They had tea under the twinkling shade of a pine copse at the end of the lawn, and presently after Mr. Alington again took his straw hat, with the design of a stroll in the fresh cool of the approaching evening. The other two ladies preferred to enjoy it in inaction, waiting for the arrival of the adventurous slip-carriage guests, about whose fate Mrs. Murchison reiterated her anxiety.
So Mr. Alington, secretly not ill-pleased, started alone. He was about half-way down the drive, when he met a telegraph-boy going towards the house, and, in his expansive, kindly manner, detained him a moment with a few simple questions as to his name and age. Finally, just as he turned to walk on, he asked him for whom he was delivering a telegram, and the boy, drawing it out of his pouch, showed him the address.
Mr. Alington opened it slowly, wondering, as he had often wondered before, why the envelope was orange and the paper pink. It was from his brokers, and very short; but he looked for some considerable time at the eight words it contained:
"Terrible panic in Carmels. Shares unnegotiable.Wire instructions."
At first he read it quite blankly; it seemed to him that the words, though they were simple and plain enough, conveyed nothing to his mind. Then suddenly a huge intense light, hot and dazzling beyond description, appeared to have been uncovered somewhere in his brain, and the words burned and blinded him. He let the pink paper fall, bowing and sidling on the gravel of the drive, then stooped down with a curious groping manner and picked it up again. He put it neatly back inside the envelope, and asked the boy for a form, on which he scribbled a few words.
"Do nothing," he wrote. "I will come up immediately."
He gave the boy a shilling, waving away the change, and then, going to the grassy bank that bounded the drive, he sat down. Except for that moment, when his brain, no doubt instantaneously stunned, refused to tell him the meaning of the words, it had been absolutely composed and alert. The telegram gave no hint as to the cause of this panic, but without casting about for other possibilities, he put it down at once to his one weak point, Mr. Chavasse. That determined, he gave it no further thought, but wondered idly and without much interest what he felt. But this was beyond him. He had no idea what he felt, except that he was conscious of a slight qualm of sickness, so slight and so purely physical, to all seeming, that he would naturally have put it down, had it not appeared simultaneously with this news, to some small error of diet. Otherwise his brain, though perfectly clear and capable of receiving accurate impressions, was blank. There was a whisper of fir-trees round him, and little points of sunlight flickered on the yellow gravel ofthe drive as the branches stirred in the wind. Lady Haslemere's voice sounded thin and high from the lawn near—he had always remarked the unpleasant shrillness of her tones—and his straw hat had fallen off. He was conscious of no dismay, no agony of regret that he had not sold out two hours ago, no sense of disaster.
He sat there five minutes at the outside, and then went back to the lawn. The ladies looked up in surprise at the quickness of his return, but neither marked any change in his sleek features nor uncertainty in his step. His voice, too, when he spoke, was neither hurried, unsteady, nor differently modulated.
"Mrs. Murchison," he said, "I have just received the worst news about—about a venture of mine, which is of some importance. In fact, there has been, I fear, a great panic on the Stock Exchange over Carmel. May I be driven back to the station at once? It is necessary I should return to London. It is a great regret to me to miss my visit. Lady Haslemere, I congratulate you on your promptitude in selling."
He stood there bland and respectable for a moment, while Mrs. Murchison murmured incoherent sympathy, surprised at the extraordinary ease with which polite commonplace rose to his lips. The courteous necessary words seemed to speak themselves, without any direction from him. The blow that had fallen upon him must, he thought, have descended internally, for his surface behaviour seemed as equable as ever. He was conscious only of the continuance of the qualm of sickness, and of a little uncertainty in movement and action.
He had intended, for instance, as far as he intendedanything, to go away as soon as he had said good-bye, and wait for the carriage alone. But he found himself lingering; his feet did not take him away, and he wondered why. His straw hat was in his hand, and he fanned himself with it, though he did not feel hot. Perceiving this, yet still holding it, he stopped fanning, and bit the rim gently; then, aware that he was doing that, he put it on again.
"So good-bye," he said for the second time. "Ah, Lady Haslemere, you asked me for a tip. Well, if this panic is really serious—and I have no doubt it is—buy Carmels at the lower price, for all you are worth, if you have the nerve. I assure you that you cannot find a better investment. Good-bye, good-bye again. Perhaps—oh no, it doesn't signify. May I order the carriage, then, Mrs. Murchison? Thank you so much!" He lifted his hat, turned, and went to the house.
The London evening papers that day were full of the extraordinary scenes that had taken place on the Stock Exchange. Before the opening of the market that morning Carmel had been eagerly inquired for, owing to the activity produced by the very extensive purchases on the day before, and an hour before mid-day news had been cabled from Australia that there was very strong support in the market there for the same, Mr. Richard Chavasse alone having purchased fifty thousand pounds' worth of the shares. Closely following on this came news from the mine itself: the last crushing had yielded five ounces to the ton, and a new, unsuspected reef had been struck. The combination of these causes led to one of the most remarkable rises in price ever known. The market (so said one correspondent) completely lost its head, and practically no business was done except by the mining brokers. The shares that day had started a little above thirty shillings, and by four o'clock they had reached the astounding figure of £5 12s. 6d. A well-known broker who had been interviewed on the subject said that never in the course of a long experience had he known anything like it. Sober, steady dealers, in his own words, went screaming, raving mad. A boom in Westralian gold, it is true, had long been expected,but nothing could account for this extraordinary demand. No doubt the fact that Mr. Alington had purchased largely the day before had prepared the way for it, for he was considered among mining operators the one certain man to follow.
But the sequel to this unparalleled rise was even more remarkable. Buying, as had been stated, was much stimulated by the news of strong support in Australia (indeed, it was this that had been the signal for the rush); but about four o'clock, when the shares were at their highest, and some considerable realizations were being made, though the buying still went on, a sudden uneasiness was manifested. This was due to the fact that the telegram announcing the strong support in Australia was contradicted by another and later one, saying that the market in Carmel was absolutely inactive. Upon this, first a general distrust of the telegrams from the mine itself was manifested, and then literally in a few minutes a panic set in, as unaccountable as the previous rise; business came to a standstill, for in half an hour everyone was wanting to sell Carmel, and buyers could not be found. A few of the heaviest plungers cleared out, with thousands to their credit, but the majority of holders were caught. The shares became simply unnegotiable. The market closed on a scene of the wildest confusion, and when the Exchange was shut the street became impassable. To a late hour a mob of excited jobbers continued trying to sell, and just before going to press came a report that Mr. Alington, who had left town that day, but suddenly returned, was picking up all the shares he could lay hands on at a purely nominal figure. Settling-day, it would be remembered, occurred next week. A committee of the Stock Exchangewas going to investigate the matter of the false telegram.
Kit and Jack had come down to Goring that day to join Toby and his wife there. Kit was steadily gaining strength, but this evening, being a little tired, she had gone to bed before dinner, and now, dinner being just over, Lily had left the others to see how she was. Neither Jack nor Toby was given to sitting over wine, and as soon as Lily went upstairs, they removed into the hall to smoke. The evening paper had just come in, and Jack took it up with some eagerness, for his stake in Carmel was a large one. He read through the account of what had taken place quite quietly, and leaned back in his chair thinking. Unlike Lady Haslemere, a few nights ago, he did not let his cigarette go out. At length he spoke.
"I expect I have gone smash, Toby," he said. He threw him over the paper. "Read the account of what happened to-day on the Stock Exchange," he added.
Toby did not reply, but took the paper.
"The only thing to be thankful for is that I didn't sell out just before the panic," remarked Jack.
Toby read on in silence till he had finished it.
"Why?" he asked.
"Because it would look as if I had known that the first telegram was false. What extraordinary nerve Alington must have! Do you see that he has been buying every share he can lay hands on?"
"I don't understand about the first telegram," said Toby.
"Nor do I, thank God!"
"Supposing it is a real smash, will you have lost much, Jack?"
"Eight thousand pounds—more than that, indeed, unless the price goes up again before settling-day, for I've only paid for about half my shares."
Toby was silent a moment, wondering how Jack had ever had eight thousand pounds to invest of late years. The latter understood the silence, and acknowledged the justice of his difficulty.
"I made three thousand over Carmel East and West," he explained. "That with my year's salary as director, makes eight. I invested it all, and bought more."
Toby looked up.
"Did that fellow give you five thousand a year as director?" he asked.
"That fellow did."
Toby whistled.
"A committee of the Stock Exchange is going to investigate the whole affair, it appears," he said. "Won't that be rather unpleasant if they get into salaries?"
"Exceedingly. Mind you don't let Kit know, Toby, until one has more certain news."
He took a turn up and down the room in silence.
"Extremely annoying," he said, with laudable moderation; "and I can't imagine what has happened, or who is responsible for the first telegram. Alington cannot have caused it to be sent merely to make the market active, for it was certain to be contradicted."
A man came into the room with a telegram on a salver, and handed it to Jack.
"Reply paid, my lord," he said.
Jack turned it over in his hand without opening it, unable to make the effort. Then he suddenlytore it open, and unfolded the thin pink sheet. It was from Alington.
"Can you meet me to-morrow morning at my rooms, St. James's Street?" it ran.
"Can you meet me to-morrow morning at my rooms, St. James's Street?" it ran.
He scribbled an affirmative, and gave it back to the man.
"I shall have to go up to-morrow," he said to Toby; "Alington wants me to meet him in London; I shall go, of course. What a blessing one is a gentleman, and doesn't scream and sweat! Now, not a word to anyone; it may not be as bad as it looks."
Jack started off early next morning, and drove straight to Alington's rooms. Sounds of piano-playing came from upstairs, and this somehow gave him a sense of relief. "Peoplein extremisdo not play pianos," he said to himself, as he mounted the stairs. Alington got up as soon as he came in.
"I am glad you were able to come," he said; "it was expedient—necessary almost—that I should see you."
"What has happened?" asked Jack.
Mr. Alington took a telegram from his pocket, and handed it to him.
"The unexpected—it always does: this, in fact."
Jack took it and read:
"Chavasse left for England by P. and O. yesterday."
"Chavasse left for England by P. and O. yesterday."
"You don't understand, my dear Conybeare, do you?" he said. "It is a very short story, and quite a little romance in its way."
And, in a few words, he told Jack the story of theburglary, Chavasse's confession, and his idea of using him as an independent operator in Australia.
"I make no doubt what has occurred," he said. "The man has drawn out the somewhat considerable balance I left at Melbourne for him to invest when ordered, and has taken it off with him. He has also, I expect, got hold of his own confession—a clever rogue."
"But the telegram?" asked Jack. "Who sent the telegram about the strong support in Australia?"
Mr. Alington opened his mild eyes to their widest.
"I, my dear fellow!" he said; "at least, of course I caused it to be sent. As usual, two days ago, I despatched one cipher telegram to this valet of mine, telling him to invest, and another to my manager telling him to wire, 'Strong support in Australia.' He did as I told him; Chavasse did not. That is all."
Jack was silent a moment, but it did not take him long to grasp the whole situation, for it was very simple.
"And what next?" he said.
Alington shrugged his shoulders.
"Unless the shares go up again before next settling-day, I shall almost certainly be bankrupt," he said.
"Then why, if the papers were correctly informed, did you go on buying last night?"
"Because I could get Carmel dirt cheap," he said. "If they go up, I am so much the richer; if they do not, I am done in any case. This unfortunatecontretempsabout my foolish valet does not affect the value of the mine. The gold is there just the same."
"But nobody will believe that," put in Jack.
"For the present, as you say—for the immediatepresent—they will not realize it. They will think themselves lucky to part with their shares enormously below their value. My fortune depends on how soon they realize it."
"There will be an inquiry into the matter?"
"Undoubtedly. Bogus telegrams are not officially recognised by the Stock Exchange."
Alington was certainly at his best, so thought Jack, when things happened. His sleek, unhurried respectability, a little trying and conventional at ordinary times, though unaltered in itself, became admirable, a rare manifestation of self-control. No flurried quickening marked his precise, unhurried sentences; they remained just as leisurely as ever. As in the days when Carmel East and West was behaving in so mercurial a manner, though so consonantly with his wishes, so now, when the greatercouphad struck so back-handedly against himself, he did not cease to be imperturbably calm and lucid. Though without breeding in the ordinary sense of the word, he had to a notable extent that most characteristic mark of breeding, utter absence of exaltation in unexpected prosperity and complete composure in disaster. There was nothing affected about him; he was, as always, unimpulsive master of himself, and this, which in the social mill seemed a lack of animation, in the mill of adversity became a thing to respect.
"You take it very quietly," said Jack.
"It is mere habit," said Alington. "By the way, I hope, my dear fellow, that your wife is better?"
"Much better, thanks. We went to Goring yesterday."
"So I saw in the papers. How much had you in Carmel?"
"Eight thousand pounds cash. And half of my shares I have bought only, not paid for."
"Ah! will that be a difficulty?"
"More like an impossibility, unless they go up before settling-day."
"I am sorry for that," said Alington, "for I should have recommended your buying even more. I am going to bluff the thing out. I am going to buy and buy. Chavasse may go hang. I shall make no attempt to get him or his—my—fifty thousand pounds."
"Fifty thousand!" exclaimed Jack involuntarily.
"Fifty thousand! Indeed, I could not before the ship touches at the Cape. But if I buy, and am known to be buying, it is still conceivable that confidence may be restored, that the damage done by that absurd, unreasonable panic yesterday may be repaired. I don't say that the rush for shares was not insane, but the panic was not less so. And now, my dear fellow, I congratulate you on the way you have taken it. You would make a financier.Æquam memento rebus in arduis!How Horace has the trick of stating simple things inspiritingly! A divine gift."
"But what do you suppose they will find out at the inquiry?" asked Jack.
"Ah, you need not fear the inquiry in the least. That will not touch your salary as director, which is the sort of thing which I see you have on your mind. No. What would perhaps be serious for you is, if I became bankrupt. Then, it is true, my private accounts where your salary figures would be made public. The surest means of avoiding that is that shares should go up again before settling-day. It is with this view I am buying now; with this view Ishould recommend you to desperate measures! Desperate? Oh, certainly! But I must remind you that the case is fairly so. I see it is lunch time. You will lunch here, of course?"
Kit had not yet risen when Jack went up to London that morning, and she found Lily alone in the garden when she came down. Her illness had left her very weak and frail, and though she was getting on rapidly, she felt very different from the Kit who, a few weeks ago, would dress twenty times a day for twenty engagements, and sit up half the night with baccarat. Physically and mentally, she had been much jarred by a very sudden and startling pull-up. All her life she had been content to go drifting giddily along, asking only of the moment that it should amuse her; and in those days when she lay in the darkened room it seemed as if somebody, not herself, had asked her some serious and frightening questions. At any rate, she had a scare, if no worse, and she felt disposed to go cautiously. Out of she knew not where had leaped the forces that strike, that pay the wages of all action, of sin, of virtue, of justice and injustice, and to her had wages been given. She had heard of such things before; cant phrases of childhood reminded her that one reaped as one had sown, that causes lead to effects, but until now she had not any more certain news of them. But during those three days of semi-consciousness, in which she had clung instinctively to Lily, it was as if some piece of herself, dormant and overlaid for the most part by the entertainment of ordinary every-day living, had, in the disablement of that, reasserted itself, and now that she was winning her way back to normal conditions this new consciousness had not been stilled again.
Lily, whom she had hitherto regarded as enviably rich, rather proper andguindée, had touched some chord in her which did not cease to vibrate. Of all people in the world, Kit would,à priori, have considered her the one who would naturally have shunned her. Hitherto she had regarded her, viewed by any intimate standard, with all the complete indifference with which people who do not consider themselves good look upon those whom they regard as being so, and the sinner is always sublimely incurious of the attitudes and actions of the saint. But Lily had come to her in her need;guindéeas she might be, she had yet been a comfort and an encouragement to her in the hopelessness of her desolation, just as if she was not, as Kit supposed she must be, shocked at her. Afterwards, during her convalescence, for days a secret fear had beset Kit that the moment would come when Lily would talk to her seriously, "jaw her," as she put it to herself—very sweetly and gently, no doubt, but still "jaw" her. That would spoil it all. But day had added itself to day, and the "jaw" was still unspoken. Lily was only more patient with her than anyone, and more comfortable. She was not amusing, but Kit for once did not want to be amused. Her presence was pleasant; it was what Kit wanted, and this gave her food for thought.
More than once, again, during those darkened days Kit had broken down, cried herself nearly hysterical, and it was Lily who had soothed her back from the borders of insanity. She had not asked after the state of Kit's soul, or urged repentance on her; she had not been improving, or told her that pain was sent her for a good reason. Once, indeed, as we have seen, she had prayed with her, and Kit,who would naturally have screamed at such an idea, or told all her friends what liberties a quite nice sister-in-law sometimes took, did neither. She found—it may have been imagination—that it did her good. All these things she had revolved secretly, but often, while they were staying at Goring, and they seemed to her significant. Her mind, indeed, used them as its ordinary provender, going to graze on them habitually.
Lily and Toby were off next day, and when Kit came down on the Sunday morning following Jack's departure to London, she had determined to talk to Lily. It struck her as odd that three weeks ago she should have been so nervous that Lily was going to talk to her, whereas now she herself was about to give her an intentional opportunity of doing so. Also to-morrow she would be left alone with Jack, who would return then, and sooner or later she and he would have to talk. Hitherto both of them had avoided the one subject which filled their minds: while in London it was an ever-present dread to each that some day this must come, each continually apprehensive that the other would begin, yet half longing to get it over. Both knew that the thing had to be talked out, there was no getting over that; nor was it any use waiting till the narcotic accumulation of time should dim the memories of that scene when Kit had told him all, and been answered by a blow. There are certain things which no lapse of time will ever cover: this was one. Words had to pass between them, and what those words should be neither could guess. Here was another reason why Kit wanted to be talked to by Lily.
They walked up and down the lawn for a few minutes, speaking of indifferent things, and Lilymade some reference to her leaving on the next day.
"And I shall be alone with Jack," said Kit simply, but with purpose.
"Yes," said the other. Then, after a pause: "You must have things to say to each other, Kit. Jack told Toby yesterday he had hardly had a word with you since you were ill."
Kit stopped.
"I dread it," she said, "and I know it must come. But, Lily, what is to be said on either side? what can be said?"
"Ah, it's no use thinking over what you are going to say," said Lily. "You will say what you must, what you feel."
"I don't know what I feel," said Kit. "Let us sit down; it is warm. And I want to talk to you."
They sat down on a garden-seat, shaded by the fan-branched cedar and looking out over the haze of summer sunshine and the slow, strong river.
"I don't know what I feel," said Kit again.
"Try to tell me as best you can," said Lily quietly.
"Well, I won't be dishonest with myself, I am sure of that," said Kit. "Just now I have a horror of what—of what is past. But how can I know from what it springs? It may be only because the terrible consequences are still vivid to me. I have been wicked all my life—it is no use pretending otherwise. I have never tried to do good or to be good. Well, I get paid out for a bad thing I have done. Is it not most probable that I have a horror of it only because the punishment is very fresh to me?"
"That is something," said Lily. "If punishment makes you detest what you did, it is doing its work."
"Ah, but the burglar who is caught doesn't detest burglary, really. He may not commit it again, but that is a very different matter. You beat a dog for chasing a cat; when it sees a cat next time, it probably will put its tail down, but you have not eradicated its tendencies, or changed its nature."
Kit paused. She was groping about helplessly in her dim-lit soul.
"You are a good woman, Lily," she said. "You don't and you can't understand a person like me. Oh, my dear, I should never have got through it but for you! I want to be good—before God, I believe I want to be good, but I don't know what it means. I can only say that I will not do certain things again. But how feeble is that! I want to see Ted again—oh, how I want to!—but I believe that I want not to. Is that any good? I want to love Jack again. I did once, indeed I did, and I want him to love me. That is hopeless: he never will."
Lily was puzzled. Kit's difficulties seemed, somehow, so elementary that explanation was impossible. But she knew that it was only through the acknowledgment and the facing of them that her salvation lay. Kit was a child in matters of morals, and perfectly undeveloped; but, luckily, plain simplicity is the one means by which to approach children. Tact, finesse, all the qualities which Kit had and she had not were unneeded here.
"Kit, dear, it doesn't matter, so to speak, whether Jack loves you or not," she said. "Anyhow, it doesn't concern what you must do. Oh, you will not find things easy, and I never heard that one was intended to. You will find a thousand things you want to do, and must not, a thousand things youmust do which are hard—harder than the old bazaar-opening, Kit. I am assuming, of course, that, on the whole, you want to be good. There is the great thing, broadly stated."
Kit nodded her head.
"I don't know. I suppose I do," she said.
"Well, there is no master key to it," said Lily. "Separately and simply you have to take each thing, and do it or avoid it. You will need endless patience. I don't want to preach to you, and I don't know how; but you have asked me to help you. Your life has been passed in a certain way: you have told me certain things about it. On the whole, you wish the future to be different. Forget the past, then—try to forget it. Do not dwell on it: it is a bad companion. It will only paralyze you, and you need all your power for what lies in front of you."
"Do you mean I must renounce the world, and all that?" asked Kit.
"No, nor go into a nunnery. You have a duty towards Jack. Do it; above all, keep on doing it, every day and always. Consider whether there are not many things, harmless in themselves, which lead to things not harmless. Avoid them."
"Don't flirt, you mean?" said Kit quite sincerely.
Lily paused a moment. There was a certain coarse simplicity about Kit which was at once embarrassing and helpful. Never were appearances more misleading; for Kit, with her pallor and exquisite face, looked the very image of a refined woman of the world, one who lived aloof from the grossness of life, yet of fine and complicated fibre. Instead, as far as present purposes were concerned, she was as ignorant as a child, but without innocence. She had lost the latter without remedying the former.
"Certainly don't flirt," she said; "but don't do a great deal more than that. Remember that you are a certain power in the world—many people take their tone from such as you—and let that power be on the right side. One knows dimly enough what goodness is, but one knows it sufficiently. I don't want you to be a raving reformer: that is not in your line. Set your face steadily against a great many things which are commonly done by the people among whom you move."
"The things I have done all my life," said Kit.
"Yes, the things you have done all your life."
Kit sat silent, and the gentleness of her face to this straight speech was touching. At last she looked up.
"And will you help me?" she asked. "Oh, Lily! I have been down into hell. And I didn't believe in it till I went there. But so it is—an outer darkness."
She said it quite simply and earnestly, without bitterness, or the egotism which want of reticence so often carries with it. Round them early summer was bright with a thousand blossoms and melodies; the mellow jangle of church bells was in the air; the time of the singing-bird had come.
"But I can't feel—I am numb. I don't know where to go, or where I am going," she went on, her voice rising. "I only know that I don't want to go back to the life I have hitherto led; but there is nothing else. The great truths—God, religion, goodness—which mean so much, so everything to you, are nothing to me. I feel no real desire to be good, and yet I want to be not wicked. One suffers for being wicked. I can get no higher than that."
"Stick to that, dear Kit," said Lily. "I can tellyou no more. Only I know—I know that, if one goes on doing the thing one believes to be best, even quite blindly, the time comes that one's eyes are slowly opened. Out of the darkness comes day. One sees from where one has come. Then one look, and on again."
"But for ever, till the end of one's life?" asked Kit.
"Till the end of one's life. And the effort to behave decently has a great reward, which is decent behaviour."
"And Jack—what am I to say to Jack?"
"All you feel."
"Jack will think it so queer," said Kit.
"You did not see Jack when you were at your worst that afternoon. Oh, Kit! it is an awful thing to see the helpless anguish of a man. He will not have forgotten that."
"Jack in anguish?" asked Kit.
"Yes; just remember that it was so. Here's Toby. I thought he was at church. What a heathen my husband is!"
Toby strolled up, with his pipe in his mouth.
"I meant to go to church," he said; "but eventually I decided to take—to take my spiritual consolation at home."
"I, too, Toby," said Kit.
Toby was sitting in the smoking-room of the Bachelors' Club some weeks later on a hot evening in July. The window was open, and the hum of London came booming in soft and large. It was nearly midnight, and the tide of carriages had set westward from the theatres, and was flowing fast. The pavements were full, the roadway was roaring, the season was gathered up for its final effort. Now and then the door opened, and a man in evening dress would lounge in, ring for a whisky-and-soda, and turn listlessly over the leaves of an evening paper, or exchange a few remarks with a friend. As often as the door opened Toby looked up, as if expecting someone.
It had already struck midnight half an hour ago when Jack entered. He looked worried and tired, and by the light of a match for his cigarette, which he lit as he crossed the room to where Toby was sitting, the lines round his eyes, noticed and kindly commiserated a few months before by Ted Comber, seemed deeper and more harshly cut. He threw himself into a chair by Toby.
"Drink?" asked the other.
"No, thanks."
Toby was silent a moment.
"I'm devilish sorry for you, Jack," he said at length. "But I see by the paper that it is all over."
"Yes; they finished with me this afternoon. Alington will have another week of it. Jove! Toby, for all his sleekness and hymn-singing, he is an iron fellow! He's got some fresh scheme on hand, and he's going about it with all his old quiet energy, and asked me to join him; but I told him I'd had enough of directorships. But there's a strong man for you! He is knocked flat, he picks himself up and goes straight on."
He picked up the paper, and turned to the money-market.
"And here's the cruel part of it all," he said, "for both of us: Carmel is up to four pounds again. If they had only given him another month, he would have been as rich as ever, instead of having to declare bankruptcy; and I—well, I should have had a pound or two more. Lord! on what small things life depends!"
Toby was silent.
"About the Park Lane house," he said, after a pause. "I talked it over with Lily, and if you'll let us have it at that price, we shall be delighted to take it. We only have our present house on a yearly lease, which expires in July."
"You're a good fellow, Toby."
"Oh, that's all rot!" said Toby. "Lily and I both want your house. It isn't as if we were doing you a kindness—it isn't really, Jack. But it's such rough luck on you having to turn out. Of course, you and Kit will always come there whenever you like."
Jack lit another cigarette, flicking the end of the old one out of the window.
"I think I will have a drink, Toby," he said; "my throat is as dry as dust answering so many pertinent and impertinent questions, as to what I received as director, and what I made over Carmel East and West. They let me off nothing, and the Radical papers will be beautiful for the next week or two. They'll be enough to make one turn Radical."
"Poor old Jack! Whisky? Whisky-and-soda, waiter—two. Well, it's all over."
"Ted Comber was in court to-day," continued Jack, "all curled, and dyed, and brushed, and manicured. He watched me all the time, Toby. Upon my word, I think that was the worst part of the whole show."
Toby showed his teeth for a moment.
"I've made it up with him, I'm sorry to say," he remarked. "Lily insisted on it. We shook hands, and I was afraid he was going to kiss me."
"By the way, how is Lily?"
"Happy as a queen when I left her this morning, and the boy, oh! Jack, a beauty. He was shouting fit to knock the house down: you could have heard him in Goring. I left early, but Kit got up and breakfasted with me. Knowing how she hates getting up early, I put that down at its proper value. But she didn't attend to me much: she has no thoughts except for Lily and the boy."
"Kit has behaved like a real trump all through this," said Jack. "Never a word or a look of reproach to me. She's just been cheery, and simple, and splendid. You know, Toby, she is utterly changed since—since that time before Easter. We had a long talk the day after you and Lily left us there two months ago. I was never so surprised in my life."
"At what?"
"At what she said, and at what I said—perhaps most of what I said. She told me she was going to try not to be such a brute. And, upon my soul, I thought it was an excellent plan. I said I would try too."
Toby laughed.
"There's your whisky," he said. "Hang it all! I haven't got any money. You'll have to pay for it yourself, Jack—and mine, too. So you and Kit made a bargain?"
Jack glanced round the room, which had emptied of all its well-dressed, weary occupants. He and Toby were alone.
"Yes, we made a bargain. The worst of it was that neither of us know how to try, so we consulted Lily. Did it ever occur to you, Toby, that you have married the nicest girl that ever breathed?"
"Ihadan idea of it. It was Kit's doing, too. Funny, that."
"Well, Lily told us. She said some damned clever things. She said that turning over a new leaf meant not even looking back once to the old one. You know, Toby, that's devilish good. I thought she'd tell us to think what brutes we had been, and repent. Not a bit of it. We've just got to go straight on. Don't grin; I'm perfectly serious."
"I'm sure you are. I was only grinning at the notion of Lily telling you to repent. You know, if there are two things that girl is not, Jack, they are a preacher and a prig."
"You're quite right, and I always thought that to be good you had to be either one or the other, and probably both. She tells me it is not necessarily so, and so Kit and I are going to set to work. Weare not going to run up any more huge bills which we can't pay; we are not going to invent or to listen to scandalous stories about other people; and we are going to flirt. We suggested that, and Lily thought it would do to begin upon. Also I was to tell the truth about Alington's bankruptcy. I did that. Really, Toby, it's very easy to tell the truth: it requires no effort of the imagination. But the truth is a brute when it comes out."
Toby looked up smiling, but Jack was perfectly grave and serious.
"Yes, you may think I don't mean it," he said, "but I do. We mean to reform, in fact; God knows it is high time. Kit and I have lived in what I suppose you would call rather a careless manner all these years, and we have come to an almighty, all-round smash. We had a very serious talk—we had never talked seriously before, as far as I can remember—and we are going to try to do better."
Jack got up and went to the window, and leaned out for a moment into the warm summer night. Then he turned into the room again.
"We are indeed," he said. "Good-night, Toby;" and he walked off.
Ted Comber had been to the opera that night, and was going on to a dance. They had been doing the "Meistersingers," and it was consequently after twelve when he got out. The dance was in Park Lane, and he turned into the Bachelors' Club to freshen himself before going on. He had spent a really delightful day; for he had lunched with amusing people, had sat an hour listening to Jack Conybeare's examination in the Alington bankruptcy case, and had had the opportunity of telling a very exalted personage about it afterwards, making him laugh forten minutes, and Ted, who had a fine loyal regard for exalted personages—some people called him a snob—was proportionately gratified. Of course it was too terrible for poor Jack, but it was absurd not to see the light side of it when properly considered.
"I was really so sorry for him I didn't know what to do," he had said to Lady Coniston at dinner. "Isn't it too terrible?" and they had both burst into shrieks of laughter, and discussed the question from every point and wondered how dear Kit took it.
The freshening up in the lavatory of the Bachelors' Club meant some little time and delicacy of touch. He had to be careful how he washed his face, for he had taken pains with it. Certainly the effect was admirable; for the least touch of rouge on the cheek-bone, and positively only the shadow of an antimony pencil below his eyes had given his face the freshness of a boy's. He looked at himself quite candidly in the glass, and said, "Not a day more than twenty-five." For he was no friend of false modesty, and any modesty he might have assumed about himself would have been undeniably false.
All this care for one's appearance, it is true, made a terrible hole in one's time; but if it lengthened one's youth, it was an excellent investment of hours. There was nothing that could weigh against that paramount consideration. He dried his hands, still looking at himself, and put on his rings. A touch of the hairbrush was necessary, and for his hands the file of the nail-scissors. Then he put on his coat again and went into the hall. Jack Conybeare was in the act of coming out of the smoking-room.
Ted had only a short moment for reflection, and almost without a pause he went on, meeting Jack.
"Good-evening, Jack," he said; "are you coming to the Tauntons'? Kit is in the country still, is she not?"
Jack had stopped on seeing him, and looked him over slowly from head to heel; then he walked by him without speaking, and went out.
Ted was only a little amused, and more than a little annoyed. Just now it did not matter much what Jack did, but, being wise in his generation, he did not care about being cut by anybody. The Conybeares would probably pick up again in a year or two, and to be cut by the master of quite one of the nicest houses in London was a bore. Besides, he was in an acme of good-fellowship after his amusing day.
He went on into the smoking-room to look round before proceeding to his dance. Toby was still sitting in the window where Jack had left him. Since their reconciliation a day or two before, Ted had felt most friendly towards him, and he went delicately across the room to him, looking charming.
"I just met Jack in the hall," he said; "he looks terribly tired and old."
Toby bristled like a large collie dog.
"Naturally," he said.
"In fact, he was rather short with me," said Ted plaintively.
This was too much. Toby got up.
"Naturally," he said again.
The poor little butterfly felt quite bruised. Really, the Conybeares had not any manners. It serves so little purpose to be rude to anyone, and it was so easy and repaying to be pleasant. He knew this well, for the whole of his nasty little life was spent in reaping the fruits of being constantly pleasant topeople. They asked you to dinner, they asked you to stay at their country houses, and having asked you once they asked you again, because you took the trouble to talk and amuse people. What more can a butterfly want than a sunny garden with flowers always open? Such a simple need! so easy to satisfy!
Well, there was a delicious flower open in Park Lane, and he went on to his dance. He must really give up the Conybeares, he thought; they were becoming too prickly. He had written twice to Kit, and had received no answer. Jack had given him a dead cut; Toby was a bear. And he sighed gently, thinking how stupid it was of the flowers to shut themselves up.
As soon as he had gone, Toby resumed his seat by the window. During the last few months he had touched life in a way he had never done before. To him this business of living had hitherto been a cheery, comfortable affair; the question of taking it seriously, even of taking it at all, had never formally presented itself to him. Then quite suddenly, as it were, as he paddled pleasantly along, he had got out of his depth. The great irresistible forces of life had swept him away, the swift current of love had borne him far out into the great ocean of human experience. Then, still encircled by that, he had seen storm-clouds gather, grim tempests had burst in hail and howling wind, the sea had grown black and foam-flecked. He had seen the tragedy of his brother's home—sin and its wages ruthlessly paid. There were such things as realities. And after that what? Into what new forms would the wreckage be fashioned, these riven planks of a pleasure-boat? But underneath the lightness of Jack's words to-nightthere had lain, Toby felt, a seriousness which was new. And the change in Kit was more marked still.
Outside, the world rolled on its way, and each unit in the crowd moved to his appointed goal, some of set purpose, others unconscious of it, but none the less on an inevitable way. In the brains of men stirred the thoughts which, for good or ill, should be the heritage of the next generation, part of their instinctive equipment. The vast design was being worked out, unerringly, unceasingly, unhurried and undelayed, through the sin of one, the virtue of another. To fall itself and to fail was but a step towards the ultimate perfection; behind all worked the Master-hand. By strange pathways and chance meetings, by the death of the scarcely born and the innocent, by the unscathed life and health of the guiltiest, by love and beautiful things and terrible things, had all reached the spot where they stood to-day. Devious might be the paths they should hereafter follow, but He who had led them thus far knew.
And as Toby thought on these things, moved beyond his wont, he looked out, and saw with a strange quickening of the blood that in the east already there were signs that out of night was shortly to be born another day.