Shortly after Osborne and Miss Gordon had left the drawing-room, Nevill raised his head, and saw he and Miss Osborne were alone. 'Bless my soul!' he cried, 'but they have slipped out. They are as artful as a pair of conspiring schoolboys.' She turned away her calm fair face to the room, and said,-- 'I did not hear them go.' 'That was their artfulness. Ah well, Miss Osborne, there is nothing sharpens the wits so much as love.' She made no reply. She felt a great reserve about George's love-affair. She spoke little or nothing to Marie about it. She would not speak to Mr Nevill. He might take it ill or well of her, but she would not speak. The sallow, plain-looking man raised his eyes quickly to hers. 'I suppose, Miss Osborne, you never met a greater fool than I?' 'Oh, Mr Nevill! How could you say such a thing! I am sure I never thought anything of the kind.' 'You always look at me as if you thought me a very great fool.' 'I am exceedingly sorry,' she said, with an appealing look, 'and I hope you forgive me. I did not mean it, believe--' 'Ah yes,' he sighed; 'I am sure you did not mean it I am quite sure of that. But what are you to do? You can't help it. You are young and candid. You see me. Your estimate of me immediately appears on your face. You cannot help letting me see you think me a very great fool.' 'But I assure you I do not think you anything of the kind,' cried the girl, in distress. She did not like to be drawn into an animated discussion, and nothing in the world could pain her more than to think she had unwittingly inflicted pain on others. 'You mustn't mind a bit, though,' he said quickly. 'I am quite used to being considered a fool, and it doesn't hurt me nearly as much as it would an average man.' 'Mr Nevill, I am greatly grieved and shocked to think you have got any such notion in your head. Pray dismiss it, I beg of you.' She was in great pain. She did not know how to convince him. He seemed disposed not to take her word for her innocence. What more could she give him than her word? 'You must not worry yourself in the least about it. I assure you nine out of ten people I meet take me for a fool. I should not have mentioned the matter to you at all, only your brother happens to be one of those tenth men, and does not take me for a fool; and I had an unwise hope you might look at me in somewhat the same way. I am sure you wouldn't do it if you could help it.' 'Mr Nevill, you are almost unkind to say such a thing. I assure you there is not the least truth in it. Do believe me. Can I in no way convince you?' She was in acute pain now. She could endure any pain herself; but the thought that she had inflicted pain on others was intolerable. 'Let me beg of you, Miss Osborne, not to mention the subject again. It is of really no consequence, and I have been most unfortunate in introducing the subject to you. I should have known it would hurt your good-nature. Forgive me, I beg of you! I hope you will forgive me. If you had been in doubt as to whether I was a fool or not, you can no longer be in any; for I may tell you frankly, I should not like you to despise me, and I don't know in what way I could more surely injure my chances of your good opinion than by alighting on so unhappy a subject of conversation. Really, Miss Osborne, you will do me the greatest possible favour if you will not again allude to the subject.' 'But,' she cried beseechingly, 'nothing in the world--' 'No, no, no, no! I beg--I pray of you not to say any more about my hideous blunder; I assure you I shall not forget it in an hour. What an unlucky fool I am!' She looked at him with a face full of pain. She did not know what to do, what to say. He would not believe her. She would not willingly hurt the humblest of God's creatures, and here was a man who had gravely disquieted her at first, but from whom she had latterly derived much amusement, attributing to her thoughts most uncomplimentary and ungenerous to him, thoughts which she did not entertain. She felt inclined to cry. It was cruel of him to fix such a charge upon her. She said, looking up earnestly at him,-- 'I think it is not generous of you to refuse taking my word for what I say. I am sure if you told me anything about yourself I should believe you.' 'I accept that test,' he answered quickly. 'Now, since I have met you, Miss Osborne, I daresay you have noticed that I speak now and then.' She smiled, and answered, 'Yes.' 'Now, do you believe every word I uttered?' 'No. You spoke a lot of things you did not want anyone to believe.' 'How do you know that?' 'I cannot tell you how I know it, but I am sure of it. You exaggerated so much. You told tales of your own adventures, which I think you invented to amuse those present.' 'And you don't think it much harm to invent adventures for the amusement of a general company?' 'Certainly riot. They do no harm to anyone; they do not deceive anyone.' 'Oh, I see. It is by the result you judge.' 'I don't understand you.' 'You think there is no harm in inventing tales so long as they do not hurt anyone and do not deceive anyone?' 'Yes. They are then no more than novels or poems.' 'Ah well, I don't agree with you there; but we will not discuss that. I want to ask you another question. Suppose a person had invented something with the sole view of paining and deceiving another, what would you think of the act and the man?' 'I should think it most unkind, ungentlemanly, most vile, and I should be sorry to know the man.' 'Ah,' he sighed, 'you see my second condition is worse than my former one.' 'What do you mean?' 'A little while ago I said you considered me a fool. Now you must think me a scoundrel.' 'Mr Nevill, you should not say such things! I think nothing of the kind of you.' 'You must.' 'Indeed, no.' 'But I tell you, you must; you cannot help it.' 'It is too bad of you to say such dreadful things. You are very hard on me, and I am not aware I have done anything to deserve it. I am sure I never thought you a fool; and as to the other thing, it is too dreadful even to think of.' 'Yet,' said he dismally, 'whatever reason you may have for not thinking me a fool, there isn't the shadow of a chance of your thinking me anything but a scoundrel.' She said, with a slight show of displeasure in her manner,--'I think there is no use in our trying to agree about this matter. I am exceedingly sorry if I have caused you pain. I never intended it; and I apologise most fully. Will you accept my apology, and let us change the subject? It distresses me.' She evidently felt uncomfortable. There was a faint flush on her cheek, and a dim dissatisfaction in her eyes. 'We cannot change the subject,' he said relentlessly, 'until we have decided whether you or I happen to be wrong.' 'I would rather admit I have been wrong than continue the topic. I assure you it gives me great pain.' 'I will be brief. When I said I knew you thought me a great fool, I did not believe what I said; I intended you should think I did believe it, and I said the words in order to give you pain.' She raised her eyes to his, and looked at him in silent wonder. 'Do you believe me now?' he asked. 'I do not know. You surprise me very much. Why should you try to pain me?' she asked, looking at him in perplexity. 'Because I wanted to try an experiment.' 'An experiment! What experiment? You are a strange man.' To the former look of perplexity had by this time been added a look of fear. 'I will not tell you now. But you see I am a scoundrel. Out of your own showing I am a scoundrel.' 'But you ought to tell me what this experiment is; and as to what I said about a man wilfully hurting and misleading, I meant that to apply to important things, to things of consequence only. What you said of me, and the little uncomfortableness I felt, are not worth a word, a thought.' 'It is only your goodness leads you to say so.' 'No, I am quite sincere.' 'Yes, your gentleness is always sincere.' She raised her eyes to him for a moment, and then dropped them, and kept them down. There was something in his look and manner that subdued her, surprised and silenced her. He went on,-- 'I do not agree with you at all, Miss Osborne, about these trifling annoyances to you being of no consequence. On the contrary, I think them of the greatest consequence. The difficulty you will have to solve is this: how is it that I, who look on any trifle which might annoy you as a thing of great consequence, should yet deliberately invent a means of rendering you seriously uncomfortable?' For a moment she looked up at him. All other expression but that of fear had now left her face. 'I--I don't know,' she said, with hesitating timidity. 'I merely wanted to try if I could interest you in any way. I wanted to find out if, by falsely attributing to you unfavourable opinions of myself, I could rouse any uneasiness in your mind. You think that very cruel no doubt.' 'I do not think you cruel.' 'Ah, that is not my question. Do not you think that cruel?' 'I really do not know. I am sure you would not be cruel to anyone.' 'No, not without a motive; and in the present case my motive was to find out if you could be hurt through me.' 'You have taken a great deal of trouble. I am sure what I could or could not feel is not worth while taking so much trouble about.' 'I know you do not mean that for satire.' 'No, no, no! I am quite in earnest. Please forgive me for any rash thing I may say. I am not clever, and often seem to mean what I do not want to say, what I do not mean.' 'Well,' he said, 'as you do not care to pursue the subject, we will drop it for the present.' 'Say for ever,' she cried, looking up pleadingly in his eyes. 'No, I cannot drop it for ever. I must speak to you of it again.' 'Why?' 'Because at some future time I intend asking you a question of an opposite character, and of ten thousand times more importance to me.' There was a long pause after this. He thought briefly, and with a self-congratulatory inward smile: 'If that does not puzzle and interest her, I know nothing about women.' She thought: 'I wish George would leave this place to-day. This man makes me most uncomfortable. I do not know what he means, and I don't see why he cannot let me alone. I shall avoid atête-à-têtewith him in future. What can the meaning be of all he said to me? Perhaps it is a scientific experiment of some kind; perhaps he wants to find out something about the human mind. I shouldn't mind it a bit if 'twas that. I wish George would take Marie and me down to Stratford to-morrow. I never met anyone like Mr Nevill before; he frightens me, and yet I am not afraid of him. I know he wouldn't do anything to hurt me, and yet he invented that story about my thinking him a fool. I don't think him a bit a fool; I think him very clever, like George, only his cleverness runs in a different way. I wonder what is this other thing he has to say to me; I wonder will he say it soon? I wish George would come back. How fond of George Marie must be! It must be very strange to be fond of any man not your brother. But Marie has no brother; she must be very fond of George, for she has no brother to divide her affection with. I wonder is she afraid of George, and does he set her riddles and tell her he'll ask her another question another day? I wonder is there any likelihood of George going home soon? He will go home at Easter, of course; but I mean before that.' Miss Osborne took up a book, and Nevill went to the piano and rattled off airs from comic operas, now and then addressing a word or two about music to Miss Osborne. He could play tolerably well any slap-dash music, but could not sing. The door opened, and a servant entered. 'Miss Gordon?' 'She is not here,' answered Kate. 'A gentleman wants to see her, miss, and I don't know where she is.' 'Have you tried the other rooms?' 'Yes, miss.' 'You'd better take the gentleman's name, and say she is out' 'When I asked him for his name to take up, he said she would not know it.' The servant shut the door. In a minute she returned and brought word the gentleman had gone, but would return in a little while. In the afternoon Marie and Osborne came back. Nevill was a little shy for a few minutes, but then turned the conversation in a new channel. He noticed something peculiar about the two. 'I can't make it out,' he thought, while Miss Gordon had gone to take off her hat and coat, and Osborne was speaking to his sister. 'I can't make it out. They went away looking anything but jolly. He looked worn and anxious, and she seemed disconcerted by his manner. They have been out an hour or two, and they come back as calm and collected as if they were brother and sister, not lovers. There is what I call a domestic look about them. Osborne appears as if he had nothing more important on his mind than the quarter's bills. I never saw so great a change in so short a time. By Jove! it can't be they have gone and got married on the quiet! No, no; Osborne isn't the man to do that.' In the meantime Osborne bent over his sister, and whispered in her ear,-- 'Kate, it is all settled between Marie and me. I shall write to mother this evening. I know you think I have done well.' 'I am sure of it, George. It will be very sudden and unexpected news for mother.' 'But don't you think when she sees and knows my Marie she will like her as you do?' 'I am quite sure of it, George. All I meant to say was that it will be a surprise. I am sure in the end she will like her. Who could help liking her?' 'Who could help it? as you say, Kate, dear. I think no man on earth could be happier than I am to-day.' The servant put in her head. 'Miss Gordon. A gentleman to see Miss Gordon.' 'She is in her own room,' answered Miss Osborne. A few minutes passed. The servant put in her head once more,-- 'Miss Gordon would be obliged if Miss Osborne would step into the parlour.' Kate rose. George bent over her, and whispered,-- 'You will kiss your new sister when you meet her?' 'Yes, George. I wish you all the happiness in the world, my dear good brother. You deserve it.' Miss Osborne left. Once more the servant entered the room. 'Miss Gordon begs Mr Osborne to come to the parlour.' 'She wishes to introduce me to her friend,' thought he, as he set out. When he reached the parlour there were four people in it. His sweetheart, his sister, and a man whose back was towards him. Osborne advanced with a cordial, open smile. Nothing could please him more than to meet a friend of hers on this great day. 'Allow me,' said his radiant sweetheart, 'to introduce to you Miss Osborne's brother. Mr Osborne--' She paused, and laughed a rich, full laugh. 'By-the-way, although you are so old a friend of mine as you say, I do not know your name.' The man turned round, and Osborne looked at him. With a cry he started back. 'I think I have seen your face before,' said the stranger. 'Yes,' whispered Osborne. 'Your name is Parkinson.' 'It is.' George raised his eyes, and fixed them with a wild look on Marie's face.
'He here! He introduced to me by her! What does this mean? What can this mean?' At that moment half-defined mental doubts looked in upon him out of satyr faces. 'This man here! This man introduced to me byher!What can it mean?' 'Parkinson!' echoed Miss Gordon. 'Parkinson! Surely I have heard that name very lately, and yet I never knew the name of Ethel's husband.' 'Well,' said the stranger, with a smile, 'I am Ethel's husband, and I am Parkinson!' 'This is the gentleman of whose address I told you yesterday,' said Osborne drearily. Now she saw what had caused that expression in George's face. He had been disturbed by that address. This Mr Parkinson, Ethel Waring's husband, was not of George's way of thinking in religious matters, and George had been made miserable by imagining she was about to pass under influence the direct opposite of what he would have selected. How like George to give his first consideration to her! But she was not so weak as he fancied, and she would show him that if she had at one time been liable to a charge of levity, that time had passed away for ever. 'Oh, indeed!' she said aloud. 'You must know Mrs Parkinson was the dearest friend I had in the world when I was a child. Once when I was very young she saved my life. I had taken poison by mistake, and only for her I should have died. After that we were inseparable, until her father and mother brought her to England ten years ago. Ethel heard in a roundabout way that I was here. We have not heard of one another for years, not since she left Australia. She did not know what her address in London would be when she left; and almost immediately after her going away we moved from Sydney to Queensland, and lost sight of one another.' Mr Parkinson bowed and smiled. 'Mr Parkinson, Mr Osborne,' she said gaily. 'I have heard my wife speak a good deal of her old girl-friend, Miss Gordon, and I hope Miss Gordon will give me an opportunity of trying to win her good opinion of Ethel's husband.' There was a subduing courtesy about the words and manner. Marie turned to Osborne and said,-- 'Mr Parkinson has asked me to dine with him to-day. He is here on behalf of Ethel, who could not come, I should like to go. Has any arrangement been made for this evening?' 'No. Nothing that would interfere with your going.' 'Perhaps,' said Mr Parkinson, with his suave smile, and a bow which brought Osborne and his sister within its scope, 'your friends would favour us with their company. They would be very welcome.' For a moment Osborne looked at his sister, then down at the carpet. Marie had promised to go to see her old friend. What more natural than that she should wish to see this friend who had saved her life once, and who formed, no doubt, the only link between the present and a happy period of the past? He was engaged to her. She was alone in the world. He was her natural guardian. Why should he not go with her? There was no earthly reason for his not going but one--fear. Fear! Was he afraid? He, who had only that day given such sound and solemn counsel to her! He, who had all his life fought the fight of failing man fighting manfully! He, who had spent the twenty-eight years of his life without one pang of doubt until a few hours ago! Washegoing to shirk contact with doubt? Not he. He was no coward. She saw his hesitancy. 'He thinks there may be danger to me in these people. I had promised to go to Ethel before I knew who her husband was. But now ought I to change my mind and not go? Surely not. Nothing could be more absurd, more unwise, than that. To decline going would be to admit I had some uneasy feeling. I have none. I am as sure of myself as I am of my love. He is now using all the faculties of his mind to find out whether or not there would be danger for me in my going to Parkinson's. Harm for me after to-day! Harm for me in the face of the promise I made him, the vow I made to God to-day! I am placing George in a false position by being engaged to him, and at the same time causing him anxiety as to my power of keeping my promise to him. This must not be. I must never put George in a false position. What are all my life, all my interests, all my hopes, compared with him? Nothing. Oh, my love, I love you better than all things!' She raised her eyes to Mr Parkinson, and said, in a cheerful, light voice, 'I am sure Mr Osborne will not refuse you.' She bent over Osborne and touched him on the arm, saying, 'Your sister and you must come. I make this a condition to my going.' Osborne looked up at her and glanced at his sister, and said,-- 'Will you go, Kate?' 'As you please.' 'Then, Mr Parkinson, we shall be very happy to accept your invitation.' Parkinson had seen a look of worship in those grave manly eyes, and he had seen the answering look of love. He guessed how matters stood, and from that moment forward treated George as the responsible master of the party. Now Osborne felt more at ease than for any moment during the past four-and-twenty hours. He had secured his sweetheart, they had solemnly pledged their troth, and he had so clearly and firmly defined the position he should hold morally and spiritually, that he was no longer in fear of anything--in fact, he was less than indifferent to recent fears, and would rather court than shun the occasion of them. Marie felt in great delight with his acquiescence in her request. It showed his confidence in her. It showed her how he valued her word, her resolution, at their true worth. She would justify his confidence. She would show this lover how she respected his devotion and faith. What to her were all the sciences and all thesavantsof the world compared to this one simple gentleman, who honoured her insignificant self with his love? Nothing; not a featherweight against all the world. What a privilege for any woman to share the confidence, the thoughts of such a man! Judged by the ordinary standard, he was far in advance of most men. His powerful, square, broad shoulders showed he could protect the woman of his choice against long odds. He could easily dispose of Nevill and Parkinson if occasion required him to do so. His face, full of manly beauty, must gather the glances of any room he entered. And then his eyes. What a charm was in his eyes! A resolute, quiet, manly dignity, nothing could hurt, nothing could degrade. And for her, and for her alone, what a spirit of heedful care! When he looked at her in that way she felt bold against all the world. Nothing could harm her while that guardian spirit watched over her. Nothing. 'Oh, my master, my lord, my king, rule me until I die. Lead, and I will follow! As you will it, under God, I will do!'
Mrs Parkinson's house was a model of what a middle-class Englishwoman's house ought to be. In the first place, it was as clean as human hands could make it. All the furniture, carpets, fittings, curtains, were substantial, sufficient, homely in the best sense of that word. The stoutest man might sit on the lightest chair in her drawing-room without a qualm of dread. A baby might tumble on the carpet all day long without soiling its hands, or picking up a pin or any other product of nature or manufacture inimical to baby life. Mrs Parkinson had no faith in furniture polish sold by grocers or oil and colourmen, or made from a family recipe. If the wood was good, dry rubbing was the best polish, and all the wood in her house was good. Brushing down walls was very well for day-to-day cleaning; but every three months the wall-paper had, moreover, to be cleaned with dough. Once a-week all curtains were taken down and shaken and brushed. Once a-day all carpets were whisked. Four times a-year all carpets were raised and beaten. Everything was in its place. Everything was tidy and yet the whole was not severe. Everything in the house was for reasonable use; there is no use for dirt, therefore there was no dirt in that house. The whole looked hearty and not prim. There were no filigree, no nick-nacks. You found nothing on a chimney-piece because someone happened to have bought it at a sale, or someone died and left it to the owner of the house. Paintings were not hung on the walls of rooms to hide defects or attract a careless eye, like patches on a beauty's face. If you wanted to see Mr Parkinson's works of art, except a few pictures of still-life in the dining-room, you had to go to a room specially set apart for them. Here they lay secure against causing offence to those who did not deliberately seek them. The theory was that works of art, merely as works of art, are out of place in ordinary rooms, and, being matter out of place, are dirt. With the works of art were kept most of the books. Naturally, books are as much works of art as pictures or bronzes or plaster casts. The scientific books and all books impinging on scientific matters he kept in his own room, his working-room, his laboratory or study. The works of art were stored in a room at the top of the house. His own room was on the ground floor, behind the dining-room. To dine at Parkinson's was to enjoy a treat. You had the most suave and intelligent of hosts, the most simple, lively, and good-humoured of hostesses. The linen was dazzling, the glass dainty, delicate; the cutlery and silver made furrows of the deepest shade, pools of brilliant glitter. The smart parlour-maid who waited, came and went silently, efficiently. To cooking as good as you could find in a West-End club was added the peaceful seclusion of home. The host was a clever talker, the hostess a fascinating listener. If you were dull, and did not wish to talk, the host took up the ball and interested you. If you were lively and full of spirits the hostess devoted herself to you, and showed more interest in what you had to say than you yourself felt. You got good wholesome wine, and as dinner went on you got the crowning effect of the festival--the gradually-developed certainty that your host and hostess were on the best of terms with one another; and that if to-morrow they found some flaw in their marriage, they would run out of the house without waiting for hat or bonnet, and get married by the first man able and willing to tie the knot. The radiation from these wedded hearts soothed and brightened the current of the time; and when on that evening the ladies rose to leave, George Osborne felt puzzled, confounded. He had often in his mind pictured the home of a man holding views such as Parkinson's. He had fancied a cold, dark, dreary abode, with diagrams on the walls, and blasphemies at the table. He had seen the master of that household morose and savage to all around him--a man who, no longer restrained by fear outside the law of the land or public opinion, gave free scope to all the evil influences of his nature, and laid at once the foundation for the destruction of domestic peace. He had entered this house with the conviction that he should be shocked at a hundred things. So far he had been edified. Eight years they had been married, and obviously they had never been such good friends as to-day. They betrayed the tenderness of the betrothed combined with the security of the married. Their house and all in it were bright and cheerful and comfortable--such a house as he might hope to have one day. Their children were intelligent in speech and manner, and not either forward or bashful, but just well-bred. During dinner a good deal of the talk had gone on between Marie and her old friend. Mr Parkinson spoke chiefly to Kate, and George spoke least of all, except Kate. Now, for the first time, the two men found themselves alone together. Parkinson offered Osborne a cigar. The latter explained that he did not smoke. 'Ah, not smoke!' said Parkinson. 'Neither did I until lately. I find tobacco most useful.' 'Intellectually or physically?' asked Osborne, who still felt the great weight of surprise, but was now quite free from anything like apprehension. What was there in this pleasant room and this agreeable gentleman to affright or even disturb anyone? Nothing. 'Well,' said the other, explaining, as he lit a cigar, and threw himself into a comfortable easy-chair, 'I don't like to say intellectually, for that would sound pretentious. I don't think I have what anyone would call an intellect. I have certain aptitudes in small things, certain ways of treating detail, that to those who do not follow my course of reading may seem to show intellect; but intellect proper I have none. What I should say with regard to the effect of tobacco on myself is that it subducates the physical man, and gives freer and more unobserved play to the operations of the mind.' 'You will excuse me,' said Osborne, looking with curiosity at his companion, 'but I understood you followed science as a pursuit?' 'Yes, but in a very unambitious way. I gathered from what passed at dinner that you are interested in poetry. Pray, may I ask, have you ever written any yourself?' George coloured slightly. 'I take a great interest in poetry, but have unfortunately no talent or ability to write it, nor have I ever tried to write any.' 'Ah!' sighed Parkinson, 'I would give half of all I own in the world for the one gift of poetry.' 'What!' cried Osborne, staring in amazement at his host. 'Would you abandon science for literature if you had only to choose?' 'No.' Osborne looked perplexed, and said, with a faint smile,-- 'I did not think the muses and the sciences got on very well together.' 'On the contrary, they are inseparable.' George sat a little forward in his chair and said,-- 'I wish you would explain. I am most deeply interested. This is new to me. You are the first scientific man I have ever met.' 'There is nothing more simple. The vision of the poet is slow, long-drawn out, gradual in development, glorious. The vision of the man of science is instantaneously complete. The visions of "Allegro" and "Penseroso" dawned gradually on Milton. The images did not all rush in upon him at one moment. Do you not agree with me?' 'Yes. He thought of one and then he thought of another. Then he put them all together in a treasure-house, and made a present of a treasure-house to each member of posterity down to the last heart-beat of the last man.' Osborne's face flushed as his heart rose up in gratitude to the poet. 'But,' said Parkinson, with strong emphasis on the word, 'when that intellectual giant, Newton, sat in his garden at Woolsthorpe watching from the earth, saw the great arm of gravitation dart his apples, he the great hand seize the apples and drag them to the ground. Then he saw other arms stretching from satellite to planet, from planet to sun, from sun to sun, until the whole firmament was traversed by arms, and all the heavenly bodies swung in secure order.Afterthis vision he took up mathematics, and optics, and astronomy, to prove the vision true; but hesawbefore he tried to prove.' 'This is new to me--very new to me,' said Osborne, out of a profound reverie. 'I have not the poetic instinct; I can never fly, I must walk along on the sober earth. If I had the poetic faculty I should invent theories, discover facts.' 'You have a great admiration of Newton?' 'The greatest. I think he was the most marvellous philosopher the world ever saw. Bacon invented a noble philosophy, which some men were afraid of at the time--which some men are afraid of yet. Newton invented modern science, which some men were afraid of then--which no man is afraid of now, except--' 'Poets.' Osborne finished the sentence for him. 'Poets! Why should poets be afraid of modern science? Believe me, there was never a greater mistake than to fancy modern science can hurt poetry. In fact, it is opening up new fields for the poet. What gigantic solar landscapes are unfolded to view! Fancy--for you have the temperament of a poet, if you have not the art--fancy gold and iron now blazing in the sun, and mountains of flaming hydrogen springing two thousand miles into space! Fancy the history of the world as now read by science, compared with the history of the world read by our grandfathers! Why, sir, they lived on the crust of the earth, with only a day and a night of history revealed to them, with souls that only wondered at the stars, and eyes that saw no further into earth than a mole will burrow. In one hundred years we have cloven the earth in two, and spelled out of its rind the syllables of its prodigious history. With the prism we have built scaffolding among the fixed stars, to serve for those who come after us as platforms of observation. Do you recollect those familiar words spoken by Newton, not long before he laid down the wisdom and knowledge of eighty-three years in the grave? "I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the seashore, and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble, or a prettier shell, than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me." Newton was right. The vulgar call this a piece of sublime modesty. Not at all. It was sublimer than any mere personal human virtue; it was truth. Reverting to what I said a few moments ago about the poetic faculty and science, are not these words I have quoted poetical?' 'Yes; but Newton would not have fitted into the science of our time,' said Osborne, with an uneasy look. 'Why not? Of course he would. He would lead us now as he had led before. Why do you think not?' 'Did he not once reproach someone for free-thinking?' Suddenly all the animation went out of Parkinson's face, all the alertness left his figure, and he lay back in his chair with the air of fatigue. 'Yes,' he answered spiritlessly, 'he reproached Dr Halley for expressing some free-thinking opinions.' 'What do you suppose Newton would have done in the face of modern science?' 'Conformed.' 'To religion?' 'No; to science.' For a few moments there was silence between the two men. Parkinson lay back in his chair, inert, relaxed, his head drooped upon his chest, his hand and arm hanging down over the side of his chair. From the cigar held in that hand a thin bent thread of blue smoke ascended, and when it reached the level of the men's eyes, waved and broke and melted into air. Osborne sat grasping the arms of his chair with fingers that whitened with the force he used. He was looking with a dull deadly fixity of fear at Parkinson. 'You think,' said Osborne slowly, deliberately, 'that the poet need not fear the advance of science?' 'I do.' 'But,' added Osborne in an impressive monotone, 'you are equally sure the priest need not fear the advance of modern science?' 'I should not care to generalise on that point.' 'As far as you yourself are concerned?' Parkinson leant forward and sideways until he could lean his elbow on the chair and rest his head upon his elbow. His eyes were no longer fixed on Osborne, but turned on some old scene, some distant apparition. He spoke in a subdued voice,-- 'In my time I have had my share of trouble, my share of shocks and alarms; but all put together never equalled the awful hour when, having pursued a certain inquiry to a certain point, I raised my eyes and saw the priest, with the Bible under his arm, make his final exit from the stage of my life.' Osborne dropped his eyes, drew his eyebrows down over them, and fell back in his chair. There was silence for a few minutes. Then Osborne spoke,-- 'You will lend me those books you allude to?' 'Yes, if you wish. I recommend you, for your peace's sake, not to read them.' 'It is, for my peace's sake I intend reading them,' answered Osborne. 'In what way can they help you to peace?' 'Because--because,' said Osborne laboriously, 'I have had some doubts, which are now at rest, and I desire to lay them at rest for ever.' 'The books I allude to will not help any existing creed in your regard.' 'So long as I think there are any books can injure it, I am not fit to believe my faith. You cannot be a Christian and believe that anything can injure or destroy the truth of Christianity.' 'Very well. You shall have the books.' After this there was silence for a few minutes more. Someone touched a piano. The introduction reached the room, softened by distance, but every note was perfectly clear. 'Are you fond of music?' asked Parkinson. 'Exceedingly.' 'Then I will open the door. This is a great favourite of mine.' He opened the door, came back, and threw himself into his chair. Presently the round, full, surprising tones of a contralto came upon their ears, followed by the low wail of the piano. The two men sat upright in their chairs, and stared into one another's eyes with amazement. Between the first and second stanza Parkinson spoke,-- 'By heaven, sir, what a voice!' 'I never heard anything like it before. It is superb.' Again the glorious organ floated out upon the silence, followed by the wail of the piano. While she sang the men stared at one another with astonishment, such as would have become their faces if the walls had vanished, and they saw before them the sacred city of Jerusalem under a pall of clouds flushed with portents. Another interval. 'Did you ever hear pathos so sublimely phrased before?' 'Never,' answered Osborne. The tears were starting into his eyes. In Parkinson's eyes gleamed a terrible, wild sadness, as though he, bound, witnessed cruel tortures inflicted on those dearest to him. Another interval. 'Did you ever hear God so importuned for mercy before?' 'Never.' 'Oh God, I cannot hear that voice and think of the priest who went away for ever!' 'Perhaps that voice will, in the end, bring him back.' 'I'd give all the world that it did,' said Parkinson passionately. The two men gazed at one another in silence. The voice once more took possession of the place. Another interval. Parkinson was deeply moved. 'I admit,' he said hoarsely, 'that nothing affects me so profoundly as music of the pathetic kind. But, Osborne, isn't it hard to think at such a moment as this that one's wife and children are no more than visions lent him for a few years, to pass away for ever afterwards?' 'I believe nothing of the kind. Your creed is simply an atrocious blasphemy.' 'Sometimes--now, for instance--I am of your mind.' The voice once more. While she sang Osborne thought: 'How can this man be a sceptic, and have a wife who can plead to Heaven like this? How can he believe man was created to plead so and be unheard?' The song ceased, and Parkinson took up the refrain, and sang it in a low soft voice. 'Miserere nobis.' He whispered, 'At this moment no man could sing more earnestly than I,Miserere nobis.' 'Does your wife sing often?' asked Osborne softly. 'Yes, pretty often.' 'Does she often sing that song?' Osborne asked, thinking that no sermon of more power could be preached to any man's heart than to hear the wife he loved pleading so for her husband, her children, herself. 'The song does not suit her voice. Hers is a soprano. She will not dare to sing after your sister.' 'Sister, sister!' cried Osborne. 'My sister's voice is a soprano too.' 'Then it must be your sweetheart who sang. She is as fine as Trebelli, with more pathos. I have no fear of lending you those books now.'
Without any further conversation the two men rejoined the ladies in the drawing-room. Osborne's heart was too full for speech. He cast at Marie one look of love and devotion, into which stole an unfamiliar fear. He moved over to where Mrs Parkinson sat, and taking a chair, fell into conversation with her. There was no more music that night. All had been impressed too deeply by that song to care for any other. A second must prove an anticlimax. Osborne, in that one short glance, saw on Marie's face an expression he had never observed there before. The eyes had grown deep and dark and sad andspirituelle. Her face was slightly paler than usual, and her hands drooped with unaccustomed languor. He had seen her in many phases, but never yet so inert. She looked subdued, abstracted. She had thrown such fervour into that song that her physical resources were diminished. Her spirit had entered upon a new phase, as though the prayer of the song had been heard and new avenues of spiritual view had been opened to her. The guests did not stay late. Then the Osbornes, with Miss Gordon, drove back to Peter's Row. When they were in the cab George asked Marie, 'How on earth did Mrs Parkinson know you were here?' In a very simple way. It appears that at the same boarding-house I lived when in New York a Mrs Burns also stayed. She and I were a good deal together, and as we were both coming to London, we exchanged our London addresses. She arrived in London three days ago. She called on the Parkinsons, who are friends of hers, and whom she had mentioned to me. Of course I did not recognise the name of Ethel's husband, for I had never heard it. She told the Parkinsons the day before yesterday she intended calling on me. Mrs Parkinson was struck by my name, and so it all came out.' George mused awhile at the strange ways things come about. Then he said, 'You were at the same table with Mrs Burns at New York. You visited to-day where she visited two days before. She, a perfect stranger to you, is the means of bringing you and your old friend together. At the same table sat Mr Nevill, whom you meet here accidentally, and you sit at the same table with him.' 'By the way,' said Marie, 'don't you think we have treated Mr Nevill very badly? I never thought of him till now.' 'After all,' said George, following his thought, 'to those who move about much the great world is no larger than a parish is to those who do not move about at all.' 'Don't you think we have treated Mr Nevill very badly?' she repeated. 'I really never thought of him until now.' 'I did not think of him either. What do you say, Kate?' 'I think we have not been very considerate.' 'But, Kate, have you thought of how wretchedly we have been treating him?' 'Yes.' Marie looked at George, rubbed the third finger of her left hand where, under her glove, lay the ring with five rubies. 'I beg your pardon,' said George. 'Did you speak?' 'How stupid men are!' said Marie, by way of comment on George's want of intelligence in not knowing she meant to call attention to Kate's vague but significant answer. Kate had often thought during the afternoon and evening that the cool way in which they had ignored him would give him additional cause to fancy they all--she among the number--considered him a fool. She had often during the evening seen, in her imagination, his plain face full of humiliation and pain at the way they had forgotten him who had hitherto formed a member of their parties and schemes. When they arrived at the boarding-house they learned Mr Nevill had gone out for the evening, and would not be in till midnight, or past midnight. 'So,' said Miss Gordon, 'we cannot apologise until to-morrow.' Neither brother nor sister said anything. When Kate got to her room that night she found a note on her dressing-table. It had come through the post. She looked long at the postmark. There was only one, 'E.C.,' of that day's date. She looked again at the writing. She felt perfectly certain she had never seen it before. With an expression of surprise and curiosity on her face she opened the envelope and took out the enclosure. It proved to be the undomiciled, undated, unsigned lines running as follows:-- 'I am in great distress. I fear your avoidance of me since morning has been the result of some foolish things I said to you about what you thought of me. You must not mind me. You must attach no meaning or importance to these most random wicked words of mine. You know I am an inveterate talker. If my talk of to-day has made any bad impression, I beg of you, for God's sake, to give me a chance of removing it! There is no woman on earth I respect more than you; no woman on earth whose good opinion is essential to me but yours, for I love you! I implore you to give me a chance, just one, of redeeming my stupid blunder. If you do not give me this one chance, I do not know what will become of me. Forget my flippant manner. I am as terribly in earnest now as ever man was. You will answer this. I cannot look at you again until I know I am forgiven. Will you write as soon as you can to me, care of Messrs Stainsforth & Co., Bankers, Lombard Street? I shall tell the housemaid here, as though from you, that if any letters come for you this evening they are to be brought to your room, so you may be saved the inconvenience of reading this in the presence of anyone.'
That night George Osborne once more found himself too excited for sleep. The day had been thick with incidents, full of conflicting emotions. The anxious morning, the solemn betrothal, the peace following it, the sharp shock of meeting Parkinson once more, the introduction to that man by his sweetheart, the strange feeling of reassurance and peace which had come upon him during the early part of his visit to Parkinson's house, the subsequent despair, followed by the cry that went up from him when he heard the plea for mercy sung by that superb voice, and the later discovery that this voice was Marie's--all crowded into one day, had left him nervous and tremulous and wakeful. He walked heavily to the window, drew back the curtains, raised up the blind, and looked out. Beneath him lay miles of dark roofs lit by the broad full moon. Fantastic gables and weird-looking vanes broke up the dull monotony of the view. Here and there deep chasms of shadow stretched right and left, leading to large pools of intense darkness where the streets broadened into squares. High above the plain of roofs and gables and vanes, like fair white spars, rose the steeples and towers and spires of a thousand churches. The peaceful beauty of the night melted his heart and soothed his troubled brain like an anodyne. All was peace abroad; and whose peace could it be but God's? How the white moonlight swept worry and doubt and tumult away! In the light of day man might lift impious eyes to heaven, for he was drunk with a foolish sense of security and importance. In the dark of night man was exposed to a thousand unmanly fears. But who could look upon the moonlight and not feel the assurance that God was near, and was the friend of man? Moonlight was the white altar-cloth of earth, and when it was spread the heart of man must send up the incense of worship. Now was not the hour to singMisererebutLaudamus. Here was no oppressive consciousness of sin, no abject pleading for mercy. Here were simple worship and confidence. No repining, no doubt, no superstitious fears or vague misgivings; no arrogance, but a full quiet sense of protection and future advancement, and of worship and love. Much has been said about the moonlight and lovers, but it seemed more fit for solitary commune between man and his Maker. Why was not life all moonlight? Why had we ever the fiery heat and passion of noon? What fools men are to allow themselves to be dragged this way and that at the beck of every passion, at the call of every party, at the decree of every sect? Were not this world here around, this beautiful moon, and the all-just God in heaven above, enough for the heart and soul of man? Ample. What could be added to these three things? After all, there may be much in the quietist's ideas. A man might do worse, provided he had no home ties, than spend his life in the vineyards and on the olive-clad slopes of Mount Athos. It was late when Osborne pulled down the blind, drew the curtains, and faced his room once more. The gas was burning brightly: its flame had warmed the room. Still he felt no inclination to go to bed. There was an old-fashioned elbow-chair by the dressing-table, and on one side of the dressing-table the books lent him by Nevill; on the other side those lent him that night by Parkinson. He took the latter pile, consisting of five books, and, holding them pressed together between his right and left hand, he read the backs carefully. He should never be able to look through these books with more unconcern than this night, the night of the betrothal, a scathless visit to Parkinson, that calm and peaceful commune with God above the moonlit city. Three o'clock struck, and he read on. Four, five, six, and still he did not rise from that chair. At seven he had finished the book, and at seven he rose, went to the window, and once more pulled back the curtains and drew up the blind. The moon had set. The sun had not yet risen. 'All is dark,' he thought, 'all is dark. This is my second vigil within a few days. My second vigil. All is dark. I suppose Marie is sleeping still. The city is slowly waking. I can hear the mutter of traffic, but I can see nothing, for all is dark. 'I wonder where the song is Marie sung last night? Quenched in this dense darkness. How strange to stand here and listen to the waking notes of this vast city! Gog and Magog are turning in their dreams. What a wonderful city this is! Its wakening cries are louder than the noonday voice of Stratford; but I miss the delicate tones of the river. 'The birds are still sleeping in the trees around our house at Stratford, and mother and Alice are sleeping too. In Stratford now you could not hear a sound but the soft secret lispings of the Avon. An hour before the dawn a river speaks as at no other time of day or night. Often in coming home from fishing I have stood to listen to the river beginning to speak. The first voice after sunset does not come from near where you stand, but from round a bend or some part you are not looking at. You think it is a late bird until you weigh the sound in your ear, and then you find no bird could touch so delicate a note, reach so weird a meaning. Then all at once a hundred soft whispers steal along the shore and from the surface of the stream, and you wait and listen minute after minute in the hope or fear the whisperings will shape themselves in some human speech. You wait until disappointment yields to despair. Then you turn to go. You have taken only one step, when you hear the river saying distinctly, "Stay, stay." You remain immoveable for awhile, only to be tantalised by whisperings and mutterings less unlike human speech than before. 'I suppose a man never had a better mother or better sister than I. Nothing in the world keeps a man so clear of that most vulgar of all mental vices, cynicism, as a good mother and good sisters. It is good women who keep men in well-ordered mind. Men are not afraid of telling their weaknesses to other men, but it hurts and degrades a man when evil news of him come to ears at home. There is one sure way of making any man careless of his conduct: make his mother and sisters believe he is not what he should be. A man's wife is theoretically his equal; but in practice who ever saw this theory hold? She must govern him or he her. 'There's Jim Truscot at Stratford. He is a hunchback and lame, and eight years younger than I. I have known him all my life. When he was a boy and I a lad, I used to watch him as he looked at the other boys playing cricket. He would clap his hands and shout when a ball was well hit or a player well stumped. No one had such judgment or knowledge of the game as poor Jim Truscot, and yet he could never swing a bat or bowl a ball. Often have I watched the boy, and grieved for him, until the tears would run into my eyes; and I would have handed the boy the bat and given up the game, if poor Jim might play one game. Jim is at home in Stratford now, hardly awake yet. Yes, poor Jim is no doubt lying asleep now in Stratford, his deformed withered legs stretched out, his misshapen breast heaving quickly! Poor Jim! perhaps now he does not care for cricket as much as formerly. Perhaps the spirit that inhabited the poor tenement has now fallen down in worship before some young girl of pastoral and woodland Warwickshire. If this were so with the man, what had been the boy's sorrow? A passing cloud compared to a life-long gloom. 'Far away there, under the pall of lingering darkness, ran the little river, now whispering as it had never whispered at any other time. The sounds came closer together, there was a hurry, a confusion in the tones. The sounds were tremulous and the accents full of fear. They came nearer to speaking a human tongue. The river seemed anxious to communicate some secret of vital importance. It appeared to make a final effort to render itself intelligible before dawn came in the broad east and silenced the voice of the river. 'Now I listen once more to these whispers. I have found the key to the tongue they speak, I know now what they have tried to say and could not. It was,-- '"Fools! Fools, you men! You think you are of some importance to the Creator. You are nothing. You are like us, merely the result of the great current of life striking the shore. While the river flows by banks, you have voice, as we. But in the great ocean beyond the shores of time you shall be like us, dumb. You are no better than we, or these rushes here, in anything you can show, except that you enjoy more privileges. Fools, why should you not be content? Is it not much to be lords of earth, without aspiring to be peers of heaven?" 'Has it all come to this? Has it all come to this at last? Mother and Alice away in Stratford, are they nothing more than ripples on the stream of life? If my mother does not get a reward on earth for all her goodness, will she get no reward for it hereafter? Monstrous thought! Will poor Jim Truscot go into his coffin, and find in his coffin nothing but nothingness? Was that poor misshapen creature brought into the world merely to be the sport of Fate? No, no; this cannot be. I will not believe it.' The cold grey dawn of midwinter was now in the east. 'And here, under this roof, sleeps my gentle sister Kate, and all the good and kindly people of the place. Are they all but ripples on the stream? 'And she, my Marie, she who is dearer than all the world beside, is she to be to me only for the span of this poor vulgar world, wherein love and time are broken up by the round of petty daily cares? Am I to clasp her in this world only to lose her in the next? I, who spent all my youth in visions of perfected love hereafter! I who held that we were sent on earth merely to learn love, that we might hereafter enjoy it in the peace as unencumbered souls!' He paused awhile, drew back from the window. He put his hand to his head in a bewildered way. He took down his hands, crying out, in a low, resolute voice,-- 'No, no. No, no, no. That is absurd. Quite absurd. I must be losing my reason. Staying up at night is bad, everyone says, and everyone is always right. You may stay up a night now and then, but not two nights in such quick succession as these two. 'I can't sleep, and I don't want to read or to think. What should I do? 'Go out for a walk and get the jaded look off my face before my love, my Marie, comes down. Yes; that is a good idea.' He changed his clothes, stole quietly down the stairs, took his overcoat off the hall rack, and went out. The morning was damp, and raw, and cold. He had no definite intention. He wandered about the streets aimlessly. He did not know whither he went. He did not care what road he took. He simply wanted to kill time and thought by walking. The streets had not awoke yet. Life beat in languid pulses at the crossings where great courses of traffic crossed one another. Odd cabs rolled by, carrying figures, well muffled up, to and from early trains. The 'All hot!' men still lingered in important thoroughfares. London would not be awake for an hour. London would not be at work for two. At the usual hour the breakfast-bell rang. Shortly afterwards it was found Mr Osborne and Mr Nevill had gone out and had not returned, and that the latter had left word he should not be back for the day.