CHAPTER IV

Meeting no one in the dreary ill-lit streets, he reached St. Ann's, Soho, where the Countess was buried; and then, for the first time, remembered that the church was locked and that he had no means of entry. Vexed at being thwarted, he crossed the churchyard and tried, despite his own reason, the heavy door. The cold iron ring of the handle rattled uselessly in his hand; some leaves fluttered from Selina's roses on to the steps.

My lord turned and looked about him. The moonlight spread softly over the tombstones, the dark houses beyond the railings and the plain lines of the church. A low wind swept through the thick grass and bore long wreaths of clouds over the sharp outline of the roofs. It was utterly silent; there seemed no one abroad. My lord pictured the dark lonely interior of the church and the draped urn in a niche in the nave. He had only looked at it once, but very clearly he could see the lettering, even the way it was placed, on the marble tablet below:

NEAR THIS SPOT

LIE THE MORTAL REMAINS

LAVINIA,

WIFE OF THE FOURTEENTH EARL OF LYNDWOOD,

Who died July 16, 1750, aged 23 years.

It was an inscription sinister in its brevity; the scandal, hushed as it was, attending my lady's death had allowed of no details, and my lord's humour permitted no eulogy, but it seemed to him now that he might have added some word of charity, for the sight of the churchyard and the thought of the cold church made him shudder with a feeling that was like pity for the unloved dead.

The locked door in no way shook his determination to place Selina's flowers where he had meant they should lie, and to-night—it must be to-night. To-morrow there were other things to do. Well he knew himself fickle, and that he could not foretell his own next mood; but now, this moment, he must enter the empty church and lay the dead white roses in the niche that held my lady's urn.

He caught the mantle over his flashing dress and crossed the churchyard. He thought he remembered where thesacristan lived; he thought the man, knowing him, would give him the key or open the church, and he put his hand into his pocket to find his purse.

As he did so the sound of voices made him pause. Sounds of laughter, loud talking, the rattle of sword-hilts on the cobbles came up the narrow street.

The Earl frowned, hesitated, opened the churchyard gate and looked out. By the moonlight and the glimmer of the swinging overhead lamps he could see a party of gentlemen advancing towards him. With an exclamation of annoyance he closed the gate. Not so quietly, however, that they, almost on him now, did not hear it, and stopped instantly arrested.

"Is the churchyard open?" said one, and my lord knew the voice and figure—it was Lord Sandys.

"La! A footpad!" replied another.

But some of them had caught a glimpse of the Earl's white and silver under his cloak.

"By Gad! A gallant, wooing a ghost!"

Rose Lyndwood opened the gate and stepped out into the street. He felt a great and unreasonable anger against these men, all of whom he knew, and some of whom were chosen companions of his.

"Split me, it is Lyndwood!"

He faced them impatiently.

"I am on business of mine own."

Both tone and situation were so unusual for Lyndwood that a laugh ran round the group.

"Hast fallen lovesick at last, my lord?"

"Nay, he only is trying to cast a spell that he may retrieve his late ill-luck with the cards!"

"Ah, enough of your fooleries, Sandys!" The Earl tried to turn away from them.

"By Gad, there is something mysterious in this," the other was still laughing, not guessing my lord's mood. "What is the adventure?"

"At least I am in no humour for any other to-night," was the swift answer. It added to the Earl's unreasonable anger that not one of them recollected or cared that my lady was buried in the church behind them. "Stand aside, sirs," he added abruptly, for they, good-humouredly, were closing round him.

At this they laughed again, and Lord Sandys, who had been in Villiers Street, caught sight of the flowers my lord held.

"Have ye been gathering roses—and here?" He pointed to the ghostly churchyard.

"Ah, let me be," said my lord wearily.

His seriousness excited their malicious merriment. They did not guess at his inward anger, nor did he allow for their light-hearted folly. Then, in a second, it happened.

"Dead roses!" cried Lord Sandys, and tried to snatch them.

The Earl turned without warning and struck him across the cheek with his glove.

Instantly all were sobered. Lord Sandys gave a cry of rage, and drew his sword. My lord dropped his cloak the length of his arm, laid gloves and flowers on the churchyard step and unsheathed his rapier. The others moved back, ringing them round.

"Why did you do that?" breathed Lord Sandys.

Rose Lyndwood did not answer; his face was flushed and reckless.

Their swords crossed. The veiled moonlight was confusing, and both were angered to passion. The light rapiers clashed aimlessly for a second.

"Come to a better spot," cried one.

"Let him take what he asked for!" exclaimed Lord Sandys, and as he spoke the Earl fell backwards on the churchyard steps.

It was perhaps but five minutes since he had first metthem, but one since he had drawn his sword. None of them could have told how it had happened. He had rushed wantonly into the quarrel. They were quieted and startled to see him lying there.

He made an effort to laugh into their faces.

"Sandys is not to blame," he gasped.

One of them stooped and held him up. There was talk of a doctor, of assistance.

He shook his head.

"I'm done for. Get Sandys away."

He tried to drag himself to a sitting posture, coughed and groaned.

"Is he dying?" asked Lord Sandys, horrified.

"Yes." Rose Lyndwood answered, fighting for his breath. "Susannah—and there is Marius. Not much miss—the debts——"

"Can no one get some water?" cried Mr. Harding, who supported him.

"Not in this church," whispered the Earl, "but at Lyndwood. Do you hear, Harding?"

He sank down on the white roses, the gloves, his mantle and his sword, his gorgeous clothes sweeping the dusty cobbles. He put his hand over his beautiful face as if he would hide its distortion.

"I always—believed," he murmured, "in the immortality of the soul. I don't need—the key."

And so it was over. Within a few feet of my lady lay my lord, dead, as suddenly, as recklessly, leaving behind him, as she had done, naught save mistakes and incompletion. It was over.

"Let us take him home," whispered Lord Sandys, and sheathed his sword.

Ithad rained all night heavily, but now, in the early morning, cleared into a bright sparkle and freshness, it was like to the morning on which my lady had died, Susannah thought as she opened her window on the clear pure sunlight.

She had never forgiven my lady, and the letter from Honoria Pryse had roused passive scorn into live anger; she disdained to allow herself to think of the Countess Lavinia, yet the image of Rose's wife would not be driven from her mind.

She pictured my lady creeping downstairs to unload my lord's pistol, following him through the wet streets, lurking among the trees in the Park, and in the early dawn, buying poison in some evil little shop off Drury Lane, and coming back in her wet muslins to her cheerless splendour to die.

Susannah shook herself and stared hard at the sunny sky; there were other things to think of—Selina for one.

My lord's marriage would be announced to-day; she must write to Selina, in some way soften or break the sharp pain of the news.

It was still so early that the Countess Agatha would be abed for a good while yet, but Susannah dressed herself and went quietly downstairs into the beautiful drawing-room. She liked this chamber at this hour, when there lay a hush over the house and the sun shone hazily through the silk curtain; she stepped softly and seated herself at the tulip-wood desk.

Early roses stood in the delf vases, and their fragrant pungent odour filled the unstirred air; on the gold settee lay the programme of last night's fête, and beside it a couple of tickets for a fête to-day; on a chair rested my lady's mask and fan, left there carelessly.

Susannah sighed and drew from one of the secret drawers of her desk the letter from Honoria Pryse.

She had read it more often than she could have told, but she read it again and with intent eyes:

"Madam,—I have a message for myLord the Earlfrom my Lady the late Countess. You will understand why I never gave it before, and I cannot tell why I give it now, save that there seems no reason for withholding it, and it may ease you of some pain you have not deserved. My lord'sBrother was guiltlessin the matter of the duel; it was theCountesswho unloaded the pistol; she followed to the Park, being, I take it, halfCrazed, and when she was disappointed of her design to compass my lord'sDeathshe took her own life. First she bid me tell thetruth, and here you have it to use for any end you will."With it, Madam, accept my Advice.The Earlwhom you favour has nothing in him;Marius Lyndwoodis a better man, albeit a straight-laced fellow and not so pretty; let myLordalone and take the brother."Madam, your servant,""Honoria Pryse."

"With it, Madam, accept my Advice.The Earlwhom you favour has nothing in him;Marius Lyndwoodis a better man, albeit a straight-laced fellow and not so pretty; let myLordalone and take the brother.

"Madam, your servant,""Honoria Pryse."

There was no address and no date on the letter, which had come through the threepenny post; Susannah folded it again and replaced it in the desk.

An extraordinary epistle and one that she could not dismiss from her mind; at first she had called its nature insolence, now it seemed to her to contain a strange kind of sincerity; she could not believe that the writer meant her harm.

And it was the truth. Marius was the better man; but she——

Miss Chressham checked herself with a smile. It was not her part to be thinking of herself; her own feelings, her own views had been repressed all her life; she was for ever acting for others, shielding others, defending others, encouraging others; who cared what she might feel or what passion might lie beneath her calm? No one excepting Marius.

Excepting Marius!

Well, it was her own perversity, her own misfortune that she could not take the only affection that had been offered her.

She firmly turned her thoughts from her own affairs and proceeded to write to Selina Boyle.

But the words would not come; sheet after sheet was torn up and thrown aside: one sentence sounded foolish, another blunt, a third had no meaning.

A thousand things distracted her; the long ray of sunlight falling between the curtains, a rose that had dropped from its vase on to the mantelshelf, the title of a book lying on a table near; these and such foolish trifles.

She pushed back her chair in despair and, turning her head, caught sight of herself in the mirror behind the harpsichord.

She was astonished at her own extreme pallor; she told herself it must be the effect of the dead-white wrapper she wore.

With a little shiver she put aside pens and paper. She would write to Selina in the evening when she had seen my lord; there was still so much for her to say to him.

Again she glanced, almost guiltily, at the mirror; her ghastly appearance was no fancy.

The house was very quiet, surely it was time some of the servants were abroad; the clock pointed to close on six.

With a pang of surprise she heard her own heart beating furiously and felt the blood tingling in her head; she rose, expectant of something.

"Rose," she found herself saying, "Rose."

She thought he was coming, that any moment he would push open the door and greet her with his weary smile.

Then she told herself that this was pure folly.

"But something has happened," she said, "something has happened."

Should she call my lady, or her maid? The silence of the house was terrifying, the loneliness insupportable.

The clock struck six.

"Something has happened," repeated Susannah. "What is it?"

It was not her way to seek help or company. She went swiftly upstairs and put on her hat and pelisse; there was only one thing to do.

She must go to Lyndwood House and find out.

"What has happened?" she kept repeating to herself. "Find out what has happened."

Light of foot and with hushed breathing she descended into the hall that was now full of sunlight, and opened the door.

As she stood on the step looking up the Haymarket it did not seem strange that she should be leaving the house hastily attired, gloveless, agitated, to go to my lord at this early hour.

She had no thought for anything, so strong, so imperative had been the wordless summons.

Then, as she drew to the door, softly, for fear of waking my lady, a man moved from out the shadow on the opposite side of the street and crossed towards her.

Miss Chressham paused. It was Mr. Harding, one of my lord's friends.

She noted, with no surprise but with a sense of horror confirmed, his dishevelled appearance, his haggard, tired face.

Fixing his eyes on her, he raised his hat, with an air of astonishment.

"Do you come from my cousin?" she asked.

He hesitated, staring.

"I have come to see you or the Countess," he answered gravely.

She held open the door.

"Will you enter?" she said.

As he followed her into the house he spoke.

"It is almost as if you knew."

"I think I do know," she replied.

She led the way into the first room they came to, the dining-room; here the shutters were still closed and it was dark.

"Do you come from my lord, Mr. Harding?" she asked, and faced him quietly.

"Madam, I come from the Earl, from Lyndwood House," he said reluctantly. "And I am a coward before what I have to say."

Susannah raised her hand.

"A moment," she breathed, "give me a moment." She moved towards the window, then checked herself and came back.

"Sit down," she said. "Sit down, sir."

But he, as she, remained standing.

"I was starting for Lyndwood House," she continued.

"Has—has anyone told you?"

She shook her head.

"A feeling—but say what you have come to say, Mr. Harding."

He stood silent, looking away from her.

"You came to tell me," she urged, standing very erect, one hand resting on the table.

Mr. Harding could not bring himself to speak.

Susannah leant slightly towards him.

"Come, Mr. Harding, tell me how my cousin died."

He looked round startled.

"The Earlisdead," said Susannah. "You are here to say that the Earl is dead."

"Alas! madam."

She interrupted him almost fiercely. "I knew—ah, I knew!"

"I have no speech suited to this need. Madam, my task is mournful—I was my lord's friend, and it was last night—I saw him fall—indeed I know not how it happened—my Lord Sandys——"

"He is dead," repeated Susannah; "dead—dead."

For a while there was silence, then she spoke again.

"A duel?"

"A quarrel, an angry word, a pass or two, and my lord fell, the moonlight was confusing; it was all over too quickly."

Susannah gave a smile that made Mr. Harding blanch.

"A street brawl," she said slowly. "So, he died that way. Did he speak—tell me, did he speak?"

"He mentioned your name, his brother's, the debts; it—it happened outside St. Ann's, madam, and he desired, I think, not to be laid in that church."

"That was all?"

"He said: 'I have always believed in the immortality of the soul,' that was all; yes, madam."

"Thank you," said Susannah. "Thank you."

She drew her handkerchief from her pocket and wiped her lips.

"They took him home?" she asked.

"I was there."

She gave him a vacant look.

"Ah, yes, you helped them."

"My lord died in my arms, madam."

She closed her eyes.

"And, afterwards?"

"We took him to Lyndwood House; a doctor was brought, but——"

"He lies there now; I will go to him; we must tell my lady, Mr. Harding, and then we will go to him."

"Alas! madam," he answered, "I fear you cannot go to Lyndwood House."

"Cannot?"

"There are the creditors"—his voice was rough with distress at the sight of her proud, contained anguish. He had not guessed Miss Chressham's affection for her cousin or nothing would have brought him on this errand. "They have seized the house, and his effects."

"We are forbidden to see him?"

Mr. Harding was startled by her quickness; he bowed his head.

"He was most heavily in debt."

"What have his debts to do with this?" she asked.

Mr. Harding tried to evade her.

"My lord leaves his affairs in chaos; this is hardly the moment to speak of them, and to you, madam——"

She broke in calmly on his agitation.

"I suppose—I think—that he had been raising money on the prospect of a rich marriage, so he would leave nothing, and they could take everything?"

"Everything," repeated Mr. Harding.

"And we are forbidden the house?"

"Madam, I cannot tell."

Susannah untied her hat-strings slowly.

"There is my lady—her husband died this way, sir—and now I must tell her how my lord came home; and there is Marius."

"We have sent to him," replied Mr. Harding quickly. "One left for Holland at once to fetch the Earl."

"The Earl?" she repeated.

"Marius Lyndwood, madam."

Miss Chressham dropped her hat on to a chair.

"Ah, yes," she said under her breath, "he had no children!" Then she raised her wide eyes. "Marius is penniless, sir."

"Still, he must return; but this talk, madam——"

She interrupted.

"You would spare me, you are in an unpleasant position. Sir, I thank you. There is no more for you to do. I must tell my lady."

"If I can be of any use, madam."

"I do not know," answered Susannah faintly. "I am grateful."

He thought she would fall as she spoke, and stepped forward.

"I shall not faint," she assured him with a piteous smile. "You can leave me now, sir, safely. Will you come later, if I might ask you?"

"I beseech you."

"You knew him," she continued. "You would do what you could now"—her eyes filled suddenly with tears—"he—he was what they call a worthless man, sir, no one was the better for his life; but for his death there are those who are sorry."

Mr. Harding could not bear to look at her.

"I am absolutely at your service, madam."

"We must sell the house, the furniture, and there are some jewels." Susannah looked slowly round the handsome room with its rich appointments. "Until Marius comes will you tell me what to do?"

He bent his head. "I will wait on you later."

"I thank you, sir."

With an instinctive, courteous sweetness she smiled at him and came to the door, and when, with some murmured words, he had gone, she came back into the room and sat down at the table.

So, she would not see him this afternoon. The tremendous fact seemed hidden by the trivial one.

And there was no need now to write to Selina Boyle; she would never know that he could not be faithful.

Susannah looked again round the chamber at the paintings, at the carvings, and every small detail seemed invested with unbearable meaning.

She leant back in her chair; she stared at the sunlight that shone through the crevices of the shutters; she rose and walked up and down the room; she seemed to see everything, to touch everything through a distorting mirror; her own body felt numb and strange.

She repeated his name.

"Rose—Rose Lyndwood," and the fantastic sound of it was beyond credence.

The house began to stir, there came to Susannah the noise of opening shutters, of the servants on the stairs; she heard the milk girl calling without and the clatter of her pails.

"Rose—Rose Lyndwood."

Someone whistled in the street and a dog barked in the distance.

Miss Chressham left the room and went upstairs to tell my lady.

"A ladyto see me?" asked Susannah, shrinking. She could not bring herself to face the sympathy or curiosity of acquaintances. The address of their present quiet lodging had not been published abroad, and the house in the Haymarket was in the hands of my lord's creditors. She could not imagine who, with any other motive but that of inquisitiveness, this might be inquiring for her. She thought there was none to take any interest in the survivors of the fallen house of Lyndwood.

"A lady," the little slim maid repeated. "Her name, madam, is Miss Boyle."

"Oh, Selina!" Susannah caught her breath. "Bring her here."

The servant closed the door and Miss Chressham gave a little shudder.

The dreary, heavily furnished room, the outlook through the long bare windows on to the blank houses opposite, the strangeness of everything, even to her own plain dark dress, were a fitting background to her secret tragedy. She wondered dully how she could bear it, and shuddered again.

But there were others to think of, as there always were in the life of Susannah Chressham.

She went to the folding doors at the back of the room and softly opened them on to a darkened bedchamber.

"Do you want anything, Aunt Agatha?" she asked gently.

From the curtained bed came a muffled answer.

"No, no."

Susannah looked pityingly at the outline of my lady's slight figure huddled on the tumbled pillows.

The Countess was attired in the gay silks of her former splendour. One hand was over her face; in the other she held a miniature, not that of her still unburied son, but that of her husband, fifteen years dead.

"Selina Boyle is here; she need not disturb you."

"Where is Marius?" moaned my lady. "Is he never coming?"

"He could not be here before to-night," said Miss Chressham for the hundredth time that day.

The Countess made no answer, and Susannah quietly withdrew, closing the doors as Selina Boyle entered the outer chamber.

For a moment the two ladies looked at each other with wild eyes, then Selina Boyle crossed the room and kissed Susannah on the cheek.

"Oh, my dear!" said Miss Chressham brokenly.

"I am very well," answered Selina, in a voice that sounded weak and hoarse. "I have just come up to town. I told my father; he brought me. I am very well."

She sank on to one of the torn striped chairs and loosened her black cloak. Her hair hung in disordered curls under her straw hat, her face was flushed, her lips feverish.

"I thought that you would come, but I did not expect you so soon," said Susannah, under her breath. "You received my letter?"

"Yes, and I saw it—in the paper."

Susannah looked at her tenderly.

"I fear you are wearied to death."

Miss Boyle took off her hat; there was a tacit avoidance in their speech of that which filled the thoughts of both.

"We have been travelling all night, but I am not tired."

"We will have some tea." Susannah rang the bell. "We are very humble here; it is but temporary."

"Why did you leave home—the other place—so soon?" asked Miss Boyle faintly.

"It was not ours; we had no right," answered Susannah. "And I could not bear to stay; we moved at once. This is our first day here."

My lord had been two days dead—only two days. They glanced away from each other.

"How is my lady?" breathed Selina.

"She is not well, I fear. She lives only for the coming of Marius."

"She is here?"

"Yes, but she will see no one."

The maid-servant, treading softly, in awe of the visitor who had driven up in a coach, entered and set the tea.

"What time is it?" Susannah asked. There was no clock in the room, and she had left her watch, with every other article of jewellery, behind in the house in the Haymarket.

"Nearly four o'clock, madam."

"Thank you." Miss Chressham dismissed her, and commenced pouring out the tea.

Selina took a cup obediently, but could not eat.

"I am a little sick with travelling," she said.

Susannah observed her covertly, wondering how much she guessed. Was she still in her fairyland? Miss Chressham thought so.

"Do you know Lord Sandys?" asked Selina.

"I have seen him," answered Susannah.

Miss Boyle raised blurred eyes.

"I saw him once, when they playedThe Rival Queens. My lord was in the box with me. The lady he married was with him."

Susannah looked into her cup.

"You saw my lord but recently?"

Selina quivered.

"We said good-bye. We—this does not matter for me; it was over."

"For you and him?" asked Susannah softly.

"What could there have been?" The tears ran slowly down her cheeks, but she smiled. "And what can it matter? He loved me, Susannah, he loved me!"

Miss Chressham was silent.

Selina wiped away the tears, and fixed her poor scalded eyes on Susannah.

"He came to tell me so again."

"I know; he told me that he was going to ask you to be his wife."

"We have always loved each other," said Selina simply, "and we have been unfortunate. For me this does not matter, and for him——"

"He might have died more nobly."

Selina shook her head.

"We do not know; it was some worthy quarrel."

Again Miss Chressham was silent; she, like Selina, was ignorant how exactly my lord had met his death—a flare-up of temper, a wanton insult. Those who had seen him die had nothing more to say. No one knew why he was in the churchyard of St. Ann's at that hour. Susannah, who knew nothing of the flowers, guessed; Selina, who remembered them, did not.

"I never thought to see him again," continued Selina, with trembling lips; "but if it might have been I——"

"You must live to think of him," said Susannah tenderly. "Ah, my dear, he did not die wholly miserably if he left you behind to mourn him."

She rose and went on her knees beside Selina's low chair, and both were clasped tightly in each other's arms in an overwhelming impulse of sad affection.

Miss Chressham kissed the bowed, delicate head resting on her shoulder, saying in her soul: "She will never know,thank God! She will never know!" She herself, whodidknow the man for whom she grieved, she who had given all her love to one who did not ever hear of it, she who must guard her secret, uncomforted, to the end, could yet conceal her deeper anguish to soothe with her strong sympathy the woman who believed in her beloved.

"I think you must not weep for him," she said softly. "He lived his life. There were no better years before him than those that he had known. He died young and splendid; he did not have to face ruin, a fallen position; he had rich tastes and lordly habits; he did not have to feel the bitterness of inadequacy." And in her heart she added: He did not break the dream of a woman who truly loved him by selling himself a second time. He died while he was still, in one woman's eyes, all she would have had him. And for that Susannah Chressham was grateful.

"I do not weep for him," murmured Selina, "only I am tired."

She raised her head.

"Why should we mourn for him, Susannah? I do not think he could have wished to live."

Miss Chressham kissed her hot cheek.

"You are very brave, sweet——"

There was a little pause, then Selina spoke.

"Will you come with me—to see him?"

Susannah turned her face away.

"I—I dare not speak of that."

"It is very terrible," shuddered Selina, clinging to her, "but I think I must go."

"Do you know what they are doing?"

Miss Boyle closed her eyes.

"I know."

Miss Chressham put her aside and rose.

"They are showing him for money," she said, in a tone of uncontrolled agony. "My God, how can one bear it?"

"You—you could do nothing?"

Susannah answered fiercely.

"Why do you ask me that, Selina? Do you think that I have not tried? And he has friends; but my lord's dead face was one of my lord's best assets, and there is not a woman in London hath not been to see him—paying gold for it."

"Ah, forgive me!" said Miss Boyle, in a broken voice. "I have been forgetting what it is to you—you who are of his house; and you were fond of him."

"Yes, I was fond of him," answered Susannah, with a short laugh, "but I could not spare him this. What are they, these men who make their profit of the dead?"

Miss Boyle rose.

"I must go," she said feverishly. "Would you forsake him, Susannah, because he hath strangers about him? When so many look on him for curiosity, shall not some look on him for love? I must go, if it kills me."

Susannah gazed at her questioningly.

"Could you bear it?"

"I could not bear to stay away," answered Miss Boyle, raising her wan face. "And my lady—hath my lady been?"

"No." Susannah clenched her hands.

"To-morrow they give him a fine funeral, a spectacle for the town; and then my lady will go to ride in the pageant, and weep at the window of her coach."

"You speak bitterly."

"God forgive me, I have no right; but I do not think that she loved him. It was always Marius."

Selina picked up her hat.

"I am going," she said. "And you——"

Their eyes met.

"I will come."

"At once," whispered Miss Boyle.

"Yes; I will fetch my cloak."

She went softly into the bedchamber, closing the doorafter her, and Selina stood leaning against the mantelpiece, fastening her pelisse over her grey dress.

It had been a cloudy day, but now the sun was shining fitfully through the long window on to the worn furniture and dark walls. A straight beam fell across a row of prints in black frames that hung opposite. Miss Boyle raised her eyes and looked at them.

The title, engraved finely beneath each subject, seemed to start out and be written on the sunlight:

"THE RAKE'S PROGRESS."

Mr. Hogarth's terrible pictures; she had seen them and shuddered over them before.

"The Rake's Progress."

"Susannah!" she cried on a sobbing breath.

Miss Chressham entered from the bedchamber.

"Hush! my lady sleeps."

"Susannah, those pictures; can you live with them?"

"My lord did not live to reach that final scene," answered Susannah; "so, they do not frighten me but make me thankful."

She glanced at that last plate with its Bedlam horrors, then again at Selina.

"My dear, you look ill," she said, a little wildly. "Can you face it?"

"Yes, ah, yes; I am ready."

She picked up her gloves, and they left the room and house.

It was a beautiful afternoon, of a mild splendour that touched and transfigured even the dull colourless street into a gracious warmth of pale magnificence; the sky was faintly coloured, but of a clear blue, the clouds were delicate but of a pure gold tint, the brick fronts of the houses glowed in the sun that dwelt on the plane-trees and the few flowers in the gardens, covering them with a wistful glory.

At the bottom of the street they got into a hackney coach. Susannah gave the address, after that they could neither of them speak; they held each other's hand and looked out of the window at the long familiar and now horribly distorted street, at the little trivial sights and objects, once pleasant and now terrible, that they passed.

At the corner of Panton Square they stopped the hackney and alighted.

It was Susannah again who paid the man and dismissed him.

"Have you," she asked, "been into my lord's mansion?"

Miss Boyle shook her head. The hackney rumbled off down towards the Mall; a chapman, shouting ballads and the last dying speech and confession of a famous thief hanged that morning, went by. The square was filled with sedan chairs, fashionable curricles and coaches, waiting footmen and pages.

"My lord's last reception seems well attended," said Miss Chressham quietly.

"Hold my hand again," whispered Selina, and she pulled her hat forward so that it concealed her face in its shadow.

Unnoticed they passed round the trees where the golden dusty light of late afternoon was burnishing the foliage, and reached the door of Lyndwood House.

A number of ladies, gaily dressed but wearing black favours, were leaving it; some were weeping, all seemed awed.

"He was very handsome," said one as she stepped into her chair.

"How much will the house fetch?" wondered her companion; and "La, I wish I had never come," sighed a third, who was very young.

"Hold my hand tight," breathed Miss Boyle.

They mounted the steps Susannah knew so well and entered the open door; here the crowd, coming and going, a little delayed them. They stood for a moment brushed by scented skirts and silk mantles and pierced by careless comment.

In the gorgeous hall stood some of the pictures my lord had delighted in, piled against the wall; cabinets of china, of gold and silver, and packing cases showed through the open door of the dining-room; men were making lists, numbering and valuing. The servants at the foot of the stairs were strange to Susannah.

She spoke to one, putting money into his hand.

"Where does my lord lie?" she asked.

He answered with an air of one weary of replying to the same question. The place was on show, for two days the town had trooped through the rooms, looking at the furniture, at the extravagances of my lord, and at my lord himself.

Selina turned her wide vacant eyes on Susannah.

"Where is he?" she asked.

Miss Chressham grasped her arm warmly.

"Hush, my dear, my dear; upstairs, in his bedchamber."

On the wide stairway were, here and there, fallen flowers: a leaf, a fern frond, a rose petal.

On the landing the armour and the enamel ware from the library were piled, and great portfolios of the engravings my lord had always so lavishly bought.

Several people passed them. Susannah glanced away for fear they might know her, but Selina gazed before her as if not aware that any came near.

So they reached the door of my lord's chamber. A woman, flauntingly dressed, came out weeping violently; she dabbed at her eyes and looked round as Miss Boyle stopped.

"Ah, you, ma'am," she said in a hysterical voice.

"You, I remember you! You were in the box with him that night——"

Selina looked at her with expressionless eyes, but Susannah spoke.

"Who are you, madam?"

"I was 'Statira,' ma'am," answered the actress, "but I am as free as you to come and look at him now."

She lifted her head defiantly; tears had stained the rouge and powder on her face, and her powdered hair was disarranged under her fantastic hat.

"Poor soul," said Miss Chressham. "I suppose you cared too. Do not look at me so fiercely," she added softly; "it does not hurt us that you have come."

The actress burst into fresh tears.

"God bless you for that; I had no right——"

She snatched Miss Chressham's cold hand, kissed it and hurried on down the stairs.

Selina did not seem to have seen her; she caught Miss Chressham by the arm and drew her gently across the threshold of the Earl's bedchamber.

There were two servants inside the door, standing quietly; the blinds were drawn and the room close with the perfume of flowers. The thing was decorously done, Susannah told herself in a passionate bitterness.

My lord's personal furniture, even his clothes, were still about the chamber, only the clock had been stopped and the mirrors were covered up; a couple of gentlemen and three ladies stood at the foot of the bed, whispering together.

Selina and Susannah stepped closer.

The gold brocade curtains were looped back from the carved canopy, displaying to all who cared to gaze the body of Rose Lyndwood, clad in the white and silver in which he had died, and resting on the purple satin coverlet and silk pillows of his bed.

His head lay lightly to one side and tilted upwards, hishair, powdered and tied with a black ribbon, spread across the pillows; his hands, on which the rings still gleamed, were crossed on the heavy lace of cravat and shirt that fell over his breast; there were diamonds in his watch-chain that hung from his waistcoat pocket, in the buckles of his shoes and in the brooch at his throat.

By his side lay his gilt-hilted rapier in its gold scabbard; the coverlet was hid in flowers, and the floor about piled with wreaths of roses, lilies, syringa, violets and hawthorn, mostly tied with ribbons on which were written ladies' names.

Selina held the curtain yet further back and gazed into his face.

The shadow was over him, and so little changed was his expression that the colourlessness and distortion of death seemed to have hardly touched him; he had always been pale.

Selina smiled.

Others entered the chamber and passed round the bed. Miss Chressham stood behind Selina, who leant forward, and both looked at Rose Lyndwood with tearless eyes.

Neither touched him nor even the edge of his garments, neither dropped a flower on his couch nor spoke one word of anguish, nor sighed once in lamentation.

After a little while they moved and left the room, their hands clasped and their lips closed. A smile lay, like a ghost of former happiness, on Selina's face; she seemed to see nothing, to hear nothing; her soul was listening to distant music, and treading different ways.

They left the square on foot; neither looked back on the shuttered windows of Lyndwood House.

Selina spoke, and her pure voice was steady.

"Now I will go home; we return to Bristol to-morrow."

She added where they were staying, and remarked on her father's grief and patience.

"He will be waiting for me," she added, and spoke ofthe life that was before her: peace and yet not loneliness, quiet but not desolation.

"It is all over," she said, and kissed Susannah.

They walked together in silence until they came to the Strand and saw the river flash in the evening sun between the houses.

"Did any tell you," asked Miss Chressham then, "what he said: 'I always believed in the immortality of the soul'?"

"I did not know," answered Selina. "It was a strange thing to say."

"A strange thing for him to believe," said Susannah. "But I am glad, are not you?"

"Yes, I am glad."

They had reached her inn.

"Good-bye; will you write to me?"

"Good-bye, sweet; it hath gone beyond words, hath it not?"

"Beyond everything," said Selina. "I think it hath passed earth and reached heaven."

They clung together, kissed and parted.

Miss Chressham took a hackney and drove home. Everything was as she had left it; the tea service stood about, my lady lay heavily asleep in the darkened bedchamber; only the bar of sunlight had shifted and deepened its golden hue.

"Oh, Rose! Rose!"

She took off her hat and mantle and flung herself on the worn sofa, hiding her face in her white arms and dark dress.

Selina thought that he loved her; she had that to comfort her, but what was to console Susannah?

"Ah, Rose! Rose!"

My lady could sleep—Selina could take up her life saying, "It is over——"

"But what for me?" cried Susannah Chressham through her clenched fingers.

The door opened softly. She lifted dazed eyes and dropped her hands to her lap.

It was Marius Lyndwood who entered—Marius, plainly dressed and dusty, pale and weary-looking, of an infinitely quieter and older aspect than formerly.

They looked at each other, and she rose.

"I am glad you have come," she said simply.

"Susannah!"

Her eyes widened; he knew, he was the one person in all the world who knew.

"This has almost broken my heart," he said, "for your sake." She turned away sharply, rested her elbows on the mantelpiece and her head in her hands.

The Earl crossed over to her. "There are two of us," he spoke hoarsely, "two of the house of Lyndwood."

"You are heir to a ruined name and fortune," she answered in a muffled voice; "you have no cause to feel kindly to us, the dead or the living, Marius."

My lord laid his hand lightly on her arm.

"Have I your friendship, Susannah?"

She raised her face.

"That, always."

"Do you forgive me that I am the Earl, Susannah?"

Susannah answered unsteadily.

"You—do you forgive Rose?"

"There was nought to forgive," said my lord.

Miss Chressham looked into his steadfast, earnest eyes.

"As you say, there are two of us."

She gave him her hands.

"Will you come and see my lady?"

Printed byBallantyne, Hanson& Co.Edinburgh & London

AUTUMN 1912

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