Chapter Twenty Three.

Chapter Twenty Three.The Melodrama.On Boxing Day, Lavender excused herself from joining a rinking party, and lay curled up on a sofa reading a Christmas number.The following morning she stayed in bed to breakfast, and complained of a swollen face. On the third day, the sight of the huge cheeks and doubled chin sent the family flying for the doctor, and the tragic verdict of “mumps” was whispered from mouth to mouth.Mumps in the Christmas holidays! Isolation for the victim for days, even weeks; the risk of infection for others; the terrible, unthinkable possibility of “missing a term”! Mrs Vernon came nobly to the rescue, and invited Darsie to spend the remainder of the holidays under her roof, since, with a Tripos in prospect, every precaution must be taken against infection. For the rest, Lavender’s own little eyrie was situated at the end of a long top passage, and might have been originally designed for a sanatorium and there, in solitary state, the poor mumpy poetess bewailed her fate, and besought the compassion of her companions. Letters were not forbidden, and she therefore found a sad satisfaction in pouring out her woes on paper, as a result of which occupation the following poetical effusion presently found its way to the schoolroom party—“All gay and fair the scene appeared:I was a gladsome maid;When the dire hand of circumstanceUpon my life was laid.Upon the eve of festal dayThe first dread symptoms fell;And those who should have sympathised,Whose tender words I would have prized,Did sneer, and jeer, and with loud cries,Ascribe the reason to mince-pies!“What time I woke the third day morn,By mirror was the sad truth borne;Not alone exile, grief, and painMust fill my cup—but alsoshame!Gone is my youthful glee and grace,I have an elephantine face;My cheeks are gross, which were so thin;I have a loathsome pendant chin.All who behold me smile aside,And their derision barely hide.Oh, cruel fate! instead of tears,In my sad plight I get but jeers.“Friends, comrades, readers of this ditty,If heart ye have, on me have pity.Go not unthinking on your way,Content to sing, content to play,While I and mumps sit here aloneIn an unending, drear ‘At home.’Put wits to work, think out some wayTo cheer the captive’s lonely day,Forget yourself, and think of me,And doubly blessed you shall be.For since the days of earliest youthYou have been brought up on this truth—To help the ailing by your sideIs the true work of Christmas-tide!”To disregard so touching an appeal being plainly an impossibility, an impromptu committee meeting was held in the Vernons’ study, when the idea of an open-air melodrama was proposed, and carried with acclamation. A melodrama acted in the back garden, underneath Lavender’s window, opened out prospects of amusement for the actors as well as the audience, and a rainy afternoon was passed in the merriest fashion discussing the plot, characters, and costume.Darsie sat on the hearthrug, and prodded the fire vigorously to mark each point scored. Vie wrote from dictation at the centre table. Dan sat chuckling in his own particular chair, and allowed himself to be cast as hero with lamblike calm, and plain Hannah affected dire displeasure at being passed over for the part of beauteous maid. It was like the dear old days when they had all been young—reallyyoung—in pinafores and pigtails, with no dread of coming Tripos, no agitation about youthful lawyers to chase away sleep at night! Looking back through the years, that hour stood out in remembrance as one most happily typical of the dear home life.The programme was delicious. Vie discovered a great sheet of white paper, left over from the parcel wrappings of the week before; Dan printed the words in his most dashing fashion; John nailed it on the lid of a packing-chest, and the whole party escorted it round the terrace to the Garnett dwelling, and waited in the street beneath until it was conveyed upstairs, and Lavender, discreetly swathed in a shawl, appeared at her lighted window and waved a towel in triumph.This was the programme—On Wednesday Afternoon Next (Weather permitting)In Aid of the Fund for Sick and Suffering SpinstersA First Performance will be given ofThe Blood-Curdling and Hair-Raising Melodrama entitledThe Blue Cabbageby Allthelotofus.Dramatis Personae.Efflorescence (A Guileless Maid)—Miss Darsie Garnett.Meretricia (1st Villainess)—Mr Harry Garnett.Mycrobe (2nd Villainess)—Mr Russell Garnett.Elijah B. Higgins (Hero)—Mr Dan Vernon.Sigismund La Bas (A False Caitiff)—Mr Percy Lister.D. Spenser (Certificated Poisonmonger)—Mr John Vernon.Endeavora (A Well-Meaner)—Miss Clemence Garnett.The Greek Chorus—Miss Hannah Vernon.N.B.—There is no Cabbage!Imagine the feelings of a solitary invalid on receipt of such a programme as the above—a programme of an entertainment organised, composed, and designed wholly and solely for her own amusement! Lavender’s mumps were at a painful stage—so sore, so stiff, so heavy, that she felt all face, had no spirit to read, craved for companionship, and yet shrank sensitively from observing eyes. Let those jeer who may, itisan abominable thing to feel a martyr, and look a clown, and poor Lavender’s sensitive nature suffered acutely from the position. Then oh! it was good to feel that to-morrow something exciting was going to happen—that she would be amused, cheered, comforted; that her dear companions would be near her, so near that once again she would feel one of the merry throng.If only it were fine! Really and truly Lavender felt that she could not support the blow if it werewet. Mumps seem to sap the constitution of moral force; if she could not see the melodrama, she would weep like a child!Itwasfine, however. The very elements conspired in her behalf, and produced a still, unshiny day, when the pageant of the melodrama appeared to the best advantage, and the voices rose clear and distinct to that upper window, before which Lavender stood, a muffled figure, in a fur coat and cap, and a great wool shawl swathed round face and neck after the fashion of an English veil.The melodrama proved even more thrilling than had been expected. On his, or her, first appearance on the scene, each character advanced to a spot directly in front of the upstairs window, and obligingly related the salient points of his life, character, and ambitions, together with a candid exposition of his intentions towards the other members of the cast; the while Hannah, as Greek Chorus, interposed moral remarks and reflections on the same. After an indulgent hearing of these confessions, it would appear that two ambitions were common to the actors—either they wished to elope with the hero or heroine, or to poison the False Caitiff, and the Villainess Number One or Two, or such a contingent of these worthies as excluded themselves.The Well-Meaner assiduously endeavoured to foil these intents, and received the scant amount of encouragement which falls to well-meaning interference in real life; the Certified Poisonmonger presided over three tin pails of liquids, labelled respectively, “Lingering,” “Sudden,” and “A highly superior article in writhes and coils. As patronised by the Empress of China” and the demand for these wares was naturally brisk in so quarrelsome a company: the False Caitiff chose a sudden death for his rival, the Hero; Meretricia, the first Villainess, poisoned the Caitiff by a more lingering means; Villainess Number Two, under the false impression that the Hero had given his heart to Meretricia, poisoned that good lady, sparing no money on the deed, whereby Russell was afforded an admirable opportunity of exhibiting his wriggling powers. The guileless maid poisoned herself with the dregs in her lover’s glass; and the Poisonmonger, fatigued with the rush of Christmas business, fainted away, and, being revived by potions from his own pails, survived only long enough to administer a forcible dose in revenge. The Well-Meaner’s fate differed from that of her companions in that she was insidiously poisoned by each actor in turn, so that, figuratively speaking, the curtain descended upon a row of corpses, in the midst of which the Greek Chorus intoned exemplary precepts and advice.Hannah, as Greek chorus, was by common consent pronounced the star of the company, her interpolated reflections being so droll and to the point that even the lingering victims found themselves overcome with laughter.As for the audience, her joy, though great, was not unmixed with pain. As the melodrama approached its critical point the actors could see her at her window, holding up her mumps with either hand, and the piteous plea—“Don’t make me laugh! Don’t make me laugh!” floated down on the wintry air.Next day Lavender was worse, and melodramas were banned as a means of recreation; but she sent a touching message of thanks to the troupe, in which she declared that “the joy outweighed the pain,” so that, all things considered, “The Blue Cabbage” was voted a great success.

On Boxing Day, Lavender excused herself from joining a rinking party, and lay curled up on a sofa reading a Christmas number.

The following morning she stayed in bed to breakfast, and complained of a swollen face. On the third day, the sight of the huge cheeks and doubled chin sent the family flying for the doctor, and the tragic verdict of “mumps” was whispered from mouth to mouth.

Mumps in the Christmas holidays! Isolation for the victim for days, even weeks; the risk of infection for others; the terrible, unthinkable possibility of “missing a term”! Mrs Vernon came nobly to the rescue, and invited Darsie to spend the remainder of the holidays under her roof, since, with a Tripos in prospect, every precaution must be taken against infection. For the rest, Lavender’s own little eyrie was situated at the end of a long top passage, and might have been originally designed for a sanatorium and there, in solitary state, the poor mumpy poetess bewailed her fate, and besought the compassion of her companions. Letters were not forbidden, and she therefore found a sad satisfaction in pouring out her woes on paper, as a result of which occupation the following poetical effusion presently found its way to the schoolroom party—

“All gay and fair the scene appeared:I was a gladsome maid;When the dire hand of circumstanceUpon my life was laid.Upon the eve of festal dayThe first dread symptoms fell;And those who should have sympathised,Whose tender words I would have prized,Did sneer, and jeer, and with loud cries,Ascribe the reason to mince-pies!“What time I woke the third day morn,By mirror was the sad truth borne;Not alone exile, grief, and painMust fill my cup—but alsoshame!Gone is my youthful glee and grace,I have an elephantine face;My cheeks are gross, which were so thin;I have a loathsome pendant chin.All who behold me smile aside,And their derision barely hide.Oh, cruel fate! instead of tears,In my sad plight I get but jeers.“Friends, comrades, readers of this ditty,If heart ye have, on me have pity.Go not unthinking on your way,Content to sing, content to play,While I and mumps sit here aloneIn an unending, drear ‘At home.’Put wits to work, think out some wayTo cheer the captive’s lonely day,Forget yourself, and think of me,And doubly blessed you shall be.For since the days of earliest youthYou have been brought up on this truth—To help the ailing by your sideIs the true work of Christmas-tide!”

“All gay and fair the scene appeared:I was a gladsome maid;When the dire hand of circumstanceUpon my life was laid.Upon the eve of festal dayThe first dread symptoms fell;And those who should have sympathised,Whose tender words I would have prized,Did sneer, and jeer, and with loud cries,Ascribe the reason to mince-pies!“What time I woke the third day morn,By mirror was the sad truth borne;Not alone exile, grief, and painMust fill my cup—but alsoshame!Gone is my youthful glee and grace,I have an elephantine face;My cheeks are gross, which were so thin;I have a loathsome pendant chin.All who behold me smile aside,And their derision barely hide.Oh, cruel fate! instead of tears,In my sad plight I get but jeers.“Friends, comrades, readers of this ditty,If heart ye have, on me have pity.Go not unthinking on your way,Content to sing, content to play,While I and mumps sit here aloneIn an unending, drear ‘At home.’Put wits to work, think out some wayTo cheer the captive’s lonely day,Forget yourself, and think of me,And doubly blessed you shall be.For since the days of earliest youthYou have been brought up on this truth—To help the ailing by your sideIs the true work of Christmas-tide!”

To disregard so touching an appeal being plainly an impossibility, an impromptu committee meeting was held in the Vernons’ study, when the idea of an open-air melodrama was proposed, and carried with acclamation. A melodrama acted in the back garden, underneath Lavender’s window, opened out prospects of amusement for the actors as well as the audience, and a rainy afternoon was passed in the merriest fashion discussing the plot, characters, and costume.

Darsie sat on the hearthrug, and prodded the fire vigorously to mark each point scored. Vie wrote from dictation at the centre table. Dan sat chuckling in his own particular chair, and allowed himself to be cast as hero with lamblike calm, and plain Hannah affected dire displeasure at being passed over for the part of beauteous maid. It was like the dear old days when they had all been young—reallyyoung—in pinafores and pigtails, with no dread of coming Tripos, no agitation about youthful lawyers to chase away sleep at night! Looking back through the years, that hour stood out in remembrance as one most happily typical of the dear home life.

The programme was delicious. Vie discovered a great sheet of white paper, left over from the parcel wrappings of the week before; Dan printed the words in his most dashing fashion; John nailed it on the lid of a packing-chest, and the whole party escorted it round the terrace to the Garnett dwelling, and waited in the street beneath until it was conveyed upstairs, and Lavender, discreetly swathed in a shawl, appeared at her lighted window and waved a towel in triumph.

This was the programme—

On Wednesday Afternoon Next (Weather permitting)In Aid of the Fund for Sick and Suffering SpinstersA First Performance will be given ofThe Blood-Curdling and Hair-Raising Melodrama entitledThe Blue Cabbageby Allthelotofus.Dramatis Personae.Efflorescence (A Guileless Maid)—Miss Darsie Garnett.Meretricia (1st Villainess)—Mr Harry Garnett.Mycrobe (2nd Villainess)—Mr Russell Garnett.Elijah B. Higgins (Hero)—Mr Dan Vernon.Sigismund La Bas (A False Caitiff)—Mr Percy Lister.D. Spenser (Certificated Poisonmonger)—Mr John Vernon.Endeavora (A Well-Meaner)—Miss Clemence Garnett.The Greek Chorus—Miss Hannah Vernon.N.B.—There is no Cabbage!

On Wednesday Afternoon Next (Weather permitting)In Aid of the Fund for Sick and Suffering SpinstersA First Performance will be given ofThe Blood-Curdling and Hair-Raising Melodrama entitledThe Blue Cabbageby Allthelotofus.Dramatis Personae.Efflorescence (A Guileless Maid)—Miss Darsie Garnett.Meretricia (1st Villainess)—Mr Harry Garnett.Mycrobe (2nd Villainess)—Mr Russell Garnett.Elijah B. Higgins (Hero)—Mr Dan Vernon.Sigismund La Bas (A False Caitiff)—Mr Percy Lister.D. Spenser (Certificated Poisonmonger)—Mr John Vernon.Endeavora (A Well-Meaner)—Miss Clemence Garnett.The Greek Chorus—Miss Hannah Vernon.N.B.—There is no Cabbage!

Imagine the feelings of a solitary invalid on receipt of such a programme as the above—a programme of an entertainment organised, composed, and designed wholly and solely for her own amusement! Lavender’s mumps were at a painful stage—so sore, so stiff, so heavy, that she felt all face, had no spirit to read, craved for companionship, and yet shrank sensitively from observing eyes. Let those jeer who may, itisan abominable thing to feel a martyr, and look a clown, and poor Lavender’s sensitive nature suffered acutely from the position. Then oh! it was good to feel that to-morrow something exciting was going to happen—that she would be amused, cheered, comforted; that her dear companions would be near her, so near that once again she would feel one of the merry throng.

If only it were fine! Really and truly Lavender felt that she could not support the blow if it werewet. Mumps seem to sap the constitution of moral force; if she could not see the melodrama, she would weep like a child!

Itwasfine, however. The very elements conspired in her behalf, and produced a still, unshiny day, when the pageant of the melodrama appeared to the best advantage, and the voices rose clear and distinct to that upper window, before which Lavender stood, a muffled figure, in a fur coat and cap, and a great wool shawl swathed round face and neck after the fashion of an English veil.

The melodrama proved even more thrilling than had been expected. On his, or her, first appearance on the scene, each character advanced to a spot directly in front of the upstairs window, and obligingly related the salient points of his life, character, and ambitions, together with a candid exposition of his intentions towards the other members of the cast; the while Hannah, as Greek Chorus, interposed moral remarks and reflections on the same. After an indulgent hearing of these confessions, it would appear that two ambitions were common to the actors—either they wished to elope with the hero or heroine, or to poison the False Caitiff, and the Villainess Number One or Two, or such a contingent of these worthies as excluded themselves.

The Well-Meaner assiduously endeavoured to foil these intents, and received the scant amount of encouragement which falls to well-meaning interference in real life; the Certified Poisonmonger presided over three tin pails of liquids, labelled respectively, “Lingering,” “Sudden,” and “A highly superior article in writhes and coils. As patronised by the Empress of China” and the demand for these wares was naturally brisk in so quarrelsome a company: the False Caitiff chose a sudden death for his rival, the Hero; Meretricia, the first Villainess, poisoned the Caitiff by a more lingering means; Villainess Number Two, under the false impression that the Hero had given his heart to Meretricia, poisoned that good lady, sparing no money on the deed, whereby Russell was afforded an admirable opportunity of exhibiting his wriggling powers. The guileless maid poisoned herself with the dregs in her lover’s glass; and the Poisonmonger, fatigued with the rush of Christmas business, fainted away, and, being revived by potions from his own pails, survived only long enough to administer a forcible dose in revenge. The Well-Meaner’s fate differed from that of her companions in that she was insidiously poisoned by each actor in turn, so that, figuratively speaking, the curtain descended upon a row of corpses, in the midst of which the Greek Chorus intoned exemplary precepts and advice.

Hannah, as Greek chorus, was by common consent pronounced the star of the company, her interpolated reflections being so droll and to the point that even the lingering victims found themselves overcome with laughter.

As for the audience, her joy, though great, was not unmixed with pain. As the melodrama approached its critical point the actors could see her at her window, holding up her mumps with either hand, and the piteous plea—“Don’t make me laugh! Don’t make me laugh!” floated down on the wintry air.

Next day Lavender was worse, and melodramas were banned as a means of recreation; but she sent a touching message of thanks to the troupe, in which she declared that “the joy outweighed the pain,” so that, all things considered, “The Blue Cabbage” was voted a great success.

Chapter Twenty Four.Dan and Darsie.No sooner did the news of Lavender’s illness, and Darsie’s consequent absence from home, reach the Percival household than three separate letters were dispatched, insisting that at least a part of the remaining holidays should be spent at the Manor.Pray why, the girls demanded, should Hannah Vernon be allowed to engross Darsie, when she enjoyed her society practically the whole year round? It was unjust, mean, contemptible. They were so dull and sad this Christmas-time. Wouldn’t Darsie come?Pray why, inquired Ralph ingenuously, did Darsie not come when she had the chance? She knew that he would be glad to see her. It was quite horribly dull. The parents were absurdly humped—Mrs Percival’s words were few but disturbing: “I want to consult with you about Ralph. You have more influence over him than any one else. Do come, dear child, if you possibly can.”In face of the last letter it was impossible to say no. Darsie was not sure that she wanted to say no; on the other hand, she was aggravatingly uncertain if she wanted to say yes. At college and at home alike the atmosphere was at once austere and bracing; it would be agreeable to live for a time in the lap of luxury—to be regarded as a miracle of cleverness and beauty; which treatment was invariably bestowed upon her during her visits to The Manor. She would enjoy staying with the Percivals, but she would be sad to miss the cosy hours when Dan and his friend, Percy Lister, joined the little party in the old study, and they all talked together round the fire. What talks they had; what themes they discussed! What animated discussions sprang from a casual word, and were pursued with a go and a spirit which seem to exist only on such informal occasions. Sometimes they laughed and quipped, and beheld everything from the comic point of view; anon, a sudden spirit of earnestness would pass from one to the other, and as the fading light hid their faces from view, tongues were set free, so that they talked of the things which mattered, the towering realities which lay at the heart of life! During these discussions Dan invariably seated himself in the darkest corner, and Darsie, looking across, had again and again the impression of deep eyes staring—staring! Vie Vernon considered the Percivals “grasping creatures,” and didn’t care who knew it; Hannah was placidly unconcerned; Dan made no remark; Percy Lister was leaving himself, and considered that things “fitted in well.” Altogether, in comparison with the enthusiasm of the invitation, the opposition was blightingly resigned. Darsie tossed her head, packed her boxes, and prepared to depart a whole three days sooner than she had originally intended.On the afternoon before her departure a party was made up for the rink, but at the last moment Darsie excused herself, and declared a wish to stay at home. There were several pieces of sewing and mending which were necessary, there was a letter to be written to Margaret France, and a farewell ode to cheer poor Lavender. A gas fire in her bedroom allowed her to perform these tasks in solitude, but as soon as they were satisfactorily accomplished she made her way downstairs to the study, prepared to enjoy an hour over an interesting book.The gas was unlit, the usual large fire blazed in the grate; an arm-chair was drawn up to the side, and within it sat Dan, head leaning on hand, in an attitude which spoke of weariness and dejection.He raised his eyes and looked at her, and Darsie shut the door and came forward eagerly.“Dan! Back again so soon? Is anything wrong?”“No!”“But you look strange. You—you didn’t hurt yourself at the rink?”“No.”“Quite, quite sure?”“Quite.”Darsie subsided on to her favourite seat—the hearthrug—with a little sigh of relief.“That’s all right. You’re very monosyllabic, Dan. Shall I disturb you if I sit here for a time?”“No.”“A hundred thanks! You aretoogracious. I can be quiet if you like. I like staring into the fire and dreaming myself.”Dan did not answer. Darsie peered at him, moving her little head from side to side so as to get the clearest view. He looked very large—a great shapeless mass of dark in the old red chair.She liked the bigness of him, felt the old satisfaction at sight of the strong, rugged face, the old craving for confidence and approval. Strange how different one felt in company with different people.Tête-à-têtewith Ralph Percival, Darsie felt a giant of strength and resource—assured, self-confident, a bulwark against which others might lean. With Dan, well, with Dan she was just a slip of a girl, conscious of nothing so much as her own weaknesses, mental and physical; her difficult gropings, compared with his clear vision; her tiny hands and wrists, compared with his big sinewy paw; her slim form, compared to the bulk of the square-cut shoulders. Never—Darsie realised it with a smile—never did she feel so humble and diffident as when in Dan’s society; yet, strangely enough, the sensation was far from disagreeable.“Dan!”“Darsie!”“Is anything the matter? Between you and me! You don’t happen to be snarkey, do you, about anything I’ve done?”“Why should you think I am ‘snarkey’?”“Because—youare! You’re not a bit sociable and friendly—evenyoursort of sociability. I’m a guest in your mother’s house if I’m nothing else and it’s your duty to be civil.”“Haven’t I always been civil to you, Darsie?”Darsie drew a quick breath of impatience and, seizing upon the poker, beat at the unoffending coal as the best method of letting off steam.“You are so painfully literal. I canfeelwhat other people are thinking, however much they try to disguise it.”“How doIfeel, for example?”Darsie turned her head and stared curiously into Dan’s face. The hand on which it leaned shielded it somewhat from view, but, even so, there was something in the intent gaze which filled her with a strange new discomfort. She turned back to her poking once more.“I think—there’s something that I don’t understand—I think—there’s something you disapprove! I’m a very good girl, and I work very hard, and I’m fond of my friends, and I expect them to be fond of me in return. I don’tlikeyou to disapprove, Dan!”“I can’t help it, Darsie. I’ve hated that friendship from the beginning, and I hate it more with every month that passes.”“Oh!thatold story.” Darsie’s voice took a tone of impatience; for it was annoying to find that Dan was harking back on the well-known subject of dispute. “Well, I’m sorry to distress you, but I am conceited enough to believe that I have taken no harm from my friendship with Ralph Percival, and that he has reaped some little good from mine. While that state of thing continues, I shall certainly refuse to give him up—even to please you!”There was silence for several moments, then Dan said slowly—“If I agreed with your conclusions, I should not try to persuade you, Darsie; but I do not, and my opportunities of judging are better than yours.”“You are unfair, Dan. It is a pity to allow yourself to be so prejudiced that you can’t give a fair judgment. I should have imagined that even you would be forced to admit that Ralph had done better this term.”Dan did not speak. He turned his head and looked Darsie full in the eyes, and there was in his look a puzzled, questioning air, which she found it difficult to understand. When he spoke again, it was not to reply in any direct way to her accusation, but to ask a question on his own account.“Darsie, do you mind telling me—is your position entirely disinterested? Do you look upon the fellow merely as a man to be helped, or do you care for him for his own personal sake?”Darsie deliberated. The firelight played on her downcast face, on the long white throat rising from the low collar of her white blouse, on the little hands clenched round the steel poker. Before her mind’s eye arose the memory of handsome, melancholy eyes; imagination conjured back the sound of impassioned appeals. Her expression softened, her voice took a deeper note.“He needs me, Dan!”That was her answer. Dan nodded in silence, accepting it as sufficient. He rose from his chair, and paced up and down the room, hands thrust deep into his trouser pockets, head held back with the characteristic forward tilt of the chin. Darsie, watching him, thought involuntarily of a caged animal striving restlessly against the bars. Her heart gave a little throb of relief when he spoke again in his own natural voice.“All right, Darsie. Good luck to your efforts! I appreciate your intentions, and am only sorry that I can’t agree. According to my belief no one can help a man who refuses to help himself. We’ve got to fight our own battles, and to bear our own burdens! If some one steps forward and offers to undertake for us, we may imagine for a time that we are set free, but it’s a mistake! Sooner or later the time comes when we’re bound to fight it out alone, and it doesn’t get easier for being deferred. Everything that is worth learning in life we have to worry out for ourselves!”Darsie drew a long, trembling sigh. How puzzling life was, when the two people on whose judgment you most relied delivered themselves of directly opposing verdicts! Mrs Reeves believed that her help was all-important to Ralph’s progress; Dan insisted that her efforts were in vain.Was he right? Was he wrong? Could she honestly assure herself that Ralph was stronger, more self-reliant, more able to stand alone without the stimulus of constant support and encouragement? Instinctively Darsie’s hand went up to touch the little golden brooch which fastened the lace collar of her blouse. If the anchor were withdrawn, would Ralph drift once more towards the rocks? The answer was difficult. She pondered it aloud, speaking in low, anxious tones, with lengthened pauses between the words.“We’re both right, Dan. We’ve both got hold ofbitsof the truth! In the end we must win through for ourselves, but surely, in preparation for the battle, we can give each othersomehelp. Some natures seem made to stand, and others to lean. A prop is not of much account, but it may serve to keep a plant straight while it is gathering strength. The big oaks need no props; they are so strong that they can’t understand; they have no pity for weakness.”Dan stopped short in his pacings.“That meant for me, Darsie?”“Humph! Just as you please! Oaks are nice things—big, and strong, and restful, but just a little bit inclined to grow—gnarled!”Dan vouchsafed no reply, and Darsie sat, hands clasped round knees, staring into the fire for five long, silent minutes. She was hoping that Dan would never grow “gnarled” towards herself, longing for him to speak and promise that he would not, but he still remained silent, and presently the door burst open, the rinking party appeared on the threshold, and the opportunity for quiet conclave was over.

No sooner did the news of Lavender’s illness, and Darsie’s consequent absence from home, reach the Percival household than three separate letters were dispatched, insisting that at least a part of the remaining holidays should be spent at the Manor.

Pray why, the girls demanded, should Hannah Vernon be allowed to engross Darsie, when she enjoyed her society practically the whole year round? It was unjust, mean, contemptible. They were so dull and sad this Christmas-time. Wouldn’t Darsie come?

Pray why, inquired Ralph ingenuously, did Darsie not come when she had the chance? She knew that he would be glad to see her. It was quite horribly dull. The parents were absurdly humped—

Mrs Percival’s words were few but disturbing: “I want to consult with you about Ralph. You have more influence over him than any one else. Do come, dear child, if you possibly can.”

In face of the last letter it was impossible to say no. Darsie was not sure that she wanted to say no; on the other hand, she was aggravatingly uncertain if she wanted to say yes. At college and at home alike the atmosphere was at once austere and bracing; it would be agreeable to live for a time in the lap of luxury—to be regarded as a miracle of cleverness and beauty; which treatment was invariably bestowed upon her during her visits to The Manor. She would enjoy staying with the Percivals, but she would be sad to miss the cosy hours when Dan and his friend, Percy Lister, joined the little party in the old study, and they all talked together round the fire. What talks they had; what themes they discussed! What animated discussions sprang from a casual word, and were pursued with a go and a spirit which seem to exist only on such informal occasions. Sometimes they laughed and quipped, and beheld everything from the comic point of view; anon, a sudden spirit of earnestness would pass from one to the other, and as the fading light hid their faces from view, tongues were set free, so that they talked of the things which mattered, the towering realities which lay at the heart of life! During these discussions Dan invariably seated himself in the darkest corner, and Darsie, looking across, had again and again the impression of deep eyes staring—staring! Vie Vernon considered the Percivals “grasping creatures,” and didn’t care who knew it; Hannah was placidly unconcerned; Dan made no remark; Percy Lister was leaving himself, and considered that things “fitted in well.” Altogether, in comparison with the enthusiasm of the invitation, the opposition was blightingly resigned. Darsie tossed her head, packed her boxes, and prepared to depart a whole three days sooner than she had originally intended.

On the afternoon before her departure a party was made up for the rink, but at the last moment Darsie excused herself, and declared a wish to stay at home. There were several pieces of sewing and mending which were necessary, there was a letter to be written to Margaret France, and a farewell ode to cheer poor Lavender. A gas fire in her bedroom allowed her to perform these tasks in solitude, but as soon as they were satisfactorily accomplished she made her way downstairs to the study, prepared to enjoy an hour over an interesting book.

The gas was unlit, the usual large fire blazed in the grate; an arm-chair was drawn up to the side, and within it sat Dan, head leaning on hand, in an attitude which spoke of weariness and dejection.

He raised his eyes and looked at her, and Darsie shut the door and came forward eagerly.

“Dan! Back again so soon? Is anything wrong?”

“No!”

“But you look strange. You—you didn’t hurt yourself at the rink?”

“No.”

“Quite, quite sure?”

“Quite.”

Darsie subsided on to her favourite seat—the hearthrug—with a little sigh of relief.

“That’s all right. You’re very monosyllabic, Dan. Shall I disturb you if I sit here for a time?”

“No.”

“A hundred thanks! You aretoogracious. I can be quiet if you like. I like staring into the fire and dreaming myself.”

Dan did not answer. Darsie peered at him, moving her little head from side to side so as to get the clearest view. He looked very large—a great shapeless mass of dark in the old red chair.

She liked the bigness of him, felt the old satisfaction at sight of the strong, rugged face, the old craving for confidence and approval. Strange how different one felt in company with different people.Tête-à-têtewith Ralph Percival, Darsie felt a giant of strength and resource—assured, self-confident, a bulwark against which others might lean. With Dan, well, with Dan she was just a slip of a girl, conscious of nothing so much as her own weaknesses, mental and physical; her difficult gropings, compared with his clear vision; her tiny hands and wrists, compared with his big sinewy paw; her slim form, compared to the bulk of the square-cut shoulders. Never—Darsie realised it with a smile—never did she feel so humble and diffident as when in Dan’s society; yet, strangely enough, the sensation was far from disagreeable.

“Dan!”

“Darsie!”

“Is anything the matter? Between you and me! You don’t happen to be snarkey, do you, about anything I’ve done?”

“Why should you think I am ‘snarkey’?”

“Because—youare! You’re not a bit sociable and friendly—evenyoursort of sociability. I’m a guest in your mother’s house if I’m nothing else and it’s your duty to be civil.”

“Haven’t I always been civil to you, Darsie?”

Darsie drew a quick breath of impatience and, seizing upon the poker, beat at the unoffending coal as the best method of letting off steam.

“You are so painfully literal. I canfeelwhat other people are thinking, however much they try to disguise it.”

“How doIfeel, for example?”

Darsie turned her head and stared curiously into Dan’s face. The hand on which it leaned shielded it somewhat from view, but, even so, there was something in the intent gaze which filled her with a strange new discomfort. She turned back to her poking once more.

“I think—there’s something that I don’t understand—I think—there’s something you disapprove! I’m a very good girl, and I work very hard, and I’m fond of my friends, and I expect them to be fond of me in return. I don’tlikeyou to disapprove, Dan!”

“I can’t help it, Darsie. I’ve hated that friendship from the beginning, and I hate it more with every month that passes.”

“Oh!thatold story.” Darsie’s voice took a tone of impatience; for it was annoying to find that Dan was harking back on the well-known subject of dispute. “Well, I’m sorry to distress you, but I am conceited enough to believe that I have taken no harm from my friendship with Ralph Percival, and that he has reaped some little good from mine. While that state of thing continues, I shall certainly refuse to give him up—even to please you!”

There was silence for several moments, then Dan said slowly—

“If I agreed with your conclusions, I should not try to persuade you, Darsie; but I do not, and my opportunities of judging are better than yours.”

“You are unfair, Dan. It is a pity to allow yourself to be so prejudiced that you can’t give a fair judgment. I should have imagined that even you would be forced to admit that Ralph had done better this term.”

Dan did not speak. He turned his head and looked Darsie full in the eyes, and there was in his look a puzzled, questioning air, which she found it difficult to understand. When he spoke again, it was not to reply in any direct way to her accusation, but to ask a question on his own account.

“Darsie, do you mind telling me—is your position entirely disinterested? Do you look upon the fellow merely as a man to be helped, or do you care for him for his own personal sake?”

Darsie deliberated. The firelight played on her downcast face, on the long white throat rising from the low collar of her white blouse, on the little hands clenched round the steel poker. Before her mind’s eye arose the memory of handsome, melancholy eyes; imagination conjured back the sound of impassioned appeals. Her expression softened, her voice took a deeper note.

“He needs me, Dan!”

That was her answer. Dan nodded in silence, accepting it as sufficient. He rose from his chair, and paced up and down the room, hands thrust deep into his trouser pockets, head held back with the characteristic forward tilt of the chin. Darsie, watching him, thought involuntarily of a caged animal striving restlessly against the bars. Her heart gave a little throb of relief when he spoke again in his own natural voice.

“All right, Darsie. Good luck to your efforts! I appreciate your intentions, and am only sorry that I can’t agree. According to my belief no one can help a man who refuses to help himself. We’ve got to fight our own battles, and to bear our own burdens! If some one steps forward and offers to undertake for us, we may imagine for a time that we are set free, but it’s a mistake! Sooner or later the time comes when we’re bound to fight it out alone, and it doesn’t get easier for being deferred. Everything that is worth learning in life we have to worry out for ourselves!”

Darsie drew a long, trembling sigh. How puzzling life was, when the two people on whose judgment you most relied delivered themselves of directly opposing verdicts! Mrs Reeves believed that her help was all-important to Ralph’s progress; Dan insisted that her efforts were in vain.

Was he right? Was he wrong? Could she honestly assure herself that Ralph was stronger, more self-reliant, more able to stand alone without the stimulus of constant support and encouragement? Instinctively Darsie’s hand went up to touch the little golden brooch which fastened the lace collar of her blouse. If the anchor were withdrawn, would Ralph drift once more towards the rocks? The answer was difficult. She pondered it aloud, speaking in low, anxious tones, with lengthened pauses between the words.

“We’re both right, Dan. We’ve both got hold ofbitsof the truth! In the end we must win through for ourselves, but surely, in preparation for the battle, we can give each othersomehelp. Some natures seem made to stand, and others to lean. A prop is not of much account, but it may serve to keep a plant straight while it is gathering strength. The big oaks need no props; they are so strong that they can’t understand; they have no pity for weakness.”

Dan stopped short in his pacings.

“That meant for me, Darsie?”

“Humph! Just as you please! Oaks are nice things—big, and strong, and restful, but just a little bit inclined to grow—gnarled!”

Dan vouchsafed no reply, and Darsie sat, hands clasped round knees, staring into the fire for five long, silent minutes. She was hoping that Dan would never grow “gnarled” towards herself, longing for him to speak and promise that he would not, but he still remained silent, and presently the door burst open, the rinking party appeared on the threshold, and the opportunity for quiet conclave was over.

Chapter Twenty Five.New Year’s Eve.Seated alone in the train,en routefor her visit to the Percivals, Darsie had time to think in a more quiet and undisturbed fashion than had been possible in the past bustling days, and a disagreeable feeling of apprehension arose in her mind as she recalled the wording of the three invitations. In each was present the same note of depression, the same hint of trouble in connection with the son of the house. Could anything have happened of which she was unaware? No letter from The Manor had reached her for some weeks past, but letters were proverbially scarce at Christmas-time, so that it would be foolish to argue ill from that fact alone. Darsie braced herself physically and mentally, squared her shoulders, and resolutely dismissed gloomy thoughts.Noreen and Ralph met her at the station, looking reassuringly cheerful and at ease a magnificent new motor stood in waiting outside, with a cart for the luggage. Inside the beautiful old house the atmosphere was warmed by hot pipes, and scented with the fragrance of hothouse plants, banked together in every corner. It was not the usual case of being warm and cosy inside a room, and miserably chilled every time one crossed a passage or ascended the stairs. Mrs Percival and the girls were marvels of elegance in Parisian gowns, Ralph looked his handsomest in knickerbocker suit and gaiters, and the servants moved noiselessly to and fro, performing their tasks with machine-like accuracy.Extraordinary how complete a change of scene may take place between lunch and tea! How swiftly a new atmosphere makes the old unreal!As Darsie sat drinking her tea in the old wainscoted hall, it seemed impossible to realise that such things as poverty and struggle were in existence; even the shabby bustle and squeeze of her own dear home became incredible in the face of this spacious, well-ordered calm!Mrs Percival made no attempt at private conversation, and showed no trace of “ulterior motive” in manner or conversation, which was a huge relief to Darsie’s mind. She was not in a mood for serious conversation; what she wanted was the usual Percival offering of praise, admiration, and petting, and this was bestowed upon her with even more than the usual generosity. The grey-whiskered old Squire kissed her on both cheeks; the girls assured her that she was prettier than ever, and greeted her feeblest sallies with bursts of delighted laughter. Ralph gazed at her with adoring eyes; it was all, as Darsie had been wont to remark, most grateful and comforting!The first evening passed pleasantly enough, though there was a noticeable effort on the part of each member of the family to keep the conversation from touching upon the subject of Ralph’s affairs. Any reference to Cambridge was taboo, as Darsie swiftly discovered, but there were many points of interest left, which were both pleasant and amusing to discuss.The next morning—the last morning of the year—broke fine and bright, and the view seen through the long windows of the dining-room was almost as beautiful as in summer itself. The park showed the same stretch of velvet green, a belt of evergreens and tall Scotch firs filled up the far distance, while the leafless boughs of elms and beeches made a lace-like tracery against the sky. To the right the old cedar stood calm and unmoved, as it had stood while generations of Percivals had lived, and loved, and sorrowed, and died.When breakfast was over—and breakfast in the country is a meal which pursues a calm and leisurely course—the four young people strolled into the porch to discuss the programme for the day.“Darsie is nerving herself to look at the horses’ tails!” said Ida laughingly. It was a Percival peculiarity, agreeable or irritating according to the mood of the hearer, that they never by any chance forgot a remark, but continually resurrected it in conversation for years to come. Never a morning had Darsie spent at the Manor that she had not been reminded of scathing comments on the habit of daily visits to kennels and stables, as delivered by herself on the occasion of her first visit. To-day, however, she had only time to grimace a reply, before Ida continued cheerfully—“You won’t be asked, my dear! We have something far more important on hand. You have walked right into the jaws of the tenants’ annual New Year’s treat, and will have to tire your hands decorating all the morning, and your gums smiling all the evening. It’s an all-day-and-night business, and we get home at cock-crow in a state of collapse—”“It’s held in the village hall,” Noreen took up the tale, slipping unconsciously into what Darsie called her “squire’s-eldest-daughter-manner.”“Quite a nice building. We make it look festive with wreaths and bunting. They think so much of decorations!” (“They” in Percival parlance alluded to the various tenants on the estate.) “We try to think of something novel each year as a surprise. They like surprises. We’ve arranged with half a dozen girls to be there to help. Quite nice girls, daughters of the principal farmers. You must bequitesweet to them, Darsie, please! It is our principal meeting of the year, and we make a point of being friendly.”“Must I really?” Darsie assumed an expression of dejection. “What a disappointment! It’s so seldom I get an opportunity of being proud and grand. What’s the good of staying at a Manor House, and driving down with ‘the family,’ if I have to be meek and friendly like any one else? Couldn’t you introduce me as the Lady Claire, and let me put on airs for a treat? It would act as a contrast to your ‘friendly ways,’ and make them all the more appreciated.”The girls laughed as in duty bound, and declared that itwouldbe sport, and wondered if they dared, but Ralph sharply called them to order.“Rot! As if everybody in this neighbourhood didn’t know Darsie by heart! Put on your hats, and don’t talk rubbish. It will take us all our time to get through with the hall before lunch.”Town-bred Darsie privately hoped that the motor would appear to carry the helpers to the hall three miles away, but the Percivals themselves never seemed to dream of such a possibility. In short skirts and thick boots they plodded cheerfully across boggy meadows and muddy lanes, climbed half a dozen stiles, and arrived at last in the High Street of the little village, close to the entrance of the unpretentious wooden building which called itself the Village Hall.Darsie thought that she had never beheld an interior which seemed so thoroughly to need, and at the same time to defy, decoration! Whitewashed walls, well splashed by damp; a double row of pegs all round the walls at a level of some five or six feet from the ground; wooden forms, and a small square platform, made up a whole which was bare and ugly to a degree.A group of five or six girls stood beside a pile of evergreens; a youth in shirt-sleeves was in process of unpacking crumpled flags and flattened Japanese lanterns from an old tin box; two ladders stood against the walls.The entrance of “the family” was marked by a general movement among the little company, and Darsie watched the greetings which ensued with twinkling amusement.Noreen and Ida weresopleasant,sofull of gratitude for the presence of each individual helper,soanxious to be assured that they couldreallyspare the time. Ralph was so laboriously polite, while the girls themselves, pleasant, kindly, and well-educated, were either happily unaware of the thinly disguised patronage, or had the good manners to conceal their knowledge. There was no doubt which side appeared to best advantage in the interview!“The first thing we must do is to decide upon a scheme of decoration,” Ida declared. “Darsie, suggest something! You have never done it before, so your ideas ought to be novel. What can we do to make the hall look pretty and cheerful?”“Rebuild it!” was Darsie’s instant and daring reply, whereat the farmers’ daughters laugheden masse, and the Percivals looked haughtily displeased.“Father built it!”“Awfully good of him!Andwicked of his architect. I shan’t employ him to build my house!”“I think,” said Noreen loftily, “that we had better confine ourselves to discovering the scheme of decoration. It is too late to interfere with the structure of the hall. We generally make wreaths and fasten them to the gas brackets, and drape the platform with flags.”“Then we may take it as settled that wewon’tdo that to-day. What happens to the pegs?”“They hang their things on them, of course—hats, and coats, and mufflers—”“Thatmustbe decorative! How would it be to make them leave their wrappings at the entrance to-night, or put them under their own chairs, and to arrange a broad band of holly round the room so as to hide the pegs from view? It would be so easy to tie on the branches, and it would have quite a fine frieze effect.”“‘Mrs Dick, you are invaluable!’” quoted Ralph gaily. “It’s a ripping idea. Let’s set to at once, and try the effect.”No sooner said than done; the little band of workers spread themselves over the room, and began the task of trying prickly holly branches to the line of pegs in such fashion as to form a band about two feet deep, entirely round the room. Berries being unusually plentiful that year, the effect was all the more cheery, and with the disappearance of the utilitarian pegs the hall at once assumed an improved aspect. A second committee meeting hit on the happy idea of transforming the platform into a miniature bower, by means of green baize and miniature fir-trees, plentifully sprinkled with glittering white powder. The flags were relegated to the entrance-hall. The Japanese lanterns, instead of hanging on strings, were so grouped as to form a wonderfully lifelike pagoda in a corner of the hall, where—if mischievously disposed—they might burn at their ease without endangering life or property. The ironwork of the gas-brackets was tightly swathed with red paper, and the bare jets fitted with paper shades to match. From an artistic point of view Darsie strongly opposed the hanging of the timeworn mottoes, “A Hearty Welcome to All,” “A Happy New Year,” and the like, but the Squire’s daughters insisted that they liked to see them, and the farmers’ daughters confirming this theory, up they went, above the evergreen frieze, the white cotton letters standing out conspicuously from their turkey-red background.It was one o’clock before the work was finished, and a tired and distinctly grubby quartette started out on their three-mile return walk across the fields. Certainly country-bred folk were regardless of fatigue! “If I owned a motor I shoulduseit!” Darsie said to herself with a distinct air of grievance as she climbed to her own room after lunch, and laid herself wearily on her couch, the while the Percival trio trotted gaily forth for “just a round” over their private golf-links.The evening programme was to begin with a concert, alternate items of which were to be given by the villagers and members of the surrounding “families.”At ten o’clock refreshments were to be served, in adjoining classrooms, and during the progress of the informal supper chairs and forms were to be lifted away, and the room cleared for an informal dance, to be concluded by a general joining of hands and singing of “Auld Lang Syne” as the clock struck twelve.The Percival ladies and their guests from the surrounding houses made elaborate toilettes for the occasion. The villagers were resplendent in Sunday blacks, “best frocks” and bead chains, the small girls and boys appearing respectively in white muslins and velveteen Lord Fauntleroy suits; the Squire opened proceedings with expressions of good wishes, interspersed with nervous coughs, and Noreen and Ida led off the musical proceedings with a lengthy classical duet, to which the audience listened with politely concealed boredom.To Darsie’s mind, the entire programme as supplied by “the families” was dull to extinction, but to one possessing even her own slight knowledge of the village, the contributions of its worthies were brimful of interest and surprise.The red-faced butcher, who, on ordinary occasions, appeared to have no mind above chops and steaks, was discovered to possess a tenor voice infinitely superior in tone to that of his patron, the Hon. Ivor Bruce, while his wife achieved a tricky accompaniment with a minimum of mistakes; the sandy-haired assistant at the grocer’s shop supplied a flute obbligato, and the fishmonger and the young lady from the stationer’s repository assured each other ardently that their true loves owned their hearts; two school-children with corkscrew curls held a heated argument—in rhyme—on the benefits of temperance; and, most surprising and thrilling of all, Mr Jevons, the butler from The Manor, so far descended from his pedestal as to volunteer “a comic item” in the shape of a recitation, bearing chiefly, it would appear, on the execution of a pig. The last remnant of stiffness vanished before this inspiring theme, and the audience roared applause as one man, whereupon Mr Jevons bashfully hid his face, and skipped—literally skipped—from the platform.“Who’d have thought it! Butlers are human beings, after all!” gasped Darsie, wiping tears of merriment from her eyes. “Ralph, do you suppose Jevons will dance with me to-night? Ishouldbe proud!”“Certainly not. He has one square dance with the mater, and that finishes it. You must dance with me instead. It’s ages since we’ve had a hop together—or a talk. I’m longing to have a talk, but I don’t want the others to see us at it, or they’d think I was priming you in my own defence, and the mater wants to have the first innings herself. We’ll manage it somehow in the interval between the dances, and I know you’ll turn out trumps, as usual, Darsie, and take my part.”Ralph spoke with cheerful confidence, and Darsie listened with a sinking heart. The merry interlude of supper was robbed of its zest, as she cudgelled her brains to imagine what she was about to hear. Ralph was evidently in trouble of some sort, and his parents for once inclined to take a serious stand. Yet anything more gay and debonair than the manner with which the culprit handed round refreshments and waited on his father’s guests it would be impossible to imagine. Darsie watched him across the room, and noted that wherever he passed faces brightened. As he cracked jokes with the apple-cheeked farmers, waited assiduously on their buxom wives, and made pretty speeches to the girls, no onlooker could fail to be conscious of the fact that, in the estimation of the tenants, “Master Ralph” was as a young prince who could do no wrong.For reasons of his own, Ralph was tonight bent on ingratiating himself to the full. For the first half-hour of the dance he led out one village belle after another, and it was not until waltz number five had appeared on the board that he returned to Darsie’s side.“At last I’ve a moment to myself! My last partner weighed a ton, at least, and I’m fagged out. Got a scarf you can put round you if we go and sit out?”Darsie nodded, showing a wisp of gauze, and, laying her hand on Ralph’s arm, passed with him out of the main room into the flag-decked entrance. For the moment it was empty, the dancers having madeen massein the direction of the refreshment-tables. Ralph looked quickly from side to side, and, finding himself unobserved, took a key from his pocket and opened a small door leading into the patch of garden at the back of the hall. The moonlight showed a wooden bench fitted into a recess in the wall. Ralph flicked a handkerchief over its surface, and motioned Darsie towards a seat.“It’s clean enough. I gave it a rub this morning. You won’t be cold?”“Oh, no; not a bit.” Darsie wrapped the wisp of gauze round her shoulders, and prepared to risk pneumonia with as little thought as ninety-nine girls out of a hundred would do in a similar case. The hour had come when she was to be told the nature of Ralph’s trouble; she would not dream of losing the opportunity for so slight a consideration as a chill!Ralph seated himself by her side, rested an elbow on his knees, the thumb and first finger of the uplifted hand supporting his chin. His eyes searched Darsie’s face with anxious scrutiny.“You didn’t hear anything about me before you left Newnham?”“Hear what? No! What was there to hear?”Ralph averted his eyes, and looked across the patch of garden. The moonlight shining on his face gave it an appearance of pallor and strain.“Dan Vernon said nothing?”“No!” Darsie recalled Dan’s keen glance of scrutiny, the silence which had greeted her own remarks, and realised the reason which lay behind. “Dan is not the sort to repeat disagreeable gossip.”“It’s not gossip this time; worse luck, it’s solid, abominable fact. You’ll be disappointed, Darsie. I’m sorry! Ihavetried. Beastly bad luck being caught just at the end. I was sent down, Darsie! It was just at the end of the term, so they sent me down for the last week. A week is neither here nor there, but the parents took it hard. I’m afraid you, too—”Yes! Darsie “took it hard.” One look at her face proved as much, and among many contending feelings, disappointment was predominant—bitter, intense, most humiliating disappointment.“Oh, Ralph! What for? I hoped, I thought—youpromisedme to be careful!”“And so I was, Darsie! Give you my word, I was. For the first half of the term I never got anything worse than three penny fines. It isn’t a deadly thing to stay out after ten. And I was so jolly careful—never was so careful in my life. But just the night when it was most important I must needs be caught. You can’t expect a fellow to get away from a big evening before twelve. But that’s what it ended in—a big jaw, throwing up all my past misdeeds, and being sent down. Now you can slang away.”But Darsie made no attempt to “slang.” With every word that had been uttered her feelings of helplessness had increased. Ralph had apparently made little difference in his ways; he had only been more careful not to be found out! At the very moment when she had been congratulating herself, and boasting of the good results of her friendship, this crowning disgrace had fallen upon him. No wonder Dan had been silent; no wonder that he had looked upon her with that long, questioning gaze! The thought of Dan was singularly comforting at this moment—strong, silent, loyal Dan, going forth valiantly to the battle of life. Darsie’s little face took on a pinched look; she shivered, and drew the thin scarf more tightly round her. Her silence, the suffering written on her face, hit Ralph more hardly than any anger; for the first time something deeper than embarrassment showed itself in face and voice.“For pity’s sake, Darsie, speak! Say something! Don’t sit there and look at me like that.”“But, Ralph, what is there to say?” Darsie threw out her arms with a gesture of hopelessness. “I’ve talked so often, been so eloquent, believed so much! If this is the outcome, what more can be said?”“Ihavetried! Ididwant to please you!”“By not being found out! It’s not much comfort, Ralph, to feel that I’ve encouraged you in deception. And all those nights when you stayed out late, were you betting as usual—getting into debt?”Ralph frowned.“I’ve been beastly unlucky, never knew such a persistent run. That’s the dickens of it, Darsie. I haven’t dared to tell the Governor yet, but I positively must get hold of the money before the tenth. I’m bound to pay up by then. It’s a debt of honour.”Darsie’s red lip curled over that word. She sat stiff and straight in her seat, not deigning a reply. Ralph appeared to struggle with himself for several moments, before he said urgently—“The mater is going to talk to you. She knows that you have more influence with me than any one else. It’s true, Darsie, whatever you may think—I should have drifted a lot deeper but for you. When she does, do your best for a fellow! They’ll be down on me for not having told about this debt. The Governor asked if there was anything else, but upon my word I hadn’t the courage to own up at that moment.”Still Darsie did not reply. She was wondering drearily what she could find to say when the dreaded interview came about; shrinking from the thought of adding to the mother’s pain, feeling a paralysing sense of defeat; yet, at this very moment of humiliation, a ray of light illumined the darkness and showed the reason of her failure.Dan was right! no one could truly help a man without first implanting in his heart the wish to help himself! She had been content to bribe Ralph, as a spoiled child is bribed to be good; had felt a glow of gratified vanity in the knowledge that her own favour was the prize to be won. If the foundations of her buildings were unstable, what wonder that the edifice had fallen to the ground? The thought softened her heart towards the handsome culprit by her side, and when she spoke at last it was in blame of herself rather than of him.“I’m sorry, too, Ralph. I might have helped you better. I rushed in where angels fear to tread. I gave you a wrong motive. It should have been more than a question of pleasing me—more even than pleasing your parents... Oh, Ralph, dear, you know—you know there is something higher than that!—Is religion nothing to you, Ralph? Don’t you feel that in wasting your life you are offending against God—against Christ! Can’t you try again withthatmotive to help you?—I can’t make light of things to your people, but I can take part of the blame on myself. If it is true that I have any influence over you, I have thrown it away...”Ralph laid his hand over the gloved fingers clasped together on Darsie’s knee.“Don’t say that! Don’t think that, Darsie. I may be a rotter, but I’d have been a hundred times worse if it hadn’t been for you. And don’t exaggerate the position: it’s a pity to do that. Every man isn’t born a Dan Vernon. Most fellows only reach that stage of sobriety when they are middle-aged. It would be a pretty dull world if no one kicked over the traces now and then in their youth. What have I done, after all? Slacked my work, helped myself to a bit more play and come down on the Governor for an extra cheque now and again. Lots of fellows come a worse cropper than that—”Darsie wondered if a “worse cropper” might not possibly be a less serious ill than persistent slacking and irresponsibility; but now that the bad news was out, Ralph was fast regaining his composure.“I’ll turn out all right yet, Darsie, you’ll see. The tenants like me. I’ll settle down and make a first-rate squire when my time comes. And I’ll make up to you then for all this worry and bother.” For a moment his voice was significantly tender, then the recollection of his present difficulty swept over him once more, and he added hastily: “You’ll—you’ll break it to the mater, won’t you? About that money, I mean. She’ll take it best from you—”Darsie rose from her seat, and stood before him, tall and white in the moonlight.“No!” she said clearly. “I will not. You must make your own confession. Things have been made easy for you all your life, Ralph. Now you must fight for yourself.”Ralph bore no malice; even his momentary irritation at finding himself, as he considered, “left in the lurch,” lasted but a few moments after his return to the hall. Darsie would rather have had it last a little longer. To see an unclouded face, to catch the echo of merry laughter within ten minutes of a humiliating confession, seemed but another instance of instability of character. It seemed literally impossible for Ralph to feel deeply on any subject for more than a few moments at a time; nevertheless, such was the charm of his personality that she felt both pleased and flattered when twelve o’clock approached and he came smilingly forward to lead her to her place in the great ring encircling the whole room. “I must have you and mother—one on either side,” he said, and as they crossed the floor together Darsie was conscious that every eye in the room followed them with a smiling significance. The young Squire, and the pretty young lady who was his sister’s friend—a nice pair they made, to be sure! Every brain was busy with dreams of the future, weaving romantic plans, seeing in imagination other scenes like the present, with Darsie in the place of hostess. She knew it, divined instinctively that Ralph knew it too, felt the recognition of it in the grip of Noreen’s hand, in the tender pathos of Mrs Percival’s smile. And once again Darsie wondered, and doubted, and feared and felt the weight of invisible chains. There are moments, however, when doubts and fears are apt to be swept away in a rush of overwhelming emotions, and one of those is surely the beginning of a new year. To be young and pretty; to be by general acceptance the queen of the evening—no normal girl could help being carried away by such circumstances as these! When the last chime of the twelve rang slowly out, and the audience with one accord burst into the strains of “Auld Lang Syne,” Darsie’s eyes shone with excitement, and she returned with unction the pressure of Ralph’s fingers.“Then here’s a hand, my trusty friend,And gie’s a hand o’ thine!”The volume of sound swelled and sank, here and there a voice took a husky tone; here and there an eye grew dim, but these belonged as a rule to the patriarchs among the guests, for whom the past was full of tender memories, for whom but a few more New Years could dawn. Perhaps this might be the last, the very last, they would live to see. The young folks shed no tears; they were not unconscious of the prevailing emotion, but with them it found vent in a tingling expectation. Life lay ahead. Life was to come. What would life bring?When the song ceased, and the linked circle broke up into separate groups, Darsie, glancing up into Ralph’s face, was surprised to see it white and tense. She smiled, half amused, half sad, bracing herself to hear some emotional protest or vow for the future; but Ralph spake no word. Instead, he led her to a seat, bowed formally before her, and, still with that white, fixed look, marched straight across the room to his father.Darsie’s pulse quickened, her little teeth clenched on her lower lip, she pressed her hands against her knee the while she watched the eloquent scene. Father and son faced each other; handsome man, handsome youth, strangely alike despite the quarter of a century between their respective ages; the Squire’s face, at first all genial welcome and unconcern, showing rapidly a pained gravity. Ralph was speaking rapidly, with an occasional eloquent gesture of the arm, obviously recounting some facts of pressing importance to himself and his hearer, as obviously pleading a cause. With a thrill of excitement Darsie leaped to the true explanation of the situation. Fresh from the singing of the New Year song, Ralph had not paused to consider conventions, but then and there had hastened to make his confession in his father’s ears.“Governor! I’m sorry! I was a coward, and wouldn’t own up. I’ve been playing the fool again, and have lost more money. I owe over fifty pounds, and it has to be paid up by the tenth of this month.”The Squire looked his son full in the face.“Is that all the truth, Ralph, or only a part?” he asked quietly. “Let me hear the whole please, now that we are about it.”“That is the whole, sir. There’s nothing more to be told.”“The money shall be paid, but you must do something for me in return. We can’t talk here. Come to my study when we get home!”The Squire laid his hand on his son’s shoulder with a momentary pressure as he turned aside to attend to his guests, but Ralph lopped crestfallen and discomfited. It was one thing to blurt out a disagreeable confession on the impulse of a moment, and another and very different one to discuss it in cold blood in the privacy of a study. In the middle of the night, too! Ralph shivered at the thought. Why on earth couldn’t the Governor be sensible, and wait till next morning? The money would be paid—that was the main point—all the rest could wait.

Seated alone in the train,en routefor her visit to the Percivals, Darsie had time to think in a more quiet and undisturbed fashion than had been possible in the past bustling days, and a disagreeable feeling of apprehension arose in her mind as she recalled the wording of the three invitations. In each was present the same note of depression, the same hint of trouble in connection with the son of the house. Could anything have happened of which she was unaware? No letter from The Manor had reached her for some weeks past, but letters were proverbially scarce at Christmas-time, so that it would be foolish to argue ill from that fact alone. Darsie braced herself physically and mentally, squared her shoulders, and resolutely dismissed gloomy thoughts.

Noreen and Ralph met her at the station, looking reassuringly cheerful and at ease a magnificent new motor stood in waiting outside, with a cart for the luggage. Inside the beautiful old house the atmosphere was warmed by hot pipes, and scented with the fragrance of hothouse plants, banked together in every corner. It was not the usual case of being warm and cosy inside a room, and miserably chilled every time one crossed a passage or ascended the stairs. Mrs Percival and the girls were marvels of elegance in Parisian gowns, Ralph looked his handsomest in knickerbocker suit and gaiters, and the servants moved noiselessly to and fro, performing their tasks with machine-like accuracy.

Extraordinary how complete a change of scene may take place between lunch and tea! How swiftly a new atmosphere makes the old unreal!

As Darsie sat drinking her tea in the old wainscoted hall, it seemed impossible to realise that such things as poverty and struggle were in existence; even the shabby bustle and squeeze of her own dear home became incredible in the face of this spacious, well-ordered calm!

Mrs Percival made no attempt at private conversation, and showed no trace of “ulterior motive” in manner or conversation, which was a huge relief to Darsie’s mind. She was not in a mood for serious conversation; what she wanted was the usual Percival offering of praise, admiration, and petting, and this was bestowed upon her with even more than the usual generosity. The grey-whiskered old Squire kissed her on both cheeks; the girls assured her that she was prettier than ever, and greeted her feeblest sallies with bursts of delighted laughter. Ralph gazed at her with adoring eyes; it was all, as Darsie had been wont to remark, most grateful and comforting!

The first evening passed pleasantly enough, though there was a noticeable effort on the part of each member of the family to keep the conversation from touching upon the subject of Ralph’s affairs. Any reference to Cambridge was taboo, as Darsie swiftly discovered, but there were many points of interest left, which were both pleasant and amusing to discuss.

The next morning—the last morning of the year—broke fine and bright, and the view seen through the long windows of the dining-room was almost as beautiful as in summer itself. The park showed the same stretch of velvet green, a belt of evergreens and tall Scotch firs filled up the far distance, while the leafless boughs of elms and beeches made a lace-like tracery against the sky. To the right the old cedar stood calm and unmoved, as it had stood while generations of Percivals had lived, and loved, and sorrowed, and died.

When breakfast was over—and breakfast in the country is a meal which pursues a calm and leisurely course—the four young people strolled into the porch to discuss the programme for the day.

“Darsie is nerving herself to look at the horses’ tails!” said Ida laughingly. It was a Percival peculiarity, agreeable or irritating according to the mood of the hearer, that they never by any chance forgot a remark, but continually resurrected it in conversation for years to come. Never a morning had Darsie spent at the Manor that she had not been reminded of scathing comments on the habit of daily visits to kennels and stables, as delivered by herself on the occasion of her first visit. To-day, however, she had only time to grimace a reply, before Ida continued cheerfully—

“You won’t be asked, my dear! We have something far more important on hand. You have walked right into the jaws of the tenants’ annual New Year’s treat, and will have to tire your hands decorating all the morning, and your gums smiling all the evening. It’s an all-day-and-night business, and we get home at cock-crow in a state of collapse—”

“It’s held in the village hall,” Noreen took up the tale, slipping unconsciously into what Darsie called her “squire’s-eldest-daughter-manner.”

“Quite a nice building. We make it look festive with wreaths and bunting. They think so much of decorations!” (“They” in Percival parlance alluded to the various tenants on the estate.) “We try to think of something novel each year as a surprise. They like surprises. We’ve arranged with half a dozen girls to be there to help. Quite nice girls, daughters of the principal farmers. You must bequitesweet to them, Darsie, please! It is our principal meeting of the year, and we make a point of being friendly.”

“Must I really?” Darsie assumed an expression of dejection. “What a disappointment! It’s so seldom I get an opportunity of being proud and grand. What’s the good of staying at a Manor House, and driving down with ‘the family,’ if I have to be meek and friendly like any one else? Couldn’t you introduce me as the Lady Claire, and let me put on airs for a treat? It would act as a contrast to your ‘friendly ways,’ and make them all the more appreciated.”

The girls laughed as in duty bound, and declared that itwouldbe sport, and wondered if they dared, but Ralph sharply called them to order.

“Rot! As if everybody in this neighbourhood didn’t know Darsie by heart! Put on your hats, and don’t talk rubbish. It will take us all our time to get through with the hall before lunch.”

Town-bred Darsie privately hoped that the motor would appear to carry the helpers to the hall three miles away, but the Percivals themselves never seemed to dream of such a possibility. In short skirts and thick boots they plodded cheerfully across boggy meadows and muddy lanes, climbed half a dozen stiles, and arrived at last in the High Street of the little village, close to the entrance of the unpretentious wooden building which called itself the Village Hall.

Darsie thought that she had never beheld an interior which seemed so thoroughly to need, and at the same time to defy, decoration! Whitewashed walls, well splashed by damp; a double row of pegs all round the walls at a level of some five or six feet from the ground; wooden forms, and a small square platform, made up a whole which was bare and ugly to a degree.

A group of five or six girls stood beside a pile of evergreens; a youth in shirt-sleeves was in process of unpacking crumpled flags and flattened Japanese lanterns from an old tin box; two ladders stood against the walls.

The entrance of “the family” was marked by a general movement among the little company, and Darsie watched the greetings which ensued with twinkling amusement.

Noreen and Ida weresopleasant,sofull of gratitude for the presence of each individual helper,soanxious to be assured that they couldreallyspare the time. Ralph was so laboriously polite, while the girls themselves, pleasant, kindly, and well-educated, were either happily unaware of the thinly disguised patronage, or had the good manners to conceal their knowledge. There was no doubt which side appeared to best advantage in the interview!

“The first thing we must do is to decide upon a scheme of decoration,” Ida declared. “Darsie, suggest something! You have never done it before, so your ideas ought to be novel. What can we do to make the hall look pretty and cheerful?”

“Rebuild it!” was Darsie’s instant and daring reply, whereat the farmers’ daughters laugheden masse, and the Percivals looked haughtily displeased.

“Father built it!”

“Awfully good of him!Andwicked of his architect. I shan’t employ him to build my house!”

“I think,” said Noreen loftily, “that we had better confine ourselves to discovering the scheme of decoration. It is too late to interfere with the structure of the hall. We generally make wreaths and fasten them to the gas brackets, and drape the platform with flags.”

“Then we may take it as settled that wewon’tdo that to-day. What happens to the pegs?”

“They hang their things on them, of course—hats, and coats, and mufflers—”

“Thatmustbe decorative! How would it be to make them leave their wrappings at the entrance to-night, or put them under their own chairs, and to arrange a broad band of holly round the room so as to hide the pegs from view? It would be so easy to tie on the branches, and it would have quite a fine frieze effect.”

“‘Mrs Dick, you are invaluable!’” quoted Ralph gaily. “It’s a ripping idea. Let’s set to at once, and try the effect.”

No sooner said than done; the little band of workers spread themselves over the room, and began the task of trying prickly holly branches to the line of pegs in such fashion as to form a band about two feet deep, entirely round the room. Berries being unusually plentiful that year, the effect was all the more cheery, and with the disappearance of the utilitarian pegs the hall at once assumed an improved aspect. A second committee meeting hit on the happy idea of transforming the platform into a miniature bower, by means of green baize and miniature fir-trees, plentifully sprinkled with glittering white powder. The flags were relegated to the entrance-hall. The Japanese lanterns, instead of hanging on strings, were so grouped as to form a wonderfully lifelike pagoda in a corner of the hall, where—if mischievously disposed—they might burn at their ease without endangering life or property. The ironwork of the gas-brackets was tightly swathed with red paper, and the bare jets fitted with paper shades to match. From an artistic point of view Darsie strongly opposed the hanging of the timeworn mottoes, “A Hearty Welcome to All,” “A Happy New Year,” and the like, but the Squire’s daughters insisted that they liked to see them, and the farmers’ daughters confirming this theory, up they went, above the evergreen frieze, the white cotton letters standing out conspicuously from their turkey-red background.

It was one o’clock before the work was finished, and a tired and distinctly grubby quartette started out on their three-mile return walk across the fields. Certainly country-bred folk were regardless of fatigue! “If I owned a motor I shoulduseit!” Darsie said to herself with a distinct air of grievance as she climbed to her own room after lunch, and laid herself wearily on her couch, the while the Percival trio trotted gaily forth for “just a round” over their private golf-links.

The evening programme was to begin with a concert, alternate items of which were to be given by the villagers and members of the surrounding “families.”

At ten o’clock refreshments were to be served, in adjoining classrooms, and during the progress of the informal supper chairs and forms were to be lifted away, and the room cleared for an informal dance, to be concluded by a general joining of hands and singing of “Auld Lang Syne” as the clock struck twelve.

The Percival ladies and their guests from the surrounding houses made elaborate toilettes for the occasion. The villagers were resplendent in Sunday blacks, “best frocks” and bead chains, the small girls and boys appearing respectively in white muslins and velveteen Lord Fauntleroy suits; the Squire opened proceedings with expressions of good wishes, interspersed with nervous coughs, and Noreen and Ida led off the musical proceedings with a lengthy classical duet, to which the audience listened with politely concealed boredom.

To Darsie’s mind, the entire programme as supplied by “the families” was dull to extinction, but to one possessing even her own slight knowledge of the village, the contributions of its worthies were brimful of interest and surprise.

The red-faced butcher, who, on ordinary occasions, appeared to have no mind above chops and steaks, was discovered to possess a tenor voice infinitely superior in tone to that of his patron, the Hon. Ivor Bruce, while his wife achieved a tricky accompaniment with a minimum of mistakes; the sandy-haired assistant at the grocer’s shop supplied a flute obbligato, and the fishmonger and the young lady from the stationer’s repository assured each other ardently that their true loves owned their hearts; two school-children with corkscrew curls held a heated argument—in rhyme—on the benefits of temperance; and, most surprising and thrilling of all, Mr Jevons, the butler from The Manor, so far descended from his pedestal as to volunteer “a comic item” in the shape of a recitation, bearing chiefly, it would appear, on the execution of a pig. The last remnant of stiffness vanished before this inspiring theme, and the audience roared applause as one man, whereupon Mr Jevons bashfully hid his face, and skipped—literally skipped—from the platform.

“Who’d have thought it! Butlers are human beings, after all!” gasped Darsie, wiping tears of merriment from her eyes. “Ralph, do you suppose Jevons will dance with me to-night? Ishouldbe proud!”

“Certainly not. He has one square dance with the mater, and that finishes it. You must dance with me instead. It’s ages since we’ve had a hop together—or a talk. I’m longing to have a talk, but I don’t want the others to see us at it, or they’d think I was priming you in my own defence, and the mater wants to have the first innings herself. We’ll manage it somehow in the interval between the dances, and I know you’ll turn out trumps, as usual, Darsie, and take my part.”

Ralph spoke with cheerful confidence, and Darsie listened with a sinking heart. The merry interlude of supper was robbed of its zest, as she cudgelled her brains to imagine what she was about to hear. Ralph was evidently in trouble of some sort, and his parents for once inclined to take a serious stand. Yet anything more gay and debonair than the manner with which the culprit handed round refreshments and waited on his father’s guests it would be impossible to imagine. Darsie watched him across the room, and noted that wherever he passed faces brightened. As he cracked jokes with the apple-cheeked farmers, waited assiduously on their buxom wives, and made pretty speeches to the girls, no onlooker could fail to be conscious of the fact that, in the estimation of the tenants, “Master Ralph” was as a young prince who could do no wrong.

For reasons of his own, Ralph was tonight bent on ingratiating himself to the full. For the first half-hour of the dance he led out one village belle after another, and it was not until waltz number five had appeared on the board that he returned to Darsie’s side.

“At last I’ve a moment to myself! My last partner weighed a ton, at least, and I’m fagged out. Got a scarf you can put round you if we go and sit out?”

Darsie nodded, showing a wisp of gauze, and, laying her hand on Ralph’s arm, passed with him out of the main room into the flag-decked entrance. For the moment it was empty, the dancers having madeen massein the direction of the refreshment-tables. Ralph looked quickly from side to side, and, finding himself unobserved, took a key from his pocket and opened a small door leading into the patch of garden at the back of the hall. The moonlight showed a wooden bench fitted into a recess in the wall. Ralph flicked a handkerchief over its surface, and motioned Darsie towards a seat.

“It’s clean enough. I gave it a rub this morning. You won’t be cold?”

“Oh, no; not a bit.” Darsie wrapped the wisp of gauze round her shoulders, and prepared to risk pneumonia with as little thought as ninety-nine girls out of a hundred would do in a similar case. The hour had come when she was to be told the nature of Ralph’s trouble; she would not dream of losing the opportunity for so slight a consideration as a chill!

Ralph seated himself by her side, rested an elbow on his knees, the thumb and first finger of the uplifted hand supporting his chin. His eyes searched Darsie’s face with anxious scrutiny.

“You didn’t hear anything about me before you left Newnham?”

“Hear what? No! What was there to hear?”

Ralph averted his eyes, and looked across the patch of garden. The moonlight shining on his face gave it an appearance of pallor and strain.

“Dan Vernon said nothing?”

“No!” Darsie recalled Dan’s keen glance of scrutiny, the silence which had greeted her own remarks, and realised the reason which lay behind. “Dan is not the sort to repeat disagreeable gossip.”

“It’s not gossip this time; worse luck, it’s solid, abominable fact. You’ll be disappointed, Darsie. I’m sorry! Ihavetried. Beastly bad luck being caught just at the end. I was sent down, Darsie! It was just at the end of the term, so they sent me down for the last week. A week is neither here nor there, but the parents took it hard. I’m afraid you, too—”

Yes! Darsie “took it hard.” One look at her face proved as much, and among many contending feelings, disappointment was predominant—bitter, intense, most humiliating disappointment.

“Oh, Ralph! What for? I hoped, I thought—youpromisedme to be careful!”

“And so I was, Darsie! Give you my word, I was. For the first half of the term I never got anything worse than three penny fines. It isn’t a deadly thing to stay out after ten. And I was so jolly careful—never was so careful in my life. But just the night when it was most important I must needs be caught. You can’t expect a fellow to get away from a big evening before twelve. But that’s what it ended in—a big jaw, throwing up all my past misdeeds, and being sent down. Now you can slang away.”

But Darsie made no attempt to “slang.” With every word that had been uttered her feelings of helplessness had increased. Ralph had apparently made little difference in his ways; he had only been more careful not to be found out! At the very moment when she had been congratulating herself, and boasting of the good results of her friendship, this crowning disgrace had fallen upon him. No wonder Dan had been silent; no wonder that he had looked upon her with that long, questioning gaze! The thought of Dan was singularly comforting at this moment—strong, silent, loyal Dan, going forth valiantly to the battle of life. Darsie’s little face took on a pinched look; she shivered, and drew the thin scarf more tightly round her. Her silence, the suffering written on her face, hit Ralph more hardly than any anger; for the first time something deeper than embarrassment showed itself in face and voice.

“For pity’s sake, Darsie, speak! Say something! Don’t sit there and look at me like that.”

“But, Ralph, what is there to say?” Darsie threw out her arms with a gesture of hopelessness. “I’ve talked so often, been so eloquent, believed so much! If this is the outcome, what more can be said?”

“Ihavetried! Ididwant to please you!”

“By not being found out! It’s not much comfort, Ralph, to feel that I’ve encouraged you in deception. And all those nights when you stayed out late, were you betting as usual—getting into debt?”

Ralph frowned.

“I’ve been beastly unlucky, never knew such a persistent run. That’s the dickens of it, Darsie. I haven’t dared to tell the Governor yet, but I positively must get hold of the money before the tenth. I’m bound to pay up by then. It’s a debt of honour.”

Darsie’s red lip curled over that word. She sat stiff and straight in her seat, not deigning a reply. Ralph appeared to struggle with himself for several moments, before he said urgently—

“The mater is going to talk to you. She knows that you have more influence with me than any one else. It’s true, Darsie, whatever you may think—I should have drifted a lot deeper but for you. When she does, do your best for a fellow! They’ll be down on me for not having told about this debt. The Governor asked if there was anything else, but upon my word I hadn’t the courage to own up at that moment.”

Still Darsie did not reply. She was wondering drearily what she could find to say when the dreaded interview came about; shrinking from the thought of adding to the mother’s pain, feeling a paralysing sense of defeat; yet, at this very moment of humiliation, a ray of light illumined the darkness and showed the reason of her failure.

Dan was right! no one could truly help a man without first implanting in his heart the wish to help himself! She had been content to bribe Ralph, as a spoiled child is bribed to be good; had felt a glow of gratified vanity in the knowledge that her own favour was the prize to be won. If the foundations of her buildings were unstable, what wonder that the edifice had fallen to the ground? The thought softened her heart towards the handsome culprit by her side, and when she spoke at last it was in blame of herself rather than of him.

“I’m sorry, too, Ralph. I might have helped you better. I rushed in where angels fear to tread. I gave you a wrong motive. It should have been more than a question of pleasing me—more even than pleasing your parents... Oh, Ralph, dear, you know—you know there is something higher than that!—Is religion nothing to you, Ralph? Don’t you feel that in wasting your life you are offending against God—against Christ! Can’t you try again withthatmotive to help you?—I can’t make light of things to your people, but I can take part of the blame on myself. If it is true that I have any influence over you, I have thrown it away...”

Ralph laid his hand over the gloved fingers clasped together on Darsie’s knee.

“Don’t say that! Don’t think that, Darsie. I may be a rotter, but I’d have been a hundred times worse if it hadn’t been for you. And don’t exaggerate the position: it’s a pity to do that. Every man isn’t born a Dan Vernon. Most fellows only reach that stage of sobriety when they are middle-aged. It would be a pretty dull world if no one kicked over the traces now and then in their youth. What have I done, after all? Slacked my work, helped myself to a bit more play and come down on the Governor for an extra cheque now and again. Lots of fellows come a worse cropper than that—”

Darsie wondered if a “worse cropper” might not possibly be a less serious ill than persistent slacking and irresponsibility; but now that the bad news was out, Ralph was fast regaining his composure.

“I’ll turn out all right yet, Darsie, you’ll see. The tenants like me. I’ll settle down and make a first-rate squire when my time comes. And I’ll make up to you then for all this worry and bother.” For a moment his voice was significantly tender, then the recollection of his present difficulty swept over him once more, and he added hastily: “You’ll—you’ll break it to the mater, won’t you? About that money, I mean. She’ll take it best from you—”

Darsie rose from her seat, and stood before him, tall and white in the moonlight.

“No!” she said clearly. “I will not. You must make your own confession. Things have been made easy for you all your life, Ralph. Now you must fight for yourself.”

Ralph bore no malice; even his momentary irritation at finding himself, as he considered, “left in the lurch,” lasted but a few moments after his return to the hall. Darsie would rather have had it last a little longer. To see an unclouded face, to catch the echo of merry laughter within ten minutes of a humiliating confession, seemed but another instance of instability of character. It seemed literally impossible for Ralph to feel deeply on any subject for more than a few moments at a time; nevertheless, such was the charm of his personality that she felt both pleased and flattered when twelve o’clock approached and he came smilingly forward to lead her to her place in the great ring encircling the whole room. “I must have you and mother—one on either side,” he said, and as they crossed the floor together Darsie was conscious that every eye in the room followed them with a smiling significance. The young Squire, and the pretty young lady who was his sister’s friend—a nice pair they made, to be sure! Every brain was busy with dreams of the future, weaving romantic plans, seeing in imagination other scenes like the present, with Darsie in the place of hostess. She knew it, divined instinctively that Ralph knew it too, felt the recognition of it in the grip of Noreen’s hand, in the tender pathos of Mrs Percival’s smile. And once again Darsie wondered, and doubted, and feared and felt the weight of invisible chains. There are moments, however, when doubts and fears are apt to be swept away in a rush of overwhelming emotions, and one of those is surely the beginning of a new year. To be young and pretty; to be by general acceptance the queen of the evening—no normal girl could help being carried away by such circumstances as these! When the last chime of the twelve rang slowly out, and the audience with one accord burst into the strains of “Auld Lang Syne,” Darsie’s eyes shone with excitement, and she returned with unction the pressure of Ralph’s fingers.

“Then here’s a hand, my trusty friend,And gie’s a hand o’ thine!”

“Then here’s a hand, my trusty friend,And gie’s a hand o’ thine!”

The volume of sound swelled and sank, here and there a voice took a husky tone; here and there an eye grew dim, but these belonged as a rule to the patriarchs among the guests, for whom the past was full of tender memories, for whom but a few more New Years could dawn. Perhaps this might be the last, the very last, they would live to see. The young folks shed no tears; they were not unconscious of the prevailing emotion, but with them it found vent in a tingling expectation. Life lay ahead. Life was to come. What would life bring?

When the song ceased, and the linked circle broke up into separate groups, Darsie, glancing up into Ralph’s face, was surprised to see it white and tense. She smiled, half amused, half sad, bracing herself to hear some emotional protest or vow for the future; but Ralph spake no word. Instead, he led her to a seat, bowed formally before her, and, still with that white, fixed look, marched straight across the room to his father.

Darsie’s pulse quickened, her little teeth clenched on her lower lip, she pressed her hands against her knee the while she watched the eloquent scene. Father and son faced each other; handsome man, handsome youth, strangely alike despite the quarter of a century between their respective ages; the Squire’s face, at first all genial welcome and unconcern, showing rapidly a pained gravity. Ralph was speaking rapidly, with an occasional eloquent gesture of the arm, obviously recounting some facts of pressing importance to himself and his hearer, as obviously pleading a cause. With a thrill of excitement Darsie leaped to the true explanation of the situation. Fresh from the singing of the New Year song, Ralph had not paused to consider conventions, but then and there had hastened to make his confession in his father’s ears.

“Governor! I’m sorry! I was a coward, and wouldn’t own up. I’ve been playing the fool again, and have lost more money. I owe over fifty pounds, and it has to be paid up by the tenth of this month.”

The Squire looked his son full in the face.

“Is that all the truth, Ralph, or only a part?” he asked quietly. “Let me hear the whole please, now that we are about it.”

“That is the whole, sir. There’s nothing more to be told.”

“The money shall be paid, but you must do something for me in return. We can’t talk here. Come to my study when we get home!”

The Squire laid his hand on his son’s shoulder with a momentary pressure as he turned aside to attend to his guests, but Ralph lopped crestfallen and discomfited. It was one thing to blurt out a disagreeable confession on the impulse of a moment, and another and very different one to discuss it in cold blood in the privacy of a study. In the middle of the night, too! Ralph shivered at the thought. Why on earth couldn’t the Governor be sensible, and wait till next morning? The money would be paid—that was the main point—all the rest could wait.

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