Johnstone had promised to take nothing less than "seven, fourteen, or twenty-one." If refused, he declared he would surrender the premises and build for himself on some land of the Colonel's just outside the town."Delane must grant it," said the Colonel, rubbing his hands, "and then we shall have one house anyhow where our bills can be put up. Bannister will be delighted. By the way, Tora, he wants us to go in to tea to-day, after skating. I suppose you're going to skate?""I am going to skate, but I am not going to Mr. Bannister's," said Tora coldly."Why not?"The Colonel was told why not with explicitness and vehemence. He tugged his white whisker in some perplexity: he did not mind much about the poems, though, of course, no excess of scrupulousness could be too great in a girl like Tora; but if she were right about the other affair! That must be looked into.The Colonel was one of those people who pride themselves on tact andsavoir faire; he aggravated this fault by believing that tact and candor could be combined in a happy union, and he determined to try the effect of the mixture on Dale Bannister. It would go hard if he did not destroy this mare's nest of Tora's.All the neighborhood was skating on the Grange lake under a winter sun, whose ruddy rays tinged the naked trees, and drew an answering glitter from the diamond-paned windows of the house. The reeds were motionless, and the graze of skaters on the ice sounded sharp in the still air, and struck the ear through the swishing of birch brooms and the shuffle of sweepers' feet. From time to time a sudden thud and a peal of laughter following told of disaster, or there grated across the lake a chair, carrying one who preferred the conquest of men to the science of equilibrium. Rosy cheeks glowed, nimble feet sped, and lissom figures swayed to and fro as they glided over the shining surface, till even the old and the stout, the cripples and the fox hunters, felt the glow of life tingling in their veins, and the beauty ofthe world feeding their spirits with fresh desire. "It is not all of life to live," but, at such a moment, it is the best part of it.Dale Bannister was enjoying himself; he was a good skater, and it gave him pleasure that, when people turned to look at the famous poet, they should see an athletic youth: only he wished that Janet Delane would give him an opportunity of offering his escort, and not appear so contented with the company of a tall man of military bearing, who had come down to the water with the Grange party. He was told that the newcomer was Captain Ripley, Lord Cransford's eldest son, and he did not escape without witnessing some of the nods and becks which, in the country, where everybody knows everybody, accompany the most incipient stages of a supposed love affair. Feeling, under these circumstances, a little desolate, for Philip was engrossed in figures and would not waste his time talking, he saw with pleasure Tora Smith and Sir Harry coming toward him. He went to meet them, and, at a distance of a few yards from them, slackened his pace and lifted his hat, not doubting of friendly recognition. Sir Harry returned his salute with a cheery "How are you?" but did not stop, for Tora swept on past Dale Bannister, without a glance at him. In surprise, he paused. "She must have seen me," he thought, "but why in the world——" Bent on being sure, he put himself right in her path as she completed the circle and met him again. There was no mistaking her intention; she gave him the cutdirect, as clearly and as resolutely as ever it was given.Sir Harry had remonstrated in vain. In Tora's uncompromising mind impulse did not wait on counsel, and her peremptory "I have my reasons" refused all information and prevented all persuasion. He felt he had done enough for friendship when he braved her disapproval by declining to follow her example. He did not pretend to understand the ways of women, and Dale Bannister might fight his own battles.While Dale was yet standing in angry bewilderment,—for who had received him with more cordiality than she who now openly insulted him?—he saw the Colonel hobbling toward him across the slippery expanse. The Colonel fell once, and Dale heard him swear testily at the sweeper who helped him to rise. He thought it kind to meet him halfway; perhaps the Colonel would explain. The Colonel was most ready to do so; in fact, he had come for the very purpose of warning Bannister that some silly idea was afloat, which it only needed a word to scatter."Is there?" said Dale. "Possibly that is why Miss Smith failed to see me twice just now?""Your poems have shocked her, my boy," said the Colonel, with a knowing look—the look that represented tact andsavoir faire."Is that all? She takes rather severe measures, doesn't she?""Well," answered the Colonel, with the smile which brought candor into play, "that isn't quite all.""What in the world else is there?""You know how censorious people are, and how a girl takes alarm at the very idea of anything—you know?"Dale chafed at these diplomatic approaches."If there's anything said against me, pray let me know.""Oh, it's nothing very definite," said the Colonel uneasily. He did not find what he had to say so simple as it had seemed."Indefinite things are most hopeless.""Yes, yes, quite so. Well, if you really wish it—if you won't be offended. No doubt it's all a mistake.""What do they say?""Well, we're men of the world, Bannister. The fact is, people don't quite understand your—your household.""My household It consists of myself alone and the servants.""Of course, my dear fellow, of course! I knew it was so, but I am glad to be able to say so on your own authority."The aim of speech is, after all, only to convey ideas; the Colonel had managed, however clumsily, to convey his idea. Dale frowned, and pretended to laugh."How absurd!" he said. "I should resent it if it were not too absurd.""I'm sure, Bannister, you'll acquit me of any meddling.""Oh, yes. I'm sorry my guests have given rise, however innocently, to such talk.""It's most unfortunate. I'm sure nothing more is needed. I hope the ladies are well?""Yes, thanks.""I don't see them here.""No, they're not here," answered Dale, frowning again."I hope we shall see some more of them?""You're very kind. I—I don't suppose they—will be staying much longer."As Dale made his way to the bank to take off his skates, Janet and Tora passed him together. Tora kept her eyes rigidly fixed on the chimneys of the Grange. He made no sign of expecting recognition, but Janet, as she drew near, looked at him, blushing red, and bowed and smiled."That girl's a trump," said Dale Bannister. "She sticks to her friends."
A Prejudiced Verdict.
It has been contumeliously said by insolent Englishmen—a part of our population which may sometimes seem to foreign eyes as large as the whole—that you might put any other of the world's capitals, say Paris or New York, down in London, and your cabman would not be able to find it. However this may be,—and there is no need in this place either for assertions or admissions,—it is certain that you might unload a wagonful of talents in Piccadilly, and they would speedily be absorbed and leave little obvious trace of the new ingredient. Hence the advantage, for a man who does not dislike thedigito monstrari et dicier"hic est," of dwelling in small places, and hence, a cynic might suggest, the craving for quieter quarters displayed by some of our less conspicuous celebrities. It is better, says a certain authority, to reign in hell than serve in heaven; and a man may grow weary of walking unrecognized down the Strand, when he has only, to be the beheld of all beholders, to take up his residence in—perhaps it will be more prudent to say Market Denborough, and notpoint the finger of printed scorn at any better known resort.
This very ungenerous explanation was the one which Miss Victoria Smith chose to adopt as accounting for Dale Bannister's coming to Littlehill. Such an idea had never crossed her mind at first, but it became evident that a man who could leave his friend in the lurch and palter with his principles, as Dale's letter to theChronicleshowed him to be doing, could only be credited with any discoverable motive less bad and contemptible than the worst through mere hastiness and ill-considered good nature. For her part, she liked a man to stick to his colors and to his friends, and not be ashamed before the tea tables of Denshire. No, she had never read his poems, she had no time, but papa had, and agreed with every word of them.
"Gad! does he?" said Sir Harry Fulmer, to whom these views were expressed. "Well played the Colonel!"
"What do you mean?"
"Well, some of them made me sit up rather," remarked Sir Harry.
"Oh, anything would make you 'sit up,' as you call it. I don't consider you a Radical."
"I voted for your friend the Doctor anyhow."
"Yes, that was good of you. You were the only one with an elementary sense of justice."
Sir Harry's sense of justice, elementary or other, had had very little to do with his vote, but he said with honest pride:
"Somebody ought to stand by a fellow when he's down."
"Especially when he's in the right."
"Well, I don't quite see, Miss Smith, what business it was of Roberts' to cut up the Vicar's sermon. Naturally the Vicar don't like it."
"So he takes his medicine from Dr. Spink!"
"Rather awkward for him to have Roberts about the place."
"Oh, of course you defend him."
"The Vicar's a very good fellow, though he's a Tory."
"You seem to think all Tories good fellows."
"So they are, most of them."
"I suppose you think Mr. Bannister's right too?"
"I shouldn't be so down on him as you are."
"You like people who lead their friends on and then forsake them?"
"Bannister never asked him to write the letter."
"Well, it's not my idea of friendship. I wouldn't have a friend who thought that conduct right."
"Then I think it deuced wrong," said Sir Harry promptly.
"It's no compliment to a woman to treat her like a baby," remarked Tora with dignity.
Sir Harry perceived that it would be to his advantage to change the subject.
"Are you going skating?" he asked. "There's nothing else to do in this beastly frost."
"Does the ice bear?"
"Yes, they're skating on the Grange lake. Imet Hume, Bannister's friend, and he told me Bannister was there."
"Wasn't he going? I rather like him."
"No, he was walking with Miss Fane. I believe I rather put my foot in it by asking her if she wasn't going."
"Why shouldn't you?"
"She said she didn't know Mrs. Delane, and looked confused, don't you know."
"Hasn't Mrs. Delane called?"
"It seems not," said Sir Harry.
"I wonder how long they are going to stay at Littlehill?"
"Forever, apparently. Shall you come to the lake?"
"Perhaps in the afternoon."
Tora returned to the house, still wondering. She was very angry with Dale, and prepared to think no good of him. Was it possible that she and the Colonel had been hasty in stretching out the hand of welcome to Mrs. Hodge and her daughter? For all her independence, Tora liked to have Mrs. Delane'simprimaturon the women of her acquaintance. She thought she would have a word with the Colonel, and went to seek him in his study. He was not there, but it chanced that there lay on the table a copy of Dale's first published volume, "The Clarion." Three-quarters of the little book were occupied with verses on matters of a more or less public description—beliefs past and future, revolutions effected and prayed for, and so forth; the leaves bore marks of use, and evidently were often turned by the Colonel.But bound up with them was a little sheaf of verses of an amatory character: where these began, the Colonel's interest appeared to cease, for the pages were uncut; he had only got as far as the title. It was not so with his daughter. Having an idle hour and some interest in the matters and affairs of love, she took a paper-knife and sat down to read. Poets are, by ancient privilege,legibus soluti, and Dale certainly reveled in his freedom. Still, perhaps, the verses were not in reality so very, very atrocious as they unhappily appeared to the young lady who now read them. Tora was accustomed to consider herself almost a revolutionary spirit, and her neighbors, half in earnest, half in joke, encouraged the idea; but her revolutions were to be very strictly confined, and the limits of her free-thought were marked out by most unyielding metes and bounds—bounds that stopped very short at the church door and on the domestic threshold. This frame of mind is too common to excite comment, and it had been intensified in her by the social surroundings against which she was in mock revolt. Dale's freedom knew no trammels, or had known none when he wrote "The Clarion"; nothing was sacred to him except truth, everything as nothing beside reason, reason the handmaid of passion, wherein the spirit and individuality of each man found their rightful expression. This theory, embodied in a poet's fancy and enlivened by a young man's ardor, made fine verses, but verses which startled Tora Smith. She read for half an hour, and then,flinging the book down and drawing a long breath, exclaimed: "I can believe anything of him now!"
And she had had this man to dinner! And that girl! Who was that girl?
The Colonel came home to luncheon in very good spirits. He had just succeeded, in the interests of freedom, in stirring up a spirit of active revolt in Alderman Johnstone. The Alderman had hitherto, like his father before him, occupied his extensive premises on a weekly tenancy; he had never been threatened with molestation or eviction; but he felt that he existed on sufferance, and the consciousness of his precarious position had been irksome to him. A moment had come when the demand for houses was slack, when two or three were empty, and when the building trade itself was nearly at a standstill. The Colonel had incited Johnstone to seize the opportunity to ask from the Squire a lease, and Johnstone had promised to take nothing less than "seven, fourteen, or twenty-one." If refused, he declared he would surrender the premises and build for himself on some land of the Colonel's just outside the town.
"Delane must grant it," said the Colonel, rubbing his hands, "and then we shall have one house anyhow where our bills can be put up. Bannister will be delighted. By the way, Tora, he wants us to go in to tea to-day, after skating. I suppose you're going to skate?"
"I am going to skate, but I am not going to Mr. Bannister's," said Tora coldly.
"Why not?"
The Colonel was told why not with explicitness and vehemence. He tugged his white whisker in some perplexity: he did not mind much about the poems, though, of course, no excess of scrupulousness could be too great in a girl like Tora; but if she were right about the other affair! That must be looked into.
The Colonel was one of those people who pride themselves on tact andsavoir faire; he aggravated this fault by believing that tact and candor could be combined in a happy union, and he determined to try the effect of the mixture on Dale Bannister. It would go hard if he did not destroy this mare's nest of Tora's.
All the neighborhood was skating on the Grange lake under a winter sun, whose ruddy rays tinged the naked trees, and drew an answering glitter from the diamond-paned windows of the house. The reeds were motionless, and the graze of skaters on the ice sounded sharp in the still air, and struck the ear through the swishing of birch brooms and the shuffle of sweepers' feet. From time to time a sudden thud and a peal of laughter following told of disaster, or there grated across the lake a chair, carrying one who preferred the conquest of men to the science of equilibrium. Rosy cheeks glowed, nimble feet sped, and lissom figures swayed to and fro as they glided over the shining surface, till even the old and the stout, the cripples and the fox hunters, felt the glow of life tingling in their veins, and the beauty ofthe world feeding their spirits with fresh desire. "It is not all of life to live," but, at such a moment, it is the best part of it.
Dale Bannister was enjoying himself; he was a good skater, and it gave him pleasure that, when people turned to look at the famous poet, they should see an athletic youth: only he wished that Janet Delane would give him an opportunity of offering his escort, and not appear so contented with the company of a tall man of military bearing, who had come down to the water with the Grange party. He was told that the newcomer was Captain Ripley, Lord Cransford's eldest son, and he did not escape without witnessing some of the nods and becks which, in the country, where everybody knows everybody, accompany the most incipient stages of a supposed love affair. Feeling, under these circumstances, a little desolate, for Philip was engrossed in figures and would not waste his time talking, he saw with pleasure Tora Smith and Sir Harry coming toward him. He went to meet them, and, at a distance of a few yards from them, slackened his pace and lifted his hat, not doubting of friendly recognition. Sir Harry returned his salute with a cheery "How are you?" but did not stop, for Tora swept on past Dale Bannister, without a glance at him. In surprise, he paused. "She must have seen me," he thought, "but why in the world——" Bent on being sure, he put himself right in her path as she completed the circle and met him again. There was no mistaking her intention; she gave him the cutdirect, as clearly and as resolutely as ever it was given.
Sir Harry had remonstrated in vain. In Tora's uncompromising mind impulse did not wait on counsel, and her peremptory "I have my reasons" refused all information and prevented all persuasion. He felt he had done enough for friendship when he braved her disapproval by declining to follow her example. He did not pretend to understand the ways of women, and Dale Bannister might fight his own battles.
While Dale was yet standing in angry bewilderment,—for who had received him with more cordiality than she who now openly insulted him?—he saw the Colonel hobbling toward him across the slippery expanse. The Colonel fell once, and Dale heard him swear testily at the sweeper who helped him to rise. He thought it kind to meet him halfway; perhaps the Colonel would explain. The Colonel was most ready to do so; in fact, he had come for the very purpose of warning Bannister that some silly idea was afloat, which it only needed a word to scatter.
"Is there?" said Dale. "Possibly that is why Miss Smith failed to see me twice just now?"
"Your poems have shocked her, my boy," said the Colonel, with a knowing look—the look that represented tact andsavoir faire.
"Is that all? She takes rather severe measures, doesn't she?"
"Well," answered the Colonel, with the smile which brought candor into play, "that isn't quite all."
"What in the world else is there?"
"You know how censorious people are, and how a girl takes alarm at the very idea of anything—you know?"
Dale chafed at these diplomatic approaches.
"If there's anything said against me, pray let me know."
"Oh, it's nothing very definite," said the Colonel uneasily. He did not find what he had to say so simple as it had seemed.
"Indefinite things are most hopeless."
"Yes, yes, quite so. Well, if you really wish it—if you won't be offended. No doubt it's all a mistake."
"What do they say?"
"Well, we're men of the world, Bannister. The fact is, people don't quite understand your—your household."
"My household It consists of myself alone and the servants."
"Of course, my dear fellow, of course! I knew it was so, but I am glad to be able to say so on your own authority."
The aim of speech is, after all, only to convey ideas; the Colonel had managed, however clumsily, to convey his idea. Dale frowned, and pretended to laugh.
"How absurd!" he said. "I should resent it if it were not too absurd."
"I'm sure, Bannister, you'll acquit me of any meddling."
"Oh, yes. I'm sorry my guests have given rise, however innocently, to such talk."
"It's most unfortunate. I'm sure nothing more is needed. I hope the ladies are well?"
"Yes, thanks."
"I don't see them here."
"No, they're not here," answered Dale, frowning again.
"I hope we shall see some more of them?"
"You're very kind. I—I don't suppose they—will be staying much longer."
As Dale made his way to the bank to take off his skates, Janet and Tora passed him together. Tora kept her eyes rigidly fixed on the chimneys of the Grange. He made no sign of expecting recognition, but Janet, as she drew near, looked at him, blushing red, and bowed and smiled.
"That girl's a trump," said Dale Bannister. "She sticks to her friends."
CHAPTER XI.A Fable about Birds.Mrs. Hodge and Nellie, being left to their own resources, had employed the afternoon in paying a visit to Ethel Roberts, and nothing was wanting to fill Dale's cup of vexation to overflowing, unless it were to have Nellie flying open-mouthed at him, as he grumblingly expressed it, with a tale of the distress in the Doctor's household. Ethel Roberts had the fortitude to bear her troubles, the added fortitude to bear them cheerfully, but not the supreme fortitude which refuses to tell a tale of woe to any ear, however sympathetic. She did not volunteer information, but she did allow it to be dragged out of her, and the barriers of her reserve broke down before Mrs. Hodge's homely consolations and Nellie's sorrowful horror. They were reduced, she admitted, in effect to living on little else than her own wretched income; the practice brought in hardly more than it took out, for, while the rich patients failed, the poor remained; the rent was overdue, bills were unpaid, and the butcher, the milkman, and the coal merchant were growing sulky."And while," said Mrs. Hodge, "that pooryoung creature is pinching, and starving, and crying, the man's thinking of nothing but Nihilists and what not. I'd Nihilist him!"Dinner was served to Dale with sauce of this sort."Can I prevent fools suffering for their folly?" he asked."The baby looks so ill," said Nellie, "and Mrs. Roberts is worn to a shadow.""Did you see Roberts?" asked Philip."For a minute," said Nellie, "but he was very cold and disagreeable.""Thought you were tarred with the same brush as Dale, I suppose?""Can't you do anything for 'em, Dale?" asked Mrs. Hodge."I can send him a check.""He'll send it back," remarked Philip."I wish he'd get out of the place.""Yes, he might as well be miserable somewhere else, mightn't he?"Dale glared at his friend, and relapsed into silence. Nevertheless, in spite of Philip's prediction, he sat down after dinner and wrote to Roberts, saying that he had heard that he was in temporary embarrassment, and urging him to allow Dale to be his banker for the moment; this would, Dale added, be the best way of showing that he bore no malice for Dale's letter. He sent a man with the note, ordering him to wait for an answer.The answer was not long in coming; the man was back in half an hour, bringing the Doctor's reply:Three months ago I should have thought it an honor to share my last crust with you, and no shame to ask half of all you had. Now I will not touch a farthing of your money until you come back to us. If your friends pay my wife further visits, I shall be obliged if they will look somewhat less keenly at my household arrangements.James Roberts."There is the snub you have brought on me!" exclaimed Dale angrily, flinging the letter to Nellie. "I might have known better than to listen to your stories.""Dale, Dale, it was every word true. How selfish he is not to think of his wife!""Many people are selfish.""Is anything the matter, Dale?""Oh, I'm infernally worried. I never get any peace.""Hadn't you a good time skating?""No. I'm beginning to hate this place.""Oh, Dale, I've enjoyed my visit so much!""Very glad to hear it, I'm sure.""You must have seen it; we've stayed so long. I've often told mamma we ought to be going."Dale lit a cigarette."Indeed we have had no mercy on you, Dale; but the country and the rest are so delightful.""Hum—in some ways.""But I must be back at work. Mamma thought next Saturday would do.""As soon as that?" said Dale, with polite surprise."Think how long we have been here.""Oh, don't go on Saturday!"Nellie's face brightened."Don't you want us to?" she asked, with an eager little smile. Dale was going to be kind after all."No. Why shouldn't you stay till Monday?"The face fell, the smile disappeared; but she answered, saving her self-respect:"Saturday is more convenient for—for arriving in town. I think we had better fix Saturday, Dale.""As you like. Sorry to lose you, Nell."He sauntered off to the smoking room to join Philip. When Philip came into the drawing room half an hour later in search of a book, he found Nellie sitting before the fire. He took his stand on the hearthrug, and looked steadily down on her."Once upon a time," he said, "there was a very beautiful bird who, as it chanced, grew up with a lot of crows. For a long while he liked the crows, and the crows liked him—very much, some of them. Both he and the crows were pleased when the eagles and all the swell birds admired him, and said nice things about him, and wanted to know him—and the crows who liked him most were most pleased. Presently he did come to know the eagles and the other swell birds, and he liked them very much, and he began to get a little tired of the old crows, and by and by he left their company a good deal. He was a polite bird and a kind bird, and never told them that hedidn't want them any more. But they saw he didn't."There was a little sob from the armchair."Whereupon some of them broke their hearts, and others—didn't. The others were wisest, Nellie."He paused, gazing down at the distressful little heap of crumpled drapery and roughened gleaming hair."Much wisest. He was not a bad bird as birds go—but not a bird to break one's heart about, Nellie: what bird is?"There was another sob. Philip looked despairingly at the ceiling and exclaimed under his breath:"I wish to God she wouldn't cry!"He took his book from the mantelpiece where he had laid it and moved toward the door. But he came back again, unable to leave her like that, and walked restlessly about the room, stopping every now and then to stand over her, and wonder what he could do.Presently he took a feverish little hand in his, and pressed it as it lay limp there."The old crows stood by one another, Nellie," he said, and he thought he felt a sudden grip of his hand, coming and timidly in an instant going.It seemed to comfort her to hold his hand. The sobs ceased, and presently she looked up and said, with a smile:"I always used to cry at going back to school.""Going back to work," said Philip, "is one ofthe few things in the world really worth crying about.""Yes, isn't it?" she said, unblushingly availing herself of the shelter of his affected cynicism. She was afraid he might go on talking about crows, a topic which had been all very well, and even a little comforting, when she was hidden among the cushions, but would not do now."And London is so horrid in winter," she continued. "Are you going back soon?""Oh, I shall wait a little and look after Dale.""Dale never tells one what is happening.""I'll keep you posted, in case there's a revolution in Denborough, or anything of that sort."A step was heard outside. With a sudden bound Nellie reached the piano, sat down, and began to play a lively air. Dale came in, looking suspiciously at the pair."I thought you'd gone to bed, Nellie.""Just going. Mr. Hume and I have been talking.""About the affairs of the nation," said Philip."But I'm off now. Good-night, Dale."Dale looked closely at her."What are your eyes red for? Have you been crying?""Crying, Dale? What nonsense! I've been roasting them before the fire, that's all; and if they are red, it's not polite to say so, is it, Mr. Hume?""Rightly understood, criticism is a compliment,as the reviewers say when they slate you," remarked Philip. "He might not have noticed your eyes at all.""Inconceivable," said Dale politely, for he was feeling very kindly disposed to this pretty girl, who came when he wanted her, and went when—well, after a reasonably long visit."Good-night, Dale. I'm so sorry about—Mr. Roberts, you know."Dale, having no further use for this grievance, was graciously pleased to let it be forgotten."Oh, you couldn't know he'd be such a brute. Good-night, Nellie."The two men returned to the smoking room. Philip, looking for a piece of paper wherewith to light his pipe, happened to notice a little bundle of proof-sheets lying on the table."Ah, the spring bubbling again?" he asked.Dale nodded."My dear fellow, how are the rest of us to get our masterpieces noticed? You are a monopolist.""It's only a little volume.""What's it about? May I look?""Oh, if you like," answered Dale carelessly; but he kept his eye on his friend.Philip took up the first sheet, and read the title-page; he smiled, and, turning over, came to the dedication."You call it 'Amor Patriæ?'""Yes. Do you like the title?""Hum! There was no thought of pleasing me when it was christened, I presume. And you dedicate it——""Oh, is that there?""Yes, that's there—'To her that shall be named hereafter.'"Dale poked the fire before he answered."Yes," he said, "that's the dedication.""So I see. Well, I hope she'll like them. It is an enviable privilege to confer immortality.""I'll confer it on you, if you like.""Yes, do. It will be less trouble than getting it for myself.""Under the title of 'The Snarler.'"Philip stood on the hearthrug and warmed himself."My dear Dale," he said, "I do not snarl. A wise author pleases each section of the public in turn. Hitherto you have pleased me and my kind, and Roberts and his kind, and Arthur Angell and his kind—who are, by the way, not worth pleasing, for they expect presentation copies. Now, in this new work, which is, I understand, your tribute to the nation which has the honor to bear you, you will please——" He paused."I always write to please myself," said Dale."Yourself," continued Philip, "this mysterious lady, and, I think we may add, the Mayor of Market Denborough.""Go to the devil!" said the poet.
A Fable about Birds.
Mrs. Hodge and Nellie, being left to their own resources, had employed the afternoon in paying a visit to Ethel Roberts, and nothing was wanting to fill Dale's cup of vexation to overflowing, unless it were to have Nellie flying open-mouthed at him, as he grumblingly expressed it, with a tale of the distress in the Doctor's household. Ethel Roberts had the fortitude to bear her troubles, the added fortitude to bear them cheerfully, but not the supreme fortitude which refuses to tell a tale of woe to any ear, however sympathetic. She did not volunteer information, but she did allow it to be dragged out of her, and the barriers of her reserve broke down before Mrs. Hodge's homely consolations and Nellie's sorrowful horror. They were reduced, she admitted, in effect to living on little else than her own wretched income; the practice brought in hardly more than it took out, for, while the rich patients failed, the poor remained; the rent was overdue, bills were unpaid, and the butcher, the milkman, and the coal merchant were growing sulky.
"And while," said Mrs. Hodge, "that pooryoung creature is pinching, and starving, and crying, the man's thinking of nothing but Nihilists and what not. I'd Nihilist him!"
Dinner was served to Dale with sauce of this sort.
"Can I prevent fools suffering for their folly?" he asked.
"The baby looks so ill," said Nellie, "and Mrs. Roberts is worn to a shadow."
"Did you see Roberts?" asked Philip.
"For a minute," said Nellie, "but he was very cold and disagreeable."
"Thought you were tarred with the same brush as Dale, I suppose?"
"Can't you do anything for 'em, Dale?" asked Mrs. Hodge.
"I can send him a check."
"He'll send it back," remarked Philip.
"I wish he'd get out of the place."
"Yes, he might as well be miserable somewhere else, mightn't he?"
Dale glared at his friend, and relapsed into silence. Nevertheless, in spite of Philip's prediction, he sat down after dinner and wrote to Roberts, saying that he had heard that he was in temporary embarrassment, and urging him to allow Dale to be his banker for the moment; this would, Dale added, be the best way of showing that he bore no malice for Dale's letter. He sent a man with the note, ordering him to wait for an answer.
The answer was not long in coming; the man was back in half an hour, bringing the Doctor's reply:
Three months ago I should have thought it an honor to share my last crust with you, and no shame to ask half of all you had. Now I will not touch a farthing of your money until you come back to us. If your friends pay my wife further visits, I shall be obliged if they will look somewhat less keenly at my household arrangements.
James Roberts.
"There is the snub you have brought on me!" exclaimed Dale angrily, flinging the letter to Nellie. "I might have known better than to listen to your stories."
"Dale, Dale, it was every word true. How selfish he is not to think of his wife!"
"Many people are selfish."
"Is anything the matter, Dale?"
"Oh, I'm infernally worried. I never get any peace."
"Hadn't you a good time skating?"
"No. I'm beginning to hate this place."
"Oh, Dale, I've enjoyed my visit so much!"
"Very glad to hear it, I'm sure."
"You must have seen it; we've stayed so long. I've often told mamma we ought to be going."
Dale lit a cigarette.
"Indeed we have had no mercy on you, Dale; but the country and the rest are so delightful."
"Hum—in some ways."
"But I must be back at work. Mamma thought next Saturday would do."
"As soon as that?" said Dale, with polite surprise.
"Think how long we have been here."
"Oh, don't go on Saturday!"
Nellie's face brightened.
"Don't you want us to?" she asked, with an eager little smile. Dale was going to be kind after all.
"No. Why shouldn't you stay till Monday?"
The face fell, the smile disappeared; but she answered, saving her self-respect:
"Saturday is more convenient for—for arriving in town. I think we had better fix Saturday, Dale."
"As you like. Sorry to lose you, Nell."
He sauntered off to the smoking room to join Philip. When Philip came into the drawing room half an hour later in search of a book, he found Nellie sitting before the fire. He took his stand on the hearthrug, and looked steadily down on her.
"Once upon a time," he said, "there was a very beautiful bird who, as it chanced, grew up with a lot of crows. For a long while he liked the crows, and the crows liked him—very much, some of them. Both he and the crows were pleased when the eagles and all the swell birds admired him, and said nice things about him, and wanted to know him—and the crows who liked him most were most pleased. Presently he did come to know the eagles and the other swell birds, and he liked them very much, and he began to get a little tired of the old crows, and by and by he left their company a good deal. He was a polite bird and a kind bird, and never told them that hedidn't want them any more. But they saw he didn't."
There was a little sob from the armchair.
"Whereupon some of them broke their hearts, and others—didn't. The others were wisest, Nellie."
He paused, gazing down at the distressful little heap of crumpled drapery and roughened gleaming hair.
"Much wisest. He was not a bad bird as birds go—but not a bird to break one's heart about, Nellie: what bird is?"
There was another sob. Philip looked despairingly at the ceiling and exclaimed under his breath:
"I wish to God she wouldn't cry!"
He took his book from the mantelpiece where he had laid it and moved toward the door. But he came back again, unable to leave her like that, and walked restlessly about the room, stopping every now and then to stand over her, and wonder what he could do.
Presently he took a feverish little hand in his, and pressed it as it lay limp there.
"The old crows stood by one another, Nellie," he said, and he thought he felt a sudden grip of his hand, coming and timidly in an instant going.
It seemed to comfort her to hold his hand. The sobs ceased, and presently she looked up and said, with a smile:
"I always used to cry at going back to school."
"Going back to work," said Philip, "is one ofthe few things in the world really worth crying about."
"Yes, isn't it?" she said, unblushingly availing herself of the shelter of his affected cynicism. She was afraid he might go on talking about crows, a topic which had been all very well, and even a little comforting, when she was hidden among the cushions, but would not do now.
"And London is so horrid in winter," she continued. "Are you going back soon?"
"Oh, I shall wait a little and look after Dale."
"Dale never tells one what is happening."
"I'll keep you posted, in case there's a revolution in Denborough, or anything of that sort."
A step was heard outside. With a sudden bound Nellie reached the piano, sat down, and began to play a lively air. Dale came in, looking suspiciously at the pair.
"I thought you'd gone to bed, Nellie."
"Just going. Mr. Hume and I have been talking."
"About the affairs of the nation," said Philip.
"But I'm off now. Good-night, Dale."
Dale looked closely at her.
"What are your eyes red for? Have you been crying?"
"Crying, Dale? What nonsense! I've been roasting them before the fire, that's all; and if they are red, it's not polite to say so, is it, Mr. Hume?"
"Rightly understood, criticism is a compliment,as the reviewers say when they slate you," remarked Philip. "He might not have noticed your eyes at all."
"Inconceivable," said Dale politely, for he was feeling very kindly disposed to this pretty girl, who came when he wanted her, and went when—well, after a reasonably long visit.
"Good-night, Dale. I'm so sorry about—Mr. Roberts, you know."
Dale, having no further use for this grievance, was graciously pleased to let it be forgotten.
"Oh, you couldn't know he'd be such a brute. Good-night, Nellie."
The two men returned to the smoking room. Philip, looking for a piece of paper wherewith to light his pipe, happened to notice a little bundle of proof-sheets lying on the table.
"Ah, the spring bubbling again?" he asked.
Dale nodded.
"My dear fellow, how are the rest of us to get our masterpieces noticed? You are a monopolist."
"It's only a little volume."
"What's it about? May I look?"
"Oh, if you like," answered Dale carelessly; but he kept his eye on his friend.
Philip took up the first sheet, and read the title-page; he smiled, and, turning over, came to the dedication.
"You call it 'Amor Patriæ?'"
"Yes. Do you like the title?"
"Hum! There was no thought of pleasing me when it was christened, I presume. And you dedicate it——"
"Oh, is that there?"
"Yes, that's there—'To her that shall be named hereafter.'"
Dale poked the fire before he answered.
"Yes," he said, "that's the dedication."
"So I see. Well, I hope she'll like them. It is an enviable privilege to confer immortality."
"I'll confer it on you, if you like."
"Yes, do. It will be less trouble than getting it for myself."
"Under the title of 'The Snarler.'"
Philip stood on the hearthrug and warmed himself.
"My dear Dale," he said, "I do not snarl. A wise author pleases each section of the public in turn. Hitherto you have pleased me and my kind, and Roberts and his kind, and Arthur Angell and his kind—who are, by the way, not worth pleasing, for they expect presentation copies. Now, in this new work, which is, I understand, your tribute to the nation which has the honor to bear you, you will please——" He paused.
"I always write to please myself," said Dale.
"Yourself," continued Philip, "this mysterious lady, and, I think we may add, the Mayor of Market Denborough."
"Go to the devil!" said the poet.