The courts had just risen, and the barristers in their wigs and gowns were hastening through the Temple on the way to their various chambers. It was not a day on which to linger, for a pitiless east wind swept across Fountain Court, making little eddies in the basin of water where the goldfish swam, and swirling the dust into little sandstorms to blind the shivering people who were using the thoroughfare down to the Embankment. The city clocks were chiming the quarter after four, as Paul Wilton came along with the precise and measured step that never varied whatever the weather might be, and mounted the wooden staircase that led to his rooms. A man rose from his easiest chair as he walked into his sitting-room, and they greeted one another in the cordial though restrained manner of men who had not met for some time.
"Sorry you've been waiting, Heaton. Been here long?" said Paul, throwing off his gown with more rapidity than he usually showed.
"Oh, no matter; my fault for getting here too early," returned Heaton cheerily, as he sat down again and pulled his chair closer to the fire. He never entered anybody's house without making elaborate preparations to stay a long while.
"Fact is," he continued, "it's so long since I saw you that, directly I heard you were back, I felt I must come round and look you up. It was young Linton who told me,—you remember Linton? Ran across him in the club, last night; he knows some friends of yours,—Kerry, or Keeley, or some such name as that; just been calling on them, apparently, and they told him you had travelled back with them. Suppose you know the people I mean?"
Paul admitted that he knew the people he had been travelling with, and Heaton rattled on afresh.
"We were talking about you at the club, only the other afternoon; coincidence, wasn't it? Two or three of us,—Marston, and Hallett, and old Pryor. You remember old Pryor, don't you? Stock Exchange, and swears a lot—ah, you know; he wanted to know what had become of you and your damned career; it was a damned pity for the most brilliant man at the bar, and the only one with a conscience,to be wasted on a lot of damned foreigners, and so on. You know old Pryor. Of course I agreed with him, but it wasn't my business to say so."
He paused a little wistfully, as though he expected Paul to say something to explain his long absence; but the latter only smiled slightly, and walked across to his cupboard in the corner.
"I'm going to have some tea," he observed, "but I don't expect you to join me in that, Heaton. There's some vermuth here, Italian vermuth; or, of course, you can have whiskey if you prefer it."
"Thanks, my boy," laughed the other. "I'm glad to see that five months in the infernal regions haven't spoilt your memory. Claret for boys, brandy for heroes, eh?"
He helped himself to whiskey, and then leaned back in his chair to survey Paul, who was making a cigarette while the water boiled. There was one of the long silences that were inevitable with Paul, unless his companion took the initiative; and for the next five minutes the only sounds to be heard were the singing of the kettle, the rise and fall of footsteps in the court below, and the occasional rattle of the window sash as the wind wrestled with it.Paul made the tea, and brought his cup to the table, and flung himself at full length on the sofa beside it.
"Well," he said at last, "haven't you any news to tell me? Who is the last charming lady you have been trotting round to all the picture galleries,—the one who is more beautiful, and more intellectual, and more sympathetic than any woman you have ever met?"
Heaton laughed consciously.
"Now, it's odd you should happen to say that," he said in his simple manner. "Of course I know it's only your chaff, confound you, but thereisjust a smattering of truth in it. By Jove, Wilton, you must come and meet her; you never saw such a figure, and she's the wittiest creature I ever ran across! I'm nowhere, when it comes to talk; but she's so kind to me, Wilton,—you can't think; I never met such a sympathetic woman. Really, she has the most extraordinary effect upon me; I haven't been so influenced by any woman since poor little May died, 'pon my word I haven't. I can't think how it's all going to end, I tell you I can't. It's giving me a lot of worry, I know."
"Ah," said Paul gravely. "Widow?"
"Her husband was a brute," said Heatonenergetically. "Colonel in the army, drank, used her villainously I expect, though she doesn't say much; she's awfully staunch to the chap. Women are, you know; I can't think why, when we treat them so badly. That's where they get their hold over us, I suppose. But her influence over me is wonderful. I wouldn't do anything to lose her respect, for the world."
He blinked his eyes, and drank some more whiskey. Perhaps it occurred to him that his companion was even less responsive than usual, for there was more vigour and less sentiment in his tone when he resumed the conversation.
"You never tell me anything about yourself," he complained, rather pathetically. "You draw me out, and I'm ass enough to be drawn; and then you sit and smile cynically, while I make a fool of myself. How aboutyourexperiences, eh? 'Pon my word, I don't remember a single instance of your giving me your confidence! You're such a rum, reserved sort of chap. Well, I dare say you're right to keep it all to yourself. It does me good to tell things; but then, I'm different."
"My dear fellow, I've nothing to tell," replied Paul, smiling. "You forget that mylife is not full of the charming experiences that seem to fall so continually to your lot. And your conversation is so much more interesting than mine would be, that I prefer to listen; that's all. I'm not secretive; I have merely nothing to secrete."
"That's all very well," said Heaton, shaking his head; "but I'm older than you, so that won't wash. You should have heard what those fellows at the club were saying about you."
"Yes? It doesn't interest me in the least," said Paul coldly. But tact was not the strong point of his friend's character, and he went on, notwithstanding.
"Of course I didn't say much,—it isn't my way; besides, you know I think you're always right in the main. But it's enough to make fellows talk, when a man like you, who always sets his career before his pleasure, goes away out of the vacation, and stays away all these months. You must own it's reasonable to speculate a little; it's only in man's nature."
"Some men's," said Paul, as coldly as before. "I should never dream of speculating about anybody's course of action, myself."
"No, no, of course not; I quite agree with you, quite," said Heaton. "By the way," he added, with bland innocence in his expression,"what sort of people are these Kerrys you have been travelling with? An old married couple of sorts, I suppose!"
Paul raised himself on his elbow and drank his tea straight off, as though he had not heard the question. He was always divided, in his conversations with Heaton, between a desire to snub him and a fear of wounding his sensitiveness.
"You haven't told me the charming widow's name," he said, dropping back into his former position. The other man's face brightened, and the conversation again became a monologue until even Heaton's prosiness was exhausted, and silence fell upon them both. And then, very characteristically, as soon as he was quite sure he was not expected to say anything, Paul suddenly became communicative.
"The Keeleys are rather nice people," he observed, taking his cigarette out of his mouth and staring fixedly at the lighted end of it. "Mother and daughter, you know, just abroad for the winter. Nice little place in Herefordshire, I believe, but they come to town for the season,—Curzon Street."
Heaton was wise enough to remain silent; and Paul went on, after a pause.
"Sat next to them at table d'hôte, and that sort of thing. One is always glad of a compatriot abroad, don't you know! And the mother was really rather nice," he added, as an afterthought.
"And what was the daughter like?" asked Heaton.
"Oh, just an ordinary amusing sort of girl! She's pretty, too, in a sort of way, but I don't admire that kind of thing much, myself. And I think she found me very dull." He paused, and looked thoughtful. "I must take you there when they come up to town, Heaton. You'd get on with them, and the girl is just your style, I fancy. She is really very pretty," he added, becoming thoughtful again.
"Nothing I should like better! Delightful of you to think of it!" exclaimed Heaton, with a warmth that was a little overdone. His want of a sense of proportion was always an annoyance to Paul. "You take me there, that's all," he said, chuckling; "and let me have my head—"
"Which is precisely what you wouldn't have," said Paul drily. "And I'm sure I don't know why you want to know them; they are quite ordinary people, and don't possess every grace and virtue and talent,like all your other lady friends. However, I shall be very pleased if you really care about it. But you'll be disappointed."
Heaton agreed to be disappointed, and as another pause seemed imminent, he began to think about taking his departure. But Paul did not notice his intention, and seized the occasion to start a new subject.
"Look here, Heaton," he began, so suddenly that the elder man sat down again with precision; "you say I never tell you anything about my experiences. Does that mean that you really think I have anything to tell?"
Heaton looked at him dubiously.
"I'm hanged if I know," he said.
Paul smiled, a little regretfully.
"After years of renunciation," he murmured, "to be merely accounted a riddle! Then you think," he continued, with an interested expression, "that I am not the sort of man women would care about, eh? Well, I dare say you're right. But then, why do they ever care for any of us? I never expect them to, personally."
Heaton was looking at him in a perplexed manner.
"Perhaps I didn't express myself quite clearly," he hastened to say, with his usualwish to compromise. "I only meant that I sometimes think you never can have cared for any one seriously. But I've no doubt I'm wrong. And I never said that nobody had ever cared foryou; I think that's extremely unlikely. In fact— Do you really want me to say what I think?"
"It would be most interesting," said Paul, still smiling.
"Well," said Heaton decidedly, "I think you're the sort of man who would break a woman's heart and spare her reputation, and perhaps not discover that she liked you at all. I know what women are, and they just love to pine away for a man like you who would never dream of giving them any encouragement. And you have such a fascinating way with you that you just lead them on, without meaning to in the least. You can curse, if you like, Wilton; it's great impertinence on my part, eh?"
"My dear fellow," was all Paul said. As a matter of fact, he had never liked him better than he did at that moment, and his words had set him thinking. But Heaton's next remark undid the good impression he had unwittingly made.
"The fact is," he said, "a woman's reputationis worth only half as much to her as her happiness."
And his worldly wisdom jarred on Paul's nerves, and sounded unnecessarily coarse to him in his present mood; and he did not try to detain him again, when Heaton rose for the second time to take his leave. When he had gone, Paul strolled to the window-seat and smoked another cigarette, looking down into the wind-swept court. And his thoughts deliberately turned to Katharine Austen. He had not seen her for five months, he had not written to her for two, and her last letter to him was dated six weeks back. It had not occurred to him, until he drew it from his pocket now and looked at it, that it was really so long as that since she had written to him; and he became suddenly possessed of a wish to know what those six weeks had held for her. Out there in the orange groves of the South, walking by the side of the beautiful Marion Keeley, with the rustle of her skirts so close to him and the shallow levity of her conversation in his ears, it had been easy to forget the desperately earnest child who was toiling away to earn her living in the dullest quarter of a dull city. But here, where she had so often sat and talked to him, where they had loved to quarreland to make it up again, where she had given him rare glimpses of her quaint self and then hastily hidden it from him again, where she had been whimsical and serious by turns, where he had sometimes kissed her and felt her cheek warm at his touch,—here, all sorts of memories rushed back into his mind, and made him wonder why he had yielded so easily to the persuasions of the Keeleys, and remained so long away from England. It was impossible to name Marion Keeley in the same breath with this curiously lovable child who had held him in her sway all last summer, who had never used an art to draw him to her, and yet had succeeded, by force of qualities that she did not know she possessed, in gaining his sincere affection. Yet he had hardly thought of her for two months, and she had not written to him for six weeks. What had she been doing in those six weeks? It had not seemed to matter, when he walked by the side of Marion Keeley, how Katharine was passing her time in London; but now that Marion was no longer near him, now that he was free from her fascination and the necessity of replying to her banalities, it suddenly became of the first importance to him to know what had happened to Katharine in those six weeks. He hadgone away, he told himself, because he had taken fright at the situation, because he could not analyse his own feelings for her, because everything, in the eyes of the world, was hurrying them on to marriage,—and of marriage he had the profoundest dread. And he had allowed himself to be captivated almost immediately, by the ordinary beauty of an ordinary girl, someone who knew how to play upon a certain set of his emotions which Katharine had never learnt to touch. An expression of distaste crossed his face as he threw away his cigarette only half smoked, and looked down at the fountain as he had so often stood and looked with her in the hot days of last July. Heaton's words returned to his mind with a new significance: "Their reputation is worth only half as much to them as their happiness." He remembered how he had parted from Katharine in this very room, before he went abroad; and how he had congratulated himself afterwards on having refrained from kissing her. But he had a sudden recollection now of the look on her face as she turned away from him; and, for the first time, he thought he understood its meaning.
He had never acted on an impulse in his life, before, nor yielded to a wish he could not analyse;but this afternoon he did both. It was about an hour later that Phyllis Hyam strolled into Katharine's cubicle with the announcement that a gentleman was in the hall, waiting to speak to her.
"Bother!" grumbled Katharine, who was correcting exercises on the bed. "He never said he was coming to-night."
"It isn't Mr. Morton," volunteered Phyllis, from behind her own curtain. "I've never seen him before. He's tall, and thin, and serious looking, with a leathery sort of face, and a dear little fizzly beard."
She made a few more gratuitous remarks on the gentleman in the hall, until she began to wonder why she received no reply to them, and then made the discovery that the occupant of the neighbouring cubicle was no longer there.
Paul was already regretting his impulse. He had never been inside the little distempered hall before, and it struck a feeling of chill into him. A good many girls came in at the door while he was waiting, and they all stared at him inquiringly, and most of them were dull looking. He remembered the sumptuous house in Mayfair that would soon contain Marion Keeley, and he shuddered a little.
"I don't think I should like to live with working-women much," he said, when Katharine came running down the wooden stairs.
It was the only remark that came easily to him, when he felt the warm clasp of her hand and saw the glad look in her eyes.
She was looking rather tired, he thought, when he examined her more critically; her eyes seemed larger, and her expression had grown restless, and she had lost some of the roundness of her face. But she had gained a good deal in repose of manner; and her voice, when she answered him, was more under control at the moment than his own.
"I shouldn't think you would," she laughed. "I shocked them all at breakfast, this morning, by saying I should like to try idle men for a change!"
It struck him that she would not have made such a remark when he left her last autumn; and again he would have liked to possess a chronicle of the last six weeks. But her laugh was the same as ever, and her hand was still grasping his with a reassuring fervour.
"Come back with me," he said, spontaneously. "We can't talk here, can we? Idare say I can knock up some sort of a supper for you, if you don't mind a very primitive arrangement."
"It will be beautiful," she said; and the throb of pleasure in her voice allayed his last feeling of suspicion.
They found that, after all, they had very little to say to one another; and they were both glad of the occupation of preparing supper, when they arrived at the Temple and found that the housekeeper had gone out for the evening. They made as much fun as they could over the difficulties of procuring a meal, and avoided personal topics with a scrupulous care, and did not once run the risk of looking each other in the face. And afterwards, when they had made themselves comfortable in two chairs near the lamp and conversation became inevitable, an awkward embarrassment seized them both.
"It's very odd," said Katharine, frowning a little; "but I have been bottling up things to tell you for weeks, and now they seem to have got congested in my brain and I can't get one of them out. Why is it, I wonder? I can't have grown suddenly shy of you; but we seem to have lost touch, somehow. Oh, it's queer; I don't like it!"
She gave herself a little shake. Paul laughed slightly.
"What an absurd child you are! It is only because we have not been together lately, and so we've lost the trick of it. You are always turning yourself inside out, and then sitting down a little way off to look at it."
"I believe I do," owned Katharine. "I always want to know why certain things affect me in certain ways."
"Did you want to know why you were glad to see me, this evening?"
She looked up quickly at him for the first time.
"No," she said, frankly. "At least, I don't think I thought about it."
"Good child!" he said. "Don't think about it." And she wondered why he looked so pleased.
"Why not?" she asked him. "Please tell me."
"Oh, because it isn't good for you to be always turning yourself inside out; certainly not on my account. Besides, it spoils things. Don't you think so?"
"What things?"
"Oh, please! I'm not here to answer such a lot of puzzling questions. Who hasbeen getting you into such bad habits, while I have been away?"
"Nobody who could answer any of my puzzling questions," she replied, softly; and Paul asked hastily if she would make the coffee. He had fetched her here as an experiment, a kind of test of his own feelings and of hers; and he had a sudden fear lest it should succeed too effectually. She went obediently and did as she was told, and brought him his coffee when it was ready; and he submitted to having sugar in it, since it compelled her to brush his hair with her sleeve as she bent over him with the sugar basin.
"Well?" he asked, in the next pause. She was balancing her spoon on the edge of her cup, with a curious smile on her face.
"Oh, nothing!"
"Nothing must be very interesting, then. But I don't suppose I have any right to know. Have I?"
The spoon dropped on the floor with a clatter.
"Of course you have! I wish you wouldn't say those things! They hurt so. I was only thinking,—it wasn't anything important, but—I'm so awfully happy to-night."
"But that is surely of the very first importance. Might one know why? Or is that some one else's secret, too?"
She disturbed his composure by suddenly pushing her coffee away from her; and there was an angry light in her eyes, as she sprang to her feet and stood looking down at him.
"Sometimes I think I hate you," she said; and the words struck him as being strangely inadequate to the occasion. They might have been spoken by a petulant child, and the moment before he had felt that she was a woman. He put his cup down too, and went towards her.
"Does sometimes mean now?" he asked jestingly. He was trying, impotently, to prevent her from going any farther. But she took a step backward, and did not heed his intention.
"Yes, it does," she said, angrily. "I am tired of being treated like a child; I am tired of letting you do what you like with me. One day you spoil me; and another, you hurt me cruelly. And you don't care a little bit. I am a kind of amusement to you, an interesting puzzle, a toy that doesn't seem to break easily; that's all. And I just let you do it,—it is my own fault; when you hurt meI hide what I feel, and when you are nice to me I forget everything else. Oh, yes, of course I am a fool; do you think I don't know it? You have only to touch my face, or to look at me, or to smile, and you know I am in your hands. I despise myself for it; I would give all I know to be strong enough to put you out of my life. But I can't do it, I can't! And you know I can't; you know I am bound up in you. Everything I feel seems to be yours; all my thoughts seem to belong to you, directly they come into my head; I can't take the smallest step without wondering what you will think of it. Oh, I hate myself for it; you don't know how I hate myself! But I can't help it."
"Stop," said Paul, putting out his hand. But she waved him away, and went on talking rapidly.
"I must say it all now; it has been driving me mad lately. At first, it seemed so easy to get on without you; but it grew much harder as it went on, and when you stopped writing to me, I—I thought I should go mad. It was so awful, too, when I had got used to telling you things; there was no one else I could tell things to, and the loneliness of it was so terrible! I wanted to killmyself, those days; but I was too big a coward. So I got along somehow; and some days it was easier than others, but it was always hard. Only, nobody ever guessed. Oh, if you knew how I have learnt to deceive people! And there was always my work to get through, as well; it has been horrible. And I could no more help it than I could help breathing. I wanted to kill myself!"
"Don't," half whispered Paul, and he came a little nearer to her. But she turned and leaned against the mantel-shelf for support, and clasped the cold marble with her fingers.
"I must say it, Paul. If you like, I will go away afterwards and never see you again. But I cannot let it spoil my life any longer; I feel as though you had got to hear itnow. When I wrote you that last letter, I said that if you did not answer it I would not write to you again, or think about you, or come and see you any more. And you didn't answer it. I got to loathe the postman's knock, because it made my face hot, and I was afraid people would find out. But they never did! I came down to breakfast every day, in the hope of finding a letter from you; and when there wasn't one, and everything seemed a blank,—oh, don't I know the awful look of that dining-roomwhen there isn't a letter from you!—I just had to pretend that I hadn't expected to find one at all." She paused expectantly, but this time Paul made no attempt to speak. "I was never any good at pretending, before," she went on in a gentler tone, "but I believe I could deceive any one now. Only, I never succeeded in cheating myself! I used to find out new ways to school, because the old ones reminded me of you; and I had to do all my crying in omnibuses, at the far end up by the horses, because I dare not do it at Queen's Crescent, where I might have been seen. For I did cry sometimes." Her voice trembled, and she ended with a little sob. She buried her face in her hands.
"So that is what you have been doing for these six weeks?" said Paul, involuntarily.
"Do you find it so amusing, then?" asked Katharine in a stifled tone. He stepped up behind her, and twisted her round gently by the shoulders, so that she was obliged to look at him. The hardness went from her face, and she held out her hands to him instinctively. "Paul," she said, piteously, "I couldn't help it. Aren't you a little bit sorry for me? What have I done that I should like the wrong person? Other girls don't do thesethings. Am I awfully wicked, or awfully unlucky? Paul, say something to me! Are you very angry with me? But I couldn't help it, I couldn't indeed! I have tried so hard to make myself different, and I can't!"
He bit his lip and tried to say something, but failed.
"And after all," she added in a low tone, "when I had been schooling myself to hate you for six weeks, I nearly went mad with joy when Phyllis came and told me you were in the hall. Oh, Paul, I know I am dreadfully foolish! Will you ever respect me again, I wonder?"
There was a quaint mixture of humour and pathos in her tone; and he gathered her into his arms and kissed her tenderly, without finding any words with which to answer her. She clung to him, and kissed him for the first time in return, and forgot that she had once thought it wrong to be caressed by him; just now, it seemed the most natural thing in the world that he should be comforting her for the suffering of which he himself was the cause. And her passionate wish to rouse him from his apathy had ended in a weak desire to regain his tolerance at any cost.
"You are not angry with me? I haven'tmade you angry?" she asked him in an anxious whisper.
"No, no, you foolish child!" was all he said as he drew her closer.
"But it was dreadful of me to say all those things to you, wasn't it?"
"I like you to say dreadful things to me, dear."
She swayed back from him at that, with her two hands on his shoulders.
"Do you mean that, really? But—youmustthink it dreadfully wicked of me to let you kiss me, and to come and see you like this? It is dreadfully wicked, isn't it? Oh, I know it is; everybody would say so."
"I can't imagine what you mean. You are a dear little Puritan to me. You don't know what you are saying. Come, there are all those things you have got to tell me. I want to hear everything, please; whom you have been flirting with, and all sorts of things. Now, it is no use your pretending that you are going to hide anything from me, because you know you can't!"
He had resumed his former manner with a rather conscious effort, and drew her down beside him on the sofa. She tried to obey him, but she could think of very little to say;and towards ten o'clock, Paul looked at his watch.
"My child, you must go," he said. Katharine rose to her feet with a sigh.
"I don't want to go," she said, reluctantly.
"Has it been nice, then?" he asked, smiling at her dejected face.
"It has been the happiest evening I have ever spent," she said, looking away from him.
"Surely not!" laughed Paul. "Think of all the other evenings at the theatre, with Ted and Monty and all the rest of them!"
"You know quite well," she said indignantly, "that I like being with you better than with any one else in the world. You know I do, don't you?" she repeated, anxiously.
"It is enough for me that you say so," replied Paul; and they stood silent for a moment or two. "Come, you really must go, child," he said again. Katharine still remained motionless, while he put on his coat.
"Must I?" she said, dreamily. He came back to her and gave her a gentle shake.
"What is it, you strange little person? I believe you would have been much happier if I had not come back to bother you, eh?"
She denied it vehemently, and exerted herself to talk to him all the way home in thecab. She was solemn again, however, when the time came to say good-bye.
"May I see you again soon?" she asked him wistfully.
"Why, surely! We are going to have lots of larks together, aren't we? Well, what is it now?"
"Oh, I was only thinking!"
"What about?"
She unlocked the door with her latch-key before she replied.
"It seems so odd," she said, "that I care more about your opinion than about anybody else's in the whole world; and yet I have given you the most reason to think badly of me. Isn't it awfully queer?"
She shut the door before he had time to answer her. And Paul walked home, reflecting on the futility of experiments.
The Sunday afternoon on which the Honourable Mrs. Keeley gave her first reception, that season, was a singularly dull and sultry one. The room was filled with celebrities and their satellites; and Katharine's head was aching badly, as she struggled with difficulty through the crowd and managed to squeeze herself into a corner by the open window. She was always affected by the weather; and to-day, she felt unusually depressed by the absence of sunshine. A voice from the balcony uttered her name, and she turned round with a sigh, to be met by the complacent features of Laurence Heaton. For a moment she did not recognise him; and then, the sound of his voice carried her back to Ivingdon, and she smiled back at him for the sake of the associations he brought to her mind.
"Is it really two years?" he was saying. "Seems impossible when I look at your face, Miss Austen. Two years! And what have you been doing with yourself all this time, eh?And how do you contrive to look so fresh on a day like this? I am quite charmed to have this opportunity of renewing so pleasant an acquaintance."
He forgot that, when he had known her before, she had annoyed him by not being in his style. And Katharine answered him vaguely, while her eyes wandered over the crowd of faces; for Paul had told her he was going to be there, and she felt restless.
"Small place the world is, to be sure," continued Heaton, with the air of a man who says something that has not been said before. "Who would have expected you to turn up at my old friends', the Keeleys'? Most curious coincidence, I must say!" Katharine, who knew of his very recent introduction to the house, explained her own relationship demurely. But her companion was quite unabashed, and changed the conversation skilfully.
"Wilton often comes here, he tells me. You remember Wilton, don't you? Ah, of course you do, since it is to him that I owe your charming acquaintance," he said, gallantly. "He met them at Nice, or somewhere. Astonishing how many people one meets at Nice! Wilton always meets everyone, though, and every one likes him; he's so brilliant, don't you think? Yes, brilliant exactly describes him. Ever seen him since he stayed in your delightful rural home?"
"Oh, I see him here sometimes. And my aunt is expecting him to-day, I believe."
"I have no doubt of it, no doubt of it whatever!" smiled Heaton, nodding his head wisely. "If I'm not very much mistaken, Wilton is often the guest of Mrs. Keeley, is he not?"
The meaning in his remarks was wasted on Katharine, for most of her attention was still concentrated on the doorway. But Heaton, to whom she was more of an excuse than a reason for conversation, rambled on contentedly.
"Nice fellow, Wilton, to bring me here, pretending he wanted me to know her! Not much chance of that, I fancy! I haven't had two words with her since I first called here with him, three weeks ago. Ah, well, I mustn't be surprised at that,—an old fellow like me; though I would have you know, Miss Austen, that I am still young enough to admire the charms of a beautiful woman! But it is amusing, all the same, to watch how a serious fellow like Wilton suddenly forgets allhis prejudices against marriage, and behaves like every one else. If it had been me, now—but then, I'm a marrying man, and I've had two of the sweetest wives God ever gave to erring man— Ah, I beg your pardon?"
"I—I don't quite understand," said Katharine.
"Nobody does, my dear young lady; nobody does. It is impossible to understand a clever, quiet sort of chap like Wilton. To begin with, he doesn't mean you to. But I'm heartily glad he has made such a fortunate choice; he is an old friend of mine, and my friends' happiness is always my happiness. He is lucky, for all that; beauty and money and influence, all combined in one charming person, are not to be despised, are they? She is so sweet, too; and sweetness in a woman is worth all the virtues put together, don't you agree with me? Now, tell me,—woman's opinion is always worth having,—do you consider her so very pretty?"
"I don't know whom you mean," said Katharine. She was wishing he would take his idle chatter away to some one else. But Heaton was accustomed to inattention on the part of his hearers, and he was not disconcerted by hers.
"Why, the beautiful Miss Keeley, to be sure," he replied. "For all that," he added, hastily, "I think she is rather overrated, don't you?" This was meant to be very cunning, for he prided himself on being an accomplished lady's man. But Katharine's reply baffled him.
"Do you mean Marion? I think she is beautiful," she said, warmly. "I am not surprised that every one should admire her."
"Just so, just so; quite my view of the case!" exclaimed Heaton, at once. "I call her unique, don't you? 'Pon my word, I never felt more pleased at anything in my life! What a future for Wilton, with the Honourable Mrs. Keeley for a mother-in-law, and her beautiful daughter for a wife; why, we shall see him in Parliament before long! The Attorney-General of the future,—there's no doubt about it. Ah, I see you are smiling at my enthusiasm, Miss Austen. That is because you do not know me well enough to realise how much my friends are to me. All the real happiness in my life comes from my friends, it does indeed. But I am boring you with this dull conversation about myself. Come along with me, and I'll see wherethe ices are to be found. Young people always like ices, eh?"
And she yielded to his kindly good-nature, even while she felt indignant with him for spreading such an absurd piece of gossip. And what had Paul been doing, to allow such an idea to take root in his foolish old head? He had known nothing of the rumour on Wednesday, for she had been to a concert with him then, and he had never once alluded to her cousin. Of course, it was ridiculous to give it another thought, and she roused herself to chatter gaily to her companion as they slowly made their way downstairs.
But, as she stood in the crowded dining-room, wedged between the table and Heaton who was occupied for the moment in seeking for champagne cup, she became again the unwilling hearer of that same absurd piece of gossip. It sounded less blatant, perhaps, from the lips of the two magnificent dowagers who were lightly discussing it, but it was hardly less vulgar in its essence; and Katharine ceased to be gay, and shrank instinctively away from them.
"Who is he? I seem to know the name, but I never remember meeting him anywhere. Surely her mother would not throw her away on a nobody? She expects such great thingsfrom Marion, one is always led to believe; though she is just the sort of girl to end in being a disappointment, don't you think so?"
"My dear, it is afait accompli, and he is not a nobody at all. He would not visit here if he were; at least, not seriously. His name is Wilton,—something Wilton, Peter or Paul or one of the apostles, I forget which. He belongs to a very good Yorkshire family, I am told. His father was a bishop, or it may have been a canon; at all events, he was not an ordinary person. Mr. Wilton, this one, is one of our rising men, I believe,—a lawyer, or a barrister, or something of that sort. He defended the plaintiff in the Christopher case, don't you remember? And with Mrs. Keeley to back him up, he will soon be in the front rank,—there is no doubt about that. They always ice the coffee too much here, don't they? Have you seen Marion to-day?"
"Yes. She's over there in the same green silk. Wonderful hair, isn't it? A little too red for my taste, but any one can see it is wonderful. He's over there too, but you can't see him from here. He is much older than Marion, and delicate looking. I shouldn't like a child of mine to marry him, but that's another matter. And, of course, allmygirlswere so particular about looks. How insufferably hot it is! Shall we go upstairs?"
Laurence Heaton had a second glass of champagne cup, and when he had drunk it he found that Katharine was gone. He dismissed her from his mind without any difficulty, however, and fought his way upstairs to find some one who was more to his taste. He certainly did not connect her disappearance with his gossip, nor yet with his old friend, Paul Wilton.
And Katharine could not have told him herself why she had slipped away so abruptly. Of course, the rumour was not true; she did not believe a word of it; and it was disloyal to Paul even to be annoyed by it. But it was disquieting, all the same, to hear his name so persistently coupled with her cousin's; and she wondered if her aunt knew any of his views against marriage, to which she had been so often a humble listener. And it was equally certain that he was one of the most rising men of the day; she did not want to be told that by a number of society gossips, who had never even heard of him until he paid his attentions to one of their set,—just the ordinary attentions of a courteous man to a beautiful woman. Had he not repeatedly told her that she knew more about his real life and his real self, moreabout his ambition and his work, than any one else in the world? He had chosen her out of all his friends for a confidant; and yet, she might not even acknowledge her friendship for him. He only trifled with Marion, teased her about the number of her admirers, talked to her about the colour of her hair, and the daintiness of her appearance; he had told her that, too. Marion knew nothing of his aspirations; she would not understand them, if she did. And yet it was common talk that he admired Marion, whileshewas to make a secret of her intimacy with him. Something of the old feeling of rebellion against him, which had been dead ever since the evening they had supped together in his chambers, was in her mind as she left the house where he was sitting with Marion, and walked aimlessly towards the park. The sun had completely vanished in a dull red mist; and the intense heat and lurid atmosphere did not tend to raise her spirits. A nameless feeling of impending trouble crept over her, and she felt powerless to shake it off. She wandered along the edge of the crowds as they listened to the labour agitators, past groups of children playing on the grass, past endless pairs of lovers in their Sunday garments, until the noisy tramp of footsteps beganto grate upon her nerves; and she turned and fled from the park, as she had fled from Curzon Street. Something at last took her towards the Temple, and an hour later she was knocking furtively at the door of Paul's chambers. She had never been there on a Sunday before, and the deserted look of the courts, and the silk dress of the housekeeper whom she met on the stairs, depressed her still further. Would she come in and wait, the housekeeper suggested, as Mr. Wilton was out, and had not said when he would be back? But Katharine shook her head wearily, and turned her face homewards. Even the solitude of Queen's Crescent could not be worse than the unfriendliness of the deserted London streets. She went out of her way to walk down Curzon Street, without knowing why she did so, and took the trouble to cross over to the side opposite her aunt's house, also without a definite purpose in her mind. It was not much after eight, but the storm was still gathering, and there was only just enough daylight left to show the figure of a girl on the balcony. It was Marion, beyond any doubt Marion, who was leaning forward and looking down into the street as though she expected to see some one come out of the house. The front door opened, and a mancame down the steps; he looked up and raised his hat, and lingered; and Marion glanced hastily around, kissed her fingers to him, and vanished indoors. The man walked away down the street with a leisurely step, and Katharine stepped back into the shadow of the portico. But her caution was quite unnecessary, for neither of them had noticed her.
For the second time that evening Katharine knocked gently at the door of Paul's chambers in the Temple. This time, he opened to her himself.
"Good heavens!" he was startled into exclaiming. "What in the name of wonder has brought you here at this time of night? It is to be hoped you didn't meet any one on the stairs, did you?"
He motioned her in as he spoke, and shut the door. Katharine walked past him in a half-dazed kind of way. There had been only two feelings expressed in his face, and one was surprise, and the other annoyance.
"What is it, Katharine? Has anything gone wrong?" he demanded in his low, masterful tone. Katharine turned cold; she had never realised before how pitilessly masterful his tone was.
"I couldn't help coming,—I was so miserable! They were all saying things about you, things that were not true. And I wanted to hear you say they were not true. I couldn't rest; so I came. Are you angry with me for coming, Paul?"
She faltered out the words, without looking at him. Paul shrugged his shoulders, but she did not see the movement.
"It was hardly worth while, was it, to risk your reputation merely to confirm what you had already settled in your own mind?"
She opened her eyes, and stared at him hopelessly. Paul walked away to look for some cigarette papers in the pocket of a coat.
"Was it?" he repeated, with his back turned to her. Katharine struggled to answer him.
"You have never spoken to me like that, before," she stammered at last.
"You have never given me any cause, have you?" said Paul, rather awkwardly.
"But what have I done?" she asked, taking a step towards him. "I didn't know you would mind. I always come to you when I am unhappy; you told me I might. And I was unhappy this evening; so I came. Whyshould it be different this evening? I don't understand what you mean. Why are you angry with me? You have never been angry before. What have I done?"
"My dear child, there is no occasion for heroics," said Paul, speaking very gently. "I am not angry with you at all. But you must own that it is at least unusual to call upon a man, uninvited, at this unearthly hour. And hadn't you better sit down, now you have come?"
Katharine did not move.
"What does it matter if it is unusual?" she asked. "You know I have been here sometimes, as late as this, before. There is no harm in it, is there? Paul! tell me what I have done to annoy you?"
Paul gave up rummaging in his coat pocket, and came and sat on the edge of the table, and made a cigarette.
"I seem to remember having this same argument with you before," he observed. "Don't you think it is rather futile to go all through it again? You know quite well that it is entirely for your sake that I wish to be careful. Hadn't we better change the subject? If you are going to stop, you might be more comfortable in a chair."
Katharine clenched her hands in the effort to keep back her tears.
"I am not going to stay," she cried, miserably. "I can't understand why you are so cruel to me; I think it must amuse you to hurt me. Why do you ask me to come and see you sometimes, quite as late as this, and then object to my coming to-night? I don't know what you mean."
Paul lighted his cigarette before he answered her.
"You have quite a talent, Katharine, for asking uncomfortable questions. If you cannot see the difference between coming when you are asked, and coming uninvited, I am afraid I cannot help you. Would you like any coffee or anything?"
All at once her brain began to clear. For two hours she had been wandering aimlessly through the streets, in a strange bewilderment of mind, not knowing why she was there nor where she was going. Then she had found herself in Fleet Street; and habit, rather than intention, had brought her to the Temple. And now his maddening indifference had touched her pride, and her deadened faculties began slowly to revive under the shock. She put her fingers over her eyes, and tried tothink. The blood rushed to her face, and she thrilled all over with a passionate instinct of resistance. He did not know what to make of her, when she stepped suddenly in front of him and faced him unflinchingly.
"You must not expect me to see the difference," she said, proudly. "I shall never understand why I have to make a secret of what is not wrong, nor why you allow me to do it at all if it is wrong. I think you have been playing with my friendship all the time; I can see now that you have not valued it, because I gave it you so freely. But I didn't know that; I wasn't clever enough; and I had never liked anybody but you. I didn't know that I ought to hide it, and pretend that I didn't like you. Perhaps, if I had done that you would have gone on liking me."
He was going to interrupt her, but she did not give him time.
"Would you ask Marion Keeley to come and see you, as you have asked me?"
Paul's face grew dark, and she trembled suddenly at her own boldness.
"I fail to see how such a question can interest either of us," he said, coldly.
"But would you ask her?" she repeated.
"I am perfectly assured," he replied, quietly,"that if I were to forget myself so far as to do so, Miss Keeley would certainly not come."
"Then you mean to say that it has always been dreadfully wrong ofmeto come?"
"Really, Katharine, you are very quarrelsome this evening," said Paul, with a forced laugh. "I have repeatedly pointed out to you that a man chooses some of his friends for pleasure, and others for business. I really fail to see why I should be subjected to this minute catechism at your hands."
"Then you chose Marion—for business? It is true, then, what they said! I wish—oh, I wish you had never chosen me—for pleasure!"
The anger had died out of her voice; he could hardly hear what she said; but he made a last attempt to treat the matter lightly.
"I really think, my child, that any comparison between you and your cousin is unnecessary," he began in a conciliating manner.
"I thought so too, until to-day," she replied, piteously.
"But what has happened to-day to put you in this uncomfortable frame of mind?"
"It is what every one is saying about you and Marion,—all those horrid people, and Mr. Heaton, and everybody. I want to know if it is true. Everything is going wrong, everywhere.I wish I were dead! I came to ask you if it is true; I thought I might do that; I thought I knew you well enough. I didn't know you would mind. If you like, I will go away now, and never come and see you any more, or bother you, or let you know that I care for you so awfully. Only, tell me first, Paul, whether it is true or not?"
Her voice had risen, as she went on, and it ended full of passionate entreaty. The stern look on his face deepened, but he did not speak.
"I wish I knew the meaning of it all," she continued, relentlessly as it seemed to him. "I wish it were easier to like the right people, and to hate all the others. Why was I made the wrong way? If I had never wanted to like you, it would have been so simple. It would not have mattered, then, that you did not really care for me. But I wish I understood you better. Why did you tell me that you wanted me for your friend, always; and that you didn't believe in marriage, and those things? I believed you so, Paul; and I was content to be your friend; you know I was, don't you? And now you have met Marion, and she is beautiful, and she can help you to get on, to become one of the first men in thecountry, they said. And you have forgotten all about your views against marriage; and you allow people to talk as though you were making a kind of bargain. Oh, it is horrible! But it isn't true, Paul, is it?"
"Who has been telling you all these things?" he asked.
"Then it is true? You are going to marry her, because of the position, and all that? I wish it wasn't so difficult to understand. Is it a crime, I wonder, to like any one so desperately as I like you? But I can't help it, can I? Oh, Paul, do tell me what to do?"
He winced as she turned to him so naturally for protection, even though it was against himself that she asked it.
"Don't talk like that, child," he said, harshly. And the hand she had held out to him appealingly fell down limply at her side.
"I can't expect you to think anything of me, after what I have just said to you," she went on in the same hopeless voice. "Girls are never supposed to tell those things, are they? It doesn't seem to me to matter much, now that it has all got to stop, for always. I only wish—I wish it had stopped before. I—I am going now, Paul."
Although she turned away from him, shestill half expected him to come and comfort her. For a couple of seconds she stood quite still, possessed with a terrible longing to be comforted by him. But he sat motionless and silent on the table; even his foot had ceased swinging. She walked unsteadily to the door.
"Stop," said Paul. "You cannot go out in this storm."
A peal of thunder broke over the house as he spoke. She had not noticed the rain until then.
"I must go," she said dully, and fumbled at the fastening of the door. Paul came and took her by the arm, and led her back gently.
"I want to explain, first," he said.
"There is nothing to explain," said Katharine. "I understand."
"Not quite, I think," said Paul. They were standing together by the table, and he was nervously caressing the hand he held between his own. "You have only been talking from your own point of view; you have forgotten mine altogether. You do not seem to think that I, too, may have had something to suffer."
"You? But you do not care—as I do."
He did not heed the interruption.
"It is the system that is at fault," he said. "A man has to get on at the sacrifice of hishappiness; or he has to be happy at the sacrifice of his position. It is difficult for a woman to realise this. She never has to choose between love and ambition."
"And you have chosen—ambition," said Katharine bitterly.
"My child, when you are older you will understand that the very qualities you affect to despise in man now, are the qualities that endear him to you in reality. You are far too fine a woman, Katharine, to love a man who has no ambition. Is it not so?"
She quivered, and lowered her eyes.
"I don't know," she said. "It seems so hard."
"It is terribly hard for both of us," continued Paul, looking down too. "But believe me, there would be nothing but unhappiness before us if it were otherwise. I am thinking of you, child, as much as of myself. Marriage for love alone is a ghastly mistake. There, I have said more to you than I have ever said to any woman; I felt you would understand, Katharine."
He mistook her silence for indifference, and put his arms round her. But she clung to him closely, and lifted her face to his and broke out into a desperate appeal.
"Paul, don't say those horrid, bitter things! They are not true; I will never believe they are true. Why must you marry for anything so sordid as ambition? Why must you marry at all? Can't we go on being friends? I want to go on being your friend. Paul, don't send me away for ever. I can't go, Paul; I can't! I will work for you, I will be your slave, I will do anything; only don't let it all stop like this. I can't bear it; I can't! Won't you go on being nice to me, Paul?"
He threw back his head and compressed his lips. He had grown quite white in the last few moments. She sobbed out her entreaties with her face hidden on his shoulder, and wondered why he did not speak to her.
"Why did you never look like that before?" he asked in a hoarse whisper. She raised her head and stared at him with large, frightened eyes.
"Like what, Paul? What do you mean?"
He flung her away from him almost roughly.
"You must go," he said, "at once."
She laid her hand on his arm, and looked into his face.
"Why are you so angry?" she asked, wonderingly. "Is it because I have told you all these things?"
"My God, no! You must go," he repeated, vehemently, and pushed her towards the door. She stumbled as she went, and he thought he heard her sob. He sprang to her side instantly, and took her in his arms again.
"Why didn't you go quickly?" he gasped, as he crushed her against him.
His sudden change of manner terrified her. None of the tenderness or the indifference, or any of the expressions she was accustomed to see on his face were there now, and his violence repelled her. She struggled to free herself from his grasp.
"Let me go, Paul!" she pleaded. "I don't want to stop any more. What is the good of it all? You know I have got to go; don't make it so difficult. Paul, I—Iwantto go."
He looked searchingly into her eyes, as though he would have read her inmost thoughts; but he did not see the understanding he had almost hoped to find there, and he laughed shortly and relinquished his hold of her.
"There, go!" he said in an uncertain tone. "Why did I expect you to know? Your day hasn't come yet. Meanwhile— Ah! what am I saying?"
"I have annoyed you again," said Katharinesorrowfully. "What ought I to have known?"
"Oh, nothing," said Paul, flinging open the door. "You can't help it. Now and again Nature makes woman a prig, and it is only the right man who can regenerate her. Unfortunately, circumstances prevent me from being the right man. Are you ready to come, now?"
He spoke rapidly, hardly knowing what he said. But Katharine walked past him without speaking, with a set look on her face. He talked mechanically about the storm and anything else that occurred to him, as they went downstairs, but she did not utter a word, and he did not seem to notice her silence. She held out her hand to him as they stood in the doorway.
"You will let me see you to a cab?" he said. "Oh, very well, as you like; but, at least, take an umbrella with you."
She shook her head mutely, and plunged out into the rain and the storm. It was on just such a night as this, more than two years ago, that she had first gone out to meet him. Paul called after her to come back and take shelter; and some one, who was walking swiftly by, turned round at the sound of his voice. The dim lamp above shed its uncertainlight for a moment on the faces of the three, whom circumstances had thus strangely brought together in the fury of that June thunder-storm. It was only for a moment. Paul drew back again into the doorway, and Katharine stumbled blindly against the man outside.
"Ted!" she cried, with a sob of relief. "Take me home, Ted, will you? Something terrible has happened to me; I can't tell you now. Oh, I am so glad it is you!"
She clung to his arm convulsively. Some clock in the neighbourhood was striking the hour, and it struck twelve times before Ted spoke.
"Kitty!" he said.
She waited, but not another word came. Exhaustion prevented her from resisting, as he led her to a hansom, and paid the driver, and left her. Then she remembered dimly that he had not spoken to her, except for that one startled exclamation.
It seemed to Katharine as though nothing could be wanting to complete her wretchedness.
But, humiliated as she was, the predominant feeling in her mind was astonishment. Could it be true that she was a prig? Was that the final definition of the pride and the strength in which she had gloried until now? Was that all that people meant when they told her she was not like other girls? It was an odious revelation, and for the moment her self-respect was stunned by it. She had boasted of her success; and to be successful was merely to be priggish. She had been proud of her virtue; and virtue, again, was only an equivalent for priggishness. She wondered vaguely whether there was a single aspiration left that did not lead to the paths of priggishness. A prig! He had called her a prig! She had thought it such a fine thing to be content with his friendship, and this was the end of it all. All the wretchedness of her solitary drive home was centred in those last cruel words of his; all the bitterness of that long, miserable Sunday was concentrated in that covert insult.She could have borne his indifference, or even his displeasure; but she could have killed him for his contempt.
And Ted? She did not give a thought to Ted. Even the reason for his curious behaviour had not fully dawned upon her yet. It had only seemed in keeping with the rest of her misfortunes, just like the rain, which she allowed to beat in upon her, with a kind of reckless satisfaction. In the fulness of her more absorbing personal trouble, Ted would have to wait. It had been her experience that Ted always could wait. It was not until she stood once more within the familiar hall of number ten, Queen's Crescent, that the recollection of Ted's astonished look returned to her mind; and then she put it hastily away from her, as something that would have to be faced presently.
As she walked into her room, too weary to think any more, and longing for the temporary oblivion of a night's rest, the first thing that met her eye was the unmade condition of her bed. The desolate look of the tiny compartment was the crowning point of her day of woe; and the tears, which she had kept back until now, rushed to her eyes. It seemed a little hard that, on this day of all others,Phyllis should have neglected to make her bed. She gave it an impatient push, and it scraped loudly over the bare boards.
"Stop that row!" said Polly's sharp voice from the other end of the room. "You might be quiet, now youhavecome in."
"Is Phyllis asleep?" asked Katharine shortly.
"Can't you be quiet?" growled Polly. "Haven't you heard she is worse? Don't see how you should, though,—coming in at this hour of the night!"
"Worse?" With an effort, Katharine's thoughts travelled back over the absorbing events of the day, to the early morning; and she remembered that Phyllis had stayed in bed with a headache. "What is the matter with her?" she asked, faintly. Everything seemed to be conspiring against her happiness to-day.
"Influenza. A lot you care! Nothing but my cousin's funeral would have taken me out to-day, I know. I had to show up for that. Of course, I thought you would look after her; I asked you to."
Katharine had pushed aside the curtain, and was looking at the flushed, unconscious face of her friend. She dimly remembered saying she would stop with her; and then a letterhad come from Paul, asking her to meet him in the park, and she had thought no more of Phyllis. She had not even succeeded in meeting him; and again her eyes filled with tears at her own misfortunes.
"I couldn't help it," she said, miserably. "How was I to know she was so bad? Have you taken her temperature?"
"Hundred and three, when I last took it. It's no use standing there and pulling a long face. She doesn't know you; so it's rather late in the day to be cut up. You'd better go to bed, I should say; you look as though you'd been out all day, and half the night, too!"
She ended with a contemptuous sniff. Katharine rubbed the tears out of her eyes. The weariness had temporarily left her.
"Let me sit up with her," she said.
"You? What could you do? Why, you'd fall asleep, or think of something else in the middle, and she might die for all you cared," returned Polly contemptuously. "Can you make a poultice?"
Katharine shook her head dumbly, and crept away. Her self-abasement seemed complete. She lay down on her untidy bed, and drew the clothes over her, and gave way toher grief. There did not seem a bright spot in her existence, now that Phyllis was not able to comfort her. She hoped, with a desperate fervour, that she would catch influenza too, and die, so that remorse should consume the hearts of all those who had so cruelly misunderstood her.
A hand shook her by the shoulder, not unkindly.
"Look here! you must stop that row, or else you will disturb her. What's the good of it? Besides, she isn't as bad as all that either; you can't have seen much illness, I'm thinking."
"It isn't that," gasped Katharine truthfully. "At least, not entirely. I was dreadfully unhappy about something else, and I wanted to die; and then, when I found Phyllis was ill, it all seemed so hopeless. I didn't mean to disturb any one; it was dreadfully foolish of me; I haven't cried for years."
Polly gave a kind of grunt, and sat down on the bed. It was more or less interesting to have reduced the brilliant Miss Austen to this state of submission.
"Got yourself into trouble?" she asked, and refrained from adding that she had expected it all along.
Katharine began to cry again. There wasso little sympathy, and so much curiosity, in the curt question. But she had reached the point when to confide in some one was an absolute necessity; and there was no one else.
"I haven't done anything wrong," she sobbed. "Why should one suffer so awfully, just because one didn'tknow! We were only friends, and it was so pleasant, and I was so happy! It might have gone on for ever, only there was another girl."
"Of course," said Polly. "There always is. How did she get hold of him?"
Katharine shrank back into herself.
"You don't understand," she complained. "He isn't like that at all. He is clever, and refined, and very reserved. He doesn't flirt a bit, or anything of that sort."
"Oh, I see," said Polly, with her expressive sniff. "I suppose the other girl thought herself a toff, eh?"
"She is the most beautiful girl I have ever seen," said Katharine simply. "But I never knew he cared about that. He had views against marriage, he always said; and he wasn't always talking about women, like some men. I did not think he would end in marrying, just like every one else."
"More innocent you, then! I always saidyou ought to have stopped at home; girls like you generally do come the worst cropper. You surely didn't suppose he would go on for ever, and be content merely with your friendship, did you?"
"Yes, I did," said Katharine wearily. "Why not? I was content with his."
Polly gave vent to a stifled laugh.
"My dear, you're not a man," she said in a superior tone. It added considerably to the piquancy of the conversation that the subject was one on which she was a greater authority than her clever companion.
"But he really cared for me, I am certain he did," Katharine went on plaintively; and her eyes filled with tears again.
"Then why is he marrying the other girl instead of you? If she is so beautiful, you're surely very good-looking too, eh? That won't wash anyhow, will it?"
Katharine was silent. She felt she could not reveal the full extent of his infamy just then; there was something so particularly sordid in having been weighed against the advantages of a worldly marriage and found wanting; and she felt a sudden disinclination to expose the whole of the truth to the sharp criticism of Polly Newland.
"I haven't done anything wrong," she said again. "I don't understand why things are so unfairly arranged. Why should I suffer for it like this?"
"Don't know about that," retorted the uncompromising Polly. "I expect you've been foolish, and that's a worse game than being bad. Going about town with a man after dark, when you're not engaged to him, isn't considered respectable by most, even if it's always the same man. I'm not so particular as some, but you must draw the line somewhere."
"I didn't go about with him much," said Katharine, making a feeble attempt to justify herself. "He didn't care about it; he was always so particular not to give people anything to talk about. He didn't care for himself, he said; it was only for me. So I used to go to his chambers instead. I couldn't be more careful than that, could I? And I should have gone in the daytime, if I had had more time; but there was all my work to get through,—so what else could I do? There wasn't any harm in it."