CHAPTER XIIARDORS AND ENDURANCES

“There,” cried Mary upon a note of triumph.

An excited wave of that delightful journal, theMorning Post, accompanied the pæan. And then it was hurled across the breakfast-table with deft precision into the lap of Milly.

“A marriage has been arranged,” said the courier of Hymen, “and will shortly take place between Charles, only son of the late Simeon Cheesewright and Mrs. Cheesewright, of Streatham Hill, and Mildred Ulrica, younger daughter of the late H. Blandish Wren and Mrs. Wren, 5, Victoria Mansions, Broad Place, Knightsbridge, W.”

Again arose the triumphant cry.

But Mrs. Wren, excavating the interior of a boiled egg, felt it to be her duty to check this unbridled enthusiasm. For some days past, with rather mournful iteration, she had let it be known that the impending announcement could not hope to receive her unqualified approval.

In the first place, as she frankly admitted, the Marquis had spoiled her. She had to confess that he had provedsadly lacking in backbone when brought to the test, but his sternest critics could not deny that “before everything he was a gentleman.”

Mrs. Wren ascribed her own pure taste in manhood to the fact that she had begun her career in the legitimate drama under the ægis of Mr. Painswick at the Theater Royal, Edinburgh. He, too, had been before everything a gentleman. Mr. Painswick had shaped Lydia Mifflin, as she was then, in his own inimitable mold. Upon a day she was to play Grace to his Digby Grant in “The Two Roses.” Then it was, as she had always felt, that she had touched her high-water mark; and the signal occasion was ever afterwards a beacon in her life. From that bright hour the Mr. Painswick standard had regulated the fair Lydia’s survey of the human male. Even the late lamented Mr. H. Blandish Wren, who was without a peer in “straight” comedy, whose Steggles in “London Assurance” had never been surpassed, even that paladin——. Still it isn’t quite fair to give away State secrets!

Mrs. Wren had once said of Charles Cheesewright “that he was not out of the top drawer.” However, if he was not of the caste of Vere de Vere she had to own that “he had points.” He was one of those young men who mean more than they say, who do better than they promise, who clothe their thoughts with actions rather than words. Also, he had two motors—a Daimler and a Rolls-Royce, he had rooms in the Albany, and though perhaps just a little inclined to overdress, he had such a sure taste in jewelry that he took his fiancée once a week to Cartier’s. And beyond everything else, he hadthe supreme advantage over my lord that he knew his own mind pretty clearly.

In the opinion of Princess Bedalia, Milly was an extremely lucky girl. Her young man was a simple, good fellow, honest as the day, he was incapable of any kind of meanness, he was very rich, and, what was hardly less important, he was very much in love. Milly, however, who had her mother’s knack of seeing men and events objectively, did not yield a final graceful assent until she extorted a promise from Mr. Charles that he would suffer the rape of his mustache, at the best a mere scrub of an affair, and that he would solemnly eschew yellow plush hats which made him look like a piano-tuner.

Still, on this heroic morning, in the middle of July, Mrs. Wren seemed less pleased with the world than she had reason to be. She did some sort of justice to her egg, but she wouldn’t look at the marmalade. If the truth must be told, a rather histrionic mind was still haunted by the shade of the noble Marquis. As Milly, in one of her moments of engaging candor, had told Mary already, as far as her mother was concerned Wrexham had simply queered the pitch for everybody.

Certainly that lady felt it to be her duty to rebuke Mary’s enthusiasm. There was nothing to make a song about. Milly was simply throwing herself away. If everyone had had their rights, she would have been Lady W., with a coronet on her notepaper. As it was, there was really nothing so very wonderful in being the wife of an overdressed tobacconist.

Mary cried “Shame,” and for her pains was sternly admonished. One who has made such hay of her owndazzling matrimonial chances must not venture to say a word. She who might have queened it among the highest in the land merely by substituting the big word “Yes” for the small word “No” must forever hold her peace on this vexed subject. But Mary was in such wild spirits at the announcement in theMorning Postthat she refused to be browbeaten. She continued to sing the praises of “Charley” in spite of the clear annoyance of Mrs. Wren. The good lady was unable to realize that the girl was trying with might and main to stifle an ache that was almost intolerable.

“What ho!” Milly suddenly exclaimed, withdrawing a slightlyretroussébut decidedly charming nose from Page 5 of theMorning Post, “so they’ve actually made Uncle Jacob a Bart.”

“My dear, you mean a baronet. Who?—made who a baronet?” Mrs. Wren laid down an imperious egg-spoon.

“Jacob Cheesewright, Esquire, M.P. for Bradbury, a rich manufacturer and prominent philanthropist. He’s in the honor list just issued by the King’s government.”

“Hooray!” Mary indulged in an enthusiastic wave of the tea-pot which happily was rather less than half full. “Which means, my dear Miss Wren, that one of these days there’s just a chance of your being my lady.”

“As though that could possibly matter!” cried Milly upon a note of the finest scorn imaginable.

“As though that could possibly matter!” Mary’s reproduction of the note in question was so humorously exact that it sent her victim into a fit of laughter.

But Mrs. Wren had her word to say on the subject. Inher opinion, which was that of all sensible people, it mattered immensely.

“As though it could!” persisted Milly.

“My dear,” said Mrs. Wren, “that is shallow and ignorant. A baronetcy is a baronetcy. All people of breeding think so, anyway.”

The prospect of Uncle Jacob’s elevation had already been canvassed in Broad Place by Charles, his nephew. There was evidently something in the wind Whitehall way. Uncle Jacob had professed such a heroic indifference to Aunt Priscilla’s intelligent anticipations, that even Charles, his nephew, the simplest of simple souls, and a singularly unworldly young man, had been constrained to take an interest in the matter. As for Aunt Priscilla, she had been in such a state of flutter for the past two months, that the upper servants at Thole Park, Maidstone, even had visions of an earldom. Still, as Mr. Bryant, the butler, who in his distinguished youth had graduated at Bridport House, Mayfair, remarked to Mrs. Jennings the housekeeper in his statesmanlike way, “The Limit for baby’s underclothing is a baronetcy.”

Breakfast was just at an end when the trim parlormaid came into the room with a portentous-looking milliner’s box. It had that moment arrived, and on examination was found to contain a long coat of sable. This enchanting garment was with Mary’s best wishes for future happiness.

The donor was scolded roundly for her lavishness, but Milly was delighted by the gift, and Mrs. Wren, whohad professed a stern determination to be no longer friends with Mary was rather touched. She well knew that she was a person “to bank on.” Besides, Mrs. Wren had an honest admiration for a fine talent and the unassumingness with which it was worn. She was incapable of making an enemy, for her one idea was to bring pleasure to other people. If ever human creature had been designed for happiness it must have been this girl, yet none could have been more fully bent on casting it willfully away.

As a fact, both Milly and her mother had been much troubled by the course of recent events. The previous afternoon Jack had taken a sad farewell of his friends in Broad Place. His passage was already booked in theArcadia, which that very Saturday was to sail from Liverpool to New York. All his hopes had proved futile, all his arguments vain. Mary could not be induced to change her mind, which even at the eleventh hour he had ventured to think was just possible. In those last desperate moments, strength of will had enabled her to stick to her resolve. And in the absence of any intimation from Bridport House the Tenderfoot had been driven to carry out his threat. Yet up till the very last he had tried his utmost to persuade the girl he loved to merge her own life in his and accompany him to that new world where a career awaited him.

Perhaps these efforts had not been wholly reasonable. She had a real vocation for the theater if ever girl had, even if he had a real vocation for jobbing land. But allowance has to be made for a strong man in love. He was in sorry case, poor fellow, but her sense of duty toothers was so strong, that even if it meant tragic unhappiness for both, as it surely must, she still sought the courage not to yield.

Such a decision was going to cost a very great deal. The previous afternoon, at the moment of parting, she had been fully aware of that, and hour by hour since she had realized it with a growing intensity. A stern effort of the will had been needed for Princess Bedalia to achieve her five hundred-and-sixty-second appearance that evening; she had spent a miserable night and now, in spite of the whole-heartedness with which she threw herself into Milly’s affairs, her laugh was pitched a little too high.

Since the visit to Bridport House she had come to know her own mind quite definitely. She was deeply in love with Jack, but unless the powers that were gave consent, she was now resolved never to marry him. In vain her friends continued to assure her that such an attitude was wrong. In vain the Tenderfoot declared it to be simply preposterous. Cost what it might, it had become a point of honor not to yield. To one of such clear vision, with, as it seemed, a rather uncanny insight into the workings of worlds beyond her own, it was of vital importance to study the interests of Bridport House.

Milly, even if very angry with her friend, could not help admiring this devotion to a quixotic sense of right, and the force of character which faced the issue so unflinchingly. She could not begin to understand the point of view, but she well knew what it was going to cost. And this morning, in spite of the pleasant and piquantdrama of her own affairs, she could not rid herself of a feeling of distress on Mary’s account. Now it had come “to footing the bill,” a heavy price would have to be paid. And to Milly’s shrewd, engagingly material mind, the whole situation was exasperating.

So much for the thoughts uppermost in a loyal heart, while the misguided cause of them danced apas seulin honor of the morning’s news. Milly, indeed, as she gazed in the glass over the chimney-piece to see what sort of a figure she made in the coat of sable, was much nearer tears than was either seemly or desirable. Still, in spite of that, she was able to muster a healthy curiosity upon the subject of her appearance. Fur has a trick of making common people look more common, and uncommon people look more uncommon, a trite fact of which Milly, the astute, was well aware. It was pleasant to find at any rate that a moment’s fleeting survey set all her doubts at rest upon that important point. The coat, a dream of beauty, became her quite miraculously. What a virtue there was in that deep, rich gloss! It gave new values to the eyes, the hair, the rounded chin, even the piquant nose of the wearer.

“You’re a dear!” Milly burst out, as she turned aside from the glass. But the person to whom the tribute was offered was quite absorbed in looking through the open window. Indeed, at that very moment a succession of royal toots from a motor horn ascended from the precincts of Broad Place, and Mary ran out on to the veranda with a view halloa. Then, her face full of humor and eloquence, she turned to look back into the room with the thrilling announcement: “Charley’s here!”

III

In two minutes, or rather less as time is measured in Elysium, Mr. Charles Cheesewright had entered that pleasant room with all the gay assurance of an accepted suitor.

“How awfully well it reads, doesn’t it?” he said, taking up theMorning Postwith the fingers of a lover.

“Uncle Jacob’s baronetcy?” said Mary, with an eye of bold mischief.

“Oh, no! That’s a bit of a bore,” said Mr. Charles with a polite grimace.

“Why a bore?”

“Uncle Jacob has no heir and he’s trying to arrange for me to be the second bart.”

Princess Bedalia looked with a royal air at her favorite. “The truth is, dear Charles, you are shamelessly pleased about the whole matter.”

“Well, ye-es, I am.” Charles was hopelessly cornered, but like any other self-respecting Briton he was quite determined to put as good a face as possible upon a most damaging admission. “I am so awfully pleased for Milly. And, of course, for Uncle Jacob.”

“Not to mention Aunt Priscilla,” interposed Milly. It was her proud boast that she had already tried a fall with Aunt Priscilla, had tried it, moreover, pretty successfully. That lady, within her own orbit, was a great light, but Miss Wren had proved very well able for her so far. The Aunt Priscillas of the world were not going to harry Miss Wren, and it was by no means clear that this simple fact did not count as much to her honor inthe sight of Uncle Jacob as it undoubtedly did in the sight of Charles, his nephew.

At any rate, Mr. Charles had come that morning to Broad Place on a diplomatic mission. It seemed that Uncle Jacob had made the sporting suggestion that the happy pair should motor down to Thole Park, Maidstone, for luncheon, that Charles, whose only merit in the sight of heaven was that he was “plus one” at North Berwick, should afterwards give careful consideration to the new nine-hole course which had been laid out in front of the house by the renowned Alec Thomson of Cupar, while Milly had a little heart-to-heart talk with Aunt Priscilla.

In a word, it began to look like being quite a good world for Charles and Milly. And even Mrs. Wren was constrained to admit it. Sheer human merit was becoming a little too much for the higher criticism. And daily these twain were discovering new beauties in each other. For one thing, Charles’s upper lip was now as smooth as a baby’s, and a mouth so firm and manly was thereby disclosed that it really seemed a pity to hide it. Moreover, for a fortnight past, in subtle, unsuspected ways he had been bursting forth into fine qualities. This morning, for instance, he seemed to have added a cubit to his stature. He was in the habit of saying in regard to himself that “he was not a flyer,” but really if you saw him at the angle Milly did, and you came to think about him in her rational manner, it began to seem after all he might turn out a bit of one. If only he could be persuaded to give up his piano-tuner’s hat there would be hope for him anyway.

Milly had scarcely left the room to put on her things before she was back in it. And she returned in such a state of excitement that she could hardly speak. The cause of it, moreover, following hard upon her heels, was a wholly unexpected visitor.

“He was just coming in at the front door,” Milly explained, as soon as the state of her emotions would allow her to do so. “I was never so taken aback in my life. Why, a feather would have downed me.”

In that moment of drama it was not too much to say that a feather would have had an equal effect upon Mary. If human resolve stood for anything, and it stood for a good deal in the case of Jack Dinneford, he should have been on his way to Liverpool. At six o’clock the previous evening they had parted heroically, not expecting to see each other again. For seventeen hours or so, they had been steeling their wills miserably. About 2 a.m., the hour when ghosts walk and pixies dance the foxtrot, both had felt that, after all, they would not be strong enough to bear the self-inflicted blow. But daylight had found them true to the faith that was in them. She had just enough fortitude not to telephone a change of mind, he was just man enough to decide not to miss the 10.5 from Euston.

Still, when the best has been said for it, the human will is but a trivial affair. Man is not much when the Fates begin to weave their magic web. A taxi was actually at the door of Jack’s chambers, nay, his luggage had even been strapped into the front of the vehicle, when there came an urgent message by telephone from BridportHouse to say that his Grace most particularly desired that Mr. Dinneford and Miss Lawrence would come to luncheon at half-past one.

What was a man to do? To obey the command was, of course, to forgo all hope of sailing by theArcadia. To ignore it was to forgo all hope of entering Elysium. In justice to Mr. Dinneford it took him rather less than one minute to decide. His servant was promptly ordered to unship his gear and dismiss the taxi.

It was the nearest possible shave. His Grace had run matters so fine, that had he delayed his communication another two minutes, the Tenderfoot would have been on his way to New York. Some miraculous change of plan had occurred at the fifty-ninth minute of the eleventh hour. Exactly what it was must now be the business of a distracted lover to find out.

Jack’s totally unexpected return to Broad Place was in itself an epic. And his unheralded appearance had such an effect upon Mary, upon Milly, upon Mrs. Wren, that he regretted not having had the forethought to telephone his change of plans. He came as a bolt from the blue, bringing with him an immensely difficult moment; and the presence of Mr. Charles Cheesewright, of whom Jack only knew by hearsay, undoubtedly added to its embarrassments.

Before anything could be done, even before the excited Milly could interpose a “Tell me, is it all right?” it was necessary for these paladins to be made known to each other. There was wariness on the part of both in the process. Neither was quite able to accept the other on trust. But a brief taking of the moral temperature by two members of the sex which inclines to reserve convincedthe one that Wrexham’s successor had the air and the look of a good chap, and what was quite as important, convinced the other that the heir to the dukedom was not the least of a swankpot. All of which was so far excellent.

A desire to ask a thousand questions was simply burning holes in Milly. But she had to endure the torments of martyrdom. Questions could not be asked in the presence of Charles. It called for a great effort to behave as if the bottom had not fallen out of the universe. In the most heroic way she kept the conversation at a diplomatic level, remarking among other things that it was an ideal day for motoring, which finally reminded her that she must really go and put on her hat.

“And don’t forget a thick veil,” Mary called after her, in a voice of superhuman detachment.

The business of not letting the innocent Charles into the secret was a superb piece of comedy. There is really no need to write novels or to go to the play. They are the stuff our daily lives are made of. The way in which these four people set themselves to hoodwink a Simple Simon of a fifth was quite a rich bit of humor. Little recked Mr. Charles Cheesewright that the heavens had just opened in Broad Place.

At last Milly returnedcap-à-pie, and then by the mercy of Divine Providence Mr. Charles suddenly remembered that it was a long way to Maidstone and that it was now a quarter past eleven.

“I’m quite ready when you are,” said Milly to her cavalier, with all the guile of a young female serpent. Mr. Charles shook hands gravely and Britishly all round, and Mary wished them a pleasant journey, and Mrs.Wren “hoped they would wrap up well,” and then Milly stepped deftly back three paces from the door, saying, “You know the way down, Charley,” as clear an intimation as any young man could desire that it was up to him to lead it.

Charles led the way accordingly, and then came Milly’s chance.

“Whathashappened?”

“Uncle Albert has sent for us.”

“For both?”

“For both!”

Just for a moment Mary’s feelings nearly proved too much for her. Having come to despair of Bridport House, there had been no reason to hope for this sudden change of front. She simply couldn’t fathom it. That was also true of Milly. And as the significance of the whole thing rushed upon that imperious creature, she turned to Mary in the manner of Helen, the Spartan Queen. “A last word to you, Miss Lawrence!” Her voice trembled with excitement. “If you do anything idiotic, I’ll never speak to you again. And that’s official!”

As the crow flies, it is just nine minutes from Broad Place to Bridport House. Therefore they had time to burn. And as it was such a perfect day for motoring, it was a day equally well adapted for sitting under the trees in the Park.

Force majeurewas applied so vigorously by Mrs. Wren, with timely aid from the Tenderfoot, that Mary was not given half a chance to jib at this new and amazingturn of fortune’s shuttle. She must wear her new hat with the roses—Mrs. Wren. She must wear Raquin’s biscuit-colored masterpiece—Mr. Dinneford. Her diamond earrings thought Mrs. Wren. Mr. Dinneford thought her old-fashioned seed pearl. There was never really any question of her going to luncheon at Bridport House at 1.30. Her friends and counselors did not even allow it to arise. The only thing that need trouble her was how she looked when she got there.

En route she made a picture of immense distinction beyond a doubt. Whether it was the hat with the roses, or the sunshine of July, or the dress of simple muslin, which on second thoughts seemed more in keeping with the occasion than the Raquin masterpiece, and in the opinion of Mrs. Wren had the further merit “that it gave her eyes a chance,” or her favorite earrings which Aunt Harriet had given her as a little girl; or the fact that Jack walked beside her, and that Happiness is still the greatest of Court painters, who shall say?—but in the course of a pilgrimage from Albert Gate to the Marble Arch and half way back again, she certainly attracted more than her share of the public notice. In fact, with her fine height and her lithe grace she actually provoked a hook-nosed, hard-featured dame in a sort of high-hung barouche to turn in the most deliberate manner and look at her. Or it may have been because the Tenderfoot in passing had raised a reluctant, semi-ironical hat.

“Aunt Charlotte,” said he.

“I hope Aunt Charlotte is not as disagreeable as she looks,” was Mary’s thought, but doubtless remembering in the nick of time Talleyrand’s famous maxim, she merely said, “What acleverface!”

“Is it?” said Jack, unconcernedly. But his mind was on other things, perhaps.

As a matter of fact, itwason other things.

“Let’s sit here five minutes,” he said, as they came to a couple of vacant chairs. “Then I’ll tell you a bit of news.”

They sat accordingly. And the bit of news was the following:

“Muriel’s hooked it.”

Respect for her mother tongue caused Mary to demand a repetition of this cryptic statement.

“Hooked it with her Radical,” Jack amplified. “They were married yesterday morning, quite quietly, ‘owing to the indisposition of his Grace,’ the papers say. And they are now in Scotland on their honeymoon.”

“Let us hope they’ll be happy,” said Mary. “She has a very brilliant husband, at any rate.”

“Not a doubt of that. If brains breed happiness, they’ll be all right.”

But do brains breed happiness? that was the question in their minds at the moment. Aunt Charlotte had brains undoubtedly, but as she passed them three minutes since no one could have said that she looked happy. The Duke had brains, but few would have said that he was happy. Mary herself had brains, and they had brought her within an ace of wrecking her one chance of real happiness.

They were in the midst of this philosophical inquiry, when Chance, that prince of magicians, gave the kaleidoscope a little loving shake, and hey! presto! the other side of the picture was laughingly presented to them.

A rather lop-sided young man in a brown bowler hatwas marching head in air along the gravel in front of them. One shoulder was a little higher than its neighbor, his clothes looked shabby in the sun of July, his gait was slightly grotesque, yet upon his face was a smile of rare complacency. In one hand he held a small girl of five, and in the other a small boy to match her; and that may have been why at this precise moment he looked as if he had just acquired a controlling interest in the planet. And yet there must have been some deeper, subtler reason for this young man’s air of power mingled with beatitude.

Rather mean of mansion as he was, it was impossible for two shrewd spectators of the human comedy on the Park chairs to ignore him as he swung gayly by. In spite of his impossible hat and his weird trousers, the mere look on his face was almost cosmic in its significance, he was so clearly on terms with heaven. But in any case he would have forcibly entered their scheme of existence. Just as he came level with them he chanced to lower his gaze abruptly and by doing so caught the fascinated eyes of Mary fixed upon his face.

“Good morning, Miss Lawrence. What a nice day!”

He was not in a position to take off his hat, but he enforced a hearty greeting with a superb bow, and passed jauntily on.

The Tenderfoot could not help being amused. “Who’s your friend?” He turned a quizzical eye upon a countenance glowing with mischief.

“That’s Alf.”

“In the name of all that’s wonderful, who is Alf?” The tone was expostulation all compact, but as mirth wasfrankly uppermost, even the most sensitive democrat could hardly have resented it.

“He’s a man on a newspaper.”

“I see,” said the Tenderfoot. But somehow it didn’t explain him.

“An old friend, my dear, and he’s now the Press, with a capital letter. The other day he interviewed me for his paper.”

“How could you let him?” gasped the Tenderfoot.

“For the sake of old times.” Suddenly she loosed her famous note. “That little man is in my stars. He dates back to my earliest flapperdom, when my great ambition was to kill him. He was the greengrocer’s boy in the next street, and he used to call after me:

“‘I am Mary Plantagenet;Who would imagine it?Eyes full of liquid fire,Hair bright as jet;No one knows my hist’ry,I am wrapt in myst’ry,I am the She-roOf a penny novelette.’”

“‘I am Mary Plantagenet;

Who would imagine it?

Eyes full of liquid fire,

Hair bright as jet;

No one knows my hist’ry,

I am wrapt in myst’ry,

I am the She-ro

Of a penny novelette.’”

“Well, I hope,” said the Tenderfoot, “you jolly well lammed into him for such a piece of infernal cheek.”

“Yes, I did,” she confessed. “One day I turned on him and boxed his ears, and I’m bound to say he’s been very respectful ever since. It was very amusing to be reminded of his existence when he turned up the other day. He paid me all sorts of extravagant compliments; he seems to hold himself responsible for any success I may have had.”

“Nice of him.”

“He says he has written me up for the past two years;and that when he edits a paper of his own, and he’s quite made up his mind that it won’t be long before he does, I can have my portrait in it as often as I want.”

“MyLord!”

“All very honestly meant,” laughed Mary Plantagenet. “It is very charming of Alf—anom de guerre, by the way. His real name is Michael Conner, but now he’s Alf of theMillennium. And the other day at our interview, when he came to talk of old times, somehow I couldn’t help loving him.”

“What, love—that!”

“There’s something to love in everybody, my dear. It’s really very easy to like people if you hunt for the positive—if that’s not a high brow way of putting it! The other day when Alf began to talk of his ambitions, and of the wife he had married, and of the little Alfs and the little Alfesses, I thought the more there are of you the merrier, because after all you are rather fine, you are good for the community, and you make this old world go round. Anyhow we began as enemies, and now we are friends ‘for keeps,’ and both Alf and I are so much the better for knowing it.”

“I wonder!”

“Of course we are. And when Alf is a great editor, as he means to be, and he is able to carry out his great scheme of founding a Universal Love and Admiration Society, for the purpose of bringing out the best in everybody, including foreign nations—his very own idea, and to my mind a noble one—he has promised to make me an original member.”

“A very original member!” The Tenderfoot scoffed.

But sitting there in the eye of the morning, with thegentle leaves whispering over his head, and the finest girl in the land by his side drawing a fanciful picture of “Alf” on the gravel with the point of her sunshade, he was not in the mood for mockery. The world was so full of a number of things, that it seemed but right and decent to have these large and generous notions. Let every atom and molecule that made up the pageant of human experience overflow in love and admiration of its neighbor. He was a dud himself, his dwelling-place wasen parterre, yet as heaven was above him and She was at his elbow, there was no denying that the little man who had just passed out of sight had laid hold somehow of a divine idea.

Yes, the ticket for the future was Universal Love and Admiration, at any rate for the heirs of the good God. Not a doubt that! He didn’t pretend to be a philosopher, or a poet, but even he could see that yonder little scug in the brown pot hat was a big proposition.

“I wonder,” he mused aloud, “how the little bounder came to think ofthat?”

“He says it came to him in his sleep.” And the artist at his elbow gave one final masterful curl to the amazing trousers of the latest benefactor of the human species.

Jackglanced at the watch on his wrist. By the mercy of Allah there were fifty minutes yet. A whole fifty minutes yet to stay in heaven. And then....

Suddenly hard set by thoughts which had no right to be there he looked up and away in the direction of Bridport House.

“There they go!” He gave the pavement artist a little prod.

“Who—goes—where?”

“Cousin Blanche and Cousin Marjorie.”

True enough! Sublimely unconscious of two pairs of amused eyes upon them, Cousin Blanche and Cousin Marjorie were passing slowly by. As usual at that hour they were riding their tall horses. And they became their tall horses so remarkably well that they might have belonged to the train of Artemis. In the saddle, at any rate, Cousin Blanche and Cousin Marjorie looked hard to beat.

“Now for your precious theory,” said the Tenderfoot with malice. “Here’s your chance to hunt for the positive.”

She fixed her eyes on the slowly-receding enemy. “Well, in the first place, my dear, those old-fashioned habits become them marvelously.”

“No use for that sort of kit myself,” growled the hostile critic.

“Then they are so much a part of their horses they might be female centaurs.”

“And about as amusing as female centaurs.”

“But we are hunting for the positive, aren’t we? We are trying ‘to affirm something,’ as Alf would say. Now those two and their horses are far grander works of art than anything that ever came out of Greece or Italy. It has taken millions of years to produce them and they are so perfect in their way that one wonders how they ever came to be produced at all.”

“You might say that of anything or anybody—if you come to think of it.”

“Of course. I agree. And so would Alf. And that’s why universal love and admiration are so proper and natural.”

“Wait till you are really up against ’em and then you’ll see.”

“The more I’m up against them—if I am to be up against them—the more I shall love and admire them, not for what they are perhaps, but for what they might be if only they’d take a little trouble over their parts in this wonderful Play, which I’m quite sure the Author meant to be so very much finer than we silly amateurs ever give it a chance of becoming.”

The sunshade began to scratch the gravel again, while Jack Dinneford sighed over its owner’s crude philosophy.

Presently he began to realize again that they were in a fool’s paradise. Surely they were taking a climb down too much for granted. Why should these hardshells give in so inexplicably? It was in the nature of things for a flaw to lurk under all this fair-seeming. Only fools would ever build on such a sublime pretense as Bridport House. Was it rational to expect its denizens to behave like ordinary sensible human people?

In order to sidetrack his fears he turned again to watch the labors of the pavement artist. The tip of a gifted sunshade was doing wonderful things with the gravel. It had just evolved achef d’œuvre, which however was only apparent to the eye of faith.

“Who do you imagine that is?”

Imagination was certainly needed. It would not have been possible otherwise to see a resemblance to anything human.

“That is his lamp,” hovered the sunshade above this masterpiece. “That is his truncheon. Those are his boots. That is his overcoat. And there we have his helmet. And there,” the tip of the sunshade traced slowly, “the noble profile of the greatest dear in existence.”

At that he was bound to own that had the Park gravel been more sensitive, here would have been a living portrait of Sergeant Kelly of the X Division. And even if it was only visible to the eye of faith it was pretext enough for honest laughter.

“No one knows her hist’ry,She is wrapt in myst’ry,”

“No one knows her hist’ry,

She is wrapt in myst’ry,”

he quoted softly.

It was quite true. Various zephyrs and divers little birds had whispered the romantic fact in their ears long ago. But what did it matter? It was but one plume more in the cap of the Magician, a mere detail in that pageant of which Mystery itself is the last expression.

There may have been wisdom in their laughter. At any rate it seemed to give them a kind of Dutch courage for the ordeal that was now so near. But a rather forced gayety did not long continue; it was soon merged in a further piece of news which Jack suddenly remembered.

“By the way,” he announced, “there’s more trouble at Bridport House. My cousins, I hear, are going to live with Aunt Charlotte.”

She was obliged to ask why, but he had to own that it was beyond his power to answer her question. All that he knew was that his cousins were “at serious outs” with their father, and that according to recent information they were on the point of leaving the paternal roof.

The Tenderfoot, however, in professing a diplomatic ignorance of a matter to which he had indiscreetly referred, had only pulled up in the nick of time. He knew rather more than he said. “There’s a violent quarrel about Mrs. Sanderson,” was at the tip of his tongue, but happily he saw in time that such words in such circumstances would be pure folly. Nay, it was folly to have drifted into these perilous waters at all; and in the face of a suddenly awakened curiosity, he proceeded at once to steer the talk into a safer channel.

“We mustn’t build castles,” she sighed, and the light fringed her eyelids

“We mustn’t build castles,” she sighed, and thelight fringed her eyelids

After all, that was not very difficult. As they sat under the whispering leaves, gazing a little wistfully at the pomp of a summer’s day, heaven was so near that ithardly seemed rational to be giving a thought to those who dwelt in spheres less halcyon. The previous evening at six o’clock they had parted for ever in this very spot. But a swift turn of Fate’s shuttle had changed everything.

As now they tried to understand what had occurred, it was hard to keep from building castles. An absurd old planet might prove, after all, such a wonderful place. When you are four-and-twenty and in love, and the crooked path suddenly turns to the straight, and the future is seen through magic vistas just ahead, surprising things are apt to arise, take shape, acquire a hue, a meaning. The light that never was on sea or land is quite likely to be found south of the Marble Arch and north of Hyde Park Corner. They were on the threshold of a very wonderful world. What gifts were theirs! Health, youth, a high-hearted joy in existence, here were the keys of heaven. Life was what they chose to make it.

Poetry herself clothed them as with a garment. But not for a moment must they forget, even amid the dangerous joys of a rather wild reaction, that all might be illusion. Voices whispered from the leaves that as yet they were not out of the wood. Jack, it is true, was fain to believe that the latest act of Bridport House implied a very real change of heart. For all that, as the hour of Fate drew on, he could not stifle a miserable feeling of nervousness. And Mary, too, in spite of a proud surface gayety, felt faint within. The dream was far too good to be true.

“Ofcourseit’s a climb down,” said Jack, whistling to keep up his courage. “Do you suppose Uncle Albertwould have sent for us like this unless he meant to chuck up the sponge?”

“We mustn’t build castles,” she sighed, and the light fringed her eyelids.

“We’ll build ’em as high as the moon!”

She shook a whimsical head. And then the goad of youth drove her to a smile of perilous happiness. All sorts of subtle fears were lurking in that good, shrewd brain of hers. They were on the verge of chaos and Old Night—yet she had not the heart to rebuke him.

The dread hour of one-thirty was now so very near, that it was idle to disguise the fact that one at least of the two people on the Park chairs had grown extremely unhappy. Mary was quite sure that a horrible ordeal was going to prove too much for her. It was hardly less than madness to have yielded in the way she had. But qualms were useless, fears were vain. There was only one thing to do. She must set her teeth and go and face the music.

Punctual to the minute they were at the solemn portals of Bridport House. And then as a servant in a grotesque livery piloted them across an expanse of rather pretentious hall into a somber room, full of grandiose decoration and Victorian furniture, a grand fighting spirit suddenly rose in one whose need of it was sore. Mary was quaking in her shoes, yet the joy of battle came upon her in the queerest, most unexpected way. It was as if a magician had waved his wand and all the paltry emotions of the past hour were dispelled. Perhaps it was that deep down in her slept an Amazon. Or a clear consciencemay have inspired her; at any rate she had no need to reproach herself just then. She could look the whole world in the face. Her attitude had been sensitively correct; if other people did not appreciate that simple fact, so much the worse for other people!

A long five minutes they waited in that large and dismal room, a slight flush of anxiety upon their faces, their hearts beating a little wildly, no doubt. In all that time not a word passed between them; the tension was almost more than they could bear. If Fate had kept till the last one final scurvy trick it would be too horrible! And then suddenly, in the midst of this grim thought, an old man came hobbling painfully in. Both were struck at once by the look of him. There was something in the bearing, in the manner, in the play of the rather exquisite face which spoke to them intimately. For a reason deeply obscure, which Jack and Mary were very far from comprehending, the welcome he gave her was quite touching. It was full of a simple kindness, spontaneous, unstudied, oddly caressing.

Jack, amazed not a little by the heart-on-the-sleeve attitude of this old barbarian, could only ascribe it to the desire of a finished man of the world to put the best possible face on an impossible matter. Yet, somehow, that cynical view did not seem to cover the facts of the case.

In a way that hardly belonged to a tyrant and an autocrat, the old man took one of the girl’s hands into the keeping of his poor enfeebled ones, and was still holding it when his sister and his eldest daughter came into the room. Both ladies were firm in the belief that this was the most disagreeable moment of their lives.Still it was their nature to meet things heroically, and they now proceeded to do so.

The picture their minds had already formed of this girl was not a pleasing one. But as far as Lady Wargrave was concerned it was shattered almost instantly. The likeness between father and daughter was amazing. She had, in quite a remarkable degree, the look of noblesse the world had always admired in him, with which, however, he had signally failed to endow the daughters of the first marriage. But there was far more than a superficial likeness to shatter preconceived ideas. Another, more virile strain was hers. The mettle of the pasture, the breath of the moorland, had given her a look of purpose and fire, even if the grace of the salon had yielded much of its own peculiar amenity. Whatever else she might be, the youngest daughter of the House of Dinneford was a personality of a rare but vivid kind.

As soon as the Duke realized that the ladies had entered the room, he gravely presented the girl, but with a touch of chivalry that she simply adored in him. The little note of homage melted in the oddest way the half-fierce constraint with which she turned instinctively to meet these enemies. Sarah bowed rather coldly, but Aunt Charlotte came forward at once with a proffered hand.

“My sister,” murmured his Grace. In his eyes was a certain humor and perhaps a spice of malice.

For a moment speech was impossible. The girl looked slowly from one to the other, and then suddenly it came upon her that these people were old and hard hit. She felt a curious revulsion of feeling. Their surrender wasunconditional, and woman’s sixth sense told her what their thoughts must be. They must be suffering horribly. All at once the fight went out of her.

In a fashion rather odd, with almost the naïveté of a child, she turned aside in a deadly fight with tears, that she managed to screw back into her eyes.

It was left to Lady Wargrave to break a silence which threatened to become bitterly embarrassing: “Come over here and talk to me,” she said with a directness the girl was quick to obey.

Lady Wargrave led the way to a couple of empty chairs near a window, Mary following with a kind sick timidity she had never felt before, and a heart that beat convulsively. What could the old dragon have to say to her? Even now she half expected a talon.

The Dowager pointed to a chair, sat down grimly, and then said abruptly, “I hope you will be happy.”

There was something in the words that threw the girl into momentary confusion. The fact was a miracle had occurred and her bewilderment was seeking a reason for it. Only one explanation came to her, and it was that these great powers, rather than suffer Jack to depart, were ready to make the best of his fiancée. There was not much comfort in the theory, but no other was feasible. Place and power, it seemed, were caught in meshes of their own weaving. And yet bruised in pride as she was by a situation for which she was not to blame, the rather splendid bearing of these old hard-bitten warriors touched a chivalry far down. Deep called unto deep. At the unexpected words of the griffin, she had again to screw the tears back into her eyes. And then she said in a voice that seemed to be stifling her, “It’snot my fault. I didn’t know.... I didn’t want this.... If you will.... If you will help me I will do my best ... not ... to....”

The eyes of the Dowager searched her right through.

“No, you are not to blame,” she said judicially. “We are all going to help you,” and then in a voice which cracked in the middle she added, to her own surprise, “my dear.”

III

At luncheon the girl had the place of honor at the right hand of his Grace. It was a rather chastened assembly. The arrival of the cuckoo in the nest was a fitting climax to Muriel. Both episodes were felt to be buffets of a wholly undeserved severity; they might even be said to have shaken a sublime edifice to its base. Not for a moment had the collective wisdom of the Dinneford ladies connived at Muriel’s Breadth, nor had it in any way countenanced the absurd fellow Jack in his infatuation for a chorus girl.

Simple justice, however, compelled these stern critics to own that Bridport’s future duchess had come as a rather agreeable surprise. She differed so much from the person they had expected. They couldn’t deny that she was a personality. Moreover, there was a force, a distinction that might hope to mold and even harmonize with her place in the table of precedence. So good were her manners that the subtle air of the great world might one day be hers.

It amazed them to see the effect she had already had on their fastidious and difficult parent. He was talking to her of men and events and times past in a way hehad not talked for years. He discoursed of the great ones of his youth, the singers and dancers of the ’Sixties when he was at the Embassy at Paris and ginger was hot in the mouth. Then by a process of gradation he went on to tell his old stories of Gladstone and Dizzy, to discuss books and politics and the pictures in the Uffizi, and to cap with tales of his own travels an occasional brief anecdote, wittily told, of her own tours in America and South Africa.

Sarah, Blanche, and Marjorie could not help feeling hostile, yet it was clear that this remarkable girl had put an enchantment on their father. While he talked to her the table, the room, the people in it seemed to pass beyond his ken. Candor bred the thought that it was not to be wondered at, her way of listening was so delightful. The beautiful head—it hurt them to admit the fact yet there it was—bent towards him in a kind of loving reverence, changing each phrase of his into something rare and memorable by a receptivity whose only wish was to give pleasure to a poor old man struggling with a basin of arrowroot—that sight and the sense of a presence alive in every nerve, a voice of pure music, and a face incapable of evil: was it surprising that a spell was cast upon their sire? Take her as one would she was a real natural force—an original upon whom the fairies had lavished many gifts.

The family chieftain was renewing his youth, but only Charlotte understood why. In common with the rest of the world, Sarah, Blanche, and Marjorie were to be kept in ignorance of the truth—for the present at any rate. But already the Dinneford ladies had taken further counsel of the sage of Hill Street, and upon her advice allthought of secession from Bridport House had been given up. Reflection had convinced Lady Wargrave, now in possession of the light, that the true interests of the Family would be served by silence and submission. After all, Mrs. Sanderson was an old and valued retainer; her integrity was beyond question; her devotion and single-minded regard for their father’s welfare ought not to be forgotten!

Taking all the circumstances into account, it was in Aunt Charlotte’s opinion, a case for humble pie. And to do the ladies no injustice they were ready to consume it gracefully. Jack, after all, was quite a distant connection; and what was even more important in their sight, the girl herself was presentable. Their father, at any rate, made no secret of the fact that he found her sympathetic. Nay, he was even a little carried away by her. As the meal went on, his manner towards her almost verged upon affection; and at the end, in open defiance of his doctors, he went to the length of wishing her happiness in a glass of famous Madeira.

At five minutes past three Mary and Jack awoke with a start from a dream fantasy, to find themselves breathing the ampler air of Park Lane. Even then they could not quite grasp the meaning of all that had happened. Unconditional surrender indeed, yet so sudden, so causeless, so mysterious. Why had this strange thing come to be?

But just now they were not in a mood to question the inscrutable wisdom of the good God. Behind the curtain of appearances the sun shone more bravely thanever, the dust of July lay a shade lighter on the trees across the road. No, there was really no need for Providence to give an account of itself at that moment; the nature of things called for no analysis.

“I’ve fallen in love with that old man.”

Even if Jack heard the words he was not in a position to offer comment upon them, for he was in the act of summoning a taxi from the lee of the Park railings.

“Where shall we go?”

“To the moon and back again?”

And why not! It is not very far to the moon if you get hold of the right kind of vehicle. But MX 54,906 proved on inspection hardly to be adapted for the purpose; at any rate Jack came to the conclusion after a mere glance at the tires that Hampton Court, via Richmond and Elysium, would meet the case equally well.

Meanwhile his Grace in his favorite chair in his favorite room, was doing his best to envisage “The Outlook for Democracy,” with the aid of theQuarterly Review. Of a sudden the clock on the chimneypiece chimed a quarter past three, and he laid down an article perfect alike in form, taste and scholarship, with the air of one who expects something to happen.

Something did happen. In almost the same moment, the housekeeper, Mrs. Sanderson, came into the room. She carried a tray containing a glass, a spoon, and a bottle.

His Grace shook his head. “I’ve had a glass of Madeira.”

“How could you be so unwise!” It was the gentle,half-smiling tone of a mother who reproves a very dear but willful child.

She measured the draught inflexibly and he drank it like a man. As he returned the glass to the tray he sighed a little, and then with a whimsical glance upwards he said slowly and softly, “She has her mother’s brains.”

As she looked down upon him, he saw the color darkening a strong and beautiful face. “And her father’s eyes.” The warmth of her voice almost stifled the words.

For nearly a minute there was so deep a silence that even the clock on the chimneypiece was lost in it. And then very slowly and gently, as one who thinks aloud, he said, “I am trying to remember those words of Milton.” He closed his eyes with a smile of perplexity. “Ah, yes, yes. I have them now:

“‘He for God only, she for God in him.’”

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